W. N. Thomas says in The Standard:—

"Lives may be lived dominated by the worldly or the religious. The worldly shuts out the high thoughts, narrows the sympathies, and limits the range of life. The religious shuts out from nothing worthy in any sphere, but widens the range of effort, multiplies the points of contact for life, and opens new fields of promise. The worldly is the source of despair. The religious is the spring of hope. To be dominated by the religious is to recognize that there are gains that do not lend themselves to ordinary measurements, but are none the less real. . . .

"He who lives the life worth the living always garners larger income for his work than can find an equivalent in money. Even where character is not appreciated by the busy business world, it still has its worth and power in self and for the world. But it is of these facts that men and women need to be persuaded. Their faith must be taught to grip these facts so that no world defeat can tear them from their souls. They can be shown that the highest work of the spirit, and therefore the best work for the world, may be found where eyes see only defeat. Jew and Gentile called the life of Jesus a failure and rejoiced in their victory over him. But history has reversed the decision and declared a cross the means of triumph and a tomb the birthplace of life. Such faith would turn the thought and work to the future. It would give to all human activities the glow and zest of the forward look. Despair would flee away from the soul that worked to share in all that is done and is to be accomplished."

True religion lies between two extremes of thought. On the one hand is the multitude who have eyes and see not, and ears and hear not, those who live for to-day, those who never seem able to anticipate the evil or the holy day to come. On the other hand are those zealots and fanatics, and contortionists whose unhealthful dreams set one shivering with fear, and another one burning with horror. True religion surrenders to neither the one nor the other. It insists upon the necessity for vision. It forever seeks an open window toward the sky. It points humanity toward the hereafter. It appeals to all men to square their lives with the base line of eternity. But the sights which true religion sees, the visions which fill it with delight and hope, the sounds which ever come to it from beyond the stars, are not those with which the literature of superstition reeks and foments. Its dream is not of horrible pits and vials of wrath. Out of the great heart and mighty works of humanity it lifts the majestic arch of prophetic faith. It crowns our life to-day with a glimpse of a higher life. It looks away into the future, and, through toil and tears and struggles and defeats, it watches man forever climbing, forever aspiring, forever vital, and heroic, and victorious in spite of all his shortcomings and humiliations.

The Universalist Leader.

The first condition of any permanent hold on any truth is this, that the truth itself should be live enough and large enough to open constantly and bring to every new condition through which we pass some new experience of itself. I know, indeed, how much a merely traditional religion will inspire men to do. I know that for a faith that is not really theirs, but only what they call it, "their fathers' faith," men will dispute and argue, make friendships and break them, contribute money, undertake great labors, change the whole outward tenor of their lives. I know that men will suffer for it. I am not sure but they will die to uphold a creed to which they were born, and with which their own character for firmness and consistency has become involved. All this a traditional faith can do. It can do everything except one, and that it can never do. It can never feed a spiritual life and build a man up in holiness and grace. Before it can do that our fathers' faith must first, by strong personal conviction, become ours.—PHILLIPS BROOKS.

Rev. W. F. Skerrye says in The Christian Register: "To believe in the overruling presence of God, we must make for ourselves lives into which God may fitly enter. Every one believes most in that to which he most yields himself. If, then, we yield ourselves and our powers to the highest and best that we know or can conceive of, we are preparing, whether we know it or not, for a higher revelation. For every such volition is a step toward God, and it is wonderful how fleetly the soul can travel when given its way. Love is born of service. Each one, then, must serve the time and place in which he is. There, not elsewhere, will God appear to him. If dull days of drudgery be appointed him,—and all work worthy of the name brings many such,—there, most of all, is he likely to find his God. For God dwells not in temples made with hands, but in a realm built of a human heart's brave patience, unselfish, unstinted sympathies, toils, self-denials, and losses made good by still unfaltering trust."

Craig S. Thoms, Ph.D., writes in The Standard on "Fundamental Truths in Genesis:" "It is not necessary to understand from the narrative that the murder of Abel occurred immediately or even shortly after the sacrifices of the two brothers. The writer is portraying the consequences of sin. Years have doubtless elapsed. Under the influence of a sinful life Cain's heart grows harder and his life becomes more bitter until he murders his brother. The first consequence of sin, therefore, is that it gains ever more and more power over the man until it leads him to the most inhuman wickedness. The narrative now proceeds rapidly. With every new syllable a consequence of sin is pointed out. One sin leads to another—Cain tells a lie to cover up his murder. Sin shall not remain hidden—Abel's blood cries from the very ground against Cain. Nor can the sinner escape punishment—God hears the cry and curses Cain. The sin of Cain waxes worse in his progeny."

A religion that does not take hold upon a man's heart, transforming his life, opening his purse-strings, and putting willingness for service into hands and feet and tongue, lacks the essential proof of its genuineness. The religion of Christ, as revealed in the New Testament, does all that; but there are many variations from the New Testament model masquerading in the garb of Christianity, that satisfy the worldly mind, but leave the heart untouched and the life unchanged.—The Examiner.

Rev. James Watts Alexander, D.D., pastor, 1851—1859 of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, New York, said: "The great reason why we have so little good preaching is that we have so little piety. To be eloquent one must be earnest; he must not only act as if he were in earnest, or try to be in earnest, but be in earnest, or he cannot be effective. We have loud and vehement, we have smooth and graceful, we have splendid and elaborate preaching, but very little that is in earnest."

Christianity has only one purpose—holiness. Christianity ends in conduct. Christianity begins in motive, but it ends in character, in manhood. We are to be perfect men in Christ Jesus; we are to be as he was on the earth; we are to breathe his spirit, repeat his deeds, follow his footsteps, and represent him to mankind, so that we cannot be Christ himself, but we can be Christones, Christians.—DR. JOSEPH PARKER.

Believe always that every other life has been more tempted, more tried than your own; believe that the lives higher and better than your own are so not through more ease, but more effort; that the lives lower than yours are so through less opportunity, more trial.—MARY R. S. ANDREWS.

Dr. Bushnell once put the truth in his effective way when he said: "If God is really preparing us all to become that which is the very highest and best thing possible, there ought never to be a discouraged or uncheerful being in the world." If there is such a one why is it? asks The Sunday School Times.

"Christians," wrote the sainted Christlieb, "are the world's Bible." The believer cannot escape that responsibility if he would—and surely he ought not to wish to if he could. It is high honor to be "a letter of Christ, written, not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God." —The Examiner.

In the Christian life "putting on" is preceded by "putting off." We cannot cover up the old rags of self-righteousness with the robe of Christ's righteousness. The old must be laid aside. "Cease to do evil" precedes "learn to do well."—United Presbyterian.

Washington Gladden says: "The minister has no business with social subjects except as vitally related to the kingdom of heaven. The minister to whom religion is not the central and dominating power has no right in the Christian pulpit."

Only the spirit-taught can give spiritual teaching.—The Ram's Horn.