Now the Y. M. C. A. started with the religion of service clearly conceived by the few Churchmen who gathered together and formed the organization for that purpose. Several times in its short life, the organization has threatened to crush the service, and the Y. M. C. A. Secretary-the typical one-has become generally an "Organization man." The Y. M. C. A. has developed its own phraseology, such as the phrase "heading up," and the crystallization process has been well under way. The first time, I am told, that process was retarded and held in abeyance by the Y. M. C. A. breaking into the Mission field. The real leaders of the War work of to-day like Mr. Carter, were missionaries—he came from India. Then the personality of Dr. John R. Mott, and his vision of an international Y. M. C. A. in the world, initiated the student volunteer movement, etc., broke through the growing provincialism of the organization, which provincialism then took refuge in a moral "cave de secours"; the trilogy of prohibitions-don't smoke, don't drink, don't gamble, and a kindred propaganda. And the domestic Y. M. C. A. had advanced far on the road to crystallization when the War came and gave it a new jolt into the first ideals. Now the Y. M. C. A. over here at any rate is a truly plastic matrix of men serving other men in every degree and detail, and so fulfilling the ideals of the religion of service. What it may become after the War is a question, and a promise. The delicate balance between real service and the necessary organization to that end, and too much organization which gradually throttles service, is going to be a harder one to make and keep in times of peace when daily adaptability is not so self-evident a necessity as in times of War.

In this connection it is very notable that the most successful men on the field here are not old time Y. M. C. A. Secretaries, but men who a few months ago had never heard of the Y. M. C. A.; though the Secretary of less than ten years standing is particularly successful too. The most striking single example is Mr. Perkins of New York, who was better known in Newport than in the Y. M. C. A. a few months ago-he has such a great love of the men he works for that he cannot be persuaded to take a vacation.

So much for the religion of service which starts with the man where he is. Its inadequacy is, of course, its lack of stability—

for stability depends upon organization and system; and human ingenuity has not yet been able to erect an organization big enough to adapt itself to every fluctuation of human need,-to successive stages of human growth. The Y. M. C. A. has internally showed the tendency of all other service organizations, and though to-day in the plastic condition of most efficient service has to guard itself, after the War, against the same danger. I have quite clearly all my life underestimated this religion of service; and now I appreciate its dangers, as well as its inevitable popularity, for it is par excellence the Religion of the Age and the Social Group and the Time. Then there is the other type of Religion-the Religious system which moulds men to itself rather than moulding itself to fit the men.

Since I had to break off this study and the dissertations which filled a long morning in the little hotel at Tours, in order to catch the train, the subject has not been once absent from my thoughts, or from my conversation. Another long helpful talk with G. on top of a good deal of prayer, and a wonderful still hour spent before the Blessed Sacrament yesterday afternoon at S. George's Church, have, I think, cleared the whole issue; and how obvious both the issue and the answer is! How oddly when one comes to such an answer-one seems to have known it always.

The antithesis between the religion which starts with the man, and the religion which starts with a system, is a false antithesis. The two must be united to be effective. If the religion which starts with the man, the religion of service, is left to itself, it crystallizes into hard and fast organization before it has grown into a system big enough to include all men, or the needs of all men even in one age-let alone all men and their needs in all times.

In consequence, effective at the start, it becomes shallow, and leading the men it reaches rapidly up to a certain point, leaves them before their development is complete; and they either harden with the organization, or slip out of its grip entirely. This is what has happened in the Protestant Churches-what the Y. M. C. A. has to face as a danger.

If, on the other hand, the religion which starts with a system, albeit the system revealed by God Himself, through Christ as "The Way," the bridge back to union with Himself for men whom He loves and wants-if it is left to itself, being built up of human beings, it tends to center its attention upon itself, upon the system, the forms and ordinances, and to make itself an end, instead of a method-the Way, the Method, if you will -but only a method-a way. So turning in on itself, it loses its human touch-loses the spirit of love, and gradually evolves a formalistic legalism with which to drive men, instead of being the conductor of the love of God with which to lead them. This is obviously what has happened to Romanism.

Without a system big enough—that is a system revealed, and not the product of any age or time-this religion of service is too shallow in its breadth. Without a love big enough the religion of the ages grows too narrow and self-centered to win men. Each fails because neither fulfils the purpose of Christ, to be "the fulness of Him that filleth all in all." Both together are needed to complete the sturdy, eternal solidarity of the Cross of Christ which reaches its arms out to embrace the whole world. "I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me."

