In the Gallery
In the gallery of human souls there is one pre-eminent figure. It has been the study of all artists, of all thinkers. From the most opposite sides of the building men have seen it, approached it, centred round it. It has been studied by the lover of beauty; it has been lauded by the lover of the commonplace. It has been examined in the interest of philosophy; it has been scrutinised in the interest of childlike simplicity. It has been admired as the embodiment of a creed; it has been eulogised as the negation of all creeds. It has drawn the eyes of the mystic who wants to soar above the world; it has attracted the gaze of the practical who find the world a home. Wise men have sought it in the pursuit of science; shepherds have sought it in A the guiding of their flocks; Herod has sought it in the policy of self-interest. Every avenue of the mind has been at some time a road to the Portrait of Jesus.
I wish as a humble spectator to take my stand with the great crowd in front of the great Portrait. I wish to approach it with the eye of the heart — not to write an essay, but to sing a song. It does not follow that the perception must be less artistic. I have read that on one occasion of the Gospel story a child was lifted up to see the Portrait of Jesus. That youngest student in the art-gallery had probably the view clearest of all. His sight was antecedent to all theory, to all argument. J should like to be that child; I shall try. I would approach the Picture as the child approaches it — without prepossession, without a cause to plead, without a brief to advocate. I would describe the Picture as the child describes it — rather by exclamation than by rounded speech. I would forget the language of the schools, the names of the theologians, the abstractions of the logical and the learned. I would stand in the presence, not of a scene recorded, but of a scene passing. I would make the notes of a reporter rather than draw the inferences of a compiler. The Portrait before me is a present reality. The History may be a thing of the past; the Gospels may have their origin in obscurity; but the Portrait is a fact of to-day. It wants, not the annalist, but the spectator. It wants the eye of the child — the eye that has no yesterday, no preconception, no image of the past to read into the Picture. The youngest and humblest student of the gallery had advantages over the Twelve.
In this gallery there are many portraits of the religious life. Wherein lies the pre-eminence of Jesus? As I scan the various faces I become impressed with a fact. The difference between them and Jesus is not a difference of feature; it is a difference of expression — of motive. The moral features of a man’s life are his acts; his expression is the motive for his acts. I have heard it said again and again, ‘The portrait of Christ is not original,’ You tell me that you can point out the same features in Confucius, in Buddha, in Zoroaster. Of course you can. It is just here that the mystery lies. Nowhere is the difference of the portraits so marked as where the sameness of feature appears. It is from the ground common to all flowers that the flower. of Jesus has sprung. Why do I wonder at the difference between the animal and the man? Precisely because I have established the likeness of their mechanisms; if they had opposite mechanisms, I should not wonder. So is it with Jesus, It is the ground common to Him and me that makes the mystery to me. It is precisely in the sphere of unity that the point of diversity rises. I marvel most where the fields meet.
Come, and let us see the truth of this. Let us look round the gallery of great portraits; let us measure Christ’s with those of other masters. Let us place Him side by side with the sage of China — the strong, the solid Confucius. Is there a similarity between them? Yes; there is a marked likeness of /eature.
Both have come to found a kingdom. Both have come to found an earthly kingdom. Both have proclaimed the value of homely and commonplace duties. Both have turned the eyes of their disciples to the trivial things at their feet. Confucius tells them to avoid flights into the air, to keep their thoughts on the soil of mother earth. The first public word of Jesus is almost on the same lines, ‘ Blessed are the poor in spirit.’
