The Chief End of Man | Page 3

of the key of
life as consisting in fidelity to certain ideals of character,--we go back
to the memorable examples of the past. We use those examples, partly
to show how the spiritual laws always worked, the same yesterday,
to-day, and forever; and partly to show how as time advanced the laws
have been understood with growing clearness, and applied with
growing effectiveness. The same stars shone above the sages of
Chaldea as shine above us, but our astronomy is better than theirs. The
sages of Greece, the prophets of Palestine, the heroes of Rome, the
saints of the Middle Ages, the philanthropists and the scientists of
to-day, each made their special contribution to the spiritual astronomy.
From age to age men have read the heavens and the earth more clearly,
and so made of them a more friendly home. Just as, too, there come
times of momentous progress in the physical world; the establishment
of the Copernican theory, the discovery of a new continent, the
mastering of electricity,--so there are periods of swift advance and
discovery in the spiritual life, and such a birth-hour, of travail and of
joy, comes in our own day.
In this hasty panorama of the past, then, the effort has been to give real
history. But every student knows how transcendent and impossible a
thing it is to recall in its entirety and fullness any phase of the past.

Even the specialist can but partially open a limited province. So with
what confidence can one with no pretensions to original scholarship,
however he may use the work of deeper students, express his opinion
on any special point in a survey of thirty centuries? If, accordingly, any
competent critic shall trouble himself to convict the present writer of
error: "This view of Epictetus confuses the earlier and the later Stoics;"
or "This account of the Hebrew prophets lacks the latest fruit of
research,"--or, other like defect,--acknowledgment of such error as
quite possible may be freely made in advance. But, in our bird's-eye
view of many centuries, any fault of detail will not be so serious as it
would be if there were here attempted a chain of proofs, a formal
induction, to establish from sure premises a safe conclusion. Only of a
subordinate importance is the detail of this history. We say only: in this
way, or some way like this, has been the ascent. The contribution of the
Stoic was about so and so; the Hebrew prophet helped somewhat thus
and thus. But the ultimate, the essential fact we reach in the Ideal of
To-day. Here we are on firm ground. The law we acknowledge, the
light we follow,--these may be expressed with entire clearness and
confidence. The test they invite is present experiment. Nothing vital
shall be staked on far-away history or debatable metaphysics.
In the fivefold division of the book, "Our Spiritual Ancestry" is a
bird's-eye view of the main line of advance, which culminates in "The
Ideal of To-Day." A more leisurely retrospect of certain historical
passages is given in "A Traveler's Note-Book;" thoughts on the present
aspect are grouped under "Glimpses;" and "Daily Bread" introduces a
homely and familiar treatment.

I
OUR SPIRITUAL ANCESTRY
The ideas and sentiments which underlie the higher life of our time
may be largely traced back to two roots, the one Greek-Roman, the
other Hebrew.

Each of these two races had originally a mythology made up partly of
the personification and worship of the powers of nature, and partly of
the deification of human traits or individual heroes.
The higher mind of the Greeks and Romans, in which the distinctive
notes were clear intelligence, love of beauty, and practical force,
gradually broke away altogether from the popular mythology, and
sought to find in reason an explanation of the universe and a sufficient
rule of life.
The Greek-Roman mythology made only an indirect and slight
contribution to modern religion. But the ethical philosophy and the
higher poetry of the two peoples belong not only to our immediate
lineage but to our present possessions.
A humanity common with our own brings us into closest sympathy
with certain great personalities of this antique world. Differences of
time, race, civilization, are powerless to prevent our intimate friendship
and reverence for Homer, Sophocles, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle,
Lucretius, Epictetus.
Homer shows the opening of eyes and heart to this whole wonderful
world of nature and of man.
Sophocles sees human life in its depth of suffering and height of
achievement. He views mingled spectacle with profound reverence,
sure that through it all is working some divine power. Goodness is dear
to the gods, wickedness is abhorrent to them. But the good man is often
unhappy,--from strange inheritance of curse, or from complication of
events which no wisdom can baffle. Yet from the