The artist can safely
forget the laws and rules of his art only when by long obedience and
practice he obeys them unconsciously. We seem to be threatened with
a belief that God will never punish sin in one who has professed
Christianity. This view cheapens sin and makes pardon worthless, it
takes the iron out of the blood, and the backbone out of all our
religion and ethics. It ruins Christians and disgraces Christianity.
We sometimes seem to think that our nation or church or denomination
is so important to the carrying on of God's work that he cannot
afford to let any evil befall us, whatever we may do or be.
"Hear this, I pray you, ye heads of the house of Jacob, and princes
of the house of Israel, that abhor judgment and pervert all equity.
They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity. The
heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for
hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean
upon the Lord and say, Is not the Lord among us? none evil can come
upon us. Therefore shall Zion for your sake be ploughed as a field,
and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as
the high places of the forest." That was plain preaching, and the
people did not like it. They would not like it any better to-day; it
would come too near the truth.
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