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English writings, 1915–1921

St Nikolai Velimirović

The Spiritual Rebirth of Europe (1920), 1. I. The Spiritual Rebirth of Europe

A Lecture delivered by
BISHOP NICHOLAI
at a Meeting arranged by the Society of the Faith
IN KING’S COLLEGE, LONDON
Before the Vice-Chancellor and other Members
of the University of London
on January 9, 1920

In introducing the BISHOP OF ŽIČA, the VICE-CHANCELLOR (Dr. S. R. Wells) said:—

YOUR IMPERIAL HIGHNESSES, MY LORDS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN,—It is my privilege as Vice-Chancellor to welcome to this, one of the most important Colleges of our University, the Right Reverend Bishop of Žiča, Nicholai Velimirović, and it is a duty which gives me peculiar pleasure, as Bishop Velimirović is essentially the type of man the University of London delights to honour. Had it been our practice to confer Honorary Degrees I have no doubt that, long ere this, had he been willing to accept the title, he would have been numbered among the Doctors of our University. Such, however, is not our custom, His Majesty the King and Her Majesty the Queen being the only Honorary Graduates of London.

We honour Bishop Velimirović not only because he is an eminent scholar and a notable patriot, but also because his learning is vivified by that progressive outlook, and that appreciation of the things of the spirit, the essential and eternal things that matter, which convert the scholar into a leader and inspirer of thought, and which have always determined the great movements in the intellectual world. His patriotism itself has been inspired by the highest ideals for humanity, by that love of freedom, by that noble spirit of service, by that willingness for self-sacrifice which have always been peculiarly venerated by the English people, and for ever gain the admiration of the enlightened nations of the world.

Before the war Bishop Nicholai Velimirović had a distinguished academic career: he held the post of Professor of Theology in the Metropolitan College of Serbia, at Belgrade; his name was known to a wide circle outside his own country as a scientific thinker and a leader in the progressive, intellectual life of the Balkans. He has played no small part in ripening that cultural and economic entente cordiale between England and Serbia and the Slavonic races, which promises so much for the intellectual and material prosperity of the world: that entente which, by realizing some of the highest ideals of humanity, may prove to be one of the great compensations for the war. May I claim that our University, and especially this College, with its School of Slavonic Studies, has played some small part in bringing about such an entente? It has certainly cherished the privilege of sharing in the endeavour.

When the war began, and the little Serbian nation, for the sake of liberty, challenged and withstood the whole strength of the mighty Hapsburg Empire, Nicholai Velimirović took his place as Chaplain in the ranks of the heroic defenders of his country. He was one of those who heartened and encouraged his countrymen to be true to that destiny of hope and suffering which, through 500 years of bondage and torture, had made them cling to the cause of freedom and progress, and gave them the spirit to be the nation which suffered that the world might live. That heroic resistance did much to save the cause of Europe: its history is written for ever in letters of blood and gold, not only in the annals of Serbia, but also in those of England and of humanity. When at last the resistance of that heroic little army was broken down, and the hordes of Bulgars and Austrians swept plundering, ravishing and murdering across the land to destroy the Serbian race, the resurrection of which from its Turkish life in death had begun scarcely a century before, and the remnants of the fighting men, dripping blood, made that for ever famous march of despair over the Arnaut Mountains, Nicholai Velimirović was one of those who, while they might well have lost hope for the time, never lost heart. Serbia had died before: she would live again!

What the spirit of the Serbs was then I know full well, for English nurses who were trained in my own wards at the Seamen’s Hospital, and English doctors who had been my pupils, were with them in that great retreat, and have infected me with some of their enthusiasm for the Serbian nation. Then came the time when English care and solicitude were nursing, in Corfu, the survivors of the Serbian army back to the strength which they had lost: and finally that renewed and wonderful advance from Salonika, which, with Allenby’s complete liberation of the Holy Land, seemed to herald the breaking of German power.

