SECULAR LIFE AND RELIGIOUS SPIRIT 451 



it cannot be said that these are achieved only by those who have 

 studied moral philosophy. If altruism is a good part of Christianity, 

 then there are more people in the world who have that part than 

 those who call them by the name of Christian. If to do justice and 

 love mercy and walk humbly are still the requirements of God, then 

 there are more people who follow God's requirements than those who 

 realize that it is God's requirement which they follow. 



It would not be true to say that these truths have gained recog- 

 nition and these principles found application in spite of religion. 

 On the contrary, Christianity, at its simplest, in its original, which 

 is also its most permanent form, would seem to have full place for 

 that recognition. And these achievements of the spirit of humanity 

 are but the witness of the presence of God ever with us, of the 

 working of God ever through us, and of that life for the good and 

 the true which religion is. But of this essential Christianity, of 

 this fundamental religion, the current forms, whether of thought 

 or of life, which call themselves by those names, are often only the 

 dead tradition or the caricature. 



How often have men sincerely but narrowly religious made war 

 upon things which are really indifferent, as if they were evil in them- 

 selves, and on behalf of things which are of absolutely no conse- 

 quence, as if the salvation of the world depended on those things. 

 How often have they regarded religion as but a corner of life 

 religion as one thing, life as another. Deeming themselves sure of 

 the divine favor and of another life, they have set at naught standards 

 of rectitude in this life - - standards which obtain among those who 

 profess no religion. They have sometimes apprehended their 

 mission as only that of the propagation of certain so-called religious 

 truths, often at variance with many other things which men know 

 to be true. They have acted as if their aim was to build churches 

 and get men to come to them. Whereas the real aim of religion is to 

 build up men into places of the indwelling of a holier spirit and the 

 whole world into a kingdom of the living God in this nobler sense. 

 In the midst of this world, with all of its manifold interests and ener- 

 getic life, the particular institution which calls itself a church stands 

 simply as focus and burning-point, hearthstone and centre of radia- 

 tion, and of an inspiration which reaches out into all the departments 

 of life. Men have acted as if the kingdom of God would then have 

 come when all the people in the world should have been brought 

 to do the particular things which people in churches do. Whereas 

 in reality the kingdom of God will have come when men do all that 

 they do, - - business, politics, the pursuit of learning, of pleasure, 

 of anything whatsoever, according to that truth and goodness 

 which obtains for those things, and in a beautiful spirit like that 

 which Jesus showed. And the Church with its ministry of teaching 



