We live in the most important age in the history of the world. No age preceding it was marked with such signal events. No other era in the history of civilization has been characterized by such agitation of human thought; such a universal tendency to investigation; such a general awakening upon all important subjects of human inquiry; such a determination to grow in knowledge, and cultivate the immortal intellect, and mount to higher plains of development. The world of mind is in commotion. All civilized nations are agitated from center to circumference with the great questions of the age. And what does all this prove? Why, that man is a progressive being; that the tendency of the human mind is onward and upward; and that it will not always consent to be bound down in ignorance and superstition. And, thanks to the genius of the age, it is the prophecy of the glorious reformation and regeneration of society,—an index of a happier era in the history of the human race. Old institutions are crumbling, and tumbling to the ground. The iron bands of creeds and dogmas, with which the people have been so long bound down, are bursting asunder, and permitting them to walk upright, and do their own thinking. In every department of science, in every arena of human thought and every theater of human action, we see a progressive spirit, we behold a disposition to lay aside the traditions and superstitions of the past, and grasp the living facts of the age. We everywhere see a disposition to abandon the defective institutions, political and religious, which were gotten up in the childhood of human experience, and supplant them with those better adapted to the wants of the age. In a word, there is everywhere manifested a disposition and determination to unshackle the human body, and set free the human mind, and place it with its living aspirations on the road to the temple of Truth. An evidence of the truth of these statements the reader can gather by casting his eyes abroad, or by reading the periodicals of the day. At this very time nearly all the orthodox churches are in a state of commotion. The growing light and intelligence of the age, penetrating their dark creeds and dogmas, are producing a sort of moral effervescence. The question of "hell" is now the agitating theme of the churches. Posterity will ridicule us, and class us with the unenlightened heathen, for discussing a question so far behind the times, and one so childish and so absurd in this intelligent and enlightened age. To condescend to discuss such a question now must be Well enough for scientific and intelligent minds. And other important religious events mark the age. When the Roman-Catholic Church, through its Ecumenical Council, dragged the Pope from his lofty throne of usurped power, and robbed him of his attribute of infallibility, it proclaimed the downfall of the Pope and the death-knell of the Church. Already thousands of his subjects refuse longer to bow down and kiss the big toe of his sacred majesty. His scepter has departed, his spiritual power is gone, his temporal power is waning. And the same spirit of agitation is operating as a leaven in the Protestant churches also. All the orthodox churches are declining and growing weaker by their members falling off. The Methodist Church has recently lost more than two hundred of its preachers; and the Baptist Church, according to the statement of a recent number of "The Christian Era," has lost twenty-two thousand of its members within a period of five years. The agitation in the churches is driving thousands from their ranks, while many who remain are becoming more liberal-minded. The orthodox Quaker Church has, in many localities, "run clear off the track."

