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Page 14
What think you now, in candour and honour, you youth of the latter
days,--what think you of these types of the thought, devotion, and
government, which not in words, but pregnant and perpetual fact,
animated these which you have been accustomed to call the Dark Ages?
The Philosophy is Augustine's; the Prayer Alfred's; and the Letter
Canute's.
And, whatever you may feel respecting the beauty or wisdom of these
sayings, be assured of one thing above all, that they are sincere; and
of another, less often observed, that they are joyful.
Be assured, in the first place, that they are sincere, The ideas of
diplomacy and priestcraft are of recent times. No false knight or
lying priest ever prospered, I believe, in any age, but certainly
not in the dark ones. Men prospered then, only in following
openly-declared purposes, and preaching candidly beloved and trusted
creeds.
And that they did so prosper, in the degree in which they accepted
and proclaimed the Christian Gospel, may be seen by any of you in your
historical reading, however partial, if only you will admit the idea
that it could be so, and was likely to be so. You are all of you in
the habit of supposing that temporal prosperity is owing either to
worldly chance or to worldly prudence; and is never granted in any
visible relation to states of religious temper. Put that treacherous
doubt away from you, with disdain; take for basis of reasoning
the noble postulate, that the elements of Christian faith are
sound,--instead of the base one, that they are deceptive; reread the
great story of the world in that light, and see what a vividly real,
yet miraculous tenor, it will then bear to you.
Their faith then, I tell you first, was sincere; I tell you secondly
that it was, in a degree few of us can now conceive, joyful. We
continually hear of the trials, sometimes of the victories, of
Faith,--but scarcely ever of its pleasures. Whereas, at this time,
you will find that the chief delight of all good men was in the
recognition of the goodness and wisdom of the Master, who had come
to dwell with them upon earth. It is almost impossible for you to
conceive the vividness of this sense in them; it is totally impossible
for you to conceive the comfort, peace, and force of it. In everything
that you now do or seek, you expose yourselves to countless miseries
of shame and disappointment, because in your doing you depend on
nothing but your own powers, and in seeking choose only your own
gratification. You cannot for the most part conceive of any work but
for your own interests, or the interests of others about whom you are
anxious in the same faithless way; everything about which passion is
excited in you or skill exerted is some object of material life, and
the idea of doing anything except for your own praise or profit has
narrowed itself into little more than the precentor's invitation to
the company with little voice and less practice to "sing to the praise
and glory of God."
I have said that you cannot imagine the feeling of the energy of daily
life applied in the real meaning of those words. You cannot imagine
it, but you _can_ prove it. Are any of you willing, simply as a
philosophical experiment in the greatest of sciences, to adopt the
principles and feelings of these men of a thousand years ago for a
given time, say for a year? It cannot possibly do you any harm to try,
and you cannot possibly learn what is true in these things, without
trying. If after a year's experience of such method you find yourself
no happier than before, at least you will be able to support your
present opinions at once with more grace and more modesty; having
conceded the trial it asked for, to the opposite side. Nor in acting
temporarily on a faith you do not see to be reasonable, do you
compromise your own integrity more, than in conducting, under a
chemist's directions, an experiment of which he foretells inexplicable
consequences. And you need not doubt the power you possess over
your own minds to do this. Were faith not voluntary, it could not be
praised, and would not be rewarded.
If you are minded thus to try, begin each day with Alfred's
prayer,--fiat voluntas tua; resolving that you will stand to it, and
that nothing that happens in the course of the day shall displease
you. Then set to any work you have in hand with the sifted and
purified resolution that ambition shall not mix with it, nor love of
gain, nor desire of pleasure more than is appointed for you; and that
no anxiety shall touch you as to its issue, nor any impatience nor
regret if it fail. Imagine that the thing is being done through you,
not by you; that the good of it may never be known, but that at least,
unless by your rebellion or foolishness, there can come no evil into
it, nor wrong chance to it. Resolve also with steady industry to do
what you can for the help of your country and its honour, and the
honour of its God; and that you will not join hands in its iniquity,
nor turn aside from its misery; and that in all you do and feel you
will look frankly for the immediate help and direction, and to your
own consciences, expressed approval, of God. Live thus, and believe,
and with swiftness of answer proportioned to the frankness of the
trust, most surely the God of hope will fill you with all joy and
peace in believing.
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