Title: The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, Volume 1, January, 1880
Author: Various
Language: English
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  Scientific and Religious Journal.


  VOL. I.      JANUARY, 1880.      NO. 1.



THE CONFLICT.


The pyramids, temples and palaces of Thebes are monuments of the ancient
intellects of our race. Great thinkers only were capable of giving to
the world the Vedas, the Apollo Belvidere and the Parthenon. The arts
and astronomy of Egypt harmonize very poorly with the idea that modern
scientists have all the wisdom and intelligence known in the history of
the ages. Among the wonderful characters of olden times we find
Epictetus, Josephus, Strabo, Pliny, Seneca, Virgil, Aristotle, Plato,
Tacitus, Thucydides and Herodotus.

The "Speculation of Evolution of Species" was advocated among the Greeks
six hundred years before the birth of Christ. Two thousand and three
hundred years ago the entire system of German philosophy, along with
modern pantheism, was advocated by the Buddhists and Brahmins.

In many very important respects the ancients were in advance of us,
especially in the arts, and we can not boast of superiority in either
letters or philosophy. "The gentlemen of modern materialistic schools do
not compare favorably with Plato and Cicero in the elevation and
reverence of their opinions." "Science has certainly made some
advancement, but where is the warrant for the boasting" of sciolists of
modern times?

Buddhists taught the most perfect outline of materialism in general.
"They believed in a supreme force, but denied the existence of a Supreme
Being. They rejected inquiry into first causes as unscientific,"
maintaining that facts alone were to be dealt with in all our
investigations.

The Brahmin contemplated the moment when his spirit would flow back into
the great "Pantheistic Being."

Modern materialists say, "We deal only with facts." "We never
speculate." The Buddhists, and the unbelievers who figure so boastingly
upon the rostrum in modern times, speak alike. They say: "As many facts
and second causes as you please, but ask no questions about first
causes; _that_ is unscientific." We should ask no questions (?) about
the invisible. They have been very true (?) to their own principles.

There is nothing speculative (?) in the hypothesis that General George
Washington was evolved from a crustacean. There never was a more absurd
and wild speculation. It is an old speculation. Anaximander, who lived
six centuries before Christ, advocated the assumption. His words are the
following: "The sun's heat, acting on the original miry earth, produced
filmy bladders or bubbles, and these, becoming surrounded with a prickly
rind, at length burst open, and as from an egg, animals came forth. At
first they were ill-formed and imperfect, but subsequently they
elaborated and developed." This has the genuine ring of the language of
modern unbelievers.

Christianity, in its beginning, had to encounter this "speculation"
along with the current literature and philosophy of a civilization which
was semi-barbarous and centuries old, but it triumphed over all, and in
the third century it triumphed everywhere. Since that time one effort
has been made upon the part of paganism to regain her former strength in
the old world. Julian made that effort. He tried to revive and establish
the supremacy of pagan thought by the power of the state. Subsequent to
this it disappeared in the east, and has only plead for toleration in
the west. But the dark ages came on in all their hideousness, and
unbelief developed itself about the close of the fifteenth century, all
over Europe. Paganism, as the result, was fostered near the bosom of
the church. The fifth Lateran Council proclaimed anew the tenet of the
imperishability of the spirit of man. The Padua University adopted a
system of materialism taught in the works of Alexander, of Aphrodisias.
A form of pantheism known in the philosophy of Averroes soon became a
center of skepticism.

In the latter part of the seventeenth century modern unbelievers began
their assaults. Lord Herbert and Hobbs in England, Spinoza in Holland,
and Bayle in France.

In seventeen hundred and thirteen Anthony Collins published a discourse
for the encouragement of a "clique" called "Free-thinkers." This
discourse was thoroughly answered by Bently. In seventeen hundred and
twenty-seven Woolston made an effort to rationalize the miracles out of
existence, interpreting them after the style of Mr. Strauss. Three years
later Tyndal got out his dialogue called "Christianity as old as the
Creation." The world received in return for this "Butler's Analogy of
Natural and Revealed Religion." In seventeen hundred and thirty-seven
Morgan's "Moral Philosophy" made its appearance, claiming the
sufficiency of the moral law without any other religion. Warburton's
"Divine Legation of Moses" was gotten up in reply to this philosophy.
Thomas Chubb wrote a discourse upon reason, and got out a few other
small tracts denying the utility of prayer, and calling in question the
truth of the Scriptures of both Testaments, in the line of Morgan's
philosophy. Bolingbroke, ignorant of the law, "that the greatest good of
the greatest number is to be sought after," even at the expense of the
lives of a few wicked Canaanites, assailed the justice and the
benevolence of the Bible God after Col Ingersoll's style, and boldly
avowed that the miracles of the New Testament never transpired; said,
"If they did occur they attested the Revelation." Voltaire lived between
1694 and 1788. He made himself busy in France, while Bolingbroke and
Tyndal and Woolston, and Hume and Morgan were at work in England. Then
Didoret, of France, made his appearance upon the stage as a bold
defender of Atheism. Next comes D'Holbach, the leading author of the
"Systeme de la Nature," which came out in 1774. Its object was to strike
down the idea of a God, of an intelligence separate from matter, of
free-will, and of immortality. Didoret and others are accused of
assisting in getting this book before the world. Rousseau lived in those
times, and assailed Christianity after the manner of Hume. To all these
enemies of Christianity we must add Condillac, who originated the
materialistic philosophy of France.

Gibbon and Paine came into notice after Bolingbroke, and the terrible
strife continued. Christianity was pronounced dead, and a prostitute was
chosen to impersonate the "Goddess of Reason" in the national
convention. God being dethroned in France, we should naturally look
there for the "absolute liberty" which unbelievers talk so much about.
But how was it? Were the people without a religious nature? Could they
think more freely? Were they in any sense better off? No, they "followed
the prostitute into the church of 'Notre Dame' in a grand procession and
seated her upon the high altar, where she was worshiped by the
audience." This was the result of the labors of all the authors to which
I have called your attention. It was a wonderful gain? In all the public
cemeteries this inscription was read: "Death is an eternal sleep."
Cabanis, Destutt de Tracy and Volney close up the seventeenth century,
but just about this time the "Critique of Pure Reason," a work which is
the bed-rock of modern metaphysics, makes its appearance. According to
its teachings there are no realities in the world.

The struggle is passed in England. In France all are dull, drowsy. In
Germany all are hungry for the food that satisfies unbelievers. The
"Critique of Pure Reason" was followed by the labors of Fitche. He was
succeeded by Schelling, and he by Hegel. All forms of torture must be
added to this account of the conflict if we would get a glimpse of the
strength of the Christian religion and of the religious element in man's
nature, from the amount of resistance which they have defied. Eusebius
says, "The swords became dull and shattered" under Diocletian. "The
executioners became weary and had to relieve each other." This would not
look as though Christianity would take the throne in four score years,
but it did in spite of all those cruel murders. Through Constantine it
became the state religion of the Roman Empire. Paganism crumbled down
and Christianity triumphed over all the opposition of the old world. The
books of the Old and New Testaments have all been thoroughly tested,
over and over in the fiery furnace of criticism, but Christianity still
lives to bless the hearts of widows and orphans; to bless the
disappointed and disconsolate. To-day there are more Christians in the
world than ever before.

What has unbelief to give to the people of our age more than it offered
centuries ago? Nothing! Nothing!! Nothing!!!

"There is nothing new under the sun."



THE BIBLE--THE BACKGROUND AND THE PICTURE.


This book is admired and respected above all others for its antiquity,
its usefulness, its conflicts, and character. It has been expressly
denominated "The book of books." Its professions are such that no
reasonable man can consistently lay it aside without giving it a careful
examination. The nature of every question determines its claims upon our
intelligence. If it professes to involve only a small interest its
claims are not so pressing.

