L'fvhit&e. founding if d College c _£«. Ittj Ca&nyf DIVINITY SCHOOL TROWBRIDGE LIBRARY BMgaggaM ^'i' VI 'll anMrtfr; :-' gr: ;¥S ¦J|*'Of 'H ¦¦>- iRIfe ¦W's'\l? 1 ! , -»,.« 4 :-5» »'a:«M^'|ijjl'',:-i'.1 '!"'.':'...':li 1 The ten Commandments. A COURSE OF LECTURES DELIVERED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA BY GEORGE DANA BOARDMAN, Author of "Studies in the Creative Week," "Studies in the Model Prayer," "Epiphanies of the Risen Lord," "Studies in the Mountain Instruc tion," "The Divine Man" (Vol. I.), Etc. He wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments Exodus xxxiv, 28. PHILADELPHIA : AMERICAN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY, 1420 Chestnut Street. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S89, by the AMEPJCAN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY, In the OfQce of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. TO YOUNG MEN AND YOUNG WOMEN THESE STUDIES IN THE TEN COMMANDMENTS ARE RESPECTFULLY OFFERED. PKEFATORY note. Isr the autumn of 1888, the Provost and Deans of the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania honored the writer with the request to deliver before the students "a series of Sunday Afternoon Addresses upon Religious Topics." In acceding to this request, the writer, believing the Ten Commandments to be the foundation-stones of Authoritative Morality or True Society, selected them for the theme of his lectures. These Commandments, being in their nature so fun damental, germinal, -and immortal, bave, of course, occupied much of the writer's reflections during a min istry of more than thirty years. Accordingly, he feels justified in incorporating into this book certain thoughts and words which have appeared elsewhere. The Scriptural citations are almost uniformly from the Revised Version. In venturing to send forth this volume, the author humbly prays that Almighty God may be pleased to bless it to the moral elevation of the young people of Christendom. G. D. B. Philadelphia, March Second, 1889. CONTENTS. I. — Introductory, Exodus xx, 1. pagh 9 II. — The First Commandment, Exodus xx, 2, 3. . 27 III. — The Second Commandment, . Exodus xx, 4-6. . 51 IV.- —The Third Commandment, Exodds XX, 7. 81 V, —The Fourth Commandment, . Exodus xx, 8-11. 109 VI.- —The Fifth Commandment, . Exodus xx, 12. 147 VII.- —The Sixth Commandment, . . . . Exodus xx, 13. 175 VIII.- -The Seventh . Commandment, Exodus xx, 14. 209 IX.- -The Eighth Commandment, . . . . Exodus xx, 15. 245 X.- -The Ninth Commandment, .... Exodus xx, 16. 275 XI.- -The Tenth Commandment Exodus xx, 17. 303 XII.- -The Lord's Summary of the Ten Command- 333 Matthew xxii, 35-40 ; Mark xii, 28-31. Index 367 Index of Principal Scriptures, .... 371 Index 7 375 I. INTRODUCTORY. God spake all these words, saying. Exodus xx, 1. I. INTRODUCTORY. Inaugukating, as we now do, a series of studies in the Ten Commandments, it is proper that our first study should be of an introductory nature. Recall, then, first of all, some of the circum stances under which the Ten Commandments were originally proclaimed. Go we back then millenniums into the venerable Mount Sinai. past — precisely how long ago we know not, say, some thirty-three centuries — and stand with ancient Israel at the foot of Mount Sinai. We are on a sandy plateau some four thousand feet above the Mediterranean ; a plain say two miles long and half a mile wide, large enough to afford standing room for more than two millions of people. Abruptly towering some twenty-two hundred feet above this plateau is a huge granite mountain peak — isolated, precipitous, fissured, altar-shaped ; it is the moun tain of Jehovah's law, the sublime throne from which the King of kings proclaimed his Ten Com mandments, or Words of Covenant with his people. Here, amid these frowning crags and awful wilds, Where all around, on mountain, sand, and sky, Keble's " Chris- God's chariot wheels have left distinctest trace, tian Year." 11 12 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Exod. iii, 1. Moses had kept the flock of his father in law, Exod. xxiv, is ; the priest of Midian ; here he twice fasted forty YYYl V ' 'K iKings xix, i-14. days and nights; here Elijah found refuge from Gai. i, 15-n. the wrath of Jezebel; here Paul, when it had pleased God to reveal his Son in him, spent three years in preparing for his majestic calling; and here, as I am inclined to believe, One greater than Matt, iv, l, 2. lawgiver and prophet and apostle betook himself that, amid the memories of the mount of smoke and thunder and law, he might equip himself for the mighty task of taking on his own head Sinai's burden and doom. The Solemn And now recall the solemn preparations for the tions!"11 a" promulgation of the great law. The mediation Exod. xix, 1-25. 0f ]yroses the man of God between Jehovah on the mountain and Israel in the plain ; the divine mes sage to the people, saying : " Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself; now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me from among all peoples ; for all the earth is mine ; and ye shall be unto me a king dom of priests, and an holy nation "; the response of the people, saying : " All that Jehovah hath spoken we will do "; the divine mandate that the people should undergo ceremonial purification for two days ; the barricading of the holy mount, lest any one, fascinated by the awful glory, should touch it, and perish ; the third morning, ushered in by lightnings, and thunders, and thick cloud, and voice of trumpet exceeding loud and waxing INTRODUCTORY. 13 louder and louder; the quaking mountain; the smoke of Sinai ascending as the smoke of a fur nace, because of Jehovah's descent upon it in flame; the trembling people; — all this made the preparation for the delivery of the law on Sinai a scene of unparalelled sublimity. O God, when thou wentest forth before thy people, l?s. lxviii, 7, 8. When thou didst march through the wilderness ; The earth trembled, The heavens also dropped at the presence of God : Even yon Sinai trembled at the presence of God, The God of Israel. And now listen to the august promulgation The Ten Com- itself : God spake all these words, saying : ejbo&xi^h! I am Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods before me. Thou shaU not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness qf any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them iliat hate me, ; and shewing mercy unto thousands, qf them that love me and keep my commandments. Thou shaU not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain : for Jehovah will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do aU thy work: but the seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God; in 2 14 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. it thou shaU not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day : wherefore Jehovah blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which Jehqvah thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt do no murder. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his man servant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbour's. Terror of the Such were some of the circumstances attending People. ^ orjgmai promulgation of the Ten Command- Exod. xx, is- ments. No wonder that when the people heard these words of Jehovah, proclaimed amid the light nings and thunderings and the voice of the trum pet and the smoke of the mountain, they trembled, and stood afar off, and cried to Moses, saying, Speak thou with us, and we will hear : but let not God speak with us, lest we die. No wonder that Heb. xii, 21. even brave Moses himself exclaimed, I exceedingly Subsequent fear and quake. History of Before leaving this part of our subject, it will be logue. interesting to trace, so far as we can, the subse- INTRODUCTORY. 15 quent history of the Ten Commandments. At the Exod. xxxi, i& end of the forty days' communion in the glory- cloud on Mount Sinai, Jehovah gave to Moses two tables of stone, on which he himself had inscribed with his own hand the Ten Commandments. Of what size and shape these tables were we are not told. We only know that the tables were the Exod. xxxii, 15, . . . . 16- work of Godr and the writing was the writing of God. Graven upon both sides of the two tables, on the one side and on the other, were the Ten Com mandments written. It is interesting to recall that the writings on the Babylonian tablets and Assyrian monoliths are also usually inscribed on both sides. Professor Keil, with that painstaking so characteristic of German scholarship, has calcu lated that, if the Sinaitic tablets were twenty-seven inches long by eighteen inches wide, the one hun dred and seventy-two Hebrew words of the Deca logue could easily have been inscribed on the four faces of the two tablets, and the tablets carried in Moses' hands. But to resume the history. When Exod. xxxii, 15- Moses descended from his mountain communion with Jehovah, and saw his people worshiping and dancing around the golden calf, his anger waxed hot, and he hurled the two tablets out of his two hands, and brake them at the foot of the mount. After Jehovah had punished his people for their Deut. *, 1-4. idolatry, he bade Moses hew two tablets of stone, on which he himself again wrote the Ten Com mandments, according to the original writing. When the tabernacle was finished, Moses, by Deut. x, 5. divine direction, deposited the two tables in that 16 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. most sacred of shrines, the Ark of the Covenant. Here they remained, sharing the wonderful for tunes and misfortunes of the ark, borne by the priests through the thirty-eight years' wilderness wandering, transported across the dry bed of Jor dan, conveyed around the walls of Jericho, en shrined at Shiloh, captured and restored by the Philistines, installed in the house of Abinadad, the house of Obed-edom, and the house of David. At iKings vm, 1-10. length, after centuries of wandering, the ark, with its precious relics of the Sinaitic tablets, was en shrined by Solomon in his magnificent temple. There, hidden from mortal eyes in the solemn se clusion of the holy of holies, they remained centuries longer, till, in the year 598 before Christ, Nebu chadnezzar captured Jerusalem, plundered the tem ple, and carried the sacred furniture and vessels as his trophies to Babylon. Were the tables of the Ten Commandments among these trophies? We are not told. But I fancy they must have been : for they were the most precious treasures in the temple, being historic relics already a millennium old, hewn from the cliffs of Sinai, inscribed by Deity's own hand. Who knows but that the archaeological expedition, so enterprisingly sent forth by our own University, shall yet discover amid the ruins of Babylonia the identical stone tablets of Sinai ? However this may be, one thing is certain, and let us thank God for it : the Ten Commandments are the most ineffaceably graven, 2 Cor. m, 3. when they are written, not on tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart. . INTRODUCTORY. 17 And this leads us to our next point, the charac ter of the Ten Commandments. Observe then, first, that the Decalogue is in form The Deca- prohibitive. Eight of the Ten Commandments hibitive in begin with an interdict: "Thou shalt have none orm" other gods before me," " Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image," " Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain," " Thou shalt not kill," "Thou shalt not commit adultery," " Thou shalt not steal," " Thou shalt not bear false witness," "Thou shalt not covet." How sternly this prohibitory form of the Decalogue testifies to the story of man's fall ! It forbids man doing this thing and that thing and the other thing, because this thing and that thing and the other thing are the very things which man is ever prone to do. Thus the very prohibition is itself a solemn witness to the fall. The " Thou shalt not " of Sinai attests the story of Satan's entrance into Eden. Again, these prohibitings of the Decalogue tend to awaken conscience : By the law is the Eom. iv, 20. knowledge of sin ; through the prohibition comes the sense of transgression. With what philosophi cal acumen and dramatic picturesqueness St. Paul describes the arousing function of the law : I had not known sin, except through the law : for Rom. vii, 7-13. I had not known coveting, except the law had said, " Thou shalt not covet : " but sin, finding occasion, Exod. xx, 17. wrought in me through the commandment all man ner of coveting : for apart from the law sin is dead. And I was alive apart from the law once : but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died ; and the commandment, which was unto life, 18 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. this I found to be unto death : for sin, finding occasion, through the commandment beguiled me, and through it slew me. So that the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous, and good. Did then that which is good become death unto me ? God forbid. But sin, that it might be shewn to be sin, by working death to me through that which is good ; that through the command ment sin might become exceeding sinful. It is as though this master of moral psychology and poetic prose had said : As the plumb-rule discloses deviation from the perpendicular or physical uprightness, so the com mandment discloses deviation from rectitude or moral perpendicularity. For example : I should not have known what coveting means, had not the 1 John ui, 4. Tenth Commandment said, " Thou shalt not covet." The practical, experimental knowledge of good and evil commonly comes through the sense of prohibi tion. Or, as my friend and fellow apostle ex- R.m. w, 15. presses it, " Sin is the transgression of the law," sin is lawlessness — that is to say : Sin is a crossing of the boundary-line marked out for us by him who made us, and who, having made us, has the right to appoint our limits. And the very fact that there are these limits is also the very fact which makes it possible to transgress these limits. For, as I have elsewhere said, where no law is, there no transgres sion is ; where there is no prohibition, there is no disobedience. Moreover, the prohibition not only. discloses sin: it also even incites to sin; the very fact that there are limits invites to transgression of l cor. xv, 56. those limits. The strength of sin is the law; the penal power of disobedience is the commandment. Now as Satan took advantage of the forbidden tree Gen. iii, i. in Eden, saying unto the woman, " Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of any tree of the garden ? " INTRODUCTORY. 19 and thus used the very prohibition as an incitement to eat ; so Sin, my most desperate foe, seized the prohibition "Thou, shalt not covet" as a base of military operations against me, and overcame me, inciting in me all manner of coveting and unlawful desires : for without the law sin is dead, apart from the commandment sin lies dormant. For there was once a time when I was alive apart from law ; it was when I was an infant, unconscious of the commandment, and therefore unconscious of sinful ness. But when the Decalogue came, when my mother read to me the commandment "Thou shalt not covet," that prohibition was to sin what warmth is to the viper; Sin revived, awakening from its torpor ; and I died, losing the sense of innocence and divine approval ; ay, The cords of death compassed me, Ps. cxvii, 8. And the pains of Sheol gat hold on me. And so the very commandment which God had appointed for my moral advantage and eternal blessedness proved to be to my moral disadvantage and eternal ruin; for as the serpent seized the oppor tunity of the forbidden tree to beguile our common mother, and destroy her, so Sin, seizing the oppor tunity of the prohibition of Sinai, beguiled me, and through it slew me, murdering my sense of innocence and moral security. But do not misun derstand me. I do not mean to imply that the Decalogue is unholy, or that the Tenth Command ment is unrighteous. Whatever blame there is attaches, not to the use of the commandment, but to the misuse of it; for we know that the law is 1 Tim. 1,8, 9. good, if a man use it lawfully, as, knowing this, that law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and unruly, for the ungodly and sin ners, for the unholy and profane. It is not, then, the commandment which slays me — perish the 20 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. thought! But it is Sin which is my assassin, working death to me through that which is in itself good, seizing the wholesome commandment as an occasion of guilt, and thus proving that sin is indeed exceedingly sinful. The Deca logue Af- fimative in Spirit. Although the Decalogue is in form prohibitive, yet in spirit it is affirmative. Indeed, a negative pole implies a positive. The prohibition which in the letter says " Thou shalt have none other gods before me," in the spirit also says: "Thou shalt have me for thy God." The commandment which says in form " Thou shalt not kill," says in fact " Thou shalt love." Not that the Ten Command ments are positive enactments in the sense of arbi trary edicts : they are rather divine arrangements in the sense of a gracious covenant. Indeed, the phrase translated the "Ten Commandments," liter ally means the " Ten Words," and is so rendered in the margin of both the Authorized Version and the Revised Version, answering to the Septuagint Version — SUa ldyoo^y transferred into our Eng lish language as the 'Deca-Logue. And these Ten Commandments, or Words, are often expressly called "the Words of the Covenant," "Tables of Exod. xxxiv, 28 the Covenant," etc. For example: "He wrote upon the tables the Words of the Covenant, the Ten Commandments" — in the Hebrew, "the Ten Words." Accordingly, when Jehovah had orally proclaimed his Ten Words amid the thunders of Sinai, he summoned Moses up to himself on the holy mount, and bade him take the book of the Heb. ix, i9, 20! Covenant, in which had been written all the words INTRODUCTORY. 21 of the Law, aud read iu the audience of the people ; aud they said : All that Jehovah hath spoken will we do, and be obedient. And Moses took the blood of the calves and the goats, with water and scan-let wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself, and all the people, saying, Behold the blood of the Covenant, which Jehovah hath made with you con cerning all these Words (marginal reading, "upon all these conditions") ; this is the blood ofthe Cove nant which God commanded to you-ward. The Ten Words then are divinely covenantal, rather than divinely statutory. And just because they are covenantal rather than statutory, they are, morally speaking, more divinely commanding than any mere statute could ever have been. Law is never so imperial as love. Observe now that the Ten Words, or Com- The Deca- mandments, are in their character germinal and mfnai in suggestive, rather than unfolded and exhaustive. Character. They are the rudimental principles of morality, the germs of ethics, the seminary, or seed-plot, of religion. Take, for instance, the First Command ment: it is an embryonic theology, or doctrine of Deity, hinting his providential government, his essential unity, his demand on our undivided worship. In like manner, the Second Command ment hints the nature of God — he is spiritual ; the character of acceptable worship — it must be direct instead of indirect; the principle of retribution, alike rewarding and penal — it is the law of hered ity. The Third Commandment hints the essential Godhood of Jehovah, and the awful guilt of 22 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. worshiping him insincerely, pledging his name to a falsehood, or using his name frivolously. The Fourth Commandment hints the obligation of daily secular labor ; the physiological necessity of periodic rest ; the duty of regularly -recurring periods for worship, private and public. The Fifth Commandment hints the duty of reverence for all in authority, whether parental, political, intellectual, or moral. The Sixth Commandment hints the sacredness of the human body, and, therefore, the sacrilegious guilt of injuring it, whether by murder or any other form of bodily harm. The Seventh Commandment hints the hallowed nature of the marriage institution, and the fearful sacrilege of invading the sanctity of home. The Eighth Commandment hints the sacredness of the rights of property, and the wickedness of all kinds of theft, whether of money, or time, or opportunity, or ideas, or reputation. The Ninth Commandment hints the unity of man kind, the sacredness of the gift of language, and the criminality of all duplicity and slander. The Tenth Commandment hints the doctrine of uni versal brotherhood, and the guilt of disturbing the equilibrium of human society. And these Ten Commandments, or germs of morality, are so intervolved that, as the Apostle James tells us, James ii, 10. " Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and vet stumble in one point, he is become guilty of all"; for the God who wrote on the first table of his Covenant " Thou shalt have none other gods before me," also wrote on the second table of his Cove- INTRODUCTORY. 23 naut, " Thou shalt not covet any thing that is thy neighbour's." But although the Ten Commandments are rudi- The Deca- mental in their form, they are also elemental in mortal i™" their meaning, and therefore universal and immor- Principle. tal in their application. Just because they are germs, they are capable of all growth, or unfolding along the lines suggested in the embryo. Men may outgrow, and have outgrown, other moralities ; for example, the Ritual of Moses, the Institutes of Manu, the Analects of Confucius, the Zend-Avesta of Zoroaster, the Ethics of Aristotle, the Koran of Mohammed, the Utilitarianism of Mill. But men have not outgrown, and never will outgrow, at least so long as this world stands, the Ten Command ments of Jehovah ; for he has engraven them, not only on tablets of stone, but also on tablets of an essential, eternal morality. In brief, the Ten Commandments are the axioms of morals, the summary of ethics, the itinerary of mankind, the framework of society, the vertebral column of humanity. And here, let me ask in passing, how do you The Deca- account for the moral anachronism of the Decalogue ? Vine Reve- For, whatever doubts there may be touching the antiquity of certain parts of the Pentateuch, it is quite generally agreed that the Ten Commandments are as ancient as Moses himself, proclaimed while Israel was yet fresh from the bondage and poly theism and immoralities of Egypt. Can you ac count for this striking anachronism of a well-nigh perfect code, appearing suddenly in an archaic lation. 24 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. age, among a most imperfect people, in any better way than by accepting the Biblical state ment that Jehovah himself proclaimed this code amid the supernatural phenomena of Mount Sinai? Our Theme Let me offer one concluding thought — the perti- Our Times, nency of our theme to our times. For it cannot be denied that we are living in an age when the doc trine of individualism is assuming an extravagant and perilous form. As in the lawless period of the judg. xvii, 6; Hebrew judges, when there was no king in Israel, and every man did that which was right in his own eyes, so in our own period there is a marked ten dency to extreme individuality, or personal lawless ness ; the lawlessness, for example, of professional anarchy, of popular sovereignty, of selfish monopoly, of conceited idiosyncrasy, of defiant irreligion ; in brief, the lawlessness which substitutes personal autonomy for divine authority, worshiping self in stead of God, exclaiming, Apres moi le deluge. Nor has the Church herself quite escaped the infection of this moral anarchy ; there are those in her com munion who in their hearts still say, with the anti- Bom, vi, 15. nomians of St. Paul's day : " I am not under law ; I am under grace : therefore I will be the law to myself; I will do what is right in my own eyes." In other words, moral lawlessness substitutes proud self-will for virile obedience to Jehovah's mandates. Here, in the subtile infection of this extravagant individualism, or sense of freedom from the obliga tion of law, lies the secret of the terrible falls which INTRODUCTORY. 25 so often and so painfully startle the community. What this generation needs is a profounder sense of divine supremacy and human obligation. What we need is a more sinewy Christianity — a Chris tianity which shall mightily execute Jehovah's mighty will. Young gentlemen, I congratulate you that our University offers you a Department of Physical Education, and the use of yonder noble athletic grounds. I sincerely wish, alike for your health of body and your health of soul, that every one of you could become an accomplished gymnast. Nevertheless, there is a nobler gymnasium than any physical — a gymnasium demanding a sterner regi men, exactef discipline, firmer will, stouter muscle, defter skill, braver movement, than any you shall ever see on yonder athletic ground : it is the gym nasium of the soul, the arena of the Ten Command ments. God grant that in that spiritual arena, where the wrestling is not against flesh and blood, Eph. vi, 12. but against the powers of lawlessness, every one of you may wax in every limb, and feel the thews of "inMemoriam,' Anakim, the pulses of a Titan's heart. So shall you become mighty before God to the casting down of 2 Cor. x, 4, 5. strongholds, hurling down imaginations, and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. So shall you receive the 2 Tim- iy. *• crown of righteousness, or chaplet of perfected character, which the Lord, the righteous judge, the impartial arbiter, has promised to all those who fear God, and love him, and keep his command ments. Heaven grant it ! 3 26 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Collect. Blessed Lord, who hast caused all Holy Scriptures to be written for our learning ; Grant that we may in such wise hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that by patience, and comfort of thy holy word, we may embrace, and ever hold fast, the blessed hope of everlasting life, which thou hast given us in our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen. II. THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. I am Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods before me. Exodus xx, 2-3 II. V THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. How shall we conceive of God ? Who is he ? A Basal Ques- What is his name? The First Commandment answers these ques- a Basal An- tions. God spake all these words, saying : swer" I am Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of Exod. xx. 1-3. the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have none other gods before me. The language is local ; but the meaning is uni versal. Accordingly, in studying the First Com mandment, let us ponder it, first, in its meaning for the ancient Jew, and, secondly, in its meaning for ourselves. I. And first, the meaning of the First Command- Meaning of ment for the ancient Jew. The commandment Command- naturally cleaves into two parts — a declaration and ment for the a prohibition. 1. And first, the divine declaration : "lam Jeho- TheDivine vah thv God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage." Let us ponder these clauses in their order. (a) First of all, the divine name: "/ am Jeho- The Divine vah." Name" This Hebrew word Jehovah, I hardly need say, appears in the Authorized Version of the Hebrew Scriptures as the English word Lord, printed in 29 30 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. small capitals. Inasmuch as the word is a proper noun, modern translators think that the word should be transliterated; but they differ as to whether the transliteration should appear as Jeho vah, or as Jahveh, or as Yahveh, or as Yahweh. The American Revisers prefer the term Jehovah, and this shall be our term in this course of lecturesi A more important question is this : What does this Hebrew word Jehovah mean ? It means the eternal, self-existing, ever-living, ever-acting One. A strik- Exod. ui, 1-15. ing Scripture is in point. While Moses was still keeping the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, in one of the wadies near the foot of Mount Sinai, there suddenly appeared to him a burning, but uncon sumed bush. Out of it came a divine voice, say ing: "I am the God of thy father the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob ; go back into Egypt, for I have appointed thee to deliver my people out of the hand of Pharaoh." But Moses, remembering that his countrymen had long been exposed to the debasing effects of servi tude, and that they were still living in polytheistic Egypt, ventures to say: " Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you ; and they shall say me, What is his name ? what shall I say unto them?" And God said unto Moses: "I AM that I AM (or, I AM BECAUSE I AM ; or, I AM WHO AM ; or, I WILL BE THAT I WILL BE). TliUS shalt thou say unto the children of Israel : I am (or, I will be) hath sent me unto you ; Jehovah, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 31 the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name forever, and this is my memorial unto all generations." This, then, is the meaning of the Hebrew word Jehovah; it means the personal, self-existent, eternal, ever-acting One.1 Observe, also, that this name Jehovah was, iu a unique sense, the name of God in his special cove nant-relation with his chosen people, Israel. Dis tinguish for a moment between the Hebrew word Elohim, translated "God," and the Hebrew word transliterated Jehovah. Elohim was the general name of God; Jehovah was the specific name. Elohim was God in the Bible of his works ; Jeho vah was God in the Bible of his words. Elohim was the God of mankind ; Jehovah was the God of Israel. Jehovah was Elohim revealed. Elohim Exod. xx, 1,2. spake all these words, saying : " I am Jehovah thy Elohim."2 Tt is unfortunate that this distinction 1 " There can be little doubt that the substitution of ' Lord ' for Jahveh in the translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, and in the Jewish Rabbinical Theology, has been associated with an undue stress upon the sovereignty of God. The Old Testa ment revelation, in its use of nin', emphasized rather the activity of the ever-living personal God of revelation. The doctrine of God needs to be enriched at the present time by the enthronement of the idea of the living God to its supreme place in Biblical theology, and the dethronement of the idea of divine sovereignty from its usurped position in dogmatic the ology." — " Messianic Prophecy," by Prof. Charles Augustus Briggs, D, D., preface, xi. 2" The Hebrew may say the Elohim, the true God, in opposi tion to all false gods ; but he never says the Jehovah, for Jehovah is the name of the true God only. He says again and again my Ood (Elohim), but never my Jehovah ; for when he says, 'my God' (Elohim), he means Jehovah. He speaks of the Ood (Elohim) of Israel, but never of the Jehovah of Israel, 32 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. between Elohim, the general name of God, and Jehovah, the specific, covenantal, Abrahamic name of God, should be concealed, or at least obscured, by the failure of the English translators of the Hebrew Scriptures to transliterate the definite, Hebrew proper noun Jehovah, substituting in place of it the indefinite translation Lord, printed iu small capitals. For oftentimes the force of an argument or of an appeal hinges on this very word Jehovah, as meaning the Covenant-God of Israel. lfS^ XTiUi The scene on Mount Carmel, when Elijah chal lenged the prophets of Baal, is strikingly in point. The question in issue was precisely this : Which was the true God, Jehovah — the God of the He brews, or Baal — the god of the Phoenicians? Listen to Elijah's appeal : " How long halt ye between two opinions? If Jehovah be God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him." Listen to Elijah's prayer : " O Jehovah, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel." Listen to the confession of Israel, hitherto vacillating between Jehovah and Baal, but at last overcome by Jehovah's ac ceptance of Elijah's burnt offering: "Jehovah, he is God ! Jehovah, he is God !" Let me, then, im press on you this injunction: Whenever you see in the Old Testament this word Lord printed in small capitals, always substitute for it the word Jehovah, for there is no other Jehovah. He speaks of the living Ood (Elohim), but never of the living Jehovah, for he»cannot con ceive of Jehovah as other than living." — Fairbairn's " Dic tionary of the Bible." THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 33 meaning the Covenant-God of the Hebrews. And yet, strange to say, notwithstanding Jehovah, the Exod. m, is. God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, had expressly said to Moses at the burning bush that this name Jehovah should be his name forever, his memorial unto all generations, this name Jehovah is precisely the one name which the Jews in after centuries superstitiously refused to pronounce, de claring that this sacred tetragrammaton was the incommunicable, ineffable name; thus making the Matt. xv,6. commandment of God of none effect by their tra dition. (b) And now we pass to the divine relation: "I The Divine am Jehovah thy God." Observe: Although the Israelites listening at that moment to Jehovah's voice numbered more than two millions, yet God addresses them in the singular number, saying, "I am Jehovah thy Elo him." This divine choice of the singular posses sive " thy" instead of the plural possessive " your," is profoundly significant, implying that Jehovah regarded his people Israel as a single, colossal per sonality, or corporate unity. The Jews, considered as individuals, were many Israelites; the Jews, considered as a nation, were one Israel, When Hosea xi.i. Israel was a child, then Jehovah loved him, and called his son out of Egypt, It was this divine conception of the Hebrew people as a single, cor porate personality which gave to Israel such a unique position among the nations of the earth, and which also made the revolt of the ten tribes under Jeroboam such an heinous sin. Nor was 34 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Israel the only people that was a person. Every nation worthy of the name of nation is also a person, having, at least, some of the attributes of personality. For example: Each nation has its own idiosyncrasy. Recall Hebrew subtilty, Greek sestheticism, Roman jurisprudence, Chinese conser vatism, French savoir-faire, German speculation, English persistence, Scotch shrewdness, Irish im petuosity, American versatility. Again, each nation has such attributes of personality as conscience, choice, purpose, manners, character, continuity of existence, the individuals as components vanishing, the totality as a person remaining. Hence, as Thomas Carlyle says, "History is the essence of innumerable biographies." And just because the nation is a person, having a character either good or bad or mixed, so therefore the nation has a des tiny either prosperous or disastrous or mingled. Pa. cxiiv, is. " Happy is the people whose God is Jehovah ! " Happy is our dear America, so long as the God of Israel can say to her, I am Jehovah, thy God. The Divine (c) And now observe the divine deliverance: Deliverance. „ j am Jen0van thj (jod) who fa^fo thge (ml 0j the land of Egypt, out of the house qf bondmen." Exod. xix, 4. Jehovah had just said unto Israel, "Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself." How exultingly Moses had chanted his triumphal ode ! Exod. xv, l-2t. * wlu sinS unt0 Jehovah, for he hath triumphed gloriously ; The horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea. Jehovah is my strength and song, THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 35 And he is become my salvation : This is my God, and I will praise him ; My father's God, and I will exalt him. Jehovah is a man of war : Jehovah is his name. Pharoah's chariots and his host hath he cast into the sea : And his chosen captains are sunk in the Red Sea. The deeps cover them : They went down into the depths like a stone. Thy right hand, O Jehovah, is glorious in power, Thy right hand, 0 Jehovah, dasheth in pieces the enemy. The enemy said, I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil : My lust shall be satisfied upon them ; I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them. Thou didst blow with thy wind, the sea covered them : They sank as lead in the mighty waters. Who is like unto thee, 0 Jehovah, among the gods? Who is like thee, glorious in holiness, Fearful in praises, doing wonders 3 And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Moses, took a timbrel in her hand, and answered in anti- phone : Sing ye to Jehovah, for he hath triumphed gloriously ; The horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea. Well then might Jehovah's rescue of Israel out of the grasp of Pharaoh be a proof that he was indeed the God of the Hebrews, and therefore had the sole claim on their undivided worship. 2. And so we pass from the divine declaration — -r^e Divllie " I am Jehovah thy God "—to the divine prohibi- Prohibition. tion — "Thou shalt have none other gods before me" — margin, "beside me." This prohibition not only forbade Israel's apos tatizing from Jehovah, and substituting the worship of other gods in his place : it also forbade Israel's 36 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. worshiping other gods in addition to their worship of Jehovah. Remember that they had just come out of polytheistic Egypt, a land where there were as many local gods as there were hamlets, the land of Ra, Phthah, Osiris, Isis, Horus, and animal wor ship. Remember also that they were going up into polytheistic Canaan, the land of Baal, and Ashtoreth, and Asherah, and Molech, and Dagon. Remember also that they themselves were origin- josh. xxiv, 1-28. ally of polytheistic ancestry. "Your fathers," said Joshua to Israel by the witnessing-stone at Shechem, " dwelt of old time beyond the River (Euphrates), even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor: and they served other gods. Now therefore fear Jehovah, and serve him in sincerity and in truth : and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond Euphrates ; and serve ye Jehovah. And if it seem evil unto you to serve Jehovah, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell : but as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah." Re membering, then, that the Jews were primarily of polytheistic origin, that they had just come up out of polytheistic Egypt, and that they were on their way to polytheistic Canaan, it is not wonderful that they needed Jehovah's prohibition — "Thou shalt have none other gods before me," or, " along side of me, in addition to me." How much they needed it is sadly proved by the fact that even after it had been proclaimed amid the thunders of Sinai, THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 37 while they were still at the foot of the mount, and Moses was still in the glory-cloud above, they said to Aaron : "Up, make us gods, which shall go be- Exod.xxxii,i-6. fore us ; for as for this Moses, we know not what is become of him." And Aaron, yielding to their demand, received their golden ear rings, and fash ioned them into a molten calf, such as he had often seen worshiped in Egypt; and the people bowed before it, exclaiming : " This is thy god, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." This, then, was the meaning; of the First Cora- Summary for i /.i ¦ t t /• i -i i . the Jew. mandment for the ancient Jew: It forbade him to worship any god except Jehovah, his own Coven ant-God. For, as I said in the introductory lecture, the Ten Commandments, or, rather, the ten Words of the Covenant, were not so much statutory as they were covenantal, setting forth Jehovah's gracious arrangement for his own people, Israel. Accordingly, Jehovah was the party of the first part, covenanting to be Israel's God ; and Israel was the party of the second part, covenanting to worship no God but Jehovah. II. Ponder now, secondly, the meaning of the First Meaning of Commandment for ourselves. Let us follow the Command- same order as before, noting, first, the divine de- ourseives°r claration; and, secondly, the divine prohibition. 1. And, first, the divine declaration: "I am The Divine Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of the aon21*™" land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage." (a) Note, first, the divine Name : "I am Jehovah." The Divine And who is this Jehovah ? It is Jesus of Naza- ame' reth, the Son of God and the Son of man, the Man 4 38 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Divine. I enter into no theological argument touch ing the Trinity, no metaphysical discussion touching the person of Jesus Christ. For, thank God, our University is not a sectarian college. At the same time, thank God, our University is a Christian college, founded under Christian auspices, and administered, I am sure, in a Christian spirit. We. are only true to the traditions of our past and to the Christian sentiment of our own age, not when we say theologically that Jesus is God or that God is Jesus, but when we say practically that Jesus is God in manifestation, the Father manifested. jolm xiv, 8-10. Philip saith unto Jesus : " Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us." Jesus answereth : "Have I been so long time with you" — have I been with you all these years of companionship and tuition and example and lifen — "and dost thou not know me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father ; how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me ? " Thus Jesus John i, is. Christ is the revelation of God. "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father " — the eternal Father's bosom intimate — "he hath declared him " — made exegesis of him, interpreted him, made him known. col. i,io. Jesus Christ is the visible image of the invisible Heb.i, 3. God, the effulgence of his glory, the very image of his substance, the very impress of his being. Jesus johni,i. Christ is Deity in exposition. He is the Word of God. Exod. iii, 14. Observe also how the " I AM" of the burnino- THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 39 bush reappears in the "lams" of the Nazarene. For example : " Where two or three are gathered Matt, xviu, 20. together in my name, there am I iu the midst of them." " Lo, lam with you alway, even unto the Matt. xxviii, 20. end of the world." " Before Abraham was, I am." John vm, 58. " I come again, and will receive you unto myself; John xiv, 3. that where I am, there ye may be also." " Father, John xvii, 24. I desire that, where 1 am, they also may be with me." Aye, " Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, Heb. xiii, 8. and to-day, yea and forever." He himself said to the exile of Patmos : " I am the Alpha and the **y- *• 8- Omega, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty." Well then might the angel ofthe annunciation bid Joseph, saying : " Thou shalt call Matt- i. 21- his name Jesus (that is " whose help is Jehovah ") : for it is he that shall save his people from their sins." Verily, his name is Immanuel, which is, Matt, 1,23. being interpreted, God with us.1 'It is interesting and instructive to trace the progressive revelation of God's name. Dean Plumptre, in his paper on the phrase " The Most Sigh Ood," arranges the chief Divine names of the Old Testament as follows : " (1) As the earliest of all,- the lowest stratum in the lan guage deposits of the religious history of the Semitic races, we have the name El (God) as seen in 'Beth-el, i?(-Shaddai, Isra-eZ, Samu-eZ, and the like. It indicates in its singular form that the primary conception is that of unity. It is the witness of a monotheistic faith. The original idea which it expresses is that of strength. That idea is intensified in the name El-Shaddai, ' God Almighty.' It is connected with the thought of an infinite elevation above man, and earth, and the things of time, in El-Elion, ' the Most High God.' If there is any traceable distinction in the use of these two names, it is that the former belongs specially to Abraham and his descend ants, that the latter is common to them and to the tribes from which they had been called to be a peculiar people, a ' congre- 40 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. The Divine (b) And now we pass to the divine relation : "I am Jehovah thy God." And who is Jehovah's Israel in our day and gation,' an ecclesia. (2) In some way, we know not how, the more common mode of using the name El came to be in the plural form Elohim. It may be, as Christian theologians have for the most part maintained, that this implied the presence in the Divine nature of a plurality mysteriously compatible with unity. It may be, as Mr. Max Muller has suggested, that Elohim originated in the growth of a polytheistic tendency among the Semitic as among the other races of mankind. In either case, when taken up by the children of Abraham, and combined with language which unmistakably asserted the Di vine unity, it testified that he who was so named united within himself all that men had imagined as belonging to the ' gods many and lords many ' before whom they bowed in worship. But the fact that it primarily expressed plurality rather than unity led naturally enough to a lower application of the name. It was given to the earthly representatives of the Divine gov ernment as well as to the Divine King himself. It was written of to the judges and rulers of Israel, 'I have said, Te are gods' (Elohim) ' and all of you are children of the Most High' (Ps. 82: 6). When the Israelites met at a time of danger, looking for new leaders, it is said of them that ' they chose new gods ' (Elohim) (Judg. 5 : 8). The name was applied in common prose narrative (as in Exod. 21 : 6 ; 22 : 8 ; 22:9) to those whom our Authorized Version calls ' judges.' (3) Such a name was, therefore, in danger of losing its power to bear witness to the unity of God. It did not direct men to the thought of God as the eternal, the ever-living, the source of all life to men. What met their want was found in Jah, or Jahveh, or Jehovah, from the time when it was revealed to Moses as expressing the truth which in its more expanded form appeared in the I am that I am. Once adopted (and its appearance in the Song of Deborah, Judg. 5, passim, with all its manifestly local and contemporary touches, is a proof that it was in use then, and not, as has been maintained, an after thought of the days of Samuel), it became, naturally enough, the distinctive name of the faith of Israel. In the combination of Jehomh-Sabaoth, ' the Lord of Hosts,' it testified of him as the God of the armies of Israel, the giver of victory in battle, THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 41 land? It is the Church of the living God: "for Bom. u, 28, 29. he is not a Jew, who is one outwardly ; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh : but as the God of the unseen hosts of the stars of heaven, and of the angels that serve him. Used in combination with Elohim (' the Lord God ') or interchangeably with it in successive verses of the same chapter or the same hymn, it rescued that name from any downward tendency, and enabled men to use it even by itself, as old associations or rhythmic influences might lead them, without any risk of weakening the faith of the people in the indivisible Unity, with no more definite dog matic purpose, it may be, than Christians have when they speak in sermons or hymns or meditations, of ' God ' and ' the Lord,' indiscriminately. The relation of the two titles was fixed for ever by the proclamation, ' the Lord thy God is one Lord ' ; ' Jehovah thy Elohim is one Jehovah' (Deut. 6 : 4). (4) But, meantime, the older, primeval name of the Most Sigh Oud kept its ground even amid the debasing polytheism ofthe Chaldeans, Phoenicians, and other sections of the Semitic race. When the Jews came in contact with them, or with the Greeks, to whom the name had passed through their instrumentality, or among whom it had sprung into use through the parallel ism of thought which the history of the religions of the world so^often presents, even where there is no traceable derivation, they were able to claim it as their inheritance, and to take it as a common ground on which both alike could stand. (5) It may seem strange at first that the preachers of the new faith, which was in the fullest sense that of a universal fellowship, they who proclaimed a covenant identical in its terms and con ditions with that made with Abraham, should have made so little use of a name which might have seemed at first so suit able for their purpose ; but the causes of their thus leaving it to drop into comparative disuse are not, I believe, far to seek. Its very prevalence in the days of the decadence of Judaism had rendered it less fit to be the vehicle of the truth they preached. It had been tainted, so to speak, by passing from the lips of exorcists and demoniacs ; and at the best it would only have conveyed the thought that the faith which the apostles preached was simply a revival of the religion of the patriarchs. It might have led, as with the heretics above referred to, to a hybrid, half-Jewish, half-Oriental system. 42 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. he is a Jew, who is one inwardly ; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, not in the letter ; whose praise is not of men, but of God." And this latter Israel of the New Covenant in Jesus, like the former Israel of the Old Covenant under Moses, is a single moral personality ; for observe again that the pronominal adjective is in the singular number : " I am Jehovah thy God." The Church of Jesus Christ is a single, definite, corporate unity : i cor. xii, 27. « Ye are the body of Christ, and severally members thereof." But when I use the term " church " in such a connection as the present, of course, I do not mean by it any local organization, or the aggre gate of organized churches. But I do mean by it the one organic Church of the living God, the one Church of the spiritual corporation of redeemed humanity, the one ideal Church of the sum-total of Christly characters in all ages and of all sects, the one Church of the second and continuous incarna tion or the immortal body of Christ — in brief, the one Church of the Lamb. And it is the Church in this spiritual, universal, immortal, ideal, divine sense which, in virtue of her own origin and nature and destiny, always has been, is now, and always It seemed only, when men looked to its significance, to express the infinite distance between man and God. Another name had been given to them, which expressed, not the distance, but the nearness, the clearness of the relation in which he had revealed himself as standing to the children of men. The name of the Most Sigh God was to yield, in the prayers and praises of the Christian Church, to that of ' Our Father which is in heaven,' ' the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," — " Biblical Studies," by E. H. Plumptre D. D. Dean of Wells. THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 43 must be a single, definite, moral personality. Here we are this afternoon representing different ecclesi astical organizations — Episcopalians, Quakers, Pres byterians, Methodists, Baptists, Lutherans, Roman ists, and some no denomination at all. And yet, if we really belong to Christ, truly loving him and obeying him and sharing his character, we are, in spite of all our diversities, one Christian person ality : for in Christ Jesus there can be neither Jew Gai. hi, 28; coi. nor Gentile, neither Greek nor Scythian, neither male nor female : for all in Christ are one, and Christ is all, and in all. As there is but one spiritual God — namely, Jehovah — so there is but one spiritual Israel — namely, his Church: "I am Jehovah thy God." (c) Observe now again the divine deliverance: T!le Diyine \ ' ° Deliverance. " I am Jehovah, thy God, who brought thee out of tfie land of Egypt, out qf the house of bond age." As it is the Church that is the true Israel, so if is Diabolus who is the true Pharaoh, and Sin which is the true Egypt, and Jesus who is the true Deliverer. Recall Gabriel's mandate to the Virgin Mother : "Thou shalt call his name Jesus ; for it Matt. i, 21. is he that shall save his people from their sins." Recall how, after he had entered on his public ministry, he proclaimed his own charter of eman cipation : " If ye abide in my word, ye shall know John viii, 31-36. the truth, and the truth shall make you free: Verily, verily,I say unto you, Every one that committeth sin is the bondservant of sin : if therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." That is to 44 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. say, truth has an emancipating power ; for, born as we are into a fallen world, we are born to a heritage of misconceptions and delusions. And a state of delusion is a state of slavery. Falsehood is a fetter chaining our best faculties. But let truth shine on it, and how soon it melts the chain ! This emancipating power of truth holds in the intel lectual world : observe how the knowledge of the sciences, or truth as it is written in nature, frees us from the thraldom of ignorance, and superstition, and fetichism. But the emancipating power of truth is best seen in the moral world : observe how the knowledge of God, or truth as it is written in the character of Jesus, frees us from the thraldom of falsehood, and degradation, and evil habit. Truth it is which unlocks the dungeon in which sin has imprisoned our Godward faculties, bidding them go forth into God's own realm of moral liberty, wherein the hitherto pent-up religious capacities shall have full scope for unfolding into all varieties of strength, and beauty, and joy. The truth shall make you free. For, alas! there is no bondage so bitter as the bondage of a sinful habit, no thraldom so absolute as the thraldom of a sinful character. How true this is of the drunkard, the libertine, the miser, the spendthrift, the scoffer ! Now if Jesus Christ makes us free, we shall be free indeed; for he, in virtue of his twofold Sonship — Son of God, and so God's heir ; Son of man, and so man's next of kin — is this world's true emancipator, striking off with his own Calvary-stained hands the shackles of sin, manu- THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 45 mitting us into the eternal freedom. For so sings William Cowper : There is yet a liberty unsung " The Task," By poets, and by senators unpraised, Which monarchs cannot grant, nor all the powers Of earth and hell confederate take away : A liberty, which persecution, fraud, Oppression, prisons, have no power to bind ; Which whoso tastes can be enslaved no more : 'Tis liberty of heart derived from heaven, Bought with his blood, who gave it to mankind, And sealed with the same token. Aye, " the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus Rom. viB, 2. hath made me free from the law of sin and of death." Stand fast then in the freedom wherewith Christ Gal- T> *• hath set us free ; and be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage. 2. And now let us pass to the divine prohibi- The Divine, *¦ L Prohibition. tion : "Thou shaft have none other gods before me — that is, "Thou shalt have no God except me." We ourselves need this prohibition no less than did ancient Israel. For, although Christendom, theoretically speaking, is monotheistic, yet Chris tendom, practically speaking, is largely polythe istic. Recall, for example, the practical tritheism of many Trinitarians, conceiving the three persons in the trinity as three distinct Gods ; orthe practical dualism of many Christians, conceiving the Father as the God of wrath, and the Son as the God of love ; or, again, conceiving the Creator as the God of nature, and the Redeemer as the God of Scrip ture. Behold in the Pantheon of our Christendom how many niches there are for various gods — the god of the deist, the god of the materialist, the god 46 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. of the fatalist, the god of the sentimentalist, the god of the churchman, the god of the pantheist. Behold here and there in this Pantheon a comprehensive worshiper, fashioning a colossal composite idol, partly man and partly beast, syncretically blending in one divine amalgam, Christianity and Paganism, Protestantism and Romanism, Mosaism and Islam- ism, Spiritualism and Theosophism, Gnosticism and Agnosticism, Christ and Antichrist : and then fall ing down before this heterogeneous chimera, shout- Exod. xxxii, 4. ing : " These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." Aye, we of this Christian age and land need the First Command ment not less than did those ancient Israelites, circling in sacred dance around the golden calf. Deut. vi, 4, 5. " Hear," then, " O Israel : Jehovah our God is one Jehovah : and thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might." Or, as the great Apostle Paul puts i cor. vm, 4-6. it: "We know that there is no God but one: for though there are that are called gods, whether in heaven or on earth ; as there are gods many and lords many ; yet to us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we unto him ; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him " : one divine fontal source — even the eternal Father; one divine mediatorial channel — even our Lord Jesus Christ. III. Let me conclude with three thoughts. Monotheism And, first, our indebtedness to the Jew for mon- the Gift of , . it., the Jew to otneism, or the doctrine that there is but one God. Mankind. The Mosaic theology is the one solitary religion of THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 47 antiquity whose constant keynote is this : " Hear, Deut. vi, 4. O Israel : Jehovah our God is one Jehovah." Accordingly, the First Commandment marks a colossal stride forward in the history of religion ; for monotheism is the basal stone of Christian wor ship. And Moses seems to have derived his mon otheism from Abraham himself. Indulge me in the luxury of quoting a passage from that master in Oriental philology and comparative religions, Professor Max Muller : How is the fact to be explained that the three great "Chips from a religions of the world, in which the unity of the Deity forms Workshop," the keynote, are of Semitic origin, and that the Aryan nations, vo'- I-> pages wherever they have been brought to the worship of the one God, invoke him with names borrowed from the Semitic lan guage ? . . . . Mohammedanism, no doubt, is a Semitic reli gion, and its very core is monotheism. But did Mohammed invent monotheism ? Did he invent even a new name of God ? Not at all. His object was to destroy the idolatry of the Se mitic tribes of Arabia, to dethrone the angels, the Jin, the sons and daughters who had been assigned to Allah, and to restore the faith of Abraham in one God. And how is it with Christi- tianity ? Did Christ come to preach a faith in a new God ? Did he or his disciples invent a new name of God ? No ; Christ came not to destroy, but to fulfill ; and the God whom he preached was the God of Abraham. And who is the God of Jeremiah, of Elijah, and of Moses ? We answer, the God of Abraham. Thus the faith in the one living God, which seemed to require the admission of a monotheistic instinct, grafted in every mem ber ofthe Semitic family, is traced back to one man, to him " in whom all families ofthe earth shall be blessed." If from our earliest childhood we have looked upon Abraham, the friend of God, with love and veneration ; if our first impressions of a truly God-fearing life were taken from him who left the land of his fathers to live a stranger in the land whither God had called him, who always listened to the voice of God, whether it conveyed to him the promise of a son in his old age, or the command to sacrifice that son, hisonly son Isaac, his venerable figure will assume still more majestic proportions when we see 48 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. in him the life-spring of that faith which was to unite all the nations of the earth, and the author of that blessing which was to come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ. And if we are asked how this one Abraham possessed not only the primitive intuition of God as he had revealed himself to all mankind, but passed through the denial of all other gods to the knowledge of the one God, we are content to answer that it was by a special divine revelation, Jehovah to be Secondly, Jehovah our God is to be worshiped. And he is to be worshiped, because he, aud he alone, is Deity — the one self-existent, eternal, un changeable, spiritual, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, holy, just, true, gracious, perfect, infi nite, only Jehovah.1 iHow profoundly Hildebert, Archbishop of Tours, in the eleventh century, sings of the Everlasting Jehovah in his "Alpha et Omegaj Magne Deus!" translated by Herbert Kyn- aston : First and Last of faith's receiving, Source and sea of man's believing, God, whose might is all potential, God, whose truth is truth's essential. Good supreme in thy subsisting, Good in all thy seen existing ; Over all things, all things under, Touching all, from all asunder; Centre thou, but not intruded. Compassing, and yet included ; Over all, and not ascending, Under all, but not depending; Over all, the world ordaining, Tinder all, the world sustaining; All without, in all surrounding, All within, in grace abounding; Inmost, yet not comprehended. Outer still, and not extended; Over, yet on nothing founded, Under, but by space unbounded; Omnipresent, yet indwelling, Self-impelled, the world impelling : Force, nor fate's predestination, Sways thee to one alteration; THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. 49 And to this infinite Jehovah each of us owes tlie perfect worship of spirit and soul and body. We must love him supremely, revere him humbly, Ours to-day, thyself forever, Still commencing, ending never; Past with thee is time's beginning, Present all its future winning; With thy counsel's first ordaining Comes thy counsel's last attaining; One the light's first radiance darting And the elements departing. The original Latin is as follows : Alpha et n, magne Deus, Heli, Heli, Deus meus, Cujus virtus totum posse, , Cujus sensus totum nosse Cujus esse summum bonum, Cujus opus quidquid bonum, Super cuncta, subter cuncta, Extra cuncta, intra cuncta; Intra cuncta., nee inclusus, Extra cuncta, nee exclusus, Super cuncta, nee elatus, Subter cuncta, nee substratus; Super totus, praesidendo, Subter totus, sustinendo, Extra totus, complectendo, Intra totus es, implendo. Intra, nusquam coarctaris, Extra, nusquam dilataris, Subter, nullo fatigaris, Super, nullo snstentaris. Mundum movens, non moveris, Locum tenens. non teneris, Tempus mutans, non mutaris, Vaga firmans, non vagaria. Vis externa, vel necesse Non alternat tuum esse ; Heri nostrum, eras, et pridem Semper tibi nunc et idem; Tuum, Deus, hodiernum, Indi visum, sempiternum; In hoc totum praevidisti. Totum simul perfecisti, Ad exemplar summae mentis Formam praestans elementia. 50 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. study him homagefully, believe him entirely, trust him absolutely, obey him perfectly, plan for him exclusively, bow to him cheerfully, pray to him constantly, praise him ceaselessly, live to him wholly, adore him everywhere now and forever more. Our whole life is to be an unceasing ex halation of incense. Jehovah alone Lastly : Jehovah alone is to be worshiped. '*' No tZi^A Wor" man can serve two masters : for either he will hate shiped. Matt, vi, 24. ^he one, and love the other ; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other : Ye cannot serve God and Mammon " — Jehovah and Baal, Jesus and Self. Loyalty to the one is disloyalty to the other. It is as impossible to be loyal to both, as it is to go east and west at the same moment ; if you go east, you go from west; if you go west, you go from east. Cease, then, trying to worship Jehovah with a divided heart. The only sacrifice which Jehovah our God accepts is a whole burnt-offering. Ps.ixxxvi, 11,12. rjnu« then my heart to fear thy name : so shall I praise thee, O Lord my God, with my whole heart. May the life of each of us be a perpetual holocaust to the one Jehovah, acceptable to him through Jesus Christ our Lord ! Collect. Almighty and merciful God, of whose only gift it cometh that thy faithful people do unto thee true and laudable ser vice ; Grant, we beseech thee, that we may so faithfully serve thee in this life, that we fail not finally to attain thy heavenly promises; through the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. III. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness of any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth : thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them : for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the chil dren, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me ; and shewing mercy unto thousands. of them that love me and keep my commandments. Exodus xx, 4-6. III. