The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-09-18

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/ who carried il 10 your door TO prove That
I il is a genuine letter The internal cVi-
Z dence settles il. and by the same process
YOU can forever settle the fact that ihe
/ Bible Is the handwriting and Commuuicd-
! ti0n of the infinite God
/ Furthermore: as ] have already intl-
mated, we may increase our faith by the
/ testimony Of others. Perhaps we of less
or brain may have been overcome by
superstition Of caioled into an acceptance
/ of "a hollow prcteusiou. So / Will. This
morning, turn this house into court
/ room and summon witnesses, and you
/ shall be the jury and now | empanel you
/ for that purpose, andI viii put upon the
1 witness stand men whom all the world
( acknowledge TO be strong Intellectually
/ and whose evidence in any other court
room would be incontrovertible. ] Will
not call to the witness stand any minister
of the gospel, for he might be prejudiced.
/ There are two ways of taking an oath IN
/ a courtroom. one is by putting the
! lips to the Bible and the other is by hold
| ing up the right hand toward heaven.
| Now, as in this case, 10 is the Bible that
/ is on trial we will not ask the witness 10
| put the book to his lips, for that would
| imply that the sanctity and divinity of the
| book is settled, and that would be begg-
| ing the question. So / will ask each wit
ness to lift his hand toward heaven IN
affirmation Samuel p. Chase, chief
Justice of the supreme court OF the
United States, appointed by President
Lincoln will take the witness stand.
Chief Justice Chase, upon your oath,
please to state what you have to say
about the book commonly called the
| Bible" The witness replies There
came a time in my life when | doubted
the divinity of the scriptures, and l re
| solved, as lawyer and Judge, / would
try the book as / would try anything in
the courtroom, taking evidence for and
! against. 1t was a long and serious and
profound study. and using the same
principles of evidence in this religious
matter as | always do in secular mat
tiers, | have come to the decision that
| the Bible is a supernatural book that it
has come from God, and that the only
safety for the human race is to follow its
| teachings" Judge, that will do. Go
! back again to your pillow of dust on the
| banks of the OhiO.0 Next | put upon
the witness stand a President of the
| United States-Iohn Quincy Adams
! president Adams, what have you to say
about the Bible and Christianity" The
| President replies: Il have for many years
made it a practice to read through the
Bible once a year My custom is to
read four or five chapters every morn
ing Immediately after rising from my
| bed. 1t employs about an hour of my
time and seems to me the most suitable
manner of beginning the day In what
| light sOever we regard the Bible, whether
with reference TO revelation, to history
or to morality, it is an invaluable and in
| eXhaustible mine of knowledge and vir-
tue" Next / put upon the witness stand
| Sir Isaac Newton, the author of the
| Principal and the greatest natural phil
osOpher the world has ever seen. Sir
Isaac, what have you to say concerning
the Bible2" The philosophers reply is:
I'VE account the scriptures of God to be
the most sublime philosophy"
Next put upon the witness stand the
enchantment of letters, Sir Walter Scott
and when I ask him what he thinks of
| the place that our great book ought TO
| take among other books he replies
"There is but one book and that is the
Bible" Next l put upon the stand the
most famous geologist of all time, Hugh
! Miller, an elder of DIR. Guthrie's Presby-
terrain church, in Edinburgh, and Fara-
day, and Keppler, and they all testify to
is from God and that the mightest intlu-
ence for good that ever touched our
world is Christianity. "ChancellOr
| Kent! What do you think of the Bible ~
Answer: ''No other book ever addressed
itself so authoritatiyely and so patheti-
cally to the Judgment and moral sense of
mankind" Edmund Burkel What do
you think of the Bible" Answer: Il
have read the Bible morning, noon and
night, and have ever since
been the happier and the better
man for such reading" Next put upon
the stand William E. Gladstone, the head
of the English government, and | hear
him saying what he said to me in January
of 1880, when, in reply to his telegram,
pray come to Hawarden tomorrow
| visited him. Then and there | asked him
as to whether, in the passage of years, his
faith in sthe holy scriptures and Christi
anity was on the increase or decrease, and
turned upon me with emphasis and en-
| thusiasm such as no one who has not con
versed with him can fully appreciate, and
expressed by voice and gesture and illu
mined comtenance his ever-increasiug
faithin God and the Bible and Christi
anity as the only hope of our ruined
! world. "That is all. Mr.. Gladstone, we
will take of your time now, for, from the
reports of what is going on in England
just now, l think you are very busy
The next man l put upon the witnes;
stand is the late Earl of KintOre, and
ask him what he thinks of Christianity
and he replies, "Why do you ask me that
Did you not hear me preach Christ in the
Midnight Mission of Londonl' "Oh
| v L L
witness present to-day in the court room
and l call you to the witness stand but
have only a second of time for any one o
you. AS you pass along just give one
sentence in regard to Christianity
Under God it has changed my entire ma
ture," says one. 1T brought me from
drunkenness and poverty to sobriety anC
a good home" says another. at sOlaCeC
me when / lost my Child says another
10 nf fYfr fpaagt4R.t,s
when my property was swept off by the
last panic, " says another 1t has giVer
me peace and satisfaction more to me
than all the world beside says another
ut has been to me light, and music, anC
fragrance, and radiant anticipation, - say;
another. All stop the procession of wit
nesses. Enough! Enough! All those
voices of the past and the present have
nightly increased our faith.
Again our belief is reinforced by arch
aelogical exploration. We must confess
that good men at one time were afraid o
biologists hammer and chemists cruel
bic and archaelogist's inveStiga ton, bu
now intelligent Christians are receiving
and still expecting nothing but COntirma
ton from all such sources. What sup
ports the Palestine Exploration So
ciety5' Contributions from churches anC
Christian benefactors. l saw the mark
of the shovels of shat exploring societ,
amid the ruins of ancient Jericho, and nj
up and down from the Dead Sea to &c
sarea Philippi. Dig awayW says tn