jects half so much as articles on common subjects written with a decidedly Christian tone." Sanctified intellect ought to be more productive along this line. Men and women of wealth ought to spend more money, and the Church itself ought to encourage and remunerate her editors, authors, and concerns, pushing to the widest extent possible their publications and supporting heartily their plans to instruct and entertain those who are so soon to take control of the world and all its interests. King or president is not comparable in honor with him who was the originator of the Chautauquan idea. Eternity alone can measure its wonderful power in elevating the people by developing a taste for good and solid reading. The educational advantages of the Epworth League should be more fully recognized, and unlimited means be used to bring its literary department to the highest excellence and usefulness.

In reference to the secular press there are hopeful signs. Already this article has hinted at the tendency to make vice and crime familiar, if not seductive, by lengthy details and ornate descriptions. It may be necessary to mention as items of news and as deserving of popular hatred villainies, divorce proceedings, and prize fights; but to make them chief features of a great daily, to the exclusion of a fuller presentation of social reforms, of eventful gatherings, and of that cause in which is bound up the happiness and prosperity of nationsin fact, of everything that is for the education and development of the nobler life-is a most alarming matter. Indications, however, point to better things. The "Editor's Study" of a late Harper's complains that popular assemblages celebrating some notable event, such, for instance, as the Bryant Centennial, were almost, if not entirely, overlooked by newspaper reporters, as if their readers could only be satisfied with daily repasts of sensationalism, if not sensuality:

This is a grave, and not a trivial matter. It concerns the very life of the community. If the newspaper editor is in this case a good judge of what his readers desire to read his judgment is a terrible indictment of the intelligence and moral sympathies of the community. If he is mistaken he is doing what he can to fit the community to the character of the paper.

The cheering information is given that the matter is engaging the serious attention of the best newspapers, how to improve

the quality of reporting being the great journalistic inquiry, lest the circulation be seriously impaired by the dissatisfaction of thousands of readers whose good will is worth cultivating. Let the demand be so clear and convincing that authors, editors, and publishers shall be compelled to give more abundant recognition to all that pertains to the higher interests of the earth-life and a stronger championship to that which carries with it the brightest promise of the life that is to come.

2. The pulpit must maintain its old-time position, keeping in the front rank as a teacher of men and molder of opinion. A progressive age, a stationary or retrograde pulpit, is the favorite comparison. A writer in the Westminster Review states it clearly:

So long as literature was an expensive luxury, and the great body of the people were either absolutely unable to read or had no taste and no time for reading, it was not remarkable that they should put up with a low standard of pulpit eloquence. . . . But in these days of half-penny papers and six-penny magazines the humblest churchgoer may, and often does, have a higher ideal of what a sermon should be than even well-todo people had fifty years ago. For the masses not only have their judgment and taste cultivated by reading, but they attend the lecture room and the theater as well as the church, and, accustomed to hear accomplished actors and brilliant platform lecturers, they are coming to expect from the pulpit entertainment and instruction, as well as exhortations to "trust in God and do the right,” which must always carry with them a certain platitudinarian sameness. Now, it is because the pulpit does not come up to the standard of excellence already attained by the press, the platform, and the stage, each after its own manner, that men stay at home and read on Sundays, go out and stroll while the morning service is being held, or go to some secular or semisecular lecture hall at night. . . . In influence for civilization and enlightenment the press, with all its faults, leaves the pulpit helplessly, hopelessly, ignominiously in the shade.

This is overdrawn; but there is no need of its even approaching the truth, with everything available for the sermon that makes a successful book or paper, the charm of voice, looks, and gesture being added; with a theme that touches every experience of our life, solves the deepest problems of our destiny, and awaits application to the stirring events that influence the public mind and the questions that agitate the human heart; with a mission to rightly develop the moral consciousness of our being, without which there cannot be true advancement; and with the authority to sway every power of the human soul and help it to the

mastery, drawing arguments and motives from that wonderful revelation which has furnished material for some of the magnificent productions in art and literature that have secured worldwide fame.

