CHAPTER XIII
VICTORY OUT OF RUIN
The world has always been a hard place for minorities. Majorities are capable of crimes which, as individuals, they would shrink from in horror. And no crimes that stain the pages of history can equal in ghastly cruelty those which have been perpetrated under the influence of religious passions. The Founder of Christianity was crucified at the frenzied call of those who were the most devout and religious of their day. The Pharisees prayed nine hours a day! Their cry, 'Crucify! Crucify!' still rings in the ear.
I
Human nature has not changed very much in these nineteen centuries. And the majority of mankind are still pretty much as they were. There is not much good in getting suffused with sentiment over a minority of one crucified so long ago. It is more important to realise that the grim tragedy is for ever and for ever being repeated. It is a grim thought to think that the very passions of self-righteousness and self-interest which crucified the Galilean are now operating in His name. In a little village in the Hebrides well known to me, four Presbyterian churches celebrate the Communion in August. Here they are—the Parish Church; the United Free Church; the Free Church; the Free Presbyterian Church! If you attended a service in any of these you would not know any difference between them. On all vital matters they are at one. But there they are in the very name of Christ negating His purpose and breaking His law. For His purpose is to unite men together; bring them into the fellowship and unity of love. And they break up that small community into four fragments—and they do it from the highest motives and under the sanctions of the name of the Highest. They act exactly as the Pharisees acted nineteen centuries ago. They too were moved by the highest motives; they too had a passion for the Sabbath. The Christians to-day, like the Pharisee of old, make the gospel vain by their traditions. If He came Himself and said to them, 'You are wrong: my law is that ye love one another: the sign of my faithful followers is the love their lives evince,' ... He wouldn't be listened to. They would not cry 'Crucify.' ... No! They would only give Him a nickname and declare that He had no right principles! ... But it isn't in remote villages one beholds that. It can be seen anywhere. Moderators and bishops and dignitaries have met for a quarter of a century in Edinburgh to knock at the door of heaven with petitions asking God to unite them! And they will meet anywhere—in licensed premises even—except in a church; they will do anything except have the Communion together.... And they go on praying! To-day the very bigotry that sent the Lord stumbling to Calvary under a Cross is glorified by the name of Christ. That to-day is His crucifixion.
II
That, however, is but half a truth. When we take long views we can realise that there is no day in the year when we have more right to cherish the spirit of hope than on this day when the world waits for the Easter joy bells: Rejoice, Rejoice. The message of a day such as this is that no cause that has in it the seed of righteousness, however feeble it may be and however overwhelming its opponents, need give way to despair. There never was a minority so feeble on the face of the earth as these Galileans whose Master had been crucified. The cause was lost. They had not even understood what He had tried to teach them. While He spoke of a kingdom not of this world they could think of nothing but pitiful thrones such as Herod's! They left Him in a minority of one—and that minority was crucified. Nobody in all the wide world knew or understood why He hung there.... He who was to smash the Gentiles, as the Jew believed, was there crucified by Gentiles; He who was innocent was stamped for ever with the criminal's brand—done to death with two thieves. If ever there was an end made of any cause there was an end made of that personified by the Carpenter of Nazareth. The majority trampled the minority into extinction.
The body can be crucified and can be sealed up in a tomb, but majorities are powerless against the spirit. When his disciples asked Socrates where they would bury him he replied: 'You can bury me anywhere if you can catch me!' The soul can never be caught; can never be sealed up in a tomb. The wind bloweth where it listeth; and no walls, however high, can imprison it; no tomb hold it. Out of the dust the new life arose—the life of the spirit. And suddenly men realised that a kingdom not of this world—an empire without legions—was not only thinkable and possible, but was actually established. So has it always been since: the perishing of the body has been but the triumphing of the spirit.