temporary stars which from time to time burst forth, like those in the Whale (in Tycho Brahe's time) and in the Northern Crown, (in our own time,) in the dark intervals of space, and glow with a proper starry light for months or years, slowly to fade and disappear. What are these but still older suns which have reached the eruptive stage which supervenes on incrustation and unavoidable collapses of the wrinkling crust? Shall we call them old, decrepit suns, or youthful planets? They are both. The old age of a sun is the infancy of a planet. As suns they utter a prophecy for our solar orb. As planets they rehearse a reminiscence of our home-world. The sky is all one vast arena of world-production. We had thought, in our narrowness and ignorance, that creation was complete and finished, but Nature is as busy to-day as she ever was; and here are the evidences that she has never ceased to elaborate. Lift our eyes high enough, and we see the universe like a forest, in which the history of the century-old tree is recited in the hundred stages of growth which we trace downward from the veteran to the sapling and the succulent twig-a panorama of history as well as a network of mutual relationships.*

Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter, as already intimated, though older in years, are younger in development, than our world. Mars is possibly already senescent. The moon is dead and fossilized and desiccated. And yet the cemetery in which she lies is the bourne toward which the whole procescession of cosmical bodies is steadily marching.

We cannot stand upon this pinnacle of thought and contemplate the scene without emotion. In one horizon we behold nebular mists springing into being. They roll on through ages, rising in the firmament as glowing suns in successive stages of incandescence; they rush past us as planetary bodies. clad in verdure and animated by the multifarious scenes of animal life; they recede from the present with the wrinkles of old age written upon their brows, and descend beneath the opposite horizon, numb and chill and unconscious, to the burial-place of effete worlds. All there is of the present world-its heats and snows, its waves and earthquakes, its upspringing and decaying vegetation, its births and its deaths

*The writer takes the liberty to refer to his little brochure entitled "The Geology of the Stars," in which these ideas are more fully wrought out.

all are but incidents in an unfaltering progress. The phases of to-day-nay, of a generation, a century, the life-time of a race—are but transient, following other scenes that are past, and making place for the new conditions which roll on in the plan of the All-wise and the All-powerful. Before our eyes the great current of events surges on-unhasting, unrestinglike the mighty, ceaseless sweep of suns and systems through the boundless abysses of space.

So we view things present, things past, and things to come. Every age is the unfolding of a previous age, and itself conditions the events of the following one. That this is evolution we.most frankly admit and most solemnly affirm. If we could not detect this relation of genesis between the antecedent and the sequent, we should miss the clearest revelation of thought in the physical world, and the strongest argument for God--one God, infinite in wisdom and in power. If the changes of the universe are now in progress, after the lapse of the past eternity; if they tend toward a finality instead of moving in a circle, as all the evidence shows that they do, then this movement of events had its origin in finite time; for, otherwise, every possible issue would have been reached an eternity since. We trace the material evolution back to the condition of a fire-mist, and for all that we can render probable this was its first condition. The lapse of time since then, however vast, is not eternity. The evolution of the universe belongs in finite time. But how of the matter of the universe? Finite, we reply; for it of infinite age, then it existed dead and motionless through an eternity before that evolution began which we behold in progress; and no cause short of omnipotence can be assigned for the vivification of matter an eternity without life. Dead an eternity, dead for all eternity.

It is an evolution, indeed, over which science leads us to this commencement. But she can lead us no further. This beginning was not evolved. Demand the antecedent condition, and she has no response to give. Demand the origin of matter, and the forces which animated it, and she is dumb. Sometimes, because she cannot climb quite to God, she refuses to have anything to say about God. Philosophy, however, bridges the awful chasm which separates that which is primordial to science from that which is primordial to thought.

She

is the beautiful, heavenly guide which takes us by the hand and leads us into a clear light, where we read lines of truth not revealed to the eye of science. The cosmical evolution had a beginning; therefore, some adequate cause began it. Matter and force exist; therefore, they have been caused to exist. The method of the evolution in progress in the universe is framed in strict accordance with the laws of thought; it is, therefore, the product of intelligence. The worlds of space, like the individual inhabitants of any world, are bursting into birth with the succession of the ages; therefore, creative and formative activity has never slept. There is a Being revealed in the depths of human consciousness who stands forth clothed in all the attributes of the Being thus revealed in the cosmos; therefore, the God of Nature and the God of the soul are one.

