An Interrupted Homily

SOMEBODY was having a tussle with the knob of my study door. It is not a difficult door to open. I have often felt it was too easy. Doubtless this was my small daughter, Virginia, attempting to turn the knob with one little fist, the other being engaged. A doughnut, perhaps. Verily, it is more blessed to give than receive a doughnut in the midst of a pile of books and papers. I resolved to watch Virginia’s movements, stealthily.

She approached with mysterious air, bearing a small pasteboard box. Her attitude made a frank bid for queries. Much guessing would be expected. I rose to the occasion. The box was tiny, thus limiting the field of conjecture. Suggestions that it might contain a ring (Virginia frequently acquires jewelry as a premium with a stick of candy) or a four-leaved clover or a pretty pebble were received with derision. I gave it up. She faced the supreme moment gravely. The box contained six trained ants. Often we have had dogs, cats, rabbits, and guinea pigs under training here, mostly to keep the peace and be hygienic. These were the first ants whose custody we had accepted.

‘What can they do ?’ I asked, interestedly. ‘Skip the rope ?' Of course, that was merely flippant. I realized my blunder, at once, and renewed my query, seriously.

‘They are just trained ants,’ maintained Virginia, in a tone of finality. ‘They are nice ants.’

I wondered how a nice ant was to be distinguished from other ants and gave voice to my bewilderment. Virginia could not inform me definitely on that point though her manner hinted that it was a stupid question. Apparently, any one should be able to distinguish between niceness and unniceness — why attempt to specify?

‘You know, when people are nice they don’t do wrong things,’ she decided to explain. ‘Same way with ants!’ Not caring to be indicted on any more counts against my faculty of subtle discernment, I conceded that the ants, now that they had been taught to be nice, fully deserved the title of trained ants.

With the interview closed, I returned to my thinking on the text ‘And be ye not conformed to this world.’ There should be a difference between worldlings and the rest of us. Anybody would agree to that. I had just arrived at the point of distinguishing between worldlings and non-worldlings when Virginia came in with the trained ants. It was not so easy to complete the truncated idea. I must get back to first principles. I would draw up an itemized list of the distinguishing qualities of those who are not of this world. They were kind. In fact, everybody is more or less kind. Nearly every one is trying to uplift someone else, either through organized effort or through individual philanthropy. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, minister to the sick and imprisoned ? Why, we had made a science of all this! These recommendations were no longer the considerations of pious people who sought eternal life through compliance with them; they were economic laws in obedience to which the very perpetuity of the race resides. Forgive your enemies? Certainly, people have quite left off carrying old grudges and hates in their hearts. Modern psychology insists that hating impairs physical vitality. The mote in thy brother’s eye? It is not considered good taste, these days, to practice ophthalmology without a license. Good measure — pressed down and running over? Of course! Successful men have come to understand that it is the margin of time, thought, and effort, in excess of the amount required,that really counts for prosperity. Believe? Believe the inexplicable? Believe in the reality of unseen forces? Why, the largest share of the world’s work is done by unseen forces. And the public is so surfeited of wonders that it not only doubts nothing but accepts the inexplicable with a yawn. Miracles? Is it too much to believe that a man could walk upon the water? Oh, no; not at all: certainly no more difficult than to fly through the air.

I began to wish that Virginia had not come in with her trained ants. The interruption had quite upset me. Here, I had arrived at secondly, in which I would show the identifying virtues of the unworldly. Must I now stammer and fall back upon the lame and vague explanation that the unworldly were the nice people who did n’t do wrong things? Ah, there I had it! If no distinction was to be drawn between the ability and willingness of worldlings and non-worldlings to feed the hungry, look out for the sick, reform the prisons, forgive injuries, offer good measure, I could, at least, draw up a list of the wrong things that trained unworldlings should refrain from doing. Let me see. They ought, for instance, to refuse to play golf of a Sunday afternoon, which is no worse than motoring, which is no worse than riding in a carriage, which is no worse than walking (much better, indeed). My junior deacon asked me what I thought about it. I did n’t know. Julia Travers, who teaches a class in the Sunday School, inquired if it was wrong to dance. I replied that one man’s meat is another man’s poison. Which was quite beside the point. And a lie; except possibly in rare cases — too rare to warrant the manufacture of a maxim for this special purpose. Then, I told her it might bewrongfor her. But why for her? What was there about her that might furnish an exception to a principle? Was it wrong to dance — that was the question! Certainly no more wrong than any one of a number of other pastimes indulged in by good people and far better than an unchaperoned tête-à-tête. Was it wrong to play cards? Probably no more wrong than to play a score of games indulged in by good people, and considerably more interesting than most of them. Theatres? It was merely a question of choosing between good and bad theatres, was n’t it? And that choice depended more upon cultivated taste than religious conviction? It did. I had admitted it.

I wish my study might be located in some remote part of the house where I could be safe from intrusions. It is so distracting to be bothered, even for a moment. Here is a whole forenoon disorganized because a child wants to exhibit a box of ants — trained ants — carrying them about insisting that they are, or ought to be, different from other ants. How absurd! Let me get back to these identifying characteristics of the unworldly. Where did I leave off? Oh, yes; they must be nice and not do wrong things. Then, one can pick them out and tag them in ever so great a crowd.

If I may be permitted to interrupt myself, we have been stall-fed, of late, on clever articles about the church: What ails it? Why has it lost its grip? What’s to be done about its failure to meet the needs of the time? And so forth. More people attending the movies, Sunday nights, than the churches. (Which is an honest-to-goodness fact.) More ethics taught in the silent drama, to the cubic foot, than in the average sermon. (Admitted.) Cooler and better ventilated. (The State rests.)

Now, something is the matter with the church, but this is n’t it. The matter is our ungodly pessimism. We cannot understand why the difference between the worldly and the unworldly should be so inconspicuous. We moan over it. We climb up on the fence beside the highway, out of the dust and gasoline fumes, and watch the procession go by. As nearly alike as two peas are they all. We rail at the mad thing. It smiles back at us and waves a hand, thinking we have had a blow-out, else we would be of the procession ourselves. (Which may be true. I hate to think what would become of me if I had a hundred thousand dollars. By grace are ye saved through poverty, is a ‘plenty good’ text for a lot of us.)

It is not beyond thought that after laboring for nearly two thousand years to teach society a few fundamental principles about efficient and purposeful living, we should now see some reward of our toil. Maybe the slight difference between the worldlings and the non-worldlings, these days, is due to the functioning of the ‘leaven.’ If some of the dough has over-run the ecclesiastical pan, what of it?

Virginia has released her trained ants, partly out of respect for their health and also because they were just ants, after all.

But I am still working on my sermon.