For the Sabbath

Waikato Times, Volume 97, Issue 1600, 31 May 1924, Page 14 (Supplement)

For the Sabbath

CREATJON. i did not dream That violins could hold so much romance, Until some happy chance Betrayed to me one, night the covert gleam From an old liddlemaker's crazy • s,lo r ) . ~ i Hid in a court off Fleet, Street, where the, 'buses slop; And as we talked in friendly wise, my heart, Went out to him, so kindly-eyed was he. So joyously the bondslave of his art, That violins now hold new thrall for me, «. Remembering that rare benignity. I did not l<now There could be in a yellow daffodil Such poetry, until Amid mv wanderings I chanced to go Through a dark arch —that disappeared forthwith — Into the dreamland workshop where Cod is the smith : And there. I marked how tenderly He wrought The curve of leaf and petal, how He spent Over those golden trumpets lingering thought, Each tiniest, calyx born of His intent— Now every yellow field's a sacrament. —Kennedy Williamson, in the British Weekly.

IWSJGHT. THE LENS OF LIFE. a sense of true values is one of the highest of all endowments. It gives a man the power to come to a rigid decision when challenged by the ennIrarient claims of life, enabling him to look beyond appearances and to see info the heart of things. Those win. possess this power arc beguiled neither by passing fashions nor by current opinions, for they have learned to estimate things as they are, and to see them in their relation io reality. Many men find life a great puzzle, of which they never gain Hie clue. The v»orld 1° them Is HI lie more than a ceaseless struggle in which the fortunes or battle are for the si con.- or cunning, if they are not lhe sport of chance. They see no moral significance in experience. It may be that what, happens is according to a law which moves in the sure processes oi' its predetermined activity, to which, men must needs sub mil as lo irresistible decrees These men see no order around them, discern no principles, and lind no purpose in what !■ to them the meaningless phantasmagoria of life. Regarding themselves as the victims of Fate, they rise in rebellion or sink into apathy, if only to escape the torture of its heartless

sentences. When once a man is-convinced of . the roalitv of a moral purpose, in life and finds its source and end in the will of a Personal God he must needs befieve that He shapes life to the achievement of what is true, good, an,! beautiful. The depth of this conviction depends on the power of man's insight. We can never know the secrets of the Divine Mind except so far as they are disclosed to us, bul •the measure of our apprehension is dependent on our power of discernment. We must bring the hearing ear and the seeing- eye before the contents of revelation can be recognised. For knowledge implies not only thai there is something to be known, but also that there is some one who lias the power of perceiving it, and is able in use it With settled purpose. [Revelation presupposes insight, and both serve their purpose only when they ac-l in unity. Insight depends on something more than the mind. II is not the resuli of intellectual activity, however welltrained and venturesome. The whole of our manhood's powers must be exercised it' \vc would come to a true view and a right judgment on any mailer of moral significance. Modern psychology shows that we are influenced in different degrees by our intellect, our affections, one moral sense, our 'instincts, and the rest. If any of these powers become disproportionate our .judgment is affected. Inlelleclualisiu has no pleasing history, and, divorced from other activities of human life, it has done singularly little cither for the knowledge or the happiness of men. Emotionalism has also ils dark pages, which perhaps record, the wore I degradations of mankind. Even the endeavour I" give prominence to moral obligations when other parts or our nature arc neglected has not seldom clouded men's lives with a dourness which lias hidden from them all joy and peace. for true insight, which is the lens of life, must' be prcperb focussed and kept clean by a rightly ordered will. The seei's of revelation aire distinguished by gifts which enabled thorn to discern eternal truth in passing incidents, and In see clearly where ail to their fellows was inscrutable. We are driven to a sense of wonder at the power of the Old Testament prophet is to discern the secrets of God and man in the fortunes- of their people or in their own personal history. They had the gift of insight by which they went past .the surface of appearance to discover what was behind it. Before I hem tin evasions of con void ion. the subterfuges of national-policy, the deception of self-inlercsl. Hie specious pleas of self-delusion were swept away, and truth was disclosed with remorseless clarity. But they were able to do this only because they had learnt to look al life from the vantage ground of faith in God, Who had taught them -what, was in His mini. They estimated human affairs and character 'in the balance of the Divine judgment, -lust as there are men who can discern diversities of colour where Others see only dull grey or black, or hear songs where others lliul ail silent, so the prophets discerned morn! purpose where their fellows saw'Mind chance or Ihe meaningless Of natural law. To acquire this gifl of spiritual vision we must he pure. in. heart. patient, teachable. We must stand at the rigid point of view, and, like the artist who to look al, his work in its true proportion stands away from it in thoughtful contemplation, so must we withdraw from our work and its claims that from the height of God's mountain of vision v.v may look at the work! to which we musl needs return to complete our life's task. Intuition bas been described as Ihe miconscious notice we lake of things. Insight is -the conscious estimate of their moral value.. We nerd not be surprised to find that even whom men recognise the reality of the spiritual world Ihoy differ'in their apprehension of its contents and purpose. We possess varied, degrees of insight, but we can all improve such powers as we already possess. If we live faithfully in such i light as we have, we shall be pre- [ pared for the fuller rays of the Divine

revclafcou, which otherwise might l.li i ml 113 by their excessive brightnessinsiirhl tested in experience brings its own amplitude oi' knowledge unlil a man passes beyond I!" 1 empiricism oi opinion to ll!' : coniMcucc of tested conviction, and, dealing with lh«t which is temporal in the light or the eternal, [inds in both the true harmony of life.