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Reputations are built on many factors—some of them unpredictable. A good many men have lived their lives and gone to their graves reputed for things for which they never would have chosen to be known. Some who would like to have been thought of as great dramatic artists have, by some circumstances come to be typed as comedians. Men of several gifts sometimes become best known for the gift which they themselves esteem the least.
July Fourth, as a day of annual commemoration, has come and gone, despite many crises and contrary influences, finding us still a liberty-loving people; and the uniting force of freedom has, in the providence of God, preserved us as a nation—notwithstanding the fact that in many places and in many philosophies one will find expressed the idea and belief that freedom is an element of weakness rather than an element of strength. But those who have proceeded on this false assumption have discovered that men who have tasted of the sweetness of liberty have more to fight for and more to live for than men who haven't. However, despite this, throughout all the centuries all manner of substitutes for freedom have been proposed.
“Whereupon, 0 king Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision: I continue unto this day, witnessing both to small and great, saying none other things than those which the prophets … did say should come…” (Acts26:19,22) As it was with Paul standing before Agrippa, so it has ever been with men of inspired […]
Thoughts and feeling’s grow on a given theme, until someone succeeds in having it publicly noted. And so today we have Fathers’ Day. In a world that has seemingly been run by men, in a civilization in which the patriarchal order has been the prevailing rule, and in which children have taken the names of […]
These are anxious days for all of us—days in which the most cherished things in our lives are at stake. Seemingly, there is scarcely a home but what awaits news of someone, somewhere, somehow, involved in the issues that breathlessly hang in the balance. We live in a contagion of tension—but if we have anxiety in our hearts, think what must be the fears of those who have perpetrated these things and who must now know that they await the inevitable.
We have come again to that time in a school year when we grade and accredit, promote and graduate, and otherwise appraise the academic accomplishments of our youth, After vacations are over, some will return to continue their studies; some will go to higher institutions of learning—but many are now forever leaving the schoolroom, leaving teachers, campus, and cherished associates. And despite all displays of exuberance and all expressions of relief, it is a sober time for youth.
As the years were added upon his head, Victor Hugo wrote: "I feel immortality in myself. Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart. The nearer I approach the end, the plainer I hear around me the immortal symphonies of the world to come.... For a half century I have been writing my thoughts in prose and verse; but I feel I have not said one-thousandth part of what is in me. When I have gone down to the grave I shall have ended my day's work; but another day will begin next morning. . ." It is comforting to read what great minds have caused to be written, but whether they had so written or not would neither affect the outcome nor alter man's conviction. Man is himself the evidence of his own immortality. "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living," (Matthew 22 -32) and Memorial Day is recognition of an undeniable conviction in men, that, being dead, they live.
There comes to mind a phrase of three words—Glorifying the Mediocre—which is indicative of a practice whereby young and old are schooled in a world of unreality and confused thinking. In its mildest forms, in casual conversation and in the recounting of experiences to our friends and acquaintances, it may be recognized by a tendency toward moderate exaggeration—placing emphasis where it doesn't belong; adding color to what really happened; speaking in terms of quantities and qualities that are somewhat beyond the facts. In its more aggravated forms this practice of glorifying the mediocre goes beyond mild exaggeration to the extreme of deliberate and premeditated hyperbole, coupled with prodigal use of extravagant words.
It would be difficult on Mother's Day to say anything new concerning mothers, or even to say anything old in a new way, so numerous and eloquent have been the tributes written and spoken of them in all past years. But this year the Channels of thought are burdened with urgent messages of love and appreciation for mothers the world over from sons in far places. For these young men, who would say it for themselves if they were here, may we assume the role of spokesman and convey their love and their gratitude to those millions of mothers whom they cherish in their hearts, and whom they dwell upon in their thoughts on this day.
Every generation has its foibles and its practices of self-deception, one of which, certainly, is the mislabeling of things—calling them something other than what they are, and hoping that somehow they will become what we have called them. In childhood we find this practice delightfully excusable. A small boy wants a horse. He finds a stick, and straddles it, and calls it a horse—and to him it becomes a horse.
