great problems of destiny. We are wrestling with the supreme powers. We are on the table-land of awakened thought, contending with the gods. We are making and testing religions. We are in the noblest work that ever occupied an awakened mind. If Christianity cannot stand the test of competition, then she must give way for some other system that can. We ask no favors. If you have any pick or bar that can remove the rock of ages, bring it on. We ask you to do your worst. If you have a telescope that can resolve the star of Bethlehem, we pray you to bring it forward. We are going to sea for eternity. We do not

wish to start on a raft that will go to pieces in the first dash of that everlasting tide. Some people who do not wish to bear the restraints of Christianity are talking about this recent Congress of Religions, as if Christianity had lost by the comparison. We wish to say that if she cannot stand this test of all tests, she has no right of way. No other religion has ever made such meetings possible. It is only through the broad liberty and intense intellectual activity created by Christianity that such gatherings are possible. We hail the gatherings, we welcome the comparisons, we are willing to abide by the results. It is not whether unregenerate men, preferring the unrebuked indulgence of their depraved propensities, shall prefer heathenism. Many believers in Christianity have not accepted its ruling power. That does not foredoom Christianity. That the rather honors it. The real question rises to the substance of the systems and to the character of the objects of worship. If any of these systems stand firmer against all sin, even the secretsins of the heart, are braver for righteousness, are more gentle, more careful for the poor and helpless, more merciful, cleaner in requirement and practice than Christianity; if Buddha or Brahma or any of the gods of heathenism with their loathsome and bloody services, with their deformed and dwarfed characters, can rise above the Infinite in majesty, in power, in purity, in righteousness, in justice, in mercy, in love, in all that can ennoble and elevate a people, then we confront a real question, and may have opened before us newer and wider possibilities. All that Christianity asks is a fair chance. Take off all restraints on religious thought and belief. Let the questions be settled by argument in the inner chamber of the soul, at the bar of the individual judgment: nowhere else can a real altar be established. Absolute freedom from coercion and in the light of

the freest competition Christianity makes her greatest conquests. Her deadliest foes are preoccupation and indifference. Turn on the search-light of awakened thought and there shall come but one verdict as from the contest on Carmel, as from the strife throughout all these centuries. The Lord, he is God. The Lord God Almighty reigns and shall forever reign.

CHRISTIAN UNION AND CO-OPERA

TION.

ORGANIC UNION: ITS REASONS AND PROSPECTS.

BY BISHOP A. CLEVELAND Coxe, D.D., LL.D., OF BUFFALO.

OUR times are earnest and full of hope. Also the great enemy is very earnest, but the Lord fufils his promise, “lifting up a standard against him," in the evident renewal of zeal, activity, and godliness among those who are true of heart. And among the signs of the times which are the most encouraging we may name the spirit of restoration; a desire to repair what has proved insufficient in the Reformation, by a return to primitive Christianity. The era of restoration has come, with "restorers of paths to dwell in." We long for that visible unity, that organized union in effort, by which the Ante-Nicene believers triumphed in suffering and overcame the Cæsars.

As yet, however, believers who respect and love one another are not agreed how this blessed consummation is to be brought about. I think it is partly because many do not yet understand organic unity itself, nor see it in its true and practical light, as something which Christ himself demands of us, and hence as something which, when we really desire it, he knows how to restore to his divided family. It is my duty, by your invitation, to plead for this "organic unity," with the great disadvantage of doing so in the presence of learned and godly brethren who think it unattainable, and who honestly believe our organized forces of division and competition may be rendered harmless, if not beneficial, if only they may be carried on with less of rivalry, and in a kindly agreement to differ as to ways and means, or even in fundamental ideas of order and divine truth.

Now, were I called to state ideas of my own in the of such brethren, I should not be willing to do so.

presence

I am em

boldened by the fact that I propose to state nothing but the views and convictions which were once universal among Christians. I plead for practical ideas, because they once were exemplified in the solid organic forces of a united church which published the truth effectually and prevailed over heathenism, because it confronted its adversaries as one body, with one faith, one baptism, and one Lord. All the evils we confess and deplore have resulted from the violation of this unity and the consequent development of sect. And such consequences are inseparable from perpetuated schism. The spirit of missions languishes and the work of missions becomes a self-stultified conflict of sects in the very presence of the heathen whom they attempt to convert. The gospeltrumpet gives forth an uncertain sound; and as in Japan at this moment, intelligent pagans exclaim, "We are ready to be converted to Christianity when you Christians agree in telling us what it is." Christ has not promised that the world shall believe in his own mission from the Father, in the face of a piebald variety of systems, all clamoring as loudly in conflict with one another as in proclaiming to heathens their irreconcilable differences in the name of truth and God's commandments.

Let me state what is meant by the organic unity for which I plead. Let me do so in the memorable words of our great Intercessor, addressed to his Father in heaven, at the sublime moment when he washed the disciples' feet, gave his new commandment of love, instituted the sacrament of their visible communion, and consecrated himself as a sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. The communion of saints, as he ordained it and promised his Holy Spirit to bring it to pass, is thus defined:

"That they all may be one

As thou, Father, art in me,

And I in thee,

That they also may be one in us."

(1) The unity required of believers therefore admits of no divisions, but is that of a divine nature, the unity of the godhead. It means (2) a visible unity among men in the body; something which gives practical effect to the words which our Lord subjoins:

"That the world may believe that thou hast sent me."

We are aided to a grasp of the divine idea of this visible unity,

what it appears to be and in what it consists, when St. Paul compares it to the fabric of a house, or again, even more forcibly, when he illustrates it by the living fabric of the human body, "fitly joined together, and compacted by that which every joint supplieth." How significant this figure is made when he describes this body in its vital functions: "The effectual working, in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love"! The same apostle is so possessed of this view of the precept that he enforces it in a detailed reference to the foot, the head, the eye, and all the members. And when he entreats that there be "no schism in the body," let us reflect how positively his exhortation excludes the objection that no such unity can be expected of believers. "I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together, in the same mind and in the same judgment." He proceeds in the same strain; and I must own before God that the indifference of "evangelical" Christians to these appeals of God's holy Word is a mystery to my mind as real, if not as stupendous, as that which the Roman religion presents in its contempt for the same apostle's teaching concerning "an unknown tongue" in the public worship of the church.

Now, in intellectual philosophy, I agree with worldly men that the unity on which St. Paul thus insists is not to be expected or conceived of. It is a spiritual effect of the Holy Spirit working in his own mighty way; a way of which the carnal mind has no conception, but which the grace of God has once effected among men of like passions with ourselves, and which, therefore, he is able to restore.

Take the simple fact recorded by the evangelist of what was effected by the first outpouring of the Spirit. "Then they that gladly received his word were baptized, and the same day were added about three thousand souls. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship and in breaking of bread and in prayers." Again at a later day it is recorded: “The multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul." Long afterwards we find this organic concord planted in Europe among St. Paul's beloved Philippians: "Standing fast in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel." When a different spirit invaded the Corinthian church