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. Wobship is a well-nigh universal instinct. Plu- Worship a ° . Human ln- tarch, writmg against Colotes the epicurean, says : stinct. If you go through the world, you may find cities without Plutarch walls, without letters, without rulers, without houses, without j ^ ^j1" ,, q money, without theatres and games : but there was never yet xxxi. seen nor shall be seen by man a single city without temples and gods, or without prayers, oaths, prophecies, and sacrifices, used to obtain blessings and benefits, or to avert curses and calamities : nay, I am of opinion that a city might be sooner built without any ground beneath it, than a commonwealth could be constituted altogether destitute of belief in the gods, or, being constituted, could be preserved. More than eighteen centuries haye rolled away since this prince of ancient biographers bore his testimony to the universality of the worshipful instinct. And the flight of time has but confirmed his testimony; wherever travelers have pene trated — whether into the polar regions, the heart of the Dark Continent, or the most isolated isles of the seas — they have never found a race so degraded that it did not worship something. On the other hand, there has never been a race so civilized that it did not have its divinity or divinities : recall Brahm of India, Jupiter of Rome, Zeus of Greece, Osiris of Egypt, Jehovah of Canaan. True, there are in our own favored times a few who profess themselves to be atheists. Nevertheless, even these 53 54 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. gentlemen haye some kind of a god of their own : if it is not this personal Jehovah of Scripture, it is the impersonal Absolute of Law, of Force, of Being, of something or other. Even Voltaire prayed in an Alpine thunderstorm. Listen then to Francis Bacon : ' Advancement It is an assured truth and a conclusion of experience, that Book I. * little or superficial knowledge of philosophy may incline the mind of man to atheism, but a farther proceeding therein doth bring the mind back again to religion ; for in the entrance of philosophy, when the second causes, which are next unto the senses, do offer themselves to the mind of man, if it dwell and stay there, it may induce some oblivion of the highest cause ; but when a man passeth on farther, and seeth the dependence of causes and the works of Providence, then, according to the allegory of the poets, he will easily believe that the highest link of nature's chain must needs be tied to the foot of Jupi ter's chair. Significant words these, for all sciolists. No man was ever born au atheist ; if he has become one, it is because he has suicidally emasculated his own moral nature. This innate sense of God is one of the few relics of Paradise. Man, therefore, needs no command to worship. He worships as instinctively as he breathes. Instinct of Alas, this instinct of worship is a perverted in- iflj o r s h i 13 Perverted, stinct, or rather it takes a perverted direction. Man is finite, and therefore cannot help conceiving the Infinite One under finite conditions, or limita tions, localizing him in time and in space. This is the origin of idolatry, or worship of images. Man, instinctively worshiping God, yet unable, because finite, to conceive him except under limitations of space and time and form, instinctively began to THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 55 make representations of God, now in this form and now in that, in order to aid him in worship. But nothing was easier than to glide from making these representations of God to the worship of the representations themselves; thus changing the glory Eom.i, 28. of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four- footed beasts, and creeping things. While, then, man needs no divine command to worship, for he worships instinctively, he does need to have his instinct of worship divinely regulated. And now we are ready for the Second Commandment. Thou shalt not make- unto thee a graven image, The Second ,7 7.7 j. j. .7 f • • t 7 Command- no?" the likeness of any form that ts in heaven above, ment. or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water Exod" xx' 4~6' wider the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them : for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands, of them that love me and keep my com/man dments. Observe: While the First Commandment, "Thou shalt have none other gods before Jeho vah," forbids polytheism, or the worship of plural gods, this Second Commandment, "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image of Jehovah," forbids idolatry, or the worship of images of God. The Second Commandment naturally cleaves into two parts — a prohibition, and a reason for the prohibition. I. And, first, the divine prohibition: Thou Prohibition. 56 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness of any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth : thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them. 1. Observe precisely what this Second Com mandment forbids. Does Not For- (a) And, first, negative! v: It does not forbid bid All Art „v ' .. . , . ' T . , , . ,,. in Worship, all use of art in worship. Jbor Jehovah himself commanded Moses to adorn the tabernacle with figures of cherubim, and trees, and flowers, and pomegranates, and bells, and all manner of cunning workmanship in engraving and embroidering, in gold and silver and precious stones, in blue and purple aud scarlet and all manner of colors. In fact, the imaging faculty, or feculty of making images — imagination in the primary sense of the term — is itself a divine endowment, and therefore, like any other divine gift, is to be cultivated. The lower the conception of God, the ruder the art of the worshiper: recall the gross figure of the Phil istine Dagon, the coarse image of the Ephesian Diana, the vulgar statue of the Indian Gautama, the tawdry figure of the Italian Bambino. On the other hand, the higher the conception of God, the more exquisite the adornments of his sanctuary. I know not all the coming ministries of art. But I do believe that, as the Creator himself, the Artist of artists, has already opened the way for the legitimate use of form and color and poetry and music in his sanctuary, so he will in the course of his unfoldings open the way for the legitimate use THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 57 of sculpture and painting and gems. No; our commandment does not forbid the use of all art in worship. (6) What, then, does the Second Commandment But Does For- forbid? It forbids all idolatrous representations atrous im- of Deity. And this for the reason which can be stated best in the Divine Man's own words, at Jacob's well: "God is Spirit; and they that Johniv,24. worship him must worship in spirit and truth." That is to say : We must worship God according to his nature ; his nature is spiritual, and, therefore, just because his nature is spiritual, we must wor ship him spiritually — spirit-wise, not image-wise ; for only what is spiritual in us can worship what is spiritual above us. Recall that memorable scene when the great Apostle to the Gentiles, standing Acts xvii, 22-31. in the midst of the Areopagus, reminds his Athe nian auditors of a saying of Aratus, one of their own poets : " We are also his offspring." Then, pointing to the mighty Acropolis towering within almost a stone's throw of him, and crowned with its colos sal and dazzling statue of Pallas Athena, he adds : "Being then the offspring of God (the spiritual God), we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and device of man." How caustic the Scriptural irony against idolatry ! For example : Isaiah's description of the stupidity of the idol-maker and idol -worshiper, as set forth in his forty-fourth chapter. First, the prophet takes us into the isaiahxiiv,9-20. blacksmith's shop, and shows us the smith making an axe, and working among the coals, and fashion- 58 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. ing a metal idol, and becoming exhausted with his toil and heat ; but the idol does not reciprocate the smith's devotions. Next, the prophet takes us into the carpenter's shop, and shows us the carpenter stretching out a line for a wooden idol, marking it out with a pencil, shaping it with carving tools, and making: it like the figure of a man, that he may enshrine it in his house as a household god. Lastly, the prophet takes us into the kitchen, and shows us the idol-maker carving half of a pine log into an image, and burning the other half, in order to bake his bread and roast his meat, thus putting his god on an equality with his food. The sarcasm is exquisite. When I remember, then, that God is Spirit, and therefore cannot be represented by any image, I do not wonder at the iconoclasm of Leo the Isaurian, who issued his edict for the demolition of all images throughout his empire; or at the iconoclasm of sturdy Oliver Cromwell, who, as he marched here and therethrough Britain, mutilated with sabre and gun the statue of this or that saint iu the English cathedrals. 2. The prohibition, then, of the Second Com mandment is a universal need. (a) The Jew at the foot of Mount Sinai needed it. He had just emerged from idolatrous Egypt: — that Egypt which was wholly given over to image- worship. Hence the more detailed account of the Second Commandment, as given in the fourth chapter of the book of Deuteronomy : Deut. iv, 15-19. Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves ; for ye saw no manner of form on the day that Jehovah spake unto you in THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 59 Horeb out of the midst of the fire : lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, the likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in the heaven, the likeness of anything that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth : and lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the host of heaven, thou be drawn away and worship them, and serve them. And yet, strange to say, notwithstanding Abra ham, the founder of the Jewish nationality, was himself conspicuous as the first monotheist after the flood, and notwithstanding the emphatic lan guage of this Second Commandment, scarcely a month passed after the delivery of this solemn pro hibition against idol-worship before these same Exod. xx^ji. Jews demanded of Aaron that he should make for them a golden calf, in order that they might worship it. Recall also the story of Micah the Judg. xvii. Ephraimite, who enshrined in his house a molten image and gods and teraphim ; the story of Solo- 1 Kins8 **• mon, who went after Ashtoreth and Chemosh and ' Molech ; the story of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, 1 KiDgs xu. who made Israel to sin by setting up his golden calves at Bethel and at Dan ; the story of Ahaz, 2 Kings xx. who filled Judah and the temple itself with im ported idols. Recall the awful vision which the Ezek. vm, 8-12, prophet Ezekiel saw when, rapt in spirit, he was transported from Babylon to Jerusalem, and be held at the north of the temple gate the image of jealousy, and, entering into the sacred precincts, saw the still darker vision of the chambers of imagery, wherein stood the seventy ancients or 60 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. presbyters of Israel, swinging their censers of in cense before the paintings of every form of creep ing things, and abominable beasts, portrayed upon the wall round about, paintings evidently copied from the Egyptian system of idol-worship. Aye, the Jew needed the Second Commandment. (6) And not only did the Jew need the Second Commandment : even modern Christendom needs it. For example : There is the worship of images by our friends of the Roman Catholic Church. I know that they deny it. Nevertheless, practically speaking, they do adore the Madonna, the crucifix, the Host, relics, etc. * But why do I go to the Roman Catholic Church for examples of image worship ? Behold our own Protestant Ecclesiola- try, or worship of the Church as an institution, bowing down before her ordinances as though they were ends instead of using them as means, worship ing her sacraments and creeds and traditions and ceremonies. Behold our Protestant Bibliolatry, or rabbinic worship of the Bible as a letter and even sacrament. These, and such as these, are, practically speaking, more or less revered as symbols of Deity. Again : there is the worship of intellect, or knowl edge as knowledge; the worship, for instance, of science, of literature, of aesthetics, of erudition — 1 " Luther said : ' If I have a picture of Christ in my heart, why not one upon canvas ? ' We answer: Because the picture in the heart is capable of change and improvement, as we our selves change and improve ; the picture upon canvas is fixed, and holds us to old conceptions which we should outgrow." — " Systematic Theology," by President Augustus Hopkins Strong, D. D., page 121. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 61 a species of idolatry into which University students are peculiarly tempted. Again : there is the wor ship of achievement : whether in the physical world, as, for example, the adoration of the thumb, as being the mechanical symbol of human skill and force ; or in the human world, as, for instance, the adoration of heroes. Has not Thomas Carlyle delivered a course of lectures on "Hero-Wor- ship " ? l Again : there is the worship of money ; and this St. Paul expressly declares is idol-worship : " Covetousness, the which is idolatry ;" aye, even we coi. Hi, 5. ourselves are ready to worship a calf, provided only that it be made of gold. How the venerable patri arch of Uz rebukes us ! If I have made gold my hope, job xxxi, 24-28. And have said to the fine gold, Thou art my confidence ; If I rejoiced because my wealth was great, And because mine hand had gotten much ; This also were an iniquity to be punished by the judges, For I should have lied to God that is above. Once more, and comprehensively : there is the worship of man, the deification of humanity, the apotheosis of self; aud in thus worshiping man, we are indeed idolaters; for God created man in Qen.1,26,27. his own image, after his own likeness ; and in thus worshiping God's image and likeness, we do indeed exchange the truth of God for a lie, worshiping Eom.i, 25. and serving the creature, rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen. 1 " Hero-worship, heartfelt prostrate admiration, submis sion, burning, boundless, for a noblest god-like Form of Man — is not that the germ of Christianity itself? " — Carlyle's "Heroes and Hero-Worship" Lecture I. 62 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. The Divine II. And now we pass from the divine prohibi- thTprohiM- tioa of idolatry to the divine reason for the tion. prohibition : For I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upqn the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me ; and shewing mercy unto thous ands, of them that love me and keep my command ments. The reason, you perceive, is presented under a twofold aspect : First, Jehovah is a jealous God, and, secondly, Jehovah visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate him, and shows mercy unto the thousandth generation of them that love him. Let us ponder this twofold reason. Jehovah a 1. And, first, Jehovah our God is a jealous God. God. °US There is a very large, but very expressive word, which the theologians use : it is the word " an thropomorphism " — that is, the attributing to God human emotions and bodily organs. And the word is as valuable as it is large; for although the Scriptural representations of God as having an eye, au ear, a hand, a voice, and the like, when taken literally, are false, yet, when taken morally, they are sublimely true. And the Scripture not only ascribes to God bodily organs; it also ascribes to God human emotions. For example, this emo tion, "jealousy." And this divine jealousy is founded upon a conception which runs throughout the Bible — namely, Jehovah is the husband of his isa.Kv,5; Church. "Thy Maker is thine husband" — Jehovah THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 63 of hosts is his name. The forty-fifth Psalm is Ps.xiv. based entirely upon this conception; so also is the elaborate metaphor in the fifth chapter of St. Paul's Eph. v, 22-33. Letter to the Ephesians. One of the very last visions of New Jerusalem seen by the exile in Patmos is that of the Lamb and his bride recjin- Eev. xix, 7-9; xxi, 2. ing at the heavenly marriage supper. Now you see the meaning of this word "jealous." Idolatry is infidelity to the most sacred of vows — namely, the divinely marital vow. Recall one of these images which Ezekiel saw towering north of the temple : Ezek. viii, 3. it was the image of Jealousy, standing as a rival to Jehovah, provoking the infinitely chaste One to jealousy. Here is the key to the expression which our Lord so often uses, "An evil and adulterous Matt, xii, 39; . XT1» ^* generation," the Jewish Church being false to the vow of the divine marriage. Beware, then, of worshiping divine images or rival deities ; for, as Moses afterward said to these same Jews : " Thou Exod. xxxiv, 14. shalt worship no other God : for Jehovah, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God." Or, as the Apostle Paul phrases it: "I am jealous over you 2Cor. xi, 2. with a godly jealousy (a jealousy of God) ; for I espoused you to one husband, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ." 2. The other aspect of the reason for the prohibition Law of He- is set forth thus : Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me ; and shewing mercy unto thousands, of them that love me and keep my commandments. It is the ancient, Sinaitic enunci ation of the great modern doctrine of filiation, or 64 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. law of heredity. This law of heredity, or personal inheritance, the Divine Man himself re-asserted johD m, 6. when he declared to Nicodemus: "That which is born of the flesh is flesh ; and that which is born of the spirit is spirit." And the Apostle Paul echoes the enunciation of this same great law when he Gai. ri, 7. declares : " Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Now the Second Commandment presents this great law of heredity under a twofold aspect — a merciless, and a merciful. Merciless As- (a) And, first, the merciless aspect of heredity : redity. ^ " Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the chil dren, upon the third and upon the fourth genera tion of them that hate me." I need enter into no argument to prove this ; we have painful ocular proof every day. Everybody knows that there are hereditary diseases ; for in stance, leprosy, scrofula, consumption, insanity, and a nameless disease far more dreadful. How care fully the medical examiners in our life insurance companies question the applicant touching ancestral maladies. And as there are hereditary diseases, so there are hereditary vices : for example, indolence, mendacity, avarice, intemperance, crime. Of course, there are exceptions, the difference between the character of the father and the character of the mother complicating the problem. The monothe istic Hezekiah was the son of the polytheistic Ahaz, and the father of the still more polytheistic Manas seh. Aaron Burr was a son of the excellent Dr. Burr, President ofthe College of New Jersey, and a grandson of the saintly Jonathan Edwards. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 65 Nevertheless, this great law of heredity, or moral entail, still holds. Moral habit is as hereditable as bodily gait. In reading the annals of the Jewish kings, how often we mee£ with the phrase : " He walked in the way of his fathers." No one familiar with the story of Abraham can fail to be struck by a tendency to craft which marked them all — Sarah, ' Lot, Laban, Rebecca, Jacob, Rachel, Abraham him self. The twelve sons of Jacob transmitted to their respective descendants their own peculiarities; in fact, the dying Jacob, in pronouncing his patri- Gen. xlix, 1-27. archal blessing, foretold the permanent traits which would distinguish the twelve tribes. The Jew himself ; what a striking example he is to this day of the law of heredity ! As Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes has somewhere stated : "A man is an om nibus, in which all his ancestors are seated." Yes ; the soul, not less than the body, has its physiology. Herein, to large extent, is the significance of Greek tragedy ; the drama is tragical, because the son is made to suffer on account of his ancestor. When Jesus was about to heal the man born blind, his disciples asked him, saying : " Rabbi, who did sin, John ix, 2. this man, or his parents, that he should be born blind ? " The question doubtless sprung from the instinctive recognition of this law of personal in heritance. This law it is which accounts for the sad fact of the universal sinfulness. Adam lived Gen. v, 3. an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth. This tells the whole dark story of hu manity's fall. For Adam himself had already 66 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. fallen, how soon after his creation we are not told ; we only know that when he begat Seth he had eaten of the forbidden fruit ; and so, in virtue of his own fatherhood, he entailed on his child a sinful heritage ; he begat a son in his own likeness ; him self fallen, his son was also fallen. And the fall was propagated according to the law of heredity throughout all mankind. As the electric spark, discharging itself on the first link of a chain, con veys itself throughout the whole length of that chain, however long, however complex, so the penal consequences of Adam's sin, falling on him self as the first of the human series, convey them selves by the simple law of propagation throughout the whole line of humanity to the farthest member. The Apostle Paul puts the case with an emphasis Rom. v, 12. terribly clear : "As through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin ; and so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned." That is to say : Adam's sin, so far as its penal con sequences are concerned, is visited upon all hu manity ; mankind fell when Adam fell. Not that the couplet which some of us were taught in our childhood — In Adam's fall We sinned all, is true. Not that mankind is guilty of Adam's sin : that is simply impossible ; personal responsi bility or conscious consent is necessary to personal guilt. But mankind is heir to Adam's fallen estate. We need, then, neither the doctrine of imputation, nor the doctrine of federal headship, THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 67 in order to establish the doctrine of universal sin fulness. Asa polluted fountain pollutes the stream which flows from it, or as a degenerate root yields degenerate fruit, or as a diseased egg unfolds into a diseased chick, so the fallen Adam yields a fallen posterity. Earth's sinful characters are the result of the law of heredity. The doctrine of original sin, or, as I would rather say, hereditary sinfulness, is therefore strictly a scientific doctrine. Physi ology itself inexorably holds us here to what the Christian Church calls orthodoxy. But to return to our commandment. The iniq uity of the fathers, which Jehovah declares he" will visit upon tbe children, upon the third and fourth generation of them that hate him, is the iniquity of violating the first two commandments — the iniquity of polytheism, or the worshiping any god except Jehovah the God of Israel ; and the iniq uity of idolatry, or the worshiping of images of Jehovah. And this iniquity, as we saw in our study of the phrase, "Jehovah is a jealous God," is the being recreant to the holiest vow conceivable, the vow of heavenly, immortal . Bridal. There is a nameless, hereditary disease born of unchastity; and the iniquity of our commandment which Je hovah visits upon the children unto the third and fourth generation is the special, awful heirloom of conjugal infidelity to the Divine Bridegroom. What an appalling illustration is idolatrous heathenism ! But you interrupt me with an objection. " This ^^ j ty law of heredity," you tell me, "tends to quench Quenches personal responsibility." bility. 68 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Answer : Learn, then, I answer, a lesson from the analogy of the Stan- the human body : although confessedly propagated, " ' '" it is also confessedly a separate, independent indi- Judgment. Ezek. xviii. viduality. Again : it is of the utmost importance in this discussion, to keep clearly and steadily in mind the distinction between personal guilt and inherited disaster, or, as the philosophers phrase it, unfortunate "environment." The best possible answer to your objection is the eighteenth chapter of the book of Ezekiel — a chapter in which the prophet, replying to his countrymen's complaint that they were being punished for their fathers' sins' vindicates the equity of the divine govern ment by shewing that God practically recognizes the fact of personal responsibility in that he awards to every man according to his own deeds, not ac cording to the deeds of another. In the outset, the prophet sets forth the people's complaint : " What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge ? " That is to say, stripping the proverb of its figura tive aspect, " Why must we suffer the penalty of our father's sins ? " The rest of the chapter is a vindication of the equity of God's dealings, showing that he retributes to every man according to the man's own personal character. I can allude only to the salient points. First, the prophet takes the case of a just man : " If a man be just, and hath not lifted up his eyes to the idols of Israel, and hath exe cuted true judgment between man and man, and hath walked in my statutes ; he is just, he shaU surely live, THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 69 saith Lord Jehovah." That is to say, whatever this man's ancestry or whatever his posterity, God will reward him according to his own personal character. Secondly, the prophet takes the case of a bad son of a good father : If this just man " beget a son that is a robber, a shedder of blood, and hath lifted up his eyes to the idols, hath committeth abomination ; he shall surely die, his blood shall be upon him." That is to say, God will punish this man for his own sin, no matter how saintly his ancestor. Thirdly, the prophet takes the case of a good son of a bad father : " If he beget a son that seeth all his father's sins which he hath done, and consid- ereth, and doeth not such like," if he "hath exe cuted my judgments, hath walked in my statutes ; he shall not die for the iniquity of his father ; he shall surely live." That is to say, God will reward this man for his own righteousness, no matter how wicked his ancestor. Fourthly, the prophet puts the case broadly, showing that God is equitable in all his awards, retributing, not according to inher ited character, but according to personal : " The soul that sinneth, it shall die : the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son ; the righteous ness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him." That is to say, God will deal with every man ac cording to his own personal character, irrespective of his ancestry. Lastly, the prophet disposes of the charge against the justice of God, by represent ing him as expostulating with sinful man; and 70 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. this on the basis of each man's own personal re sponsibility : " O house of Israel, is not my way equal ? are not your ways unequal ? Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one ac cording to his ways, saith the Lord Jehovah : re turn ye, and turn yourselves from all your trans gressions ; make you a new heart and a new spirit : for why will ye die, O house of Israel? have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked? wherefore turn ye from your wicked ways, that ye may live, saith the Lord Jehovah." That is to say, God will render to every man according to his own works, not according to somebody else's. Such is Eze kiel's theodicy, or vindication of God's ways toward- men. Tremendous as the law of heredity is, it Rom. xiv, 12. does not quench personal responsibility. "Each one of us shall give account of himself to God." Jehovah's government is as equitable as it is invincible. Objection: But I hear another objection: "This law of Unjust and heredity," you tell me, "is unjust and cruel; it Cruel. makes the innocent suffer -for the guilty ; according to this law, the innocent child of the drunkard in herits a tendency to drunkenness, the innocent child of the criminal inherits a tendency to crime; look at the great heathen world, which for thous ands of years has constituted the vast majority of mankind; generation after generation they have inherited the wretched heirloom entailed on them by their heathen ancestors. How, then, will you reconcile the awful working of this law of heredity with the character of a holy and loving God?" THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 71 Young gentlemen, it is indeed a terribly grave Answer : He- question, demanding not only recognition, but also Hope'of So- fairest, most thoughtful consideration. Now, I ciety- might content myself with answering that you do not object to the working of this law of heredity in other parts of the organic world. For example, you do not object to it when you undertake to im prove your stock of strawberries, or your breed of cattle. Why, then, do you, who, it may be, zeal ously insist on the universality and stability of law in nature, demand that in the case of man, God should abruptly depart from his usual order and method, and work a miraculous exception ? Would you have a God of law in matter, and a God of whim in morals ? But I prefer to give a broader, deeper answer. Man is mortal. How, then, shall the continuauce of the race on earth be secured ? I can conceive of but two ways. First, by the continuous creation of men, or a perpetual repeti tion of the miracle of Eden, the ceaseless bringing into the world, fresh from the Maker's hand, of a succession of created Adams, or parentless Mel- chizedeks. But under such a condition of things there would be, in all probability, a repetition of Adam's painful story. For, as was shown iu my introductory lecture, the very fact of our finiteness invites us to sin ; the very fact that there are limits beckons us to cross those limits — that is, to " trans-gress." Again, there would not only be, in all likelihood, a repetition of Adam's fall; there would also be, what is now mercifully spared us, the personal guilt of a separate, personal 72 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. falling. Once more: there would be no boud of consanguinity. Disastrously as this law of heredity has worked "in this fallen world, the race would have been in a far worse state without it ; an inor ganic, isolated, atomic state of eternal war between man aud man, with no organic, molecular, corporate bond of union between them. Secondly, the con tinuance of the race on earth can be secured in the way iu which the Creator does actually secure it — namely, by the law of propagation. Heredity it is which renders this profound fact — Society — possible. There is such a thing as man-kind, be cause there is such a thing as meu-kiuued.1 It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of consanguinity as a curbing, uplifting, unifying force. Heredity ! Why it is my real hope under God for humanity. Merciful As- (b) And so we gladly turn from the merciless redityf He~ aspect of this law of heredity to its merciful aspect : " Shewing mercy unto thousands, of them that love me and keep my commandments." Observe: While Jehovah visits the penalty of bad fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate him, he visits the reward of good fathers upon their children unto the thousandth generation of them that love him and keep his commandments. Not that these ordinals — third, fourth, thousandth — are to be taken with arithmetical exactitude ; that would be ' 'Compare Hamlet's A little more than kin, and less than kind. — " Hamlet," Act 1, sc. 2. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 73 idolatry of the letter : but they are to be taken in their moral dimensions ; that would be recognition of the spirit. They set forth the gracious truth that mercy glories against and over judgment, or jamasii, 13. the unspeakable transcendence of goodness : Vis iting the iniquity upon the third and fourth gener ation of them that hate Jehovah, but showing mercy upon the thousandth generation of them that love him and keep his commandments. What a superb illustration of this the story of Abraham and his posterity is! Precisely here, let me repeat, is my real hope Heredity the for humanity. Let me apply the point to the Missionary missionary enterprise. This law of heredity is Triumph. for me a real inspiration for foreign missions. Of course, it is our blessed duty to save all we pos sibly can of the heathen adults. But, after all, the true hope for the missionary cause, surveyed in its broadest and deepest scope, lies not in the conversion of adults, but in the conversion of children ; for it is the children of this generation who are to be the ancestors of the coming gener ations, and who will therefore shape the coining history. While, then, our missionaries must an nounce the glad tidings to the heathen adults, they must take special pains to save the heathen children; for converted children are. according to God's own law of heredity, the mighty hope of our world's future. I admit that this law has hitherto worked most disastrously. But I believe in God ; I believe in his gracious purposes ; I believe that he will redeem humanity ; I believe 7 74 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. that he will redeem humanity in accordance with means; I believe that the means he will use in redeeming humanity is this same law of heredity. In other words, I believe in what Horace Bush- nell quaintly calls" the out-populating power of the Christian stock." Taking into account the whole possible range of coming history, and remembering 2 Peter iu, 8. that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day, I firmly believe that the advantages of this law of heredity will yet vastly counterbalance its disadvantages, both present and past. And when the Church of the living God shall fully awake to the conception of the tremendous resources of evangelistic victory latent in this law of heredity, and shall accordingly vastly multiply the number of those whom she sends forth to address themselves specifically to the work of saving the heathen little children, thus putting into new, vigorous operation the law of heredity on its merciful side, then shall the mis sionary enterprise take a colossal stride forward, isa. lxvi, 8. and nations shall be born in a day. The law of heredity is the right arm of the missionary cause. The family institution is the hope of the world. III. Let me offer in conclusion three thoughts : Heredity the 1. First, heredity the key to social regeneration,. ciai Regen- I know that it is the fashion to charge the woes of humanity to what is called a faulty construction of society. But society is not a human construction ; it is neither an invention, nor a convention, nor a fabric. Society is a divine organism, a colossal eration. THE SECOND COMMANDMENT. 75 moral person. Hence the deep meaning of such ex pressions as " body politic," " esprit de corps," " the national will," " the national conscience," and the like. Herein was one of the great meanings of our late civil war : it was fought to decide the question whether this union of States is a nation, or merely a confederation. You know how that issue was decided. The United States is one national person, each member of the civic body contributing his own personal character to the national organism. This solemn truth casts light on a memorable saying of our Lord, uttered on the occasion of his terrible arraignment of the Jewish hierarchy : Behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and Matt, xxiii, 34- scribes : some of them shall ye kill and crucify ; and some of '¦ them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city ; that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of Abel the righteous unto the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom ye slew between the sanctuary and the altar : verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation. But the assassination of Zachariah had occurred more than eight hundred years before; and yet Jesus charges his own contemporaries with that assassination : " That upon you may come the blood of Zachariah, whom ye slew between the sanctuary and the altar." It was because the Jewish nationality was an organized corporate unity that we can understand this fearful saying of our Lord. Being sons of those who had killed Matt, xxiii, si. the prophets, they were filling up the measure of their fathers. The cup of their iniquity had been 76 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. gradually filling from generation to generation, from century to century; and now at length, in the Messiah's own day, the cup was full, and all those crimes, in respect to their penalty, were visited on that generation. The overlying mass may accumulate to such a degree that at last: a solitary snowflake dislodges the avalanche. The Hebrew nationality from Abraham onward was one person, and the blow that crushed it fell in our Saviour's own generation. It is folly, then, to talk of " relaying the foundations of society," or "re-adjusting human relations," or "projecting society on a new basis." You might as well undertake to re-adjust human anatomy, transposing eyes and lungs, ears and toes. No ; the woes of society are to be annihilated, not by legislation, not by bureaus of reform, not even by education ; but by taking advantage of God's great law of heredity. For men, not less than animals, can be improved by stirpiculture, or selective breediug. The hope of the world is in the family institution. A Summons 2. Secondly, a summons to personal heroism. HcroTsmnal For ifc is 7t auis." ingly, the Apostle Paul says: "Putting away falsehood, speak ye truth each one with his neighbor." Why ? '•' Because," he adds, " we are members one of another." Membership in human society means a common, reciprocal, interacting life; so that falsehood on the part of one member is both murderous and suicidal. Even Achilles, in that far-off age when Agamemnon sent Ulysses and Ajax to seek a reconciliation, replied : *lVho dares think one thing, and another tell, My heart detests him as the gates of hell. But abominable as a lie is, perjury is still more abominable; for it adds sacrilege to mendacity, blasphemy to falsehood. Perjury is the abyss, the very nadir of moral crime. 2. Again, we take the name of Jehovah our God in vain when we use it insincerely or hypocritically. How graphic the laureate's portrayal of the hypocrite: With all his conscience, and one eye askew, So false, he partly took himself for true ; Whose pious talk, when most his heart was dry, Made wet the crafty crowsfoot round his eye ; Who, never naming God except for gain, So never took that useful name in vain ; Made him his catspaw, and the Cross his tool, And Christ the bait to trap his dupe and fool ; Nor deeds of gift, but gifts of grace he forged, And, snakelike, slimed his victim ere he gorged ; And oft at Bible meetings, o'er the rest Arising, did his holy, oily best, Dropping the too-rough h in hell and heaven, To spread the word by which himself had thriven. If there was one sin which more than another THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 89 excited the Divine Man's utmost ire, it was the sin of religious insincerity, hypocritically honoring Mark vii, 6. God with the lips, while the heart is far from him. No wrath of his was so direful as his eightfold woe against the Pharisees and hypocrites, who Matt, xxiii 13- devoured widows' houses, even while for a pre tense they made long prayers; who tithed mint, and anise, and cummin, but left undone the weightier matters of the law — justice, mercy, and fidelity; who strained out gnats of peccadillos, but gulped down camels of flagranoy ; who cleansed the outside of the cup and platter of behavior, but were within full from extortion and excess ; who were like unto whited sepulchres, outwardly appearing beautiful, but inwardly being full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness ; who sancti moniously built the sepulchres of the prophets and garnished the tombs of the righteous, while at the same time they were scourging the moral success ors of those ancient worthies, persecuting them from city to city, and crucifying them. Oh, young friend, beware of the sacrilege of insincere worship ! God is a spirit, just and wise ; Isaac Watts. He sees our inmost mind ; In vain to heaven we raise our cries, And leave our hearts behind. Nothing but truth before his throne With honor can appear ; The painted hypocrites are known Whate'er the guise they wear. Their lifted eyes salute the skies, -Their bending knees the ground ; But God abhors the sacrifice Where not the heart is found. 90 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Forbids fanity. Pro- Christ's Doc trine of Oaths. Matt, v, 33-37. Rabbinic Mis interpretation of Oaths. Lev. xix, 12. Num. xxx, 2. Deut. xxiii, 21. Lord, search my thoughts, and try my ways, And make my soul sincere ; Then shall I stand before thy face, And find acceptance there. 3 Again : We take the name of Jehovah our God in vain when we use it lightly, on trivial occasions. The best possible comment here is the Great Teacher's own saying in his Instruction on the Mount : Te have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths : but I say unto you, Swear not at all ; neither by the heaven, for it is the throne of God ; nor by the earth, for it is the footstool of his feet; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, for thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your speech be, Tea, yea ; Nay, nay : and whatsoever is more than these is of the evil one. In pondering these words, glance first at the rab binic interpretation of the law of oaths : " Ye have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths." This saying seems to blend reminiscences of several Mosaic statutes : for example, our commandment: "Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain ; " " Ye shall not swear by my name falsely, so that thou profane the name of thy God : I am Jehovah." "When a man voweth a vow unto Jehovah, or sweareth an oath to bind his soul with a bond, he shall not break his word ; he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth." " When thou shalt vow a vow unto Jehovah thy THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 91 God, thou shalt not be slack to pay it : for Jehovah thy God will surely require it of thee; and it would be sin in thee." Now the scribes in interpreting these Mosaic statutes had resorted to all sorts of sophistry. For example : they taught that, so long as men did not use the express name of God in their oaths, these oaths were not relig iously binding. Thus Maimonides, the famous rabbi and systematizer of Jewish traditions, says : If any one swears by heaven, by earth, by the sun, etc., Maimonides. although it is the intention of him who swears in these words to swear by him who created these things, yet this is not an oath ; or, if one swears by one of the prophets or by one of the books of Scripture, although it is the purpose of the swearer to swear by him who sent that prophet or who gave that book, nevertheless this is not an oath. It is not strange, then, that under such teachings by the authorized expounders of the law the Jew ish people should have become terribly addicted to profanity. Swearing became to them almost as natural as breathing. Accordingly, I do not won der that, when Peter, in a moment of weakness Mark xiv, 66-71. and fright, denied his Master, he fell back into his old Jewish habits, and began to curse and swear, saying, " I know not this man of whom ye speak." But the point in the rabbinic misinterpre tation of Moses was this : Oaths are allowable, if the name of God be not expressly mentioned. And now let us see how the Heavenly Teacher Christ'sinter- pretation of interprets the law or oaths : Oaths. But I say unto you, Swear not at all ; neither by the heaven, for it is the throne of God ; nor by the earth, for it is the foot stool of his feet ; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the 92 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, for thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your speech be, Tea, yea ; Nay, nay ; and whatsoever is more than these is of the evil one. Question of And here an important question arises: Does Oaths'.01 our Lord mean to forbid all oaths of every kind? For example, Does he mean to forbid judicial oaths ? The brethren of some of our communions — for instance, Waldenses, Anabaptists, Mennonites, Moravians, Quakers — answer, Yes. It is a grave question for one who professes to be a Christian, taking Jesus for his King, to answer. Let us, then, examine it thoughtfully. Observe, then, precisely, the abuse which the Divine Man is here correcting. The scribes, as we have seen, taught that no oath was absolutely bind ing in which the name of the Supreme Being did not directly occur. So long as they abstained from swearing by any of the names of Deity, they fancied that all other oaths were permissible, and might be taken with impunity. This is the abuse — this surreptitious perjury, this Jesuitical pro fanity — which the Lord of heaven and earth em phatically forbids. Accordingly, he proceeds to show that swearing by any created thing, such as heaven, earth, Jerusalem, one's own head, is really swearing by Deity himself; and this because he is the Creator, and therefore every created thing is in a certain sense his representative. What he condemns, then, is not the solemn religious or judi cial oath, but the practice of taking oaths in com mon conversation, and especially of swearing by secular objects. Moreover, the apostles took what THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 93 virtually were oaths. Thus Paul, and on more than one occasion. For example : " God is my wit- Rom. i, 9. ness " ; "I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my Rom. ix. 1. conscience bearing witness with me in the Holy Spirit "; " I call God for a witness upon my soul "; 2 cor. i, 23. "Behold, before God, I lie not." In like manner Gai. i,2o. the angel of the Apocalypse, who stood upon sea Rev. x, 5, 6. and upon land, and, lifting up his right hand to heaven, sware by him who liveth for ever and ever that there should be delay no longer. So Jesus Christ himself before Caiaphas : The high priest Matt, xxvi, 63, said unto him, " I adjure thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the Son of God." Jesus saith unto him, " Thou hast said." In like manner even infinite God himself: When God made promise to Abraham, since he could swear Heb. vi, 13,18. by none greater, he sware hy himself, saying, Surely blessing Gen. xxii, 16, 17. I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee. For men swear by the greater : and in every dispute of theirs the oath is final for confirmation. Wherein God, being minded to shew more abundantly unto the heirs of the promise the im mutability of his counsel, interposed with an oath ; that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we may have a strong encouragement, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us. But although the solemn oath may thus seem permissible, one thing is very certain : it is admin istered far too often aud far too lightly. It seems almost impossible to do any kind of court business without interposing an oath between. each step of the operation. Did you ever undertake to get a package from the custom house? Judges, jurors, witnesses, sheriffs, tipstaffs, magistrates, assessors, 94 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. collectors, treasurers, soldiers, midshipmen, opera tors in almost every kind of business transaction, are put to oath on almost every conceivable occa sion : C°lZtulation!"" Sworn on every slight pretence, Till perjuries are common as bad pence, While thousands, careless of the damning sin, Kiss the book's outside, who ne'er look'd within. When I remember the tremendous sweep and import of an oath — the extreme frequency with which it is administered, and in connection with the most trival occasions, the flippant, almost merry volubility with which it is administered, the perfect nonchalance with which the most profane men take it — I shudder at the blasphemy which is practically perpetrated under forms of law. You tell me, indeed, that oaths are necessary in order to ensure veracious testimony. What a mournful comment on the Fall, or rather what a mournful proof of it ! Here is a land of Bibles aud Sabbaths and churches. And yet so little is the confidence you have in your fellowmen that you will not submit the most insignificant case, involving the most trifling pecuniary amount, to a jury, without subjecting each and every witness to an oath which, if he understands what he is saying, he solemnly accepts as a warning that the all-seeing God will punish him should he testify falsely. Friends, there is something wrong here. The oath is too common a thing in our courts and places of business. If it is to be administered at all, let it be administered only on gravest occasions and in THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 95 the most solemn manner. As matters stand, how often our oaths really become curses ! Reviewing this matter of judicial oaths as a whole, I confess to a deep sympathy with the view maintained by our excellent friends, the Quakers. Their interpretation of our Lord's words is cer tainly safer, and has the immense advantage of being literal and exact. I thank God that I am permitted to live under a Government which ac cepts my affirmation as the equivalent of a formal oath. So much for the question touching judicial oaths. What, then, does the Divine Man, in his doctrine of oaths, really forbid ? First: He directly forbids all profanity, all as- Christ Per severations and avouchments and protestations on fanity. slight occasions — everything beyond a simple affirmation or a simple denial. And here, also, he fulfills the law by fulfilling the spirit in the letter, Moses forbade swearing by any of the names of God; Jesus forbids all light adjurations of any kind, whether by heaven or by earth, by Jerusalem or by one's head. Alas, how many of us, even professing Christians, are morally guilty here! How full our speech is of vehement asseverations, strong ejaculations, iterated protestations, meaning less expletives (such as " heavens," " goodness gra cious," O my," etc.); which seem to be meaning less, but which really mean profanity ! Other sins, such as lying and stealing, may sometimes seem to bring temporary advantage. But this sin of swear ing is perfectly useless. Moreover, it is an essen- 96 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. tially vulgar sin, a characteristic habit of the criminal, the libertine, the sot, the outcast. "A gentleman," says that model of courtesy so often quoted in circles where etiquette is the law of life, Lord Chesterfield, " never swears." Once more : profanity is a silly, idiotic sin. The drunken man swears ; and the drunker he is, the profuser are his oaths, at least so long as he is able to articulate at all. One of the most painful things in connec tion with our asylums for idiots and imbecile children is the easy capability with which they swear. The lower the mental grade, the easier it is to take the name of Jehovah our God in vain. How incisive the genius stroke of Shakespeare, when he represents Caliban — the savage, deformed, half-witted slave of Prospero — as saying: "The Tempest," You taught me language ; and my profit on't Actl,Scene2. 6 , nu. /i Is, I know how to curse : The red plague rid you, For learning me your language I Forbids ail Again: The Divine Man forbids, at least by Mendacity. ,. ,. n i ., c -, ., implication, all mendacity; for mendacity is a most fruitful source of profanity. Why is it that we demand that every one who gives testimony be put on his oath ? It is because we instinctively distrust one another. Why is it that so many of us, in common conversation, asseverate so strongly — using such phrases as, "I do declare," "upon my word," " upon my soul," " upon my honor," and the like — as though the simple yea or nay were not enough ? It is because we have a sense more or less distinct of personal untruthfulness, THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 97 and a fear that others will not believe us. Verily, the lie and the oath are twins ; or, rather, the lie is mother and the oath is daughter. And so it comes to pass that truthfulness is a test of character, per sonal and national. Listen to the King of Words : Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. Matt, xii, 34-37. The good man, out of his good treasure, bringeth forth good things ; and the evil man, out of his evil treasure, bringeth forth evil things. And I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. And no wonder. For, as I have hinted, God has bestowed on man the gift of language, to serve as the means of human communication. It is through words that men understand one another, and co-operate in carrying on and building up society. Words are the very ligaments of society itself. Hence, if words are to fulfill their true mission, they must be trustworthy. Recall St. Paul's forcible saying: "Putting away falsehood, Eph. 17,25. speak ye the truth each one with his neighbour ; for we are members one of another." Confidence in one another is one of the basal stones of society. And nothing is more beautiful than a pellucid, transparent character. No loftier tribute can be paid to any man than to say of him, as, thank God, we are so often permitted to say of truthful men, "His word is as good as his bond." Cultivate then, O friend, the spirit of truthfulness. Spirit, I say : for a man may be true to the letter of a statement, and yet be false to its spirit, using his 9 98 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. very veracity as a plea for his duplicity, even as did Sir Lancelot of the Lake: Tennyson'B His honor rooted in dishonor stood, "Elaine." And faUh unfaithful kept Wm falsely true. Avoid, then, all dissimulation, and possibility of moral equivoque. " Hamlet," Act This above all : to thine own self be true, 1, Scene S. And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man. John ii, 24, 25. Would God that he who knew all men, and needed not that any one should testify to him con cerning man — for he himself knew what was in man — could point to each of us and exclaim, as he John i, 47 did of Nathanael, "Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile ! " Whatever disaster may be fall our beloved America, God spare her the guilt and degradation of untruthfulness ! Whatsoever is more than a simple Yea, yea, or Nay, nay, cometh of evil, even the Evil One. Were there no kingdom of darkness and no dark king thereof, there would be no oath or suggestion of oath. jainesv,i2. Above all things, then, my brothers, swear not, neither by the heaven, nor by the earth, nor by any other oath : but let your yea be yea, and your nay, nay; that ye fall not under judgment. Thank God, the coming ideal state will need no oaths. The Divine Teacher's doctrine of oaths, like all his other teachings, reaches and overlaps Ultima Thule. In that coming paradise of perfected society into which the Man Divine is uplifting humanity, it will be simply, Yes, yes ; No, no. Aud this because all human speech, like the speech THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 99 of him who is the very Word of God, even Truth itself, will be simply, Amen, amen; Verily, verily. God hasten the day ! And now note the reason which the Great Christ's Rea- Teacher assigns for forbidding all oaths aud as- Prohibi- severations; it is because all things, not less than 10n' the Creator himself, are sacred : " Swear not at all; neither by the heaven, for it is the throne of God ; nor by the earth, for it is the footstool of his feet ; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, for thou canst not make one hair white or black." It is the same great truth which our Master subsequently re-announced to the scribes and Pharisees themselves. Those blind guides of the people were wont, in their miserable casuistry, to distinguish between oaths, declaring that who ever swore by the temple or by the altar, it was nothing : but whoever swore by the gold of the temple, or by the gift upon the altar, he was bound. " Ye fools and blind," thunders the Car- Matt, xxm, is- penter Teacher, " whether is greater, the gold, or the temple that hath sanctified the gold ? the gift, or the altar that sanctifieth the gift ? He there fore that sweareth by the altar, sweareth by it, and by all things thereon. And he that sweareth by the temple, sweareth by it, and by him that dwelleth therein. And he that sweareth by the heaven, sweareth by the throne of God, and by him that sitteth thereon." Aye, friends, all things from atom to star are sacred ; and this because all things from atom to star are God's, gleaming, if 100 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. our true eyes were open, with God's own super scription and seal. Oh, could we always keep this in mind — could we always remember that we are evermore in solemn court-room, the Almighty, All-seeing God our everlasting bench and jury — Gen. xxi, si. we should need no Beer-sheba, or Well of the ben. xvi, 13, 14. Oath ; because all our life would be spent by Beer- lahai-roi, or, Well ofthe living One who seeth me! The Divine II. And now we pass from the divine prohibi- ammg. ^oq tQ ^ ^jvjne warning : " For Jehovah wiU not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain." Indeed, Jehovah could not : for this sin, whether in the form of perjury, of insincerity, or of pro fanity, is a sin directly against Jehovah himself ; the name of God being, as we have seen, the very epitome and symbolic essence of Deity. It is to insult and defy and blaspheme the Almighty in the citadel of his Godhead. Being in its very nature the most godless of sins, God from his very nature cannot allow it to go unpunished. True, he may not, and indeed, does not often punish this sin in this world : for this is a physical world, whereas, this sin is a spiritual sin, a sin against the John iv, 24. very nature of God, for God is spirit. Neverthe less, even the next world will doubtless be also a physical world, although under more spiritual con ditions. Did you ever read that remarkable asser tion of the famous mathematician, Charles Bab- bage, in the "Ninth Bridgewater Treatise," to the effect that the slightest word, though it be but a whispered interjection, vibrating in the air, sets in operation a series of changes which undulate to tbe THE THIRD COMMANDMENT, 101 very outskirts of creation, rising and falling like an everlasting tide ? It is a pathetic touch when the author of " Tristram Shandy," having quoted an oath, adds : The accusing Spirit, which flew up to heaven's chancery '"ETi8tr?m„ with the oath, blushed as he gave it in : and the Recording Angel, as he wrote it down, dropped a tear upon the word, and blotted it o„ut forever. The sentiment, however, is as fanciful as it is pathetic. John Milton comes nearer to scientific truth when he speaks of: Airy tongues, that syllable men's names On sands and shores and desert wildernesses. "Comus." The whole material universe is a mighty whisper ing gallery, in which the Infinite One is everlast ingly hearing every word, every whisper, breathed by every human being, from the day Adam pro nounced his first vocable in Eden to the day when human time shall be no more. If, then, the scarcely audible rustle of an unconscious aspen leaf sets in inexorable motion atom after atom — from leaf to tree, from tree to earth, from earth to star, till the whole material creation responds in undu lation — think you that an oath, spoken by con scious, responsible man, will ever die away, or go unpunished ? Oh, no ! Jehovah will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. III. Let me, in conclusion, present two thought"? : 1. First: The knowledge of Jehovah's name The Reveia- i, /.it Ti il tion of God's has been an unfolding process. .Let me take as an Name Pro- illustration three Scriptural incidents. gressive. 102 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Jacob at Pen- (a) It is night, and the patriarch Jacob is alone Genf xxxii, 22- by the brook Jabbok. Suddenly a mysterious 32" antagonist comes against him, and wrestles with him until the breaking of the day. Seeing that he does not prevail against him, the stranger touches the hollow of Jacob's thigh, and disjoints him. The crippled wrestler, victorious through his very defeat, in adoring curiosity »asks : "Tell me, I pray thee, thy name ! " The unknown con queror vouchsafes as his only answer a question in turn : " Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name ? " And he blessed him there. Thus the patriarch's adoring curiosity is both gratified and baffled ; gratified, because he has been blessed in being permitted to see God face to face; baffled, because he is not allowed to learn his Blesser's name. This august reticence ; what an awful symbol it was of Jehovah's reserve in Revelation's gray, indistinct dawn ! Moses at Ho- (6) Centuries roll away. Israel's emancipator and lawgiver, iu a moment of rapt communion, ex- Exoa. xxxih, is. claims: "Shew me, I pray thee, thy glory!'' The august One answers : Exod.xxxiii,18- I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and will pro claim the name of Jehovah before thee ; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy. Thou canst not see my face ; for man shall not see me and live. Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon the rock ; and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand until I have passed by ; and I will take away my hand, and thou shalt see my back ; but my face shall not be seen. Exod. xxxiv, 5, And the august One descends in the cloud, and 6. THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 103 passed by before Moses, and proclaimed his own infinite name: Jehovah, Jehovah, a God full of compassion, and gracious, Exod. xxxiv, 6- slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy and truth ; keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin : and that will by no means clear the guilty ; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the chil dren's children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation. And Moses makes haste, and bows his head toward the earth, and worships. Thus the reve lation to the lawgiver at Horeb was an advance upon the revelation to the patriarch at Peniel. Still, it was only an indirect disclosure; the glimpse, not of Jehovah's face, but only of his back, as, with tornado rush, he swept by. (c) Fifteen more centuries roll away. In a se- Philip in the eluded guest-chamber Jesus and his eleven are cele- chamber. brating the passover supper. It is his last night on earth as the Man of Sorrows. Parting- words of holy counsel and love fall from his lips : Let not your heart be troubled ; believe in God, believe also John xiv, 1-10. in me. In my Father's house are many mansions ; if it were not so, I would have told you, for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go, ye know the way. Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; how know we the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life ; no one cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also ; from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. Philip saitn unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and dost thou not know me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father; how sayest thou, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me ? 104 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Thus Jesus Christ is the culminating revelation Heb. i, 1,2. of God. " God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days John i, is. spoken unto us in his Son." "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him " — made exegesis of him, interpreted him, made him known. In his own person and character and words and work, in his own sweet manners and sympathetic passion and vicarious death, we see coi. i, is. the image ofthe invisible God, the picture and demonstration of Jehovah as our Heavenly Father. He that seeth the Son seeth the Father also. No longer need an .ffisehylus pray: "Zeus, whoever thou art, if this, or whatever be the name by which thou art pleased to be called, I call on thee, and pray." No longer need worshipers, whether idolaters in heathen lands or agnostics in a Chris- Acts xvii, 23. tian, erect altars bearing this inscription : ArNQZTQ 6EQ, To AN Unknown God. Jesus Christ is Deity made known. No longer need a Moses pray, "Shew me, I pray thee, thy glory." The same Gen. i, 3. God who in the beginning said, Out of darkness 2Cor.iv,6. let light shine, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ ; even him who is the Heb. i,3. effulgence of the Father's glory, aud the very image of his substance, impress of his essence. No longer need a Jacob pray, " Tell me, I pray thee, thy name." Jesus Christ is the Word, the John i, 1. articulation, the very name of God. " In the be- THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 105 ginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Oh, not Philip's prayer, " Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth John xiv, 8. us," but its converse, is the prayer which befits us: "Shew us, O Spirit Most Holy, thou who John xvi, 15. takest of Christ's things and shewest them to us, shew us the Son ; that so we may see, and under stand, and love, and trust, and commune with the Father; shew us the Sou, and it sufficeth us." Aye, Jesus Christ is the name of God. 2. Lastly: Cultivatethespirit of reverence. For Cultivate "R P.V P. 1*P.TI P.P. ours is an age of iconoclasm, overthrowing ances tral traditions, dethroning venerable beliefs, mak ing the sacred common, dissolving the sacramental in the physical equation of correspondence with environment : in brief, shattering the very instinct of homage. And this is peril indeed. For, as Ralph Waldo Emerson says, " No greater calamity can befall a nation than its loss of worship." Bad as heathenism is, irreligion is worse. Better super stition than atheism ! With the poet of Windermere : I'd rather be "Sonnets." A pagan, suckled in a creed outworn ; So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses, that would make me less forlorn ; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea ; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn. Young man, believe me ; no man is ever so great as when he kneels. Be it yours to have the same lowly reverence which so beautifully marked such illustrious scientists as a Galen, who regarded his professional life as " a religious hymn in honor of 106 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. the Creator"; a Copernicus, on whose tombstone, iii St. John's of Frauenburg, is the following epitaph: "Not the grace bestowed on Paul do I ask, not the favor shown to Peter do I crave ; but that which thou didst grant the robber on the cross do I implore";1 a Kepler, who concludes his treatise entitled "Harmony ofthe Worlds" thus : " I thank thee, my Creator and Lord, that thou hast given me this joy in thy creation, this delight in the works of thy hands; I have shown the excellency of thy works unto men, so far as my finite mind was able to comprehend thine in finity ; if I have said aught unworthy of thee, or aught in which I have sought my own glory, graciously forgive it"; a Newton, who never men tioned the name of Deity without uncovering his head ; a Faraday, who amid his profound researches never forgot his little obscure Sandemanian chapel ; a Dana, who concludes his " Observations on Geo logical History " with the august words — " Deus Fecit "; a Bacon, who prayed as follows : "Worksof Fran- Thou, O Father I who gavest the visible light as the first- xiv patS'l02 Dorn °f thy creatures, and didst pour into man the intellectual light as the top and consummation of thy workmanship, be pleased to protect and govern this work, which coming from thy goodness returneth to thy glory. Thou, after thou hadst reviewed the works which thy hands had made, beheldest that every thing was very good ; and thou didst rest with complacency in them. But man reflecting on the works which he had made, saw that all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and could by no means acquiesce in them. Wherefore if we labor in thy 'Non parem Pauli gratiam requiro, Veniam Petri neque posco, sed quam In crucis ligno dederas latroni, Sedulus oro. THE THIRD COMMANDMENT. 