Page:Free Opinions, Freely Expressed on Certain Phases of Modern Social Life and Conduct.djvu/364

 *some way out of mere Sham—in the belief that if it obeys its own instinctive desire towards the Highest Ideal, God will not suffer it to go far astray. For the quarrels of the Churches are the second crucifixion of Christ. The apathy of the priesthood is the deliberate casting away to sin of the people. Where there is no unity, there is no force; and the divine founder of Christianity Himself has told us that a house divided against itself shall not stand.

Yet when one comes to think of it, it is the strangest thing in the world that Christians should quarrel, seeing how plain and clear are the instructions left to them for their guidance by the Master whom they profess to serve. The New Testament is easy reading. Its commands are brief and concise enough. There would seem to be no room for discussion or difference. Why should there be followers of Luther, Wesley, or any other limited human preacher or teacher, when all that is necessary is that we should be followers of Christ? The Soul of the Nation asks no more than this Gospel of Love, lovingly imparted,—it seeks but for the one firm faith in the eternal things which are its birthright,—a faith held purely, and wholly undoubted by those whose high mission is to teach it to each generation in turn,—it craves no more than that touch of heavenly sympathy which makes the whole world kin—that holy link which binds all mankind together in one strong knot of indissoluble spiritual belief in the love and justice; the Unseen Force behind Creation, which will surely, out of the verities of that same love and justice, grant us a future life wherein will be made clear to us the reason and necessity of our strange