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491

SHORT LESSONS FOR SIMPLE MINDS.

NO. V.-HUMILITY.

John xiii. 4-10.

THE lesson which first strikes us when reading the account of our Saviour washing His disciples' feet, is that of His humility; He whom we now know to be God as well as man, condescending to do for His disciples that which few of us would like to do for each other.

We read a great deal in the Bible about the necessity of being humble, meek and lowly, and whilst we read, it seems very beautiful, and we feel as if it would be very delightful to practise it, and that the next time we have a chance we will do so.

We go back to our work amongst others, and perhaps we are asked to do something in the work which we think degrading. We reply that we will do nothing menial, and that it ought to be given to some one who is younger and less able for better work than we consider ourselves to be. We thus immediately forget how beautiful humility has appeared, and we show by our manner, and perhaps more unmistakeably by our words and actions, that if we are expected to serve our neighbour, it must be in some way that we like, and not to please others, and by so doing, we at once take all the sweetness out of our work, everything that could render it acceptable to God or man; for our heavenly Father only loveth a cheerful giver, whether it be of time, money, or useful employment.

Or, perhaps, we go to our duties quietly, with no feeling of distaste for them, and are taunted by some one of those around us of being slow, or careless, or awkward in doing what we have to do. No sooner do these reproaches strike upon our ears, than the angry retort passes from our lips, we forget all about the Divine declaration, "Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth," and we excuse ourselves by saying, Well, I was so provoked, I could not help saying what I did.

Truly the tongue is an unruly member, and we cannot be too earnest in our prayers that we offend not in word. But, as we have learnt in the case of the curing of the lame and the blind, etc., the Lord was not only continually in the effort to teach us some useful lesson for our daily conduct, but also to give us rules for the government of our affections and desires, by means of His outward actions. Thus, though the first lesson we learn in this instance is humility, there is another and higher one of which humility is the basis. As the feet are the lowest part of the body, and represent our walk in life, they

are the fit emblems of the character which we exhibit before others. In that character those with whom we associate see many defects, and we are all tempted to speak unkindly of each other when we observe their faults. But this will not help them to cure them, and yet it is our bounden duty to try to do so; for if we really love our neighbour as ourselves, we shall be anxious for their happiness as for our own.

This desire will lead us to pray to the Lord to show us how to help them to overcome their evils, and He will give us those indispensable fruits of the Spirit, love and gentleness, which will soften our words, and help us to show to the wrongdoers their wickedness and folly, in such a manner as not to excite their anger, but to make them feel that it is real love which prompts us to reprove. This, then, is washing one another's feet spiritually; helping each other to see what is wrong in our daily life, and by the grace of the Lord to overcome it.

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Ir we read beneath the lines of history, a remarkable parallelism is perceived between the life of any people and its intellectual status.

1 History of the Conflict between Religion and Science. John W. Draper, M.D., LL.D. King & Co., London.

History of the Conflict between Religion & Science. 493

The one is an outbirth of the other, a concrete manifestation. Taking, then, certain social and political facts for an ordinary period, a somewhat correct notion may be gathered respecting the tendency of the thoughtcurrent of a given people. And this stream, narrow in remote antiquity, is seen to grow broader and deeper as the course of history rolls on. The records of Greece relating to early times bring before us a nation whose mind, vigorous and powerful, was much given to the creation of deities. Olympus became with that people the sacred abode of the gods, every stream and fountain had its nymphs and naïads, satyrs revelled in the woods, and from the Delphic tripod the oracle made known the decrees of fate. These ideas, deeply implanted in the mind, affected the social and political life of the nation, and gave a form to its literature. The Iliad is at once so beautiful and sublime, so terrible and grand, because it grew amid enchanted groves and near the habitations of the immortals, and Homer stands out as the type of a people imbued with profound reverence for the higher powers. This reverence received its first shock when thinkers began to speculate upon the laws of the universe and lay the foundations of a daring philosophy. The thought-current was emerging from the mystic shades of Pluto, becoming broader and clearer in its onward sweep. Marked change of thought in opposition to long-standing principles engenders conflict between mind and mind, and interrogation of nature results in the ultimate demolition of the fabrics and temples of superstition, and in a conflict between religion and science. The writer in the work before us traces in a brief yet comprehensive sketch the history of that conflict from its origin to the present time. Such a history is valuable, because, while relating the progress of thought and the achievements of intelligence, it reveals the operations of a higher Power, leading man from the shades of superstition upward to the bright regions of truth. The work is distributed into twelve chapters, beginning with the origin of science and ending with a sketch of the present position of the Church in its relation to advanced thought. In the hands of the writer the cause of science by no means suffers by contrast with the narrow dogmatism of a perverted Christianity. We expect those who devote their energies and talents to the study of science to regard with contempt any religious system which appeals not to reason but to intellectual credulity; nevertheless even a scientific thinker may in his own domain become narrow and dogmatical. He may consider science as the all in all; he may so limit his thought to the confines of materiality as to regard the world of spirit as the creation of imagination, and Divine revelation as an imposition. Neither the theologian nor the man of science, however, ought to be dogmatical, but rather willing to welcome truths that bear the stamp of rationality. In the preface the writer remarks that "the history of science is not a mere record of isolated discoveries; it is a narrative of the conflict of two contending powers, the expansive force of the human intellect on the one side, and the compression arising from traditionary faith and human interests on the other."

