Chapter 3 No.3

The Discipline of the Soul

SECOND SUNDAY IN LENT

St. John vi. 38

"For I am come down from Heaven, not to do Mine own will, but the will of Him that sent Me."

To-day we are going to speak of the soul not in its popular sense, as set over against the body, but in the scriptural meaning of the word as the broad equivalent of life.

To enter upon a philosophical discussion might prove interesting from a merely academic point of view, but would be eminently unpractical. Suffice it to say that when S. Paul speaks of the "body, soul and spirit" (1 Thess. v. 23), he takes the two latter as different faculties of the invisible part of man.

Soul (ψυχη) is the lower attribute which man has in common with the animals; spirit (πνευμα) the higher one which they do not possess, and which makes man capable of religion.

In this sense, then, the soul would mean the life the man or woman is leading, in the home, the business, the pleasures, the relaxations, as distinct from the definite exercise of devotion or worship.

Of course it is absolutely impossible to draw a hard and fast line between sacred and secular. All secular affairs, rightly conducted, have their sacred side; and conversely all sacred matters have their secular side, for they form part of the life the man is living "in the age."

It is the neglect of this truth which is responsible for much of the moral and religious failure of the day.

Business is secular, prayer is sacred, and so they have no practical connection each with other.

Amusement is secular (often vastly too much so, in the very lowest sense of the word); Holy Communion is sacred; therefore there is no link between them. Whereas the prayer and the Communion should be the ennobling and sanctifying power alike of work and play.

Bearing this caution in mind, we shall to-day look at certain features of the so-called secular life of the day in which discipline needs to be strongly exercised.

No doubt about it, the soul of the nation has been growing sick, sick "nigh unto death."

Luxury has been increasing with giant strides; the mad race for pleasure has helped to empty our Churches, to rob our Charities, to diminish the number of our Candidates for Holy Orders, to make countless ears deaf to the call which the country, through that magnificent Christian soldier, Lord Roberts, and many others, has been making to manhood of the land. Week-ending, meals in restaurants, turning night into day, have robbed home-life of its grace and power, and produced a generation of young folk blasé and discontented before they are out of girlhood and boyhood.

With this has come, inevitably, the loss of sense of responsibility. So long as I can enjoy myself and get my own way, why should I vex myself with the outworn question, "Am I my brother's keeper?" No! That has gone into the limbo of effete superstition.

And further, loss of the sense of proportion. There are some to whom it causes no moral shock to wear a dress costing a hundred guineas, while a vast number of seamstresses, shirtmakers, artificial flower makers, boot-closers, and the like, are working seventy hours for 5s. to 8s. a week. One mantle-presser, in Dalston, receives ?d. per mantle; she is most respectable, has four children, and earns from 5s. 6d. to 7s. a week!

We do not grumble at the hundred guineas being spent upon the dress, or a thousand guineas even, if the money went in due proportion all round to supply the full living wage to each one engaged in its production: and if the wearer interested herself keenly in social problems, and used her means wisely and well to afford relief where it was needed. This, alas! does not happen when the sense of proportion is lacking.

Take another case-alas! a fearfully common one. Men and women will gamble recklessly at Bridge, lose heavily, pay up, at whatever cost, because it is a debt of honour. All the while a hard-pressed tailor, a famished dressmaker and her children are kept out of their money, because it is only a debt of commerce. Could there be a more ghastly parody on the word honour?

Yet once more-the lack of seriousness. By seriousness we do not mean gloominess, nor withdrawal from society, or anything of the kind. We mean the flippant attitude towards life, the lack of serious, sustained interest in literature, in music, in art, in the legitimate drama; witness the theatres being turned into cinema shows, and the terrible paucity of sound, strong plays. Everything must be scrappy, light, and if a little (or more than a little) risky, so much the better.

We do not for a moment say that these evils are universal, God forbid, but none can deny that they have eaten deep into a large part of society, using the word in its broadest, not in its technical sense.

The soul of the nation needed discipline, and it has come suddenly, sharply, but, who shall dare to say, not mercifully?

And even in its very coming it brought a tremendous opportunity, for we were not compelled to make war, notice that!

We had an option. The temptation was subtle. You have no concern with Servia, throw over Belgium, let France take care of itself.

For a time, probably a very short time, we should have avoided war and its horrors. The bait was held out by some peddling politicians that we should have stood in a magnificent position to obtain trade, to control markets, to dictate prices to the rest of the world. Magnificent prospect! We went to war, and, by a strange paradox, secured peace with honour: peace of the national conscience. Had we forsaken Belgium we could never again have held up our heads among civilised honourable nations. Thus the very circumstances under which the War came about formed an appeal to the soul of the nation as embodied in its legislature; the Government rang true, and the nation, as one man, endorsed its decision.

