ONE is almost ashamed to repeat so trite an aphorism as the well-worn saying that "history repeats itself." But in studying the course taken by the advocates of what is called "revealed religion," in seeing their disdain of "mere nature," their scornful repudiation of the idea that any poor natural product can come into competition with their special article, hall-stamped by heaven itself, I feel irresistibly compelled to glance backwards down the long vista of history, and there I see the conflict of the present day raging fierce and long. I see the same serried ranks of orthodoxy marshalled by bishops and priests, arrayed in all the splendour of prescriptive right, armed with mighty weapons of authority and thunderbolts of Church anathemas. Their war-cry is the same as that which rings in our ears to-day; "revelation" is inscribed on their banners and "infallible authority" is the watchword of their camp. The Church is facing nature for the first time, and is setting her revealed science against natural science. "Mere Nature" is temporarily getting the worst of it, and Galileo, Nature's champion, is sorely pressed by "revealed truth." I hear scornful taunts at his presumption in attacking revealed science by his pretended natural facts. Had they not God's Own account of His creation, and did he pretend to know more about the matter than God Himself? Was he present when God created the world, that he spoke so positively about its shape? Could he declare, of his own personal knowledge, that it was sent hurtling through space in the ridiculous manner he talked about, and could he, by the evidence of his own eye-sight, declare that God was mistaken when He revealed to man how He "laid the foundation of the earth that it never should move at anytime?" But if he was only reasoning from the wee bit of earth he knew, was he not speaking of things he had not seen, being vainly puffed-up in his fleshly mind? Was it probable, À priori, that God would allow mankind to be deceived for thousands of years on so important a matter; would in fact—God forgive it!—deceive man Himself by revealing through His holy prophets an account of His creation which was utterly untrue; nay, further, would carry on the delusion for century after century, by working miracles in support of it—for what but a miracle could make men unconscious of the fact that they were being hurried through space at so tremendous a rate? Surely very little reverence, or rather no reverence at all, was needed to allow that God the Holy Ghost, who inspired the Bible, knew better than we did how He made the world. But, the theologian proceeds, he must remind his audience that, under the specious pretext of investigating the creation, this man, this pseudo-scientist, was in reality blaspheming the Creator, by contradicting His revealed word, and thus "making Him a liar." It was all very well to talk about natural science; but he would ask this presuming speculator, what was the use of God revealing science to us if man's natural faculties were sufficient to discover it for himself? They had sufficient proofs of the absurdities of science into which reason, unenlightened by revelation, had betrayed men in past ages. The idea of the Hindoo, that the world rested on an elephant and the elephant on a tortoise, was a sad proof of the incapacity of the acutest natural intellect to discover scientific truth without the aid of revelation. Reason had its place, and a very noble placer in science; but it must always bow before revelation, and not presume to set its puny guesses against a "thus sayeth the Lord." Let reason, then, pursue its way with belief not unbelief, for its guide. What could reason, with all its vaunted powers, tell us of the long-past creation of the world? Eye hath not seen those things of ages past, but God hath revealed them to us by His Spirit. A darkness that might be felt would enshroud the origin of the world were it not for the magnificent revelation of Moses, that "in six days God created the heaven and the earth." He might urge how our conceptions of God were enlarged and elevated, and what a deep awe filled the adoring heart on contemplating the revealed truth, that this wonderful earth with its varied beauty, and the heavens above with their countless stars, were all called forth out of nothing within the space of one short week by the creative fiat of the Almighty. What could this pseudo-science give them in exchange for such a revelation as that? Was it probable, further, that God would have become incarnate for the sake of a world that was only one out of many revolving round the sun? How irreverent to regard the theatre of that awful sacrifice as aught less than the centre of the universe, the cynosure of angelic eyes, gazing from their thrones in the heaven above! Galileo might say that his heresy does not affect the primary truths of our holy faith; but this is only one of the evasions natural to evildoers—and it is unnecessary to remark that intellectual error is invariably the offspring of moral guilt—for consider how much is involved in his theory. The inspiration of Scripture receives its death-blow; for if fallible in one point, we have no reason to conclude it to be infallible in others. If there is one fact revealed to us more clearly than another in Holy Scripture, it is this one of the steadfastness of our world, which we are distinctly told, "cannot be moved." It is plainly revealed to us that the earth was created and fixed firmly on its foundations; that then there was formed over it the vast vault of heaven, in which were set the stars, and in this vault was prepared "the course" for the sun, spoken of, as you will remember, in the 19th Psalm, where holy David reveals to us that in the heavens God has made a tabernacle for the sun, which "goeth forth from the uttermost part of the heaven, and runneth about unto the end of it again." Language has no definiteness of meaning if this inspired declaration can be translated into a statement that the sun remains stationary and is encircled by a revolving earth. This great revealed truth cannot be contradicted by any true science. God's works cannot contradict His word; and if for a moment they appear mutually irreconcileable, we may be sure that our ignorance is to blame, and that a deeper knowledge will ultimately remove the apparent inconsistency. But it is yet more important to observe that some of the cardinal doctrines of the Church are assailed by this novel teaching. How could our blessed Redeemer, after accomplishing the work of our salvation, ascend from a revolving earth? Whither did He go? North, south, east, or west? For, if I understand aright this new heresy, the space above us at one time is below us at another, and thus Jesus might be actually descending at His glorious Ascension. Where, too, is that Right Hand of God to which He went, in this new universe without top or bottom? How can we hope to rise and meet Him in the air at His return, according to the most sure promise given to us through the blessed Paul, if He comes we know not from what direction? How can the lightning of His coming shine at once all round a globe to herald His approach, or how can the people at the other side of the world see the sign of the Son of Man in the heavens? But I cannot bring myself to accumulate these blasphemies; all must see that the most glorious truths of the Bible are bound up with its science, and must stand or fall together. And if this is so, and this so-called natural science is to be allowed to undermine the revealed science, what have we got to rely upon in this world or in the next? With the absolute truth of the Bible stands or falls our faith in God and our hope of immortality; on the truth of revelation hinges all morality, and they who deny to-day the truth of revealed science will tamper tomorrow with the truth of revealed history, of revealed morality, of revealed religion. Shall we, then, condescend to accept natural science instead of revealed; shall we, the teachers of revelation, condescend to abandon revealed science, and become the mere teachers of nature?