107 works with the sweat of our brows, thou wilt make us par takers of thy vision and thy Sabbath. We humbly beg that this mind may be steadfastly in us, and that thou, by our hands and also by the hands of others on whom thou shalt bestow the same spirit, wilt please to convey a largeness of new alms to thy family of mankind. These things we com mend to thy everlasting love, by our Jesus, thy Christ, God with us. Amen. Cultivate, then, the faculty of reverence, the capacity of worship, the instinct of adoration. Ock Fatheb who abt in heaven, hallowed be tht Matt, vi, ( NAME. Almighty God, unto whom all hearts are open, all desires Collect. known, and from whom no secrets are hid ; Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and worthily magnify thy holy Name ; through Christ our Lord. Amen. THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work : but the seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God : in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor .thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates : for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day : wherefore Jehovah blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. Exodus xx, 8-11. Y. THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. In our study of the First Commandment, we Recapituia- saw that we are to worship Jehovah our God, and tory- him only : "I am Jehovah thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage ; thou shalt have none other gods before me." In our study of the Second Commandment, we saw that we are to worship Jehovah our God directly, without the intervention of images of any kind: "Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness of any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath." In our study of the Third Commandment, we saw that we are to worship Jehovah our God sincerely, de voutly, adoringly : " Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain." In briefest words, we are to worship God ; we are to worship him directly ; we are to worship him devoutly. And here a question arises: How often are we The Fourth to worship God? The Fourth Commandment m°ntmand~ answers this question : Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six Exod. xx, 8-n. days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God : in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor- thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy 111 112 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Duties of Fourth Command ment. DutyofWork, G«n. ii, 7-15. gates: for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore Jehovah blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. I. In pondering the Fourth Commandment, note, first, the duties which it enjoins: Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shaU thou labour and do all thy work : but the seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God : in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidser vant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. 1. And, first, the duty of work: "Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work." Observe: Jehovah our God commands us to work six days, as well as to rest on the seventh day. In fact, work is man's normal condition. No sooner had the Creator planted the garden of Eden, than he put the man whom he had just formed into the garden, to till it, and to keep it. Eden was the birthplace of industry. Man is to work, first, for the soil's sake. Generous as Mother Nature is, she is generous, as a rule, only to those who industriously and skillfully avail themselves of her resources. Her capacities are latent as well as vast, and need the quickening, unfolding, mar shaling power of a tireless and skillful labor. A very laboratory she is, whence the husbandman — that true chemist for society — obtains, by elabora tion, those indispensable products of the soil which are more truly treasures than the diamonds of Gol- THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 113 conda. The first of all arts was agriculture, and the first of all laborers a sinless man. Again: Man is to work for his own sake. He, also, has latent capacities, and as vast as latent, which can be brought into light and usefulness only as the ' are subjected to the quickening, unfolding power of a wisely-directed exercise. No man knows what reservoirs of force lie within him till he sets himself to work in the way his Maker appoints for him. He who does not use his faculties is as though he had none. And so it comes to pass that indolence and barbarism go hand in hand. The busy beehive that is large enough for its myriad workers is too small for a single drone. Here, at least, in part, is the key to that great problem — the cure of pauperism : it is work. Regard with dis trust every able-bodied man who is unwilling to work — that is, when he has opportunity. It is a mistaken kindness, founded neither in reason nor in morality, which feeds the healthy mendicant who would rather beg than dig. I know that it seems hard to turn away from the tattered wretch who, like your dog, piteously supplicates for the crumbs which fall from your table. But it is pre cisely because this tattered wretch is not a dog, but a man, that makes it sinful to pamper him in his wicked laziness. Employment for the suffering poor is a wiser and more generous bounty than a ten thousand gratuities. When will legislators, prompted though they may be by the purest phil anthropy, cease substituting human enactments, in the shape of Poor Laws, for the divine arrange- 114 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. ment that maintenance is the natural product of a properly rewarded industry ? Listen to the greatest 2 Thess. iii, 10. of the apostles : "If any will not work, neither let him eat." Listen to one greater than any Matt, x, io. apostle, even him who sent forth his twelve : "The labourer is worthy of his food." Let these two principles be carried out, and the problem of politi cal economy is largely solved. Once more : Man Gen.u, 15. is to work for God's sake. Not only is he to "dress" or till the garden, and so develop its resources : he is also to "keep" the garden, and so hold it in trust for its real owner, gratefully and homagefully returning to God the fruits of his own industry. Thus labor and stewardship, vigilance and respon sibility, have their birth in Eden. Work — that is, all true work — means accountability. Work, then, I repeat, is man's normal condition, his condition as man before he fell. And if it was needful that man should work while he was still sinless, how much more needful is it now, since he has fallen, Gen. iii, 17, is. and the ground has been cursed for his sake; so that in place of the fig has come up the thorn, and in place of the grape has come up the brier. In Eden man had to work in order to subdue nature ; now man has to work lest nature should subdue him. "Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work." Duty of Rest. 2. Secondly, the duty of rest : " The seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates." THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 115 (a) No one familiar with the Bible can fail to Seven the Sa- be struck with the frequency with which it men- £™d Num' tions the number seven. For example : Seven Gen. vii, 2-4. days was Noah allowed in which to stock his ark with the preservers of the animal kingdom, and of each kind of clean animals he was to take seven ; seven days elapsed between each of the three mis- Gen. viii, 8-12. sions of his dove ; seven years did Jacob serve for Gen. xxix, is- 28 Leah, and seven more for Rachel; seven well- Gen. xu, 26-30. favored kine and seven ill-favored, seven full ears of corn and seven blasted, did Pharaoh see in his dreams ; seven years of plenty and seven years of famine did Egypt experience ; seven altars did Num. xxiii, 1,2. Balak set up, and offered thereon seven bullocks and seven rams; seven was to be the aggregate Lev. xxiii. number of the holy convocations of the Hebrew Year ; the seventh day was to be the sabbath day, the seventh week after passover the sabbath week, the seventh month to be the sabbath month, the seventh year to be the sabbath year, the seven times seventh year the great sabbath year of the sabbath years — that is, the year of Jubilee ; seven weeks were appointed as the interval between Pen tecost and Passover, seven days as the length of the feasts of Passover and Tabernacles ; seven days were the priests to be in course of consecration ; seven things were to be offered in sacrifice; seven utensils were to be the indispensables of the taber nacle, and the candlestick was to be seven-branched ; seven days were appointed for ceremonial lustra tion, and for the interval between birth and cir cumcision ; seven was the number in compacts, in 116 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Josh. vi. 2 Kings v, 10. Dan.iv, 32. Isa. xxx, 26. Matt, xviii, 22. Acts vi, 3. Eev. passim. treaties of peace, in marriage settlements ; seven is solemnly embalmed in the Hebrew term for oath, the term signifying "to swear," literally meaning "to do seven times"; seven times was Jericho sur rounded, and on the seventh day it was surrounded by seven priests blowing seven trumpets ; seven times was Naaman bidden to dip himself in Jordan ; seven periods were to pass over Nebuchadnezzar iu his insanity; sevenfold is to be the light of the sun in the restitution as the light of seven days; Jesus Christ himself was the seventy-seventh from Adam, and he bids us forgive not only seven times, but also seventy times seven ; seven deacons were appointed by the infant church ; seven is the apocalyptic numeral — for example : the seven churches, the seven spirits, the seven candlesticks, the seven stars, the seven seals, the seven horns, the seven eyes, the seven angels, the seven trum pets, the seven thunders, the seven plagues, the seven vials, the seven visions, the sevenfold doxol ogy to God and the Lamb. But why cite more? Holy Scripture, from Genesis to Apocalypse, teems with this mystic numeral, seven. And, for aught we know, seven is still the symbolic, dominical number of God's administration, regulating the whole world's history, from his rest on the seventh day in Eden to his Church's rest on the seventh day in the Eden to come. If you ask me why the Bible selects this numeral seven as its regent num- ber, I cannot answer. Perhaps this is among the icor. xiii, 9-12. many riddles we shall understand when that which is perfect is come, and we shall no longer see in a THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 117 mirror, darkly or enigmatically, but face to face. Meantime, all I ask you to observe in this connec tion is this : Seven is the tonic, or keynote, of the scale of the Hebrew numeration — a fact perhaps owing to the venerable circumstance that seven was the completing, perfecting number of the creative week. (6) Now the seventh day, or sabbath, I repeat, The Seventh was divinely appointed to be a day of rest : in fact, 0faRest. "y the word sabbath is but a transliteration of the Hebrew word shabbath, meaning to rest from labor. The seventh day is to be a day of rest for the body, jaded with the toils of the week : a day of rest for the mind, jaded with the cares of the week : a day of rest for the heart, jaded with the griefs of the week. Observe also that our com mandment forbids all work of whatever kind : and this not only on the part ofthe head of the family, but also on the part of his children, his employees, his visitors, and even his cattle. 3. Thirdlv, the duty of worship, or sacred rest: Duty of Sa- " The seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God: remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy." The sabbath, if I may so say, is God's weekly toll on mankind, the periodical tribute which he demands in token of human fealty. Living in this mate rial world, burdened by the catastrophe of the fall, we cannot give all our time to the formal worship of our Creator and Benefactor : we have to work six days for ourselves. But once a week we are bidden to give a symbolic toll of our allegiance and adoration. What delight angels must take in 118 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. observing humanity's myriads kneeling as the sab bath suu circles earth's latitudes ! Reason forthe II. Having noted the duties which the Fourth Command- Commandment enjoins, observe now, secondly, the ment- reason which the Fourth Commandment assigns : For in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day : wherefore Jehovah blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. It recalls the primeval account of the close of Gen. ii, 1-3. the creative process: " The heaven and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. Aud on the seventh day God finished his work which he had made ; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it : because that in it he rested from all his work which God had created and made." Close of the 1. Observe, First, the cessation of the creative ProcesI? process: "In six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is": "and on the seventh day God finished all his work which he had made." I enter upon no discussion touching the length of the creative " days." Enough that the scholars of Christendom affirm that the days of the creative week were indefinite ages. It matters not. The point here is not concerning the length of the days : the point is that at the end of the six days, whatever their length, the Creator is represented as having ended his creative work. Observe precisely the kind of activity from which Deity ceased on the seventh day : it was not the THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 119 activity of administration, either in providence or in morals — our Father worketh even until now — John v, 17. but it was the activity of creating : God finished his work which he had created. And physical science strikingly confirms the hoary archive. HoWever much scientists may disagree as to the origin of the universe, or the age of the globe, or the method of the geologic processes, or the antiquity of man, they all agree in one point — namely, Man himself was the last organism to appear on this earth's stage. 2. Secondly, the Oreator's resting : "And Jeho- The Creator's vah rested the seventh day." But you interrupt me with a question : " How is this possible ? Does not resting imply fatigue, infirmity, finiteness ? Does not his own prophet declare : ' The everlasting isa. xi, 28. God, Jehovah, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary ' ? How, then, can infinite God be said to rest ? " Observe, then, first, and in a general way, the poverty of human speech and human thought when Deity is the theme. How can the finite ever take in the infinite, the bounded the boundless ? Infinite God can become known to us only in the measures of human capa cities, through the interpretations and hints of human relations and feelings. Hence all our thought and speech of him is and must be in imagery. Hence the frequent Scripture represen tations of him under figures of human organs and affections ; for example : God's hand, God's voice, God's heart, God did so and so, etc. To speak of him as having these human organs, or as doing this 120 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. and that in connection with days and years, or any human notations of time, is to speak of him after the manner of men. Nevertheless, we cannot con ceive him except in measures of our own finite- ness : and so we are forced to speak of him, as does also the Bible, as being situate in space and acting in time. Thus the laureate's lines touching the Divine Workman and his work : Tennyson, Let there be light and there was light ; 'tis so : " Princess' For was, and is, and will be, are but is ; And all creation is one aet at once, The birth of light : but we that are not all, As parts, can see but parts, now this, now that, And live, perforce, from thought to thought, and make One act a phantom of succession : thus Our weakness somehow shapes the shadow, Time. Not that the Creator absolutely rested on the seventh day ; but to us finite beings he seemed to rest, his seeming to rest being a sign, not of his fatigue, but of his condescension to our finite- ness. He no more rested in the sense of reposing than he uttered the creative " God-saids " in audi ble articulations, or breathed into the first man's nostrils, or took from him one of his ribs and turned it into a woman. But, while this is true, there is a sense in which even God may be said to have rested ; it was the rest of holy, blessed, festal contemplation. For the work of creation was fin ished, not only in the sense of being ended, but also in the sense of being perfected. Man's works, alas! are oftener ended than finished. Twice only in this world of ours has that word " Finished " been used in absolute truth : first, in the end ofthe first THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 121 creation, when the Maker of heaveu and earth had created the man and the woman in his own image and likeness, and so were finished the heavens and the earth and all their host ; and, secondly, in the end of the second creation, when the same Maker of heaven aud earth restored on the cross the lost image and likeuess, and so exclaimed : "It is fin- John xix, 30. ished ! " And how intense must have been the Creator's delight as he surveyed his finished work, aud pronounced it very good ! Even iu this world of imperfections and failures, where our ideals are so seldom reached, how intense the delight, for instance, the artist sometimes feels as he gazes on his finished statue, or picture, or building ! He not only ceases from toil : he verily rests — the rest, not of repose, but of joy. Even so, if I may ven ture to compare Creator with creature, did the Maker of the universe rest on the seventh day. It was the rest of a holy, festal celebration over a per fected work ; a perfect filling-out ofa divine ideal ; au absolute equilibrium of plan aud execution. It was the sabbath of God, Jehovah's blessed rest. 3. Thirdly, the Oreator's sanctification of tlie The Seventh seventh day: " Wherefore Jehovah blessed the sab- lowed. bath day, and hallowed it." That is to say, Jehovah separated the seventh day from the other six days of the creative week, setting it apart, distinguishing it, consecrating it. Not that he made the seventh day holy, as though the other six-days were unholy : but he made the seventh day peculiar, as though the other six days were ordinary. He did not rest on the seventh day because it was hallowed ; but 11 122 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. the seventh day became hallowed because he rested Gen. ii, s. on it. « Soft blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it ; because that in it he rested from all his work which God had created and made. What though the seven days of the Sinaitic week were ordinary days of twenty-four hours each, while the seven days of the creative week were extraordinary days of in definite length? It affects not the reason which the Fourth Commandment assigns for observing the seventh day as the sabbath. That reason is based, not on the length of the days, but on the fact that on the seventh of the days, whatever their length, the Creator rested. And that seventh day of the creative week still continues. Although thousands of years have swept by since God ended his work of creation, it is still his sabbath, or rest-day. Works of necessity — that is, works of providence John v, 17. and mercy — he still carries on. " My Father work eth even until now, and I work." But creation is not a work of necessity. That work he ended at the close of the far-off sixth day, and ever since has rested. This, in fact, is the underlying thought of the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews. The argument of the chapter, in brief, is this: Heb. iv, i-ii. "God as Creator is resting from his works : let us take care lest, a promise being left of entering into his rest, any one of us should seem to have come short of it." There are, then, three great sab baths : first, the seonian sabbath of God, resting from his creative work ; secondly, the weekly sab bath of man, resting from his six days of toil ; and, thirdly, the eternal sabbath of heaven, even the THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 123 sabbatismos, the sabbath-rest, which still remaineth Heb. iv, 9. for the people of God. When will my pilgrimage be done, James Edmes- The world's long week be o'er, ton- That sabbath dawn which needs no sun, That day which fades no more ? Such is the seventh day of the Fourth Command ment, or the Mosaic sabbath. III. And now we pass from the Fourth Com- Christ's Doc- mandment to Christ's doctrine of the sabbath : Sabbath. " The sabbath was made for man, and not man for Mark u, 23-28. the sabbath : so that the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath." It is one of the profoundest sayings of him who always spake profoundly. Let us now give to this saying our most studious and reverent attention. We learn from it : 1 . First, Man himsel f is the basis of the sabbath : Man the Basls of the Sab- " The sabbath was made for man, and not man for bath. the sabbath." That is to say : the sabbath, like any other divine institution or ordinance, whether in nature or in morals, was appointed on man's account, for man's benefit, and not the converse. Let us go somewhat into detail. (a) And, first, man needs the sabbath — that is, Man Needs one day of rest after six days of toil — for his secular for his Sec- nature, alike bodily and mental. The testimony of "„,.*/ a physicians, physiologists, political economists, man agers of industrial establishments, etc., is emphatic on this point. Let me cite some instances. Dr. John William Draper, the eminent physicist and author, by uo means a special champion of what is 124 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. called "evangelical" Christianity, writes as fol lows : Draper's "Hti- Out of the numberless blessings conferred on our race by the ology " pages Church, the physiologist may be permitted to select one for 627, 628. remark, which, in an eminent manner, has conduced to our physical and moral well being. It is the institution of the sab bath day. . . . No man can for any length of time pursue. one avocation, or one train of thought, without mental and, there fore, bodily injury — nay, without insanity. The constitution of the brain is such that it must have its time of repose. Peri odicity is stamped upon it. Nor is it enough that it is awake and in action by day, and in the silence of night obtains rest and repair ; that same periodicity which belongs to it as a whole, belongs to all its constituent parts. One portion of it cannot be called into incessant activity without the risk of injury. Its different regions, devoted to different functions, must have their separate times of rest. The excitement of one part must be coincident with a pause in the action of another. It is not possible for mental equilibrium to be maintained with one idea, or one monotonous mode of life Thus a kind providence so overrules events that it matters not in what sta tion we may be, wealthy or poor, intellectual or lowly, a refuge is always at hand, and the mind, worn out with one thing, turns to another, and its physical excitement is followed by physical repose. Again : Lord Macaulay, iu his speech before the House of Commons, on the " Ten Hours' Bill," spoke thus : Macaulay's The natural difference between Campania and Spitzbergen " Speeches,'' js trifling when compared with the difference between a coun- vol. 2, page 28. try inhabited by men full of bodily and mental vigor, and a country inhabited by men sunk in bodily and mental decrepi tude. Therefore it is that we are not poorer but richer, be cause we have, through many ages, rested from our labor one day in seven. That day is not lost. While industry is sus pended, while the plough lies in the furrow, while the ex change is silent, while no smoke ascends from the factory, a process is going on quite as important to the wealth of nations as any process which is performed on more busy days. Man, THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 125 the machine of machines, the machine compared with which all the contrivances of the Watts and the Arkwrights are worthless, is repairing and winding up, so that he returns to his labors on the Monday with clearer intellect, with livelier spirits, with renewed corporeal vigor. I might multiply similar citations indefinitely. One historical fact stands out with instructive em phasis : France, in the time of her atheistic revo lution, undertook to abolish the weekly sabbath, substituting for it a rest day in every ten days ; but the trial of it worked so disastrously, that, in spite of her atheism, she returned to the seventh day. You may tell me, indeed, that there are many instances of apparent success on the part of individuals who disregard the seventh-day institu tion. But the question is not concerning individ uals, man by man : the question is concerning society, or the totality of a nation. And society must have a rest day in every seven. The sabbath is the detent, or " ratchet in the wheel of life," by regular interpositions of which life's machinery is prevented from turning back, and so failing. To him who has been toiling the six days, how sweetly does the sabbath come as a day of repair for his jaded body, and. of restful change for his weary brain ! Now may the stiffened fingers, which all the week have been grasping the plane, the awl, the crowbar, the type, the needle, the pen, be loos ened ; and the cramped back, which has been wea rily bending over spade or bench, anvil or ledger, be uplifted ; and the tethered intellect, which has been absorbed in guiding the movements of hand, or foot, be set free to expatiate amid the serene 126 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. grandeurs of truth, whether written on the pages of Scripture or of Nature. Thus the sabbath, surveyed as a compensation reservoir, is as much a constituent part of the economy of nature as are the nutritive organs and processes, or the alternation of day and night. Well, then, may it be called "sabbath " — that is, "rest." And all toiling creatures, alike human and animal, after working six days, are entitled to this seventh day of rest. And even if employers, whether individuals or corporations, care not for the sabbath on their own account, they are bound by every consideration to give the sab bath to their employees, alike persons and cattle. Sabbath Leg- And here, let me remark in passing, and here only, is the proper sphere of sabbath legislation. Society has the right to enforce the observance of the sabbath on the ground of the public weal — that is, on sanitary, economic, ethical, social grounds. But society has no right to enforce the sabbath on re ligious grounds, except to the extent that it ought to guarantee to every person the right of rest and freedom of worship. The State must not be per mitted to invade at this or any other point the empire of conscience. If we allow it to interfere at the point of the sabbath, we may allow it to interfere at any other point — say, the Trinity, or Baptism, or Second Advent. We believe in the Church, and we believe in the State; but we on this side the Atlantic do not believe in Church and i«u xxxi, l State, or a State-Church.1 No; we put not our i How clear and ringing the words of the English exiles of Amsterdam, published about 1612 : " The magistrate is not to THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 127 trust in princes, neither go down to Egypt for help, nor trust in chariots because they are many, nor in horsemen because they are very strong. Not zech. iv, 6. by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith Jehovah of hosts. (6) Again: Man needs the sabbath for his re- Man Needs ,. . TT . . , „ the Sabbath ligious nature. He needs it as a day oi con- for his Re- scious, formal, stately acknowledgment of the ture.US "" divine supremacy. "Sunday," says Emerson, "is the core of our civilization, dedicated to thought and reverence. It invites to the noblest solitude, and to the best society." Man needs it as a day on which to dismiss worldly cares and look through unobstructed vistas into the opening heavens. An English gentleman was inspecting a house in Newcastle, with a view of buying it. The landlord, after having shown him the prem ises, took him to an upper window, and remarked : "You can see Durham Cathedral from this win dow, on Sundays." "How is that?" asked the visitor. "Because, on Sundays, there is no smoke from the factory chimneys." Ah ! man must have a day on which he can retire to some solitude, where his spirit — With her best nurse, Contemplation, "Comus." May plume her feathers, and let grow her wings, That, in the various bustle of resort, Were all too ruffled, and sometimes impaired. And how exquisitely the sabbath meets man's meddle with religion, or matters of conscience, nor to compel men to this or that form of religion, because Christ is the King and Lawgiver of Church and conscience.'' — " Works of John Robinson," vol, IJL, page 277. 128 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. necessity ! The hushed bustle of life ; the vacated exchange; the closed factory; the bolted shop; the arrested engine; the attired popula tion, walking with subdued tread the tranquil street, or strolling with chaste buoyancy the odor ous grove ; the open sanctuary ; the subdued, yet blithesome, hum of Sunday-school; the voice of prayer and Scripture lesson ; the melody of hymn and song — these are the angel voices which invite us to restful worship. And these the sabbath gives. Looping down, like celestial festoons from the throne of God, at regularly recurring intervals along the highway of life, each return ing sabbath invites the caravan of humanity to halt for a few hours, that it may gaze up, with worshipful vision, into the opened heavens. Henry Bright shadows of true rest ! Some shoots of bliss ; Vaug an. Heaven once a week ; The next world's gladness prepossest in this ; A day to seek Eternity in time ; the steps by which We climb above all ages ; lamps that light Man through his heap of dark days ; and the rich And full redemption of the whole week's flight ! The pulleys unto headlong man ; time's bower ; The narrow way ; Transplanted paradise ; God's walking hour ; The cool o' the day ; The creature's jubilee ; God's parle with dust ; Heaven here ; man on those hills of myrrh and flowers ; Angels descending ; the returns of trust ; A gleam of glory after six days showers 1 The Church's love-feasts ; time's prerogative, And interest Deducted from the whole ; the combs and hive And home of rest ; THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 129 The milky way chalkt with suns ; a clue, That guides through erring hours ; and in full story A taste of heaven on earth ; the pledge and cue Of a full feast ; and the out-courts of glory. Thus man is the basis of the sabbath. The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sab bath. The sabbath was made for man as much as is light, or air, or food. (e) And what man needs God has appointed. The Sabbath 1-I7-- -n i /^ -i mV i • a Divine Witness our fourth Commandment, lrue, tins Appoint- commandment, although a part of the Decalogue, men " is not to be taken as though it settled for all men, and all time, the question of the origin, the basis, or the authority of the sabbath. For, although the Decalogue, in its spirit, is for all lands aud ages, yet, in its letter, it was evidently for the Jews. The very preamble proves the assertion : " God spake all these words, saying : I am Jehovah Exod. xx, 1,2. thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage." Then follow the Ten Commandments, based on the unique fact that Jehovah was the Covenant God of Israel. The Fifth Commandment is a striking evidence of the Hebrew character of the Deca logue: "Honour thy father and thy mother : that Exod. xx, 12. thy days may be long upon the land which Jeho vah thy God giveth thee" — that is, "that thou mayst live long in the Canaan whither thou art going." And when we turn to the second account of the Decalogue as recorded in Deuteronomy, we find that the very reason assigned for the Fourth Commandment is the gracious fact of Israel's 130 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Dent. v, 15. emancipation: "Thou shalt remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, aud Jehovah thy God brought thee out thence by a mighty hand and by a stretched-out arm : therefore Jeho vah thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day." Indeed, Jehovah directed Moses to teach his people that the sabbath was appointed as a covenant-sign between Jehovah and Israel, and, as Exod. xxxi, 12- such, a badge of the Jewish nationality: Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying : " Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, Verily ye shall keep my sabbaths : for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations ; that ye may know that I am Jehovah who sanctify you." And nine hundred years afterward the declaration is echoed Ezek. xx, 12. by the Prophet Ezekiel. And when we turn to the New Testament, the Jewish character of the Sinaitic sabbath becomes still more evident. It is a significant fact that the only full twenty- four hours which the Saviour of mankind spent in the tomb was the seventh day, the sabbath of the Decalogue, the Hebrew sabbath. Indeed, if we base the sabbath on the Decalogue, I do not see but that we are bound to keep Saturday, and inflict Exod. xxxi, 15. the Mosaic penalty of death for sabbath-breaking. Moreover, the apostolic disregard of the Mosaic sabbath is strikingly significant, especially when we remember that by far the larger proportion of the early Christians were converts from heathen ism, and therefore needed special instruction in the matter of the sabbath. The Apostle Paul was wont to insist on a strict observance of all practical THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 131 duties, often mentioning them in detail: aud yet in all his extant letters there seems to be but one soli tary allusion to the Mosaic sabbath ; and even then he classifies it with the ceremonial observances which had been abolished: "Let no man judge you in coi. a, 16, 17. meat, or in drink, or in respect of a feast day or a new moon or a sabbath day ; which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ's."1 All this shows that the Fourth Commandment, or the sabbath as an ordinance in the letter, was Jew ish ; aud, as such, local and temporary. On the other hand, the sabbath as a necessity, or nature's sabbath, is human; and as such, as universal and abiding as man. The moment that the Son of man — even the Lawgiver greater than Moses — speaks, saying, " The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath," we feel that he speaks, not as a Jew to Jews, but as the Divine Man to men, instantly raising the sabbath from a Jewish ordinance to a human necessity. And ob serve the authority which Jesus quotes : it is not Moses, but Man : not Scripture, but Nature. The sabbath is in the Decalogue ; but it is in the Deca logue because it had been before in nature; and the Jew was a man. Thus Nature and Scripture are in alliance ; the one demanding a sabbath, the other appointing a sabbath. 1 Perhaps there is an allusion to the sabbath in Romans 14 : 5: " One man esteemeth one day above another; another es- teemeth every day alike. Let each man be fully assured in his own mind." That is to say : it is a question in casuistry, and each one must decide it for himself, as in the presence of God. 132 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Man Greater than the Sabbath. Mark ii, 28. Gen ii, 7. Gen. i, 26. Luke iii, 38. Rolo. viii, 17. Ps. viii, 5-8. 2. But Christ's doctrine of the sabbath teaches a second lesson — namely, this : Man is greater than the sabbath : " So that {therefore), the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath." Observe this phrase — " The Son of man." Without staying to un fold this phrase with theological accuracy, let it be enough that I use it as expressing, in outline, the truth that Jesus Christ is the representative and exemplar of humanity, the archetypal Man. As Divine, or the Son of God, he was, of course, the lord of the sabbath. The point is that he is lord of the sabbath as human, as the Son of man : "The sabbath was made for man ; so that (therefore), the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath." In other words, the sabbath is to be used as a means, uot as an end. This the rabbins could not under stand. They utterly failed to grasp this majestic word — " Man." For man is man : not because he is strong — the elephant is strong ; not because he is ingenious — the beaver is ingenious ; not because he is affectionate — the dog is affectionate. Man is man because he is God's inbreathing, God's image, God's son. As such, man is God's heir, and Christ's joint-heir, and so the lord of all. Thou hast made him but little lower than Elohim, And crownest him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands ; Thou hast put all things under his feet : All sheep and oxen, Tea, and the beasts of the field ; The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, Whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. That is to say : Man, as God's son and image aud THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 133 representative, is the end, and the sabbath, like every other ordinance, is a means. He is an im mortal being-, outliving- institutions and economies and aeons, capable of carrying a heaven within him, God's own image and son. Man is more sacred than ordinances. Jesus Christ did not die for ordi nances ; Jesus Christ died for man. The sabbath is not sacred in itself; it is sacred because man is sacred. Hence, man is lord of the sabbath. And in accordance with this principle Jesus Christ him self ever acted. For example: On a certain occa- Matt. xu, 1-8. sion the Pharisees charged his disciples with sab bath-breaking, because, as they passed through the cornfields on a sabbath, they plucked in their hun ger some of the ears, rubbing them in their hands, and eating. Our Lord makes defense by a three fold citation from their own Scriptures. First, he reminds them ofthe case of King David: " Have 1 Sam. xxi, 1-6. ye not read what David did, wheu he was an hun gered and they that were with him; how he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which it was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them that were with him, but only for the priests?" Our Lord's argument is this : " What, though a law of Moses forbids laymen eating of the priests' shewbread ? David and his comrades wei-e men, and they were hungry, aud man is greater than rules." Next he reminds them" of the case of their own priests : " Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the sabbath day the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are. guiltless ? But I say unto you, that one greater than the temple is here," 12 134 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. And our Lord's argument is this : " What, though the law forbids all manner of work on the seventh day ? The priests, in carrying on their ministra tions, are compelled to toil on the sabbath, yet, even ye yourselves do not think that they are to blame ; for ye need their services ; and man, whose repre sentative I am, is greater than temple and sabbath." Once more he reminds them of a weighty saying Hosea vi, 6. of one of their own prophets: "But if ye had known what this meaneth, I desire mercy and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guilt less." And our Lord's argument is this : " Hosea himself declares that when mercy comes into col lision with ritual, so that the one or the other must yield, God prefers the mercy to the ritual ; now if ye had really understood this saying of Hosea, ye never would have condemned my disciples for sat isfying their hunger on the sabbath ; for, as man is greater than institutions, so mercy is greater than rubric." Then follows the Lord's own definition of the sabbath : " The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath ; so that the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath." Again : On Matt, xii, 9-u. another sabbath, as he was teaching; in one of the Mark iii, 1-6. ' & Luke vi, 6-n. synagogues of Lraliiee, a man was present whose right hand was withered. As usual, Pharisees were watching him, whether he would heal on the sabbath, that they might find how to accuse him. But he knew their thoughts ; and he said to the man who had his hand withered, Rise up, and stand forth. And he arose, and stood forth. And Jesus said unto them, I ask you, THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 135 is it lawful on the sabbath to do good, or to do harm? to save a life, or to destroy it? But they held their peace. And he said unto them, What man shall there be of you, that shall have one sheep, and if this fall into a pit on the sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out? How much theh is a man of more value than a sheep ? Wherefore it is lawful to do good on the sabbath day. Aud when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved at the hardening of their heart, he saith unto the man, Stretch forth thy hand. And he stretched it forth : and his hand was restored. And the Pharisees were filled with madness, and went out, and straightway with the Herodians took couusel against him, how they might destroy him. Again: On another sabbath, Jesus was teaching in one of Luke xta, 10-17. the synagogues of the Perea. And behold, a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years ; and she was bowed together, and could in no wise lift herself up. And when Jesus saw her, he called her, and said to her, Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity. And he laid his hands upon her: and immediately she was made straight, and glorified God. And the ruler of the synagogue, being moved with indignation because Jesus had healed on the sab bath, answered and said to the multitude, There are six days in which men ought to work : in them therefore come and be healed, and not on the day of the sabbath. But the Lord answered him, and said, Ye hypocrites, doth not each one of you on 136 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. the sabbath loose his ox or his ass from the stall, and lead him away to watering ? And ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound, lo, these eighteen years, to have been loosed from this bond on the day of the sab bath? And as he said these things, all his adversa- Lukexiv, 1-6. ries were put to shame. Again: On still another sabbath Jesus was dining with one of the rulers of the Pharisees; aud they were still watching him. And behold, a certain man was present who had the dropsy. Aud Jesus answering spake unto the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath or not ? But they held their peace. And he took him, and healed him, and let him go. And he said unto them, Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a well, and will not straightway draw him up on a sabbath day ? And thev could not answer ag;ain unto these thing-s. John v, 1-18. Once more: On a certain occasion, when Jesus was in Jerusalem, he found lying by the pool of Bethesda au unfortunate man who had been thirty and eight years in his infirmity ; and he said unto him, Arise, take up thy bed, and walk. Aud straightway the man was made whole, and took up his bed and walked. But it happened that the day this miracle was wrought was the sabbath. The Pharisees therefore were horror-struck, and said to the man who had been cured, It is the sabbath, and it is not lawful for thee to take up thy bed. Jesus, in self-vindication, replied : My Father worketh even until now, and I work. For this cause therefore the Jews sought the more to kill THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 137 him, because he did these things on the sabbath; Months afterward, in referring to this cure, he justified himself on the ground that ritual must John vii, 21-24. yield to mercy, ordinance to man : I did one work, and ye all marvel because thereof. Moses hath given you circumcision ; and on the sabbath ye circumcise a man ; if a man receiveth circum cision ou the sabbath, that the law of Moses may not be broken, are ye wroth with me, because I made a man every whit whole on the sabbath ? In other words : If the sabbath must yield to man in the case of the mutilating rite of circum cision, how much more ought the sabbath to yield to man in the case of restoring soundness to his whole body? In view, then, of these repeated instances of Christ's teaching and practice, how resistless the conviction that he believed that .man is greater than the sabbath. And yet he was very far from meaning to lessen the obligation of the sabbath : he only meant to emancipate the sabbath from the thrall of Pharisaic sanctimoniousness, superstition, and gloom. Instead of destroying the sabbath, he brought out its real meaning, as being a day of rest and gladness; and so he kept in deepest sense the sabbath. And just because the Son of man disenthrals the Jewish seventh day, my Christian freedom binds me to keep the sabbath even more conscientiously than did the ancient Jew. It is easier to be a Hebrew than a Christian. May the God of our fathers evermore avert the day when our American sabbath degener ates into the European ! bath. 138 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Such, it seems to me, is Christ's doctrine of the sabbath. And if any one has the right to define the sabbath, it is Christ himself, even that Son of man who is the Lord of the Sabbath. True Method IV. From what has been said, we cannot fail the Sab- to infer the true method of keeping the sabbath. It is to be kept in such a way as will unfold man heavenward the most thoroughly, totally, symmetri cally. The sabbath being made for man, he must use it religiously ; for the faculty of worship is man's chief definition. The sabbath must be kept in homage of God, in the study of his truth and character and will, in the spirit of worship — private and public. But full unfolding of man's spiritual nature is possible only in the sphere of edification — that is, society building. The sabbath summons man to conjugate life in a new mood and tense ; but still in the active voice. And here the Son of man is our teacher and blessed model. How many of his works of mercy were wrought on the sabbath day ! And what is man's office in this fallen, sor rowful world, but a ministry of healing? And healing, or edification, is the highest form of wor ship. Nothing can take the place of it. True, it is our solemn duty to engage in forms of devotion, going with the throng to the house of God, with the voice of joy and praise, a multitude keeping holy day. Beware of the pantheistic sentimentalism which teaches that " religion demands no particular acts, forms, or modes of thought ; man's plowing is as holy as his praying, his daily bread as the smoke of his sacrifice, his home as sacred as his temple ; THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 139 his weekday and his sabbath are alike God's day." No ; I believe in sabbaths, and churches, and ser mons, and hymns, and prayers, and sacraments. Without these, and such as these, I believe that personal godliness would speedily be swept away from the face of the earth.1 No, young gentle men, you cannot afford to dispense with acts of devotion. For God has endowed you with the instinct of worship; and you must give this instinct fair scope. I know indeed that many of you are subjected to severe mental pressure during the week, and that, as a result, you are tempted either to continue your studies on Sunday, or else to abandon yourselves wholly to rest and recreation. But I assure you that the best rest you can possibly have is in worshiping Almighty God, and the gravest peril you can encounter is the neglect to adore him. "Sunday," says the poet Longfellow, "is the golden clasp that binds to gether the volume of the week." And the busy Sir Matthew Hale quaintly sings : A sabbath well spent Sir Matthew Brings a week of content, Hale. With joy for the toils of to-morrow. A sabbath profaned, Whatsoe'er may be gained, Is a sure forerunner of sorrow. 'Horace Bushnell, in a striking sermon, entitled, "Routine Observance Indispensable," shows, in his own masterly way, " this great law of practical Christian living" — namely, "That we need to keep fixed times, or appointed rounds of observance, as truly as to be in holy impulse ; to have prescribed periods in duty, as truly as to have a spirit of duty-; to be in the drill of observance, as well as in the liberty of faith." 140 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. No man in the world of science has ever stood higher, or ever was busier than Michael Faraday ; and Michael Faraday never failed to worship every Sunday in his little Sandemanian chapel. Never theless, morally indispensable as it is that you should regularly attend divine service, this, after all, isa, lviii, 6, 7. is but a minor part of worship. Is not this the fast — the liturgy — that Jehovah chooses: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the bands of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, to deal thy bread to the hungry, to bring the poor that are cast out to thy house, to clothe the naked? No one truly keeps the sabbath unless he keep it as the Divine Acts x, ss. Man kept it: and he went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil. In deed, I cannot conceive how a young man can un fold himself more thoroughly or more symmetric ally than by devoting himself vigorously to study during the week, and then setting apart Sunday as a day of restful worship, first praising God in his sanctuary, and then praising him in works of mercy, visiting the sick, comforting the sorrowful, teaching the ignorant, reclaiming the outcast. May the good Lord make every one of you a wise almoner of his grace! So shall you realize his own blessed' promise : Isa. lviii 13 14. ^ thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, From doing thy pleasure on my holy day ; And call the sabbath a delight, The holy of Jehovah honourable ; And shalt honour it, not doing thine own ways, Nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words : THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 141 Then shalt thou delight thyself in Jehovah ; And I will make thee to ride upon the high places of the earth ; And I will feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father : For the mouth of Jehovah hath spoken it. The consideration of this great topic is opportune. Secret of the The sabbath question is one of the questions victory. of the age, which thoughtful philanthropists must look squarely in the face. The foe is keen and powerful. Before such an enemy the question is not to be settled by ipse dixits, or citations of an cestral creeds. If we would win the fight, we must wage battle on solid, abiding ground. How, then, shall we meet the question? I know no better way than that in which the Lord of the sabbath has him self met it : " The sabbath was made for man, and Mark a, 28. not man for the sabbath." The basis of the sab bath is not God's outward, graven letter, but man's inward, personal need. Meet the foe on the ground of the Mosaic ordinance, and you are bound to lose: for Mosaism was local and transient. Meet the foe on the ground of man's need, and you are bound to win : for you have Nature and Nature's Lord on your side. V. Before closing our study, it will be proper The Change to say a few words touching the change of the daWo Sunl sabbath from the seventh day to the first — from day- Saturday to Sunday. How was this tremendous change brought about?1 Tremendous, I say, for, i " The first Christian writer who speaks of the first day of the week as Sunday is Justin Martyr in the second century. His words are as follows : ' On the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and 142 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. considering the circumstances of the case, the change was nothing less than stupendous. When we re- Gen, a, 1-3. member that the seventh day had received the august sanction of the Creator's own example in Exod. xx, 8-11. the very beginning ; that the commandment to keep the seventh day holy, proclaimed as it had Exod. xix. been amid the trumpet clangs aud lightnings and divinely-ordained barricades of quaking Sinai, was distinctly based on the Creator's own example in Exod. xxxi, 16, Eden ; that the keeping of the seventh day had been expressly set forth as one of the distinctive isa. lviii, 13, 14. badges of the Jewish nationality ; that the keepiug the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits ; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs and exhortsto the imi tation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like, manner offers prayers and thanksgiving, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying, Amen ; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons. And they who are well to do, and willing, give what each thinks fit ; and what is collected is deposited with the president, who succours the orphans and widows, and those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, and those who are in bonds, and the strangers sojourning among us, and in a word, takes care of all who are in need. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world ; and Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead. For he was crucified on the day before that of Saturn (Satur day) ; and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the day of the Sun (Sunday), having appeared to his apostles and dis ciples, he taught them these things, which we have submitted to you also for your consideration.' " — " First Apology of Jus tin Martyr," chapter lxvii. 15. 56 ; xxiv, 1. THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 143 the seventh day had been promised the most glorious rewards, and that the breaking the seventh Exod. xxxi, 14, day had been threatened with the direst penalties, even death itself; that the Hebrew people, with here and there an exception in times of apostasy, had always scrupulously observed the seventh day as the divinely-appointed sabbath; that this observ ance had never been so scrupulous as in the days of Jesus Christ himself, it being, in fact, the very point at which he came into oftenest and sharpest collision with his adversaries, and which was one of tlie precipitating causes of his premature death; that the saintly women who had bravely stood by Lnke xxiii, 55, the cross, and were yearning to minister to their dead Lord the, last sepulchral honors, yet scrupu lously refrained from doing so because the seventh day was over the land ; that the apostles were Jews, and as such shared in the intense conserva tism and traditionalism of their race; that there is no record of any divine command to substitute the first day for the seventh ; — when we remember all this, we are forced to admit that the change from Saturday to Sunday was, under the circumstances, nothing less than a tremendous revolution. But revolutions do not take place without causes. How, then, will you account for this stupendous revolu tion ? It is a fair question for the philosophical historian to ask. Here is a venerable, sacred insti tution, believed to be hallowed by the Creator's own example in Eden, solemnly enjoined amid the thunders of Sinai, distinctly set apart as one of the chief signs that Israel was Jehovah's chosen, 144 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. covenanted people, majestically buttressed by loftiest promises in case of observance and by direst threats in case of non-observance, freighted with the solemn weight of fifteen centuries of sacred associations and scrupulous observance — suddenly falling into disuse, and presently sup planted by another day, which to this Year of Grace has held its own amid the throes of eighteen hundred years. How will you account for this tremendous revolution? It is, I repeat, a fair question for the philosophical historian to ask. And the philosophical historian knows the answer. Jesus the Nazarene has been crucified. All through the seventh day, or Hebrew sabbath, he has lain in Joseph's tomb. In that tomb, amid solitude and darkness and grave-clothes, he has grappled in mortal duel with the King of Death, and has thrown him and shivered his sceptre. At the close Matt, xxviii, i. of that awful seventh day, as it begins to dawn toward the first day ofthe week, he rises triumphant from the dead. And by and in the very fact of this triumphant rising, he henceforth and for ever more emblazons the first day of the week as his own royal, supernal day, even Time's first true Sabbath. Ah, the primitive Church needed no command ! Conscious of their need of a sabbath, and aware that the Hebrew seventh day, like the other institutions of the Sinaitic covenant, had shared Christ's sepulchre, but not Christ's resurrec tion, it was enough for them and it is enough for us that he who himself was the Lord of the sab bath, and greater than Eden and Sinai, had risen THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT. 145 on Sunday. Aye, Saturday was the sabbath of nature, Sunday is the sabbath of grace ; Saturday the sabbath of a rejected, executed, entombed Jesus, Sunday the sabbath of a risen, exalted, triumphant Christ; Saturday Creator's day, Sunday Re deemer's day. Hail the Lord of earth and heaven 1 Charles Wesley. Praise to thee by both be given ; Thee we greet triumphant now, Hail I the resurrection thou 1 VI. Lastly : Jesus Christ himself is our Sab- Jesus Christ bath, alike its origin, its meaning, and its end. In bath. fact, the final cause of the sabbath is to sabbatize each day and make all life sacramental. And Jesus Christ being our true sabbath, Jesus Christ is also our true rest, even the spirit's everlasting Eden. May it be for us all evermore to be in the Lord's Eev. i, 10. own Spirit on the Lord's own day. So shall we keep his sabbath as a resurrection festival. Why Luke xxiv, 5, 6. seek ye the living one among the dead ? He is not in the tomb ; he has risen. Ours is not the Church of the Sepulchre : ours is the Church of the Resur rection. Well then may the Church of the Resur rection take the day of her Lord's rising as her sabbath. May it be for us all to know the power pui. hi, 10. of his resurrection, and so to enter the sabbath rest Heb. iv, 9. which remaineth for his people. Grant, we beseech thee, Almighty God, that like as we do Collect. believe thy only begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ to have ascended into the heavens ; so we may also in heart and mind thither ascend, and with him continually dwell, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world with out end. Amen. 13 VI. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which Jehovah thy God giveth thee. Exodus xx, 12. VI. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. The division of the Ten Commandments into The Two two tables — a table of duties to God and a table of duties to man — is of an immemorial antiquity. It was probably suggested by our Lord's answer to the lawyer's question : A certain scribe came and Matt, xxii, 35- 40- Mark xii asked him, saying, "Master, which is the great 2s4i. commandment in the law?" The Divine Man re plies : " Hear, O Israel ; The Lord our God, the Lord is one : and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength : this is the great and first commandment. And a second like unto it is this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these: on these two commandments hangeth the whole law, and the prophets." Thus love to God and love to man mutually involve each other. In fact, instead of allowing the vulgar distinction between religion and morality, the Dec alogue fuses them into one. According to the first ^ table, which announces our duties to God, religion is morality looking Godward ; according to the second table, which announces our duties to man, morality is religion looking manward. And the Fifth Commandment is the link joining these two 149 150 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. tables, looking both Godward and manward. As such it is the centrepiece of the Decalogue, the keystone of the Sinaitic arch. And now we are ready for the Fifth Command ment : — Exod. xx, 12. Honour thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be long upon the land which Jehovah thy God giveth thee. The Divine I. In studying the Fifth Commandment, pon der, first, the divine mandate : Honour thy father and thy mother. Not an Edict, 1. In pondering this mandate, observe, first, that ciple* f " our commandment is not an arbitrary edict : it is a natural principle, having its constitutional basis in the very essence of the relation which subsists between parents and children. True, we might legitimately enough ground this duty of filial rev erence on the basis of aesthetic propriety, or of justness, or of the personal worth of the parent himself. But resistless as these motives to filial devotion are, I believe that our commandment rests on a basis more fundamental. That basis is this : The parent is to his child, in a certain sense, the representative and symbol of God. It is a sig nificant fact that the Romans denoted dutifulness to the gods and dutifulness to parents by the same word — namely, pietas.1 How often Virgil de- 1 In fact, they personfied pietas as a goddess. Acilius Glabrio reared a temple to ber honor, on the spot where a woman had nursed with her own milk her aged father, whom the senate had ordered to be imprisoned and starved. The goddess is represented on Roman coins as a matron, throwing incense upoD an altar, and her attributes are a stork and children. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 151 scribes the dutiful son of Anchises as pius ^Eneas! I believe, young gentlemen, that when a son is disobedient to his parents, he is guilty of some thing more than undutifulness; and that when he insults them, he is guilty of something more than insolence ; and that when he is unkind to them, he is guilty of something more than cruelty; and that when he wrongs them, he is guilty of something more than injustice. There is in each of these acts a peculiar element of wick edness, perfectly distinguishable frdm that which gives to each separate act its specific title. I think that every right-minded person intuitively discrimi nates between the wronging our neighbors and the wronging our parents ; so that, while he describes the first wrong as wicked, he instinctively describes the second wrong as impious. This it is which gives the terrific fascination to such tragedies as Orestes and Oedipus and Lear : listen to the King of Britain : — Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend, More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child Than the sea-monster 1 and again : — How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is To have a thankless child ! — Away, away ! It is not enough, then, to say that it is proper, or beautiful, or even just, that we honor our parents. For this duty is absolutely binding in itself. Let me illustrate from an ancient usage. The Phari sees had a custom, founded on rabbinic tradition, of refusing in certain cases to assist their needy " King Lear," 1,4. " King Lear," 1,4. Matt, xv, 8-6; Mark vii, 9-13. 