THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY f' c cc Tf' A ■y — n :c R rc X c ^r* ^ IV ^» '^*' ''' ' “> 'V* *< •' ' ' '*'•••, 4,»r • V' • • V. - -x-.^-.V ■ M •X •‘- • *. ■ '< < '’-•'^ \ •; * "' ct:,./. • ■ '. V- A' : ■■ • '•>• '‘. ,. '■-'. •' ; .^ _ »• *l ■' •' T ’. '■ •••< '. » *' • - V. ...... ‘-T- T.? -■_ •-■‘W ■'.••&> -Aj iSr' . .’ / ' • -^ .. .-•vxy'*' ' ■ - '■' t r^« r-_ r''-*v' - ■ ' '< ■: i r »• r?>>; v.y* t >.-. V, •• i'r :!/• V ' • . * ..' * X' - r. ..• • • - y•'^ ^ - 44 V V. • >r i jk •* ' «i O'-^. • ' - / * ■ ■'' '■- 4'S .■V^^ ' '. ■ -!.> 4 .<- '^' !-'. s ,y-:'\: -.-.-.w.? ■■-■. -■: ,■.■ ' ■ ■i-‘r.J:\ ■■-■■■:,-, I ■ ._ • . ■ •, '. V.' -. [ .'U'^ ,v- .., 4---- • • • ' . ^- •; • ^ • V - ^ . *.• ‘A ^ ^ > I 4. ■*■•' '•? .■•4' :■" <*'. ■ -•' vr ■‘' ^ .' .;• *:-/ • ••, '' 'i . *-•.".,- * .*«•: t r . 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NEELY’S HISTORY ^£-r m The Pmiment of Religions AND RELIGIOUS CONGRESSES 9 AT THE WGrid’s Columbiari Exposition Com/piled from Original Manuscripts and Stenographic Reports. EDITED BY A CORPS OF ABLE WRITERS. PROF. WALTER R. HOUGHTON, Editor in Chief AUTHOK OF *• History of American Politics,” “ Conspectus of Federal His¬ tory,” “View of United States History,”' “Growth of Geographical Science,” “ Nineteen Centuries of Christianity ” (in preparation). TWO VOLUMES IN ONE—FULLY ILLUSTRATED F. T. NEELY, Publisher, Chicago. COPYRIGHTED BY FRANK TENNYSON NEELY, 1893. All Rights Reserved, Cop3Tight covers the principal illustrations. PROF. WALTER RALEIGH HOUGHTON. Of 0 if ILlWC'^ Chicago, III., October 28, 1893. The speeches, papers, and essays reported in this volume are largely from my stenographic notes, and from manuscripts secured from authors. In some instances it has been necessary to condense, but the essential features of all the addresses have been carefully retained, making a thorough and comprehen¬ sive report of the great World’s Parliament of Religions. Having faithfully attended the various sessions of the Parliament, I can certify to the accuracy, completeness, and authenticity of the work. John W. Postgate. « NOT THINGS, BUT MEN. The World’s (ongress Auxiliary OP THE WORLD’S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION OF 1893. NOT MATTER, BUT MIND. President, CHARLES C. BONNEY. Vice-President, TH9S. B. BRYAN. Treasurer, LYMAN J. GAGE. Secretaries, BENJAMIN BUTTERWORTH, CLARENCE E. YOUNG. The Woman’s Branch of the Auxiliary; President MRS. POTTER PALMER. Vice-President, MRS. CHAS. HENROTIN. The World’s I^eligious Congresses OF 1893. Including Churches, Missions, Sunday Schools^ and other Religious Organizations. GENERAL COMMITTEE OF THE WORLD’S CONGRESS AUXILIARY ON RELIGIOUS CONGRESSES. Rev. John Henry Barrows, D.D. (Presbyterian), Chairman. Rt. Rev. Bishop William E. McLaren, D.D., D.C.L. (Prot. Episcopal). Rev. Prof. David Swing (Independent), Vice-Chairman. Rev. Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Secretary (Unitarian). His Grace Archbishop P. A. Eeehan (Catholic). Rev. Dr. F. A. Noble (Congregational). Rev. Dr. A. J. Canfield (Universalist). Rev. Dr, Wm. M. Lawrence (Baptist). Rev. M. C. Ranseen (Swedish Luth.). Rev. F. M. Bristol, D.D. (Methodist). Rev. J. Berger (German Methodist) Rabbi E. G. Hirsch (Jew). Mr, J. W. Plummer (Quaker). Rev. J. Z. Torgersen (Norwegian Lutheran). Rev. L. P. Mercer (New Jerusalem, Swedenborgian). Rt. Rev. Bishop C. E. Cheney (Reformed Episcopal). TABLE OF CONTENTS. PAET I. Mission of the Wokld’s Congeess Auxiliary of the World’s Columbian Exposition. CHAPTER I. THE WORLHS CONGRESSES OF 1893. Origin of the Idea—Preliminary Work—Organization in 1890 —Plan Universally Approved—President Bonney’s Sketch of the Work - 15 CHAPTER II. ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. Appointment of General Committee—Preliminary Address to Relig¬ ious Leaders of the World—Grand Consummation of the Project in Columbus Hall, Art Institute, Chicago, September 11,1893 - 22 PAKT II. Proceedings of the Parliament of Religions. CHAPTER I. FIRST DAY, SEPTEMBER 11th. Words of Greeting—Opening Address—Address of Welcome—Official Welcome—Response to Addresses—On Behalf of Women—Address —New England Puritan—Thanks from Greece—Prom India and China—Legend of Russia—Shinto Bishop of Japan—Words on Toleration — Greeting from France — From Australasia — Good Wishes of Ceylon—Sweden for Christ—Word from Bombay—Sees Spirit and Matter—Most Ancient Order of Monks—Canada as a Link in the Empire—Converted Parsee Woman of Bombay— Sympathy from England—In Behalf of Africa - - - - 33 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS. CHAPTER II. SECOND DAY, SEPTEMBER 12th. Existence and Attributes of God—The Infinite Being—Rational Demon¬ stration of the Being of God—Evidence of a Supreme Being— Theistic Teachings of Historic Faiths—I'heology of Judaism—The Ancient Religion of India and Primitive Revelation—Religious Belief of the Hindus—Argument for the Divine Being—Idealism the New Religion - - - -.72 CHAPTER III. THIRD DAY, SEPTEMBER 13th. The Nature of Man—Voice from New India—Foundation of the Ortho¬ dox Greek Church—Man from a Catholic Point of View—Human Brotherhood as Taught by the Religions Based on the Bible—Much to Admire in All Men—Confucianism—The Model Man—Would Win Converts to Buddhism—The Real Position of Japan toward Christianity—Good Will and Peace Among Men—Concessions to Native Religious Ideas—Supreme End and Office of Religion— Immortality—The Soul and Its Future Life—Religious System of theParsees. 133 CHAPTER IV. FOURTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 14th. Necessity of Religion—Bishop Keane’s Introduction—Cardinal Gib¬ bons’ Message—Religion Essentially Characteristic of Humanity— Divine Basis of the Co-operation of Men and Women—The Relig¬ ious Intent—Spiritual Forces in Human Progress—Orthodox or Historical Judaism—Certainties of Religion—History of Buddhism and Its Sects in Japan. -184 CHAPTER V. FIFTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 15th. Systems of Religion—What the Dead Religions Have Bequeathed to the Living—The Points of Contact and Contrast between Chris¬ tianity and Mohammedanism—Study of Comparative Theology— Duty of God to Man Inquired—Confucianism—Each in His Own Little Well—Service of the Science of Religions to the Cause of Religious Unity—The Ancient Egyptian Religion—The Genesis and Development of Confucianism—The Social Office of Religious Feeling—The Buddhism of Siam—The Importance of a Serious Study of All Religions—Religions of the World . - - - 22'i CHAPTER VI. SIXTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 16th. Sacred Scriptures of the World—The Truthfulness of the Holy Script¬ ures—The Greatness and Influence of Moses—Christianity as Inter¬ preted by Literature—The Catholic Church and the Bible—What the Hebrew Scriptures Have Wrought for Mankind—The Sacred Books of the World as Literature^—The Character and Degree of the Inspiration of the Christian Scripture—Buddhism—Outlook for Judaism.292 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 3 CHAPTER VII. SEVENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 17th. Religion in Social and Married Life—The Work of Social Reform in India—The Catholic Church and the Marriage Bond—The Influ¬ ence of Religion on Women—The Divine Element in the Weekly Rest-Day—The Religious Training of Children . . - - 330 CHAPTER VIII. EIGHTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 18th. Great Teachers of Religion—The Sympathy of Religions—The His¬ toric Christ—A New Testament Woman; Or, What did Phoebe Do?—Jewish Contributions to Civilization—The Law of Cause and Effect as Taught by Buddha—Christianity an Historical Religion —The Need of a Wider Conception of Revelation—Christ the Reason of the Universe—The Incarnation Idea in History and in Jesus Christ—The Incarnation of God in Christ—The World’s Debt to Buddha. .- - 364 CHAPTER IX. NINTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 19th, Religion Connected with Art and Science—A Letter—Toleration— Greek Philosophy and Christian Religion—Man’s Place in Nature —The Religion of Science—Music, Emotion, and Morals—What Constitutes a Religious as Distinguished from a Moral Life—How Can Philosophy Aid the Science of Religion?—Hinduism as a Religion—The World’s Debt to Buddha—The Relation of the Sciences to Religion—History and Prospects of Exploration in Bible Lands.410 CHAPTER X. TENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 20th. Working Forces in Religion—Plea for Toleration—Christian Evan¬ gelism as One of the Working Forces in Our American Christianity —Religious State of Germany—The Spirit of Islam—Christ, the Savior of the World—Reconciliation Vital, Not Vicarious—The Essential Oneness of Ethical Ideas among All Men—Religion and Music—The Relation between Religion and Conduct—Christianity in Japan; Its Present Condition and Future Prospects—Religion in Pekin—The Redemption of Sinful Man through Jesus Christ— Stones When They Need Bread.- - 452 CHAPTER XI. ELEVENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 21st. Connection of Religion with Social Problems - Thanks from Arme¬ nians—Restoration of Holy Places—Brotherhood of Christian Unity—Test of Works Applied—Religion and the Erring and 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS. Criminal Classes—The Relations of the Roman Catholic Church to the Poor and Destitute—Christianity and the Social Question— The Women of India—Buddha—The Influence of Social Condition —Christianity as a Social Force—What Judaism Has Done For Woman—Individual Effort at Reform Not Sufficient—Religion and Labor .. 507 CHAPTER XII. TWELFTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 22d. Civil Society —• Religious Debt — Foreign Missions — Religion and Wealth^—-What the Bible Has Wrought-—Religion in Hawaiian Lands—Crime and the Remedy—Ethics of Christian Science— The Religion of the North American Indians—Churches and City Problems—World’s Religious Debt to Asia—The Catholic Church and the Negro Race—Christianity and the Negro—Foreign Mis¬ sionary Methods—The Mohammedan Koran and Its Doctrines - 567 CHAPTER XIII. THIRTEENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 23d. Love of Humanity an Outgrowth of Religion—Religion and the Love of Mankind—-The Grounds of Sympathy and Fraternity among Religious Men—The Essentials of Religion—International Arbitra¬ tion—What Can Religion Further Do To Advance the Condition of the American Negro?—The Religious Mission of the English- Speaking Nations—The Spirit and Mission of the Apostolic Church of Armenia—Greek Church Characteristics—International Justice and Amity—Universal Brotherhood—A Protest Against Erroneous Ideas—Some Teachings of the Koran—America’s Duty to China— Woman and the Pulpit—The Voice of the Mother of Religions on the Social Question . ..618 CHAPTER XIV. FOURTEENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 2m. •How American Civilization Has Been Affected by Christianity—What Christianity Has Wrought for America ■— Present Outlook of Religions—Government Census of Churches.669 CHAPTER XV. FIFTEENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 25th. A Voice from Syria—Relations between the Anglican Church and the Church of the First Ages—Religious Unity and Missions—The Reunion of Christendom—Interdenominational Comity—Persist¬ ence of Bible Orthodoxy—Ethics and History of the Jains—Free Baptist Church History—Spiritual Ideas of the Bfahmo-Somaj— A White Life for Two—Worship of God in Man—Christianity as Seen by a Voyager Around the World 699 TABLE OF CONTENTS,^ 5 CEIAPTER XVI SIXTEENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 26tk, Attitude of Christianity to Othei* Religions—Possible Results of the Parliament—Message of Christianity to Other Religions—Religious Thought in France—Results of Protestant Missions in Turkey— What Buddhism Has Done for Japan-—Religious Union of the Human Race—The Armenian Church—World’s Religious Debt to America—Contact of Christian and Hindu Thought: Points of Likeness and Contrast—Future of Religion in Japan—Arbitra¬ tion Instead of War—Synthetic Religion—Buddhism and Chris¬ tianity—A Voice from the Young Men of the Orient - - - 759 CHAPTER XVII. SEVENTEENTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 27th. The World’s Parliament—The Good in all Faiths—Religion and Music—Elements of Universal Religion—Swedenborg and the Harmony of Religions—The World’s Salvation—The Only Possible Method of Religious Unification—Christianity and Evolution—The Baptists in History—The Ultimate Religion—Christ the Unifier of Mankind.811 CHAPTER XVIII. Closing Scenes of the Parliament—Addresses by Dr. Alfred W. Momerie, Rev. P. C. Mozoomdar, Mr. Hirai, Rt. Rev. Mr. Shabita, H. Dharmapala, Swami Vivekananda, Vichand Gandhi, Prince Momolu Masaquoi, Dr. Emil Hirsch, Rev. Dr. Prank M. Bristol, Rev. Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Mrs. Charles Henrotin, Rev. Augusta Chapin, Julia Ward Howe, Bishop-Arnett, Rt. Rev. Dr. J, J. Keane, Rev. Dr. John Henry Barrows, President Bonney - - - - 846 PART III. DENOMINATIONAL AND OTHER CONGRESSES. Jewish Church Congress—Congress of Jewish Women—Congresses of the Lutheran Church—The Congress of Wales—Columbian Catho¬ lic Congress—Other Catholic Congresses—Congregational Church Congress—The Catholic Church Presentation—Universalist Con¬ gress—Congress of Disciples of Christ—New Jerusalem Church Congress—Seventh-Day Baptist Congress—Congress of Theoso- phists—Unitarian Church Congress—Advent Christian Church— United Brethren Church—Reformed Episcopal Church—Presby¬ terian Church — Friends Congress — Free Religious Association —Christian Scientists—African Methodist Episcopal Church— Friends Church (Orthodox)—King’s Daughters and Sons—German Evangelical Synod of North America—Methodist Episcopal Church —^Reformed Church of the United States—Swedish Evangelical TABLE OF CONTENTS, 6 MisBion Covenant—Chicago Tract Society—Cumberland Presby¬ terian Church—Congress of Evolutionists—Ethical Congress— Evangelical Association Congress—Congress of Missions—Sunday- Rest Congress — Young Men’s Christian Association — Young Women's Christian Association—Presentation of the Buddhists— Evangelical Alliance Congress — Woman’s Missions — Sunday- School Presentation — Reformed (Dutch) Church — Christian Endeavor.865 PAKT IV. BIOGRAPHIES, ARTICLES AND OPINIONS, Charles Carroll Bonney—Dr. John Henry Barrows—^Very Rev. Dion- ysios Latas—Building a Great Religion (Prof. David Swing)—The Wise Men of the East (Mary Atwater Neely)—A Limitless Sweep of Thought (Madeleine Vinton Dahlgren)—Song of Prophecy (John W. Hutchinson)—Opinions -.971 ILLTJSTRATIOKS. The Art Institute, where the Parliament of Religions was held Prof. Walter Raleigh Houghton. Dr. Barrows. Clarence E. Young - . C. C. Bonney. - Mrs. Potter Palmer, President Woman’s Branch of the Auxiliary - 32 Japanese Group. --37 Harlow N. Higinbotham, President World’s Columbian Exposition - 47 Dr. Carl von Bergen, of Stockholm, Sweden.61 Very Rev. Augustine F. Hewitt, C. S. P., New York - ... 75 Mf 'St Rev. Dionysios Latas, Archbishop of Zante, Greece - - 130 R^bbi K. Kohler, New York ... 145 Zonshiro Noguchi, Japanese Buddhist.155 Kinza Ringe M. Hirai, Japanese Buddhist.169 Cardinal Gibbons. 185 Eminent Seventh-Day Baptists.357 H. Dharmapala, Ceylon. 405 Mohammed Alexander Russell Webb.461 Swami Vivekananda, Hindu Monk.505 East Indian Group: Narasima Chaira, Lakeshnie Narain, Swami Vivekananda, H. Dharmapala, Vichand Ghandi .... 535 Group of Reporters, etc..581 Rev. Geo. T. Candlin, Tientsin, West China ..... 609 Narasima Chaira.735 Herant M. Kiretchjian, Armenian Orator, Constantinople - - 805 Mrs. Charles Henrotin, Vice-President Woman’s Branch of the Auxiliary.- 857 John W. Postgate, in Charge Chicago Herald Report ... 864 Geo. R. Davis, Director-General World’s Columbian Exposition - 865 Rev. L. M. Heilman, D. D., Chairman Committee of Lutheran Congress.875 Archbishop Ireland.891 Mary Atwater Neely -.979 Bishop C. H. Fowler, D. D., LL. D., of the Methodist Episcopal Church 967 T. W. Palmer, President World’s Columbian Commission - - - 919 Rev. Prof. David Swing, Vice-Chairman General Committee - - 975 Rev. Dr. W. F. Black, LL. D., Chairman Foreign Committee - - 917 KEV. JOHN HENRY BARROWS, D. D., Chairman General Committee INTRODUCTION The snows of winter will soon wrap the beautiful White City in an unbroken silence. It has been for two years the home of all the arts, its forums thronged with the devotees of every science. Though change and the needs of the busy Garden City may scatter to the four winds these deserted altars where a world has worshiped the Great Architect, an imperishable • record will remain! While countless lliousands, taking up again the threads of daily life, or journeying forth to the uttermost ends of the earth, may, in the heart, memory, and delighted “mind’s eye,” preserve for years the visions of the fairyland of our century, were it not for the genius of Literature all would in time be lost! Of all the arts, useful or ornamental, precious beyond any branch of God’s great embodied wisdom shown to us as “ sciences ” here. Literature is the truest, noblest friend of man. The art preservative! Long after kindling eye and ringing voice of the disciples thronging there are gone forever, when the bounding life pulses of the guiding heroes of peace who taught the world’s lessons by the lake are stilled, on white wings soaring down through the corridors of Time, the immortal spirit of Literature will guard and spread abroad the golden truths garnered in our century! Painting, architecture, and sculpture are limited to the enjoy¬ ment of the few! Their reign is transitory. The world rings yet with the wail over the “ Lost Arts ” throbbing in Wendell Phillips’ exquisite monograph! The single ode of Sappho, the lost books of Tacitus, the perished wisdom of Hermes, the world’s desolation when the Alexandrian library vanished in flames, the gloom of the dark ages, all the lost lore of the 7 8 INTRODUCTION, world’s youth are sad reminders of dark eclipses which can turn back the hands on the dial of human progress no more! Never again can a world groping toward the light halt hundreds of years in the wilderness of enforced ignorance! Literature? oblivious of time, deathless in its sway, appealing to the heart, mind, soul, and swaying every sense, is the immortal guardian now of every product of the brain, every throb of the human heart! Her brows, decked with the laurels of the scribe, historian, poet, prophet, and thinker. Her right and left hand sup¬ porters are the inventor and mechanic. She throws open the doors of the past, and points to the garnered sheaves of the present! The harvest of the human mind is safe now forever! The faithful children of the pen, with reverent awe before the * shades of Faust and Grutenberg, look to the American disciples of God-enlightened Franklin to perpetuate the story of the marvels of the world’s greatest congress! With words of truth, in impartial verity of record, aided by the graphic art, the visible wonders of the 19th century shown at the White City will be herein described By the aid of modern machinery, almost sentient in its perfec¬ tion, with the help of the phonograph, stenography, and the myriad duplicated records of stereotyped modern printing, future generations shall listen almost to the very tones of those who met at the World’s Columbian Exposition in brotherly love to exchange pearls of wisdom for the gold of truth! The wonderful prophecy of the Bible, that “ Brethren should meet and dwell in amity,” has been realized! It is no marvel that in the great convocation of one week, with thankful hearts, all men turned before bidding adieu to the great Source of all Good. While from the science-haunted alleys of the White City, “ Civilization, on her luminous wings, soared phoenix-like to Jove,” a chastened awe led all to look up to and talk of Him who is the Author of all Good! Next in importance to the study of the Holy Bible with its miraculously preserved records, fraught with the glad tidings of INTRODUCTION, 9 salvation, a very present help, the only lamp to our feet, is the unbiased history here presented of the only unconstrained gen¬ eral exchange of religious thought which the world has ever seen! Dictated by no sectarian pens, the story of how pure-hearted, bright-browed men and women paused in their grand chorus of worship and gave to all, each of his best, is a priceless trust of our times! To those who heard not, who saw not: this record, never to be lost, of the brotherly commune of the wise and good is cast abroad for the good of the human race 1 It is the story of a meeting such as the world never knew before 1 Religion, morality, social science, charity, toleration, benevolence, exact science, and philosophy, freely praising Him whose face no man may look upon. The spirit of love was abroad. In peace, free from the domination of prince, prelate, tyrant, or schemer, the song of a world’s worship was raised, with no discordant voice. Marvelous as it seems, the farthermost ends of the earth shall ring with the good news that, in our day, laying aside the sword, all men from wandering in different paths have learned that the path of Life leads to Him alone. As the dome rises over the cold, gray foundations of the temple, so do the great truths of man’s inner life and future destiny rise above the magic of mere handicraft. It is fitting that the music of the soul can never sink into silence. The great accepted general creeds of common belief now welded in one golden ingot shall be treasured forever. In offering to the student, thinker, and moralist these pages, the publisher feels that the gravity of the great task has been appreciated. A corps of experienced scholars and editors, under the judicious and faithful direction of Professor Walter R. Houghton, has sought to embrace in this veracious and studied report and record every essential truth and thought, impartially representing the priceless interchanged wisdom of the Parlia¬ ment of Religions! Filled with a sense of duty well done, in the consciousness of earnestness and candor, this detailed record of the greatest modern Religious Congress is sent out to an inquiring 10 INTRODUCTION, generation. It would have been beyond the power of the wisest or mightiest ruler of the earth to have achieved this great task fifty years ago. In rapidity, perfection, extent, and the neces¬ sary cheapness of record, these chronicles are. a marvel of later literary perfection! To place such a work fairly within the means of all, to effect its distribution, to aid its future translation, and its victorious passage over the storms of Time, is to continue from a religious standpoint the great work of ‘‘Liberty enlightening the world! Freedom, tolerance, liberty, charity, benevolence, these are the white-winged spirits hovering over the brethren of light who spoke the words of love and truth recorded in these pages; it is a noble record; an honor to the manhood of our age; a pride and credit to the aspiring reverence of human faith! May this record teach, even to the careless, that “ God’s great¬ ness flows around our incompleteness, round our restlessness. His rest.” If there are lost bars in the music of Life, if to some, a part of the “ Sweet Story of Old ” is missing: let the disturbed at heart look for it in these pages. There is no soaring dream of future perfection, no kindly thrill of goodness, no yearning for the unseen, no prayer for light and truth, which may not be met or answered in these triumphal announcements of the faith of Humanity. The golden chain of brotherhood here forged shall endure and shall lead all men up toward that heaven in which there shall be no more sorrow, and the shadows of parting shall be lifted for eternity. The Publisher. PREFACE. This volume records how the world placed on exhibition the wonders of faith and thought, and reveals to the reader man’s highest intellectual attainments upon the greatest themes of our day. The preparation for this exhibition was a part of the work performed by the World’s Congress Auxiliary of the World’s Columbian Exposition. An explanation, therefore, of this organization has been given in the first part of the book. The second chapter closes with some excellent and valuable observations prepared for these pages by Richard Henry Sav¬ age, the world’s soldier, scientist, world-wide traveler, and most successful author. Throughout the proceedings of the Parliament of Religions, women maintained a conspicuous position. “ In the preliminary work,” says President C. C. Bonney, “ women had no part. It was deemed expedient and just to await their pleasure. An application to unite in the great undertaking was soon pre¬ sented, and was, of course, heartily welcomed. The woman’s branch of the World’s Congress Auxiliary was accordingly organized, to have especial charge of the interests of women in the World’s Congresses of 1893.” The part which women took in the Parliament of Religions was under the direction of the woman’s branch of the auxiliary. Part second contains a record of the daily proceedings of the parliament, furnished by an expert stenographic reporter, who attended every session, and had access to the original manu¬ scripts of the different speakers. 11 12 PREFACE. The concise account of the many denominational and inter¬ denominational congresses, held in the Art Palace, serves to impress that which the parliament most potently has shown, that religion is now, as it always has been, the chief concern of the human family. The proceedings of each day of the parliament were not devoted exclusively to the general subject, though a central idea was followed as much as circumstance would allow. Cer¬ tain themes received consideration at different times. To render available at once the material of any subject con¬ sidered, an ample index is made a part of this book. The reader of these pages can be impressed with the influ¬ ence of him who gave a new world to Castile and Leon, and observe how the glowing fancies of the great discoverer have been, in many ways, more than realized. Columbus regarded that part of the earth which he discovered as higher and nearer heaven than any other portion of the world. It contained, he thought, the primeval abode of man, where a pure and never- failing pleasure was furnished to every sense; where flowers were ever blooming, and “ the waters, limpid and delicate, were swelling up in crystal fountains, and wandering in peaceful and silver streams.” No boisterous winds were there, no melan¬ choly or darksome weather, but all was bland and gentle and serene. The delightful abode, inaccessible to mortal feet, flourished in a heavenly temperature upon an eminence above the vapors, clouds, and storms. The material delights of this peaceful abode were never experienced by the great discoverer. The nearest approach to its reality, but from a standpoint higher than the material, was found in the Parliament of Keligions. In that great gath¬ ering an eminence of brotherhood was reached which, before, had been inaccessible; and all was gentle in an atmosphere of peace above clouds of war and storms of contention. The reader, too, may well recall the poetic flight of the black-robed seer of Judea, as he magnifies the work of God; PREFACE, 13 ‘‘He will lift up an ensign to the nations from afar and will hiss unto them from the ends of the earth, and, behold, they shall come with speed swiftly.” The ensign of the nations is the lowly Nazarene, whose influence, more potent now than at any preceding period, has rendered the parliament a possibility and a fact. The record as found in succeeding pages lifts on high the heaven-chosen ensign, and urges on the day when every nation, kindred, tribe, and tongue shall rest in peace beneath its protecting folds CHARLES C. BONNEY, President World’s Congress Auxiliary. >3 ) h; PART I. Peeparation for the Parliament of Religions. CHAPTER I. THE WORLD’S CONGRESSES OF 1893. The idea of a series of congresses for the consideration of the greatest themes in which mankind is interested, and so compre¬ hensive as to include representatives from all parts of the earth, originated with Charles Carroll Bonney in the summer of 1889. In the early days of autumn he presented his views upon the subject to a few thinking friends, among whom was Walter Thomas Mills, editor at that time of the Statesman magazine. The editor was so impressed with the greatness of the thought that he prevailed upon Mr. Bonney to write an article for the Statesman^ setting forth his ideas upon the remarkable con¬ ventions. A proof sheet of the article was taken by Mr. Mills to Dr. John Henry Barrows, Judge L. D. Thoman, Professor David Swing, E. Nelson Blake, T. B. Bryan, and Dr. P. S. Henson. The statements of these gentlemen, favorable to the proposal, were published, with Mr. Bonney’s article, in the Statesman of October, the same year. The viev/s then enunciated were so well matured that they contained in substance the propositions subsequently embodied in the formal announcement to the world. “ The coming glory of the World’s Fair of 1898,” says Mr. Bonney in the article, “ should not be the exhibit then to be made of the material triumphs, industrial achievements, and mechanical victories of man, however magnificent that display may be. Something 15 16 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. higher and nobler is demanded by the progressive spirit of the present age. In connection with that important event of the world, all government, jurisprudence, finance, science, litera¬ ture, education, and religion should be represented in a con¬ gress of statesmen, jurists, financiers, scientists, literati, teach¬ ers, and theologians, greater in numbers and more widely representative of all peoples and nations and tongues than any assemblage which has ever yet been convened.” The comments of the press upon Mr. Bonney’s proposal brought his views into much public favor, and Lyman J. Gage, President of the World’s Columbian Exposition, took a decided position in support of the series of congresses. Having secured the approval of the Directory, Mr. Gage, in October, 1889, appointed a committee, of which Mr. Bonney was made chair¬ man, to take the preliminary steps for the realization of his ennobling idea. From that day, till the congresses were a reality, the work was diligently prosecuted. The committee at first consisted of seven persons, but subsequently the number was increased. It soon became apparent that the great undertaking could not be conducted by a single committee, and “it was accord¬ ingly arranged that an auxiliary organization should be formed. On the 30th of October, 1890, the World’s Congress Auxiliary of the World’s Columbian Exposition was organized, with authority to carry on to full effect the plans for the World’s Congresses of 1893.” The officers of this body were: C. C. Bonney, chairman and chief executive manager; T. B. Bryan, vice-president; Lyman J. Gage, treasurer; Benjamin Butter- worth, secretary, and Clarence E. Young, associate secre¬ tary. The World’s Congresses were outlined by Mr. Bonney, and placed in charge of working committees, selected with refer¬ ence to their fitness for particular duties. Of these working committees there were more than two hundred organized. They were necessarily local, and their aggregate membership, exceeding sixteen hundred persons, constituted the local mem- THE WORTHS CONGRESSES OF 1893, 17 bership of the auxiliary. The committees were composed of any convenient number according to the nature of the case. “ The nature of the work of organization required a committee so located that it could meet on short notice, and with little expense or loss of time. A series of world’s congresses, however, could not be prop¬ erly organized without the co-operation of the representatives of progress in all parts of the world.” To secure this co-opera¬ tion there was adjoined to each local committee a non-resident but active branch called the Advisory Council of the congress. Members of this council co-operated through correspondence. “ An honorary membership was also created to act as a general advisory council for all the congresses. The members of the special advisory councils ranked as honorary members of the auxiliary. “ Existing societies and institutions were invited to appoint committees of co-operation to take an active part in the organization of the appropriate congresses.” The auxil¬ iary thus constituted, and numbering more than ten thousand representatives of the participating countries, accomplished its great work with remarkable patience, good sense, and har¬ monious action. The work of organization began in 1890, and was carried on by the committees until the opening of the congresses in May of 1893. An extensive correspondence throughout the world was required and a period of three years was necessary to effect all arrangements. Vigilance was exercised by Mr. Bonney in utilizing the press for extending to all parts of the earth infor¬ mation regarding the great world’s congresses. The govern¬ ment of the United States promptly approved the comprehensive plan; ^‘an act of recognition and support was passed by the Senate and House of Representatives, and approved by the chief executive.” After the organization of the auxiliary, the State Department sent to foreign governments an official announcement which contains the following: “Among the great themes which the congresses are expected to consider are the following: The grounds of fraternal union in the language. 18 THt: PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. literature, domestic life, religion, science, art, and civil institu¬ tions of different peoples; the economic, industrial, and financial problems of the age; educational systems, their advantages and their defects, and the means by which they may best be adapted to the recent enormous increase in all departments of knowl¬ edge; the practicability of a common language for use in the commercial relations in tlie civilized world; international copy¬ right and the laws of intellectual property and commerce; immigration and naturalization laws and the proper international privileges of alien governments and their subjects or citizens; the most efficient and advisable means of preventing or decreas¬ ing pauperism, insanity, and crime, and of increasing productive ability, prosperity, and virtue throughout the world; inter¬ national law as a bond of union and a means of mutual protec¬ tion, and how it may best be enlarged, perfected, and authorita¬ tively expressed; the establishment of the principles of judicial justice as the supreme law of international relations and the general substitution of arbitration for war in the settlement of international controversies.’ ’ The plan for the congresses was received with almost uni¬ versal approval throughout the world. Words of appreciation and encouragement were returned from every continent, “ show¬ ing that the time for such a movement had indeed arrived.” The letters which came from the advisory and honorary members of the World’s Congress Auxiliary contained such ardent expressions of approval that from them might be com¬ pleted such an “ anthrology of exalted sentiments, fraternal hopes, and offers of co-operation as would gladden the heart of every lover of human kind.” Some who responded were called to the mightier congress of the illustrious dead before the opening hour of the Columbian Exposition. Among them was Rutherford B. Hayes, ex-Pres- ident of the United States, who had accepted the presidency of the congresses of the department of moral and social reform; James G. Blaine, who, through the American State Department, gave the World’s Congress Auxiliary an official standing in all THE MOULD'S CONGRESSES OF 1893. 19 the countries of the earth with which our own has diplo¬ matic relations; Henry Edward Manning, Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, one of the foremost religious leaders of his time; Lord Alfred Tennyson, the laurel crowned poet of Eng¬ land, who wished to gladden the authors’ congress with, perhaps, his last earthly song; Bishop Phillips Brooks, of Boston, fore¬ most in the ranks of American preachers; John Greenleaf Whittier, the muse of freedom and of every virtue; George William Curtis, of New York; and Prof. Emile de Laveleye, a scientist of Belgium. So many living representatives of progress gave their active ' co-operation that only an allusion to them can be made in this volume. “Not only were the great centers of learning in Europe, Asia, and Australia represented by their brightest minds, but the governments of those countries were officially represented, and no more significant feature of the event can be found than the interest and sympathy manifested by the crowned heads of some of the oldest nations in the world.” From the 15th of May, 1893, to the 28th of October, there were held twenty general department congresses, embracing woman’s progress, the public press, medicine and surgery, temperance, moral and social reform, commerce and finance, music, literature, education, engineering, art, and architecture, government and law reform, general department, science and philosophy, labor, social and economic science, religion, Sunday rest, public health, and agriculture. Under these general heads there were held 200 distinct congresses, at which there appeared many of the most distinguished men and women of the day. So numerous were these congresses and so extensive the proceedings that their programmes bound in one volume constitute an interesting book of 160 pages. All the congresses were held in the Memorial Art Palace, located in Chicago, on the shore of Lake Michigan. In the palace are two large auditoriums called the Hall of Columbus and the Hall of Washington, and besides these are numerous 20 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, smaller halls of various dimensions. These spacious divisions were utilized by the congresses as convenience and necessity required. The women’s congress was the first in the series to be held. That great assemblage, representing women of many lands, met on the morning of Monday, May 15th, in Columbus Hall, and their sessions continued during the week. President Charles C. Bonney, delivering the opening address, says: “The day of realization has come. What must have seemed to many a splendid but impossible dream has become a present reality. We enter this day upon the actual enjoyment of the pleasures and benefits it promised. The shining blossoms of the dream, have changed to ripened fruit that waits our taking. “We turn with grateful hearts to the past, for it is the high¬ way which has led us to this hour. We look with pleasing anticipations to the future, for its beckoning heights glow with the dawn of a fairer day of peace and plenty than our race has hitherto known. “The 19th century, richer in manifold wonders thah any which has preceded it in the august procession of the ages, crowns its great achievements by establishing in the world the sublime idea of a universal fraternity of learning and virtue. This idea, long cherished by the illuminati of every clime, descends at last from the luminous mountains of thought to the fertile fields of action, and enters upon the conquest of the world. “We have asked the leaders of all countries to aid us in crowning the whole glorious work by the formation and adop¬ tion of better and more comprehensive plans than have hitherto been made; to advance the progress, prosperity, unity, peace, and happiness of the world, and to secure the effectual prose¬ cution of such plans by the organization of a series of world¬ wide fraternities, through whose efforts and influence the intellectual and moral forces of mankind may be dominant over the earth. THE WORLD'S CONGRESSES OF 1893. 