Yet, strange to say, it is here and nowhere else that the difference appears. The originality of Jesus lies not in the ‘what,’ but in the ‘why. W#y does Confucius value commonplace duties? Because he wants men to be worldly. Why does Jesus value commonplace duties? Because he wants men to be unworldly. To the sage of China the power to do little things is the proof of an earthly intelligence; to the Son of Man the power to do little things is the proof of a heavenly intelligence. To Confucius the blessedness of the poor in spirit is the sense that they are born from below; to Jesus the blessedness of the poor in spirit is the sense that they are born from above — ‘theirs is the kingdom of heaven.’ And is not Jesus right? Do you think any man can pass through the ordeal of commonplace duty unless he sees something out of the common? I do not. I have never known Chinese work to be done successfully without a vision deyond the work. The boy does not learn his lesson by the light of the lamp, but by the light of the coming holiday. I do not think it is purely by present attention that work is best done. Rather should I say that the attention to the present comes from hope in the future. Yon poor clerk who bends over his ledger is not sustained by his ledger. His work would be badly done if he did not see beyond it, hope beyond it, dream beyond it. He could not bear his poverty of spirit if he had not glimpses of the kingdom of heaven. Very likely this kingdom takes to him a human form — the hope of promotion, the prospect of wealth, the anticipation of domestic love. None the less is it the vindication, not of Confucius,
IN ‘1: HE GALLERY 4
but of Jesus. It tells me that I cannot conquer the hour dy the hour. I must look beyond if I would get through it — on to the golden sands that are not yet upon the shore, on to the cloudless skies that still are far away.
Let us pass to another side of the gallery — from the sage of China to the sage of India. Buddha and Christ — the names are often linked together. And there is good ground for the union. There is here again a similarity — nay, an identity, of feature. They are both in the attitude of sacrifice. Both cry, ‘Give, give!’ Both have emptied themselves of a former glory. Both have selected poverty, privation, toil. Both call upon men to take up the cross. Both are seen ascending the steps of a Calvary,
Yet here again it is the similarity of feature that reveals the difference. Nowhere are these figures so unlike as in their point of union. The value of the cross to Buddha is the opposite of its value to Jesus. To Buddha the tross is a submission to human misery; to
Jesus it is a protest agaist human misery. Buddla calls upon men to realise their nothingness, to accept their nothingness, to bow the knee to their nothingness; Jesus calls upon them to resent the imputation, to deny the impeachment, to lift the burdens that humiliate mankind. To Buddha the bearing of the cross is a resignation to the state of humanity; to Jesus the bearing of the cross is a resistance to the state of humanity. Jesus calls on me to lift the burden of my brother, not because it is our common destiny, but because it ought not to be there. His own endurance of the cross is ‘for the joy set before Him,’ If, like Buddha, He feels that all flesh is grass, unlike Buddha, He would not have it so. He calls upon His brethren to vemove the grass, to lift it up in bundles, to carry it away. This carrying away is the burden of Jesus. It is not the submission to pain; it is the resistance to pain. It is the bearing of a present load for the sake of a future freedom. It ts no surrender to calamity; it is a bid for joy. It is the payment of a price for human
IN THE GALLERY nd
emancipation; it is the acceptance of a sore operation for the permanent cure of suffering.
Look at another figure — the sage of Persia, Zoroaster. Does he resemble Jesus in feature? Yes, very much. He comes to the world with a war-cry, He says, ‘Things are all wrong; there is an evil Power fighting against God; arise and prepare for the battle.’ Jesus, too, has the sense of a coming struggle. He, too, refuses to take an optimistic view of life. He, too, bids his followers prepare for a scene of conflict — for wars and rumours of wars. To the sage of Persia, to the Prophet of Judah, this world presents one and the same aspect — the aspect of a great battlefield on which the powers of earth war with the powers of heaven.
Are these portraits, then, identical? No; the difference comes out just in their common features. Zoroaster says in effect, ‘You are living in a fighting world; therefore put on the warlike spirit.’ Jesus says, ‘You are living in a fighting world; therefore put on the spirit of peace, To Jesus it is not the warlike spirit
Lo IN THE GALLERY
that fits for war; it is the rest within. The power that overcomes the world, with Him, is peace. His preparation for conflict is mental calm. It is by the lone hill-side that He braces Himself for the sea. The mind that enters into the struggles of His kingdom is the mind at leisure from itself — undisturbed even by the thought of its own foes. It is by the still small voice that the Elijahs of His army conquer the thunder, the earthquake, and the fire. Other founders of religions promise peace at the end of war; the promise of Jesus is peace before the battle.
