elieved at once.

Yes, but, as you see and hear, that, if it be our way, is not God's. He
has chosen to grant knowledge of His truth to us on one condition and no
other. If we refuse that condition, the rational evidence around us is
all in proof of our death, and that proof is true, for God also tells
us that in such refusal we shall die.

You see, therefore, that in either case, be Christianity true or false,
death is demonstrably certain to us in refusing it. As philosophers, we
can expect only death, and as unbelievers, we are condemned to it.

There is but one chance of life--in admitting so far the possibility of
the Christian verity as to try it on its own terms. There is not the
slightest possibility of finding out whether it be true, or not, first.

"Show me a sign first and I will come," you say. "No," answers God.
"Come first, then you shall see a sign."

Hard, you think? You will find it is not so, on thinking more. For this,
which you are commanded, is not a thing unreasonable in itself. So far
from that, it is merely the wisest thing you could do for your own and
for others' happiness, if there were no eternal truth to be discovered.

You are called simply to be the servant of Christ, and of other men for
His sake; that is to say, to hold your life and all its faculties as a
means of service to your fellows. All you have to do is to be sure it
_is_ the service you are doing them, and not the service you do
yourself, which is uppermost in your minds.

293. Now you continually hear appeals to you made in a vague way, which
you don't know how far you can follow. You shall not say that, to-day; I
both can and will tell you what Christianity requires of you in simplest
terms.

Read your Bible as you would any other book--with strictest criticism,
frankly determining what you think beautiful, and what you think false
or foolish. But be sure that you try accurately to understand it, and
transfer its teaching to modern need by putting other names for those
which have become superseded by time. For instance, in such a passage as
that which follows and supports the "Lie not one to another" of
Colossians iii.--"seeing that ye have put on the new man, which is
renewed in knowledge after the spirit of Him that created him, where"
(meaning in that great creation where) "there is neither Greek nor Jew,
circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free." In
applying that verse to the conduct and