Page:The World's Parliament of Religions Vol 1.djvu/162

 134 HISTORY OF THE PARLIAMENT. either side in as much danger as you were, and presently, with the blessing of Providence, you got back to mother earth again. O, that descent to mother earth ! Do you remember how mother earth seemed to rise to meet you ? How every steeple seemed sticking up in the air, how every high building came presently within your vision, and how you would bless the Moedhdhin as he called the noon-time prayer in the mosque, if he happened to do it at that time ? Gradually, step by step, you settled down into actual life again, and you are glad even if you have the somewhat shady society of the Midway Plaisance. [Laughter and applause.] That is the way we are coming back to earth to-day. We are entering on the study of social reform. You remember, perhaps, that story of the Scotch candidate for the ministry who was being examined by one of the sternest of the presbyteries, or whatever they call them. Every one of his examiners stood firm in favor of justification by faith, and each one had fif- teen minutes of questions all bearing upon faith to put to him. By and by, when the candidate was in an exhausted condition, one indiscreet examiner said, " Well, what do you think of good works ? " " O," said the exhausted candidate, looking around at his persecutors, " I'll no say that it might not be weel enough to have a few of them." Here to-day we are aiming to have a few of them. [Laughter.] We have tried to contrast ourselves, as far as our natural humility would permit, with these visitors from foreign lands. We have tried to apply the test of our convictions to theirs, with the universal feeling that each one of them might have been a very respectable man if he had been brought up in our Sunday-school. [Laughter.] Suppose we try them by the test of works at last, and try ourselves by the same test. It is not enough for our admirable Chairman to marshal us together and address us like St. Anthony, who preached to the fishes in the old German poem. The poem records how eloquently the good saint addressed them and how well they all listened to him. He explained to the pickerel that they ought not to eat each other ; he told the trout they ought not to steal each other's food, and he said the eel ought not to go reeling around miscellaneously, getting into all manner of mischief. It is recorded that the fishes heard him in raptures, but at the end, the poem says, at the end, after all — "The trout went on stealing. The eels went on eeling. Much delighted were they, But preferred the old way." Let us guard against that danger, and how can we guard against it so well as by a little mutual humility when we ask ourselves how well any of us have dealt with the actual problems of human life ? When it comes to that, after all, have any of us so very much to boast of ? With the seething problems of social reform penetrating all our com- munity, and raising the question whether one day the whole system of