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FASCINATION 161
felt in other days; but in our days they seem almost ridiculous because people are no longer what they were.
‘Go and sit in the last place,’ saysJesus, ‘and you will be invited to take the first.’
To which the modern world replies, ‘If you sit down in the last place you will have to stay there and it will serve you right.
‘If some one wants to take away your coat, let him have your cloak also’ says the Gospel.
‘And when you are completely naked the highwayman will give you his blessing and the police will arrest you for indecent exposure’s comments the dry logician.
Take no thought for the morrow,’ says the Saviour.
‘And on the morrow when misery overtakes you, no-one wili think of you,’ is the world’s retort.
‘Seek ye the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.’
Yes, once you have found, but not while you are looking, and I fear you may have to look for a long time.’
‘Woe to those who laugh for they shall weep; blessed are they who weep for they shall laugh.’
‘With respect, this is like a see-saw; it is the same as saying:
“blessed are the sick for they shall get well and woe to those who are well for they shall become sick.” If those who laugh are wretched and if you have nothing to promise to the happy people who weep than the misery of laughing in their turn, who then will be truly happy?’
‘Do not resist the wicked person: if someone strikes you on one cheek, turn the other.’
‘This is a positively immoral maxim. If you do not resist the evildoer you are his accomplice. If you turn the other cheek to somebody who has struck you unjustly, you are approving his offence and provoking him to repeat it; after you have offered your other cheek and received a second buffet, what will you do then? Fight him? This would make your recent behaviour pointless Turn your back so that he can kick your posterior? That would be ignoble and ludicrous!’
This is how the spirit of our age would respond to what are probably the most sublime sayings in the Gospels, i it had the courage of its convinctions to speak so freely. There is and must be a huge misunderstanding between Jesus Christ and mankind.
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