The Milan exchange. (Milan, Gibson County, Tenn.) 1874-1978, 1879-06-26

A Broad Fellowship.

Writing in Scribper for April of
Some Thin Virtues" and especially of
liberation, DR.. Holland says:
Men tolerate each other and each
sther's sentiments and opinions, and are
much too apt to be content with that.
They altogether overestimate the value
of it, but beyond this there is in some
quarters, and ought to be in all quar-
tiers, a sense of brotherhood among all
honestly and earnestly-inquiring souls.
There is no reason why Dean Stanley
and Mr.. Darwin should not be the most
affectionate friends. There is no good
reason why Cardinal Manning and Mr..
Matthew Arnold should not be on the
most delightful terms of intimacy.
There is no good reason why Mr..
rockingham and DR.. Hall, DR.. Draper
and DR.. Taylor should not be'bound up
in a loving brotherhood. They un-
doubtedly tolerate one another now. 1t
would be simply indecent for them to
do anything less, but we fear that we
have not quite reached the period when
these men, with profound respect for
one another's manhood, truthfulness and
earnestness, recognize each other as
seekers for truth, and love and delight
in each other as such. We are all in
terested in the same things, but we hap
pen to be regarding them from different
angles.
Some of the sincerest men in the
world are the doubters.
There is more faith in honest doubt.
Believe me, than IN half the creeds.
Ia &C Aan
pathy that by right belongs to them.
They have as great love for truth as
anybody, and are looking for it, but, by
the constitution of their minds, or by
the power of an unfortunate education,
or the influence of an untoward per-
sonal experience, they find themselves
thrown off into a region of skepticism,
where they have no cOngenial cOmpan-
ionship. They do not get even tolera-
ton from those particularly who inherit
their creeds, and to whom faith is as
natural as breathing. These men ought
all and always to be brought affection
ately into the great brotherhood of
truth-lovers and truth-seekers, and a
Christian of any name who cannot
throw his warmest sympathies around
these, and regard them with a peculiar
ly affecUionate interest, must necessarily
be a very poor sort of creature. All
honest truth-seekers are always truth
finders, and all have something in pos
session that viii he of advantage to the
others. The differences between them
are sources of wealth to the whole.
THIS is true of all truth-seekers, and
il is particularly true of the different
sects of Christendom. Let not the
Catholic think for a moment that he
has nothing to learn of the Protestant,
and let not the Protestant think that he
holds all truth to the exclusion of his
Catholic brother. The fact that all
these sects exist and find vitality enough
in their ideas to keep them prosperous
ly together shows that there is some
thing to be learned everywhere and
among them all, and that the policy is
poor which shuts them away from one
another's society. 1t is better to re-
member that truth is one, and that those
who are earnestly after it, whether they
deny Christianity or profess it, whether
they are called by one name or another,
belong together, in one great sympa-
thetic brotherhood of affection and pur-
suit,