to rescue Christianity from all the sentimental vulgarities
which have disfigured it in recent years--alike from the aesthetic
extravagances of the ritualist and the organising fussiness of the
evangelical; to rescue it from these obscuring unessentials, and to set
it clearly before the eyes of mankind in the pure region of thought--a
divine philosophy which teaches the only true science of life, a
discipline which fits the Soul for its journey, "by an inner ascent," to
the presence of God. Mysticism, he says, is the pursuit of ultimate,
objective truth, or it is nothing.

Christianity demands the closest attention of the mind. It cannot be
seen at a glance, understood in a moment, adopted by a gesture. It is a
deep and profound philosophy of life. It proposes a transvaluation of
values. It insists that the spiritual life is the only true life. It
sets the invisible above the visible, and the eternal above the
temporal. It tears up by the roots the lust of accumulation. It brings
man face to face with a choice that is his destiny. He must think, he
must decide. He cannot serve both God and Mammon. Either his life must
be given for the imperishable values of spiritual existence or for the
meats that perish and the flesh that will see corruption. Let a man
choose. Christianity contradicts all his natural ideas; but let him
think, let him listen to the voice of God, and let him decide as a
rational being. Let him not presume to set up his trivial notions, or to
think that he can silence Truth by bawling falsehood at the top of his
voice. Let him be humble. Let him listen to the teacher. Let him give
all his attention to this great matter, for it concerns his soul.

Here again is the aristocratic principle. The average man, until he has
disciplined his reason to understand this great matter, must hold his
peace; certainly he must not presume to lay down the law.

When we exclaim against this doctrine, and speak with enthusiasm of the
virtues of the poor, Dr. Inge asks us to examine those virtues and to
judge of their worth. Among the poor, he quotes, "generosity ranks far
before justice, sympathy before truth, love before chastity, a pliant
and obliging disposition before a rigidly honest one. In brief, the less
admixture of intellect required for the practice of any virtue, the
higher it stands in popular estimation."

But we are to love God with all our _mind_, as well as with all our
heart.

Does he, then, shut out