Part 6 (2/2)
For thoughts are the food of a man's mind; and as the mind feeds, so will it grow. If it feeds on coa.r.s.e and foul food, coa.r.s.e and foul it will grow. If it feeds on pure and refined food, pure and refined it will grow.
There are those who do not believe this. Provided they are tolerably attentive to the duties of religion, it does not matter much, they fancy, what they think of out of church. Their souls will be saved at last, they suppose, and that is all that they need care for. Saved? They do not see that by giving way to foul, mean, foolish thoughts all the week they are losing their souls, destroying their souls, defiling their souls, lowering their souls, and making them so coa.r.s.e and mean and poor that they are not worth saving, and are no loss to heaven or earth, whatever loss they may be to the man himself. One man thinks of nothing but money--how he shall save a penny here and a penny there. I do not mean men of business; for them there are great excuses; for it is by continual saving here and there that their profits are made. I speak rather of people who have no excuse, people of fixed incomes--people often wealthy and comfortable, who yet will lower their minds by continually thinking over their money. But this I say, and this I am sure that you will find, that when a man in business or out of business accustoms himself, as very many do, to think of nothing but money, money, money from Monday morning to Sat.u.r.day night, he thinks of money a great part of Sunday likewise. And so, after a while, the man lowers his soul, and makes it mean and covetous. He forgets all that is lovely and of good report. He forgets virtue--that is manliness; and praise--that is the just respect and admiration of his fellow-men; and so he forgets at last things true, honest, and just likewise. He lowers his soul; and therefore when he is tempted, he does things mean and false and unjust, for the sake of money, which he has made his idol.
Take another case, too common among men and women of all ranks, high and low.
How many there are who love gossip and scandal; who always talk about people, and never about things--certainly not about things pure and lovely and of good report, but rather about things foul and ugly and of bad report; who do not talk, because they do not think of virtue, but of vice; or of praise either, because they are always finding fault with their neighbours. The man who loves a foul story, or a coa.r.s.e jest--the woman who gossips over every t.i.ttle tattle of scandal which she can pick up against her neighbour--what do these people do but defile their own souls afresh, after they have been washed clean in the blood of Christ? Foul their souls are, and therefore their thoughts are foul likewise, and the foulness of them is evident to all men by their tongues. Out of their hearts proceed evil thoughts about their neighbours, out of the abundance of their hearts their mouths speak them. Now let such people, if there be any such here, seriously consider the harm which they are doing to their own characters. They may give way to the habits of scandal, or of coa.r.s.e talk, without any serious bad intention; but they will surely lower their own souls thereby. They will grow to the colour of what they feed on and become foul and cruel, from talking cruelly and foully, till they lose all purity and all charity, all faith and trust in their fellow-men, all power of seeing good in any one, or doing anything but think evil; and so lose the likeness of G.o.d and of Christ, for the likeness of some foul carrion bird, which cares nothing for the perfume of all the roses in the world, but if there be a carcase within miles of it, will scent it out eagerly and fly to it ravenously.
The truth is, my friends, that these souls of ours instead of being pure and strong, are the very opposite; and the article speaks plain truth when it says, that we are every one of us of our own nature inclined to evil. That may seem a hard saying; but if we look at our own thoughts we shall find it true. Are we NOT inclined to take, at first, the worst view of everybody and of everything? Are we NOT inclined to suspect harm of this person and of that? Are we NOT inclined too often to be mean and cowardly? to be hard and covetous? to be coa.r.s.e and vulgar? to be silly and frivolous? Do we not need to cool down, to think a second time, and a third time likewise; to remember our duty, to remember Christ's example, before we can take a just and kind and charitable view? Do we not want all the help which we can get from every quarter, to keep ourselves high-minded and refined; to keep ourselves from bad thoughts, mean thoughts, silly thoughts, violent thoughts, cruel and hard thoughts?
If we have not found out that, we must have looked a very little way into ourselves, and know little more about ourselves than a dumb animal does of itself.
How then shall we keep off coa.r.s.eness of soul? How shall we keep our souls REFINED? that is, true and honest, pure, amiable, full of virtue, that is, true manliness; and deserve praise, that is, the respect and admiration of our fellow-men? By thinking of those very things, says St. Paul. And in order to be able to think of them, by reading of them.
There are very few who can easily think of these things of themselves. Their daily business, the words and notions of the people with whom they have to do, will run in their minds, and draw them off from higher and better thoughts; that cannot be helped.
The only thing that most men can do, is to take care that they are not drawn off entirely from high and good thoughts, by reading, were it but for five minutes every day, something really worth thinking of, something which will lift them above themselves.