And now the discipline has commenced.

Who can be flippant and careless with our coast towns liable to bombardment, and over a hundred lives already sacrificed in this little island, which we have always deemed to be the one absolutely secure spot in the whole world? Five months ago an earthquake in London would have seemed a far more likely event than the bombardment of Hartlepool, Scarborough, Whitby, and the dropping of shells on Yarmouth foreshore, or of bombs at Dover and Southend.

Who can be unconcerned when our ships are liable at any moment, and apparently in almost any place, to be sent headlong to the bottom of the sea by torpedoes or mines; possibly sometimes by those very mines we have been compelled to lay, and which happen to have broken loose?

This is one of the unavoidable hazards of war under modern conditions. It does not make us ignore the magnificent work of our Fleet, nor tremble for the ultimate issue.

Who can be giddy and careless with darkened streets, trains, trams, all telling of the awful possibilities of the new development of aerial warfare?

Who, even among those not directly touched by anxiety or bereavement, can go on just as usual in luxury, self-indulgence, and ease amid the crushing mass of suffering around them on all sides?

Thank God that, though we may have erred very grievously through softness of living, we are not a callous people, but we needed a strong, stern discipline of the national soul; some stirring and trumpet-tongued appeal to the national life, and in the righteous mercy of God it has come.

Some of the immediate effects are obvious; but what are the lasting results to be?

The Guardian, of a few weeks back, thus soundly comments upon the matter:-

"It is true that the outbreak of war put a sudden end to much that was thoughtless, stupid, and even base in contemporary life. 'Tango teas' and afternoon Bridge among women have receded almost as far into ancient history as dinners at Ranelagh or suppers at Cremorne. But human nature is easily frightened into propriety by a crisis; it is not so easy to maintain the new way of life when the fright is safely over. The things that are amiss in our national life, and above all that lack of seriousness which so many observers have lamented during the last few years, can be amended only by a clear conviction of the inherent unsoundness of our outlook, and a firm determination to rebuild it upon new and more stable foundations."

The soul of the nation needs discipline, and that can only come through the effort of the individual to discipline his own life.

There is a ceaseless temptation to echo the cry of the disciples in regard to the few loaves and fishes: "What are they among so many?"

Of what value or power is my feeble little life among the teeming millions that go to make up the nation?

Put away the thought, for it is a direct temptation of the Devil.

It was just when, in the very depths of his human despair, Elijah cried out, "I, I only am left," that God revealed to him the seven thousand men who had not bowed the knee to Baal.

It was because Athanasius was content to stand contra mundum, against the world, that the Catholic faith was preserved to the Church.

Let us very seriously examine ourselves as to the use we are making of our life with regard to other people.

We have considered that life, in various details, in respect to ourselves, and only incidentally as it affects others, but now let us put away all thought of self.

Take the one absolute standard of life as set in the text, "I came down from Heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of Him that sent me."

The result was a life entirely devoted, from the first moment to the last, to one stupendous cause: the lifting up of humanity to the very throne of God.

You and I cannot reach even a fraction of the way towards that perfect standard; but it is our pattern, our plummet, our measuring-line.

Very practically, then, we must ask ourselves such questions as these:

What proportion of my time is spent for others?

Have I any method of employing time or any stated hours that I give to philanthropic or religious work; or do I just, in a casual way, let other people have odd moments, when I happen to think of it?

Similar questions should be asked as to money. Many people, especially those who do not keep accounts (which everyone ought to do), would be shocked if at the end of a year they could see the enormous disproportion between the vast amount they have frittered away on self, and the pitiful little doles they have handed out in the cause of charity.

One man, who kept three cars for private use, reduced an already paltry allowance made to a dependent because the price of petrol had gone up!

It is not that people cannot give; it is often only that they do not think. Look at the vast sums being poured into the Relief Funds. Why has not some proportion of it gone long ago to Hospitals obliged to close their wards, Waifs and Strays Societies compelled to refuse poor little outcasts? The money was there; it could have been spared then as well as now, but it needed some great shock to wake its owners up to the sense of proportion, the realisation of responsibilities.

And so in regard to such gifts as music, painting, acting, mechanics, stitchery; even such simple things as reading and writing. Have you ever read a book to, or written a letter for, anyone else? We might multiply these questions indefinitely, but enough has been said to enable us seriously to take in hand the disciplining of the soul, remembering that this life of ours is a precious loan entrusted to us by God the Father, redeemed for us by God the Son, sanctified in us by God the Holy Ghost, to be used by us, in due proportion, for our neighbours and ourselves.

For suggested meditations during the week, see Appendix.