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LESSON VI

 

TRANSFIGURATION

 

            HAVING received a great many questions concerning the story of the transfiguration of Jesus and its attendant circumstances, and being particularly asked to apply its teachings to modern life, we present the following summary of our views on this intensely interesting subject, and as the subject easily permitted of it, we have embodied in this address replies to several questions bearing on the proper government of refractory children and offenders against the civil law. In the seventh chapter of Matthew we find the story of the transfiguration briefly outlined as follows: Jesus takes Peter, James and John to a high mountain apart, and is transfigured before them. His face shines as the sun, and his garments appear white as the light. Moses and Elias appear to the disciples talking with Jesus. Peter asks Jesus whether three tabernacles can not be erected on that glorious height, one for Jesus, one for Moses and one for Elias, but before he finishes speaking a bright cloud overshadows them, and a voice speaks from out the cloud saying, “This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, hear ye him.” When the disciples hear the voice they fall on their faces, and are sore afraid. Jesus bids them arise and fear not. After he has touched

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them and they raise their eyes the two visitors are no longer visible, they are alone with Jesus who tells them the time has not yet arrived for making public the vision, but he assures them after his resurrection the time will have arrived for publicly testifying to their marvelous experiences on the mount. This narrative is immediately followed by the narration of a marvelous case of healing of one who was oppressed with lunacy, which affords occasion for a homily on the need of faith as a grain of mustard seed (a topic of vital moment to all spiritual students), and then a practical discourse on paying tribute, which seems to open up to the earnest and intelligent meditator much important teaching on the subject of the proper relation existing between faith in God, worship of the Supreme Being, recognition of the sole sovereignty of divine truth in matters of conviction and the honorable discharge of our duties in the external state.

 

            Let us transport ourselves in mind to the scene of the vision. Significant, indeed, is the account of its being seen on a high mountain, a figure of speech which incessantly occurs in the Scriptures in connection with states of spiritual exaltation, moral and intellectual enlightenment and conquest over enemies.

 

            More than three thousand years ago, according to the Pentateuch, Moses received the Ten Commandments from the hand of Jehovah, on tables of stone, upon the top of an Arabian mountain, while the multitude at the base was enveloped in thick darkness. Their eyes were so weak that after Moses had come down from the mountain into their midst, they could not gaze upon his features until he had covered his face

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with a veil. How striking the resemblance between the glorified countenance of Moses at the time of the giving of the law to the Hebrews in the desert and the transfigured countenance of Jesus when Moses re-appeared upon a mountain top in Asia Minor.

 

            The correspondence of a mountain is not far to seek. Mountainous districts are peculiarly salubrious. There is far less disease and far fewer early deaths on high ground than in low-lying valleys. Miasmic emanations do not reach those lofty heights. In India, during the summer season, when the climate in all the cities is so oppressive to Europeans that they can scarcely endure it, the mountainous region round about is healthy and invigorating. Scarcely ever does a Western traveler to the far Orient suffer severely from the climate if he can take refuge in the mountains during the hottest portion of the year.

 

            In Europe, when the cities of the Italian plain lie sweltering under the summer sun Alpine tourists are encountering bracing air wafted to them from snow-clad peaks whose ermine robes are never melted, even though the torrid rays of the summer sun scorch to death every flower and blade of grass in the low-lying districts. The air is always pure on mountain heights, no matter what form of fell disorder may be raging in the valleys. So universally is this fact recognized that physicians the world over prescribe mountain air as an effectual antidote to disorders considered incurable while the patient remains on lesser elevations.

 

            In the religious thought of the world we find the sacredness of mountain heights a peculiarly conspicuous feature. Temples were almost always built on high

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ground, and it was a common belief among the ancients that divinities dwelt on mountains, and especially was it felt among the Jews in olden times that God could fight for them on mountain tops, and nowhere else. One of the interpretations given of the name, Jehovah (Yahveh), by some authorities is, “the god of the mountains,” a deity who was ever at home in high latitudes, but utterly out of his element on low land.

 

            Puerile as this definition would be of the Supreme Being, if any allusion to the Infinite were contained in it, it accords so precisely with the universal beliefs of ancient peoples that it is but one out of many instances proving that the Israelites shared a common faith with the great mass of humanity, even though at certain periods of the world’s history they have undoubtedly been the custodians of a particularly pure and noble monotheism, while Jewish influence the world over has liberally contributed to the advancement of morals, science, philosophy and art.

