atically outranked, but utter failure demonstrated the necessity of a more subtle force than "simon-pure" social equality, and that was seen to be the religious element. Then religionists essayed to enter the lists and secure the triumph, but from the Shakers to General Booth, even so-called religious sentiment has failed to give cohesion to an assumed individualism which was deemed essential to success. Most of these have taken their cue, and based their hopes, and felt sure of success because a really united people had built "an empire in the desert," and compelled (as was thought) success from the very jaws of death. Copyists and imitators had not divined the secret into the arcana of action; they had failed to find the proper entrance; every excuse was used to explain defeat, every possible idea was urged as the sure basis of success. Some said it was Brigham Young, some said it was the ignorance or subservience of the people, some claimed that isolation made unity possible, but the great, the giant leader said that "God was in it," while everything demonstrated that as to the imitators, "God was not in all their thoughts." Dealing with and utilizing barbarous and semi-civilized tribes of men attests the genius and spirit of the "Mormon" people. When Brigham said that "it was cheaper to feed Indians than to fight them," he uttered a pregnant truth, one which is today the basis of all Indian reservation projects however corruptly the idea may have been carried out. Utah, for lo these many years, has seen its devoted missionaries laboring among that class, teaching them the arts of peace, training them to independence through industrial activity, opening farms, planting orchards, establishing schools, and introducing the primary elements of an expanding civilization "without fee or hope of reward;" and to see the red man drive his own team, guide his own plough, build his own rude home, and meet in school or church, is testimony to the genius of the Gospel, which counts a fading race as of Israel and included in the promises. Ministers of many churches, after spending years of time and uncounted treasure, have in late years awakened to the "Mormon' idea that industrial training is better than dogmas, and that temporal salvation must run parallel with all salvation which had its origin in the Divine mind! Africa, India, and other prominent sectarian mission fields, have followed the lead of the "Mormon” Church, and modern effort is now being developed on that grand scale which wealth implies, but which their predecessors walked in in poverty, and for many and many a year alone! Hawaii and other of the Pacific Islands testify to the industrial, moral and religious training of the unselfish and unsalaried "Mormon” Elders. They were not college men, not theorists, not dealers in abstract or contradictory doctrines; they were sternly educated, practical men, they had stormed and conquered the sterilities of nature; they had learned the value of unremitting toil, and in the simplicity but earnestness of their faith, they saw the otherwise invisible hand of God, and this spirit they sought to impress, in association with the Gospel, into the hearts of all believers! This is getting to be understood by some minds who control the press. An editorial in the Liverpool Post said lately: Far be it from any thinking man to underrate the value of religious teaching pure and simple; but if that teaching is to be really effectual, it must be followed by such lessons and examples as will lead to the transformation of the converted heathen into a good citizen; the attributes of civilization must take the place of savagery; the convert must be taught that daily labor is not degrading, but elevating; he must be shown how to work, and he must be allowed to reap the fruits of his labors! Ah me! surely the leaven of example, the silent force of truth, is at work in unexpected places. If seventy years of unostentatious advocacy of the Gospel as restored and revealed through the Prophet Joseph, and practically applied by his successors under God, hath done this, what may we not anticipate in change and silent revolution ere fifty more shall astound the nations by its development of "Mormon” influence, "Mormon," example, and progressive "Mormon" thought? In other departments of human action, changes and tests have been made from time to time, all clearly traceable to "the new dispensation." But this article is already too much drawn out for the limited pages of the ERA; nevertheless, in conclusion it may be said that politics, family life, social life, industrial methods, cooperative theories, questions of education, patriotism, finance, civil government and state founding, have all been touched and partially glorified by "Mormon" thought and consideration. If this is egotism, if it is deemed rash, improbable, or untrue, let the observing mind follow the penetrating power of ideas, the irresistible force of thought. "The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation," there is no flourish of trumpets, no Sinaic thunders, no laudation of men, no patronage of wealth, no governmental aid, none of the lauded appliances of intellectual culture or approbation of learned societies. Its only auxiliaries are simple men who, under an unmistakable inspiration, are voicing the decrees of destiny, the purposes of the living God. The preaching of the Gospel by authority is the voice of the Father, it is really the philosophy of the Heavens, the science of eternal life; but it embraces all truth, includes all topics, touches all interests, and circumscribes both heaven and earth, time and eternity; and it marvelously demonstrates the power of a silent force which is as tangible and powerful as the forces which control the starry heavens, and glorify each season on the bosom of our present mother earth. BRILLIANTS. "What God appoints, enjoy- "I cannot read His future plans, I have the smiling of his face And all the refuge of his grace While here below. "Enough; this covers all my wants, And so I rest; For what I cannot, he can see, And in his care I safe shall be, Forever blest." THEOLOGY IN EDUCATION. BY PROFESSOR WILLARD DONE, OF THE BRIGHAM YOUNG COLLEGE, LOGAN. II. PLACE OF THEOLOGY IN THE DOMAIN OF HUMAN LEARNING. In the preceding paper, consideration was given to the definitions of knowledge, science, philosophy, and theology. From the statements there made, the following conclusions may be drawn and defended: 1. Knowledge is at first crude, unorganized, ununified; whether it is a knowledge of things or merely of phenomena, remains to be discussed. 2. When this knowledge is systematized and unified along various appropriate lines, it becomes science. 3. When all these sciences, in their most general laws and principles, are unified and organized to the limit of man's unaided intellect, the result is philosophy. 4. This unified knowledge, the fruit of the intellectual powers, and the knowledge gained through the exercise of faith, when combined under the influence of the Holy Ghost, constitute true theology. To the first of these propositions but little space will be given. Pyrrho and Timon, advocates of the skeptic school of philosophy, Kant, the great transcendentalist, and, in our own day, the agnostic school of philosophy, with Herbert Spencer as one of its chief representatives, have advanced the idea that all our knowledge is limited to phenomena, and that a knowledge of things in them selves is impossible. It is impossible in this paper to go into metaphysical argument on the subject. It is sufficient to say that men as noted as Mr. Spencer in the field of thought, affirm the opposite; and that common sense, the final arbiter of all disputed questions of speculation, loudly proclaims against such agnosticism. A few quotations may not be out of place: By the testimony, the words, and the works of other men, we know that human knowledge is always in like manner the knowledge of the subject knowing and the object known. I may say that the entire experience of mankind is the continuous revelation of these realities to the human consciousness, and that all human experience is conditioned on their real existence. Man lives in their presence and in every act of intelligence sees their reality. If, therefore, the primordial postulate on which human knowledge rests is false, all human knowledge vanishes away.* Nor does it discredit the reality of knowledge that its evidence is not a demonstration. It is more than a demonstration; it is the very essence of knowledge itself; it is the primitive datum which underlies every demonstration and makes it possible. Man lives in the light of the knowledge of himself and of the world, and all his experience is the continual illumination of these realities.† As the inner life has grown more complex in manifestation, and richer in content, the system of conceptions has progressed to correspond. It is by this contact with life and reality that thought grows, and not by a barren logic-chopping or verbal haggling about proof. * The law which the mind implicitly follows is this: Whatever our total nature calls for may be assumed as real in default of positive disproof.‡ First, we must hold that the system of things is essentially a thought system. It is, however, not merely a thought, but a thought realized in act. As such it is real; and as such, it is transparent to thought. * It may be unknown; it cannot be essentially unknowable.§ It can be shown that the theory of the relativity of knowledge has arisen from barren speculation. Here the words of Goethe are applicable: *Harris' "Philosophical Basis of Theism," p. 12. Bowne's "Philosophy of Theism," p. 25. § Bowne's "Metaphysics," p. 487. |