CHURCH AND WAR

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2988, 27 January 1917, Page 6

CHURCH AND WAR

THE "HAPPY.WARRIOR" WISDOM OF "A STUDENT, IN ARMS." The moral'and spiritual , aspects or war, have been iwpressivoly dealt with by "A Student in Aims"- in. a series of striking articles which have been published jn tho London "Speotator." "A Student iu Arms" was Second Lieutenant Donald Harikey, of the Ist B.gyal Warwickshire Regiment. Hβ was killed in action on the Soinrae on October 12,1916. Tho editor of tho "Spectator" has described Lieutenant Hankey as "an inspired interpreter of the piiyato soldier. , ' Ho was the "Hanpy Warrior" if there over was one. 'Tie was one of a family in whom the loots of patriotism struck deep. His elder 'brother gave np his life for his country at Paardeberg. Another brother is Colonel Sir Maurice Hankey, secretary of the War Council. A third is an officer in a Territorial battalion. These two, a mafried sister, and the sister who was his constant advisor and sustainer in all his work, have the prioeless consolation of knowing ihai) their brother laid down his life just as he had always desired to lay it .down." The following article, entitled "The Wisdom of 'A Student in Arms,' ' appeared in the "Spectator" of NoveniT her 25, 1916:— It is no good trying to fathom "things" to the bottom; they, have not got one. . Knowledge, is always descriptive, and never fundamental. Wo can describe the appearance and conditions of a-pro-oess; but not the way of it. Agnosticism is a fundamental fact. H is the starting-point of the Wise man who has discovered that it needs eternity to'study infinity.. _ Agnosticism, however, is no-excuse for indolence- Because we cannot know all, we need not therefore _ Iβ totally ignorant. The true wisdom is that in which' all knowledge is subordinate to practical aims, and blended into a working ;philosophy of life.. ' ' , The true wisdom is that' if is not what a man does, or has, or-'Says that matters; but what lie is. a , This must be the aim of practical philosophy —to <nako a man be somewhat. The world judges a- man by his station, inherited , or acquired. God judges by his charaoter. To he our beat we.must share God's viewpoint. To the world death is always a tragedy; to tho Christian it is never a tragedy unless a man has been a contemptible character. Religion is the widening of a man's horizon so as to include God. It is in the nature of n. speculation, but its returns aro immediate. True religion means betting Vine's life that there is a God. Its immediate fruits are courage, stability, calm, unselfishness, friendshit), generosity, humility, and hone. - Religion is the only possible basis of optimism. Optimism is the essential-- condition of progress. One is what' one believes oneself td be. If one believes oneself to lie an animal one becomes bestial: if one be'lieves oneself spiritual ono becomes Divine. Faith- fa an effectivo force whose sure has never yet been taken. _ Man is the creature of heredity and environment. Hβ canonly rise superior to circumstances by bringing God into environment of which' he is conscious. The recognition of God's presence upsets the balance of a man's environment, and means a new birth into a new life. The faculties which perceive God increase with use like any other perceptive faculties. .... .... ...' ' Belief in! God may- be. an illusion"; but it is an illusion that pays. If belief in God is illusion, happy is ho who is deluded I _ He gains this world and thinks he will gain the next. The disbeliever loses this world, and risks losing the nest. To be tho centre of ono's universe is misery. To havo ono's universe centred in God is tho peaco that pasiseth . understanding. Greatness is founded on inward ' Energy is only effeotivo whon" it springs from deep calm. The pleasure of life lies in'contrasts; tho fear of contrasts is a chain, that binds most men. In the hour of danger a man is proven. The boaster hides, and the egotist trembles. He whose care is for others forgets to bo afraid. Men live for eating and drinking, passion and wealth. They die . for honour. Blessed is he of whom it has been said he so loved giving thai ho oven gave his own life. FELLOWSHIP FOR DISCOVERY. MR. GLUTTON-BROCK ON. THE WORK OF THE CHURCH. Mr. A. Clutton-Brock, in a lecture delivered in the Church of St. Mar-tin-in-theFields, London, said laymen sometimes had a curious way of regarding the Church as they would an incompetdnt railway company and Bishops and clergy as directors and officials. It was a wholly mistaken notion. Laymen wero as much members as tho clergy, and if the Church failed it was as much failuro of tho laity as of the clergy. The National Mission showed a- genoral fooling that the Church, had in some respects failed. If they were to go right down to tho cause they must consider it as not only failuro in execution, hut in conception of what the Church was. Some would Tegard the Church as a picturesque survival, others as a kind of benefit society. Sometimes it was regarded as an institution for the preservation of certain doctrines and truths, and thero was also the fundamental error of -thinking of Christianity as something landed down from the past to be preserved in a kind of mental museum. To put it into a phrase, he would say Church fellowship was for discovery. Undoubtedly thero wero certain truths of tho Christian faitli which they had been told wero truths and a., great many people accepted them because they were told but did not know them to he trno. They could only como to believe they were true by going throiieh a course oF test and experiment. Tho Church existed as a fellowship to discover that dnctrinos really wore true. The doctrines of tho Christian religion could not be tested as by individuals. They only came true in fellowship. The position of the Church should be like that of scientific inqniriers with e.ves to the future to' discover with more cortaintv and precision the truths nf the Christian faith through tho collective life of all members; to prove that the Christian, religion was really true. ' , THE ANCIENT UNIVERSITIES. RECONSTRUCTION PROSPECTS. Professor H. B. Swote, preaching in Great St. ilary's Church, Cambridge, gave a fine sketch of tho great opportunities'opening out before the University in tho coming days, which he spoko of as "that lesser Houso of Wisdom which has been built up among us in this place. "How this House of Wisdom has been builded, how its pillars have been hewn out and sot up by the labour and self-sacrifice of former days, the commemoration reminds us from year lo year. Some of the names in that great list are fnmiliar to us all; oEfiers to most of us are names only. And of necessity there are many more of our 2pfldeiß jyho, Can ir,ecoiv6 no pientiom

