Year: 1876

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY.
Some stricturies s'P8U the Course Of Sci


entisfs with Regard 20 Religion


and the Bible.


There never Was q time when the ne
cessity for bringing home to the mind
the sacred associations of the Christmas
seGsth WAS greater than it is now. Men
Of unquestionable learning and ability
ar. everywhere striving to destroy the
foundations of the christian religion.
They insist that God can not and does
not exist, but that the universe is gov
erned by some unknown laws, which are
the result of spontaneous evolution.


First came atoms, and then the atoms
assumed a sNape, and then the shape be-
gan to turn round the sun, and then a
germ with life appeared upon it, and the
germ gradually became man. The same
process is always being continued in
other planets. Worlds come into eKis-
tence, live out their days, and then per
ish, with all the countless myriads of
generations which pass to and fro upon
them and this vast tragedy goes on
without design or plan, without even a
designer. There is a claw" but who


made the law, or how came 1T into eNis-
tence, the philosophers acknowledge that
they can not even conjecture. Some of
them will go so far as to admit that


there must be first cause" but they
regard it as a mere philosophical abstrac-
ton, inConceivable TO the finite sense,
and inexpIicable in all the operations
which can be traced to it. But the
belief in wise and benefiCent God, or
in eternal wisdom ruling all things &C
cording 20 it's own immutable decTeCs, or
in any dealings of the creator with man,
or in a life hereafter-all this IL sum-
marily rejected by the philosophers. 1t
almost seems at times as though the


present aim of science was not so much


to enlarge its own boundaries and fields
of knowledge, as to convince the world


that christianity Is an impOsture and
that its founder was merely an amlable
enthusiast.


To protest against this warfare of
science upon religion would be worse
than useless, for the leaders of the new
scientific school are not disposed to listen
| to anv remonstrance. They will give
no quarter to christianity. 1t is an old
wives fable, and those who believe IN 1T
| barely surrender their reason to a super
| stitiOn, or are creatures destitute OF
reason. This is the tenor, often the very
| language, of modern science. One Is
| inclined sometimes to wonder that
| philosopher, who is obliged to announce
at frequent intervals that some fresh
| " discovery compels him to make


very complete change in his "views
concerning his new creed, or nO-Creed-
| that such a man should be presumptuOus
enough to declare that he, at length, has
! found out what God is, and that it IS


nothing more than a fetch Of mans own
! imagining. There is nothing liked or
| permanent in modern science. When
| Eozoon was lately found in the Lauren
| tian rocks, the accepted theories as to


the age of life on this planet were over
! turned. Geology itself is but IN its in
! fancy. That quarter of the world in


which philology gives us good reason for
| believing that man made his first ap-


pearance is still totally unexplorcd.
| Biologists have but scratched the sur
face of very limited section of the


earth Astronomy, also, has Just began


to tell its story. 1t may almost be SAID
that every time a good astronomer looks
at the heavens through a telescope, he
observes something which mOdities the
conclusions or discoveries of his pTedeces-
| sors. Science Is not positive, although


its professors arc There Is nothing in
our day which can be compared with
! Newton's discovery of the law of gravi-
tation. He brought to our knowledge


one of the supreme laws Of the universe;
| and vet Newton was christian, and
| what he detected in the great ocean Of


truth" only led him to believe more
| firmly than ever in the God of revela-
| ton. We have lost in our day two


great christian philosophers-Fa Faraday
| and Agassiz-and that loss Is one which
it would be difficult to oyerestimate.
The weight of their names was per.


petual check to the assumptions of the
new school which now rushes forward
once a week to announce to a bewlldcred


world that there is no God. They are
satisfied that all the universe sprung
from a single germ, but how the germ


was made, or why they can not make


one like it, are questions left unanswered.


In all essential respects, the religion OF


the germ Is much harder to reconcile with
, reason than the religion Of Christ. Mat


thew Arnold insists that we shall not be-
lieve in anything which we can not un-


stand. Can anyone, then, understand
: his mystical revelation concerning the
unknown Essence" which he labor
, ouslv manufactures into a deity7 II
, surely is no harder to believe that Al
) mighty God made the universe than
that this wondrous and glorious system
Is the result of the spontaneous evolution
: of matter. There must be a beginning
TO everything, even to law and germs, &c
= matter and essences. What was the be
, ginning? The philosophers reject what
7 they call the incredible teaching Of the
5 Bible for something tenfOld more III
? credible. Man dashes himself in vain
- against the adamantine barriers which
: lie between him and the solution Of the
| mystery If the scriptures warn us thai
we never pass beyond them, science car
= at least carry us no further. The one
t gives us ample ground for hope and con
ISOLATION, and scope for the exercise o.
2 the Ioftiest faculties. The other bids III
2 look backward into chaos, and forward
into nothingness.


IF the teachers of christianity were al


ways as earnest and as thorough IN thel


work as the preachers Of the germ theory
and other equally remarkable deities o
= purely human invention, the latter coulf
not make the progress which they nov
2 seem TO be doing. For their Pretension
n will not bear investigation, and thell
e coniectures are far more irreconcilabl'
e with the natural instincts and prompt
. inqs of the mind-which the philosopher
p profess to reverence 20 much-than th'
; belief that there Is a God who rules tn,


world. and that it is ruled with infinite