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people that they are at liberty to open the Bible as they do any book; find any passage of truth or beauty which inspires or satisfies them, and leave the rest to take care of itself. They must be taught that they are not obliged to accept all or reject all; that those who love the Bible most may be its severest critics; that it can not stand in the way of science or philosophy, nor supersede the necessity of individual judgment.

Did you ever reflect that this is in fact the way in which the Bible has always been received? The most inveterate Scripture-reader has his favorite passages, which he reads in the various conditions in which his discipline places him. Even if he reads from Genesis to Revelation every year, the reading in course is merely formal, and has no effect upon his mind and heart. But when he is in troublewhen a loved wife or child dies, and life seems robbed of every joy-he very carefully selects his Scripture. The curses of David are mockish to him; but he reads with tenderness, "The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want;" or "Thou hast been our dwelling-place in all generations." He passes over the genealogies of Matthew or Luke; but lingers with affection on that sweet poem, "Let not your heart be troubled." And so it is always. well read are well worn at the best places. men and women are in earnest, and hungering for comfort in the fast of a great sorrow, they will of themselves "judge what is right." And to this certain instinct of our nature we commit the keeping of the Bible. The more thoroughly I purge myself from all superstition about the Bible, as the word of God, the more heartily do I love it, as the inspiration and the help of man.

Bibles that are
Because, when

XII.

SHEEPFOLDS.

"I AM the door," said Jesus. How absurd, then, to claim that he was the sheepfold itself, or the pasture itself, or that the door of communion with the infinite is the infinite, or that Christ, who found God in life, was God. Did you ever observe the peculiar reading of the verse, "I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and go in and out, and find pasture." Now, he could not find pasture by going in. There is no pasture in the sheepfold. There is nothing green or living there; it is merely a place to sleep in, a preparation to go out again. I should like to hold the church strictly to its own definition of this text. If the sheepfold is the church, and out of it is the world, very good. The church, then, is a place to sleep in; a place where no living thing is, not a blade of grass, nor a lily of the field. It is a place which we are never to enter, so long as there is light enough to see to be elsewhere. All the pasture is, then, in the world. The springing grass, the living water, the cooling shade, are out of the church. With the first streak of daylight we go out to gather life, and strength, and joy, and beauty, and health from the world. And at twilight, when the coming darkness reminds us of the close, dull fold, we only wish it were always day, that we might not be obliged to sleep at all. But we will release the church from the alternatives of its own claim. It is not a place for sleep, but a place for work, and search for new

pastures. We will not build a wall as high as heaven between it and the world, but would rather take it all down, believing that the going out and the coming in are both alike essential to salvation. We would leave each soul free to rest in the sheltering fold, or feed in the infinite pasture of truth. The necessities of life, of a consecrated, harmonious life, will mark out the true sphere of the church. There is but one test by which every thing essential to man asserts its own authority; that test is, "Does it feed a hunger of his nature? Does it quench a thirst of his spirit ?" Whatever does this, justifies itself; there can be no other authority to a free soul than the authority of truth, and no other test of truth than the fact that it gives pasturage to the seeking spirit. The truth shall make you free, and the soul left to this freedom will naturally find for itself shelter in the fold of a true church. But the door must not be guarded by a priest, lest he bolt and fasten it, and shut us in when we want to go out into living nature. We will go to the church which will open a door of thought, through which we may look in upon the infinite beauty, goodness, truth. We will go to the fold where the weary life may receive new consecration and new harmony. We will go where music, and thought, and silence, and sympathy may give wings to our spirits, and bear them up to pure, cloudless day. And while the door shall not be shut by priests, nor bolted by a dogma, we will enter cheerfully, and rest securely, or sleep sweetly, if we know that the door is watched only by the Good Shepherd who knoweth his own sheep, and calleth them by name, and smiles his benediction upon those who go out and those who come in by the way of the blessed

XIII.

WHITHER GOEST THOU?

It is common in theological discussions to divide mankind into two classes-saints and sinners, good and bad, saved and lost. But it is an entirely artificial classification. It is wholly wrong to base a judgment concerning the absolute condition of men upon the place which they happen to occupy at any given time. It would be absurd to draw a line across the Hudson River at West-Point, and say that all boats above that line were going to Albany, and all below it going to New-York. Absolutely, a boat which is within ten rods of Albany, headed toward New-York, with all steam on, is nearer New-York than a boat close by the wharf here, which is headed for Albany with steam on. The river of life is dotted all over with precious life-boats ascending and descending. They were launched at different points, they have different degrees of speed; some are propelled from hearts of fire within, some blown by winds of influence from without; some are freighted with five talents, some with one; some are started in one direction, some in another. Now, the church stretches her line across this stream at the point of conformity, and says, all above this are going to life, all below it are going to death.

But God, who seeth not the

church record but regardeth the heart, seeth many a feeble soul born at the very gates of death who has manfully set his boat against the stream, and is rowing with all his might to ascend it. He may be far, far below the church point of conformity; yea, below society's point of propriety, and he may die there with his bark set toward the fountain. God will not say, Where were you? but, Whither were you going? On the other hand, God sees many a man born far above the line of church conformity, who ingloriously sets his boat downward with the current of popularity, and although he may die long before he drifts past the church line, or society's line, yet he is absolutely nearer moral death than the other who was born at its very door. The prodigal was really further from home when he stood on its threshold, resolved to seek a far country, than when, in that far country, he came to himself and said, "I will arise and go to my father."