in what sense exactly our fellow readers of the British Controver sialist may understand the topic. We have cast together our first impressions without attending to the minutiae of controversy, being anxious to cast abroad light, if we could, over the question, and to lift it out of the region of verbal quibble, into that of christian consciousness. Our last argument will, therefore, be a solemn one, viz., were a belief in the miraculous essential to personal Christianity" the eternal welfare of the soul would be based on the absolute capacity or incapacity of reason, and not on faith. If this were so, extreme weakness of intellect incapable knowing what a miracle is, as well as that high far-seeing power of genius which beholds only one miracle-God, and finds that explains all, would be alike cut off from participation in the mercy of God in Christ. Whereas, the apostle assures every Christian, "By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God," Ephes. ii. 8. Whether, Oh, brethren, miracle is comprehensible to you, or testimony be doubtful, let Christ be your all in all.

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For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the richness of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. Now unto Him that is able to do exeeeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end."

We

If it should be asserted that this Faith itself is a miraculous gift, and cannot be felt or enjoyed except by those who feel within themselves the stirrings of the Holy Spirit; we would reply, that Faith is Christian Life, and that it is no more miraculous than any, or every, other good gift of God-as life, health, and all things. It is communicated in the natural way of God's dealings with man. know, that in a predetermined way and by appointed means the gifts of God are bestowed; and whenever a gift is got by the usual means there is nothing miraculous-the miraculous being some indefinite and unusual method of imparting or producing change, whether in the material or mental universe, or any of its parts. Hence Faith is not miraculous.

TIMOTHY.

Philosophy.

DOES CIVILIZATION NECESSITATE

DEMORALIZATION?

AFFIRMATIVE REPLY.

WE cannot say that civilization necessitates demoralization with out affirming also that it necessitates morality, since without the agency of civilization neither the one condition nor the other could possibly obtain.

Man without civilization—that is, in a state of nature-has no moral principle other than his conscience to guide him, has no tangible hope of a future, has no revelation of the cause, the purpose of his creation, and has consequently no sufficient knowledge or motive for the practice of moral principles; he, gratifying his natural desires and appetites, cannot infringe any moral law, for he has none; his conscience, being untutored, may to him recognise only a positive duty where the civilized being may behold unmitigated evil. For instance, the pursuit of arms, among savages as among civilized beings, is considered the most honourable profession to follow; the moral education of the one teaches him to consign the bodies of those who fall, to the keeping of the earth, and, by religious aid, blessing from on high is invoked on those who sleep the sleep of death; but the cannibal education of the other causes him to feast his own body on the remains of his fallen foe, and his religious belief teaches him that a wild war dance is the fitting preliminary to his sanguinary repast, and if compunction he should feel, it would simply be caused by the leanness of his victim.

Now each of these, the civilized and the savage, acts according to the principles he has received, and to act otherwise would be to shock the notions of propriety that each entertains.

This consideration will prove to us, therefore, that civilization necessitates first, morality, because to be demoralized must involve a falling from a higher position in the moral scale. Instance this by another word; depopulation means that the population which was once there has ceased to exist, so must demoralization mean that the morality which once existed has ceased to be.

Assuming, then, that civilization is the progress that man has effected on his condition by his own intelligence and exertions, we have, first, to consider in what this civilization consists; and, Secondly, Whether its results must lead to moral perfection, or to ultimate demoralization.

Now civilization, i. e., human progress, includes various and dis

tinct branches, as agriculture, commerce, and the industrial arts, the arts and sciences, literature, education, political institutions, religion, and morality. Now it is obvious these do not all progress in the same ratio, at the same time, or in the same place.

When the monks of old, with ascetic severity, punished their bodies for the good of their souls, they had not achieved any progression from that primitive time when the exponents of religion improved, by enjoying the social circle without abusing it.

If, in art, the noblest effort is first in the conception of an idea, and then worthily to realize it, we cannot recognise in modern art any progression from the great masters who, in Greece and Italy, have flourished and passed away, but whose works we are content to imitate.

The first step man would take, in emerging from his primitive condition, would necessarily be agriculture. This is the foundation on which, for the most part, the progress of every nation has been built, the pursuits of the chase yielding to its superior influence. Agricultural pursuits afford not only the means of sustenance, but also the materials for manufacture, and manufacturing pursuits find their development in those of commerce.

Now in the days of chivalry, when commerce was ignoble to those who, securely cased in steel, bravely sought the dangers of the field to gain a smirk from some simpering fair one, the only progress that we can observe was in the towns-more especially in Flanders -in manufactures and commerce, and through the influence of these may be traced the progress of the other branches of civiliza tion, for the class who followed these pursuits ultimately gained political liberty, and established the principle that every man has equal rights, if not equal privileges, the latter being due to the accident of birth or position, but the law guaranteeing the first to all.

To the protecting ægis of this principle, modern civilization owes its progress, therefore we can point to science and say that no modern Galileo can now by ignorance be doomed, in gloomy cell and by bigoted persecution, to deny that which he knows to be immutably true.