Regarded, then, as an expansion of the mind, and the enlargement of the sphere of human thought, science has a history which may be traced to very remote times. It is a mark of the mind that it continually strives to extend the domain of thought and resist restraint and coercion. This expansive power of the mind has brought the world through ages of darkness and superstition to its present advanced state. The compression experienced by mind has usually been exerted by the guardians of religion, and especially when that religion has become an instrument for the acquisition of temporal power. The punishment of Socrates was rather for a political purpose than for the vindication of the gods. He thought in advance of the men of his time, at least of the multitude, for it is doubtful whether the dignitaries who regulated the religious institutions were equally credulous as the people whom it was their interest to overawe. Men are not slow to use religion for the purposes of ambition and dominion. In the early days of Rome, the pontiffs were aware of its power over the minds of a people educated in superstition. Livy indicates in a brief passage the purpose religion was made to serve in these times. "Quæ ad sacra pertinebant," he says, "a pontificibus maxime, ut religione obstrictos haberent multitudinis animos, suppressa." 1 But Rome was destined to behold the decay of religion hallowed by the names of Romulus and Numa, a religion ancient as the constitution, and powerful in its influence over the minds of her subjects. "No spectacle," says the author, "can be presented more solemn, more mournful, than that of the dying of an ancient religion which in its day has given consolation to many generations of men." The spectacle may be solemn, but one which the mind would contemplate rather with satisfaction than grief. The Christian religion brought that consolation to the multitude which Paganism was powerless to afford. The pure and simple precepts of Christ displaced the babblings of heathenism. But the decay of the old faith was a work of time; it had commenced long before the birth of Christ. The study of nature and humanity by the Greek philosophers brought discredit upon the Olympian deities. They were seen to be the creations of the poet and the priest. The acquiescence of the people followed, but not without conflict. The extension of the Greek Empire under Alexander conduced to this result. The author gives a brief sketch of the campaigns of Alexander in order to show how the Greek intellect was stimulated to activity by its contact with the wonders of the mighty empires of Egypt and Persia. With an extract from that admirable account we will close this paper, taking up our notice of the work in a future number. "There were men," he says, "who had marched with the Macedonian army from the Danube to the Nile, from the Nile to the Ganges. They had felt the hyperborean blasts of the countries beyond the Black Sea, the simooms and tempests of the Egyptian deserts. They had seen the Pyramids, which had already stood for twenty centuries, the hieroglyphic obelisks of Luxor, avenues of silent sphynxes, colossi of monarchs who reigned in the morning of the world. In the halls of Esar-haddon they had stood before the thrones of grim old

1 The Histories, book vi. ch. i.

Assyrian kings, guarded by winged bulls. In Babylon there remained its walls, once more than sixty miles in compass, and after the ravages of three centuries and three conquerors, still more than eighty feet in height; there were still the ruins of the temple of cloud-encompassed Bel, on its top was planted the observatory where the weird Chaldean astronomers had held nocturnal communion with the stars; still there were vestiges of the two palaces with their hanging gardens, in which were great trees growing in mid air, and the wreck of the hydraulic machinery that had supplied them with water from the river. If Chaldea, Assyria, Babylon, presented stupendous and venerable antiquities reaching far back into the night of time, Persia was not without her wonders of a later date. The pillared halls of Persepolis were filled with miracles of art, carvings, sculptures, enamels, alabaster libraries, obelisks, colossal bulls. Ecbatana, the cool summer retreat of Persian kings, was defended by seven encircling walls of hewn and polished blocks, the interior ones in succession in increasing height and of different colours, in astrological accordance with the seven planets. The palace was roofed with silver tiles, its beams were plated with gold. At midnight in its halls the sunlight was rivalled by many a row of naphtha cressets. A paradise, that luxury of the monarchs of the East, was planted in the midst of the city. The Persian Empire from the Hellespont to the Indus was truly the garden of the world."

(To be continued).

Review.

I. T.

ACCOUNT OF Swedenborg, from D. G. GreGORY'S HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Vol. ii. pp. 541-546. (Communicated.) "THOUGH not strictly to be accounted sectaries, since each of them were declared enemies to all separation from their respective Churches, the names of John Hutchinson and Baron Swedenborg have excited too much attention to be entirely omitted. The former was a person of uncommon abilities and of extensive knowledge. The Holy Scriptures he esteemed the source of all knowledge, human and divine. After Origen and others, he asserted that the Scriptures were not to be understood in a literal, but in an allegorical sense, and asserted further, agreeably to this interpretation, that the Hebrew Scriptures would be found to testify amply concerning the nature and person of Jesus Christ."

Then Dr. Gregory proceeds to give an account of Swedenborg. "The Hon. Emanuel Swedenborg was the son of Jasper Swedberg, Bishop of West Gotha. He appears to have had an uncommonly good education, for his learning was extensive in almost every branch, and at a very early period of life he became remarkable for his abilities at the Court of Sweden. His first and favourite pursuit was natural knowledge, on which he published several excellent treatises. He was intimate with the celebrated Charles XII., who appointed him to the office of Assessor to the Metallic College, and in 1719, he was ennobled by Queen Ulrica Eleanora, and named Baron Swedenborg. "In the year 1743 he professed to have been favoured with a particular This statement respecting Swedenborg Dr. Gregory must have made on some other authority than that of Swedenborg himself-on that of Mr. Clowes, it would appear.

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