with widened power through the coming year! To editor, readers, contributors, and publisher, I send fraternal greeting. Never was our cause so strong. We have deep reasons for enthusiasm. From HOWARD N. BROWN: I am glad to send greeting through you to all of our household of faith, and to congratulate them that the New Year is so bright with signs of hope and promise for the work that is dear to their hearts. New light is surely coming into the world; and, though it may sometimes seem that, as the old adage says, "As the days lengthen, so the cold strengthens," yet this increase of light must mean at last increase of vital heat. It means a coming springtime, when the old formal creeds shall once more bud and blossom with spiritual truths, so that men will wonder at their former wintry nakedness. It is the time of all others for earnest, hopeful work; and it is folly to be discour aged if the growth be slow, or if some green shoots have been pinched by the frost. He who looks back ever so little should know that the season is advancing toward a more fruitful era for all religion of the spirit. In that day great will be the joy of those who can feel that they have some right to share in the reaping, because they have helped A SHORT CATECHISM. What is our religious faith? What do we believe about God? Is he near? He is. "In him we live and move and have our being." Does he see us? Yes, he that formed the eye, shall he not see! Will he hear us? Yes, he that made the ear, shall he not hear! Will he help us? Yes, we are all his children. What book best explains God's ways? The Bible. It is the history of how men found out about God. Were there many difficulties? Yes, men went wrong, and often dis- How does the Bible end? Love to God and love to man. What would follow if we all obeyed this gospel? If we loved God, we should keep our Why did Jesus wish all men to accept this gospel? Because it is the only salvation. Salvation from what? From sin and selfishness and worldliness, which so easily beset us. Is Jesus, then, our best teacher? Yes; for he leads us to the best life. To be real Christians, then, to love Jesus and follow him, and be saved by him, must we believe in the Trinity and in miracles, in the doctrines of the fall of man, the atonement or eternal punishment? No, these things only lead us away from the gospel of Jesus Christ. Repeat once more that gospel which the Master himself proclaimed, which we as Unitarians believe, and as Christians pledge ourselves to obey. Love to God and love to man! RELIGION. FROM A SERMON BY REV. JOHN W. CHADWICK. For one thing, I cannot look at the succession of the ages, and see what a tremendous part religion has been playing on the busy scene, without being convinced that here is something essential to the completeness of humanity, something so deeply implicated in its structure that it can no more be taken out of it without destructive consequences than the bones can be taken out of a man's body or his muscles be unstrung of every quivering nerve. No other force or institution has played such a stupendous part in human history, has reared such splendid fanes, dominated such mighty nations and events, inspired such hopes and fears. . . . Religion and morality were originally two separate streams, one rising in the contact of man's spirit with the mystery of nature and the mystery of his own life, and the other in the contacts between man and man; but long since the two streams coalesced, and now you might as well endeavor to separate them as to separate the waters of the Hudson and the Mohawk below their junction with each other. Here and there you find an individual like Benvenuto Cellini or the last pious defaulter whose religion seems to have no moral character, and here and there you find a splendid ethical development with no conscious lifting of the heart to God; but, in the wide average of history and of our semi-civilization, the religious and the moral elements are inextricably interwoven. Separated in theory they often are by moralists and theologians. So are the bones and muscles on the dissecting table or in anatomical treatises; but in the living organism they are mutually supporting and sustaining, and cannot be torn asunder without the destruction of that unity in which they both inhere. There are those who, because they were originally separate, would keep them separate still; but they have coalesced as naturally as two rivers winding to the sea, and it would be as absurd to seek to isolate them now as to seek to isolate the Hudson's or the Mohawk's streaming flood. At the first swelling of the waters they would reunite; and separate religion and morality as you will in theory or practice, given some inundation of the one or of the other, and they would rush together with a joy and welcome as when long-parted lovers reunite. Whatever religion has been, this is what it is,-man's sense of his relation to the power and mystery of universal life, and his endeavor to convert that sense into a binding law of life. . . . Somehow, by God's grace and man's, religion has become the twofold energy of a divine and human inspiration, the twofold response of human nature to the Allembracer, the All-enfolder, and to the obligations of a social life. And, seeing that these things are so, how is it possible for any one to be a man, in all the fulness of his intellectual powers, and not make the religious confession and take the religious attitude? It must be that the man who thinks seriously and feels profoundly is the true, the ideal man; and how is it possible for a man to think seriously and feel profoundly concerning the power and mystery of universal life, and that need men have of one another which we call morality, without having that sense of the former and that conviction of the latter which, in their interplay and mutual support, make up the fulness of religion? ... Religion in its earliest dawn, before it was yet moralized, was exclusively the sense of man's relation to a power unseen, but felt in all the wonderful and strange appearance of the world; and to call that religion, be it never so sublimely moral, that has nothing of this most characteristic glow upon its face, is to use language with disloyal freedom and abuse. But it is loyalty to facts as well as to the sanctities of speech that makes the religious attitude and the religious confession an absolute necessity for every man who thinks seriously and feels profoundly concerning the deep things of life. Here, pressing on his mind and heart, is not only that need men have of one another which we call morality, but also pressing on his mind and heart are the immeasurable power and beauty, order and bounty, of the material universe, flowering