There is no reason aside from the preacher himself why the pulpit should not be to-day what it once was—the highest power in society. It cannot and it must not compete with the press in scientific disquisitions, philosophical speculations, literary ventures, political economics, social gossip, or as a chronicler of current news; but, standing as the oracle of God to hearts and consciences agonizing in spiritual struggles or blunted by the six days' contact with real world-life, to utter platitudes and commonplaces, to deal in a mere conventional theology, to forget the living issues and practical needs of the hour and the study of current thought and opinion in poring over the musty records of antiquity or discoursing on the myths of past ages, is simply to provoke scorn and contempt for incompetency, to deserve keenest criticism for "alienation of the masses" and decay of the pulpit," and to warrant the advice that "the best thing the preacher can do is to gather up his robes, bow to the editor and author, and retire." It is difficult for thoughtful men, even though they may be religious and loyal to the church service, to pass from the reading of clever and pointed editorials or vigorous and convincing articles in the periodical to hearing sermons dull, prosy, scarcely above mediocrity, and often painfully below it. How much less can such efforts be expected to reach the careless and indifferent, arousing their lethargy and awakening their interest in that other-worldliness which is, after all, the greatest want of the soul.

A certain vigorous preacher has said that "Christianity needs her Columbus to discover the 'new world' that is around and awaiting our conquest.' That "new world" is, indeed, not far off, awaiting its more complete discoverer-a baptized pulpit-to reveal its yet hidden wonders of love and mercy and subjugate its yet unconquered forces to the sway of Him who is Lord of all. Let the preacher, with a vivid apprehension from personal experience of the value of his message, bring the constraining motives, ruling passions, and varied circumstances of life to the test of the two great commandments; let him try the stirring events that awaken men's interest, the great movements

that absorb their energies, and the innumerable forms of present progress by the everlasting principles of the Gospel; let him ring out boldly and earnestly a warning voice to a selfish and material Church; as God's ambassador let him utter the yearning compassion and tender love of the infinite One to men who are waiting and expecting God to speak to them; as man's best friend and counselor let him plead, warn, exhort, and strive that he may be reconciled to God; let him help the doubting to settle those heart questions which no one can answer for them, the faltering to a stronger hold on the good and true, and the burdened to the great Burden-bearer; let him cultivate, not less intellect and learning (the very circumstances of the age demand these), but more heart and conscience, a veritable incarnation of the Christianity he preaches-and men will be attracted by the mighty truths he enunciates. It will not be said, "The periodical speaks to hundreds, while the preacher speaks to units;" for a crowded temple will await him, the press itself will sit at his feet to learn those basic truths which must underlie its highest usefulness and achievement, and the pulpit will be what it was intended-"the power of God" and, consequently, the master of the world.

3. The pew must more clearly distinguish between the good and bad in the literature, of whatever kind, it patronizes. Not to do this is to aid the bad in the most effectual way. In using the term "bad" there is meant, not so much the vile and polluting, as the latitudinarian, neutral, and non-Christian. Take away the profits accruing from the sale of such publications to Christian people, and it would materially affect their financial success. A little sum in arithmetic will show that thousands of dollars go from this source annually to sustain papers that, more or less openly, violate decency and scatter broadcast material that must corrupt both public and private morals. The gambler, libertine, or criminal could not personally enter these Christian homes as a guest; but they go there, nevertheless, and that, too, with an indorsement that gives them a dangerous foothold.

An earnest appeal should be made to the pew that, if there be in the home anything that would tend to the destruction of an immortal soul or endanger the integrity and character of the children, a fire should be kindled on the kitchen hearth and

allowed to burn until not a single paragraph remains. Harmless though it may appear, issuing from a respectable publishing house and ably editing the latest news and telegrams, no matter-away with it! Boycott it as effectually as you would the literature of crime and lust. Put a guard at the door of the Sunday school library and, by a rigid supervision, protect that life which is at the most impressionable age from the nondescript productions that abound everywhere, eager to gain an entrance, but that can only result in enfeebling the intellect, if not unfitting it for devotion and making the pleasures of the Christian life appear tasteless and dull. Fiction cannot be excluded; but let it come in such elegance of language, chaste imagery, manly spirit, and pure sentiment as shall prove a savor of life unto life and guide aright the precious souls of the rising generation.

There is no power better fitted than the pew to concentrate and give direction and force to the rising public sentiment for the enactment and, especially, the enforcement of wise laws for the suppression of all classes of vile literature. Let the pew be deeply impressed with the responsibility of spreading a pure literature to the ends of the earth, itself contributing articles of commanding interest and Christian feeling written under the inspiration of the life of religion; let it enthusiastically sustain a fresh, vigorous, earnest, baptized Pulpit, thereby promoting and extending the influence of Christianity in the world; let it exemplify, and so imbue society with, the spirit and regenerative principles of the blessed Master-and the products of an evil press must sink into utter oblivion. "No talent will keep a corrupt book alive in a pure age. The Byrons will not be tolerated a day in the millennium of holiness." The press, pulpit, and pew, if they will, can soon usher in the golden day.

JR. Creighton