great office of religion has not been to teach us to live, but to die, not to create a heaven on earth, but to enable us to endure suffering. There is nothing true but heaven. All here is mere illusion, unworthy a wish or a thought. All human pursuits are vain; earth is cursed for man's sake; and thistles and brambles only shall it bring forth to his labor. Seek merely to gain admittance into heaven. Heaven is the home of the soul. There all our toils will be over. There no more pain, no more fatigue, no more sickness, no more sorrow; but all one clear, unclouded noon of unutterable bliss. No matter what are the sufferings of this short and transitory life, they are not worthy to be compared with the exceeding weight of glory which awaits us in the life to

come.

"In all this there is a truth, a great truth, but not the whole truth. This life is not and cannot be exempt from suffering, and far be it from me to think lightly of the religion which makes us patient under suffering, and consoles us for present sorrows with the hope of joys to come. We all need consolations, a friendly hand to wipe the tears from our eyes, and to pour oil and wine into our wounded hearts. But then this world is God's world and is not to be contemned, and this life is God's gift and should therefore count for something, cannot be mere illusion all. It is easy to account for the view which the church has taken of this world. The church grew up amid a dissolving world, when nothing seemed settled, when the earth seemed abandoned by its Maker to the devil and his angels. But the effects of this view have been none the less disastrous, because we are able to account for it. These effects have been to sink below its natural level the social element of Christianity, to make the devout think meanly of whatever pertains to this mode of being, and to produce the conviction that the melioration of society as such is unnecessary if not even sinful. In this view of the office of religion, you see why it is that the church through all the stages of her existence has never labored directly for man's earthly wellbeing. It has indeed given alms and founded hospitals and asylums, for it has been charitable; it has sent out its missionaries to evangelize the world, for it has been zealous, and filled with the spirit of propagandism; but it has sent out these missionaries expressly for the purpose of saving the soul hereafter, never for the purpose of diffusing the arts and blessings of civilization, albeit these have often fol

lowed.

"In all this I own the church has had a truth, a great truth, perhaps the only truth past ages were able to appreciate, but, as the church has interpreted it, by no means a peculiarly Christian truth, nor the truth demanded by the present. Christianity recognises the universal belief of mankind in a future life; it assumes always an hereafter; but it never makes it the principal object of man's life here to secure to his soul admission into heaven after death. It teaches us to prize the soul above the body; to seek the salvation of the soul; but not in the sense in which the church has alleged. Jesus would save the soul, not from future burnings, but from ignorance, low wants, grovelling propensities in a word, from sinning. When he said his kingdom was not of this world, he spoke in reference to the world in which he appeared, and asserted that his kingdom, the order of things he came to introduce and everywhere build up, was to be based on other principles than were the kingdoms then existing. These kingdoms were established on the principle that might gives right; or at best on the idea of justice, as distinct from that of love. Their maxim was, 'an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, love to one's neighbor, but hatred to enemies,'-a maxim which at best could only create an eternal circle of injuries. But the kingdom of Jesus was to be based on the broad principle of absolute right, of universal philanthropy, a love for mankind, even for enemies, strong enough, if need be, to die for them on the scaffold or the cross. kingdoms were supported by the sword; his kingdom required the sword to remain in its scabbard, and commanded its subjects not to slay their enemies but to die for them. Jesus came to introduce a kingdom, a spiritual kingdom, not an ecclesiastical kingdom, a kingdom of righteousness, peace, and love; to establish the reign of a new and a higher morality; but it was on the earth he sought to establish it. It was this world, the affairs, the minds, and the hearts of men in this mode of being, he sought to subject to the law of God which is the law of right, which is again the law of love. Hence the angels sang not only 'Glory to God in the highest,' but 'on earth peace and good will to men.'

Those

"This great fact has been overlooked or misinterpreted; and yet it was of this fact that the wise and good of old prophesied. They saw the vice, the crime, the poverty, the suffering, the bigotry, the idolatry, the superstition, with

which their own age was cursed, and they looked forth intc the dim and distant future for a new order, a new age, a new world to spring into birth. They saw in the visions of their souls, in the inspirations of their hopes, an individual, a chosen messenger, a prophet, priest, king, or hero, the anointed of God, the Messiah, by whom, in due time, this new order should be introduced, and the latter-day glory, for which they yearned and hoped, and must die without witnessing, should be realized. The utterance of their hopes and their wishes and their presentiments, in the sublime strains of inspired poetry, is what the church reverences, and rightly reverences as prophecy, and the authority of which, with equal justice, it has always asserted. These prophecies of a long line of patriarchs and sages, all point to the new world Jesus came to create, to the establishment of the reign of justice and love throughout all the earth. And I, for one, believe that they were from God and shall be realized. These patriarchs and sages read in the stars, which ever and anon broke through the clouds which obscured their heavens, that the night should not last forever, that a glorious morning should dawn, a golden sun uprise, before whose beams the darkness should roll back, and the clouds disperse. To me Jesus is that sun. His light has been rising for ages on our world, struggling with the darkness, and I doubt not that he will, ere long, shine forth in all his glory, the whole earth be illumined, and man everywhere be able to stand up in his true dignity, the brother of man, and the child of God. This is the purport of all prophecy; and this realized, is the establishment of universal right, and the establishment of this, is the realization of the highest social perfection, as well as individual holiness.