 

            But to discard the more external meanings of Bible mountains, let us at once give way for the spiritual interpretation which lies so thinly veiled in the literal dress which drapes without concealing its majestic features that any child of ordinary intelligence need not err in learning the lessons such narratives as the account of the transfiguration enforce. As a mountain is a lofty height up which no one can climb without an effort, as when once gained it secures a commanding view of surrounding scenery invisible in the valley, as it frequently rains down into the valleys when it is clear upon the hill-tops, as clouds hang frequently about the mountain sides, obscuring its peaks and

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completely hiding the celestial panorama we can gaze at when on its summit, the mountain fitly represents a state of mind attained alone through earnest and oft-times laborious effort, a mental state above the doubts, fears, worries and vexations of every  day existence, a state which once reached allows the one who has attained it to gaze henceforth on spiritual glories undiscernible by all save those who have scaled the rocky peaks upon whose towers one may see the pageant of the heavens and not the dust of earth; on mountain heights we are so far above the noise, strife and bustle of ordinary affairs that we seem to dwell in a fairy region, a charmed estate where music not of earth and sights unknown to mortal observation entrance our eyes and ears with glimpses of the realms eternal.

 

            The everlasting hills! What a sublime expression that is. How calm, strong and satisfied the mountains seem! How they appear to smile, half disdainfully and half compassionately at the little nervous enterprises of the ever changing towns and hamlets at their base.

 

            It is not a foolish speculation which leads many to inquire if God is not nearer to us on the mountains than in the valleys. He is not nearer to us, but we are apt to be consciously nearer to Him. The vastness of the solitudes brings us into closer relations with our inner selves, and through the highest in us can we alone approach the highest in the universe. Mountain solitudes are often so terribly oppressive to the external mind that the brain reels, reason totters, and insanity ensues. We have heard of many men, some of them mere youths, who have become maniacs through tending

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sheep alone on mountain heights. Such experiences were frequently alluded to in ancient works on occultism, where initiatory rites were spoken of as entailing the utmost danger and distress on the weak and faltering, while the strong, persistent, and courageous neophytes grew stronger and more gifted with every trial they encountered, till, at length, they rose superior to every dread, and came off triumphant victors over sense and its seductions.

 

            It may be in place here to allude briefly to an article published some time ago in the Two Worlds, an English spiritualistic newspaper, edited by Mrs. E.H. Britten. The article is entitled Practical Occultism, and the writer is styled “One Who Knows.” This article was copied by Dr. J.R. Buchanan in the January 1888 number of his Journal of Man, accompanied by editorial comments which are on the whole extremely reasonable, as they are to the effect that no kind of occult discipline which disqualifies one for the performance of the regular appointed duties of life, can be as much a blessing as a drawback to the progress of humanity.

 

            This is just the point we want to emphasize, and it needs especial emphasis at this particular time when occult studies are being pursued, or, at least, looked into by the most intelligent persons everywhere, while, as may be expected, there are many bats in human form ready, if possible, to eclipse the sunshine because they are too blind to appreciate its radiance.

 

            Esoterically considered, the New Testament agrees exactly with the Hindoo Vedas, and every other pure and ancient Script ire designed to preserve a concise

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record of spit ritual discovery upon the earth in the exact language of precise and unchanging correspondence. The recent publication of the Bhagavad Gita, or the Lord’s Lay, in a new form, by Mohini M. Chatterji, with copious annotations and references to thee Christian Scriptures, has furnished a fresh proof of the striking similarity of one inspired form of teaching to another.

 

            All inspired writers point to one only means of reaching a knowledge of truth, so far as to make it practical in every relation of existence, and that is by going up, or, in other words, going in to the mountain of the higher, which is the inner nature, there to discover the pearl of great price which lies buried in the depths of man’s spiritual being, so as to be able when that pearl is found to carry it out into all the family and business transactions of life, till, at length, there is a new earth or external state of justice and purity, as well as a new heaven or higher and deeper internal realization of things divine.

 

            To pay especial attention to the details of the story we are now specially considering, let us note the three disciples accompanying Jesus up the mountain. We find these three going with him wherever he went. John was the most beloved and intimate of all, but Peter, James and John were his constant followers and immediate attendants. They suggest to us the three representative orders of human faculties Ave all recognize: the moral, the intellectual and the physical, while Jesus represents the immortal soul. All our faculties must go up to the summit of the mountain, or, in other words, our entire nature, classified as

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it may be in three grand divisions, must be employed in the discovery, diffusion and application of spiritual knowledge to the diversified needs of our common humanity.