The questions of the Bible hold in their principles the present and
eternal interests of our humanity, and therefore challenge the attention
of the world. Thousands of the wisest and best men of the ages have been
intensely interested in its contents. Its great influence and reputation
are evidences of its trustworthiness, and of the consistency and
intelligence of those who give it their attention; for sensible men do
not disregard questions of great importance. This book contains a
record of many ugly, dark and wicked deeds, known in the lives of wicked
men and nations, with imperfections and apostacies of individuals in
high places. This is what we must look for in a book of its pretensions.
It professes to contain a revelation of God and his will to man. The
ugly, wicked, licentious, and bloody things constitute the background of
the picture, representing man in all his ways. It is also shaded with
all there was, and is, of moral and noble character in the human. God
with his attributes, as the true, grand and glorious Bible picture,
shines out through this human background. The justice of God, with his
love, long suffering and tender mercies, his approbation and
disapprobation, must in the very nature of things be revealed in
connection with human character as it presents itself in iniquity and
crime, in piety and virtue, both individual and national, in order that
the revelation may be complete, full and perfect. The history of men and
nations must also be true, sufficiently full to call out, in the divine
dealings, all there is in the divine character; otherwise, the
revelation would be partial and imperfect.

No physician ever revealed his skill without his patients. No court has
ever revealed its justice without its cases. The doctor's dealings with
his patients measure the extent of his known skill. Allowing that he
understands himself and the conditions of his patients perfectly, and
does his whole duty, the revelation of his skill must be perfect, to the
full extent of its connection with the diseases treated. So it is with
the revealed justice of the court. This rule is a necessary law,
governing all revelations of character, both human and divine; otherwise
we are left in the dark with reference to the true character of the one
who makes the revelation. Our common sense is such that we are always
led astray by improper action, unless our superior wisdom enables us to
know that the action is improper. Improper action upon the part of a
doctor reveals imperfect skill; on the part of the court it reveals
imperfect justice, if it is not an entire want of skill and justice.

No such imperfection belongs to our God; therefore the revelation which
he made needs only to be understood and it will never mislead us. These
great principles of common sense are to be applied in the revelations of
God to the nations as the God of nations. Such being the case, we have a
very interesting field of thought before us in the bloody scenes that
are known in the history of nations, as it is given in the Bible. Where
is the morality and righteousness of the wars of which we read? Where is
the justice and goodness of God in the bloody wars of Israel? Where is
the righteousness of capital punishment? A great many persons say, in
their ignorance, there is no righteousness in those things. Friend,
travel slowly over this ground. "Take the shoes off thy feet, for it is
holy ground." Go into the Bible and look! God is there. You knew it not.
Principles never change. Circumstances change and necessitate changes of
law, but that which was right at any time in the history of our race is
right at all times, under the same circumstances. Is there such a thing
as morality carried into public relations? Is there such a thing as
jurisprudence? Yes; jurisprudence is morality carried into public
relations in the following law: "That course of conduct which pertains
to the greatest good of the greatest number is right." This law is of
universal application. It belongs to men in all their relations, both
public and private, collectively and individually. In the relation of
the State to its citizens it taxes them for the support of government,
it fines, imprisons and puts them to death for crime. In the relation of
nation to nation it imposes tariffs and declares war, filling history
with scenes of blood and woe. The common sense of mankind approves this
law, and the Bible declares it just. Wars were approved of God, when
they were for the greatest good of the greater number. It was upon the
same principle that all the divine judgments were administered, from the
destruction of the Antediluvians down to the overthrow of Jerusalem by
Titus.

This law is the substratum in moral righteousness, underlying all that
is right. Such is its wonderful latitude and longitude that, in order to
carry it out, it sometimes becomes necessary to tilt a nation into a
sea of blood and replace it with a better people. Unbelievers and
skeptics who admit this are guilty of wresting Bible facts from their
proper places and testing them upon the plane of morality, regardless of
the laws of jurisprudence.

This erroneous method of reasoning leads the minds of many ignorant and
unsuspecting persons away from the right ways of God. The guilty
reasoner justifies taxation, fines, imprisonment and wars in the history
of his own country.

It sometimes seems cruel to carry out this great moral principle of
which we are treating; it is nevertheless right, and men who abuse its
facts and turn things upside down are guilty of opposing the right.

Unbelievers are guilty of selecting from the Bible all that can be
tortured out of its place in the laws of jurisprudence and made to look
ugly out of its proper relations, and are continually holding such
things up before the people, turning them into ridicule, and at the same
time they have been through all the bloody scenes of war and justify
themselves, wishing to be known in many instances as Major, General or
Colonel. We have some such in our own country. They seem to have never
learned that many things which are good for humanity are very ugly out
of their proper relations. I am glad that God has revealed himself in
the jurisprudence of nations, for the facts given inspire confidence in
rulers and officials, strength to judges upon the bench, and nerve to
warriors who are acting with direct reference to the "greatest good of
the greatest number."

A history of God in his dealings with states and nations in order to a
perfect revelation of himself necessitates a history of states and
nations so far as it is necessary to make known the approbation and
disapprobation of God in connection with all that may ever enter into
national or state character. Without this we would find states and
nations where God did not see fit to show himself. We must find him
wherever we find man, approving or disapproving. This is just what we do
in the Bible. We do it in no other book. But let us ever remember that
all that is wicked had its origin with wicked men and demons, and that
the Divine Being, with all his attributes, appears in the foreground in
all his relations to men and their conduct, as the grand Bible picture
shining out through all the darkness and gloom, surrounded with the
virtues and noble deeds of all his worshipers, and that he is building
up and throwing down as his righteous judgment approves or disapproves.
This revelation of God is like the sun at noonday bursting through dark
and heavy clouds and blessing the earth with its rays. In making this
revelation, which is related negatively or affirmatively to all there is
in human history, God saw fit to communicate his will through man, and
in his own language, except in the gift of the great charter of the
national existence of the children of Israel and the great foundation
truth of the church of God. These he uttered with his own wonderful
voice.

Was it reasonable to expect a revelation from God? Is it necessary to
the greatest good of the greatest number? If so, it is a thought at once
involving the moral character of God and necessitating a revelation of
himself. In answering these questions intelligently we must look after
the demands for such a communication. Where shall we find them? Answer,
in the wants of our humanity. Here two kinds of light are needed for two
pair of eyes in order that we may be happy in two respects. First,
physical light for the physical eyes, in order to the enjoyment of
physical life in a material world. Second, the light of knowledge for
the eyes of the understanding, in order to the enjoyment of spiritual
life in a spiritual world. It is universally conceded that there are
means provided in nature to meet man's physical wants and adaptations
that manifest the wisdom that belongs to God; also, that it would have
been the work of a demon to create man with these wants, like so many
empty vessels, without any provision to satisfy or fill them. Without
those supplies our suffering would be great and our wretchedness
unendurable. Is there no liability to mental suffering? Are there no
spiritual wants consequent upon the nature of mind?

Is it not unreasonable to allow that "Infinite wisdom" provided for all
our physical wants and left our spirits with all their demands, like so
many children away out in the darkness without hope, uneasy, restless,
always dissatisfied, and ever trying to get into the possession of the
knowledge of the unseen and future, without one ray of mental light
shining out from the heavens upon our relations to perfect our condition
and declare the glorious goodness of an all-wise Creator? Volney says,
"Provident nature having endowed the heart of man with inexhaustible
hope, he set about finding happiness in this world, and failing in his
efforts, he set out in his imagination and created a world for himself,
where, free from tyrants, he could have all his wrongs redressed and
enjoy unsullied bliss." This is Volney's account of the origin of
religion, the tap-root of the tree. It contains a most wonderful
concession, one that Tyndal made when he said, "There is a place in
man's psychological nature for religion." Is there a place in man's
physical nature for bread and meat, for food of every variety that man's
soul desires? Do we attribute all the mercies of physical life to a
supreme intelligence? Has that intelligence created us and left us
endowed with "Inexhaustible hope," to be disappointed forever, and the
only result, the "imaginary" creation of the Christian's happy heaven.
But Volney makes another grand concession in the quotation which I have
given, and that is the nature of the Christian's future world in its
relations to wrongs as well as tyrants, neither are to exist there. That
the Christian's religion, with its beautiful world, does fill up the
soul's demands is a fact unintentionally conceded by Volney, and known
throughout the land in the contentment and bliss and heroism of the
dying Christian. In this hope alone man's spiritual wants are met. This,
with all that pertains to it, is in the revelation that God has made to
our race. How could this be made? I answer, it was made by the spirit of
God. "Holy men of old spake as they were moved upon by the Holy Spirit."
This is what we call _inspiration_. This word is a translation of
"_Theopneustos_," which is from "Theos," _God_, "pneuma," _spirit_,
_Spirit of God_. Is it reasonable to allow that this revelation could be
given by the spirit of God through holy men? I will let an infidel
answer this question. Bolingbroke said, "It is just as easy to
comprehend the operation of the spirit of God upon the mind of a prophet
in order to give his will to us as it is to comprehend the operations of
our own spirits upon our physical nature in order to an expression of
our own thoughts." Has such a revelation been made? From all we know of
man, his wants, and the adaptation of means in nature to those wants, we
are driven to the conclusion that it has, presenting the means adapted
to our spiritual wants so perfectly as to enable us to realize fully
what Volney declares our very nature, as creatures of hope, impelled us
to create "in our imaginations for ourselves." There is no consistent
ground that any man can occupy between Christianity and Atheism. And if
there is no God, "nature," or the "forces," or whatever lies behind
them, to which they belong, as the manifest energies of the same, call
it what you may, has made a very unreasonable, bungling mistake in
giving in the very nature of man's mind an empty vessel that is to be
filled only by the false whims of the imagination of an ever restless
and dissatisfied spirit, which, in that case, is to be eternally
disappointed and plunged deeper down by the realization of the fact that
all its anxieties and hopes were only so many misleading demons.

