The Ascent of the SoulBradford, Amory H. (Amory Howe)
Religion
The Ascent of the Soul
Bradford, Amory H. (Amory Howe)
Ascension of the soul; Soul
In some way men have been kept dissatisfied with their ignorance and
persistent in their search for truth. I make no distinction between
sacred and secular here because all truth is sacred. Scientist and
theologian alike have to do with reality. Whether we examine the tracks
of an extinct animal on ancient rocks, or bow our heads in prayer, we
are facing a real world which is steadily enlarging. For centuries men
have sought the causes of things; they have been made to feel that they
ought to do right, and then have been inspired with a passion to
discover the right. This is very wonderful. The being who has almost
limitless powers of physical enjoyment, whose senses are exquisitely
fitted for pleasure, is not satisfied with pleasure, but, in obedience
to unseen attractions, ever seeks for higher things. Whence does this
eagerness come? Is it from man himself? Then our problem is great
indeed, for, at one and the same time, something within himself impels
him upward, and another something drags him downward. But the point for
special consideration now is that the soul is never satisfied with
anything but truth, that the history of thought is the record of the
search for truth, that every new discovery has acted as a stimulus to
still more ardent exploration, and that the search is always for
elemental realities, the causes of phenomena, for "things as they are."
The promise of Jesus was fulfilled long before it was spoken. Some one,
in all the ages, has been leading into truth and showing things to come;
and the process was never more evident than after all these years of
intellectual and spiritual progress. I say some one has led. By that I
mean a personal spirit, unseen, but ever present; for how could he whose
home is in the mire be supposed, steadily and unwaveringly, to reach
toward the skies unless there was some attraction in the skies? The only
attraction for one spirit is another spirit. This age-long, unwavering
passion for truth and progress, the wisest of men have believed to have
been inspired by Providence or God or by guardian angels--which after
all are only other ways of stating the doctrine of Jesus concerning the
Holy Spirit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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