Before the retreat Bishop Velimirović would have preferred to stay with his countrymen, but duty called him to England and America to plead their cause, and to make provision that, should the material life of Serbia be saved, its spiritual life should not be killed or crippled. For four years he interpreted Serbia to England, both by the written and by the spoken word. If we now in some measure understand the soul of Serbia, that Serbia who, from Kossovo onwards, has counted her chief glories in the memory of suffering and defeat, in tears and not in rejoicings, it is to his genius chiefly that we owe our knowledge. There is, however, another side to his work in this country, that is perhaps less widely known: by the end of 1914 the boyhood of Serbia was almost wholly destroyed, or in Austrian hands: some few indeed struggled through Albania in 1915, where thousands died. It would not have been surprising if, in that great wreck of a whole nation, there had been neither hope nor care for the things of the mind. Serbian leaders, however, saw that in those boys lay the future of their race, and it fell to Nicholai Velimirović to see that they were fitted, should Serbia live, to be her spiritual leaders. With the help of the Serbian Relief Fund, of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Salisbury, Dr. Headlam (the former Principal of this College), Mr. Fynes Clinton, and other Englishmen, he placed them at good schools in England and at the Universities: thus not only equipping them for their future work, but at the same time forging one of the greatest links that can unite two nations, the bond of a common academic life. Some of those students are now back in Serbia, busy at the task of rebuilding their nation, equipped as perhaps they otherwise never would have been: others will soon follow. Nor is this connection between the two countries to stop: it has been arranged that an English Committee shall take the responsibility for keeping a number of Serbian Theological students in the English Universities, and, while not interfering in matters of religion, will bear the expense of their being trained in the best methods of English thought and science. In the near future it is hoped that we shall see some of these students here at King’s College; already there are in London students of the sister Balkan Orthodox nation, Greece, whose distinguished Ministers, Their Excellencies Dr. Gennadius (a scholar whom we regard as only less English than Greek), M. Caclamanos, together with the representatives of His Majesty King Peter, we have with us here to-day. This liaison between our Balkan Allies and ourselves must be in the highest degree fruitful, both to us and to them, and is bound to have a powerful influence on the world’s development. Now that the war is over, what has happened to the Serbian nation? It has done more than emerge alive, though greatly shattered by its ordeal: it has fought the good fight, it has kept the faith, it has saved its soul. Not only has it recovered its lands, it has also freed its kinsmen, the Slovenes and Croats, and has united with them into a single free nation of Jugo-Slavia. Before that nation and before historic Greece there should be a great and glorious future: together they will lead the development of the Near East, and in that future we believe that Bishop Velimirović and the students for whom he has cared will play an important part, because they care for the things of the spirit and for the highest ideals of mankind. We have learnt that Bishop Nicholai Velimirović not only interprets the mind of the orthodox and of the Serbs to us, but that he has also something to say which is peculiarly his own: that he is not only a provoker of thought and a stimulating personality, but has the even rarer gift of the practical application of ideals. I therefore feel sure that what he has to say this afternoon on the Spiritual Rebirth of Europe will not only interest and instruct those of us who have the privilege of hearing him, but will appeal to a far larger audience in the great world outside.

BISHOP NICHOLAI then delivered his lecture as follows: The aim of the present lecture is to bring before your noble consideration the most vital need of the European Continent. Please take all my reflections, observations and conclusions as coming from one who sees Europe from inside, you Britons yourselves being almost outsiders. It is a startling experience for one, who thinks intensely of Europe from the point of view of civilization, to find out that two countries, i.e. Great Britain and Russia, cannot be considered otherwise than as only partly belonging to Europe. If you take Great Britain as a hundred-eyed Argus, you may say that only ten out of her hundred eyes are looking to Europe and that with the other ninety eyes she is engaged in looking at all the other parts of the globe. Russia, on the other hand, represents a Janus with two faces, one of them turned to Asia and the other turned towards Europe, but still making a civilization of her own. That is the reason why you must be considered very much as outsiders, though in several points both of you must be taken as forming one whole with the Continent of Europe.

