Stoics and Saints - College of Stoic Philosophers

138 THE MONASTIC SYSTEM.
fearful picture of corruption, of the tales of unutterable
abominations and horrors, which might
be drawn from
authentic monastic history. A life of such high tension,
when the tension re
kept at full pitch so long, inevitably,
laxed, sank into dark, sad depths. Great spiritual
move
ments are powerful for a time only. Very noble, beautiful,
heroic, in many respects, this one was, while the red blood of
its youth was in it ; very pallid, foul, and base it became when
it dragged on a dull mechanical existence after its work in
oO
the
world was done. To judge it aright we must look at it in itsprime
;
in the light of its aims, aspirations, and hopes. It
would be easy to show what dragged monachism to the dust ;
it is more profitable to consider what enabled it, in spite of
this constant human proneness to corruption, to regenerate
itself so often, and to endure so long.
On the whole, we must say, to sum up the matter, that
nothing in the long run and on a large
scale succeeds in God s
world but God s law. Extremes on either hand are ultimately
fatal. In the beginning God made them male and female,
body and soul, man and the world. All rebellion against His
institution is in the end futile and ruinous. No doubt it
would have been a blessed thing if the monks had had an
open eye
for this world as well as for the world to come.
Men, however, as a rule, see but one thing thoroughly at a
time.
Any great principle which has entered largely into the
life of humanity, has held for generations and even ages,
almost exclusive possession of some considerable section of
society.
Hence the march of humanity has been a march en
Whenever any one masterful principle has possessed the
zigzag.
world and bent it
powerfully in one direction, there has never
failed to appear some equally important principle
seized society in time and turned it
which has
in the other, and thus, the
world swaying now in one direction, now in another, but ever
onward, a clear progress through the ages has been gained.