21 Henceforth, the ‘decisive battles of the world’ will be fought on moral fields and on intellectual heights. The artil¬ lery of argument will take the place of the shot and shell hurled by the mighty guns of modern war. The piercing bayonet of perception and the conquering sword of truth will take the place of the weapons of steel which soldier and captain bear. The fame of a great general will become less attractive than that of a great statesman, or orator, or poet, or artist, or scientist, or teacher. The laboratory of the chemist, the workshop of the architect, the field of the engineer or scientific investigator, the stu9.y of the author, and the institution of learning will more and more attract the rising genius of mankind. “ The army of peace enters upon the scene. The splendid procession of 1893 marches into view. At its head a golden banner bears the golden legend of woman’s progress. Behind it walk the living leaders of that progress, reflecting renewed honors upon all the long line of illustrious women, from Zeno- bia. Queen of Palmyra, to Victoria, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and Empress of India.” The second in the series of congresses was the Department of the Public Press. It began on the 22d of May and embraced the general congress of the public press, the congress of the religious press, and the congress of trade journals. Following this congress came the others of the series in unbroken order till the great feast of thought was ended. “ The world had been invited to meet in friendly conference in the progressive and hospitable city of the West. Leading thinkers of the world responded to its fraternal greeting in the same friendly spirit in which it was tendered. Minds and hearts, severed by distance but united in sympathy, were drawn together, and how the world answered to the bugle call of uni¬ versal brotherhood is now the proud record of the congresses that have closed.” CHAPTER II. ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. In the Hall of Columbus at the convention of religions from all parts of the earth, Dr. Alfred Momerie, a distinguished thinker of England, said: “ I have seen all the great exhibitions of Europe during the last fifteen years, and I can safely say that the World’s Columbian Exposition is greater than all of them put together, and the Parliament of Religions is, in my opinion, greater than the exposition.” Under the department of religion, the denominational and inter-denominational congresses that were held in Art Palace numbered forty-one. “ But among these wonderful conventions of men and women from the ends of the earth, the World’s Parliament of Religions will stand out in history as the great¬ est event of the World’s Columbian year. In the popular interest attending it, in the breadth of its scope, in the gorgeous spectacle it presented, and in the deep questions of universal interest involved in its discussions, it outranked all other gath¬ erings of the year. Such a scene was never witnessed before in the world’s history as that presented on the platform of Columbus Hall on the morning of September 11th, when the parliament convened.” The convocation is without parallel, and great interest attaches to its origin. During the French Revolution there occurred, at Paris, a gathering of men representing great relig¬ ious faiths, and this coming together has been recalled as a forerunner of the council on the shore of Lake Michigan; but the rehearsal of faiths in the capital of France, whether genu ine or in disguise, indicated an indifferent gathering of Chris¬ tians and heathen to enjoy a feast of humanity, not an earnest, 22 ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. 23 attempt at searching diligently for the highest truth. A nearer approach to what took place at the Parliament of Religions was originated several years ago by President W. F. Warren, cf the Boston University. That earnest writer describes, in an address, an imaginary congress of religions, located in Japan, and suggests “ The Perfect Religion ” as a subject for discus¬ sion. The address furnished suggestions to those who arranged for the congress of faiths at the Columbian Exposition. These two kindred ideas, the gathering at Paris and the vision of President Warren, are isolated by the lapse of one hundred years, and indicate how little human thought has been directed toward a congress of all the faiths. The Parliament of Religion:: is the crowning glory of the great Series of ecumenical councils, known as the World’s Congresses of 1893, and conducted under the World’s Con¬ gress Auxiliary, as described in the preceding chapter. The general idea of the parliament, therefore, was first in the mind of Charles Carroll Bonney; but the details thereof were referred to a most efficient committee. President Bonney, in the spring of 1891, appointed the General Committee on Religious Con¬ gresses of the World’s Congress Auxiliary. Rev. John Henry Barrows, D. D., pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, was made chairman of the committee. His associates were the Most Rev. P. A. Feehan, Archbishop of the Catholic Church, and a favorite among his people; Rev. David Swing, pastor of the Central Church of Chicago, an independent body of Christians; Rt. Rev. Bishop William E. McLaren, D. D., D. C. L., Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Chicago; Rev. Will¬ iam M. Lawrence, D. D., of the Second Baptist Church of Chicago, celebrated as a successful preacher; Rev. Dr. F. A. Noble, of Union Park Congregational Church; Rev. Dr. Frank M. Bristol, an eloquent preacher of the Methodist Church; Dr. E. G. Hirsch, minister of the Sinai Temple and professor of rabbinic literature in the University of Chicago; Rev. Jenkin Lloyd Jones, a talented Unitarian writer; Rev. A. J. Canfield, pastor of St. Paul’s Universalist Church, Chicago; Rt. Rev. 24 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. Bishop Charles Edward Cheney, D. D., a founder of the Reformed Episcopal Church; Rev. L. P. Mercer, of the New Church (Swedenborgian) ; Mr. J. W. Plummer, of the Society of Friends; Rev. J. Berger, of the German Methodist Church; Rev. John Z. Torgersen, a member of the Norwegian Lutheran Church, and the Rev. M. Ranseen, of the Swedish Lutheran Church. The general committee sent out to the world a preliminary address in June of 1891. The generous spirit which moved the committee is shown by the following words of the address: “ Believing that God is, and that He has not left Himself with¬ out witness; believing that the influence of religion tends to advance the general welfare, and is the most vital force in the social order of every people; and convinced that of a truth God is no respecter of persons, but that in every nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteousness is accepted of Him, we affectionately invite the representatives of all faiths to aid us in presenting to the world, at the Exposition in 1893, the relig¬ ious harmonies and unities of humanity, and also in showing forth the moral and spiritual agencies which are at the root of luiman progress. It is proposed to consider the foundations of religious faiths, to review the triumphs of religion in all ages, to set forth the present state of religion among the nations and its influence over literature, art, commerce, government, and the family life, to indicate its power in promoting temperance and social purity, and its harmony with true science, to show its dominance in the higher institutions of learning, to make prom¬ inent the value of the weekly rest-day on religious and other ground, and to contribute to those forces which shall bring about the unity of the race in the worship of God and the service of man.” The preliminary address was sent to religious leaders in many countries, and evoked replies that encouraged, delighted, and amazed the committee. The invitation of Christianity to all the historic faiths had been accepted, and the fact was made known that the thinking world was prepared to welcome the Parliament of Religions., ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. 25 Earnest co-operation with leaders of mankind in many parts of the earth enabled the committee to complete their arrange¬ ments; representatives arrived from all quarters of the earth, and on the morning of September 11, 1893, the Parliament of Religions was opened in Columbus Hall. The fruitless discord mingled with the response of the sympa¬ thetic world to the invitation of Christianity will receive con¬ sideration in succeeding pages. Longer would we dwell upon that other sentiment, lofty and ennobling, which harmonizes with the spirit that made the parliament a reality. In doing so we select a voice from him whose genius shines with brilliancy in the literary world, whose works are read in five European tongues, the story of whose success within two short years is a theme of wonder—a voice from a man of wo rid-wide experi¬ ence, Richard Henry Savage, the author, scientist, soldier, and traveler. This distinguished writer, embodying the sentiments that hail from many a clime, has sent to the publisher the fol¬ lowing comprehensive, poetic, and appropriate words, with which we close this chapter: This is a century of marvels ! Whatever progress may be vouchsafed by the Almighty to the human race, it is incredible to us that its rate should ever surpass the leaps and bounds of the 19th century. Soon the White City will be no more! Its domes and palaces will rise no longer by this blue lake, near that great Mecca of applied thought in this memorable year—Chicago I In itself a monumental triumph of the four hundred years since the daring Genoese landed in the Bahamas, Word and Bible in hand, the great city’s purest glory will cling around the site of the vanished fairy palaces of the World’s Exposition of 1893. Bearing the palms of peace, with aspiring brows, the children of light have gathered herein amity, tolerance, and brotherhood, following the star of empires, which paused over the birth¬ place of the gentle Nazarene, to hallow and to bless, and in its: westward course has finished the circuit of the thinking world. 26 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. For the mild-eyed children of Asia, moving eastward to meet the imperial rays of its progress, here have paused by the placid shores of the central waters of that continent which Columbus gave to the Old World ! The blameless Goddess of Justice and the white-robed angel of peace have left their bless¬ ings on the great assemblage of nations whose faith and works have been here exhibited in friendly rivalry! Neither fray nor discord has stained the unbroken record of a dawning brother¬ hood ! While the memories of these world pilgrims treasure the scenes which here delighted the eye, while these pictures of grace and beauty linger in the rapt soul, the lessons of the great World’s Fair will be unforgotten! Grim time may sweep away to the unknown sea the genera¬ tion which achieved the wondrous friendly Babel of our day, and it is to the twin fairies of science and art, a world, halting in its onward path, will owe the treasured records of this grand human pageant! Mere cloudy tradition would preserve the story of all that brain, mind, heart, and deft fingers have done here for a brief time only were it not for the art preservative! Thanks to Almighty God! The century which opened the mist-veiled waters of the New World to the European explorer also gave to the human race the printing press! Sixty years before Columbus sailed westward, printing was a gift of the All-Wise, and thirty years previous to the voyage of the great ^admiral, the Bible first appeared in print! Since then the chequered records of the passing years, the flights of genius, the remotest speculations of the human mind, and all the handbooks of science, art, and philosophy have been freely spread abroad on life’s pathway, so that “ he who runs may read ”! Four hundred years from the time of the first rude attempts of Faust and Gutenberg, the world of books thrown open to the voyager in life dwarfs in comparison the dark continents found by the sailor! And to-day, the real arbiter of human opinion ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, '27 is the press! King, potentate, and peer go down before a touch of the pen of truth! It is to this human recording angel that a vast, friendly mul¬ titude confide the records of the world’s first and only peaceful Parliament of Religions ! Hundreds of thousands have gazed at the marvels of science, the triumphs of art, the varied productions of man and wonders of nature, gathered here under these fairy domes, rising as if by the touch of Aladdin’s lamp! The priceless treasures spread around in these works may crumble and decay, but the great waves of human thought hence rolling forth will beat long upon the shores of time! Not in idle curiosity, led on by no mere desire of amusement, did the earnest-browed religious thinkers of the world gather here to heap up a pyramid of garnered golden grains of truth, in honor of the great Giver of All Good. In their temporary camps the children of fetichism, wide- eyed and speechless, have gazed here upon this multitude of believers bearing palms, trooping hither from the uttermost parts of the earth and the islands of the great deep! In unison, the children of revolution, the sons of philosophy, the disciples of reason, and the devotees of inexorable science, have raised up here their reverent voices to the Most High, forgetting all differences of creed and varieties of belief ! In divers tongues, with varied vestments, of all ages, sexes, and degrees of mental polish and experiences, this chorus of aspiring worship raised thankfully under these great^domes has echoed to heaven and sent a warmer heart-throb of brotherhood around the whole world With no carnal weapons displayed, leaving aside all pride of place and the temptations of contention, a truly remarkable body of men and women has for the first time in the world’s religious history met by a common accord, under the silver band’ of love and hope, with varied forms of faith and a patient charity, to look into each other's friendly eyes ; to depart, reflecting each other’s aspiring, soaring thoughts! 28 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. In the twenty councils of the Christian church, from the year 325 A. D. to the great ecumenical council of 1870, no such sight has been vouchsafed to mortal eyes! The road that led to Nice or Eome has led here to the great heart of man. For once, through worthy representation, the five-hundred creeds of the thinking world have met in an uncompelled hosanna of thanks. The gravity of the scene, the brotherly spirit and knitted friendship here exhibited, have called forth from doubter, atheist, infidel, agnostic, and those at sea, rudderless, on the waves of error, a respectful and merited applause. If some came not to worship, none dared to scoff, and few wandered away to sneer! It is to the printed record of this great Parliament of Religions, in permanent form, that the student, thinker, mis¬ sionary, preacher, priest, and scholar will look for future words of cheer and for lessons of priceless value! The honest exactness of the report, the independence of suggestion or control, the lack of any insidious undercurrent, or taint of hypocrisy, will cause thousands of thirsty souls to drink of these waters of truth—to every man according to his need. The result has been a credit to the self-control of these chil¬ dren of the 19th century—this grand assemblage, meeting in frank kindness, dealing with each other without acrimony, and parting sorrowing that they shall look upon each other’s faces no more. Orthodoxy and liberalism, clerk and layman, prelate and penitent, acute inquirer and submissive devotee, all these representative men, classes, and ideas have met, as in friendly watch, saying: “Brother! give me of thy good cheer!” Fourteen hundred millions of wanderers here below have sent to the parliament whose record is in these pages the most skillful champions of the varied faiths! Those of little faith have listened to the claims of nearly five hundred millions of Buddhists, Shintostes, and Confucians, four hundred mill¬ ions of Christians, over a hundred millions each of Brahman- ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, 29 ical Hindoos and Mohammedans, the compact phalanx of eight millions of Hebrews, the forlorn hope of one million Parsees, and have gazed on scattered tribes representing the two hundred and twenty-five millions who drone in darkness under fet¬ ich ism. Years of thought will enable no man to draw from these pages the whole lessons of humanity’s great problem! The dark pall of death will hang still unlifted before the open gate of the tomb! The clouds of unbelief will gather still around the lonely human wanderer, but in these recorded words will be found tidings of great cheer to all! The philosopher, moralist, natural scientist, socialist, agnostic, protestant of every grade, and the orthodox of the Roman and Greek churches may all labor with a new inspiration toward ihe near and blessed end of human religious persecution and intolerance! “ Credo in unum Deum ” may not be sung by all for ages! There is but one fold—its sheep may be widely scat¬ tered, but this momentous concourse will send to the uttermost parts of the earth men who, variously believing in the Father¬ hood of God, have learned here new lessons in the brotherhood of man! It has not been a harvest time! It has been only a sowing of seed! In the friendly arena of the White City, unguarded by armies, coerced by no government, under no dictation of man or close creed, the world’s delegates have listened in peace to each other under the safe passport of the flag of the earth’s greatest republic! It is only in a land where church and state are classed as independent works of God and man, where a free and untram¬ meled press spreads the light of truth in fearless candor in every direction, that such a meeting and such a parting could have been possible! The practical value of the convocation will not be apparent for years. It must be remembered that the mere expression of a common respect and friendship has limited the proposed work in hand. 30 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, To distant climes, bearing their burdens of trust, care, and thought, the pilgrims have now returned. While the success¬ ful meeting has proved much as to tolerance, it will be through the press, pulpit, and schools that the final results will be proclaimed later. Differences of belief have not vanished; they have been only veiled in courtesy, and the future action of the great faiths at home, alone^ will tell of any appreciable effect. Whether zealous Christianity has learned aught from calm Buddhism, whether the Confucian has added any truths caught from science or revelation to his golden wisdom, whether the prying mission¬ ary has made peace with the fanatic Mohammedan, time alone will show! If it is the gospel of a new peace or a sword the years alone will tell 1 The optimist must remember that dif¬ ferences of race, education, and law, the rights of churches as to property, the education of youth, and the social duties of home religionists constrain the nations of the earth yet to a wise con¬ servatism in religious changes. There are especially interesting features of this great record. The Mohammedan, Buddhist, and Confucian have put Chris¬ tianity on its defensive in some matters of good taste and polit¬ ical interference. Calm scientists have manfully quoted the history of nature as traced by the finger of time, the oppressed Hebrew has boldly claimed the rights of racial justice, and the unshaken philosopher has also had his say 1 The great triumph of the parliament has been the frank statements, clearly defining, in every possible shade of human thought, the various faiths now holding up appealing hands to the Father of all! It is to the printer, to the press, that the great record is given! In our later day, the pulpit reluctantly yields to the great struggle of the modern human mind for eclectic educa¬ tion, freedom of belief; for broader lines, for less dogma, and more mental light! There is no one man, no sect, no single school which can, in these broadening days of intelligence, tie ORIGIN OF THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. 31 down the human hearts of the 19th century to any bounden or groveling belief! By the grace of God and His tolerance, now spread abroad, in the remotest corners of the world, the earnest reader, in divers tongues, will be able to scan the glowing page, and in the silence of the chamber draw out lessons to lift up the weary hearts of men! The hour has now passed for the debates of schoolmen, the arrogance of creeds, or the absurd pretensions of earthly rulers to narrow or shackle the soaring flight of the human mind! May the record of these pages be imperishable and in long years to come the wise, tender, and eloquent words of the honest and outspoken advocates of every creed herein set down be fruitful in leading toward the kindly light and in spreading abroad peace and good will on earth to men! The echoes of the mingled songs of praise of these pilgrims of light should ring out clearly on the wintry sky of the Old World!—the Old World of Intolerance, Narrowness, Bigotry, and Persecution! These peaceful songs snould echo, in union, only thankful praise to that ‘‘ God from whom all blessings flow! ” When enlightened humanity can learn how near in heart all brothers really are on the world’s highway it will treasure these recorded pages as prophetic of the time when wars, the legacy of Cain, will be no more! MRS. POTTER PALMER, President Woman’s Branch of the Auxiliary. I PART II. Proceedings of the World’s Parliament of Eeligions, September 11 to 27, 1893. CHAPTER I. FIRST DAY, SEPTEMBER 11th. WORDS OF GREETING. The assembling of the World’s Parliament of Religions in the forenoon of September 11, 1893, was proclaimed in due form by ten strokes on the new Liberty Bell, upon which is inscribed the words of Him who is the ensign of the people : A new commandment I give unto you that ye love one ano¬ ther.” The ten strokes represented the ten chief religions of the world, each of which had a prominent place in the remark¬ able gathering of the nations. Prior to the opening hour, the doors of the Art Palace were besieged by multitudes eager to secure seats in the auditorium or gallery of the great Hall of Columbus, in which they were to assemble. Dr. J. H. Barrows and other committeemen were early in the building to give information, and the office of President Bonney was turned into a reception-room, where representatives, both men and women, arrayed in picturesque attire, formed a medley most pleasing to every observer. An audience of about four thou¬ sand people had assembled before the time announced for the opening of the exercises, and awaited in silence the appearance of the interesting speakers,. 34 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. The mass of people was so wonderfully quiet that the flut¬ tering of wings was heard when a tiny bird flew through an open window and over the vacant platform. The organist played “Jerusalem the Golden” in the interval of waiting, and the triumphant strains fitly expressed the feeling of many intensely expectant hearts. At the appointed hour for the commencement of proceedings, the crowds in the right-hand aisle of the auditorium parted in quiet step, and two and two the royal delegates of the one Great King, escorted by the managers of the parliament, came slowly into view. Heading the procession, and arm in arm, were President Bonney and Cardinal Gibbons, following whom came Mrs. Potter Palmer and Mrs. Charles Henrotin. Next in order moved a stately column, composed of men of many tongues, of many lands, of many races; disciples of Christ, of Mohammed, of Buddha, of Brahma, of Confucius, in the name of a common God for the glorification of the Eternal Father. The sight was most remarkable. There were strange robes, turbans and tunics, crosses and crescents, flowing hair and tonsured heads. The representatives marched down the center aisle, and amid the cheer that welled up from the hearts of 4,000 men and women, took their seats in triple rows upon the platform, beneath the waving flags of many nations. In the center of the company, and seated in the huge chair of curiously wrought iron, was His Eminence James (Cardinal) Gibbons, magnificent in his robes of red; on the right sat the priests of the Celestial Empire in their long flowing garments of white; on the left were the patriarchs of the old Greek Church, wearing strangely formed hats, somber cassocks of black, and leaning on ivory sticks carved with figures representing ancient rites. Peculiar modes of dress were indicative of different religions. The Chinese secretary of legation wore the robes of a mandarin; the high priest of the state religion of Japan was arrayed in flowing robes, presenting the colors of the rainbow. Buddhist monks were attired in garments of white and yellow; an orange turban and robe made the Brahman conspicuous; the Greek Arch- WORDS OF GREKTINU. f)isliop of Zante, from whose high head-gear there fell to the waist a black veil, was brilliant in purple robe and black cassock, and glittering as to his breast in chains of gold. Dharmapala, the reformed Buddhist, was ' recognized in his woolen garments; and, in black clothes, hardly to be dis¬ tinguished from European dress, was Mozoomdar, author of the “ Oriental Christ,” a most touching history of a soul struggling homeward to God. In a golden bond of friend¬ ship, the oldest of the religions of the world greeted the youngest of the religions. “ From faraway India, from the snow-locked crests of the Himalayas, from the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates, the representatives of a race and country, old and decrepid with age, clasped hands with a race now in the first flutter of youth, and blossoming manhood.” It was a grand intermingling of religions, a salutatory of an unprecedented era of good will among men; an event that will linger in the minds of men through coming ages; a gathering under the star of Christianity, whose steady beaming draws wise men of the East to the unfading brightness and growing splendor of the Prince of Peace. The historic assembly was called to older by President C. C. Bonney, and suddenly, from the great organ in the gallery, broke forth to the strains of “Old Hundred,” the inspiring measures From all that dwell beneath the skies Let the Creator’s praise arise. And the vast audience arose and filled the hall with the music of humanity’s thanksgiving. After the song had died away, a moment of silence, which the uplifted hand of Cardinal Gibbons sustained, then his voice began: “ Our Father who art in heaven,” and was lost in the rush of voices which followed in the well-known universal prayer. The supreme moment of the 19th century was reached. Asia, Africa, Europe, America, and the isles of the sea, together called him Father. This harmonious use of the Lord’s Prayer by Jews, Mohammedans, 36 THE PaRLIAMEITT of RELidlONS, Buddhists, Brahmans, and all divisions of Christians, seemed a rainbow of promise pointing to the time when the will of God will be done on earth as it is done in heaven.”. 'Ihe presiding officer of the day was Dr. John Henry Barrows of Chicago, to whose prudence, judgment, liberality, and untiring efforts the success of the parliament is due. Few prouder moments need he wish than that wherein he beheld the realization of his labors and the fulfillment of his most sanguine dreams—the bringing together the ends of the earth. When the distinguished and remarkable company had taken their seats, it was found that the following were upon the platform : Bishop D. A. Payne, A. M. E. Church of Wilberforce, Ohio; Siddhu Ram, appeal writer, Mooltan, Punjab, East Indies; Carl von Bergen, Ph. D., president of the Swedish Society for Physical Research, Stockholm, Sweden; Birchand Raghavji Gandhi, B. A., honorary secretary to the Jain Association of India, Bombay; Rt. Rev. Banrui Yatsubucha and Professor G. N. Chakravarti, Swami Vivekananda, a monk of the orthodox Brahminical religion; Rev. B. B. Nagarkar, minister, Brahmo Somaj of Bombay, India; Rev. P. C. Mozoomdar, minister and leader of the Brahmo Somaj of India, Calcutta; Jinda Ram, a lawyer, president of the temperance society Vedic, Muzaffar- garh, India; Rev. P. G. Phiambolis; Occonomus, a priest of the Greek Church; Most Rev. Dionysius Latas, archbishop of Zante, Greece; Homer Peratis, arch-deacon of the Greek Church; Relichi Shibata, president of one of the Shinte Soots, Tokio, Japan; Zikuzen Ashiku, representative from the Tendai Sect, Omi, Japan; Banrim Yatsubuchi, president of Hoju Buddhist Society, Kamamolo, Japan; Soen Skaka, archbishop of the Zen of the Buddhist sect, Kamakura, Japan; Horin Toki, professor of Shingne Sect and its bishop, Sanuki, Japan; Noguchi and Nomura, interpreters, Tokio, Japan; H. Dharmapala, general secretary Maha Bodhi Society, Calcutta; Professor G. N. Chak¬ ravarti, Allahabad, India; Dr. F. A. Noble, Prince Serge Wolkon- sky, of Russia; D. G. Grandon, secretary of the Free Religions Society of Boston; Rev. J. H. Macomber, chaplain United States of America, Angel Island, Cal.; Yunkway China; Mise Jeanne Serabji K. Langraiia; G. Benet Maury, professor a la fauilte de theologie, Paris; Prince Memulu Massoquoi, of Liberia; tirioa, ^ v / s ■C - I ✓ THE lIBRAF.y OF THE UHiVFRSITy RF IIJ.IH81S / ?r V / / <1^'' WORDS OF GREETING. 37 Bishop Jenner, Anglican Free Church; Rev. Augusta Chapin, D. D. Chicago; Mrs. Potter Palmer, Mrs. Charles Henrotin, Cardinal Gibbons, Archbishop Feehan, Archbishop Ryan, Archbishop Redwood, of New Zealand; President C. C. Bonney, Dr. Adolf Brodbeck, Count Bernstorlf, Z. Zmjgrowdski, John W. Hoyt, Bishop Keane, H. N. Higinbotham, W. J. Onahan, Rev. Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Bishop D. W. Arnett, Bishop Handy, Principal Grant, of Canada; Rev. Alfred William Memorie, D. D., Rev. Maurice Phillips, of Madras, India; Professor N. Valentine, Dr. William T. Harris, Dr. Ernest Faber, Rev. George T. Candin, Professor Kosaki, Bishop Cotter, of Win¬ ona; Hon. Pung Quang Yu, Chinese Legation. At the close of the universal prayer. President Bonney arose, spoke earnest words of greeting, and declared the first Parlia¬ ment of Religions opened. OPENING ADDRESS. C. C. BONNEY. At 10:30 o’clock C. C. Bonney called the vast assemblage to order and requested the audience to remain standing while Cardinal Gibbons led in the universal prayer. The cardinal recited the Lord’s Prayer in impressive tones. Mr. Bonney then stepped forward amid loud cheers and delivered the following address of welcome: Worshipers of God and Lovers of Man :—Let us rejoice that we have lived to see this glorious day; let us give thanks to the Eternal God, whose mercy endureth forever, that we are ijermitted to take part in the solemn and majestic event of a World's Congress of Religions. The impor¬ tance of this event can not be overestimated. Its influence on the future relations of the various races of men can not be too highly esteemed. If this congress shall faithfully execute the duties with which it has been charged it will become a joy of the whole earth, and stand in human history like a new Mount Zion, crowned with glory, and marking the actual beginning of a new epoch of brotherhood and peace. For when the religious faiths of the wmrld recognize each other as brothers, children of one Father, whom all profess to love and serve, then, and not till then, will the nations of the earth yield the spirit of concord, and learn war no more. It is inspiring to think that in every part of the world many of the worthiest of mankind, who would gladly join us here if that were in their power, this day lift their hearts to the Supreme Being in earnest prayer for the harmony and success of this congress. To them our own hearts speak in love and sympathy of this imxjressive and prophetic scene. In this congress the word “ religion” means the love and worship of God and the love and service of man. We believe the scripture that “ of a truth God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that feareth 38 THE PARLIAME'NT OF RELIGIONS. God and worketh righteousness is accepted of Him.’* We come together in mutual confidence and respect, without the least surrender or compromise of anything which we respectively believe to be truth or duty, with the hope that mutual acquaintance and a free and sincere interchange of views on the great questions of eternal life and human conduct will be mutually beneficial. As the finite can never fully comprehend the infinite, not perfectly express its own view of the divine, it necessarily follows that individual ox)inions of the divine nature and attributes will differ. But, properly understood, these varieties of view are not causes of discord and strife, but rather incentives to deeper interest and examination. Necessarily God reveals himself differently to a child than to a man; to a philosopher than to one who can not read. Each must see God with the eyes of his own soul. Each one must behold him through the colored glass of his own nature. Each one must receive him according to his own capacity of reception. The fraternal union of the religions of the world will come when each seeks truly to know how God has revealed himself in the other, and remembers the inexorable law that with what judgment it judges it shall itself be judged. The religious faiths of the world have most seriously misunderstood and misjudged each other from the use of words in meanings radically different from those which they were intended to bear, and from a disregard of the dis¬ tinctions between appearances and facts; between signs and symbols and the things signified and represented Such errors it is hoped that this congress will do much to correct and to render hereafter impossible. He who believes that God has revealed himself more fully in his religion than in any other, can not do otherwise than desire to bring that religion to the knowledge of all men, with an abiding conviction that the God who gave it will preserve, protect, and advance it in every expedient way. And hence he will welcome every just opportunity to come into fraternal relations with men of other creeds, that they may see in his upright life the evidence of the truth and beauty of his faith and be thereby led to learn it, and be helped heavenward by it. When ic pleased God to give me the idea of the World’s Congress of 1893, there came with that idea a profound conviction that their crowning glory should be a fraternal conference of the world’s religions. Accordingly, the original announcement of the World’s Congress scheme, which was sent by the Government of the United States to all other nations, contained among other great themes to be considered, “ The grounds for fraternal union in the religions of different people.” At first the proposal of a World’s Congress of Religions seemed impracti¬ cable. It was said that the religions had never met but in conflict, and that a different result could not be expected now. A committee of organi¬ zation was, nevertheless, apixnnted to make the necessary arrangements. This committee was composed of representatives of sixteen religious bodies. Rev. Dr. John Henry Barrows was made chairman. How zealously and efficiently he has performed the great work committed to his hands this congress is a sufficient witness. The preliminary address of the committee, prepared by him and sent throughout the world, elicited the most gratifying responses, and proved that the proposed congress was not only practicable, but also that it was most earnestly demanded by the needs of the present age. The religious leaders of many lands, hungering and thirsting for a larger righteousness, gave the proposal their benedictions, and promised the congress their active co-operation and support. To most of the departments of the World’s Congress’ work a single week of the exposition season was assigned. To a few of the most important a longer time, not exceeding two weeks, was given. In the beginning it was supposed that one or two weeks would suffice for the department of religion, OPENING ADDRESS. 