True Words for Brave Men
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Charles Kingsley >> True Words for Brave Men
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What a question! Oh, ask it yourselves honestly! I have been out in
gales myself, and I cannot understand how you can go out, in thirty feet
of timber, upon that mighty sea, with the wind howling over your heads
like a death-bell, and the great hungry waves chasing you for miles, each
one able and willing to swallow you up into the deep, and the gulls
screaming over you as if they were waiting to feed upon your floating
carcases, and you alone, in a tiny boat, upon that waste, howling
wilderness of waters!--I cannot understand, I say, how, when a man is in
such a case as that, day after day, year after year, he can forget his
God, the only friend who can save him from the sea! the only friend who
can send him safe out to his work in the evening, and bring him home safe
to his wife at morning. One would think that when you went down to the
shore in the morning, you would say, "Oh, God! without whose help I am no
stronger than a piece of sea-weed floating up and down, take care of me!
Take care of my wife and my children; and forgive me my sins, and do not
punish me by calling me away this night to answer for them all!" And
when you come home at night, you would say, "Oh, God! who hast kept me
safe all this day, what can I do to show how thankful I am to Thee!" Ay!
what _can_ you do to show how thankful you are to God for His care? What
_ought_ you to do to show your thankfulness to Him? What _must_ you do
to show your thankfulness to Him? He has told you. "If you love me, He
says, keep my commandments. Do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with
thy God."
These, my friends, are the holy and thankful thoughts which ought to be
in your hearts every day and hour. This is the thought which God meant
to put into your hearts when He made sailors of you, and brought you into
the world, by the sea-side, to take up your business in great waters. You
might have been born in Bristol or Liverpool or London, and never seen
anything but streets and houses, and man's clumsy work. But God has been
very good to you. He has brought you up here, in this happy West
country, where you may see His wonderful works day and night; where you
ought never to forget that you have a Father in heaven who made the sea,
and who keeps you safe at sea by night and day. God has given you a
great deal. He has given you two books to read--the book of God's Word,
the Bible, and the book of God's earth, the sky and sea and land, which
is above you and below you and around you day and night. If you can read
and understand them properly, you will find in them everything which you
want; you may learn from them to be holy in this world and happy in the
next. God has given you, too, fathers, mothers, wives, children, a
comfortable home, a holy trade--the same which the apostles followed. God
has given you England for your country, and the West country--the best
place in England for your home. God has given you a good Queen, and good
magistrates and landlords. God has given you health and strength, and
seamanship, and clear heads and stout hearts. And God has made you
seamen and fishermen, and given you a business in which you can see God's
mighty power and wisdom day and night, and feel Him taking care of you
when you cannot take care of yourselves.
Therefore you ought to thank God that yours is a dangerous business,
because it teaches you to trust in God alone for safety. And what are
you to give Him in return? What does God require of you? You cannot pay
Him back again for all His mercies, for they are past counting, but you
must pay Him back all you can. And what must you pay Him back? First,
you must trust in God; for he who comes to God and wishes to walk with
God through life, as a good man should, must believe that there is a God,
and that He will reward those who look to Him.
I never heard of a sailor who did not _believe_ in God; for how can a man
look at the sea, and not say to himself, _God_ made the sea! But I have
seen a great many sailors who did not _trust_ in God. As long as it is
fine weather, and everything goes right, they will forget God, and fancy
that it is their own seamanship, and not God alone, which keeps their
boats afloat, and their own skill in fishing, and not God alone, which
sends the shoals of fish into their nets; and so they are truly
fine-weather sailors--men who are only fit for calm seas and light
breezes, when they can take care of themselves without God's help; but
when a squall comes their hearts change, by God's mercy. For when a man
has done all he can to save himself, and all he can do is no use, and his
nets are adrift, and his boat on her beam ends, and the foaming rocks are
on his lee, then he comes to his senses at last, and prays. Why did he
not pray before? Why did he not save himself from all that misery and
trouble and danger by thanking God for taking care of him, and praying to
God to take care of him still. "Foolish men are plagued for their
offences, and because of their wickedness. They that go down to the sea
in ships, and occupy their business on great waters; these men see the
works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep; for at His word the
stormy wind ariseth which lifteth up the waves thereof; they are carried
up to heaven, and down again into the deep; their soul melteth away
because of the trouble; they reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken
man, and are at their wit's end." And justly they are punished for
forgetting God. God made the calm as well as the storm. Could they not
remember that? But look at God's mercy; for when they cry unto the Lord
in their trouble, He delivers them out of all their distress. For He
makes the storm to cease, so that the waves are still; then are they glad
because they are at rest, and so God brings them to the harbour where
they would be.
Is there an old man sitting here who has not had this happen to him? And
what did you _do_, my friend, when God had saved you out of that danger?
It is easy to tell what you _ought_ to have done; you ought to have gone
home and fallen on your knees, and prayed to God; you ought to have said,
Oh, Lord, I am a miserable, foolish sinner, who can only remember Thee
when Thou art angry; an ungrateful son, who only thinks of his father
when he beats him! Oh, God, forgive me, I ought to have trusted in Thee
before! I deserved all my danger and punishment and more. I did not
deserve to be pardoned and saved from it! I deserve to be at the bottom
of the sea at this moment. But forgive me, forgive me, loving and
merciful Father, for the sake of Thy dear Son Jesus Christ, who died on
the cross that I might be saved from death!
And when you had prayed thus, the next thing you ought to have asked
yourself was--What does God require of me? how can I try to pay Him
back--how can I show that I am thankful? My good friends, what does God
require of you? "To do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly
with your God." I told you He required of you first to trust in Him at
all hours, in all weathers. This is the next thing which He requires of
you--To do justly, to cheat no man, not in the price of a pilchard; to
love mercy; to love your neighbours, as Christ loved you; to help your
neighbours, as Christ helped you and all mankind, by dying to save you;
and as Christ has helped you, night after night, when you might have been
buried in the waves, if Christ had not prayed for you that you might have
time to repent, and bring forth fruits fit for repentance. To love
mercy; to forgive every man who hurts you, for they are all Christian men
and your brothers. Christ loved every one! Why should not you? If your
wife or friend loved anything, you would be kind to it for their sakes;
and so, if you really love God, and are thankful to Him for all His mercy
and kindness, you will love every man you meet, for God's sake, who loved
them and gave His Son for them.
"To walk humbly with your God." That is the beginning and end of all--you
must be humble; you must confess that you are foolish, and God alone is
wise; that you are weak, and God alone is strong; that you are poor
fishermen, whom any squall may drown, and that God is the Great, Loving,
Almighty God, who made heaven and earth, and the sea and all that is
therein, and who helps all those who put their trust in Him. This is
what God asks you to do in return for all He has done for you! To pray
to Him, to praise Him, to put your trust in Him, to keep His commandments
like thankful, humble, obedient, loving children. They who do these
things, and only they, shall never fail. By night and day, in summer and
winter, in storm and calm, in health and sickness, in richness and
poverty, God will be with them. Christ will be with them. He sat in a
fisherman's boat once, on the sea of Tiberias, and He will sit in your
boats if you will but ask Him. He will steer you, He will save you, He
will take care of your wives and children when you are far away, and He
will bring you through the troublesome waves of this mortal life, so
that, having faith for your anchor, and hope for your sail, and charity
for your crew, you may at last land on the happy shore of everlasting
life, there to live with God, world without end. God grant it may be so!
My good brothers--for I am a Christian like you, and an Englishman like
you, and a west countryman like you--I thank our Father in heaven that He
has brought me from the other end of England, and put this message into
my mouth, to remind you of who you are--that _you_ are the men who see
the works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep; and that God will say
to every one of you at the day of judgment,--I taught you all this, I
gave you all this, I did all this for _you_, what have you done for _Me_
in return?
Go home--read over these verses in 107th Psalm, and think over what I
have said. Do it to-night, for the weather has broken up--there are
gales coming. Which of you can say that he will be alive next Sunday?
XXIII. THE GOOD SOLDIER OF JESUS CHRIST.
"Thou therefore endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."--2
TIMOTHY ii. 3.
Suppose a young man went of his own will for a soldier; was regularly
sworn in to serve the Queen; took his bounty; wore the Queen's uniform;
ate her bread; learnt his drill; and all that a soldier need learn, as
long as peace lasted. But suppose that, as soon as war came, and his
regiment was ordered on active service, he deserted at once, and went off
and hid himself. What should you call such a man? You would call him a
base and ungrateful coward, and you would have no pity on him, if he was
taken and justly punished.
But suppose that he did a worse thing still. Suppose that the enemy, the
Russians say, invaded England, and the army was called out to fight them;
and suppose this man of whom I speak, be he soldier or sailor, instead of
fighting the enemy, deserted over to them, and fought on their side
against his own country, and his own comrades, and his own father and
brothers, what would you call that man? No name would be bad enough for
him. If he was taken, he would be hanged without mercy, as not only a
deserter but a traitor. And who would pity him or say that he had not
got his just deserts?
Now, for God's sake and your own sakes consider. Are not all young
people, when they are old enough to choose between right and wrong, if
they choose what is wrong and live bad lives instead of good ones, very
like this same deserter and traitor?
For are you not all Christ's soldiers, every one of you? Did not Christ
enlist every one of you into His army, that, as the baptism service says,
you might fight manfully under His banner against sin, the world, and the
devil,--in one word, against all that is wrong and bad? And now when you
are old enough to know that you are Christ's soldiers, what will you
deserve to be called, if instead of fighting on Christ's side against
what is good, you forget you are in His service? What are you but
deserters from Christ's banner and army, traitors to Christ's cause?
But some may say, "My case is not like that soldier's. I did not enter
Christ's service of my own free will. My parents put me into it when I
was an infant, without asking my leave. I was not christened of my own
will. My parents had me christened before I knew any thing about it! I
had no choice!"
Is it so? Do you know what your words mean? If they mean anything, they
mean that you had rather _not_ have been christened, because you are now
expected to behave as a christened man should. Now is there any one of
you who dare say, "I wish I had not been christened?"
Not one! Then if you dare not say that; if you are content to have been
christened, why are you not content to do what christened people should?
If you are content to have been christened, you are christened people now
of your own free will, and are bound to act accordingly.
But why were you christened? not merely because your parents chose, but
because it was their duty. Every child ought to be christened, because
every child belongs to Christ. Every child is in debt to Christ,--every
child is bound to serve Christ.
In debt to Christ, you say? Certainly, from the moment you are born, and
before that too. You are in debt to Him since you were born, for every
good thought and feeling which ever came into your hearts and minds, for
He put them there. And will any of you answer, "Then I wish He had not
put them there, if they are to bring me into debt to Him, and force me to
serve Him. I don't wish, of course, that I had been bad; but I wish that
I had been neither good nor bad. I wish I had had no immortal soul,
which is bound to serve Christ."
Now does any man of you wish that really? Dare any of you wish that you
were like the beasts, without conscience, without honour, without shame,
without knowing right from wrong, without any life after death, without
being able even to _talk_--for mind, without immortal souls men could not
_speak_. The beasts cannot talk to each other; reasonable speech belongs
to our souls, not to our bodies. Then if you are glad that you have
souls, and are better than the dumb beasts, you confess that you feel in
debt to Christ, and are bound to serve Him. For who gave you your souls
but Christ?
But even if you had had no souls, you would have been in debt to Christ,
and bound to serve Him. "What for?" you ask. Why, for life itself. How
did you come here? Who gave you life? Who brought you into the world?
Who but Christ, by whom all things were made, and you among the rest? Who
gave you food? Who made every atom of food grow which you ate since you
were born? Who made the air you breathe, the water which you drink, the
wool and cotton which clothes you? Who but Christ? Do you not know that
you cannot even breathe a breath of air, unless Christ first makes the
air, and then gives your lungs life to breathe the air? and yet you
cannot understand that you are in debt to Christ, and have been eating
His bread and living on His bounty ever since you were born?
And mind, all this while I have not said one word about the greatest debt
of all which you owe to the Lord Jesus Christ, even His own life, which
He gave for you! Only think but once that for _your_ sakes the Lord was
crucified--for _your_ sakes He died the most horrible, painful, shameful
death. And then say, Are you not in debt to Him? "Greater love has no
man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." If any mere
man had died for your sake, would you not love him--would you not feel
yourself in debt to him, a deeper debt than you can ever repay? Then
Christ died for you--how can you be more deeply in debt to any one than
to Him?
You have now no _right_ to choose between Christ and the devil, because
Christ has chosen you already--no right to choose between good and bad,
because God, the good God Himself, has chosen you already, and has been
taking care of you, and heaping you with blessings ever since you were
born.
And why did Christ choose you? As I have told you, that you may fight
with Him against all that is bad. Jesus Christ's work at which He works
for ever in heaven and in earth, is to root out all that is bad, all sin,
all misery; and He will reign, and He will fight till all His enemies,
even Death itself, are put under His feet and destroyed. And Christ
expects you and me to help Him. He has chosen you and me, and all
Christian people, to fight against what is bad, and to put it down and
root it out as far as we can wherever we find it; and therefore, first,
to root it out of our own hearts and lives; for while we are bad
ourselves we cannot make others good. But if we go on doing bad and
wrong things, are we fighting on Christ's side? No, we are fighting on
the devil's side, and helping the devil against God.
Do you fancy that I am saying too much? I suspect some do. I suspect
some say in their hearts, "He is too hard on us. _We_ are not like that
traitorous soldier. If an English soldier went over to the enemy, and
fought against the English, and killed Englishmen, _that_ of course would
be too bad; but we do not wish to harm any one, much less our neighbours.
If we do wrong, it is ourselves at most that we harm. If we do wrong, it
is only we that shall suffer for it. Why does he talk as if we were
robbers or murderers, or had a spite against our neighbours? We do not
wish to hurt any one, we do not want to help the devil."
Now, my friends, if any of you say that, do you not say first what is not
true? and next do you not know that it is not true?
First, It is not true that by doing wrong you hurt no one but yourself.
Every wrong thing which any man does, every wrong way into which he runs,
is certain sooner or later to hurt his neighbours. The worse man a man
is, the worse for those who have to do with him. You know it is your own
case. You know that bad people hurt you, and make you unhappy; and that
good people do you good and make you happy. You know that bad example
does you harm and good example does you good. Think for yourselves--use
your own common sense. Recollect what you know, what has happened to you
again and again. You know that if any one uses bad language before you,
you are tempted to use bad language too. If any one quarrels with you,
you are tempted to quarrel with him. You know that if parents do wrong
things before their children, the children learn to copy them. It is
nonsense to talk of a man keeping his sins to himself. No man does, and
no man can. Out of the abundance of a man's heart his mouth speaks; and
a bad tree will bring forth bad fruit. If there are bad thoughts in your
head, they will come out in bad words. If there are bad tempers in your
heart, they will come out in bad and unkind and dishonest actions. You
may as well try to keep in fire, as to keep in sin. It will break out,
and it will burn whatever it touches. And if you, or I, or any one does
wrong in any thing, we shall surely hurt some one or other by it. If
you, or I, or any one is worse than he ought to be, we shall make the
parish we live in worse than it ought to be. You know that it is so. Who
made you different from the rest of the world? If any body else's sins
are harmful, who will make your sins harmless? Not the devil, for he
wishes to see as much harm done as possible. And not God, for He will
not be so cruel as to let your sin prosper and go unpunished, as it would
if it did not make people hate it, by feeling the bad effects of it.
My good friends, if you by doing wrong hurt other people, and make other
people unhappy, are you doing Christ's work or the devil's? Are you
fighting for Christ, who wishes to make all good, or for the devil, who
wishes to make all bad? Are you Christ's faithful soldier and servant,
or are you a traitor to Christ who has gone over to the devil's side, and
is helping the devil to make this poor world (which is bad enough
already) worse than it is?