Let us take one more figure of the great gallery. This time let it be not from the East but from the West. Let us select the man who beyond all others in the sphere of thought has caught the spirit of the Roman Empire — the Stoic, Epictetus. What is that spirit of the Roman Empire which he has incarnated? It is fortitude amid life’s dangers, calmness amid life’s tempests, fearlessness amid life’s spectres. Jesus, too, has these Roman features, His attitude is ever that of the man who walks
IN THE GALLERY re
upon the wave — who on the very crest of the wave has said to his own soul, ‘ Peace, be still.’ Are, then, these two figures one? Has the deformed slave on the banks of the Tiber reproduced the courage of the Man of Sorrows on the banks of the Jordan? Is the spirit of the Roman Empire identical with the spirit of the Kingdom of God?
Nay, it is only their features that are alike. Put again the question, Why? and you will see the difference. I do not say that Jesus walks upon the wave more firmly than Epictetus. I do not say that the man of the Tiber is less free from fear than the Man of the Jordan. But they are fearless for opposite reasons; nay, is not their fortitude valued for opposite reasons? Epictetus stands upon the sea because he has conquered his passions; Jesus stands upon the sea by reason of a great passion of love — what we call the Lord’s passion. Epictetus has reached fortitude by restraining the vital stream; Jesus has reached fortitude by enlarging the vital stream. Epictetus has won by suppressing emotion; Jesus has won by the emotion of a wider interest. Epictetus has seen the mountains of danger dwindle because he has seen the world itself dwindle; to Jesus the mountains of danger have been dwarfed, not by the contraction, but by the extension, of the world. There are two ways in which I may lose my fears — by a diminution of interest, or by an increase of interest. I may pass through the furnace because I have ceased to feel pain, or I may pass through the furnace to save another from pain. The one is the courage of passionlessness; the other is the courage of pathos. The one has crucified the sense of danger; the other has eclipsed it by the sense of a greater danger. The one has conquered by the contraction, the other by the expansion, of the heart.
And this latter is the movement of Jesus. When He goes out into the storm, it is not because the storm to Him has ceased to seem violent. He does not deem it one whit less destructive or the least more desirable than it was yesterday. He does not estimate the personal danger less, but the impersonal danger more. He has treasures of the heart in the storm; those whom He loves are in the wrecked ship. It is passion, not passionlessness, that drives Him forth into the blast. He, like the Stoic, can be dumb in the presence of calamity; but it is because He is absorbed in listening to the complaints of another voice whose loss in the calamity outweighs His own.
ON of Man, before whose Portrait I stand to-day, Thou art still unique, alone. Thou
art never so unique, Thou art never so alone, as where others touch Thee. Thou hast in Thy possession treasures that once belonged to wise men of the East and wise men of the West; but in the sunlight where Thou standest they have become new. I used to say, ‘I have seen this gold, this frankincense, and this myrrh, before.’ So I have; but in Zhy presence the gold is more glittering, the myrrh more precious, the frankincense more fragrant. Others have stood on the same Mount with Thee; but Thou alone hast caught the glory. To me Thou speakest ever, not ox the Mount, but from the Mount. Thy voice is from aloft; I am always below it. Even where it says old things I am always below it. I may have seen the painted rainbow before I saw the rainbow in the sky; yet the rainbow in the sky remains original. So is it with my sight of Zee. Thy face gives new meaning to the instincts of my soul. Old words on Thy lips become winged. Plain chords on Thy harp become melody. Truths spoken long ago become discoveries in Thee. The trite terms of endearment that man utters to man thrill with the surprise of pathos when they are uttered by Zhee. The language is from Bethlehem, but the accent is from Heaven.