controlling element is not love. If orthodoxy is to be of any value, it must bear blossoms as well as leaves, and fruit as well as blossoms; and that fruit must spring from a loving disposition. And in order to reap the full fruition of love, it must be atmospheric and continuous. And when it is the fashion for men to manifest this feeling at all times; when it has currents, and electric influences, and communal forces overhanging the church and the community as a summerbrooding atmosphere overhangs a continent, then it will have power to subdue the passions and appetites in men.

But more, love must, by the example and stimulation of the church, be exalted and made a working force in society. Broad social relations must be cast according to its directions and determinations. All civic and judicial proceedings, all police arrangements, all affairs of legislation, all conduct of business, also, must be guided and controlled by this same element before it will have its perfect work in the world.

I am not speaking of the possibility of bringing about this result to-day or to-morrow; but such is the ultimate tendency. And, when love is the crowning virtue; when it is the main experience of the individual; when it is the great element of churches, by which one is joined to another; when it is the atmosphere in which the processes of society are developed and carried on; when we recognize, at all times and in all places, that selfishness is heterodoxy, and that love is orthodoxy; and when the public sentiment of the whole community is surcharged with this divine principle, then will come in another and a final element-namely, that of heredity.

You cannot re-create the world so fast at the adult end as you can breed sinners at the childhood end. If men are to be born into life with such disproportion of disposition, and with such malformation of body, if whole generations of men are to carry in themselves the sins and the tendencies of sin which have been accumulating for generations back, then you cannot convert them so fast as to make any great headway in the world; but, as moral qualities are transmissible as well as immoral qualities, when the church has done its duty and society is leavened by the spirit of love, then there will

be, as a part of the co-operative plan of God's providence, larger and larger proportions of children born into life with this great principle more and more clearly recognized than it was even in the days of Moses, when, as we are told, in the Old Testament, blessings were sent down from parents to children, and to their children's children. Men will be started in the world on a higher plane, and in a condition such that the animal faculties will be brought under the control of the moral and spiritual faculties more and more easily. And at last, under the inspiration of the providence of God, and under the influence of the church of Christ, operating together, the true gospel will be established. I do not despair of the time when the earth shall be filled with men who are centered on love, who are governed by love, and who through love govern one another.

I remark, then, first, in view of this development of the love-disposition, in all its forms, that the intellectual elements will help indirectly. Increase of knowledge as to the conditions of a man's life, his structure, and the best conditions of society, with all its forces-this tends to build up the outward form of our life. It throws its light on the true lines of development.

Far, therefore, should it be from any wise man to deride the progress of scientific knowledge. What we affirm is, that this knowledge is not that which is to convert the lower man, the ordinary flesh-man, into the spirit-man. Nothing will do this but the disposition of love.

We recognize the value of thought; we recognize the value of exactitude of statement; we recognize the value of the discovery of the arrangements of the truths of scientific research; we hold that true religion demands the growth of man all around, and, if possible, consentaneously; but after all, the central element of manhood lies not in the direction of knowledge, but in the direction of disposition. The intellect is not the master: it is the servant. Dealing with matter, it is more nearly independent than under any other circumstances; but the moment the intellect has to do with the facts of interior human life, with the conscience of man, with nature in its most highly developed form (for nature de

veloped means man and mankind)-that moment it is itself the subject of the lower faculties.

A man can understand only that of which he has something in himself. If a man has goodness in him, then goodness flashes into his intellect, and he discerns it. The intellect is dependent upon the disposition. If it be a problem of truth, justice, humanity, rectitude, or large benevolence that is to be looked at, the intellect is absolutely obliged to stand and wait till the disposition throws its light into it, in order that it may interpret its nature. The intellect therefore is subordinate. This is the very antithesis of Buckle's theory.

not.

