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one safely over this moral pithole. If conscience is hoodwinked by her wily foe, and made to tumble into the snare, it is a reason, not for denunciation, but for pity and deep sadness. Give policy an inch, and it takes an ell; begin to calculate, and the habit grows apace. There is to the preacher no safety from moral deterioration, but unconditional surrender to truth. Moral courage cannot breathe the crass atmosphere of calculation. What is more mournful than to see generous enthusiasm cooling down to the average temperature? The men who have electrified the world are those who have sacredly obeyed their inspirations, and dared to be impolitic. The least compromise of principle with policy always involves, even as a matter of policy itself, a grave miscalculation of results. Grant that immediate evil as well as good follows the blast of every trumpet that gives no uncertain sound; grant that cowards and bounty-jumpers take it as the signal for deserting the ranks; grant that it works partial disorganization in the army, by starting a stampede among bummers and camp-followers, is it not true that the army's morale is enhanced by purification from all but veterans and reliable recruits? A handful of heroes is worth a host of faint-hearts. Whatever ills befall the preacher or his flock, in consequence of bold adhesion to the cause of human progress, be very sure that in the long-run, in the final issue of things, the great moral spectacle of incorruptible fidelity to truth infinitely outweighs, in true service to this cause, the petty advantage of apparent and brief prosperity at truth's expense. If such men fail, they make their failure a Thermopylæ.

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It cannot be overlooked, however, that, even among those preachers who mean on the whole to be faithful to their best insight, two theories of pulpit instruction exist.

One theory is to treat the society like a child, study its average condition, and administer to-it only so much truth in one dose as is judged to be safe, reserving more advanced truth for the future: in other words, to break the truth to the people by degrees, and thus gradually "educate them up to it." But the society is not a child. It consists of many

minds, in many stages of development; and it is impossible to average its intelligence so as to adapt preaching to it. The most striking feature of this theory is the amazing selfcomplacency it implies. Let the ablest mind in America concentrate all its powers, and it cannot overshoot the wants, the real wants, of even a village congregation. By all means let the preacher beware of lowering himself to find his audience. His highest thought is none too high for it, if simply put; his deepest thought is none too deep. He shows little. policy and less principle, if he hangs his flag at half-mast. What society, furthermore, would ever settle a minister who should plainly tell them that he should only preach so much truth as he thought they could bear? Assuredly not one. If, then, a minister settles over a society with a theory of preaching which he could not venture to state in public, is there no insincerity in his conduct? Yet, on the other hand, what liberal society would refuse to settle a minister who should only demand perfect liberty of utterance for his profoundest convictions? If, after the candidate had boldly showed his colors, he had nevertheless received a hearty "call," such a stipulation would only increase their respect for him. The moment we look at the matter from the congregation's point of view, we see plainly enough that the theory of preaching under consideration is an oil-and-water admixture of principle and policy, in which policy largely predominates. It is a theory which cannot be squared with high-toned sincerity.

The other theory is to treat the society as an assemblage of men and women, who desire the best instruction their minister can give, to study only the best expression of the best truth in the best spirit, and preach this unreservedly from the pulpit, leaving all care for consequences to the God of truth. This alone is the theory of unadulterated principle. The preacher has no business to discriminate between "safe" and "unsafe" truth: his business is to preach unflinchingly the truth as he sees it, without asking any questions about its safety. All truth is safe: it is error and sin that are dangerThe parish is not an infant-school, to be coaxed into learning its A B C. Has it not been the trick of priestcraft,

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in all ages, to treat the people like children, and spoon out pap into their mouths from the church-porringer? Liberal Christianity, if truly such, must go and do otherwise. The clergy are not so affluent of truth themselves, that they can feed this American people with crumbs from their own tables. There are more vigorous thinkers to-day in the pews than in the pulpits, and more outside the church-doors than in pulpits and pews together. We have little patience with the current complaints of the short "supply of ministers." What does more to keep our young graduates of finest abilities out of the ministry, than the knowledge that in it their abilities are under bonds to keep the peace ?. The ruinous theory of policy in the pulpit, practised and advocated by the pulpit itself, has made parishes intolerant of instruction; and the last thing they really want is a preacher of genuine independence and first-class powers. But all this indicates an approaching crisis. The fear that religion is going to suffer by the very frankest and boldest speech in the pulpit, grows out of appalling want of faith in religion itself. There is a very deep, widespread, and growing discontent with every form of instituted Christianity. The "evangelical" denominations feel the coming storm, and are huddling together like cattle for mutual shelter from the blast. If the Church is indeed a house of cards, to be toppled over by the first wind that blows, let that wind blow at once, stiff and strong! The deeply religious soul wants no shelter from such architecture. It demands an open bivouac, out on the broad prairies of unchurched humanity, with the damp turf for bed, and the starry heavens for roof, and its own deep faith for meat, rather than any ecclesiastical couch and bowl of charity-soup. This plan of doling out truth from the pulpit in quantities proportioned to imagined wants, leaves hungry and dissatisfied the very best minds in the congregation. What can the minister know of the real wants of his listeners? Their first and last want is the want of a preacher with manhood enough to fling policy to the winds. They have urgent want of all the truth he has to give, and more; and though, perhaps, in ignorance of their own want, they may break out into dissension among themselves, or

