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XLVI

THE HARD LIFE

_Matthew_ xiii. 1-9.

Let us look still further at this parable of the sower. There are described in it various kinds of lives on which G.o.d's influences fall, and fall in vain. The first of these is the hard life,--hard, like a road, so that the seed lies there as if fallen on a pavement, and gets no root, and the pigeons come and pick it up. We usually think of the hard life as if it were a life of sin. We speak of a hardened sinner, of a hard man, as of persons whom good influences cannot penetrate.

But the hard soil of the parable is not that of sin. It is that of a roadway, hardened simply by the pa.s.sing to and fro. It is the hardening effect of habit. Sometimes, the pa.s.sage says, your life gets so worn by the coming and going of your daily routine, that you become impenetrable to the subtle suggestions of G.o.d, as if your life were paved. Some people are thus hardened even to good. They lose capacity for impressions. {117} Some people are even gospel-hardened. They have heard so much talk about religion that it runs off the pavement of their lives into the gutter. Thus the first demand of the sower is for receptivity, for openness of mind, for responsiveness. Give G.o.d a chance, says the parable. His seed gets no fair opportunity in a life which is like a trafficking high-road. Keep the soil of life soft, its sympathy tender, its imagination free, or else you lose the elementary quality of receptiveness, and all the influences of G.o.d may be scattered over you in vain.

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XLVII

THE THIN LIFE

_Matthew_ xiii. 1-9.

The first thing which hinders G.o.d's seed from taking root is, as we have seen, hardness,--the life which is trodden down like a road; an impenetrability of nature, which is not a trait of sinners only, but of many privileged souls. The second sort of unfruitful soil is just the opposite of this. It is not the unreceptive, but the impulsively receptive life. It is not too hard, or too soft, but it is too thin.

It is a superficial soil which has no depth of earth, and so with joy it receives the word; but the seed has no depth of earth and quickly withers away. This sort of soil receives quickly and as quickly lets go. It is like that unstable man of whom St. James writes and who is like the wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed. We see the wave come flashing up out of the general level, catching the sunshine as it leaps and crowned with its spray, and then we look again for it, and where is {119} it? It has sunk again into the undistinguishable level of the sea.

Thus the parable turns to this instability and says: "It is bad to be hard, but it is bad also to be thin." When tribulation or persecution arises, something more than impulsiveness is needed to give a root to life. How strongly and serenely Newman writes of this:--

"Prune thou thy words, the thoughts control That o'er thee swell and throng; They will condense within thy soul And turn to purpose strong.

But he who lets his feelings run In soft luxurious flow, Faints when hard service must be done, And shrinks at every blow."

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XLVIII

THE CROWDED LIFE

_Matthew_ xiii. 1-9.

In the parable of the sower the third kind of soil is one which is very common in modern life. The first soil was too hard, and the second too thin, and now the third is too full. It is overgrown and preoccupied.

Other things choke the seed. There is not room for the harvest. The influences of G.o.d are simply crowded out. And of what is life thus so full? Of two things, answers the parable. For some it is full of the cares of this world, and for some it is full of the deceitfulness of riches. Care is the weed that chokes plain people, and money is the weed that chokes rich people. Sometimes a poor man wonders how a rich man feels. Well, he feels about his money just as a poor man does about his cares. His wealth preoccupies him. It is a great responsibility. It takes a great deal of time. It crowds out many things he would like to do. The poor man says that {121} money would free him from care, but the rich man finds that money itself increases care. Thus they are both choked by lack of leisure, one by the demands of routine, and one by the burdens of responsibility. And this parable says to both these types of life: "Keep room for G.o.d." It comes to the scholar and says: "In this busy place reserve time to think and feel; do not let your cares choke your soul." And then it goes out to the great scrambling, money-getting world, and sees many a man hard at work in what he calls his field, watching for things grow in his life, and finding some day that he has been deceived in his crop. He thought it was to come up grain and it turns out to be weeds. He sowed money and expected a harvest of peace; and behold! he only reaps more money.

That is the deceitfulness of riches.

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XLIX

THE PATIENCE OF NATURE

_Matthew_ xiii.; _Mark_ iv. 27.

The parable of the sower, which begins with its solemn warnings against the hard life, the thin life, and the crowded life, ends with a note of wholesome hope. Who are they who bring forth fruit in abundance? They are, the parable says, not great and exceptional people. The conditions are such as any life can fulfil. It is an honest and good heart which hears the word and keeps it and is fruitful. Nothing but sincerity and receptivity is demanded. A plain soil is productive enough. G.o.d only needs a fair chance. He only asks that life shall not be too hard, or too thin, or too crowded.