In order to a perfect revelation of God to man it was necessary that the
entire page, the "background" as well as the "foreground," or the human
as well as the divine, should be truth, and in every case, all the truth
that was necessary to enable man to realize and understand the whys and
wherefores of the divine procedure; and also to call out in word or
action the Divine Being in all his relations to the conduct of the
children of men. Such a record is found in the Bible, given to us by men
who were impelled and borne by the Holy Spirit when they wrote and
spoke. But it was not necessary that anything upon the dark human
"background" of this picture should have its origin with God; it was
only necessary that, having originated with man, men or demons, it
should be put to record just as it was in all its heinousness and
wickedness in order that we might see the true character of God in his
relations to it. If a wise physician should undertake to make himself
known to the world he would not give us a history of all he did with
every patient, and at the same time fail to give us just so much of the
true history of each patient as would be necessary to enable us to
understand him in all that he did, for both stand or fall together. So
it is in the Bible revelation of God to man. Take away the "background"
of the picture, and the picture itself is destroyed. That which skeptics
in their ignorance are always trying to ridicule is just as essential to
a revelation of God in his justice, purity, love and power as the word
of God himself. That is to say, the revelation has an objective as well
as a subjective side. The subjective is God in his attributes, and the
objective is man in his works. It was the objective that drew out the
subjective, because all was done for the objective. Take either side
away and the revelation ceases to exist. On the subjective side all is
of God in its origin, is charged up to him, being spoken by him, and in
his name, or done by him, or by his authority. The indices to this great
truth are in these or similar phrases, "Hear, O, Israel, thus saith the
Lord, thy God," "Thus saith the Lord," "And the Lord said," "The Lord
spake, saying," "The Lord said unto me," "The word of the Lord came unto
me," "The Lord commanded," "The burthen of the word of the Lord to,"
"The Lord answered, saying." We are not authorized to charge, as many
through their ignorance or wickedness have done, all that we read about
in the Bible to God as the author. The words and doings of wicked men
and demons are truthfully recorded there, and they are often licentious
and blasphemous. The words and doings of good men and angels are there,
and the words and doings of God are there. We are authorized to charge
to God's account that only which is spoken in his name, or by his
instructions, along with that which was done by him, or by his
authority, or approved by him. When we get outside of these
common-sense thoughts in our interpretations of Bible history we are
acting upon our own responsibility, and are liable to be found doing
violence to the divine will. If we contradict the record we call in
question the veracity of the spirit which controlled the writer, whether
the statement relates to God, man or demons. But this statement does not
apply to mistranslations, for it is one thing to contradict an
uninspired translator, and another altogether to contradict the
statement of one controlled by the spirit of God. We fearlessly assert
that the Bible is just the book that common-sense and reason demands
that it should be in order to contain a revelation of God to man. We
would as soon attempt to destroy the divine and lovely side, as change
its character, so far as to take from its pages its record of
wickedness, misery and woe, for it amounts to the same thing. One more
question of importance bearing on this subject demands our attention,
and that is the question of miracles. Men have, without any authority
from the Bible, treated all miracles as violations of natural law. But
it would be well for us to determine the extent of our knowledge of
natural laws before we thus dogmatize. That which we call miracle may be
in perfect harmony with law that lies just beyond our knowledge.
Omniscience seems to be a necessary qualification for such theorizing as
asserts that miracles are violations of the laws of nature. Omnipotence
is an essential attribute of the Ruler of the universe. But in order to
its existence, the Infinite one must be above the laws which he has
established, able to take hold of those laws and handle them as he sees
proper, otherwise he is not all-powerful. On the simple plane of nature
we get lost. Who can account for "Partheno Genesis," or generation
without any known sexual organs, which obtains in the animal kingdom.
"The spirit of God moved upon," "brooded over" the face of the great
deep and life filled the waters. "The Holy Spirit overshadowed the
Virgin" and the Nazarene was begotten. The original expresses the same
idea in both cases. Scientists who are radical materialists admit this
wonderful feat in the animal kingdom as a natural affair, and yet,
without any authority from the Bible, speak of the birth of Christ as
the result of "Miraculous conception," in the sense of a violation of
natural law. What natural law is violated in "Partheno Genesis?" With me
it is allowable that a thousand more just such beings might be, and if
necessary to the accomplishment of the great purposes of God, would be
produced under the same circumstances and by the same instrumentalities.
The feature of the question of miracles which bears on the subject of a
divine revelation must now be considered. It is this, would a book
containing such a record as that which we have in the Bible, except the
record of miracles, reveal God in his attributes to our world? We lay it
down as a correct proposition that we must have creative and life-giving
power manifested in order to a revelation of God.

If the Bible contained no record of the exercise of powers above the
human it would reveal only a human God, which would be no God; and
common sense would declare, "It is a book treating of, and presenting
man in his attributes." Those facts upon its pages which are in the
power of God alone confirm, that is, make sure, the revelation of God to
man. Without this feature of the book common sense would have at least
one good excuse for rejecting its claims. The Master recognizes this
fact in the saying, "If I do not the works of my Father believe me not,
but if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works, that ye may
know and believe that the Father is in me and I in him." Here we have
the fact of "God revealed in the flesh," evinced by the works which the
Savior performed. The foundation of faith, or the obligation to believe,
is identified with those works. They were a greater evidence of his
divinity than the words of any prophet, although those words were the
words of the Divine Spirit. Jesus said, "I have greater witness than
that of John, for the works which the Father hath given me to finish,
the same works that I do, bear witness of me that the Father hath sent
me." "If I had not done among them the works which none other man did,
they had not had sin; their rejection of my claims would be justifiable
but for the fact that my divinity is demonstrated in the works which I
do." The same thought accompanies the introduction of the gospel of
Jesus Christ in the preaching of the Apostles. Paul said, "Our gospel
came not unto you in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Spirit."
"They went everywhere preaching the word; the Lord working with them and
confirming the word with signs following." The confirmation was not in
the simple fact that miracles were wrought, but in their character. The
miracles of Christ were not in the power of false prophets, magicians,
or demons. They were in the power of God. Peter said, "God anointed
Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power," and that "He
went about doing good, and healing all who were oppressed of the devil;
for God was with him." The presence of God was manifested in his
miracles.

The question is often asked, "Why were they not continued throughout the
Christian dispensation?" Answer: If they had been continued, they would
have lost all their power over the mind by becoming ordinary, and then
they would cease to have any bearing whatever in the establishment of a
divine proposition. It was not necessary to continue them beyond the
witnesses whose testimony closed up the revelation of God. "A covenant
once confirmed no man disannulleth or addeth thereto." A continual
repetition of the evidence of confirmation was not necessary in order to
give faith in a communication already confirmed and left in a historic
age for the faith of the world. It is true of sense that the continual
sensuous experience causes the object experienced to lose its
controlling power, but the opposite is true of faith. So he who knew
best what man's nature required ordained that the just should walk by
faith and not by sense. And to this end he confirmed "once" the
revelation of himself and his will, and left it in the world as his
witness to produce faith. "If we receive the witness of men the witness
of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which he hath
testified of his Son. He that believeth hath the witness in himself; he
that believeth not God hath made him a liar, because he believeth not
the _record_ that God gave of his Son." Is it not a dangerous thing to
make God a liar? Is it not a great insult? All unbelievers are thus
guilty before God. Our Savior did not speak unadvisedly when he said:
"He that believeth not shall be condemned."