and fruiting in the glory of the human, in golden deeds that "pierce the night like stars, and by their mild persistence urge men's search to vaster issues." How is it possible for a man to be a man, and not experience in every deeper moment, however it may be with him in the stress of business anxiety or in pleasure's giddy whirl, that expansion of the heart, that joy ous lift, that happy confidence, that awe, that tenderness, which, call it by whatever name you please or by no name at all, is of the incorruptible essence of religion? If such a thing is possible in any way, it is not in my imagination to conceive that it is so; and I must hold that every man who is in truth a man is as much bound to be religious in religion's primal sense as he is to be moral, as he is to eat for hunger and to sleep for rest and love for love's sweet pain. OUR WORK IN COUNTRY TOWNS. The village church problem is that of uniting division and weakness into union and strength. In towns able to support one vigorous and successful church there are from five to ten, with a consequent impairment of the religious life of the place. Under such conditions religion becomes a competition of the sects, lowering, to an extent, the whole ethical and religious tone of the community. Energies that might be set in the direction of much, making for the betterment of life in many ways, must be devoted to the maintaining of these several struggling, competing churches. The Young Men's Christian Association, the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and the Christian Endeavor movements, the general awakening of a desire for Christian union, have greatly modified the battle of the sects; and by union meetings a purer Christianity has had gain, and the community been led into the doing of some work of general righteousness which no one church could win it into doing. When in college, I went once to preach in a village where there were three churches. To my delight, their bells, instead of being rung in jangling discord, "sweet bells out of tune," were rung in unison, the one sounding out its three strokes, the other answering, and the third echoing their call. Once each month these people came together in a union meeting, each pastor, in his turn, preaching to the united congregations in the one church. Christian union in that village has a very gracious reality; and yet, although that is almost eighteen years ago, there are still in that village three churches, struggling each to support itself, of necessity in competition with each other. There are organizations to encourage Christian union in the villages, to discourage the formation of new competing churches. In Maine and Dakota there are State organizations among the orthodox people for this end. In Dakota the movement is especially directed against the formation of competing churches in even the larger towns, urging missionary societies in the East to withhold funds, requesting union with the church first in the field or with the one having strongest following. In my own general neighborhood I am told there are committees from each of the denominational associations, conferences, and presbyteries, working in the general interests of practical Christian union in these lines of lessening the sect competition in the smaller towns; but their action is x minus, I think, for I doubt if they have led, in a single instance, to the uniting of the several competing elements into strong church, the people abandoning their denominational differences. a While in such places the church which has the ablest and most liberal minister draws often the largest congregations, there is yet no real organic union in sight, nor will be until all these churches are ready to abandon present organizations, and unite in one great congregational body, locally named, the needs of the field being the creative genius of the organization; and that looks to me to be yet very far off, because the general activity of denominations in many ways fosters the retention of such churches in the denominational fellowship. The beauty of Christian denominational self-effacement is not yet a beauty of holiness striven after in the name of Christ by the sects. I think that our entrance into these fields may help forward this kind of practical Christianity. The dissemination of our literature will tend, I am sure, to enlarge and deepen the undenominational spirit, to lessen the hold of the spirit and teachings of sectarianism, which are the strength of practical Christianity's failure. A few men of prominence in the community, holding its confidence, and well equipped with the Unitarian spirit and teachings, will inevitably, in quiet ways, loosen the denominational hold on public opinion, and ripen it toward an organic unity of all the religious bodies of the place. When such men are far enough on to organize a liberal religious society, such society will draw together all who are in spirit of the new day, becoming a positive liberalizing force in the religious life of the community. It will tend to influence the orthodox churches to draw closer together, losing their keener vision to sectarian differences, and emphasizing what they deem the essentials of Christian religion. In speaking in such villages, I have said that the next step forward in organic Christian union was the establishment, in such places, of a liberal Christian church, ready to keep their fellowship in the conviction that love is the greatest thing in religion, and religion's greatest duty the duty of growth, that growth gained without test of opinion, welcoming all to the fellowship who wish to establish love and righteousness in the world. Such liberal church would tend to compel orthodox bodies, in a kind of self-defence, to gather themselves out of a sectarian waste into a closer unity, achieving, by such union the greater success of those things they believe to be essential in Christianity. In the present stage of the evolution of Christianity, there is in the country towns but room for two churches, a liberal and a conservative one. But, aside from such a contribution to organic Christian union, we have a mission to the country towns in the fact that our gospel has no voice there. What union there is in such places is of a theology which we believe to be in many things false and hurtful in many of its influences. That our work is needed in such towns is evidenced in the fact that we will be met with the spirit of intolerance. Many interested in our coming will be told that they will suffer in their business if they encourage us; and this telling is more than the con veyance of the fact: it is a gentle hint that we, the conveyers of the intelligence, will help realize this