Volume Ii Part 52 (1/2)
Carleton said, after a while.
Fleda's heart throbbed an answer ? she did not speak.
”Both in its direct and indirect action. The mind is set free from influences that narrowed its range and dimmed its vision, and refined to a keener sensibility, a juster perception, a higher power of appreciation, by far, than it had before. And then, to say nothing of religion's own peculiar sphere of enjoyment, technically religious ? what a field of pleasure it opens to its possessor in the world of moral beauty, most partially known to any other ? and the fine but exquisite a.n.a.logies of things material with things spiritual ? those _harmonies of Nature_, to which, talk as they will, all other ears are deaf.”
”You know,” said Fleda, with full eyes that she dared not show, ”how Henry Martyn said that he found he enjoyed painting and music so much more after he became a Christian.”
”I remember. It is the subst.i.tuting a just medium for a false one ? it is putting nature within and nature without in tune with each other, so that the chords are perfect now which were jarring before.”
”And yet how far people would be from believing you, Mr.
Carleton.”
”Yes, they are possessed with the contrary notion. But in all the creation nothing has a one-sided usefulness. What a reflection it would be upon the wisdom of its Author, if G.o.dliness alone were the exception ? if it were not 'profitable for the life that now is, as well as for that which is to come!' ”
”They make that work the other way, don't they?” said Fleda; ”not being able to see how thorough religion should be for anybody's happiness, they make use of your argument to conclude that it is not what the Bible requires. How I have heard that urged ? that G.o.d intended his creatures to be happy ? as a reason why they should disobey him! They lay hold on the wrong end of the argument, and work backwards.”
”Precisely.
” 'G.o.d intended his creatures to be happy.
” 'Strict obedience would make them unhappy.
” 'Therefore, he does not intend them to obey.' ”
”They never put it before them quite so clearly,” said Fleda.
”They would startle at it a little. But so they would at the right stating of the case.”
”And how would that be, Mr. Carleton?”
”It might be somewhat after this fas.h.i.+on ?
” 'G.o.d requires nothing that is not for the happiness of his people.
” 'He requires perfect obedience.
” 'Therefore, perfect obedience is for their happiness.'
”But unbelief will not understand that. Did it ever strike you how much there is in those words, 'Come and see?' All that argument can do, after all, is but to persuade to that. Only faith will submit to terms, and enter the narrow gate; and only obedience knows what the prospect is on the other side.”
”But isn't it true, Mr. Carleton, that the world have some cause for their opinion ? judging as they do by the outside?
The peculiar pleasures of religion, as you say, are out of sight, and they do not always find in religious people that enlargement and refinement of which you were speaking.”
”Because they make unequal comparisons. Recollect that, as G.o.d has declared, the ranks of religion are not for the most part filled from the wise and the great. In making your estimate, you must measure things equal in other respects. Compare the same man with himself before he was a Christian, or with his unchristianized fellows, and you will find invariably the refining, dignifying, enn.o.bling, influence of true religion ?
the enlarged intelligence, and the greater power of enjoyment.”
”And besides those causes of pleasure-giving that your mentioned,” said Fleda, ”there is a mind at ease; and how much that is, alone! If I may judge others by myself, the mere fact of being unpoised, unresting, disables the mind from a thousand things that are joyfully relished by one entirely at ease.”
”Yes,” said he; ”do you remember that word, ? 'The stones of the field shall be at peace with thee?' ”
”I am afraid people would understand you as little as they would me, Mr. Carleton,” said Fleda, laughing.