Thunders of applause greeted the right reverend theologian as he concluded—he happened to be a bishop, the direct ancestor in regular apostolical succession of a late prelate who inherited among other valuable qualities the very argument which closed the speech above quoted—and Galileo, the foolish believer in facts and the heretical student of mere nature, turned away with a sigh from trying to convince them, and contented himself with the fact he knew, and which must surely announce itself in the long run. E pur si muove! Fear not, noble martyr of science: facts alter not to suit theologies: many a one may fall crushed and vanquished before the Juggernaut-car of the Church, but "God does not die with His children, nor truth with its martyrs;" the natural is the divine, for Nature is only "God in a mask." So, looking down at that first great battle-field between nature and revelation I see the serried ranks break up and fly, and the excommunicated student become the prophet of the future, Galileo the seer, the revealer of the truth of God.

It is eternally true that nature must triumph in the long run. Theories are very imposing, doubtless, but when they are erected on a misconception the inexorable fact is sure to assert itself sooner or later, and with pitiless serenity level the magnificent fabric with the dust. It is this which gives to scientific men so grave and calm an attitude; theologians wrangle fiercely and bitterly because they wrangle about opinions, and one man's say is as good as another's where both deal in intangibles; but the man of science, when absolutely sure of his ground, can afford to wait, because the fact he has discovered remains unshaken, however it be assailed, and it will, in time, assert itself. When nature and revelation then come into contact, revelation must go to the wall; no outcry can save it; it is doomed; as well try and dam the rising Thames with a feather, as seek to bolster up a theology whose main dogmas are being slowly undermined by natural science. Of course no one nowadays (at least among educated people, for Zadkiel's Almanac I believe still protests on Biblical grounds against the heresy of the motion of the earth) dreams of maintaining Bible, i e., revealed, science against natural science; it is agreed on all hands that on points where science speaks with certainty the words of the Bible must be explained so as to accord with the dictum of nature; i e., it is allowed—though the admission is wrapped up in thick folds of circumlocution—that science must mould revelation, and not revelation science. The desperate attempts to force the first chapter of Genesis into some faint resemblance to the ascertained results of geological investigations are a powerful testimony to the conscious weakness of revealed science and to the feeling on the part of all intelligent theologians that the testimony graven with an iron pen on the rocks cannot be contradicted or refuted. In fact so successfully has science asserted its own preeminence in its own domain that many defenders of the Bible assert loudly, to cover their strategic movement to the rear, that revelation was not intended to teach science, and that scientific mistakes were only to be expected in a book given to mankind by the great Origin of all scientific law. They are freely welcome to find out any reasons they like for the errors in revealed science; all that concerns us is that their revelation should get out of the way of advancing science, and should no longer interpose its puny anathemas to silence inquiry into facts, or to fetter free research and free discussion.

But I challenge revelation further than this, and assert that when the dictates of natural religion are in opposition to those of revealed religion then the natural must again triumph over the revealed. Christianity has so long successfully impressed on human hearts the revelation that natural impulses are in themselves sinful, that in "the flesh dwelleth no good thing," that man is a fallen creature, thoroughly corrupt and instinctively evil, that it has come to-pass that even those who would be liberal if they dared, shrink back when it comes to casting away their revelation-crutches, and ask wildly what they can trust to if they give up the Bible. Their teachers tell