who are perislicd out of memory, as though they had not been—the forgoi.ton workers who toiled on with bod and trowel, laying stono upon stone in the rising fabrio; without whose labour our great benefactors, royal or other, hnd contributed endowments in. vain* There- is pathos in tho thought'of thn countless workmen whose piety can neve]" receive recognition on earth.

"The problems before the ancient universities aro bigger than those which face us at the moment—how to recover from financial losses, bow to fill again our collego halls and the classrooms of our professors and lecturers. No one who turns the pages of our great history will doubt that both these difficulties will be overcome in due time. A.great university has no need to fear bankruptcy, either of means or of men. Some time may pass before the prosperity of the opening years of this century returns, but return ib assuredly will, and perhaps it may even be surpassed. "Majiy of the men who have left tie for the front can never, alas, come back; they nave found a better part. Many more, whose immaturity Jias been exchanged by' the._ strenuous life of the trenches for a ripeness beyond their years, may not care to place themselves again under the tutelage of the undergraduato course. Parents, ' who in easier times would have sent their sons hero from the public schools, may be compelled to place them at once in some remunerative service, without the costly interval of a university career. But for all this the years will bring their remedy; and it is at least ■possible that, with returning prosperity, the university may have to lengthen her cords and strengthen her stakes, in order to make room for all yho will flock to her feast of good things. It is not here, then, that there is cause for anxiety, hut rather in the piisopect of reconstruction, which is opening before us—reconstruction not only in the details of our educational system, but in the whole conception of school and university education which has hitherto prevailed- in -this country. "No true sou of Cambridge will com-' plain of any widening of her studies which the new conditions of English life may be found to require. It is a commonplace that a new England will arise out of this war, an England which has broken with past weaknesses and follies, and will reach forth toward the tasks to which a new sense of Empire and a new leadership in the councils of Europe may presently call her. And a new England, less insular, more imperial, more conscious of her mission to the world, must Bet herself, first of all, to* revise the intellectual training of her people.

"Already we hear the sounds of axe , and hammer at work upon. English education; the wrecker must needs go hefore the builder, and some of our , oherished traditions must.make room for a new learning. Such -changes, pressed upon ub by the national "will, are not to be jealously resisted at all points. It becomes us not to cling to the old in such wise as to refuse all that is new; to rise to the call of the ,, times,; as our forefathors rose to the earlier cry of Wisdom at the gate.

"Enlargements of our national life,y the opening up of fresh channels of thought and work, may demand a cor- , responding growth in the curriouliim of our studios. ■ The ancient Universities would bo held, not without reason, to have fallen short of their duty, if they failed to satisfy the demands made upon them by the English people at a new turning point in. its history}- and they would presently see tho country turn from them to their younger siV ters, who would bo ready to' do its bidding." CHRISTIAN EVIDENCE SOCIETY. ADDRESSES BY DR. INGE 'AND BISHOP WELt/DON, Dean Inge,.presiding at a meeting of the Ohriteian" Evidence Society at Siou College, said that the atheist could aoldom be. refuted by argument; it was generally the experience of life which •refuted him. Very few atheists lived to be seventy without avowing' some kind of theism before their death. That had been tho csise with some wellknown authors. The society's report emphasised tho truth that the fight was between a materialistic and a spiritual outlook upon existence. It was the contemplation of the things not seen which would help people- most do their duty and to reform tho conditions of life. He was glad that the society was working hard in tho causo of purity. Christianity was fighting a winning battle against intemperance, but ho feared that the battle against Impurity was a losing one. Tho latter was going to Tie one of the great issues of the nex£ century, and there were many influences which would make tho contest very difficult and arduous. There might,_ the Dean thought, bo some truth in tho statement that tho churches had failed, and they would fall so long as they substituted loyalty to a corporation for loyalty to the teachinc of Christ. ■ h

Bishop Welldon said that the war was no argument against Christianity., and did'not create any religious prpbloms which wore iiot existent before? It merely intensified them. If Christianity could be said to have failed because of the war,_ much more could that be alleged against soionce and education seeing that tho forces which hadTfuilt up the world were now bidding fair to destroy it, and this ho illustrated by the case of Germany.