So my personal problem is just the problem of Christian unity, with the added realization that only when united can Christianity be really effective, both in winning men by persuasive contact through service and love, and in leading men to the fullest, deepest, self-expression through utter self-oblation, in both worship and service. The personal problem was precipitated by the realization over here that (1) the Sacraments and the Catholic system do not draw the mass of men, of these soldiers of ours and of France, and (2) that the Y. M. C. A., which is Protestantism at its best, while showing an adaptability to human needs, conspicuous by its absence both in Catholicism and the churches, nevertheless did not lead men anywhere, in practice, had no formulated method in its religious department (beyond the sweeping generalization that all its work was service and consequently all its work was religious) and had no clear cut goal, being unable to define what was meant by leading a man to Jesus Christ.

But in and through and after the War, and this war work is the great opportunity, by uniting the two ideals, under the mighty workings of the Spirit of God, we are to realize not only the breadth, not only the depth, but the heighth and length and breadth and depth of the mystery of His will-to sum up all things in Christ.

That text "To make known the mystery of His will-to sum up all things in Christ," was I remember the answer I made in the Seminary to Dr. Dickinson Miller, when he asked us as a class to write out what was to be the burden of our preaching through life, the ideal which was to be the goal of our effort. And so at last I have found the chord of unity in my life and work here which has fretted me for seven months by its apparent absence. This was, I know, the ideal for which I came, but I ran into the practical difficulties of its realization so "plump" when I actually got to work here, difficulties in theory, in personal experience and capacity, that I have wondered often, honestly enough, if I really belonged here, and I have never been able wholly to see my way through till just now. Now comes the question of what is my immediate job in connection with the ideal? Somewhere in the mind of God is my little place in His gigantic program for reunion of Christendom into an adequate instrument for drawing all men unto Himself, all, all—not a few geniuses here and there. The method is clear in outline, is eternal and is the same "Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ!" Moreover, it is His method, which consists in (1) personal contaet with men; (2) personal service of men, as Jesus served in healing the sick, etc., "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto me"; and (3) personal leading of men along The Way.

First, one must know men; second, one must love men; third, one must know The Way; in order to lead, for one can lead only over a road which is mapped by one's own experience. The love of men comes (1) from knowing men where they are —their problems and their possibilities; and (2) from loving our Lord and knowing Him sufficiently to be able to see His image in every man one meets. The Way one learns (1) by tradition; (2) by authority; (3) by the recorded experience of

other men; but most effectively and only in any realized sense, by having travelled it oneself. I know The Way a little by experience; much, by the first three means. I love our dear Lord, but up to date I have not known Him well enough to be able to see His image in every man I meet. I do not yet love men because I do not yet know men.

So instead of ending, my apprenticeship is just begun. But the task is clear, and please God, I shall launch into it with enthusiasm. Perhaps my Priesthood may go into abeyance again for a little while; probably, however, God will give me priestly opportunities that I never dreamed of. That is in His hands. What does matter is that by His help and counsel and encouragement, and by your prayers I am going to know men and love them before the War is over. I am going to seek now one of two positions for that purpose, (1) a little hut, where I shall be alone with a group of men wholly responsible for the whole service for them, or a subordinate position in a big hut, or (2) work with the troops in the trenches. I will leave it to the judgment of Mr. C and Mr. G. as to which will give me my best opportunity to know and love men.

My pencil has run down to a stub of wood; it is beginning to get too dark to see. Let me say good-by and thank you for being so patient through the meanderings of this letter. My only excuse for it is that it has been the guiding thread out of "the labyrinthine ways of mine soul."

The real front this time

A night of serving hot coffee and fresh water to hundreds of incoming men on this new American front. The second night on the kitchen shift, we cooked the stuff in the kitchen of the foyer and rushed it in a forch camion to our tables in the station shed where it was served. Just at dawn we looked out to where, over the horizon, the flickers like heat-lightning and the rolling thunder denoted the drum-fire barrage of a trench raid. It lasted just a short time and then, as it suddenly ceased, we knew that the nettoyers were busy cleaning up the captured bit of boche trench! Tomorrow I am to take the field,-my opportunity is coming,as the terms on which I was sent here are thoroughly understood. Will you not pray for me that I may be of some real use to these dear men of ours?