39 but so great has been the interest, and so many have been the applications in this department, that the plans for it have repeatedly been rearranged, and it now extends from September 4 to October 15, and several of the religious congresses have, nevertheless, found it necessary to meet outside of these limits. The programme for the religious congresses of 1893 constitutes what may with perfect propriety be designated as one of the most remarkable publications of the century. The programme of this general Parliament of Religions directly represents England, Scotland, Sv/eden,Switzerland,Prance, Germany, Russia, Turkey, Greece, Egypt, Syria, India, Japan, China, Cey¬ lon, New Zealand, Brazil, Canada, and the American States, and, indirectly, includes many other countries. This remarkable programme presents, among other great themes to be considered in this congress, Theism, Juda¬ ism, Mohammedanism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Shin¬ toism, Zoroastrianism, Catholicism, the Greek Church, Protestantism in many forms, and also refers to the nature and influence of other religious systems. This programme also announces for presentation the great subjects of revelation, immortality, the incarnation of God, the universal elements in religion, the ethical unity of different religious systems, the relations of religion to morals, marriage, education, science, philosophy, evolution, music, labor, government, peace and war, and many other themes of absorbing interest. The distinguished leaders of human progress, by whom these great topics will be presented, constitute an unparalleled galaxy of eminent names, but we may not pause to call the illustrious roll. For the execution of this part of the general programme seventeen days have been assigned. During substantially the same period the second part of the programme will be executed in the adjoining Hall of Washington. This will consist of what are termed presentations of their distinctive faith and achievements by the different churches. These presentations will be made to the world, as represented in the World’s Religious Congresses of 1893. All persons interested are cordially invited to attend. The third part of the general programme for the congresses of this department consists of separate and independent congresses of the different religious denominations for the purpose of more fully setting forth their doctrines and the service they have rendered to mankind. These special congresses will be held, for the most part, in the smaller halls of this mem¬ orial building. A few of them have, for special reasons, already been held. It is the special object of these denominational congresses to afford oppor¬ tunities for further information to all who may desire it. The leaders of these several churches most cordially desire the attendance of the repre¬ sentatives of other religions. The denominational congresses will each be held during the. week in which the presentation of the denomination will occur. The fourth and final part of the programme of the department of relig¬ ion will consist of congresses of various kindred organizations. These con¬ gresses will be held between the close of the Parliament of Religions and October 15. and will include missions, ethics, Sunday rest, the evangelical alliance, and other similar associations. The congress on evolution should, in regularity, have been held in the department of science, but circum¬ stances prevented, and it has been given a place in this department by the courtesy of the committee of organization. To this more than imperial feast, I bid you welcome. We meet on the mountain height of absolute respect for the religious convictions of each other; and an earnest desire for a better knowledge of the consolations which other forms of faith than our own offer to their devotees. The very basis of our convocation is the idea that the representa¬ tives of each religion sincerely believe that it is the truest and the best of 40 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, all; and that they will, therefore, hear with perfect candor and without fear the coiiYictions of other sincere souls on the great questions of the immortal life. Let one other point be clearly stated. While the members of this con¬ gress meet, as men, on a common ground of perfect equality, the ecclesiastical rank of each, in his own church, is at the same time gladly recognized and respected, as the just acknowledgement of his services and attainments. But no attemi)t is here made to treat all religions as of equal merit. Any such idea is expressly disclaimed. In this congress, each system of religion stands by itself in its own perfect integrity, uncompromised, in any degree, by its relation to any other. In the language of the preliminary publica¬ tion in the department of religion, we seek in this congress “ to unite all religion against all irreligion; to make the golden rule the basis of this union; and to present to the world the substantial unity of many religions in the good deeds of the religious life.” Without controversy, or any attempt to pronounce judgment upon any matter of faith or worship or religious opinion, we seek a better knowledge of the religious condition of all mankind, with an earnest desire to be useful to each other and to all others who love truth and righteousness. This day the sun of a new era of religious peace and progress rises over the world, dispelling the dark clouds of sectarian strife. This day a new flower blooms in the gardens of religious thought, filling the air with its exquisite perfume. This day a new fraternity is born into the world of human progress, to aid in the upbuilding of the kingdom of God in the hearts of men. Era and flower and fraternity bear one name. It is a name which will gladden the hearts of those who worship God and love man in every clime. Those who hear its music joyfully echo it back to sun and flower. It is the brotherhood of religions. In this name I welcome the first Parliament of the Religions of the World. ADDRESS OF WELCOME. DR. J. H. BARROWS, CHAIRMAN OF THE GENERAL COMMITTEE. Mr. President and Friends; If my heart did not overflow with cordial welcome at this hour, which promises to be a great moment in history, it would be because 1 had lost the spirit of manhood and had been forsaken by the spirit of God. The whitest snow on the sacred mount of Japan, the clearest water springing from the sacred fountains of India, are not more pure and bright than the joy of my heart and of many hearts here that this day has dawned in the annals of time, and that, from the farthest isles of Asia; from India, mother of religions; from Europe, the great teacher of civiliza¬ tion; from the shores on which breaks the “long wash of Australasian seas;” that from neighboring lands, and from all parts of this republic which we love to contemplate as the land of earth’s brightest future, you have come here at our invitation in the expectation that the world’s first Parliament of Religions must prove an event of race-wide and perpetual significance. For more than two years the general committee, which I have the honor to represent, working together in unbroken harmony, and presenting the picture of prophecy of a united Christendom, have carried on their arduous and sometimes appalling task in happy anticipation of this golden hour. Your coming has constantly been in our thoughts, and hopes, and fervent prayers. I rejoice that your long voyages and journeys are over, and that here, in this young capital of our Western civilization, you find men eager for truth, sympathetic with the spirit of universal human brotherhood, and loyal, I believe, to the highest they know, glad and grateful to Almighty God that they see your faces and are here to hear your words. ADDRESS OF WELCOME 41 Welcome, most welcome, O wise men of the East and of the West. May the star which has led you hither be like unto that luminary which guided the men of old, and may this meeting by the inland sea of a new continent bs blessed of heaven to the redemption of men from error and from sin and despair. I wish you to understand that this great undertaking, which has aimed to house under one friendly roof in brotherly council the represent¬ atives of God’s aspiring and believing children everywhere, has been conceived and carried on through strenuous and patient toil, with an unfaltering heart, with a devout faith in God, and with most signal and special evidences of His divine guidance and favor. Long ago I should have surrendered the task intrusted to me before the colossal difficulties looming ever in the way had I not committed my work to the gracious care of that God who loves all his children, whose thoughts are long, long thoughts, who is patient and merciful as well as just, and who cares infinitely more for the souls of his erring children than for any creed or philosophy of human devising. If anything great and worthy is to be the outcome of this parliament, the glory is wholly due to Him who inspired it, and who in the Scriptures, which most of us cherish as the word of God, has taught the blessed truths of divine fatherhood and human brotherhood. I should not use the word “ if ” in speaking of the outcome of this Con¬ gress of Religions, since, were it decreed that our sessions should end this day, the truthful historian would say that the idea which has inspired and led this movement, the idea whose beauty and force has drawn you through these many thousand miles of travel, that this idea has been so hashed before the eyes of men that they will not forget it, and that our meeting this morning has become a new, great fact in the historic evolution of the race, which will not be obliterated. What, it seems to me, should have blunted some of the arrows of criticism shot at the promoters of this movement is this other fact, that it is the repre¬ sentatives of that Christian faith which we believe has in it such elements and divine forces that it is fitted to the needs of all men who have planned and provided this first school of comparative religions, wherein devout men of all faiths may speak for themselves without hindrance, without criticism, and without compromise, and tell what they believe, and why they believe it. I appeal to the representatives of the non-Christian faiths, and ask you if Christianity suffers in your eyes from having called this Parliament of Religions? Do you believe that its beneficent work in the world will be one whit lessened? On the contrary; you agree with the great mass of Christian scholars in America in believing that Christendom may proudly hold up this Congress of the Faiths as a torch of truth and of love which may prove the morning star of the 20th century. There is a true and noble sfense in which America is a Christian nation, since Christianity is recognized by the supreme court, by the courts of the several states, by executive officers, by general national acceptance and observance, as the prevailing religion of our people. This does not mean, of course, that the church and state are united. In America they are separated, and in this land the widest spiritual and intel¬ lectual freedom is realized. Justice Ameer Ali of Calcutta, whose absence we lament to-day, has expressed the opinion that only in this Western Republic would such a congress as this have been undertaken and achieved. I do^ not forget—I am glad to remember—that devout Jews, lovers of humanity, have co-operated with us in this parliament; tliat these men and women representing the most wonderful of all races and the most persistent of all religions, who have come with good cause to appreciate the spiritual freedom of the United States of America—that these friends, some of whom are willing to call themselves Old Testament Christians, as I am willing to call myself a New Testament Jew, have zealously and powerfully co-oper- 42 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. ated in this good work. But the world calls us, and we call ourselves, a Christian people. We believe in the gospels and in him whom they set forth as “ The Light of the World,” and Christian America, which owes so much to Columbus and Luther, to the pilgrim fathers and to John Wesley, which owes so much to the Christian church and Christian college and the Christian school, welcomes to-day the earnest disciples of other faiths and the men of all faiths, who, from many lands, have hocked to this jubilee of civilization. Cherishing the light which God has given us, and eager to send this light everywhere, we do not believe that God, the eternal spirit, has left himself without witness in non-Christian nations. There is a divine light enlightening every man. One accent of the Holy Ghost. The heedless world has never lost. Professor Max Muller, of Oxford, who has been a friend of our move¬ ment, and has sent a contribution to this parliament, has gathered together in his last volume .a collection of prayers—Egyptian, Acadian, Babylonian, Vedic, Avestic, Chinese, Mohammedan, and modern Hindu, which make it perfectly clear that the sun which shone over Bethlehlem and Calvary has cast some celestial illumination and called forth some devout and holy aspir¬ ations by the Nile and the Ganges, in the deserts of Arabia, and by the waves of the Yellow Rea. It is perfectly evident t all illuminated minds that we should cherish loving thoughts of all people, and humane views of all the great and lasting religions, and that whoever would advance the cause of his own faith must first discover and gratefully acknowledge the truths contained in other faiths. This parliament is likely to prove a blessing to many Christians by mark¬ ing the time when they shall cease thinking that the verities and virtues of other religions discredit the claims of Christianity or bar its progress. It is our desire and hope to broaden and purify the mental and spiritual vision of men. Believing that nations and faiths are separated in part by ignorance and prejudice, why shall not this parliament help to remove the one and soften the other? Why should not Christians be glad to learn what God has wrought through Buddha and Zoroaster — through the Sage of China and the prophets of India and the projihet of Islam? We are met together to-day as men, children of God, sharers with all men in weakness and guilt and need, sharers with devout souls everywhere in aspiration and hope and longing. We are met as religious men, believing even here in this capital of material wonders, in the presence of an exposi¬ tion which displays the unparalleled marvels of steam and electricity, that there is a spiritual root to all human progress. We are met in a school of comparative theology, which, I hope, will prove more spiritual and ethical than theological; we are met, I believe, in the temper of love, determined to bury, at least for the time, our sharp hostilities, anxious to find out wherein we agree, eager to learn what constitutes the strength of other faiths and the weakness of our own; and we are met as conscientious and truth-seek¬ ing men, in a council where no one is asked to surrender or abate his individual convictions, and where, I will add, no one would be worthy of a place if he did. We are met in a great conference, men and women of different minds, where the speaker will not be ambitious for short-lived, verbal victories over others, where gentleness, courtesy, wisdom, and moderation will pre¬ vail far more than heated argumentation. I am confident that you appre¬ ciate the peculiar limitations which constitute the peculiar glory of this assembly. We are not here as Baptists and Buddhists, Catholics and Con- fucians, Parsees and Presbyterian Protestants, Methodists and Moslems; we ADDRESS OF WELCOME. 43 are here as members of a Parliament of Religions, over which flies no sectarian flag,which is to be stampeded by no sectarian war-cries, but where for the first time in a large council is lifted up the banner of love, fellowship, brother¬ hood. We all feel that there is a spirit which should always pervade these meetings, and if anyone should offend against this spirit let him not be rebuked publicly or personally; your silence will be a graver and severer rebuke. We are not here to criticise one another, but each to speak out positively and frankly his own convictions regarding his own faith. The great world outside will review our work; the next century will review it. It is our high and noble business to make that work the best possible. There will be social gatherings in the course of this parliament in which we shall be able to get at each other more closely; there will be review sections in the smaller halls where, in a friendly way, through question and answer and suggestion, the great themes to be treated in the Hall of Columbus will be considered and various lights thrown upon them; but in this central hall of the parliament the general programme will be carried out, and I trust always in the spirit which glows in your hearts at this hour. It is a great and wonderful programme that is to be spread before you; it is not all that I could wish or had planned for, but it is too large for any one mind to receive it in its fullness during the seventeen days of our ses¬ sions. Careful and scholarly essays have been prepared and sent in by great men of the old world and the new, which are worthy of the most serious and grateful attention, and I am confident that each one of us may gain enough to make this parliament an epoch of his life. You will be glad with me that, since this is a world of sin and sorrow as well as speculation, our attention is for several days to be given to those greatest practical themes which press upon good men everywhere. How can we make this suffering and needy world less a home of grief and strife, and, far more, a commonwealth of love, a kingdom of Heaven ? How can we abridge the chasms of alienation which have kept good men from co-operating ? How can we bring into closer fellowship those who believe in Christ as the savior of the world ? And how can we bring about a better understanding among the men of all faiths ? I believe that great light will be thrown upon these problems in the coming days. Outside of this central parliament, and yet a part of it, are the con¬ gresses of the various religious bodies in the Hall of Washington and elsewhere. And they will greatly help to complete the picture of the spir¬ itual forces now at work among men, and to bring to a gainsaying and gold-worshiping generation a sense of those diviner forces which are moving on humanity. I can not tell you, with any completeness, how vast and various are my obligations to those who have helped me in this colossal undertaking. Let me, however, give my heartiest thanks to the devout women who, from the beginning, have championed the idea of this parliament and worked for its realization; to the President of the Columbian Exposition and his associ¬ ates; to the President of the World’s Congress Auxiliary, whose patient and Titanic labors will one day be appreciated at their full value; to the Christian and secular press of our country, which has been so friendly and helpful from the start; to the more than 3,000 men and women upon our advisory council in many lands; to the scores of missionaries who have been far¬ sighted and broad-minded enough to realize the supreme value of this par¬ liament; to President Miller, of the Christian College at Madras, who has used his pen and voice in our behalf; to the Buddhist scholars of Japan, who have written and spoken in favor of this congress of the faiths; to Mr. Dharmapala, of Ceylon, who has left important work in connection with his society in Southern India to make this long journey to the heart of America; to Mr. Mozoomdar and all others who have come to us from 44 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. the most populous portion of England’s great empire, which has been well called “ the hugest standing Parliament of Religions in the world; ” to the Imperial Government of China, that has commissioned a learned and able Confucian to speak for one of the faiths of his nation; to scores of the Bishops of the Anglican, Methodist, United Brethren, African Methodist, and other churches; to business men in our own city, who have generously helped me in times of special need, and to the dignitaries of the great Catholic Church of our country, who, through the learned and broad¬ minded rector of the Catholic University at Washington, have brought to us a degree of co-operation and fellowship for which I can never be too grateful. All these I welcome to-day; or, if some of them be not here, I send to them, and to a multitude of others whom I have not named, my affection¬ ate gratitude and fraternal salutation. And to the representatives of the orthodox Greek church, of the Russian church, of the Armenian church, of the Bulgarian and other churches I extend the most cordial welcome and salutation. I believe that you will all feel at home with us; I believe that your coming will enlighten us. We shall hear about the faith of the Parsees in the words of those who hold that ancient doctrine; we shall hear of the faith of the Jains of India in the words of one who belonged to that com¬ munity, which is far older than Christianity. Our minds and our hearts are to be widened as we take in more fully the various works of divine jjrovidence. Welcome, one and all, thrice welcome to the world’s first Parliament ol Religions. Welcome to the men and women of Israel, the standing miracle of nations and religions. Welcome to the disciples of Prince Siddartha, the many millions who cherish in their heart Lord Buddha as the Light of Asia. Welcome to the high priest of the national religion of Japan. This city has every reason to be grateful to the enlightened ruler of the sunrise kingdom. Welcome to the men of India and all faiths! Welcome to all the disciples of Christ, and may God’s blessing abide in our council and entend to the twelve hundred millions of human beings the representatives of whose faiths I address at this moment. It seems to me that the spirits of just and good men hover over this assembly. I believe that the spirit of Paul is here, the zealous missionary of Christ, whose courtesy, wisdom, and unbounded tact were manifest when he preached Jesus and the resurrection beneath the shadows of the Par¬ thenon. I believe the spirit of the wise and humane Buddha is here, and of Socrates, the searcher after truth, and of Jeremy Taylor, and John Mil- ton, and Roger Williams, and Lessing, the great apostles of toleration. I believe that the spirit of Abraham Lincoln, who sought for a church founded on love for God and man, is not far from us, and the spirit of Tennyson, and Whittier, and Phillips Brooks, who looked forward to this parliament as a realization of a noble idea. When, a few years ago, I met for the tirst time the delegates who have come to us from Japan, and shortly after the delegates who have come to us from India, I feel that the arms of human brotherhood had reached almost around the globe. But there is something stronger than human love and fellowship, and what gives us the most hope and happiness to-day is our confidence that The whole round world is every way Bound by gold chains about the feet of God. OFFICIAL WELCOME. ARCHBISHOP FEEHAN OF CHICAGO. On this most interesting occasion, ladies and gentlemen, a privilege has been granted to me—that of giving greeting in the name of the Catholic Church to the members of this Parliament of Religion. Surely we all RESPONSE TO ADDRESSES, 46 regard it as a time and a day of the highest interest, for we have here the commencement of an assembly unique in the history of the world. One of the representatives from the ancient East has mentioned that his king in early days held a meeting something like this, but certainly the modern and historical world has had no such thing. Men have come from distant lands, from many shores. They represent many types of race. They rep¬ resent many forms of faith; some from the distant East, representing its remote antiquity; some from the islands and continents of the West. In all there is a great diversity of opinion, but in all there is a great, high motive. Of all the things that our city has seen and heard during these pass¬ ing months the highest and the greatest is now to be presented to it. For earnest men, learned and eloquent men of different faiths, have come to speak and to tell us of those things that of all are of the highest and deepest interest to us all. W"e are interested in material things; we are interested in beautiful things. We admire the wonders of that new city that has sprung up at the southern end of our great City of Chicago; but when learned men, men representing the thought of the world on religion, come to tell us of God and of His truth, and of life and of death, and of immortality and of justice, and of goodness and of charity, then we listen to what will surpass, infinitely, whatever the most learned or most able men can tell us of material things. Those men that have come together will tell of their systems of faith, without, as has been well said by Dr. Barrows, one atom of surrender of what each one believes to be the truth for him. No doubt it will be of exceeding interest, but whatever may be said in the end, when all is spoken, there will be at least one great result; because no matter how we may differ in faith or religion, there is one thing that is common to us all, and that is a common humanity. And those men representing the races and the faiths of the world, meeting together and talking together and seeing one another, will have for each other in the end a sincere respect and reverence and a cordial and fraternal feeling of friendship. As the privilege which I prize very much has been given to me I bid them all, in my own name, and of that I represent, a most cordial welcome. RESPONSE TO ADDRESSES. CAKDINAL GIBBONS. Your honored president has informed you, ladies and gentlemen, that if I were to consult the interests of my health I should perhaps be in bed this morning, but as I was announced to say a word in response, to the kind speeches that have been offered up to us, I could not fail to present myself at least, and to show my interest in your great undertaking. I would be wanting in my duty as a minister of the Catholic Church if I did not say that it is our desire to present the claims of the Catholic Church to the observation and, if possible, to the acceptance of every right- minded man that will listen to us. But we appeal only to the tribunal of conscience and of intellect. I feel that in possessing my faith I possess a treasure compared with which all treasures of this world are but dross, and, instead of hiding those treasures in my own coverts, I would like to share them with others, especially as I am none the poorer in making others the richer. But though we do not agree in matters of faith, as the Most Reverend Archbishop of Chicago has said, thanks be to God there is one platform on which we all stand united. It is the platform of charity, of humanity, and of benevolence. And as ministers of Christ we thank him for our great model in this particular. Our blessed Redeemer came upon this earth to break down the wall of partition that separated 46 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. race from race and people from people and tribe from tribe, and has made us one people, one family, recognizing God as our common father, and Jesus Christ as our brother. We have a beautiful lesson given to us in the gospel of Jesus Christ— that beautiful parable of the good Samaritan which we all ought to follow. We know that the good Samaritan rendered assistance to a dying man and bandaged his wounds. The Samaritan was his enemy in religion and in faith, his enemy in nationality, and his enemy even in social life. That is the model that we all ought to follow. I trust that we will all leave this hall animated by a greater love for one another, for love knows no distinction of faith. Christ the Lord is our model, I say. We can not, like our divine Savior, give sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf, and walking to the lame and strength to the par¬ alyzed limbs; we can not work the miracles which Christ wrought; but there are other miracles far more beneficial to ourselves that we are all in the measure of our lives capable of working, and those are the miracles of charity, of mercy, and of love to our fellowman. Let no man say that he can not serve his brother. Let no man say, “Am I my brother’s keeper ?” That was the language of Cain, and I say to you all here to-day, no matter what may be your faith, that you are and you ought to be your brother’s keeper. What would become of us Christianii to-day if Christ the Lord had said, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Wo would be all walking in darkness and in the shadow of death, and if to-day we enjoy in this great and beneficent land of ours blessings beyond compar¬ ison, we owe it to Christ, who redeemed us all. Therefore, let us thank God for the blessings He has bestowed upon us. Never do we perform an act so pleasing to God as when we extend the right hand of fel¬ lowship and of practical love to a suffering member. Never do we approach nearer to our model than when we cause the sunlight of Heaven to beam upon a darkened soul; never do we prove ourselves more worthy to be called the children of God our Father than when we cause the flowers of joy and of gladness to grow up in the hearts that were dark and dreary and barren and desolate before. For, as the apostle has well said, “ Religion pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: To visit the orphan and the fatherless and the widow in their tribulations, and to keep one’s self unspotted from this world.” ON BEHALF OF WOMEN. REV. AUGUSTA G. CHAPIN, CHAIRMAN OF THE WOMAN’S COMMITTEE OF ORGANIZATION OF THIS CONGRESS. I am strangely moved as I stand upon this platform and attempt to realize what it means that you all are here from so many lands, represent¬ ing so many and widely differing phases of religious thought and life, and what it means that I am here in the midst of this unique assemblage to represent womanhood and woman’s part in it all. The parliament which assembles in Chicago this morning is the grandest and most significant convocation ever gathered in the name of religion on the face of this earth. There have been and are yet to be within these walls congresses for the discussion of a multitude of themes, each attracting the attention of a select and limited company. But this great Parliament of Religions appeals to all the people of the civilized world, for all who wear the garb of human¬ ity have inherited from the infinite fatherly and motherly One, whose children we are, the same high spiritual nature; we have all of us, whether wise or unwise, rich or poor, of whatever nationality or religion, the same supreme interests, and the same great problems of infinitude, of life and of destiny press upon us all for solution. HARLOW N. HIGINBOTHAM, President World’s Columbian Exposition. V -• /. ADDRESS, 47 The old world, which has rolled on through countless stages and phases of physical progress, until it is an ideal home for the human family, has, through a process of evolution of growth, reached an era of intellectual and spiritual attainment where there is malice toward none and charity for all, where without prejudice, without fear and with perfect fidelity to personal convictions, we may clasp hands across the chasm of our indifferences and cheer each other in all that is good and true. The world’s first Parliament of Religions could not have been called sooner and have gathered the religionists of all these lands together. We had to wait for the hour to strike, until the steamship, the railway, and the telegraph had brought men together, leveled their walls of separation and made them acquainted with each other—until scholars had broken the way through the pathless wilderness of ignorance, superstition, and falsehood, and compelled them to respect each others’ honesty, devotion, and intelli¬ gence. A hundred years ago the world was not ready for this parliament. Fifty years ago it could not have been convened, and had it been called but a single generation ago one-half of the religious world could not have been directly represented. Woman could not have had a part in it in her own right for two reasons; one that her presence would not have been thought of or tolerated, and the other was that she herself was still too weak, too timid, and too unschooled to avail herself of such an opportunity had it been offered. Few indeed were they a quarter of a century ago who talked about the divine brother¬ hood and human brotherhood, and fewer still were they who realized the practical religious power of these great conceptions. Now few are found to question them. I am not an old woman, yet my memory runs easily back to the time when, in all the modern world, there was not one well equipped college or univer¬ sity open to women students, and when, in all the modern world, no woman had been ordained or even acknowledged as a preacher outside the denomi¬ nation of Friends. Now doors are thrown open in our own and many other lands. Women are becoming masters of the languages in which the great sacred literatures of the world are written. They are winning the highest honors that the great universities have to bestow, and already in the field of religion hundreds have been ordained and thousands are freely speak¬ ing and teaching this new gospel of freedom and gentleness that has come to bless mankind. We are still at the dawn of this new era. Its grand possibilities are all before us, and its heights are ours to reach. We are assembled in this great parliament to look for the first time in each others’ faces and to speak to each other our best and truest words. I can only add my heartfelt word of greeting to those you have already heard. I welcome you, brothers of every name and land, who have wrought so long and so well in accordance with the wisdom high heaven has given to you; and I welcome you, sisters, who have come with beating hearts and earnest purpose to this great feast, to participate not only in this parliament but in the great congresses asso¬ ciated with it. Isabella the Catholic had not only the perception of a new world but of an enlightened and emancipated womanhood, which should strengthen religion and bless mankind. I welcome you to the fulfillment of her prophetic vision. ADDRESS. H. N. HIGINBOTHAM, PEESIDENT OF THE WOELD’S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION COMPANY. It affords me infinite pleasure to welcome the distinguished gentlenien who compose this august body. It is a , matter of satisfaction and pride that the relations existing between the peoples and the nations of the earth 48 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. are of such a friendly nature as to make this gathering possible. I have long cherished the hope that nothing would intervene to prevent the frui tion of the labors of your honored chairman. I apprehend that the fruitage of this parliament will richly compensate him and the world and jjrove the wisdom of his work. It is a source of satisfaction that, to the residents of a new city in a far country, should be accorded this great privilege and high honor. The meeting of so many illus¬ trious and learned men under such circumstances, evidences the kindly spirit and feeling that exists throughout the world. To me this is the proudest of the works of our exposition. There is no man, high or low, learned or unlearned, who will not watch with increasing interest, the pro¬ ceedings of this parliament. Whatever may be the differences in the religions you represent, there is a sense in which we are all alike. There is a common plane on which we are all brothers. We owe our being to conditions that are exactly the same. Our journey through this world is by the same route. We have in common the same senses, hopes, ambi¬ tions, joys, and sorrows, and these, to my mind, argue strongly and almost conclusively a common destiny. To me there is much satisfaction and pleasure in the fact that we are brought face to face with men that come to us bearing the ripest wisdom of the ages. They come in the friendliest spirit that, I trust, will be aug¬ mented by their intercourse with us and each other. I hope that your parliament will prove to be a golden milestone on the highway of civiliza¬ tion—a golden stairway leading up to the tableland of a higher, grander, and more perfect condition, where peace will reign and the engines of war be known no more forever. NEW ENGLAND PURITAN. REV. ALEXANDER MCKENZIE OF MASSACHUSETTS. I suppose that everybody who speaks here this morning stands for some thing. The very slight claim I have to be here, rests on the fact that I am one of the original settlers. I am here representing the New England Puritan, the man who has made this gathering possible. The Puritan came early to this country, with a very distinct work to do, and he gave himself distinctly to that work, and succeeded in doing it. There are some who criticise the Puritan, and say that if he had been a different man than he was he would not have been the man he was. I venture to say that if the Puritan had not been precisely the man he was, this gathering would never have been heard of. The little contribu¬ tion that he makes this morning, in the way of welcome to these guests from all parts of the world, is to congratulate them on the opportunity given them of seeing something of the work his hands have established. We are able to show our friends from other countries, not that we have something better than what they have, but that we have that which they can see nowhere else in the world. It would be idle to present trophies of old countries to men from India and Japan. We can not show an old history or stately architecture. We can not point to the castles and abbeys of England, but we can show a new country which means to be old. We can show buildings as tall as any in the world, and we c^m show the displacement of buildings that are a few score years old l)y the stately and elegant structures of our time. But there is another thing we can show, if our brethren from abroad will take pains to notice it. I am not exag¬ gerating when I say that we can show what can be shown nowhere else in the world, and that is, a great republic, and a republic in the process of making by the forces of Christianity. We can show the whole nation, wo can show its beginning, we can show NEW ENGLAND PURITAN. 49 the men who began to make it; at any rate, we can show their pictures, the letters they wrote, and the cradles their children were rocked in. The begin¬ ning of this republic was purely religious. The men who came to start it came from religious motives. Their religion may not have been exactly what other people liked, but they worked with a distinctive religious pur¬ pose. They came here to carry out the work of God. They worked with energy and perseverance and steadfastness to that end. They started on Plymouth Rock a parliament of religion. They had presently in Massa¬ chusetts a parliament of two somewhat varying religions. Then, when the Dutch went to New York, there were three elements of religion in the country. So it has been going on ever since, and if to-day there is any religion in the world which has not its representative in this country, I wish somebody would guess what it is. ^ ^ There is one thing very remarkable in the working out of the Puritan idea; it has never gone backward, there has been no recession, no losing ground from the time the Mayflower took its way from old Plymouth into new Plymouth. There have been little variances from time to time, but they have tended to cement the great idea of building up this republic. At first they were colonies. Presently they shook off their allegiance to the old country and became a country of their own, but fettered and held with slavery, which is inconsistent in any republic. Presently came the revolu¬ tion, which bound them together as a nation, and then came the civil war, which shook slavery off from the republic, and we stood a free and inde¬ pendent nation before the world. Our work advanced without receding, and is still going on. I say that this is the first republic of the world. You may ask if I am not ignorant of history. I believe there were other republics. I have heard of the Roman republic; I have heard of the French republic, and the republics of Central America. But these were not republics in our sense. They w^ere simply the change in form of government of their own people. A republic like this is peculiar in this respect, that we have here twenty-five different nations to make into one, twenty-five different languages, twenty-five different religions, with great diversities, and some no-religions which have more diversity than the religions. Now, with all this diversity of taste, diversity of religion, and desire and purpose, we had to make one nation where the people shall think together, shall worship together, shall rally under the same flag, and shall believe in the same principles and same institutions. Since the morning of crea¬ tion there has never been given to any people in the world so great a task as to make out of twenty-five nations a republic along the old Christian lines. We begun our work with the church and school. I have no sympathy with the discussion which has been frequently heard as to whether we should have the school or the church. You might as well ask, in bringing up children^ whether they should have clothes or bread. Why, in the name of reason, should they not have both? The pilgrim fathers came with the church and came with the school. They were not boys when they came or wild adventurers. They were scholars from the universities of England. They brought books with them and made books, and they founded what they called a university. They believed that no religion has any right to live which does not make men more intelligent, and they believed that there is no intelligence worth hav¬ ing that does not reach out to the highest pinnacle of knowledge. To-day we are simply continuing the process they began. Men sometimes find fault and say that we are a material nation. I think we should give thanks that we are materialists, that we are blessed with railroads, steamships, banks, bankers, and many kinds of money, providing they are good. It would be no use attempting to maintain institutions of religion or schoolhouses without material and financial 50 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. resources. It is rather a reproach to us if we can not advance the institu¬ tions of religion and learning as fast as men advance railroads. I wish our friends would take pains to notice what we are doing here. I should like them to see the line churches of this and other great cities; I should like them to go into the country communities and see our mission¬ ary churches and country schools. I wish they would let me be their guide. 