Daily Thoughts: selected from the writings of Charles Kingsley by his wife - Charles Kingsley 2 стр.

Safe!  There is no safety but from God, and that comes by prayer and faith.

I believe that the union of those who have loved here will in the next world amount to perfect identity, that they will look back on the expressions of affection here as mere meagre strugglings after and approximation to the union which then will be perfect.  Perfect!

A friend once won need never be lost, if we will be only trusty and true ourselves.  Friends may part, not merely in body, but in spirit, for a while.  In the bustle of business and the accidents of life, they may lose sight of each other for years; and more, they may begin to differ in their success in life, in their opinions, in their habits, and there may be, for a time, coldness and estrangement between them, but not for ever if each will be trusty and true.  For then they will be like two ships who set sail at morning from the same port, and ere night-fall lose sight of each other, and go each on its own course and at its own pace for many days, through many storms and seas, and yet meet again, and find themselves lying side by side in the same haven when their long voyage is past.

It is morning somewhere or other now, and it will be morning here again to-morrow.  Good times and bad times and all times pass over.  I learnt that lesson out of old Bewicks Vignettes, and it has stood me in good stead this many a year.

Shall we not recollect the blessed dead above all in Holy Communion, and give thanks for them thereat that holy table at which the Church triumphant and the Church militant meet in the communion of saints?  Where Christ is they are; and, therefore, if Christ be there, may not they be there likewise?  May not they be near us though unseen? like us claiming their share in the eternal sacrifice, like us partaking of that spiritual body and blood which is as much the life of saints in heaven as it is of penitent sinners on earth?  May it not be so?  It is a mystery into which we will not look too far.  But this at least is true, that they are with Him where He is.

True rest can only be attained as Christ attained it, through labour.  True glory can only be attained in earth or heaven through self-sacrifice.  Whosoever will save his life shall lose it; whosoever will lose his life shall save it.

There is a God-appointed theocracy promised to us, and which we must wait for, when all the diseased and false systems of this world shall be swept away, and Christs feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives, and the twelve apostles shall sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel!  All this shall come, and blessed is that servant whom his Lord when He cometh shall find ready!  All this we shall not see before we die, but we shall see it when we rise in the perfect material and spiritual ideal, in the kingdom of God!

Christ may come to us when our thoughts are cleaving to the ground, and ready to grow earthy of the earththrough noble poetry, noble music, noble artthrough aught which awakens once more in us the instinct of the true, the beautiful, and the good.  He may come to us when our souls are restless and weary, through the repose of Naturethe repose of the lonely snow-peak and of the sleeping forest, of the clouds of sunset and of the summer sea, and whisper Peace.  Or He may come, as He comes on winter nights to many a gallant soulnot in the repose of Nature, but in her ragein howling storm and blinding foam and ruthless rocks and whelming surgeand whisper to them even soas the sea swallows all of them which it can takeof calm beyond, which this world cannot give and cannot take away.

And therefore let us say in utter faith, Come as Thou seest bestbut in whatsoever way Thou comest, Even so come, Lord Jesus.  Amen.

Since we gave up at the Reformation the superstitious practice of praying to the saints, Saints Days have sunkand, indeed, sunk too muchinto neglect.  We forget too often still, that though praying to any saint or angel, or other created being, is contrary both to reason and Scripture, yet it is according to reason and to Scripture to commemorate them.  That is, to remember them, to study their characters, and to thank God for them,both for the virtues He bestowed on them, and the example which He has given us in them.

On this day the Lord Jesus was first shown to the Gentiles.  The word Epiphany means showing.  The Wise Men were worshippers of the true God, though in a dim confused way; and they had learnt enough of what true faith, true greatness was, not to be staggered and fall into unbelief when they saw the King of the Jews laid, not in a palace, but in a manger, tended by a poor village maiden.  And therefore God bestowed on them the great honour that they first of allGentilesshould see the glory and the love of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  God grant that they may not rise up against us in the Day of Judgment and condemn us!  They had but a small spark, a dim ray, of the Light which lighteth every man who cometh into the world; but they were more faithful to that little than many of us, who live in the full sunshine of the Gospel, with Christs Spirit, Christs Sacraments, Christs Churches,means of grace and hopes of glory of which they never dreamed.

How did St. Paul look on his past life?  There is no sentimental melancholy in him.  He is saved, and he knows it.  He is an Apostle, and he stands boldly on his dignity.  He is cheerful, hopeful, joyful.  And yet, when he speaks of the past, it is with noble shame and sorrow that he calls himself the chief of sinners, not worthy to be called an Apostle, because he persecuted the Church of Christ.  What he is, he will not deny; what he was, he will not forget; lest he should forget that in him, that is, in his fleshhis natural characterdwelleth no good thing; lest he should forget that the good which he does, he does not, but Christ which dwelleth in him; lest he should grow careless, puffed up, self-indulgent; lest he should neglect to subdue his evil passions; and so, after preaching to others, himself become a castaway.