Secondly, the Christian forces of the world to-day are struggling, like Esau and Jacob in the womb-quarreling as to whether or not the world's religious growth is to stand in its outward relations and regulations and doctrinal lines, or That is the struggle of the churches to-day. You may look through Christendom and you will find that there is everywhere a high and a low party-a party of liberty and a party of authority-though neither party altogether realize what they are doing or know what they mean. The struggle of to-day is not between two parties-one that represents selfishness, and arrogance, and pride, and self-seeking, and the other that represents love as the central element, and demands that everything else shall be under its control; though that is the battle which must be fought out before the Lord shall reign in the hearts of men. But the conflict of the time indicates the rebellion of thinking religious men against the bonds with which ecclesiasticism seeks to hold them bound.

Look at the struggle in the Roman church abroad. What mean all these fitful outbursts in the direction of liberty under the lead of Père Hyacinthe and his German colleagues, in which men attempt to break away from the restraints of an external system which surrounds them? The quarrel is between the liberty of man's understanding and authority in externalities and in faiths.

Look at the condition of the Church of England. It is broken up into some four sects. If you were only to cut one

or two of its hoops, four churches would spring out of the Church of England to-day. There used to be a time when the Presbyterians and Congregationalists had their little pet quarrels on hand, and when the Episcopal church used to open its great slumberous doors, and say, "O brethren, come into this harbor of peace, and rest." The time was when they had good rest. They slept soundly! But they do not extend that invitation to those of other denominations any longer. It is too sarcastic. It would be absurd to throw open the great cathedral doors of England, and say to anybody, "Come in here, so as to get out of dispute and debate." Why, there are four fighting armies on the field spiritual there to-day.

Go and look at the condition of things in France and Germany, and see what the struggles of Christianity are. See how largely they are external. See how much is being written. which relates merely to its outward features. See how all the schools are studying back along through books and libraries to establish the usages of the past. See how everybody is working to ascertain what are the relations of Papacy; what is the right of bishops; what is the condition of the ministry; what is the status of the priesthood; what is the nature of the organization of the church; what is liberty in a church; what is servility in a church; how far the observance of ordinances should be carried; what is right or what is wrong on this, that, or the other subject.

The whole Christian world to-day is embattled on these externalities; and the power of the church is not now, any more than it has been at any other time, concentrated in this: Man must be like God in loving.

Now, there will never be a conversion of this world until there is an enthusiasm of love; until men at last understand that the kingdom of God comes without observation; until it is recognized that Christianity may make use of anything which will promote its objects, but that it does not stand in external forms, in governments, in orders, in ordinances, in a priesthood, in the ministrations of the sanctuary, nor in scholastic appliances of any kind; until men believe that the kingdom of God is within them, and that it is made up of

the fruits of the Spirit-love, peace, joy, humility, and goodwill toward men. If you throw this out, you throw everything out. You may erect your cathedrals till they kiss the heavens with gold, you may build your altars till they glow like the rainbow, you may drape your priests, and let them walk in solemn processions, you may have your songs, your chants and your music in the sanctuary; and yet, without love these things are nothing, or are like the bubble which the boy blows, which he tosses in the air, in which he sees his face for an instant, and which is then gone forever.

And after two thousand years, in which the example of Christ has been held up to teach the world what love means, how much does the world know of its meaning? Love means willingness to suffer; it means what the mother in her heart feels toward her babe, and who will perish in the snow, in the sun, or in the flame, to save that babe which is dearer to her than her own life-it means all these things; but who will ever learn it? O ye that will not learn it of Christ, will ye not learn it of motherhood? Love that counts itself nothing, love that is a force for good and for happiness; love that is patient, bearing all things, enduring all things, believing all things, and waiting, without envy, without jealousy, without vanity and without incivility; love, with all its wondrous traits-where have you ever found a church that was filled with it? Where have you ever found a denomination that was marked off from other denominations by the essential predominance of this quality? Here we are sending our missionaries to the heathen, and quarreling at home! [Applause.] Yes, you enjoy it when I lay it on others, but you are just as bad as they are. There exists yet the old essential depravity. It is that which has wrought woe, and mischief, and blood, and tears, and suffering, and torments unutterable, since the world began. In the name of religion the rack has ground bones to powder. In the name of religion, the priest has blown the taper, and put it under the faggot. In the name of religion men have been cast out of home and out of country. In the name of religion men have been thrashed with flails, poisoned with serpent fangs. In the name of religion there have been criticisms