408 RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE: PERSONAL 



What hope, too, must be his! for he knows that the issue must 

 be victory. The purpose of Almighty God must be fulfilled, and 

 those who cooperate in that purpose will share in the triumph. 

 Thus the strength that comes from the certainty of victory will 

 pass into the heart of the lowliest worker, and in his eyes there 

 will be the light of those who see visions and dream dreams. 



(3) The sense of God, then, can make life pure and peaceful and 

 strong. What will be its effect upon the relation of the individual 

 to other men? Just because he believes that God is contin- 

 ually with him, so he must believe that God is, in some very real 

 sense, continually with them; for in God we all live and move and are. 

 Then is it not plain, to begin with, that he is bound to respect 

 each man, if not for what he is, at least for what he might be? He 

 looks upon men with the eyes of hope, for he believes that the 

 purpose of God in the long march of history is the redemption of 

 humanity. He will, therefore, hope and bear and believe all things 

 for the men who are bound, like himself, to God, by the chains of 

 a common humanity; and he will not only hope and bear and believe, 

 for them, but he will work for them - - not for himself, but for them; 

 for he knows that he only finds his true life by losing it in the service 

 of men. Though it is true that the man who believes in God will 

 see visions, though his heart will be in the heavenly places, though 

 he will remember that he is a citizen of the city which hath the 

 foundations, he will never allow himself to forget that he is also a 

 citizen of some earthly city, and that his love for God must translate 

 itself into some good work for the men and women who need him. 

 There is no part of the teaching of Jesus so recurrent or so plain as 

 this, that love of God has to show itself as love of man. There were 

 only two commandments, he said : the first, Thou shalt love the 

 Lord thy God with heart and soul, strength and mind; and the 

 second, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself and these two are 

 one and the same. Not ten commandments, but two; not two, but 

 one Love. The ultimate, though not always the acknowledged, 

 basis for the love of humanity is the common relation of humanity 

 to God. Why should I love my neighbor? There may be much in 

 him that is unlovely; why should I be willing to forget all this and 

 to look upon him as my friend and brother? There is no reason but 

 'this, that the brotherhood of humanity, if it is to be more than a 

 loud-sounding phrase, must rest upon the fatherhood of God. Or, as 

 Jesus said, the second commandment is, Thou shalt love thy neigh- 

 bor ; and this is to be reached through the first, Thou shalt love the 

 Lord thy God. It would be absurd, of course, to deny that love of 

 humanity may exist where there is no conscious love of God; but 

 such a love has not adequately realized its implications. 



It follows that one of the ways in which the religious man will 