them that if they let this go they will wander compassless on the waves of a pathless ocean; and so determinedly do they fix their eyes on the foaming waters, striving to discern there the trace of a pathway and only seeing the broken reflections of the waving torches in their hands, that they do not raise their heads and gaze upwards at the everlasting stars, the silent natural guides of the bewildered mariner. "Trust to mere nature!" exclaim the priesthood, and their flocks fall back aghast, clutching their revelation to their bosom and crying out: "What indeed is there to rely on if this be taken from us?" Only God. "Mere" God indeed, who is a very feeble support after the bolstering up of creeds and dogmas, of Churches and Bibles. As the sunshine dazzles eyes accustomed to the darkness, as the fresh wind makes shiver an invalid from a heated room, so does the light of God dazzle those who live amid the candles of the Churches, and the breath of His inspiration blows cold on feeble souls. But the light and the air invigorate and strengthen, and nature is a surer medicine than the nostrums of the quack physician.

"Mere" God is, in very truth, all that we Theists have to offer the world in exchange for the certainties of its Bibles, Korans, Vedas, and all other revelations whatsoever. On points where they each speak with certainty, our lips are dumb. About much they assert, we confess our ignorance. Where they know, we only think or hope. Where they possess all the clearness of a sign-post, our eyes can only study the mistiness of a valley before the rising sun has dispelled the wreathing clouds. They proclaim immortality, and are quite au fait as to the particulars of our future life. They differ in details, it is true, as to whether we live in a jewelled city, where the dust is gold-dust and the gates pearls, and spend our time in attending Sacred Harmonic Societies with an archangelic Costa directing perpetual oratorios, or whether we lie in rose-embowered arbours with delights unlimited, albeit unintellectual; but if we take them one at a time they are most satisfactory in the absolute information afforded by each. But we, we can only, whisper—and the lips of some of us quiver too much to speak—"I believe in the life everlasting." We do not pretend to know anything about it; the belief is intuitive, but is not demonstrable; it is a hope and a trust, not an absolute knowledge. We entertain a reasonable hope of immortality; we argue its likelihood from considerations of the justice and the love which, as we believe, rule the universe; we, many of us—as I freely confess I do myself—believe in it with a firmness of conviction absolutely immovable; but challenged to prove it, we cannot answer. "Here," the revelationists triumphantly exclaim, "is our advantage; we foretell with absolute certainty a future life, and can give you all particulars about it." Then follows a confused jumble of harps and houris, of pasture-field and hunting-grounds; we seek for certainty and find none. All that they agree in, i e., a future life, we find imprinted on our own hearts, a dictate of natural religion; all they differ in is contained in their several revelations, and as they all contradict each other about the revealed details, we gain nothing from them. Nature whispers to us that there is a life to come; revelation babbles a number of contradictory particulars, marring the majesty of the simple promise, and adding nothing reliable to the sum of human knowledge. And the subject of immortality is a fair specimen of what is taught respectively by nature and by revelation; what is common to all creeds is natural, what is different in each is revealed. It is so with respect to God. The idea of God belongs to all creeds alike; it is the foundation-stone of natural religion; confusion begins when revelation steps in to change the musical whisper of Nature into a categorical description worthy of "Mangnall's Questions." Triune, solitary, dual, numberless, whatever He is revealed to be in the world's varied sacred books, His nature is understood, catalogued, dogmatised on; each revelation claims to be His own account of Himself; but each contradicts its fellows; on one point only they all agree, and that is the point confessed by natural religion—"God is."

