The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1879-01-09
Sunday.SchOOl Lessons.
Religion in These Days.

OSSAA ~ oA~A PAy sSuSA pAOAOuuuAy
toned as it has been during the past
ten years. The answer which science
presumes to give, when it presumes to
give any, is not one which pleases or
in any way satisfies itself. "Dust thou
art and to dust shalt thou RETURN
Matter and force have manifested
themselves in man, in form and phe-
nomena, and the matter and force
which have made man shall at last all
be refunded into the common stock, to
be used over and over and over again,
in other forms and phenomena. There
is a body, but there is no such thing as
mind, independent of body. The
dualism of constitution in which we
have believed, and which lies at the
basis of all our religion and philosophy,
is delusicn. Out of all the enormous
expenditure of ingenuity, or of what
appears to be, or seems like, ingenuity,
nothing is saved. The great field of
star-mist out of which our solar system
was made has been hardened into
planets, set in motion and filed with
life, to go on for untold ages, and then
come to an end-possibly to become q
field of star-mist again; and nothing is
to be saved out of the common field of
matter and force that can 60 on in an
independent, immortal life. Man is
simply higher form of animal. God
as personality does not exist. I'M
mortality is dream, and the Christian
religion, of course, is delusion.
These conclusions seem to be the
best that science can give us. Science
believes nothing that it cannot prove.
There may be a personal God, who
takes cognizance of the personal af-
fairs of men, but science cannot prove
it; therefore, belief in a personal God
is " unscientifc'.' There may be such
a thing as the human soul-a spirit
that has life. or the possibilities of a
life, independent of the body; but it
cannot be proved. Indeed, it seems to
be proved that all the phenomena of
what we call mind are attributable
to changes that take place among the
molecules of the brain. Therefore, a
belief in the human soul is unscicn-
tiic. Of course, if there is no human
soul, there is nothing to save, and, if
there be nothing to save, Christ was,
consciously or unconsciously, an i'm
poster; and the hopes and expectations
of all Christendom are vain. And this
is the highest conclusion to which
science seems to be able to lead us.
Can anything be imagined to be more
lame and impotent? We should think
that every laboratory and every scien-
tific school, and every library and study
of a man of science would seem like a
tomb!
After all, we have every
thing left that we have ever possessed.
Nothing is proved against our faith.
Science has never proved that there is no
personal God, 10 soul, no Immortality,
no Christ, and these are matters that
we have always taken on faith. Not
only this, but they are matters which
science is utterly incompetent to ham
die. They are outside of the domain
of science. Science can no more touch
them than it can touch anything that it
confesses to be "unknowable."
Now, there are several important
things that are to be got out of the way
before thoughtful Christendom can be
induced to give up its faith in a per-
sonal God. First, there is the moral
nature of man which infallibly recog-
nizes personal God. A sensitive moral
nature and guickened conscience,
whose outcome is sense of moral
responsibility, would be lost in the
marvel of their own existence without
the certainty of the personal God to
whom they owe allegiance. They
would have no meaning, no authority,
no object, without this certainty. There
is also the religious nature of man.
Reverence for God, love to God, devo-
ton to God-all these, actually or po-
tentially, exist in mans nature. They
underlie character. They are potent
among motives; and if there be no per-
sonal God who exists as their legiti-
mate object, what, in the economy of
Nature, do they mean? There is a
question for science to answer that is
quite worth it's while. Why! man
cannot admit the evidence of design in
creation without admitting the exist
ence of a personal God, and when men
get so far bankrupt in common sense
as to deny the existence of design, are
they worth minding?
When we admit the existence of a
personal God, the rest all comes. This
doctrine lies at the basis of all faith.
If there is a great, conscious, spiritual
personality in existence, there are like
ly to be smaller spiritual personalities.
If there is personal God who has be-
gotten family of children capable of
recognizing and loving Him, is it prob
able that He has destined them to an
nihilation? Is He to get nothing out
of this great experimental carry
nothing over into higher life? What
are the probabilitiesP' And why has he
planted this desire for Immortality in
all Nations and races of men-not only
the desire, but the expectation? The
truth is that every unsophisticatcd man,
looking into himself, knows, with the
highest degree of moral certainty, that
he is living soul, and. that the mind
acts upon the brain as often and as
powerfully as the brain upon the mind.
How offan has the brain heen paralvzed