USA > Indiana > Vanderburgh County > Evansville > Foundation stones, of the Church of the Unity, Evansville, Indiana > Part 5
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Those who have never been connected with a small and feeble society, shut outside of the sympathies and fellowship of every other church through, the strength of their convictions in the value of religious freedom, cannot understand what we suffer in the loss of one whose name has been ever identificd with this church, and whose devotion has been a very large part of its strength. So closely and individually has he been always iden- tified with its interests that I have several times heard it spoken of as Colonel Hornbrook's church. And yet this, above all churches, is not the church of any individual or individuals, but of world-wide and natural principles. We claim fellowship with the worth and goodness of every human heart, within or without the walls of any church. No doubt there are those present who honorably and sincerely differ from us in our re- ligious convictions, but I am not afraid to say that there is no 7
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one within the sound of my voice, or in the city of Evansville, more honest than he was in his religious faith, or more loyally or patiently devoted to the work of giving its truth to others. I dare not take your time to'recount the history of his faithful en- deavors to plant here the standard of a sublime, yet simple and intelligent religious faith. He has not altogether toiled in vain. Like Abraham, he has obtained at least a foothold, a small field in the land he had faith to believe would yet be devoted to this cause; the wedge of possession has been entered, and I have no doubt whatever but the time is coming when the fulfillment of his highest hopes will be more than realized, when the Fatherhood of God, the divinity as well as humanity of every soul, will be the acknowledged faith of every church, when religion, instead of being taught as something foreign to our lives, to be super- naturally added on in response to a faith in some dogma, will be seen and acknowledged as the best hopes and noblest quali- ties of all human hearts. Nor is this fulfillment of our own hopes and of our brother's dependent altogether upon the present success of this church.
The fulfillment of Abraham's faith was not immediate. For many a long year his descendants were slaves to the strongest government of the age-the Egyptian.
But the faith of Abraham, living on from age to age, supple- mented and nourished by the natural love of liberty of the human heart, was bound to bring them back to the land of promise, just as soon as they were strong enough to storm and fight their way out.
So, as our cause is yet outwardly weak, we may have to sub- mit for some time to the stronger power We know that there are very many who look longingly towards this land of promise, who have caught some glimpse of this new vision, who are as yet held by the almost unconquerable powers of social force and association to what has become to them a bondage. We enter no complaint against them. If they are worthy of our love, they will come to us as soon as they can. Nor is this altogether an unmixed evil. Egypt gave to the descendants of Abraham much that was of service to them after securing their liberty. Egypt was at that time the most enlightened nation of the world. Very much of its good was preserved in the new land
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that was destined to supercede it as the hope and light of the world. So here the old has its claims upon us, and whatever is good within it must be carried forward and incorporated into the new. But as sure as the superior faith of Abraham triumphed over that of Egypt, which, though once pure, had become cor- rupt, will the simple and intelligent faith, that has been the hope and vision of our brother's life, some day come to honor liberty and power. While, then, we as a church mourn his loss, let us lean for support on this assurance : that whatever temporary re- verses we may have, victory is finally certain.
With all love and friendship for those who think otherwise, I have felt that I could not say less than this and do justice to the memory of our friend and brother. But while I have thus spoken, I have been mindful of how far away most of this must be to-day from those who have been united to him by that near- est and most sacred tie of family life. At some future day they may think of it, but not now, while all is swallowed up in the one sad, heartrending thought, "Father is gone from us; we shall see his face no more on earth; we had hoped to have been with him in his last hours-to have received his last words, and given to him the light of our love and tenderness through the dark valley." Surely a stranger meddleth not with such grief. How vain and empty do all our words seem before these sad and tearful faces that but faintly portray the grief of the heart! We loved him, too, we say ; but not as they. We feel and mourn his loss ; but not as they do. We read that when Job's friends saw his great grief that they kept silent before him seven days and nights. When I came here to speak to-day it seemed to me that silence in such an hour would be more eloquent than speech.
But oh, friends immortal-torn and riven as your hearts are on this the last day of the year, has not our friend and your father filled well the year of his life ? Though the battle is ended, has he not won the victory ? Has he not been to you all, as a parent, you would ask of your Heavenly Father ?