1 would take them to the place on our own Atlantic seaboard, where they can see men manufacturing a republic—taking the black material of humanity and building it up into noble men and women ; taking the red material, wild with every savage instinct, and making it into respectable men. I do not think America has anything better or more hopeful to show than the work of General Armstrong at Hampton. We have not built cathedrals yet, but we have built log schoolhouses, and if you visit them you will see in the cracks between the logs the eternal light streaming in. And for the work we are doing a log schoolhouse is better than a cathedral. THANKS FROM GREECE, MOST KEV. DIONYSIOS LATAS, THE AKCHBISHOP OE ZANTE, GEEECE, A EEPKESENTATIVE OE THE GEEEK CHUECH. Reverend Ministers., Most Honorable Gentlemen., the Superiors of this Congress., and Honorable Ladies and Gentlemen: I consider myself very happy in having set my feet on this platform to take part in the congress of the different nations and peoples. I thank the great American nation, and especially the superiors of this congress, for the high manner in which they have honored me by inviting me to take part, and I thank the min¬ isters of divinity of the different nations and peoples which, for the first time, will write in the books of the history of the world. I thank them still more because this invitation gave me the opportunity to satisfy a desire which I have had for a long time to visit this famous and most glorious country. I sat a long time at Athens, the capital of Greece, and there had the opportunity to become acquainted with many American gentlemen, ministers, professors, and others who came there for the sake of learning the new Greek, and travelers who visited that classic place, the place of the antiquities. By conversing with those gentlemen, I heard and learned many things about America, and I admired from afar the greatness of the country. My desire has always been to visit and see this nation, and now, thanks to Almighty God, I am here in America, within the precincts of the city which is showing the great progress and the wonderful achievements of the human mind. My voice, as representing the little kingdom of Greece, may appear of little importance as compared with the voices of you who represent great and powerful states, extensive cities, and numerous nations, but the influence of the church to which I belong, is extensive and my part is great. But my thanks to the superiors of this congress and my blessings and prayers to Almighty God must not be measured by extent and quantity but by true sympathy and quality. I repeat my thanks to the superiors of this congress, the president, Charles Bonney, and Dr. Barrows. The archbishop then turned to the dignitaries on the plat¬ form and said: Reverend ministers of the eloquent name of God, the creator of your earth and mine, I salute you on the one hand as my brothers in Jesus Christ, from whom, according to our faith, all good has originated in this world. I salute you in the name of the divinely inspired gospel, which. FROM INDIA AND CHINA, 5l according to our faith, is the salvation of the soul of man and the happiness of man in this world. All men have a common creator, without any distinction between the rich and the poor, the ruler and the ruled; all men have a common creator without any distinction of clime or race, without distinction of nationality or ancestry, of name or nobility; all men have a common creator, and con¬ sequently a common father in God. I raise up my hands and I bless with heartfelt love the great country and the happy, glorious people of the United States. ‘‘This indeed is glorious,” cried Mr. Bonney, as the arch¬ bishop resumed his seat, a sentiment which was greeted with prolonged cheering. FROM INDIA AND CHINA. P. C. MOZOOMDAR OF INDIA. P. C. Mozoomdar, of India, was loudly cheered upon rising to make the following address: Leaders of the Parliament of Religions^ Men and Women of America: The recognition, sympathy, and welcome you have given to India to-day are gratifying to thousands of liberal Hindu religious thinkers, whose repre¬ sentatives I see around me, and, on behalf of my countrymen, I cordially thank you. India claims her place in the brotherhood of mankind, not only because of her great antiquity, but equally for what has taken place there in recent times. Modern India has sprung from ancient India by a law of evolution, a process of continuity which explains some of the most difficult problems of our national life. In prehistoric times our forefathers worshiped the great living spirit, God, and, after many strange vicissitudes, we Indian theists, led by the light of ages, worship the same living spirit, God, and none other. Perhaps in other ancient lands this law of continuity has not been so well kept. Egypt aspired to build up the vast eternal in her elaborate sym¬ bolism and mighty architecture. Where is Egypt to-day ? Passed away as a mystic dream in her pyramids, catacombs, and sphynx of the desert. Greece tried to embody her genius of wisdom and beauty in her wonder¬ ful creations of marble, in her all-embracing philosophy; but where is ancient Greece to-day ? She lies buried under her exquisite monuments, and sleeps the sleep from which there is no waking. The Roman cohorts under whose victorious tramp the earth shook to its center, the Roman theaters, laws, and institutions—where are they ? Hid¬ den behind the oblivious centuries, or, if they flit across the mind, only point a moral or adorn a tale. The Hebrews, the chosen of Jehovah, with their long line of law and prophets, how are they ? Wanderers on the face of the globe, driven by king and kaiser, the objects of persecution to the cruel or objects of sym¬ pathy to the kind. Mount Moriah is in the hands of the Musselman, Zion is silent, and over the ruins of Solomon’s Temple a few men beat their breasts and wet their white beards with their tears. But India, the ancient among ancients, the elder of the elders,^ lives to-day with her old civilization, her old laws, and her profound religion. The old mother of the nations and religions is still a power in the world; she has often risen from apparent death, and in the future will arise again. When the Vedic faith declined in India, the esoteric religion of the Vedan- tas arose; then the everlasting philosophy of the Darasanas. When these 52 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. declined again the Light of Asia arose, and established a standard of moral perfection which will yet teach the world a long time. When Buddhism had its downfall, the Shaiva and Vaish Rava revived, and continued in the land down to the invasion of the Mohammedans. The Greeks and Scyth¬ ians, the Turks and Tartars, the Monguls and Musselmen, rolled over her country like torrents of destruction. Our independence, our greatness,' our prestige—all had gone, but nothing could take away our religious vitality. We are Hindus still and shall always be. Now sits Christianity on the throne of India, with the gospel of peace on one hand and the scepter of civilization on the other. Now, it is not the time to despair and die. Behold the aspirations of modern India—intellectual, social, political—all awak¬ ened; our religious instincts stirred to the roots. If that had not been the case do you think Hindus, Jains, Buddhists, and others would have trav¬ ersed these 14,000 miles to pay the tribute of their sympathy before this august Parliament of Religions? No individual, no denomination, can more fully sympathize or more heartily join your conference than we men of the Brahmo Somaj, whose religion is the harmony of all religions, and whose congregation is the brotherhood of all nations. Such, being our aspirations and sympathies, dear brethren, accept them. Let me thank you again for this welcome in the name of my countrymen, and wish every prosperity and success to your labors. HON. PUNG QUANG YU, SECRETAEY OF THE CHINESE LEGATION IN WASHINGTON Began to read the address, but was unable to make himself heard. He, therefore, turned the manuscript over to Dr. Barrows, who read, in ringing tones, the following: On behalf of the imperial government of China, I take great pleasure in responding to the cordial words which the chairman of the general com¬ mittee and others have spoken to-day. This is a great moment in the his¬ tory of nations and religions. For the first time men of various faiths meet in one great hall to report what they believe and the grounds for their belief. The great Sage of China, who is honored not only by the millions of our own land, but throughout the world, believed that duty was summed up in reciprocity, and I think that the word reciprocity finds a new mean¬ ing and glory in the proceedings of this historic parliament. I am glad that the great empire of China has accepted the invitation of those who have called this parliament and is to be represented in this great school of comparative religion. Only the happiest results will come, I am sure, from our meeting together in the spirit of friendliness. Each may learn from the other some lessons, I trust, of charity and good will, and discover what is excellent in other faiths than his own. In behalf of my government and people I extend to the representatives gathered in this great hall the friend¬ liest salutations, and to those who have spoken I give my most cordial thanks. LEGEND OF RUSSIA. PRINCE SERGE WOLKONSKY OF RUSSIA. Those who, during the last week, have had the opportunity of attending not only the congresses of one single church, but who could witness differ¬ ent congresses of different churches and congregations must have been struck with a noticeable fact. They went to the Catholic congress and LEGEND OF RUSSIA. 53 heard beautiful words of charity and love. Splendid orators invoked the blessings of heaven upon the children of the Catholic Church, and in elo¬ quent terms the listeners were entreated to love their human brothers, in the name of the Catholic Church. They went to the Lutheran congress and heard splendid words of humanity, and brotherhood, orators inspired with love and the blessing of God invoked on the children of the Lutheran church. Those who were present were taught to love their human broth¬ ers, in the name of the Lutheran church. They went to other more limited congresses, and everywhere they heard these same great words, proclaim¬ ing these same great ideas and inspiring these same great feelings. They saw a Catholic archbishop who went to a Jewish congress and with fiery eloquence brought feelings of brotherhood to his Hebraic sisters. Not in one of these congresses did a speaker forget that he belonged to humanity, and that his own church or congregation was but a starting point, a center for a further radiation. This is the noticeable fact that must have struck everybody, and everybody must have asked himself at the end of the week: “Why don’t they come together, all these people who all speak the same language? Why do not all these splendid orators unite their voices in one single chorus, and, if they preach the same ideas, why don’t they proclaim them in the name of the same and single truth that inspires them all?” This seems to have been the idea of those who, in comjwsing the programmes of the religious congresses, decided that the general religious congress should follow the minor ones. To-night, in fact, we see the representatives of different churches gathered together, and actuated with one common desire of union. Being called to welcome it on the day of its opening, I will take the liberty of relating to you a popular legend of my country. The story may appear rather too humorous for the occasion, but one of our national writers says: “Humor is an invisible tear through a visible smile,” and we think that human tears, human sorrow and pain are sacred enough to be brought even before a religious congress. There was an old woman, who for many centuries suffered tortures in the fiames of hell, for she had been a great sinner during her earthly life. One day she saw far away in the distance an angel taking his flight through the blue skies; and with the whole strength of her voice she called to him. The call must have been desperate, for the angel stopped in his flight and coming down to her asked her what she wanted. “ When you reach the throne of God,” she said, “ tell him that a miser¬ able creature has suffered more than she can bear, and, that she asks the Lord to be delivered from these tortures.” The angel promised to do so and flew away. When he had transmitted the message God said: “ Ask her whether she has done any good to anyone during her life.’’ The old woman strained her memory in search of a good action during her sinful past, and all at once: “I’ve got one,” she joyfully exclaimed: “ one day I gave a carrot to a hungry beggar.” The angel reported the answer. “ Take a carrot,” said God to the angel, “ and stretch it out to her. Let her grasp it, and if the plant is strong enough to draw her out from hell she shall be saved.” This the angel did. The poor old woman clung to the carrot. The angel began to pull, and lo! she began to rise! But when her body was half out of the fiames she felt another weight at her feet. Another sinner was clinging to her, She kicked, but it did not help. The sinner would not let go his hold, and the angel, continuing to pull, was lifting them both. But, oh! another sinner clung to them, and then a third, and more and always more—a chain of miserable creatures hung at the old woman’s feet. The 54 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. angel never ceased pulling. It did not seem to be any heavier than the small carrot could support, and they all were lifted in the air. But the old woman suddenly took fright. Too many people were availing themselves of her last chance of salvation, and, kicking and pushing those who were clinging to her, she exclaimed: “Leave me alone; hands off; the carrot is mine.” No sooner had she pronounced this word “ mine ” than the tiny stem broke, and they all fell back to hell, and forever. In its poetical artlessness and popular simplicity this legend is too elo¬ quent to need interpretation. If any individual, any community, any con¬ gregation, any church, possesses a portion of truth and of good, let that truth shine for everybody; let that good become the property of everyone. The substitution of the word “mine” by the wwd “ours,” and that of “ ours ’ by the word “ everyone’s ” — this is what will secure a fruitful result to our collective efforts as well as to our individual activities. This is why we welcome and greet the opening of this congress, where, in a combined effort of the representatives of all churches, all that is great and good and true in each of them is brought together, in the name of the same God and for the sake of the same man. We congratulate the president, the members and all the listeners of this congress upon the tendency of union that has gathered them on the soil of the country whose allegorical eagle, spreading her mighty wings over the stars and stripes, holds in her talons these splendid words: “ E Pluribus Unum.” SHINTO BISHOP OF JAPAN. RIGHT REV. RENCHI SHIBATA, REPRESENTATIVE OF THE SHINTO FAITH, THE STATE RELIGION OF JAPAN. The bishop appeared in his full pontificals and salaamed profoundly toward the audience and to the right and left w^hen he came forward. Mr. Bonney, in his words of introduction, alluded to the rapidity with which Japan had advanced in civilization, and the peculiar kindness felt by the people of this country toward the people of the empire of the mikado. The address was read by Dr. Barrows. I can not help doing honor to the Congress of Religions held here in Chicago as the result of the partial effort of those philanthropic brothers who have undertaken this, the greatest meeting ever held. It was fourteen years ago that I expressed, in my own country, the hope that there should be a friendly meeting between the world’s religionists, and now I realize my hope with great joy in being able to attend these phenomenal meetings. In the history of the past we read of repeated and tierce conflicts between different religious creeds which sometimes ended in war. But that time has passed away and things have changed with advancing civil¬ ization. It.is a great blessing, not only to the religions themselves, but also to human affairs, that the different religionists can thus gather in a friendly way and exchange their thoughts and opinions on the important problems of the age. I trust that these repeated meetings will gradually increase the fraternal relations between the different religionists in investigating the truths of the universe, and be instrumental in uniting all religions of the world, and WORDS ON TOLERATION. 55 in bringing all hostile nations into peaceful relations by leading them unto the way of perfect justice. When he had finished reading, Dr. Barrows introduced three Buddhist priests from Japan, namely, Zitzuzen Ashitsu, Shaku Soyen, and Horin Tokia. The priests arose and remained standing while Z. Noguchi, their interpreter, said: ' I thank you on behalf of the Japanese Buddhist priests for the wel¬ come you have given us and for the kind invitation to participate in the proceedings of this congress. Dr. Barrows said that the Buddhists were bishops in their land, and had been touched with the kind greetings and hos¬ pitalities they had received since arriving in America. WORDS ON TOLERATION. COUNT BEKENSTOKFF OF GEKMANY. I am happy to be able, as a German, to return words of thanks for the kind welcome that has just been expressed to the visitors from different nations. I can hardly say that I speak on behalf of Germany. Not coun¬ tries as such, nor even churches as such, can take part in a conference like this. I fully understand that men, who in high offices represent the church, hesitated to accept the invitation, which, as private persons, they would perhaps gladly have followed. I think the gentlemen who have come to attend this parliament, yet unique in the history of the world, come as individuals, not binding, by their presence, the religious or national bodies to which they belong; but this does not in the least diminish the value of their presence here. They come as men engaged in the religious work of their country, and are representative men as such, even if no religious body has given them full powers. I also come only as an individual, but in the hope that I may, perhaps, help a little to further the great object which you, who so kindly invited us, have in view. It is a great pleasure to me to be once more in this great country, which I visited for the first time in 1873. One week spent here twenty years ago has remained deeply rooted in my memory. Let me begin by stating my great pleasure, and I know that I am not alone with this feeling in my country, that for the first time religion should be officially connected with a world’s exhibition. Religion, the most vital question for every human being, is generally laid aside at such gatherings, and men are too apt to forget the claims of God in the bustle of life. Here is a free country, where the church is not supported by the government, and yet where the churches have more influence on public life than any¬ where else. It has been recognized that such a large influx of men should not meet without paying attention to the question of all questions. This parliament is, therefore, a testimony, and one whose voice will, I trust, be heard all over the earth, that men live not by bread alone, but that the care for the immortal soul is the paramount question for every man, the ques¬ tion which ought to be treated before all others when men of all nations meet. The basis of this congress is common humanity. Though the term humanity has often been used to designate the purely human apart from all claims of divinity, I hesitate not, as an evangelical Christian, to accept this thesis. It is the Bible which teaches us that the human race is all 56 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. descended from one couple, and that they are, therefore, one family. Let us not forget this; but the Bible also teaches that man is created after the image of God. Therefore, man as such, quite apart from the circumstances which made him be born among some historic religion, is meant to come into connection with God. I have heard preachers who spoke at the anni¬ versary of a reformation say that children who were baptized end what obligations this fact lays upon them. I could not help thinking that if children were not baptized, would not the duty to lead them to Christ be quite the same? He said every child is a member of the great human family. Has the offspring of that race, created after the image of God, the right to be brought into contact with truth? If this was not the case the precept which states in the Old Testament, “ Love thy neighbor as thyself,” would have been impossible. It is based on the principle that every man, as such, through his religious convictions, has a claim on our help; yea, more, on our love Even the Jews, who were separated from all other nations of the world, had this taught to them. The abuse of this truth, made by men of no religion, can not abrogate the truth itself. If this parliament helps to bring forth this truth in the right light, if it shows that we can profess common humanity wdthout putting the human in opposition to the divine, it will do a great w^ork for the progress of civilization. The word “ neighbor ” in that precept that we are to love our neighbor as ourself seems very narrow at first sight. It seems as if it only meant the person who lives next door to us, but in truth it is very comprehensive. The parable of the good Samaritan shows that the suffering one is our neighbor in so far as he requires our help. Every man is our neighbor. Every man practically becomes so by being brought near to us. Now the World’s Fair, by bringing together a number of men from all nations, makes neighborhood practical for many peox)le who never met before. Altogether the progress of civilization, the facilities offered for locomotion in this century of steam and electricity, make many men closer neighbors than they were before, and if all the representatives of foreign nations who come here for the Fair are told by this jjarliament that every man has a claim on the love of every other for the sake of the common humanity, it is a lesson which certainly deserves not to be lost. We alreadv feel that for¬ eigners coming here can learn much, esjjecially from the great voluntary Christian efforts of Americans. This parliament teaches us that other great lesson. Not that—some one might say, and I have heard the objections expressed before—this idea of humanity will tend to make religion indifferent to us. I will openly con¬ fess that I also for a time felt the strength of this objection, but I trust that nobody is here who thinks light of his own religion, I, for myself, declare that I am here as an individual evangelical Chris¬ tian, and that I should never have set my foot in this parliament if I thought that it sign^'fied anything like a consent that all religions are equal and that it is only necessary to be sincere and upright. I can consent to nothing of this kind. I believe only the Bible to be true and Protestant Christianity the only true religion. I wish no compromise of any kind. We can not deny that we who meet in this parliament are separated by great and imi)ortant principles. We admit that these differences can not be bridged over, but we meet, believing everybody has the right to his faith. You invite everybody to come here as a sincere defender of his own faith. I, for my part, stand befc^re you with -the same wdsh that prompted Paul when he stood before the representative of the Roman congress and Agrippa, the Jewish king. I would to God that all that hear me to-day were both almost and altogether such as I am. I can not accept these bonds. I thank God that I am free, except for all these faults and defi¬ ciencies which are in me and which prevent me embracing my creed as I should like to do. GREETING FROM FRANCE. 57 But what do we then meet for if we can not show tolerance. Well, the word tolerance is used in a very different way. If the words of the great King Frederick, of Prussia, “ In my country everybody can go to heaven after his own fashion,” are used as a maxim of statesmanship, we can not approve of it too highly. What bloodshed, what cruelty would have been spared in the history of the world if it had been adopted. But if it is the expression of the religious indifference prevalent during this last century and at the court of the monarch who was the friend of Voltaire then we must not accept it. St Paul, in his epistle tc the Galatians, rejects every other doctrine, even if it were taught by an angel from heaven. We Christians are servants of our master, the living Savior. We have no right to com¬ promise the truth He intrusted to us, either to think lightly of it, or with¬ hold the message He has given us for humanity. But we meet together, each one wishing to gain the others to his own creed. Will this not be a parliament of war instead of peace? Will it bring us further from instead of nearer to each other? I think not if we hold fast our truths that these great vital doctrines can only be defended and propagated by spiritual means. An honest fight with spiritual weapons need not estrange the combatants; on the contrary, it often brings them nearer. I think this conference will have done enough to engrave its memory forever on the leaves of history if this great principle found general adoption. Our light is dawning in every heart, and the 19th century has brought us much progress in this respect; yet we risk to enter the 20th century before the great principle of religious liberty has found universal acceptance. I am proud that in Prussia the ideas of religious liberty are so far advanced. The present Bohemian churches in our capital are a horrible memorial of how the Protestants of Bohemia and Austria found refuge in our country. Many blessings have come from these immigrants. The Jews are also fully emancipated with us, as the law gives all religious liberty. In Roman Catholic countries, like Spain, every obstacle is put in the way of Protestants. In Turkey, and equally in Russia, we hear of sad persecutions. The principle of religious liberty is based on the grand foundation that God wants the voluntary observance of free men. GREETING FROM FRANCE. PEOFESSOR G. BONET MAURY. Ladies and Gentlemen: It is for me a great honor to have to answer for France, my country, to the welcome greetings which have been just now expressed by our president, Mr. Bonney, and by the energetic chairman of the organizing committee of the Parliament of Religions, Rev. J. H. Bar- rows, and others. That honor fell due to more prominent leaders of relig¬ ious thought in our country, such as Albert Reville, the learned professor of the history of religions at our College de Prance (Paris), or Baron de Shickler, the generous president of our “ Societe d’Histoire du Protestant- isme Francais.” Unhappily they were prevented from coming here, and therefore I ought to speak—not as a delegate of the French Government, or of such a one or such another church—but as a Christian Frenchman and a liberal Protestant. I consider it as my first duty to this Columbus Hall to say to you American friends, “Hail, Columbia! Hail, the land of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln! The glorious country in the New World, which was the first cradle of liberty for men of every religion, of every nation, of every color! Hail to the land of Channing and Longfellow, of Emerson and Parker, of Fulton and Graham Bell, those heralds of poetical and Christian 58 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. ideals. We, republican and Protestant Frenchmen, are much obliged to them all, not only as business men, but as Christians. It was from those heaven-born heroes, from those spiritual prophets that our great citizens, Lafayette, Mirabeau, Tocqueville, and Laboulaye, Ath. Coquerel, Sr., and Reville, have taken example to introduce in France the capital prin¬ ciples of self-government, of religious liberty, and of ecclesiastical tolera¬ tion. But the republic of the United States has not degenerated from its illustrious founders; it is a fertile ground, unceasingly bringing forth new inventions or pregnant ideas. I ought afterward to pay to the organiz¬ ing committee of this Parliament of Religions a tribute of admiration for its colossal efforts and to present it my heartiest wishes for its success. It is, indeed, the first time since the days of the conqueror Akbar, who reigned in East India at the end of the 26th century, that an attempt is made to bring the representative men of the various, and, alas ! often adverse relig¬ ions of mankind into a pacific intercourse. The great Mongol emperor had proclaimed full toleration of all religions among his numerous sub¬ jects, and, consequently, he ordered to be built near his palace in Agra a splendid hall, with large rooms, where Brahmins, rabbis, and court mission¬ aries found opportunities of debating with each other on religious matters. There is also at Paris a similar institution in our religious branch of the “ Ecole fratique des hauter etude.” You might have seen for six years in the old Sorbama’s house, just now pulled down, Roman Catholios and Protestant ministers, Hebrew and Buddhist scholars commenting on the sacred books of old India and Egypt, Greece and Palestine, or telling the history of the various branches of the Christian Church. Well now, gentlemen, you have resumed the same work as the conqueror Akbar, and more recently the French Republic. You have convoked here, in that tremendous city which is itself a wonder of human industry and, as it were, a modern Phoenix springing again from its ashes, representa¬ tive men of all great religions of the earth, in order to discuss, on courteous and pacific terms, the eternal problem of divinity, which is the torment, but also the sign of sovereignty of man over all animal beings. I present you the hearty messages of all friends of religious liberty in France and my best wishes for your success. May God, the Almighty Father, help you in your noble undertaking. May He give us all His spirit of love, of truth, of liberty, of mutual help, and unlimited progress, so that we may become pure as He is pure, good as He is good, loving as He is love, perfect as He is perfect, and we shall find in these moral improvements the possession of real liberty, equality, and fraternity. For, as said our genial poet, Victor Hugo: All men are sons of the same father. They are the same tear and pour from the same eye I FROM AUSTRALASIA, ARCHBISHOP REDWOOD OF NEW ZEALAND. I am glad, indeed, that it has been announced to you that I shall address you in only a few words, for we have been here so long, we have been listening to such strains of eloquence, we have had our minds so enlarged by the presence of this multitude and the varied representatives of the races and colors of mankind, that it would be impossible for me at this stage of the proceedings to detain you for any great length of time. However, as your honorable president has had the kindness to say, I have at least one merit, that of having come from afar. I have also another merit: I have the honor of representing the newest phase of civilization of the Anglo-Saxon race and the English speaking people. FROM AUSTRALASIA. 59 I represent Australia, a country divided into various colonies, governing themselves with wonderful freedom, and, I may say without boasting, making rapid advances on the way to true civilization. I deem it a very great honor and privilege to be present on such an occasion as this in an assembly that begins as it were on a new era for mankind—an era, I believe, of real brotherly love. It is a sad spectacle, when the mind ranges over a whole universe, to see that multitude of 1,200,000,000 of human beings created by the same God, destined to the same happiness, and yet divided by various barriers; to see that instead of love prevailing from nation to nation, there are barriers of hatred dividing them. I believe an occasion like this is the strongest possible means of removing forever such barriers. I stand here as the representative of that distant land, of that noble old church founded by God from the beginning ; for, as one of the holy fathers said, the beginning of all things is the holy Catholic Church. We go back to Christ, her founder; to Christ, foretold thousands of years before he came. There she stands as a landmark in history. In her teaching there is an event which the human race shall never forget—that the Godhead took up our human nature to so elevate and unite it with the divine nature, whence began a brotherhood of man never dreamed of by merely human beings. Now we can walk the earth and say truly we are the brothers of God. Indeed, in the whole of creation is the brotherhood of God known. It is known in the soul representing the spiritual creation, in the body repre¬ senting the material creation, for man’s body is an epitome of the material universe. Is it indeed that God glorified and deified the whole of creation in that act, so that now the very mountains, trees, rocks, and plants can be saluted not only as his creation but as Christ’s brother ? These are the great ideas that underlie Christianity fully understood. We are to remove, in this 19th century, the barriers of hatred that prevent men from listen¬ ing to the truth contained in all religions. In all religions there is a vast element of truth, otherwise they would have no cohesion. They all have something respectable about them, they all have vast elements of truth ; and the first thing for men, to respect themselves and to take away the barriers of hatred, is to see what is noble in their respective beliefs, and to respect each other for the knowledge of the truth contained therein. Therefore I think that this Parliament of Religions, will promote the gr eat brotherhood of mankind, and in order to promote that brotherhood it will promote the expansion of truth. I do not pretend as a Catholic to have the whole truth or to be able to solve all the problems of the human mind. I can appreciate love and esteem and any element of truth found outside of that great body of truth. Some men have said we are the lovers of truth, we are the seekers of truth, we are the philosophers of truth, but Christ had the divine audacity to say, “ I am the truth.” Wherever there is truth there is something worthy the respect not only of man but of God, the god-man, the incarnate God. Therefore, in order to sweep away the iDarriers of hatred that exist in the world, we must respect the elements of truth contained in all religions, and we must respect also the elements of morality contained in all religions. Man is an intelligent being and therefore he requires to know truth. He is also a moral being that is bound to live up to that truth and is bound to use his will and liberty in accordance with truth. He is bound to be a righteous being. W’e find in all religions a number of truths that are the foundation, the bed-rock of all morality, and we see them in the various religions throughout the world, and we can surely, without sacrificing one point of Catholic morality or of truth, admire those truths revealed in some manner by God. 60 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. Man is not only a mortal being, but a social being. Now the condition to make him happy and prosperous as a social being, to make him pro¬ gress and go forth to conquer the world, both mentally and physically, is that he should be free, and not only to be free as a man in temporal matters, but to be free in religious matters. Therefore, it is to be hoped that from this day will date the dawn of that period when, through¬ out the whole of the universe, in every nation the idea of oppressing any man for his religion will be swept away. I think I can say in the name of the young country I represent, in the name of New Zealand, and thechurch of Australasia that has made such a marvelous progress in our day, that we hope God will speed that day. Less than a century ago there were only two Catholic priests in the whole of Australasia. Now we have a hierarchy of one cardinal, six archbishops, eighteen bishops, a glorious army of priests, with brotherhoods, and sisterhoods teaching schools in the most practical manner. The last council of the church held in Sydney sent her greeting to the church in America, and the church in America was seized by sur¬ prise and admiration at the growth of Christianity in that distant land. It is in the name of that church I accept with the greatest feeling of thank¬ fulness the greeting made to my humble self representing that new country of New Zealand and that thriving and advancing country of Australasia. GOOD WISHES OF CEYLON. H. DHAEMAPALA OP CEYLON. Friends: I bring to you the good wishes of 475,000,000 of Buddhists, the blessings and peace of the religious founder of that system which has prevailed so many centuries in Asia, which has made Asia mild, and which is to-day in its twenty-fourth century of existence, the prevailing religion of the country. I have sacrificed the greatest of all work to attend this par¬ liament. I have left the work of consolidation — an important work which we have begun after 700 years—the work of consolidating the different Buddhist countries, which is the most important work in the history of modern Buddhism. When I read the programme of this Parliament of Religions I saw it was simply the re-echo of a great consummation which the Indian Buddhists accomplished twenty-four centuries ago. At that time Asoka, the great emperor, held a council in the city of Patma of 1,000 scholars, which was in session for seven months. The pro¬ ceedings were epitomized and carved on rock and scattered all over the Indian peninsula and the then known globe. After the consummation of that programme the great emperor sent the gentle teachers, the mild dis¬ ciples of Buddha, in the garb that you see on this platform, to instruct the world. In that plain garb they went across the deep rivers, the Himalayas, to the plains of Mongolia and the Chinese plains, and to the far-off beauti¬ ful isles, the empire of the rising sun; and the influence of that congress held twenty-one centuries ago is to-day a living power, because you every¬ where see mildness in Asia. Go to any Buddhist country and where do you find such healthy com¬ passion and tolerance as you find there? Go to Japan, and what do you see? The noblest lessons of tolerance and gentleness. Go to any of the Buddhist countries and you will see the carrying out of the programme adopted at ^he congress called by the Emperor Asoka. Why do I come here to-day? Because I find in this new city, in this land of freedom the very place where that programme can also be carried out. For one year I meditated whether this parliament would be a success. Then I wrote to Dr. Barrows that this would be the proudest occasion of modern history, and the crowning work of nineteen centuries. Yes, friends, if you are serious, if you are unselfish, if you are altruistic, this programme DR. CARL VON BERGEN Of Stockholm, Sweden. SWEDEN FOR CHRIST. 