Their Yesterdays Part 6

The little brook was a safe stream for the boy and the girl to play beside. Nor did they know, then, that their streamlet flowed on and on until it joined the river; and that the river, in its course, led it past great cities that poured into it the poisons and the filth of their sewers, fouling its bright waters, until it was unfit for children to play beside.

They did not know, _then_--but the woman knew, _now_.

And what--she thought as she came back from her Yesterdays--what of the boy who had played with her beside the brook? He, too, must have learned what happened to their brook. In learning, what had happened to him--she wondered--and wondering, she was afraid.

Because she was no longer ignorant, she was afraid for the mate of her Yesterdays. Not that she thought over to meet him again. She did not wish, now, to meet him for she was afraid. She would rather have him as he was in her Yesterdays.

Slowly the woman turned away from the quiet seat beside the brook. It was time for her to go.

Not far away, she pa.s.sed the gray haired policeman, who again smiled and touched his hat.

Smiling in return she bade him: "Good afternoon."

"Good afternoon, Miss," he said, still smiling gravely. "Come again, Miss, when ye's want a breath of air that's pure and clean."

May heaven bless, for the sweet sake of womanhood, all men who understand.

RELIGION

It was springtime--blossoming time--mating time. The world was a riot of color and perfume and song.

Every twig that a few weeks before had been a bare, unsightly stick was now a miracle of dainty beauty. From the creek, below the little girl's house, the orchard hill appeared against the soft, blue, sky a wonderous, c.u.mulus, cloud of fleecy whiteness flushed with a glow of delicate pink. The meadows and pastures were studded with stars of gold and pearl, of ruby and amethyst and silver. The fairy hands that had thrown over the wood a filmy veil of dainty color now dressed each tree and bush in robes of royal fabric woven from many tints of shimmering, shining, green.

Through the amber light above new turned furrows; amid the jewel glint of water in the sun; in the diamond sparkle of the morning; against the changing opal skies of evening; the bees and all their winged kin floated and darted, flashed and danced, and whirled, from flower to flower and field to field, from blossom to blossom and tree to tree, bearing their pollen messages of love and life while sweet voiced birds, in their brightest plumage, burdened the perfumed air with the pa.s.sionate melody of their mating time.

All nature seemed bursting with eager desire to evidence a Creator's power. Every tint and color, every breath of perfume, every note of music, every darting flight or whirling dance, was a call to life--a challenge to love--an invitation to mate--a declaration of G.o.d. The world throbbed and exulted with the pa.s.sion of the Giver of Life.

Life itself begat Religion.

Not the least of the Thirteen Truly Great Things of Life is Religion.

Religion is an exaltation of Life or it is nothing. To exalt Life truly is to be most truly religious.

But the man, when he first awoke that morning, did not think of Religion. His first thought was a thought of lazy grat.i.tude that he need not get up. It was Sunday. With a long sigh of sleepy content, he turned toward the wall to escape the too bright light that, from the open window, had awakened him and dozed again.

It was Sunday.

There are bitter cold, icy, snowy, Sundays in mid-winter when one hugs the cheerless radiator and, shivering in chilly discomfort, wishes that Sundays were months instead of days apart. There are stifling, sticky, sweltering. Sundays in midsummer when one prays, if he can pray at all, for the night to come. And there are bl.u.s.tering, rainy, sleety, dismal, Sundays in the fall when the dead hours go in funeral procession by and the world seems a gloomy tomb. But a Sunday in blossoming time! That is different! The very milk wagons, as they clattered, belated, down the street rattled a cheery note of fellowship and good will. The long drawn call of the paper boy had in it a hint of the joy of living. And the rumble of an occasional pa.s.sing cab came like a deep undertone of peace.