While then you mourn, try, also, to be grateful for so rich a gift. It will not be long before our lives, too, will be rounded by the sleep of death. But shall we not wake in a fairer land-
"Where parted friends again shall meet
In union, holy, calm and sweet,
And earthly sorrow, fear and pain Shall never reach our hearts again !"
*IN MEMORIAM OF MRS. ANN MAIDLOW.
GEORGE CHAINEY.
But we all with open face, beholding as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the spirit of the Lord .- 2 Cor., 3: 18.
Three years ago the first of this month the soul of Mrs. Ann Maidlow was convoyed to the bosom of God.
During her lifetime on earth she had been earnestly devoted to the cause of Liberal Christianity. For many years she had labored to secure a church of her own faith in this place, and before her death she left sufficient means to the Society, with such other help as it could secure, to erect this church. Since its completion and dedication to the worship of one God, our Father, nothing has ever been said in it in honor of her memory. We are not here to-day to remourn her loss. Time takes away the bitterness of all grief, and doubtless we are better prepared now to profit from the lessons of her life.
In our homes we keep the pictures of the friends who have left us to assist us in keeping fresh and green the memory of their love. We also plant above above their graves the ever- green and weeping willow, at once a picture of our sorrow and our hope; thus when we go there we not only recall the friend- ship of earth, but pass joyfully over into the unknown, where we shall meet again on the fields of immortal youth. So it seems to me that in the family life of the church we should oc- casionally remember those who, though absent, are still with us through the ministrations of their lifetime to the adorning of this our common home. The old church (especially the Catholic) has its saints' days-days in memoriam of the good and true- days in which it endeavors to feel the presence of God through their intercessions. That God needs to be prayed to by one of
#A sermon preached in the Church of the Unity, Sunday morning, May 5th, 1878.
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IN MEMORIAM OF MRS. ANN MAIDLOW.
his children, however good that child may be, in order to be merciful to such as are disobedient, we do not believe. Still there is a sense in which this idea of mediatorship is true : " Be- ing dead, they yet speak." Whatever they were in spirit that they are still to us, and so I think it is perfectly proper and per- fectly wise for us to seek to-day to come nearer to God through the memory of her devotion.
No doubt the early Christian saints that have a place in the calendar of the church are worthy of our honor, but to many of us they are too far removed and too much hidden by imperfect records to know exactly what light they have shed on the path of life. But we are not of those who believe that all the good lived yesterday ; that there are none in these times who are true enough, pure enough and good enough to stand as way-marks to the kingdom of God.
I have selected my text because by analogy it will enable me to speak of the influence of the Unitarian faith upon the life and character of one who is devotedly and intelligently attached to it. What the mind and heart contemplates with ardent desire is sure to cast its image in time upon our souls. As we behold in the mirror of life the glory of the Lord will we be changed from glory to glory into the same image. The glass through which each one best beholds this glory is their religious faith. Each system of belief produces its likeness in the lives of its ardent believers. As a test of the character of any faith, I know of none better. The tree is known by its fruit. In asking the question what is the type of character produced by the Unita- rian faith, it is not every one that bears the name that can give to us the answer. Many of us have not been under its influence from childhood. Many of us came into it after a weary heart- struggle with opposing doubts under another system. Like shipwrecked mariners we were cast upon her shore to gather ourselves together after our long battle with the waves, and then, with such help as she so generously gives to all who come to her in this extremity, begin anew among strangers. Now there is a great deal of poetry and beauty in the music and white surf of the rolling waves, but, I expect it is a great deal easier for one to see it and feel it who has never been any nearer to them than the shore or firm deck of some stout vessel, than for one who has
