Excerpt from The Ohio State University Quarterly, Vol. 3: July, 1911

The second text is a quotation from the one just referred to and is valuable not simply for the content of the words but has a new value by reason of the fact that it was the answer Jesus made in the hour of temptation when worn and wearied with the fasting of forty days. He was tempted to use the power of God to prove his own Sonship and to put the emphasis upon the physical or material side of life. To this temptation He did not yield, but gave an added emphasis to the old doctrine that man should not live by bread alone, but by every word proceeding from the mouth of God.

The third text occurs in the midst of the ordinary teaching of Jesus in a chapter where he is putting the emphasis upon Himself as a leader, a good Shepherd who gave his life for the sheep. He is suggesting very clearly that He was the door through which men were to enter into the larger life. By me if any man enter in he shall be saved and shall go in and out and find pasture. This is quite in accord with the teaching elsewhere that He was the life and light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

A review of these passages and experiences will suggest the uni versal experience of men everywhere. It is so easy to put the emphasis upon the material things and so difficult to make an appeal from extreme physical need. It is so easy to see the naturalness of the human desire and human ambition and so difficult to turn away from the things of lesser value and find our heart loyalty with the things that are unseen and eternal. It need not be assumed for a moment that no emphasis belongs upon the needs that are to be satisfied with bread. These have their proper place. Our generation has been preaching a gospel of condition rather than a gospel of character. Men have been pitied because they were hungry or naked, but have been utterly neglected when they were known to be feeding their better natures upon the husks of vanity and folly. I would enter no protest or criticism upon the generosity of heart that would remove the pangs of poverty and the misery and distress which so abound in the less fortunate conditions of human life. Indeed nothing but commendation can be offered for people whose hands are ready and hearts responsive to the call of phys ical need wherever found. The mistake lies, however, in the assumption that the full dinner pail is the guarantee of a full life. Too often weassume that if we are well fed and well dressed and well entertained and carry with us all the trappings of wealth and pleasure we are living the favored and the highest life. In other channels men feed upon their vanities, satisfy themselves with the lust of power, expend their energies for that which is not as good as bread, and come back after a wearisome life of toil and turmoil to see the truth of the statement 'made by a man of large worldly experience who said: Vanities of vanities; all is vanity.

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