A Sermon by Ralph Birdsall former rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Cooperstown, NY. originally published in his book Sermons in Summer.
There sat in a window a certain young man named
Eutychus, being fallen into a deep sleep; and as Paul was long preaching, he
sunk down with sleep, and fell down from the third loft, and was taken up dead.
— Acts xx, 9.
Here is given a brief but vivid glimpse of a service of the
primitive Church. Little of the pomp and ceremony of later ecclesiastical life
appears. It is not amid the dim aisles of some imposing cathedral that the
Christians of Troas gather to celebrate the Sacred Mysteries and to hear the
word of God from the lips of S. Paul, greatest of missionary apostles.
The hoary ruins of the city of Troas show how much its architectural
magnificence was built upon other than Christian foundations. Fragments of
colossal masonry that belonged to baths and theatres still loom from the site
of Troas over the Aegean sea, and the waves of
the ocean for a thousand years have sported there amid granite columns torn
from the vast arches of ruined temples. These memorials of ancient splendor
serve to throw into relief the humble simplicity of the shrines of primitive
Christianity.
In the midst of this city of palaces and temples the
Christian disciples are huddled together in the upper room, probably of some
private dwelling. The ship which is to carry S. Paul to Jerusalem rocks in the harbor. The prospect
of his departure has brought every Christian in Troas
to the place of meeting, to receive Holy Communion at his hands and to hear his
final words. The night is dark, for three weeks have not elapsed since the Pass
over feast, when the moon was full. The atmosphere of the upper room is hot and
stifling. There is added to the intense heat of the evening not only the
sweltering of the crowd that chokes the entrances and windows, but the reeking
of many lights that are set about for illumination and ceremonial use.
Every preacher who has attempted to ad dress a congregation
on a hot summer day, and every member of a congregation who has attempted to
listen under such conditions, can realize that there is no sort of ordinary
discomfort which renders more difficult the effort of commanding or giving
sustained attention. S. Paul is preaching earnestly, and, in the fervor of his
enthusiasm, thinks not of heat, or discomfort, or the lateness of the hour, or
of the length of his discourse. Many preachers prolong their sermons beyond
what they intend, partly because it is easier to expand one's thoughts than to
state them concisely, but chiefly because time passes with such incredible
swiftness to one who speaks of what interests himself. As the seven years which
Jacob served for Rachel seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to
her, so the discourse which sometimes wearies the congregation by its prolixity
seems to the preacher to occupy but a few moments, because of the love he has
for his subject.
It is fair to assume, however, that S. Paul holds the close
attention of his congregation, with the single exception of this young man
named Eutychus, who sits in a window where the lattice, overlooking the
courtyard, is open for air. There is a descriptive exactness in the tense of
the Greek verbs in the narrative that brings this young man vividly before us.
As S. Paul continues long in preaching, the young man's head begins to droop, the
words of the sermon grow indistinct and drowsy, his body relaxes, his head
sinks low upon his breast ; — suddenly he lurches and falls head long from the
window into the courtyard be low. The congregation is thrown into confusion.
Some rush down the outer stairs into the courtyard. Eutychus lies there,
apparently killed by the fall. But S. Paul hastens to the spot, flings aside
the crowd, throws his arms about the young man, and cries, "Trouble not
yourselves. For his life is in him!"
There is perhaps no person mentioned in the New Testament who
has so singular a claim for distinction as Eutychus, since the one thing we
learn of him is that he went to sleep while S. Paul was preaching. Judas was a
traitor, and Ananias was a liar, and Stephen was a hero, and Peter was a prince
of apostles. Such claims to fame and infamy are comprehensible. But the name of
this man is preserved for nearly two thousand years, who went to hear S. Paul,
and in the discourse of one of the most flaming and dominant personalities of
all human history was so little interested that he fell asleep. S. Paul was a
man who universally stirred either the most intense devotion, or the most
implacable hostility. The jailer who imprisoned S. Paul at Philippi heard him
speak, and fell at his feet a suppliant ; the people at Lystra heard him speak,
and brought oxen and garlands to do sacrifice unto him, believing him to be one
of the gods ; Felix the governor heard him speak, and trembled upon his throne;
the mob at Jerusalem heard him speak, and cast off their clothes, threw dust in
the air, and cried, “Away with such a fellow from the earth, for it is not fit
that he should live!” Nero heard him speak, and had him put to death by the
sword.
But Eutychus heard him speak, and went fast asleep. Eutychus
was a man whose purpose and profession were Christian, else he would not have
been attracted by that gathering of Christians in Troas.
But he was lacking in Christian enthusiasm, else he could not have fallen
asleep, despite adverse conditions, while listening to the foremost Christian
hero of his time. He stands as a type of conven tional Christian, who if he
does little evil, does very little good. He is unenthusiastic, lukewarm. He is
a Laodicean. Dante discovers such a type in his Inferno :
This
miserable measure the wretched souls maintain, Of those who lived apart from
infamy or praise; Mingled are they with that caitiff choir of angels, Who were
not rebels, nor holding faith to God, But lived all for themselves. To be not
less glorious, the heavens chased them out, Nor doth the depth of Hell receive
such shades Because the damned would have some glory from them.
As we look back through the vista of centuries to the
conquests of S. Paul and his companions, they appear among the most romantic
exploits of Christian heroism. But we can perhaps realize, in recalling the actual
scene at Troas, that to a man like Eutychus
the whole thing was most unromantic. A hot, upper room crowded with perspiring
people, and a converted Pharisee talking for hours about the conquest of the
world! Where was the romance in that?
As Eutychus looked at the things of his day, so, perhaps, we
are tempted to look at ours. The romance is always of yesterday.