Above all, it is wise, at night, after the care and bustle of the day is over, to read, but for a few minutes, some book which will compose and soothe the mind; which will bring us face to face with the true facts of life, death, and eternity; which will make us remember that man doth not live by bread alone; which will give us, before we sleep, a few thoughts worthy of a Christian man, with an immortal soul in him.
And, thank G.o.d, no one need go far to look for such books. I do not mean merely religious books, excellent as they are in these days: I mean any books which help to make us better and wiser and soberer, and more charitable persons; any books which will teach us to despise what is vulgar and mean, foul and cruel, and to love what is n.o.ble and high-minded, pure and just. We need not go far for them.
In our own n.o.ble English language we may read by hundreds, books which will tell us of all virtue and of all praise. The stories of good and brave men and women; of gallant and heroic actions; of deeds which we ourselves should be proud of doing; of persons whom we feel, to be better, wiser, n.o.bler than we are ourselves.
In our own language we may read the history of our own nation, and whatsoever is just, honest and true. We may read of G.o.d's gracious providences toward this land. How he has punished our sins and rewarded our right and brave endeavours. How he put into our forefathers the spirit of courage and freedom, the spirit of truth and justice, the spirit of loyalty and order; and how, following the leading of that spirit, in spite of many mistakes and failings, we have risen to be the freest, the happiest, the most powerful people on earth, a blessing and not a curse to the nations around.
In our own English tongue, too, we may read such poetry as there is in no other language in the world; poetry which will make us indeed see the beauty of whatsoever things are lovely and of good report.
Some people have still a dislike of what they call foolish poetry books. If books are foolish, let us have nothing to do with them.
But poetry ought not to be foolish; for G.o.d sent it into the world to teach men not foolishness, but the highest wisdom. He gave man alone, of all living creatures, the power of writing poetry, that by poetry he might understand, not only how necessary it was to do right, but how beautiful and n.o.ble it was to do right. He sent it into the world to soften men's rough hearts, and quiet their angry pa.s.sions, and make them love all which is tender and gentle, loving and merciful, and yet to rouse them up to love all which is gallant and honourable, loyal and patriotic, devout and heavenly. Therefore whole books of the Bible--Job, for example, Isaiah, and the Psalms-- are neither more nor less than actual poetry, written in actual verse, that their words might the better sink down into the ears and hearts of the old Jews, and of us Christians after them. And therefore also, we keep up still the good old custom of teaching children in school as much as possible by poetry, that they may learn not only to know, but to love and remember whatsoever things are lovely and of good report.
Lastly, for those who cannot read, or have really no time to read, there is one means left of putting themselves in mind of what every one must remember, lest he sink back into an animal and a savage. I mean by pictures; which, as St. Augustine said 1400 years ago, are the books of the unlearned. I do not mean grand and expensive pictures; I mean the very simplest prints, provided they represent something holy, or n.o.ble, or tender, or lovely. A few such prints upon a cottage-wall may teach the people who live therein much, without their being aware of it. They see the prints, even when they are not thinking of them; and so they have before their eyes a continual remembrancer of something better and more beautiful than what they are apt to find in their own daily life and thoughts.
True, to whom little is given, of them is little required. But it must be said, that more--far more--is given to labouring men and women now than was given to their forefathers. A hundred, or even fifty years ago, when there was very little schooling; when the books which were put even into the hands of n.o.blemen's children were far below what you will find now in any village school; when the only pictures which a poor woman could buy to lay on her cottage- wall were equally silly and ugly: then there were great excuses for the poor, if they forgot whatsoever things were lovely and of good report; if they were often coa.r.s.e and brutal in their manners, and cruel and profligate in their amus.e.m.e.nts.
But even in the rough old times there always were a few at least, men and women, who were above the rest; who, though poor people like the rest, were still true gentlemen and ladies of G.o.d's making.
People who kept themselves more or less unspotted from the world; who thought of what was honest and pure and lovely and of good report; and who lived a life of simple, manful, Christian virtue, and received the praise and respect of their neighbours, even although their neighbours did not copy them. There were always such people, and there always will be--thank G.o.d for it, for they are the salt of the earth.
But why have there always been such people? and why do I say confidently, that there always will be?
Because they have had the Bible; and because, once having got the Bible in a free country, no man can take it from them.
The Bible it is which has made gentlemen and ladies of many a poor man and woman.
The Bible it is which has filled their minds with pure and n.o.ble, ay, with heavenly and divine thoughts.
The Bible has been their whole library. The Bible has been their only counsellor. The Bible has taught them all they know. But it has taught them enough.
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