This is a saying of great comfort to plain people. And yet, even for these, one last demand is added,--the demand for patience. If fruit is to be brought forth it must be "with patience." The autumn comes, but not all at once. Jesus is always recalling to us the gradualness of nature; first the blade, {123} then the ear, then the full corn.

Nothing in nature is in a hurry. It is not a movement of catastrophes, it is a movement of evolution. And so the last word of the parable is to the impetuous. What a hurry we are in for our results. We look about us among the social agitations of the day and demand a panacea; but G.o.d is not in a hurry. Delay, uncertainty, doubt, are a part of Christian experience. It brings forth its fruit with patience. It is like these lingering days of spring, when one can discern no intimation of the quickening life; and yet one knows that through the brown branches the sap is running, and slowly with hesitating advance the world is moving to the miracle of the spring.

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L

THE DISTRIBUTION OF TALENTS

_Matthew_ xxv. 14-30.

The parable of the talents takes up the side of life which is not emphasized in the parable of the sower. In the story of the sower G.o.d is doing the work and man is receptive of his influence. In the story of the talents G.o.d is a master who leaves his servants to do his work, and the parable is one of activity. These men are responsible agents.

Life is a trust. That is the natural teaching of the parable. All these men are accountable; there has been given to them that which is not their own, a trust from G.o.d, to be used in his service. But then enters the extraordinary teaching of this parable as to the fact of diversity. We talk of men as created free and equal. The cry of the time is for equality of condition, for leveling down the rich, and leveling up the poor; for paying the genius and the hod-carrier alike; time for time, and man for man. But this parable stands for no such definition of {125} equality. It recognizes diversity. Some have many talents and some have few. To each is given "according to his several ability." Diversity of condition is accepted as a natural feature of human life, just as the hills and valleys make up the landscape. The parable does not make of life a prairie.

Where then, in this diversified life, is justice, the social justice which men in our time so eagerly and so reasonably claim? There is no justice, answers the parable, if the end of life is to be found in getting the prizes of this world; for some are sure to get more than others. The justice of this diversity is found only in its relation to G.o.d. It is in the proportional responsibility of these holders of different gifts. Of those to whom much has been entrusted much will be required; of those who are slightly gifted the judgment will be according to the gift. There is no absolute standard. The judgment is proportional. One man may accomplish less than another, and yet be more highly rewarded, for he may do the less conspicuous duty laid on him better than the man with the larger trust does his. The parable humbles the privileged and encourages the disheartened. {126} There is no distinction of reward between the five-talent man and the two-talent man. Each has done his own duty with his own gifts, and to each precisely the same language of commendation is addressed. They have had proportional responsibility, and they have identical reward. Both have been faithful, and both enter into the same joy of their Lord.

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LI

THE LAW OF INCREASING RETURNS

_Matthew_ xxv. 14-30.

The parable of the talents adds to its doctrine of responsibility a second teaching. It is its doctrine of interest; the return to be looked for from investment in the spiritual life. The economists have a law which they call the law of diminishing returns; but Jesus calls attention to the converse of that principle,--the law of increasing and accelerated returns. We see this principle on a great scale in the world of money. Money has a self-propagating quality. It breeds money. If you should ask a very rich man how he acc.u.mulated his fortune he would tell you that the first savings involved great thrift and wisdom or great good luck, but that after a while his wealth flowed in upon him almost in spite of himself. He began to get money, and the more he got the more easily he got more. Now this law, says Jesus, which is so obvious in the business world, is true in a much deeper way of the {128} spiritual life. Knowledge, power, faith, all grow by investment. Use of the little makes it much; h.o.a.rding what you have leaves it unfruitful. Do you want to know more? Well, put what you now know to use. Invest it, and as you seem to spend it, it increases, and you have found the way to the riches of wisdom. Do you want faith?

Well, use what faith you have. Try the working hypothesis of living by faith. Our ancestors in New England trading used to send out on their ships what they called a "venture." They took the risks of business.

There is a similar venture of faith, which says: "Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief." He who sends the venture of his faith over the ocean of his life may look for a rich cargo in return. To the faithful in the few things the many things are revealed. That is the law of increasing returns.

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LII