If we make a mistake, no doubt upon sincere repentance we may reasonably expect forgiveness. The principle of forgiveness is closely associated with the principle of repentance. But lest there be any who may suppose that forgiveness comes easy, let us be reminded of some of the facts and prerequisites. There are those who expect to be forgiven times without number simply by announcing that they are sorry.
In considering great moral and religious principles, we are sometimes inclined to assume that they are idealistic rather than practical—that the benefits and penalties associated with them are virtually devoid of application so far as our commonplace daily affairs are concerned. But nothing could be further from the truth.
Perhaps most of us have had the experience of looking down from great heights, or of peering into deep chasms, to find that we seem somehow to be drawn toward the abyss—in our thoughts and feelings, if not in an actual physical sense. Gazing into an abyss may have its attractions, but it is an exceedingly hazardous pastime. Gazing needlessly into voids of other kinds also has its hazards. It has long been recognized that people tend to take on the characteristics of the thoughts they entertain, and of the atmosphere they frequent.
To see death gently pronounce its benediction upon a fullness of years, to see its merciful hand remove the infirmities of one who has traveled long and become weary of the journey, is a hallowed experience—but to see death hover near the fairest youth of many lands and make its choices from among them is quite another thing—youth, whose lives are crowded with plans and prospects—youth, who should be confident in the promise of many days to come, but who, paradoxically, live as though they had less time than the aged.
We have all had the experience of being urged to do something against our inclinations, and sometimes against our better judgment, by those who persuasively use the argument: "0, come on and try it! You don't know what you're missing!" And, no doubt, many people, old and young alike, have been introduced to some good things and have also been introduced to some undesirable practices and places by this philosophy.
Not infrequently we hear someone who shrugs off a puzzling situation with the comment: "A hundred years from now what will it matter!" This, of course, is one of those ready-made platitudes by which we by-pass those facts we don't want to be bothered with facing. But it's a good question if we'll ask it seriously: "A hundred years from now what will it matter?"
If we were to allow ourselves to be unnerved by the daily impact of all we see and all we hear, and by all the untoward circumstances of our lives, we would soon be so completely upset in our feelings that long-time objectives and ultimate values would tend to be crowded from our planning and thinking.
In addition to the false fears that destroy the effectiveness of men (most of which are vainly imagined and are without substance), it must also be admitted that there are fears which are not false-that some fears have their foundation in fact-for example, the fears of a man whose life is filled with wrong, and who knows it, and who vainly tries to quiet his fear of consequences. Not all who carry such fears are known to us. Some walk our streets, and live long, and never rise above their fears—and "die many times before their death" as Shakespeare wrote of those who die a thousand deaths.
The war of nerves, so-called, is a new name for an old stratagem—the stratagem of deliberately bringing about a state of fear in the lives of men. It has long been known that if you can strike fear into the heart of a man you have already gone far toward destroying his effectiveness. Fear is, no doubt, a "secret weapon" of Satan himself—and of many who have sought to emulate him—who would like others to be paralyzed by fear so that they may accomplish their own purposes.
One of the accepted methods of teaching and learning is by the process of repetition. By saying a thing over and over again, eventually it may become ingrained. But, effective as it is, this process may become very tiresome. Perplexed parents frequently become weary of the number of times they have to remind their children of even the simplest rules of conduct, with little apparent carry-over effect—and frequently from children comes the impatient reply: "O we know! We've heard that before!" After having gone through such repeat performances times without number, exhausted mothers and fathers have often despaired.
We pause again, as we do each recurring year at this season, between the birthdays of two American patriots whom time has given the mark of greatness—two men who have outlived all of the pettiness and prejudices, all of the misunderstandings and misrepresentations of their own generations—who have outlived all partisanship, to find permanent place in the minds and hearts of Americans and of freedom-loving peoples everywhere.
In this day and age, whenever anyone speaks of the social precautions which were formerly observed for the safeguarding of womanhood in general, and of young girls in particular, one is likely to be accused of being Victorian-which is another way of saying that the idea is thought to be stuffy and old-fashioned. But when safeguarding the most precious things in life becomes old-fashioned, civilization will be on its way out, together with the finest things that the finest people of all ages have stood for.
