Ancient Truth-One God. 433 gods among little gods, the difference being rather of rank than of nature. In after-times, culture does not invent, but develops amongst Aryan nations, and descends to lowest form in Fetishism. Sir William Jones writes—“We must not be surprised at finding, on a close examination, that the characters of all the Pagan deities, male and female, melt into each other, and at last into one or two; for it seems a well-founded opinion that the crowds of gods and goddesses in ancient Rome, and modern Váránes (Benares), mean only the powers of Nature, and principally those of the sun, expressed in a variety of ways and by a multitude of fanciful names.' The statement of Sir William Jones evidences that theology, even amongst rude races, rested not on the error -that there are many gods; but on the truth-there is one God, the Divine ancestor of men, Shaper, Animator, Ruler, Spirit, holding up heaven, shining in the sun, smiting with the thunder. Nature was the high priestess, not goddess; but a symbol of Him, the Giver of Wisdom; of Him who is Good as True. Conviction of the Being of one God, is not an evolution from highly cultured world-consciousness acting on appropriate facts, but a primitive faith. This is further shown by the fact that some highly cultured races have low doctrines and rites; while others, not so intellectually gifted, form exalted conceptions of the Supreme. There is among existing genuine savage faiths not only a rudimentary form of idea as to the deep problem of good and evil, but an effort to solve the mystery by realisation of the good and by victory over evil. The good, the valiant, all who excel, are heroes, divine men; symbols, though not understood, of Him who became Incarnate. DOCTRINE Of Souls. There are two beliefs: 1. Every creature has a soul capable of continued existence; therefore, the dead chief's horse is slain at the tomb for use of the human spirit. 2. There are souls and spirits ranging from low degree to the high rank of powerful deities. I. "The theory of the soul is one principal part of a system of religious philosophy, which unites in an unbroken The First Anniversary Discourse before the Asiatic Society of Bengal. line of mental connection, the Fetish-worshipper and the civilised Christian."1 This unbroken line of mental connection, this universal and imperishable conviction, is found in the soul-depths of every human creature; and reminds us, though sometimes in rudest quaintest symbols, of a Spiritual Kingdom. In lowest levels of culture the notion of a ghost-soul occasionally inhabiting the dead body, and in vision and dream appearing out of the body, is deeply ingrained. This faith leads to acts of reverence and propitiation. Part of the old culture of souls and spirits survives in modern spiritualism. It is believed that phantasms are ghosts; that, being disembodied, they enter the sleeper's mind and excite perception apart from any external or objective figure. As to persons awake, spirits are said to be visible to some, to others invisible, according to the will of the spirits. It is also taken for granted, both in rude and advanced culture, that spirits recognise one another by a likeness of the body retained in the disembodied state. Man's spirit, after death, lives in complete and abiding human shape: "Eternal form shall still divide The eternal soul from all beside; 2. In Chinese and Zulu theology, not only do souls exist after the death of the body, but are spirits and deities worshipped by the living. In modern thought, the soul furnishes a more intellectual side to the religious doctrine of the future life; but, in all faiths, however unintellectual, it is an essential. The most formal denial of future life, found amongst an uncultured race, is in a poem of the Dinka tribe concerning Dendrid the Creator: "He made man: And man comes forth, goes down into the ground, and comes no more." There is, nevertheless, even in this tribe, testimony to belief in another life. Indeed, the continued existence of the soul, after the death of the body, may be counted part of the universal faith. 1 "Primitive Culture:" Edward B. Tylor. Regions of the Dead. Two forms of doctrine are found: 435 1. The Transmigration of souls, which, ascending from lower stages, has established itself amongst the huge communities of Asia. 2. The separate personal Existence of the Soul, found not only amongst rude and primitive men, but in the heart of Christianity-where it is at once an inducement to goodness, a sustainer of hope, and solver of the problem presented by the mixed state of our present life. The savage mind is generally incapable of a large and clear view of immortality; all dull and careless natures are wont to regard the world to come as far off; but conviction of its reality finds expression in every definition of faith. Sometimes continuance of life is the main fact, sometimes retribution is the chief feature. Four great regions are assigned to the dead: hell, earth, hades, heaven; the conception does not sink into dreaminess, but is characterised by ghostliness. The low creeds have little moral element in connection with the state and place of the departed. It was reserved for our Christian Faith to implant righteousness and holiness, to give the inspiration of duty and love, as chief verities in the Kingdom of God. FUTURE RETRIBUTION. The idea of future retribution and grades of condition