My thesis is simple and clear. I assert: (1) that Europe has put aside her centre of civilization—which has been the Christian religion for over twelve hundred years—counting that this centre had ceased to be the centre in the eighteenth century—and that she is now tottering on the edge, eagerly grasping, now this, now that, partial agency of human life as her central light and principal guide; and (2) that Europe’s day—if all the laws of history do not deceive us—soon will be over unless she returns to the centre, from which all her chief achievements in civilization hitherto have emanated as radiations.

Now let us, first of all, look into human history to gather from it some knowledge of the foundations of other civilizations. It is said, and rightly, that gods and gods alone are making civilization. The legend of Prometheus taking the fire from the gods and teaching men through it to make civilization, is true as a beautiful symbol of the absolute necessity of divine inspiration, divine fire, in every form of civilization. It is therefore much more correct to speak of civilizations of different religions, than of different nations and tribes. The religion of Osiris produced the civilization of Osiris in Egypt; the same religion would have produced a similar, if perhaps not quite the same, civilization in Rome or in London. The religion of Mithras produced the civilization of Mithras; that of Zeus produced the civilization of Zeus in Greece, and later on in Rome, too; that of Brahma produced the civilization of Brahma in India; that of Buddha produced the Buddhistic civilization in several countries; that of Islam produced the Islamic civilization in Arabia, Turkey, Spain and some other countries, and that of Christ produced the civilization of Christ in Europe, America and some other countries. Not nations produced civilization, but religions; and not men, but gods. Nations, tribes and men are only instruments of the divine fire, which is given them to use and which they are able to handle.

What are, then, the grandest remnants of all the lost civilizations, if not the human works dedicated to their gods? The grandest buildings left in Egypt, in Asia Minor, in Mexico, in Crete and Greece are the temples, the pyramids and the images of the corresponding divinities. Are not the best paintings, the greatest works of poetry, laws, philosophy and science, which have been left behind as a heritage of those dead and gone founders of these civilizations, inspired by and dedicated to their gods? Their gods were their guides and companions in life and also the memorial stones upon the ashes of their vanished lives. The greatest things that ever human brain, heart, and hands could create were confessedly created under the inspiration of religion. And if you leave the works of the lost religions and consider the contemporary civilization of non-Christian countries—in India, China or Japan—you will be struck by the same phenomenon, e.g. that religions are the real sources and foundations of them all. It is so, in spite of all the non-lovers of religion who call religion a popular philosophy of the people. This “philosophy of and for the people” has indeed created most marvellous things on our planet. No, religion is not a popular philosophy in a low sense, as its opponents would have it; but it is such conception of the world as could be incarnated in life by nations or races. A scientific philosophy might be incarnated in the life of one or of several individuals, but it never has been and never could be the foundation of a civilization. The smallest prophet or the smallest founder of a religion in Asia has been a far greater factor in making civilization than Kant or Hegel, the reasoning philosophers, reasoning by themselves, apart from God. Could you imagine a civilization inspired by Darwin or Spenser, or by Hartmann and Bergson? Impossible. Why? Simply because a reasoning philosopher gets into motion only your powers of reasoning, and the reasoning power cannot be the foundation stone of a gigantic work of civilization; whereas a prophet, revealing the will of God, sets in motion your brain, your heart, and your will. You may pour as much petrol as you like into a motor but it will not start moving unless it be lit. As soon as this takes place, the movement starts. In the same way you may pour as much worldly knowledge into your brain as you please; you will not start moving by the amount of your knowledge. Your heart must be filled, too; so that brain and heart may react to a mutual pressure, till both are set on fire. When both are burning you will be ready at their service, and your whole personality will move to perform some great work. This is just the procedure of a religious inspiration. When God speaks He always appeals to the man as a whole, and not to a part of a man. He fills brain and heart first and then enkindles them. God’s tongue is always a flaming tongue; that is why God is called The Word. Human tongues are mere separate letters, heard only at a short distance of space and time; but God’s Word echoes through thousands of years, breaking the walls of nationality and race, and moulding the cement for a civilization of hundreds of millions of human beings, counted by generation and generation.