From these facts I deduce two conclusions: first, that revelation does not come to us with such a certainty of its truth as to enable us to trust it fearlessly and without reserve; second, that revelation is quite superfluous, since natural religion gives us every thing we need.

I. Revelation gives an uncertain sound. There are certain books in the world which claim to stand on a higher ground than all others. They claim to be special revelations of the will of God and the destiny of man. Now surely one of the first requisites of a Divine revelation is that it should be undoubtedly of Divine origin. But about all these books, except the Koran of Mahomet, hangs much obscurity both as regards their origin and their authorship. "Believers" urge that were the proofs undoubted there would be no room for faith and no merit in believing. They conceive it, then, to be a worthy employment for the Supreme Intelligence to set traps for His creatures; and, there being certain facts of the greatest importance, undis-coverable by their natural faculties, He proceeds to reveal these facts, but envelopes them in such wrappings of mystery, such garments of absurdity, that those of His creatures whom he has dowered with intellects and gifted with subtle brains, are forced to reject the whole as incredible and unreasonable. That God should give a revelation, but should not substantiate it, that He should speak, but in tones unintelligible, that His noblest gifts of reason should prove an insuperable bar to accepting his manifestation, are surely statements incredible, are surely statements utterly irreconcileable with all reverent ideas of the love and wisdom of Almighty God. Further, the believers in the various revelations all claim for their several oracles the supreme position of the exponent of the Will of God, and each rejects the sacred books of other nations as spurious productions, without any Divine authority. As these revelations are mutually destructive, it is evident that only one of them, at the most can be Divine, and the next point of the inquiry is to distinguish which this is. We, of the Western nations, at once put aside the Hindoo Vedas, or the Zendavesta, on certain solid grounds; we reject their claims to be inspired books because they contain error; their mistaken science, their legendary history, their miraculous stories, stamp them, in our impartial eyes, as the work of fallible men; the nineteenth century looks down on thee ancient writings as the instructed and cultured man smiles at the crude fancies and imaginative conceits of the child. But when the generality of Christians turn to the Bible they lay aside all ordinary criticism and all common-sense. Its science may be absurd; but excuses are found for it. Its history may be false, but it is twisted into truth. Its supernatural marvels may be flagrantly absurd; but they are nevertheless believed in. Men who laugh at the visions of the "blessed Margaret" of Paray-le-Monial assent to the devil-drowning of the swine of Gadara; and those who would scorn to investigate the tale of the miraculous spring at Lourdes, find no difficulty in believing the story of the angel-moved waters of Bethesda's pool. A book which contains miracles is usually put aside as unreliable. There is no good reason for excepting the Bible from this general rule. Miracles are absolutely incredible, and discredit at once any book in which they occur. They are found in all revelations, but never in nature, they are plentiful in man's writings, but they never deface the orderly pages of the great book of God, written by His own Hand on the earth, and the stars, and the sun. Powers? Yes, beyond our grasping, but Powers moving in stately order and changeless consistency. Marvels? Yes, beyond our imagining, but marvels evolved by immutable laws. Revelation is incredible, not only because it fails to bring proof of its truth, but because the proofs abound of its falsehood; it claims to be Divine, and we reject it because we test it by what we know of His undoubted works, for men can write books of Him and call them His revelations, but the frame of nature can only be the work of that mighty Power which man calls God. Revelation depicts Him as changeable, nature as immutable; revelation tells us of perfection marred, nature of imperfection improving; revelation speaks of a Trinity, nature of one mighty central Force; revelation relates interferences, miracles, nature unbroken sequences, inviolable law. If we accept revelation we must believe in a God Who made man upright but could not keep him so; Who heard in his far-off heaven the wailing of His earth and came down to see if things were as bad as was reported; Who had a face which brought death, but Whose hinder parts were visible to man; Who commanded and accepted human sacrifice; Who was jealous, revengeful, capricious, vain; Who tempted one king and then punished him for yielding, hardened the heart of another and then punished him for not yielding, deceived a third and thereby drew him to his death. But nature does not so outrage our morality and trample on our hearts; only we learn of a power and wisdom unspeakable, "mightily and sweetly ordering all things," and our hearts tell of a Father and a Friend, infinitely loving, and trustworthy, and good. The God of Nature and the God of Revelation are as opposed as Ormuzd and Ahriman, as darkness and light; the Bible and the universe are not writ by the same hand.

