he nature of the ether alone
pours a flood of illumination on the theory of an ethereal world,--a
theory with which all the known facts of science and psychology accord,
and with which they range themselves. Rev. Doctor Newman Smyth says that
the facts disclosed by a study of biology, as well as the theories
advanced by some trained biologists, fairly open the new and
interesting question whether death itself does not fall naturally under
some principle of selection and law of utility for life? "It is of
religious concern as well as of scientific interest," he continues, "for
us to learn, as far as possible, all the facts and suggestions which
microscopic researches may bring to our knowledge concerning the minute
processes or most intimate and hidden laws of life and death. For if we,
children of an age of questioning and change, are to keep a rational
faith in spiritual reality,--strong and genuine as was our fathers'
faith according to their light, ours must be a faith that shall strike
its roots deep down into all knowledge, although light from above alone
may bring it to its perfect Christian trust and sweetness.... The least
facts of nature may be germinal with high spiritual significance and
beauty."

The twentieth century leads faith to the brink of knowledge. The deepest
spiritual feeling must perpetually recognize that faith alone--Christ's
words alone--are enough for every human soul; but faith grows not less,
but more, when informed by knowledge. When man measures and weighs the
star and discovers their composition; when he sends messages without
visible means, then he may believe with Fichte, that "here, in the earth
life, we have it in our power to seize our future destination." Mr.
Weiss objected to any (possible) evidential demonstration of
immortality, because (as he said), "If you owe your belief in
immortality to the assumed facts of a spiritual intercourse, your belief
is at the mercy of your assumption.... It is merely an opinion derived
from phenomena." But this reasoning would not hold good regarding any
other trend of knowledge; the vital necessity of the soul to lay hold on
God and immortality is not lessened, but rather deepened and reinforced
by understanding, when knowledge goes hand in hand with faith. And the
one supreme argument of all is that a truer knowledge of man's spiritual
being--now and here--with a truer conception of his destiny in the part
of life immediately succeeding the chan