I may say, 'Oh, yes! I know it is true, I feel when I spend myself, and am being spent for my fellow-creatures -when I am consulting the interest of others, and not my own-when I am thus generous and unselfish, I feel it is indeed more blessed to give than to receive. Of course it is true. It is my faith.' But did Christ say it? Did Christ say it? That is another question. You cannot determine that by any religious sentiment -by any amount of faith; it is simply a question for the intellect to decide. If you are satisfied about the authenticity and the correctness of the Acts, if you believe that record to be in all parts true, then you will believe that Christ said those words; but as far as your faith is concerned, it is no matter whether He said them or not—it is equally true and good whoever said it. I believe He did say it; but if you can prove to me that He did not say it, and show me that that part of the Acts of the Apostles was inserted in the third or fourth century, or even in more recent times, as any moderate scholar can show with reference to other passages in the Bible, then I say my belief is amended, because I always thought it was said by Christ, but now I know that, lovely and beautiful as it is, it is only said by some one speaking in the spirit of Christ, and as a matter of fact was not said by Christ. I say I believe it was said by Christ; but if find out that it was not, and if you get your belief thus amended through your intellect, this is so much gained for truth, and nothing lost for faith. The Bible stands or falls upon these two principles. First, you have to show by an intellectual process pure and simple

you

-by examining the records, by seeing where the manuscripts came from before the Bible was printed, by collecting versions and working out the history of those ancient records-you have to decide which are right and which are wrong; but this process has nothing to do with religion, except so far as it is a religious duty to ascertain what is true. But secondly, when you come to the value of individual utterances of the Bible, you must try the spirits whether they be of God or no; you must try them by the test of their correspondence to your spiritual necessities-your moral nature, your religious aspirations, and your consciousness of what is right and wrong.

Remember this distinction between faith and belief. Don't be alarmed by the feeble and querulous cry which you hear constantly raised against bringing the mind to bear on religious problems. What are we to bring to bear upon them, I should like to know? The great thing is to have your intellect, or the intellect of those whom you trust in as guides, in harmony with your religious sentiments; but it is your intellect, or the intellect of those who are able to think and come to right conclusions for you-it is the intellect which is to provide you with the objects of your faith; and the clearer the intellect is, and the more free from error your conclusions are intellectually, the more true, unclouded, and beautiful will be the objects of your faith. I have such an opinion of faith, I do so believe in the principle of simple trust in God, that I am certain it can mould itself about almost any religious opinion-concerning God's nature

and His relations to man-however absurd. I am sure there are most pious Roman Catholics, most pious Unitarians, pious Mohammedans, pious Hindoos; and although I differ from these people in many cardinal points and innumerable points of detail, yet I see that they have faith, although this faith is moulded about what seems to me to be an imperfect and wrong series of intellectual positions or false facts. Separate belief and faith.

The great aim of all religious reformers has been just this, to bring the belief of their age into harmony with its faith to get a correspondence between religious doctrine and religious life. Moses succeeded for a time, but the prophets improved upon Moses. Moses's theology had become in points out of date when the prophets began to speak. They had to give new readings of truth, to bring it into accord with the advanced religious sentiment of their age. Moses and the prophets passed away, and we get to the great Talmudical doctrines, embodying many a true and exalted sentiment. Christianity has made the world familiar with these, and has added the glory of a life whose power still fulfils without destroying, and whose energy still breathes a kind of spiritual life into many a dogmatic corpse. But Christianity itself is not a fixed term-so ready is it to change, so eager is it to assimilate with every new mode of life and character in every age. The Christianity of Christ is different from the Christianity of the Apostles; the Christianity of the Apostles was distinct from that of the Fathers. The scholastic Christianity differed

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again from the patristic, and both differed considerably from the Reformation theology, and the Reformers differed among themselves, and our liberal Christianity is different from that of any of the Reformers. But each change has been an attempt to arrive at some more true expression of some phase of faith. Those who have not read this simple lesson of history have been much disturbed in mind at the various opinions around them and in every age there have been those who insolently trample upon all that is new, and try to silence what they cannot understand; but there have been others upon whom the truth has flashed with the force of a new Revelation; and these men have been the lights shining in darkness-the apostles of progress and the heralds of civilisation.

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I ask, what has the world done with such people? What has the world done with most of its victorious champions and saviours? Its greatest benefactors have been despised, rejected, and put to death. I look down the vista of ages, and the long procession comes towards me. I know them all-the old, the saintly, the familiar faces. SOCRATES, condemned to drink poison, because he told the young men of his day that their religion must not lean upon the myths and fables which had accumulated round the popular deities, but should depend rather upon that inward voice of conscience which every man would hear within him just in proportion as he had his spiritual sense developed by use. GALILEO, shut up, because scientifically he was in advance of the age. Where are the pioneers of civilisation?

Where are the prophets of thought? Where are the priests of science? Where are the reformers of faith? Their bones are rotting in unknown graves-their ashes are scattered to the winds. And time would fail me to tell of the Albigenses, the victims of St. Bartholomew's day, of PALISSY, of LUCILIO VANINI, of GIORDANO BRUNO; or turn to those great precursors of our English Reformation, JOHN HUSS and SAVONAROLA. Do you remember what the Bishop of Florence said to Savonarola, as he cast a brand upon his burning faggot? 'I cut you off from the Church militant!' 'Ay,' cried the heretic, 'but you cannot cut me off from the Church triumphant!' And yet one more figure rises before me-One whose head is filled with dew, and His locks with the drops of the night-One who spake as never man spake, and who came to seek and to save that which was lost. He placed His foot upon the serpent's head, and its fangs pierced Him. He went boldly in amongst the cruel wheels of a disordered world, and set them right, although He was torn to pieces in the act. Once more I hear the voice of One walking in the garden in the cool of the day; but that garden is not Eden, but Gethsemane. Once more the sweat of agony and the lone prayer, 'Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.' Once more the cry of the rabble breaks the silence of the ages with a shout of blasphemy that makes us shudder-Crucify Him! crucify Him!' and from the accursed tree comes the last wail of agony, 'My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?' It is the form of the Son of Man; He who put Himself into opposition