Sermon. student-muet invoice and take stofck of or hfc will be ilnadvised oF tho' premise that has forced this gigantic result. Iv the first place there is the realm of physical science. in the next place there 's the realm of aieb»<jfcjgical~ai£ceT6ry, 15 thS'lM'M' pTaciT tyg** «"' ** .domparative theojogv,; Or the religions ofjhe past-,' anil last therTTarS"'tTie inventions* of our century. *. &* , . ~,* ,---.., $OK.».thia issue is so rnomeat©ue4»-its consequences thafc-dt cannot b& got rid of by deuun&itione-wholesale bt those who have adopted new ttifth after fearless and mjeiiigewt research. :Ihe. fitian «&» j?ishe3 to sleep betimes hv_the day when the Jfltat is first flecked tWith the coming dawn, may pull down hia lattice, ma*h« down on his couch, but the onward trend of the god of day finds him, it searches him out through crevices of his lattice, and the song of the birds, Jhe bostle and of the life of the worTd all about him, anuouoce to him that the night is past, and he must waken. So the Church. The Church may turn a deaf ear to the signs of the times, the Church may refuse to acknowledge the accomplishment of physical science, the Clsurch may misinterpret th<? arehajological discoveries of this age, the Church may de-, noiance the discoveries of comparative theology aad find it dangerous, if you please, the Church way" Say that advance and discovery aad progress belong io the physical world j blip- itcie partexst tothe moso superficial student to-uay that the world - will move-on ;and Jeawe - the-C'uoFcb, with the i dea-i husk of its dryulagmu. ] ; \Yhji6. the, Aeaebjnjg^f j science to which we refer? \Vhy, if we go back a little while in all our memories we discover how Darwin and Dr. Alfred Russell Wallace picked op the thread" "that wae dropped by Lamarck and Erasmus Darwin, and formulated fact upnn fact until they classified and arranged, and deducted an infallible logic that is the crown of scientific discovery ; then came a companion piece in that magniiicsub philosophy of Herbert; Spencer, and the world was compelled. ;U>;gi¥e attention and admit that the law of evoiution was true".- Orthodox Europe was compelled to cheose between Henry Drummond and the dogma that would contradict > evolutigxi. Orthodox ! America was -compelled Lymau Abbott and the theory that would contradict evolutionary development,' .And so we say that; this is a fact, a fact laid upon the bed-rock foundation of a larger and a better philosophy that shall release man from thjp pig:ny conditions that have held him so long in bondage. Now every step of that advance in the rej.lm of physical science was accompanied by antiigouism, by derision, by blind contradiction as long as it was po3sii»ie,-b,ufc if, never altered a fact for one moment. Rig.it along in the trend of these tremendous influences caple the archtejlogical discoveries of this century, whicti interpreted to us Jewish life and the life of the contemporaneous- nations. Later discoveries have compelled us to make a revision, a sweeping alteration in our preconceived opiniocs ; of tJiese peoples, a something'that' has touched j the tottering shapa of ecclesiasticisrn "with the kindly hand of an iconoclast which knows it must break down and destroy before it can relieve and rebuild. "■ 'SfSfcify'-'side with this of comparative theology has been no less important) than our discovery of cv lutionary .development. It was thought that God had never spoken to any, age .prior to the Jewish; it was believed that fie had never touched in any vital way the lives "of those aspiring souls in those ages. Awakening U3 from thia dream of ignorant selfishness there came such men as Max Mulier, through i whose tireless energy we have discovered that the golden thread of truth -lived and throbbed in everyone of the religions of the Orient; we have discovered the gojden rule of life was there written in letters large; we have discovered there the depth ot * philosophy that says " uuselfishness is the only pricftoi happiness." . -. . ,Is it not odd that out of the deluge of. the past the sublime truth of God comes to us in thia century to apeak its language to v? ? A loftier ethic was never written thau tnat which we discover in these old -world, religions. A sublimer virtne- was "'never s|>okea than was that 6i Confnciua, of Zoroaster, of Buddha,, the earlier Brahmins. We' have learned to read the gospel o£ these religions, and :in Confhcius we find trtese-wdrdsj ■■" the highesfc,virtue ia love to others." Iα the Zend Avesta of Zoroaster we find this statement, " Holiness is the best God." In the Rig Veda' we find this question and answer, "To which God shall 1 offer sacrifice?? " and , the 1 answer, "To the God whose love is the shadow of immortality-? . In the Buddhistic Bible t w* tind these words, "rtfatred can never overcome hatred." Among the Greek and Roman stoics ib was the same; Epictetus, in one of. his jewel statements, says, "Not only oto not do'the wrong, bub" dflre not think the wrong," Then we discover tuab ill every age the pulse of God has beaten in the tenets of ' men, and that men, have sought after truth and love, and have * .aspired in all agss towardft.jdiKiuity.ulß all -religions us to avoid thoyroncTami do the right. V When we have'gSiae' thus *tar we stand before the-invenljicma. of our- century., These speak to/ua ofiajtuenf heuven'--and a new earth ; these have made the nations of the earth one family." " of the Middle Ages was nob the Europe that knew Coperuicua .and Galileo ; ib wjva not the Europe that learht its raaaniScent lessons of art from Raphael and Titian and Anqelo ; ib was not the same Europe wheu Christopher Columbus discovered the Continent of America ; it was not the same Europe wheu the torch of the Reformation" was lifted. No more is the age. in which we live the age that thrived before Darwin and Wallace and Spencer and Proctor; it is--without exaggeration a new hoaven and a new earth in which we are living, we are living in au ago the largest, broadest and widest of any in the.world's history. We to-day are Vtha heirs of a.U the ages/ , iv fact, not' in a rhapsody of words. All the results which were accomplished in those preceding age 3 find their complement aud : symmetry °iv this. , • This, is to-day, this is to-night, and to-day and to-night we stand before the curtained to-morrow -that is lifting its golden crest above the horizons to bring lp us a more exalted concept, to reveal to us nobler and more beautiful, ideals, to fiud in us men of larger achievement and of truer virtues. This is to-nighb that *aita in the orphanage of doubt wnile to-morrow cornea in the effulgence of a more advanced revelation, this is to-night in the sha.de and, twilight of fear, while to-morrow in the breadth and scope of a divine audacity measures the purpose of eternity in the soul of man. Oh ! is ib not a niaguificeut thought that every failure of to-night may look toward, the accomplishment of toimorrow in the promise of victory. Is it not a magnificent thonghtjthat every wouiujed one in the great arena of human, experience to-uisht. may to-morrow carry in his soul the tremor of a powerful inspiration that shall make him a conqueror Oh !ia it not a subhme ! fact that the failure of to-d.ay in the ciumbling vortex of its ruin furnishes -ths .wsvit-* able success of to-mcrrow. j Is it not a sublime thought that all the failures of the past, making a vast salvage against the shore of eternity, shall afford °a stairway up which our conquering race shall mount to God. Then hope conies to-night to every tired soul &nd whispers to-morrow. Then the Calvary and the Gethsemane that now broods and weeps and prav3j dies, touched by the gladness of an Easter morning, ia whieU the that imprisons hope, the gflye that holds dead the of men, ahall give up its victim. crovrnadi Christ of an universal "Mqjauitv shall 4Mnd>in the "irena of queror.—[Ann , .] SITU DENTS OF C TRUTH. t SXRVICWe ATTHK TEME, L E p-J , Tk HUT H. STODAY. SSTHAPRIIi. 1894. MB W9KTHIN«*bN . ti s i>f. II a.aa.—' r .-; . ; 2.30 tLm.-J9andnr «b'oSi and teetcrttte. 7 p.m.-"The Evil. J Foram every Monday at Tempi \ 8 p.m. ,ing clave every Tharsony ac Temple, #.3(> p.iri. Prayeis every day at Temple at 10 am. Temple open every day to visitors from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.. except Saturday s, when it closes at 1 pan. Head annlverury*aaniber of the " Comforter." . sgsi He: "I am rather in favour of the English than the American mode of spel- , llnj?. Slw>*' TaJ^e jr'^ftflour , for fn.ir-aace; hariag Ju « I makes ail toe dlfftrtnc* lv ih% world."
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Press, Volume LI, Issue 8780, 28 April 1894, Page 2
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1,459Page 2 Advertisements Column 2 Press, Volume LI, Issue 8780, 28 April 1894, Page 2
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