turn the preacher adrift for his faithfulness, none the less has he rendered them the highest service in his power. When was a true prophet otherwise received? He may yet live to be welcomed back with contrition and open arms. Such things have been. But he has at least delivered his own soul.

It is the high privilege of the preacher, above all others, to be a student of truth. His coffers, above all others, should be wealthy with golden accumulations. His mind, indeed, should be a mint, converting bullion into specie, and making great ideas the current coin of humanity. Nor should he half perform his work, out of deference to popular nervousness concerning “negations." That distinction of affirmative and negative has been put to evil use. Affirmation and negation. are but the obverse and reverse of the same coin; and either implies the other. Impress upon a thought the stamp of the affirmative alone, and it is worthless as currency, a nugget but half fit for service. Until it bears the double stamp of affirmative and negative, it is undefined, and useless in the spiritual commerce of society. As the preacher climbs the pulpit-stair, his audience silently accosts him, with somewhat of the rough manners of the highwayman, "Your money

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or your life!" That stern alternative he cannot escape. To pour out, without stint or stinginess, the golden treasure he has won; or to yield up his own spiritual life, between these must he choose. He must confess his sincerest and innermost thought; he must avow with earnestness and simplicity of soul his dearest and mightiest faith, or his spiritual eyes shall grow purblind, and the divine fires of enthusiasm expire in the suffocating fumes of expediency. He must pour new life into his audience, or they will unknowingly rob him of his own. Alas for him whose epitaph is written, "Killed by his congregation!" And well for him who-reviewing his life-long services in the cause of all truth, as Mr. May reviews his life-long services in the cause of antislavery

can write his own epitaph in these noble words: "It may be that I recurred to this subject oftener than was necessary; but that were better than not to have spoken."

VOL. LXXXIV. -NEW SERIES, VOL. V. NO. I.

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ART. IV. PIAZZI SMITH AND THE GREAT PYRAMID.

Life and Work at the Great Pyramid in 1865, with a Discussion of the Facts. By C. PIAZZI SMITH, F.R.SS.L. & E., F.R.A.S., F.R.SS.A., Professor of Astronomy in the University of Edinburgh, and Astronomer-Royal for Scotland. In three vols., large octavo, 600 pp. Illustrations on Stone and Wood. Edmonston & Douglas, 1867.

THESE Volumes contain the best measures of the Great Pyramid ever yet made, with plans and tables of its construction, which are probably the best that the world will ever have. We have to thank the errors of mankind for some valuable service; for the mainspring of endeavor to this man of many honors seems to have been his horror of Bunsen's rationalism, born of his theory and conviction, that the Great Pyramid was built under divine inspiration, like the tabernacle in the desert, as an ordained sample of every sort of mensuration, terrestrial and celestial! He is excessively indignant at Bunsen, for daring to suggest, that men had lived in Egypt for thousands of years before a pyramid was built; but he can only get out of the dilemma of advanced science and civilization, which Bunsen so solved, by assuming immediate divine inspiration for the builders! But the vivacious little professor is honest; and whenever his figures tell a story he does not expect, he follows them faithfully,- quite sure they will return to their allegiance by and by: and so, to do him justice, they generally do. His malignity against Bunsen is extraordinary. In those five wonderful volumes, he will never once allow for possible errors of the press: and while he points to the commanded measures of the tabernacle, corresponding to those of the Great Pyramid, and the traditions of scientific meaning attached to the latter; and raves away about the absence of every sign of idolatrous worship within it; and reminds us of the hatred the Egyptians bore its builder, because his dynasty suppressed their abominable worships, — we are

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