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battled among them for hours in despair of his life as they have rolled and tumbled about him, as if hungering to bury him in their dark depths. So I expect it is far less difficult for one who has been nurtured from childhood in the Unitarian faith to feel kindly towards the orthodox system than for one who has only escaped from it with his life after a bitter and weary struggle. Such a one may resolve over and over to say nothing that will hurt the feelings of any one, but the darkness and weariness of that struggle for hope and life in the waves of dogma generally comes between him and the fulfillment. Then there are those who come into the Unitarian faith from nowhere in particular ; who escape all early religious impressions and training until years of manhood and reflection open to them the need of life in this direction, and so, looking about them, they find that what seems to agree best with their natural and common sense views is the Unitarian system; but these are not apt to have that idealism, warmth and glow of devotion to it as is born of life- long associations and memories. So I take it that the truest way to see the work a faith can do in the development of character is to take one who has been educated in it and always found their mind and heart responsive to its vision of life and duty. Such a one was Mrs. Maidlow. Her parents were staunch English Unitarians-Unitarians when to be such was more than it is to- day in the way of difference with those of other churches. Some of its earliest defenders, heroic men, who dissented from the established church rather than be guilty of mental duplicity and reservation, were the ministers that visited at her father's house. When her parents came to this country she saw them faithful to the principles they had espoused. Though there was no one else about them of like opinion, though their orthodox neighbors looked upon them as infidels, yet she had the example before her of those most dear, living upright and honorable lives while cherishing these opinions, growing old together, then one by one passing over to the other side in unshaken confidence in the Fatherhood of God, sinking to rest as sweetly in his arms as a babe slumbers on its mother's bosom. The parents had set the children the example of trying to win the attention of others to their sunnier and more intelligent faith, and this good work was faithfully repeated by them. It has been for them and others
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hard, slow and discouraging work to arouse much interest for it among the people of this section. But in the course of her life Mrs. Maidlow bore ample witness to the fact that hers was no private faith or selfish devotion. I sometimes meet people who think that there is nothing in our faith to call out our devotion ; who have gathered the impression that one of our principles is for us who believe in it, to enjoy it among ourselves, without caring a straw whether others come to think as we do or not. But this is quite a mistake. It doubtless comes from the great emphasis we place on the value of individual liberty of opinion. Catching this part of our message alone they get from it the idea that we think one opinion just as good as another. But that is only one side of the question. Whatever is true to an earnest soul will be felt by them to have vital interest for the rest of mankind. The reason I know that true faith in the evangelical scheme is on the decline is because the efforts to make converts to it are growing every year more feeble. Only occasionally do we meet with a man like Moody, whose profession of belief and conduct go together. So I know that genuine faith in Liberal Christianity is on the increase, because efforts to spread it abroad are on the increase.
" Each breeze that sweeps the ocean Brings tidings from afar Of nations in commotion Prepared for Zion's war."
Mrs. Maidlow was one who believed, with all her heart and mind, in the Liberal Faith; and so one of the constant desires and efforts of her life was to give others the same precious hope and promise. To her it was no system of negations, lulling the soul to slumber, but vital, with living affirmations that gave abundant room for the most earnest activity. Others who called themselves by its name might be careless as to its growth, but to her it was the trumpet-call to duty. It made her life grand with a noble purpose, and sublime in its self-sacrifice to its glori- fying truths. Some seem to think that superstition and fanati- cism are necessary companions to devotion to any phase of religious thought, and so they wrap themselves up into a genteel indifferentism to this whole question, and talk of having so much
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else to attend to that they leave these things to be settled by those who have an especial call to that kind of work. What shame is cast upon such petty dilletantism by a noble, intelli- gent, earnest faith in some system of truth that deals with the Divine possibilities of the soul! Yea, by any form of true de- votion, no matter how much superstition or fanaticism it may carry. But it is by no means necessary to be either superstitious or fanatical in order to be intensely concerned about these mat- ters. Indifferentism and formalism leads, at last, to more blind- ing superstition and bigoted fanaticism than was ever allied to real, earnest, thoughtful interest in religion. But the religious faith of Mrs. Maidlow was intelligent and yet vital. I cannot tell you that she prayed so many times a day, or that her voice was ever heard pleading with God at a prayer-meeting ; but I know that she made her life a prayer, that to many gathered about the idea of God tenderer and more affectionate sentiments. It may be beyond the interest of some to care about the usual conceptions of God that are conveyed by the popular form of religious teaching, but the desire of her heart and endeavor of her life was to help others to see Him as the tender, loving Father and Mother of all souls, instead of as a