The streets were nearly empty. The stores and offices, with closed doors, were deserted and still. A solitary policeman on the corner appeared to be meditating, indifferent to his surroundings. The few pedestrians to be seen moved leisurely and appeared as though in a mood for reflective thought and quiet interest in the welfare of their fellows. The hurrying, scrambling, jostling, rushing crowd; the clanging, crashing, roaring turmoil; the racking madness, the fierce confusion, the cruel selfishness of the week day world was as a dreadful dream in the night. In the hard fought battle of life, the world had called a truce, testifying thus to the place and power of Religion.

This is not to say that the world professes Religion; but it _is_ to say that Religion possesses the world. In a thousand, thousand, forms, Religion possesses the world. In thoughts, in deeds, in words--in song and picture and story--in customs and laws and industries--in society, state, and school--in all of the Thirteen Truly Great Things of Life, Religion makes itself manifest and declares its power over men. If one proclaim himself without Religion then is its power made known in that one's peculiarity. If Religion did not possess the world, to scorn it would mark no one as different from his fellows, And this, too, is true: so imperial is the fact of Religion, that he who would deny it is forced to believe so firmly in his disbelief that he accepts the very thing he rejects, disguised in a dress of his own making, and thus bows down in worship before a G.o.d of his own creation.

To many, Sunday is a day of labor. To many others, it is a day of roistering and debauch. To some, it is a day of idleness and thoughtless pleasure. To some, it is a day of devotion and worship.

But still, I say, that, whatever men, as individuals, may do with the day, the deserted streets, the silent stores, the closed banks, the empty offices, evidence that, to the world, this day is not as other days and give recognition--not to creeds and doctrines of warring sects indeed--but, to Religion.

Again the man awoke. Coming slowly out of his sleep and turning leisurely in his bed he looked through the open window at the day. And still he did not think of Religion.

Leisurely he arose and, after his bath, shaved himself with particular care. With particular care he dressed, not in the garb of every day, but in fresher, newer, raiment. Thus did he, even as the world, give unthinking testimony to the power and place of Religion.

Later, when the church bells sent their sweet voiced invitations ringing over the city, the man went to church. He did not go to church because he was a religious man nor because he was in a religious mood; he went because it was his habit to go occasionally. Even as most men sometimes go to church, so this man went. Nor did he, as a member of any religious organization, feel it his duty to go. He went as he had always gone--as thousands of others who, like himself, in habit of dress and manner were giving unconscious testimony to the power of Religion in the world, went, that day, to some place of public worship.

The streets of the city were now well filled with people. Yesterday, these same people, in the same streets, had rushed along with anxious, eager, strained, expressions upon their faces that told of nerves tense, minds intent, and bodies alert, in the battle they waged for daily bread, for gain, and for all the things that are held by men to be worth the struggle. To-morrow, these same people would again lose themselves in the fierce and strenuous effort of their lives. But to-day, they walked leisurely; they spoke calmly; they thought coolly; they had time to notice each other; to greet each other, to smile, to shake each others' hands. There were many children, too, who, dressed in their Sunday clothes, with clean faces and subdued manners, even as their parents, evidenced the power of Religion in the life of humankind. And, even as their parents, the children knew it not. They did not recognize the power of Religion in their lives.

The man did not think of the meaning of these things; though he felt it, perhaps, somewhat as he felt the warm life of the sun filled air: he sensed it, perhaps, as he sensed the beauty of the morning. He did not realize, then, how, in his Dreams, Religion had subtly manifested itself. He did not realize, that, in his Occupation, he was, every day, revealing the influence of Religion in his life. He had seen Religion but dimly when he had thought to follow the golden chain of Knowledge, link by link, to its hidden end. Dimly had he seen it when he was learning the value of Ignorance. And yet, in all of these things it had been even as it would be in all the things that were yet to come. No man can escape Religion. Man may escape particular forms of Religion, indeed, but Religion itself he cannot escape.

With many others the man entered a church. An usher gravely led him to a seat. I do not know what church it was to which the man went that morning nor does it, for my story, matter that I do not know. My story is not of churches nor of sects nor of creeds. This is my story: that the man came to realize in his life the power of Religion.