"Life and immortality are brought to light through the Gospel." Is it
not strange that dying men will reject the motive of life? "This is the
record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his
Son; he that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God
hath not life." Jesus "came to his own and his own received him not, but
as many as received him to them gave he power to become the sons of
God." Will we possess him through faith and live, or shall we make God a
liar, die in our sins, be condemned and banished from the presence of
God and the glory of his power?

       *       *       *       *       *

The practice of dating from the Christian era was first introduced about
the year 527, by Dionisius, surnamed "Exiguus," but better known as
Deny's le Petit, a monk of Scythia and a Roman abbot. It was not
introduced into Italy until the sixth century. It was first used in
France in the seventh century; it was universally established in France
in the eighth century. It was used in England in 680; it was in general
use in the eighth century. The years of the Christian era are described
in ancient documents as the years "of Grace," of "the Incarnation," of
"our Lord," of "the Nativity," etc.--_Chambers._

       *       *       *       *       *

The cardinal virtues are Justice, Prudence, Temperance and Fortitude.
_Cardinal_ signifies, in a general sense, principal or pre-eminent. It
comes from the Latin word _cardo_, a hinge. Take cardinal things away
from any science and its foundation is gone. Everything in science turns
upon cardinal things, as the word _cardo_ signifies.



A FUNERAL ORATION.

BY COL. G. DE VEVEU.


     Of the future, the hereafter, we are as ignorant as we are of the
     infinite conditions through which we have passed during the
     eternity which has preceded our brief present existences. If we
     could know the history of our past we might get a glimpse of our
     future; but no message ever reached man from beyond the grave. The
     past is a mere sealed book, the future is a blank. No records are
     left to us save those written in the rocks and the evidences
     brought before our senses; they tell their own stories. Whence came
     we? Whither are we tending? Ah! who can tell? Some profess to know,
     but they know not. Where have last summer's roses gone? What will
     become of yon dry leaf, torn from its parent stem by this wintry
     blast? Like us they disappear and are merged into the ocean of
     matter from which they are evolved, ready to be re-combined into
     new forms of beauty; for although individual existences perish,
     matter is imperishable; having had no birth it will have no death.
     Like time and space, it is infinite and eternal. Brought forth into
     this world without being consulted, we are hurried out of it
     without our consent. Like that leaf, which was the hope of spring,
     the pride and glory of summer, we are rudely torn away, the sport
     of destiny, to return to the elements of nature from which we
     spring--dust to dust. The past is beyond recall; the future is
     veiled in obscurity and in doubt; the present alone is ours.

The above is from the Boston _Investigator_. It has gone the rounds of
the press, and it is regarded as a very fine literary production. But
all is not gold that glitters. This oration was delivered as a tribute
of respect to the memory of Mrs. Boulay. It is a curiosity when viewed
from the speaker's standpoint. The man was evidently broken down in the
presence of death. I have sometimes thought it would be well for the
unbelievers to adopt the custom of delivering funeral sermons, for it is
certain, from all that is known of man, that no strong defense of
unbelief, nor even a respectable presentation of it, is made in the
presence of death. When an unbeliever speaks at his brother's grave of
the "rustling of wings," I intuitively think of the old trite saying,
"It is but one step from the sublime to the ridiculous." That step is
from the "rustling of wings" to "infidelity." Col. G. Veveu, in the
above oration, sticks close to his unbelief, but smashes _his science_.
If our incredulous friends will continue to respect the dead enough to
remember them with an oration at their graves, I think it will be but a
short time till the people all over the country will see the hollow,
empty, good-for-nothing character of unbelief.

Mr. Veveu says, "Although individual existences perish, matter is
imperishable; having had _no birth_ (_italics mine_) it will have _no
death_." A wonderful discovery! _Matter had no birth_; organisms are
born. They existed, however, prior to their birth. The matter that
composed them existed before it entered into organic forms. The living
element, spirit, or whatever you please to name it, took hold of the
elements of matter and built the organism. The life existed before the
organism. Why should it perish with it? Matter exists before birth and
after death. Spirit also exists before birth and after death. Why affirm
the eternity of matter and deny the eternity of spirit? These
unbelievers, being materialists, advocate the one substance theory. Yet
they talk about the "unknown" which they know, and know it to be the
"invisible," the "wonderful," the life, and the cause, at least, of all
intelligence and order. They are compelled to deify this. Does this pass
out of being with death? Does matter pass out of being with death? No,
nothing passes out of being except the organic form. The body returns to
the dust, _as it was_, and the spirit to God who gave it. Next, we have
this statement with reference to matter, "Like time and space, it is
infinite and eternal." Why? The answer is, because it can not be
annihilated; death has simply destroyed an organization, changed the
condition of matter, the matter of the organism, and changed the
relations of the intelligent, living spirit; neither matter nor spirit
ceases to be. If matter is therefore infinite and eternal, spirit is
therefore infinite and eternal. The sooner scientists learn the fact
that birth simply brings us into certain relations, and death takes us
out of those relations, the better it will be for all who are concerned
in this interesting subject.

The next item in that eloquent effusion is that man is "like the leaf,"
the mere "sport of destiny," returning in his "autumn" "to the elements
of nature from which he sprang: dust to dust."

This orator asks the questions, "Whence came we?" "Whither are we
tending?" "Who can tell?" To them he gives two answers. First, he says,
"Some profess to know, but they know not." "The past is a mere sealed
book." "The future is a blank." "Of the future, the hereafter, we are as
ignorant as we are of the infinite conditions through which we have
passed during the eternity which has preceded our brief present
existences. If we could know the history of our past, we might get a
glimpse of our future," "The past is a mere sealed book." Conclusion,
"The future is a mere sealed book." The man is lost in the unbeliever's
"narrow vale lying between two cold, bleak, barren eternities," viz:
life. Lost (?) in the narrow vale. Yes! He knows nothing about his
origin. He knows nothing about his destiny. So he says, and we have no
right to contradict him. He is lost! But here he is again, listen!
Speaking of the autumn leaves, he says, "LIKE US, they disappear and are
merged into the ocean of matter from which they are evolved, ready to be
RE-COMBINED into new forms of beauty." (Capitals mine.) Once more he
says, "LIKE THAT LEAF which was the hope of spring, the pride and glory
of summer, we are rudely torn away, the sport of destiny, to return to
the elements of nature from which we sprung: dust to dust."

How he contradicts himself! But we must make all due allowances. He is
in the presence of death. He says, "The past is beyond recall; the
future is veiled in obscurity and in doubt; the present alone is ours."
Here confusion is confounded; but let us ever remember that this was a
funeral occasion, and the friends of the deceased were present, and this
man Veveu was there, for the purpose, ostensibly, of giving a small
amount of consolation to bereaved and broken hearts. Oh, how barren, how
cold, how gloomy and God-dishonoring the consolation given! Those empty
vessels of ours, hearts "endowed with inexhaustible hope," must turn
away from the grave (?) _empty still_. No, not necessarily. God has
provided a fountain. Go to it and fill your vessels. Let us not be too
severe upon the man. There he stands amid bleeding hearts, and the open
tomb just before him. Show pity, Lord! The man says, "No message ever
reached man from beyond the grave." How very singular it is that many
men repudiating God make a god of themselves. What kind of a being must
I be to know that "no message ever reached man from beyond the grave?"
How much must I know? Away back yonder in the past, in that "mere sealed
book," is a grand and glorious message from beyond the grave. But to our
friend it is a "sealed book."

What becomes of evolution?

What becomes of natural selection?

What becomes of the doctrine of the survival of the fittest?



THE MOTIVE THAT LED MEN TO ADOPT DARWINISM.