152 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. parents; and this on the ground that what they owned was already consecrated to God, and hence they claimed that they were released from the duty of maintaining their parents : it was enough for them to exclaim, " Corban ! " — that is, " Already devoted ! " But the divine Searcher of human hearts pointed out the impiety which lurked beneath this cloak of sanctity by affirming in substance that, while it was their duty to contribute of their re sources to the Lord's treasury, yet the specific com mandment, — Honour thy father and thy mother, — and the duty involved in it of maintaining them, was of the nature of an antecedent, fundamental obli gation, and never could be dispensed with to make room for a subsequent, incidental duty. In like manner, the Apostle Paul, addressing children, says : Eph. vi, 1. " Obey your parents in the Lord : for this is right" — that is, right inherently and absolutely, not merely incidentally or relatively. And then again to his 1 Tim. v, 4. spiritual son Timothy : " If any widow hath chil dren or grandchildren, let them learn first to shew piety toward their own family, and to requite their parents : for this is acceptable in the sight of God." How beautiful and divinely imperative the Luke ii, 41-52. example of our blessed Lord himself, when, hav ing returned from his child visit to the temple, he went down with his parents to Nazareth, and con- Lukeiii, 23. tinued subject unto them till he was thirty years old ! But, alas ! it often happens that parents, viewed in respect to their personal characters, are unworthy of being honored. And therefore my idea of the Fifth Commandment -is that, in its THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 153 deepest and truest sense, it does not mean the parent himself as much as it means the parental relation ; not so much the person as the principle. In other words, the gist of the Fifth Command ment consists of these two fundamental principles : First, there is such a thing as law ; and, secondly, law must be obeyed. For man was created for obedience as well as for enjoyment, for law as well as for love. Never was this lesson needed more than in our democratic age and our republican land. Allegiance, or amenability to law, this is a constitu tional, constituent part of manhood. And it is the parent (father and mother equally) who is the nat ural symbol of authority. Parentage, in simple virtue of its being parentage, is inherently impera tive : it is of the very essence of parentage that it is constitutively and rightfully authoritative. Au- thorhood, genealogically as well as etymologically, is the sire of authority. -2. But you interrupt me with a question : Must the "Must the child always obey his parents?" I ways Obey? answer, first, your question is a question in casuistry ; and questions in casuistry are not to be answered dogmatically, for they are the most puzzling of problems. I answer again that there can be no real conflict between moral laws ; whatever conflict there may seem to be is not between the laws themselves, but in our subjective apprehension of them. I an swer once more that in all matters of casuistry, as in this particular matter raised by your question, we must be guided by general principles. For ex ample : In the sphere of fundamental moral obli- 154 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. gations, my father and I stand on an equality before God ; in this sphere he has no more right to command me than I have to command him. But in the sphere of incidental, shifting duties, my father is over me, and has a right to command me. For instance : suppose, on the one hand, that my father command me to do something that has no moral quality in itself — say something that is sim ply irksome to me — I must obey : for he is my father, and I am commanded to honor him. But suppose, on the other hand, my father commands me to do something in itself morally wrong — say to worship graven images, or to lie, or to steal — then I must at all hazards disobey him : for my father has no authority to make or unmake moral laws. Eph. vi, 1. Listen again to the Apostle Paul : " Children, obey your parents in the Lord" — that is, in the sphere of moral divine obligation. Duty of Par- 3. Of course, our commandment, let me say in passing, presupposes a reverend element in the parent himself. The very command — "Honour" — involves moral worth on the part of him who is to be honored. How naturally the Apostle Paul links filial revering and parental worth in his letter Eph vi. 1-4. to the Ephesians: "Children, obey your parents in the Lord : for this is right : honour thy father and mother: and, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath : but nurture them iu the chas tening; and admonition of the Lord." And asrain Coi. ui, 20, 21. iu his letter to the Colossians: "Children, obey your parents in all things ; for this is well-pleas ing in the Lord : fathers, provoke not your chil- ents. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 155 dren, that they be not discouraged." That is to say : Do not take advantage of your parental authority, divinely ordained though it is, to lord it over your children. Do not irritate them by unreasonable commands, or by excessive scrupulous ness, lest they lose heart in their endeavors to be good, for children are especially sensitive and easily discouraged. Christian parents often err in this mat ter of excessive discipline. They are conscientious and painstakingly anxious to train up their children in the way that they should go ; but their train ing is so minute and austere that it defeats itself. Overloaded with requirements, and held in too tight a vise, the children lose all heart in trying to be good, their very life being pressed out of them by over-conscientiousness. " But nurture them in the chastening and admonition of the Lord." Observe that the apostle addresses this precept particularly to fathers ; and well he may, for fathers, instead of personally taking in hand the moral supervision of their children, are too apt to turn it altogether over to mothers. Observe, also, that this precept is a two-edged sword. How can a father bring up his child in Christ's discipline and education unless he himself is a Christian ? How can a child honor his father unless that father is in his own personal character worthy of being honored ? I grant that a child can obey a bad father ; but he certainly cannot honor his father unless that father is inher ently worthy of honor. The child can pay him the reverence of an outward obedience, but he cannot really revere that which is not in itself reverend. 156 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. It is not possible for a father to fulfill his sacred office without being himself a child of God. How exquisitely the Scottish bard portrays a Christian household gathered for family worship : ' The Cotter's They chant their artless notes in simple guise ; Night." They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim : Perhaps " Dundee's " wild warbling measures rise, Or plaintive " Martyrs," worthy of the name ; Or noble " Elgin " beets the heav'nward flame, The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays, Compared with these, Italian trills are tame ; The tickl'd ears no heartfelt raptures raise ; Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise. The priest-like father reads the sacred page, How Abram was the friend of God on high ; Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage With Amalek's ungracious progeny ; Or how the royal bard did groaning lie Beneath the stroke of heaven's avenging ire ; Or Job's pathetic plaint and wailing cry ; Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire ; Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed ; How He who bore in heaven the second name Had not on earth whereon to lay his head ; How his first followers and servants sped ; The precepts sage they wrote to many a land : How he, who lone in Patmos banished, Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand ; And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by Heaven's command. Then, kneeling down to heaven's eternal King The saint, the father, and the husband prays : Hope springs " exulting on triumphant wing," That thus they all shall meet in future days : There ever bask in uncreated rays, No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear, Together hymning their Creator's praise, In such society, yet still more dear, While circling Time moves round in an eternal sphere. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 157 II. And now we pass, secondly, from the divine The Divine mandate—" Honour thy father and thy mother "— Promise- to the divine promise : That thy days may be long upon the land which Exod. xx, 12. Jehovah thy God giveth thee. , Here is another instance of tlie fact that the Deca logue, in its primary intent, was meant for the He brew nation, it being, as we have seen, Jehovah's covenant with his chosen people. Recall the First Commandment: "I am Jehovah thy God, who Exod. xx, 2,3. brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage : Thou shalt have none other gods before me." And so here : " Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon that land of Canaan which Jehovah thy God hath promised thee, and whither thou art going up." But while the phraseology of the Fifth Commandment is local, and therefore transient, the meaning is universal, and therefore abiding. Listen to Paul's generalization : " Honour thy father and mother (which is the first Eph. vi, 2, 3. commandment with promise), that it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth," not simply in the land of Canaan. Nothing is more certain, at least in a physiological way, than this : Respect for parental authority tends to lon gevity ; filial reverence is itself an admirable hygiene. Recall the story of the Rechabites : Be- Jer.xxxv,i8,ia cause they had for centuries obeyed the command ment of Jonadab, their ancestor, and kept all his precepts, therefore Jehovah promised, through the mouth of his prophet Jeremiah, that the house of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, should stand before 14 158 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. him forever. And the promise has been wonder fully fulfilled : as late as the year of our Lord 1862, Signor Pierotti met a tribe of Rechabites near the southeast end of the Dead Sea, who still observe the precepts and maintain the organization enjoined by their ancestor Jonadab, in the time of Elijah the prophet.1 What was it that gave to Rome its long-continued tremendous power and majesty ? It was the patria potestas, or paternal authority, before which every Roman youth unquestioningly bowed ; for loyalty is the sire of royalty. Even China her self, although her civilization was long ago arrested and petrified, owes, I doubt not, her preservation through millenniums to the fealty of her children to their ancestral commandments and traditions. But why cross the oceans for examples ? Behold the Quakers of our own Pennsylvania ; the unwrinkled brows of their octogenarians placidly testify that the honoring of father and mother is a healthful, Lev. xix, 32. life-promoting habit. Rise, then, young man, be fore the hoary head, and honor the face of the old man, and fear thy God. Prov. vi, 20-22. My son, keep the commandment of thy father, And forsake not the law of thy mother : Bind them continually upon thine heart, Tie them about thy neck. When thou walkest, it shall lead thee ; When thou sleepest, it shall watch over thee ; And when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. On the other hand, Prov. xxx 17. The eve *^a* mocketh at his father And despiseth to obey his mother, 1 "Hours with the Bible," by Cunningham Geikie, D. D. Vol. V., pages 350-352. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 159 The ravens of the valley shall pick it out, And the young eagles shall eat it. Honor, then, O young man, thy father and thy mother, that it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth. III. And now we turn to a wider application of The Parent a our theme. Hitherto I have spoken of the Fifth ^sMe."1 Commandment as enjoining reverence for those who are literally our parents. But the terms " father " and " mother," as every Orientalist knows, have a much wider range of application, meaning any who are reverend because of their years, their wisdom, their station, or their character.1 Let me, then, in the third place, apply our commandment to the sphere of the citizen life, interpreting it as meaning that we must honor our civic parents. For the relation between parent and child is, as I believe, a divinely ordained type of the relation between the State and the citizen. It was not with out deep significance that the Romans were wont to 1 " This truth was impressed on my mind by an incident in my journey across the desert of Sinai. My companions in travel were two young men, neither of them a relative of mine — as my dragoman very well knew. When, however, in mid- desert, we met an old Arab sheik, through whose territory we were to pass, my dragoman introduced me as the father of these young men. ' No ; they are not my sons,' I said to the dragoman ; but his answer was : ' That's all right. Somebody must be father here.' And when I found that, according to the Arab idea, every party of travelers must have a leader, and that the leader of a party was called its ' father,' I saw that it would look better for me to be called the father of the young men, than for one of them to be called my father." — " The Ten Commandments as a Covenant of Love," by H. Clay Trumbull, D. D., page 14. 160 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. call the rebel against his country a parricide. What the parent is to the child, that the State in many particulars is to the citizen, only vastly aug mented. In fact, no sooner is the infant born than he enters the jurisdiction of law. As soon as he is able to notice relations and reason about them, so soon does he perceive that he is under authority. One of the first lessons he learns is this : There are some things which he must do, and some things which he must not do ; and these commands and prohibitions awaken the ideas of law and subor dination. As he grows older, these ideas become more vivid and dominant. And, finally, when he leaves home to take his position as a member of society, he finds that the authority which had hitherto resided in his parents has been transferred to the State. Accordingly, parental authority is the grand, divinely-appointed educator for citizen ship. Loyalty to parental law prepares the way for loyalty to civic law. For whatever ideas of law and authority a young man has received as a son, these he will retain as a citizen. If he has been accustomed to disregard parental authority at home, the likelihood is that he will always be a disorderly member of society. If he has been accustomed to honor his parents at home, the likeli hood is that he will be a loyal citizen ; for national laws, after all, are but a sort of expansion of parental laws. Remember, then, that the laws of the United States of America are not primarily framed in the Congressional chambers at Washing ton. The lawmakers and the law-abiders of the next THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 161 generation are the parents and the children of this. The laws which are to govern us a generation hence are being essentially framed and executed in em bryo to-day, beneath the roofs of the households of our loved American Union. I beg you, then, young gentlemen, to remember that, as is the son, so is the citizen ; as is the family, so is the State. Lawlessness in the family circle is the certain precur sor of lawlessness at the polls, in the chambers of leg islature, in the temple of justice, in the executive mansion — in brief, in the arena of citizenship. And when a young man has plunged to that depth of impiety where he shrinks not from insulting the father whose name he bears, or speaking lightly of the mother whose bosom was his earliest home; when he has become so oblivious of the idea of law, or so lost to the sense of moral obligation as to be able to laugh at the idea of parental au thority ; — I say of this young man that, when he enters society, he enters it with a heart prepared, should the opportunity offer, to do the work of a felon, an outlaw, a traitor. And when the youths of a nation grow up with the idea that it is un manly to honor their parents, or to venerate old age, or to respect authority, I say of this nation that, whatever be the richness of her natural pro ducts, or the spread of her commerce, or the wealth of her revenue, or the bravery of her citizens, or the learning of her scholars, or the genius of her statesmen, or the grandeur of her history — her foundation-stones are already unsettled and heaving, and that it only needs the slightest jar, and all that 162 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. shall remain to tell of her prosperity and liberty and richness and glory will be the magnificent ter- ribleness of her ruins. Believe me, the surest guarantee which the patriot has that tbe people of the next generation will be a prosperous, virtuous, law-abiding people, consists in the fidelity with which in this generation parents enforce and chil dren obey the commandment — Honour thy father and thy mother. Fifth Com- IV. And now let me, in the fourth place, re- Pertiilentto mind you that our theme is especially pertinent to OurTimes. our own times. There are two tendencies in our land and age which make the discussion of the Fifth Commandment particularly appropriate. Ours an Age 1. And first, our age is an age of innovation. Now I am far from joining in the Jeremiad that we are living in a period of hopeless degeneracy. isam.iv,2i. I do not believe that the glory has altogether de parted from our Israel, and therefore I am not yet ready to name the new generation Ichabod. Nevertheless, I fear that we have lost somewhat ofthe profound religious convictions and child-like obedience of our forefathers ; and therefore I echo in your ears the prophet's summons to ancient jer. vi,i6. Israel: "Stand ye in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls." The Past the For the past iu its essentials is the sire of all that is essential in the present and in the future. This, in fact, is the reason why we so often say, " History repeats itself." Listen to quaint Sir Thomas Browne : of Innova tion. Same as the Present. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 163 Every man is not only himself : there have been many Diog- « Reiigl0 Med- cneses and many Timons, though but few of the name ; men ici-" are lived over again ; the world is now as it was in ages past ; there was none then, but there has been some one since that parallels him, and is, as it were, his revived self. Only non-essentials — fashions of raiment and vehicle and etiquette — have changed. There is the same material nature ; the same sun, rising and setting, shining and clouded; the same winds, now blowing east, now blowing west, now a tempest, now a zephyr; the same tides, now spring, now neap; the same gravitation, still giving us and all things weight. There is the same human nature; the same body, with heart to throb, and blood to flow, and muscle to contract, and nerve to transmit, and hunger to prompt, and death to dissolve; the same intellect, to reason, and imagine, and compare, and judge; the same sensibility, to love, and hate, and joy, and grieve ; the same heart, to conquer or to be conquered. There is the same divine nature, still loving and rewarding uprightness, still hating and punishing wickedness. As there is oneuess of law through space, so there is oneness of law through time. The words of the wisest of men are as true to-day as they were three thousand years ago : One generation goeth, and another generation cometh ; and Eccl. i, 4-10. the earth abideth forever. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he ariseth. The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north ; it turneth abijut continually in its course, and the wind returneth again to its circuits. All the rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full ; unto the place whither the rivers go, thither they go again. That which hath been is that which shall be ; and that which hath been done is that which shall be 164 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. done : and there is no new thing under the sun. Is there a thing wherof men say, See, this is new ? it hath been already, in the ages which were before us. The Present But not only is the past in its outlines and of the Past, essence the same as the present; the past is also the root of the present and the seed of the future. As the germ is but the first stage of a living career, so the experience of the earliest of our race is but the first stage of our own. And as the embryologist may discern in the egg the prophecy and type of the animal, so he who reads history aright may discern in the experiences of those who have gone before us the prophecies and types of our own. For spontaneous generation is as impossible in the spiritual world as it is now admitted to be in the material. Even the inventions which are the glory of our century were conceived in embryo thousands of years ago, as every well-educated inventor knows. It is so with human experience, and the progressive mastery of truth. As the oak is identical with the acorn from which it sprung, only larger, so our experience is identical with the experience of those who have gone before us, only ampler. And as the animal is identical with the ovum of which it is but the unfolding, so the wis dom which exists in the world to-day is identical with the germ-like notions which existed in our ancestors. They were the seed, we are the harvest; aud the harvest is of the same nature as the seed. The Past an Now it is just because the past in its essentials is the same as the present, and, in fact, is the parent of it, that the past becomes to us an oracle, speak- THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 165 ing with tbe. voice of prophecy, of instruction, of authority. I do not, indeed, forget that Francis Bacon has said that "a froward retention of custom "Essays," xxiv, is as turbulent a thing as an innovation ; aud they that reverence too much old times are but a scorn to the new." Neither do I forget that he elsewhere says: "The antiquity of past ages is the youth of the world," the poet-philosopher meaning that it is the present which is really old, and the past which is really young. Certainly we ought to know more than our fathers, for we have reached a maturer stage in the world's life than they; the oak, though identical with the nut, is larger. I would not, therefore, unduly exalt the value of precedents, or conclude that whatever is ancestral must therefore be excellent. On the other hand, I cannot venture to pronounce the results of thousands of years of thoughts and experiences as altogether worthless. Au American orator, not long since departed, al though himself one of the doughtiest champions of innovation, was wont to enchain his audiences with a eulogy on the Lost Arts. It is quite possi ble that this Apollo of orators might have found a richer theme on which to expatiate had his silvery voice descanted on the Lost Virtues. Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona Horace. Multi. I believe that whatever of real excellence our forefathers taught or practiced should be accepted by us as though it were invested with the sceptre of empire, all the more imperial because ancestral. I cannot believe that the judgments of wise men, 166 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. and the institutions and customs formed in times "whereof" — to use the grand phraseology of the law books — " the memory of man runneth not to the contrary," are to be set aside simply because they are old. The new may seem better ; but it is because it has the charm of novelty, and relieves for a moment our restiveness. Great weight is there in the words of an orator whose eloquence was rivaled by his philosophic sagacity — Edmund Burke: "It cannot be too often repeated, 'line upon line, precept upon precept,' until it comes into the currency of a proverb, that to innovate is not to reform. Rage and frenzy will pull down more in half an hour than prudence, delibera tion, and foresight can build up in a hundred years." A Plea for Therefore do I, young gentlemen, lift up my voice in behalf of reverend antiquity: doubly reverend, first, because it is antiquity ; and secondly, because, being antiquity, it is an oracle. For it is too evident that there is a growing tendency to undervalue the lessons of the past, and tread with disdain on its authority. The very word "antiquated" has come to mean worn out with age, obsolete. This tendency to undervalue the past often finds expression in the attitude of the young toward the old. The callow stripling feels himself to be the master of the situation, and looks with a sort of pity on the white-haired patriarch. Poor old Decrepitude must hasten to hobble off the sidewalk, lest it should be tripped up by the swaggering gait of blustering Adolescence. Young Antiquity. THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 167 gentlemen, recall Alexander Pope's satire, and be warned by it: We think our fathers fools; so wise we grow ; - "Essay on Criti- Our wiser sons, no doubt, will think us so. cism." Yes ; it is time that we turn our faces ancient-ward, and make salaam to the hoary past. And in thus summoning you to bow before the past,-I but echo many an ancient Scripture. For example — the farewell song of Sinai's mediator : Remember the days of old, Deut. xxxii, 7. Consider the years of many generations : Ask thy father, and he will shew thee ; Thine elders, and they will tell thee. Again, the patriarch of Uz : Inquire, I pray thee, of the former age, Job viii, 8-10. And apply thyself to that which their fathers have searched out: (For we are but of yesterday, and know nothing ; Because our days upon earth are a shadow :) Shall not they teach thee, and tell thee, And utter words out of their heart J Once more, the prophet of Anathoth : Stand ye in the ways and see, Jer. vi, 16. And ask for the old paths, where is the good way, And walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. 2. Secondly, our age is an age of anarchy or Ours an Age moral lawlessness. This lawlessness takes on ° naic y' various guises. For example : There is the law lessness of avowed anarchy — whether communism, nihilism, socialism, or what not. But I suppose there are no professional anarchists in these classic halls ; and therefore why should I descant on this 168 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. point ? Again, there is the lawlessness of popular- sovereignty ; and here we come nearer home. This lawlessness betravs itself in such American idioms as these : " Manifest destiny," " Our country, right or wrong," " Might makes right," " The voice of the people is the voice of God," aud the like. My countrymen, be warned in season. The democracy that does not bow reverently before that Theocracy whose constitution is the Decalogue, and whose interpretation is the life and character of Jesus of Nazareth, is essentially a lawless and atheistic democracy. Do you want an illustration? You shall have one that is appalling — the French Rev olution ; listen to one of the haranguers of that crimson epoch, Anacharsis Clootz: " The people is sufficient for itself, and will subsist forever. Citi zens, there is no other sovereign than the human race, the people-God. To this Utopia the only obstacle is religion. Let us grind it to powder ! " And in grinding it to powder, they compounded that terrific fulminating force which exploded into blackened fragments the liberty and peace and virtue and glory of France. Again, there is the lawlessness of selfishness : for instance, the lawless ness of ambition, setting at naught all moral obli gations that stand in the way of personal promotion ; the lawlessness of avarice, overriding all require ments of veracity, honesty, equity, charity ; the lawlessness of monopoly, planting its relentless heel on the neck of society, tyrannically setting up the throne of its parvenu morality. Again, there is the lawlessness of intemperance; a lawlessness THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 169 which defies all restraints of government, human and divine, which riotously scatters over the com munity firebrands and arrows and death, which gives loose rein to all hot passions of debauchery, strife, blasphemy, cruelty, lust, murder : if there is a duty which the patriot owes his country, it is the duty of extinguishing the saloon ; for if there is in all this world an incarnation of anarchy, it is the demon of alcohol. Again, there is the law lessness of idiosyncrasy ; a lawlessness which tempts the man who believes himself to be a "genius" (how many such there are in most universities !) to fancy that he is so peculiarly great as to be above law ; which tempts each vocation to set up for itself a sort of professional conscience that condones in its own case what it condemns in the case of others ; which sometimes gives even to a thing so sacred as the sense of a personal mission an egotism . that feels itself to be quite above law. Again, there is the lawlessness of irreligion : for instance, the lawlessness which undertakes to break down the Sabbath, because it is the symbol of God's sovereignty over man, the weekly toll which the Almighty imposes on human capacities ; the law lessness which assumes to decree what shall be Scripture and conscience and truth and duty and God ; the lawlessness which infects the church her self, tempting her to say with the antinomian of the apostle's day : "I am not under law ; I am Eom. vi, 15. under grace; therefore I will be the law unto myself; I will do what is right in mine own eyes." Ah ! here is the secret of the fall of so manv pro- 15 170 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Phii.ii,9. fessors of the Name that is above every name. Once more and comprehensively, there is the law lessness of individualism ; the lawlessness which, substituting personal autonomy for divine authority, tends to disintegrate society, making men independ ent of each other by making thein independent of God, breaking men off as splinters from the great continent of mankind, leaving them to drift as ego-islets in the ocean of existence, even to that Luke, xv, 13-16. far-off and ignoble country wherein no man gives aught to his famishing brother, but all would fain fill themselves with the husks that the swine do eat. It is not pleasant to play the role of Cassan dra, especially in the presence of buoyant youth. Nevertheless, Cassandra told the truth, and Ilium fell. Young gentlemen, I cannot help feeling that we are living in portentous days. I seem to see the ravens of evil augury flying at my left. For descendants of Pilgrims and Quakers are living in times when, under cover of liberty, the Sabbath is ostentatiously desecrated ; when trustees betray trusts, and statesmen sell opportunities, and juries ogle at justice, and judges wink at bribes ; when Christian communities purr over crime in propor tion to its atrocity ; when self-appointed vigilance committees take it upon them to execute in half an hour the various functions of lawmaker, con stable, attorney, judge, juror, jailor, hangman; when mobs of drunken anarchists bespatter our streets with human gore; when "respectable" people sneer at the marriage bond as a relic of a priestly and effete despotism, and openly dispense with it THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 171 as a superstitious inconvenience ; when men and women huddle in sacrilegious rendezvous, and in the exercise of an infinite imbecility resolve that there is neither law nor gospel, neither hell nor heaven, neither sin nor God, and that man's true dignity consists in his own apotheosis aud in doing what is right in his own eyes. In such indexes, although small pricks "Troilus and To their subsequent volumes, there is seen Cressida,!' Aet 1 Scene 2. The baby figure of the giant mass Of things to come at large : even that final anti-Christ, whom St. Paul por- 2 Thess. a, 1-12. trays as the man of sin, the lawless one, the son of perdition, the mystery of lawlessness, he who opposes and exalts himself against all that is called God, or that is worshiped ; he who sits in the temple of God, setting himself forth as God, whose coming is according to the working of Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and with all deceit of unrighteousness for them that are perishing : whom, thank God, the Lord Jesus shall slay with the breath of his mouth, and bring to naught by the manifestation of his coming. God speed the day ! V. And now we are ready for our concluding Human Par- thought — namely : Human parentage is a symbol symbol6 of of the Divine. In fact, this is the final meaning the Divine. of the Fifth Commandment ; for, strictly speak ing, it is the human fatherhood which is figurative, or, as the theologians might say, an accommodation to the divine ; not the divine fatherhood which is figurative, or an accommodation to the human ; for 172 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. the spiritual exists before the material, even as the substance exists before the shadow which it casts. Accordingly, it is in the school of the earthly fath erhood that we are trained for the heavenly. For 1 Cor. xv, 46. that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural ; then that which is spiritual. Here, in fact, is the meaning, the final cause, of the parental institution itself. The Creator ordained it, not so much for man's sake as for his own sake, meaning that it should serve as the ladder by which we may ascend to his own blessed fatherhood, and joyously feel his paternal sway. And this is majesty indeed. It is told of Daniel Webster that, when a party of distinguished gentlemen were dining with him at his Marshfield home, and one of his guests asked him what single thing had contributed most to his personal success, the famous statesman paused for a moment, and then, with great solemnity, replied : " I think that the most fruitful and elevating influence I have ever felt has been my impression of my obligation to God." Believe me, young gentleman, no man is ever so sublime as when he is consciously loyal to the King of kings ; no man is ever so supremely blessed as when he reverently sits at the feet of the infinite Father. This, in fact, is the meaning of that fre quent and wonderful Scriptural phrase — the King dom of God, that is to say, God's reign in man's soul. This is that Golden Age of which philos ophers have dreamed, for which poets have sighed, and of which Jehovah's prophets have foretold from the beginning. And when that Kingdom of THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT. 173 God shall be set up, then shall the human father hood be merged into the divine, earthly anarchy shall flee before the heavenly Monarchy, and God i cor. xv, 28. shall be all in all. Then shall a loyal universe joyously confess that Richard Hooker's sublime description of law is true : Of Law there can be no less acknowledged than that her " Ecclesiastical seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world ; Polity," Book all things in heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power : both angels, and men, and creatures of what condition soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all, with uniform consent, admiring her as the mother of their peace and joy. Then shall it be seen that the kingdom of God Our Father's i.ii.i /»i t i Chara cter is also the kmgdom ot heaven, because heaven the True itself will be a dominion, even God's kingdom. Canaan- Then shall it also be seen that our Father's char acter is the true and eternal Canaan, which he has promised those who honor him. For if we are Bom.vm, n. children of God, then are we heirs of God, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ his Son. The patri mony of God's character, the heritage of our Father's perfections — this is that true inheritance l Peter i, 4. which is incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for all those who truly honor him. Becoming partakers of the 2 Peter 1,4. divine nature, this is the true land of Canaan. God grant that all of us may dwell in it eter nally ! O God, whose blessed Son was manifested that he might Collect. destroy the works of the devil, and make us the sons of God, and heirs of eternal life ; Grant us, we beseech thee, that, 174 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. having this hope, we may purify ourselves, even as he is pure ; that, when he shall appear again with power and great glory, we may be made like unto him in his eternal and glorioua_ kingdom ; where with thee, 0 Father, and thee, O Holy Ghost, he liveth and reigneth, ever one God, world without end. Amen. VII. THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt do no murder. Exodus xx, 13. VII. THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. What is the origin of life? This is probably Origin of the most fascinating, baffling enigma of to-day. How shall we bridge the measureless chasm between lifeless matter and living matter, between C H O N (Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen) as an in organic mass and C H O N as an organic person ? What is that subtile, potent thing, vaguely called " principle of life, vital force, vis formativa," etc., which, enshrined in the inert, apparently structure less centre of a microscopic cell, suddenly quickens it, endows it with energy, makes it a living, grow ing, parental thing, organizes its own products into that wonderful thing we call a man ? This is the problem over which some of the keenest-eyed of our race are poring with intensest gaze. Standing in this academic presence, it is not for me to presume to discuss this problem from the view-point of the physicist. But standing here as a lecturer on ethical themes, it is proper for me to survey this problem from the Christian platform. Listen, then, to one of the primeval archives of humanity : " Jehovah Gen. u, 7. God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life ; and man became a living soul." This venerable chroni cle, you perceive, is threefold. First, "Jehovah God formed man of the dust of the ground." However various the opinions of scientists touching 177 178 the ten commandments. the origin of man, they all agree at least on this point : Man's body is composed substantially of the same chemical elements as the soil on which be Gen. m, 19. treads. Dust he is : for out of dust was he taken, and unto dust does he return. How striking, in light of this, such words as humus, homo, human, humane, humanity, posthumous, autochthon, etc. ! Lorenzo is exactly right when he speaks of the "Merchant of human body as "this muddy vesture of decay." Venice," v, i. J J J 1 cor. xv, 47. Aye, the first man was of earth, earthy. " Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust ! " But, thank God, man was to be something more than an organ ized mass of dust. That statue of clay was to become living, tenemental, vehicular, instrumental. And so, secondly, Jehovah God " breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." Or, as Elihu, son of Barachd, phrases it : Job xxxiii, 4. The spirit, of God hath made me, And the breath of the Almighty giveth me life. The language, as on all such high themes, is of course figurative, and is to be taken chiefly in way of hint. But the figure must be the figure of some thing. What, then, is the truth which underlies the figure, and, impregnating it, glorifies it? What does this inbreathing by the Creator signify, if not the communication, in some way augustly inscruta ble, of the Creator's nature itself — even his eternal breath or spirit into man, Godhood into manhood ; God's expiration or outbreathing becoming man's inspiration or inbreathing. How majestic Gregory's Pentecostal Hymn : Veni, Creator Spiritus I THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 179 And now, thirdly, " Man became (or, as the verb might perhaps have been quite as correctly ren dered, was) a Uving soul" — that is, a creature having life. Accordingly, this venerable archive records three independent, yet co-ordinate facts. At the one extreme we have the body, formed of the dust of the ground ; at the other extreme we have the spirit, inbreathed by the Creator; and connecting the two, serving as the nidus for them to dwell in, holding them, so to speak, in solution, we have the soul, or living and sentient principle common to man and animal. I do not then regard the " living soul" as a consequent or product of the union of body and spirit : man would have been a " living soul " had he received from his Creator no spirit or inbreathing, just as the animals around him, and created on the same day with him, were "living Gen. i souls." No ; man's peculiarity, as distinguished from animal, comes out in the second statement of our hoary chronicle : " Jehovah God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." I lay no special stress on the phrase rendered " breath of life " con sidered by itself; although I believe that an exam ination of all the passages in which it occurs will show that it is invariably applied to God or man, never to animal. But I do lay special stress on the verb rendered " breathed," a mysterious act of the Creator, which, whatever it may mean, the Scripture never predicates of brutes. Man alone has the inspiration of Deity. This divine in breathing is the august peculiarity which sepa rates man discretively and everlastingly from the gm, 180 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. animal creation. Such is the origin of man as recorded in this ancient document. Infinite Deity was his maker. On his body side be sprang from dust ; on his soul side he sprang with the animals ; on his spirit side he sprang from God. Thus in his very beginning, in the original make-up of him, man was a religious being. Coming into existence as Jehovah's inbreathing, man was, in the very fact of being divinely inbreathed, God's son and image. I never read the closing words of Luke's account of the genealogy of our Lord without a thrill of awe at the remembrance of my august paternity : Luke m, 38. " The son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God." Contrast, young gentle men, this paternity with the ancestry vouchsafed us by the materialists — a protoplastic molecule, an indivisible atom. " Hamlet," I, 2. That was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr ! Sacredness of Hence it is that the human body is such a sacred Body. thing. It is the shrine of God's Son, God's image, God's likeness, God's spirit, God's breath. As such it is the priceless casket of unknown sacred potentialities. Let not the philosopher imagine that he has gauged the measure of man's capacities : Uohniii, 2. "It is not yet' manifest what we shall be." Mean while, we have been told, and a mighty thing it is to know, that the human body is that Sanctuary of sanctuaries in which the Divine Spirit is enshrined. l Cor. vi, 19. " Know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have from God." Indeed, so sacred is the human body, that I THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 181 am almost ready to say that the mystic Novalis hardly exaggerates, when he declares : " There is Novalis. but one temple in the world, and that is the body of man. Nothing is holier than this high form. Bending before men is a reverence done to this revelation in the flesh. We touch heaven, when we lay our haud upon a human body." Aye, listen to the golden-mouthed himself: "The true curysostom. Shechinah is man." That is to say : man's body is the true glory-cloud in which Deity himself may dwell and shine. And now we are prepared for the Sixth Com- Murder usac- mandment : Thou shalt do no murder. Exod. xxj 13. For murder is, in the intensest sense of the word, sacrilege. It is not only a crime against man : it is also a crime against God, in whose image man is Gen. i, 26. made. Think not that this expression — " made in God's image" — belongs only to the good: it be longs also to the bad. Wherever there is a human being, however wicked, there is an image of God ; terribly defaced indeed, but not altogether effaced, in spite of all its abrasion and corrosion, still bear ing God's image and superscription. This is the very argument of the Apostle James when denoun cing sins of the tongue : " Therewith curse we men, James m, 9, who are made after the likeness of God." That is to say, to curse men is to blaspheme God ; for men are made in God's image. In like manner, to commit murder is to commit sacrilege : it is to shorten man's probation, abridge God's day of grace, crush out all possibilities of repentance, for giveness, salvation, saintliness. No wonder the 16 182 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 1 cor. iii, n. apostle declares : " If any man destroyeth the tem ple of God, him shall God destroy ; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are." Murder is in some respects the darkest form of sacrilege. Various But murder may be of varying degrees of atroc- Murder! ° ity. Accordingly, let us now glance at some of the various forms of murder. Willful Mur- And, first, there is the murder which is born of malice, or murder in the common acceptation of the term. That master of legal learning, Sir Edward Coke, three centuries ago, defined mm*der — a definition which, I believe, still holds in our courts of law — as follows : " When a person of sound memory and discretion unlawfully killeth any reasonable creature in being, and under the king's peace, with malice aforethought, expressed or implied." Murder of this kind, whether per petrated swiftly, as by the bullet, or slowly, as by arsenic, is the most fiendish of crimes. And nature, in an especial manner, ever waits to avenge it. Nor is this strange ; for, as we have seen, man, on his body side, is linked with the material crea tion. The same elements which compose our physical organism compose, although in different proportions, the water we drink ; the food we eat ; the air we breathe; the dust we await. Hence nature herself often becomes a principal factor in the detection of the murderer. She ever stands ready to be murder's avenger, supplying the prose cuting attorney with her re-agents, even with Gen.iv, io. blood-corpuscles themselves. Aye, the voice of our brother's blood often cries unto Jehovah from THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 183 the very ground. And so the royal Dane is right : Murder, though it have no tongue, will speak "Hamlet," II, 2. With most miraculous organ. Or, as Judea's prophet phrases it : The stone shall cry out of the wall, Hab. ii, 11. And the beam out of the timber shall answer it. Again, tliere is the murder which is born of Sudden Mur- sudden passion: the murder, for example, of lynch-law, when a mob usurps the functions of a court of justice; the murder of sudden vengeance, as when an outraged husband encounters and slays the destroyer of his home; the murder of manslaughter, whether voluntary or involuntary, whether provoked by insult, by menace, or by alcohol. I have neither the time nor the subtility to enter into the many delicate distinctions which the law makes between various kinds of homicide. Nor is it needful. Enough that our Sixth Com mandment divinely forbids the taking, of human life, whether slowly or suddenly, whether inten tionally or heedlessly. And here let me, in passing, seize the opportu- Abolish the nity of denouncing the practice of carrying pocket pistols. For, as I believe, the invention of gun powder is the most satanic of inventions. If it were not for the pistol, it may be that Abraham Lincoln and James A. Garfield would be alive to day. I believe that, next to alcohol itself, the pistol is the most frequent occasion of murder. The very fact that a man knows that he has a Pistol. 184 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. pistol in his pocket tempts him to act the bully. Many a man who has not the open bravery to strike his foe with his fist will resort to the cheap bravery of drawing a concealed pistol, and cravenly take advantage of forestalling his enemy's unde livered fire. Young gentlemen, believe me, nobody but a coward is in the habit of carrying a pocket pistol. If you are so very brave, why are you not content with the fist which nature gave you? But let me return to the point in hand — namely, various kinds of murder. Suicide. Again, there is the murder which is born of despair. Let me speak gently : for it is doubtless true that suicide is often a consequence of some form of insanity, permanent or temporary. Never theless, let us not be too sentimental here : for even what is called "insanity" is oftentimes a moral madness rather than a mental — a species of mania for which the sufferer himself is to blame. And suicide, when committed by a sane person, is murder. Indeed, how often the two crimes are committed by the same person — the murderer first slaying his victim, then slaying himself. I remem ber indeed that some of the distinguished ancients — for instance, Demosthenes, Themistocles, Han nibal, Antony, Cleopatra, Brutus, Cato — fell by their own hands. I also remember that suicide has even been defended by some able modern writers, for example, Madame de Stael, Gibbon, and Hume. Nevertheless the general judgment of civilized mankind, and especially of Christendom, has pronounced suicide an ignoble crime. Even THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 185 heathen Aristotle declared: "To die in order to A^°hics» avoid the pains of poverty, or anything that is disagreeable, is not the part of a brave man, but of a coward ; for it is cowardice to shun the trials and crosses of life, not undergoing death because it is honorable, but to avoid evil." Even pagan Martial sang : When all the blandishments of life are gone, Martial XI, 56. The coward sneaks to death, the brave lives on. Justly does the law pronounce a suicide a felo de se — that is, one who makes a felon of himself, suicide being felonious self-murder. Again, there is the murder which is born of Infanticide. shame : I mean infanticide. Let me speak deli cately, but at the same time sternly: for we are dealing this afternoon with a sacred theme, even human life, and I must not be too dainty. In fanticide not only prevails in heathen land, it being in fact one of the sombre tokens of barbarism. Alas! infanticide, pre-natal as well as post-natal, prevails even in Christian lands; and I blush to add, this crime is often perpetrated in what are called the upper classes of society. The unborn infant, as I believe, is already a person; foeticide is moral murder. Again, there is the murder which is born of Murderous harmful occupations. First in this list I would tions!1 Pa" put the dram shop; it matters not that the killing is slow; the killing is moral murder; and before every saloon I would post a placard bearing the Sinaitic legend: "Thou shalt not kill." Again, there is the sale, when not prescribed by the physi- 186 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. cian, of narcotic drugs, in their various forms, from opium joints to chloral drops. Again, there are the slow murders which are perpetrated in houses of nameless sin — murders which are particularly 1 Cor. vi, 15-20. sacrilegious, because, as we have seen, the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. And let me in this connection warn you, young gentlemen, against bodily excesses of whatever kind ; for all sins against the body have a suicidal tendency. 2 peter i, 6. " In your knowledge," says the Apostle Peter, " supply temperance " — that is, self-control, self- mastery, especially in the matter of the appetites, passions, etc. Cicero long ago declared that " a Cicero. Prov. xxiii, 1-3. ¦The Sinnge- dichte." Phil, iv, 5. 1 Cor. ix, 25. sensual and intemperate youthhood transmits to old age a worn-out body." And a wiser than Cicero had already said : When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, Consider diligently him that is before thee ; And put a knife to thy throat, If thou be a man given to appetite. Be not desirous of his dainties ; Seeing they are deceitful meat. Even so sanitary a habit as gymnastic exercise may be pushed to such an extreme as to be suicidal ; recall the premature death of Wilkie Collins' Geoffrey Delamayn. Let Friedrich von Logau prescribe for us the best medicines : Joy, and Temperance, and Repose, Slam the door on the doctor's nose. Let your moderation, then,. be known unto all men, being temperate in all things.1 1 Horace Bushnell, speaking of the disorganizing effect of sin in the body, declares : " How the vices of the appetites and THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 187 Again, there is the murder which is born of Murderous thoughtlessness. A Mosaic precept is still in lessnfss!' point: "When thou buildest a new house, then Deut.xxii, 8. thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thy house, if any man passions terminate in diseases and a final disorganization of the body is well understood. The false conjunction made by intemperate drink, deluging the tissues of the body with its liquid poisons, and reducing the body to a loathsome wreck, is not peculiar to that vice. The condition of sin is a condition of general intemperance. It takes away the power of self- government, loosens the passions, and makes even the natural appetite for food an instigator of excess. Indeed, how many of the sufferings and infirmities even of persons called virtu ous, are known by all intelligent physicians to be only the groaning of the body under loads habitually imposed, by the untempered and really diseased voracity of their appetites. And if we could trace all the secret actions of causes, how faithfully would the fevers, the rheumatisms, the neuralgic and hypochondriacal torments, all the grim-looking woes of dyspepsia, be seen to follow the unregulated license of this kind of sin I Nor is anything better understood than that whatever vice of the mind — wounded pride, unregulated ambi tion, hatred, covetousness, fear, inordinate care — throws the mind out of rest, throws the body out of rest also. Thus it is that sin, in all its forms, becomes a power of bodily disturb ance, shattering the nerves, inflaming the tissues, distempering the secretions, and brewing a general ferment of disease. In' one view, the body is a kind of perpetual crystallization, and the crystal of true health cannot form itself under sin, because the body has, within, a perpetual agitating cause, which for bids the process. If, then, looking round upon the great field of humanity, and noting the almost universal working of disease, in so many forma and varieties that they cannot be named or counted, we sometimes exclaim with a sigh, what a hospital the world is I we must be dull spectators, if we stop at this, and do not also connect the remembrance that sin is in the world — a gangrene of the mind, poisoning all the roots of health, and making visible itB woes, by so many woes of bodily disease and death." — " Nature and the Supernatural," by Horace Bushne}!, Chapter VI. 188 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. fall from thence." Translating this ancient man date from the sphere of Oriental architecture and custom into the sphere of our modern American life, the mandate reads thus : Whenever you build a structure, or manage a corporation, or engage in any kind of transaction, provide beforehand againsl the possibility of injuring the life or health of any human being ; otherwise you may be guilty of murder. It is one of the cheering signs of the times that the public is awakening to the sense of its grave responsibility in this direction, for ex ample, demanding that life shall not be imperiled by the failure to provide substantial structures, fire-escapes, life-preservers, railway precautions, sanitary arrangements of fresh air and wholesome food and pure water and clean streets, isolated refuges for sufferers from contagious and infectious diseases, competent physicians and druggists and nurses, sufficient hours for rest on the part of operatives, excursions for children, sanitariums for the poor, parks and recreation grounds — in brief, hygienic regulations in general. Thank God, society is at last really beginning to practice what long ago it crystallized into a proverb: "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." The failure, then, to provide the ounce is, in light of the Mosaic ordinance touching battlemented roofs, to incur the guilt of possible murder. Thus fundamental and far reaching is the Sixth Com mandment. Treatment of Before leaving this part of our topic, let me sav Animals. „ , , , . , , T , ' , J a few words touching what 1 cannot but regard as THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 189 a murderous treatment of animals. For, as I have said, that mysterious force which we vaguely call " principle of life," and which the Bible dis tinguishes from spirit by calling it "soul," is com mon to both man and animal. Ah ! little we know what mystic bonds of kinship join animal and man. How humanlike the ways of the higher forms of animals ! Whistle to your de voted Fido ; see how joyously he bounds toward you, wagging his tail in nervous ecstasy ; how lovingly he rests his paw and head on your knee. Speak sharply to him ; see how he slinks away, crestfallen and grieved. What Shylock, protest ing to Salarino, said of his race, you may say of your Fido : Hath he not eyes, hath he not organs, dimensions, senses, "Merchant of affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the Venice," III, same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and sum mer, as a Christian is ? if you prick him, doth he not bleed? if you tickle him, doth he not laugh ? if you poison him, doth he not die? if you wrong him, will he not revenge ? No wonder, then, that Israel's lawgiver, in pro claiming to his people the code dictated to him * from heaven, guarded so jealously the sacredness of animal life. Listen : Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother's milk. Whether Exod. xxiii, 19. it be cow or ewe, ye shall not kill it and her young both in T' xxu' ' one day. If a bird's nest chance to'be before thee in the way, Dent, xxii, 6, 7. in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs, and the dam sitting upon the young, or upon the eggs, thou shalt not take the dam with the young ; thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, but the young thou mayest take unto thyself, that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days. Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the corn — Deut. xxv, 4. 190 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 1 cor. ix, 9; 1 a prohibition which the Apostle Paul twice quotes Tim. v, 18. . x approvingly. Accordingly, I must speak a word in hearty praise of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Consign not that gentle institution to the limbo of sentimentalities. For it is but carry ing out the merciful provision divinely fore shadowed in the Mosaic jurisprudence, given to mankind through the Jew while Jehovah was still his direct teacher. Promptly report, then, to the proper authorities every instance of cruelty. Allow me also to allude to the practice of vivi section. I do not profess to be a scientist; and therefore it does not become me to discuss the question in its scientific aspect; indeed, I am ready to admit that vivisection has probably con tributed not a little to physiological and psychologi cal science. But I do profess to be a teacher of morals ; and therefore I lift up my voice in em phatic protest against all vivisection which is not conducted by acknowledged, conscientious, humane scientists. I am glad to state that years ago the Trustees of our University of Pennsylvania ordered that no vivisection shall be allowed, ex cept when deemed necessary by a competent instructor and conducted in his presence. Ah ! young gentlemen, here is the delicate, telling test of civilization ; the way that we treat, not our superiors, but our inferiors. The gentleman is a gentle-man. Cowper's I would not enter on my list of friends "Task." (Though graced with polished manners and fine sense, THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 191 Yet wanting sensibility) the man Who needlessly set3 foot upon a worm. An inadvertent step may crush the snail That crawls at evening in the public path ; But he that hath humanity, forewarned, Will tread aside, and let the reptile live. The killing of an albatross in the South Seas has laid the foundation for one of the most touch ing ballads in English literature. What is the "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" but a poet's de fense of the truth that animals have souls ? Farewell, Farewell I but this I tell To thee, thou Wedding Guest ! He prayeth well, who loveth well Both man and bird and beast. He prayeth best, who loveth best All things both great and small ; For the dear God who loveth us, He made and loveth all. Or, as Robert Browning expresses it : God made all the creatures and gave them our love and our fear, To give sign, we and they are his children, one family here. "Ah! this," you tell me, "is poetry." Listen, then, to the calm words of Louis Agassiz, in his profound treatise entitled "Essay on Classifica tion": Most of the arguments of philosophy in favor of the immor tality of man apply equally to the permanency of the immaterial principle in other living beings. May I not add that a future life in which man should be deprived of that great source of enjoyment and intellectual and moral improvement which re sults from the contemplation of the harmonics of an organic world would involve a lamentable loss? And may we not look to a spiritual concert of the combined worlds and all their inhabitants in presence of their Creator as the highest conception of paradise ? " The Ancienl Mariner." Browning's "Saul.'7 Professor Agassiz. 192 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Christ's E x- And now let us ponder Christ's interpretation of Sixth°Com- *ne kw against murder : mandment. Matt, v, 21, 22. Te have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt not kill, and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment ; but I say unto you, that every one who is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment ; and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in dan ger of the council ; and whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of the hell of fire. There are two ways of regarding the law against murder. The Rabbins' First, the way in which the rabbins regarded Definition ' ¦' . & of Murder, it. They expounded it as a letter, a matter of out>- ward conduct belonging to the domain of the senses, a statute for the security of life and limb — in short, a civic ordinance for the peace and wel fare of society. Thus regarding it, the scribes and Pharisees were faultless touching the law against murder. What though they allowed any amount of verbal vituperation, tirelessly interjecting their talk with exclamations of Raca (Blockhead !) and Moreh (Fool !). Surely there was no mur der in that. What they sternly forbade was the overt act of murder. Thus, touching the letter of the Sixth Commandment, they were righteous, obeying it iu all strictest exactitude. And yet the Matt, v, 20. Lord of Righteousness told his disciples that except their righteousness exceeded that of the scribes and Pharisees, they should in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven. Christ's Defi- And so we pass to consider the other way of un order? derstanding the law against murder — namely, the way in which the Divine Man denned it : " But I THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 193 say unto you, that every one who is angry with his brother shall be in danger of the judgment, and whosoever shall say to his brother, Thou simpleton, shall be in danger ,of the council ; and whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of the hell of fire." Each clause of the Great Teacher's doc trine of murder demands comment. "But I say unto you." How imperial the dig- "But I Say nity with which this untitled Teacher from Naza reth plants himself against the authorized teachers of the law, joining issue, be it carefully observed, not with Moses, but with the scribes — the interpre ters of Moses — calmly overturning the misinterpre tations of centuries : " Ye have heard that it was said to them of old time; but I say unto you"! Not that he undertakes to amend the Mosaic statute by way of supplement : he simply expounds the Mosaic statute, unfolding the spirit in the letter ; and so he truly fulfills it. For he came not Matt, v, 17. to destroy the law or the prophets, but to fulfill. "Every one who is angry with his brother." "Angry with t-. 1 t-v • -»«- 1 1. 1 • i 11 n /-n I1'8 Broth- Does tlie Divine Man then forbid all auger 1 Cer- er." tainly not. His own apostle Paul expressly commands: "Be ye angry, aud sin not." The Eph. iv, 26. wrath-faculty is one of the inborn, constituent faculties which the Creator himself has implanted in our moral nature. In fact, it is a positive sin to look, for example, on a scene of injustice, or oppression, or cruelty to man or beast, and not feel angry. How often did such scenes arouse the anger of earth's one Perfect Man ! For instance : Do the Pharisees of Capernaum complain that he Mark m, 1-5. 