condition, and the end of that condition must be the extinction of consciousness. Nor yet to children and those innocent of actual sin; but to all that vast majority whose earthly conditions were unfavorable.

His system of eschatology offers a new opportunity to the morally incompetent, and seems to promise extinction to the thoroughly unloving-that is, the selfish. Then, all living beings having become capable of love, the harmonized universe will become a matter of universal consciousness.

The lameness of this theory is seen in the fact that, in providing another opportunity for the "vast majority whose earthly conditions were unfavorable," it does away with its necessity for the extinction of some. For ordinarily it is true of the obdurate and selfish class whom it disposes of in that way, that their evil character was developed under adverse conditions. Commonly it is an evil inheritance. Their claim to another chance is as good as any other class of the "morally incompetent."

It is just here that we find the doctrine of re-incarnation more satisfactory than this hypothesis of extinction. On the one hand it satisfies the demand for the destruction of this evil class, for it pre-supposes the loss by them of personality and a break in the thread of their self-consciousness, only to be gathered up again when the goal of a purified and perfect personality is reached. On the other hand it preserves, for another opportunity to reach the goal of perfect manhood, the germ of the divine nature in every man, and insures that even the most wandering prodigal will at last "come to himself" by recognizing that he is a son of the divine Father. At the same time it provides just the process of judgment and correction

necessary to bring about that result. God's universal law is that human souls must be "judged according to men in the flesh," that they may learn to "live according to God in the spirit."

THE SUBSTITUTE.-Hitherto the Church has steadfastly adhered to the doctrine of everlasting punishment, which it officially defines to be endless torment in hell, because the surface view of Scripture seems to require it, and because her own mission seems to lose its chief importance if she be not sent to save men from this terrible doom. And yet, deep down in her heart, she has always protested against this fearful doctrine. Among her best members there is to-day an earnest craving to find some substitute for it.

The substitute we propose is based upon the distinction to be made between the essential man, made in God's image, and the existent man. We have found that the Bible teaching about hell relates to a destruction to be visited upon man as at present constituted and developed in sin under this present world-system, except so far as the divine nature which forms the ground-work of every man's being may rescue and appropriate to its uses this existent personality. Beyond this destruction there is provided for all men a resurrection, which is always and essentially a redemptive act, although the time and order and degree of the deliverance it brings must, in every case, be according to deeds done. The death and hell of Scripture, therefore, lie this side of and not beyond resurrection. This gives room for an altogether new view of the design of God in providing to raise mankind from death.

We have also discovered that this law of resurrection is connected in some way with the power that is lodged in the race to perpetuate and to perfect its forms of life. It was through a chosen and perfected seed that the renovating power was to permeate and regenerate the whole. Here there opens a wide field of interesting inquiry as to the organic connection subsisting between the successive generations of men and between the living and the dead, by which the sorrows and failures of the past are transmitted to the present, and by which the suffering and triumphant members of the whole body become the helpers and redeemers of their brethren. While few of us are yet able to explore this field, we can yet see emerging from this depth of the divine wisdom a doctrine of the vocation of the Church infinitely higher than the old view of her as sent to save men from eternal torment. As the chosen seed, she is the depositary of that saving energy which is to fill the face of the earth with the fruit of a regenerated humanity. And against her transforming power not even the gates of hell can prevail to hold its captives. But her triumph can be won only as she "fills up that which is behind of the sufferings of Christ." And for the doctrine of retribution there remains yet the majestic truth that "Our God is a consuming fire," and "Without holiness no man shall see the Lord."

NOTES ON CURRENT TOPICS.

THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY at Portland made a slight advance toward the settlement of the great questions now before the Presbyterian Church. It sent down the report of the Committee on

Revision to be acted on in the Presbyteries. In the case of Dr. Briggs it sustained the appeal of the prosecutors who were thrown out of court by the Presbytery of New York last autumn, and that Presbytery is now directed to go on and try the case. It reaffirmed the decision of a year ago that the chair which Dr. Briggs holds in Union Seminary is de jure vacant, and refused to accede to the request of the Seminary that the compact by which the General Assembly was given a veto power over its appointments be dissolved.

Whereunto all this agitation will lead no one can foresee. The Presbyterians have been building their system upon the false foundation that their knowledge of the truth is so clear and complete that its past conclusions are not to be called in question, and no further growth in the knowledge of these mysteries is to be looked for. It is needless to say that a Church so constituted must be sooner or later shaken to its foundations.

THE PRESBYTERIAN JOURNAL in its notice of the retirement of the Rev. Paul Vandyke from his professorship at Princeton says:

"When one finds himself no longer in accord with the tenets and teachings of the Church or institution he serves, he owes it both to himself and such Church or institution to say so and withdraw from it."

This remark evinces that the author of it is infected with an utterly unscriptural and degrading view of the Church. It assumes that the Church has already arrived at the full knowledge of the truth, and that her office is simply to hold fast to what she has already gained. It virtually denies that the Holy Spirit has anything more to teach His Church, or that He can ever be expected to use individual members of it to correct any of the ignorance or mistakes of the past, or to lead the whole body on to that "unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God" which it must attain, before it can come to its perfection or successfully fulfill its high mission of bringing the world to know and confess the name of her Lord. According to the view of this writer, the Presbyterian Church is a mere society-has no claim to be called a Church.

If this kind of doctrine is to control the Presbyterian body, it is more likely to become a morass than a garden of the Lord in which that tree is found whose leaves are for the healing of the nations.

AN UNSPOKEN SPEECH.-Mr. John Shirley Ward, a Presbyterian Elder from California, who was a member of the last Assembly, and who was cut off, as he alleges, from making the speech he had prepared through the operation of "the previous question," contributes it to the New York Evangelist. We extract from it some things which ought to have been heard on the floor of the Assembly, and which we are glad to know will secure a wider hearing through the Evangelist :

There are four leading propositions of the Westminster Confession, which by the plainest interpretation of English language are clearly set forth:

First. That God, for the praise of His glorious justice, foreordained some men to everlasting death.

2d. That Christ died only for a part of mankind.

3d. That non-elect infants, dying in infancy, are lost.

4th. That the Holy Spirit operates savingly only on the elect. These doctrines are all in the Confession, but if they were now proposed personally to each minister in this Assembly, is there a single man who would say he believed them?

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It would be safe to say there are not fifty ministers in the Presbyterian Church who will stand up before their congregations and say that God, before the foundations of the world were laid, passed by" and "ordained to dishonor and wrath" a certain part of the human race, and at the same time give Dr. Hodge's definition of this clause of the Confession, wherein he says, those passed by are no worse than those elected." This is now the creed of the Church and the Committee's report does not change its meaning. Such a declaration from the pulpit would speedily vacate the pews, and the pews would soon vacate the pulpit. Ă doctrine that cannot be preached certainly has no legitimate place in our creed. If the mir sters do not believe these dogmas, and do not and will not preach them, why should they cumber our Standards?

These doctrines are abhorrent to the best Christian thought of this day. They are unscriptural, and they fetter every minister in the presentation of the Gospel to dying sinners. Love is written on every page of God's Word. It gleams in the first