If the past of mankind is able to teach us anything without misleading, it teaches us for certain, first of all, that no human faculty is so indestructible as religion; then, that religions, even the most primitive, have been the constructive powers and the key to civilization; and last, that though a race be divorced from religion, withered away, overthrown, it yet leaves behind itself its religious monuments. When a civilization is at its height we may always observe that science, philosophy and art are inspired by religion and dedicated to it. Take Solomon’s temple at Jerusalem. All that human brain and heart and hands of a whole race could perform was concentrated in that building—the sanctuary of God. Take the Acropolis and you will see the same thing, provided you do not consider it as the prejudiced Renan did, as a work of art for art’s sake. No! not so. But you will see also the same thing as with the Jewish temple, viz., that all the best Greek artists, scientists and thinkers were in the service of the religion of their race.

With this experience in front of us, let us now turn to Christianity, and to Europe—its chief field of civilization.

What was Christianity at the beginning? At the very beginning Christianity was Christ Himself. And who was Christ? He was the fulfilment of the prophets, the law, and “the heir of all things” (Heb. i. 3). What does it mean? It means that the Divine Law, given to the Jews through Moses and the prophets, was only a preparation for Christ—a straightening of the way for God¹—yea, a prophecy of Christ. But this is not all. Christ came as fulfilment of all the Divine Law given to different nations through different prophets. Thus He embraced and fulfilled the sacred law—which means the religion—of every civilization on earth from the beginning of the world. Just as he was the fulfilment of the Divine Law in Judaism, so He was the fulfilment of the Divine Law of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, of Parseeism, of Druidism, of the religions of Egypt and of Greece—in one word, of all that was divine in all religions, from the very lowest (adapted for men in their childhood) to the very highest (adapted for men in their ripe age). In essence, nought but Christ was ever worshipped on earth. But never before was He worshipped as a whole, but only as a part. When people worshipped power they worshipped Christ, for Christ is the greatest power. When they worshipped light, they worshipped Christ, for behold, Christ repeatedly spoke of himself as the Light of the World. When the Brahmins preached the unity of man with God they prophesied Christ, the absolute unity of man with God. When Buddha preached extreme self-abnegation he preached Christ’s methods. When Lao-Tze taught that nothing can be done by men as man, because everything is done by Tao, he almost verbally quoted Christ: not “I speak,” but “my Father speaketh through me, and the works I do I do not, but my Father is doing them.” When Zoroaster spoke of Ormuzd and Ahriman, he made the same sharp distinction of God and Mammon, of good and evil, as Christ did. When the childlike races conceived their gods as the miracle-doers, they indeed prepared the way for Christ, the greatest miracle-worker. When Islam—which I would call a pre-Christian, prophetic religion, if not historically, certainly essentially—asserts the resurrection of the body, the Last Judgment, and Jesus, Son of Mary, as the Judge of the world, I see no reason why we should not consider it as a prophecy of Christ, even as a post-eventum prophecy.

I am aware of two objections that you might make: firstly, “Why mix Christ with idolatry?” and secondly, “You make of Christ and Christianity a poor eclecticism.”

My answer to the first is: I do not mix Christ with idolatry. God forbid! I do not speak of misuse, of the abuses and extravagances of different religions, but of their essentially Divine Light. You may find as many misuses and extravagances as you like, even amongst Christians. Each separate religion had the task of realizing one aspect, one trait of Christianity. And by realizing one aspect only each of them went naturally to the extreme and the extreme always becomes idolatry. And then, I am very far from making Christ a poor eclectic, combining the aspects of all creeds and making a new creed. Not at all. He is God’s Wisdom in fulness, which, from the beginning of history, was striving to penetrate with one ray of His light, the different nations, and who, when the fulness of time was come, was sent in person. He came not as a part of the sun’s rays but as the sun itself, the source of all the rays, previously known and adored. He came as Incarnation, not as Reincarnation. He never walked before in person on this ground, but he warmed the world with His rays, through His elect. He was prophesying Himself all over the earth. His prophets, as His heralds, appeared in every corner on the earth preparing the way for Him. The earth was full of expectations, of symbols, of legends of Him. He was expected to come as Prophet, as Priest and as King. But this was not written only on the pages of the Old Testament; it was written on this whole globe of ours. The prophets ruled over the people of Israel for thousands of years; the priests ruled over India and Egypt for thousands of years; the sacred kings, called the sons of heaven, ruled over China for thousands of years.

