The Unseen Powers.
I. That which lies on the very surface of St. Paul's language is this commanding truth: that spiritual forces are much greater than material forces. It takes time and trouble for many of us to be really certain of this truth, because from time to time in the world events appear to contradict, or at least to overcloud, it; and yet in the long run the truth asserts itself, ay infallibly. A strong will is a more formidable thing than the most highly developed muscle. They, it has been said, who aspire to rule in permanence, must base their throne, not upon bayonets, but upon convictions and sympathies, upon understandings, and upon hearts. This is true within the sphere of human nature, and St. Paul knew that the Church had to contend with the thought and the reason of paganism much more truly than with its pro-consuls and its legions.
II. Behind all that met the eye in daily life St. Paul discovered another world that did not meet the eye, but which was, for him at least, equally real. Behind all the social tranquillity, all the order, all the enjoyment, of life, all the widening intercourse between races and classes, all the maintenance of law with a fair amount of municipal and personal liberty, which distinguished undoubtedly the imperial regime considered as a whole, behind all that spoke and acted in this vast and most imposing system, behind all its seeming stability and all its progress, St. Paul discerned other forms hovering, guiding, marshalling, arranging, inspiring, that which met the eye. "Do not let us deceive ourselves," he cried, "for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."
III. The contest of which St. Paul is speaking is not only to be waged on the great scene of history. St. Paul is speaking of contests humbler, less public, but certainly not less tragical, the contests which are waged sooner or later, with more or less intensity, with the most divergent results, around, within, each human soul. It is within ourselves that we meet now, as the first Christians met, the onset of the principalities and powers; it is in resisting them that we really contribute our little share to the issue of the great battle that rages still as it raged then, which will rage on, between good and evil until the end comes, and the combatants meet with their rewards.
H. P. Liddon, Christian World Pulpit,vol. i., p. 17.