If humility is the base of all the virtues, as it is commonly reported, then a profession that directly favors pride is not productive of the highest type of character. And if love,—kindness, brotherhood, fellowship,—is the fulfilment of the law, then a calling that puts desire in conflict with duty is not conducive to unity or peace, whether in the private mind or in the collective household. Character, as naturally interpreted, consists of an innate superiority to one's fellow-men in the qualities that glorify humanity, purity, heavenly-mindedness, patience, earnestness, truthfulness, sincerity. Character, as spiritually interpreted, consists of the cordial affiliation with one's fellow-men in the qualities that unite the atoms of humanity in love, compassion, humility, forgiveness, sympathy. But the higher view has not prevailed in my experience; let me repeat, in the most emphatic language at my command, my conviction that ministers as a body do not succumb to the temptations thus apparently incident to their profession.
It is commonly supposed that the intellectual part of the minister's labor—the making of the sermons—is most severe. It is imagined that the task of addressing the same audience every Sunday must be exceedingly arduous. This is a mistake. There is a facility of work in every profession. The mind becomes accustomed to running in certain grooves, to going through the same process of thinking, to applying the same rules to many details of practice. The longer one's continuance in the ministry, the easier this becomes. Experience accumulates. Themes multiply. Novel suggestions occur. New thoughts arise. Fresh books are written. Singular questions are proposed. Problems present fresh aspects. The old interests remain in all their force. Men never tire hearing about God, Immortality, Destiny. In truth, the intellectual difficulties become less and less appalling until at last they disappear. The real effort is to keep alive the feelings of humanity; to overcome the inclination towards separation into classes; to avoid distinguishing between persons; to keep love glowing; to maintain the supremacy of soul; to identify spirituality with custom. The preaching is subordinate not to the private practice alone, but to the religious attitude towards mankind, which is conditioned on charity and the recognition of human worth and sonship. The most beautiful trait in the pastor is his universality, his simple, unaffected manhood.
But enough of criticism. It is a privilege to belong to a profession occupied with things ethereal; to be interested in the grandest themes; to hold intercourse with the loftiest minds; to live aloof from the world; to put the happiest constructions on the events of human life; to interpret Providence beneficently. And it is my firm persuasion that in proportion as the profession throws off the thraldom of ecclesiasticism and dogmatism, it increases in power and is sure to recover its ancient superiority.
XII.
MY TEACHERS.
Among Englishmen, I owe the most to James Martineau, at the time of my ordination (1847), a Unitarian clergyman in Liverpool. His lectures in the Unitarian controversy (1839) on "Christianity without Priest and without Ritual," on "The Christian View of Moral Evil," on "The Bible: What It Is and What It is Not"; his articles on "Distinctive Types of Christianity," on "Creeds and Heresies of Early Christianity," on "The Ethics of Christendom," on "The Creed of Christendom," on "St. Paul and His Modern Students," made a profound impression on my mind. One passage in particular, at the close of the essay on "The Ethics of Christendom," still lingers in my memory:
The old antagonism between the world that now is and any other that has been or is to come, has been modified, or has entirely ceased.... Here is the spot, now is the time for the most devoted service of God. No strains of heaven will wake man into prayer, if the common music of humanity stirs him not. The saintly company of spirits will throng around him in vain if he finds no angels of duty and affection in his children, neighbors, and friends. If no heavenly voices wander around him in the present, the future will be but the dumb change of the shadow on the dial. In short, higher stages of existence are not the refuge of this, but the complement to it; and it is the proper wisdom of the affections not to escape the one in order to seek the other, but to flow forth in purifying copiousness on both.
Martineau's intellectual fidelity, accurate learning, earnestness of feeling, were exceedingly fascinating.
In this country Ralph Waldo Emerson was the great teacher. He gave an atmosphere rather than a dogma. He was air and light. He is best described, not as a philosopher, a man of letters, a poet, but as a seer. His gift was that of insight. This he tried to render comprehensive, searching, intelligent, accurate, by reading, study, meditation, the acquaintance of distinguished men; but he was never beguiled into thinking that learning, eloquence, wit, constituted his peculiarity. He had a penetrating, eager, questioning look. His head was thrust out as if in quest of knowledge. His gaze was steady and intense. His speech was laconic and to the purpose. His direct manner suggested a wish for closer acquaintance with the mind. His very courtesy, which was invariable and exquisite in its way, had an air of inquiry about it. There was no varnish, no studied grace of motion or demeanor, no manifest desire to please, but a kind of wistfulness as of one who took you at your best and wanted to draw it out. He accosted the soul, and with the winning persuasiveness which befits friendliness on human terms. There was a certain shyness which indicated the modesty which is born of the spirit.