Pax Vobiscum | Page 2

in trying to be better. The amount of spiritual
longing in the world--in the hearts of unnumbered thousands of men
and women in whom we should never suspect it; among the wise and
thoughtful; among the young and gay, who seldom assuage and never
betray their thirst--this is one of the most wonderful and touching facts

of life. It is not more heat that is needed, but more light; not more force,
but a wiser direction to be given to very real energies already there.
The Address which follows is offered as a humble contribution to this
problem, and in the hope that it may help some who are "seeking Rest
and finding none" to a firmer footing on one great, solid, simple
principle which underlies not the Christian experiences alone, but all
experiences, and all life.
What Christian experience wants is thread, a vertebral column, method.
It is impossible to believe that there is no remedy for its unevenness
and dishevelment, or that the remedy is a secret. The idea, also, that
some few men, by happy chance or happier temperament, have been
given the secret--as if there were some sort of knack or trick of it--is
wholly incredible. Religion must ripen its fruit for every temperament;
and the way even into its highest heights must be by a gateway through
which the peoples of the world may pass.
I shall try to lead up to this gateway by a very familiar path. But as that
path is strangely unfrequented, and even unknown, where it passes into
the religious sphere, I must dwell for a moment on the commonest of
commonplaces.

EFFECTS REQUIRE CAUSES
Nothing that happens in the world happens by chance. God is a God of
order. Everything is arranged upon definite principles, and never at
random. The world, even the religious world, is governed by law.
Character is governed by law. Happiness is governed by law. The
Christian experiences are governed by law. Men, forgetting this, expect
Rest, Joy, Peace, Faith to drop into their souls from the air like snow or
rain. But in point of fact they do not do so; and if they did they would
no less have their origin in previous activities and be controlled by
natural laws. Rain and snow do drop from the air, but not without a
long previous history. They are the mature effects of former causes.
Equally so are Rest, and Peace, and Joy. They, too, have each a
previous history. Storms and winds and calms are not accidents, but are
brought about by antecedent circumstances. Rest and Peace are but
calms in man's inward nature, and arise through causes as definite and
as inevitable.
Realize it thoroughly: it is a methodical not an accidental world. If a

housewife turns out a good cake, it is the result of a sound receipt,
carefully applied. She cannot mix the assigned ingredients and fire
them for the appropriate time without producing the result. It is not she
who has made the cake; it is nature. She brings related things together;
sets causes at work; these causes bring about the result. She is not a
creator, but an intermediary. She does not expect random causes to
produce specific effects--random ingredients would only produce
random cakes. So it is in the making of Christian experiences. Certain
lines are followed; certain effects are the result. These effects cannot
but be the result. But the result can never take place without the
previous cause. To expect results without antecedents is to expect cakes
without ingredients. That impossibility is precisely the almost universal
expectation.
Now what I mainly wish to do is to help you firmly to grasp this simple
principle of Cause and Effect in the spiritual world. And instead of
applying the principle generally to each of the Christian experiences in
turn, I shall examine its application to one in some little detail. The one
I shall select is Rest. And I think any one who follows the application
in this single instance will be able to apply it for himself to all the
others.
Take such a sentence as this: African explorers are subject to fevers
which cause restlessness and delirium. Note the expression, "cause
restlessness." Restlessness has a cause. Clearly, then, any one who
wished to get rid of restlessness would proceed at once to deal with the
cause. If that were not removed, a doctor might prescribe a hundred
things, and all might be taken in turn, without producing the least effect.
Things are so arranged in the original planning of the world that certain
effects must follow certain causes, and certain causes must be abolished
before certain effects can be removed. Certain parts of Africa are
inseparably linked with the physical experience called fever; this fever
is in