XXI.

THE CHRISTIANITY OF OLD AGE.

PHILEMON 9.

FOR LOVE'S SAKE I RATHER BESEECH THEE, BEING SUCH A ONE

AS PAUL THE AGED.

THE reverence for age is a striking and refreshing feature in the civilization of ancient and Pagan times. The frequent traces of it in the literature of Greece and Rome, compared with the silence of Christian precept on the subject, might be thought to indicate, that this sentiment owes no obligation to Christianity, and has a better home in the humanities of nature than in the suggestions of faith. The conclusion, however, would be wholly unwarrantable; and would never occur except to those who do not look beyond the letter into the spirit of a system, and who think to understand a religion by arithmetical reckoning of its maxims. Every system naturally strengthens

most its weakest points. That Cicero wrote a treatise upon Age, and expended on it all the ingenuity of his philosophy, and the graces of his dialogue, proves that he regarded this department of morality with anxiety and apprehension: nor would Christianity have left the topic untouched, if its spirit and faith had not lifted this class of duties beyond the danger of neglect. A decline of tenderness towards the aged,-mean or even melancholy sentiments with respect to their infirmities, can never arise without scepticism of human immortality, and a total defection from the Christian mind.

The dignity of age, in the ancient world, was sustained by many considerations, of mingled expediency and affection, which retain with us but little force. Of how many honours has the printing-press alone deprived the hoary head! It has driven out the era, so genial to the old, of spoken wisdom, and threatens a reign of silence by putting all knowledge and experience into type. The patriarch of a community can never be restored to the kind of importance which he possessed in the elder societies of the world. He was his neighbours' chronicler; bearing within him the only extant image of many departed scenes and memorable deeds, and able to link the dim traditions of the past with the living incidents

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of the present. He was their most qualified counsellor; his memory serving as the archives of the state, and supplying many a passage of history illustrative of existing emergencies, and solving some civic perplexity. He was their poet; representative of an age already passed from the actual into the ideal; associate or contemporary of men whose names have become venerable; and in the oft-repeated tale of other days, from which time has expelled whatever was prosaic, weaving the retrospect of life into an Epic. He was their priest; loving to nurture wonder and spread the sense of mystery, by recounting the authentic prodigies of his or his fathers' years, when omen and prophecy were no dubious things, but sober verities which Providence had not yet begrudged the still pious earth. From all these prerogatives he is now deposed, supplanted in his authority by the journal and the library; whose speechless and impersonal lore coldly, but effectually, supplies the wants once served by the living voice of elders kindling with the inspiration of the past.

By far other and higher considerations does Christianity sustain reverential sentiments towards age. In the shape which they formerly assumed, they were the effects and marks of an imperfect intellectual civilization: surviving now, they are a part of the devout humanities diffused by the

spirit of Christ. But for that spirit, every change which made the old less useful would have made them less revered. But the merely social and utilitarian estimate of human beings can never become prevalent, so long as faith in the immortal soul is genuine and sincere, and Jesus is permitted to teach in his own way the honour that is due to all men. To him did God give it to be the great foe of all scorn and negligence of heart: nor are there any tenants of life on whose lot he has shed a greater sanctity, than on those who are visibly on the verge of their departure. Let us observe for a few moments how Christianity teaches the world to look upon the aged.

Not, certainly, as its worn-out tools, who have done their work, and are fit only to be flung aside to rust amid worthless things. Not with sordid discontent, as on unwelcome and tedious guests, that they linger still to consume a hospitality which they will never repay, and keep possession of sources of enjoyment, on which more vivid appetites are impatient to enter. For wherever the slightest vestige of such feelings exists, there can be no remembrance of that higher field of service, of that nobler and more finished work, for which time, to its last beat, continues to prepare. So Epicurean a thought dwells in the crust of selfishness and sense, and has never felt the pure

breath of faith and reverence.

Is there nothing

which can drive us from this infatuation, and per

being, not for what

Is he nothing then whose pittance is a

suade us to look at a human he has, but for what he is? but a pensioner of Mammon, pleasant sight for greedy eyes? Can we see him decline step by step to the brink of the dark abyss, till the ground crumbles beneath him and he slips in, and yet spend all our anxiety on the dropped cloak he has left behind?

Nor are the mere feelings of instinctive compassion towards weakness and selfishness those with which Christianity encourages us to look on age. For, these contemplate only its physical attributes; they virtually deny or overlook all its claims, except those of its animal infirmities; and show a mind forgetful of the capacities within, latent perhaps, but yet imperishable, that have toiled in a great work, and are on the threshhold of a greater; that can know no eclipse but that of shame, nor any decrepitude but that of sin.

It has been imagined that religious faith does not like to draw attention to the decline which precedes, often by years, the approach of death; that the spectacle of a human being in ruins terrifies the expectation of futurity, and humbles the mind with mean suspicions of its destiny. Scepticism, which delights in all the ill-bodings which