It may have been the beauty of the morning that did it; it may have been that the week just past was unusually hard and trying and that the day of rest, therefore, was more than usual, needed: or, perhaps, it was because the man had learned that he could never follow the golden chain of Knowledge to its hidden end and had come to know the value of Ignorance for Religion walks ever close to both Knowledge and Ignorance, hand in hand with each; whatever it was that brought it about, the man, that Sunday, came to realize the power of Religion in the world and in his own manhood life.

It was very quiet in the church but it was not a sad quietness. The people moved softly and, when they spoke at all, spoke in whispers but there was no feeling of death in the air; rather was there a feeling of life--a feeling of life, too, that was very unlike the feeling of life in a crowded place of business or amus.e.m.e.nt. The sweet, plaintively pleading, tones of the organ trembled in the air. The glorious sunshine came through the stained gla.s.s windows softened and subdued. Here and there heads were bowed. The people became very still. And, in the stillness, the man felt strongly the spirit of the day and place. The organ tones increased in volume. The choir filed in. The preacher entered. The congregation arose to sing an old triumphant hymn.

The man did not sing, but, as he listened to the music and followed the words of the hymn, he smiled. The people were singing about unknowable things--of streets of gold and gates of pearl--of crowns and harps and the throne of G.o.d.

All his life, the man had known that hymn but he had never before thought of it just as he thought of it that morning. He looked about at the people who were singing. Who were they? Uneducated, irresponsible, fanatical dreamers of no place or importance in the week day world? No indeed! They were educated, responsible, practical, hard headed, clear brained, people of power and influence--and--the man smiled again--they were singing about unknowable things. For the first time in his life, the man wondered at the strangeness of it all.

When the minister prayed, the man listened as he had never listened to a prayer before. He felt baffled and bewildered as though he had wandered into a strange land, among strange people, of whose customs he was ignorant, and whose language he could neither speak nor understand. Who was this man who seemed on such familiar terms with the Infinite? Upon what did he base his a.s.surance that the wealth of blessings he asked for himself and his people would be granted or even heard? Had he more than finite mind that he could know the Infinite?

The sermon that followed was largely a sermon about unknowable things.

It was full of beautiful, helpful, thoughts about things that it was impossible for anyone to really know anything about. Very familiar were the things that the minister said that morning. Since his childhood, the man had heard them over and over many times; but he had never before thought of them in just that way.

The sermon was finished and the beautifully mysterious and impressive words of the benediction were spoken as the people stood with bowed heads, hushed and still. Again the deep tones of the organ trembled in the air as the crowd poured forth from the building into the street.

The man was thoughtful and troubled. He felt as one, who, meeting an old friend after many years, finds him changed beyond recognition. He was as one visiting, after years of absence, his old home to find the familiar landmarks all gone with the years. He was sadly conscious that something had gone out of his life--that something exceedingly precious had been taken away from him and that it could never be replaced.

Seriously, sadly, the man asked himself: must his belief in Religion go as his faith in fairies had gone? Was Religion, after all, but a beautiful game played by the grown up world, even as children play?

And if, indeed, his faith must go because songs and prayers and sermons have to do so largely with unknowable things, what of the spirit of the world expressed in the day that is so set apart from all other days? Sunday is a fact knowable enough. And the atmosphere of the church is another fact as knowable as the atmosphere of a race track, a foundry, or a political convention. And the fruits of Religion in the lives of men--these are as clearly knowable as the fruits of drunkenness, or gambling, or licentiousness. The man was as sure of the fruits of Religion as he was sure that the sun was shining--that the day, so warm and bright, was unlike the cold, hard, stormy, days of winter. And still--and still--the songs and prayers and sermons about unknowable things--must his belief in Religion go as his faith in fairies had gone?