 

            Every one needs a time for mountain climbing, and a place which may be to him a holy mountain so far as outward isolation from the busy world can make it so. When it is asked why the Orientals are said to attain spiritual altitudes more readily than members of the bustling communities of the Western world, the answer is invariably the same. Hindoos reply: “We live nearer to the soul of the universe than you do; we care less about money, rank and fashion; we spend less time and thought upon external things than you, and, as a consequence, we have our reward; we seek spiritual bread, and we get it; you seek the stone of worldly honors and distinctions and you get them; according to your desires, so are the answers to your prayers, for all desire and effort is prayer, and as you pray, so you are answered, no matter to whom you pray or what you pray for.”

 

            The great question for modern moralists, yes, and for physiologists also to consider is the relation of external striving to health and purity. It may sound to some a worn out platitude that you are destroying your national health and undermining the very foundations of future greatness, but this truth needs to be sounded as with the voice of a trumpet sounding an alarm, in the ears of all heads of families and public instructors throughout the land. Morality cannot be taught successfully to youth so long as parents and teachers set the example of mammon worship. The

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influences surrounding a forming mind, subtle, unseen, usually unrecognized influences are what tend to develop character far more effectively than any amount of routine instruction. There is everything in a pure, healthy, invigorating, mental atmosphere. The moral air a child breathes in unconsciously is what molds his temper of thought and character, not the scholastic drill which is often a painful and unwelcome strain on the intellectual faculties.

 

            If, as Dr. Buchanan prophesies, psychometry is to be the dawn of a new civilization, psychometry, which means, literally, soul measurement, another term for psychical perception, must be utilized in tracing the effects of unseen influences on the triune constitution of man. The question is constantly raised as to the education of sensitives. Crammed scholastically they had better never be, for the less they are burdened with pedantic technicalities, the freer and sweeter will be their inspirations. But can any one doubt that something very practical can be accomplished in the way of helping to unfold psychic powers and perceptions naturally?

 

            In the Two Worlds, “Schools for the Prophets” are discussed. Mrs. Britten and many of her most intelligent correspondents are strongly in favor of doing something practical in the way of assisting sensitive persons to unfold and use their powers under the best possible conditions. Speaking for ourselves, we are not much in favor of endowed and incorporated institutions for such a purpose, as trustees and directors are too frequently dogmatic and intolerant. They may have excellent financial and executive ability in the

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business world, but spiritual gifts are not in the market to be auctioned off to the highest bidder. You cannot purchase the gift of the spirit for money. Thus if colleges for sensitives be established there is a danger that, falling into the hands of dogmatists, they will develop into nothing better than mesmeric establishments, in which all the subjects would be connected by means of invisible wires of thought with some centralizing and controlling power, not so much spiritual as material.

 

            The gospel story of the transfiguration need not be considered as a literal historical fact, if one does not so desire to consider it, as its spiritual import is universal. The evangelists tell us of certain methods being adopted and certain ends obtained. We may say then, in a certain sense, a challenge is thrown out to the world; let whoever will pick up the gauntlets. Jesus, the central figure, is exoterically whoever fills the position of a great and advanced teacher; esoterically, he is the spiritual nature in all mankind. The Great Teacher gathers together those of his followers who are prepared to receive a higher lesson in divine truth on the top of a mountain, and there is transfigured before them. Far away from the strife and bustle of the noisy, mercenary, contentious world they are brought face to face with the sublimest aspects of truth the world has ever witnessed; Moses and Elias appear to them. If this is literal history, then they receive on that high altitude, in the clear, bracing air, a proof of human immortality they could never receive on the low tablelands or in the valleys. If the spirit of the story be alone regarded, then, what is Moses

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but an embodiment of law, or what is Elijah but prophecy personified?

