The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1920-06-06
FOUR RELIGIOUS ESSAYS.

Religious Thought, Richard G. Badger,
The Gorham Press, Boston, has just
placed on the market Four Religious
Essays. in book form, by John C.
iSkottowe, of Pensacola. Mr.. Skottowe
is rector Of st. Katherine's (EpiscopaD
Church, and aside from the value of
| the thought expressed, much local in
iterest attaches to the publication,
which comprises: ID Some Thoughts
on the Psychic Constitution of Man
and His Latent Possibilities; CD Love
the Basis of Religious Unity; (3) Does
/ the Church Care More for Various
Theories of the Truth Than She Does
for the Truth Itself? "a The Divinity
! of Man.
/, The first essay bases its conclusions
on close study of psychic phenomina
and research into the so-called Occult
Sciences.
| The author says TN paper of this
kind it is impossible to give more than
| a smattering of the ground gone over
in ones researches in this intensely
interesting and al1-absorbing Topic
and it would not be possible in the
space of a short review to make any
just criticism on this first essay, which
lis in itself mainly a review of the
teachings of the Masters, with the fol-
lowing conclusion: 1T teaches us not
only to believe but to know that the
great universal Intelligence is at all
events a God of Divine Law and Or
der, and that man in fulfilling the laws
of his highest being unfolds ever more
land more freely his latent divine prin-
lciples and potentialities. 1t teaches us
that by the wrong use of the higher
principles attained through personal
development man for time can sink
lower than the brutes and that with in
tense pain and suffering he must re-
trace his steps. 1t destroys all ideas
lof an unworthy mechanical or substi-
tutionary religion. 1t gives us mex
|pressible and marvellous beauty and
spiritual understanding of the work
and teachings of our Blessed Lord and
Master, Jesus the Christ
Therefore let no man glory in man,
for all things are yours, whether Paul
or Appollos, or Cephas, or the world, or
life, or death, or things present, or
things to come, all are yours, and We
are Christ's and Christ is Gods" TAX
ing this verse from First Corinthians.
third chapter, 2123, the author, in the
second essay declares that the Univer-
oDlT1I w IlOIl we Call NIOu Is CIlduSt-
less; it is we, as we progress and
evolve, that change. God is as much
in his universe as ever. But if any
church or Christian body fails to strive
earnestly to live up to it's highest ideals
and refuses to grow or permit growth
by refusing to recognize the further
embodiment of truth as it is mani
tested upon earth in many and mani
- syfa oy,f
and dead instead of living and grow
ing organism and will be weighed in
the balances and found wanting, as
have many other forms of Religion in
the past, all of which have served a.
good purpose in their day and genera
ton, and will give place to higher
form that is purer type of Chris
tianity. Political autocracies are fast
making way for the Higher Democra-
cies. Religious autocracies will also in
time leave, when the time is ripe, and
they have served their purpose in the
evolution of the race and will give
way to true religious democracy"
Following the evolution of man, as
based on the fundamental truth, "as a
man thinketh in his heart, so is he
in the third essay the author states the
promise that the New Psychology
teaches the importance Of keeping con-
stantly before us high and lofty ideals,
and the great aid, to be gained in CIV
ing expression to these.
Jesus said: IF We would enter into
the kingdom of God We must become
as little children" that is, we must
empty our minds of all preconceived
ideas and hold the receptive state of
mind, which is willing to examine the
truth from all sides and compare all
opinions, drawing our own conclusions,
ever keeping the spiritual faculty of
intuition free and clear for fuller rev.
elation of truth from the source of all
truth. that Universal Spirit of the In
finite Intelligence God.
Can any serious and thoughtful man
or woman help but realize that there
is even now a New Heaven and New
Earth to that which was in existence a
hundred years ago?"
The volume closes with The Divin-
ity of Man, perhaps the most compell-
ing of the four essays, each of which in
a few pages gives meat and bread to
the student who is reaching out for
the substance of things, rather than
for the shadow.
Perhaps this paragraph, as much as
any other, will give the reader con-
ception of the force of this essay:
Thus we see that the Religious of
Jesus is emphatically a life and not a
mere intellectual conception of any
particular scheme of salvation. Until
this fact is fully recognized many
thoughtful and truly sincere men and
women will hold aloof from connection
with any religious body that insists on
a scheme of salvation and not a life
of divine embodiment according to the
laws of God, leaving their intel1ects
free as to their Individual conceptions
concerning the nature of God, our
Lord, and dogmas in general some of
which are the accretions of later day
than that when our Lord ministered
upon earth, and some of which are
pagan in origin, and which may have
served their purpose in a day and
generation when ideals morally and
spiritually were at a lower ebb, but
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