Like fashions and customs in a good many other things, the words of our language come and go. Many times within our generation we have seen words suddenly come into daily usage, and we have seen words gradually fall into disuse, almost without our being aware of it. One, such word that was once used more often and with much meaning, and which more recently seems to be on the wane, is the word "chaperonage." To those who have lived through earlier decades, it stirs memories. But to many of today's youth it has little or no meaning outside the dictionary. But old-fashioned as it is, the word still has a meaning, and old-fashioned as it may seem to say so, that meaning has a fundamental significance.
The conduct of men is modified by laws which provide penalties for almost every outward act of evil that could be named or devised. Whether enforced or not, there are on the statute books prohibitions and punishments for immorality, theft, drunkenness, bearing false witness, violence, duplicity, and dishonorable dealings of every kind and description, notwithstanding which the multiplicity of violations is appalling. And these outward evidences of an inward condition bring us face to face with the truth that no present means of physical enforcement can prevent evil, so long as the greater offenses are committed within the minds of men and in the secret places of their hearts.
"But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions." (Matthew 19:22.) The problem of the young man and his choices in life is always with us—and likewise of young women. Many of our own young men today—rich young men, all of then—rich in the heritage of country, rich in opportunity, rich in friends and in prospects for happiness—have, by the millions, had to decide between clinging to their accustomed comfort and personal convenience, or offering themselves in defense of a cause. But it isn't only a time of war that brings such decisions before us.
There comes to mind one of the pastimes of our childhood when we paused with wide-eyed children to watch the billposter, harbinger of circuses and travelling shows, skillfully ply paste and brush, and somehow make the parts of a ready-made picture, piece by piece, slip precariously into place—thus to tell all passers by of things to come.
The cycle of fashion in human affairs has often been observed and commented upon. Succeeding generations come back to old styles, modified, but strikingly similar. Not only in such things as dress, in literature, and in art do we tend to move recurrently, but also in thought. And not only does the aggregate thinking of the world tend to repeat itself, but each man in his own life tends to go through phases from faith to doubt, and back again from skepticism to belief. In childhood, an implicit faith in an intelligent direction of the universe and in the reality and approachability of God is the likely condition. And then comes a little learning—so tritely but truly described as being "a dangerous thing"—a smattering of knowledge acquired here and there, a fragment of fact, which, unrelated to the whole, would seem to discredit the pattern of faith.
The New Year brings with it the annually recurring question, to resolve or not to resolve. No doubt some of us have quit making resolutions, and some of us are still making and breaking them. Too often resolutions that wait for the New Year, and which are made dramatically with the ringing of the bells, play out undramaticallv and ingloriously. Usually the resolutions that stay with us are those we make quietly and earnestly to ourselves when we feel the strength and the need to do so— without waiting for a great occasion. And so we are not calling for any overt or declamatory resolutions, but we could, all of us, use some quiet personal determination about many things—one of which could be the resolve in the year ahead to do our own thinking—to cut through the maze of misinformation and ready-made opinion and look for the facts and the reasons behind the facts.
This day between Christmas and the New Year would seem to be a good time to remind ourselves of some realities that bear repetition. If we were to measure the accomplishment of ultimate purposes in terms of the lifetime of any one man or any one generation, many things that are certain of eventual fulfillment would seem to have been vain and hopeless. Progress is slow at best, and, at times, certainly, it would seem that we move in the wrong direction. The race of men learn stubbornly.
There are many thoughts that crowd in upon us at Christmas—but most of all, perhaps, our thoughts at this season are of home and those we love; and, if we were free to go our own way, the footsteps of most of us would turn homeward at Christmas. This year perhaps the greatest unfulfilled longing in all the world is the longing expressed by the words, "I want to go home." There are millions of men in far countries and strange places, on battlefields and on broad seas, friend and foe alike, in whose hearts this thought will not be stilled: "I want to go home." There are millions, both friend and foe alike, who yearn at home to welcome those who would come if they could.