realities of whatever our great men now hope for ; lasting satisfactions, which will make " memory a glory-haunted place."

"I sometimes hold it half a sin

To put in words the grief I feel;
For words, like Nature, half reveal
And half conceal the soul within."

Lord Tennyson, In Memoriam V.

The exercise of speech being connected with the use of thought, enlightenment and elevation of thought will tend to unify language. Memory, imagination, reflection, can be so intensified, transfigured with a new glory, that we shall be brought into close conscious relation with the invisible and eternal. The Gift of Tongues, on the Day of Pentecost, shows this. St. Paul declared, Tongues are a sign" (1 Cor. xiv. 22). The Word, one of our Lord's titles, also signifies that the natural and the supernatural, will dwell together in man. This highest meaning of speech, so beautifully exemplified in Jesus, the Word of God, will receive universal accomplishment when all believing men, made like Jesus, have God's Name, God's Word, in them; and are manifested as God's sons. The former creations of life in our earth were perfected in Adam; the latter creations are spiritual; beginning by means of Christ taking our flesh, they are finished by our partaking of His glory. "We meet and gather round Him, and together enter in, Where the rest is consummated and the joys of home begin! Where the tempest cannot reach us, where the wanderings are past, Where the sorrows of the journey not a single shadow cast."

Frances Ridley Havergal, Right.

RESEARCH XVII.

NATURE IS ON THE WAY TO SOMETHING ELSE.

"Besides his particular calling for the support of this life, every man has a concern in a future life, which he is bound to look after."--JOHN LOCKE, Conduct of the Understanding, sect. viii., Religion.

"I think if thou couldst see,

With thy dim mortal sight,
How meanings, dark to thee,
Are shadows hiding light;
Truth's efforts crossed and vexed,
Life's purpose all perplexed,—

If thou couldst see them right,

I think that they would seem all clear, and wise, and bright.”
ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTER, If Thou Couldst Know.

NATURE remains but a very little while in one stay. We, and all things around, are continually becoming something else. There is not anything in existence, so far as we know, whose being is limited to the present; or that remains in any permanently fixed locality. The progression of our sun, and the whole planetary system, at the annual rate of about one hundred and fifty millions of miles through space; the twofold motion of the earth, orbitual and axial; are unceasing and work ceaseless change. No two days are alike, nor any two consecutive moments; there is not anything, at any

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time, anywhere, at a standstill: all are passing into new places and into new states.

It is the same with individual and national life. The child grows into a man, and uncultured tribes either perish or become civilized nations. With the larger clearer experience of mankind knowledge advances. This knowledge, systematized by thought, we call "science;" and the labours of past ages, amended and enlarged by new experiments and generalizations, are formulated and accepted; so that, little by little, the thoughts of the greatly wise fashion the common sense of ordinary men; and grand intellectual conceptions of the universe, once the ideal of a few, become a reality to all.

The advance of knowledge is not wholly like growth in nature. Knowledge enlarges, but the things, of which we take knowledge, do not correspondingly magnify themselves. We become aware of laws, but those laws were already in existence; and, to brief superficial observation, seem unaltered and unalterable. Despite this, and though nature neither creates new matter nor new force, matter and force are continually modified afresh; so that new shapes appear, combinations and conditions, which before had no existence.

The progress of nature in general, and human advance in particular, are from rudimentary conditions into finished forms. The so-called "failures" of nature are not failures, but returns to more primitive states, or a masked advance. Rash politicians, endeavouring to innovate, or to unduly retain the past, are not less dull. than rash. The true statesman, reading the signs of the times, is willing to be led but not less influences the

times by prescient measures: even as nature represents all the past in the present; and, by that which is now, makes all the future. The principle is universal; all things are on their way to something else.

The operations of nature are not merely mechanical, there is everywhere an intelligible adaptation by which everything occupies its own place and does its own work in the universal harmony. The whole is rightly regarded as the materialization of some mental operation; for our highest reasonings, those accounted absolutely true, are nothing more than a logical reproduction, a systematized knowledge, of the actual order in nature. Whether we observe molecular or vital operation, special adaptations or universal harmony, we are compelled— seeing that, though the variety is infinite, there is no confusion anywhere-to attribute the adaptations and the harmony to an all-comprehending, all-pervading Purpose-not yet accomplished.

The unique accuracy, in union with the mysterious grandeur of this progress, humbles yet exalts every man, who is able to know the truth. The Divine Idea, in its completeness, is that toward which the universe is moving. The history of worlds, of angels, of men, is a mighty drama extending through immeasurable time; presented on the platform of infinitude, with the sky for canopy, the suns for lamps, God for Author.

The beginning of things, or of any one thing, we can never trace back, nor can we discern their end. As for magnitude and extension, we are unable accurately to measure either the minutest or grandest compartments of matter and space. We may as well endeavour to square the circle. There is always something more,

within the smallest recess, than that we attain to; and something in the largest that goes beyond our grandest conception. The true meaning is in a paradox: that we count the smallest, may be the greatest; and the greatest, the smallest; or, like the universal ether, greatest and smallest at the same time; so vast, as to occupy all known space; so minute, that nothing is less; no crevice so infinitesimal that is not occupied by it. The solution of the paradox-this great, this small, the within everything, the beyond everything—is the presence of God. He dwells in all, all dwell in Him. By Him everywhere, in everything, during all time, are new combinations, new appearances, unto infinity and eternity.

Perception of this may be regarded as the intellectual beginning of religion. Religion had a beginning, so also nature, so also knowledge. Knowledge grows to that full apprehension which refers substances, forces, laws, to one eternal Power. Religion is reverence and service of that high all-accomplishing intelligent Power of the universe Who is the essence of reasonableness.

We know that things are in a state of reasonableness, because the advance is always into some further condition, which was prepared by the prevenient state. The growth of nature is an intelligible advance from chaos to inorganic mechanical order, thence to organic activity. Somewhat similarly, the advance of knowledge is from primitive wonder to ancient thought, then from Copernicus to Kepler, from Kepler to Newton, even until now. The progress of religion was from Adam's intuition to patriarchal faith, to Moses' insight, to the Apostles' power, to the indwelling of the Holy Ghost. David