is not universal. Some savage races are in an intermediate condition between the continuance theory and the retribution theory. This confirms the New Testament statement that the full revelation of a pure and glorious immortality is by Jesus Christ. All races have idea of the soul outliving the body in a country of ghosts; and all carnal men, whether of low or high culture, count a corner in this world the better place. In all faiths, except the Christian Faith, whether the spirit dwells with the body in the grave, or in a subterranean void, or in the dark classic realm of hades, or the Roman Orcus of pallid souls, or roams the ghostly prairie of the savage hunter, the life is shadowy and dismal. The Sheol of ancient Jewish dead was, to common conception, but little better-a place where the dead met the dead. Nevertheless, we trace amongst many barbarous nations germs of that holy comforting doctrine which lies at the very heart of Christianity; but the roads by which a happy land is attained are so strangely different that one race's path of life seems to another a descent into the pit. The chief idea in low culture is what gives prosperity or renown here will give it hereafter; present contrasts have reality in future existence; "the good are good warriors and hunters," said the Pawnee chief; but as the good, whatever it may mean, is a qualification for reward, the theory, even among lowest races, belongs to morality. The higher faiths more and more spiritualise the definite regions of heaven and hell into states rather than localities of happiness and misery. In the last hours of earthly dwelling godly men say of the coming change-"It is not death, but life." Mourners, setting aside the evidence of their physical senses, exclaim-"Life is not severed by fatal shears, only the bands of earth, the consummation is in eternal glory." The Christian Faith reveals a state of perfect purity; and to aid our conception of it brings to view a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. THE POWER AND DOCTRINE OF HOLY SCRIPTURE. The attempts to discredit the Divine truth of Holy Scripture, Prophecy, faith in a Personal God, in moral order, in spiritual existence, in judgment to come, have led to searching investigation. We find that predictive power is possessed by peculiar states of human consciousness, and prophecy of some kind existed among all nations. Apart from sacred purpose, considered as a faculty in the human mind, it is distinct from intelligent thought and consciousness, not inconsistent with them, but a relation of the psyche to the inner and outer world. In Hellas, the office of the Pythia, with the rational prophet or vπoþýτηs to stand beside her; and amongst Jews, the school of the Prophets; are historical proofs. The power, in its lowest form, is a morbid condition of consciousness, or a sickly brooding enthusiasm ; but, though uncertain in the degree and accuracy of sacred prophetic enunciation, it has, through the whole course of history, obtained and kept power over stoutest minds. In high states, or the spiritual grade-we speak not of the sacred Predictive Power. 437 and Divine as found in Holy Scripture-the inward vision is allied with the faculty of recollection; is related to, but is not, demoniacal possession. It is an error to assume that it belongs wholly to lower culture, and will be destroyed by higher medical knowledge. Higher medical knowledge will do well to investigate it as psychic power. Men of the highest rank and greatest ability are spiritualists. Millions and millions, having investigated, assert its truth. In British India, moving, writhing, tearing men, are entered by a psychic power and oracles are uttered, This kind of prevision, or delusion, or disease, or whatever it may be, arose in times of so-called barbarism; continued in full vigour throughout the classic world, and exists now scarcely altered. Men, who naturally have neither ability nor eloquence, will, in the possessed state, pour forth earnest lofty declamation in well-knit harangue of metaphor and poetic figure. We are not prepared with any explanation, and only use the fact as one of the many links by which human consciousness is united to a world of occult influences; and as example, whether good or bad, of that higher and holier power which is manifested in Scripture. The relation seems to be somewhat like that of the divining damsel, at Philippi, to St. Paul and the preached gospel (Acts xvi. 16-18). Investigations, worked, for the most part, by those who refuse Holy Scripture, show that the attempt of physicists to limit the universe to material existences is in opposition to universal consciousness and experience. Matter is but one small piece of furniture in the many-chambered House of God. There is world within world, as there are stars beyond stars; and space, where we see nothing, may teem with a more manifold existence than that exhibited in material forms. It is the attribute of high Art and Science to suggest more than they express; that material things are not carcases of the dead, but forms between life and life. We all, at times, have the shuddering impression, embodied by Coleridge in dark and fearful verse, that something not of earth is behind us; and he is less than man who does not weave wild contrasts of heights and depths, of solemn mysteries, of possible loss, of holy and eternal triumph, "A spirit moves within us, and impels |