February

The first and last business of every human being, whatever his station, party, creed, capacities, tastes, duties, is morality; virtue, virtue, always virtue.  Nothing that man will ever invent will absolve him from the universal necessity of being good as God is good, righteous as God is righteous, holy as God is holy.

The first and last business of every human being, whatever his station, party, creed, capacities, tastes, duties, is morality; virtue, virtue, always virtue.  Nothing that man will ever invent will absolve him from the universal necessity of being good as God is good, righteous as God is righteous, holy as God is holy.

God has not only made things beautiful; He has made things happy; whatever misery there is in the world there is no denying that.  Misery is the exception; happiness is the rule.  No rational man ever heard a bird sing without feeling that the bird was happy, and that if God made that bird He made it to be happy, and He takes pleasure in its happiness, though no human ear should ever hear its song, no human heart should ever share in its joy.

God grant that the day may come when in front of the dwellings of the poor we may see real fountainsnot like the drinking-fountains, useful as they are, which you see here and there about the streets, with a tiny dribble of water to a great deal of expensive stone, but real fountains, which shall leap, and sparkle, and plash, and gurgle, and fill the place with life and light and coolness; and sing in the peoples ears the sweetest of all earthly songssave the song of a mother over her childthe song of The Laughing Water.

Strive all your life to free men from the bondage of custom and self, the two great elements of the world that lieth in wickedness.

There comes a time when we must narrow our sphere of thought much, that we may truly enlarge it! we must, artificialised as we have been, return to the rudiments of life, to childrens pleasures, that we may find easily, through their transparent simplicity, spiritual laws which we may apply to the more intricate spheres of art and science.

The Lords Prayer teaches that we are members of a family, when He tells us to pray not My Father but Our Father; not my soul be saved, but Thy kingdom come; not give me but give us our daily bread; not forgive me, but forgive us our trespasses, and that only as we forgive others; not lead me not, but lead us not into temptation; not deliver me, but deliver us from evil.  After that manner our Lord tells us to pray, and in proportion as we pray in that manner, just so far, and no farther, will God hear our prayers.

All the deep things of God are bright, for God is Light.  Gods arbitrary will and almighty power may seem dark by themselves though deep, but that is because they do not involve His moral character.  Join them with the fact that He is a God of mercy as well as justice; remember that His essence is love, and the thunder-cloud will blaze with dewy gold, full of soft rain and pure light.

Science is, I verily believe, like virtue, its own exceeding great reward.  I can conceive few human states more enviable than that of the man to whompanting in the foul laboratory, or watching for his life in the tropic forestIsis shall for a moment lift her sacred veil and show him, once and for ever, the thing he dreamed not of, some law, or even mere hint of a law, explaining one fact: but explaining with it a thousand more, connecting them all with each other and with the mighty whole, till order and meaning shoots through some old chaos of scattered observations.  Is not that a joy, a prize, which wealth cannot give nor poverty take away?  What it may lead to he knows not.  Of what use it may be he knows not.  But this he knows, that somewhere it must lead, of some use it will be.  For it is a truth.

Physical and spiritual science seem to the world to be distinct.  One sight of God as we shall some day see Him will show us that they are indissolubly and eternally the same.

Passion and reason in a healthy mind ought to be inseparable.  We need not be passionless because we reason correctly.  Strange to say, ones feelings will often sharpen ones knowledge of the truth, as they do ones powers of action.

. . . People smile at the enthusiasm of youththat enthusiasm which they themselves secretly look back at with a sigh, perhaps unconscious that it is partly their own fault that they ever lost it. . . .  Do not fear being considered an enthusiast.  What matter?  But pray for tact, the true tact which love alone can give, to prevent scandalising a weak brother.

Be earnest, earnest, earnest; mad, if thou wilt:

Do what thou dost as if the stake were heaven, And that thy last deed ere the judgment-day.

When alls done, nothings done.  Theres rest above

Below let work be death, if work be love!

God hath showed thee what is good, . . . what is good in itself, and of itselfthe one very eternal and absolute good, which was with God and in God and from God, before all worlds, and will be for ever, without changing, or growing less or greater, eternally the same goodthe good which would be just as good and just and right and lovely and glorious if there were no world, no men, no angels, no heaven, no hell, and God were alone in His own abyss.

A difference in words is a very awful and important difference; a difference in words is a difference in things.  Words are very awful and wonderful things, for they come from the most awful and wonderful of all beings, Jesus Christ, The Word.  He puts words into mens minds.  He made all things, and He made words to express those things.  And woe to those who use the wrong words about anything.