ridiculed as an ungainly and retrograde structure, rode in peace over their heads.

There were centuries in which the Sophists ran their career; when Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle taught at Athens; when the school of Alexandria was founded and Euclid wrote his Elements; when Archimedes propounded theories and principles in mechanics and hydrostatics; when Pythagoras experimented on harmonic intervals, Hipparchus and Ptolemy studied the stars, and anatomy began to be investigated as the basis of scientific medicine; did they win the world from misery, regenerate one heart, or save one soul? When the science of ancient Greece had cleared the world of fantastic images of false divinities, when the scientific method was well nigh completed by the union of induction and experiment, was this science the salt of the earth? Did the scientific intellect go on and possess the universal mind? The impact of atoms being accounted the all-sufficient cause of things, were men satisfied with the operation? The whole world answers-No. From the minds of philosophers was dissipated "every thought of a deflection of the universe by the gods," but neither sage nor simple was content. Literature, arts, refinement, luxury, gave much outward fineness, softness, and finish to manners; the old poets, orators, sculptors, painters, philosophers, were a wonder, but Juvenal and Perseus among the Latins, Lucian amongst the Greeks, and St. Paul of the Hebrews, testify that society was a sink of sensuality. Why? Because Intellect was divorced from piety.

The ethics of Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Cicero, are in some respects admirable; but they had no authority from Divinity, and failed. The ablest people of whom history bears record is unquestionably the ancient Greek. "The average ability of the Athenian race is, on the lowest possible estimate, very nearly two grades higher than our own-that is, about as much as our race is above the African negro."1 This race did not go on to possess the world. Though highest in products of the understanding, fairest of all men in form, and cleverest in art, they speedily became servile and sensual,

1 Galton's " Hereditary Genius."

intolerant and fierce. Like the Romans, they fell into moral putrefaction, which slew them. When science has done the utmost, and art has put her finest finish on work, only Frankenstein's monster is produced, which slays them both. Art and science are good as the handmaids of religion, as adorners of morality, as lighteners of labour, as smoothers of nature's asperity; but, when put instead of religion, and held up as gods, they perish like children of Cain.

The gutter-child, by intellectual drill, may be converted into "the subtlest of all the beasts of the field; " but we know the original of that description. History, human experience, and scripture alike testify-"Where there is no vision the people perish" (Prov. xxix. 18). "It is impossible to show by what practical measures religious feeling, which is the essential basis of conduct, can be kept up without use of the Bible;" while experience proves that the purest morality and noblest life are formed by its precepts and examples. "The inability of laws to attain even the imperfect end at which they aim, is proved by the fact that in all ages and in every condition of society, an authority superior to their own has been called in to sanction and maintain them. Religion is that authority." 1

Social and moral direction is a far more important object than scientific enquiry, and the wickedest of men allow that a life guided by the rule of Christ's morality, and governed by Christ's authority, is the noblest of which we are capable; while even lowest ranks find that by Christ's rule they are enabled to perform the highest actions of virtue.

There are, among the opponents of scripture, some highminded honest men. The laureate lauds them too much

"There lives more faith in honest doubt,

Believe me, than in half the creeds."

I only believe him so far as old John Newton was wont to say "Some men's doubts are better than other men's certainties." The character of other doubters whose heart, not head, is at fault, has been quaintly sketched by an old writer" Sinners perched on the dunghill of their vices,

"The Great Problem: can it be Solved?" Rev. G. R. Gleig, Edinburgh Maga., Jan. 1875.

clapping their wings in self-applause, and fancying themselves much grander creatures than the Christian; who all the while is soaring on high like the lark, and mounting on his way to heaven." There are dishonest sceptics, professing to be wise, whom Tennyson describes—

6

""Law is God,' say some: 'Not God at all,' says the fool;

'For all we have power to see is a straight stick bent in a pool.'"

To all such, these are my only words

"Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small; Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He all."

