tant when the pulpit will be like the voice crying in the wilderness. And it will not be, "Prepare the way of the Lord," either. This work is going to be done. The providence of God is rolling forward a spirit of investigation that Christian ministers must meet and join. There is no class of people upon earth who can less afford to let truth run ahead of them than Christian ministers. You cannot wrap yourselves in professional mystery, for the glory of the Lord is such that it is preached with power throughout all the length and breadth of the world, by these investigators of His wondrous creation. You cannot go back and become an apostle of the dead past, drivelling after ceremonies, and letting the world do the thinking and studying. There must be a new spirit infused into the ministry. Some men are so afraid that, in breaking away from the old systems and original forms and usages, Christianity will get the go-by! Christianity is too vital, too really divine in its innermost self, to fear any such results. There is no trouble about Christianity. You take care of yourselves and of men, and learn the truth as God shows it to you all the time, and you need not be afraid of Christianity—that will take care of itself. You might as well be afraid that battles would rend the sky, or that something would stop the rising and setting of the sun. The power of Divine love and mercy is not going to be stopped, and will certainly not be stopped, by the things that are true.
You cannot afford to shut your eyes to the truths of human nature. Every Christian minister is bound to fairly look at these things. Every scientific man who is studying human nature is bound to open his eyes and ears, and to study all its phenomena. I read that Huxley refused to attend a séance of spiritualists. He said, contemptuously, that it was a waste of time, and gave expression to other sentiments of disdain. I am not an adherent of the spiritual doctrines; I have never seen my way clear to accept them. But phenomena which are wrapping up millions of men, and vitally affecting their condition, are not to be disdained by scientific men, whose business it is to study phenomenology of all kinds. No scientific man can excuse himself from examining them. He may say that he has no time to do it, and that some other man must investigate them. That would be right. All men cannot do all things. But to speak of any thing of this kind with contempt is not wise. I am not afraid to look at this thing, or any thing. I am not afraid that we are going to have the New Testament taken away from us. We must be more industrious in investigation, more honest in deduction, and more willing to take the truth in its new fulness; and we must be imbued with that simplicity in faith and truth which we inculcate in our people.
With this general statement of the necessity of the study of the human nature and mind in its structure and functions, I will pass on to the next point, which is, the way in which this study is to be prosecuted. How are we going about it?