 

            Let us look at Moses in the light of law for a few moments, and then at Elijah in the light of prophecy. Flippant, would-be critics may dismiss biblical narratives with a contemptuous sneer, because the hidden treasure has to be dug out of the mine, and they have neither inclination nor ability to dig it out; but to the student of life’s mysteries, to the reverent inquirer into the secrets of the universe, every page in all the Scriptures of the earth glows with the light of a hidden flame, whose guiding light ever beckons the world on to higher and ever higher attainments. The true theory of evolution is more plainly exemplified in Bible history than in all the treatises of Darwin and his followers, even the latest scientific speculations concerning natural selection, and the survival of the fittest are all magnificently illustrated in scripture stories when esoterically interpreted.

 

            There can be but little question to-day among those whose researches are something more than despicably superficial, of the existence in remote ages in Egypt of a splendid spiritual dynasty, of which the most powerful and glorious kingly dynasty was but the outward shadow. Chronologists inform us that Egypt was ruled by gods for 13,900 years prior to the reign of demi-gods, who, in their turn, were succeeded by Pharaohs, who were ordinary men, native princes.

 

            Let us strip ancient history of all its fantastic apparel, and let ancient phraseology melt into modern forms of speech. Let us employ the gospel interpretation as a working hypothesis in deciphering the hieroglyphics

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of the past, contained in the words, “They were called gods, on whom the spirit of God (the Eternal) came,” and we can readily perceive how. the Jews (the word Jew really means any enlightened person, not necessarily a relative by blood of any special human ancestor) in the clays of Moses, probably a contemporary of Sesostris the Great, borrowed and never returned, i.e., carried out of Egypt, the most valuable treasures of wisdom which they locked up at length in the jewel cases of their correspondentially written scriptures. The Mosaic law was a perpetuation of a system of legislation, dating back no doubt to the sunken Atlantis, from which actual (not fabulous) country Egypt received her first impressions of science and religion. The Atlantian heroes and wise men who colonized Egypt were the gods who ruled the country for nearly 14,000 years in the long ago.

 

            The most ancient law buried in the letter of external Mosaism, is the one divine law of truth. It is the universal, spiritual, natural law, to transgress which is sin. This law never changes; it is absolutely immutable, like its author and sustainer, God. When law is transfigured, and not till then, do we see how perfectly at one are all the religious systems and bibles of the world. The unity of law is to be found only in its spirit; its letter killeth, and that which kills also dies, while its spirit giveth life, and therefore lives forever. Time great paradox of the New Testament is the presentation of diametrical opposites in the life and teaching of the ideal man. Jesus is constantly represented in the two-fold capacity of law destroyer and law fulfiller. In the sermon on time mount, he disallows the

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letter of Hebrew legislation in its every particular, and attributes the enforcement of antiquated customs to a spirit of servile submission to the traditions of the past.

 

            How can the law be destroyed in letter but fulfilled in spirit? How can we in this day, in this land, completely set aside the letter of the ancient law, and at the same time enforce its spirit in every particular? Take the Sabbath law as an example. The old Jewish institutes concerning Sabbath observance are literally so repellant to the spirit of human liberty and even justice that we shrink with horror from the thought that a human being was ever put to death for working on the seventh day.. We can have no sympathy with the old blue law of New England, which ordained heavy fines and imprisonment for the slightest departure from the rigorous enactments of the Puritans. Still, we all know by practical experience, that one day of rest and recreation out of every seven is intensely beneficial to all who observe such a periodical season of refreshment and repose.

 

            The institution of the Sabbath dates back to an age and country where slave-holding was as common as hired labor is to-day. The Sabbath law was, in its intention, a humane and merciful provision against the overworking of human beings and animals alike. Read the Fourth Commandment of the Decalogue carefully through, and you must, every one of you, be thoroughly convinced that men and women, oxen and asses, as creatures who worked with scarcely an intermission, except for nightly sleep, during six consecutive days of every week, were greatly blessed by having secured to them the rest of the Sabbath. In the olden

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days, when men were not to be moved, it appears, by any merely human mandate, the authority of a really or assumedly divine revelation was absolutely necessary to compel tyrannical masters to allow their slaves some seasons of repose, and, as Solomon truly and wisely says, “A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast” – the Sabbath law was as stringent concerning animals, as it was concerning men, while an extension of the same law insisted that the land should rest every seventh yeah, and by thus resting the land, oriental agriculturists prevented the soil from wearing out, and the land from becoming sterile through over-cultivation. So wise and so beneficent is the Sabbath law in its essential spirit, that we can, none of us, afford to disregard it here to-day, and we are happy to say that avowedly materialistic papers, such as the Boston Investigator, are as much in favor of intelligent Sabbath observance as any Christian sheet can be.

