, and in slippery peril
maintained the royalty of his manhood, and sent a brother's cheer and a
brother's help through the storm; when I think of that noble achievement
where the Stars and Stripes and the Cross of St. George were lost and
blended in the light of universal humanity; I say to myself--how does an
act like this shed light upon a thousand instances of human depravity!
What is any material triumph compared to this moral beauty! And what is
the great distinction between rags and coronets, between senates and
workshops, when in the breast of every man, and everywhere, there is the
possibility of such heroism, such charity, and such splendid
performance!

And so, my friends, turning from this specific illustration, and looking
through the wards of cities, the busy factories, the dim attics and
cellars, they all become glorious by the reflected light of the humanity
that toils and suffers within them. Man is greater than any achievement
of mechanism, any interest of capital, and all the questions which these
involve must be brought to the test of his moral capabilities, and his
spiritual as well as earthly wants.

But I observe, finally, that the words of the text suggest the
_Providential design_ and the _Divine agency_ that are involved in the
great mechanical achievements of our age. As the Divine Spirit flowed
through those living creatures and moved those wheels, so God's
influence is in the movement of humanity, and in the instruments of that
movement. We get only a narrow, and often an inexplicable conception of
things, until we behold them encircled by this horizon of a Providential
design. And if humanity, with all its claims and possibilities, is
involved in this network of mechanism, so doubtless are the processes of
Infinite Wisdom. Something more than material greatness, or ends limited
merely to this earth, is to be wrought out by it. Indications of this
appear already. The telegraph and steamship, for instance, serve not
only the interests of trade and commerce, but of liberty, and
brotherhood, and of Christian influence.

It is beautiful to see how the most selfish agents presently become
converted to the broadest uses, and matter is transformed into the
vehicle of spirit. For God is in history. It is a Divine dispensation,
and has miracles of its own. And, because they come by natural
development let us not fail to recognize the benevolence and the
significance involved with them. Is not the e