therefrom, have been acquired. The doctrines of the Conservation of Energy, now universally received, and Evolution, now received by the most eminent in every department of science, have had their birth within the same period; and their acceptation has changed the whole world's mode of thinking.

"The greater number of naturalists consider the doctrine of Evolution as firmly established to-day as is the Copernican theory of planetary revolution, the theory of gravitation, or the undulatory theory of light."

(Angelo Heilprin: Geolog. Evidences of Ev., 1888.) In Biology the advances have been marvelous. While lifeforce yet remains a mystery, it is well enough known to-day that the germ out of which man is built differs in no visible respect from that which constitutes the germ of any animal, or plant. The simplest form of life is that which is common to every living thing. The name of this elementary life, is protoplasm. It is a colorless, jelly-like, heterogeneous substance, very unstable in its composition. The lowest known form of animal life, called Bathybius, differs but little, if at all, from a molecule of protoplasm; and man, the highest form of animal life, is only a multitude of these molecules arranged differently in different parts of the body, according to the function to be performed.

Of Geology, although the first volume of Lyell's Principles appeared only in 1830, we know that it has made us acquainted with the history of the earth, and with her extinct forms of plant and animal life. Her history is indelibly written in tables of stone; and those who will, may know

her biography from her cradle, the bosom of the sun, to her present state of declining life.

The spectroscope has revealed to us the nature and condition of the sun, stars, and comets. The latter bodies being known, are no longer feared; nor can their frightful appearances again be used to forward the evil designs of the ecclesiastics. Astronomy teaches us that the sun with all its attendant bodies, is but a small star with its satellites revolving around some common astral centre of gravity. the days of Newton who made the great discovery of universal gravitation, all movements are more and more referred to general laws. Indeed it may in truth be said that we live to-day under the conscious sway of universal law.

Since

In Chemistry rapid strides have been made. As the mighty globes swinging in the awful universe tell us of their similarity in constitution, origin, and history; so of the atoms which form these globes, is it believed that their ultimate substance is common. By whatever name we call matter under different atomic arrangement or association, it is quite generally admitted that there is but one ultimate substance; and that even the different forces of matter and mind may be but the manifestation of one common, universal force, or being, acting everywhere according to law and order.

The days of little things in science are over; great discoveries may now be expected. We are yet to behold more clearly the footprints of the Everlasting Father. If a man, having fallen asleep sixty years ago, were now to awake, he would not know the earth. On beholding the locomotive, he would imagine he saw the medieval devil; and the telegraph

ing for his fairies, they would nowhere be found; his witches and wizards would long ago have been dead. In the words of Huxley, before the British Association of scientists:

"For good or for evil we have passed into a new epoch,the epoch of science."

This means that science is ruler of the world; it is she that to-day speaks ex cathedra. It certainly may be said that all men of even a very moderate education are to a very large extent governed in their action by the opinions of scientists; and that all in search after any form of truth whatever, accept as facts, undisputed scientific determinations. This is nowhere made more manifest than in the pulpit of to-day, when the man in it is educated, that is, conversant with the thought of the age in which he lives. Such a man knows little or nothing of hell; little or nothing of damnation; but he is not slow in speaking to us of our duties one to another, as children of the same dear God who loveth all; and of the deep satisfaction which results from doing good; of the heaven abiding in the breast of the virtuous, of the hell raging in the breast of the vicious. But in the monstrous doctrines of old, which the ignorant man labors so earnestly to inculcate, the educated minister does not deal, and does not believe. It is well, therefore, that we should know what science, which represents so largely the intellect of the world, thinks of our faith.

a: The Fact of a Revelation.

The world is scientific; the world is theistic; the world is religious. That man is theistic and religious is a necessary consequence of his nature and environments.

But can

inite knowledge of God, we have a Revelation. Should we, while affirming the existence of God, deny that we have any higher knowledge of him than nature gives us, such a denial must be based on one of the following suppositions:

A Revelation is impossible;

A Revelation is useless;

A Revelation has never been made.

(a): Is a Revelation Possible:

If we deny the possibility of a Revelation, it must be on some one of the following grounds:

God is not free;

God is unknowable;

A Revelation could not be proved.

I: In answer to the assertion that God is not free, we have the admission on the part of even the most eminent evolutionists that there are in nature the marks of design. The opinions of atheists, such as Haeckel, Seidlitz, Oscar Schmidt, Clifford, and others, negative all marks of design in the universe; but we have shown, and we affirm, that the scientific world, as such, is theistic. On the question of the marks of design in nature, we again quote Prof. Crookes:

"This building up of evolution is above all not fortuitous; the variation and development which we recognise in the universe, run along certain fixed lines which have been preconceived and fore-ordained. To the careless and hasty eye evolution seems antagonistic to design; but the more careful observer sees that evolution steadily proceeding along an ascending scale of excellence, is the strongest argument in favor of a preconceived plan." This opinion

nent a body of men as the earth ever saw,- the British Association of Scientists. Among the many English scientists who see in nature the marks of design, we may mention the names of Owen, Wallace, Darwin, Romanes, Dawson, Lyell and others; and very many of the most eminent German scientists take their stand with them: Here are found such great names as Heer, Koelliker, Baumgarten, Braun, Volkman, Schaaffhausen, Maedler, Wigand, von Baer, and many others. We affirm without fear of contradiction that, notwithstanding some exceptions, the scientific world, as such, believes in design. But a designing mind must necessarily be free. Therefore we cannot deny the possibility of a Revelation on the ground that God is not free. And let us not forget that we have already shown that apart from the teaching of the physical scientists, admitting our own freedom, the freedom of God follows as a necessary consequence. Failing to disprove the possibility of a Revelation on the ground that God is not free, shall we next assert its impossibility on the ground that II: God Is Unknowable.

It seems to us that the word, "unknowability," carries with it an ambiguity. If it be meant that we cannot comprehend the Infinite One, we admit it. It were absurd to say that the limited could comprehend the unlimited; the conditioned, the unconditioned. But if on the other hand it be meant that we are unable to have any idea of the nature and attributes of God, I deny the truth of the

assertion.

"We are compelled by the constitution of our mind, to