Knoxville journal. [volume] (Knoxville, Iowa) 1874-1986, 1874-10-08

vale. But we have exhausted our criti-
cism of this materialism when we say
that it does not touch single fact of the
whole spirit world but is nothing but an
inquiry how any fact ever came. Hav-
ing found that life came from matter it
gives up the enigma how matter be-
gan. and, having bartered away
the mystery of the spirit, takes
back in payment the mystery OF
such potent" dust. A theory which
thus makes room for the spiritual world
of the most imaginative Christian, for
even the apocalypse of st. John, and
which only tells US how things began,
and not what they are nor where they
will carry US, theory which dares to
say nothing about the quality of God,
but only points out the place of His in
fancy, is theory curious rather than de-
structive or alarming. Instead of being
alarming it only reminds us of the inn
pressive value as an argument of the great
fact of what we call soul. The patient
naturalists may toll long and hard to
solve the whole enigma of the past, but,
be their conclusion this or that, here is
the soul itself, perfectly unmoved by its
origin, thoughtful only about its destiny.
Come by what far-off path it may, here
it is, with mind, with love, with charity,
with hope, with love of truth which
can never leave all things, and with
longing for blessedness which this
career cannot give. If there was "po-
tency of matter which set all this going,
all we can say is that that potency" is
glorious one, and can make and has
made an angelic world as well, divine
world as well, and we shall expect man
kind to be carried along to heaven by
this wind which has carried up dust from
chaos and made the particles turn into
angels on the way.
Better far, however, is the theory OF
the Bible; for it does not ask man to at
tempt the lesson how anything began to
be, lesson which man cannot learn; for
if he creates spirit he must assume matter,
and if he creates matter he must assume
spirit; but which sets him down in
realm and commands him to assume a
spirit and to begin his study, not over the
absolute origin of the world, but over the
sublime realities around and before him.
All who have reached middle life, unless
they have been blessed with wonderful
power of faith and uniformity of temper
ament, have felt in many an hour the icy
touch of unbelief and have looked up to
the sky and wondered If anywhere there
was God, anywhere there were now in
homes of bliss those who had walked
once upon this beautiful little earth. We
have found no cure for this sad wonder
ment so effectual as the firm resolve al
ways to cast ones self upon the highest
conception of human life and assume as
real its best morals and best duties and
best hopes. The years of life are not
l,,+ a. ;. n oil iHa in,
man that teaches him that he should fling
his heart upon the best ideal, and, even
if life be mystery, live it out well to
the very extreme moment of the beating
heart. Now the best ideal is that which
assumes the great spiritual destiny of
the soul That ideal is that the soul is
going forward and not downward or back.
Man must assume the reality of his best
hopes and best morals and best religion,
for in this lies the value of the power to
perceive the better and the best. Any
thing that falls below the best idea
not noble enough to be true. 1t is true
that nothing in the ideal or whole religion
of immortality should rob this life of any
of the care and labor and love and hap
piness it needs, for if there is to be a
should all be made the best possible, that
it might become golden steps leading up
to the better mansion; but over this being,
as making it better here, should be cast
this halo of immortal life to give impulse
to the virtue and religion that bind us to
our fellow.men. The Christian theory
seems able to produce higher order of
mind than can ever hope to come from a
world without a God and a future life
Atheism enjoys the advantage of never
having been tried. 1t has never formed,
never wholly constructed a shape of civ
ilization for itself. 1t can point only
to individuals and those affected
by the presence all around them of the
deepest religious sentiment In order TO
Judge of its merit or demerit as plan of
these threescore years, it Is necessary to
conceive of a whole society from which
God had been removed and from whose
grave all hope and fear have been taken,
and from whose individual hearts all the
solemnities and mysteries of religion
have been withdrawn forever. How
amid such poverty of faith and hope
this atmosphere laden with nothing but
mortality could ever again grow such
beings as now adorn its history is be-
yond conjecture. Very much of the
worlds charity is founded upon the di-
vine destiny Of man. 1t is because all
these earthly children are journeying
toward a brotherhood beyond that good
men have FASTENED TO confess the broth
erhood here.
And oh! what parting hearts which the
grave has come between have had their
tears dried in the sunshine of coming
heaven. This worlds civilization all in
art and law and morals has come up
from Immortality and God.
+" IT, at the last, mans thirst for higher things
BE quenched In dust-that giyer Of his life
Why press with growing zeal hopeless strife,
Why, born for creeping, should he dream oil
wingsr'
Civilization is flower that grows up
on the tomb of man,
While we thus agree and speak against
any pure atheism, yet we confess that of
all forms Of thought it is least to be
feared. The human heart will certainly
never receive it. II is soil so cold and
barren that mankind will not ever hope
tn grow great nations of great minds uD-