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On the Old Road Volume 2 (of 2), essay(s) by John Ruskin |
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Theology - The Lord's Prayer And The Church - Letter XI |
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_ XI. [Greek: kai me eisenenkes hemas eis peirasmon, alla rhysai hemas apo tou ponerou; hoti sou estin he basileia, kai he dynamis, kai he doxa, eis tous aionas. Amen.] _Et ne nos inducas in tentationem; sed libera nos a malo; quia tuum est regnum, potentia, et gloria in sceeula sceculorum. Amen._ BRANTWOOD, _14th September, 1879._ 244. DEAR MR. MALLESON,--The gentle words in your last letter referring to the difference between yourself and me in the degree of hope with which you could regard what could not but appear to the general mind Utopian in designs for the action of the Christian Church, surely might best be answered by appeal to the consistent tone of the prayer we have been examining. Is not every one of its petitions for a perfect state? and is not this last clause of it, of which we are to think to-day--if fully understood--a petition not only for the restoration of Paradise, but of Paradise in which there shall be no deadly fruit, or, at least, no tempter to praise it? And may we not admit that it is probably only for want of the earnest use of this last petition that not only the preceding ones have become formal with us, but that the private and simply restricted prayer for the little things we each severally desire, has become by some Christians dreaded and unused, and by others used faithlessly, and therefore with disappointment? 245. And is it not for want of this special directness and simplicity of petition, and of the sense of its acceptance, that the whole nature of prayer has been doubted in our hearts, and disgraced by our lips; that we are afraid to ask God's blessing on the earth, when the scientific people tell us He has made previous arrangements to curse it; and that, instead of obeying, without fear or debate, the plain order, "Ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full," we sorrowfully sink back into the apology for prayer, that "it is a wholesome exercise, even when fruitless," and that we ought piously always to suppose that the text really means no more than "Ask, and ye shall _not_ receive, that your joy may be _empty_"? Supposing we were first all of us quite sure that we _had_ prayed, honestly, the prayer against temptation, and that we would thankfully be refused anything we had set our hearts upon, if indeed God saw that it would lead us into evil, might we not have confidence afterwards that He in whose hand the king's heart is, as the rivers of water, would turn our tiny little hearts also in the way that they should go, and that _then_ the special prayer for the joys He taught them to seek would be answered to the last syllable, and to overflowing? 246. It is surely scarcely necessary to say, farther, what the holy teachers of all nations have invariably concurred in showing,--that faithful prayer implies always correlative exertion; and that no man can ask honestly or hopefully to be delivered from temptation, unless he has himself honestly and firmly determined to do the best he can to keep out of it. But, in modern days, the first aim of all Christian parents is to place their children in circumstances where the temptations (which they are apt to call "opportunities") may be as great and as many as possible; where the sight and promise of "all these things" in Satan's gift may be brilliantly near; and where the act of "falling down to worship me" may be partly concealed by the shelter, and partly excused, as involuntary, by the pressure, of the concurrent crowd. In what respect the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of _them_, differ from the Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory, which are God's forever, is seldom, as far as I have heard, intelligibly explained from the pulpit; and still less the irreconcilable hostility between the two royalties and realms asserted in its sternness of decision. Whether it be, indeed, Utopian to believe that the kingdom we are taught to pray for _may_ come--verily come--for the asking, it is surely not for man to judge; but it is at least at his choice to resolve that he will no longer render obedience, nor ascribe glory and power, to the Devil. If he cannot find strength in himself to advance towards Heaven, he may at least say to the power of Hell, "Get thee behind me;" and staying himself on the testimony of Him who saith, "Surely I come quickly," ratify his happy prayer with the faithful "Amen, even so, come, Lord Jesus." NOTE.--The following further letters from Mr. Ruskin to Mr. _Sept. 13th._
Interrupted to-day! more to-morrow with, I hope, the last letter. J. RUSKIN. _14th Sept._ I've nearly done the last letter, but will keep it till to-morrow, rather than finish hurriedly, for the first post. Your nice little note has just come; and I can only say that you cannot please me better than by acting with perfect freedom in all ways; and that I only want to see, or reply to, what you wish me for the matter's sake. And surely there is no occasion for any thought or waste of type about _me_ personally, except only to express your knowledge of my real desire for the health and power of the Church, More than this praise you must not give me; for I have learned almost everything, I may say, that I know, by my errors. _17th Oct._
Yes, there _will_ be a chasm to cross--a _tauriformis Aufidus_[168]--greater than Rubicon, and the roar of it for many a year has been heard in the distance, through the gathering fog on the earth, more loudly. The River of spiritual Death to this world, and entrance to Purgatory in the other, come down to us. When will the feet of the Priests be dipped in the still brim of the water? Jordan overflows his banks already. * * * * * When you have put your large edition, with its correspondence, into press, I should like to read the sheets as they are issued; and put merely letters of reference to be taken up in a short "Epilogue." But I don't want to do or say anything more till you have all in perfect readiness for publication. I should merely add my reference letters in the margin, and the shortest possible notes at the end. J. RUSKIN.