 

            The question which naturally arises is, What do you mean by Sabbath observance? We answer, We do not mean any sort of ecclesiastical observance, but a healthy cessation of business cares and vexations, for the whole of one day out of seven. Let people go to church if they like, into the parks, onto the water, or wheresoever they please, and if it is found necessary to employ some people on the day when others rest, an equitable arrangement might be made whereby some people should observe the Jewish and others the Christian Sabbath. Still, as far as possible, all should observe the same clay, for the purpose of rendering possible a calm and quiet general mental influence due to the absolute cessation of at least nine-tenths of the work done

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on the six working days. Jesus, in all his teaching and example treated this question in the most practical manner conceivable. He healed the sick on the Sabbath day, thereby dedicating it to the best good of the race physically, as well as morally and mentally; and when accused of being a Sabbath-breaker, he answered, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”

 

            In that statement he caused Moses to appear transfigured before the mental vision of those who claimed to be devoted disciples of the great Hebrew legislator; and when we pass on to a consideration of teachings yet more vital and important, we shall find the same transfigured Moses held up by Jesus to the people in place of the old Mosaic commands, whose literal barbarity is so shockingly repulsive to the enlightened thought of the nineteenth century.

 

            When we spoke against the hanging of the Chicago anarchists, at the time of their trial and condemnation, we took for our text, “Whosoever sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed;” but we coupled with it many words attributed to Jesus, taken from the sermon on the mount, in which he most emphatically dissents from the retaliatory interpretation of those grandly prophetic words, the full inner meaning of which can only be comprehended by a true theosophist deeply versed in a knowledge of Karma, or the law of consequence. Several Boston newspapers were sent to us by friends in Massachusetts, containing lengthy reports of sermons by Christian ministers, approving of the execution of the anarchists. Almost every one of those sermons, delivered in Christian pulpits

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was in downright defiance of Jesus, and justified the comment of a friend who sent us the papers. “If Jesus were on earth to-day, those very ministers would cry out, ‘Crucify him.’” We ask, in the name of common sense, how can preachers or hearers be so hypocritical, or so blind to the meaning of words as not to see that their applications of old Hebrew texts to modern events are at deadly variance with the teachings they profess to regard as the words of incarnate Deity? The Christian Church will never put down iniquity, so long as it worships Jesus with the lip, and insults him in every act of legislation. Joseph Cook’s oft repeated babble, “May God, have mercy on their souls, but may the Government of the United States not have mercy on their bodies,” was one of the most inconsistent sentences any man professing to be a follower of Jesus could possibly utter or frame. As Moses Hull, editor of The New Thought, said at Mt. Pleasant Park Camp Meeting in August, 1887, Why do not these professing Christians condemn men for shaving the corners of their beards, for the sane chapter in Leviticus which enforces the barbaric commands against which the sermon on the mount so forcibly inveighs, is as strict in its denunciations against shaving the whole face, as it is against adultery.

 

            Swedenborgians interpret the old law spiritually, and thereby assist in the transfiguration of Moses; but we regret to say that even among people professedly constituting the New Jerusalem Church, there are some who advocate capital punishment. “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,” is still their motto, in spite of all that Jesus said so earnestly against it, and

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the singular anachronism is, that the very people who advocate these awful barbarities read as a portion of the divine word publicly in their churches the most emphatic condemnation of their own acts. We do not wish to be severe, but we cannot resist repeating the words of an intelligent Oriental, who had just been studying the New Testament, “Well, it is difficult for me to see how any Christian can advocate capital punishment without being either an idiot or a hypocrite.”

 

            We have no difficulty in perceiving that the original intent of even such a monstrous act as decapitation may have been to deter others from crime, and therefore may have seemed legitimate; but that the wisest men of the Fast saw no deeper into human nature than to believe that doing evil, that good may come, brings good to pass, is something we neither will nor can believe.

 

            The lesson to be derived from the appearance of Moses on the Mount of Transfiguration is primarily and essentially the adjustment of our laws in harmony with the Sermon on the Mount. When the wail is removed, and law appears in its own intrinsic beauty, undimmed by false disguise, there will no longer be any need for prisons, jails and penitentiaries, but before these institutions, relics of barbarism that they are, are totally abolished, prison reform must be carried to such a pitch that going to prison will be looked upon in the same light as going to school or to a hospital.