In the good old days, when freedom of thought and action was as restricted as the minds that imposed it, railways, the electric telegraph and the numberless appliances of modern science in arts and manufactures could hardly have found their development, for they flourish only where freedom of thought and action are guaranteed, so we can therefore safely assume that so far-in agriculture, manufactures, commerce, and science-progress has been made. In general knowledge, education, and literature, also, we find progress. Education is now generally diffused, and among all classes literature exercises its potent influence, and so far from printing being the black art, its black impressions have become, in modern times, more powerful than any other agency in civilizing the people, not only in diffusing a knowledge of the words enshrined in holy writ, but also in

sowing the seeds of information, bringing the ripened fruit of mature thought to all classes of society, and placing them under the shadow of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, so that knowledge may cover the earth as the waters cover the deep. So education, made compulsory to all classes in some civilized nations, and an object of attainment to which all good efforts are directed in others, has in all its various branches made progress. Religion, in some cases the pioneer of civilization, but generally its accompaniment, has, in Christian principles, immeasurably progressed beyond all other creeds that have previously existed; and, without stopping to inquire how far profession has superseded practice, we are content to affirm that had it not been for civilization, instead of the glorious aspiration of eternity that as Christians we believe will be realized, we should even now be condemned to the blankness of earthly hope, the abyss of unlettered ignorance.

The remaining branch of civilization, on which hinges our present subject, morality, is properly so intimately connected with religion that we may dismiss it at present by saying that if it can be found to exist without religious principles for its basis and support, it is as purposeless for benefit as the shining sun eclipsed by lunar influ. ence; at the best, it embraces nought but earthly and therefore limited and selfish motives, whereas Christianity teaches the sacrifice of all selfish and earthly ideas, and replaces them with the idea of universal brotherhood, so organized that the hope of its full development supplies the motive for all morality. Therefore, as by civilization alone have we become acquainted with the christian religion, and admitting that the brightness of christian hopes is infinite progress from the dark superstitions of uncivilized climes, we are compelled to admit that civilization has produced morality; but how far it has progressed with the other branches, how far other influences may have neutraliezd its power, remains for our consideration.

Now all the branches of civilization have an intellectual and a moral element; the intellectual is ever progressive; every step in advance is but a prelude to another; we cannot imagine intellectual perfection. Newton, a giant in comparison with the pigmies of ordinary life and knowledge, conscious of the insignificance of his attainments when compared with what to him was unknown, could only express the idea by saying he was, as it were, a child playing on the sea-shore, with all the vast ocean of knowledge before him unexplored. If he thus felt, after a life of study, we must affirm that we cannot imagine or hope to realise intellectual perfection. Can we then imagine or realise moral perfection? if so, are we hastening to it, or, in spite of, or caused by civilizing agencies, are we degenerating to demoralization ?

Now the progress we have shown hitherto to have accompanied the march of civilization will be seen to have been the progress of the intellectual element; the moral element in all ages is stationary in its character: the christian morality of the primitive fathers should be the morality of every succeeding age: we know what its

perfection is, since it was inaugurated by the Living Example of its founder.

But if morality is not progressive in the sense of intellectual progression, it is, or should be, progressive by diffusion. Like water it should, by its intrinsic character, diffuse itself; and if civilization, instead of opening channels for its diffusion, impedes or closes them, then does demoralization prove the failure of its mission, while intellect, by the progressive additions of ages, should, like the towering mountain, greet first the rising sun of knowledge and retain its latest glimmer; so should the vast moral ocean reflect its genial influence, warmed and strengthened by its rays, but not dried up or destroyed by its influence. Now if the truthful aspect of the facts of civilization compels us to ignore the beautiful fiction of moral perfection our opponents appear to revel in, we must not shrink from its necessity, but accept its teachings; therefore, while we have gladly welcomed all the progress made, we are compelled to admit that, speaking collectively of the aggregate of civilized humanity, it has not, it is not, it cannot lead to ultimate moral perfection-it cannot diffuse universal morality. We trace intellectual progress in trade, manufactures, and commerce, but at the cost of practically ignoring every moral principle. Self-interest rules the individual, the society, the nation; it reveals itself in shams and adulterations, in the unjust measures and the false weights, in the unnatural labour that fashion demands, and in the last sigh of those who, to gain their bread, have lost their virtue. And, in the social sphere, who can shine but those who have successfully worshipped at Mammon's shrine; they, like sainted relics, impart a sensuous influence to a deluded circle, where none can enter whose only credentials are nature's gifts, as distinguished from the artificial acquisitions of modern civilization.

Can friendship endure or love exist, when the nature of each-pure disinterestedness-has vanished, save in the pages of a novel. We are compelled to affirm, from too many examples, that to gain a few years of worldly position and prosperity, the majority of mankind are willing to forfeit an whole eternity of future bliss. At the expense of truth and honour a nation gains material guarantees, a society gains wealth and prosperity, a maiden fair will barter her charms, and the young man strong will sacrifice his health.

Say drunkenness has ceased, and visit our music halls. Say crime has decreased, and peruse our cases of Palmer, Pullinger, and Roupell. Say vice is decreasing, and walk our streets in the cold winter's nights; visit our public gardens, our dancing saloons, our theatres, and hear the tale from that class who have been more sinned against than sinning, then tell your thoughts, and see if your boasted civilization will not blush at the recital of your tale.

And now, what say the advocates on the opposite side ?

W. H. begins by expressing the difficulties in defining the terms civilization and demoralization; then he gives us long extracts from Gibbon, Crombie, and Guizot, which, if they prove anything, simply prove the advantages of civilization over barbarism, which no person