er religion was reserved for our consolation and guidance. We
cannot afford, in one sense, to give up even the semblances and shows of
religion, and these will survive until the new dayspring from on high
shall supersede the necessity of their existence. 'Take care,' said
Goethe, in some such words as these, 'lest, in letting the dead forms of
religion go, you sacrifice all reverence and worship, and thus lose
religion itself!' There is great danger of this in the transition state
of human thought and speculation which marks the present crisis of
American history. We are not a religious people, and shall not present
any development of that sort until the intellectual reaction which has
set in among us against the old modes and organons of belief has
exhausted the tests of its crucibles, and reduced the dross to a
residuum of gold which shall form the basis of a new and sacred
currency, acceptable to all men for the highest interchanges.

In the mean while we must work out the problem of this religion of the
future in any and all ways which lie open to us--doubting nothing of the
final issues. The wildest theories of Millerites, Spiritists,
Naturalists, and Supernaturalists, are all genuine products of the time,
and of the spirit of man struggling upward to this solution--blindly
struggling, it is true, but gradually approaching the light of the
far-off truth, as the twilight monsters of geology gradually approached
the far-off birth of man, who came at last, and redeemed the savage
progressive, the apparent wild unreason of the terrestrial creation.

It is more than probable that this great fratricidal war with which we
are now struggling, will prove, in its results, of the very highest
service to the nation, and make us all both better and wiser men than we
were before. We have already gained by it many notable experiences, and
it has put our wisdom, and our foolishness also, to the test. It has
both humbled and exalted our pride. It has cut away from the national
character all those inane excrescences of vanity and brag which
judicious people everywhere, who were friendly to us, could not choose
but lament to see us exercise at such large discretion. It has brought
us face to face with realities the most terrible the world has ever
beheld. It has measured our strength and our weakness, and has developed
within us the mightiest intellectual and physical resources. All the wit
and virtue which go to make up a great peop