The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1876-03-03

tiah rocks, the accepted theories as to
the age OF life On this planet were over
turned. Geology itself is but in its in
fancy. That quarter of the world in
which philology gives us good reason for
believing that nlaii made his first ap-
peafance is still totally unexplored.
biologists have but scratched the sur
face. OF a very limited section of the
earth. Astronomy, also, has just began
to tell It's story. It may almost be said
that every time good astronomer looks
at the heavens through telescope, he
observes something which modifes the
conclusions or discoveries of his predeces-
sors. Science is not positive, although
its professors are. There is nothing in
our day which can be compared with
Newton's discovery of the law of gravi-
tation. He brought to our knowledge
one OF the supreme laws of the universe;
and yet Newton was christian, and
what he detected in the "great ocean of
truth" only led him to believe more
firmly than ever in the God of revela-
ton. We have lost in our day two
great christian philosophers Faraday
and Agassiz- and that loss is one which
it would be difficult to overestimate.
The weight of their names was a per.
petual check to the assumptions Of the
new school which now rushes forward
once week to announce to bewildered
world that there is no God. They are
satisfied that all the universe sprung
from a single germ, but how the germ
was made, or why they can not make
one like it, are questions left unanswered.
In all essential respects, the religion of
the germ is much harder to reconcile with
reason than the religion of Christ. Mat
thew Arnold insists that we shall not be-
lieve in anything which we can not un-
stand. Can anyone, then, understand
his mystical revelation concerning the
| unknown Essence" which he labor
ously manufactures into a deity? Il
surely is no harder to believe that Al
mighty God made the universe than
that this wondrous and glorious system
! is the result of the spontaneous evolution
Of matter. There must be a beginning
TO everything, even to law and germs, to
matter and essences. What was the be-
ginning? The philosophers reject what
they call the incredible teaching of the
Bible for something tenfold more in
credible. Man dashes himself in vain
/ against the adamantine barriers which
] lie between him and the solution of the
mystery. If the scriptures warn us that
we never pass beyond them, science can
at least carry us no further. The one
gives us ample ground for hope and con-
ISOLATION, and scope for the exercise of
the loftiest faculties. The other bids us
look backward into chaos, and forward
into nothingness.
!, If the teachers of christianity were al
ways as earnest and as thorough in their
J work as the preachers of the germ theory,
and other equally remarkable deities Of
J purely human invention, the latter could
not make the progress which they now
seem to be doing. For their pretensions
will not bear investigation, and their
! conjectures are far more irreconcilable
} with the natural instincts and prompt
ings of the mind-which the philosophers
/ profess to reverence so much-than the
belief that there is God who rules the
world, and that it is ruled with infinite
wisdom, although in manner quite in
| comprehensive to u.s. We do not know
the true meaning of anything we see
around us, or in any of the ordinary con-
} ditions of life. To our apprehensions,
i death is the greatest evil, and yet it is
by no means certain that it is an evil at
all. The general testimony of physicians
is that the vast majority of people meet
, it with fortitude which they never an
ticipated they could summon up. To
the bcreaved survivors, death is indeed
) an evil, an evil hard to be borne. But
, at such times the departed should also
: be remembered. What have they lost !?
They are gone, and we must quickly
: follow. For either grief or JOY, for
either pleasure or pain, our day is short.
: Is it the survivor or the departed who
would be pitied most if we could see and
! know all? DR.. johnson feared death
j excessively all his life-the thought O.
lit rendered him wretched beyond de-
scription for over fifty years, and vet
when it came he bore it cheerfnlly, and
J as one who stood over him bears witness,
"all his fears and anxieties seemed to be
absorbed" Almost everyone who has
, recovered from a dangerous illness will
attest that the fear of death bad no in
! fiuence over his mind, unless, indeed, as
, associated with the thought of the great
beyond. And what is to come then
! must remain matter of belief. not OF
knowledge. No audible voice can reach
us out Of the solemn darkness which lies
before u.s. The teaching of christianity
, can alone illumine it. It is the domain
of faith, and it is wiser on every ground
, to hold to the faith taught by the chris
tian church, than to plunge into the
bottomless sea of skepticism toward
) which the philosophers are ceasebe. sly
endeavoring to push us.
j For what, after all, does their knowl-