[Footnote 153: These letters were written by Mr. Ruskin to the Rev. F. A. Malleson, Vicar of Broughton-in-Furness, by whom they were read, after a few introductory remarks, before the Furness Clerical Society. They originated, as may be gathered from the first of them, in a request by Mr. Malleson that Mr. Ruskin would address the society on the subject. They have been printed in three forms:--(1) in a small pamphlet (October 1879) "for private circulation only," among the members of the Furness and one or two other clerical societies; (2) in the _Contemporary Review_ of December 1879; (3) in a volume (Strahan & Co., 1880) entitled "The Lord's Prayer and the Church," and containing also various replies to Mr, Ruskin's letters, and an epilogue by way of rejoinder by Mr. Ruskin himself. This volume was edited by Mr. Malleson, with whose concurrence Mr. Ruskin's contributions to it are reprinted here.--ED.] [Footnote 154: Called Letter II. in the Furness pamphlet,--where a note is added to the effect that there was a previous unpublished letter.--ED.] [Footnote 155: In answer to the proposal of discussing the subject during a mountain walk.--F. A. M.] [Footnote 156: Art, xi.] [Footnote 157: Homily xi. of the Second Table.] [Footnote 158: "_Arrows of the Chace._"] [Footnote 159: See postscript to this letter.--ED.] [Footnote 160: Referring to the closing sentence of the third paragraph of the fifth 'ter, which _seemed_ to express what I felt could not be Mr. Ruskin's full meaning, I pointed out to him the following sentence in "Modern Painters:"-- "When, in the desert, Jesus was girding Himself for the work of life, angels of life came and ministered unto Him; now, in the fair world, when He is girding Himself for the work of death, the ministrants come to Him from the grave; but from the grave conquered. One from the tomb under Abarim, which _His_ own hand had sealed long ago; the other from the rest which He had entered without seeing corruption." On this I made a remark somewhat to the following effect: that I felt sure Mr. Ruskin regarded the loving work of the Father and of the Son to be _equal_ in the forgiveness of sins and redemption of mankind; that what is done by the Father is in reality done also by the Son; and that it is by a mere accommodation to human infirmity of understanding that the doctrine of the Trinity is revealed to us in language, inadequate indeed to convey divine truths, but still the only language possible; and I asked whether some such feeling was not present in his mind when he used the pronoun "His," in the above passage from "Modern Painters," of the Son, where it would be usually understood of the Father; and as a corollary, whether, in the letter, he does not himself fully recognize the fact of the redemption of the world by the loving self-sacrifice of the Son in entire concurrence with the equally loving will of the Father. This, as well as I can recollect, is the origin of the passage in the second paragraph in the seventh letter.--F. A. M.] [Footnote 161: The "Letters to the Clergy" adds note: "Yet hast thou not known Me, Philip? he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father" (John xiv. 9).--ED.] [Footnote 162: _Fors Clavigera_, Letter lxxxii. (See _ante_, Sec. 148.--ED.)] [Footnote 163: "Bibliotheca Pastorum," Vol. i. "The Economist of Xenophon," Pref., p. xii--ED.] [Footnote 164: See _ante_, p. 319, Sec. 154; p. 330, Sec. 166.--ED.] [Footnote 165: "_Arrows of the Chace._"] [Footnote 166: "_Arrows of the Chace._"] [Footnote 167: Referring to the first edition, printed for private circulation.--F. A. M.] "Sic tauriformis volvitur Aufidus, --HOR., _Carm._, iv. 14.] _ |
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