It has abandoned its old time-honored peculiarities in dress and language, once deemed by them sacred, and essential to true godliness. The use of "thee" and "thou" is laid aside by many of its members; and even leading members have given up the "shad-bellied coat," and the round-crowned hat with a brim broad enough to "cover a multitude of sins." They no longer wait for "the Holy Ghost" to move them to preach; but, as a member once remarked, "they go it on their own hook, like the Methodists, hit or miss." Music, once regarded by many of them as an emanation from "an emissary of the Devil," is now admitted into many of their churches. Thus it will be seen they are making some progress. The light without is benefiting them more than "the light within." All the orthodox systems committed a fatal error at the outset in assuming that their religions were derived directly from God, and consequently must be perfect and unalterable, and a finality in moral and religious progress. Such an assumption will cause the downfall, sooner or later, of any religious body which persists in propagating the error. Religious institutions, like all other institutions, are subject to the laws of growth and decay. Hence, if their doctrines and creeds are not improved occasionally to make them conform to the growing light and intelligence of the age and the principles of science, they will fall behind the times, cease to answer the moral and religious wants of the age, and become a stumbling-block in the path of progress. Common sense would teach us that the doctrines preached by the churches two hundred years ago must be as much out of place now as the wooden shoes and bearskin coats worn by the early disciples would be for us. Their spiritual food is by no means adapted to our moral and religious wants. We are under no more moral and religious obligation whatever to preach the doctrines of original sin, the fall of man, endless punishment, infant damnation, &c., because our religious forefathers believed in these doctrines, than we are morally bound to eat beetles, locusts, and grasshoppers, because our Jewish ancestors feasted on there nasty vermin, as we learn by reading Lev. xi. Why is it that in modern times there has arisen great complaint in all the orthodox churches about the rapid inroads of infidelity into their ranks? It is simply because, that while the people are beginning to assume the liberty to do their own thinking, the churches refuse to recognize the great principle of universal progress as applicable to their religion, which would and should keep their doctrines and precepts improved up to the times. Instead of adopting this wise policy, they try to compel their members to be content with the old stale salt junk of bygone ages, in the shape of dilapidated, outgrown creeds and dogmas; but it will not do. It is as difficult to keep great minds tied down to unprogressive creeds as it would be to keep grown-up boys and girls in baby-jumpers. Enlightened nations are as capable of making their own religion as their own laws; that is, of making its tenets conform to the natural outgrowth of their religious feelings as they become more expanded and enlightened. And it is a significant historical fact, that great minds in all religious nations have wholly or partially outgrown and abandoned the current and popular religions of the country. It is only moral cowards, or the ignorant and uninformed, who throw themselves into the lap of the Church, and depend upon the priest to pilot them to heaven. Moses, Jesus Christ, Mahomet, Martin Luther, John Wesley, Emanuel Swedenborg, George Fox, Elias Hicks, and many other superior minds, strove hard unconsciously to rise above the religion in which they were educated; and all succeeded in making some improvement in its stereotyped doctrines or practices. The implied assumption of the churches, that their doctrines and precepts are too perfect to be improved and too sacred to be investigated, and their Bible too holy to be criticised, is contradicted both by history and science; and this false assumption has already driven many of the best minds of the age from their ranks. Theodore Parker declared that all the men of great intellects had left the Church in his time, because, instead of improving their religion to keep it up to the times they bolt their doors, and hang curtains over their windows to keep out the light of the age. There could not be one inch of progress made in any thing in a thousand years with the principle of non-progression in religion adopted by the churches; for, if it will apply to religion, it will apply with still greater force to every thing else: and hence it would long ago have put a dead lock upon all improvement, had it not been counteracted by outside counter-influences. It is because a large portion, and the most enlightened portion, of the community have assumed the liberty and moral independence to think and act for themselves, that society has made any progress either in science, morals, or religion. A religion which sedulously opposes its own improvement can do nothing essential toward improving any thing else, unless forced into it by outside influences; and it can not feel a proper degree of interest in those improvements essential to the progress of society. On the contrary, it must check the growth of every thing it touches with its palsied hands. Here we can see the reason that no church in any age of the world has inaugurated any great system of reform for the improvement of society, but has made war on nearly every reform set on foot by that class of people which it has chosen to stigmatize as "infidels." Such a religion will decline and die in the exact ratio of the enlightenment and progress of society.

THE COMING REVOLUTION.

That there is a general state of unrest in the public mind, at the present time, on the subject of religion, must be apparent to every observing person. Theological questions, long since regarded as settled for ever, are being overhauled and discussed with a freedom and general interest far transcending that known or practically realized at any previous period. This is premonitive of a speedy religious revolution. That it will come sooner or later is as certain as that seed-sowing is succeeded by harvest. Reforms no longer move with the snail's pace they did a century ago. This is an age of steam and electricity; and every thing has to move with velocity. We cherish no unkindly feelings toward any church or people; but we must rejoice that the strongholds of orthodoxy are being shaken, and error exposed, and that creeds are loosening their iron grasp upon the immortal mind Old, long-cherished dogmas, myths, and blinding superstitions are passing away, to make room for something better.

Yes, the signs of the times indicate the dawning of a brighter day upon the world,—a day which shall be illuminated by the rays of reason and science.

And, if this work shall contribute any thing toward speeding the dawning of that glorious era, we shall feel amply rewarded for the labor and personal sacrifice required in its production.

REASON WILL SOON TRIUMPH.

The march of science and the rapid growth of the reasoning faculties peculiar to this progressive age are daily revealing the errors of our popular theology, and exposing their demoralizing effects in repressing the growth and healthy action of the intellect, and perverting the exercise of the moral faculties. And this progressive change and improvement must be a source of great rejoicing to every true-hearted philanthropist, and furnishes a strong incentive to labor with zeal in this field of reform. It should be borne in mind, that all the dogmas and doctrines of our current religious faith originated at a period before the sun of science had risen above the moral horizon, and anterior to the birth of moral science, and hence, like other productions of that age, are heavily laden with error. But rejoice, O ye lovers of and laborers for truth and science! the dark clouds of our gloomy theology are rapidly receding before the sunlight of our modern civilization, and will soon leave a clear and cloudless sky! And all will rejoice in having learned and practically experienced the glorious truth, that true religion is not incorporated in Bibles, or inscribed on the pages of any book, and cannot be found therein, but is a natural and spontaneous outgrowth of man's moral and religious nature, and is "the most beautiful flower of the soul."