mystery of existence as now I find it—at such times I shall ever feel it impossible to avoid the sharpest pang of which my nature is susceptible.[1]
It is well that Churchmen should be aware of this state of things; and especially that the clergy, when they are tempted to have their fling (secure from all reply) against the so-called "infidel," should bear in mind how often the bravery of defiant arrogance is a mere mask to cover a sinking heart. For pity's sake, therefore, as well as for their own sake, the clergy should guard against two gross but common mistakes: 1. The mistake of abusing modern science, and depreciating its unquestionable difficulties in relation to the established theology; 2. The still more fatal blunder of trusting to worn-out tactics and to the "artillery" of Jonathan and David for the reduction of these modern earthworks. "To the Greeks became I as a Greek," said St. Paul. And so must the minister of Christ in these days make up his mind to bring home the gospel to his own countrymen, with all their faults and peculiarities; and to the Englishmen of the nineteenth century must become an Englishman of the nineteenth century, that he "may by all means save some."
But no success will be obtained, unless Churchmen will remember that the vast domains recently conquered by science are (practically speaking) assured and certain conquests. They are no encroachment, but a rightful "revindication" of scientific territory. And, accepted in a friendly spirit, harmonized with skill and boldness, and consecrated (not cursed) in the Master's name, they bid fair to become a new realm whereon his peace-bringing banner may be right royally unfolded, and where, even in our own day, the beginning of a permanent unity may certainly be effected. And this must be attempted by a brave and telling proclamation of the great Christian doctrines—that the awful self-existent "I AM" is none other than "our Father in heaven"; that Christ, the blameless Son of man, is the best image of his person; and that his pure Spirit, brooding over the turbid chaos of human society, offers the surest means and pledge of a future Cosmos, where "life" may perhaps transcend these baffling veils of space and time, and, in forms "undreamed of by our philosophy," display the boundless riches of nature and of God.—Contemporary Review.
| THE STING OF THE HONEY-BEE.[2] |
PERHAPS there is no object more common in the cabinets of microscopists than mounted specimens of bee-stings. Almost every popular work on the microscope describes and figures them, but it is
