Richard La Rue Swain

“ The man who knows nothing but a material universe cannot believe in immortality. Any effort to convince him is but a waste of breath. If he is right in thinking that the universe has no soul, then he is right in believing that there is no future life.
The Soul—granting that it has a Soul—is the best part of the universe. To have lost God, therefore, is to have lost the best part of reality. And the loss does not end here, for, in the best sense, we have lost the world also. ”

“ I could see that if one would bring all his powers into harmony, and then relate them to the beautiful enfolding universe, all things must work together for his good,—if by his good one meant the perfect unfolding of his life. Instantly there came a great joy in living. It took shape in the thought, "All things work together for good to them that love God." I felt that no proposition in geometry was more capable of proof. A life with its powers united in the will of God must unfold to match the harmony without, even as the rose unfolds to the light and warmth of the sun. ”

“ As hungry cannibals feed upon the body of a civilized man with never a thought that his trained mind would be worth more to them than his body, so multitudes feed upon the body of the universe with no thought of what its animating Will might be to them. To all who sustain such an attitude toward the universe, its body looms large while its Soul fades. As the cannibal missed the wealth and civilization which the larger mind of his victim could have brought, so the mere world-consumers miss that which the Soul of the universe could abundantly give. ”

“ Seeing all, and feeling all, God was the greatest sufferer in the awful carnage of the contending armies. "In Him we live, and move, and have our being;" and therefore armies live, and fight their battles in God. They fight their battles with God's own powers, and make gaping wounds in His own body. And yet, some will ask, "Where was God?" Not only was He in the thick of the fight, but the thick of the fight was in His beautiful, enfolding energies. We shall make heaven out of the selfsame energies when we are done making hell out of them. ”

“ God wakes His child to consciousness in His own body, by making all kinds of impressions upon the sense organs. There are many rappings on the door, and flashes of light through the windows until the soul wakes. And when the soul becomes conscious, God may not cease beating upon the instrument with myriad forces, lest His child fall asleep.
Some morning when a loved form bends over the infant body, the baby smiles, and the soul begins to appear. That is a wonderful day when the baby gives its first smile. Little by little the child becomes aware of itself and of its mother. ”

“ I here speak of man in the sense of God's children, wherever they may be in the universe. The people on this earth might fail without bringing universal disaster; but if God's children throughout the universe should fail Him, then all is lost. If God did not "care for" His children, it would be the same as not caring for Himself, since all His aims and purposes culminate in His family. God has crowned man with glory and honor, by putting all things under his feet.
The world is as ignorant of man as it is of God; and the prevailing idea of either is a caricature. ”

“ Here was personal assurance of God and immortality deep, strong, and jubilant. Whence came it? Such assurance is inherent in a life spiritually nourished and divinely employed. Hope simply comes to such a soul, like color to the ripening apple.
This generation, though engaged in many noble charities, shows marked signs of under-nourishment; its mind is active in the acquisition of material knowledge, and its body is overworked in the effort to accumulate wealth, yet its soul languishes. And there is a near likeness between a starved soul and a starved body. ”

“ To be brought face to face with God in the beauty and awfulness of nature is the only cure for the irreverence of this generation.
But some one says, "This makes God too great. Have you looked, and staggered before the limitless heavens?" Yes, but is it not claimed that God is Infinite?—and we have not yet found the equal of infinity. With all our insistence upon the infinitude of God, perhaps it offends some to think of Him as being equal to His universe,—or even to the little part of it that we can imagine. However, God must be greater than all His works. ”

“ Unless God's world could blossom into myriad, delicate forms, as homes for man souls, the universe would be as useless as a barren apple tree. The little flower is not something apart, its production taxes the entire strength and purpose of the tree. Neither is the human body something apart, its production taxes the entire strength and purpose of the universe. As the flower is the tree's glory and promise of fruit, so the human body is nature's glory and promise of souls. ”

“ Have you walked in the recesses of the deep, have you seen the gates of death, does the morning come at your bidding, do you know the way of the lightning, do you cause the east wind to scatter over the earth? With all your wisdom, surely, you can answer. Job, "Canst thou bind the cluster of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?" Can you thunder, Job? Can you send forth the lightning, can you draw out old leviathan with a fish hook? Gird up your loins like a man and answer me. ”

“ I thought you were modern men, and knew that there is no other world. Science, philosophy, religion, and common sense, teach us that there is but one world, a uni-verse. We now live in all the world there is. But since we have not penetrated it very deeply, if your friend had remarked that the minister was no more developed than you, or that he had gone no deeper into the meaning of the universe than you, he would at least have been on debatable ground. ”