II. Revelation then being so utterly untrustworthy, it is satisfactory to discover, secondly, that it is perfectly superfluous.

All man needs for his guidance in this world he can gain through the use of his natural faculties, and the right guidance of his conduct in this world must, in all reasonableness, be the best preparation for whatever lies beyond the grave. Revelationists assure us that without their books we should have no rules of morality, and that without the Bible man's moral obligations would be unknown. Their theory is that only through revelation can man know right from wrong. Using the word "revelation" in a different sense most Theists would agree with them, and would allow that man's perception of duty is a ray which falls on him from the Righteousness of God, and that man's morality is due to the illumination of the inspiring Father of Light. Personally, I believe that God does teach morality to man, and is, in very deed, the Inspirer of all gracious and noble thoughts and acts. I believe that the source of all morality in man is the Universal Spirit dwelling in the spirits He has formed, and moving them to righteousness, and, as they answer to His whispers by active well-doing—speaking ever in louder and clearer accents. I believe also that the most obedient followers of that inner voice gain clearer and loftier views of duty and of the Holiest, and thus become true prophets of God, revealers of His will to their fellows. And this is revelation in a very real sense; it is God revealing Himself by the natural working of moral laws, even as all science is a true revelation, and is God revealing Himself by the natural working of physical laws. For laws are modes of action, and modes of action reveal the nature and character of the actor, so that every law, physical and moral, which is discovered by truth-seekers and proclaimed to the world is a direct and trustworthy revelation of God Himself. But when Theists speak thus of "revelation" using the word as rightfully applicable to all discoveries and all nobly written religious or scientific books, it is manifest that the word has entirely changed its signification, and is applied to "natural" and not "supernatural" results. We believe in God working through natural faculties in a natural way, while the revelationists believe in some non-natural communication, made no one knows how, no one knows where, no one knows to whom.

Where opposing theories are concerned an ounce of fact outweighs pounds of assertion; and so against the statement of Christians, that morality is derived only from the Bible and is undiscoverable by "man's natural faculties," I quote the morality of natural religion, unassisted by what they claim as their special "revelation."