 

            Moral asylums are needed just as asylums for the blind, the deaf and dumb. And as visitors go frequently to these latter institutions to watch the progress made

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by those who, often from some unknown cause, have been deprived of some natural gift, toward the obtaining or recovery of it, so should prison inspectors take an active interest and sincere delight in the moral recovery of those who, often through infamous early training, or lack of training, have so comported themselves as to render their temporary captivity within four walls necessary for their own reform and others safety. We are not necessarians, and we do not condone offences; but what we do maintain is that love being the fulfilling of the divine law, only through loving administration is the world to be redeemed from the innumerable errors which now curse it.

 

            What a lesson the disciples of Jesus must have learned on the top of that mysterious mount where Moses thus marvelously appeared rehabilitated in the garments of loving kindness! What a difficult lesson it was for Peter to digest, who, even at the most affecting moment of his beloved Master’s surrender of himself into the hands of his accusers, thought to advance that Master’s interest by lifting up his sword and cutting off the ear of the high priest’s servant Malchus! How small must be the mind of any caviler who picks at the outer garb of the gospel story, and utterly fails to see how applicable are all the events therein recorded to the present day and this very land of ours. Was it, after all, enthusiasm for the Master, or was it a feeling of spiteful revenge which lifted Peter’s hand? He could not have been, at that tine, very brave or noble, when he so soon after denied his Master! Hot-headed impetuosity is never associated with genuine fealty and lasting friendship. The man who would fight boldly

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for Jesus was the man who was the most ready, through cowardice, to deny him. Physical culture dissociated from spiritual culture develops the pugilist, who is never brave. The gymnasium, and certainly the fighting ring, will develop in one and the same person a herculean body and a pigmy soul; physical giants are often mental dwarfs. To strike a blow or fire a pistol is not courageous. Courage gives the soft answer and therewith turns away wrath.

 

            Oh! how often do we witness the saddening spectacle of men and women seeking to enforce discipline by boxing children’s ears, and other cowardly and wicked practices. Children grow up sneaks and criminals, be-come yet viler through the machinery of a law of late and fear, when a loving, just, and merciful regime would educate little ones, and reform criminals.

 

            But we must revert, ere we conclude, to the appearance of Elijah, or Elias, who was the embodiment of prophecy, as Moses was of law. Prophecy is said by Paul to be the greatest of all spiritual gifts. Now, what is prophecy? A prophet is a seer. one who looks ahead, who scans the heavens, and foretells coming events; but he is, most of all, an exhorter – one possessing the power to speak directly to the hearts and consciences, as well as to the intellects of his hearers. Between priest and prophet there is always the same difference that there is between inventor and copyist, between creative and imitative genius. Priests and those under then do not usually believe in prophecy, and they often stone the prophets. A prophet can not be confined within the narrow limits of any man-made creed, he can not submit to having his wings clipped and living

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like an eagle in a cage. He must be free as the air, and lie would rather starve than compromise. Of such pure metal was Elijah made, and of such, verily in every age and country, may it be said, “Their’s is the kingdom of heaven.” No earthly crown decorates their brow, no earthly honors and emoluments are theirs, nor do they seek them; their motto is ever, “For God and for humanity,” and their whole life is an exemplification of the truth to which, through good repute and ill, through fire and sword if need be, they steadfastly adhere. The significance of the appearance of Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration is far removed above that controversial speculation which disputes over the literal identy of John the Baptist with Elias of old. Whether John the Baptist was the personal Elias re-embodied is not a question of any vital moment.

 

            Elijah is the synonym of prophecy, the representative of prophets everywhere, and for all time. When prophesy is transfigured, or, in other words, understood not in the killing letter, but in the life-giving spirit, it no longer appears as unconditional as it did before. Israel of old was so favorably situated that all things seemed conspiring together to make of the house of Israel and of the city of Jerusalem the greatest nation and the metropolis of the whole earth. Had Israel always remained true to her sacred trust, had she invariably adhered to the commandments of the decalogue, the day could never have arrived when the name of Caesar had to be acknowledged in Palestine.