Before presenting the motive that led some of the great minds in
unbelief to advocate the Darwinian theory of creation, it will not be
amiss to remind the reader of the fact that the author of the "Vestiges
of Creation" presented the evolution theory about twenty years before
Mr. Darwin excited the public mind with the "hypothesis." Men who read
the "Vestiges" looked upon the assumption as a speculation, but refused
its adoption until Mr. Darwin, for the purpose of setting aside the
idea of separate creations of species, improved so far upon the
"Vestiges of Creation" as to repudiate design in nature. Having done
this, many of the leading spirits in skepticism, with a few great minds
in unbelief, at once accepted the wild speculation. Their motive may be
seen in the following quotations: "The eye was not made for the purpose
of seeing, or the ear for the purpose of hearing. Organisms, according
to Darwin, are like grape-shot, of which one hits something and the rest
fall wide." (Lay sermons, p. 331.) According to the above it appears
that Huxley regarded the evolution of species, as advocated by Darwin,
as identical with the old, effete idea that circumstances have
determined everything. Buchner says, "According to Darwin the whole
development is due to the gradual summation of innumerable minute and
accidental operations." This is the same idea. Carl Vogt says, "Darwin's
theory turns the Creator, and his occasional intervention in the
revolutions of the earth and in the production of species, without any
hesitation, out of doors, inasmuch as it does not leave the smallest
room for the agency of such a being." Haeckel says, "The grand
difficulty in the way of the mechanical theory was the occurrence of
innumerable organisms, apparently, at least, indicative of design." He
further says, "Some who could not believe in a creative and controlling
mind, to get over the difficulty of apparent design, adopted the idea of
a metaphysical ghost called vitality." He then presents his estimate of
the service of Darwin in the following words: "The grand service
rendered by Darwin to science is that his theory enables us to account
for the appearances of design without assuming final causes, or, a mind
working for a foreseen and intended end."

Strauss, after making the admission that the evolution theory is a mere
guess, that it is no explanation of the cardinal points in descent,
adds: "Nevertheless, as he has shown how miracles may be excluded, he is
to be applauded as one of the greatest benefactors of the human
race."--_Old Faith and New, p. 177._

The same author says: "We philosophers and critical theologians have
spoken well when we decreed the abolition of miracles; but our decree
remained without effect, because we could not show them to be
unnecessary, inasmuch as we were unable to indicate any natural force to
take their place. Darwin has provided or indicated this natural force,
this process of nature; he has opened the door through which a happier
posterity may eject miracles forever."

Helmholtz says: "Adaptation in the formation of organisms may arise
without the intervention of intelligence by the blind operation of
natural law." This author confounds law with cause or agent. "Law is
nothing without an agent to operate by it." Law is simply a rule of
action. Let us hear Strauss once more: "Design in nature, especially in
the department of living organisms, has ever been appealed to by those
who desire to prove that the world is not SELF-EVOLVED (capitals mine),
but the work of an intelligent Creator."--_Old Faith and New, p. 211._
On page 175 Strauss says of those who ridicule Darwin's evolution
hypothesis and yet deny miracles: "How do they account for the origin of
man, and, in general, the development of the organic out of the
inorganic? Would they assume that the original man, as such, no matter
how rough and unformed, but still a man, sprang immediately out of the
inorganic, out of the sea or the slime of the Nile? They would hardly
venture to say that; then they must know that there is only the choice
between miracle, the divine hand of the Creator, and Darwin." According
to this statement every man is left to one of three conclusions, viz:

1. That man came up immediately _as man_ from the inorganic, or from the
slime of the Nile, or from some other slimy place. Or,

2. That man was evolved from the lowest forms of life, according to
Darwinism. Or,

3. That man was created by the divine hand, according to Christian
belief.

Reader, which will you accept. Will you dethrone the Creator?

Choose you this day between the Creator and the slime of the sea with
the sun's rays. What does Darwin know about the origin of life and
mind? I am informed that he believes in a God, who, by miracle, gave the
living unit at the base of his evolutionary series, but it seems to be
an admission for the sake merely of avoiding disaster, for he says: "In
what manner the mental powers were first developed in the lowest
organisms is as _hopeless an inquiry_ as how life itself _first
originated_. These are problems for the distant future, if they are ever
to be solved by man."--_Descent of Man, p. 66._ This is an open
confession; in it all is given up.

I am now reminded of one of the last sayings of Strauss; here it is: "We
demand for our universe the same piety which the devout man of old
demanded for his God." This brings us to the same standard of piety.
Then why the opposition?

Strauss denied a personal God. Of his mental condition we learn
something from these words: "In the enormous machine of the universe,
amid the incessant whirl and hiss of its jagged iron wheels, amid the
deafening crash of its ponderous stamps and hammers--in the midst of
this whole terrific commotion, man, a helpless and defenseless creature,
finds himself placed, not secure for a moment, that on an imprudent
motion a wheel may not seize and rend him, or a hammer crush him to a
powder. This sense of abandonment is at first SOMETHING AWFUL."
(Capitals mine.) Reader, the religion of Jesus Christ will save you from
the terrible mental condition which is legitimate from a denial of God
and his Christ. Will you accept it and experience the fact?



SHALL WE ABANDON OUR RELIGION?


There is no counterfeit without a genuine. Even a myth is related to
something, near or remote, to which it bears some resemblance. There is
nothing of great value that is not counterfeited. There is nothing that
is not abused. Civil government has been wonderfully abused; in this
respect it has fared no better than religion. There are many forms of
civil government. There are many forms of religion. Let us ever seek the
best form in each.

We are often pointed to the blood that has been shed in religious wars;
but do unbelievers value civil government less because of the blood
which they have cost? No. That blood speaks better things. May we not
estimate civil government and religion both by the blood they have cost?

Unbelievers are very industrious in keeping before us the disagreements
among Protestants. They say, Look! they can't agree among themselves.
Well, is there any better agreement among politicians, or in civil
governments? Is there any agreement among unbelievers which would serve
as a model for us poor souls to imitate? I confess that the way is open
for improvement among Protestants in this respect, but is it not just as
open for a similar improvement among unbelievers in the scientific field
of thought? There we find Atheists, Pantheists, Deists, Polytheists and
Theists. In their history will be found an immense mass of contradictory
opinions.

Man is imperfect in many of his attainments. A few men are more perfect
than others, but all are liable to mistakes. Errors are found in all the
histories of humanity; shall we therefore discard science and civil
government? or shall we turn misanthropists? No; we will do neither. We
are in a progressive age. We were capacitated for progression. We would
not be men without this capacity. Let us ever remember that man is,
after all his mistakes, the noblest creature of God, having God-like
attributes. Do you doubt this? Then tell us why it is that a falsehood
is always detestible to the mind. Why do men strenuously avoid
contradictory propositions? The God-like in man is the great secret of
his progression. He is a progressive being. Shall we on this account
condemn all that in which man has and does progress? Shall we condemn
Christianity on account of man's failures? Shall we discourage his
honest efforts by keeping those failures always before him? Have men
made no mistakes in science? Shall we repudiate on account of mistakes?
Then there will be no end to repudiations. Let us remember and talk of
the many mistakes that have been made in both science and religion, like
the man "who visits the shadows in the deep ravines, in order that he
may more fully realize the fact that the sun shines;" that is to say,
let us talk of old, effete dogmas in science and in religion only to
more fully realize the fact that the sunlight of truth is shining. Yes!
Man has progressed. "Science and religion both stand true to their God."
Man alone deviates. How often do we hear men say, "Science is
progressive?" Scientific truth is always the same. Man is not always the
same. Shall we keep his many deviations from truth and principle before
him in order to cause greater deviations? Who will "deliver" the
unbelievers of our country "from this dead body?" It contains all the
errors of the ages. Their name is "legion." Among them we behold laws in
the early history of our own country that to-day would shock the common
sense of our country. Examine the old "Blue Laws of Connecticut." Among
the errors of the past we find the "rack," the "thumb-screw," the
"inquisition"--I was going to add the cross, but I recollect that
unbelievers do not put that in their list. They do not sympathize with
Christ, so they leave the cross out; in fact they do not like to talk
about it. "It is their stumbling stone; the rock of their offense." I am
tempted to say more about the errors of scientists in the bygone, but I
must forbear; for in so doing I would ape the unbelievers. I have no
great love for apes. So far as old, effete, erroneous opinions and
faiths are concerned, with the old instruments of torture belonging to
the shadows of the dark ages, we should say, disturb not the dead.

A man making his appearance among us as a lecturer, condemning all the
sciences, presenting to the public mind the hundred and one old false
ideas known in the history of scientific investigation, would be hissed
out of literary circles.