Buddha, as he lived 700 years before Christ, can hardly be said to have drawn his morality from that of Jesus or even to have derived any indirect benefit from Christian teaching, and yet I have been gravely told by a Church of England clergyman—who ought to have known better—that forgiveness of injuries and charity were purely Christian virtues. This heathen Buddha, lighted only by natural reason and a pure heart, teaches: "a man who foolishly does me wrong I will return to him the protection of my ungrudging love; the more evil comes from him the more good shall go from me;" among principal virtues are: "to repress lust and banish desire; to be strong without being rash; to bear insult without anger; to move in the world without setting the heart on it; to investigate a matter to the very bottom; to save men by converting them; to be the same in heart and life." "Let a man overcome evil by good, anger by love, the greedy by liberality, the liar by truth. For hatred does not cease by hatred at any time; hatred ceases by love; this is an old rule." He inculcates purity, charity, self-sacrifice, courtesy, and earnestly recommends personal search after truth: "do not believe in guesses"—in assuming something at hap-hazard as a starting-point—reckoning your two and your three and your four before you have fixed your number one. Do not believe in the truth of that to which you have become attached by habit, as every nation believes in the superiority of its own dress and ornaments and language. Do not believe merely because you have heard, but when of your own consciousness you know a thing to be evil abstain from it. Methinks these sayings of Buddha are unsurpassed by any revealed teaching, and contain quite as noble and lofty a morality as the Sermon on the Mount, "natural" as they are.

Plato, also, teaches a noble morality and soars into ideas about the Divine Nature as pure and elevated as any which are to be found in the Bible. The summary of his teaching, quoted by Mr. Lake in a pamphlet of Mr. Scott's series, is a glorious testimony to the worth of natural religion. "It is better to die than to sin. It is better to suffer wrong than to do it. The true happiness of man consists in being united to God, and his only misery in being separated from Him. There is one God, and we ought to love and serve Him, and to endeavour to resemble Him in holiness and righteousness." Plato saw also the great truth that suffering is not the result of an evil power, but is a necessary training to good, and he anticipates the very words of Paul—if indeed Paul does not quote from Plato—that "to the just man all things work together for good, whether in life or death." Plato lived 400 years before Christ, and yet in the face of such teaching as his and Buddha's,—and they are only two out of many—Christians fling at us the taunt that we, rejectors of the Bible, draw all our morality from it, and that without this one revelation the world would lie in moral darkness, ignorant of truth and righteousness and God. But the light of God's revealing shines still upon the world, even as the sunlight streams upon it steadfastly as of old; "it is not given to a few men in the infancy of mankind to monopolise inspiration and to bar God out of the soul.... Wherever a heart beats with love, where Faith and Reason utter their oracles, there also is God, as formerly in the heart of seers and prophets."*

It is a favourite threat of the priesthood to any inquiring spirit: "If you give up Christianity you give up all certainty; rationalism speaks with no certain sound; no two rationalists think alike; the word rationalism covers everything outside Christianity, from Unitarianism to the blankest atheism;" and many a timid soul starts back, feeling that if this is true it is better to rest where it is, and inquire no more. To such—and I meet many such—I would suggest one very simple thought: does "Christianity" give any more certainty than rationalism? Just try asking your mentor, "whose Christianity am I to accept?" He will stammer out, "Oh, the teaching of the Bible, of course." But persevere: "As explained by whom? for all claim to found their Christianity on the Bible: am I to accept the defined logical Christianity of Pius IX., defiant of history, of science, of common sense, or shall I sit under Spurgeon, the denunciator, and flee from the scarlet woman and the cup of her fascinations: shall I believe the Christianity of Dean Stanley, instinct with his own gracious, kindly spirit, cultured and polished, pure and loving, or shall I fly from it as a sweet but insidious poison, as I am exhorted to do by Dr. Pusey, who rails at his 'variegated language which destroys all definiteness of meaning.' For pity's sake, good father, label for me the various bottles of Christian medicine, that I may know which is healing to the soul, which may be touched with caution, as for external application, and which are rank poison." All the priest will find to answer is, that "under sad diversities of opinion there are certain saving truths common to all forms of Christianity," but he will object to particularise what they are, and at this stage will wax angry and refuse to argue with anyone who shows a spirit so carping and so conceited. There is the same diversity in rationalism as in Christianity, because human nature is diverse, but there is also one bond between all freethinkers, one "great saving truth" of rationalism, one article of faith, and that is, that "free inquiry is the right of every human soul;" diverse in much, we all agree in this, and so strong is this bond that we readily welcome any thinker, however we disagree with his thoughts, provided only that he think them honestly and allow to all the liberty of holding their own opinions also. We are bound together in one common hatred of Dogmatism, one common love of liberty of thought and speech.