 

            It was the scheming, calculating spirit which animated the demagogues in the days of Jesus to curry favor at the court of Rome by condemning the innocent

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to death, that through many centuries as a deadly but most insidious poison had been lurking in the veins of the Israelitish people. This alone it was which wrought their, downfall and made it possible for the Christ to weep on Olivet. No more touching scene has ever been portrayed than that of the weeping Savior of a doomed humanity – not doomed by any cruelty of God, but self-destroyed, preferring war to peace, hate to love, falsehood to truth, vice to virtue. Is there a medical man who can not at once apply the scene to many among his own patients? Faithfully and patiently he has pointed out to them their errors, reasoning and remonstrating with them till time and language were alike exhausted, and then, when they had proved utterly incorrigible, in sadness he has turned away and lamented the idiotic folly of men and women rushing headlong to physical perdition, when the means had been placed within their grasp of working out their own salvation ere it became too late.

 

            Prophecy is not prediction solely or chiefly, it is first of all and more than all, exhortation. The true prophet is a genuine exhorter, one who sets the truth before the world with convincing power and fervor; one who, with more than usual hindsight, insight, and foresight, knows the inevitable law of consequence more fully than his fellows, and consecrates that knowledge zealously, untiringly to blessing the world. No prophet can tell you what will of necessity befall you; but he can tell you what must inevitably accrue if a certain course of action is persisted in.

 

            Nothing is more natural than prophecy. Front a spiritual standpoint prophecy is an exact science, and

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the understanding of it as such is the master key to all those occult mysteries which continually beset us. When the followers of Jesus knew what prophecy really meant, all their national hopes were dashed to pieces. No longer could they regard the Infinite Jehovah as the tribal deity of the Jewish clan, almost exclusively interested in the welfare of a fragment of the human race. A broader conception took possession of their minds, and henceforward God to them appeared as no respecter of persons, but a respecter of righteousness only. This sublime view of Deity was not new; Hebrew prophets had entertained and expressed it long before, but there is little reason for supposing that the Jews as a people had ever risen to a general acceptance of the idea of a universal and utterly impartial Deity.

 

            To apply this subject to vital issues of the living present, we have only to change the time and scene of gospel episodes to render them intensely applicable to present conditions in Europe and America. We need to press the matter still nearer home, and individualize the lesson of the story, by contemplating how poor a thing is bald prediction when applied to our own circumstances, while genuine prophecy, that gift of the spirit which Paul extolled above so many others, is the richest dower which can fall to the lot of any human being.

 

            It requires a lecture on heredity to explain in anything like detail the working of the prophetic element in daily life. Supposing yon are told your lungs are weak, and you believe it, and instead of setting to work to strengthen your system by healthy discipline you give in to the saddening thought – a thought most woefully depressing wherever entertained – that it is a

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part of your ill luck or adverse fortune to succumb to a terrible disorder. You fulfill a vile, and perhaps utterly baseless prediction by affiliating in thought with the very forces which tend to tear you down, while you might just as readily have affiliated with an opposite class of influences, association with which would have built you up. Now take an instance on the other side being told that you inherit an exceptionally robust constitution, and that in consequence of being thus naturally vigorous you are bound to live a long life and enjoy excellent health to the end of your days, you fritter away your energy in disgraceful dissipation; you will most certainly fail, like the hare inn the old fable, while your less fortunately started neighbor may be the winning tortoise in the race.

 

            These illustrations are intensely commonplace, but our ambition is to be practical, not to indulge in bights of eloquence or flowers of rhetoric. Let the history of the Jewish people two thousand years ago and the - history of all peoples who have once been great, but who have yielded to the corroding moth of presumptuous self-satisfaction, lead us all to yield to that glorious Elias ministry of the soul, which, in the stentorian tones of a rugged and utterly inelegant dweller in the deserts, often proclaims to us the only means of escape from all the evils which menace us, when lie lifts up his voice in the wilderness, and loudly cries: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” A kingdom of heaven is now at our doors. We are entering upon a new social, religious, and political order. The great industrial problems of the hour, the tremendous struggle between capital and labor, between monopoly and

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justice, can not much longer be dallied with; the final issue can not much longer be delayed by unsatisfactory temporizing in the way of palliative concessions, when radical reform is loudly called for over all the earth. Not those who fare delicately, and are clad in costly raiment are the prophets, but those who dare to lift tip their voice in humanity’s cause, espousing right and liberty even though their cry shall cause thrones to totter, and shall shake the hoary foundations of a false political system -until it falls about the ears of those whose material interest it is to uphold it.