An orator coming before the American people as a speaker, loaded with
all the imperfections of our government, with its errors in legislation,
its wicked and corrupt men accepting bribes, its mistakes on the fields
of battle, resulting in great loss of life, as an open enemy to our
country, breathing out treason, would subject himself to the anathemas
of our government. The course pursued by unbelievers against the
religion of Jesus Christ is without a parallel in the fields of science,
civil governments and morals, yet the way is equally open in all those
directions for a similar effort.

What is the value of the religion of Christ? What is the estimate placed
upon it by the best minds of America? Andrew Jackson said, in his last
hours, "That book, sir," pointing to the Bible, "is the rock on which
our republic rests."

Benjamin Franklin said, "As to Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you
particularly desire, I think the system of morals, and his religion, as
he left them to us, is the best the world ever saw, or is likely to
see."

John Adams said, "The Bible is the best book in the world."

Henry Clay said, "I always have had, and always shall have, a profound
regard for Christianity, the religion of my fathers, and for its rites,
its usages and observances."

U. S. Grant said, "Hold fast to the Bible as the sheet anchor of our
liberties; write its precepts on your hearts, and practice them in your
lives. To the influence of this book we are indebted for the progress
made in true civilization, and to this we must look as our guide in the
future."

General George Washington said, "It is impossible to govern the world
without God. He must be worse than an infidel that lacks faith, and more
than wicked that has not gratitude enough to acknowledge his
obligation."



THE DOMAIN OR PROVINCE OF SCIENCE.


The Greeks used the word "epistasin" to express the idea that we express
by the word science. Our word means certain knowledge. Theirs was
understood to mean "coming to a stand," from "epi," upon, and "staseo,"
to stand. Science takes account of phenomenon and seeks its law. When
you apprehend a phenomenon and discover its law you have accomplished
all that the term indicates, even though you fail to comprehend the whys
and wherefores of the law. "Certain knowledge," this phrase indicates
limitation. All that it demands is that you know that which you profess
to know. It therefore follows that the word "science" is equally
applicable to the comprehensible and incomprehensible. The word is from
"scio," _I know_. As men's knowledge, in the present state, at least, is
limited, so science, as presented by man, is also limited; but, as men
are progressive beings, science and the sciences may increase, adding
more and more of truth. There are, however, shores beyond which science
will never carry us, but on the contrary will leave us to settle down,
to rest forever in content or discontent, just as we choose.

The modern hypothesis of materialistic unbelievers is that there is but
one substance in the universe, and that is matter. If this be so, then
all knowledge pertains to matter, and when you have reasoned yourself to
the last element known, or knowable, in physical analysis, which will be
the point of departure as well as your ultimate truth behind which you
can not go, then, of course, you are where you must rest satisfied or
dissatisfied; you have come to the Rubicon beyond which you will never
pass. The mere physicist finds, as a legitimate result of his hypothesis
of but one substance, his rest in the ultimate of eternal matter and
blind force. The Christian, recognizing spiritual substance also, finds
his ultimate or resting place in God, who is the last element in vital
and mental analysis, and also the Christian's starting point in his
inductive reasonings. We realize that scientific knowledge is
profitable, even in the field of matter, but if we refuse to science any
domain above matter she will lead us to the dust of the grave, there to
forsake us forever amid its gloom and sorrow. Here Colonel Ingersoll's
"night birds"--for angels he has no use--move with "rustling of wings."
When such men reason themselves back to the germ cells and sperm cells,
and stand there upon the last element in the analysis of the human body,
they are not able to take another step until they acknowledge the
existence of spiritual substance as matters master, which ever was, and
is above matter, which takes hold of matter and builds germ cells and
sperm cells and inhabits them, as the inherent fore which superintends
the building, differentiating the species, and determining the sex.

Ask the unbeliever, the materialist, what this vital principle is, and
he answers: "It is the all-pervading force that is modified by the
organic structure." That is, in his philosophy, the "vital force is
produced by the organism," and the "organism is produced by the vital
principle?" So, being at the last limit of the physical analysis of the
organic being, he is involved in a contradiction, while the Christian
who believes in a spiritual substance refers all to spirit, and claims a
continuation of his identity as an intelligent spirit, resting in his
ultimate or starting point, viz: God. Do you say I am lost in God? Well,
to be thus lost in God is to be saved from corruption and from the dust
of the grave; but to be lost in the dust of the grave and in the
ceaseless changes of matter is to be lost to God and to spiritual being.
Let me be with God rather than lost amid the dark waves of oblivion.

Has science no prerogatives above the physical? Tread lightly here; you
might step on holy ground. Do you use the old cry that all outside of
matter belongs to the "unknown" and "unknowable?" Exchange the terms for
the terms the "uncomprehended" and the "incomprehensible," and we will
walk side by side. We know many things which we do not comprehend. Do we
comprehend all that belongs to the physical sciences? Do we comprehend
matter? I know that I know, but do I comprehend that knowledge? If I
should say I know the unknowable, I am guilty of a contradiction in
language. Do you say matter is infinite? Can I comprehended the
infinite? If science be that certain knowledge which is the equivalent
of comprehension, then one of two things is true: First, there is no
such thing as physical science; or, secondly, I may have certain
knowledge of the infinite--may comprehend the infinite. How is this?
Where is the difficulty? It is here: the knowledge which constitutes
science is not necessarily that knowledge which is the equivalent of
the comprehension of the thing known. Hence the incomprehensible is not
to be excluded from the field of scientific investigation. If matter be
infinite, and if it belongs to the field of scientific knowledge, then
the infinite and incomprehensible belong, also, to the domain of
scientific investigation. If the infinite can not be comprehended,
matter can not be comprehended, and if all that can not be comprehended
should be dismissed from scientific investigation, then matter should be
dismissed.

In physical science we know the vital force exists which builds the germ
and sperm cells, but we do not comprehend it. If you ask physical
science to explain this invisible force or power, she will say,
Gentlemen, I have given you an introduction to this wonderful builder;
you see it is there at the threshold of organic being, but I can not
tell you why it is there, nor what its properties are; if it has any,
they are outside of my domain. I deal with matter. You must ask at the
gate of the unseen, ask the science of the spiritual, the mental and
vital. I am in wonderful contrast with mind, with life also. I am
inertia. Some of my votaries have tried to give you the answer which you
so much desire. They have said, "It is the all-pervading force which was
lying away back in the antechambers of eternity." Have said, "It was
burdened with a universe of worlds." Have said, "It was destitute of
personality." Have said, "It was not, and is not, an intelligence." Have
said, "It was without will, purpose or desire." Have said, "All beauty,
harmony and order were its results." Have also said, "It was," away back
in the ages past, groaning and heaving, travailing, in great anxiety to
be delivered. Speaking of it in the light of "natural selection," they
have deified it, giving to it all the mental operations of an
intelligent, living God. On this account some of my lovers are
Pantheists. They deify nature; deify everything, and call it all God. A
few ignorant Christians, on this very account, are ready to give up
their warfare with Pantheists. But the battle is not won because the
word "God" is pronounced; for sober reason says, If nature is _all_
God, she is _a_ God, who is no God; or a nature without a God, just as
you choose to express it. After all, it remains an axiom, that "you can
not get more out of a thing than there is in it." So, of necessity,
there must be, somewhere in this universe, _Eternal life and mind_.
Reader, "how readest thou?"



BLIND FORCE OR INTELLIGENCE, WHICH?


In the discussion of this question I think it proper to submit a few
axiomatic or common-sense truths which are universally admitted by the
unbiased mind.

_First._ "Every effect must have a cause."

_Secondly._ "Every series must have a unit lying at its base."

_Thirdly._ "In every beginning there must be that which began."

_Fourthly._ "Something is eternal."

_Fifthly._ "There can not be an endless succession of dependent things."

_Sixthly._ "There must be that upon which the first dependent link in
the chain of dependent things depended."

_Seventhly._ "That thing, whatever it may be, upon which the first
dependent thing depended, must be eternal."

Was it blind force or intelligence, which?

The existence of a supreme intelligence is the first great leading
thought made known in the Bible.

The first that is made known in unbelief, is the existence of "the
unknown."