Longfellow. Amongst the higher and more honest infidels, some of scientific power have little imagination and small spirituality, fail in reverent heed of Scripture, and consequently are not whole or comprehensive men. They amass, and sometimes systematise facts, and unsparingly devote the best years of their life to one class of ideas, but their mechanical process on things fails when applied to thoughts, because a partial apprehension of general truth, and the attempt to formulate nature as wholly material and external, narrow their minds. Good in technicalities, but incapable of wide range, they are specially unfit for the elevated themes of theology, which are in the widest sense universal. From the habit of contemplating phenomena in which uniformity of antecedents and consequents obtains, they cannot refrain from the assumption that nothing was, is, or can be at variance with their constant but limited experience. They explain the external structure of the world indeed, but according to the technic of man, taking no account of the spiritual and internal. The mechanism is all, the maker is nothing in their theory; nevertheless, their own doctrine of continuity proves that the visible is the actualisation of the invisible, and the natural a passing of the supernatural into history, or as Schelling too pantheistically expresses it: "Nature is visible mind, and mind is invisible nature;" or putting it more correctly and scientifically," the phenomenal universe is the manifestation of a Divine power that cannot be identified with the vitality of phenomena."

Professor Tyndall infers that Aristotle, praised as a physi

Errors of Materialists.

23

cist, was wholly unphysical; and says of Goethe, "He could not formulate distinct mechanical conceptions; he could not see the force of mechanical reasoning; and in regions where such reasoning reigns supreme, he became a mere ignis fatuus to those who followed him." It may be said with equal fairness, that scientific men, in pursuit of the merely mechanical, neglect their best and greatest work, the establishment of intelligent enduring alliance between Religion and Science; the shewing that they wage battle for one and the same cause -the cause of truth, of goodness, of beauty, of God. Like Lucretius of old, they affirm: "Nature is seen to do all things spontaneously of herself," when nothing of the kind is seen, for the energy that works cannot be identified with the phenomena. They pretend to find in the chance clash of atoms the world's ground plan from origination to completion, for some, even of those who own God to be the cause of all things, assert that He is the explanation of nothing: "Dieu est la cause de tout, mais il n'est explication de rien." They profess that inorganic matter, unaided by God, contains the promise and potency of all life; yet of this life, concerning x which is such positive affirmation, they know little or nothing: "it is the continuous equilibration of the organism with its environment," that is, the art or power of living! They so express the law of conservation of energy as to bind the world in the chains of fate, leave no place for God, no liberty for man, no soul for eternity, and strangely enough, count this conservation of energy in the things that are, a sort of means by which those that are not began to exist. They claim regard as clear witted men, who live in "the high and dry light of intellect," yet wholly forget, for any pious purpose, that every meal we eat and cup we drink of, illustrate the mysterious control of mind over matter, and of higher law subordinating lower. They know that, even as to geometrical truths, more is required than axioms and definitions -there must be intuition of the figures, and knowledge besides that of experience; yet not being able to see the Unknown by introspection of what they know, they would

1 "Address before the British Association at Belfast, 1874."

2 M. Scherer.

X Lifan

we know by conscioueness, & by he phenomena but I cannot be defined. The worch warnstore Through the fields of defini ito.

deprive others of all that knowledge which grows out of spiritual experience.

In the Secular School, human morality is identified with brute selfishness, and conscience is declared to be "a hoarded fund of traditionary pressure of utility." Shall we waste our time with these men, and try every possible way of going wrong? Life is too short. Religion satisfies a moral and spiritual yearning, which cannot be otherwise appeased. Intellect and Piety unite in worship of the Great Supreme, whom to know is eternal life. Brothers come with us, and escape the horrors of Richter's dream. He passed through unknown shadows, darkling around an empty altar. On the church dome was a dial plate barren of figures, but a dark figure pointed at it, and dead men sought to see and read. Be not like those men, pointing at the figureless dial-plate of unrecovered centuries. Be not those blind, trying to read where nothing can be read; not those deaf, listening where no voice can be heard.

The best thinkers in every science give up the despairing creed, and decide for religion. The great facts and doctrines of Revealed Truth are becoming more and more approved by accurate thought. The light of Revelation illumines the invisible world; we not only look into certain apartments of the material universe, but behold within them many forms of spiritual grace and grandeur. While we look, our constitution and faculties enlarge in conscious existence, and we become almost other beings in impassioned emotion and intellectuality. The promise and prophecy of higher and imperishable corporeity, which will ere long be fulfilled to believers, increase every present enjoyment. New melodies and harmonies, continually breaking in upon the soul, are delicious refreshments, and assurances of heavenly help. The strength of our intellect delights in the words of inspired narrative and in its glorious acts. Intelligence unites with Piety in proclaiming that God is the source of all and the disposer of all; that the birth of a human being is not a less manifestation of Divine Power than is the exit of a human being in chariot of fire. The ordinary and extraordinary acts of Divine Government are known to be relatively, not essentially,