Here are all the four human races, the blacks in Africa, the Semites in Palestine, the Aryans in India and the Mongols in China, keeping each one a special symbol and a special prophecy of Him. The descendants of the three sons of Noah were bearing the witness of Christ, each one in his own way. Therefore, it is said, “He came to His own.” The world was His own, and he came to inherit the world, to be the heir of all things. His own did not recognize Him, because they knew Him darkly, prophetically, in parts only. They knew Him in one part of the world as Light, in another as Power, in another as a Magician, in another as an Ascetic, in another as a Law-giver, in another as Transcendant Bliss, in another as the Keeper and Owner of all things. If you show to a barbarian all the parts of an aeroplane separately he will say that he knows all of them, i.e. wood, iron, tin, oil, steam, etc., but when he sees a machine flying in the air he will be fear-stricken and will confess that he never knew such a thing. Of course the simile is but approximate. For Christ was not a technical construction of different things, but a living being, the very Incarnation of all the Divine particles, which were known and adored in different countries, yet adored, not as particles, but as the whole. Every one who knows the Divine element in the teachings and doings of all religions on earth will find all of them either in Christ’s teaching or Christ’s works or Christ’s life. They are all slightly touched on in the Gospels, all of them without a single exception. Moses is recognizable in them as well as Krishna, and Zoroaster as well as Buddha, and Orpheus as well as Lao-Tze—all in one life Incarnate.

This induces me to believe that the study of religion is like a vicious circle, i.e. you cannot understand clearly any religion on earth except through Christ, and, on the other hand, you cannot understand Christ except through understanding of all religions on earth. So you cannot understand a human being as an organic being unless you know each separate part of its body and soul, nor can you know anything about any separate part of the human being unless you know it as a whole.

It is the most mysterious fact that I am speaking of, but nevertheless a fact. In all human history there has existed only one religion, that is, Christ’s religion. Considered historically, this religion has had two chapters only: firstly the prophecy of the Incarnation, and secondly the Incarnation of the prophecy. The third chapter is the Church of Christ, i.e. the process of Christ’s potential absorption of everything and everybody, of every nation and every race, of the living and of the dead into His mystical body.

Well, this religion, which is not one among religions, but which is the Religion, the only one, embracing all, fulfilling all, inheriting all, was meant first to be the foundation of the civilization of European humanity, and finally the foundation of the civilization of all mankind, of a pan-human civilization, it itself being a pan-human religion.

Why was Christ’s religion directed chiefly to the West and not to the East? Because the road leading to the West was the narrowest. On that road three huge bulwarks stood against Christ. The first was the nation of the Jews, the most rooted in its soil, the most tenacious in its exclusive patriotism and faith. The second was the Roman Empire. And the third was the barbarians of the Franco-German forests, of the Russian plains and of the British Isles. But gradually one obstacle was removed by another, until all of them disappeared. The first obstacle, the Jewish nation, was rooted out from its soil and dispersed all over the world. It was rooted out and dispersed by the Roman Empire. The second obstacle, the Roman Empire, was smashed and decomposed. This was done by the barbarians of Europe. The third obstacle, European barbarism, was removed by a long and hard training by the Christian Church during many centuries. It took about a century to remove the first obstacle. It took about five centuries to remove the second. And it took nearly ten centuries to remove the third.

Now the Christian religion created a civilization in Europe unique in human history. As long as this was the centre of human life, it inspired the greatest works of lasting value accomplished in Europe: in architecture, in painting, in sculpture, in poetry, in social reforms. Supposing that the European race now died out and Europe was deserted for some thousands of years: what would be possible for a travelling stranger to find and to see in the ashes of all that we to-day call the monumental work of our civilization? He would find out and he would be able to see only the remnants of those works inspired and executed under the influence of religion, i.e. the same thing that we are able to-day to see of the civilization of Egypt, or Crete or Mexico. He would find the great ruins of St. Sophia at Constantinople, but without Constantinople. He would see Notre Dame in Paris surrounded by desolate fields and by heaps of dust and dung. Travelling through England he would mark some ruins of cathedrals looking sadly like ivory teeth out of the ashy soil. If he established a museum, the greatest part of it would be occupied by the things found in the churches; by crucifixes, sacred vessels, inscriptions, wall paintings, probably Bibles too, etc. All that concerns religion will survive that which does not concern it. Why? Because that represents the greatest human efforts, the most solid work, the real material, the most careful execution, and the loving grace of the makers of those works. All that does not concern religion is made quickly, with as little effort as possible, with carelessness, of any material, and without any marked loving grace. Therefore this kind of work is likely to perish sooner than the first.

Up to the eighteenth century the Christian religion had been the incontestable centre of European civilization. But in the eighteenth century this centre began to be deserted, and the makers of civilization, the leaders of European humanity, slipped to the periphery of life, trying to find there a new central ideal, which would be a possible new source and a new start for civilization.

The greatest blow that the Christian religion had to suffer from outside was the blow from Islam. Yet the Christian world has succeeded gradually, and in our days definitely, in freeing itself from Islam. But the greatest blow ever dealt to the Christian religion from inside was that dealt by the French thinkers and writers in the eighteenth century. From this blow Christianity not only has not recovered up till now, but it has been retiring more and more from its central position and from its omnipotent influence and inspiration, to the humble place of a superfluous housemaid who has nothing to say about the household, but who is kept in the house on account of her former services and long stay.

The French encyclopædists declared war on religion. The French Revolution, in fact, began that war, the nineteenth century continued it, and the twentieth century is going on in the same track. The example of France was followed by Germany. It was Frederick the Great, one of Carlyle’s heroes, who was the first Christian king in Europe to confess his unbelief in God. Germany was followed by all other nations on the Continent, until the poison partially affected two outsiders, Russia and England.

It is very interesting to know what men take as their central idea when they thrust religion aside. A survey of European history during the last 150 years will give you exact information on this subject. The central idea of Europe during this period has been first politics, then science, and finally economics. From the middle of the eighteenth century up to 1848 politicians were the most respected men in Europe. They were almost worshipped as infallible. During that time accordingly you see men like Talleyrand, Goethe, and Lamartine—priests, poets, writers and philosophers, occupying themselves in politics.

But the old centre was mistrusted and abandoned, and science took the central place instead of politics.

The last half of the nineteenth century saw the Continent under the tyranny of all-dominant science. The scientists of Europe knew best—or at any rate pretended to know best—not only science, but religion, social life, and politics.

The absolutism of science soon came to an end when the scientists found that their definition of matter—the very foundation of their autocracy over Europe—was wrong, and that matter was something which escaped their hands, their eyes and their microscope. They lost their dominant power after a horrifying devastation of human conscience, and the banner of absolutism took a new direction, i.e. toward Labour. The economical problem in our days is the ominous star under which we are now living. This is the central idea, the central focus, around which the rejected politicians, scientists, artists and ecclesiastics are shyly dancing and looking at in bewilderment. Labour interests have taken the place of all other interests in civilized humanity, denying all other interests either altogether or putting their value at practically nothing.

Now, if you please, take into your consideration what have been the results of this constant change in the central idea, this prevention of religion from occupying its natural place? A very striking result has been that during the last 150 years in Europe, there has been created no single monument, either in architecture or in any other art, nearly as glorious as the ancient cathedrals, or Dante’s poetry, or Raphael’s painting, or Michael Angelo’s sculpture. Some might say: “Well, but we have invented electric light, radium, many new medical drugs, and the telegraph.” Certainly, but China invented the compass, printing and gunpowder, and yet she never took her inventions as a sufficient reason for parting with her religion.