When a man adopts the idea of the unknown, he lays down all his strength
to oppose the idea of a supreme intelligence, for what right has he to
dogmatize about the unknown? The use of the word force will not help us
to a better understanding of things. Force is simply the manifestation
of energy, and there must, necessarily, be something lying behind it to
which it, as an attribute or quality, belongs. That "something" the
Bible calls "spirit." It has never been christened with a name by the
unbeliever. Force is the bridge between it and matter, and the bridge
between it and all things upon which it operates. The unbeliever's
"unknown" lies behind force. Has he ever given it a name?

So far as science is concerned, it is paying her proper respect to say
she demands an intelligence in order to account for the wonderful things
with which she has to deal. Laycock, treating upon the questions of mind
and brain, says: "The phenomena of life present a vast series of
adjustments and modifications to fill certain purposes and bring about
ends."--_Mind and Brain, vol. 1, p. 222 to 224._

Systematic action in the use of means to accomplish certain ends or
purposes we regard as the evidence of intelligence. By what other means
do we distinguish between the rational and the insane? Winchel says, in
his "Religion and Science," p. 102, "Without God we can not account for
the correlation presented by the world of structural part to structural
part, of structural part to intelligible end, of structural part to
persistent plans or archetypes, of correlations which show that they
were anticipated."

Beal, on Protoplasm, p. 104 to 107, says, "Living matter overcomes
gravitation and resists and suspends chemical affinity." He adds, "It is
in direct opposition to chemical affinities that organized beings
exist."

What power is that which lies behind chemical affinities, and controls
them with direct reference to organic being? Will some bold unbeliever
answer?

Carpenter says, "The most universal and fundamental attribute of life is
the mode of vital activity manifesting itself in the development of the
germ into the complete organism and type OF ITS PARENT, and the after
maintenance of the organism in its integrity at the expense of materials
derived from external sources. The life in the germ is the controlling
agency, superintending the building, charged with the working out the
design of the architect." Who is the architect? Or, if you prefer it,
what is the architect? Whoever he or whatever it may be, the design and
decrees of nature are with that official. All the changes that can be
made in environments or food will not change the organism from the type
of its parent. Then the structure of the male and the female with
reference to future living organisms, or procreation, is in very poor
harmony with the idea that the architect is "blind force."

The same milk from one and the same animal, with the same heat and air,
will build up bodies of different types, one as well as another, making
human flesh in the human body, and dog's flesh in the dog's body, and
sheep's flesh in the sheep's body. If the living germinal organism has
its paternity in a dog, it will remain a dog in spite of food and
environments.

Carpenter says, "The vital force," in the germ, "is not the entire force
or means of growth; heat is a constructive stimulus, but amounts to
nothing where there is no life. Food is material for the building, but
like heat, it is of no consequence in the absence of life."

The constructing force in the germ manifests itself, in the plant, in
the conversion of the insoluble starch of the seed into sugar, and in an
additional change of a part of that sugar so as to set at liberty a
large amount of carbon, which, uniting with the oxygen of the air, forms
carbonic acid, and this process is attended with a liberation of heat
which supplies the germ with stimulus.

"It is different with the advanced plant. The organic compounds required
to extend the fabric, are formed by the plant, instead of being supplied
from without. The tissues of the green surface of the stem and leaves
have the peculiar power, when acted on by light, of generating, at the
expense of carbonic acid, water and ammonia, with various ternary and
quarternary organic compounds, such as chlorophyll, starch, oil and
albumen. A part goes to build new tissues, and a part is stored up in
the cavities of tissues for food for parts to be developed in the
future." Mr. Carpenter says, "Of the source of this peculiar power we
have no right to speak confidently." Is it a blind force that
anticipates growth in the plant, and lays away food, in the tissues,
for future use? Why should it be different with the young plant?

Sixteen simple substances are known to exist in vegetable organisms, and
many of them are more strongly inclined to unite with substances which
have no existence in vegetable cells; so they separate, in violation of
chemical laws, and unite in vegetable cells in utter disregard of the
affinities which are known to be their strongest. How do unbelievers
manage such objections to the hypothesis that chemical laws explain
everything in vegetable life? How is all this accounted for? We,
Christians, answer, "The course of nature is the art of God." This
answer is equivalent to the thought that vegetable life is the result of
the union existing between God and the vegetable kingdom. The force that
lies behind all chemical affinities and controls them, together with the
wisdom displayed in that kingdom, belongs to God.



SPECIES, OR UNITS OF NATURE.


Are millions of years adequate as a cause, when associated with all the
forces known in nature, to produce new species and extirpate old ones?
The teachings of Darwin require an answer in the affirmative.

The survival of the fittest is one of Darwin's emphasized laws of
natural selection. He says: "In all cases the new and improved forms of
life tend to supplant the old and unimproved forms. New varieties
continually take the place of and supplant the parent form. New and
improved varieties will inevitably supplant and exterminate the
older."--_Origin of Species, pp. 264, 266, 413._

Do the facts sustain this assumption? The little animals whose remains
compose the great chalk-beds are alive and working. Inarticulate or
molluscan life is seen in a sub-fossil condition in the Post Pliocene
clays of Canada. They are just as they were in the beginning of their
history. Species seem to be immutably fixed. The demand for millions of
years, in order to get old species out and new ones in, breaks down with
the mollusk of the Pliocene in the clays of Canada. The Pliocene species
are the more recent; such is, in fact, the meaning of the term in
geology. The mollusk of Canada Pliocene clay has undergone no change
since its first appearance upon our globe.

In order to account for ancient life, that passed away, as far back as
the carboniferous age, it is claimed that millions of years passed
before that age began. But here are the very first species of mollusca
in the more recent clays unchanged, and here are the same little animals
that floored so much territory in the bygone with chalk. How does this
look by the side of the last quotation from Darwin?

Crabs or lobsters, cuttle-fish, jelly-fish, star-fish, oysters, snails,
and worms lived contemporary with the first vertebrates. I have recently
read an article in which it is said by an advocate of the Darwinian
hypothesis, that man in his original condition was a cannibal, feasting,
ordinarily, upon snails and worms. Now, it is claimed that millions of
years have passed, and that millions of years inevitably destroy old
species and introduce new ones; and yet here are the same old pesky
snails and worms. If millions of years have passed the system is false.
And if millions of years have not passed the system is false; so it is
certainly false.

Hybrids are wonderfully in the way of the hypothesis. They can not be
saved. All artificial varieties return to their simple form. Mr. Huxley
recognizes this as an objection that can not be surmounted. He says,
"While it remains Darwin's doctrine, must be content to remain a mere
hypothesis;" that is, a mere guess.

In the latest productions of Agassiz we have this statement: "As a
palæontologist I have from the beginning stood aloof from this new
theory of transmutation, now so widely admitted; its doctrines, in fact,
contradict what the animal forms buried in the rocky strata of our earth
tell us of their own introduction and succession upon the surface of the
globe."

The first vertebrates are sharks, ganoids and garpikes, which are the
highest in structure of all known fishes. Darwin's hypothesis demands
this order _reversed_.

When you ask an evolutionist for the links connecting new and old
species, as he is pleased to denominate them, you receive the
satisfactory (?) answer, "They are lost." A painter presented a man with
a red canvass, claiming that it represented the children of Israel
crossing the Red sea. The question was asked, "Where are the
Israelites?" The painter answered, "They have crossed over." "But," said
the man, "where are the Egyptians?" "O, my dear sir," said the artist,
"they are under the sea." This is a very fine illustration of facts, if
Darwinism may boast of facts, for the connecting links between species
are "under the sea" of oblivion, never to be found, and the old species
"have passed over." Mr. Darwin's apology is in these words: "Every one
will admit that the geological record is imperfect; but very few can
believe that it is so very imperfect as my theory demands." This is a
grand concession. The "wild speculation" has no support from geology.
The blanket of oblivion, which Mr. Darwin and his friends spread over
the difficulty, is "millions of years." In that length of time the
missing species, or links, would, of course, all pass out of sight. Is
this true? No. In the geological record millions of specimens are
fossilized and laid away in nature's great cabinet. Why not find a few
of the missing links there? Just one. "One fact, gentlemen, if you
please." Science is certain knowledge. Is there certain knowledge of
missing links? Gentlemen, just bridge one gulf for us; the gulf lying
between any _two species_ will do. We get impatient, standing and
gazing. Look! Can you see across?