17 194 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. has healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath day? He looks round about on them with anger, being grieved at the hard- Mark x, 13-16. ening of their heart. Again: Do the disciples, in the spirit of an officious and stupid reverence, rebuke the fond parents of Perea for bring ing their little ones to him that he may put his hands upon them and bless them with his prayer? He is moved with indignation. In fact, nothing angered him more than pretentious morality or icy cant: and this just because he was perfect. Just wrath : what is it but love itself at white heat? I know no expression in the Bible Eev. vi,i6. more awful than this : "The wrath of the Lamb." I am less afraid of the anger of the Lion of the tribe of Judah than of the wrath of God's Lamb. What, then, is the anger which the Mountain Teacher forbids ? Evidently unreasonable, pas sionate, protracted, revengeful anger. Let us get a hint of the Lord's meaning from the saying of Eph.iv, 26, 27. his apostle which I have just quoted: "Be ye angry, and sin not; let not the sun go down upon your wrath ; neither give place to the devil." What though your anger over a scene of wrong is instinctive and just? Do not brood over it, incu bating anger into malice, " nursing the wrath to keep it warm." Let not the sun go down upon your wrath ; lest in nursing the wrath, you give "The Judg- place to the devil. "TheCoun- "Shall be in danger of the judgment," "the He'll' ofThe counciV " the hel1 of fire" The phraseology is Fire." Jewish. The "judgment" was the local court. THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 195 The " council " was the Sanhedrin. The " hell of fire " was the fire in the hideous gorge on the south of Jerusalem, variously called Hinnom, Tophet, Gehenna. But although the Lord's phraseology was Jewish, his meaning was for all men and for all time. "Judgment," "council," "Gehenna of fire": these are but symbols of a fate intensely fiercer, even the second death. And what our Lord teaches is this : Whoever is angry with his brother is in danger of this second death. That is to say : Causeless or unreasonable anger, whether expressed or unexpressed, is virtual murder, and, as such, exposes him who cherishes it to the doom of the everlasting Gehenna. Does this seem to be an extreme interpretation of the Great Teacher's saying? Listen, then, to the disciple whom Jesus loved, even him who himself was the apostle of love: "Whosoever hateth his brother is a mur- Uoimiii, 15. derer : and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding iu him." You see, then, how intensely radical is Christ's Murder a interpretation of the Mosaic law touching murder. thananAct. According to him, murder is not a matter of out ward act, but of inward feeling : not a question of standing before the community, but of character before the All-seeing. No murder was ever com mitted which did not begin in the heart. "Out of Matt. xv, 19. the heart come forth evil thoughts, murders, adul teries, thefts, false witness, railings." And in thus looking at the germ rather than at the fruit, Jesus Christ proved himself to be a philosopher indeed. A moment's reflection will convince you of the 196 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. difference between single, deliberate acts of voli tion and the general current or tendency of the moral life ; of tlue former we are conscious, of the latter we are not conscious, except as our attention is particularly directed to it. And yet it is the latter which originates or is the basis of the former. To illustrate : A deliberately, with malice prepense, shoots B and kills him. 'Suppose you are to sit in moral judgment on the case, and endeavor to ascertain the actual guilt of the transaction as that transaction appears before the All-seeing. If I mistake not, you will find here two distinct ele ments of guilt. First, there is the deliberate voli tion — the conscious criminal intent to murder. And, secondly, there is the nature capable of originating and harboring such an intention. Be neath the surface of acts, and passions, and inten tions, and volitions — things of which he was con scious — there is a deep undercurrent of guilt, a profoundly criminal nature or tendency, of which he may or may not, at any given instant, have been conscious. Your verdict, then, after a thorough investigation of the moral elements of the case, will be this : Guilty as this man is, in that lie intended to murder, he is still guiltier in that he has a nature which is capable of giving birth to such au intention. Judging him in the forum of God's vision, where sin is surveyed, not as fruit, but as germ, not as it seems, but as it is, you feel that the chief element of this man's guilt lies, not in his intent to murder, but in his having a nature capable of originating and cherishing a murderous THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 197 intent. That is to say : The murder lay neither in the pistol, nor in the hand that fired the pistol, nor even in the volition that directed -the hand to fire the pistol ; the murder lay in the nature capable of the volition to move the hand to fire the pistol. You feel that in God's judgment it would have made but little difference whether the man had ever actually committed the murder or not. In God's sight the murder was in the nature; and this before the man himself became conscious of it through his murderous desire, purpose, and deed. If, then, every one who is angry with his brother is a murderer, how many embryo assassins there are all around us ; aye, it may be in our own bosoms ! Who of us has kept the Sixth Commandment as the Divine Man has interpreted it ? Who of us has not been angry, passionate, revengeful, petu lant ? Remembering, then, these quarrels of ours, these grudges and piques and faults of temper, who of us is not in danger of the eternal Gehenna? But we are not yet through with the Sixth Christ's Doc- Commandment. Although it is prohibitive in giveness. form, saying, Thou shalt not kill, yet it is af firmative in spirit, saying, Thou shalt love. Let us pass, then, to Christ's doctrine of perfection : Te have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye, and a Matt. v. 38-48. tooth for a tooth : but I say unto you, Resist not him that is evil : but whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man would go to law with thee, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go one mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away. Te have heard that it was said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour and hate thine enemy , but 198 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. I say unto you, Love your enemies, and pray for them that per secute you; that ye may be sons of your Father who is in heaven : for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sendeth rain on the just and the unjust. For if ye love them that love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the Gentiles the same ? Ye therefore shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. 'uto uJ?»S "But is not this Ut0Pian?" * near y°u askiug- "Can it be that our Lord really intended that these precepts should be carried into practical ef fect? Am I never to resist the evil-doer? If a man does me bodily injury, am I to submit quietly, and even expose myself to further insult and out rage? If a man at variance with me determines to wrest from me, by legal processes, a certain property, am I to yield without a struggle, and even more beside, adding to the coat which he asserts he will have, the cloak which he does not even claim? If Government imposes on me unreasonable burdens in respect either to person or to property', am I to obey without protest, and even offer twice the amount demanded? If a stranger, or a beggar, or a professional borrower asks me for money, am I to grant, without hesita tion, his request? Were I to do such things, would it not make me the vassal and caitiff of anybody and everybody who chose to wrong me, or insult me, or lord it over me ? Were the followers of Jesus Christ to do such things, would it not derange all business and social relations, and eventually up heave the very foundations of society itself? In brief, is not this teaching of the Nazarene THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 199 Utopian?" Such, doubtless, is the feeling of many a true disciple as he ponders these pre cepts of his heavenly Master. He cannot quite accept them in the fullness of their apparent meaning, and so he instinctively searches for some interpretation which shall somehow tone down their severity. And as for the unbe liever, he has more than once paraded these precepts as a signal evidence that the Man of Nazareth, however gentle and pure, was never theless a visionary and an extremist. It be comes us, then, as pupils of the Divine Teacher, to sit reverently at his feet, aud, in the spirit of a special docility, ask him to explain to us more fully what he means when he bids us not to resist the evil-doer, but love our enemies, do good to them that hate us, bless them that curse us, and pray for them that despitefully use us. Of course, we have not time to study all these Christ's Doc- precepts. Let me select for specific comment and Non-Kesis- application Christ's doctrine of non-resistance: tance. Te have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye, and a Matt, v, 38, 39. tooth for a tooth. But I say unto you, Resist not him that is evil : but whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. "Ye have heard that it was said, an eye for an Mosaic Le x eye, and a tooth for a tooth." Not only did the rabbins say this ; Moses himself had said it: "Life Exoa.xxi,23-25. for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." This lex talionis was not peculiar lo Moses ; it was distinctly recognized 200 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. in the legislation of the Greek Solon, and in the Twelve Tables of the Roman forum. It has a striking illustration in our own day and land, in the penalty of capital punishment — a penalty which is the exact reproduction of the Mosaic legislation — eye for eye, tooth for tooth, life for life. But although the law of retaliation is a venting of the instinct of justice, it is but a rude venting. It is a clumsy attempt to subsidize in behalf of society the capacity for pain. It is at best but a sort of mechanical equivalent, an awk ward endeavor to express moral equilibrium in physical terms. Young gentlemen, the theory of equivalents holds better in chemistry than in ethics: for morals are not a matter of the micro meter or the balance.. But let me not be diverted from the point in hand. Moses did assert the law of retaliation. But the scribes, in interpreting Moses, were not content with applying the statute of retaliation to the sphere for which their great lawgiver meant it — the sphere of public offenses: they dragged it into the sphere of private quarrels. They debased a civic statute into a personal pre rogative. "Resist Not And now listen to the Divine Man himself: Matt. v,' 39. "But I say unto you, Resist not him that is evil " (that is, him who has wronged you). Remember, however, that there is a difference between civic life and private life, between our duties as citizens and our duties as men. Do not suppose, then, that be cause our Master forbade all private avengement, he therefore meant to overthrow all legal institu- THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 201 tions and penalties. The lex talionis, whether, as iu Mosaic days, in the stern form of literal equiva lent — eye for eye, tooth for tooth — or, as in our own days, in the milder, commuted form of fine and imprisonment, is a civic law, concerning us as subjects of human government, not as subjects of tbe divine. While humanity remains as imperfect as it is, the law of retaliation, in some form or another, is perhaps essential to the welfare of so ciety. But then it was one of the peculiarities of Jesus Christ that he always and distinctly dis claimed being in any sense a political lawgiver. He never allowed himself to be drawn into civil disputes. Do Pharisees and Herodians come to Matt.xxii,is-22. him with the question, " Is it lawful to give tribute unto Csesar or uot?" he declines to commit him self, but simply replies : " Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's ; and unto God the things that are God's." For Jesus Christ had something greater to do than to teach even so great a thing as statesmanship. Enactments are local and transient ; ethics are universal and abiding. To the Divine Teacher the citizen was lost in something vaster, even the man. He did not argue from citizenship up to manhood ; he argued from manhood down to citizenship. He knew that if the man was right, the citizen would be right also. He regulated the watch, not by moving the hands, but by touching the mainspring. Take a single example. On a Luke xii, 1.3-21. certain occasion, a man in the throng said to him, " Master, bid my brother divide the inheritance with me." But Jesus said unto him : " Man, who 202 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. made me a judge or a divider over you ? " Then turning to the group standing around, he added : " Take heed, and keep yourselves from all covet ousness : for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth ; " and then he pronounced his parable of the Rich Fool. Thus he declined all political interference, content to let laws stay or go as the times should demand, while he set himself to the mightier task of right ing the radical, abiding elements of our nature. Do not, then, infer that, because he forbade all private vindication, he meant to forbid all civic re dress aud penalty. He struck deeper than any civic statutes ; he struck at that fallen nature which makes civic statutes needful. And here comes out one of the many differences between the lawgiver who wrote his commandments on tables of stone and the Lawgiver who writes his commandments on tables of heart. Moses taught an institutional religion — a religion of condition ; Jesus taught a personal religion — a religion of character. Moses legislated with reference to building up a common wealth ; Jesus legislated with reference to building up man : for he knew that the best way to build up a commonwealth is by building up men — man by man. When, therefore, in opposition to the Mosaic statute of civic retaliation, he bids us not resist the evil-doer, he addresses you and me, not as citizens, but as men ; not as subjects of civil government, but as Christians, citizens of his spiritual kingdom. And now let us apply his mandate of non-retaliation in practical directions. THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 203 " Whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, Th(?ne^ltten turn to him the other also." Are we to take this literally? Certainly not. For this would be to interpret Jesus rabbinically, even as the scribes had interpreted Moses. This scrupulous literalism it is which mars the ethical writings of that remarkable author, Count Tolstoi, especially his book entitled "My Religion." No; Christ's own behavior, when . arraigned before Annas, proves that he did not mean that his precept is to be taken literally. One of the officers who was standing by struck John xvin,22,23. Jesus with his hand, saying, " Answerest thou the high priest so ? " Jesus answered him : " If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil ; but if well, why smitest thou me?" Thus even the Divine Proclaimer of our precept did not literally turn the other cheek. Had he done so, he might have achieved nothing more than to provoke toward himself additional brutality. Nevertheless, even here he did not resist the evil-doer : he con tented himself with dignified expostulation. And herein he is our example as well as the interpreter of his own precept. Ah ! young friends, one may obey the letter of our Lord's precept, and yet disobey its spirit. At the very time he is offering the outer cheek, he may be withholding the inner. The point will be illustrated best by two anecdotes which I take from a British periodical. The first story is this : Many years ago an eminent minister of the gospel, who had "The Exnosl- been a great athlete in his youth, on returning to his native pp.' 139 140. ' town soon after he had been ordained, encountered in the 204 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. High Street an old companion whom he had often fought and thrashed in his godless days. " So you've turned Christian, they tell me, Charley?" said the man. " Tes," replied the minister. " Well, then, you know the Book says, If you're struck on one cheek, you're to turn the other. Take that!" and with that hit him a stinging blow. " There, then," replied the minister, quietly turning the other side of his face toward him. The man was brute enough to strike him heavily again. Whereupon the minister said : " And there my com mission ends," pulled off his coat, and gave his antagonist a severe thrashing, which no doubt he richly deserved. The other story is this : It is told of a celebrated officer in the army that, as he stood leaning over -¦ wall in the barrack yard, one of his military servants, mistaking him for a comrade, came softly up behind him, and suddenly struck him a hard blow. When the officer looked round, his servant, covered with confusion, stammered out : " I beg your pardon, sir ; I thought it was George." His master gently replied : " And if it were George, why strike so hard ? " Now, young gentlemen, which of these two, think you, obeyed our Master's precept touching the smitten cheek the more completely : the min ister who kept the letter, or the officer who kept the spirit? Do you not see that literal obedience is sometimes virtual disobedience, and that literal disobedience is sometimes virtual obedience? Question of But let me apply our Lord's precept still more fense. " specifically. Take, for example, the case of per sonal assault. A man, without provocation, strikes you. What shall you do ? Strike back again ? Society says " Yes ; if not directly with your own fist, at least indirectly through the law." Jesus Christ says : " No ; resist not the evil-doer." Or, Eom. xii, 21. as his apostle says : "Overcome evil with good." Expostulate with your evil-doer. Tell him THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 205 bravely, but lovingly, that you are a Christian man, a follower of the Nazarene; that you think it wicked to retaliate; that your Master has ex pressly forbidden it. And ninty-niue cases out of a hundred, believe me, friend, you will completely disarm him (if he is sober), and hereafter you will be as safe from him as though he had been sen tenced for life to the penitentiary, or, for that matter, to the gallows. Again : let me apply our Lord's precept to the Question of case of war. Suppose a foreign power should invade us; or, worse still, another secession from our American Union be attempted. How ought we as a Christian people to meet, the difficulty ? I do not like to make absolute promises ; for I am finite aud fallible, and may see just occasion for changing my mind. But as I feel to-day, listen ing to him who taught as man never spake, I do John vii, 46. not thiuk that I can ever defend another war. No man can go beyond me in my admiration and even reverence for the patriotism, the courage, the self- sacrifice of the noble thousands who so sublimely braved every sort of hardship and peril in defense of our glorious country. All honor to the illus trious dead ! All honor to their illustrious sur vivors ! Nevertheless we are living under God's government; and one of the fundamental princi ples of his administration is progress, or, if yon please, evolution. Accordingly, what was rela tively right once may be relatively wrong now. Because war was right under the old covenant of Sinai, it does not follow that war is right under 206 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. the new covenant of Calvary. The Geneva arbi tration has done wonders in shedding light on such precepts as this of the smitten cheek ; for it has shown how wars may be averted, and yet the national honor be kept unstained. Young gentle men, the time is fast coming when, in the judg ment of Christendom, no nation will ever be justified in resorting to war except after every attempt at peaceful arbitration has been thoroughly tried. Aye, the time is fast passing by when statesmen will any longer cherish the juvenile, grotesque, barbarous fancy that a moral question of right and wrong can ever be settled by gunnery. If you were materialists, and really believed that the uational honor consists in a peculiarly deft arrangement of molecules, then you could consist ently defend the national honor by a molecular appeal. In fact, brute force is the animal's stand ard of ethics : Isaac Watts. ^et Dears and lions growl and fight ; For 'tis their nature too. But if you believe that right and justice and honor and truth are spiritual in their nature, then 2 cor. x, 4. let the weapons of your warfare be spiritual, not carnal; so shall you become mighty before God to the casting down of strongholds. Do you say that Christ's precept of non-resistance is impracti cable and visionary? William Penn, peaceful founder of our own great commonwealth, fightino- barbarous aborigines with no sword but the olive- branch ; aye, our own respected fellow-citizens of THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 207 to-day, the Quakers (and Friends indeed they are) — this is a sufficient answer. Talk about Utopia? Obey Jesus Christ ; and Utopia becomes actuality, the laud of promise becomes the land of heritage. And this leads me to my last point : Christ's doc- The Coming trine of love or perfection is growing in favor. The Man of Nazareth has not taught and lived, and illustrated in vain. When he was led as a lamb Acts via, 32. to the slaughter, yet opened not his mouth; when he was reviled, yet reviled not again; when he 1 Peter ii. 21-23. suffered, yet threatened not; when he died, the just for the unjust, — he' left us an example which ever since has been growing in omnipotence. Yes, it is coming to be understood that Christ's man ners are the world's ethics. His morals are slowly but most surely impregnating and transfiguring society. Contrast, for example, modern legislation with the Mosaic, Christian hymn-books with David's imprecatory Psalms. Even Victor Hugo, "free thinker" though he was, represents the hero of "Les Miserables" — the thief, Jeau Valjean — as saved and transfigured by the forgiveness of the good Bishop Monseigneur Bienvenu. No ; the animal shall not always rule. The more spiritual, and therefore the more imperial side of humanity is yet to come, and will come to stay. Men will not always herd with the beasts, believing in guns or brute force. The Son of Mary is the Coming Man. There sits the unplumed, unsworded Warrior of the Mountain, calmly abiding the ages, mending Matt, xii, 20, a. the bruised reed, fanning the dying wick, sending forth righteousness unto victory; there he sits, 208 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Longfellow's "Arsenal at Springfield." Collect. evermore drawing humanity nearer and nearer to himself; aud, as they approach, I see them drop ping the spear, uplifting the olive-branch, arrang ing themselves in shining and rapturous groups around the Man of Nazareth — the Lamb of God himself being their everlasting Mount of Beati tudes, Down the dark future, through long generations, The echoing sounds grow fainter, and then cease ; And like a bell, with solemn, sweet vibrations, I hear once more the voice of Christ say, Peace ! Peace 1 and no longer from its brazen portals The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies ; But beautiful as songs of the immortals, The holy melodies of love arise. O Lord, who hast taught us that all our doings without charity are nothing worth ; Send thy Holy Spirit, and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of charity, the very bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before thee. Grant this for thine only Son Jesus Christ's sake. Amen. VIII. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Exodus xx, 14. viii. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. The wedded state is earth's most sacred relation. The First It carries us back to the Eden that has been, when the Maker of heaven and earth joined together the parents of the human race. Listen to the divine account of the first bridal : Jehovah God said : It is not good that the man should be Gen ii, 18-25. alone; I will make him ahelp meet (answering to) for him. And out ofthe ground Jehovah God formed every beast of the field and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto the man to see what he would call them ; and whatsoever the man called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And the man gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field ; but for man there was not found a help meet for him. And Jehovah God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept ; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof ; and the rib, which Jehovah God had taken from the man made he (builded he into) a woman, and brought her unto the man. And the man said : This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh ; she shall be called Woman (Isshah), because she was taken out of Man (Ish). Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife : and they shall be one flesh. And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. Of course, it is quite possible that this venerable The Archive archive is to be taken literally. My own impres- a arab e' sion, however, is that it is a divine parable, convey ing to us great truths, not so much in literal details as in colossal, shadowy outlines. For when we 211 212 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. move, as in this matter of the original creation, in the region of unprecedented facts, altogether tran scending human experience, the language must in the very nature of the case be figurative. And so it comes to pass here, as elsewhere in the realm of incomparable truths, shadowy parable is really truer than crystalline chronicle. Let us, then, ascend the mount of panoramic vision, and behold with the venerable inspired seer the unrolling scene of emergent woman. It is still the sixth day of the creative week. Eden in all its ravishing beauty lies before us. Adam, fresh from the hands Gen.ii,7. 0f his Maker, respirant with his inbreathing and Gen. i, 26. radiant with his image, walks before us lord of all. Aud yet, notwithstanding his Edenic perfections, » he is ill at ease. There is somehow the sense of an indefinable want. And now his Maker would teach him the secret of his disquietude. Accord ingly, he summons before the man the various forms of animal life, in order that Adam may catch a glimpse of what is meant by society. And so every beast of the field and every bird of the air come trooping to Adam, and he gives, to each its name. The vision of this moving, sentient, abound ing life awakens the latent sense ofthe capacity for companionship. But amid all these varieties of animal life he finds no true companion, no help meet, no mate answering to him. And now, wea ried with his task of naming the animal creation, and still disquieted by the sense of a mysterious defect, he lies down on the rich, odorous sward, it may be, in the shadow of the tree of life, and falls THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 213 into profound slumber. It is the golden hour for divine instruction; for it is in a dream, in a Job xxxiii, 15, ' 16. vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed, that God open eth the ears of men and sealeth their instruction. Wrapped in his deep sleep, Eden's dreamer beholds the vision of his second self. He' sees his Maker taking from out of him one of his own ribs, form ing it into a woman, and presenting her in all her glorious beauty to himself, to be to him henceforth that blessed mate for whom he has unconsciously sighed. And so his God has in very truth given p»- cxxvii, 2. unto his beloved in his sleep. sin- Of all the thoughts of God that are Mrs. E. B. Borne inward unto souls afar, °" Along the Psalmist's music deep, Now tell me if that any is, For gift or grace, surpassing this — " He giveth his beloved sleep " ? Nor is the slumbering dreamer's vision altogether a dream. Awaking from his sleep, he beholds still standing by his side his fair, blessed counter part. Instinctively recognizing the community of nature, he joyously exclaims: "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh : this shall be called Isshah, Woman, because out of Ish, Man, was she taken." And hand in hand they stroll raiment- less — the man and his wife — and are not ashamed. And so falls the curtain on the final scene of the drama of the creative week. Such is the vision of humanity's first bridal. And now let us ponder some of the lessons of the vision. 214 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Essential Unity of Man and Woman. Comma nity of Man and Woman. Charles Wesley. Bulwer's " Richelien," III, 2. And, first: The essential unity of man and woman ; the man said : " This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh ; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man." Accordingly, man and woman, considered in their essence, are a unity. But, observe, unity implies complexity; that is to say : unity involves likeness and unlikeness, sameness aud difference, community and diversity. Consider, then, first, the community of man and woman. According to the story of Eden, woman is of the same generic nature with man, bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh. Their community is something more than mere similarity of nature; it is in fact con-nature itself. Woman's very name is Isshah, that is, Man-ness, because out of Ish, that is, Man, was she taken. And it is significant that she was taken out of his side. Not from his head he woman took, As made her husband to o'erlook ; Not from his feet, as one designed The footstool of the stronger kind ; But fashioned for himself, a bride ; An equal, taken from his side. » And the side (I assume it was the left side) is near the heart; and the heart is, after all, the world's real sceptre ; and therefore woman, after all, is the world's real monarch. Aye, More royalty in woman's heart Than dwells within the crowned majesty And sceptred anger of a hundred kings. Woman, then, is something more than a supplement THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 215 or appendix to man ; woman is mau's complement, his essential peer, his alter ego, his second self; constituting with him the genus mankind, or Homo. There is nothing, then, in the essential nature of woman which should exclude her from the rights and privileges which inherently belong to the genus Homo. Whatever is legitimately open to man, not indeed as a man, but as homo or a human being, is equally open to woman ; for both are equally human. Woman, not less than man, can reason, imagiue, observe, classify, generalize, deduce. Woman, not less than man, can plan buildings, make statues, resolve nebulae, discover elements, diagnosticate diseases, construct philoso phies, write epics. There is no reason in the nature of woman as woman which should forbid her having a specific employment or vocation as distinctively as the brother brought up by her side. True, there are some things which woman cannot do as well as man ; this, however, is not because she is inferior in any of the essential attributes of humanity, but simply because she is inferior in the accidental matter of physical strength. It is no more to woman's discredit that she does not figure well in leaving her nursery to shoe a horse than it is to man's discredit that he does not figure well in leaving his anvil to rock a baby. While, then, many of the occupations which man has hitherto claimed as exclusively his own are in the growing wisdom of society admitted to be equally open to women, there are certain other occupations from which woman manifestly ought to exclude herself. 216 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Evidently she is not called to hold the plow, or wield the sledge, or fell the forest, or hoist the mainsail, or seize the burglar, or harangue the caucus. Nevertheless, in all that constitueutly belongs to man as man, in all that makes up the essentiality of his being, woman is one with man, sharing his nature, his inspiration, his imageship, his sonhood. Thank God, we are living iu an age of the world when St. Paul's doctrine that in Gai. m, 28. Christ there can be no male or female — for all are one in Christ Jesus — is really beginning to be believed, and when woman, as man's essential equal, is resuming those majestic, heaven-endowed proportions which she wore in that far-off sixth Gen. v, 1,2. day when God created man in his own likeness, male and female created he them, and blessed them, and called their name Adam (Man), in the day when they were created. Diversity of Nevertheless, as I have already said, this unity Man and ,, , .,.-,.., ,. Woman. ot man and woman implies diversity as well as community. In fact, diversity is essential to unity. For consider for a moment the difference between a unity and a bare unit. A unit is a homogeneous something, for example, an atom of oxygen, or an atom of hydrogen. A unity is a blended, coherent, systematized collection of diverse somethings in a state of homogeneousness or oneness — for example, the union of eight weights of oxygen and one weight of hydrogen, forming one molecule of water. It is the blending of different yet comple- mental colors of blue and orange, of green and red, of purple and yellow, in fact, of all the colors at THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 217 once which yields the unity of perfect whiteness. Looking at the point under discussion in this light, there is no superber earthly instance of unity than man and woman. Recall the phraseology of the primeval archive : " It is not good that the man Gen. u, is. should be alone ; I will make him a help meet for him " — that is to say, a helper suited to him, cor respondent to him, complemental to him, matching him. It was the birth of Society. Woman is something more than man's supplement : woman is man's complement. In other words, man and woman are the two poles of the sphere of mankind ; opposite and complemental, complemental because opposite. And the one pole implies the other. Legislate as much as you please, you cannot abolish the fact of the sexes. Elementally the same, man and woman are organized on different bases. Like the stars, they differ in their glory. Each has cer- 1 cor. xv, iu tain excellences which are peculiar to each, and distinctive of each. Man's excellences are virtues; woman's excellences are graces; and I suspect that, iu the judgment of him who sees in secret, the graces are diviner than the virtues. It is woman's delicate beauty of spirit which gives her the right to win, and which, thank God, does win man's sturdy love. It is woman's physical weakness which constitutes her claim on man's physical strength. It is woman's purity which constitutes her claim on man's reverence. It is woman's womanliness which constitutes her claim on man's manliness. No manner of sympathy, then, have I with those so-called reformers — heaven save the 19 218 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. mark ! — who, in their noisy and witless champion ship of what they imagine are Woman's Rights, fancy they can override the everlasting laws of nature, and turn woman into man. Only one thing in this world is feebler than a womanized man; it is a manized woman. It is only as woman remains womanly that woman remains imperial. In these days, then, of confused, riotous, infidel reform — these days when woman proposes to unsex herself, and usurp the reins and the toga — it is well to go back to first principles, even the Eden of the primal, unfallen pair. In so doing we shall learn to honor man and woman equally. For each is 1 cor. xi, n, 12. essential to the other. Listen to St. Paul : " Neither is the woman without the man, nor the man with out the woman, in the Lord. For as the woman is of the man, so is the man also by the woman ; but all things are of God." Each is incomplete without the other. It is the union of the hemi spheres which makes the sphere. For so the lau reate sings : Tennyson's For woman is not undevelopt man, Pnucess. jjuj; diverse : could we make her as the man, Sweet Love were slain : his dearest bond is this, Not like to like, but like in difference. Tet in the long years liker must they grow ; The man be more of woman, she of man ; He gain in sweetness and in moral height, Nor lose- the wresting thews that throw the world ; She mental breadth, nor fail in childward care ; Nor lose the childlike in the larger mind ; Till at the last she set herself to man, Like perfect music unto noble words ; And so these twain, upon the skirts of Time, Sit side by side, full-summ'd in all their powers, THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 219 Dispensing harvest, sowing the To-be, Self-reverent each and reverencing each, Distinct in individualities, But like each other ev'n as those who love. Then comes the statelier Eden back to men : Then reign the world's great bridals, chaste and calm; Then springs the crowning race of humankind. May these things be 1 This, then, is the first great lesson of the primeval archive touching the primal pair: The unity of man and woman: "The man said, This is now Gen. 11,2s. bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Isshah (Woman), because she was taken out of Ish (Man)." But our venerable archive teaches a second great Marriage a lesson : it is this : Marriage is a divine institution, stitution." "The rib, which Jehovah God had taken from the Gen. u, 22. man, builded he into a woman, and brought her unto the man." I know indeed that human legis lation declares, aud quite properly, that any given marriage is a civil contract, or, as I would rather say, status. Nor can human legislation guard with a jealousy too keen the sacredness of the marriage bond. That sacredness is the ffigis of our firesides, the palladium of our homes. Nevertheless, mar riage is a divine ordinance, older than any human institution, older than man's fall, older even than God's Sabbath ; marriage is as old as Eden and the primal pair. Marriage is a constituent, elemental fact of humanity. As such, marriage is as much a divine fact as day and night or the universe itself. In the very fact of creating the Woman and pre senting her to the Man, the Creator of all ordained the marriage institution. 220 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Marriage the But our hoary archive teaches a third great les- jp^rtant Im~ son : Tile marriage relation takes precedence of Human Ee- every other human relation : " Therefore shall a man lation. J ... Gen. ii.24. leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife : and they shall be one flesh " — that is, one personality. These words are memorable as being the first statement of the Old Testament that is cited Mait. xix, 3-6. in the New. There came unto Jesus Pharisees, tempting him, and saying : " Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?" Jesus answered and said : " Have ye not read, that he who made them from the beginning made them Gen. u, 24. male and female, and said : For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife ; and the twain shall become one flesh ; so that they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder." Thus the very idea of mar riage, as existing in the Creator's mind, precludes its dissolution while life continues: "No longer twain, but one flesh ; no longer two individuals, henceforth' one personality." Accordingly, none but the God who joins can disjoin. " What there fore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder." Summary uj Such is the original Charter of Marriage, as old Ari hive.' as Eden, as divine as Deity. And well may we thank God that he has given us this sacred account. For the marriage institution is the very root of society, alike its basis and its bond. Monogamy is the unit of humanity; the family is the micro cosm of mankind. Accordingly, as husbands and THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 221 wives are, so are men and women — that is, society itself. The sanctity of the marriage bond is the very bulwark of humankind. Such are some of the reasons why the marriage institution is so un speakably sacred. It is not only divine in its origin : it is also divine in its tendency, and, as we shall see, divine -in its final meaning. Well, then, may we speak of marriage as the " holy estate of matrimony." It is most fitting, then, that the marriage ceremony should be ecclesiastical — that is to say, religious. Not that the minister really weds the couple : it is God who joins them. The minister's function is not executive : it is only declarative. But the minister is not omniscient. Alas, that he should ever be mistaken, declaring those wedded whom God has not joined together. > Nevertheless, marriage is a divine ordinance, and as such intensely religious. Matrimony " therefore is not by any to be entered into unadvisedly or lightly ; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of God." Consider, then, well, young friends, what you may be proposing. Marriage is, in sight of God, an act as sacred as baptism itself. God grant that all who are think ing of matrimony may indeed be also joint heirs of 1 Pet. iii, 7. the grace of life; to the end that your prayers be not hindered. And now we are prepared for the Seventh Copa- The Seventh mandment : Thou shalt not commit adultery. ment. It is the divine Lawgiver's ordinance, guarding Exodxx> u- the chastity of marriage, the sanctity of home, the blessedness of the household, the preservation of 222 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. John ii, 25. Christ's Ex position of Seventh Com mandment. Matt, v, 27-32. Christ's Doc trine of Adultery. Matt, xv, 19; Mark vii, 21, 22. society, the upbuilding of mankind. Let earth's civic authorities, then, take exceeding care that they legislate and administer in this supreme matter of marriage according to the divine oracle. Would God they all conceived it according to the standard and iu the spirit of the Nazarene Teacher! For he who knew all men, and needed not that any one should testify to him concerning man, since he himself knew what was in man, is a diviner Law giver than even Sinai's. And so we pass from the Seventh Command ment itself to the Divine Man's exposition of it : Te have heard that it was said, Thou shalt not commit adultery : but I say unto you, that every one that looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. And if thy right eye causeth thee to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from thee : for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body be cast into hell. And if thy right hand causeth thee to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee : for it is profit able for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not thy whole body go into hell. It was said also, Whosoever s.2all put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorce ment : but I say unto you, that every one that putteth away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, maketh her an adulteress : and whosoever shall marry her when she is put away committeth adultery. Observe, first, Christ's definition of adultery: "Ye have heard that it was said, Thou shalt not commit adultery : but I say unto you, that every one that looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her in his heart." Listen, also, to our Divine Master, when, on another occa sion, he said : From within, out of the heart of men, come forth evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 223 fornications, covetings, lasciviousness, an evil eye. Thus does the Lord of all vision, in the sublime austereness of an infinite chastity, step behind all legislation and all overt act, and, as in the case of his interpretation of the law against murder, which Matt. 6, 21, 22. we studied last Sunday afternoon, plant himself amid the secrets of the inner life, and lay his scorching finger on the primal, elemental germ of all impure feeling. How different his teaching here from that of the ancient scribes and Phari sees, and, for that matter, of the modern paragons of a reputable, conventional morality! Those ex pounded, and these expound the Seventh Com mandment letter-wise: he expounds it spirit-wise, declaring that the guilt of breaking the Seventh Commandment lies not in the outward, bodily act, but in the inward, unchaste feeling. Thus does he in very truth fulfill the law, his righteousness in finitely exceeding the literal righteousness of the blameless scribes and Pharisees. Verily, "The word Heb. iv, 12, 13. of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the divid ing asunder of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and in tents of the heart. And there is no creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and laid open before the eyes of him with whom we have to do." Who, then, may not well tremble? For, thus interpreted, who has thus not broken the Seventh Commandment? Ah, if Moses, the lawgiver, was so terrible, how much more terrible is Jesus, the law-interpreter and the law-fulfiller! 224 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. And here I stay my words touching this point. Our Lord's exposition of the Seventh Command- iBa.xxxv,8. ment is so divinely simple that "the wayfaring men, yea fools, need not err therein." Christ's Doc- And now observe Christ's doctrine of divorce: trine of Di vorce. It was said also, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him Matt, v, 31, 32. gjye ner a wrjting 0f divorcement. But I say unto you, that every one that putteth away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, maketh her an adulteress; and whosoever shall marry her when she is put away committeth adultery. Recall also the occasion to which I have already alluded, when Jesus was in Perea: Matt, xix, 3-12 ; There came unto him Pharisees, and asked him : Is it lawful Mark x, 2-J2. f0T a man i0 pUj away his wife? trying him. He answered and said unto them, What did Moses command you? They said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away. But Jesus said unto them, For your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. But from the begin ning of the creation, male and female made he them. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife ; and the twain shall become one flesh : so that they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. And in the house the disciples asked him again of this matter. They say unto him, Why then did Moses command to give a bill of divorcement, and to put her away ? He saith unto them, Moses for your hardness of heart suffered you to put away your wives : but from the beginning it hath not been so. And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except for forni cation, and shall marry another, committeth adultery : and he that marrieth her when she is put away committeth adultery: and if she herself shall put away her husband, and marry another, she committeth adultery. Our Master's language is sufficiently plain : there has never been any need of dispute about it, least of all in the church. Let me simply recall your attention to the principal statements. First: Moses THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 225 did allow his countrymen divorce for other causes than the one which the Nazarene Teacher specifies : but he allowed it because of his countrymen's hard ness of heart — that is, because of that moral obtuse- ness into which they had sunk as one of the sad results of their long servitude in idolatrous and polygamous Egypt. Secondly: In the beginning, however, it was not so; in the primal estate no divorce was allowed. Monogamy was a law of Eden. Thirdly : The marriage estate takes prece dence of every other human relation: "For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife" : every domestic and social relation is to be subordinate to the law of monog amy. Fourthly : Marriage merges the dualism of man and woman into the unity of husband and wife, blending them into a twofold yet single personality: No longer twain; henceforth one. Fifthly : The marriage bond is divine, and there fore indissoluble while life continues: "What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder." Sixthly : The one solitary exception to the indissolubleness of the marriage bond is infi delity to the marriage vow : " Saving for the cause of fornication." Seventhly : Re-marriage, alike in the case of the divorcer and the divorced, except ing the divorce based on the solitary cause of marital infidelity, is adultery. Such is the shining chastity of the carpenter's Son. It is one of the fashions of cavilers to impugn the originality of Jesus, alleging that some of his characteristic teachings were already commonplaces in pagan literature. 226 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Search, then, the Analects, the Vedas, the Zend- avesta : can you find in them any such doctrine of chastity as the Nazarene's ? Here at least is fresh- Ps. ex, s. ness of moral statement, radiant in beauties of holiness, born from the morning, sparkling with the dew of perpetual youth. Our Topic Our topic, I must sorrowfully add, is pertinent Pertinent. , T . to our age and laud. .Loose notions touching mar riage, divorce, re-marriage, are painfully, alarm ingly prevalent. We need not go so far as Utah to find Mormons, theoretical and practical. Even among those who call themselves cultivated there are some whose teachings concerning marriage are so lax and sensuous that, were they carried into practical effect, the "holy estate of matrimony" would sink into the open polygamy and polyandry of savage tribes, and even the promiscuous society of roaming animal hordes. Let it be thundered from the pulpit, from the academy, from the forum, that divorce (absolute divorce, allowing re-mar riage), saving for one solitary cause, is a threefold crime — a crime against home, a crime against society, a crime against God. Aye, young gentle men, the legislators of the nineteenth century have yet a great deal to learn from the Lawgiver of the first. Christ's Cure And now let us ponder the Divine Man's pre fer Unchas- x r tity. scription for the cure of unchastity : " If thy right ' T" ' ' eye causeth thee to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from thee : and if thy right hand causeth thee to The Body the stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee." sin. ere ° The phraseology, you perceive, is taken from the THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 227 sphere of the bodily life. And most justly. For, philosophize and refine as much as you please, all earthly spirits, even the most etherial, live, and — so long as the present constitution of things lasts — must perforce live in the body, and by means of the body. Our bodily senses — seeing, hearing, touching — are the hinges of the soul, the axles on which character turns to and fro, in and out ; they are the inlets and the outlets of two worlds, the world without and the world within. It is liter ally true that a man without senses is a man -with out sense, actual or possible. Nor is there in this anything necessarily degrading. Matter is not in itself inherently evil. That is a pagan notion, bequeathed us from an immemorial antiquity, of which Christendom, even at this late day, has but partially succeeded in ridding herself. No ; matter is not inherently evil. On the evening of the sixth Gen. i, au day of the creative week, the Maker of the universe saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And had man never fallen, his body would have ever continued to be the faultless and blessed instrument of naught but what is divinely pure, and bright, and lovely. Alas ! man did fall ; and in falling he, Samson-like, brought down all nature with himself: Earth felt the wound ; and Nature from her seat, "Paradise Lost," Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe, ^M> That all was lost. Nor can there be sadder evidence of this .than the simple fact that the bodily senses, which our Creator has bestowed on us as a means of honoring him, are 228 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. so often actually used as a means of dishonoring him. For example : How often does the eye, Ps. xix, 1. • instead of gazing on that glory of God which the heavens declare, and that hahdywork of his which the firmament sheweth, gloat over heaps of filthy lucre, or the sensuous sketches of dissolute artists ! How often does the ear, instead of hearkening to p8.xix, 2. that speech which day uttereth unto day, and that knowledge which night sheweth unto night, listen to the song of the ribald, and the sneer of the scoffer ! How often does the tongue, instead of Ps. cxiv, 1-13. speaking of the glorious majesty of God's kingdom, and uttering the memory of his great goodness, blurt blasphemy against Jehovah its Maker ! How often does the hand, instead of feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, wield the slanderer's pen, or the assassin's dagger ! How often does the foot, Ps. xiii, 4. instead of openly walking to the house of God in procession with the multitude who keep holy day, stealthily visit the haunts where virtue is an outlaw, and debauchery holds orgies ! How true it is that sin has conquered the eutire man — spirit, and soul, and body — inverting the order of nature, or, rather, turning her order into disorder, upsetting the primal Rom. vii, 14-20. equilibrium in man, setting the members of his body at war against the members of his spirit, making the sensuous to triumph over the spiritual. Well, then, may man, surveyed as fallen, be called carnal — that is, fleshly, enslaved under sin. And it is just because sin has so perverted and prostituted the bodily side of our nature, which is the avenue and organ of our moral operations, that the Great THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 229 Teacher draws his illustrations from the sphere of the bodily life : If thy right eye, or thy right hand, causeth thee to stumble, pluck out the eye, cut off the hand, and cast them from thee. Not that our Lord's command is to be taken The Excision literally. True, the literal interpretation of Scrip- Literal. ture is always the best when it is the simplest and raises the fewest difficulties. But certainly this is not the case here. For, first, the bodily senses are not in themselves guilty. They are merely the organs of guilt — the inlets of temptation and the outlets of surrender. When, in the reign of the Bloody Mary, Archbishop Cranmer was led to the stake, and extending the hand wh:ch in a moment of weakness had subscribed to the dogmas of the Papal Supremacy and the Real Presence, he held it steadily in the flames, exclaiming: "This unworthy hand hath offended," he did an act which, in spite of all my reverence for him as one of "the noble army of martyrs," I cannot but feel was unworthy of an educated conscience. Cranmer's hand was not to be blamed for having subscribed to the doctrines of Antichrist any more than Cranmer's hand was to be praised for having translated the four Gospels; and for him to punish his hand as though it were guilty was a piece of needless cruelty, if not of ostentatious penance. No; the guilt was not in the hand : the guilt was in the soul that wielded the hand.1 Again: to pluck out the bodily eye, to cut off the bodily hand, does not 1 It is painful to recall that the ardent Origen, in much the same spirit, literally obeyed Matt, xix, 12. 20 230 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. really relieve the moral difficulty. For, suppose the Lord's command were to be literally carried out — all humanity becoming eyeless, earless, tonguel ess, hand- less, footless — think you that all sin would thereby be abolished? Rendering our verdicts according to the rulings of the Divine Judge, many a man has committed murder whose hand was at the same time locked in paralysis, many a man has com mitted adultery whose eye was at the same time veiled by cataract. No ; a literal obedience would not remove the difficulty. Once more : the bodily organs, as we have seen, are the instruments of tbe soul's operations, indispensable, at least while we are in this world, to its activities. This it is which Eom. vi, 13. makes it possible for us, on the one hand, to pre sent our members unto sin as instruments of un righteousness, and, on the other hand, to present these members as instruments of righteousness unto 1 cor. vi, 20. God. In fact, we are expressly bidden to glorify ' God in our bodies as well as in our spirits, for both are alike his. But how can I glorify God in my body, if I have no eyes to see his glory, no ear to hear his word, no tongue to speak his praise, no hand to do his will, no foot to move toward his throne? No; the Mountain Teacher evidently means something^ far deeper than mere bodily amputation. The Excision What, then, does our Lord mean ? Simply this : ituai! Pir" According to a very common figure of speech, which you, young gentlemen, recognize as meton ymy, he puts the eye or organ of seeing for the thing seen, the hand or organ of doing for the THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 231 thing done ; the eye being the passive side of our natures, the hand the active. It is as though our Master had said: "If that which thine eye sees or thy hand does occasions thee to sin, either against others or against thyself, then let that thing hence forth be to thee as though it existed not; in other words, as though thou hadst in reference to that thing no eye, no hand; renounce that thing so thoroughly that it shall be to thee as though it were annihilated." It is Christ's doctrine of asceti cism. Not asceticism for self-denial's own sake, as though it were meritorious in itself: that is the mistake of those who subject themselves to the pre- Coi. h, 20-23. cepts and doctrines and ordinances of men, such as "Handle not, nor taste, nor touch (all which things are to perish with the using) ; which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will-worship, and humility, and severity to the body; but are not of any .value against the indulgence of the flesh": such morbid asceticism as St. Simeon Sty- lites displayed when, in the spirit of an ostentatious humility and self-denial, he lived, exposed to all the vicissitudes of the weather — day and night, summer and winter— for thirty years on the top of a column sixty feet high and four feet thick. No ; Christ's asceticism is not asceticism for its own sake, but asceticism for the sake of the moral disci pline and rectification of character. And so we pass to the, reason which the Divine Christ's Eea- Man assigns for his severe prescription: "For it Preserip- is profitable for thee that one of 'thy members Matt! v' 29. should perish, and not thy whole body be cast 232 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. into hell." The same reason is again assigned later on in Capernaum, with still greater particu larity and emphasis : Mark ix, 43-48. If thy hand cause thee to stumble, cut it off : it is good for thee to enter into life maimed, rather than having thy two hands to go into hell, into the unquenchable fire. And if thy foot cause thee to stumble, cut it off: it is good for thee to enter into life halt, rather than having thy two feet to be cast into hell. And if thine eye cause thee to stumble, cast it out : it is good for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell ; where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. The phraseology, you perceive, is Jewish. This word here translated "hell" is Gehenna, the Greek word for Valley of Hinnom, which was a deep glen on the south of Jerusalem, sometimes also called Tophet. In this gorge of Hinnom, or Gehenna, during the idolatrous reigns of Ahaz and Manasseh, parents had offered their children in fiery sacrifice to the Ammonite god Molech. In consequence of these horrid abominations, the pious king Josiah defiled the valley — that is, pronounced it ceremonially unclean, by strewing it with human bones. Afterward it became the receptacle, not only of the refuse and offal of the city, but also of the carcasses of animals and executed felons; and, according to some accounts, fires were evermore kept burning in the valley to consume the garbage relics. At all events, even as early as the time of Isaiah, the Valley of Hinnom or Gehenna, had become the type of that corning world of punish ment which awaits the reprobate, whose worm dieth not, whose fire is not quenched. iugHuman" This is the sense in which our Lord himself uses The Phraseol ogy Jewish. 2 Chron. xxviii 3 : xxxiii, 6. 2 Kings xxiii, 10. Isa. lxvi, 24. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 233 the word: for, although his language is Jewish, his meaning is for all lands and times. As he would have us take the plucking out the eye or the cutting off the hand, not literally, but spiritually, so he would have us take the casting of the whole body into Gehenna, not literally, but spiritually. His meaning is this : Whatever occasions you to stumble, no matter how innocent in itself, renounce it instantly and wholly, even though it pains you as much as the plucking out an eye or the cutting off a hand; for it is better to suffer partial loss in this world than total loss in the next; eternity is longer than time. This, then, is the choice before you: Self-indulgence here, and remediless destruc tion there ; or, self-denial here, aud eternal salva tion there. It is, you perceive, a simple, prac tical question of profit and loss — a question which every business man can appreciate. It is the pro logue of our Lord's own fuller declaration a few months later: If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and Mark viii, 34-87. take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever would save his life shall lose it ; and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's shall save it. For what doth it profit a man, to gain the whole world, and forfeit his life? For what should a man give in exchange for his life ? That is to say: "Better lose this world if, by losing it, you gain the next." Sharp language, this, for one whose name is Love. But who shall teach us, if it is not the Lord of truth and Judge of men? Practical Ap- , . . . , plication to And now let us take^this prescription home, and Seventh honestly inquire, each for himself, whether we have ment. *" 234 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. any offending members which need amputation. You will suffer me to be very specific and plain and faithful. I know that our topic is a painful one, a genuine instance of morbid anatomy. Neverthe less, the scalpel and saw and forceps do have their healing uses. Let us, then, be heroic as we submit ourselves to this spiritual surgery. Naturally enough, for it is distinctly hinted iu the Heavenly Teacher's own language, our attention should be chiefly directed to those occasions of stumbling which are, in an eminent sense, bodily. For, although the bodily senses in themselves are not and cannot be guilty, yet, as we have seen, they are the organs of communication between the world within us and the world without us, the avenue through which evil spirits rush in on incursions of temptation, and through which evil passions rush out on excursions of indulgence. Such, for ex ample, as our Lord himself indicates with awful emphasis of specification, is the capacity for the marital relation. Constituting, as it does, the very basis and bond of human society, affecting pro foundly all its supreme interests, this matter is too tremendously momentous to be passed over in silence; at the same time, it is too delicate to admit of amplified discourse. Enough that I simply remind you that whatever fosters or suggests un chaste desire or thought — whether it be painting or statuary, opera or dance, romance or song, am biguous allusion or the figment of one's own im agination, as iu the prophet Ezekiel's vision ofthe Ezek. vm. chambers of imagery — it must be instantly, remorse- THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 235 lessly, everlastingly renounced. Martin Luther never uttered anything more sensible than when he said: Tou cannot prevent the devil from shooting arrows of evil Martin Luther. thoughts into your heart : but take care that you do not let such arrows stick and grow there. Do as a good old man of past times has said : " I can't prevent a bird from flying over my head, but I can prevent him from making a nest in my hair." May you and I ever be worthy of the eulogium pronounced by Coriolanus on the noble sister of Publicola, "the moou of Rome": Chaste as the icicle " Coriolanus," That's curded by the frost from purest snow, And hangs on Dian's temple. Let me, as I draw toward mv conclusion, remind T^ Earthly . ' . p Marriage a you that the earthly marriage is, and from the Type of the beginning was divinely meant and ordained to be, a type of the heavenly marriage. We are ex pressly told that Adam is a figure or type of him Eom. v, 14. who was to come; and that the Church has been 2Cor. xi,2. espoused as a pure virgin to one husband, even Jesus Christ. Indeed, this conception of Jesus Christ and his Church under figure of bridegroom and bride underlies the whole Scripture from Gen esis to Revelation. It is foreshadowed in the para- Gen. a, 18-25. ble of Eden. It is typified in the spiritual marriage between Jehovah and his covenant-people: "Thy isa.iiv,5. Maker is thy husband; Jehovah of hosts is his Thou shalt no more be termed Azubah (Forsaken) ; Isa. lxii, 4. Neither shall thy land any more be termed Shammah (Deso late) : 236 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. But thou shalt be called Hephzi-bah (My delight is in her), And thy land Beulah (Wedded) ; For Jehovah delighteth in thee, And thy land shall be married. It is the theme of the Song of loves, wherein Ps.xiv. the Psalmist sets forth the warlike prowess, the divine majesty, the just government of the royal Bridegroom ; and the personal beauty, the gor geous attire, the exultant retinue of the royal Bride. It furnishes the prophets with their most frequent and powerful imagery in their denuncia tions of Israel's coquetry with idols and open apostasy, setting forth her sins in this respect under the various terms of marital infidelity. It is expressly and emphatically asserted in the New Testament. Let me cite a single example : Eph. v, 22-33. Wives, be in subjection unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, being himself the saviour of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives also be to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself up for it ; that he might sanctify it, having cleansed it by tbe washing (laver) of water with the word, that he might present the church to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing : but that it should be holy and without blemish. Even so ought husbands also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his own wife loveth himself; for no man ever hated his own flesh ; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as Christ also the church ; because we are members of his body. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife ; and the twain shall become one flesh. This mystery is great ; but I speak in regard of Christ and of the church. Nevertheless do ye also severally love each one his own wife even as himself; and let the wife see that she fear her husband. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 237 It is a striking instance of St. Paul's habit of struggling after the ideal. Instead of conceiving the relation of Christ and his Church from the relation of husband and wife, he conceives the rela tion of husband and wife from the relation of Christ and his Church. Instead of pulling heaven down to earth, he lifts earth up to heaven. To him Christ is the ideal Bridegroom; and the Church is the ideal Bride, As then Christ can never impose a despotic command, so the Church can never yield a slavish obedience. Here, then, is the model for the wife's submission.1 It is as i It will relieve the apparent severity of the apostle's pre cept, if we recall the condition of woman in the age in which he lived : in fact, contemporaneous circumstances are as much a part of the exegetical apparatus as is the lexicon or the grammar. Remember, then, that when Paul wrote his letters, the doctrine of human equality before God was an absolutely new doctrine. From time immemorial, even as now in the pagan East, woman had been over-ridden in every direction of life, physical, intellectual, aesthetic, social, moral. She had been regarded almost as a chattel, at best but a convenient animal. When therefore the Apostle Paul, in his missionary tours among the heathen communities, went forth announcing that in Christ Jesus there was henceforth neither Jew nor Gen tile, neither bondman nor freedman, neither male nor female, but all were one in Christ, no wonder that pagan woman, sud denly conscious of her emancipati6n and moral equality with her husband before God, was tempted to abuse her new- born freedom. Suddenly emancipated, her Oriental, exuberant temperament easily led her into undue liberties. Perhaps — e. g., she felt impelled to air her opinions too freely in public assemblies : therefore the apostle (1 Cor. 14 : 84) bade her keep Bilence in the churches. Perhaps she felt herself absolved from all obligations to her husband, especially if that husband continued to be, as was doubtless often the case, an uncon verted, heathen husband : therefore the apostle says : "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands." But while all 238 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. though the apostle had said : " Wives, I would have you ponder well the meaning of the conjugal relation. It was divinely ordained to be a type of the heavenly marriage. Christ is the real Hus band, being the Head of the Church and the Saviour of the body. Infinitely perfect, he cannot impose any unjust command. The Church is the real Wife : as such, she is subject to her divine Lord in everything. In like manner, your husband, and this because he is your husband, is your supe rior. Submit yourselves therefore unto him as unto the Lord, in everything : not because he is absolutely perfect — he may be immensely far from that — but because he is a husband, and therefore ideally perfect. That is to say : In submitting yourself to your husband, obey not so much the man as the idea." It is a very lofty standard of morals, carrying us quite into Utopia. But then, young gentlemen, it is the destiny of Christianity to solidify Utopia into Realization. In like man ner, Christ's love to his Church is the model for the husband's love to his wife : " Christ loved the Church, and gave himself up for her." Accord- this is true, I must also say that, in the matter of technical, formal, visible authority, the wife is subordinate to the hus band. Indeed, a dual authority is practically impossible ; there must be a. head, a formal, recognized head ; and that head, according to the Bible, is the man : (See Gen. 2 : 31-23 ; 3 : 16 ; 1 Cor. 11 : 3, 7-9 ; 14 : 34, 35 ; 1 Tim. 2 : 11-14 ; Titus 2 : 5 ; 1 Peter 3 : 1-6, etc.) Not that woman is, in any of the essen tial, constituent elementals of humanity, inferior to man : she is, as we have seen, homogeneous in nature with him, bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh. But in the matter of formal authority, she is divinely meant to be subordinate to man. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 239 ingly, the husband who follows this divine model will ever gladly sacrifice himself for his wife. • Least of all, can he ever impose a command or exercise an authority which his wife will not gladly obey. And when any husband takes advantage of the Scriptural teaching respecting the wife's modal or formal inferiority, and lords it over her, or talks slightingly of her or of her sex as an inferior creation, he does a contemptible, brutal thing ; and with Emilia, I could pray heaven to — Put in every honest hand a whip, "Othello," IV, 2. To lash the rascal naked through the world, Even from the East to th' West I No ; it is Christ who is the real Bridegroom ; it is his Church who is the real Bride. And this heavenly bridal, let me repeat, was divinely fore shadowed from the very beginning, even in Eden's primeval nuptial. Let me advert to three points of analogy between the two bridals. And, first : As Eve owed her origin to Adam, so Christhimseif the Church owes her origin to Christ. She at least' 0f his r Sm is no instance of spontaneous generation ; she is no Church. autochthon, self-orient out of humanity or nature. She is, so to speak, a divine gemmation, budding from the bleeding side of the second and true Adam, pierced on the cross, and sleeping in that other garden which, alas, was no Eden, but a ceme tery, out of whose sepulchre sprung the true tree of life.1 In other words, Jesus Christ, is the head Eph. i, 22, 2s. of the Church, which is his body. 1 The idea is as old as Augustine, but he curiously subsidizes it in behalf of Sacramentalism. "At the beginning of the 240 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Christ and his Ao-ain: As Adam and Eve were not twain but one Unity. flesh, that is, one personality ; so are Christ and his Church. As such, they share a common life,' being one in nature, in character, in experience, in temptation, in passion, in triumph ; she his fol- Lukexxii, 28. lower, continuing with him in his temptations, fill- Coi. i, 24. ing up on her part that which is lacking of his afflictions in her flesh for his body's sake, which is Coi. iu i. the Church ; rising with him from the dead; over- Rev, iii, 21. _ . . . ... coming, aud sitting down with him in his throne ; Eom. vui, 17. ioint heir with him to his patrimony of the worlds Heb i 2, and the ages. Not that the Church has yet attained l Cor. xiii, 9-n. to all this. She is still but a child, speaking as a child, feeling as a child, thinking as a child. But the day is approaching when that which is perfect is come, and that which is in part shall be done away. Then shall she put away childish Eph. iv, 13. things. Then shall she attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a full-grown personality, unto the measure of the stature of Christ, standing before him in very truth as his helpmeet and complemental, his peer in the second Eden as Eve was Adam's peer in the human race the woman was made of a rib taken from the side of the man while he slept ; for it seemed fit that even then Christ and his Church should be foreshadowed in this event. For that sleep of the man was the death of Christ, whose side, as he hung lifeless upon the cross, was pierced with a spear, and there flowed from it blood and water ; and these we know to be the sacraments by which the Church is 'built up.' For Scripture uses this very word, not saying, ' he formed,' or ' framed,' but ' built her up into a woman ; ' whence also the apostle speaks of 'the building up of the body of Christ, which is the Church.' "— " City of God," Book XXII, ch. 17. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 241 first. Then shall he indeed proudly present her to Eph. v, 27. himself as his own Lady-elect, even the Church, glorious and holy, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. Even now, in view of this magnifi cent certainty, she may well be called by her divine Husband's own name — Christ, Christian.1 O Church of the living God, espoused as a pure vir- 2Cor. xi,2,3. gin to oue husband, even Christ, beware lest by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, so thy heart should be corrupted from the simplicity and the purity that is toward Christ, from thy single-heartedness toward thy one Bride groom. Once more : As there was but one Adam and As but One one Eve, so there is but one Christ and one Church, but One How mistaken, how egotistic, how sinful, the sane- urc ' tity of St. Catharine of Alexandria, and St. Catha rine of Sienna, in fancying each far herself that she was the spouse of Christ ! No ; as there is but one Bridegroom, so there is but one Bride. And that Bride is the one Church of the living God, of what ever land, or age, or sect, who call upon the name icor.1,2. of our Lord Jesus Christ in every place, their Lord and ours. Neither Christ nor his Church is a mon strosity, neither hydra-headed nor hundred-bodied. Many stones, indeed, yet but one Temple ; many branches, yet but one Vine; many sheep, yet but one Shepherd; many members, yet but one Body ; many paranymphs or virgins, yet but one Bride. Aye, monogamy is the law alike for both Edens. 1 Perhaps also iciipiot, ku/ho«ij, Kirche, Kirk, Church. 242 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Eph. iv, 1-6. I beseech you then to walk worthily of the calling wherewith ye were called, with all lowliness and meekness, with long- suffering, forbearing one another in love ; giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as also ye were called in one hope of your calling ; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all, and through all, and in 1 Cor. xii, 12, 13. all. For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body ; so also is Christ. For in one Spirit were we all bap tized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free ; and were all made to drink of one Spirit. George Eobin son. Head of thy Church beneath, The catholic, the true, On all her members breathe, Her broken frame renew : Then shall thy perfect will be done, When Christians love and live as one ! The Bride groom's PromisedReturn. Isa. liv, 7, 8. Rev. xix, 6-9. And now I come to my last point : The Bride groom's promised return. For now it is only the espousal time, the Church's secret as a pure virgin to Christ : then shall be the open, everlasting bridal, even the Bridegroom's joyous presentation of the Church to himself before all the universe in all her incomparable beauty. Then shall it be seen, that although for a small moment he had forsaken us, it was that he might with great mercies and ever lasting kindness gather us. Even now may it be ours to hear, as it were, the voice of a great multi tude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunders, saying : Hallelujah : for the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigneth. Let us rejoice and be exceeding glad, and let us give the glory unto him : for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT. 2J3 Blessed are they who are bidden to the marriage supper of the Lamb. Ascend, Beloved, to the joy ; Horatlus Bonar. The festal day is come ; To-night the Lamb doth feast his own, To-night he with his Bride sits down, To-night puts on the Bpousal crown, In the great upper room. Sorrow and sighing are no more, The weeping hours are past ; To-night the waiting will be done, To-night the wedding robe put on, The glory and the joy begun ; The crown has come at last. Ascend, Beloved, to the feast ; Make haste, thy day is come ; Thrice blest are they the Lamb doth call, To share the heavenly festival, In the new Salem's palace hall; Our everlasting home. 0 God, who hast prepared for those who love thee such good Collect. things as pass man's understanding ; Pour into our hearts such love toward thee, that we, loving thee above all things, may obtain thy promises, which exceed all that we can desire ; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. IX. THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt not steal. Exodus xx, 15. IX. THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. What is the origin of property? What is the Problems o basis of property? What are the rights of prop- roper y- erty? What are the limitations of property? In brief, and comprehensively: What is property? These are basal questions, lying among the very roots of society, justly engaging the deepest atten tion of modern sociologists. It is not for me to discuss these grave questions Man's Orfgi- technically, from the platform of the professional na ar political economist. But it is for me to discuss them in light of what I believe to be a divine revelation. Listen, then, to one of the primeval archives of mankind : God said, Let us make man in our image, after our like- Gen. 1, 26-28. ness : and let them have dominion over the fish ofthe sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. And God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him ; male and female created he them. And God blessed them : and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. It was man's original commission, humanity's primal charter. And history is the record of man's execution of his original commission ; civilization is the story of man's unfolding of the privileges 247 248 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. of* his primal charter. Wherever civilized man has gone, there he has been subduing the earth, gaining dominion over everything that moveth on it. Behold, for example, man's dominion over the animals of nature ; see how he makes the fish feed him, the sheep clothe him, the horse draw him, the fowl of the air yield him the pinions with which to spread his own opinions. Behold man's dominion over the face of nature ; see how he dikes out the ocean, as in Holland; digs canals, as at Suez; shatters reefs, as at Hell Gate ; spans waters, as East River: tunnels mountains, as St. Gothard; builds railways, as from Atlantic to Pacific; re claims jungles and deserts and pestilential swamps; brings about interchanges of vegetable and animal life; even modifies the very climates. Behold man's dominion over the resources of nature; see how he subsidizes its mineral substances, turn ing its sands into lenses, its clay into bricks, its iron into countless shapes for countless purposes; see how he subsidizes its vegetable products, making its grains feed him, its cottons clothe him, its forests house him, its coals warm him. Behold man's dominion over the mechanical powers of nature; see how he makes its levers Hft his loads, its wheels and axles weigh his anchors, its pulleys raise his weights, its inclined planes move his blocks, its wedges split his ledges, its screws propel his ships. Behold man's dominion over the forces of nature ; see how he makes the air waft his crafts, the water run his mills, the heat move his engines, the elec tricity bear his messages; see how he converts THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 249 gravitation itself into a means of levitation. What a magnificent illustration of all this was our own glorious International Exposition of 1876 ! Verily, Thou hast made man but little lower than God, Ps- vili> 5 9- And crownest him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands ; Thou hast put all things under his feet : All sheep and oxen, Tea, and the beasts of the field ; The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, Whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. O Jehovah, our Lord, How excellent is thy name in all the earth 1 Such is humanity's Magna Charta. All is in right of Eden's majestic commission : " Subdue the earth." And this commission to subdue the earth — that Labor the is, to subsidize nature — is the moral basis of prop- Property. erty. A man has the right to own what he wins, provided he wins it under the authority and according to the terms of the divine charter. Not that he absolutely owns what he wins ; for he is not the creator of the earth — he is only an admin istrator of it ; not the owner — he is only a tenant ; not the lord paramount — he is only a feudatory. In other words, man holds the estate of earth in trust, his only right here being the right of usu fruct. But relatively, in relation to his fellows, man owns, at least within limits, what he rightfully wins. What these limits are constitute one of the gravest problems of political economy and soci ology itself. But to this we shall recur. Mean while observe : Labor (or, to revert to the poetic 250 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. phraseology of Eden's charter, obedience to the divine command to subdue the earth) is the moral source and basis and condition of the right to prop erty. The right to property rests not on mere occupancy, or mere cultivation, or mere physical force of any kind ; the right to property rests on obedience to the Creator's mandate to subdue the earth to the Creator's own sway. Hence, property is a divine institution ; the right of property is a sacred right. Nor can I do better here than to cite a paragraph from that masterly treatise, entitled " The Nation," by the late Dr. Elisha Mulford : Mulford's " Na- The ground of the right in the existence of property, and hon, Chap. Qf ^e rj^.j1t t0 property, is in the vocation from God in the world, of the individual and of the nation. Property is the material for the work of man in his vocation on the earth, and in that alone is the ground of its right. If property becomes in itself an end, then personality is subjected to the things which it possesses. If it be held apart from the vocation of man and the moral relations and obligations involved in that, then it becomes mere possession, the instrument of a selfish interest, and the means for the degradation of personality. To the individual and to the nation God gives his powers and his working field, and these are the talents of each, and in this alone does property consist. It is thus, as it is given in and for the vocation of man on the earth, that its use affords a ground for the manifestation of character, and there may be in it the expression of individuality, and elements of culture and freedom. In this also is the sign of the sacredness of the relation which the individual and the nation bear to the earth. Thus, also, if there be no recognition of a vocation which the individual and the nation are to fulfill, then the origin of prop erty is in the arbitrary or the accidental ; it is in its origin arbitrary — the seizure by force and choice of that which each may lay hold of; or accidental — that which each in his fortune may stumble on or is in luck to obtain, and it is the sign only of the avarice of men who clutch it in their grasp, or the risk of men who find it by the way. Dr. Brownson's definition of THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 251 property is as profound as it is beautiful — "Property is com munion with God, through the material world." As a matter of fact, the sense of ownership is Sense of one of the necessary outgrowths of civilization, a Human Aud the higher the civilization, the more personal ° en' this sense of owuership. Here is one of the secrets of the elevation of oppressed races. Proba bly the richest blessing which the Act of Emanci pation conferred on the freedmen was the recogni tion of their right to own property. One of the surest ways of elevating the Indians, as we are beginning to see and acknowledge, is by granting them proprietary rights. One of the . peculiar blessings of our Philadelphia system of building associations is that it enables so many of our towns people to own homes, and so fosters the spirit of industry, economy, independence, aud domesticity. In fact, it is only in imaginary commonwealths, like the Atlantis of Plato, or the Utopia of Sir Thomas More (the very meaning of "U-topia," ob, tStcos, is " no place ") that society exists without property. The commonwealth proposed by Gon- zalo, the honest old counsellor of Naples, is as impossible as it is picturesque : I' the commonwealth I would by contraries Execute all things : for no kind of traffic Would I admit ; no name of magistrate ; Letters should not be known ; riches, poverty, And use of service, none ; contract, succession, Bourn, bound of land, tilth, vineyard, none; No use of metal, corn, or wine, or oil : No occupation ; all men idle, all : And women too ; but innocent and pure : No sovereignty : "The Tempest," II, 1. 252 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. All things in common nature should produce, Without sweat or endeavour : treason, felony, Sword, pike, knife, gun, or need of any engine, Would I not have ; but nature should bring forth, Of its own kind, all foisson, all abundance, To feed my innocent people. No, young gentlemen, Society, in any just sense of the term, cannot long exist without the emergence of property. Moreover : property differentiates men. The very raising of the question "mine" and " thine" individualizes men, giving them personal characteristics and personal responsibilities. Prop erty: why it is the etymological daughter of the Laiin proprius, meaning special, peculiar (from peculiaris, belonging to one, one's own), personal. In brief, and comprehensively : The sense of own ership is one of the characterizing tokens of humankind, separating mau discretively and ever lastingly from brute. The animal has its habitat, but does not own it : man alone can own his own home. It is this sense of rightfully owning prop erty — whether it may have been acquired by gift, by inheritance, or by toil — which gives to mau a sense of dignity and responsibility impossible to a mere animal. Yes; it is right to get and to keep property. ManhasLimi- But now we must look at another fundamental tations. principle: Mau himself has limitations. In fact, human life itself is largely a matter of definitions, or discoveries of divine boundaries. The best definition of a man is when you have clearly de fined {de, finis) him — that is, marked the limits of him. For no man really understands his place in THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 253 society until he has first discovered his own limita tions. And this discovery is of slow growth. How profoundly as well as musically the laureate has described it : "In Memor- The baby new to earth and sky, iam," XLIV. What time his tender palm is prest Against the circle of the breast, Has never thought that " this is I " : But as he grows he gathers much, And learns the use of " I " and " me," And finds " I a,m not what I see, And other than the things I touch." So rounds he to a separate mind From whence clear memory may begin, As through the frame that binds him in His isolation grows defined. And it is God himself who assigns our limita tions, determining our appointed seasons, and the Acts xvii, 26. bounds of our habitation. What a signal instance of this was the divine allotment of the land of Canaan under Joshua : Te shall inherit the land by lot according to your families ; Num. xxxiii, 54. to the more ye shall give the more inheritance, and to the fewer thou shalt give the less inheritance : wheresoever the lot falleth to any man, that shall be his ; according to the tribes of your fathers shall ye inherit. It is this divine allotment " which," to use the "Jewish graphic language of Dean Stanley, " has made the 289. latter half of the Book of Joshua the geographi cal manual of the Holy Land, the Domesday- Book of the Conquest of Palestine." I believe, young gentlemen, that a profound mysterious sociological truth still underlies the ancient law- 22 254 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Dent, xxxii, 8, 9. Prov. xvi, i Ps. xvi, 5, 6. Limitations SpeciallyTrue of Property. giver's statement in his farewell song in the plains of Moab : When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, When he separated the children of men, He set the bounds of the peoples According to the number of the children of Israel. For Jehovah's portion is his people ; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance. But whatever the venerable patriarch may have meant by these mysterious lines, this thing is cer tain : human life is not a chance lottery: human life is a divine allotment. Hearken to the Wise Man : The lot is cast into the lap ; But the whole disposing thereof is of Jehovah. May.it be for you and me to join in the Psalmist's grateful song : Jehovah is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup : Thou maintainest my lot. The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; Tea, I have a goodly heritage. May each of us ever be found "standing in his own lot and place ! " In other words, may all of us ever be found devoutly acknowledging this great principle of divine limitations : each of us, on the one hand, stoutly maintaining his own allotment, and each of us, on the other hand, cheerfully recog nizing the allotments of others. So shall each of us be true to his own vocation as a member of human society. Now this doctrine of limitations is especially true of property. The very fact that a man has THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 255 property is a limiting fact, investing him with moral boundaries which no other mau has a right to cross. For, as it is right to acquire property, so it is right to retain property. It is no mere play of words to say that what a man owns is his own. And being his own, what he owns cannot at the same time be anothers. And all men have this right to own: not indeed the right to own co- equally — that is the Communistic delusion — but the co-equal right to own something — that is the Christian doctrine; and this is as true for the stevedore as for the millionaire. The right of the poorest widow to her mite is as sacred and inviolable as the right of the richest nation to its exchequer. And now we are prepared for the Eighth Com- The Eighth mand ment: Thou shalt not steal. ment. This word "steal" is a short, unambiguous, Exod-xx>15- English word, as open in its meaning as it is stealthy in its working. Let us, then, deal with' it honestly. For our commandment is still greatly needed. 0nr Cem- T . mandment lo steal, 1 am sorry to say, is a universal tempta- Needed. tion, common to all sorts of people. True, I would not go as far as Hamlet went when he said to Polouius, "Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world "Hamiet,"ii,2. goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand " ; or when, having asked, "What's the news?" aud Rosencrantz having replied, "None, my lord, but that the world's grown houest," the royal Dane grimly remarked, " Then is Doomsday near." No; I believe that there are a great many more houest 256 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. people in this world than society is commonly cred ited with. Nevertheless, stealing is a frequent vice of society, common to poor and rich, savage and savant. This temptation to steal springs from various sources. For example : It often springs from -the sense of necessity : this it is which, as you remember, gives such tragic power to Victor Hugo's " Les Miserables," whose hero, Jean Val- jean, stole a loaf of bread. Again, the temptation to steal springs from indolence, or, to use a good, or rather bad, old French-Latin word, laziness : for there are not a few persons (possibly you know some of them) who, instead of getting an honest living by working, prefer to get it by what they call their wits, resorting to all sorts of shifts and tricks, which are really stealings. Again, the temptation to steal springs from dissolute or what is called fast living : how many of the embezzle ments which so often startle the community spring from the fact that the embezzlers had entered on careers of personal debauchery ! Again, the temp tation to steal springs from the love of display: how many of the defalcations which land our citi zens in prison or in Canada are owing to their pas sion for equipage, for furniture, for jewelry, for fashion! Again, and chiefly, the temptation to steal springs from the haste to become rich : how lTim.vi, io. true it is that the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil ! And the poor may love money just as much as the rich. How scorching the stigma with which the blind bard of the Commonwealth brands the lover of money : THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 257 Mammon led them on ; " Paradise Mammon, the least erected spirit that fell Lost," Book J. From heaven ; for e'en in heaven his looks and thoughts Were always downward bent ; admiring more The riches of heaven's pavement, trodden gold, Than aught divine or holy else enjoyed In vision beatific. And just because this temptation to dishonesty — springing from the haste to become rich, is so universal and powerful, it extorted from the ancient prophets their most eloquent denunciations, fiercely accenting their oratory with the wrathful "Woe, woe, woe ! " And now let me pass to mention some of the Samples of many samples of stealing — many, I say ; for the ea mg' varieties of thieving are so great that the name of this evil genius, like that of the Gerasene unclean demon, is Legion. Of course, I need not speak Mark v, 1-9. of overt violations of our commandment, those samples of stealing which the law recognizes and brands as thefts. I need not speak, for example, of professional robbers, or footpads, or smugglers, or burglars, or pickpockets, or shoplifters, or forgers, or swindlers. Neither need I speak of those who keep in their bags divers weights, a great and a Deut. xxv, 13. small, making the ephah small and the shekel Amos vui, 6-7. great, and dealing falsely with balances of de ceit, that they may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes, and sell the refuse of the wheat. Let me rather speak of covert violations of our commandment, carried on un der sanction of society, excepting an occasional rebuke by the especially scrupulous. The vari- ings. 258 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. eties of this kind of stealing are really alarming, and almost infinite. Private steal- Let us first glance at the case of private steal ings. For example: There is the taking advantage of the ignorant in a bargain. Now I am very far from saying that a man who has the opportunity of using the telegraph, or cable, should never use it to his personal advantage. Nevertheless, I think that a fine sense of honor and justice will tend to make him at least careful how he uses information not given to the general public : there is such a thing as the selfish abuse of knowledge. Again : There is the taking advantage of the necessitous, when they lie prostrate and helpless, demanding from them, for instance, extortionate interest for the use of money, exorbitant rent for premises or tools, or extravagant prices for commodities. Again : There is the refusing, I will not say lawful Mages, but I do say fair wages — that is, just com pensation to servants, whether in the family, the farm, the factory, the store, or the bank : for every man born into this world is entitled, by the very fact of his existence upon this footstool of God, to a living. I do not, of- course, say a luxurious living, but I do say a decent living. The em ployee is quite as much entitled to a respectable living as his employer is entitled to net profits. In brief, the compensation should be just : of course, a married man, having a family to sup port, needs larger wages for the same kind of work than a single man does: this is but fair; for society can live only through the family insti- THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 259 tution. Again : There are the misrepresentations on the part of the seller— misrepresentations some times direct, as when he suggests what is false in his advertisements; sometimes indirect, as when he suppresses what is true concerning defects of his offered goods. It is curious to observe in passing that, while the ancients cheated chiefly in quantity, as when they made the ephah small, and the shekel Amo" ^ 5- great, we moderns cheat chiefly in quality, as when we interweave textiles with shoddy, or adulterate butter with oleomargarine. I suspect that qualita tive lying is even worse than quantitative. Again : There are the misrepresentations on the part of the buyer. So long ago as the time of Solomon, this modern habit was in vogue : It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer : Prov. xx, 14. But when he is gone his way, then he boasteth. This vulgar habit of beating down the price of articles is a two-edged sword. When a buyer goes into a store to buy a piece of goods, and undertakes to beat down the price, not because he thinks it unfair, but simply because he likes to beat down, and succeeds in his attempt, he thinks he is " smart." But the seller has been smarter ; for, knowing his customer's habit, he put his first price high enough to bear the depression. The trouble is that both buyer and seller have been using divers weights, a great and a small, each talking avoirdupois for the other, but meaning troy; each talking troy for himself, but meaning avoirdupois. How constantly every buyer has to 260 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. be on the alert lest he be taken in by " the short ton"! Again: There is the delay in the pay ment of debts when due. Hearken to the Wise Man: Prov. iii, 28. Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come again, And to-morrow I will give, When thou hast it by thee. For the delay to meet obligations when they ma ture amounts to stealing. Again : There is the con tracting of debts beyond any reasonable possibility of paying them, the indulgence in venturesome speculations, the living beyond income — these, and such as these, morally surveyed, are stealings. Again : There is the practice of endorsing, or going security. Hearken again to the Wise Man : Prov. xi, 15. He that is surety for a stranger shall smart for it : But he that hateth suretiship is sure. Not that this adage of the wise man forbids kind ness to a person who has been unfortunate in business : but it does forbid rash endorsement, or inconsiderate lending of name without understand ing all the circumstances of the case. It is right for you to help your friend when he is in trouble : but it is not right for you to help him, however much in trouble, if your endorsement of his note is going to cost some other friend of yours his comfortable home. To aid one man by endorsing him may re sult in stealing from many men. Again : There is the habit of begging for endorsements : for example : tempting one to misrepresent, on the one hand, the amount of assets, and, on the other hand, the THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 261 amount of liabilities ; contracting liabilities without the knowledge of the endorser ; keeping up appear ances when insolvent : in brief, offering a premium for the use of your name. I know that when a man has been unfortunate, and no one but himself knows it, the world's advice often is : " Oh, keep up appearances ; don't dismiss your coachman ; the tide will turn ; your trouble need not be known." Friend, you have no right to do that when the name of your kinsman or kind acquaintance is on the back of your paper. If you conceal your mis fortune from him, you are stealing. Again : There is the dishonest taking advantage of bankrupt laws : I mean, the profiting by ambiguities, by mis constructions or misapprehensions, by oversights in a statement of particulars, by legal loopholes and quibbles. Young gentlemen, I am not speaking here as an expounder of current or conventional morali ties : but I am speaking here as a teacher of distinc tively Christian principles. I declare, then, that the refusing, after the return of prosperity, to pay debts not legally binding or from which you have been legally released, is a genuine case of stealing. Again : There is the withholding from foreign authors the proceeds due them for sales of their literary property in this country. Our poet-diplo matist, himself President of the American Copy right League, puts the point tersely thus : In vain we call old notions fudge James Eussell And bend our conscience to our dealing ; The Ten Commandments will not budge, And stealing will continue stealing. Lowell. 262 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Again : There is the evading of government taxes and custom-house duties by making defective or ambiguous returns — a mode of stealing which, I regret to say, is not altogether unfashionable among people of position. Once more : There is the lazy subsistence or dependence on charity (and there is a great deal more of this than we at first recognize) ; the dependence on friends to eke us out, when, if we had been a little less slothful in diligence as Eom. xu, ii. well as a little more fervent in spirit, we might not have needed their aid : the sluggard, I take it, is quite a prince among thieves. Such are some of the many samples of private stealings. Did I not say their name is Legion ? Official steal- Let me now for a few moments speak of the case of official stealings, no matter what the office is, whether public or private, whether in a bank, or in a store, or in an institution, or under the govern ment. Office is in its very nature a trust ; and as such it is a sacred thing. And to betray a trust is the worst, because the meanest, kind of stealing. For example : There is the misappropriation or diversion of trust-funds by the officers of corpora tions, the managers of societies, the executors of estates and bequests. Again : There is the embez zlement by confidential clerks ; the dishonest entries or omissions in ledgers; the fraudulent returns made by agents; the deceiving contracts under mythical names ; the civic corruptions by bribes, emoluments, sales of offices, vendues of political opportunities; the Congressional substitution of the " fiat " silver dollar, worth say eighty cents, for ings. THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 263 the standard gold dollar, worth one hundred cents; and so on almost endlessly. Young friends, the ancient race of Homan publicans is not yet dead. The extortionate farmers of taxes and dishonest collectors of returns are still in the land. If it should please God to grant an awakening of con science among the office holders of America, public and private, how many Zaccheuses would have to announce : " Lord, if I have wrongfully exacted Luke xix, 8. aught of any man, I restore fourfold." ?Lnd now let me pass from official stealings to Corporate what I may call associated or corporate stealings. There is something in the very nature of the organ ization of a company which somehow tends to the extinction of personal responsibility. It is well understood that many a man will, as a member of a corporation — no matter what kind, whether a trust company, like a bank or a charitable institu tion, or an executive company, like a railroad or a telegraph organization — do things as a manager of that company which he would scorn himself for doing as a private individual on his own personal responsibility. In fact, it has become an aphorism that corporations have no souls. And monopolies, or corporations granted the exclusive privilege of manufacturing or selling certain articles of com merce: — what are they but oftentimes organized robberies of society, thefts of your purse and my purse ? Pardon me, young gentlemen, if I, a man of the cloister rather than of the exchange, shall not be able in what I am about to say, to quote the dialect of the mart or the pool-room with technical 264 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. exactitude : I think, however, I shall be able to speak with sufficient clearness for you to under stand what I mean. For example : There is, on the one hand, the practice of " bearing " the market — that is, lowering the value of stocks ; and there is, on the other hand, the practice of " bulling " the market — that is, raising the value of stocks : and all this through the deliberate starting and spreading of sensational rumors : for aught I see, this is theft organized on the basis of fictitious undelivered stock, which was never meant to be delivered : in fact, the name " bear," as applied to a speculative jobber on the Stock Exchange, is said to be de rived from the story of the man who sold a bear's skin before he had caught the bear. Again : There is the practice of "pooling" — that is, when it is a conspiracy organized for contributing money to be used either for a gambling operation in the market, or for bearing and bulling the market price of stocks, with a view to the settlement of differences. Again : There is the practice of " cornering " — that Noah Webster, is, the combining of persons, " who, while secretly holding the whole or the greater part of any stock or species of property, induce another combination to agree to deliver to them a large further quantity at some future time : when the time arrives, the second combination, if tbe corner succeeds, suddenly finds itself unable to buy the amount of the stock or property necessary to enable it to fulfill its contracts, and the first combination fixes at its own will the price at which differences must be settled." Would to Heaven that this second combination were always THE EIGHTH COMMANDMEJST. 265 successful in delivering the promised goods, thus " breaking " the infamous corner ! Again : There is the practice of " watering " — that is, the " increas ing in apparent bulk, without adding to the real value"; as when a company increases its capital stock by issuing new stock, pretending that accu mulated or anticipated profits warrant such increase. Some companies seem to have invested all their cap ital in the constellation Aquarius, illustrating the Wise Man's saw, although in a sense which he did not mean : He that watereth shall be watered also himself. Pr0T- *h 25- Once more : There is the practice of " regrat- ing," or " forestalling the market " — that is, buy ing goods before they are brought to the stall, or contracting for merchandise or provision on its way to the market, with the view of selling it again at an advanced price, thus practically monopolizing the market. Hearken again to the Wise Man : He that withholdeth corn, the people shall curse him : Prov. xi,26 But blessing shall be upon the head of him that selleth it. The withholding of breadstuff's, in order to raise the market, is in some respects the culmina tion of stealing. A profound truth underlies the legend of Hatto, the avaricious Archbishop of Mainz, who, in the time of the great famine of 914, compared the poor to rats, and shutting up a great company of poor people in his vast barn, burned them alive, mocking their cries of agony : wherefore God made him reap what he had sown, sending against him a great plague of mice 23 266 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. who chased him continually from place to place, till, fleeing into his own strong tower in the Rhine near Bingen, they invaded him in his retreat, and miserably devoured him. Bobert Southey has en shrined the legend in his poem entitled "God's Judgment on a Bishop" : Eobert Southey. Down on his knees the Bishop fell, And faster and faster his beads did he tell, As louder and louder drawing near The saw of their teeth without he could hear. And in at the windows and in at the door, And through the walls by thousands they pour, And down from the ceiling and up through the floor, From the right and the left, from behind and before, From within and without, from above and below, And all at once to the Bishop they go. They have whetted their teeth against the stones, And now they pick the Bishop's bones ; They gnaw'd the flesh from every limb ; For they were sent to do judgment on him I Degradation Before leaving this part of my topic, let me be- " Trust." wail the degradation ofthe word "trust." Once it was among the noblest of words, akin to the word "true," meaning just confidence, assured re liance, unshaken fidelity. In those days there could be no richer token of confidence in the moral worth of a corporation or institution than to make it the custodian and manager of an en- trustment, whether sacred or secular. But now this word "trust" has often come to mean, at least practically, the very reverse of what it once meant — namely, an organized betrayal of trust; so that there is even talk of abolishing trust-companies altogether. Young gentlemen, there can be no THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 267 greater literary felony than the debasing a noble word, poisonously tainting its moral tissues, slowly and sacrilegiously murdering its moral personality. But there are other kinds of property besides Thefts besides those which we call real and personal, which may Property. also be stolen. For example : There is the stealing of time ; and time, you know, or will know, is money. When a man comes and takes up twice the time that is necessary in arranging with me for his own advantage, or even the advantage of a good insti tution, he steals my time, and in stealing my time, he steals my patience as well as my money. Again : There is the petty larceny of writing a letter of inquiry for your own advantage, and omitting to enclose a postage stamp; for he that Luke xvi, 10. is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much ; and he that is unrighteous in a very little is unrighteous also in much. Again : There is the stealing of another's time and opportunity and serenity when you keep him waiting and fuming through your own failure to meet your engagement with him punctually. Again: There is the theft of plagiarism, the stealing of ideas, the withholding of credit or praise when credit or praise is due. Again: There is the stealing of reputation or character; but of this I shall speak iu my next lecture. Thus endless are the varieties of stealing. Let me now revert to what I said in the early Removing part of this lecture touching divine limitations, especially in the matter of property. You will remember that this great principle of limitation 268 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. was signally illustrated in Joshua's apportionment of the land of Canaan, allotting to each family its own plat, and defining each lot by what were called " landmarks." These landmarks often con sisted of stones, and therefore could be easily moved. Hence Jehovah's stern prohibition when Deut. xxvii, 17. Israel stood between Gerizim aud Ebal : " Cursed be he that removeth his neighbour's landmark. And all the people shall say, Amen." Keeping in mind that the ancient landmark defined the boundary of what was a divine allotment, let me apply this word landmark to certain fundamental human rights or properties. For example : Every' man has a right to space — that is, the space he needs to live in : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, the man or the company that builds tenement houses without providing sufficient spaces for the occupants removes a neighbor's landmark — that is, steals. Again : every man has right to health : this is one of his landmarks. Accord ingly, the man or the corporation that builds fac tories, without providing proper sanitary arrange ments, removes a neighbor's landmark — that is, steals. Again : every man has right to time. Not indeed to his whole time — for he is a member of society, and therefore owes time to others — but suf ficient time for himself for rest, for study, for his family, and the like : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, the man or the syndicate that does not take this into account removes his neighbor's land mark — that is, steals. Again : every man has right to a fair chance in the struggle for existence. Not THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 269 an equal chance with everybody else ; not a speci ally bright chance, but still a fair chance : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, the man or the monopolist who puts a stumbling block in the way of this man's fair chance removes his neigh bor's landmark — that is, he steals. Again : Every laborer has right to profits of labor: not merely to wages, but also to profits : this is one of his landmarks. O capitalist, respect your neighbor's landmark: do not steal! Again: Every capitalist has right to profits of capital : this is one of his landmarks. O laborer, respect your neighbor's landmark: do not steal! Again: Every man has right to clear judgment : this is one of his land marks. Accordingly, the man who sells him intox icants, stealing away his clearness of mind, removes his neighbor's landmark. O dramseller, do not steal ! Again : Every man has the right to rest : physiologists say, every night, or its equivalent, and one day in every seven : this is one of his land marks. Accordingly, the man or the syndicate that denies him Sunday removes a neighbor's land mark. O corporation, do not steal ! Again : Every man has right to worship : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, the man or the church that makes salvation costly instead of free removes a neighbor's landmark. O Christian, do not steal ! Again, and to follow the second table of the Decalogue : Every man in just authority has right to reverence : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, the child who is unfilial, or the citizen who is disloval, removes a neighbor's landmark. 270 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Again: Every man has right to life: this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly the man who kills, whether swiftly or slowly, removes his neigh bor's landmark. Again : Every man has right to domestic joys: this is one of his landmarks. Ac cordingly, he who commits adultery, whether against the statute of .Moses or against the interpretation of Jesus, removes his neighbor's landmark. Again : Every man has right to property : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, he who steals, whether r.uke xxi, 2. a millionaire's fortune or a widow's lepton, removes his neighbor's landmark. Again : Every man has right to fair representation of his acts, motives, character : this is one of his landmarks. Accord ingly, he who bears false witness against him, whether by word or by act, removes his neighbor's landmark. Again: Every man has right to cer tain environment : this is one of his landmarks. Accordingly, he who covets his neighbor's house, or his wife, or his manservant, or his ox, or any thing that is his, removes his neighbor's landmark. Once more, and comprehensively : Every man has right to himself (under God) : this is his great landmark. Accordingly, the man or the corpora tion that takes from him his chance for personal accountability removes his. neighbor's landmark. O neighbor, do not steal ! God forbid that any one of us should by theft of any kind, however great or however small, incur from Ebal the anathema : Deut. xxvii, 17. Cursed be he that removeth his neighbour's landmark. And let all the people say, Amen I THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 271 God grant that each of us may ever share in the noble maxim of the Father of his Country : I hope I shall always possess firmness and virtue enough to George Wash- maintain, what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the lng n' character of an " Honest Man." So shall we, with a greater than Washington, not only provide things houest in the sight of all men : Eom. xii, 17. we shall also take thought for things honorable in 2 cor. vtu, 21. the sight of the Lord. Let me, as we approach our conclusion, present Our Com- » i , , . , ,. mandment tor a moment our commandment in the light ot in Light of the New Covenant. Moses' legislation was pro- Cnrist- hibitive, saying : " Thou shalt not steal ! " Jesus' legislation is affirmative, saying: "All things what- Matt, vii, 12. soever ye would that men should do unto you, even so do ye also unto them." Or, as his great apostle expresses it: "Owe no man anything, save to love Eom.xiii,s. one another : for he that loveth his neighbour hath fulfilled the law." According to the New Cove nant in Christ Jesus, love is a positive debt. Very interesting and instructive is the etymological his tory of this word "debt": thus: debeo, debitum, debit, debiter, debt, devoir, du, due, duty (in the sense of import or a civic must), duty (in the sense of obligation or a moral ought). So also the words owe, own, owed, ought, etc.1 What profound mor- 1 " The English defective verb, ought, is the old preterite of the verb to owe, which was at an early period used as a sort of auxiliary with the infinitive, implying the sense of necessity, just as we, and many of the Continental nations, now employ have and its equivalents. ' I have much to do,' in English ; J'ai beaucoup a faire, in French ; Ich habe viel zu thnn, in Ger man : all mean, substantially — ' There is much which I must 272 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. ality, then, is wrapped up in the history of these words, owe, owu, ought, due, debt, duty, etc. ! Ah, these words of ours, what witnesses they will be Matt, xii, 37. for us or against us in the day of Judgment : for by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. But to return to our commandment as seen in the light of Chris tianity. The Apostle Paul puts the negative and the positive aspect of our commandment vividly thus (and remember he is writing to a Christian Eph. iv,28. church): "Let him that stole steal no more; but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing that is good, that he may have whereof to give to him that hath need." That is to say : Be not content with negative honesty ; be intent on positive charity. For the Church of the living God is the true Community, the genuine Common weal — that is, Common-wealth. Aud in that good time coming, when the loving brotherhood of Christian altruism shall supplant the selfish isola tion of sinful egoism, then shall men enact iu truth what Lord Macaulay poetically puts in do.' Afterward, by a common process in language, the gen eral idea of necessity involved in this use of the word owe, resolved itself into two distinct senses : the one of pecuniary or other liability in the nature of a debt, or the return of an equivalent for property, services or favors received ; the other that of moral obligation, or at least of expediency. Different forms from the same root were now appropriated to the two senses, to owe, with a newly-formed weak preterite, owed, being exclusively limited to the notion of debt ; and the simple form ought, being employed in all moods, tenses, numbers, and per sons, to express moral obligation or expediency, or as an aux iliary verb."—" Lectures on the English Language," by George P. Marsh, pages 320, 321. THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT. 273 the mouth of Horatius in the time of mythical Rome : Then none was for a party ; " Lays of An- Then all were for the state ; cient Rome-" Then the great man helped the poor, And the poor man loved the great : Then lands were fairly portioned ; Then spoils were fairly sold : The Romans were like brothers In the brave days of old. Lastly: Irreligion is the typical specimen of per- irreligion the feet theft. For while man in relation to his fel- Theft.al lowman has right to own property on his own account, yet man in his relation- to his God is but a trustee. Steal not, then, O friend, from a greater than thy neighbor, even thy divine Master! "Will Mai. m, 8,9. a man rob God?" expostulates Jehovah through his prophet Malachi : " Yet ye rob me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings. Ye are cursed with the curse; for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation." Oh, my countrymen, no longer withhold from the King of kings your tithes, and offerings of gold, and thanksgiving, and adoration, and confession, and' supplication, and aspiration. While you render Matt, xxu, 21. unto Csesar the things that are Csesar's, beware lest you withhold from God the things that are God's. Language fails you when you undertake to denounce a defaulter against mau. But where is your language when you think of a defaulter against Almighty God ? Oh, young man, if we might keep up the old legal distinction between petit and grand larceny, this moral deficit in our 274 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. duty to God is an awfully conspicuous sample of grand larceny. God forbid that any of us should continue guilty of this dreadful defalcation ! Matt, vi, 9,11. Our Father who art in heaven, Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors ! Collect. o Lord, we beseech thee, mercifully hear our prayers, and spare all those who confess their sins unto thee ; that they, whose consciences by sin are accused, by thy merciful pardon may be absolved ; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. X. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neigh bour. Exodus xx, 16. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. Were I asked what I thought was the most wonderfui- wonderful faculty of man, I would answer : The Language f faculty of language. Just consider for a moment what a word is. A word consists of two elements, which not only have nothing in common, but which are even diametrically opposed. Suppose it is a spoken — that is, an audible — word ; as such it is but a sound, an aerial vibration striking tympanum and brain ; or, suppose it is a written — that is, a visi ble — word ; as such it is but a certain shape on a piece of paper. Yet in either case, whether an audible word or a written word, it is also an enshrined, in- figured — so to speak — materialized idea. A word is a symbolized thought, an embodied idea. The same material air that wafts a leaf may enshrine and waft to the percipient mind an immaterial idea. Language marries thought to matter, or rather thought to thought, in the sphere of matter. A word may incarnate the vastest conception, as, for example, gravitation ; or it may incarnate the subtilest conception, as, for example, the undulatory theory. Again : Words conserve the immaterial past, turnmg it into an immortal heirloom ; a word carries us back to Washington, to Shakspeare, to 24 277 278 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Mohammed, to Cicero, to Plato, to Abraham, to Adam. Words are the Manes of past centuries. Aye, words are immortal. H. W. Long- I shot an arrow into air, feUow- It fell to earth, I knew not where ; For, so swiftly it flew, the sight Could not follow it in its flight. I breathed a song into the air, It fell to earth, I knew not where ; For who has sight so keen and strong That it can follow the flight of song ? Long, long afterward, in an oak, I found the arrow still unbroke ; And all the song, from beginning to end, I found again in the heart of a friend. You think that the phonograph is a wonderful thing ; and so it is. But it does not compare in wonderfulness with the most careless, insignificant word which it echoes and preserves. Even the childish prattle of the nursery is mOre wonderful than the most surprising transformation in chem istry: for it turns vibrations of material, uncon scious air into immaterial, intelligible, influenc ing ideas. Words are the most wonderful of things. Sacredness of But language is not only wonderful, language is anguage. ^^ sacred. For, as I indicated in my lecture on the Third Commandment, God has bestowed on man the gift of language that it may serve as the means of human intercommunication and reciprocal co operation. It is by means of words that men can understand and enjoy one another, and can co operate in carrying on and building up society. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 279 Language is the bridge between man and man ; it is the circulating medium of human exchange — the exchange of human thoughts, sentiments, plans. Language is the blood of humanity, flowing through its arteries and veins, making all mankind one human corporation or body, converting numberless human units into the one human unity, all men into one Man. Words are the very ligaments of human society ; language is the osseous, vertebral frame work of humanity itself. In other words, language is the covenant of a people. If I may say it, each language is the sacramental bond of the nation speaking it. In brief, language is the sacred com pact of humanity, the very symbol of human unity itself. Hence language, in order to its being true to its great mission, must itself be true — that is, trustworthy. For confidence in one another is one of the basal stones of society. Accordingly, false hood is one ofthe blackest of sins, for it is a crime directly against society itself, sapping its very foun dations. St. Paul puis the case forcibly thus : " Putting away falsehood, speak ye truth each one Eph. iv, 25. with his neighbour." Why ? " Because," he im mediately adds, " we are members one of another." That is to say, membership in human society means a common, reciprocal, interacting life; so that falsehood on the part of one member is treachery against the whole body. To utter a lie is even more criminal, morally speaking, than to forge a note, or to counterfeit a coin ; for the note and the coin you can catch and destroy: but the lie you can never overtake; the poison of it is already ab- 280 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. sorbed into the very structure of the social organ ism.1 Whatever disaster may befall our beloved America, God spare her tbe guilt and degradation of untruthfulness, national and personal ! The God of our fathers be praised, her honor, at least in this re gard, has hitherto been unstained. America has received many noble eulogies for her patriotism, her enterprise, her advance in the arts and sciences, her large plans for national education; but I doubt whether any nobler eulogy was ever pronounced on her than when a great millionaire recently invested, I know not how much, say forty or fifty millions, in gov ernment four-per-cent. bonds. Not that he intended this as a eulogy; nevertheless it was, practically speaking, a significant tribute to American truthful ness and honor. Young gentlemen, be it for you, as you enter upon the responsibilities of citizenship, to bear your part in keeping our national honor un sullied ! To this end, do the truth as well as speak it. The Ninth And now we are prepared for the Ninth Com- Command- r r ment. mandment : Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. In pondering the Ninth Commandment, observe, first, what our commandment forbids. And, first, our commandment forbids all injurious 1 " The deadliest poisons are those for which no test is known ; there are poisons so destructive, that a single drop insinuated into the veins produces death in three seconds ; and yet no chemical science can separate that virus from the contaminated blood, and show the metallic particles of poison glittering palpably, and say, ' Behold, it is there ! ' " — F. W. Robertson's " Sermons," Third Series, page 49. I do not vouch for the scientific accuracy of the gifted preacher's statement ; I merely quote it for the sake of its moral suggestiveness. Exod. xx, 16. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. "281 perjury — this lies on the very surface of the phrase- Ninth Com- ology : "Thou shalt not bear false witness against ^dTil thy neighbour." This Ninth Commandment differs juriousPer- from the Third Commandment in this respect : that forbids perjury against God ; this forbids perjury against man. As the Fifth Commandment — * " Honour thy father and thy mother " — guards the rights of authority ; and as the Sixth Command ment — "Thou shalt do no murder" — guards the rights of person ; and as the Seventh Command ment — "Thou shalt not commit adultery" — guards the rights of home ; and as the Eighth Command ment — " Thou shalt not steal " — guards the rights of property : so the Ninth Commandment — " Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour" — guards the rights of name. A lie is bad enough; but penury is worse : for it adds sacrilege to men dacity, blasphemy to falsehood. But I need not dwell on this point, for I have already descanted upon it in my fourth lecture. Again, our commandment forbids all slander of Ninth Crm- whatever kind : not merely perjury in the court j?