e and frost,
scourge of disease, and appalling convulsions of earthquake and
eruption. But man prospers; and we know that the catastrophes are
greatly fewer than the accepted bounties. We have no choice but to
abide. No growth comes from hostility. It would undoubtedly be a poor
human race if all the pathway had been plain and easy.

The contest with nature is wholesome, particularly when pursued in
sympathy and for mastery. It is worthy a being created in God's image.
The earth is perhaps a stern earth, but it is a kindly earth.

Most of our difficulty with the earth lies in the effort to do what
perhaps ought not to be done. Not even all the land is fit to be farmed.
A good part of agriculture is to learn how to adapt one's work to
nature, to fit the crop-scheme to the climate and to the soil and the
facilities. To live in right relation with his natural conditions is one
of the first lessons that a wise farmer or any other wise man learns. We
are at pains to stress the importance of conduct; very well: conduct
toward the earth is an essential part of it.

Nor need we be afraid of any fact that makes one fact more or less in
the sum of contacts between the earth and the earth-born children. All
"higher criticism" adds to the faith rather than subtracts from it, and
strengthens the bond between. The earth and its products are very real.

Our outlook has been drawn very largely from the abstract. Not being yet
prepared to understand the conditions of nature, man considered the
earth to be inhospitable, and he looked to the supernatural for relief;
and relief was heaven. Our pictures of heaven are of the opposites of
daily experience,--of release, of peace, of joy uninterrupted. The
hunting-grounds are happy and the satisfaction has no end. The habit of
thought has been set by this conception, and it colors our dealings with
the human questions and to much extent it controls our practice.

But we begin to understand that the best dealing with problems on earth
is to found it on the facts of earth. This is the contribution of
natural science, however abstract, to human welfare. Heaven is to be a
real consequence of life on earth; and we do not lessen the hope of
heaven by increasing our affection for the earth, but rather do we
strengthen it. Men now forget the old images of heaven, that they are
mere sojourners and wanderers lingering for deliverance, pilgrims in a
strange land. Waiting for this rescue, with posture