FAITH OF OUR FATHERS

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LII, Issue 30, 12 August 1925, Page 51

FAITH OF OUR FATHERS

(By the Right Reverend Monsignor Power, V.F., for the N.Z. Tablet.)

* • f / MAN’S PRIMARY DUTY— KNOW GOD.

We have seen that God has set up a Moral Law for the right conduct of His intelligent creatures. It now remains to ask if human IK reason, by its own powers, can discover the f primary duties following from this law. Human reason, by its own powers, can dism cover that man was made to know, love, and Iplf serve his Creator. This brings us to the pit t third question of importance in the Catechism; “Why did God make man?” Let f‘,Lv reason answer the question without appealing to either faith or tradition. What is this that is just happening in front of my It window?a draught-horse, pulling a heav-ily-laden dray, is turning the corner, and a racehorse, seeing it, suddenly swerves pt across the street. Here we have two kinds of horses, each with its own distinguishing qualities. I presume that the distinctive 7i‘ quality of one is speed, and that of the other S' ■> strength. Very well, it follows that if it is pV desirable to bring each of these horses to a f|V'“ greater state of perfection than it now enjoys, its distinctive quality must la' exercised and developed; speed must he devel- | oped in the one, and the power of pulling heavy weights in the other. From this I p Conclude that a thing is made perfect by the exercise and development of the particular faculties that distinguish it from all other g: things. • Man is the paragon of all animals, he is few peerless among them all. lint how is he so? Not in swiftness, he would be outrun by a (v greyhound; not in beauty or grace of form, nfof in this some animals outshine him; not in lung power, an average donkey would make a- louder cry than he; not in strength, p;* he would be easily overthrown by a bear, i w There is in him probably not one physical trait in which he would not be outclassed by some plant, or bird, or animal; certainly w he could not rival the physical proportions L of Mount Egmont. But, nevertheless, he is greater than any or all of these, greater ' simply and solely because he is “in action V like an angel and in apprehension like a cj « god,” in a word, . because he has intellect and free will; these- are his great and divine ■V endowments that make him what he is; therefore, his perfection must be brought about by the exercise and development of w ' these two faculties. How are these faculties to bo exercised, what is the process through which they must be made to pass if man would reach that perfection for which he was created? Truth is the end of the intellect, with truth it jkw must be concerned, after truth in greater • and greater measure it must be ever stretchfe- ing, It will not be enough for the mind to - V> see and gather historical and physical facts, p., „ the eye of the mind must be trained to p; ; utilise these. The eyes of the , body are a k> paj± of our physical nature, an endowment ’ Mftowed upon the normal man; but the eye the mind will be largely of our own created tion, born of discipline, training, and habit, t The eyes of the body see the various objects

of sense that come within our range of vision just as the eyes of the mere animal see them, hut the eye of the mind must be trained to see them in a manner befitting an intelligent being: it must be taught to apprehend them, to contemplate, and compare and correct, and then to co-ordinate them one with another. This is what we mean by cultivation of the intellect. The eyes of the body see the mountain, the clouds, the rivers, and the flowering meadows; the eye of the mind, in it's process of cultivation, discovers a harmony between all these, and comes to see how one depends upon another. The cultivation progressing, it finds “tongues in the trees, books in the running brooks.” During the progress of life no man can help gathering together an immense number of facts; lie sees them, he reads about them, he hears of them; he picks them up in the street, in the workshop, in the meeting place; his mind is filled with them; but if the eye of the mind is not trained to look upon all these as mere materials for reasoning, his intellect is not being cultivated, it is not tending towards its end; it is like a man who takes largely of food which his system is unable' to digest, the truths become an obsession, not an aid to intellectual life. There is a beauty and grace of intellect, as there is a beauty and grace of form ; there is a refinement of intellect, as there is a refinement of manners, but the beauty, and grace, and refinement are the fruit of culture, the offspring of exercise and training, which will be found only in those who bring thought and reason to bear upon the facts that come within their range of knowledge. A man may know all the words in the Centura Dictionary, and yet have never once turned the eye of his mind upon them. His intellect, despite his industry, is not being directed towards its end, he is not becoming an educated man, a man of culture. He has a vast accumulation of words, but he will never fill a glowing page of literature, he will never entrance an audience with a burst of oratory. He has all the materials, but he does not know that they are only materials, and not the finished article; his intellect, instead of being elevated, is crushed by their dead weight. To the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom we are all drawn, and this proper object of the intellect is a good in itself, apart from any further fruits that may follow from it. Scholars were always right in holding that knowledge was a reward and end in itself, although it might be also considered a means to a higher and nobler end. Hence in every age' of the human race we find men devoted to the pursuit of wisdom, we find them engaging in every branch of science, ennobling themselves and enriching the whole race by their discoveries. By hard labor the geologist makes the bowels of the earth, , its strata, and its fossils, contribute their share to the enlightenment of man; the astronomer makes

a patient study of the starry heavens, .and garners treasures for his fellows while they sleep. But now a strange phenomenon confronts usthe most brilliant and most sue- >. • . cessful among the. astronomers and geologists are the least contented ;, and the same phenomonen may be witnessed in the leaders of every branch of physical science. Substantial quantities of truth do 11 not content them as substantial quantities of food satisfy the recurring needs of the body; the more enlightened they become, the more enlightened they seek to be. They are like some torrent, sprung from a mountain top, and becoming more and more voracious as it rushes >_ on, eating up the land and the rocks that bar its way to the ocean. v ? The speculative seeker after universal knowledge has an unbounded appetite for truth. Unlike the experimentalists, he disdains to work in a narrow and narrowing groove, the whole field of knowledge is his domain; he goes down into fundamentals he studies principles, and causes, and forms, •and ends; he analyses the facts and theories presented by the experimentalists, he rejects what is of no value, he corrects errors, he composes differences, he co-ordinates and presents a harmony. He shows a general grasp ot knowledge that no master of a physical science could hope to get:—“Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy,” he is simply not content, and he knows well that the wiser he grows, the less contented will he be. “.I he eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor is the ear filled with hearing.” Why is this, why is man’s desire for knowledge still unsatisfied, why must it remain so, though he were the wisest man that ever lived? Simply because, not this or that particular truth, nor all the knowledge that earth can give, but God, Who is Truth itself, is the proper and final end of the human intellect. Thus we see how human reason, by its own light, tells us that man was made to know God. So also is it with the desires of the will; these stretch beyond the things of earth and the limits of time, and nothing less than God Himself can satisfy them. A study of the grades of being in creation and their purposes, will teach us that maij cannot be satisfied with that which is. inferior to himself, but the whole of visible creation is inferior to man. The fish in the stream, the kine in the meadow, the birds in the air, are all content: they have what they wore made for. “Thou hast made us for Thyself, 0 God! and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee.” The verdict, then, of human reason agrees with that of Theology:—“God made us to know, and love, qnd serve Him here, and to tic happy with Him for ever hereafter.” If we are so noble, why should we degrade ourselves by living and striving merely for earthly goods? If our intellect and will are great and divine endowments, why should we allow them to be engrossed by the things of this passing show? Why should we not exercise and develop them by a loving study of God and His Law? Henceforth when the priest at Mass says: “Sursum corda; Lift up your hearts!”’• let us be able to answer in truth: “We have lifted them up to the Lord.” s ; ■