A more striking result has been the number and the importance of wars and revolutions in Europe from the time of Frederick the Great till the present day. During the last 150 years, Europe has shed more human blood than all Asia during the last thousand years. Another very striking result is that goodness and charitableness on the Continent is amazingly decreased, and as a consequence inner peace and harmony in individual souls is lost. Mistrust of man toward his fellow man has become a general disease of society. Honour—personal honour—is the highest notion of secular ethics, a notion which conceals in itself a great deal of pure selfishness, self-conceit, anger against and contempt of others. The men and women of Europe have indeed become the children of wrath, irritable and quarrelsome, rushing from work to work, from pleasure to pleasure, in order not so much to find pleasure in it as to escape solitude. For solitude reveals the unbearable discontentedness with one’s own life, and leads either to religion or to suicide: very seldom to religion, and very often to suicide. Every student of life of non-Christian nations in Asia may have observed that there is more harmony of life, more inner peace—nay, more happiness in those non-Christian communities than in Europe. Why is this so? The reason is quite obvious. The nations of Asia still keep religion as the centre of their civilization and of their life, whereas Europe has lost her centre and is hunting now for a centre on the circumference.

What, then, is to be expected as a consequence of the present state of things in Europe? The number of those who believe in a speedy end of the world is growing from day to day in every country. There are writers, sects, groups of men and women, all eager believers in the end of the world. Is this belief altogether foolish, or is there some bitter truth in it? It seems indeed that the end of a world is near at hand. Yet not of the whole world, but of Europe. The spiritual base of life among European nations is obviously lost; in other words, the agency which makes for civilization is being discharged. Consequently, the Europe of to-day may be considered a barren country as far as any real progress is concerned. And by analogy with the fate of other races of old, which became barren for any new creation after they divorced themselves from religion, and perished, Europe stands indeed on the verge of perishing. People may be deceived by material progress. But certainly no civilization in history perished from famine of bread, but from famine of spirit. The want of spiritual life in the Europe of to-day is perfectly appalling. In the brutal struggle for wealth, in steady preparations for war, and in making war and revolutions, Europe has lost the refinement and loftiness of spirit which was characteristic of her before the nineteenth century. And now she is entirely plunged into economical problems. Apart from any other danger, it is quite enough danger for a race to employ all its mental and physical powers for many years on merely material problems. For simultaneously with the possibly growing capacity for dealing with material problems will be growing also the incapacity for the higher, spiritual sciences, and especially for religion. Besides, there is acute danger from the new peripheric centre of life in Europe, i.e. Labour. What is Labour going to do? Labour to-day is governing one of the greatest empires of the world, Russia. Its government means the absolute disintegration of human society. It governs, not by reason and justice, but by revengeful passion. It is grinding a great nation and a great civilization down to the very dust. There Labour is in the most passionate conflict with Christian religion. That, of course, was to be expected. For in Russia, unlike Western and Central Europe, the Christian religion, even in the nineteenth century, was not shifted from its central position in civilization. The world to-day is witnessing in Russia, as I believe, the decisive struggle between the forces which are for, and those which are against, civilization. The issue of this struggle in Russia will be the issue for the whole of Europe—either death or a spiritual rebirth. The death of Europe would, of course, mean Europe’s death and not the death of the Christian religion. Never that! Rejected Christ would go from Europe to His own somewhere else. All God’s children on earth are equal in His sight. He has no predilection for Europe, certainly not for a Europe covered with blood. There are three great empires in Asia awaiting Him. When the eyes of China, Japan and India are opened, they will see that Christ means fulfilment of their own law and their own prophets. And they will receive Him and make Him the heir of all things. And He, in his turn, will make them new-born, regenerated and glorious. And I only pray to God that in the event of their opportunity they will not come to defenceless Europe in the spirit of Tamerlane but in the spirit of St. Paul.

