The Mankato free press., 1909-09-17

on Sunday evening Rev. E. L. Heer.
nance introduced his series of sermons
on Evolution" by speaking of "Tht
Freedom of Thought John S:32: aye
shall know the Truth and the truth
shall make you Free John 1913:
when he, the Spirit of truth is come
he shall guide you into all the truth
He said in part: Christianity stands
for Freedom of Thought. 1t is pledged
to that by these statements of the
Master. God made us with minds like
His own, and our minds are given us
TO train, to use. We must put all our
faculties to use. We must not. like
Mr.. Darwin himself, neglect the feel
ing side of our nature, lose all interest
in music and poetry, and become, as he
confessed, merely machine for grind
ing out general laws from mass of
facts. But on the other hand we must
not so love in our feelings, like a good
many women / know, or so live i'm our
business, like a good many men, that
we never do any hard straight think
cover. He has told us almost nothing
about the world in which we live, be-
cause He wanted us to find things out
for ourselves. He hid secrets away in
every corner so as to stimulate our
curiosity. The stars up in the sky to-
night, what are they, how far away,
how did they come to be? God has
given us no ready-made answers to
those questions. And yet He expected
us to know some day, He made us to
know. We shall see later the wonder
ful journey we have already made to-
ward finding an answer to those ques-
tions. And still we are learning Only
few years. ago astronomers thought
that we had gone about as far as we
could ever 60 in our knowledge of the
stars. We could not increase the power
of our telescopes very much more. We
had almost reached the end But then
some scientist discovered that we could
pass the light from the various stars
through a prism and, by a study of
the series of light and dark lines so
tion and age and history of the stars
than the older astronomy ever asked
questions about. As consequence,
astronomy, instead of being science
nearing old age, is now rather a
science in its youth. So with physics;
the discoveries of the last ten years
have made every textbook out of date.
We are still learning; it has not all
been done. We are still learning to
know, as God intended. And | trust
it will be so with all future genera
tions.
If God made us to know, if He has
arranged the world on that plan, don't
be afraid of the Truth. God gives
you absolute freedom to think, to
know, to doubt, to investigate, to
form theories. That you reach the
Truth, that you discover what is really
so, is His only concern. Never mind
from what source truth comes, from
the Bible or Bob Ingersoll, from Deu.
teronomy or Darwin. If it is the truth,
receive it, as you would a message
from God, which it is. Never mind if
some new truth threatens to upset
all your cherished opinions. Thomas
Arnold of Rugby always woke up in
the morning with the feeling that he
might have to revise all his opinions
before nightfall. If you have to choose
between Christianity and the truth
l don't believe you will-choose the
truth every time. If so-called Chris
tianity in any point is untrue, in that
point it is not divine and we don't
want it. Don't fear for the Truth.
The truth can stand alone; it does not
need to be explained away or apollo
gized for or buttressed by false argu-
ments. You remember the story of
David bringing the ark to Jerusalem
The road was rough and the wagon tip
ped and Uzza, fearing that the ark
would fall, put out his hand to steady
it. You remember what happened
Uzza didn't. The ark of truth may
tip once in while on the rough road
but never you mind. 1t cannot fall,
for God is watching over it. You stick
to your place at the ropes, pulling
truth on to its rightful place in the
Jerusalem temple of human thought
The man who puts out timid hand
and says: "This state must in the Bible
may not be true, but we mustn't let
the people know it," is liable to get
hurt, like Uzza God wants faith and
honesty.
Mr.. Heermance went on to speak OF
the possibilities and limitations of our
knowing. There is, humanity speaking
no such thing as absolute knowledge
as being perfectly sure. As Bishop
Butler used to say: probability is the
guide of life" 1t is the only guide
we have. The process of knowing is
the same i'm the sciences as i'm common
life and religion. We use the same
minds to find out the truth, and we
use them in the same way We reason
from our experiences, and draw con-
clusions which are probable but never
certain. Mr.. Heermance illustrated this
by taking such simple statements from
different spheres, as "The sun will rise
tomorrow" "the earth revolves on its
axis every twenty-four hours" "God
loves me-" He showed that the pro
cess of knowing was the same in each