has ever been a chief spring of human
improvement. We look to it as the true life of the intellect. No man
can be just to himself, can comprehend his own existence, can put
forth all his powers with an heroic confidence, can deserve to be the
guide and inspirer of other minds, till he has risen to communion with
the Supreme Mind; till he feels his filial connection with the
Universal Parent; till he regards himself as the recipient and
minister of the Infinite Spirit; till he feels his consecration to the
ends which religion unfolds; till he rises above human opinion, and
is moved by a higher impulse than fame."

The Christian religion is in harmony with intellectual activity,
because it favors application to study, and enjoins the duty of
seeking truth, as well as awakens and intensifies the love of the good
and beautiful. In fact, the human intellect owes its greatest triumphs
to Christianity. From the beginning, the Christian religion has
assimilated and employed human learning, and has become a great
formative force in modern intellectual movements. It favors a broad
catholic spirit, and is the counterpoise and remedy of a narrow range
of intellectual activity. History teaches that it has been a strong
incentive in the search after truth, and the chief factor in training
the race to a higher civilized life. The changes in the progress in
modern civilization are stimulated and guided by Christian knowledge.
The whole trend of modern thought and instruction in the higher
intellectual circles is to apply Christian principles to the problems
of life. In every age it has stimulated and invigorated the human
mind. It has introduced nobler and better ideas of life, given impetus
to self-development, and has produced the highest types of manhood and
of womanhood. The inspiration and encouragement in advancing general
intelligence and founding the higher institutions of learning is
principally due to the Christian religion.

"From the days of the Apologists onwards," says Prof. John De Witt,
"learning has always advanced under the fostering care of our
religion. In the schools of Antioch and of Alexandria, in Carthage and
Hippo, in the old Rome on the Tiber, and in the new Rome on the
Bosphorus, throughout the period of the ancient church, religion is
the great inspiration of intellectual labor. How true this is of the
Middle Age I need not stop to say. Religion in Anselm assimilates the
philosophy of Plato. In the Anglic