And yet if Europe’s fate is not definitely sealed in Heaven, because of Europe’s—not crimes, but criminality, i.e. criminal mentality, there is still a gleam of hope for Europe’s salvation at the eleventh hour. And this gleam of hope could be justified only by possible signs of the Christian religion being brought back to its central position in the life of European humanity. And this I should call the Spiritual Rebirth of Europe.

If you notice signs in Anglo-Saxon Labour—and especially its readiness to take Jesus the Carpenter as its infallible guide, instead of its own self-interest—then you may expect a rebirth of your own race, and through you of all of the Continent of Wrath. Labour to-day has indeed got every chance, and all the responsibility too.

And if you hear that the leaders of the continental nations, the best of whom are indifferent to religion, are being moved by the vision of Europe’s catastrophe and are declaring in repentance their faith in the salvation of Europe through Christ only, then you may redouble your prayers to God that all of them should do the same. If about 5,000 men, the Cabinet Ministers and Members of Parliaments in Europe, could be brought back to accept religion, it would save Europe. And it would be more beneficial for the world than the conversion of 5,000,000 non-Christians in Africa.

When you see that the Church in Russia is coming out of the struggle victorious, you may be sure that you have seen a sign of the spiritual rebirth of Europe.

When you are told that all Christian churches in the world have met in a reconciliatory spirit and in mutual love, in order to offer their help to a drowning world, even though that world, in its false pride, asks no help from the Church, then leap for joy, for God’s mercy will come upon Europe instead of God’s justice. And when you learn that during a century and more Christian Europe has been the most un-Christian country in the world, you will tremble in all your soul. Verily your trembling will be a sure sign of the postponement of the world’s destruction. For nothing leads so directly to a spiritual rebirth, to a change of spirit, as the trembling of the human soul before sin.

When you help those who are rejecting faith in Christ through not knowing which Church is true and which is not true, simply to embrace the Church in which they were baptized, not excluding from their respect and love all other churches, then you yourselves will have produced a sure sign of Europe’s continuing to live a creative life.

And finally, when you see that the spirit of religion, the only constructive, the only life-giving agency, is becoming the guiding spirit in education, in family life, in literature and journalism, in shops, in streets, in towns and in villages, not only in your own country but especially on the Continent, then know that God has forgiven Europe and that she is on the way to become New Europe.

Whoever can work, let him work to bring about these signs; whoever can pray, let him pray; whoever can think, let him think. All may be helpful. For unless those signs of a religious rebirth in Europe, i.e. of bringing religion to the very centre of life, be soon visible, the catastrophe that you may witness during your own life, of a Continent crashing into ruin, will be without a parallel in history.

At the conclusion of the lecture, a cordial vote of thanks having been accorded the lecturer, on the motion of the Dean of King’s College (the Rev. W. R. Matthews, B.D.), seconded by the Bishop of Woolwich, the Vice-Chancellor presented Dr. Velimirović with a water-colour sketch of the interior of St. Paul’s Cathedral, painted by Mr. A. E. Henderson for the purpose, and bearing the following inscription:—

TO HIS HOLINESS NICHOLAI VELIMIROVIĆ,
BISHOP OF ŽIČA,
THIS PICTURE IS PRESENTED BY
THE SOCIETY OF THE FAITH IN MEMORY OF HIS
SERMON IN ST. PAUL’S CATHEDRAL,
LONDON, ON DEC. 16, 1919.

In doing so he said, “My Lord Bishop, it is with great pleasure that, on behalf of the Society, by the initiative of which we have had the privilege of listening to you this afternoon, I ask you to accept this fine picture as a souvenir of the event to which the inscription on it has reference. It was an historic occasion, for, I am told, you are the first person, not being in formal communion with the Anglican Communion, that has preached from the pulpit of our Metropolitan Cathedral. This picture will, I trust, remind you not only of that happy event but that many of us here in England value the inspiration and stimulus which you have given us.”

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