This is the spirituality of Bedlam, and is of no kindred with the soul that finds its greatest joy in the discharge of obligation perceived.
V. REVERENCE.
What is reverence?
It is the feeling produced when we stand in the presence of our ideal, or of that which most nearly approaches it—that which is produced by what we consider the highest degree of excellence.
The highest is reverenced, praised, and admired without qualification.
Each man reverences according to his nature, his experience, his intellectual development. He may reverence' Nero or Marcus Aurelius, Jehovah or Buddha, the author of Leviticus or Shakespeare. Thousands of men reverence John Calvin, Torquemada, and the Puritan fathers; and some have greater respect for Jonathan Edwards than for Captain Kidd.
A vast number of people have great reverence for anything that is covered by mould, or moss, or mildew. They bow low before rot and rust, and adore the worthless things that have been saved by the negligence of oblivion.
They are enchanted with the dull and fading daubs of the old masters, and hold in contempt those miracles of art, the paintings of to-day.
They worship the ancient, the shadowy, the mysterious, the wonderful. They doubt the value of anything that they understand.
The creed of Christendom is the enemy of morality. It teaches that the innocent can justly suffer for the guilty, that consequences can be avoided by repentance, and that in the world of mind the great fact known as cause and effect does not apply.