Glooskap

“ Subject only to the laws of immortal equity, unknown to culpable compassion, indifferent to cursing and entreating prayers, obeying the voice of our conscience alone—-we illumed this earth with the light of human wisdom and sublime, sacred truth. Not for a single moment forgetting that justice is the foundation of life, we have crucified the Christ in days gone by, and since, to this very day, we cease not to grace Golgotha with new crosses. ”

“ Here therefore follows the conclusion, which is the soul’s glorification, consisting in the humble and grateful acknowledgment, both in heart and life, Thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory; in other words, Thine is the all of love and of wisdom, of goodness and of truth, both in heaven and the church. For the soul of man is glorified, in proportion as it gives glory to God; and it gives glory to God in proportion as it acknowledges in heart and life that every good and perfect gift is from God, or from the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. ”

“ Love that transcends our highest powers
Demands our soul, our life, our all.
And then once more the heart said, How true! Marvelous sight the Lord of Glory on that cross for me! Forsaken of God, paying the penalty of my sins, drinking the cup of wrath, untasted by me. Such love surely demands our soul, our life, our all. But is it so? How often we sing these blessed truths and our lives are strangers to them. God grant that we may live out the truth of the cross in our lives. May the deliverance, the victory, the power of His cross be manifested in our lives. ”

“ Goodheart. “The Bishop?”
“Oh, well,” said Christian, “words to [120] that effect. He doesn’t appreciate the subtleties of gloom distinction. What he looks for is sheer brutality. Might as well employ an out-and-out desperado for the work. I like to infuse a little art into my work. I’ve tried to bring Gloomsterism up to the level of an art, a science. Slapping a man in the face doesn’t make him gloomy; it makes him mad. But subtlely infusing woe into his daily life, so that he doesn’t know whence all his trouble comes—ah! that is the perfect flower of the Gloomster’s work!” ”

“ For us it may be as profitable to go behind the writings till we find the man, and to think of the manhood, with every power and every endowment, sensibility, imagination, energy, flung with passionate enthusiasm on the side of purity and righteousness, of God and Truth; to think of the silent self-sacrifice freely and generously made for a despised cause, of a life-long readiness for martyrdom, of a spirit, unable to compromise, unable in its love of Christ to see His work undone by cowardice, indulgence and unfaith, and of a nature in all its fulness surrendered. ”

“ The heavens cannot be silent forever and He who now is the object of the faith of believers, and the One whom the world has rejected, will come forth in all His Majesty and Glory and every eye shall see Him. Then every knee must bow at the name of Jesus and every tongue confess Him as Lord. In that manifestation of the Lord of Glory and the Glory of the Lord we His redeemed will be manifested in Glory. ”

“ The blessed One who is there crowned with glory and honor is the One who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death; He bore our sins on the cross and died for us. What a blessed, blessed proof then it is, as we behold Him there, that our sins are completely and forever gone!
But more than that. In seeing Him there we behold ourselves. The deliverer of our souls at the right hand of God, the second man, crowned with glory and honor, is the pattern and forerunner of all who belong to Him and whom He is not ashamed to call brethren. ”

“ Why was the Saviour of the world born in a stable?
To show, from His very birth, that He had not come to establish a splendid worldly kingdom, but a kingdom of grace, justice, and peace, and to lead us to imitate His example of poverty, humility, and contempt of the world.
Why was the birth of Christ first announced to the poor shepherds, and not to the high priests?
To show that God does not distribute His graces through respect for persons: He exalts the humble, and humbles those who exalt themselves. ”

“ It is plain, indeed, that one who gives glory to another must be found himself in the possession of superabundant glory; for how could one devoid of glory glorify another? Unless a thing be itself light, how can it display the gracious gift of light? So the power to glorify could never be displayed by one who was not himself glory [47] , and honour, and majesty, and greatness. Now the Spirit does glorify the Father and the Son. ”

“ The Master's injunction was to pray in secret; to desire to be better, and let our lives attest the sincerity of that desire. Are we really grateful for the good we receive? then we shall have more, and never until then, and avail ourselves of the blessings we have, and this will thank God more than speech. From the Intelligence that numbers the very hairs of our heads, we cannot conceal the ingratitude of barren lives by thanking Omnipotence with our lips, while the heart is far from Truth. ”

“ IN Revelation V, that great worship scene, beginning some day in heaven and going on into future ages, we read of the Lamb to whom honor and glory are due. He alone is worthy. And every heart who knows Him rejoicing in His love, cries out, “Thou art worthy!” Yea, the sweetest song for the redeemed soul is the outburst of praise, which we find on the threshold of His own Revelation. “Unto Him that loveth us and washed us from our sins in His own blood and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. ”

“ A divine magnificence seemed to burn on the distant altar, like the far-off but clearly visible goal of man’s supreme ambitions, nameless save in dreams, the reward only of perfect achievement, absolute victory—the glamour of that immaculate glory which alone can satisfy the hero’s highest need. ”

“ Or again, that those have suffered all they have to experience, who still gloating in sensuality and hypocrisy, or murder and rapine, succeeding in all villainies up to the time they pass suddenly from sight in this loathsomeness, are pardoned, and pushed straight into glory? Their punishment here was certainly insufficient to reform them, which is the design of Wisdom, and the good man's heaven would be to them a hell. How can they find bliss in purity and Truth, to whom these are the very opposites of themselves. ”