*" bTds room, but also all private slander, however ex- siandef- pressed. For example : It forbids all false reports . of whatever kind concerning our neighbors, whether spoken, or written, or printed, or pictorial, or hinted. It forbids all misrepresentation of our neighbor in any wise, whether by insinuation, by imputing an evil motive, by pervert'ng his meaning, or by mis quoting him either intent'onally or carelessly. It forbids all detraction of whatever kind, all dispar agement of personal character, all undervaluing of 282 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. ITim.v, 13. our neighbor's good deeds or good name ; for this is theft indeed. Even lago, cold-blooded slanderer of Desdemona though he was, could say : "Othello "HI, 8. Good name, in man and woman, dear my lord, Is the immediate jewel of their souls : ¦ Who steals my purse, steals trash ; 'tis something, nothing ; 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands : But he that filches from me my good name Robs me of that which not enriches him, And makes me poor indeed. Again : Our commandment forbids all tale bearing, and tattling, and gossiping. When I think of those multitudinous, buzzing, venomous, tiny pests of society whom St. Paul describes as idlers, and tattlers, and busybodies, going about from house to house, speaking things which they ought not, I feel, in spite of my scruples touching capital punishment, that old Plautus is almost right when he says : Those men who carry about, and those who listen to slanders, should, if I could have my way, all be hanged ; the tattlers by their tongues, the listeners by their ears.1 Again : Our commandment forbids all indul gence in that irresponsible but all-permeating cal umnious rumor of mere hearsay, having no better basis than the Latin "Dicitur" the French "On dit," the German "Man sagt," the English "They say." How many small people there are who are never so happy as when, mosquito like, they can keep flitting, and buzzing, and stinging, especially in the night time when, the sufferer cannot see to 1 Homines qui gestant, quique auscultaut crimina, Si meo arbitratu liceat, ouiues pendeant, Gestores Unguis, auditores auribus. Plautus. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 283 hit and crush his tiny tormentor ! Again : Our commandment forbids that kind of slander which the old honest English represents by the expressive word "backbite" — that cowardly slander which dares not meet the object of its calumny face to face, but stealthily bites him in the back. How quaint the great Augustine's distich, which he sus pended over his hospitable table : Quisquis amat dictis absentem rodere vitam Augustine. Hanc mensam vetitam noverit esse sibi : a couplet translated by old Richard Turnbull, thus : He that doth love with bitter speech the absent to defame Richard Tur Must surely know that at this board no place is for the same ; DUU- and more pithily by Dr. Neale, as follows : He that is wont to slander absent men J<*n ,Maaon Neale. -May never at this table sit again. Again : Our commandment forbids all that kind of initial slander which i3 covertly conveyed in such expressions as these : "Inter nos ; sub rosa ; entre nous ; in strict confidence ; I wouldn't for the world have it go further," and the like : expres sions which oftentimes are the meanest kind of backbiting. Again : Our commandment forbids all kinds of slander, however hinted; for words are not the only form of calumny. For example : There are the pictorial representations in our comic journals. Now, I do not object to a caricature — indeed I greatly enjoy it — when it is a good- natured and really artistic exaggeration of the per sonal appearance or habit of a public character : but when the caricature becomes so gross that its 284 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. malignity is more apparent than its grotesqueness, then the cartoon becomes a cruel and wicked calum niator. Slander may also be expressed, and power fully too, by a mere gesture, a shrug, a wink, a George EUot. sigh, an intonation.1 Aye, "there are glances of hatred that stab and raise no cry of murder." Once more : Slander may be uttered by even silence itself; as when the fair fame of another is assailed in your presence, and you do not spring to his defense. Oh, Protean are the forms of bearing false witness against our neighbor ! Satan the And Satan himself is the prince of slanderers. Slanderers. The very meaning of the Greek Aidfioko<;, reappear ing in English as " devil," is " calumniator, false accuser, slanderer." When, in the days of the jobi, 6-n. patriarch of Uz, Satan presented himself among the sons of God, and Jehovah said unto him : " Hast thou considered my servant Job? that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an up right man, one that feareth God and escheweth evil ? " Satan, the traducer, calumniously insinu ated in reply : " Doth Job fear God for nought ? Hast thou not made an hedge about him, and about i A signal instance of the effectiveness of a mere intonation occurs in a famous scene in " Kenilworth." Queen Elizabeth, bidding the Earl of Sussex and the Earl of Leicester, rival suitors for her affection, and therefore mutually hostile, to join hands in token of reconciliation, said : " Sussex, I entreat — Leicester, I command you." But Sir Walter immediately adds : " Yet, so were her words accented, that the entreaty sounded like a command, and the command like an en treaty." Oh," The shrug, tbe hum, the ha (these petty brands That calumny doth use)." =»" Winter's Tale." II, 1. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 285 his house, and about all that he hath, on every side ? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. But put forth thy hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will renounce thee to thy face." And as it was in those far-off days, so it has been to this day. Satan, the slanderer, is still going to and fro in the Job. a, 2. earth, and roaming up and down over it, seeking 1 Peter v, 8. whom he may devour. God be praised, he shall not be permitted to do this forever. The saintly prisoner of Patmos, beholding in apocalyptic vis ions the things to come, saw Michael and his angels Kev. xii, 7-10. prevailing over the great dragon and his angels, even the old serpent, called the devil and Satan ; and when he was cast down the exile heard a great voice in heaven, saying : " Now is come the salva tion, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ : for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, who accuseth them before our God day and night." Yes, slander is devilish. Again, our commandment forbids, at least by Ninth Com- implication, all falsehood, of whatever kind, p^mT. whether slanderous or not. For example : Falsehood. It forbids the lie direct, or deliberate falsehood. Of course, I need not dwell on this point. Enough that I simply mention as samples of direct false hood- the failure to keep engagements, to fulfill con ditions of agreement, to pay promissory notes, to discharge trusts, to observe treaties, and the like. While Louis, Duke of Burgundy, was Dauphin of France, he was present at an im- 286 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. portant cabinet session, in course of which one of the ministers proposed the violation of a certain treaty. Many apparently strong reasons of State were urged for the perfidious policy. The Dau phin listened silently till they had closed the dis cussion, and then simply said to his fellow-minis ters : " Gentlemen, there is our treaty." Of course, this settled the point. Would to God that our own Government had always had the same delicate sense of honor in the matter of treaties, as, for instance, in the case of our outraged Indians ! No breach of promise is more infamous than Punic faith. Again, our commandment forbids the lie indi rect, the name whereof is Legion. It forbids, for example, all misrepresentation, whether by ambig uity, exaggeration, false coloring, equivocation, innuendo, flattery, distortion, prevarication, mental reservation, false pretense, quibbling, suggestion of falsehood, suppression of truth ; in brief, as Mrs. Opie would say, " white lies " — that is, venial false hoods. Fiemember what the laureate has said : Tennyson's That a lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies ; " ^ti? *i.rand" That a lie which is all a lie may be met and fought with out right, But a lie which is part a truth is a harder matter to fight. Scorn, then, young gentlemen, all jugglery and ambushes of words. Let it be said of you, only more truly, what Julia of Verona said of her lover Proteus : "Two Gentle- His words are bonds, his oaths are oracles ; rona" II 7.*" ^'8 l°ve sincerei kis thoughts immaculate ; His tears pure messengers, sent from his heart ; His heart as far from fraud as heaven from earth. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 287 But while the Ninth Commandment is prohibi tive in statement, it is also affirmative in meaning. Observe, then, now what our commandment by implication enjoins. And, first, the Ninth Commandment enjoins Ninth Com- , . . .. j. . , , -— mandment bearing true witness tor our neighbor. ± or exam- Enjoins pie: When your neighbor makes an ambiguous T^ttoony. statement, capable of a good meaning and a bad meaning, choose the good meaning. Again : Be not chary of warmly commmending. Let St. Paul be our example here. Recall the introductions of some of his epistles, even in the case of churches he had occasion to censure most sternly : " I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that Eom. i, 8. your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world." "I 1 Cor. i, 4-9. thank my God always concerning you, for the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus ; that in everything ye were enriched in him, in all utterance and all knowledge; even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you : so that ye come behind in no gift ; waiting for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ ; who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye be unreproveable in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, through whom ye were called into the fellow ship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord." "I thank my God Phil. i, 3-6. upon all my remembrance of you, always in every supplication of mine on behalf of you all making my supplication with joy, for your fellowship in furtherance of the gospel from the first day until now ; being confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ." " We give thanks to God the Father of our Lord Col. i, 3-8. Jesus Christ, praying always for you, having heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which ye have toward all the saints, because of the hope which is laid up for you in the heavens, whereof ye heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel, which is come unto you ; even as it is also in all the world bearing fruit and increasing, as it doth in you also, since the day ye heard and knew the grace of God in truth ; even as ye learned of Epaphras our beloved fellow-servant, 288 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, who also 1 Thess. i, 2-8. declared unto us your love in the Spirit." " We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers; remembering, without ceasing your work of faith and labor of love and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, before our God and Father; knowing, brethren beloved of God, your election, how that our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance ; even as ye know what manner of men we shewed ourselves toward you for your sake. And ye became imitators of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Spirit ; so that ye became an ensample to all that believe in Macedonia and in Achaia. For from you hath sounded forth the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia, and Achaia, but in every place your faith to God-ward is gone forth ; so that we need not to speak any- 2 Thess. i, 3-5. thing." " We- are bound to give thanks to God alway for you, brethren, even as it is meet, for that your faith groweth exceedingly, and the love of each one of you all toward one another aboundeth ; so that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your perse cutions, and in all the afflictions which ye endure ; which is a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God ; to the end that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for Philemon 4-7. which ye also suffer." " I thank my God always, making mention of thee in my prayers, hearing of thy love, and of the faith which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus, and toward all the saints ; that the fellowship of thy faith may be effectual, in the knowledge of every good thing which is in you, unto Christ. For I had much joy and comfort in thy love, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through thee, brother." I never recall the unstinted encomiums by my Lord and Master, as, for instance, when he says of John i, 47. Nathanael: " Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile ! " without feeling that I ought to be on the watch for good points in my neighbor, and be swift to approve them warmly to his face. Be it for you and me, then, to be like our God, who THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 289 giveth to all liberally and upbraideth not. Let James i, s. your speech then, young gentlemen, be always Coi. iv, o. with grace, seasoned with salt — not the biting salt of Attic wit — but the gracious salt of Christian encomium, giving grace to them that hear. Eph. iv, 29. Again : Our commandment enjoins truthfulness Ninth Com- vi n 1 ji?ii • . t £* j. i i ¦ mandment alike ot speech, and ot behavior. In fact, behavior Enjoins was the meaning of the word "conversation" at Truthfui- * ne6s ot the time our Authorized Version was made. For Character. example : St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, says: "Our glorying is this, that in holiness and 2Cor. i, 12. sincerity of God, we had our conversation (behaved ourselves) in the world." Again: Writing to the Galatians, he says: "Ye have heard of my con- Gai.i, 13. versation (mauner of life) in time past in the Jews' religion." Again : Writing to the Philippians, he says: "Let your conversation (manner of life) be pmi. 1,27 worthy of the gospel of Christ." So James : " Who is wise and understanding among you ? let James Hi, 13. him shew out of a good conversation (by his good life) his works in meekness of wisdom." So Peter : "As he who called you is holy, be ye your- ipeteri, 15. selves also holy in all manner of conversation (living)." Cultivate, then, O young man, truth fulness of act as well as truthfulness of speech. For nothing is more beautiful than an open, pellucid, candid character. Do you not remem ber the origin of this word " candid " ? It comes from the Latin candidus, meaning white, clear, shining: hence the word candidatus — that is, robed in white, because the Roman candidate for office was wont to robe himself in a glittering 25 290 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. white toga. Alas, in our own office-seeking America, how many are " candidates " only iu name, not having the white character! Again, recall the derivation of the word " simplicity " : it also comes from the Latin, sine, without, and plica, fold ; simplicity means having one fold, as comes out in the antithetic word "duplicity," having two folds ; simplicity is single-mindedness, straightfor wardness.1 So also, sincerity is honesty of character, Matt, v, 8. purity of heart. And blessed are the pure in heart : for they shall see God. Not, of course, in John iv, 24. any physical sense : for God is a Spirit, whom no man hath seen, nor can see : but in a spiritual sense, in the dear kinship of moral affinity. Alas ! at 1 cor. xiii, 9-12. present we see him only in part : for now we see him in a mirror, darkly, {iv alviyiiari) enigmatically, distortedly, as in chromatic aberration, our best perceptions of God being "I.n Mem or- But spiritual presentiments, And such refraction of events As often rises ere they rise. But, then, when that which is in part shall be done away and that which is perfect is come, we shall see God face to face, through the achromatic lens of a heart absolutely pure. Then shall be the Beatific Vision indeed. Cultivate, then, O vouno- friend, simplicity of purpose, candor of character, truthfulness of life. May you and I be so true to 1 In like manner, at least according to some etymologists, the word " sincerity " is a Latin compound, composed of sine, without, and cera, wax, all the wax having been eliminated from the honey : " sincerity " is purity of heart. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 291 ourselves that the Lord of all vision shall also say of you and me, as he said of Nathanael, " Behold, John i, 47. an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!" And now let me revert to the early part of my Awful Power lecture, and say a few words about the awful gran- guage."" deur of the gift of language. Its tremendous power is simply inconceivable. On the one hand, language is an incalculable power for good ; for it is not only the instrument of thought, reacting on the mind of him who speaks and writes, giving to his thoughts solidity, order, clearness, energy — it is also the grand instru ment of human edification — that is, society building. The best comment on this point-is the fourteenth chapter of St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinth ians. Language is the grand architect of mankind. Listen to some proverbs : The mouth of the righteotis is a fountain of life ; Prov. x, 11. A wholesome tongue is a tree of life ; Prov. xv, 4. Pleasant words are as an honeycomb, Prov. xvi, 24. Sweet to the soul, and health to the bones ; A word fitly spoken Prov. xxv, 11. Is like apples of gold in baskets of silver. Each true word is, so to speak, another Nehemiah, of the true Jerusalem, adding another stone in the rebuilding of the temple of humanity. May the Lord Jehovah give each of us the tongue of them isa. 1,4. that are taught, so that, like Jehovah's own Ser vant, we may know how to sustain with words him that is weary, and so help to upbuild society.1 i01d Edward Elton, commenting on St. Paul's saying — " Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, 292 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. But alas ! this same gift of speech, which is such an incalculable power for good, is also an incal culable power for bad. As each -good word is a noble Nehemiah, inserting a goodly stone in the growing temple of mankind, so each bad word is a heathen Sanballat, dislodging a stone from the sacred temple. Listen, then, to another proverb : Prov. xxvi, 18, As a madman who casteth firebrands, Arrows, and death ; So is the man that deceiveth his neighbour, And saith, Am not I in sport ? that ye "may know how ye ought to answer each one " — (Col. 4 : 6) quaintly says : " Wouldest thou then be able to speak fitly, and to good purpose, on every occasion, as in one particular case, in time of distress, in time of trouble and vexation of body or mind ; wouldest thou be able to speak a word of comfort, and, as the Prophet saith (Isa. 50 : 4) know how to minister a word in time to him that is weary ? Oh, then , let thy tongue be ever powdered with the salt of grace, have in thy mouth at all other times gracious speeches, and certainly then thou shalt not be to seek of sweet and com fortable words in time of need. Many come to their friends, whom they love well, and wish well unto, in time of their trouble, haply lying on their sick beds, and are not able to afford them one word of spiritual comfort ; only they can use a common form of speech, ask them how they do, and say they are sorry to see them so, and then they have done. Here is one special cause of it : their mouths are not seasoned with gra cious speeches at other times; they use not to season their speech with grace at other times, and so it comes to pass that when they should, and (it may be) would use gracious and comfortable words, they cannot frame themselves to them ; but even then, also, they are out of season with them. Learn thou, therefore, to acquaint thyself with holy and religious speeches, let thy mouth at other times be exercised in speaking graciously, and then (doubtless) though thou canst not speak so eloquently, as some that foam out nothing but goodly speeches, yet thou shalt be able to speak to better purpose, because (indeed) it is not man's wit, but God's grace, that seasons speech, and makes it profitable and comfortable." THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 293 But the most burning description of the terrific power of the tongue is given us by the Apostle James : If any stumbleth not in word, the same Is a perfect man, James iii, 2-8. able to bridle the whole body also. Now if we put the horses' bridles into their mouths, that they may ohey us, we turn about their whole body also. Behold, the ships also, though they are so great, and are driven by rough winds, are yet turned about by a very small rudder, whither the impulse of the steersman willeth. So the tongue also is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how much wood (how great a forest) is kindled by how small a fire ! And the tongue is a fire : the world of iniquity among our members is the tongue, which defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the wheel of nature, and is set on fire by hell. For every kind of beasts and birds, of creeping things and things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed by mankind : but the tongue can no man tame ; it is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. Aye, slander is the most epidemic and fatal of pestilences. A breath of scandal sweeps through the community and the nation like a sirocco. Thus faithful Pisanio to noble Imogen: What shall I need to draw my sword ? the paper » Cymbelme,'' Hath cut her throat already. — No ; 'tis slander, "*> *• Whose edge is sharper than the sword ; whose .tongue Outvenoms all the worms of Nile ; whose breath Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie All corners of the world : kings, queens, and states, Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave This viperous slander enters.1 Oh, what untold misery and anguish the tongue has . brought into the world : for example, the 'How powerful Virgil's portrayal ofthe swift momentum of pestilential Rumor's flight : " Fama, malum qua non aliud velocius ullum ; Mobilitate viget, viresque acquirit eundo," et seq. — " ^Eneid," IV, 173-197. 294 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. tongue of the talebearer, taking up a reproach against his neighbor, and giving it wings; the tongue of the slanderer, blasting a fair name, and crushing glorious powers; the tongue of the scan dal-monger, filling a continent with pestilential stench ; the tongue of the insinuator, undermining success, and murdering an illustrious renown; the tongue of the gossiper, carrying into a household tears and anguish and death. Verily, the tongue is an untameable mischief, full of deadly poison, a world of iniquity, itself set ou fire by hell. Such is the awful grandeur of the gift of speech. Words make earth a heaven or a hell. I hardly Mark vii, a-34. marvel that when the wonder-working Nazarene touched the tongue of the deaf stammerer of Decapolis, and loosed its bond, he sighed. R esp on si- Aud here let me say a few words about the Journal- responsibility of journalism. Were 1 asked what lsm" I thought is the most influential factor in our American life, I would unhesitatingly answer the newspaper-press. You may say that the mother is more influential : but the mother dies. You may say that the school is more influential : but the school, even so great a school as a university, is only for our younger days. You may say that the church is more influential : but, alas ! the church, practically speaking, reaches only a part of the community. But the newspaper is ubiqui tous and perennial. Young gentlemen, I love mv calling. I honestly believe that the ministerial vocation is a divine appointment, and that, so long as the present economy lasts, it is absolutely indis- THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 295 pensable to the welfare of society. Nevertheless, I must admit, and I cheerfully do admit, that there is a preacher who exercises a vaster influence than the preacher in the pulpit; it is the preacher in the press-room. For the journal comes to its readers not only as a news-teller ; it also comes as au oracle. For the moment one sees a statement in a paper, it somehow takes on a dignity and importance which it might never have possessed had he only heard it from the lips. The very fact that it is anonymous gives it a sort of shadowy majesty. How many vast indefinables may be lying implicit and potential in that little anony mous editorial pronoun " we ! " Omne ignotum pro magnifico est. And yet why, allow me to ask in passing, should we pay such grave attention to an anonymous statement in a newspaper, when that same newspaper gravely announces that it will pay no attention whatever to any anonymous contribu tor? I think that a great moral gain would be secured were every writer of any statement con cerning any individual or institution compelled to assume the responsibility for his statement by pre fixing or suffixing his own legal signature. I see no reason why a newspaper should be granted an immunity denied to a gentleman. But let me revert to the point in hand — the tremendous power of journalism. It not only reflects public senti ment : it also largely shapes it. It makes a man or it unmakes him by the motives which it assigns to him. It often outlines the plans of individuals, the methods of institutions, the policies of corpora- 296 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. tions, even the polity of a nation. Edmund Burke once said : "There are three Estates in Parliament: but, in the Reporters' Gallery yonder, there sits a Fourth Estate more important than the other three ! " What Augustus was to Rome, or Peter to Russia, or Napoleon to France, that the News paper is to America ; it is America's dictator. The Journal is Columbia's natural Censor : I wish it were always as just as was Cato of Rome. Thank God, many are the editors who are true to their great vocation. They are brave to denounce -wrong-doing in conspicuous places ; swift to recog nize merit in public life; chivalric to defend the op pressed and to set right the misunderstood; strong to cheer those who are burdened with great respon sibilities; wise to guide the perplexed; skillful to build up society — in brief, like the Apostle Paul, 2 cor. x, 8. exercising the authority which the Lord hath given them for building up and not for casting down. Alas! I cannot say this for all editors. Gentlemen of the Press, the warmth of my tribute to you justifies me in speaking plainly. Allow me, then, to say that there is too much of catering to morbid tastes; too much intrusion into the privacy of home life; too much indulgence in personalities; too much publication of mere rumors; too much detailed accounts of crimes and brutalities and scandals: in brief, too much news that is not news, or which, if it were news, had better never have become news. "Ah,'' you tell me, "the people demand this kind of reading." Alas ! what you say is too true. But, gentlemen-journalists, it is your THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 297 glorious vocation to lead the people, not to follow them ; to lift them up, not to' kneel to them. If you must have a scandal column, label it at the top with the caution: "Beware of deadly poison." 1 Observe now that words are in an eminent sense. Words Re- revealers of character. Icter.Char" Not that it is always so. Words sometimes misrepresent character. Thus the Psalmist, awak ing to the treachery of the friend he had trusted. exclaims : His mouth was smooth as butter, Ps. lv, 21. But his heart was war : His words were softer than oil, Yet they were drawn swords.2 And, in fact, the hypocrite will be condemned on this very ground : his words did not reveal his character — they were lies : therefore his very words will condemn him. Neither are we to imagine that there is no disclosure of character except through words. There is such a thing as unspoken i Benjamin Harris, the pioneer journalist of America, in issu ing the prospectus of his " Publick Occurrences both Foreign and Domestick," published September 25, 1690, quaintly an nounces what he conceives to be the duties of an editor. Among these duties he mentions the following : " Thirdly, That some thing may be done towards the Curing, or at least the Charming of that Spirit of Lying, which pre vails among us, wherefore nothing shall be entered, but what we have reason to believe is true, repairing to the best foun tains for our Information. And when there appears any material mistake in anything that is collected, it shall be cor rected in the next." What a blessing it would be were every modern editor as conscientious as old Benjamin Harris I » Compare Hamlet's soliloquy : I will speak daggers to her, but use none. — " Hamlet," III, 2. 298 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. speech. There is such a thing as inaudible solilo quy and even dialogue of soul. Thus Plato, in one of his Dialogues, represents Socrates as saying to Theaetetus : Plato's " The- I speak of what I scarcely know ; but the soul when think ing appears to me to be just talking — asking questions of her self and answering them, affirming and denying. And when she has arrived at a decision, either gradually or by a sudden impulse, and has at last agreed, and does not doubt, this is called her opinion. I say, then, that to form an opinion is to speak, and opinion is a word spoken, I. mean, to one's self and in silence, not aloud or to another. — " The Dialogues of Plato," translated by Professor Benjamin Jowett. And Socrates is right. The soul's speech is not necessarily articulate speech, but what she says to herself. And what she says to herself, she ex presses not only in words, but also in acts. And so even the very dumb speak. The whole conduct is a ceaseless discourse, life itself is an unbroken oration. The Jews have a saying, that "God is better pleased with adverbs than with nouns : for nouns are but the names of things, whereas adverbs describe how things are done." Young gentlemen, be it ours to serve God adverbially. But while it is true that words sometimes mis represent character, and that character may be revealed in other ways than by words, it still re mains true that words are the chief revealers of character. For character is a secret spring, hidden in recesses ofthe heart, the waters of which become visible as they flow forth in rills of words and Matt. xii, 34, 35. brooks of phrases and rivers of sentences. "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 299 The good man out of his good treasure bringeth forth good things : and the evil man out of his evil treasure, bringeth forth evil things." Speech is the exhalation of the heart. Thus words are represen tatives of character, translating character into lan guage which he who runs may read. In fact, this very word " character " etymologically means what is marked, engraved, lettered. Thus Orlando in his apostrophe to his sweetheart in the Forest of Arden : O Rosalind I these trees shall be my books, "As You Like And in their barks my thoughts I'll character ; That every eye, which in this forest looks, Shall see thy virtue witnessed everywhere. It," III, 2. A man's character is the inscription which his habits have engraved on him. And his words translate this inscription. His words characterize him — that is, they give his characteristics ; and this is but another way of saying that his words reveal his character. And so it is that our speech be- Matt, xxvi, 73. wrayeth us. And therefore our words will be our judges on Our Words the last great day. Listen to the Supreme Judge ur u ges himself: "By thy words thou shalt be justified, Matt. xii, 37 and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." Let us anticipate for a moment that great final Assize. W.hat, then, is the character of your words, the tenor of your speech ? Are you strictly a truthful man? Do your By Words words always and exactly represent your opinions, Justlneii- your purposes, your feelings? Do you avoid all prevarication, false suggestion, double meaning, verbal ambushes? Are you in the habit of speak- 300 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. ing kindly to others, encouraging them by words of warm sympathy and cheery commendation? Are you in the habit of speaking kindly of others ? , Do you speak generously of those whose reputation is under a cloud, magnanimously of those who have injured you? In short, does your conversa tion tend to edification — that is, society-building? If in reply to these and similar questions you can answer, Yes, blessed are you : for by these words of yours you will be justified. By Words Or, do you ever and anon indulge in loose and random talk? Do you ever speak equivocally, misleadingly, taking advantage of double entendre? Do you ever intend that your words shall misrep resent your purposes, your views, your feelings? Do you ever speak unkindly to others ? Do you ever indulge at home in morose, or surly, or peev ish, or passionate expressions ? Do you ever speak unkindly of others? Do you ever allow yourself to fall into the critical mood, speaking disparag ingly of others, pointing out their faults, making them the butt of your ridicule, and sarcasm, and wit ? When a fair and honored name is clouded, do you ever join in the popular hue and cry — "Guilty! Guilty!"? Do you ever indulge in innuendoes, or ambiguous hints, or allow to pass unchallenged surmises about your classmates, or your rivals, or those who have injured you? Do you ever Pope's "Pro- Damn with faint praise, assent with. civil leer, ires'" ° -^n^ w'thout sneering teach the rest to sneer ; Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike, Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike ? THE NINTH COMMANDMENT. 301 Do you ever listen to a tale of slander or vagabond hint of gossip, and, without stopping to inquire into its truth, thoughtlessly repeat it? In short, does your conversation lack in edification — that is, society-building ? If in reply to these and similar questions you must answer, Yes, wretched are you : for by these words of yours you will be con demned. Finally : Jesus Christ himself is the true, eternal Christ the language. He himself is the Word of God.' In guage. the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Divine Man is Deity's eternal alphabet, from eternity to Kev. xxii, 13. eternity God's Alpha, from eternity to eternity God's Omega. And just because he was and is aud ever will be the Word of God — that is, God in expression, in articulation, in manifestation — the express image of his substance, the very impress of Heb.i, s. his person, God's very -^apaxHjp, he was and is aud ever will be the Truth : and therefore by his own words and works the world and the universe is year by year, century by century, seon by seon, justifying him — the Word of God — more and more. Aud so it comes to pass that a Christian life or the life of Christ is also man's true language. Oh, young friend, let your words be like Christ's, and you too shall be justified. What though you have not graduated from the school of earth's oratory ? Enough iu this regard that you speak the language of Christ's character: for in thus speaking you speak correctly, according to the eternal grammar ; aye, even eloquently, according to the eternal rhet- 26 302 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Matt, xxvi, 73; Mark xiv, 70. oric. Heaven grant that when you and I shall stand in the judgment-hall of a greater than Pilate, some friend of the Judge shall say to each one of us : "Thou also art a Galilean: for thy speech bewrayeth thee." Almighty and everlasting God, who art always more ready to hear than we to pray, and art wont to give more than either we desire or deserve ; Pour down upon us the abundance of thy mercy ; forgiving us those things whereof our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things which we are not worthy to ask, but through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, thy Son, our Lord. Amen. XL THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbour's. Exodus xx, 17. XI. THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou The Tenth shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manser- ment^" vant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, Exodus xx> 17- nor anything that is thy neighbour's. How charming the naivete" of this ancient phrase- Naivete of the f^ Tl I* fl. fl P — ology ! How refreshingly it carries us back to the ology. simplicity of the patriarchal life! Instead of the modern complicated inventories of deeds and deben tures aud mortgages and stocks and bonds and notes and cheques and bills of exchange and securities of ever so many kinds, there was the patriarchal and simple inventory of house aud servant and ox and ass. Yet those were real though humble types of our modern elaborately constructed properties. For example : What is the modern manufactory, turn ing out hundreds of locomotiveF a year, or the modern steamship transporting thousands of tons from New York to Liverpool, but the^aaciejat.ox power or ass power, raised to the nth degree? And yet notwithstanding all the multiplied forms of the modern wealth and comforts — notwithstanding all our budgets and ledgers and vaults, our manufac tories and city halls and drawing-room cars and private palaces — I doubt whether we are any hap pier than were those far-off patriarchs, who dwelt 305 306 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Our Com- in an dm en t o e S NOT Forbid Ac- cumula tion. in Lents and led their flocks through green pastures and beside still waters. In all events, I suspect that we need the Tenth Commandment quite as much as they needed it. In pondering, then, this last of the Ten Com mandments, observe, first of all, what our com mandment does not forbid : It does not forbid the accumulation of property. For, as we saw in our study of the Eighth Commandment, the right to ownership is a human right, inherent in mau because he is what he is — namely, man. Do not imagine, then, that the impulse to accumulate is one of the results of Adam's fall. On the other hand, this impulse js jo universal and_strong,tJ)aJuLthink we ought to regard it as one of the innate, constitu tional, "e¥sehfiaTelements of fflaTTas man7 IiTotuer words, this'instihcl of acquisitiouTs R§sTI_jignof Adam's sinful fall than it is a sign of Adam's diy_meorigjn^T6Y'man being characteristically a creature of the future, he instinctively forecasts — that is to say, man is instinctively pro-vident. And the higher a man is in the scale of civilization, the more pro-vident or provident he is. It is the savage man who lives or rather exists from dav to day without plan, without toil, without accumula tion : it is the civilized man who lives from year to year, forecasting the future, making plans, sub ordinating everything he can control to the achieve ment of a distinctly conceived, and, it may be, distant end : and that end, generally speaking, is the providing against a day of want. Thus sur veyed, the impulse to accumulate, I honestly believe, THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 307 is one of the sacred, divinely-implanted instincts of our moral nature ; being as much a divine gift as the gift of reason, or love, or conscience; and therefore to be sacredly used. Accordingly, I hold it toiibeiiij;heidutyi of every Accumuia- hunian being to acquire all hetcan.: provided al ways he acquires it honestly, and consistently with Tiis other duties, and disposes of wnat he acquires " as^n^commands-ium, ... Thave no sympathy, Then, with that class of saints who profess to have soared so high Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot Milton's " Co- Which men call earth mus-" that they feel constrained to look down with pity and disdain on money-getting, beyond what suffices for the bare necessaries of life, as a sin. I always distrust the saintliness of such professors, just as I distrust the humility of the church member who never tires of parading before others his own unworthiness, forgetting that true humility shrinks from attracting the gaze of men, and, like the timid bird of the forest, warbles its plaint before none save the Father who sees in secret. No ; our Creator has endowed us with an ard en tTTn eraflLi- cable '"desire"' to "accumulate. And we disobey alike our own moral natures and our lathers will when we refuse to give play to this divinely-implanted impulse, or strive to crush it out as though it were sinful. And it is right to allow this instinct of *TJ rinl«IHWMiiil.Bll»BiT -YTT--7~'Ti "f --^1.^--- ^e-"*' accumulation to take the direction °_^P^S^X-S^~ pecuniary gain J provided always, we do this, not 308 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. for_tlie.sake.pf ,thg gain itself, but for the_sake of whaju-the gain may accomplish for ^tlijg glory, of „.. God in the service of man. ,. For the true worth of money consists not in its being an end, but in its iBehrg* a means. In fact, the way in which a man dispoiesToT the money he makes, supplies one of the most delicate, decisive tests of his moral character. Remember that the Church of Jesus Christ is the earthly agency which God has ap pointed for the restoration of mankind to himself. Aud he has appointed money, not less than prayer and example, as one of the means which the Church in her turn is to use in fulfilling her august mission. Luke xix, 29-34. Recall the story ofthe triumphal entry: Jesus bade two of his disciples go loose a certain colt and bring it to him, adding : " If any one ask you, Why do ye loose him? answer, The Lord hath need of him." Yes, young friends, there is a sense in which it is still true that our Lord needs our property. . He needs our property in the same sense that he needs ourselves — namely, as his agents to accomplish his own gracious will. Instead, then, of wishing to see the day when an embargo shall be laid on our ships of commerce, and the doors of our warehouses shall be closed, and all the various spheres of secular industry shall be vacated, because men shall have lost all desire to accumulate, I be lieve that the true Goldeu Age will have come when an intense business activity shall prevail through out the world ; when the white sails of commerce shall swell before the breezes of every zone; when the marts of the world shall be multiplied, and THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 309 crowded with the products of every clime and of every kind of human skill, and thronged with eager tradesmen of every race; when mines of mineral wealth, yet undiscovered, shall disclose their precious treasures, and not a foot of soil shall be left unreclaimed from the wild sway of nature ; when the whole globe shall become one vast emporium, wherein all the peoples shall be busy in holy competition and sanctified enthusiasm : and all this, in order that every human being may gratefully offer on the altar of Messiah's service all that a kind Providence has helped him to amass. Yes, youug gentlemen, it is right to acquire prop erty : for property is one of the essential factors in setting up Immanuel's kingdom. / What, then, does the Tenth ComrnandmentVytu- -uom- forbid j "^Horo^arc^ulaf ion at the expense ^To^il\ of others. The especially emphatic '"word in "ouT Selfish Ac- *»<>¦ --¦ . , ¦, '% cumula- commandment is the word " neighbour's.' \ Our commandment does not say : " Thou shalt nqtcoyef a house, oranjoxjjjr an ass, or anything." Butf wjiat ourcoinma^Uaen^aj^JbjJjs :^ "Thou .shalt. not covetihy^neighbour's ox, thy neighbour's ass, thy neighbour's anything." For your neighbor has the- -same right to property that you yourself have. In other^words, each manjaas^ja^ja^^pjaaj. right with every other man to gain property ; but no man has the ri^f'to^fuT^^rQ^e^^An^s.uch a way as to entail loss__m_any,o,thgr man.. In still other words, rightful accumulation does not consist so much in the profitable^ acquisition, "Kowever honestly made, of praperty^lready existing, as in 310 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. the absolute production of propertyorcreation of wealth. Significant is the verb '(make}' in such expressions as " make money," " make profits," " make a fortune," and the like. Lawful accumu lation consists in lawfully making money rather than in simply getting money, however lawfully. And the remark is equally true of the laborer and the capitalist. For work — that kind of genuine, solid work which actually produces, or, to use the Gen. i, 28. Scriptural phrase, which subdues the earth — is the primary foundation, the substratal basis of prop erty. Adam Smith, the father of modern political economy, discussing in his great treatise the prices of commodities, declares as follows : SinithVWealth The value of any commodity to the person who possesses it, of ^utioiis " I 5_ ' ' and who means not to use or consume it himself, but to ex change it for other commodities, is equal to the quantity of labor which it enables him to purchase or command. Labor, therefore, is the real measure of the exchangeable value of all commodities. The real price of everything, what everything really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it. What everything is really worth to the man who has acquired it, and who wants to dispose of it, or exchange it for something else, is the toil and trouble which it can save to himself, and which it can impose upon other peo ple. What is bought with money, or with goods, is purchased by labor, as much as what we acquire by the toil of our own body. That money, or those goods, indeed, save us this toil. They contain the value of a certain quantity of labor, which we exchange for what is supposed at the time' to contain the value of an equal quantity. Labor was the first price, the original purchase-money that was paid for all things. It was not by gold or by silver, but by labor, that all the wealth of the world was originally purchased ; and its value, to those who possess it, and who want to exchange it for some new pro ductions, is precisely equal to the quantity of labor which it can enable them to purchase or command. THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 311 That is to say : Work— work that is work, re sulting in positive production of material rather than in mere maintenance of monetary equilibrium — is the basis of just profits or rightful accumula tion. Or, to translate my idea into the language of moral arithmetic: Righteous acquisition does not consist in the subtraction of aught from our neighbor's property, whether capital or labor — for this is coveting. But righteous acquisition consists in the positive addition to the world's general capi tal — for this is loving our neighbors as ourselves. Personal muItiplicatib~h~"of*" material in order to universal division of profits — this, it seems to me, is one of the fundamental principles of political" economy, as it certainly is a splendid illustration of the Golden Rule. But to return to our commandment : What it forbids is not accumula tion, but unrighteous accumulation, or acquisition at another's cost. And now let us proceed to examine briefly the Specifications . ., i n. ¦ ym '- "*" of Tenth specifications of the lenth Commandment. Command- And, first, "Thou shalt not covet thy neigh- hour's house." OCk^Us-^iL.we.m.a^j^nlnxe,, to putj into the mouth of Sinai's ancient iurist such modern?' JBMSnTT^ ¦TOSTj7 18-24. itual mountain, whereon sits enthroned the Mediator of the New Covenant. And now let me say some words about the perils Perils of Cov- of covetousness. They are,many and grave. I can hardly do more than simply mention some of them. For example : Coveting tempts us into the viola tion of the First Commandment, or polytheism, worshiping Mammon in addition to Jehovah. Happy the man who can exclaim with the venerable emir of Uz : If I have made gold my hope, Job xxxi, 24-28. And have said to the fine gold, My confidence ! If I rejoiced because my wealth was great, 316 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. And because my hand had gotten much : This also were a crime to be punished by the judges : For I should have denied God that is above. Again : Coveting tempts us into a violation of the Second Commandment, or idolatry. Ah ! we need not go to heathendom in order to find wor shipers of images; we shall find plenty of idolaters of gold and silver, of bonds and realty, in our own counting-rooms and workshops — aye, by our own hearthstones, enshrined there as our Lares and Penates. In fact, the Apostle Paul expressly iden- Epb.r, 5. tifies the covetous man and the idolater: "Covet- ousness, the which is idolatry." Again : Coveting tempts us into violation of Tihe Third Command- 2 Kings t, 20-27. ment, or sacrilegious falsehood : for instance, Gehazi, lying in the matter of his interview with Naaman Aeta-r.i-io. the Syrian, and Ananias and Sapphira, perjuring themselves in the matter of the community of goods. Again : Cxfij£tin|r„,igmpts us mt° violation of the Fourth Commandment, or Sabbath-breaking ; jkjs, covetousness which encroaches on God's appointed day of sacred rest, tempting us to run trains for merely secular purposes, to vend tobacco and liquors, to hawk newspapers. Again : Coveting tempts us into violation of the Fifth Command ment, or disrespect for authority ; tempting the young man to deride his early parental counsels, the citizen to trample on civic enactments. Again : Covetousness tempts us into violation of the Sixth Matt. xxvi, 14- Commandment, or murder; recall how Judas' love of money lured him into the sacrilegious betrayal of his Divine Friend into the hands of his murder- THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 317 ers, his lure being the paltry sum of — say — fifteen dollars. Again : Covetousnesgjgmpts.us into viola tion of the Seventh Commandment, or adultery ; observe "Kow Scripture combines greed and lust : The Gentiles, being" past 'feeling, gave themselves Eph. iv, 19. up to' lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness-*(cT3vetoiot§lress):' "Fornication, and all un- Eph. v, 3-5. cleanness, or covetousnSsTTfirir^ioTeveir'De named among you, as becometh samts ; for this ye know of a surety, that no fornicator, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God ; Put coi. m, 5. to death your members which are upon the earth ; fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, the which is idolatry. Again : Covet ousness tempts us into violation of the EightnCom- mandment, or theft ; recall hoyy j.|yteinpted Achan josh, vii, 21. to steal a goodly Babylonish mantle, and two hun dred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight. Again : Covetousness tempts us into violation of the Ninth Commandment, or bearing false witness against our neighbor ; recall how the eovetousEtesS of Ahab jnstigateoThis wife Jezebel to 1 Kings xxi, 1- employ two sons of Belial to bear blasphemous and fatal testimony against Naboth, saying, " Thou didst curse God and the king." Again, and generally : Covetousness tempts into niggardliness ; see how it tempted Lot to take mean advantage of the magnan- Gen. xiii. 1-12. imous offer of his venerable uncle, and choose for him self all the plain of Jordan, because it was well- watered everywhere, like the garden of Jehovah. Again: Covetousness tempts into trickery; see 318 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Gen. xxix, 1-30. Gen. xxx, 25-43. how it tempted Laban into the deception of Jacob in the matter of his wedding, Jacob himself into his stratagem of the flocks and the peeled rods. Again : Covetousness tempts into arrogant churlish- l sam. xxv, 1-13. ness ; recall the story of Nabal, rightly so named, for Nabal means fool, and Nabal was a fool by practice as well as by name ; when the outlawed David, fleeing before the spear of Saul, sent to Nabal a courteous request for supplies, the rich fool insolently replied : " Who is David, and who is the son of Jesse? There be many servants now-a- days that break away every man from his master ! " Whereupon the wandering outlaw, stung to the quick, fiercely shouted to his followers, " Gird ye on every man his sword ! " — an ancient struggle, intensely interesting because it is the first recorded instance of the collision of Capital and Labor. Again : Covetousness tempts into unnatural cruelty ; recall the story of the dearth in the days of Nehe miah, when there arose a great cry of the people against their brethren the Jews, because they were mortgaging their fields and vineyards and houses to their own kindred, exacting usury every one of his brother, and bringing their own sons and daughters into bondage — a tragic story, alas ! often repeated in the world's history. Again : Covetous ness tempts into prostitution of noble gifts and opportunities ; see how it tempted Balaam the son of Beor, who loved the hire of wrong doing, to sell his divinations for rewards ; the sons of Samuel the Judge to forsake his ways, and turn aside after lucre, and take bribes, and pervert judgment ; Felix Neh. t, 1-13. 2 Peter ii, 15. 1 Sam. viii, 3. THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 319 to postpone the acquittal of Paul, hoping that money Acts xxiv, 26. would be given him for releasing him. Alas ! Samuel Butler's satire is still often applicable : What makes all doctrines plain and clear ? — " Hudibras," III l About two hundred pounds a year. ' ' And that which was proved true before, Prove false again ? — Two hundred more. Oh, young gentlemen, Heaven grant that when you come to lay down the responsibilities of life, whether official or personal, each of you may receive substantially the same noble testimony which all Israel _ rendered their incorruptible prophet-judge : Samuel said unto all Israel, Behold, I have hearkened unto 1 Sam. xii, 1-5. your voice in all that ye said unto me, and have made a king over you. And now, behold, the king walketh before you : and I am old and grayheaded ; and, behold, my sons are with you : and I have walked before you from my youth unto this day. Here I am : witness against me before Jehovah, and before his anointed : whose ox have I taken ? or whose ass have I taken ? or whom have I defrauded ? whom have I op pressed ? or of whose hand have I taken a ransom (bribe) to blind mine eyes therewith ? and I will restore it you. And they said, Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken aught of any man's hand. And he said unto them; Jehovah is witness against you, and his anointed is witness this day, that ye have not found aught in my hand. And they said, He is witness I Such are a few of the many grave perils of cov etousness. Let the Apostle Paul, writing to Timo thy, his own beloved son iu the faith, sum up for us these perils : They that desire to be rich fall into a temptation and a snare i Tim. vi, 9-11. and many foolish and hurtful lusts, such as drown men iu destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of 320 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. all kinds of evil : which some reaching after have been led astray from the faith, and have pierced themselves through with many sorrows. But thou, O man of God, flee these things. It is as though St. Paul had said : My dearly beloved Timothy, you are peculiarly exposed to the temptation of covetousness : for you are the youthful pas tor of a rich church in the wealthy and already heretical city of Ephesus. Many of your associates have misconceived the new religion, grossly supposing it to be a source and means of pecuniary gain. Let me then warn you that they who set their heart on wealth, whether rich or poor, expose themselves to the most terrible dangers, stumbling into pitfalls of many senseless and hurtful passions, such as plunge men into bodily wreck and spiritual destruction. For the love of money (and the poor may love it as much as the rich) is a root of all kinds of sin and disaster. It looks indeed at a distance like a beautiful and wholesome plant : but it is a most baleful plant. Alas, there are church members in Ephesus who, fascinated by this seemingly fair and innocent flower, have forsaken the pil grim's path to pluck it : but it was only to find themselves wounded by its many thorns. O my beloved son, flee these things I Tenth Com- And, young gentlemen, the apostle's warning is still still Need- pertinent. Remand not the Tenth Commandment ed" to the ancient avaricious sons of Abraham. It is still needed in our own times and land. For covetousness is a universal and long-lived plant, having its roots deep down in the soil of our fallen natures, the subsoil of selfishness. Covetousness is born of laziness, of discontent, of envy, of ambi tion, of love of show, of craving for position, of passion for power — in brief, of the sense of a mighty void and majestic want. Indeed, I scarcely know any greater tribute to the magnificent possibilities of the human soul than this sense of a vast, inde finable incompleteness, a majestic vacuum which THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 321 covetousness undertakes to fill, alas, in the rudest, shabbiest, tiniest of ways. But to this I shall soon recur. Meanwhile, note that the need of our com mandment in our own age and land is painfully evi dent. It is seen in our greed of gold, our greed of show, our greed of rank, our greed of office, our greed of power, our greed of great fortunes ; it is seen in our fraudulent transactions of countless kinds, our breaches of contract, public and private, our be trayals of trusts, our defalcations and embezzle ments of endless varieties ; it is seen in our grasp ing, merciless, conscienceless monopolies ; it is seen, to use an expressive Americanism, in our " rings," those magic circles of financial sorcery and political incantation ; it is seen in the stunted growth of the Christian life itself, for there is nothing which so chokes the word, and makes it become unfruitful Mark iv> 19< as the entering in of the cares of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things. John Milton is right : Let none admire " ^arad,!s1?n That riches grow in Hell ; that soil may best Deserve the precious bane. Yes; the Tenth Commandment is still sadly needed. Would that all men were content with asking for the simple things desired by Agur the son of Jakeh : Two things have I asked of thee ; Prov. xxx, 7-9. Deny me them not before I die : Remove from me vanity and lies : Give me neither poverty nor riches * Feed me with the food that is needful for me : Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is Jehovah? Or lest I be poor, and steal, And use profanely the name of my God. 322 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Problem o f Limiting Capital. Eph. iv, 25. 1 Cor. xii, 12. James i, 21. And this leads me to say a few words about the problem of Umirinrj ""pHn.l It is a very grave problem, for the solution of which we are not yet prepared. It must be admitted, however, that the amassing enormous capital on the part of a single individual, or on the part of a corporation, does throw society out of equilibrium, setting its com ponents at strife. If we have a right, as is con ceded, to regulate certain matters — for example, the incomes of certain corporations; if we have the right to prohibit, except under certain conditions, the sale of gunpowder or the sale of intoxicants, — I do not see why we may not by-and-by, under guidance of sagacious jurists, legislate with a view to the limitation of capital. In all events, the great principle to be borne in mind here as elsewhere is this : We are members one of another. For, Society, as I have often reminded you in these lectures, is a single moral personality, consisting of many mem bers organized into one body. Accordingly, when onebf these members or organs accumulates — to use phraseology which medical students will appreciate — excessive pecuniary tissue, it suffers congestion, and distempers thejwhole social organism. How of ten society or the body politic suffers from monetary engorgement or plethora — for example, financial hy pertrophy, fiscal dropsy, even pecuniary hydroceph alus! These financial tumors in the body of society, disfiguring it and enfeebling it — what a striking il lustration they are of the superfluity of naughtiness ! And how to arrest this tendency to morbid conges tion of wealth is indeed a baffling problem. THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 323 Perhaps we may gain some useful hints for the Year of JuM- solution of the problem if we recur to the Mosaic institute of the Year of Jubilee. Take, for ex- Lev. xxv, 8-55. ample, its provision for the reversion of landed property. When Israel under the lead of Joshua took possession of Canaan, the whole territory was divided into portions or shares, which were then distributed by lot among all the people, each family having its own share or allotment ; and this allotment was a family possession to continue forever as the property of the descendants of the original possessor under Joshua. But the Hebrew lived, as we live, in a world of mutations and mis fortunes. Accordingly, he might feel himself compelled under stress of poverty to sell his an cestral estate ; and this the Mosaic law allowed him to do. But he could not absolutely alienate it : the year of jubilee restored it to him. In other words, the transfer of the land was not a sale, but a lease ; and this lease, in the extremest case possi ble, could not run beyond forty-nine years. Mean while, the land could be redeemed at any interven ing period, either by its owner or by his nearest kinsman, at a price to be graduated by the esti mated produce of the soil for the unexpired term of the lease — that is, till the next jubilee. If he was too poor to redeem it, it was restored to him in the fiftieth year without any redemption price. Thus the Hebrew Jubilee prevented the rise of a landed oligarchy. For ownership of the soil is iu the last analysis the source of personal supremacv. "The profit of the earth," says Koheleth, "is for Ecci. v,9. 324 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. all : the king is served by the field." It is the laud which serves both governor and governed with vegetables for food, textiles for clothing, timber and clay and stone for buildings, wood and coal for heat, ores for manufactures, gold for circu lating medium. The reason why, according to some etymologists, the first man was called "Adam" is that " Adamah" means earth or soil : Gen. ii, 7. Jehovah God formed man (Adam) of the dust of the ground (Adamah). Thus the land supplies man with his cradle, his home, his food, his tomb. I think that man has reached the nadir of degra dation when, too poor to buy a spot for his grave, the authorities are obliged to bury him in Potter's Field. "Mother-Earth," then, being the primal fgunt of our resources, it is not strange that there should be a tendency in all civilized lands to monopolize the soil. Hence the patrician usurpa tions of ancient Rome ; the feudal sovereignties of the mediaeval age; the partition of England by William of Normandy, giving rise to the complex and oppressive land-law of England, aptly styled " the Herculaneum of Feudalism ; " the cruel land lordism of Ireland; the selfish hunting-lodges of Scotland; the vast land-monopolies of our West; and the like. Now this monopoly of the soil, or rise of a landed aristocracy, was prevented in ancient Palestine by the Mosaic statute of the Jubilee. Twice every century all the lands were re-distributed according to the original allotment under Joshua. Thus Moses anticipated by nearly a millennium some of the essential features of the THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 325 famous Agrarian laws of Rome. And in thus securing the agricultural equality of the people, he averted social tumults, aud struggles between patrician and plebeian orders. It was a sort of realization of an ideal society : Judah and Israel 1 Kings iv, 25. dwelt safely, every man under his own vine and under his own fig tree, from Dan even to Beer sheba. In brief, the Jubilee was Israel's conservative institution, periodically rectifying the congestions and inequalities and wrongs of society, restoring the original order, and so realizing in large degree " Machiavelli's great maxim — the constant renova- Miiman's " His- n , t ir» «'i t. tory of Jews," tion ot the state according to the first principles of Book v. its constitution." Thus the law of the Jubilee was in many respects a practical solution of some of the most perplexing problems of political economy. Was not Moses a consummate states man? Nevertheless, I ara obliged to admit that the The Hebrew Hebrew Jubilee, as an institute for our day, would Utopian. be Utopian. The institution was admirably suited to a people living in a primitive age, when the social relations were still few and simple, and made possible a minute and imperious legislation, and even justified it. But it would be quite unsuited to our times, and even impossible, except at cost of revolutions. Recall, for a moment, the almost infinitely intricate complexities of our modern civilization : for example, our vast domain, with its many varieties of climates, and productions, and pursuits; the myriadfold application of natural forces and inventions to all sorts of industries, 28 326 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. dividing the life of the people into numberless different vocations; the complex aud countless reticulations of commerce, domestic and foreign ; the prevalence of enormous systems of credits and exchanges; the swiftness of locomotion and tele graphic interchange of information and proposals ; and the like. What a contrast this intricate and intense life of ours to that far-off simple age when the Jews occupied Palestine as an agricultural and pastoral people! To enact, then, that iu every fiftieth year all the economic relations of life shall revert to the condition of the original, patrimonial entail, would be to solicit every possible disorder, and upheave the very foundations of society itself. Take, for instance, the chief peculiarity of the He brew Jubilee, the inalienability of estates. While it is right that we should have, as we do have, laws regulating succession or inheritance, yet the principle of a universal and perpetual entail would in our age invite to improvidence and laziness. For it is the very possibility of mutations of pro perty which tend to make men vigilant, industri ous, and self-respecting. To earn my own living is infinitely more manly than simply to inherit it. No; the jubilee, as a statute or institution, was fitted for a primitive age, when infant society needed a legislation which was both minute and peremptory. But when society reaches a maturer stage, it outgrows the need of, and indeed will not brook, microscopic legislation. I think it was our Thomas jeffer- own President Jefferson who said, " That is the best governed country which is the least gov- son. THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 327 erned." In other words, while children are to be governed largely by rules, men are to be governed largely by principles. But although the Hebrew Jubilee, as an or- Analogy of dinance or letter has perished, yet the Hebrew Ju- Body. bilee as a principle or spirit survives. It has even undergone transfiguration, re-emerging in a form nobler than any statute, even the form of a living organism. Listen, then, to St. Paul's parable or analogy of the human body : The body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say, 1 Cor. xii, 14-26. Because I am not the hand, lam not of the body ; it is not there fore not of the body. And if the ear shall say, Because I am not tlie eye, lam not of the body ; it is not therefore not of the body. Jf the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing ? Jf the whole were hearing, where the smelling? But now Ood hath set the members each one of them in the body, even as it pleased him. And if they were all one member, where were the body 1 But now they are many members, but one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of thee : or again, the head to the feet, I have no need of you. Nay, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary .- and those parts of the body which we think to be less honourable, upon these we bestow more abundant honour; and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness ; whereas our comely parts have no need : but Ood tempered the body together, giving more abundant honour to that part which lacked; that there should be no schism i« the body ; but that the members should have the same care one for another. And whether one member suffereth, all the members suffer with it; or one member is honoured, all the members rejoice with it. Young gentlemen, the political economist has never been born who has stated the philosophy of society so profoundly. It is only when we con ceive mankind as one vast body, having all its members or organs and functions in co-ordination and reciprocal action, that we get the key to the" 328 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. problem of society. In fact, it is just because we persist in conceiving society as a mechanical struct ure, or at best a voluntary compact, rather than as a physiological organism, that we resort to legisla tion rather than to sympathy as our medicine for its maladies and woes. For society, it must be confessed, is shockingly distempered, its members surveying each other awry, Dives' lordly eyes haughtily shouting to Lazarus' drudging feet, I have uo need of you; and horny-handed Labor ominously muttering in the fastidious ear of Capital, I have no need of thee. How, then, shall we heal the social schism? By accepting God's own method of tempering the body together, giving special honor to the uncomely parts which lack ; removing, so to speak, the obstructions in the cir culatory system, and equalizing the flow of the life-blood throughout the social organism ; setting the members of the body in sympathetic compen sation, letting eye and ear, hand and foot, nerve and muscle, bone aud joint, deftly co-operate iu reciprocal counterplay. In what proportion society feels itself to be what its Maker intended it should be — namely, one organic person rather than an organized structure — in that proportion social strifes will cease, class distinctions disappear, Capital and Labor mutually embrace, reciprocally exclaiming, " We are members one of another !" In fact, one of the chief functions of riches is to enrich the poor. For, while men have a right to property, they have a right to it only as trustees of God, charged by him with administering his intrustments for the THE TENTH COMMANDMENT. 329 benefit of the community. Accordingly, over against Proudhon's famous dictum : "La propriety, cest le vol," I venture the dictum : Property is a divine means of equity. That is, God has appointed the rich to be his trustees for the poor, the poor to be the wards of the rich. The bosoms of the poor are the rich man's real coffers. Nor is there in this any communism, . except in the noble sense of this perverted word. The true socialism is not a statute, but a spirit ; not a mechanical screw, but a natural flow ; not a vast Sahara of arid monotony, but a vast compensation of mountain and valley, keeping the waters under the firmament and the waters Gen. i, 7. above the firmament in everlasting equipoise. Let the moral scales be accurately adjusted in the matter of property, and the miracle of the manna will be renewed : He that gathered much had nothing Exod. xvi, is ; . i -i -i • i 1 -1 ° 2 Cor. viii, 16. over, and he that gathered little had no lack. Let me offer two concluding thoughts. And, first, the follv as well as guilt of covetous- Folly of Cov- T ¦ i r^ i i. ^ i etousness. ness. Listen to the leacner sent from God: Take heed, and keep yourselves from all covetousness : for a Luke xii 15-21. man's life consisteth not in theabundance of the things which" ' - he possesseth. And he "spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully: and he reasoned within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have not where to bestow my fruits ? And he said, This will I do : I will pull down my barns, and build greater ; and there will I bestow all my corn and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years ; take thine ease, eat, drink, be merry. But God said unto him, Thou foolish one, this nioht is thy soul required of thee ; and the things which thou hast prepared, whose shall they be ? So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God. 1 Tim. vi, 7. 330 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Long before the Lord of parables said this, one of the sons of Korah had sung concerning a rich man : When he dieth he shall carry nothing away ; His glory shall not descend after him. And the Apostle Paul echoes the sentiment : " We brought nothing into the world, for neither can we carry anything out." It is told of Alexander the Great that he gave orders that, when he should die, his hands should be left outside his coffin, so that his friends might see that, though he had conquered the world, he could take nothing of his conquests into the hereafter. In like manner, the famous Saladin, it is said, ordered a long spear with a white flag attached to it to be carried through his camp, bearing this inscription : " The mighty King Sa ladin, the conqueror of all Asia and Egypt, takes with him, when he dies, none of his possessions except this linen flag for a shroud." So also Vin- centio, Duke of Vienna, to Claudio : Measur' for If thou art rich, thou art poor ; Measure," III, j all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength : this is the great and first commandment. It is a citation from the sixth chapter of the Book of Deuteronomy : Hear, O Israel : Jehovah our God is one Jehovah : and thou Deut vi, 4, 5. shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.1 'These words form the beginning of what is termed the Shama ("Hear") in the Jewish services, and belong to the daily Morning and Evening Office. They may be termed the Creed of the Jews (" Speaker's Commentary," in loco). This is one of the four Scriptures which the Jews were accustomed to inscribe on their phylacteries and Mezuzah ; the custom being based on a literal obedience to the injunction of Deut. 6 : 4-9 : " Hear, O Israel ; Jehovah our God is one Jehovah : and thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, 342 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Unity of God. Hear, 0 Israel; Jehovah our Elohim is one Jehovah. It is a very weighty saying. First, it asserts that Jehovah, the Covenant God of Israel, is Deity absolute ; the self-existent, eternal, unchange able, spiritual, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, holy, just, true, gracious, perfect, infinite God. Sec ondly, it asserts that this infinite Jehovah is abso lutely one, being himself an infinite unity, all his infinite perfections being in infinite equilibrium. God's very blessedness consists in this infinite equi poise of himself. Thirdly, it asserts that there is only one true God — namely, Jehovah, Covenant God of Israel. This sublime annunciation, as we saw in our study of the First Commandment, marks a colossal onward stride in the history of religion; for monotheism, or the doctrine that there is but one God, is the basal stone of Christian worship. And for this doctrine of monotheism we are indebted to the Jew. The Mosaic theology is the one solitary religion of antiquity, whose corner stone was this : " Jehovah our Elohim, Jehovah one." The singleness and unity of God is still the corner stone of theology. God to be Su- And because Jehovah is what he is, Jehovah is Loved/ to be supremely loved : Thou shalt love Jehovah which I command thee this day, shal] be upon thy heart : and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shall talk of them when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And tbou shalt bind them for a sign upon thy hand, and they shall be for frontlets between thine eyes. And tho" shalt write them upon the door posts of thy house, and upon thj' gates." THE LORD'S SUMMARY. 343 thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. This word " love," as the Bible uses it, is a very com prehensive word, meaning not only affection, but also trust, obedience, reverence, worship. First, we are to love the Lord our God with all our heart — that is, religiously, with all our spiritual faculties. Secondly, we are to love the Lord our God with all our souls — that is, aesthetically, with all our psychical gifts. Thirdly, we are to love the Lord our God with all our minds — that is, intellectually, with all our mental powers. And fourthly, we are to love the Lord our God with all our strength — that is, corporeally, with all our bodily energies. In brief, we are to love the Lord our God with a supreme, undivided love. For, as our Divine Teacher himself has said : No man can serve two masters : for either he will hate the Matt, vi, 24. one, and love the other ; or else he will hold to one, and despise the other. Te cannot serve God and mammon. Vivid as the language is to us, it must have impossibility been still more vivid to those who heard it from Loyalty. the great Master's own lips in those days of actual slavery. For man must be under the sway of some governing principle or master passion. This is one of the characteristic attributes of man. As you ascend the scale of manhood, choice takes the place of instinct, loyalty to a governing principle takes the place of drift. The little child lives from day to day without settled plan, drifting according to instinct, or some whim of the passing moment. This is true also of the savage — for the savage is 344 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. but a child's soul in a man's body ; the savage has no plans, and he drifts like waif or cloud. This is even true of those full-grown persons in civilized communities who have the outside stature of men but the inside smallness of infants — their minds puerile, their wills irresolute, their moral grasp imbecile. But an unfolded, robust character is a character which is consciously under the sway of some distinct, dominant principle. It matters not, at this stage of my statement, what that principle is — it may be this, or it may be that — the supreme point is this : Whatever the principle be, it controls him. This is one of the points which distinguishes man from animal. And this governing principle will brook no rival or competitor. It may indeed give way to some other principle ; but in the very fact of its giving way it ceases to be the master power. It is a con tradiction in terms to say that two conflicting prin ciples can at one and the same time be paramount ; the one or the other must yield. It is as impossible for a man to be under the sway of two opposite principles at the same time, as it is for a ship to have her deck and her keel uppermost at the same instant. And not only must man be under a gov erning principle : man can be under but one gov erning principle at a given time. And this governing principle, whatever it be, if steadily obeyed, gives directness and coherence and unity to his plans and conduct and life. It co-ordinates all his desires, and purposes, and forces by sub ordinating them to one and the same governing THE LORD'S SUMMARY. 345 principle. It gives him clearness of vision, single ness of aim, directness of movement, symmetry of conduct, unity of life. This, then, is the meaning of the Lord's great saying : " No man can serve two masters." Loyalty to the one is disloyalty to the other. It was not possible, in the war of our independence, for an American to be loyal to George the Third, and, at the same time, loyal to George Washington. In short, you cannot go up and down, backward and forward, the same instant. You can serve Jehovah one moment, and you can serve Baal the next moment ; but you cannot serve both Jehovah and Baal the same moment. And what Jehovah demands is an undivided service. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. This is the great and first commandment} It The First is "the great commandment" because undivided ment. love to God is tbe basal condition of piety ; and it is "the first commandment" because undivided love to God is the primal fountain of piety. And now we pass from the first table of the law, The M a n - or the commandment looking Godward, to the mandment" second table of the law, or the commandment looking man ward. J " This was changed by many documents from ' great and first 'to 'first and great,' as smoother. We can see, upon reflection, that the phrase properly begins with 'great,' be cause that was the point of the inquiry ; but copyists, like modern compositors, seldom had time to reflect." — " Com ments ry on the Gospel of Matthew," by John A. Broadus, D. D., LL.D. 346 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Matt, xxii, 39; And a second like unto it is this: Thou shalt Lev. xix, 18. ' love thy' neighbour as thyself. The Second A second like unto it. Observe: This second mentmand" commandment — " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself" — is something more than a mere sup plement to the first : to say only that were to miss a great truth. This second commandment, instead of being merely supplemental to the first, is abso lutely complemental. The two commandments are really not two ; they are simply a twofold com mandment, being the obverse and reverse legends engraved on the great medallion of the divine testimony or covenant. In other words, the first commandment, or love to God, is" piety in its root: the second commandment, or love to man, is piety in its fruit. As a matter of fact, we cannot truly love oup Father in heaven without loving our brothers on earth : here is the mistake of the religionist, or the man who is orthodox in creed, but heretical in life. And we cannot truly love our brothers on earth without loving our Father in heaven : here is the mistake of the moralist, or the man who is blameless in life, but Christ- less in creed. Let St. Paul express the idea for us : 1 Cor. xiii, 1-3. If j speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal. Aud if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge ; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And if I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profiteth me nothing. THE lord's summary. 347 Or, as good Isaac Watts versifies it : Had I the tongues of Greeks and Jews, Isaac Watts. And nobler speech than angels use, If love be absent, I am found, Like tinkling brass, an empty sound. Were I inspired to preach and tell All that is done in heaven or hell, Or could my faith the world remove, Still am I nothing without love. Should I distribute all my store To feed the hungry, clothe the poor, Or give my body to the flame To gain a martyr's glorious name ; If love to God and love to men Be absent, all my hopes are vain ; Nor tongues, nor gifts, nor fiery zeal, The work of love can e'er fulfill. Or, in still other words, there is no real differ ence between morality and Christianity : morality is Christianity looking earthward ; Christianity is morality looking heavenward. Christianity is Christian morals. Thou shaU love thy neighbour. But who is Christ's Defi- my neighbor? Once before has this question been Neighbor. asked, and memorable was the answer. Let me recall to your memory the occasion, for the remi- niscience is particularly appropriate to the point iu hand : Behold, a certain lawyer stood up and tried him, saying, Lukex, 25-37. Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life ? And he said unto him, What is written in the law? how readest thou? And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind ; and thy neighbour as thyself. And he said unto him, Thou hast answered right : this do, 348 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. and thou shalt live. But he, desiring to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour ? Jesus made answer and said, A certain man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho ; and he fell among robbers, who both stripped him and beat him, and departed, leaving him half dead. And by chance a certain priest was going down that way : and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. And in like manner a Levite also, when he came to the place, and saw him, passed by on the other side. But u, certain Samaritan, as he jour neyed, came where he was : and when he saw him, he was moved with compassion, and came to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring on them oil and wine ; and he set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And on the morrow he took out two pence (say, thirty-four cents), and gave them to the host, and said, Take care of him ; and whatsoever thou spendest more, I, when I come back again, will repay thee. Which of these three, thinkest thou, proved neighbour unto him that fell among the robbers? And he said, He that shewed mercy on him. And Jesus said unto him, Go, and do thou likewise. According to the Divine Man, then, neighbor hood does not consist in local nearness ; it is not a matter of ward, or city, or State, or nation, or kinship, or guild, or political party, or religious denomination : neighborhood means a glad readiness to relieve distress wherever found. According to human teachers, it was the Jewish priest and Jewish Levite who were neighbors of the Jewish traveler to Jericho. According to the Divine Teacher, it was the Samaritan foreigner who was the real neighbor of the waylaid Jew. That is to say : every human being who is in distress, and whom I can practically help, whether he lives in Philadelphia or in Pekin, is my neighbor. As a matter of fact, the locomotive and the steam engine aud the telegraph are making the whole world one the lord's .summary. 349 vast neighborhood. In brief, opportunity is the only practical limit of neighborhood. And Jesus Christ himself was the best illustration of his own parable of the Good Samaritan. He was man kind's great, typical Neighbor, stooping from heaven to bind up the wounds of our far-off, alien, waylaid, bleeding humanity, and convey it to the inn of his own redeeming grace. As thyself. That is to say: Let thy neighbor Our Neighbor be to thee as though thou thyself wert duplicated, Self/ himself thy other self. It repeats in fresh phrase ology the Golden Rule : " As ye would that men Luke vi, 31. should do to you, do ye also to them likewise." It is Christ's doctrine of Society. According to him, we are members one of another. Even the Eph. iv, 25. great Comte, in whose elaborate system of religion the worship of Humanity lies as the corner-stone, discerned, as though from afar, this splendid truth : for he taught that the key to social regeneration is to be found in what he called altruism, or the state of being regardful of the good of others, the victory of the sympathetic instincts over self-love. Would to God that the scales had fallen from this great man's eyes, and that he had recognized in the Man of Nazareth and of Calvary the true, infinite Altruist ! For Christianity — I mean Christ's own Christianity — has, on the one hand, nothing in common with the spirit of a selfish monasticism ; she shuns the cloister and the desert, to nestle in the family and to brood over the exchange. And, on the other hand, Christianity has nothing in common with the spirit of a selfish 30 350 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. communism : instead of saying with the socialist, " All thine is mine," she says with her divine Founder, " All mine is thine." Modern Sociology juts out into the sea of time two opposite promon tories : the promontory of volatilization, or the dispersion of the individual into . the community ; and the promontory of solidification, or the concen tration of the community into the individual. Rome, both the ancient imperial and the modern pontifical, represents the former extreme; dissi pating the personal into the general. France, with her ideal notions of communism, represents the latter extreme; condensing the general into the personal. The Church of the living God, in so far as she answers to the ideal of her Divine Founder and Head, blends the two extremes, evermore say- Eph.iv,25. ing, "We are members one of another." Recall St. Paul's profound analogy of the human body ; an analogy so profoundly philosophical that I must quote it again : for it is the master key to the stupendous problem of Sociology : 1 Cor. xii 14-26. The body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body ; it is not therefore not of the body. And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body ; it is not there fore not of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing ? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling ? But now hath God set the members each one of them in the body, even as it pleased him. And if they were all one member, where were the body? But now they are many members, but one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of thee : or again, the head to the feet, I have no need of you. Nay, much rather those members of the body which seem to be more feeble are necessary : and those parts of the body, which we thiuk to be less honourable, upon the lord's summary. 351 these we bestow more abundant honour; and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness ; whereas our comely parts have no need : but God tempered the body together, giving more abundant honour to that part which lacked ; that there should be no schism in the body ; but that the members should have the same care one for another. And whether one mem ber suffereth, all the members suffer with it ; or one member is honoured, all the members rejoice with it. That is to say : As the human body is a single organism, consisting of many diverse members and organs and functions, balanced in common counter poise, and working in mutual interaction, so society- is a single moral organism, in like manner consist ing of many diversities, balanced in similar counter poise, and working in similar interaction. Here, as we saw last Sunday, is the secret of the reconciliation of the schism in the body of humanity. What so ciety needs is to be educated into the perception of the possibility of its own moral equilibrium, the sense of its own social equipose. Let me mention some of the social benefits which will follow the cultiva tion of this sense of moral balance or human equilibrium. For example : This sense of moral balance will tend to broaden each man's horizon, assuring him that he is not so much one of the many units of society as he is a member of the one social unity ; and must therefore look to the things phii. ii, 4. of others as well as to his own things — that is, love his neighbor as himself. Again : The sense of moral balance will tend to equalize the blessings and opportunities of life, prompting, for instance, the owner of two coats to impart one of them to Luke m, n. him who has no coat at all; thus bringing about 2Cor.viu,i4. 352 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. equality, his own abundance being a supply for his neighbor's want. Again : The sense of moral balance will tend to settle disputes, whether per sonal or international, by submitting the question, not to the capricious fortunes of litigation or of war, but to the equitable decision of the sense of society set in equilibrium. Again : The sense of the moral balance will tend to make the blessings of Christianity the common possession of mankind, a Cor. iv, 17. impelling each Christian to feel that the exceeding and eternal weight of glory in his own scale makes nom. i, 14. Lira a grateful debtor both to Greeks and to Bar barians, both to the wise and to the foolish. In brief: The sense of moral balance will tend to reduce the moral inequalities of society to a gracious isa. xi, 3-5. equation, exalting the valleys of poverty, laying low the mountains of opulence, straightening the twists of wrongs, smoothing the roughnesses of mis fortune : thus preparing in the wilderness the way of Jehovah, and leveling in the desert a highway for our returning God. The Golden Rule itself — Matt. vii, i-2. "All things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, even so do ye also unto them" — what is it but humanity's colossal balance? And when this colossal balance shall be truly adjusted, then shall every man indeed love his neighbor as himself. Heaven speed the day ! The Cardinal And now listen to our Lord's cardinal summary : Matt xxu?4o.' " On these two commandments hangeth the whole law, and the prophets." Cardinal, I say : for this word "cardinal" comes from the Latin cardo, meaning hinge. On these two commandments THE LORD'S SUMMARY. 353 swing, as a door or gate on its hinges, all the law and the prophets, or the whole Old Testament. Thus, on the hinge of the First Commandment — Hinge of First Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy ment. heart and soul and mind and strength — hangeth the first table of the Decalogue : Thou shalt have none other gods before me. Exod. xx 3-11. Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the like ness of any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth : thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them : for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me ; and shewing mercy unto thousands, of them that love me and keep my command ments. Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain ; for Jehovah will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work : but the seventh day is a sabbath unto Jehovah thy God : in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates : for in six days Jehovah made heaven aud earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day ; wherefore Jehovah blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. On the hinge of the Second Commandment — Hinge of Sec- Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself — hangeth Mandment the second table of the Decalogue : Honour thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be Exod. xx, 12-17. long upon the land which Jehovah thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt do no murder. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not 354 THE TEN" COMMANDMENTS. Apos tolic Echo of Lord's Summary. Ruin, xiii, 8-10. 1 Cor.xlii, 13. Gal. v, 14. Col. iii, 14. 1 Tim. i, 5. James ii, 8. 1 John iv. 7-21. Summary of the Proph ets. Micah. vi, 6-8. covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maid servant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's. And observe how the apostles echo and re-echo our Lord's cardinal summary. For example : Owe no man anything, save to love one another : for he that loveth his neighbour hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not covet, and if there be any other com mandment, it is summed up in this word, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour : love therefore is the fulfilment of the law. Now abideth faith, hope, love, these three ; and the greatest of these is love. The whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in this : Thou shalt love thy neigbour as thyself. Above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfectness. The end of the charge is love out of a pure heart and a good conscience and faith unfeigned. If ye fulfil the* royal law, according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well. Beloved, let us love" one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is begotten of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God ; for God is love. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. If we love one another, God abideth in us, and his love is perfected in us. God is love ; and he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God abideth in him. If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar : for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, cannot love God whom he hath not seen. And this commandment have we from him, that he who loveth God love his brother also. On these two commandments hang also " all the prophets." The whole prophetic system itself — what was it but a denunciation of selfishness, an inculcation of brotherly love ? Let me cite a single example : Wherewith shall I come before Jehovah, And bow myself "before the high God ? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, the lord's summary.. 355 With calves of a year old ? Will Jehovah be pleased with thousands of rams, With ten thousands of rivers of oil ? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul ? He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good ; And what doth Jehovah require of thee, But to do justly, and to love mercy, And to walk humbly with thy God ? In fine, we are trained for the heavenly sonhood in the school of the human brotherhood. In briefest language, Society is the test of character. Thus, on these two commandments of love to Love the God and love to man, hangs, as a colossal portal on Ethe'rV/the its two massive hinges, the whole Bible from Gen- Moral Uni- ° ' . . verse. esis to Revelation. Or, to express myself in phrase ology suggested by the undulatory theory : Love is the etherial medium pervading God's moral universe, by means of which are propagated the motions of his impulses, the heat of his grace, the light of his truth, the electricity of his activities, the magnetism of his nature, the affinities of his character. In brief, love is the very definition of Deity himself. Listen to the beloved disciple : " God is love ; and he that abideth in love abideth 1 John iv, 16. in God, and God abideth in him." " I'm apt to think the man That could surround the sum of things, and spy The heart of God and secrets of his empire, Would speak but love : with him the bright result Would change the hue of intermediate scenes, And make one thing of all theology." Let me, young gentlemen, in closing this series Three Con- of studies in Christian morality, offer three parting Thoughts. thoughts. 356 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Christ's Con- And, first, Jesus Christ's positive contribution to So£o"°gyto sociology, or the philosophy of society. I hardly need say that sociology is, in an eminent sense, the practical problem of our age. How true this is may be seen in such new words, or old words with new meanings, as altruism, anarchy, communism, nihilism, socialism, solidarity, sociology, and the like. The recent attempts on the lives of monarchs, the widespread and elaborate machinery for pre cipitating social revolutions, the fierce debates about land-tenures and monopolies and preroga tives of capital and rights of labor, the constant imminence of strikes and bloody uprisings — all this certifies with ominous eloquence that sociology is indeed the paramount practical problem of tlie dav. And love, according to the Divine Man, is the key to the problem. Without loitering amid minute classifications, it is enough to say that the various theories of society may be reduced to two. The first, to borrow a term from chemistry, is the atomic theory. It proceeds on the assumption that men are a mass of separate human units, or independent Adams, with no common bond of organic union or interfunctional connection. Push ing to the extreme the idea of individuality, its tendency is egotistic, disjunctive, chaotic. Its motto is, "After me the deluge." It is the theory of the anarchist, the professional agitator, the hater of mankind. The other theory, to borrow again from chemistry, is the molecular. It pro ceeds on the assumption that humanity is one colossal person, each individual member forming a THE lord's summary. 357 vital component, a functional factor in the great organism, so that membership in society is univer sal, mutual co-membership. Recognizing each indi vidual of the race as a constituent member of the one great human corpus, or corporation, its ten dency is altruistic, co-operative, constructive. Its motto is, " We are members one of another." It is Eph. iv, 25. the theory of Jesus Christ and those who are truly his. I say, then, that it is Jesus Christ who has given us the key to the great problem of sociology. Recall, now, the intense, unparalleled narrowness of the ancient Jew. Even broad- minded Aristotle said: " Of all wars those are most necessary and just which are Aristotle's made by men against wild beasts, and next, those made by " Pohty>" LL 8- Greeks against strangers, who are naturally our enemies." — Quoted by Charles Loring Brace in his valuable book entitled " Oesta Christi, or a History of Humane Progress under Chris tianity," page 190. How bitter the invective of Plautus "A man is i'i?u.tU8'. ,. " Asinarius. ' a wolf to a man he does not know" {Homo homini ignoto lupus). But when Jesus Christ came into the world and taught, never man so spake. How John vii, 47. profoundly original, for example, his Golden Rule: All things therefore whatsoever ye would that men should do Matt, vii, 12. unto you, even so do ye also unto them : for this is the law and the prophets. I am aware, indeed, that cavilers allege that this was already one of the commonplaces in Jewish and classic literature. Thus, Gibbon, speaking of Calvin's persecution of Servetus, says: A Catholic inquisitor yields the same obedience which he Edward Gibbon. requires ; but Calvin violated the golden rule of doing as he 35 5 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. would be done by, a rule which I read in a moral treatise of Isocrates (in Nicole, torn. 1, p. 93, edit. Battie) four hundred years before the publication of the gospel : " 'A itiaxovr^ 'v0* iriptav o£yi£e{T0e, TavTa Tois aAAoif /ii] 7roietT£." — " Decline and Fall cf the Roman Empire," LIV, note 36. But, as Guizot has partly pointed out, Gibbon, notwithstanding his eminent scholarship, makes here a twofold mistake. First, he misquotes Isocrates by representing him as uttering an affirm ative maxim : " Do unto others as ye would that men should do unto you." Whereas, the maxim of Isocrates is merely negative : " What would anger you, if done to you by others, that do not to them." And, secondly, Gibbon misquotes Jesus himself by overlooking this pivotal word "there- Matt. vii, 9-12. fore " (that is, in view of Christ's teaching of God's Fatherhood), and so misses the very gist of the Golden Rule. In other words, the maxim of Isocrates appeals to self-love ; the maxim of Jesus appeals to God's Fatherhood. Accordingly, Gib bon's sneer is as unscholarly as it is malignant. No; the Golden Rule is absolutely original. So, also, is Christ's doctrine of neighborhood. His parable of the Good Samaritan abolishes the word " foreigner," and transfigures the word " neighbor," making " the whole world kin." Ave, Jesus Eph. ii, u. Christ is himself our peace. Accordingly, wher ever he is honored, there is brotherhood and peace. Wherever he is denied, there is anarchy and war. May it be for us all to share in the spirit of the Prince of Peace, for so shall we share in his own Matt. v, 9. beatitude: " Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God." THE LORD'S SUMMARY. 359 Secondly: The coming one nation of Mankind. The Coming For humanity is still advancing in the direction Nation"maI1 indicated in the parable of the Good Samaritan. Men are learning more truly than ever the art of loving their neighbors as themselves. Indeed, the • great problem of sociology is no longer a problem concerning societies or men so much as it is a problem concerning Society or Man. How sig nificant such modern expressions as international law; comity of nations; international congresses for securing a common standard of time, distance, weight, money, signals; a universal alphabet; and the like. Here is the secret of the vision which inspired the youthful hero who had left his comrade for a little to gaze once more on the castle which sheltered his shallow-hearted Amy: Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping something ¦¦ Locksley new ; Hal1-" That which they have done but earnest of the things that they shall do. For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see, Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be ; Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of magic sails, Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales ; Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rain 'd a ghastly dew From the nations' airy navies grappling in the central blue ; Far along the world-wide whisper of the south-wind rushing warm, With the standards of the peoples plunging through the thun der-storm ; Till the war-drum throbbed no longer, and the battle-flags were furl'd In the Parliament of Man, the Federation of the World. 360 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. And it is to Jesus Christ that we owe this ma jestic conception, this august possibility of the coming one mighty nation of Mankind. What Matt, vi, 6-13. though he bids each of us enter his own inner chamber, and having shut his door, pray to his Father who seeth in secret? He also bids each of us carry the race with him, making his closet the world's oratory, bidding us use, in our solitary prayer, the plural "our, we, us": "After this manner pray ye: Our Father, Give us this day our daily bread, Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors, Bring us not into temptation, Deliver us from the evil one." Ah ! with what easy, blessed omnipotence does the Son of man sweep away with these two words — " Our Father " — all the elaborate conceits of your ethnologists touching the varieties of Man ! In spite of all your measurements of craniums and facial angles, the fact remains clear, solid, un alterable, that common fatherhood means, on the part of the children, common brotherhood. As ActB x 34. l°u£> as he> who is no respecter of persons, and with James 1,17. whom there can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning, invites Jew and Gentile, Mongolian and Kelt, Iranian aud Eskimo, Hottentot and Iroquois, to call him Father ; so long Jew and Gentile, Mongolian and Kelt, Iranian and Eskimo, Hottentot and Iroquois, are brothers. These two words — "Our Father" — forever settle the ques tion of the moral unity of the race. As a matter of fact, Christianity, or Christ's spirit, is making Aotsxvii,26. of one every nation of men for to dwell on all the the lord's summary. 361 face of the earth ; Christ's character is the unifying force of the nations, bridging the rivers of lan guages, tunnelling the mountains of castes, dis mantling the fortresses of races, incorporating all human varieties into the one majestic temple-body icor. vi,w. of humanity. For Jesus Christ is the true centre of gravity ; and it is only as the forces of humanity are pivoted on him that they are in balance. And the oscillations of humanity perceptibly shorten as the time of the promised equilibrium draws near. Ere long earth shall be girdled with the shining zone of love ; and then shall — All men's good Be each man's rule, and universal Peace Lie like a shaft of light across the land, And like a lane of beams athwart the sea, Through all the circle of the Golden Tear. "The Golden Year." Aye, the Golden Rule is the Golden Key to the Golden Age. Be it for us all to join in the laureate's Christmas peal for Humanity's New Year : Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light : The year is dying in the night ; Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. " In Memo riam," CIV. Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, acrosB the snow : The year is going, let him go ; Ring out the false, ring in the true. Ring out the grief that saps the mind, For those that here we see no more ; Ring out the feud of rich and poor, Ring iu redress for all mankind. 31 362 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Ring out a slowly dying cause, And ancient forms of party strife ; Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out the want, the care, the sin, The faithless coldness of the times ; Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes. But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite ; Ring in the love of truth and right, Ring in the common love of good. Ring out old shapes of foul disease ; Ring out the narrowing lust of gold ; Ring out the thousand wars of old, Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant mau and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand ; Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be. Edification Lastly: The purpose of education : it is human th,eFT?Jpose edification — that is, Societv-building. o f Educa- ' a tion. And this parting hint, I am sorry to say, young gentlemen, is really needed. For, as St. Paul re- 1 cor. viii, 1. minds us, knowledge puffeth up. Of course, the apostle does not mean to denounce knowledge as knowledge. The man never lived who had a deeper reverence for wisdom or true philosophy. But what he means to assert is this : Knowledge, when worshiped as an end rather than handled as a means, does tend to vaunting. There is something in the very sense of being erudite or intellectual that somehow tempts into airy self-conceit and moral tumefaction : Knowledge puffeth up. The the lord's summary. 363 very sense of superior mental attainments is apt to separate the scholar from the people, not by the upbuilding force of moral growth, but by the levita ting force of moral emptiness. The capacity for distention is good when used for purposes of pul monary inflation or of aerial navigation : but it is bad when it takes the form of moral flatulence. But, although the Apostle Paul asserts that knowledge puffeth up, he immediately adds that charity edifieth — that is, love buildeth up. I love icor.viu,i. this word " build." I think that the craft of mak ing things, whether in the world of matter or in the world of spirit, is the noblest of crafts. Aud love is the sublimest of builders. Here is one of the differences between knowledge and love: Knowledge expands by distention, and ends in col lapse; love expands by construction, aud ends in edifice. Knowledge swells into a balloon : love swells into a minster. While knowledge puffs up, love vaunts not herself, but builds up. Knowledge rears Towersof Babel : love rears the Temple of God. Knowledge is atomic, existing in isolation : love is molecular, crystallizing in architecture. And yet even knowledge itself may, and very often does, become architectural ; it is when it yields itself to the guidance of love. Ah ! here is the real office of knowledge : it is to be the servant of love. The true science, the genuine art — oh, that every young student here may understand and believe it ! — is to know how to build. Here is the acme of human genius and human force; here is the cul mination of human majesty. As Coleridge sings: 364 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. B. T. Coleridge. ,Tls the sublime of man, Our noontide majesty, to know ourselves Parts and proportions of one wondrous whole ! This fraternizes man, this constitutes Our charities and bearings. 2 Peter i, 5-7 In your faith, then, young gentlemen, supply vir tue ; aud in your virtue knowledge ; and in your knowledge temperance (self-control); and in your temperance patience ; and in your patience godli ness ; and in your godliness love of the brethren (love of the church) ; and in your love of the brethren love (love of mankind, philanthropy). Oh, young brothers, engaged in academic and professional studies, be true to the great office of knowledge ; subsidize it as the chief minister of love and society building. For you best build yourself when you build others. So shall the Lord give you, as he gave his great servant Paul, 2 Cor. x, 8. an authority for building up, and not for casting down. Love the Ar- This, then, is the lesson of the afternoon, and Sodety. °f indeed of this entire series. Love to God, or the first table of the law, and love to man, or the sec ond table of the law, is the architect of human society, even that sacred fane which is Jehovah's Eph. ii, 20-22. own mighty cathedral : " Built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief corner stone, in whom each several building, fitly framed together, groweth into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye are also builded together for a habitation of God in the Spirit." Heaven grant to you and me the love to God and the love to man which shall impel us so to use our THE LORD S SUMMARY. 365 knowledge that we shall indeed share in the erec tion of God's growing temple of humanity. Then, when the great minster shall have been finished, it will be seen that you and I had not only brought living stones to the one living corner stone, but also 1 Peter a, s. that you and I are ourselves pillars in the temple Eev. m, 12. of our God ; and we shall go out thence no more. Thus inwrought by divine grace into that perfected temple, we shall, with the ransomed and glorified of all lands and ages, forever sing : Love is heaven, and heaven is love. " £jy ?f Last ' Minstrel." O Almighty God, who hast knit together thine elect in one Collect. communion and fellowship, in the mystical body of thy Son Christ our Lord; Grant us grace so to follow thy blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those unspeakable joys, which thou hast prepared for those who unfeignedly love thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. THE END. INDEX OF TOPICS. PAGE Abraham: monotheism one of his gifts to mankind.... 47, 48 Accumulation : a divine in stinct 306-309 Adultery : Christ's doctrine of. 222-224 Age: golden: business activity of. 308, 309 Allotment of Canaan 253, 323 Altruism : Christ's doctrine of. 349, 352 Anarchy: a mark of our times 24, 167-171 Anger: Christ's doctiine of, 197-208 sometimes right 193, 194 Animals: have "souls" 179,189 immortality of. 191 treatment of. 188-191 Anthropomorphism 62, 119, 120 Antinomians: modern 24, 169 Antiquity: plea for 166,167 Arbitration : should supplant war 205-208 Art: place of in worship 56, 57 Asceticism: Christ's doctrine of 222-224 Atheism : Bacon's cure for 54 Balance: sense of a test of society 351, 352 Bibliolatry 60 Body : a parable of society 327-329, 350, 351 sacredness of. 180, 181 the sphere of sin 226-229 Bridal: the first 211-221 Brotherhood of man 360, 361 Calumny: forms of 281-286 Canaan: allotment of 253,323 Candid: etymology of. 289,290 Capital: problem of limit ing 322-329 Chambers of imagery 59,60 PAGE Character: etymology of. 299 standard of the judgment.. 68-70 Chastity: Christ's doctrine of 222-224 Child: must be always obey? 153, 154 Christ: his contribution to soci ology 356-358 bis doctrine of adultery. 222-224 altruism 344-352 asceticism 231-235 brotherhood 360, 361 chastity 222-224 divorce 224-226 forgiveness 197-208 murder 192-197 neighborhood 347-352 non-resistance 197-208 oaths 91-100 sabbath 123-129 society 349 truthfulness 87-90 words 299-302 hate of hypocrisy 89 originality 225,226 revelation of God 104, 105 summaryof decalogue, 341-355 not a civic lawgiver. 201,202 the coming Man 207, 208 I AM of Old Testament, 37-39 image of God 78 manifested Father 38 pivot of creation 361 true bridegroom 237-243 emancipator 43-45 language 301 sabbatb 145 to be worshiped 78 under law of beredity 77 Christianity: morality looking Godward 149 Church : a single personality, 42, 43 definition of. 42 the true bride 237-243 Israel 40-43 367 368 INDEX OF TOPICS. PAGE Church : unity of. 42, 43, 240, 241 Corban: meaning of. 152 Covetousness: folly of. 333 origin of. 320 perils of. 315-320 Debt: etymology of. 271,272 Decalogue: a divine covenant, 20,21 a divine revelation 23 affirmative in meaning. 20, 21 anachronism of. 23,24 Christ's summary of. 341-355 convicting power of. 17-20 division of. 149, 150 etymology of. 20 germinal in character 21-23 history of. 14-16 immortal in principle 23 pertinent to our times 24 prohibitive in form 17-20 two tables of. 149, 150 Devil: etymology of. 284 Divorce: Christ's doctrine of.... 224-226 Dualism in Christendom 45 Ecclesiolatry. 60 Eden: birthplace of industry 112-114 charter of. 247-250 Education: purpose of.. 362-364 Elohim: meaning of. 31,32 Equilibrium of society 351,352 Evil: problem of. 314 Excesses: suicidal 186 Falsehood : guilt of.....96-99, 285, 286 "Finished": a divine word, 120,121 Foeticide 185 Forgiveness: Christ's doctrine of. 197-208 Gehenna: meaning of. 232 God: unity of. 342 Golden Age 207,308,309 Golden Eule 357,361 Golden Year 361 Good Samaritan : parable of, 347-349 Heredity : accounts for heathen ism 66 for sinfulness. 65, 66 PAGE Heredity : apparent exceptions to 64 hope for foreign missions... 73, 74 hope of society 71-74 Jews, a striking sample of..... 65 merciful aspect of. 72-74 merciless aspect of. 64-67 neither cruel nor unjust.... 70-72 not inconsistent with respon sibility 67-70 Sinaitic announcement of, 63, 64 Heroism: summons to per sonal 76, 77 Husbands: duties of. 238 Hypocrisy: guilt of. 88,89 I AM 30,31,39 Iconoclasm 58 Idiosyncrasy : lawlessness of..... 169 Idiosyncrasies: national 34 Idolatry compared to adul tery 62,63,67 origin of. 54 stupidity of. 57,53 Image-worship: samples of.... 60,61 Imagination : to be cultivated... 56 Individualism : lawlessness of... 170 Iofanticide 185 Innovation : a mark of our times 162-167 Intemperance: lawlessness of... 168, 169 murderous 185, 186 Irreligion : the typical theft 273 Israel: a single personality... 33,34 Jealousy: Jehovah's 62,63 statue of. v 63 Jehovah: a jealous God 62,63 his unity 342 Israel's husband 62,63 meaning of. 29-33 Jews: a single personality 33,34 example of heredity 65 Journalism: responsibility of, 294-297 Jubilee: year of. 323-327 Knowledge: puffeth up 362-363 the minister of love 363,364 INDEX OF TOPICS. 369 PAGE Labor: the basis of property 249-251, 310 Lamb: wrath of. 194 Land: private ownership of, 311,312 Landmarks : samples of remov ing. - 267-270 Language: bridge of society... 87,88 covenant of society 278, 279 power of. 2yl,294 sacredness of 87, 88 standard of the judgment 294-302 wonderfulness of. 277,278 Lawlessness: a mark of our age 24, 167-171 Lex talionis 199,200,285,286 Lie: guilt of. 87,88,96-99 Life: a matter of boundaries 252-254 origin of. 177-180 sacredness of. 178-181, 189 Limitations of man 252-254 property 254,255 Longevity : promoted by duti fulness ^ 157-159 Love: architect of society™ 363,364 Christ's doctrine of. 197, 208, 341-355 mediating ether of the moral universe 355 Man and Woman : community of. 214-216 diversity of. 216-219 unity of. 214-219 Man: basis of sabbath 123-131 greater than sabbath 132-138 his dominion over na ture 247-249 primal charter- 247-249 image of God 1S1 limitations of. .' 252-254 needs sabbath for his relig ious nature 127 secular nature 123-127 origin of. 177-180 Marriage: a divine institution, 219-226 topic of, pertinent to our times 226 type of Christ and Church... 235 PAGE Monogamy: law of Eden 225,241 Monopoly: lawlessness of. 169 Monotheism : basal stone of Christianity 342 gift of Jew to mankind 46-48 Morality: Christianity looking man ward 149 Murder: a state rather than an act 195-197 Christ's definition of 191-197 forms of. 182-191 sacrilegio usn ess of. 181 Name of God : a gradual reve lation 39-42 meaning of phrase 83 Scriptural frequency of..... 85, 86 Names of God 29-33, 37, 42 Nation: a single personality 34, 74-76 of mankind 359-362 Nations: idiosyncrasies of. 34 Neighborhood : Christ's doc trine of. 347-352 Non-resistance: Christ's doc trine of. 197-208 Oaths: Christ's doctrine of.. 91-100 Occupations: murderous 185,186 Origin of evil 314 Original Sin : doctrine of, scien tific 67 Ownership: right of. 252 Parent: duties of. 154-156 symbol of God 171-173 symbol of State 159-162 Parentage: inherently authori tative 153 Parricide: Horn an name for traitor 159, 160 Past: an oracle 164-166 same as present 162-164 Patria potestas 158 Paul: warmth of his encomi ums 287,288 Pauperism : work the cure of 113,114 Perjury : sacrilegiousness of.. .88, 281 370 IXDEX OF TOPICS. PAGE Peter: bis sudden profanity 91 Piety : Roman conception of, 150, 151 Pistol : should be abolished 183, 184 Polytheism: in Christendom.... 45 Present: harvest of past 164 Profanity: idiotic 96 sacrilegious 95 vulgar 96 Property : a divine institution.. 249 basis of 250 differentiates men 252 limitations of. 254,255 origin of 252 outgrowth of civilization...... 251 problem of limiting 322-328 Rechabites: tribe of, still sur viving 157, 158 Religion : morality looking God ward 149 Rest: Creator's 119,122 duty of. „ 114, 117 Retaliation: Mosaic 199,200 Reverence: should be cultiva ted 105-107 Sabbath : a day of rest 114, 117 a divine appointment 129 a means, not end 123-131 a question of our age. 141 changed from Saturday to Sunday 141-145 Christ's doctrine of. 123-128 God's symbolic toll 117 legislation 126, 127 secret of victory 141 true method of keeping.. 138, 141 Sabbaths: three great 122 Satan : prince of slanderers 284, 285 Self-defense: problem of..... 204,205 Seven : a sacred number 115-117 Simplicity : etymology of. 290 Sin: pedigree of. 314 Sinai: description of. 11 Sincerity: etymology of 290 Slander: guilt of 281-284 Society : a moral balance.... 351, 352 a moral personality 322 Christ's doctrine of. 349-351 PAGE Society: compared to bodily organism 327-329 heredity the hope of. 71, 72 test of character 355 Sociology : Christ's contribution to 356-358 Stealing: a common tempta tion 255-257 origin of 256,257 samples of corporate ... 263-270 samples of ofucial , 262, 263 samples of private 258-262 Suicide: guilt of 184,185 Sunday: the Christian Sab bath 141-145 Tolstoi: literalism of. 203 Tritheism : in Christendom 45 Trust: degradation ofthe word 266 Truth : freeing power of „ 43, 44 Unity of Christ and Church....- 42, 43, 240, 241 God. 342 man and woman 214-219 Vivisection: question of. 190 War: question of 205-208 Wealth: problem of limiting 322-328 Wives: duties of. 238 Woman: origin of. 211-213 place of 237-239 Words: immortal 100,101 our judges 294-302 power of. 291-294 reveal character 297-299 Work : basis of property 249-251, 310 cure of pauperism 113,114 duty of 112-114 man's primal condition „ 112 Worship: an instinct 53,54 duty of. 117 must be spiritual 57 must be undivided 343-345 Wrath of Lamb 194 Year of Jubilee 323-327 INDEX OF PEINCIPAL SCEIPTUEES. PAGE Genesis i, 26-28 247-251 Genesis ii, 1-3. 118-123 Genesis ii, 7 177-180 Genesis ii, 7-15 112-114 Genesis ii, 18-25 211-221 Genesis iii, 19 178 Genesis v, 3 65, 66 Genesis xvi, 13, 14 100 Genesis xxi, 31 100 Genesis xxxii, 22-32 102 Genesis xlix, 1-27 65 Exodus iii, 1-15 30-33 Exodus xix, 1-25 12,13 Exodus xx, 1,2 31 Exodus xx, 1-3 29-50 Exodus xx, 4-6 51-79 Exodus xx, 7 81-107 Exodus xx, 8-ll~ 109-145 Exodus xx, 12. _.. 147-174 Exodus xx, 13 175-208 Exodus xx, 14 210-243 Exodus xx, 15- 246-274 Exodus xx, 16 276-302 Exodus xx, 17 304-332 Exodus xxi, 23-25... „ 199,200 Exodus xxxi, 12-17 130 Exodus xxxii, 4. 46 Exodus xxxiii, 18-23 102 Exodus xxxiv, 5-8 102, 103 Exodus xxxiv, 14 63 Leviticus xix, 18 346-352 Leviticus xxv, 8-55 „ 323-325 Numbers xxxiii, 54. 253 Deuteronomy iv, 15-19. 58,59 Deuteronomy v, 15 130 Deuteronomy vi, 4, 5- 341-343 Deuteronomy xxii, 8 187, 188 .Deuteronomy xxvii, 17 268-270 Deuteronomy xxxii, 8, 9_ 254 PAGK Joshua xxiv, 1-28 30 1 Samuel xii, 1-5. 319 1 Samuel xxv, 1-13 318 IKings xviii, 19-39 32 1 Kings xxi, 1-16. 317 Job xxxi, 24-28 61,315,316 Psalm viii, 5-9 132, 249 Psalm xv, 1-5. 331 Psalm xvi, 5, 6 254 Psalin xiv, 1-17 63 Psalm lxxxvi, 11,12 50 Psaho cxxvii, 2 213 Proverbs iii, 28 260 Proverbs xi, 15 260 Proverbs xi, 25 265 Proverbs xi, 26 265 Proverbs xvi, 33 254 Proverbs xx, 14 259 Proverbs xxx, 7-9 321 Isaiah xxxi, 1_ 126, 127 Isaiah xl,3-5 352 Isaiah xliv,9-20_ 57, 58 Isaiah liv, 5 62, 63 Isaiah lviii, 6, 7 140 Jeremiah xxxv, 18, 19 157, 158 Ezekiel vfii,3-12 59 Ezekiel xviii, 1-31.. 68-70 Ezekiel xx, 12, 130 Hosea vi, &. 134 Mieah vi, 6-8 354, 355 Habakkuk ii.ll 183 Zechariah iv, 6. 127 Malaehi iii, 8, 9. 273 371 372 INDEX OF PEINCIPAL SCRIPTURES. PAGE Matthew v, 21, 22 192-197 Matthew v, 27-32 222-235 Matthew v, 33-37. 90-100 Matthew v, 38-48 197-208 Matthew vi, 6-13 360 Matthew vi, 24 50, 343-345 Matthew vii, 12 , 357,358 Matthew xii, 1-8 133,134 Matthew xii, 9-14 134,135 Matthew xii, 34-37 97 Matthew xii, 37 272,299 Matthew xv, 3-6 151-152 Matthew xv, 6. 33 Matthew xv, 19 195, 222, 314 Matthew xvi, 4 63 Matthew xviii, 20. 39,86 Matthew xix, 3-12. 220-226 Matthew xxii, 15-22 201, 335-337 Matthew xxii, 23-33 337,338 Matthew xxii, 34-40 339-365 Matthew xxiii, 16-22 89,99 Matthew xxiii, 34-36 75 Matthew xxvi, 73 299, 302 Matthew xxviii, 1 144 Matthew xxviii, 20 39 Mark ii, 27,28 123-137 Mark iv, 19. 321 Mark vii, 9-13 151,152 Mark vii, 31-34 294 Mark vii, 21, 22 222,223 Mark viii, 34-37 233 Mark ix, 43-48 232 Mark x, 2-12 224-226 Mark xii, 28-34. 339-365 Mark xiv, 66-71 91 Luke iii, 38 132,180 Luke vi, 31 349 Luke x, 25-37 347-349 Luke xii, 13-21 201,202,329 Luke xiii, 10-17 135,136 Luke xiv, 1-6 136 Luke xvi, 9. 332 Luke xvi, 10 267 Luke xix, 29-34 308 Luke xxiv, 5,6 145 John i, 1 104, 105 John i, 18 38, 104 PAGE John i,47 288 John iii, 6. 64 John iv,24. 57 John v, 1-18. 136,137 John v, 17 - 119,122 John vii, 21-24 137 John viii,31-36. 43-45 John viii, 58. 39 John ix, 2. 65 John xiv, 1-10. 103 John xiv, 8-10.- 38 John xvii, 24 39 John xviii, 22,23 203 John xix, 30. 121 Acts xvii, 22-31 57 Acts xvii, 23 121 Acts xvii, 26 253, 360, 361 Romans i, 14 352 Romans ii, 28, 29 41, 42 Romans iv, 20. 17 Romans v, 12. 66 Romans vii, 7-13 17-20 Romans viii, 2. 45 Romans viii, 17. 132, 173 Romans xiii, 8. 271 Romans xiv, 5 131 Romans xiv, 12. 70 1 Corinthians vi, 15-20...- ISO 1 Corinthians vi, 19. 180 1 Corinthians viii, 1 362-364 1 Corinthians viii, 4-6 46 1 Corinthians xi, 11,12 218 1 Corinthians xii, 14-26. 327, 350 1 Corinthians xii, 27 42 1 Corinthians xiii, 1-3. 346,347 1 Corinthians xiii, 9-12 290 1 Corinthians xv, 56 18 2 Corinthians iii, 3 16 2 Corinthians iv,4-6 104 2 Corinthians viii, 14. 351 352 2 Corinthians viii, 15 329 2 Corinthians x,4 209 2 Corinthians x,8 296,364- 2 Corinthians xi, 2, 3 63, 235, 241 INDEX OF PRINCIPAL SCRIPTURES. 373 PAGE Galatians iii, 24 315 Galatians iii, 28 43,216 Galatians vi, 7 64 Ephesians iv, 13 240 Ephesians iv, 25 88, 97, 279, 322 349, 350, 357 Ephesians iv, 26, 27 193, 194 Ephesians iv, 28 272 Ephesians v, 22-33 63, 236-239 Ephesians vi, 1-4 154-156 PhUippians ii, 4 351 Colossians i, 15 104 Colossians ii, 16, 17. 131 Colossians ii, 20-23 231 Colossians iii, 2 43 Colossians iii, 20-21 154,155 Colossians iv, 6 289,291 2 Thessalonians ii, 3-12. 171 2 Thessalonians iii, 10 114 1 Timothy i, 8, 9 19 1 Timothy v, 13 282 1 Timothy vi, 7-11 319, 320 PAGE Hebrews i, 3 104 Hebrews i, 6... 78 Hebrews ii, 14-18 77 Hebrews ix, 19, 20 21 Hebrews iv, 1-10 122, 123 Hebrews iv, 12, 13 223,314 Hebrews xiii, 8 39 James i, 13-15 314 James ii, 10 22 James ii, 13 73 James iii, 1-9 .- 293 James iii, 9 185 James v, 12 98 1 Peter i, 4 173 2 Peter i, 4 173 2 Peter iii, 8 74 1 John iii, 15 195 1 John iv, 7-21 354 Revelation i, 8 39 Revelation vi, 16 194 Revelation xii, 7-10 285 Revelation xix, 6-9 63, 242, 243 INDEX OF PEINCIPAL AUTHOES. PAGE Msc hylu s : " Zeus, whoever thou art" 104 Agassiz : On immortality of ani mals 191 Alcoran: "When a man dies, they who survive him ask what property has be left." (Footnote) 332 Aratus: "We are also his off spring " 57 Aristotle: "Of all wars, those are most necessary" 357 " To die in order to avoid the pains of poverty" 185 Augustine : On the origin of the Church 239,240 " Quisquis amat dictis absen- tem rodere vitam " 283 Bacon: His prayer. 106,107 On atheism 54 On innovation 165 Bonar : "Ascend, Beloved, to the joy" 243 Briggs: On the term "Jah veh" 31 Broadus: Footnote on Matt. xxii, 38 345 Browne, Sir Thomas: On his tory repeating itself. 163 Browning, Elizabeth B. : " Of all the thoughts of God that are borne inward." 213 Browning, Robert : " God made ail the creatures and gave them our love" 191 Bui wer : " More royalty in wo man's heart" 214 Burke: On innovation 166 On journalism 296 Burns: " The Cotter's Saturday Night »„ 156 PAGE Bushnell: On sin and disease 186, 187 " Outpopulating power of the Christian stock" 74 "Routine observance indis pensable" 139 Carlyle: "History is the essence of innumerable biogra phies" 34 On hero worship and Chris tianity 61 Chrysostom : " The true Shechi nah is man" 181 Cicero : " A sensuous and in tem perate youthhood trans mits to old age" 186 Coke: Definition of murder 182 Coleridge : " Farewell, fare well! but this I tell" 191 "'Tis the sublime of man" 346 Colton : His apothegm on words. (Footnote) 87 Copernicus: " Non parem Pauli gratiam requiro" 106 Cowper: "I would not en ter on my list of friends" 190,191 "Sworn on every slight pre tense" 94 " There is yet a liberty un sung " 45 Dana: "Deus fecit" 106 Draper: " On the physiological benefit of Sabbath" 124 Edmeston : " When will my pil grimage be done?" 123 Eliot, George : " There are glan ces of hatred that stab and raise no cry" 284 Elton: On Colossians iv, 6....291,292375 376 INDEX OF PRINCIPAL AUTHORS. PAGE Emerson : " No greater calamity can befall a nation than loss of worship " 105 "Sunday is the core of our civilization" 127 Fairbairn : On the distinction between Elohim and Jeho vah 31,32 Galen: His vocation "a relig ious hymn in honor of his Creator" 105 Geikie: On the tribe of Recha bites 158 Gibbon: On tbe Golden Rule 357,358 Girdlestone: On the difficulty of translating the name of God 84 Hale, Sir Matthew : "A Sabbath well spent" * 139 Harris: On duties of editors of journals 297 Hildebert: " Alpha et o magna Deus " 49 Holmes: "A man is an omni bus, in which all his an cestors are seated" 65 Hooker: "Oflawtherecanbeno less acknowledged than that her" 173 Horace: "Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona" 165 Isocrates: Declared by Gibbon to have anticipated the Golden Rule 358 Jefferson : " That the best gov erned country which is least governed " 326 Justin : His description of" Sun day " 141, 142 Keble: "Where all around, on mountain, sea, and sky ".. 11 Kepler: His prayer 106 Kynaston : " First and Last of faith's receiving" 48, 49 Leathes : On taking God's name in vain. (Footnote) 87 Logau: "Joy, and Temperance, and Repose " 186 PAGE Longfellow: "Down the dark future, through long gen erations" £08 " I shot an arrow into the air " 278 "Sundayisthegoldenclasp" 130 Lowell: " In vain we call old no tions fudge " 261 Luther: "If I have a picture of Christ in my heart, why not one on " 60 " You cannot prevent the de- eil from shooting arrows of evil " 235 Macaulay: On economic value of Sabbath 124, 125 On power of the incarnation 78 "Then none was for a party" 273 Machiavelli : On the constant renovation of the State... 325 Maimonides: On oaths.. 91 Marsh : On the verb " ought." (Footnote) 271, 272 Martial: "When all the bland ishments of life are gone" 185 Milton : "Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot " 307 "Airy tongues, that syllable men's names" 101 " Earth felt the wound ; and Nature from her seat" 227 " Let none admire that riches grow in HeU" 321 " Mammon led them on " 257 " With her best nurse, Con templation " „ 127 Mulford: On the ground of right to property 250, 251 Muller: On. Semitic monothe ism 47, 48 Neale: " He that is wont to slan der absent men " 283 Novalis: On the sacredness of the human body 181 Perronet: "All hail the power of Jesus' name" 78, 79 Plato: On unspoken soliloquy... 298 INDEX OP PRINCIPAL, AUTHORS. 377 PAGE Plautus: "Homines quigestant, quique auscultant crimi- na " „ 282 " Homo homini ignoto lu pus " 357 Plumptre : On progressive reve lation of God's name.... 39-42 Plutarch : On universality ofthe religious idea 53 Pope: "Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer"-... 300 " In quibbles angel and arch angel join " 340 " We think our fathers fools, so wise we grow" 167 " Who dares to think one thing, and another tell "- 88 Proudhon : " La propri