Oh, think of this now, while you have time before you. Remember all that
Christ has done for you, and remember that all He asks of you in return
is to do for Him nothing but good, which is good for you as well as for
your neighbours. The devil's wages now are shame, discontent,
unhappiness, perhaps poverty, perhaps sickness, certainly punishment as
traitors to Christ after we die. Christ's wages are love, joy, peace,
the answer of a good conscience, the respect and love of all good men, as
long as we live, and after death, life everlasting. Choose; will you be
traitors or deserters, and serve the worst of all masters, the King of
Hell, or be honest, honourable, and brave men, and serve the best of all
masters, the King of Heaven, the Lord of Life, and love, and goodness
without bound, whose ways are ways of pleasantness, and all His paths are
peace?
XXIV. HOLY COMMUNION; CHRIST AND THE SINNER.
"Have mercy upon, me, O God, according to thy loving-kindness;
according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my
transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me
from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever
before me. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a
contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise."--PSALM li. 1, 2, 3, 17.
This Psalm was written by David when he was sorrowing for sin, and if
there are any such among you, my dear friends, let me speak a few words
to you. Would to God that I had the tongue of St. Paul to speak to you
with--though even when he preached some mocked, as it will be to the end.
But if to one of you God has brought home His truth, then to that one
conscience-stricken sinner I will say, "You confess with David that all
your sorrows are your own fault. Thank God that He has taught you so
much."
But what will you do to be saved from your sins? "I cannot wait," you
say in your heart, "to go home and begin leading a new life. I will do
that, please God, but I want to know at once that I am forgiven. I want
to be saved. I cannot save myself. I cannot save myself from hell
hereafter, or from this miserable sinful life, nearly as bad as hell
here. Oh! wretched being that I am, who shall deliver me from the body
of this death?"
Friend, dost thou not know it is written, "Believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ, and thou shalt be saved."
"_Ah yes_!" _says the sinner_, "_I have been hearing that all my life_,
_and much good it has done me_! _Look at me_, _I want something more
than those words about Christ_, _I want Christ Himself to save me if He
can_."
Ah, my brother!--poor sinner! thou hast never believed in Christ, thou
hast only believed _about_ Christ. There was the fault. But Christ
Himself will save thee, though thou hast been the worst of reprobates, He
will save thee. Only one thing, He _will_ have thee answer first. "Dost
thou wish to be saved from the _punishment_ of thy sins, or from the sins
themselves?"
"_From my sins_--_from my sins_," says the man who truly repents. "_They
are what I hate_, _even while I commit them_. _I hate and despise
myself_, _I dare look neither God nor man in the face_, _and yet I go on
doing the very things I loathe the next minute_. _Oh_, _for some one to
save me from my own ill-temper_, _my own bitter tongue_, _my own
laziness_, _my own canting habits_, _my own dishonesty_, _my own
lustfulness_. _But who will save me from them_? _who will change me and
make a new creature of me_? _Oh_, _for a sign from heaven that I can get
rid of these bad habits_! _I hate them_, _and yet I love them_. _I long
to give them up_, _and yet_, _if some one stronger than me does not have
mercy on me_, _I shall go and do them again to-morrow_. _I am longing to
do wrong now_, _and yet I long not to do wrong_. _Oh_, _for a sign from
heaven_!"
Poor sinner!--My brother! _there_ is a sign from heaven for thee! On
that table it stands. A sign that Christ's blood was shed to wash out
thy sins, a sign that Christ's blood will feed thee, and give thy spirit
strength to cast away and hate thy sins. Come to Holy Communion and
claim thy share in Christ's pardon for the past, in Christ's strength for
the future.
"_What_!" says the sinner, "_I come to the Sacrament_! _I of all men the
most unfit_! _I who but yesterday committed such and such sins_!"
Friend, as to the sin you committed yesterday, confess that to God, not
me. And if you confess it to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive it.
But just because you think yourself the most unfit person to come to the
Holy Sacrament, for that very reason I suspect you to be fit.
"_How then_!" says he in his heart, "_I have but this moment repented of
my sins_! _I have but this moment_, _for the first time felt that God's
wrath is revealed against me_, _that hell is open for me_!"
For that very reason, come to the Holy Sacrament, and thou shalt hear
there that not hell at all, but heaven is open for thee.
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