The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1891-05-20
o1SUNDAY TH0UGHTSp~
AOHk
MORALSbp MANNERS
BY A CLERGYMAN.
NON X

Although as we stated last week, this is
not a theological age, current events sig
Nifty that it is interested in theology. In
religion as everywhere else, unrest is in
the air. Ours seem likely to GO into his
tory as the age of unsettlement. The hu-
man mind is as migratory nowadays as
the human race was in "Auld Lang Sine"
The citation last Monday by the presby-
terry of New York OF DIR. Briggs Tor heresy,
and the voicing of views similar to- or
more ultra than, his in various demon
national quarters, followed by pro-
tests and designations, is proof of the
transitional character of the decade.
Scientific theology should be studied.
Sound knowledge should be iostered.
Theological scholarship needs to be deep
as well as broad. 1t ought to comprehend
science and philosophy, so that it may be
equipped to meet materialism, positivism'
agnosticism and general skepticism.
Moreover, the departments OF sociology
and political economy wait to be annexed
in order to precipitate abstract theology
into concrete religion. Thus the theologi-
cal seminary NOu.u become the
tending from heaven to earth.
IT'S significant fact that science and
philosophy, no less than theology, have
been popularized. Today learning olonger
hides in the convent nor secludes itself in
the palace. She comes out into the street,
Joins hands with the multitude and cush-
ions the peasant. Our astronomy looks
at but does not dwell in the stars, as one
hath said. 1t serves navigation and helps
to stake out boundary lines. Our chem
istry is not the secret OF the alchemist,
striving to change base metals into gold,
but Liebig with his hands full of bless
ings for every farmer. Precisely so We
have brought religion down from the
clouds, where we don't live, to the earth,
where we do. The diffusion of knowl-
edge and the practical tone of it-these
are characteristic distinctions OF the nine
teenth century.
All the more, therefore, does it become
important that our culture should he
thorough. Diluted knowledge is full of dam
ger. 1t tends to conceit, and teens with
perversions. The antidote for nall knowi-
edge is whole knowledge. The disquiet-
ude OF the day is largely due to lack OF
information. Men do not know what
they believe or why. AS in nature, the
thunderstorm is the voice of nature
unrest, when the equipoise of her ele-
ments is disturbed, and she seeks to regain
the wonted repoSe of harmony; so In the
moral world the current dissatisfaction
finds its true Interpretation in a super
fetal knowledge and an unintelligent
faith. Heresv is unripe faith-the green
apples of theology. If heretics knew
more and knew deeper, they would be-
lieve more, and save themselves and the
church much sorrow. Hence, as the
most timely Of suggestions, We urge our
readers to hear and heed the admonition
of Solomon: with all thy getting, get
understanding"
Lord Bacon in memorable passage
says: "a little philosophy inclined mans
mind to atheism, but depth In philosophy
bringeth mems minds about to religion"
In theology, therefore, prominently,
A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring;
There shallow draughts intoxcate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again
The animal in man is strong and master
full The angel in our nature ought to
dominate. AZ fact, however, as Pascal
has pointed out, the angel in man lies
under the dirty uplifted paw of the ami
NAL in him. An eminent Swiss physician,
writing for socialistic journal, Neue Zeit,
is quite orthodox on this subject, and con-
fesses that by nature and by train
ing the majority of men show
little ability to govern their ami
NAL propensities, even in normal
situations, while in unfavorable circum-
stances they give unbridled license to
passions; that is they become, almost
of necessity, the victims of every kind Of
| excess"
Nevertheless, as another distinguished
thinker reminds us, the normal condition
of the spirit of man is one of communion
with Deity. And in the feverish desires,
the fretting cares and tolls and hopes and
anxieties of life, we may hear the uncon-
scious murmurings of a nature that has
| lost its true level and is seeking it in vain /;
and so in the wilder storms of human
passion that sometimes burst forth we
| have the imitation of disunion from God
| in this fierce disharmony within or among
| ourselves.
Had man been born only for the things
| OF time and sense he had been content
and happy among them. The crawling
| worm is haunted by no Renaissance of
the skies, nor is the born beggar's heart
embittered by the recollection OF better
4 nuNSs DOb W III ~ CNoC anu COh-
sciously degraded, the essence of his
misery is the latent conviction that he
has fallen beneath himself. 1t is posi-
bic, indeed, for the soul to reach spuri-
| GUS rest-to sink into the unreal tran
guilty of hardened impenitence in which
il says with Milton's Satan, evil, be thou
my good" But so long as the soul has
not sunk thus low its very restlessness
and misery are at once the tradition Of a
nobler and happier past and the prophesy
| of possible future nobler and happier
still.
How potent the spirit of the age is may
be inferred from proverb, which, strange
to say, was made by the Arabs, that "a man
| is not so much the child of his father, as
the child OF the age in which he lives.
A foreign writer describes recent
| funeral in an atheistic cemetery. owned
by free religious congregation in Berlin.
He paints the motley crowd OF attend
antesome well-dressed. others in their
work-a-day suits, without a collar, un-
shaven and smoking cheap cigars. He
indicates the utterly dreary and empty
platitudes OF the speaker who consigns
the deceased to "a rest followed by no
| life" He then adds:
Il