Gladly and devoutly do we take a further step. We have spoken of the forces of matter, and have viewed them as evolving worlds. What do we know of the nature of these forces? We know that, while in their essence inscrutable, they tend more and more to reveal themselves as but forms of one force. What is this one force? Sir William Thomson uttered the suggestion of the common intelligence when he said, in substance, that the controversy between materialisın and Christian faith was likely to be reconciled in the mutual recognition of immediate Divine agency in the one force which manifests itself in Nature under so many guises, working out such an infinitude of results. This, while an old suggestion of philosophy, is a new confession for science. It commends itself equally to the thinking and the religious nature of man; and neither science nor philosophy can bring one witness against it. We are comforted to feel that the forces of Nature are but the immediate exertions of Divine will. The laws of Nature are but God's uniform methods of acting. The more demonstrable the evolution of a system of events, the clearer the revelation of the antecedent and accompanying exercise of Divine thought and power. The whole universe is radiant with. the presence of God and vocal with the thoughts of God; and we rise, at last, to that awe-inspiring conception of the relation of Deity to his works which seems to have been almost a national inspiration in the Hebrew mind. "Who layeth the

beams of his chambers in the waters; who maketh the clouds his chariot; who walketh upon the wings of the wind." "He looketh on the earth and it trembleth; he toucheth the hills and they smoke."

ART. VI.-DR. CHAMBERLAYNE ON SAVING FAITH. IN the "Methodist Quarterly" for October, 1873, we find a review of Dr. Chamberlayne's work on "Saving Faith." From the highly eulogistic character of the review there can be no doubt of the writer being in harmony with the author respecting the peculiar teachings of the work. We had almost said, too, that there can be no doubt of his intention to bring the work very prominently before the Methodist Church, and its ministers in particular, with the design of incorporating such teaching into the theology and constitution of said Church. Perhaps, however, there is room for doubt whether he wishes the book to be thus widely read. He requests all cursory readers and superficial thinkers to let it alone. Hence, it is not the Church generally, only persons of profound and comprehensive minds, who are to peruse it, and be instrumental in effecting the suggested changes. We hope this is not intended as a warning to objectors that they are to consider themselves superficial, and therefore are to refrain from making known their objections.

The writer of these lines examined very closely Dr. Chamberlayne's work soon after its publication. He saw in it evidence not only of an earnest purpose, but likewise of a very acute mind, of wonderful skill in framing an argument, and of extensive research upon the subject discussed-more, however, without than within the circle of Methodist writers. But the doctrine. of the book occasioned much surprise, being so directly contrary to what he had learned in a forty years' membership in the Methodist Church. Could it be that he had been mistaken all these years in his views respecting the Methodist doctrine of saving faith? After considering the subject for some time he turned to Mr. Wesley's works to satisfy himself. A protracted examination led to the conclusion that the views of the book were anti-methodistic as well as anti-scriptural. He withstood the

earnest solicitations of many ministerial brethren to publish his conclusions, supposing the work itself would produce but a very slight and transient wave on the surface of Methodist thought; but as an effort is now made to push the little volume into great prominence, he offers his views to the periodical which has been used for this purpose.

Still, he has considerable doubts whether he shall be allowed thus to present himself before the Church. He has understood for years, though he cannot say now upon what authority, that opposing papers upon any subject are never admitted to the pages of the "Quarterly." It seems, however, that the case in hand might form an exception to such rule. The reviewer asks for a thorough investigation of the whole matter referred to in the book; he states his conviction that the work should at once be placed on the list of preparative ministerial studies, being better fitted for a place on such list than almost every book now on it; and he assumes throughout his article that many, perhaps we should say the majority, of Methodist preachers are fundamentally wrong in their ideas respecting saving faith. If the work be thus important to Methodism, and so much be claimed for it, opinions pro and con may properly be placed before the Church, such opinions being expressed with due regard to truth and brotherly affection.

Is saving faith a condition of membership in the Methodist Church? This is the first question of the book. The answer is plain and easy. Since the year 1864 a profession of such faith has been required from every person who seeks full membership. But Dr. Chamberlayne contends that the General Rules require such faith; hence, it has been a condition not only of completed, but likewise of initial, membership ever since those rules were published; and hence, again, General Conference acted under a mistake when it passed a resolution requiring such a profession ere full membership is granted. An objection is anticipated grounded on the description given in the General Rules of the persons forming the Church, namely, "a company of men hav ing the form and seeking the power of godliness." The author meets this by the statement that such a description may "very well consist with any measure of saving faith on this side heaven." We more than doubt this statement. To say of a mature Christian that he has the form and is seeking the power