harsh, cruel sovereign, wreaking vengeance on his innocent children, and only accessible to any through the atonement of Jesus. To her Jesus came not to reconcile God to us, but us to God. It might be nothing to others that children are taught that they are natu- rally sinful; that they must experience some mysterious change that bewilders and perplexes them before God can know them as His children. But to her such teaching seemed to open wide the gates leading to immorality, and so the cry of her soul was that they might be taught, as she was, at her mother's knee, that they are God's children-all; that they have a divine nature as well as human; that evil is its own punishment instead of making a scarecrow of God ; that right-doing is its own reward, instead of cultivating in them the principle of selfishness by making the object of life consist of getting to Heaven. Fain would she have had others-instead of seeing the dear Christ as an offering for sin to the wrath of God, a part of a mysterious trinity removing him far from all real human sympathy and fel- lowship-see him with her as a true brother, helper and friend ;
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the true light of life sent in the plan and purpose of God from the foundation of the world to reveal to us our near relation to him as children, and all the possibilities that are included therein. To her the world was no dismal, howling wilderness, no gloomy penitentiary. Her faith in God's infinite love, her understand- ing of the words of Jesus, her sympathy with nature, her faith in and love for humanity, made all thought of an hopeless state impossible. All things for her breathed hope. No dark vision of an endless hell was permitted to haunt her childhood's dreams. The religious teaching which guided her youth was no voice of wrath but of mercy. The Heavens were always bright above her with the love and goodness of God. The religious people she knew (when lasting impressions are made) were not gloomy hypochondriacs, possessed with the idea that the world is all wrong and everybody going to hell but themselves-pretending to set no store on the vain things of this life, and yet holding the world with as firm grip as any one-but simple, natural, cheerful men and women, whose religion was to love God and man, re- ceive thankfully the good He gives to-day without fear of to- morrow. And so looking into this open glass of light, of promise and hope, her life was changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the spirit of the Lord. So that the remembrance of one and all her friends about her at once recalls her sunny disposition, her love of flowers and all things bright and fair. Moved by these recollections they have brought flow- ers here to-day, as the best expression of what her life was to them. A sweet and precious thing, speaking of hope as natu- rally as this springtime, pointing ever to the bright side of life as these flowers fit into all our best days, always helpful and cheerful in her presence, making not only her own life blessed, but enabling many through her faith to say in the words of her favorite hymn :-
God is love ; his mercy brightens All the path in which we rove ; Bliss he wakes and woe he lightens ; God is wisdom, God is love.
The tendency of a faith to produce cheerful, contented human lives cannot be too highly valued. If Unitarianism had no other claim on the esteem of mankind than this it ought to have re- 8
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ceived better at its hands than it has. I know of no phase of religious teaching that has done so much to put hope into the hearts of men in the midst of life's cares and bereavements. It knows no place for despair in the universe of God. Its watch- word is ever onward and upward. There is a silver lining to every dark cloud. No night was ever so long as not to give place to a new day. Winter may come, but it is only to make us happier in the spring. Each dark hour of life has its true use. The storm may sweep over our hearts, bending low each bloom- ing plant therein, but they shall soon lift themselves into new grace and sweeter perfume. Nor can we be too grateful for the memory of a life that has actualized the good cheer of such a faith. Who can measure the influence of one of the first bright, sunny days of springtime, just as all nature is bursting into birth? So who can measure the influence of a cheerful, con- tented life upon all those who come within its range? It is not the one who gives the most of knowledge or of wealth to man- kind that does the most for his race, but the one who gives the most sunlight, dries the most tears and kindles the most smiles. Jesus, who brought the most of peace and good will, with the fullest thought of God as a Father, is the best boon for which millions thank God, the Giver, to-day. Charity is not ended with gifts to the poor. Life will be almost lived in vain unless we, through faith, hope and love give to the world a sweet, wholesome, cheerful, inspiring life. So through these flowers let us look up to God to-day and thank him for the memory of this lifetime that fits so naturally into their fullest hope and promise. But the atmosphere in which our sister was reared was something more than one of fine sentiment. I know it is sometimes charged against us that our religion is one of senti- mentalism-dreams that, though bright and fair, have no waking reality. Nothing was ever farther from the truth. No system of faith was ever locked so fast to the eternal truth, as the most giant intellects of earth have seen, it as this one. Its defenders have always ranked with the leading scholars and master minds of the times. Its followers have always been strongly intellect- ual. If it has any fault, it is its failure to attach the thoughtless. I think myself that if its ministers had devoted more time to the kindling of its fires of hope and enthusiasm that we should have
