wn child by the hand, and
pray, and pray:

The way is long, my Father! and my soul
Longs for the rest and quiet of the goal;
While yet I journey through this weary land,
Keep me from wandering, Father, take my hand.

THE ATHEIST

Forth from his dark and lonely hiding-place,
(Portentous sight!) the owlet Atheism,
Sailing on obscene wings, athwart the noon,
Drops his blue-fringed lids and holds them close,
And hooting at the glorious Sun in heaven,
Cries out: "Where is it?"--Coleridge.

The laugh of the foolish infidel and the sneer of the
solemn atheist are abroad in the land. The awful draught they hold to
the lips of humanity is well honeyed with some of the adjuncts of
religion itself, else the perilous cup would be rejected. Let us see how
the atheist secures his victim, for he is never content to enjoy alone
the extravagances of his folly. I have noticed that when a Democratic
editor receives dispatches containing news of a Republican victory, he
is frequently expert enough in the guile pertaining to his profession to
put a displayed heading on those same dispatches which clearly saves
the day for the Democrats--or _vice versa_. And I have also noticed that
it takes true mental pluck to rightly scan, first, that rooster of
roosters (invented during the last few years), then the ten lines of
Democratic Io Paians which follow, and lastly, the small type containing
the real facts.

MAN IS SO MUCH LIKE A FISH

that certain bait is sure to catch him. The morning after the election
the most astute Republican or Democrat in the country trembles before
the terrors of a ten-line Democratic or Republican displayed heading, as
the case may be. Now the crafty atheist has a way of laying down
fallacies which often terrifies one into involuntarily believing that
those fallacies are facts, until one stops to think that the atheist is
but a man, after all, and that there is an appeal from his findings. It
is, therefore, in the defense of humanity that I advance against him,

HOPING TO HIT HIM BECAUSE HE IS SO BIG,

and to escape his blows because I am so small. "What though the day be
lost, all is not lost!" Though man have glaring faults, he is still a
problem far beyond the fiat of any atheist. He still has a destiny. The
atheist lays down dogma after dogma. In this changing world, where even
the little balance-wheel of a watch must be "compensated," it