a mode of mind, that it was the method in which God worked. But this is not all, according to the materialistic philosophers. They sketch for us the future work of evolution as well as the past, and that future work consists in undoing everything that has been done. Instinct, reason, memory, imagination, will, thought, worship, love, are all to pass away and be no more. The planets and the stars, after having lasted long enough to be the charnel-houses of the sentient creatures which at some time or other probably existed upon all of them, will gradually be forced together into one central mass, which will radiate its heat into space, and at last become a frozen block. That is to be the dénouement. The curtain of history is to fall upon a lump of ice!1 If, then, the universe be so fundamentally irrational and so diabolically tantalising, why (I cannot help asking myself)—why should I trouble myself about character? If in so ridiculous and contemptible a world there be one thing more stupid than another, would it not be the attempt to act as if we were rational and moral beings?

1 See Clifford's Lectures and Essays. If the laws of nature turn out to be less exact and unchangeable than has been commonly supposed, the end, though less tame, would be equally undesirable.

Would not a belief in the reality of right and wrong be the maddest of all delusions? What does it matter, what can it matter, how I act, if my life be but a momentary and accidental gleam of consciousness in the passage of the atoms from the fiery cloud to the frozen block? Surely there can be no right and wrong for a being who has been made, and who will be unmade, at the caprice of dead, unthinking atoms. I am certain I may say for myself-I think I may venture, may I not? to say for most of you that if we believed ourselves to be in a godless, soulless universe, our moral progress would be at an end; we should be stricken with the paralysis of despair.1

But whether or not faith in God be necessary to stimulate you and me to try and form for our

1

My reviewer in the Westminster' says I speak here foolishly, not to say immorally. That is, of course, precisely what I meant to do. My argument is, that if the materialistic assumptions be logically followed out, foolish thinking and speaking and acting are the inevitable consequences.

It has been suggested to me by a correspondent that a disbelief in immortality is the greatest stimulus to kindliness and self-denial; that if we are thoroughly convinced the present life is the only life men will have, we shall be all the more anxious to do what we can for them here and now. But surely belief in the essential irrationality and immorality of the universe can never afford a logical basis for rational and moral conduct.

selves a perfect character, there is one thing very certain, it is absolutely necessary, if we are ever to succeed in achieving such a character. For we are morally very weak, and we need superhuman help. Without Christ we can do (comparatively at any rate) nothing. St Paul was assuredly not weaker than other men, but you remember his passionate lamentation-"To will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. For the good that I would, I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. . . I delight in the law of God after the inward man: but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" This is no rhetorical rhapsody, but mere sober fact, as our own experience may suffice to show. How often, when we know and approve the right, do we reject it and choose the wrong! How often have we tried in vain to give up evil habits! How often have our efforts to live worthily ended only in disappointment and remorse! Every one who is not totally destitute of a conscience, must in effect have sometimes despondingly declared

'I see,
but cannot reach, the height
That lies for ever in the light;
And still, for ever and for ever,
What seeming just within my grasp,
I feel my feeble hands unclasp,

And sink, discouraged, into night."

Now, it is implied in our text, it is taught throughout the New Testament, and it is confirmed by experience, that there is nothing so morally helpful as faith in God. We shall not be surprised at the practical value and the moral effects of faith, if we consider for a moment all that it implies. It implies, first of all, a conviction that the forces of nature are being made to work together for good, under the guidance and control of an intelligent and beneficent Will. If so, it is worth our while to strive after perfection. Do not misunderstand my phrase "worth our while." I am not thinking only nor chiefly of rewards and punishments. That would be a very low view to take of the matter. There is nothing more contemptible than the other-worldliness manifested by numbers of men and women, who seem to regard the working out of salvation as a mere business transaction, in which, by the performance of a few disagreeable actions in the present, they purchase for themselves the title to a comfortable state of existence by and by.

What I meant by saying that, on the Christian view of things, it was worth our while to strive after perfection, was this. On the Christian view the universe is rationally organised and morally governed, and therefore attempting to act rationally and morally is attempting to bring one's self into harmony with one's surroundings. Whereas, on the atheistic view, since there is no rationality or goodness outside of us, endeavouring to be wise or good is, in reality, going contrary to nature, acting in opposition to the laws of the universe. If Christianity be true, it signifies but little what becomes of that which we call matter. It may be the case, it probably is the case, as Shelley has magnificently put it in his 'Hellas'

"Worlds on worlds are rolling ever

From creation to decay,

Like the bubbles on a river

Sparkling, bursting, borne away."

But the man of faith is not to be dismayed by the dissolution of a planet, nor a system, nor a galaxy of stars. He sees a "ring of light round nature's last eclipse." He believes that before Nature is dissolved, if that be her future destiny, the universe will have been peopled with beings capable of an eternally intensifying life. So