61 can be carried out, and the 20th century will see the teachings of the meek and lowly Jesus accomplished. I hope in this great city, the youngest of all cities but the greatest of all cities, this programme will be carried out, and that the name of Dr. Barrows will shine forth as the American Asoka. And I hope that the noble lessons of tolerance, learned in this majestic assembly, will result in the dawning of universal peace, which will last for twenty centuries more A recess was then taken until 2:30 o’clock. SWEDEN FOR CHRIST. DE. GAEL VON BEEGEN OF STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN. There is at present, and has existed during a long time in the past, a bond of mental, spiritual affinity between the leaders of religious thought in Sweden and the United States of America. Those grand and glorious principles, which are, so to say, the foundation-stones upon which this great international congress hopes to build the temple of religious truth for the everlasting benefit of coming generations, have been—every one of them—enunciated and proclaimed to the multitude long ago by world- famous seers and sages in Sweden. They are, in our days, the war-cry of those “ worshipers of God and lovers of human progress ” (to use the words of our respected President, Mr. Bonney) in Sweden, who do battle, with unrelenting energy, against an earth-bound, superficial, grossly unscientific atheism and materialism, which makes itself sometimes the mouthpiece of a teaching of immorality most vile and pernicious. The speaker quoted from the printed programme of the Parliament of Religions several of the principles, to which he referred—religious freedom, universal brotherhood of man, tolerance, unity of God, Christ as the Savior of mankind—and he showed by quotations from great Swedish scientists, philosophers, historians, and poets, that all those lofty ideas have been and are the watchwords of the leaders and representative men in his own country. The heroes of Swedish science and literature—men such as the immortal Linnaeus, Swedenborg, Berzelius, Agardh, Geijer, Tegner, Wallin, Bostrom, Viktor Rydberg, and many others—have all joined in the strain that was struck on the lyre of the grand bard of modern England, Alfred Tennyson: King out the darkness of the land, King in the Christ that is to be! “ In sign you will conquer!” Such is the conviction of the truly great ones and the best in Sweden as well as in America. WORD FROM BOMBAY. Vichand A. Gandhi, a lawyer of Bombay, and one of the chief exponents of Jain religion of that oriental country: Mr. President., Ladies and Gentlemen: I will not trouble you with a long speech. I, like my respected friends, Mr. Mozoomdar and others, come from India, the mother of religions. I represent Jainism, a faith 62 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. older than Buddhism, similar to it in its ethics, but different from it in its psychology, and professed by 1,500,000 of India’s most peaceful and law- abiding citizens. You have heard so many speeches from eloquent mem¬ bers, and as I shall speak later on at some length, I will therefore, at present, only offer, on behalf of my community and their high priest, Moni Atma Ranji, whom I especially represent here, our sincere thanks for the kind welcome you have given us. This spectacle of the learned leaders of thought and religion meeting together on a common platform, and throwing light on religious problems, has been the dream of Atma Ranji’s life. He has commissioned me to say to you that he offers his most cordial con¬ gratulations on his own behalf, and on behalf of the Jain community, for your having achieved the consummation of that grand idea, of convening a Parliament of Religions. GREETING FROM OLD ARMENIA. In introducing Professor Minas Sclierez, editor of an Arme¬ nian newspaper published in London, Dr. Barrows appropri¬ ately referred to the fact that Armenia is supposed to have been the cradle of the race, and that, according to the Biblical story, the ark, after the flood, rested on Mount Ararat, in Armenia. He paid a tribute to the noble traits exhibited by the old Arme¬ nian Christian nation when suffering under persecution. Salutations to the New World, in the name of Armenia, the oldest coun¬ try of the Old World. Salutations to the American people, in the name of Armenia, which has been twice the cradle of the human race. Salutations to the Parlialnent of Religions, in the name of Armenia, where the religious feeling first blossomed in the enraptured heart of Adam. Salutations to every one of you, brothers and sisters, in the name of the Tigris and the Euphrates, which watered the Garden of Eden; in the name of the majes¬ tic Ararat, which was crowned by the ark of Noah; in the name of a church which was almost contemporary with Christ. A pious thought animated Christopher Columbus when he directed the prow of his ship toward this land of his dreams: To convert the natives to the faith of the Roman Catholic Church. A still more pious thought animates you now, noble Americans, because you try to convert the whole of humanity to the dogma of universal toleration and fraternity. Old Armenia blesses this grand undertaking of young America, and wishes her to succeed in laying, on the extinguished volcanoes of religious hatred, the foundation of the temple of peace and concord. At the beginning of our sittings, allow the humble representatives of the Armenian people to invoke the divine benediction on our labors, in the very language of his fellow-countrymen: Zkorzs tserats merots oogheegh ora i mez, Der, yev zkorzs tserats merots achoghia mez. SEES SPIRIT AND MATTER. PROFESSOR C. N. CHAKRAVARRTI, A THEOSOPHIST FROM INDIA. I came here to represent a religion, the dawn of which appeared in a misty antiquity which the powerful microscope of modern research has not yet been able to discover; the depth of whose beginnings the plummet of history has not been able to sound. From time immemorial spirit has been represented by white, and matter has been represented by black, and SEES SPIRIT AND MATTER. 63 the two sister streams which join at the town from which I came, Allaha¬ bad, represent two sources of spirit and matter, according to the philosophy of my people. And when I think that here, in this City of Chicago, this vortex of physicality, this center of material civilization, you hold a Parlia¬ ment of Religions; when I think that, in the heart of the World’s Pair, where abound all the excellencies of the physical world, you have provided also a hall for the feast of reason and the flow of soul, I am once more reminded of my native land. “ Why ? Because here, even here, I find the same two sister streams of spirit and matter, of the intellect and physicality, joining hand and hand, representing the symbolical evolution of the universe. I need hardly tell you that, in holding this Parliament of Religions, where all the religions of the world are to be represented, you have acted worthily of the race that is in the vanguard of civilization—a civilization the chief characteristic of which, to my mind, is widening toleration, breadth of heart, and liberality toward all the different religions of the world. In allowing men of different shades of religious opinion, and holding different views as to philosophical and metaphysical problems, to speak from the same platform—aye, even allowing me, who, I confess, am a heathen, as you call me—to speak from the same platform with them, you have acted in a manner worthy of the motherland of the society which I have come to represent to-day. The fundamental principle of that society is universal tolerance; its cardinal belief that, underneath the superficial strata, runs the living water of truth. I have always felt that between India and America there was a closer bond of union in the times gone by, and I do think it is probable that there may be a subtler reason for the identity of our names than either the theory of Johnson or the mistake of Columbus can account for. It is true that I belong to a religion which is now decrepit with age, and that you belong to a race in the first flutter of life, bristling with energy. And yet you can not be surprised at the sympathy between us, because you must have observed the secret union that sometimes exists between age and childhood. It is true that in the East we have been accustomed to look toward some¬ thing which is beyond matter. We have been taught for ages after ages, and centuries after centuries, to turn our gaze inward toward realms that are not those which are reached by the helx) of the physical senses. This fact has given rise to the various schools of philosophy that exist to-day in India, exciting the wonder and admiration, not only of the dead East, but of the living and rising West. We have in India, even to this day, thou¬ sands of people who give up as trash, as nothing, all the material comforts and luxuries of life with the hope, with the realization, that, great as the physical body may be, there is something greater within man, underneath the universe, that is to be longed for and striven after. In the West you have evolved such a stupendous energy on the physical plane, such unparalleled vigor on the intellectual plane, that it strikes any stranger landing on your shores with a strange amazement. And yet I can read, even in this atmosphere of material progress, I can discern beneath this thickness of material luxury a secret and mystic aspiration to some¬ thing spiritual. I can see that even you are getting tired of your steam, of your elec¬ tricity, and the thousand different material comforts that follov/ these two great powers. I can see that there is a feeling of despondency coming even here — that matter, pursued however vigorously, can be only to the death of all, and it is only through the clear atmosphere of spirituality that you can mount up to the regions of peace and harmony. In the West, there¬ fore, you have developed this material tendency. In the East we have developed a great deal of the spiritual tendency, but even in this West, as I travel from place to place, from New York to Cincinnati, and from Cin- THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. G4 cinnati to Chicago, I have observed an ever increasing readiness of people to assimilate spiritual ideas, regardless of the source from which they ema¬ nate. This, ladies and gentlemen, I consider a most significant sign of the future, because through this and through the mists of prejudice that still hang on the horizon will be consummated the great event of the future, the union of the East and of the West. The East enjoys the sacred satisfaction of having given birth to all the great religions of the world, and even as the physical sun rises ever from the East, the sun of spirituality has always dawned in the East. To the West belongs the proud privilege of having advanced on the intellectual and on the moral plane, and of having supplied to the world all the various contrivances of material luxuries and of physical comfort. I look, there¬ fore, upon a union of the East and West as a most significant event, and I look with great hope upon the day when the East and the West will be like brothers helping each other, each supplying to the other what it wants — the West supplying the vigor, the youth, the power of organization, and the East opening up its inestimable treasures of a spiritual law and which are now locked up in the treasure boxes grown rusty with age. And I think that this day, with the sitting of the Parliament of Relig¬ ions, we begin the work of building up a perennial fountain from which wdll flow for the next century waters of life and light and of peace, slaking the thirst of the thousands of millions that are to come after us. MOST ANCIENT ORDER OF MONKS. SWAMI VIVEKANANDA OF BOMBAY, INDIA. When Mr. Vivekananda had addressed the audience as “ Sisters and Brothers of America,” there arose a peal of applause that lasted for several minutes. He spoke as follows: It fills my heart with joy unspeakeable to rise in response to the warm and cordial welcome which you have given us. I thank you in the name of the most ancient order of monks in the world; I thank you in the name of the mother of religion, and I thank you in the name of the millions and millions of Hindu people of all classes and sects. My thanks, also, to some of the speakers on this platform who have told you that these men from far-off nations may well claim the honor of bearing to the different lands the idea of toleration. I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions to be true. I am proud to tell you that I belong to a religion into W’hose sacred language, the Sanscrit, the word seclusion is untranslatable. I am proud to belong to a nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and all nations of the earth. I am proud to tell you that we have gathered in our bosom the purest remnant of the Israelites, a remnant which came to southern India and took refuge with us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to pieces by Roman tyranny. I am proud to belong to the religion which has sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation. I will quote to you, brethren, a few lines from a hymn which I remember to have repeated from my earliest boyhood, which is every day repeated by millions of human beings: “As the different streams having their sources in different places, all mingle their water in the sea, Oh, Lord, so the different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee.” Canada as a link in the empire. 65 The present convention, which is one of the most august assemblies ever held, is in itself a vindication, a declaration to the world of the wonderful doctrine preached in Gita. “ Whosoever comes to me, through whatsoever form I reach him, they are all struggling through paths that in the end always lead to me.” Sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descendant, fanaticism, have possessed long this beautiful earth. It has filled the earth with violence, drenched it often and often with human blood, destroyed civ¬ ilization and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for this horri¬ ble demon, human society would be far more advanced than it is now. But its time has come, and I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morn¬ ing in honor of this convention will be the death-knell to all fanaticism, to all persecutions with the sword or the pen, and to all uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal. CANADA AS A LINK IN THE EMPIRE, PEINCIPAL GRANT OF CANADA. The dream that allured hardy navigators for many years was the sup¬ posed existence of a northwest passage by land. But in our day it has been found that great northwest passage is not by sea, but by land. We have discovered that the shortest way from the Old World to the world of Japan and China is across Canada. So Canada feels herself now to be the link between old Europe and the older East, and the link between the three great self-governing parts of the British Empire. How is it possible for a people so situated to be parochial? How is it possible for them not to meet in a genial way the representatives of other religions? It is very impossible, because across our broad lands millions are coming and going from east to west, mingling with us, and we are obliged to meet them as man should always meet man. Not only this, but on that great new ocean which is to be the arena of the future commerce of the world—on that our sons are showing that they intend to play an important part. Their position as thfe fourth maritime nation of the world as regards ocean tonnage, shows the aptitude of our people for foreign trade, and as sailors owning the ships they sail in they are more likely than any others to learn the lesson that the life of the world is one, that truth is one, that all men are brothers, and that the service of humanity is the most acceptable form of religion to God. And therefore we feel that we have a sort of right to join with you in this matter of extending a welcome to those from different nations, whose faiths are different, but whose spiritual natures are the same, in whom dwelleth that true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. Our place in history gives us a still more undoubted right to come here and to take our place in a friendly way beside the representatives of other religions. Our racial, political, and religious evolution bids us do that. Our racial evolution your own Parkman has described to you in pages glowing with purple light. He has told you of the two centuries of conflict between France and Britain for the possession of this fair young continent, and he has told you that, while outward failure was the part of the former, all the heroism and enduring successes were not with the conquerors. Prance gave, without stint, the greatest explorers, whose names are sown all over this continent thick as seeds in a field—martyrs and missionaries of death¬ less fame, saintly, whose works still follow them. In Canada the seeds sprang from good soil, and we see its permanent memorial now in a noble, fresh Canadian people, enjoying their own language, laws, and institutions, 66 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. under a flag that is identified with their liberties, and under a constitution that they and their fathers have helped to hammer out. Their children sit side by side in our federal parliament with the children of their ancestral foes, and the only real contest between them is which shall serve Canada best. The union of the two races and languages was needed to enable England to do her imperial work. Will not the same union enable Canada to do a like work, and does it not force us to see good even in those that our ancestors thought enemies? Our political evolution has had the same lesson for us. It has taught us to borrow ideas with equal impartiality from sources apparently oppo¬ site. We have borrowed the federal idea from you; the parliament, the cabinet, the judicial system from Britain, and, uniting both, we think we have found a constitution better than that which either the mother coun¬ try or the older daughter enjoys. At any rate we made it ourselves and it fits us; and this very political evolution has taught us that ideas belong to no one country, that they are the common property of mankind, and so we act together, trying to borrow new ideas from every country that has found by experiment that the ideas will work well. Our religious evolution has taught us the same thing. And so we have been enabled to accomplish a measure of religious unification greater than either the mother land or the United States. Eighteen years ago, for in¬ stance, all the Presbyterian denominations united into one church in the Dominion of Canada. Immediately thereafter all the Methodist churches took the same step, and now all the Protestant churches have appointed committees to see whether it is not possible to have a larger union, and all the young life of Canada says “ Amen ” to the proposal. Now it is easy for a people with such an environment to understand that where men differ they must be in error, that truth is that which unites, that every age has its problems to solve, that it is the glory of the human mind to solve them, and that no church has a monopoly of the truth or of the spirit of the living God. It seems to me that we should begin this Parliament of Religions, not with a consciousness that we are doing a great thing, but with an humble and lowly confession of sin and failure. Why have not the inhabitants of the world fallen before truth? The fault is ours. The Apostle Paul, look¬ ing back on centuries of marvelous God-guided history, saw as the key to all its maxims this: That Jehovah had stretched out his hands all day long to a disobedient and gainsaying people; that although there was always a remnant of the righteousness, Israel as a nation did not understand Jehovah and therefore failed to understand her own marvelous mission. If St. Paul were here to-day would he not utter the same sad confession with regard to the 19th century, of Christendom. Would he not have to say that we have been proud of our Christianity instead of allowing our Christianity to humble and crucify us; that we have boasted of Chris¬ tianity as something we possessed instead of allowing it to possess us; that we have divorced it from the moral and spiritual order of the world instead of seeing that it is that which interpenetrates, interprets, completes, and verifies that order, and that so we have hidden its glories and obscured its power. All day long our Savior has been saying, “ I have stretched out my hands to a disobedient and gainsaying people.” But, sir, the only one indispensable condition of success is that we recog¬ nize the cause of our failure, that we confess it with humble, lowly, peni¬ tent and obedient minds, and that with quenchless Western courage and faith we now go forth and do otherwise. CONVERTED PARSEE WOMAN OF BOMBAY. 67 CONVERTED PARSEE WOMAN OF BOMBAY. MISS JEANNIE SAEAJBJI, OF BOMBAY, INTEODUCED AS A EEPEE- SENTATIVE OF THE PAESEES. Dr. Barrows just told you that I belonged to the order of Parsee. He is correct in one way and not in another. My people \v^ere fire worshipers, but I am not now. Before I go on further, I wish to thank all those who have extended their welcome to us. This morning as I looked around and saw the many faces that greeted a welcome, I felt indeed that it was the best day I have seen in Chicago. I have been here for some time, and I have asked the question over and over again : Where is religious America to be found—Christian America ? To-day I see it all around me. You have given me a welcome. I will give you a greeting from my country. When we meet one another in our land, the first thing we say to each other is “Peace be with you.” I say it to you to-day in all sincerity, in all love. I feel to-day that the great banner over iis is the banner of love. I feel to-day more than ever that it is beautiful to belong to the family of God, to acknowledge the Lord Christ. My father, at the age of eighteen, was brought to the knowledge of Christ by the light of an English missionary. He gave up friends and countrymen, rank and wealth and money to be a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ; and I tell you, friends, that it is a great privilege and a great honor to be able to stand here and say to you that I love that Lord Christ, and I will stand by him and under his banner until the end of my life. I would close with one little message from my countrywomen. When I was leaving the shores of Bombay the women of my country wanted to know where I was going, and I told them I was going to America on a visit. They asked me whether I would be at this congress. I thought then I would only come in as one of the audience, but I have the great privilege and honor given to me to stand here and speak to you, and I give you the message as it was given to me. The Christian women of my land said: “ Give the women of America our love and tell them that we love Jesus, and that we shall always pray that our countrywomen may do the same. Tell the women of America that we are fast being educated. We shall one day be able to stand by them and converse with them and be able to delight in all they delight in.” And so I have a message from each one of my countrywomen, and once more I will just say that I haven’t words enough in which to thank you for the welcome you have given to all those who have come here from the East. When I came here this morning and saw my countrymen my heart was warmed, and I thought I would never feel homesick again, and I feel to-day as if I were at home. Seeing your kindly faces has turned away the heartache. We are all under that one banner, love. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ I thank you. You will hear possibly the words in his own voice saying unto you, “ Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” Bombay’s second message, b. b. naegaekae of Bombay. Brothers and Sisters in the Western Home: It is a great privilege to be able to stand on this noble platform. As the president has already announced to you, I represent the theistic movement in India, known in my native country as the religion of the Brahmo Somaj. I came from the City of Bombay, the first city of the British Empire. It was only five months ago that I left my native land, and to you, the Americans, who are 68 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. BO much accustomed to fly, as it were, on wing's of the atmosphere, it would be a hard task to imagine the difficulties and the troubles that an Oriental meets when he has to bring himself over fourteen thousand miles. The Hindus have been all along confining themselves to the narrow precincts of the Indian continent, and it is only during the last hundred years or so that we have been brought into close contact with Western thought, with English civilization, and by English civilization. I mean the civilization of English speaking nations. The Brahmo Somaj is the result, as you know, of the influence of various religions, and the fundamental principles of the Theistic Church, in India, are universal love, harmony of faiths, unity of prophets, or rather unity of prophets and harmony of faiths. The reverence that we pay the other prophets and faiths is not mere lip loyalty, but it is the universal love for all the prophets and for all the forms and shades of truth by their own inher¬ ent merit. We try not only to learn in an intellectual way what those prophets have to teach, but to assimilate and imbibe these truths that are very near our spiritual being. It was the grandest and noblest aspiration of the late Mr. Senn to establish such a religion in the land of India, which has been well known as the birth-place of a number of religious faiths. This is a marked characteristic of the East, and especially India, so that India and its outskirts have been glorified by the touch and teachings of the prophets of the world. It is in this way that we live in a spiritual atmosphere. Here in the far West you have developed another phase of human life. You have studied outward nature. We in the East have studied the inner nature of man. Mr. Senn, more than twenty years ago, said: “ Glory to the name of God in the name of the Parliament of Religions.” Parliament of Religions is exactly the expression that he used on that occasion in his exposition of the doctrine of the new dispensation. It simply means the Church of the Brahmo Somaj, Church of India, so that what I wish to express to you is that I feel a peculiar pleasure in being present here on this occasion. It was only two years ago that I heard of the grand scheme that was to be worked out here in the midst of the country of liberty, and I took the first opportunity to put myself in communication with the worthy Dr. Barrows. For a long time I thought I would not be able to come over in the midst of you, but God has brought me safe and I stand in the midst of you. I consider it a great privilege. In the East we have a number of systems of philosophy; a deep insight into the spiritual nature of man, but you have at the same time to make an earnest and deep research to choose what is Occidental and what is essential in Indian philosophy. Catch hold very firmly of what is permanent of the Eastern philosophy. Lay it down very strongly to the heart, and try to assimilate it with your noble Western thoughts. You Western nations represent all the material civilization. You who have gone deep into the outward world and tried to discover the forces of outward nature, you have to teach to the East the glory of man’s intellect, his logical accuracy, his rational nature, and in this way it is that in the heart of the church of the new dispensation—call it by whatever name you will—you will have the harmony of the East and the West, a union between faith and reason, a wedding between the Orient and the Occident. SYMPATHY FROM ENGLAND. REV. ALFRED W. MOMERIE, D. D., OF LONDON. Dr. Barrows said that one of the letters he had received in reply to his invitations was from the late Lord Tennyson, and SYMPATHY FROM ENGLAND. 69 that it was a letter that gave him great satisfaction. The Parlia¬ ment of Religion, he added, has a number of eminent friends in Great Britain, and he believed that if that great and noble man, the Archbishop of Canterbury, were here, his frown upon the parliament would not be so severe as he had made it. Dr. Momerie addressed the meeting as follows: Mr. Chairman,, Ladies and Gentlemen: One of your humorists, Arte- mus Ward, has said, “I am always happiest when I am silent,” and so am I, friends. I shall not trespass on your attention more than two minutes. But there are three things which I feel I must say. First, I must tender my most sincere thanks to you for the honor which you have done me in in¬ viting me to come here, and also for the many words and deeds of welcome with which I have been greeted ever since I came. Secondly, I feel bound to say that there is one thing which, to me personally, casts a gloom over the brightness of the day, and that is the absence of my own archbishop. I am always bound to speak with all respect of my ecclesiastical superior, and personally, I have the highest regard for him. He has been very kind to me; I may almost venture to call him a friend, but that makes me all the more sad that he is absent on this occasion. But, as the chairman has just told you, you must not therefore think that the Church of England, as a whole, is out of sympathy with you. One of the greatest and best men the Church of England has ever had, the late Dean of Westminster, would, if he were alive to-day, have been with us, and I believe, too, he would have succeeded in bringing with him the Archbishop of Canterbury, also many men like Arnold, of Rugby; Frederick Robinson, of Brighton; Frederick Morris, who was one of my predecessors at King’s College. All these men would have been here, and further, I know for a fact, from my own personal experience, that a very large number of the English clergy, and a still larger number of English laity, are in sympathy with your congress to-day. So that in spite of the fact that the Archbishop of Canterbury is away, it still remains true that all the churches of the world are in sympathy with you and taking part in the congress this week. Then the third, the last thing which I wish to state, is that I feel, and shall always feel, the profoundest thanks to the president. Dr. Barrows, and for all who have helped him in bringing about this great and glorious result. Of all the studies of the present day, the most serious, interesting, and important is the study of comparative religion, and I believe that this object lesson, which it is the glory of America to have provided for the world, will do far more than any private study in the seclusion of the student’s own home. The report of our proceedings, which will be telegraphed all over the world, will help men by thousands and tens of thousands and hun¬ dreds of thousands to realize the truth of those grand old Bible words that God has never left himself without witness. It can not be—I say it can not be—that that new commandment was inspired when uttered by Christ, and was not inspired when uttered, as it was uttered, by Confucius and by Hillial. The fact is, all religions are fundamentally more or less true, and all reli¬ gions are superficially more or less false. And I suspect that the creed of the universal religion, the religion of the future, will be summed up pretty much in the words of Tennyson—words which were quoted in that magnifi¬ cent address which thrilled us this morning: “The whole world is every¬ where boup'^ bv gold chains about the feet of God.” 70 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, IN BEHALF OF AFRICA. BISHOP AENETT, OF THE AFRICAN METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH. Through the partiality of the committee of arrangements, I am put in a very peculiar position this afternoon. I am to respond to the addresses of welcome on behalf of Africa. I am to represent on the one side the Afri¬ cans in Africa, and on the other side the Africans in America. I am also, by the chairman, announced to give color to this vast Parliament of Religions. Now, I think it is very well colored myself, and, if I have any eyes, I think the color is in the majority this time, anyhow. But Africa needs a voice. Africa has been welcomed, and it is so peculiar a thing for an African to be welcomed, that I congratulate myself that I have been welcomed here to-day. In responding to the addresses of welcome I will, in the first place, respond for the Africans in Africa, and accept your welcome on behalf of the African continent, with its millions of acres, and millions of inhabitants, with its mighty forests, with its great beasts, with its great men, and its great possibilities. Though some think that Africa is in a bad way, I am one of those who has not lost faith in the possibilities of a redemption of Africa. I believe in providence and in the prophesies of God that Ethiopia yet shall stretch forth her hand unto God, and, although to-day our land is in the possession of others, and every foot of land, and every foot of water in Africa has been appropriated by the Governments of Europe, yet I remember, in the light of history, that those same nations parceled out the American continent in the past. But America had her Jefferson. Africa in the future is to bring forth a Jefferson, who will write a declaration of the independence of the dark continent. And, as you had your Washington, so God will give us a Washington to lead our hosts. Or, if it please God, He may raise up not a Washington, but another Toussaint L’Ouverture, who will become the pathfinder of his country, and, with his sword, will at the head of his people, lead them to freedom and equality. He will form a republican government, whose corner-stone will be religion, morality, education, and temperance, acknowledging the fatherhood of God, and the brotherhood of man; while the ten commandments and the golden rule shall be the rule of life and conduct in the great republic of redeemed Africa. But, sir, I accept your welcome, also, on behalf of the negroes of the American continent. As early as 1502 or 1503, we are told, the negroes came to this country. And we have been here ever since, and we are going to stay here too—some of us are. Some of us will go to Africa, because we have got the spirit of Americanism, and wherever there is a possibility in sight, some of us will go. We accept your welcome to this grand assembly, and we come to you this afternoon and thank God that we meet these rep¬ resentatives of the different religions of the world. We meet you on the height of this Parliament of Religions and the first gathering of the peoples since the time of Noah, when Shem, Ham, and Japhet met together. I greet the children of Shem, I greet the children of Japhet, and I want you to understand that Ham is here. I thank you that I have been chosen as the representative of the negro race in this great parliament. I thank those representatives that have come so far to meet, and to greet us of the colored race. A gentleman said to-day in this meeting that he had traveled 14,000 miles to get here. “ Why,” said I to myself, “ that is a wonderful distance to come to meet me. I wonder if I would go that far to meet him.” Yes, he says he came 14,000 miles to meet us here, and “ us ” in this case means me, too. There¬ fore I welcome these brethren to the shores of America on behalf of 7,400,- 000 negroes on this continent, who, by the providence of God, and the IN BEHALF OF AFRICA. 71 power of the religion of Jesus Christ, have been liberated from slavery. There is not a slave among us to-day, and we are glad you did not come while we were in chains, because, in that case, we could not have got here ourselves. Mr. President, we thank you for this honor. God had you born just at the right time. 'We come last on the programme, but I want everybody to know, that although last, we are not least in this grand assembly, where the fatherhood of God and brotherhood of man is the watchword of us all; and may the motto of the church which I represent be the motto of the coming civilization; “God onr father, Christ our redeemer,and mankind our brother.” CHAPTER II. SECOND DAYy SEPTEMBER 12th. EXISTENCE AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. The proceedings of the Parliament of Religions on the sec¬ ond day, were as impressive and instructive as on the first. The appearance of the platform at the opening exercises was somewhat modified by the absence of some representatives and the presence of others. In the midst of the picturesque attire of the East there were discerned Jewish rabbis and the venerable form of Frederick Douglass. Arrangements were made for review sessions and devotional meetings to be held daily in con¬ nection with the parliament. At the review sessions in lesser halls, a leading divine, when asked, explained the difficult points in the proceedings of the previous day and answered any ques¬ tions asked by seekers of information. For the purpose of these reviews, halls were offered to all denominations that wished them. The first review meeting was conducted by Bishop Keane, of the Roman Catholic Church. The devotional meetings, held in the Hall of Columbus, were in charge of the Brotherhood of Christian Unity, and began at nine o’clock in the morning. They were conducted by leaders of different faiths, both Chris¬ tian and non-Christian, and everybody attending the parlia¬ ment was welcome from day to day. The great hall was thronged with auditors when President Bonney, at ten o’clock, called upon the vast audience to rise and silently invoke the blessing of God. A hush fell upon the great assemblage, while the representatives of many nations sent up a silent petition to the Eternal Father 72 THE INFINITE BEING. 