Today lacks the picturesque touch that stirs enthusiasms, and
high resolves, and noble sacrifices. When you stand in a gallery of old
portraits — knights in armor, ladies bedizened in head-dresses of long ago —
the romantic spirit is stirred within you, and you muse fondly of the part in
life that these men and women played amid the pleasing quaintness’s of
antiquity. How rich was their life in the poetry and adventure that inflame
enthusiasms and make it glorious to be alive! Yet, if such portraits could
speak, they would say to us: "Our life appears to you antique; to us it
was modern: to you it is full of poetry; to us it was practical: to you it is
romantic; to us it was commonplace: some of the bitter problems of your day had
their origin through our failure to recognize the interest and importance of
forces that developed before our very eyes.”
So it may be, perhaps, that a future generation will marvel
at us, that we have not recognized the romance of our everyday surroundings,
that we have not addressed our selves with more enthusiasm to the problems that
loom in the foreground of our daily life. We shall appear, perhaps, as
Eutychus, who went to sleep while a spirit was abroad that was about to change
the current of history and to alter the face of the world. We need to develop a
kind of idealism which refuses to assign different spheres to romance and to
modern interests, but recognizes that just so far as modern life is creating a
new world, and is tireless and venture some and unconquerable, it is permeated
with the spirit of romance.
It was a son of this Church and parish who first revealed the
romantic possibilities of American life. James Fenimore Cooper was the first of
men to perceive that the pioneer life in America was as full of romance as
the exploits of the ancient Greeks of which Homer sang, or the adventures of
armored knights, who made the Middle Ages glorious with spears and banners and
minstrelsy. To the common view nothing was more sordid than the rude life of
our American forefathers, with its dirty log cabins, its squalid tasks, and its
contact, hostile and friendly, with filthy savages. But Cooper touched this
life with a magic that transfigured it, and revealed its splendor. All the
world recognized that in his works of fiction a new truth had been disclosed.
His tales were translated into the languages of Europe,
and Cooper has won historic fame as the discoverer of American romance.
Romance is always a discovery. It is the mission of the
greatest poets to reveal to us the power of romance, not in the dead past, but
in the things that be. What Cooper did for the pioneers, Rudyard Kipling has
done with even greater artistry, for modern life. He has shown us that
steam-engines are romantic, and whirring dynamos, and thundering locomotives.
What can compare with the romance of the bridge-building which Kipling
describes, and tunneling, and track-laying, and the grappling of engineers with
problems so intricate that brawny men break down and sob like children in their
solution! It is important to the maintenance of idealism in modern life that the
romantic spirit be preserved, with its elements of courage and chivalry, and
its demand upon the self-sacrifice of the individual to the triumph of great
and sacred causes. War, as Prof. James once said, is the romance of history,
and since war is a gradually diminishing force in civilized life, there perish
also the heroic qualities which war develops in mankind unless we can somehow
discover them anew in the pursuits of peace.
The great heresy of modern life is the belief that success
means the success of the individual. The one thing too commonly assumed is that
you cannot expect a man actually to risk his promotion or prosperity out of
devotion to a mere ideal. Such is not the spirit of romanticism. It is as if
there should be a fair maiden chained in yonder castle, and here an armored
knight who says, "There is an exceeding fierce dragon in the castle keep,
and while I would fain rescue the maiden, it would too greatly endanger my
life." Or here is a soldier upon the battle field who says, "Captain,
I would have captured the flag, as you commanded, but some of the enemy with
loaded guns were there, and I feared that I should risk my skin!” Truly we
should re-write all our romances to discover such sentiments as these!
Yet do we not hear exactly the same thing in the life of
today? Here is a business man who declares that the whole modern system is
rotten, "but," he says, "while I should like to keep my hands
clean, if I don't pay graft and resort to sharp methods like the rest, I shall
surely fail." The knight and the dragon! Here is a politician who says,
"It is all very well to talk about righteousness in politics, and I am for
it, but if I don't agree to certain unpleasant things and close my eyes to
certain other things, there are influences that will put an end to my political
career." The soldier and the flag! Here is a minister of the Gospel who
says, or perhaps only whispers to himself, "I ought to be a pastor of the
poor, but if I don't please certain people I can't get the money to run the church."
Christ and Satan on the mountain top!
This is the tragedy of modern enterprise, with each man
assuming that you cannot possibly expect him to fail, if he must, for the sake
of some nobler triumph, each assert ing that he, poor, pygmy individual, must
win his little personal success in the vast on ward and upward movement of the
ages! As battles are won, and truths are vindicated, and nations are glorified,
through the blood of the men who risk all upon the issue, so the religious, and
civic, and commercial, and industrial life of today waits for men who are
willing to go down into the dark of failure for the establishment of principles
more important and lasting than their own success. Every man who fails in
public life merely because of his honesty makes it a little more difficult for
the next man to succeed by means of dishonesty. Every man who fails in business
merely because of his incorruptibility hastens the day when none shall dare
succeed by corrupt methods. The fame of such failures would ultimately compass
the ruin of dishonorable success. The story of such failures would be
incomparably more brilliant in splendid recklessness and courage than all the
annals of knightly chivalry, or pioneer bravery, or military conquest. To carry
such failures to their logical conclusion would be to write the most thrilling
chapter in the romance of humankind.
The greatest of all romances is found in the eternal truth of
the Christian religion, which shows the God of the Universe Him self entering
the lists for the glory of His Kingdom and the salvation of the world. Nothing
that the romantic imagination can conceive is so wonderful as the truth of the
sacrifice of the Son of God upon the Cross, and the splendor of that shameful
death. If we have not been fully alive until now to the claims of Christian
privilege, let us pray that some genuine apostolic fervor may awaken us, as S.
Paul raised Eutychus to life, to seize the possibilities of romantic adventure
in the Church, and in our home, and in our vocation.
Above: James Fenimore Cooper