hurt to you, if there is not sometimes the open and positive threat of persecution. There is in these places no union large enough for the Unitarian gospel; and, until there is, there is, amid all the excellences there, a bit of religious barbarism which it is our duty to civilize,-a bit of heathenism which it is our duty to Christianize. And now to my question of How shall we do our work in country towns? In these places we should make a place for our literature. When two or three readers are there, of any congeniality at all, get them to gather together, they and their children, on a Sunday, and read to each other the sermon or the book; to hold such meetings as regularly, and be as much devoted to them, as if they were a church maintaining public services.. I have known a church, not of our fellowship, but a church of the new theology, to be held, together with its Sunday-school, in a private house for as many as eight years, doing a good work, enlarging the natures of its few adherents, and gaining something of enlarging discipleship to its teachings. Positive encouragement to the organization of such churches ought to be given. It will not only strengthen those interested, but will become a missionary centre in that village. Often out of such a successful church will be organized. But I would call these side assemblies churches, and give them fellowship as such. This idea of the church of the two or three-an actual, real, spiritual church-needs to be talked of, Unitarian people and Unitarian churches made familiar with it. Such groups of people ought to be organized as a church, and, as a church, recognized, entitled to representation in our conferences, making reports to our conferences. If possible, they should have some ministerial or lay oversight by personal visitation, at least once a year, and by correspondence, at least once a month. In many cases a visitation by the superintendent of missions can be made, and meetings held by our ministers-at-large in some public hall. These churches of the two or three can be grouped into local conferences, under the oversight of the church in that neighborhood, and conference meetings held twice a year, say. Aside from the good that these churches in little would do, in their own place, it would be an enlargement and growth to the church having such oversight, giving them the bliss of living for others than themselves. If some one about headquarters or else where could consecrate himself to this organizing and superintending these churches in little, becoming a central bureau of them all, I believe that ten years of such consecrated and enthusiastic work would garner a fruitage of blessed astonishment. This lies naturally along the line of our Post-office Mission work; and, as I see, it is necessary, in order to give that work a more permanent outcome, and give its cause of liberal religion at large the help and perpetuity of organization. I think that in country towns, and even in the farming neighborhoods, such work would have its greatest appreciation and largest fruitfulness. In such places you find the very best type of American,-earnest, kindly in life, reading the best of books and periodical literature, enjoying real think ing, often gathering in the district schoolhouse for a literary and debating society. In my boyhood's village in Pennsylvania I well remember that a society we boys started in the school-house grew, by the gradual coming in of the men, to be the literary and debating society of the whole community, maintaining through the whole winter season its weekly meeting, which was both the intellectual and the social centre of old and young. I have seen these debates participated in by physicians and educated villagers and farmers, and as well by farmers who could hardly speak a sentence without grammatical error and errors of pronunciation, but, notwithstanding, alive with interest in the questions of the day, and able to say words of homely and weighty sense. If the record of that community were written, it would not only show a splendid average of intelligence and character, but an astonishingly large proportion of contribution to what we are pleased to call the learned professions, to politics and the largest business success in the cities. One of the promoters of the Brooklyn Bridge came from that village by way of the country school mastership. And it is herein that our Unitarian churches-out of New England: I do not know how it may be there-are lamentably weak. Some of the best blood of these country places, going up into the smaller and the larger cities for life-work and home, generally attach themselves to the church of their childhood's love; and by this are the city churches being constantly enriched. By this inflow of country manhood and consecration, they are made strong. Just in our little church in Ithaca, for instance, some of our best helpers come from a village in our county where has been maintained for years a Universalist church. From other villages with their liberal church there come to us naturally some of our best members, making their religious home with us. We need a work in country towns, not simply for those country towns' sake, but for the sake of those larger places where is a centre of population such as we like to plant our churches among. If in my home village there had been a liberal church, the Pittsburg society would have the strengthening, doubtless, of some of the best known men of that city. If you have been flattering yourself that your gospel is for the learned and city-bred, you will put some slight and littleness upon your gospel. It is a gospel for the country places, and there it will have some of its deepest and most earnest appreciation. I have gone many times with a man, who was superintendent of the Ithaca Baptist Sunday-school for about twelve years, into the villages round about to speak upon Sunday evenings upon reform themes. He bas said to me many times: "I tell you, Scott, these people out here want the best preaching. They are hungry for it. They want the new truths, but their pastors do not give them to them. They are afraid of the people; while in reality the people are in advance of the minister, and want what the preachers do not give them." I think he is right. My experience confirms him, of which I might tell a tale or two, if I had the time, of my welcome in orthodox pulpits, once preaching for and entertained by a people who but a few years before my going to Ithaca had held a public prayer-meeting in behalf of a young business man who had removed to Ithaca from their village, and had fallen from grace by uniting with our Unitarian church. When my first visit was made to speak at this place, on occasion |