73 The stillness of a few moments was broken by the closing word, “ Amen,” pronounced by Mr. Bonney. Following this, while the assembly remained standing. Dr. Barrows led in the Lord’s Prayer, known in the parliament as the “ universal prayer.” Dr. John Henry Barrows, having been placed in charge of the parliament, designated a chairman for the day, and in intro¬ ducing him, said: “ I have been very much cheered in the work of preparing for this parliament by the friendly words of distinguished men of my own church in this country, and among them I cherish none in higher regard than Rev. S. J. Niccolls, pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church of St. Louis. He will take charge of our session this morning and make an introductory address.” THE INFINITE BEING. REV. S. J. NICCOLLS, PASTOR OF THE SECOND PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF ST. LOUIS. Members of the Parliament^ Sons of a Common Heavenly Father, and Brothers in a Common Humanity, it is with special pleasure that I assume the task now assigned to me. Happily for me at least it involves no serious labor, and it requires no greater wisdom than to mention the names of the speakers and the subjects placed upon the programme for to-day. And yet when I mention the name of the subject that is to invite our consider¬ ation to-day I place before you the most momentous theme that ever engaged human thought—the sublimest of all facts, the greatest of all thoughts, the most wonderful of all realities; and yet when I mention the name it points not to a law, not to a principle, not to the explanation of a phenomenon, but it points us to a living person. The human mind, taught and trained by human thoughts and human loves, points us to one who is over all, above all, and in all, in whom we live, move, and have our being, with whom we all have to do, light of our light, life of our life, the grand reality that underlies all realities, the being that pervades all beings, the sun of all joys, of all glory, of all greatness; known yet unknown, revealed yet not revealed, far off from us yet nigh to us; for whom all men feel if happily they might find him; for whom all the wants of this wondrous nature of ours go out in extinguishable longing; one with whom we all have to do and from whose dominion we can never escape. If such be the subject that we are to consider to-day, surely it becomes us to undertake it in a spirit of reverence and of humility. We can not bring to its contemplation the exercise of our reasoning faculties in the same way that we would consider some phenomenon or fact of history. He who is greater than all hides himself from the proud and the self- sufficient; he reveals himself to the weak, the lowly, and the humble in 74 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. heart. It is rather with the heart that we shall find him than by measur¬ ing him merely with our feeble intellects. To-day, as always, the heart will make the theologian. Perhaps some one may say: “After so long a period in human history why should we come to consider the existence of God? Is the fact so obscure that it must take long centuries to prove it? Has He so hidden Himself from the world that we have not yet exactly found out that'He is or what He is?” This is only apparently an objection of wisdom. If God were simply a fact of history, if He were simply a phenomenon in the past, then once found out or once discovered it would remain for all time. But since He is a person each age must know and find it for himself; each generation must come to know and find out the living God from the standpoint which it occupies. It is not enough for you and for me that long generations ago men found Him and bowed reverently before Him and adored Him. We must find Him in our age and in our day, to know how He fills our fives and guides us to our destiny. This is the grand fact that lies before us, the great truth that is to unite us. Here, if anywhere, we must find God and unite in our beliefs. We could not afford to begin the discussions of a religious parliament without placing this great truth in the fore¬ ground. A parliament of religious belief without the recognition of the living God—that were impossible. Religion without a God is only the shadow of a shade; only a mockery that rises up in the human soul. After all, we can form no true conception of ourselves or of man’s great¬ ness without God. The greatness of human nature depends upon its con¬ ception of the living God. All true religious joy, all greatness of aspiration that has wakened in these natures of ours, comes not from our conception of ourselves, not from our own recognition of the dignity of human nature within us, but from our conception of God and what He is, and our relation to Him. No man can ever find content in his own attainments, or find peace and satisfaction in his own achievements. It is as he goes out toward the infinite and the eternal and feels that he is linked to Him that he finds satisfaction in his soul and the peace of God, which passeth understanding, comes down into his heart. There are many reasons, therefore, why we should begin to-day with the study of Him who holds all knowledge and all wisdom. If there is a God or a Creator, a Lord of all things, beginning of all things and end of all things, for whom all things are, then in Him we are to find the key to history, the explanation of human nature, the light that shall guide us in our pathway in the future. You can all readily see, if you will refiect a moment, how everything would vanish of what we call great and glorious in our material achievements, in our literature, in all our civil and social institutions, if that one thought of the living God were taken away. But utter that simple name and straightway there comes gathering around it the clustering of glorious words shining and leaping out of the darkness until they blaze like a galaxy of glory in the heavens—law, order, justice, love, truth, immortality, righteousness, glory! Blot out that word, and leave in its place simply that other word, “ atheism,” and then in the surrounding blackness we may see dim shadows of anarchy, lawlessness, despair, agony, distress; and if such words as law and order remain, they are mere echoes of something that has long since passed away. We need it, then, first of all, for ourselves, that we may understand the dignity of human nature, that this great truth of God’s existence should be brought close to us; we need it for our civilization. VERY REV. AUGUSTINE F. HEWITT, C. S. P., New York. % • ^ ^ ^ •} 9 Ti;£ I !5S?.RY Of rlis ussiviiiiit? (f laiNois f 4 its .\ - p'f '. ' ■ j j '■ ■• - 1 RATIONAL DEMONSTRATION OF THE BEING OF GOD. It RATIONAL DEMONSTRATION OF THE BEING OF GOD. VEEY BEV. AUGUSTINE F. HEWITT, C. S. P., OF NEW YOEK. The paper was read by Rev. Walton Elliott. “It is to be regretted,” remarked Father Elliott, before beginning the paper, “ that Father Hewitt, superior of the community of Paulists, of which I am a member, can not be present in person; as much regretted by himself, I am sure, as by any of us. But it is a privilege that he, whose whole life since he entered the Catholic Church, now within one year of half a century, has been devoted to metaphysical studies, represents the knowledge of God to this distinguished assembly, as known without the light of revelation, as known by evidences entirely apart from the special teaching of God to mankind by revelation.” An honorable and arduous task has been assigned me. It is to address this numerous and distinguished assembly on a topic taken from the highest branch of special metaphysics. The thesis of my discourse is the rational demonstration of the being of God, as presented in Catholic philosophy. This is a topic of the highest importance, and of the deepest interest to all who are truly rational, who think, and who desire to know their destiny and to fulfill it. The minds of men always and everywhere, in so far as they have thought at all, have been deeply interested in all questions relating to the divine order and its relations to nature and humanity. The idea of a divine princi ple and power, superior to sensible phenom¬ ena, above the changeable world and its short-lived inhabitants, is as old and as extensive as the human race. Among vast numbers of the most enlightened part of mankind it has existed and held sway in the form of pure monotheism, and even among those who have deviated from this original religion of our first ancestors the divine idea has never been entirely effaced and lost. In our own surrounding world and for all classes of men differing in creed and opinion who may be represented in this audi¬ ence, this theme is of paramount interest and import. Christians, Jews, Mohammedans, and philosophical theists are agreed in professing monotheism as their fundamental and cardinal doctrine. Even unbelievers and doubters show an interest in discussing and endeavoring to decide the question whether God does or does not exist. It is to be hoped that many of them regard their skepticism rather as a darkening cloud over the face of nature than as a light clearing away the mists of error; that they would gladly be convinced that God does exist and govern a world which he has made. I may, therefore, hope for a welcome recep¬ tion to my thesis in this audience. I have said that it is a thesis taken from the special metaphysics of Catholic philosophy. I must explain at the outset in what sense the term Catholic philosophy is used. It does not denote a system derived from the Christian revelation and imposed by the authority of the Catholic Church; it signifies only that rational scheme which is received and taught in the Catholic schools as a science proceeding from its own proper principles by its own methods, and not a subaltern science to dogmatic theology. It has been adopted in great part from Aristotle and Plato, and does not disdain 76 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. to borrow from any pure fountain or stream of rational truth. The topic before us is, therefore, to be treated in a metaphysical manner on a ground where all who profess philosophy can meet, and where reason is the only authority which can be appealed to as umpire and judge. All who profess to be students of philosophy thereby proclaim their conviction that meta¬ physics is a true science, by which certain knowledge can be obtained. Metaphysics, in its most general sense, is ontology i. e., discourse con¬ cerning being in its first and universal principles. Being, in all its latitude, in its total extension and comprehension, is the adequate object of intellect, taking intellect in its absolute essence, excluding all limitations. It is the object of the human intellect, in so far as this limited intellectual faculty is proportioned to it and capable of apprehending it. Metaphysics seeks for a knowledge of all things which are within the ken of human faculties, in their deepest causes. It investigates their reason of being, their ulti¬ mate, efficient, and final causes. The rational argument for the existence of God, guided by the principles of the sufficient reason, and efficient casu¬ alty, begins from contingent facts and events in the world, and traces the chain of causation to the first cause. It demonstrates that God is, and it proceeds, by analysis and synthesis, by induction from all the first princi¬ ples possessed by reason, from all the vestiges, refiections, and images of God in the creation, to determine what God is. His essence and its perfec¬ tions. Let us then begin our argument from the first principle that everything that has any kind of being—that is, which presents itself as a thinkable, knowable, or real object to the intellect, has a sufficient reason of being. The possible has a sufficient reason of its possibility. There is in it an intelligent ratio which makes it thinkable. Without this it is unthinkable, inconceivable, utterly impossible; as, for instance, a circle, the points in whose circumference are of unequal distances from the center. The real has a sufficient reason for its real existence. If it is contingent, indifferent to non-existence or existence, it has not its sufficient reason of being in its essence. It must have it, then, from something outside of itself—that is, from an efficient cause. All the beings with which we are acquainted in the sensible world around us are contingent. They exist in determinate, specific, actual, indi¬ vidual forms and modes. They are in definite times and places. They have their proper substantial and accidental attributes; they have qualities and relations, active powers, and passive potencies. They do not exist by any necessary reason of being; they have become what they are. They are subject to many changes even in their smallest molecules and in the com¬ binations and movements of their atoms. This changeableness is the mark of their contingency, the result of that potentiality in them, which is not of itself in act, but is brought into act by some moving force. They are in act—that is, have actual being, inasmuch as they have a specific and indi¬ vidual reality. But they are never, in any one instance, in act to the whole extent of their capacity. There is a dormant potency of further actuation always in their actual essence. Moreover, there is no necessity in their essence for existing at all. The pure, ideal essence of things is, in itself, only possible. Their successive changes of existence are so many move¬ ments of transition from mere passing potency into act under the impulse- of moving principles of force. And their very first act of existence is by a motion of transition from mere possibility into actuality. The whole mul¬ titude of things which become, of events which happen, the total sum of the movements and changes of contingent beings, taken collectively and taken singly, must have a sufficient reason of being in some extrinsic prin¬ ciple, some efficient cause. The admirable order which rules over this multitude, reducing it to the unity of the universe, is a display of efficient causality on a most stupen- RATIONAL DEMONSTRATION OF THE BEING OF GOD. 77 dous scale. There is a correlation and conservation of force acting on the inert and passive matter, according to fixed laws, in harmony with a definite plan, and producing most wonderful results. Let us take our solar system as a specimen of the whole universe of bodies moving in space. According to the generally received, and highly probable nebular theory, it has been evolved from a nebulous mass permeated by forces in violent action. The best chemists affirm by common consent that both the matter and the force are fixed quantities. No force and no matter ever disappears, no new force, or new matter ever appears. The nebulous mass, and the motive force acting within it, are definite quantities, having a definite location in space, at definite distances from other nebulsB. The atoms and molecules are combined in the definite forms of the various elementary bodies in definite proportions. The movements of rotation are in certain directions, conden¬ sation and incandescence take place under fixed laws, and all these movements are co-ordinated and directed to a certain result, viz.: the for* mation of a sun and planets. Now, there is nothing in the nature of matter and force which deter¬ mines it to take on just these actual conditions and no others. By their intrinsic essence they could just as well have existed in greater or lesser quantities in the solar nebula. The proportions of hydrogen, oxygen, and other substances might have been different. The movements of rotation might have been in a contrary direction. The process of evolution might have begun sooner, and attained its finality ere now, or it might be begin¬ ning at the present moment. The marks of contingency are plainly to be discerned in the passive and active elements of the inchoate world as it emerges into the consistency and stable equilibrium of a solar system from primitive chaos. Equally obvious is the presence of the determining principle, acting as an irresistible law, regulating the transmission of force along definite lines and in a harmonious order. The activo forces at work in nature, giving motion to matter, only transmit a movement which they have received, they do not originate It makes no difference how far back the series of effects and causes may be traced, natural causes remain always secondary causes, with no tendency to become primary principles; they demand some ante¬ rior, sufficio t reason of their being, some original, primary principle from which they rive the force which they receive and transmit. They demand a first cause. In the case of a long train of cars in motion, if w’e ask what moves the last car, the answer may be the car next before it, and so on until we reach the other end, but we have as yet only motion received and transmitted, and no sufficient reason for the initiation of the movement by an adequate efficient cause. Prolong the series to an indefinite length and you get no nearer to the adequate cause of the motion; You get no moving principle which possesses motive power in itself; the need of such a motive force, Ixovvover, continually increases. There is more force necessary to impart motion to the whole collection of cars than for one or a few. If you choose to imagine that the series of cars is infinite, you have only augmented the effect produced to infinity without finding a cause for it. You have made a supposition Avhich imperatively demands the further supposition of an original principle and source of motion, which has an infinite power. The cars, singly and collectively, can only receive and transmit motion. Their passive potency of being moved, which is all they have in themselves, would never make them stir out of their motionless rest. There must be a loco¬ motive with the motive power applied and acting, and a connection of the cars with this locomotive, in order that the train may be propelled along its tracks. The series of movements given and received in the evolution of the world from primitive chaos is like this long chain of cars. The question. 78 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. how did they come about, what is their efficient cause, starts up and con¬ fronts the mind at every stage of the process. You may trace back conse¬ quents to their antecedents, and show how the things which come after were virtually contained in those which came before. The present earth came from the paleo-zoic earth, and that from the a-zoic, and so on, until you come to the primitive nebula from which the solar system was con¬ structed. But how did this vast mass of matter, and the mighty forces acting upon it, come to be started on their course of evolution, their movement in the direction of that result which we see to have been accomplished. It is necessary to go back to a first cause, a first mover, an original principle of all transition from mere potency into act, a being, self-existing, whose essence is pure act and the source of all actuality. The only alternative is to fall back on the doctrine of chance, an absurdity long since exploded and abandoned, a renunciation of all reason, and an abjuration of the rational nature of man. Together with the question “ How” and the inquiry after efficient causes of movement and changes in the world, the question “ Why ’• also perpet¬ ually suggests itself. This is an inquiry into another class of the deepest causes of things, viz., final causes. Final cause is the same as the end, the design, the purpose toward which movements, changes, the operation of active forces, efficient causes, are directed, and which are accomplished by their agency. Here the question arises, how the end attained as an effect of efficient casuality can be properly named as a cause. How can it exert a causative influence, retroactively, on the means and agencies by v/hich it is produced? It is last in the series and does not exist at the beginning or during the progress of the events whose final term it is. Nothing can act before it exists or give existence to itself. Final cause does not, therefore, act phys¬ ically like efficient causes. It is a cause of the movements which precede its real and physical existence, only inasmuch as it has an ideal pre-exist¬ ence in the foresight and intention of an intelligent mind. Regard a masterpiece of art. It is because the artist conceived the idea realized in this piece of work that he employed all the means necessary to the fulfill¬ ment of his desired end. This finished work is, therefore, the final cause, the motive of the whole series of operations performed by the artist or his workmen. The multitude of causes and effects in the world, reduced to an admir¬ able harmony and unity, constitutes the order of the universe. In this order there is a multifarious arrangement, and co-ordination of means to ends, denoting design and purpose, the intention and art of a supreme architect and builder, who impresses his ideas upon what we may call the raw mate¬ rial, out of which he forms and fashions the worlds which move in space, and their various innumerable contents. From these final causes, as ideas and types according to which all movements of efficient casualty are directed, the argument proceeds which demonstrates the nature of the first cause, as in essence, intelligence and will. The best and highest Greek philosophy ascended by this cosmological argument to a just and sublime conception of God as the supremely wise, powerful, and good author of all existing essences in the universe and of all its complex, harmonious order. Cicero, the Latin interpreter of Greek philosophy, with cogent reasoning, and in language of unsurpassed beauty, has summarized its best lessons in natural theology. In brief, his argument is that since the highest human intelligence discovers in nature an intel¬ ligible object far surpassing in capacity of apprehension, the design and construction of the whole, natural order must proceed from an author of supreme and divine intelligence. The questioning and the demand of reason for the deepest causes of RATIONAL DEMONSTRATION OF THE BEING OF GOD. 79 things is not, however, yet entirely and explicitly satisfied. The concept of God as the first builder and mover of the universe comes short of assign¬ ing the first and final cause of the underlying subject-matter which receives formation and motion. When and what is the first matter of our solar nebula? How and why did it come to be in hand and lie in readiness for the divine architect and artist to make it burn and whirl in the process of the evolution of sun and planets? Plato is understood to have taught that the first matter, which is the term receptive of the divine action, is self- existing and eternal. The metaphysical notion of first matter is, however, totally different from the concept of matter as a constant quantity, and distinct from force in chemical science. Metaphysically first matter has no specific reality, no quality, no quantity. It is not separate from active force in act, but is only in potency. Chemical first matter exists in atoms, say of hydrogen, oxygen, or some other substance, each of which has definite weight in pro¬ portion to the weight of different atoms. It would be perfectly absurd to imagine that the primitive nebulous vapor which furnished the material for the evolution of the solar system was in any way like the Platonic con¬ cept of original chaos. We may call it chnos, relatively to its later, more developed order. The artisan’s work-shop, full of materials for manufact¬ ure, the edifice which is in its first stage of construction, are in a compar¬ ative disorder, but this disorder is m inchoate order. So, our solar chaos, as an inchoate virtual system, was full of initial, ele¬ mentary principles and elements of order. The Platonic first matter was supposed to be formless and void, without quality or quantity, devoid of every idea' element or aspect—a mere recipient of ideas which God im¬ pressed upon it. The undermost matter of chemistry has definite quiddity, and quantity is never separate from 2orce, ind s it was in the primitive solar nebula, was in act and in violent activity of motion. It is obvious at a glance that a Platonic first matter, existing eternally by its own essence, without form is a mere vacuum, anci only intelligible under the concept of jjure possibility. Aristotle saw and demonstrated this truth clearly. There¬ fore the analysis of material existence, carried as far as experiment or hypothesis will admit, finds nothing except the changeable and the contin¬ gent. Let us suppose that underneath the so-called simple substances, such as oxygen and hydrogen, there exists, and may hereafter be discerned by chemical analysis, some homogeneous basis, there still remains something which does not account for itself, and which demands a sufficient reason for its being, in the efficient casuality of the first cause. The ultimate molecule of the composite substance and the ultimate atom of the simple substance, each bears the mark of a manufactured article. Not only the order which combines and arranges all the simple elements of the corijoreal world, but the gathering together of the materials for the orderly structure; the union and relation of matter and force; the beginning of the first motions, and the existence of the movable element and the motive principle in definite quantities and proportions, all demand their origin in the intelli¬ gence and the will of the first cause. In God alone essence and existence are identical. He alone exists by the necessity of his nature, and is the eternal self-subsisting being. There is nothing outside of his essence which is coeval with him, and which pre¬ sents a real, existing term for his action. If he wishes to communicate the good of being beyond himself, he must create out of nothing the objective terms of his beneficial action. He must give first being to the recipients of motion, change, and every kind of transition from potency into actuality. The first and fundamental transition is from not being, from the absolute non-existence of anything outside of God, into being and existence by the creative act of God; called by his almighty word the world of finite creatures into real existence. 80 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. In this creative act of God the two elements of intelligence and volition are necessarily contained. Intelligence perceives the possibility of a finite, created order of existence, in all its latitude. Possibility does not, however, make the act of creation necessary. It is the free volition of the creator which determines him to create. It is likewise his free volition which determines the limits within which he will give real existence and actuality to the possible. We have already seen that final causes must have an ideal pre-existence in the mind which designs the work of art and arranges the means for its execution. The idea of the actual universe and of the wider universe which he could create if he willed must have been present eter¬ nally to the intelligence of the divine creator as possible. Now, therefore, a further question about the deepest cause of being con¬ fronts the mind with an imperative demand for an answer. What is this eternal possibility which is coeval with God? It is evidently an intelligible object, an idea equivalent to an infinite number of particular ideas of essences and orders, which are thinkable by intellect to a certain extent, in proportion to its capacity, and exhaustively by the divine intellect. The divine essence alone is an eternal and necessary self-subsisting being. In the formula of St. Thomas: “ Ijjsum esse subsistens.” It is pure and per¬ fect act, in the most simple, indivisible unity. Therefore in God, as Aristotle demonstrates, intelligent subject and intelligible object are identical. Possibility has its foundation in the divine essence. God contemplates His own essence, which is the plenitude of being, with a comprehensive intelligence. In this contemplation He per¬ ceives His essence as an archetyjje which eminently and virtually contains an infinite multitude of typical essences, capable of being made in various modes and degrees a likeness to Himself. He sees in the comprehension of His omnipotence the power to create whatever He will according to His divine ideas. And this is the total ratio of possibility. These are the eternal reasons according to Vv'hich the order of nature has been established under fixed laws. They are reflected in the works of God. By a perception of these reasons, these ideas impressed on the universe, we ascend from single and particular objects up to universal ideas, and finally to the knowledge of God as first and final cause. When we turn from the contemplation of the visible word and sensible objects to the rational creation, the sphere of intelligent spirits and of the intellectual life in which they live, the argument for a first and final cause ascends to a higher plane. The rational beings who are known to us—our¬ selves and our fellowman—bear the marks of contingency in their intel¬ lectual nature as plainly as in their bodies. Our individual, self-conscious, thinking souls have come out of 'non-existence only yesterday.' They begin to live with only a dormant intellectual capacity, without knowledge or the use of reason. The soul brings with it no memories and no ideas. It has no immediate knowledge of itself and its nature. Nevertheless the light of intelligence in it is something divine—a spark from the source of light— and it indicates clearly that it has received its being from God. In the material things we see the vestiges of the Creator, in the rational soul his very image, it is capable of apprehending the eternal rea¬ sons which are in the mind of God; its intelligible object is being in all its latitude according to its specific and infinite mode of apprehension, and the proportion which its cognoscitive faculty has to the thinkable and knowa- ble. As contingent beings, intelligent spirits, come into the universal order of effects from which by the argument, a posteriori, the existence of the first cause, as supreme intelligence, and will is inferred, and likewise the ideas of necessary and eternal truth which, as so many mirrors, reflect the eternal reasons of the divine mind, subjectively considered, come under the same category as contingent facts and effects produced by second causes and ultimately by the first cause. RATIONAL demonstration OF THE BEING OF GOD. 81 These ideas are not, however, mere subjective concepts. They are, in¬ deed, mental concepts, but they have a foundation in reality, according to the famous formula of St. Thomas: “Universalia sunt conceptus mentis cum fundamento in re.” They are originally gained by abstraction from the single objects of sensitive cognition; for instance, from single things which have a concrete existence, the idea of being in general, the most extensive and universal of all concepts is gained. So, also, the notions of species and genius; of essence and existence; of beauty, goodness, space and time; of efficient and final cause; of the first principles of metaphysics, mathematics, and ethics. But, notwithstanding this genesis of abstract and universal concepts from concrete, contingent realities, they become free from all contingency and dependence on contingent things, and assume the character of necessary and universal, and therefore of eternal truths. For instance, that the three sides of a triangle can not exist with¬ out three angles is seen to be true, supposing there had never been any bodies or minds created. There is an intelligible world of ideas, super¬ sensible, and extra-mental, within the scope of intellectual apprehension; they have objective reality, and force themselves on the intellect, compel¬ ling its assent as soon as they are clearly perceived in their self-evidence or demonstration. Now, what are these ideas? Are they some kind of real beings, inhabit¬ ing an eternal and infinite space? This is absurd, and they can not be conceived except as thoughts of an eternal and infinite mind. In thinking them we are rethinking the thoughts of God. They are the eternal reasons reflected in all the works of creation, but especially in intelligent minds. Prom these necessary and eternal truths we infer, therefore, the intelli¬ gent and intelligible essence of God, in which they have their ultimate foundation. This metaphysical argument is the apex and culmination of the cosmological, moral, and in all its forms the a posteriori argument from effects, from design, from all reflections of the divine perfections in the cre¬ ation to the existence and nature of the first and final cause of the intellect¬ ual, moral, and physical order of the universe. It goes beyond every other line of argument in one respect. Prom concrete, contingent facts we infer and demonstrate that God does exist. We obtain only a hypothetical neces¬ sity of His existence; i. e,, since the world does really exist, it must have a creator. The argument, from necessary and eternal truths, gives us a glimpse of the absolute necessity of God’s existence; it shows us that He must exist that His non existence is impossible. We rise above contingent facts to a consideration of the eternal reasons in the intelligible and intelligent essence of God. We do not, indeed, perceive these eternal reasons immediately in God as divine ideas identical with His essence. We have no intuition of the essence of God. God is to us inscrutable, incomprehensible, dwelling in light, inaccessible. As when the sun is below the horizon, we perceive clouds illuminated by His rays, and moon and planets shining in His reflected light, so we see the reflection of God in His works. We perceive Him immedi¬ ately, by the eternal reasons which are reflected in nature, in our own intellect, and in the ideas which have their foundation in His mind. Our mental concepts of the divine are analogical, derived from created things, and inadequate. They are, notwithstanding, true, and give us unerring knowledge of the deepest causes of being. They give us metaphysical certi¬ tude that God is. They give us, also, a knowledge of what God is, within the limits of our human mode of cognition. All these metaphysical concepts of God are summed up in the formula of St. Thomas: “Ipsum esse subsistens.” Being in its intrinsic essence subsisting. He is the being whose reason of real, self-subsisting being is in His essence; He subsists, as being, not in any limitation of a particular kind and mode of being, but in the irftelligible ratio of being, in every 82 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. respect which is thinkable and comprehensible by the absolute, infinite intellect. He is being in all its longitude, latitude, profundity, and pleni¬ tude; Heia being subsisting in pure and perfect act, without any mixture of potentiality or possibility of change; infinite, eternal, without before or after; always being, never becoming; subsisting in an absolute present, the now of eternity. Boethius has expressed this idea admirably: “Tota simul ac perfecta possessio vitae interminabilis.” The total and perfect possession, all at once, of boundless life. In order, therefore, to enrich and complete our conceptions of the nature and perfections of God we have only to analyze the comprehensive idea of being and to ascribe to God, in a sense free from all limitations, all that we find in His works which comes under the general idea of being. Being, good, truth, are transcendental notions which imply each other. They include a multitude of more specific terms, expressing every kind of definite concepts of realities which are intelligible and desirable. Beauty, splendor, majesty, moral excellence, beatitude, life, love, greatness, power, and every kind of perfection are phases and aspects of being, goodness, and truth. Since all which presents an object of intellectual apprehension to the mind and of complacency to the will in the effects produced by the first cause must exist in the cause in a more eminent way, we must predict of the Creator all the perfections found in creatures. The vastness of the universe represents His immensity. The multi¬ farious beauties of creatures represent His splendor and glory as their archetype. The marks of design and the harmonious order which are visible in the world manifest His intelligence. The faculties of intelligence and will in rational creatures show forth in a more perfect image the attributes of intellect and will in their author and original source. All created goodness, whether physical or moral, proclaims the essential excel¬ lence and sanctity of God. He is the source of life, and is, therefore, the living God. All the active forces of nature witness His power. All finite beings, however, come infinitely short of an adequate represen¬ tation of their ideal archetype; they retain something of the intrinsic nothingness of their essence, of its potentiality, changeableness, and con¬ tingency. Many modes and forms of created existence have an imperfection in their essence which makes it incompatible with the perfection of the divine essence that they should have a formal being in God. We can not call him a circle, an ocean, or a sun. Such creatures, therefore, represent that which exists in their archetype in an eminent and divine mode, to us incomprehensible. And those qualities whose formal ratio in God and creatures is the same, being finite in creatures, must be regarded as raised to an infinite power in God. Thus intelligence, will, wisdom, sanctity, happiness, are formally in God, but infinite in their excellence. All that we know of God by pure reason is summed up by Aristotle in the metaphysical formula that God is pure and perfect act, logically and ontologically the first principles of all that becomes by a transition from potential into actual being. And from this concise, comprehensive formula he has developed a truly admirable theodicy. Aristotle says: “It is evident that act (energeia) is anterior to potency (dunamis), logically and ontologi¬ cally. A being does not pass from potency into act, and become real, except by the action of a principle already in act.” (Met. viii, 9.) Again, “All that is produced comes from a being in act.” (De Anim, hi, 7.) “ There is a being which moves without being moved, which is eternal, is substance, is act. * * * The immovable mover is necessary being, that is, being which absolutely is, and can not be otherwise. This nature, therefore, is the principle from which heaven (meaning by this term immortal spirits who are the nearest to God) and nature depend. Beatitude is his very act. * * * Contemplation is of all things the most delightful and excellent, and God enjoys it always, by the intellection of the most excellent good, in EVIDENCE OF A SUPREME BEING, 83 which intelligence and intelligible are identical. God is life, for the act of intelligence is life, and God is this very act. Essential act is the life of God, perfect and eternal life. Therefore we name God a perfect and eternal living being, in such a way that life is uninterrupted; eternal duration belongs to God, and indeed it is this which is God.” (Met. xi, 7.) I have here condensed a long passage from Aristotle and inverted the order of some sentences, but I have given a verbally exact statement of his doctrine. I will add a few sentences from Plotinus, the greatest philosopher of the Neo-Platonic school. “Just as the sight of the heavens and the brilliant stars causes us to look for and to form an idea of their author, so the con¬ templation of the intelligible world and the admiration which it inspires lead us to look for its father. Who is the one, we exclaim, who has given existence to the intelligible world? Where and how has he begotten such a child, intelligence, this son so beautiful? The supreme intelligence must necessarily contain the universal archetype, and be itself that intelligible world of which Plato discourses.” (Ennead iii, L viii, 10 v. 9). Plato and Aristotle have both placed in the clearest light the relation of intelligent, immortal spirit to God as their final cause, and together with this highest relation the subordinate relation of all the inferior parts of the universe. Assimilation to God, the knowledge and the love of God, communication in the beatitude which God possesses in himself, is the true reason of being, the true and ultimate end of intellectual natures. In these two great sages rational philosophy culminated. Clement of Alexandria, did not hesitate to call it a preparation furnished by divine providence to the heathen world for the Christian revelation. Whatever controversies there may be concerning their explicit teachings in regard to the relations between God and the world, their principles and premises con¬ tain implicitly and virtually a sublime natural theology. St. Thomas has corrected, completed, and developed this theology, with a genius equal to theirs and with the advantage of a higher illumination. It is the highest achievement of human reason to bring the intellect to a knowledge of God as the first and final cause of the world. The denial of this philosophy throws all things into night and chaos, ruled over by blind chance or fate. Philosophy, however, by itself does not suffice to give to mankind that religion the excellence and necessity of which it so brilliantly manifests. Its last lesson is the need of a divine revelation, a divine relig¬ ion, to lead men to the knowledge and love of God and the attainment of their true destiny as rational and immortal creatures. A true and practi¬ cal philosopher will follow, therefore, the example of Justin Martyr; in his love of and search for the highest wisdom he will seek for the genuine religion revealed by God, and when found he will receive it with his whole mind and will. EVIDENCE OF A SUPREME BEING. EEV. ALFRED WILLIAMS MOMERIE OF LONDON, ENGLAND. “ We have just heard a voice,” said Chairman Niccolls, ‘‘from the largest and one of the most venerable of the churches of Christendom. That voice was clear, eloquent, logical, and learned in its testimony. The church which it represents is to-day the teacher of millions, and if such are its convictions we know that the doctrine of Christian theism is 84 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. safe in her hands. Another church has been eloquent in its testimony, and I am glad we have to-day one of its representa¬ tives here, a distinguished preacher and teacher, a learned scholar and professor. Rev. Dr. Momerie, of London, who will present the next paper on ‘ The Moral Evidence of a Divine Existence.’ ” Before submitting his paper. Dr. Momerie said: ‘‘It is only this moment that I have discovered the subject of my paper as shown on the programme. I was originally asked to write upon ‘The Philosophic and Moral Evidence for the Existence of God,’ and it is upon that subject trhat I have written. Indeed, I could hardly have written on any other, for the argument for God seems to me to be distinctly one and indivisible. I must apologize if in the first part of the paper I have to tread upon ground already traversed. I looked at the philosophical argu¬ ment from a somewhat different point of view, and, perhaps, therefore, there will be no more harm done.” The evidences for the existence of God may be summed up under two heads. First of all there is what I will designate the rationality of the world. Under this head, of course, comes the old argument from design. It is often supposed that the argument from design has been exploded. “Nowadays,” says Comte, “the heavens declare no other glory than that of Hipparchus, Newton, Kepler, and the rest who have found out the laws of sequence. Our power of foreseeing phenomena and our power of control¬ ling them destroy the belief that they are governed by changeable wills.” Quite so. But such a belief — the belief, viz., that phenomena were gov¬ erned by changeable wills, could not be entertained by any philosophical theist. A really irregular phenomenon, as Mr. Fiske has said, would be a manifestation of sheer diabolism. Philosophical theism — belief in a being deservedly called God -- could not be established until after the uniformity of nature had been discovered. We must cease to believe in many change¬ able wills before we can begin to believe in one that is unchangeable. We must cease to believe in a finite God, outside of nature, who capriciously interferes with her phenomena, before we can begin to believe in an infinite God, immanent in nature, of whom mind and will and all natural phenomena are the various but never varying expressions. Though the regularity of nature is not enough, by itself, to prove the existence of God, the irregu¬ larity of nature would be amply sufficient to disprove it. The uniformity of nature, which, by a curious observation of the logical faculties, has been used as an atheistic argument, is actually the first step in the proof of the existence of God. The purposes of a reasonable being, just in proportion to his reasonableness, will be steadfast and immovable. And in God there is no change, neither shadow of turning. He is the same yesterday, to day, and forever. There is another scientific doctrine, viz., the doctrine of evolution, which is often supposed to be incompatible with the argument from design. But it seems to me that the discovery of the fact of evolution was an important EVIDENCE OF A SUPREME BEING. 85 step in the proof of the divine existence. Evolution has not disproved adaptation; it has merely disproved one particular kind of adaptation—the adaptation, viz., of a human artifice. In the time of Paley, God was regarded as a great Mechanician, spelled with a capital M, it is ture, but employing means and methods for the accomplishment of his purposes more or less similar to those which would be used by a human workman. It was believed that every species, every organism, and every part of every organ¬ ism had been individually adapted by the Creator for the accomplishment of a definite end, just as every portion of a watch is the result of a partic¬ ular act of contrivance on the part of the watchmaker. A different and far higher method is suggested by the doctrine of evo¬ lution, a doctrine which may now be considered as practically demonstrated, thanks especially to the light which has been shed on it by the sciences of anatomy, physiology, geology, palaeontology, and embryology. These sciences have placed the blood relationship of species beyond a doubt. The embryos of existing animals are found again and again to bear the closest resem¬ blance to extinct species, though in this adult form the semblance is obscured. Moreover, we frequently find in animals rudimentary, or abortive, organs, which are manifestly not adapted to any end, which never can be of any use, and whose presence in the organism is sometimes positively in¬ jurious. There are snakes that have rudimentary legs—legs which, how¬ ever interesting to the anatomist, are useless to the snake. There are rudi¬ ments of fingers in a horse’s hoof, and of teeth in a whale’s mouth, and in man himself there is the vermiform appendix?. It is manifest, therefore, that any particular organ in one species is merely an evolution from a some¬ what different kind of organ in another. It is manifest that the species themselves are but transmutations of one or a few primordial types, and that they have been created not by paroxysm but by evolution. The Creator saw the end from the beginning. He had not many conflicting purposes, but one that was general and all-embracing. Unity and con¬ tinuity of design serve to demonstrate the wisdom of the designer. The supposition that nature means something by what she does has not infrequently led to important scientific discoveries. It was in this way that Harvey found out the circulation of the blood. He took notice of the valves in the veins in many parts of the body, so placed as to give free passage to the blood towards the heart, but opposing its passage in the contrary direction. Then he bethought himself, to use his own words, “that such a provident cause as nature had not placed^ so many valves without a design, and the design which seemed most probable was that the blood, instead of being sent by these veins to the limbs, should go first through the arteries, should return through other veins whose valves did not oppose its course.” Thus, apart from the supposition of purpose, the greatest discovery in physiological science might not have been made. And the curious thing is—a circumstance to which I would particularly direct your attention—the word purpose is constantly employed even by those who are most strenuous in deying the reality of the fact. The supposition of purpose is used as a working hypothesis by the most extreme materialists. The recognition of an immanent purpose in our conception of nature can be so little dispensed with that we find it admitted even by Vogt. Haeckel, in the very book in which he says that “the much talked-of purpose in nature has no existence,” defines an organic body as “one in which the various parts work together for the purpose of producing the phenomenon of life.” And Hartman, according to whom the universe is the outcome of unconsciousness, speaks of “the wisdom of the unconscious,” of “the mechanical contrivance which it employs,” of “ the direct activity in bringing about complete adaptation to the peculiar nature of the case,” of “ its incursions into the human brain which determine the course of history in all departments of civilization in the direction of the goal intended by the 86 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. unconscious.” Purpose, then, has not been eliminated from the universe by the discoveries of physical science. These discoveries have but intensified and elevated our path. And there is yet something else to be urged in favor of the argument from design. If the world is not due to purpose, it must be the result of chance. This alternative can not be avoided by asserting that the world is the outcome of law, since law itself must be accounted for in one or other of these alternative ways. A law of nature explains nothing. It is merely a summary of the facts to be explained—merely a statement of the way in which things happen; e. g., the law of gravitation is the fact that all mate¬ rial bodies attract one another with a force varying directly as their mass and inversely as the squares of their distances. Now, the fact that bodies attract one another in this way can not be explained by the law, for the law is nothing but the precise expression of the fact. To say that the gravita¬ tion of matter is accounted for by the law of gravitation, is merely to say that matter gravitates because it gravitates. And so of the other laws of' nature. Taken together, they are simply the expression, in a set of convenient formulae, of all the facts of our experience. The laws of nature are the facts of nature summarized. To say, then, that nature is explained by law, is to say that the facts are explained by themselves. The question remains, Why are the facts what they are ? And to this question we can only answer, either through purpose or by chance. In favor of the latter hypothesis it may be urged that the appearance of purpose in nature could have been produced by chance. Arrangements which look intentional may sometimes be purely accidental. Something was bound to come of the play of the primeval atoms. Why not the par¬ ticular world in which we find ourselves? Why not? For this reason: It is only within narrow bounds that seemingly purposeful arrangements are accidentally produced. And, there¬ fore, as the signs of purpose increase the presumjjtion in favor of their acci¬ dental origin diminishes. It is the most curious phenomenon in the history of thought that the philosophers who delight in calling themselves experi¬ enced should have countenanced the theory of the accidental origin of the world, a theory with which our experience, as far as it goes, is completely out of harmony. When only eleven planets were known De Morgan showed that the odds against their moving in one direction round the sun with a slight inclination of the planes of their orbits—had chance determined the movement—would have been 20,000,000,000 to one. And this movement of the planets is but a single item, a tiny detail, an infinitesimal fraction in a universe which, notwithstanding all arguments to the contrary, still appears to be pervaded through and through with purpose. Let every human being now alive upon the earth spend the rest of his days and nights writing down arithmetical figures; let the enormous numbers which these figures would represent—each number forming a library in itself—be all added together; let this result be squared, cubed, multiplied by itself 10,000 times, and the final product would fall short of expressing the probabilities of the world having been evolved by chance. But over and above the signs of purpose in the world there are other evidences which bear witness to its rationality, to its ultimate dependence upon mind. We can often detect thought even when we fail to detect pur¬ pose. “ Science,” says Lange, “ starts from the principle of the intelligible¬ ness of nature.” To interpret is to explain, and nothing can be explained that is not in itself rational. Reason can only grasp what is reasonable. You can not explain the conduct of a fool. You can not interpret the actions of a lunatic. They are contradictory, meaningless, unintelligible. Similarly if nature were an irrational system there would be no possibility of knowledge. The interpretation of nature consists in making our own the thoughts which nature implies. Scientific hypothesis consists in guess- EVIDENCE OF A SUPREME BEING. 87 ing at these thoughts; scientific verification in proving that we have guessed aright. “ O God,’’ says Kepler, when he discovered the laws ot planetary motion, “ O God, I think again Thy thoughts after Thee.” There could be no course of nature, no law of sequence, no possibility of scientific predic¬ tions in a senseless play of atoms. But as it is, we know exactly how the forces of nature act, and how they will continue to act. We can express their mode of working in the most precise formulae. Every fresh discovery in science reveals anew the order, the law, the system — in a word, the rea¬ son which underlies material phenomena. And reason is the outcome of mind. It is mind in action. Nor is it only within the realm of science that we can detect traces of a supreme intelligence. Kant and Hegel have shown that the whole of our conscious experience implies the existence of a mind other than but similar to our own. For students of philosophy it is needless to explain this; for others it would be impossible within the short time at my disposal. SulBRce it to say it has been proved that what we call knowledge is due subjectively to the constructive activity of our own individual minds, and objectively to the constructive activity of another mind which is omnipresent and eternal. In other words, it has been proved that our limited consciousness implies the existence of a consciousness that is unlimited—that the common, every¬ day experience of each one of us necessitates the increasing activity of an inunite thinker. The world, then, is essentially rational. But if that were all we could say we should be very far from having proved the existence of God. A question still remains for us to answer; Is the infinite thinker good? I pass on, therefore, to speak briefly on the second part of my subject, viz., the progressiveness of the world. The last, the most comprehensive, the most certain word of science is evolution. And it is the most hopeful word I know. For when we contemplate the suffering and disaster around us we are sometimes tempted to think that the Great Contriver is indifferent to human welfare. But evolution, which is only another form for continuous improvement, inspires us with confidence. It suggests, indeed, that the Creator is not omnipotent, in the vulgar sense of being able to do impossi¬ bilities; but it also suggests that the difficulties of creation are being surely though slowly overcome. Now, it may be asked, How could there be difficulties for God ? How could the Infinite be limited or restrained ? Let us see. We are too apt to look upon restraint as essentially an evil; to regard it as a sign of weak¬ ness. This is the greatest mistake. Restraint may be an evidence of power, of superiority, of perfection. Why is poetry so much more beautiful than prose ? Because of tho restraints of conscience. Many things are possible for a prose writer which are impossible for a poet; many things are possible for a villain which are impossible for a man of honor; many things are possible for a devil which are impossible for a God. The fact is, infinite wisdom and goodness involve nothing less than infinite restraint. When we say that God can not do wrong, we virtually admit that He is under a moral obligation or necessity, and reflection will show that there is another kind of necessity, viz., mathematical, by which even the Infinite is bound. Do you suppose that the Deity could make a square with only three sides or aline with only one end? Admitting, for the sake of argument, that theoretically he had the power, do you suppose that under any con¬ ceivable circumstances he would use it? Surely not. It would be prosti¬ tution. It would be the employment of an infinite power for the production of what was essentially irrational and absurd. It would be the same kind of folly as if some one who was capable of writing a sensible book were de¬ liberately to produce a volume with the words so arranged as to convey no earthly meaning. The same kind of folly but far more culpable, for the guilt of foolishness increases in proportion to the capacity for wisdom. A 88 TITE PARLTAMENT OF RELTGTONS, being, therefore, who attempted to reverse the truth of mathematics would not be divine. To mathematical necessity Deity itself must yield. Similarly in the physical sphere there must be restraints equally neces¬ sary and equally unalterable, viz., it may be safely and reverently affirmed that God could not have created a painless world. The Deity must have been constrained by his goodness to create the best world possible, and a world without suffering would have been not better, but worse than our own. For consider; sometimes pain is needed as a warning to preserve us from greater pain — to keep us from destruction. If pain had not been attached to injurious actions and habits, all sentient beings would long ago have passed out of existence. Sui^pose, e. g., that fire did not cause pain, we might easily be burnt to death before we knew we were in danger. Suj)- pose the loss of health were not attended with discomfort, we should lack the strongest motive for preserving it. And the same is true of the pangs of remorse, which follow what we call sin. Further,pain is necessary for the development of character, especially in its higher phases. In some wayor other, though, we can not tellexactly how pain acts as an intellectiud and spiritual stimulus. The world’s greatest teachers, Dante, Shakespeare, Darwin, etc., have been men who suffered much. Suffering, moreover, develops in us pity, mercy, and the spirit of self-sacrifice; it develops in us self-respect, self-reliance, and all that is implied in the expression, strength of character. In no other way could such a character be conceivably acquired. It could not have been bestowed upon us by a creative fiat; it is essentially the result of personal conflict. Even Christ became perfect through suffering. And there is also a further necessity for pain arising ► from the reign of law. There is no doubt something awesome in the thought of the absolute- inviolability of law; in the thought that nature goes on her way quite regardless of your wishes or mine. She is so strong and so indifferent! The reign of law often entails on individuals the direst suffering. But if the Deity interfered with it He would at once convert the universe into chaos. The first requisite for a rational life is the certain knowledge that the same effects will always follow from the same cause; that they will never be miraculously averted; that they, will never be miraculously produced. It seems hard—it is hard—that a mother should lose her dar¬ ling child by accident or disease, that she can not by any agony of prayer recall the child to life. But it would be harder for the world if she could. The child has died through a violation of some of nature’s laws, and if sucht violation were unattended with death, men would lose the great iuducement to discover and obey them. It seems hard—it is hard—that the man who has taken poison by accident dies, as surely as if he had taken it on purpose. But it would be ’harder for the world if he did not. If one act of carelessness were ever overlooked, the race would cease to feel the necessity for care. It seems hard—it is hai d—that chil¬ dren are made to suffer for their father’s crimes. But it would be harder for the world if they were not. If the j)enalties of wrongdoing w^ere averted from the children, the fathers would lose the best incentive to do right. Vicarious suffering has a great part to piny in the moral development of the world. Each individual is apt to think that an excep¬ tion might be made in his favor, But, of course, that could not be. If the laws of nature were broken for one person justice would require that they should be broken for thousands, for all. And if only one of nature’s laws could be proved to have been only once violated our faith in law would be at an end; we should feel that we were living in a disorderly universe; we should lose the sense of the paramount importance of con¬ duct; we should know that we were the sport of chance. Pain, therefore, was an unavoidable necessity in the creation of the best of all possible worlds. But however many or however great were the diffi- THEISTIC TEACHINGS OF HISTORIC FAITHS. 89 culties in the Creator’s path, the fact of evolution makes it certain that they are being gradually overcome. And among all the changes that have marked its progress, none is so palpable, so remarkable, so persistent, as the development of goodness. Evolution “ makes for righteousness.” That which seems to be its end varies. The truth is constantly becoming more apparent that on the whole, and in the long run it is not well with the wicked; that sooner or later, both in the lives of individuals and of nations, good tnumplis over evil. And this tendency toward righteousness, by which we find ourselves encompassed, meets with a ready, an even readier, response in our own hearts. We can not help respecting goodness, and we have inextinguishable long¬ ings for its personal attainment; Notwithstanding “ sore lets and hindrances,” notwithstanding the fioTcest temptations, notwithstand¬ ing the most disastrous failures, these yearnings continually reassert themselves with ever-increasing force. . We feel, we know that we shall always be dissatisfied and unhappy unti] the tendency within us is brought into perfect unison with the tendency without us, until we also make for righteousness steadily, unremittingly, and with our whole heart. What is this disquietude, what are these yearnings, but the spirit of the universe in communion with our spirits, inspiring us, impelling us, all but forcing us to become co-workers with itself. To sum up in one sentence—all knowledge, whether practical or scien¬ tific, nay, the commonest experience of everyday life, implies the existence of a mind which is omnipresent and eternal, while the tendency toward ^ righteousness, which is so unmistakably manifest in the course of history, together with the response which this tendency awakens in our own hearts, combine to prove that the infinite thinker is just, and kind, and good. It must be because He is always with us that we sometimes imagine that He ' is nowhere to be found. I “Oh. where is the sea?” the fishes cried I As they swum the crystal clearness through; \ “We’ve heard from of old of the ocean’s tide \ And we long to look on the waters blue, i The wise ones speak of an infinite sea, I Oh, who can tell us if such there be? I The lark fiew up in the morning bright 1 And sang and balanced on sunny wings j And this was its song: “I see i he light; ( I look on a world of beautiful things; I And flying and singing everywhere 1 In vain have I sought to find the air.” THEISTIC TEACHINGS OF HISTORIC FAITHS. PROFESSOl^ N. VALENTINE, A REPRESENTATIVE OF THE LUTH¬ ERAN CHURCH. “We have heard two-fold testimony, to-day,” said Chairman Niccolls, “with reference to the existence of God, and I am afraid that if there is one here who has listened to this two- fold testimony and yet doubts, we must remind him of the description tliat was given by one of Israel’s psalmists long ago, with reference to the man who was unconvinced. Now we 90 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. advance a step farther, and I am glad we shall have a paper from a distinguished professor in one of the great churches of reformation, a representative of the Lutheran Church, Profes¬ sor N. Valentine, whose name is well known throughout the land.” In calling attention to the “ Harmonies and Distinctions in the Theis- tic Teaching of the Various Historic Faiths,” I must, by very necessity of the case, speak from the Christian standpoint. This standpoint is to me synonymous with the very truth itself. I can not speak as free from ju’e- possessions. This, however, does not mean any unwillingness, nor, I trust, inability to see and treat with sincerest candor and genuine appreciation the truth that may be found in each and all of the various theistic concep¬ tions which reason and providence may have enabled men anywhere to reach. Undoubtedly some rays from the true divine “Light of the World” have been shining through reason, and reflected from “the things that are made” everywhere and at all times. God never nor in any place leaves himself wholly without witness. And though we now and here stand in the midst of the high illumination of what we accept as supernat ural revela¬ tion, we rejoice to recognize the truth which may have come into view from other openings, blending with the light of God’s redemptive self-manifesta¬ tion in Christianity. It is not necessary prejudice to truth anywhere when from this stand¬ point I am further necessitated, in this comparative view, to take the Christian conception as the standard of comparison and measurement. We must use some standard if we are to proceed discriminatingly or reach any well-defined and consistent conclusions. Simply to compare different con¬ ceptions with one another, without the unifying light of some accepted rule of judging, or at least of reference, can never lift the impression out of con¬ fusion or fix any valuable points of truth. Only to hold our eye to the varied shifting colors and combinations of the kaleidoscope can bring no satisfactory or edifying conclusion. The Christian’s comparative view of the “historic faiths” other than his own necessarily thus ranges them under his own Christian canons of judgment, means no exclusion or obscuration of the light, but merely fixes the leading parallelism of its fall, securing consistency and clearness of presentation, a presentation under which not only the harmonies and distinctions, but the actual truth, may be most clearly and fairly seen. The phrase, “theistic teaching,” in the statement of the subject of this paper, I understand, in its broadest sense, as referring to the whole con¬ ception concerning God, including the very question of His being, and, therefore, applicable to systems of thought, if any such there be that, in philosophic reality, are atheistic. In this sense teachings on the subject of deity, or “the divine,” are “theistic,” though they negative the reality of God, and so may come legitimately into our comparative view. Ana yet, we are to bear in mind, it is only the “ theistic ” teaching of the historic faiths, not their whole religious view, that falls under the intention of this paper. The subject is special, restricting us specifically to their ideas about God. At the outset we need to remind ourselves of the exceeding difficulty of the comparison or of precise and firm classification of the theistic faiths of mankind. They are all — at least all the ethnic faiths — developments or evolutions, having undergone various and immense changes. Their evolu¬ tions amount to revolutions in some cases. They are not permanently marked by the same features, and will not admit the same predicates at different times. Some are found to differ more from themselves in their THEISTIC TEACHINGS OF HISTORIC FAITHS. 91 history than from one another. There is such an inter-crossing of principles and manifold form of representation as to lead the most learned specialists into disputes and opposing conclusions, and render a scientihc characteriza¬ tion and classification impossible. The most and best that can be done is to bring the teachings of the historic religions, in this particular, into com¬ parison as to five or six of the fundamental and most distinctive features of theistic conception. Their most vital points of likeness and difference will thus appear. It will be enough to include in the comparison, besides Chris¬ tianity, the religions of ancient Greece and Rome, of old Egypt, Indian Hinduism or more exactly Brahmanism, Persian Parseeism or Zoroastrian¬ ism, Buddhism, Chinese Confucianism, Celtic Druidism, the Norse or Teu¬ tonic mythology, and Mohammedanism, with incidental reference to some less prominent religions. I class Judaism as the early stage of unfolding Christianity. Adopting this method, therefore, of comparing them under the light of a few leading features or elements of the theistic view, we begin with that which is most fundamental—belief in the existence of God, or of what we call “the divine” Deity, some higher power to which or to whom men sus¬ tain relations of dependence, obligation, and hope. This is the bottom point, the question underlying all other questions in religious belief: Does a God exist ? And here it is assuring; a wonderful harmony is found. All the historic faiths, save perhaps one, rest on belief in some divine existence or existences to be acknowledged, feared, or pleased. It seems to be part of the religious instinct of the race. And the intellect concurs in fostering the belief. History, ethnology, and philology not only suggest, but amply prove, that the idea of God, of some power or powers above, upon whom man depends and to whom he must answer, is so normal to human reason in the presence and experience of the phenomena of nature and life, that it is developed wherever man’s condition is high enough for the action of his religious nature at all. “ God ” is the fundamental and constructive idea, and it is the greatest and most vital idea of humanity. But the harmony of the world’s religious faiths in this positive theistic teaching is, according to prevailing interpret¬ ation, broken in the case of Buddhism. This appears to be atheistic; a religion, or, rather, a philosophy of life, without a Deity or even the apothoesis of nature. Many things, however, incline me to the view of those interpreters who deny, or at least doubt, the totally atheistic character of Buddhism. For instance, it is rooted in the earlier pantheistic Hindu faith, and has historically developed a cult with temples and prayers. In the face of these and other things, only the most positive evidence can put its total atheism beyond question. Gautama’s work of reform, which swept away the multitudinous divinities of the popular theology, may not have been a denial of God, even as Socrates alleged atheism was not, but rather an overthrow of the prevalent gross polytheism in the interest of a truer and more spiritual conception, though it may have been a less definite one of the Divine Being. And may we not justly distinguish between Buddhism as a mere phil¬ osophy of life or conduct and Buddhism as a religion, with its former nature —gods swept away, and the replacing better conception only obscurely and inadequately brought out ? At least it is certain that its teaching was not dogmatic atheism, a formal denial of God, but marked rather by the negative attitude of failing positively to recognize and affirm the divine existence. The divergence in this case is undoubtedly less of a discord than has often been supposed. There are cases of atheism in the midst of Chris¬ tian lands, the outcome of bewilderment through speculative philosophies. They may even spread widely and last long. They, however, count but little against the great heart and intellect of mankind, or even as giving a definite characteristic to the religion in the midst of which they appear. 92 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. And they lose sway, even as the Buddhist philosophy, in becoming a re¬ ligion that has had to resume recognition of deity. And it is something grand and inspiring that the testimony of the world’s religions from all around the horizon and down the centuries is virtually unanimous as to this first great principle in theistic teaching. It is the strong and ceaseless testimony of the great, deej) heart and reason of mankind. Nay, it is God’s own testimony to His being, voiced through the religious nature and life made in His image. But let these various religions be compared in the light of a second principle in theistic teaching—that of monotheism. Here it is startling to find how terribly the idea of God, whose existence is so unanimously owned, has been misconceived and distorted. For, taking the historic faiths in their fully developed form, only two, Christianity and Mohammedanism, present a pure and maintained monotheism. Zoroastrianism can not be counted in here, though at first its Ahriman, or evil spirit, was not con¬ ceived of as a God, it afterward lapsed into theological dualism and prac¬ tical polytheism. All the rest are prevailingly and discordantly poly¬ theistic. They move off into endless multiplicity of divinities and grotesque degradations of their character. This fact does not speak well for the ability of the human mind without supernatural help, to formulate and maintain the necessary idea of God worthily. This dark and regretful phenomenon is, however, much relieved by several modifying facts. One is that the search-lights of history and phil¬ ology reveal for the principal historic faiths, back of their stages and condi¬ tions of luxuriantly developed polytheism, the existence of an early, or possibly though not certainly, primitive monotheism. This point, I know, is strongly contested, especially by many whose views are determined by acceptance of the evolutionist hypothesis of the derivative origin of the human race. But it seems to me that the evidence, as made clear through the true historical method of investigation, is decisive for monotlieism as the earliest known form of theistic conception in the religions of Egypt, China, India, and the original Druidism, as well as of the two faiths already classed as asserting the divine unity. Polytheisms are found to be actual growths. Tracing them back they become simpler and simpler. “The younger the polytheism the fewer the gods,” until a stage is reached where God is conceived of as one alone. This accords, too, as has been well pointed out, with the psychological genesis of ideas—the singular number preceding the plural, the idea of a god preced¬ ing the idea of gods, the affirmation, “There is a God,” going before the affirmation there are two or many gods. Another fact of belief is that the polytheisms have not held their fields without dissent and revolt. Over against the tendency of depraved human¬ ity to corrupt the idea of God and multiply imaginary and false divinities, there are forces that act for correction and improvement. The human soul has been formed for the one true and only God. Where reason is highly developed and the ijetsting powers of the intellect and conscience are earn¬ estly applied to the problems of existence and duty, these grotesque and gross polytheisms prove unsatisfactory. In the higher accents of civilization, faith in the mythologic divinities is undermined and weakened. Men of lofty genius arise, men of finer ethical intuitions and higher religious sense and aspiration, and better conceptions of the power by and in which men live and move are reached and a reform¬ ation comes. This is illustrated in the epoch-making teachings of Confu¬ cius in China, or Zoroaster in Persia, of Gautama in India, and of Socrates, Plato, Cicero, and kindred spirits in Ancient Greece and Rome. In their profounder and more rational inquiries these, and such as these, have pieiTced the darkness and confusion and caught sure vision of the one true eternal God above all gods, at once explaining the significance of them all, THE 1STIC TEACHINGS OF HISTORIC FAITHS. 