Unknowable things? Yes--as unknowable as that mysterious something that colors the trees and plants and flowers with tints of infinite shadings--as unknowable as that which puts the flavor in the peach, the strength in the corn, the perfume in the rose--as unknowable as the awful force that reveals itself in the lightning flash or speaks in the rolling thunder--as unknowable as the mysterious hand that holds the compa.s.s needle to the north and swings the star worlds far beyond the farthest reach of the boasting eye of Science. Unknowable?

Yes--as unknowable as that which lies safe hidden behind the most commonplace facts of life--as unknowable indeed, as Life itself.

"Nature," said the man, in answer to himself, and smiled at the foolishness of his own answer. Is nature then so knowable? Are all her laws revealed; all her secrets known; all her ways understood; all her mysteries made clear? Do the wise men, after all, know more of nature than they do of G.o.d? Do they know more of earth than of heaven? Do they know more of a man's mind than they do of his soul? And yet--and yet--does one refuse to live because he cannot understand the mystery of life? Does one deny the earth because the secrets of Mature are unknowable? Does one refuse to think because thoughts are not material things--because no one has ever seen a thought to say from whence it came or whither it went?

Disbelief demands a knowledge as exact as that demanded by belief. To deny the unknowable is as impossible as to affirm it. If it be true that man knows too much to believe in miracles these days, it is just as true that he does not know enough to disbelieve in them. And, after all, there is no reason why anyone should believe in miracles; neither is there any reason why one should disbelieve in them.

Every altar is an altar to an unknown G.o.d. But man does not refuse to believe in bread because he cannot understand the mystery of the wheat field. One believes in a garden, not because he knows how, from the same soil, water, and air, Nature produces strawberries, potatoes, sweet corn, tomatoes, or lettuce, but because fresh vegetables are good. The hungry man neither believes nor disbelieves but sits down to the table and, if he be a right minded man, gives thanks to the G.o.d of gardens who, in ways so unknowable, gives such knowable gifts to man.

Nor was the man, at this time, able to distinguish clearly between Religion and the things that men have piled about and hung upon Religion. Therefore was he troubled about his waning belief and worried because of his growing doubt. He did not wish to doubt; he wished to believe.

In all these many years, through intellectual pride or selfish ambition, because of an earnest but mistaken purpose to make clear, or in a pious zeal to emphasize, men have been piling things about and hanging things upon Religion; and, always, they have insisted that this vast acc.u.mulation of things _is_ Religion.

These things that men have hung upon Religion are no more a part of Religion than the ivy that grows upon the stone wall of a fortress is a part of the nation's defensive strength. These things that men have piled about Religion belong to it no more than a pile of trash dumped at the foot of a cliff belongs to the everlasting hills. But these traditions and customs of men, with their ever multiplying confusions of doctrines and creeds and sects, beautiful as they are, hide Religion even as the ivy hides the wall. Even as the acc.u.mulated trash of the ages piled at the foot of the cliff is of interest to the archaeologist and the seeker after curious junk, so these things that men have piled about Religion are of interest. But the observer, in admiration of the ivy, is in danger of ignoring the stern reality of the fortress. The curious digger in the pile of trash, if his interest be great, heeds not the grandeur of the cliff that towers above his head.

That afternoon the man went for a long walk. He wished to think out, if he could, the things that troubled him.

Without plan on his part, his walk led toward a quarter of the city where he had never been before and where he came at last to an old cemetery. The ancient iron gates, between their vine clad columns of stone, were invitingly open and within the enclosure were great trees that locked their green arms above the silent, gra.s.s grown, graves as though in sheltering kindness for the dead. Tempted by the beauty of the place the man entered, and, in the deep shade of the old trees, screened from the road by their mossy trunks, found a seat. Here and there, among the old graves under the trees, a few people moved slowly; pausing often to decipher the inscriptions upon the leaning and fallen tombstones. So old was that ancient burying place that there was left among the living no one to keep the flowers upon the graves and visitors came only from idle curiosity.