It is probably a puzzle to good and unlearned Christians whence men, unenlightened by revelation, drew and still draw their morality. We answer, "from mere Nature, and that because Nature and not revelation is the true basis of all morality." We have seen the untrustworthiness of all so-called revelations; but when we fall back on Nature we are on firm ground. Theists start in their search after God from their well-known axiom: "If there be a God at all He must be at least as good as His highest creature;" and they argue that what is highest and noblest and most lovable in man must be below, but cannot be above, the height and the nobleness and the loveableness of God. "Of all impossible thing, the most impossible must surely be that a man should dream something of the Good and the Noble, and that it should prove at last that his Creator was less good and less noble than he had dreamed."* "The ground on which our belief in God rests is Man. Man, parent of Bibles and Churches, inspirer of all good thoughts and good deeds. Man, the master-piece of God's work on earth. Man, the text-book of all spiritual knowledge. Neither miraculous or infallible, Man is nevertheless the only trustworthy record of the Divine mind in things pertaining to God. Man's reason, conscience, and affections are the only true revelation of his Maker,"** And as we believe that we may glean some hints of the Glory and Beauty of our Creator from the glory and beauty of human excellence, so we believe that to each man, as he lives up to the highest he can perceive, will surely be unveiled fresh heights of righteousness, fresh possibilities of moral growth.

To all men alike, good and evil, is laid open Nature's revelation of morality, as exemplified in the highest human lives; and these noble lives receive ever the heavenly hall-mark by the instinctive response from every human breast that they "are very good." To those only who live up to the good they see, does God give the further inner revelation, which leads them higher and higher in morality, quickening their moral faculties, and making more sensitive and delicate their moral susceptibilities. We cannot, as revelationists do, chalk out all the whole range of moral perfection: we "walk by faith and not by sight:" step by step only is the path unveiled to us, and only as we surmount one peak do we gain sight of the peak beyond: the distant prospect is shrouded from our gaze, and we are too fully occupied in doing the work which is given us to do in this world, to be for ever peering into and brooding over the world beyond the grave. We have light enough to do our Father's work here; when he calls us yonder it will be time enough to ask Him to unveil our new sphere of labour and to cause His sun to rise on it. Wayward children fret after some fancied happiness and miss the work and the pleasure lying at their feet, and so petulant men and women cry out that "man that is born of woman... is full of misery," and wail for a revelation to ensure some happier life: they seem to forget that if this world is full of misery they are put here to mend it and not to cry over it, and that it is our shame and our condemnation that in God's fair world so much sin and unhappiness are found. If men would try to read nature instead of revelation, if they would study natural laws and leave revealed laws, if they would follow human morality instead of ecclesiastical morality, then there might be some chance of real improvement for the race, and some hope that the Divine Voice in Nature might be heard above the babble of the Churches.

And Nature is enough for us, gives us all the light we want and all that we, as yet, are fitted to receive. Were it possible that God should now reveal Himself to us as He is, the Being of Whose Nature we can form no conception, I believe that we should remain as ignorant as we are at present, from the want of faculties to receive that revelation: the Divine language might sound in our ears, but it would be as unintelligible as the roar of the thunder-clap, or the moan of the earthquake, or the whisper of the wind to the leaves of the cedar-tree. God is slowly revealing Himself by His works, by the course of events, by the progress of Humanity: if He has never spoken from Heaven in human language, He is daily speaking in the world around us to all who have ears to hear, and as Nature in its varied forms is His only revelation of Himself, so the mind and the heart alone can perceive His presence and catch the whispers ot His mysterious voice.