Our Unitarian Gospel

by Minot J. Savage

Are we going to wait for criticism to settle metaphysical problems before we do anything about these great practical matters?

Whatever your theory about Jesus may be, you can at least be like him, and wait; and, when you see him, you will love him, and know the truth about him, if you cannot before.

Matthew Arnold, an agnostic, has put into two or three lines, which I wish to read now at the end, what might well be the creed of the person who doubts so much that he thinks nothing is settled. If you cannot say any more than this, here is all that is absolutely necessary to the very noblest life:

"Hath man no second life? Pitch this one high. Sits there no Judge in heaven our sin to see? More strictly, then, the inward judge obey. Was Christ a man like us? Ah I let us try If we, then, too, can be such men as he."

THE REAL SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PRESENT RELIGIOUS DISCUSSION.

SCIENCE tells us that the law of growth is embodied in the phrase, "the struggle for life and the survival of the fittest." As we look beneath the surface in any department of human endeavor, analyze things a little carefully, we discover that this contest is going on. We know that it is not confined to the lower forms of life or the order of the inanimate world. It is a universal law. We are not always conscious of it; but, when we do think and study, we discover it as an unescapable fact.

In the religious world, for example, between the different thoughts and theories which are held among men as solutions of the problems of life we find this contest going on. Here, again, it is not always noticed; but in the mind of any man who thinks, who reads, who reflects, this process is apparent. This view is considered, another view mentioned by somebody else is set over against it, and the claims of the two theories are brought up for judgment. And so there goes on perpetually this debate. Now and again it comes to the surface, and attracts popular attention. We have been in the midst of an experience of this kind for the last two or three weeks here in New York City.

But the thing I want you to note is — and that is the great lesson I have in mind this morning that all of this superficial discussion of one point or another is only an indication of a larger, deeper contest. When, for example, men are debating as to the infallibility or inerrancy of the Old Testament, as to the story of the creation as told in Genesis, as to the nature and work of Jesus, as to the future destiny of the race, when they are discussing any one of these particular problems, they are dealing with matters that are really superficial. Underneath these there is a larger problem; and to this problem and its probable issues I wish to call your attention this morning.

There are two great world theories, complete each in itself, both of them thinkable, mutually exclusive, one of which only can be true, and one of which must finally become dominant in the educated and free thought of the world. These two theories I wish to place face to face before you this morning, call your attention to some of their special features and note the claims they have on our acceptance.

Before doing this, however, I wish you to note that there are indications of a dual tendency on the part of the human mind which has not been manifested in the development of these two theories alone, but which has had illustrations in other directions and in other times.