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made more rapid progress. Still our business is to know the truth and strive for it with our lives. Unitarians have always been foremost here. Its history is the record of a wonderful scholarship. Though its numbers are small when compared with other denominations, its literature and hymnology will bear com- parison with any. The leading influence to-day in the world of letters is in its noblest features the product of this faith. The most immortal names therein shall be stars in its final crown of rejoicing. But there is good reason for this fact. Literature is the art of copying or interpreting nature. Shakespeare is the greatest, poet because he is most completely the representative of universal human nature. His greatness is his naturalness. The great writer is always the one who either opens to us the world without or within-helps us to know ourselves and others- expresses to us what we have seen and felt but could never have told. The true writer always finds readers, because all natural hearts respond to him. Now Unitarianism cultivates this. It has always fostered the genius of letters; it looks lovingly into the face of nature within and without ; its Bible has always room in it for another page. The soul of man is the temple of God. God to it is revealed in all things. Not a flower blooms on the earth or star that flames in the sky that does not reveal some part of His infinite goodness and power. With it
All things are but parts Of one stupendous whole, Whose body nature is And God the soul.
With such a faith it is not to be wondered that it has fostered letters and attracted to it those with mental grasp and vision strong enough to look into this shining face of the Glory of God and write down what they have seen and felt. Its faith is the worship and adoration of the Divine without the limitation of creed and dogma. To it the glory and truth of God are infinite, and so beyond all possibility of being confined in one book or system of doctrine. Its Bible is made up of every true word and noble thought. No age has a mortgage on inspiration. That which is most inspiring is most inspired, whether it was written yesterday or thousands of years ago, by Deborah or
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George Eliot, Solomon or Emerson. Whatever puts on record the tragic of life so as to teach and inspire others in its changing hopes and visions from childhood to old age, painting in glowing natural colors the innocency of childhood, the new and thrilling emotions of the heart in the birth hour of conscious individual- ity, the sweet dream of love in its first new life, fresh born from Heaven, the holy and tender mystery of motherhood, the noble ambitions of heroic youth, the strength of manhood and glory of womanhood, is received as the gift of God. No truth is pro- fane and no lie is sacred. All of truth is of God, no matter who reveals it. And so all who love or discover any truth, new or old, touching the earth beneath or the Heavens above, the world without or the world within, what has been or is yet to come, are received as the servants of God. For as it is written, "Man must not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from out of the mouth of God." Such was the in- tellectual life with which Mrs. Maidlow was surrounded. Her parents were richly endowed intellectually, both by nature and culture ; and all who knew her say that she possessed a mind that was rich in its store of information and fertility of thought. She was fond of gleaning from all sources the best thoughts of the best thinkers. She delighted in and yet richly rewarded the so- ciety of the most intelligent. In this respect her life does honor to the faith whose name she bore. Though she received much of her intellectual inspiration from it, it is not every one that so worthily repays it. She looked into this glass and beheld the glory of the Lord in wisdom, in large information and wide range of thought, until she was changed from glory to glory into the same image. In the New Testament we read : "That unto every one that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not even that he hath shall be taken away." He who hath ten talents gaineth ten talents more and is made ruler over large cities, while he who had but one hid it in a napkin, had it taken from him and given to him who had abundant and left to weep and bewail himself over his neglect of opportunity to improve that which he had. So we find that whoever takes largely and freely of the good cheer and knowledge of truth that God offers to all are at once enlarged and increased in their possessions. When the end of this first day of trust comes to a close and the
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