Mr. Darwin says, "Professor Haeckel, in his general Morphology and other
works, has brought his great knowledge and abilities to bear on what he
calls phylogeny or the lines of descent of all organic beings."--_Origin
of Species, p. 381._

This author, Mr. Haeckel, has "lines of descent" which involves the idea
of a plurality of beginnings in the history of organic being; that is,
Mr. Haeckel claims a vertebrate series with a vertebrate lying at the
base of the series, and an articulate series with an articulate lying at
its base. So there must be A SPECIAL CREATION AT LAST. Hear him: "There
appears, indeed, to be a limit given to the adaptability of every
organism by the type of its tribe or phylum. Thus, for example, no
vertebrate animal can acquire the ventral nerve chord of articulate
animals instead of the characteristic spinal marrow of the vertebrate
animals."--_History of Creation, vol. 1, p. 250._ So the vertebrate must
forever remain a vertebrate, and the articulate forever an articulate.
Were they both evolved from the same unit? We are anxious to know, how
from a pulpy mass of flesh, from a moneron, a creature of one substance,
_vertebrates_ were evolved. We would like to know, also, how a creature
of more than one substance could be evolved from a creature of one
substance without more being gotten out of the thing than there was in
it. Here spontaneous generation passes into a wreck. Do you see? The
pulpy mass of flesh, or moneron, from which so much has been "evolved"
was the result of "the sun's rays falling upon the sea slime," and was
and is a creature of one substance, homogeneous. "Natural selection"
could not operate in the vertebrate type before it existed. It was
"limited to the type or phylum." That is to say, natural selection could
evolve new species without limitation from each type, but could never
evolve a vertebrate from an articulate, nor an articulate from a
vertebrate. Then, how are the two series from the same unit; or, if they
are connected with two different units, how are those units the effect
of the same unintelligent cause? How are we going to cross this chasm
lying between the sun's rays and the sea slime upon the one hand, and
the articulate and the vertebrate upon the other? Darwin says, "Judging
from the past, we may safely infer that not one living species will
transmit its unaltered likeness to a distant futurity." Well, how is it
with the past? We are told that millions of years are the demand for the
changes already brought about. Millions of years would certainly be
enough to constitute a "distant futurity." How is it now? Is there not
one species having its likeness represented by a species in the distant
past? Yes; the genus lingula, the species appearing in all the ages, was
"connected by an unbroken series of generations from the lowest Silurian
stratum to the present day."--_Origin of Species, pp. 293, 294, 428._

Darwin's "theory" claims that the first forms of all life still exist,
and are known and named. The ape, if it could talk like a man, would
boast of a history reaching all the way back to time prior to the
existence of the greater number of the mammals. To get rid of the
difficulty of first forms still existing, Mr. Darwin cuts off his unit
from the law of "the survival of the fittest," or "the inevitable
destruction of the parent form." He says: "A very simple form, fitted
for very simple conditions of life, might remain for indefinite ages
unaltered, or unimproved; for what would it profit an infusorial
animalcule, or an intestinal worm, to become highly organized?"--_Animals
and Plants, vol. 1, p. 19._ "Under very simple conditions of life a
higher organism would be of no service."--_Origin of Species, p. 100._

How are we to reconcile the conflicting ideas in this speculation? At
one time we are taught that all forms of life were, originally, very
simple forms, existing under very simple conditions. At another time we
are taught that "new and improved forms _inevitably_ supplant and
destroy parent forms." At another we are taught, at great length, the
doctrine of the survival of the fittest.

At another we are taught that all things have worked, and do work,
without designs upon the part of a present intelligence.

At another we are taught that very simple forms of life, under the very
simple conditions of life, have continued to the present day, because of
the fact that it would be of NO SERVICE for them to become highly
organized. No service to whom? To what end?

Out of thine own mouth will I condemn thee. What! Is there an end in
view that has governed in the great question of evolution of species,
and the survival of the fittest? Darwin seems to think so. The
wonderful "machine" that Strauss talked about in connection with the
"smashing" and "crashing" that destroys parent forms did not smash the
simplest forms of life. Why? The answer is, "It would be of no service
for them to become highly organized." Then all the smashing and crashing
known in the doctrine of "the survival of the fittest" and in "the
destruction of the parent form" was under the supervision of some
controlling power, having an end to accomplish.

       *       *       *       *       *

If we see a member of the church of Christ living in obedience to the
"law of Christ," we say he is a Christian, and speak of him as such; on
the other hand, if we know he is in works denying Christ, being
disobedient, we tacitly assume that he is not a Christian, yet a
_mawkish charity_ keeps us, in too many instances, from speaking out in
this matter, and also keeps us from earnestly trying to distinguish the
true Christian; and this is one of the great sins of the church in our
times, for thus the wicked are not put to shame, and others are caused
to hesitate in their graces by the conduct of those whom, in mawk
charity, are called Christians.

       *       *       *       *       *

"Mouth-glue is made of pure glue, as parchment glue, or gelatine and
coarse brown sugar. Take pure glue and add one-quarter or one-third of
its weight of brown sugar. Put both into a sufficient quantity of water
to boil and reduce the mass to a liquid, then cast into thin cakes on a
flat surface _very slightly_ oiled, and, as it cools, cut up into pieces
of a convenient size. When you wish to use it moisten one end in the
mouth, and rub it on any substance you wish to join; a piece kept in the
work-box is very convenient."--_Chambers._

       *       *       *       *       *

The Christian's faith was not intended to sit him down in ease, but to
stimulate him to the discharge of his duties. So the work of faith is a
noble work, a life of labor.



MISCELLANEOUS.


The oft-repeated story that man had his beginning in a low state of
barbarous cannibalism is a groundless assumption.

       *       *       *       *       *

What is the difference between getting more out of a thing than there is
in it and creating something out of nothing?

       *       *       *       *       *

"If the religious foundations and sanctions of morality are to be given
up, what is to be substituted for them?"--_Lord Selborne._

       *       *       *       *       *

The Orang and Pongo monkeys, which are classed with those which make the
nearest approach to man, have three vertebra fewer than man.

       *       *       *       *       *

"Live while we may;" "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die," are
natural corollaries from the teachings of modern as well as ancient
infidels.

       *       *       *       *       *

Finding human skeletons with the skeletons of extinct animals
necessitates the bringing of those animals forward, for specimens have
been found in modern times with the flesh upon their bones and food in
their stomachs.

       *       *       *       *       *

If all organized animal life was evolved from the moneron, a creature of
one substance, homogeneous, how were creatures of more than one
substance evolved without more being _evolved_ than was _involved_? Let
some of our scientific "wise-acres" solve this problem.

       *       *       *       *       *

Paul says, "Things which are seen were not made of things which do
appear." Every negative has its affirmative. The affirmative of the
above is this, "Things which are seen were made of unseen things." The
Bible does not teach that anything was made of nothing.

       *       *       *       *       *

The Chimpanzee has thirteen pair of movable thoracic ribs. Man has two.
If man lived up in the bushes, like the Chimpanzee and other apes, he
would need more movable ribs so that he might not be ruined by broken
ribs every time he might happen to fall. Is there no evidence of design
here?

       *       *       *       *       *

All unbelievers who advocate the idea of spontaneous generation try to
get more out of matter than there was in it, viz: life, sensation,
intelligence and moral nature. Can you get more out of a thing than
there is in it? Is there life without antecedent life, etc.? Unbeliever,
are you mocking the Bible because somebody said the Lord created
something of nothing, and at the same time advocating spontaneous
generation, and thereby professing to get more _evolved_ than was
_involved_?

       *       *       *       *       *

The idea that stone implements are an index to man in the beginning of
his existence is an unwarranted conceit; they may point to a degeneracy.
The lost arts are indicative of that which might have been repeated many
times. Stone implements might have been used, as we know they have been,
in times of great civilization. They are an uncertain index of
civilization among the tribes who used them, and no index of the
civilization of other tribes who lived at the same time in other parts
of the earth.

       *       *       *       *       *

Professor Huxley says, "I understand and I respect the meaning of the
word soul, as used by Pagan and Christian philosophers, for what they
believe to be the imperishable seat of human personality, bearing
throughout eternity its burden of woe, or its capacity for adoration and
love. I confess that my dull moral sense does not enable me to see
anything base or selfish in the desire for future life among the spirits
of the just made perfect; or even among a few poor fallible souls as one
has known here below."--_Modern Symposium, vol. 1, p. 82._





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