Man has suffered long; for ages been alienated from his brother man, the prey of false notions and anti-social habits. Long has he gone about bent to the earth, pale and haggard, bemoaning his existence, and at times, in the bitterness of his soul, cursing his Maker. Christianity comes to his relief. It brings a remedy; not merely by enjoining submission, patience, resignation; but by recognising his right to a better condition, and breathing into his soul, the courage to attempt its realization. Christianity, sir, deals with man's rights as well as with his duties. Nay, rightly interpreted, it concerns itself even more with our rights than with our duties, for even the duties it enjoins are but another name for the rights it recognises. It begins by

recognising all men as brethren,-'one is your Father in heaven and all ye are brethren,'-it proceeds by enjoining universal philanthropy, legitimated by the fact of the common brotherhood of the race; and ends by commanding us to labor especially for the poor, the friendless, the downtrodden. Jesus claimed to be the anointed of God, because he was anointed to preach glad tidings to the poor. His ministry began with the poor, the lower classes; they heard him gladly, while the rich scorned, and the great took counsel against him; from them were taken his chosen ministers, not learned scribes and rabbis, but poor unlettered fishermen, and humble tent-makers,-men who had nothing but their simple humanity, and therefore could be satisfied with nothing short of those broad and eternal principles of right, which extend alike to all the members of the race. The principles of the Gospel were broad enough to reach even them. Therefore blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,'-is, not merely shall be in another world, but is now, for it is for their especial benefit the Son of God has come to introduce the reign of righteousness and love.

"You see, now, Mr. Elwood, I hope, why it is I call Christianity the poor man's religion. It is not because it comes with the voice of God to make him submissive to his masters; not because it seeks to reconcile him to an order of things, the whole weight of which he must bear; but because it comes to reveal to him his rights, his own lofty and deathless nature; his equality with those who have for ages trampled him in the dust, fattened on his sweat and blood; and to assure him that he also is a man, and has a man's wants, a man's rights, and energies; because it says to his oppressor in the tone and authority of God: Hold, thou wrongest a brother, and blasphemest thy Maker by oppressing his child; because it says to the rich, the proud, the would-be nobility of earth: In the meanest, the lowest, the most filthy of the human race, behold an equal, a brother, a child of God, humanity in all its integrity, with all its imprescriptible rights, and its capacity of endless progress in truth, love, goodness. Here, sir, is what I see in Christianity, and seeing this, I could not be a Christian did I not recognise the rights of the poor, and feel my obligations to them; I could not for one moment find peace in my own bosom, did I not make the moral and social melioration of all the members of the community, the express object of all my thoughts, wishes, and labors. I hope, sir, you will no

longer feel surprised to find a professed Christian sympathizing with efforts designed to promote man's earthly

weal.'

"You have presented me the Gospel," I replied, “in a new light; and had I seen it in the same light some years ago, it would, perhaps, have saved me some trouble, and reconciled me to the Christian faith. But what signifies it? You call yourself a Christian, but the whole Christian world will call you an infidel, and were you not rich would condemn you as loudly as it does me.'

"Well, what of that? The first Christians were called atheists, and Jesus himself was crucified as a blasphemer, and I trust that I shall not be frightened by a nickname. The truth never yet was extinguished by a nickname, and if I have the truth, the world may call me what it will. But there is no fear that my views will be termed infidelity. I have not stated my views only. Millions of hearts are there already to respond to them, and millions of voices ere long shall echo them. The Christian world is prepared for these views, and daily in the temple is it praying for them. Everywhere is there a Simeon to whose heart it has been revealed that he shall see the Lord's anointed, ready, on beholding the Gospel in the light I have presented it, to exclaim, Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation.""

We had now reached Mr. Howard's residence and the conversation dropped.

CHAPTER XV.-CONVALESCENCE.

Of Mr. Howard's family I shall not say much. It consisted of a wife and two daughters; the eldest daughter was eighteen, the other some two years younger, both intelligent, beautiful, and religious, according to their father's reading of the Gospel. It was a quiet family, and in more respects than one, just the family in which the bruised spirit might be made whole, the chilled affections recover their warmth, and the troubled heart find its peace.

This family was cheerful, nay, lively; and the girls were now and then, as girls will be, a little frolicsome in a quiet way; but never, as I could discover, disposed to waste their time on trifles. Each had a regular employment, and each seemed to feel that life had serious aims which must not be lost sight of, and solemn duties which must not be neglected. Whether it was a fashionable or unfashionable