“ But as this ought never to be made the incitement to any Vertue but in the earliest Childhood of our Reason, so also at no time should Glory (which is the Reward only of Actions transcendently Good, either in kind, or degree) be represented as the purchase of barely not meriting Infamy: The apprehension of which, is a much stronger perswasive to most People not to do amiss, than that of Glory, which cannot consist with it: For no Body can rationally think that Glory can be due to them for doing that, which it would be shameful in them not to do. ”

“ Thou art deceived, my son, thou art deceived, if thou expectest to pass from pleasures to pleasures, to rejoice here with the world, and hereafter to rejoice with me in heaven. Without a contest, not one of the Saints has been crowned. Look upon me: was it not necessary that I should suffer, and so enter into my own glory? [25] and shalt thou, without toil and suffering, enter into another’s glory? Act, then, courageously, and endure patiently; short and momentary is the labour, but lasting and eternal the reward. ”

“ But still it is growing more and more; for ‘we all,’—not merely special Christians, who have attained what they call ‘the higher life,’—‘beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory.’ Now I believe it is impossible to press this too strongly on all those who desire holiness, for there is a perpetual tendency in every one of us to turn the eye inward on ourselves, instead of keeping it fixed on Him. ”

“ And yet, notwithstanding, I am now striving for honor, which I should wish to obtain, if possible, without envy, but still at any cost; for a fiery thirst for glory possesses me, so that I wish to be ennobled as highly as possible. I should make but a poor figure in my own eyes, dear Billibald, if, born in the rank, in the family I am, and of such ancestors, I could be content to hold myself to be noble, though I never ennobled myself by my own exertions. ”

“ If the glory was too bright for his eyes to bear, if he staggered under the trance of delight, the more excellent is the spectacle he saw, the realities of being which beam and blaze through him, and which no infirmities of the prophet are suffered to obscure; and he renders a second passive service to men, not less than the first, perhaps, in the great circle of being,- and, in the retributions of spiritual nature, not less glorious or less beautiful to himself. ”

“ Considering the needs of our nature, which is not destroyed, but perfected in heaven, accidental glory is necessary to perfect and complete the blessedness of God's children, and to gratify every rational craving of human nature.
Thus the crown of the virgins—who sing a canticle that no one else can sing, and who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth—is a mere accidental glory; and yet it is one so much prized that many have given life itself, amidst the most cruel torments, in order to enjoy it. ”

“ They come out of it, and become part of our lives. Glory is a vivid creature, with her moods and fancies, her dual nature, with the one side of her in love with John Storm and his work, and the other side—and so much the stronger side, alas! in love with the world, and filled with merry, buoyant life. One follows her through every step of her course, and feels the moral deterioration coming upon her so gradually and yet so surely. ”

“ Eager inquiries concerning the twins were pouring into their enchanted ears all the time; each was the constant center of a group of breathless listeners; each recognized that she knew now for the first time the real meaning of that great word Glory, and perceived the stupendous value of it, and understand why men in all ages had been willing to throw away meaner happiness, treasure, life itself, to get a taste of its sublime and supreme joy. ”

“ For this is truly right and just, whereas, on the contrary, nothing is more misplaced than for the sinner to exalt himself, and seek for honour and praise, who is dust and ashes, corruption and a worm, by arrogating to himself what belongs to God alone; for, says the apostle, To God alone be honour and glory. The prophet, too, expresses his utter aversion to human glory, in saying, Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to thy name give glory. ”

“ Alone, the meek demonstrator of God and fittest teacher of man, met his fate; no eye to pity, no arm to save; he who had saved others, a solemn, faithful sentinel at the threshold of the great Truth he would establish, unprotected by man, was ready to be transformed by its renewing. He had taught what he was about to prove, that Life was God, and superior to all conditions of matter, above the wrath of man, and able to triumph over the cross and grave. ”

“ But having the Spirit dwelling in us we have, even now, the first-fruits of this transformation in the daily renewing of our inward man, in the helping and healing and strengthening which sometimes comes to our bodies through the hidden life of the Holy Ghost. Sanctification is progressive, waiting to be {121} consummated in the future; so is glorification in some sense progressive, since by the presence of the Spirit we already have the earnest of the glory that is to be. ”

“ It is not his individual life, full of endless significance as that is, but his realization thereby of man's life and his attitude toward it that is the real gift of the great man—his thought, his character, himself in fact. And here our difficulty vanishes, for no one, who has cared to study the gospels with any degree of intelligent sympathy, has failed to realize the personality there revealed and to come in some way or other under its influence. ”

“ These Attributes of Glory each had Share:
'Tis true that Mercy seem'd obscure, and here
Did Mercy follow only in the Rear,
Till Adam fell it did not much appear.
Redemption-Work doth in a Strain more high
Each Attribute extol and glorify;
Yet this much of Creation we may say.
That it did for Redemption-Work make way;
Man must be made, fall, and be guilty deem'd. ”

“ Sweeter than the balm of Gilead, richer than the diamonds of Golconda, dear as the friendship of those we love, are justice, fraternity, and Christian charity. The song of my soul must remain so long as I remain. ”

“ Thus, Glaucon, the tale has been saved, and will be our salvation, if we believe that the soul is immortal, and hold fast to the heavenly way of Justice and Knowledge. So shall we pass undefiled over the river of Forgetfulness, and be dear to ourselves and to the Gods, and have a crown of reward and happiness both in this world and also in the millennial pilgrimage of the other. ”

“ This thou wilt not fail to do, and to give that glory to Him which is due, when thou shalt glory in nothing but in Him only, according to the words of the Prophet: “Let not the wise [pg 244] man glory in his wisdom; neither let the mighty man glory in his might; let not the rich man glory in his riches: but let him that glorieth, glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord which exercise loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth ”