|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 24
_The Truth_, then, _makes us free_. The State which controls men's
actions and educates their intellects, which, in a word, enforces the
knowledge of truth and compels obedience to it, is actually freeing its
citizens by that process. It is only by a misuse of words or a failure
to grasp ideas that I can maintain that an ignorant savage is more free
than an educated man. It is true that I am, in a sense, "free" to think
that two and two make five, if I have not learned arithmetic; on the
other hand, when I learn that they make four I rise into that higher and
more real liberty which a knowledge of arithmetic bestows. I am more
effective, not less so; I am more free to exercise my powers and use the
forces of the world in which I live, and not less free, when I have
submitted my intellect to facts.
III. (i) Now the soul too has an environment. Men may differ as to its
nature and its conditions, but all who believe in the soul at all
believe also that it has an environment, and that this environment is as
much in the realm of Law as is the natural world itself. Prayer, for
example, elevates the soul, base thinking degrades it.
Now the laws of this environment were true even before Christ came.
David knew, at any rate, something of penitence and of the guilt of sin,
and Nathan knew something, at least, of the forgiveness of sins and of
their temporal punishment. Christ came, then, with this object amongst
others: that He might reveal the laws of Grace and convey to men's minds
some at least of the facts of the spiritual life amongst which they
lived. He came, moreover, partly to modify the workings of these laws,
to release some more fully, and to restrain others; in a word, to be the
Revealer of Truth and the Administrator of Grace.
He came then, to increase men's liberty by increasing their knowledge,
as, in another sphere, the scientist comes to us with the same purpose.
Here, for example, is the law that murder is a sin before God and brings
its consequences with it, a law stated briefly in the commandment _Thou
shall not kill_. But our Divine Lord revealed more of the workings of
this law than men had hitherto recognized. _I say unto you_, declared
Christ, _that whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer._ He revealed,
that is to say, the fact that this law runs even in the realm of
thought, that the hating spirit incurs the guilt and punishment of
murder, and not merely the murderous action. Were men less free when
they learned that fact? Not unless I am less free than I was before,
when I learn for the first time that lightning kills. Christ came, then,
to reveal the _Truth that makes us free_, and He does so by informing
our intellects and enabling us to _bring into captivity every
understanding to _His obedience_.
(ii) Turn now to the Catholic Church. Here is a Society whose function
it is to preserve and apply the teaching of Christ; to analyze it and to
state it in forms or systems which every generation can receive. For
this purpose, then, she draws up not merely a Creed--which is the
systematic statement of the Christian Revelation--but disciplinary rules
and regulations that will make this Creed and the life that is
conformable to it more easy of realization, and all this she does with
the express object of enabling the individual soul to respond to her
spiritual environment and to rise to the full exercise of her powers and
rights. As the scientist and the statesmen take, respectively, the great
laws of nature and society and reduce them to rules and codes, yet
without adding or taking away from these facts, that are true whether
they are popularly recognized or not--and all with the purpose not of
diminishing but of increasing the general liberty--so the Church,
divinely safeguarded too in the process, takes the Revelation of Christ
and by her dogma and her discipline popularizes it, so to speak, and
makes it at once comprehensible and effective.
What, then, is this foolish cry about the slavery of dogma? How can
Truth make men anything except more free? Unless a man is prepared to
say that the scientist enslaves his intellect by telling him facts, he
dare not say that the Church fetters his intellect by defining dogma.
Christ did not condemn the Pharisaic system because it was a system, but
because it was Pharisaic; because, that is, it was not true; because it
obscured instead of revealing the true relations between God and man;
because it _made the Word of God of none effect through its traditions_.
But the Catholic system has the appearance of enslaving men? Why yes;
for the only way of aiming at and using effectively the _truth that
makes us free_ is by _bringing into captivity every understanding to the
obedience of Christ_.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|