chapter 16
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We have now found the inspiration, the liviion that is in religion. But this inspiration or liviion in religion is foun<s></s>d not only in religion_I mean Church religion. This inspiration or liviion is known to everyone who has ever felt an impulse which makes him obey the rules of moral duct above all siderations of self-i or fear. In fact, this inspiration or liviion that is in religion is found in every a of men which is not prompted by the base motive of self-i or fear, but by the sense of duty and honour. This inspiration or liviion in religion, I say, is found not only in religion. But the value ion is that the words of the rules of moral duct which the founders of all great religions have left behind them have, what the rules of morality of philosophers and moralists have not, this inspiration or liviion which, as Matthew Arnold says, lights up those rules and makes it easy for men to obey them. But this inspiration or liviion in the words of the rules of duct ion again is found not only in religion. All the words of really great men in literature, especially poets, have also this inspiration or liviion that is in religion. The words of Goethe, for instance, which I have just quoted, have also this inspiration or liviion. But the words of great men in literature, unfortunately, ot reach the mass of mankind because all great men in literature speak the language of educated men, which the mass of mankind ot uand. The founders of all the great religions in the world have this advahat they were mostly uneducated men, and, speaking the simple language of uneducated men, make the mass of mankind uand them. The real value, therefore, ion, the real value of all the great religions in the world, is that it vey the inspiration or liviion which it tains even to the mass of mankind. In order to uand how this inspiration or liviion came intion, into all the great religions of the world, let us find out how these religions came into the world.Now, the founders of all the great religions in the world, as we know, were all of them men of exceptionally or even abnormally stroional nature. This abnormally stroional nature made them feel intehe emotion of love or human affe, which, as I have said, is the source of the inspiration in religion, the soul ion. This intense feeling or emotion of love or human affe ehem to see what I have called the indefinable, absolute essence ht and wrong or justice, the soul of justice which they called righteousness, and this vivid perception of the a<tt></tt>bsolute essence of justiabled them to see the unity of the laws ht and wrong or moral laws. As they were men of exceptionally stroional nature, they had a powerful imagination, whisciously persohis unity of moral laws as an almighty supernatural Being. To this supernatural almighty Being, the personified unity of moral laws of their imagination, they gave the name of God, from whom they also believed that the intense feeling or emotion of love or human affe, which they felt, came. In this way, then, the inspiration or liviion that is in religion came intion; the inspiration that lights up the rules of moral duct ion and supplies the emotion or motive power needful for carrying the mass of mankind, along the straight and narrow way of moral duct. But now the value ion is not only that it has an inspiration or liviion in its rules of moral duct which lights up these rules and makes it easy for men to obey them. The value ion, of all the great religions in the world, is that they have an anisation for awakeniing, and kindling the inspiration or liviion in men necessary to make them obey the rules of moral duct. This anisation in all the great religions of the world is called the Church.
The Church, many people believe, is fouo teach men the belief in God. But that is a great mistake. It is this great mistake of the Christian Churches in modern times which has made ho men like the late Mr.J.A. Froude feel disgusted with the modern Christian Churches. Mr. Froude says: "Many a hundred sermons have I heard in England on the mysteries of the faith, on the divine mission of the clergy, on apostolic successioc., but never ohat I recolle on hoy, on those primitive as, Thou shalt not lie and Thou shalt not steal. " But then, with all defereo Mr. Froude, I think he is als when he says here that the Church, the Christian Church, ought to teach morality. The aim of the establishment of the Churo doubt is to make men moral, to make mehe rules of moral duct such as " Thou shalt not lie" and "Thou shalt not steal." But the fun, the true fun of the Chur all the great religions of the world, is not to teach morality, but to teach religion, which, as I have shown you, is not a dead square rule such as "Thou shalt not lie" and" Thou shalt not steal," but an inspiration, a liviion to make mehose rules. The true fun of the Church, ther<s></s>efore, is not to teach morality, but to inspire morality, to inspire men to be moral; in fact, to inspire and fire men with a liviion which makes them moral. In other words, the Chur all the great religions of the world is an anisation, as I said, for awakening and kindling an inspiration or liviion in men necessary to make them obey the rules of moral duct. But how does the Church awaken and kihis inspiration in men?
Now, as we all know, the founders of all the great religions of the world not only gave an inspiration or liviion to the rules of moral duct which they taught, but they also inspired their immediate disciples with a feeling aion of unbounded admiration, love, ahusiasm for their person and character. When the great teachers died, their immediate disciples, in order to keep up the feeling aion of unbounded admiration, love, ahusiasm which they felt for their teacher, founded a Church. That, as we know, was the in of the Chur all the great religions of the world. The Church thus awakens and kihe inspiration or liviion in men necessary to make them obey the rules of moral duct, by keeping up, exg and arousing, the feeling aion of unbounded admiration, love, ahus<s>９９lib.</s>iasm for the person and character of the first Teacher and Founder ion which the immediate disciples inally felt. Men rightly call not only the belief in God, but the belief in religion a faith, a trust; but a trust in whom? In the first teacher and founder of their religion who, in Mo-hammedanism is called the Prophet and in Christianity the Mediator. If you ask a stious Mohammedan why he believes in God and obeys the rules of moral duct, he will rightly answer you that he does it because he believes in Mohammed the Prophet. If you ask a stious Christian why he believes in God and obeys the rules of moral duct, he will rightly answer you that he does it because he loves Christ. Thus you see the belief in Mohammed, the love of Christ, in fact the feeling aion, as I said of unbounded admiration, love, ahusiasm for the first Teacher and Founder ion which it is the fun of the Church to keep up, excite and arouse in men_is the source of inspiration, the real power in all the great religions of the world by which they are able to make men, to make the mass of mankind obey the rules of moral duct.
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