The record-union., 1898-04-10
IN RELIGIONS N'S~,REALM.
FROM VARIOUS
RELIGIOUS NEWSPAPERS.

The Religious Thought of the Day
as Expressed in the Sec
tartan Press.
SEhat the work of the liberal church
es is not done, even the destructive
work. says the '.Universalist Leader
OF Boston and Chicago, lis shown by
the Presbyterian Messenger empha-
sizing as one of the great truths of
Christianity, that men do not have
eternal life on the ground of their mer-
it,, and proceeds to take away all in
centIve to personal effort by making
salvation an arbitrary gift as a result
OF compliance with certain arbitrary
conditions. AS Well might it be said
that intellectual salvation can be be-
slowed by a teacher on condition that
the pupil assumes certain attitudes and
repeats certainfornlulas of words Only
in so far as the attitudes and formulas
have intrinsic instructing powers are
they efficient in developing the merit
Of the pupil which is his salvation.
Intellectual salvation is not something
that can be bestowed from the outside !;
it is truth taken into the mind and
made part of the minds life, and in
proportion as the mind becomes truth it
is saved from ignorance. Though
teachers be the best, and conditions
most favorable, the pupil gets intellect
ual salvation only when he merits it,
because of his own effort The same
natural conditions hold in the spiritual
world, in the salvation of the soul.
Given a teacher of divine authority, an
eXemplar of supreme excellence even
a God of infinite power, wisdom and
benevolence, yet salvation cannot be
imposed upon a human soul any more
than muscle can be put upon body
except by means of assimilated food"
There is discernible here and there
in history" says the New York "Ob-
server" Pres.), g a small, a very small,
class of heroic, strenuous souls, self
abandoned to sacrificial service, whose
whole being has become permeated and
possessed by great truths and causes.
These men have been the creed makers,
the impassioned leaders, the fiery
prophets of the world Such men are
carried away, we say, with the ,inspira-
ton of the cause they champion, which
has ensphered and mastered them
man of that class cannot but speak the
things that he has seen and heard,
and Is instant, in season and out of
season, in sacrifice and service. In the
case of such an individual we may not
speak of a man with message, but
of a message with a man It is when
the message has the man, when it has
free course to be gIorified in him and
with him, that magnificent effects OF
influence upon the world follow The
world may resist such men, it may
cruelty them, but in the end it will he
other and better because they have
lived and labored as the bond-servants
of great principle or cause, and it
will finally build their sepulchers. The
world is always calling for the man
with a message, who has that mes
sage under control, but 1t does not al
ways call for a message with man.
since the very, exeeedingness of the
zeal and devotion, where the cause con-
trolls the convert, oprresses it, frets it,
or too greatly shames it."
"a large part, of the difficulty of the
intellectual class in their present atti
tude toward the church., says the
Christian Register (Unit) of Boston,
arises from this duality that separates
the thought of religion from the rest
of the life of mankind 1t is truly felt
that there is no real difference between
so-called religious people and others.
The worshipers in churches are not the
only humane and righteous people.
Sometimes they show rscant humanity
and righteousness The learning of
Bible lore is seen to be compatible with
downright hypocrisy The mastership
of the Hebrew language never gives a
man any monopoly of noble character
| What is the use of this special religious
learning? Men ask, What deep need
is there that boys and girls shall be
punctual in their attendance at Sun
day-school? Why are there not a
dozen different ways of spending a
Sunday morning all of them as profit
able as hearing a sermon? The answer
to these skeptical questions which the
multitudes vaguely are asking is in
setting forth the chief and permanent
office of the church. The teaching of
the church is not something apart from
other teaching, but it is rather the in
depreciation and unifying of all teach
ing and experience The religious train
ing of the individual is not the mere
development of a certain part of him
to be known as the worShipful faculty,
but it is the bringing of his whole
powers and life into the unity of a
complete manhood. The religious train
ing of a community is not in the mere
outward function of a great cathedral
service, but it is the solidizing of a
thousand personal interests into the
unity of the great common welfare"
1--WE would not for a moment advo-
cate the suspension or abandonment OF
any of our church colleges" says the
Church Standard Up. Ed of Philadel-
phia; 1--WE would take no steep back
ward; we would so endow our colleges
that they might be expanded into uni
versities of the first class; and this,
we trust, may yet, be done. On the
other hand we would build no more
church colleges. When the country had
nothing better than small colleges, and
most of them deneminational, there
Was SoOu iedSoii why church ColieSeS
should be tablished That reason has
passed away. We are entering upon an
educational epoch in which the small
college is becoming obsolete, in which
the great university holds the ground
more and more efficiently, and in which
the competition of the small college.
even if it be a church college, becomes
daily more hopeless. We should say
that in the educational epoch into
N, \ iok ,n-o q re emf tarincc the fr11a r,nIicv