Humanistic writing is full of the
exulting sense of this emancipation. These superconsiderations do not
belong in the world of experience as the humanist ordinarily conceives
of it. Hence, man lives in an immensely contracted, but a very real
and tangible world and within the small experimental circumference of
it, he holds a far larger place (from one viewpoint, a far smaller one
from another) than that of a finite creature caught in the snare of
this world and yet a child of the Eternal, having infinite destinies.
The humanist sees man as freed from the tyranny of this supernatural
revelation and laws. He rejoices over man because now he stands,
"self-poised on manhood's solid earth
Not forced to frame excuses for his birth,
Fed from within with all the strength he needs."
It is this sense of independence which arouses in Goethe a perennial
enthusiasm. It is the greatest bliss, he says, that the humanist won
back for us. Henceforth, we must strive with all our power to keep it.
We have attempted this brief sketch of one of the chief sources of the
contemporary thought movement, that we may realize the pit whence we
were digged, the quarry from which many corner stones in the present
edifice of civilization were dug. The preacher tends to underestimate
the comprehensive character of the pervasive ideas, worked into many
institutions and practices, which are continually impinging upon him
and his message.
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