ate what I mean: Prince Alphonso of Castile used to say, as
he studied the Ptolemaic theory of the universe, that, if he had been
present at creation, he could have suggested a good many very important
improvements. In other words, he was keen enough to see that the
Ptolemaic theory of the universe was not a good working theory. Must he
keep still about that because, forsooth, he was not able to establish
another theory of the universe in its place?

Do you not see that the criticism, the testing of positions which are
held, are the primary steps in the direction of finding some larger and
grander truth, provided these positions are not adequate and do not
hold?

The Rev. Dr. George A. Gordon, of the historic Old South Church in
Boston, told us, in an address which he gave in Brooklyn the other day,
that Calvinism was dead; that it was even necessary to clear the face
of the earth of it, in order to save our faith in God. At the same time
Dr. Gordon said frankly that he had no other as complete and finished
system to put in place of it. Was he justified in telling the truth
about Calvinism because he has not a ready-made scheme to substitute
for it?

I wish you to note that I do not concede for an instant that I must not
tell the truth about anything that I perceive because I have not a
ready-made theory of some kind to put in the place of that which is
taken away. It is my business to tell what seems to me true in all
reverence, seriousness, earnestness and love, and trust the
consequences to God.

In the next place, another consideration. I have been talking as though
I conceded that Unitarians, or that I myself, sometimes take away
things, beliefs. Now I wish to ask you who it is that takes away
beliefs. Has Unitarianism ever taken away any faith or hope or trust
from the world? Has anybody ever done it?

If we pit ourselves against one of God's eternal truths, is that truth
going to suffer? Rather shall we not beat ourselves to pieces against
God's adamant? If a thing is true, nobody is going to take it away from
the world; for nobody has the power to uproot or destroy a divine
truth.

Who is it, then, that takes these beliefs away? Is it not just this?
Does it not mean that men have discovered that what they supposed to be
true is not true, and it is the old belief that passes away in the
presence of a larger and clearer light? Is not that the process?

When Magellan, for instance, demonstrated that this p