The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-12-02

change-types, they may be called, or the first stage, the middle and the last that matter passes through in the long process of the evolution of worlds, And of all changes, that change has most in- terest for us which affects our own planet, the earth; 1t has reached a later stage than saturn, though not so late a stage as the moon. but only In long ages and by minute effects will further changes be noticed.
 Ages hence 1t may be discovered that there Is some slight change in the earth's orbit; or Mercury, yet nearer to the sun than we, may be seen to pursue yet smaller orbit than now, and the terrible fact may come home to man that we are drawing nearer to the sun. Time goes on, and the tropics become too hot for existence, and colder regions find a welcome change to warmth.
 Age by age goes by, and the end is vislbly nearer; but the figures of as- tronomers only too surely tell their tale.
 "Now the tropics are an impossible desert, and all the life on the globe con- gregates around the poles, Spain has lost her vineyards and the Alps their snow; England Is a burning desert and Greenland teens with the vegetation of the tropics; in smaller and smaller circles the inhabitants gather around the poles. But the narrowed limits of the habitable earth can no longer support this vast increase of popula- tion, and famine begins to mow down it's victims by millions
 "The heat and drought become more and more insupportable; rain and snow fall no longer All springs of water fail and the rivers dwindle down to stream lets and trickle over their stony beds; and now scarcity of water is added to scarcity of food Those who escape from the famine perish by the drought, and those who escape from the drought are reserved for fate more awful yet. For a time the few remaining inhabi- tants are partially screened from the overwhelming power of the sun by dense canopy of clouds formed by the evaporation of every lake and sea. But soon the sun scorches up these vapor banks and dissipates them into space as fast as they can form. Then the fiery orb shines out in unutterable splendor without the slightest cloud wreath to interpose between himself and his victims. Then the last deni- zens of the world are stricken down and consumed; the last traces of 5rgan- ic life are plotted from it's face"
 There you have side by side the final dicta of the natural human soul. of the Bible and of modern science. Scrutinize them. Compare them. And then tell me, Is there any real disagreement be- tween them as to the general prospect of this earth? And are there not very few matters, indeed, about which we have such strong and Independent, yet converging, lines of evidence?
 So, then, it may be fairly said that all well-informed and intelligent men know that this earth is doomed. But do we believe it? We all know that we are going to die, but few of us believe 1t; for belief is knowledge converted into moral and intellectual motive-power, and there are few whose lives indicate that their knowledge of death has been transmitted into belief that they are going to die Even so, though a vast many men know that this earth is doomed, few men believe it. Why, more than half of the immoral people of our society, and two-thirds of the religious skeptics, are immoral or skep- tical chiefly for the reason that they do not believe this earth is coming to an end, although they know this perfectly welt
 | Nevertheless, my friends, we shall never look this matter through and through, we shall never wiring from 1t | it's only helpful lesson, unless we go further and ask ourselves, what differ- 1 ence will a. vital belief that this world
 is doomed to pass away make in the
 actual lives of those who both know
 this and believe it?
 Let us acknowledge stlaightway that
 to casual observation the difference, so ! far as what We call respectable people or common, will be small. So far as
 the exterior complexion of life goes there will be little difference between l the man who is devoted to this world
 for it's own sake, and the man who is
 devoted to this world for the sake of | LI6 WOTlu UO CUlil6, dIlu LIllS TOT one
 single reason: that both this world and \ the next are Gods worlds, and God is
 all in all. Here we pass, my brethren,
 from the realm of outward doings ito the
 realm whose very existence the devil wishes us to ignore--the realm of moral
 motives, ''the kingdom that cometh not with observation Yet even in our courts of secular justice the distinctionis
 constantly drawn that the very same deed may be either righteous or crim- inal, and that no man can tell which l 1t is until the motive of it be discerned
 Now the devil dislikes even secular
 courts of justice, for he prefers that
 men should not examine into their mo- tives, since to examine motives is tc
 test things material and temporal and
 seen by things spiritual unseen and ] eternal. And just because it is possi- I ble for men to do identical acts from | different motives, it is the natural ten l dency of human society to disguise and
 confuse what the courts must disclose
 and separate. But secular courts have | to do with this world only Witt
 mans eternal life religion has to do And in the case before us the task oi | religion is, to insist that while mer l who do, and men who don't, believe | fbia aa y,th ic donYf7nd +n