“ To achieve insight in any line requires effort. The man who has senses only, lacks the insight of the man who has both sense and senses. Therefore we must earn not only our bread by the sweat of our brow, but everything else which has priceless worth.
How covetous we all are for the material side of things! That we may truthfully know and really possess the material side of the universe, we put forth prolonged and painful effort. Our striving, however, to know and to possess the Soul of the universe is pitifully meager. ”

“ It is most fortunate when children, through experimental knowledge, have been taught to love good types of religion and music; and this while they are receptive, and before they are ensnared by a thousand other influences. Yet no one, at any age, dare neglect his religious duties and privileges if he wishes religion to be an impelling power in his soul. In my youth, mathematics was a great inspiration to me, but through neglect my mathematical lamp burns low. To keep mathematics interesting and alive one must work problems applied to constructive business. ”

“ Having a universe like the present on His hands, with no one to use it, nor to inhabit it, God would be an object worthy of ridicule. The idea that God could murder His children, or carelessly allow them to perish, and then spend an eternity in an unfinished and depopulated world shatters reason itself; such a thought is too appalling and abhorrent to be entertained for a moment. Just as sure as there is a God, we shall continue to live. Anyone who believes in God and does not believe in immortality surely never gave two consecutive logical thoughts to the subject. ”

“ Recently I met a man who is a good worker in one of the most prominent churches in America, and I was surprised to find that his ideas of religion compare with those of his renowned minister as the Ptolemaic astronomy compares with the Copernican,—and yet he has no realization of the discrepancy. His capable minister should draw the picture for him. A great many sincere and genuine churches greatly irritate the sceptical mind because of the forms in which their religious ideas are clothed. Like a grapevine that is never trimmed, their faith is free and easy and of luxurious growth. ”

“ Of these noble sons and daughters it should be said: their growth in the knowledge of God, their success in the discovery of man, their achievements in wresting from nature its deepest secrets, their grasp on the meaning of God's Kingdom, their accomplishments in the practical launching of everything pertaining to a new era and a finer world order have made this the golden age for all who have seen the vision and shared in the work. Yet over against this kingdom of light and love, there has grown up a kingdom of darkness and hate. ”

“ The articulate body of humanity has become as great as the nations of the earth, and that body is made up of the infinite energies of God. We now have the privilege of making this mighty body express more fully than ever before the thought and love of God, or else we shall be compelled to shape it into the most gigantic monster that ever stalked forth to do the foul deeds of hell. ”

“ And though I meet some severe hardships, yet I am convinced that this is the best conceivable world in which to begin a life that is to live forever. History helps me, science helps me; and I feel myself borne along by a union of forces toward a glorious goal. God becomes more and more articulate in me and in all men and in all nature as we learn to will His will and to use nature's forces as the instruments of our enlightened and purified spirits. I also find that this vision will not leave me unless I live beneath my best. ”

“ It seemed an irreparable loss if there were no God. My life, also, would go out in eternal night. If there was a God, and I gave up faith, then I should go to an endless hell of inexpressible torment. There was no comfort in either alternative. The problem was no longer the problem of the Church; it was my personal problem. And the battle had to be fought to a decisive issue. Being impaled on the two horns of the dilemma, I found it increasingly difficult to reproduce the exalted state of feeling on which I still relied for assurance. ”

“ Were there a legion of leering and jeering devils, plotting evil against our earth, the comprehending mind could hear them say, "We wish for no more awful instruments of torture than these energies of the Infinite with which His children clothe themselves. Only let us lead them to fall out by the way, and they will damn each other by smiting with the infinite powers of their God." Men,—individuals and nations!—do we see it, do we know the simple rudiments of life, is it not clearly manifest that we must strive for the Christ life or socially commit suicide and murder? ”

“ If He were left solitary in the world, all God's labors in creation would lead directly to shameful defeat. Without other inhabitants than Himself, the universe would become one colossal piece of junk. Yes, it would be worse than that; even junk has value where there are people. Without intelligent souls to inhabit the universe, an appalling night would settle over all creation. Love, truth, wisdom, righteousness, and the last semblance of a kingdom would be gone ”

“ The great pity of it all is that so many people have never known the world's best religious thought and experience. There are those, a thousand years behind their age, who are launching new religions or fostering old ones, who are utterly oblivious to the strata upon strata of human achievement above them.
Yes, God is the Father of all spirits, whether they reside on earth, or in heaven, or in hell. When once the meaning of spirit, or personality, is realized there is no dodging the issue. ”

“ And once more devout men exclaimed with awe, "Is this what the good God made for us by the mere fiat of His will?" That God said, "Let there be light: and there was light," was the affirmation of an inspired man who little realized that light travels the distance of eight times around the earth in one second, and yet requires more than four years at that speed to come from the nearest star. Thus science may forever change our conception of the world, and our sense of the Creator's majesty. ”