93 and reducing all but the One to myths or symbols. Polytheism, which has put its stamp so generally on the historic faiths, has not held them in undis¬ puted, full, unbroken sway. Taking these modifying facts into account, the testimony of these faiths to the unity of God is found to be far larger and stronger than at first vi^w it seemed. For neither Christianity, with its Old Testament beginning, nor Mohammedanism, has been a small thing in the world. They have spoken for the divine unity for ages, and voiced it far through the earth. And unquestionably the faith of the few grand sages, the great thinkers of the race, who, by “The world’s great altar-stairs that slope through darkness up to God,” have risen to clear view of the sublime, eternal truth of the divine unity, is worth ten thousand times more, as an illumination and authority for correct faith, than the ideas and practice *of the ignorant and unthinking millions that have crowded the polytheistic worships. But of the two found purely monotheistic, Christianity has unique char¬ acteristics. Its witness is original and independent—not derived as that of Islam, which adopted it from Judaic and Christian teaching. It is trini¬ tarian, teaching a triune mystery of life in the one infinite and eternal God, as over against Islam’s repudiation of this mystery. The trinities detected in the other religions have nothing in common with the Christian teaching save the use of the number three. And it stands accredited, not as a mere evolution of rational knowledge, a scientific discovery, but as a super¬ natural revelation, in which the Eternal One Himself says to the world; “I am God, and beside Me there is none.” But we pass to another point of comparison in the principle of person¬ ality. Under this principle the religions of the world fall into two classes; Those which conceive of God as an intelligent being, acting in freedom, and those that conceive of Him pantheistically as the sum of nature or the impersonal energy or soul of all things. lii Christian teaching God is a personal being with all the attributes or predicates that enter into the concept of such being. In the Christian scriptures of the Old and New Testaments this conception is never for a moment lowered or obscured. God, though immanent in nature, filling it with His presence and power, is yet its creator and. preserver, keeping it subject to His will and purposes, never confounded nor identified with it. He is the infinite, absolute per¬ sonality. The finding of this feature of teaching in the other historic religions depends on the period or stage of development at which we take them. In the polytheistic forms of all grades of development we are bewildered by the immense diversity in which, in this particular, the objects of worship are conceived, from the intense anthropomorphism that makes the gods but mighty men or apotheosized ancestors down through endless personifica¬ tions of the powers and operations to the lowest forms of fetichism. Largely, however, their theistic thought includes the notion of personality, and so a point of fellowship is established between the worshiper and his gods. But we have to do mainly with the monotheistic faiths or periods of faith. In the early belief of Egypt, of China, of India, in the teaching of Zoroaster, of Celtic Druidism, of Assyrian and Babylonian faith, and in the best intuition of Greek and Roman philosophers, without doubt, God was appre¬ hended as a personal god. Indeed, in almost the whole world’s religious thinking this element of true theistic conception has had more or less positive recognition and maintenance. It seems to have been spontaneously and necessarily demanded by the religious sense and life. The human feeling of helplessness and need called for a God who could hear and understand, feel and act. And whenever thought rose beyond the many pseudo-gods to the existence of the one true God as a creator and ruler of the world, the ten thousand marks of order, plan, and purpose in nature speaking to men’s hearts and reason led up to the grand truth that 94 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. the Maker of all is a thinker and both knows and wills. And so a relation of trust, fellowship, and intercourse was found and recognized. None of the real feelings of worship, love, devotion, gratitude, consecration, could live and act simply in the presence of an impersonal, unconscious, fatefui energy or order of nature. No consistent hope of a conscious personal future life can be established except as it is rooted in faith in a personal God. And yet the personality of God has often been much obscured in the historic faiths. The observation has not come as a natural and spontane¬ ous product of the religious impulse of consciousness, but of mystic specu¬ lative philosophies. The phenomenon j^resented by Spinozism and later pantheisms, in the presence of Christianity, was substantially anticij)ated again and again, ages ago, in the midst of various religious faiths, despite their own truer version of the eternal God. As we understand it, the philosophy of religion, with Hinduism, the hiter Confucianism, developed Parseeism, and Druidism is substantially pantheistic, reducing God to impersonal existence or the conscious factors and forces of cosmic order. It marks some of these more strongly and injuriously than others. How far do the religions harmonize in including creational relation and activity in their conception of God? In Christianity, as you know, the notion of creatorship is inseperable from the divine idea. “ In the begin¬ ning God created.” Creator is another name for Him. How is it in the polytheistic mythologies? The conception is thrown into inextricable con¬ fusion. In some, as in the early iGreek and Roman, the heavens and the earth are eternal, and the gods, even the highest, are their offspring. In advancing stages and fuller pantheons, almost everywhere, the notion of creatorship emerges in connection with the mythologic divinities. In the monotheisms, whether the earlier or those reached in philosophic periods, it is clear and unequivocal — in China, India, Egypt, Persia, and the Druidic teaching. Pantheistic thought, however, while it offers accounts of world origins, confuses or overthrows real creational action by various processes of divine self-unfolding, in which God and the universe are identified, and either the divine is lost in the natural, or nature itself is God. The pantheism seems to resolve itself sometimes into atheism; sometimes into acosmism. But while the creative attribute seems to appear in some way and measure in all the historic religions, I have found no instance apart from Christianity and its derivatives in which creatio ex nihilo, or absolute creation, is taught. This is a distinction in which Christianity must be counted as fairly stand¬ ing alone. A point of high importance respects the inclusion of the ethical attribute in the notion of God and the divine government. To what extent do they hold him not only a governor, but a moral governor, whose will enthrones righteousness and whose administration aims at moral character and the blessedness of ethical order and excellence? The comparison on this point reveals some strange phenomena. In the nature-worships and polytheistic conditions there is found an almost complete disconnection between religion and morality, the rituals of worship noi being at all adjusted to the idea that the gods were holy, sin-hating, pure, and righteous. The grossest anthropomorphisms have prevailed, and almost every passion, vice, mean¬ ness, and wrong, found among men were paralleled in the nature and actions of the gods. Often their very worship has been marked by horrible and degrading rites. But as human nature carries in itself amoral constitution, and the reason spontaneously acts in the way of moral distinctions, judg¬ ments, and demands, it necessarily, as it advanced in knowledge, credited the objects of its worship with more or less of the moral qualities it required in men. The moral institutions and demands could notact with clearness and force in rude and uncivilized men and peoples. The degrees of ethical THEISTIC TEACHINGS OF HISTORIC FAITHS. 95 elements in their conception of the gods reflected the less or greater development of the moral life that evolved the theistic ideas. But whenever the religious faith was monotheistic, and especially in its more positive and clear forms, the logic of reason and conscience lifted thought into clear and unequivocal apprehension of the supreme being as the power whose government makes for righteousness. Finely and impres¬ sively does this attribute come to view in the teachings of the faith of the ancient Egyptians, of Confucianism, of Zoroastrianism, of Druidism, and of the theism of the Greek and Roman sages. But Brahmanism, that mighty power of the East, though it abounds in moral precepts and virtuous maxims and rules of life, fails to give these a truly religious or theistic sanction by any clear assurance that the advancement or triumph of the right and good is the aim of the divine government. Indeed, the pantheistic thought of that system, obliterating the divine personality, leaves scarcely any room for a moral purpose, or any other purpose, in the cosmic energy. And Budd¬ hism, though largely a philosophical ethic only—however, of the “ good ” sort—yet by its failure to make positive assertion of a supreme being, save simply as the infinite unknown behind nature of which (Brahma) nothing may be predicted except that it is, perceives, and is blessed, fails also, of course, to affirm any moral predicates for its nature or movement. The ethics of life, divorced from religious sanction, stand apart from theistical dynamics. Christianity makes, the moral attributes of God fundamental. His gov¬ ernment and providence have a supreme ethical aim, the overthrow of sin with its disorder and misery and the making of all things new in a kingdom in which righteousness shall dwell. And we rejoice to trace from the great natural religions round the globe how generally and sometimes inspiringly this grand feature of true theism has been discerned and used for the up¬ lifting of character and life—furnishing a testimony obscured or broken only by the crudest fetichisms, or lowest polytheisms, or by pantheistic teachings that reduce God to impersonality where the concept of moral character becomesflnapplicable. But a single additional feature of theistic teaching can be brought into this comparative view. How far do the various religions include in their idea of God redemptive relation and administration? Some comparativists, as you are aware, class two of them as religions of redemption or deliver- ance—Buddhism and Christianity. But if Buddhism is to be so 'classed there is no reason for not including Brahmanism. For, as Professor Max Muller has so clearly shown. Buddhism rests upon and carried forward the same fundamental conceptions of the world and human destiny and the way of its attainment. They both start v/ith the fact that the condition of man is unhajjpy through his own errors, and set forth a way of deliverance or salvation. Both connect this state of misery with the fundamental doctrine of metempsychosis, innumerably repeated incarnations, or births and deaths, with a possible deliverance in a final absorption into the repose of absolute existence or cessation of conscious individuality—Nirvana. It is connected, too, in both, with a philosophy of the world that pan- theistically reduces God into impersonality, making the divine but the ever- moving course of nature. And the deliverance comes as no free gift, gracious help, or accomjfiishment of God, but an issue that a man wins for himself by knowledge, ascetic repression of desire and self-reduction out of conscious individuality, reabsorption into primal being. God is not conceived of as a being of redeeming love and loving activity. A philosophy of self¬ redemption is substituted for faith and surrender to a redeeming god. As I understand it, it is a philosophy that pessimistically condemns life itself as an evil and misfortune to be escaped from and to be escaped by self¬ redemption, because life finds no saving in God. And so these faiths can not fairly be said to attribute to God redemptive character and adminis- trationp 96 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. Christianity stands, therefore, as the only faith that truly and fully con¬ ceives of God in redemptory rulership and activity. In this faith “ God is love,” in deepest and most active sympathy with man. While he rules for the maintenance and victory of righteousness, he uses also redeeming action for the same high ends— recovering the lost to holiness. In this comes in the unique supernatural character of Christianity. It is not a mere evolu¬ tion of natural religious intuitions. Even as a revelation, it is not simply an ethic or a philosophy of happy life. Christianity stands fundamentally and essentially for a course of divine redemptive action, the incoming pres¬ ence and activity of the supernatural in the world and time. Let us fix this clearly in mind, as its distinction among all religions, causing it to stand apart and alone. Prom the beginning of the Old Testa¬ ment to the end of the New, :.t is a casclosure in record of what God in grace has done, is doing, and will do for the deliverance, recovery, and eternal salvation from sin of lapsed.; sin-enslaved humanity. It is a super¬ natural redemptory work and provision with an inspired instruction as to the way and duty of life. If Christianity be not this Christendom has been deluded. It is the religion of the divine love and help which the race needs and only God could give. Let us sum uji the results of this hurried comparison. On the funda¬ mental point of affirming or implying the existence of God the testimony is a rich harmony. To the monotheistic conception there is strong witness from the chief earliest great historical religions—ithe Egyptian, Chinese, Indian, Original Zoroastrianism, and Druidism, obscured and almost lost in later growths of enormous polytheisms, till restored there and elsewhere in greater or less degree under the better intuitions of sages, including those of Greece and Rome. The divine personality is witnessed to, though often under the rudest and most distorted notions, by almost all religions, but darkened out of sight by pantheistic developments in India, China, Druid¬ ism, and among the Greeks. Creational activity in some sense and measure has been almost everywhere included in the idea of God; but creatio ex nihilo seems peculiar to Christianity. The attribution of ethical attributes to God has varied in degrees'according to the civilization and culture of the tribes and nationsjor their religious leaders, made inconsistent here and there by pantheistic theories—Christianity, however, giving the moral idea supreme emphasis. And finally, redeeming love and effort in redemption from moral evil is clearly asserted only in the Christian teaching. The other historic faiths have grasped some of the great essential ele¬ ments of theistic truth. We rejoice to trace and recognize them. But they all shine forth in Christian revelation. As I see it, the other historic beliefs have no elements of true theistic conception to give to Christianity what it has not, but Christianity has much to give to the others. It unites and consummates out of its own given light all the theistic truth that has been sought and seen in partial vision by sincere souls along the ages and round the world. And more, it gives what they have not—a disclosure of God’s redeeming love and action, presenting to mankind the way, the truth, and the life. And we joy to hold it and offer it as the hope of the world. THEOLOGY OF JUDAISM. DR. ISAAC WISE RABBI OF CINCINNATI. “We are now to have the pleasure,” said the chairman, “of hearing from that Jerusalem, which is the mother of us all. The oldest faith will speak to us. I am sure that all who call THEOLOGY OF JUDAISM. 97 tliemselves Christians are ready to respond to the simple creed of that ancient faith — ‘Hear, oh Israel, the Lord, our God, is one Lord’—and we are also ready to join in the testimony of Israel’s greatest psalmist—‘Happy is he who has the Lord God of Israel for his trust.’ I take great pleasure in introduc¬ ing to you Dr. Isaac M. Wise, a well-known scholar, who, by his teaching, has left a deep impression on the public thought of this country.” The theology of Judaism, in the opinion of many, is a. new academic discipline. They maintain Judaism is identical with legalism, it is religion of deeds without dogmas. Theology is a systematic treatise on the dogmas of any religion. There could be no theology of Judaism. The modern latitudinarians and syncretists on their part maintain we need more religion and less theology, or no theology at all, deeds and no creeds. For religion is undefinable and purely subjective; theology defines and casts free sentiments into dictatorial words. Religion unites and theology divides the human family, not seldom, into hostile factions. Research and reflection antagonize these objections. They lead to con¬ viction, both historically and psychologically. Truth unites and appeases; error begets antagonism and fanaticism. Error, whether in the spontaneous belief or in the scientific formulas of theology, is the cause of the distract¬ ing fractionalism in the transcendental realm. Truth well defined is the most successful arbitrator among mental combatants. It seems, therefore, the best method to unite the human family in harmony, peace, and good will is to construct a rational and humane system of theology, as free from error as possible, clearly defined, and appealing directly to the reason and con¬ science of all normal men. Research and reflection in the field of Israel’s literature and history produce the conviction that a code of laws is no reli¬ gion. Yet legalism and observances are but one form of Judaism. The un¬ derlying principles and doctrines are essentially Judaism and these are material to the theology of Judaism and these are essentially dogmatic. Scriptures from the first to the last page advance the doctrine of divine inspiration and revelation: Ratiocinate this as you may, it always centers in the proposition: There exists an inter-relation and a faculty of inter¬ communication in the nature of that universal, prior, and superior being and the individualized being called man; and this also is a dogma. Scriptures teach that the Supreme Being is also Sovereign Providence. He provides sustenance for all, all that stand in need of it. He foresees and foreordains all, shapes the destinies and disposes the affairs of man and mankind, and takes constant cognizance of their doings. He is the law¬ giver, the judge, and the executor of his laws. Press all this to the ultimate abstraction and formulate it as you may, it always centers in the proposi¬ tion of‘‘Die sittliche Weltordnung,” the universal, moral, just, benevolent and beneficent theocracy, which is the cause, source and textbook of all canons of ethics; and this again is a dogma. Scriptures teach that virtue and righteousness are rewarded; vice, misdeeds, crimes, sins, are punished, inasmuch as they are free-will actions of man; and adds thereto that the free and benevolent Deity under certain conditions pardons sin, iniquity, and transgression. Here is an apparent contradiction between justice and grace in the Supreme Being. Press this to its ultimate abstraction, formulate it as you may and you will always arrive at some proposition concerning atonement, and this also is a dogma. As far back into the twilight of myths, the early dawn of human rea^ 98 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. son, as the origin of human knowledge was traced, mankind was in posses¬ sion of four dogmas. They were always present in men’s consciousness, although x^hilosophy has not discovered the antecedents of the syllogism, of which these are the conclusions. The exceptions are only such tribes, clans or individuals that had not yet become conscious of their own senti¬ ments, not being crystalized into conceptions, and in consequence thereof had no words to express them, but those are very rare exceptions. These four dogmas are: 1. There exists—in one or more forms of being—a superior being, liv¬ ing, mightier and higher than any other being known or imagined. (Exis¬ tence of God.) 2. There is in the nature of this superior being, and in the nature of man, the capacity and desire of mutual sympathy, inter-relation and inter¬ communication. (Revelation and worshiji.) 3. The good and the right, the true and the beautiful, are desirable, the opposites thereof are detestable and repugnant to the superior being and to man. (^Conscience, ethics, and msthetics.) 4. There exists for man a state of felicity or torment beyond this state of mundane life. (Immortality, reward or punishment.) These four dogmas of the human family are the postulate of all theol¬ ogy and theologies, and they are axiomatic. They require no proof, for what all men always knew is self-evident; and no proof can be adduced to them, for they are transcendent. Philosophy, with its apparatus and methods of cogitation, can not reach them, can not expound them, can not negate tnem, and none ever did prove such negation satisfactorily even to the individual reasoner himself. All systems of theology are built on the four postulates. They differ only in the definitions of the quiddity, the extension and expansion of these dogmas in accordance with the progression or retrogression of different ages and countries. They differ in their derivation of doctrine or dogma from the main postulates; their reduction to practice in ethics and worship, forms and formulas; their methods of application to human affairs, and their notions of obligation, accountability, hope, or fear. These accumulated differences in the various systems of theology, inas¬ much as they .are not logically contained in these postulates, are subject to criticisms; an appeal to reason is always legitimate, a rational justification is requisite. The arguments advanced in all these cases are not always appeals to the standard of reason—therefore the disagreements—they are mostly historical. “Whatever we have not from the knowledge of all man¬ kind, we have from the knowledge of a very respectable portion of it in our holy books and sacred traditions” is the main argument. So each system of theology, in as far as it differs from others, relies for proof of its particular conceptions and knowledges on its traditions, written or unwrit¬ ten, as the knowledge of a portion of mankind; so each particular theology depends on its sources. So also does Judaism. It is based upon the four postulates of all theology and in justification of its extensions and expansions, its derivation of doctrine and dogma from the main postulates, its entire development, it points to its sources and traditions and at various times also to the standard of reason, not, however, till the philosophers pressed it to reason in self-defense; because it claimed the divine authority for its sources, higher than which there is none. And so we have arrived at our subject We know what theology is, so we must define here only what Judaism is. Judaism is the complex of Israel’s religious sentiments ratiocinated to conceptions in harmony with its Jehovistic God-cognition. These conceptions, made permanent in the consciousness of this people, are the religions knowledges which form the substratum to the theology of Judaism. The Thor ah maintains that its “ teaching and canon ” are divine. THEOLOGY OF JUDAISM. Man’s knowledge of the true and the good comes directly to human reason and conscience (which is unconscious reason) from the supreme and uni¬ versal reason, the absolutely true and good; or it comes to him indirectly from the same source by manifestations of nature, the facts of history and man’s power of inductioc. This principle is in conformity with the second postulate of theology, and its extension in harmony with the standard of reason. All knowledge of God and His attributes, the true and the good, came to man by successive revelations, of the indirect kind first, which we may call natural revelation, and the direct kind afterward, which we may call transcendental revelation; both these revelations concerning God and His substantial attributes, together with their historical genesis, are recorded in the Thorah in the seven holy names of God, to which neither prophet nor philosopher in Israel added even one, and all of which constantly recur in all Hebrew literature. What we call the God of revelation is actually intended to designate God as made known in the transcendental revelations including the suc¬ cessive God-ideas of natural revelation. His attributes of relation are made known only in such passages of the Thorah, in which He Himself is reported to have spoken to man of Himself, His name and His attributes, and not by any induction or reference from any law, story, or doing ascribed to God anywhere. The prophets only expand or define those conceptions of Deity which these passages of direct transcendental revelation in the Thorah con¬ tain. There exists no other source from which to derive the cognition of the God of revelation. Whatever theory or practice is contrary or contradictory to Israel’s God- cognition can have no place in the theology of Judaism. It compromises necessarily. The doctrine concerning providence, its relations to the individual, the nations, and mankind includes the doctrine of covenant between God and man, God and the fathers of the nation, God and the people of Israel, or the election of Israel. The doctrine concerning atonement. Are sins expiated, forgiven or par¬ doned, and which are the conditions or means for such expiation of sins? This leads us to the doctrine of divine worship generally, its obligatory nature, its proper means and forms, its subjective or objective import, which includes also the precepts concerning holy seasons, holy places, holy con¬ vocations and consecrated or specially appointed persons to conduct such divine worship, and the standard to distinguish conscientiously in the Thorah, the laws, statutes, and ordinances which were originally intended to be always obligatory, from those which were originally intended for a certain time and place, and under special circumstances. The doctrine concerning the human will; is it free, conditioned or con¬ trolled by reason, faith, or any other agency? This includes the postulate of ethics. The duty and accountability of man in all his relations to God, man, and himself, to his nation and to his government and to the whole of the human family. This includes the duty we owe to the past, to that which the process of history develoijed and established. This leads to the doctrine concerning the future of mankind, the ulti¬ mate of the historical process, to culminate a higher or lower status of humanity. This includes the question of perfectibility of human nature and the possibilities it contains, which establishes a standard of duty we owe to the future. The doctrine concerning personal immortality, future reward and punishment, the means by which immortality is attained, the condition on which it depends, what insures reward or punishment. The theology of Judaism as a systematic structure must solve these 100 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. problems on the basis of Israel’s God-cognition. This being the highest in man’s cognition, the solution of all problems upon this basis, ecclesiastical, ethical, or in eschatology, must be final in theology, provided the judgment which leads to this solution is not erroneous. An erroneous judgment from true antecedents is possible. In such cases the first safeguard is an appeal to reason, and the second, though not secondary, is an appeal to holy writ and its best commentaries. Wherever these two authorities agree, reason and holy writ, that the solution of any problem from the basis of Israel’s God-cognition is correct, certitude is established, the ultimate solution is found. This is the structure of a systematic theology. Israel’s God-cognition is the substratum, the substance; holy writ and the standard of reason are the desiderata, and the faculty of reason is the apparatus to solve the problems which in their unity are the theology of Judaism, higher than which none can be. THE ANCIENT RELIGION OF INDIA AND PRIMITIVE REVELATION. KEY. MAURICE PHILLIPS OF MADRAS. The more we go back, the more we examine the germs of any religion, the purer I believe we shall find the conceptions of the Deity.— Max Mullee. The ancient religion of India is revealed in the Vedas. The Vedas con¬ tain three strata of literature extending over a thousand years, viz., the Manthras, the oldest hymns; the Brahmanas, treatises of ritualism, and the Upanishadas, philosophical disquisitions. Each of these mark a distinct period in the development of religion. To do justice, therefore, to the sub¬ ject of this paper it would be necessary to trace the Vedic doctrine of the¬ ology, cosmology, anthropology, and soteriology in each of these periods, and to point out what light they throw on the Bible doctrine of a“ primitive revelation.” Space, however, will not permit me to do more than to trace roughly the first, viz., the Vedic doctrine of God, and to show that it can be much more rationally accounted for on the supposition that it is a “ rem¬ iniscence ” than on the supposition that it is an evolution. The Manthras brings before us the ancient Hindus, then called Aryans, worshiping the elements of nature as living persons, such as Dyaus, the bright sky; Varuna, the all-embracing firmament; Indra, the cloudy atmos¬ phere; Surya, the sun; Ushas, the dawn, and Prithivi, the broad earth. Hence, their worship is denominated “ physiolatry.” This term,however, does not cover the whole ground. Their worship included the elements of nature and something more; it included the natural and supernatural, so blended as to be indistinguishable. Were it all nature there would be no room for personificatmn, for personification implies the knowledge of a person, and the personification of a natural object as an object of worship implies the conception, more or less clear, of what we call God. The recognition of the supernatural in the natural is the result of that tendency deeply rooted in humanity which impels man everywhere to seek and to worship some being or beings greater than himself. Hence he grows in religion as naturally and unconsciously as he grows into manhood.. He no sooner wakes into the consciousness that he is a being separate from nature than he feels his dependence upon and moral relationship to some being above nature, to whom he owes homage. This is the first sense of the Godhead, the sensus numinis, “ a sense divine of something interfused,” a sense not the result of reasoning, nor generalization, but an immediate per¬ ception as real and irresistible as that of the Ego. And as a man is con- THE ANCIENT RELIGION OF INDIA. 101 scious of the Ego before knowing what man is, so he is conscious of the supernatural before knowing what God is. This is necessarily a very vague and incomplete idea of the Godhead, so vague as to elude definition and so incomplete as not to be named. The Pelasgians, according to Herodotus, worshiped gods without hav¬ ing names for any of them; and the ancient Germans, according to Tacitus, worshiped God as “ that secret thing known only by reverence.” Many of the Vedic bards express their consciousness of Him by the phrase That” and “ That One.” They know that He is, but where and how they know not, and hence they tried to find him in the phenomena of nature. In perceiving the infinite we neither count, nor measure, nor compare, nor name. We know not what it is, but we know that it is, because we actually feel it and are brought into contact with it.—Max.Mullp.r’ s Hilbert Lectures. Besides that definite consciousness which logic formulates into laws, there is also a definite consciousness which can not be formulated. Besides complete thoughts, and besides the thoughts which though incomplete admit of comple¬ tion, there are thoughts which it is impossible to complete and yet which are still real, in the sense that they are normal affections of the mind.—Herbert tipencer. But thougb they knew not God as a personal being distinct from natural phenomena, they possessed a wonderful knowledge of the actions and attri¬ butes which pre-eminently belong to Him. They ascribe to the personified elements of nature the function of creator, preserver, and ruler, and the attributes of infinity, omniscience, omnipotence, immortality, righteousness, holiness, and mercy. The content of this knowledge is far more definite and extensive than that furnished by the sensus numinis. The question then arises, how do they acquire this knowledge? An answer to this ques¬ tion will make clear the correctness of our definition of the “first sense of the Godhead,” and the means by which it was developed so as to embrace the characteristics of the Deity. There are only three answers conceivable. They acquired it (1) by intu¬ ition; or (2) by experience; or (3) by revelation. Did they acquire it by intuition? We have stated already what knowledge of God we conceive man capa¬ ble of acquiring by intuition, viz.: A vague, indefinite idea of the super¬ natural in the natural, of some being above himself on whom he depends and whom he should worship. But who that being is and his attributes are, he has no means of knowing. If this be correct, it follows that the ancient Hindus did not acquire their knowledge of a divine function and attribute by intuition. In order to test the validity of this position, let us suppose that man possesses a power of intuition transcending that of the sensus numinis, by means of which he is able, so to speak, to gaze immediately on God; and to this power let us ascribe the Vedic knowledge of the divine functions and attributes. No one will doubt, I presume, that in a mental intuition of this kind it is inconceivable that one can acquire knowledge of the divine functions and attributes without at the same time acquiring knowledge of the divine person]to whom they belong. It is historically trufe, however that the ancient Hindus did not know God as a person distinct from nature; they only knew of His functions and attributes, which they applied indiscriminately to all the gods of their pan¬ theon, the personified elements of nature. All these gods are alike supreme, creators, preservers, omnipotent, beneficient, immortal. Among you, O, gods, there is none that is small, none that is young; for all are great indeed.—i2. F,, vUL, 30. It might be affirmed that the personality of God was originally appre¬ hended by man, and that, in course of time, it gradually faded from his memory till nothing was left but the divine attribute. This is inconsistent with the supposition that m.an possesses a power of intuition transcending that of the sensus numinis. For as long as man is conscious, he must be 102 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. conscious of that power, and if that power once supplied him with the knowledge of God and His attributes, there is no reason to suppose that it will not always do so. Again, had the ancient Hindus acquired their knowledge of the divine functions and attributes by intuition, which intuition involves a knowledge of the divine person, and assuming that the mental powers and the spir¬ itual necessities of man are similar everywhere, we must suppose that other nations would have acquired divine knowledge in the same: way. There is no fact, however, better known To the student of ancient religion than that no individuals, much less nations, when left to themselves, have ever acquired anything like a clear and certain conception of a supreme being distinct from nature. “ Even Plato* did not make his way up'to The idea of a divine, self-conscious, personal being; nor'distinctly propounded the ques¬ tion of the personality of God. It is true that Aristotle maintained more definitely than Plato that the Deity must be a personal being. But even for him it was not absolute, free, creative power, but one limited by primor¬ dial matter; not the world’s creator, but only one who gave shape to the rude materials, and so not truly absolute.” If the ancient Hindus did not acquire their knowledge of the divine functions and attributes intuitively, did they acquire it empirically ? We acquire knowledge by experience, by what we see, hear, and feel. And the conclusions of experience are wider than its data. We have the concepts of infinite space and time as an inference from, or an intuition by, the finite space and time supplied to us by the senses. When we look back into space as far as we can see we can neither fix its beginning nor its end¬ ing. And when we contemplate time, whether we look backward or for¬ ward, there is always a beyond and a before. Both time and space are to us boundless, infinite: Therefore there is no apriori reason why the an¬ cient Hindus should not have acquired their knowledge of the divine attri¬ butes and functions by the impressions of sense and the reflections of reason—the mind in contact with the external wwld. By contemplating the boundlessness of the firmament from which the dawn and the sun flash forth every morning they might have acquired the concept of the infinite to which they gave expression in Aditi. The regu¬ larity with which the heavenly bodies move, the succession of day and night, and the periodical recurrence of the seasons within the sphere of Varuna, the heaven-god, might have suggested the idea that he is\the ruler of all things, visible and invisible, whose laws are fixed and unassailable. The permanenceof the firmament as contrasted with the visible movements of the sun, moon,, and stars, the clouds, the storms, and the changes and bustle of this noisy world, might have originated the idea of undecaying, immortal, or eternal. Again, when contemplating the heaven-god en¬ throned high above the earth, with the sun, moon, and stars as eyes pene¬ trating the darkness and seeing all that takes place in the world below, what is the more natural than that they should call him asura visvadevas, the all-knowing spirit or the omniscient. Moreover, perceiving that light and form, color and beauty, emerge every morning from a gloom in which all objects seem confounded, the old Aryans might have supposed that in a like manner the brightness, order, and beauty of the world had sprung from darkness from which the elements of all things had existed, to indistinguishable chaos. And since it is the sun that dispersesThe darkness of the night and gives back to man the heaven and the earth every morning, it is not difficult to imagine how they might have concluded that the sun brought them forth from the original chaos, and hence that he is the creator. Lastly, by applying superlative epithets to the sun it would become supreme. “ God among gods and the divine leader of all the gods,” and so the concept of omnipotence might have been formed. THE ANCIENT RELIGION OF INDIA. 103 In this way, it is conceivable that the functions of creator, preserver, and ruler, and the attributes of infinity, omniscience, omnipotence, and eternity might have been empirically acquired. And, as it is natural to suppose that all the excellent qualities which man is conscious to exist in himself must necessarily exist in the same manner, but in an infinitely higher degree, in the' object of the worship, we may conceive that thus the moral attributes of holiness, justice, mercy, love, and goodness ascribed to God might have been ascribed. ^ When we say that the knowledge of God’s attributes and functions might have been acquired empirically, we must remember that this is con¬ ceivable by us who, already possessing that knowledge, bring it to the con¬ templation of natural phenomena. It was very different with the ancient Hindus, for they ex hypothesi had no such antecedent knowledge. All that they had was the consciousness of the supernatural in the natural which they could neither define nor separate, and which, consequently, they worshiped together with the natural. Is it probable then that they, starting with that consciousness, only elaborated their knowledge of the divine functions and attributes from the impressions of sense and the reflections of reason ? Let us suppose that they did so, and it follows that they possessed a power of abstraction and generalization equal to that of the best thinkers in any age. There is nothing, apriori, impossible in this, but we may reasonably ask: Is the possession of such a power consistent with the historical fact that they were not conscious of the contradiction involved in the ascription of infinite attributes to many individuals? This contra¬ diction can neither be resolved into mere exaggerated expressions uttered in the ecstatic fervor of prayer and praise nor in different epochs or diver¬ sities of worship, for it is the chief characteristic of the whole Vedic theology, as strikingly expressed by Professor Max Muller; Each god is to the mind of the suppliant as good as all the gods. He is felt at the time as supreme and absolute, in spite of the necessary limitations which to our mind a plurality of gods must entail on every single god. Is the possession of this power consistent with the historical fact that the ancient Hindus never grasp the idea of God as a personal being distinct from nature? In obedience to the imperious law of the human mind, which leads it to logical unity, they discard the old Vedas, the old gods of nature, and afSrmed in the Upanishads the existence of “One without a second.” But this “ one” is not the unity of religion which is monotheism, but the unity of philosophy which is monism. It is Brahma, and Brahma is the abstract totality of all existences. It is not the abstract of any one group of thoughts, ideas, or conceptions. It is analogous to the word existence in Western philosophy. For that which is common to all thoughts, ideas, or conceptions, and can not be got rid of is what we predicate of existence. Dissociated as this becomes from each of its modes by the perpetual changes of those modes, it remains an indefinite consciousness of some¬ thing constant under all modes—of being apart from its appearance. The sages of the Upanishads grasped the idea of existence—of some¬ thing constant under all modes—which they call Brahma. But they went further. They denied the reality of all modes, regarding the world as phenomenal only, and all things therein fictitious emanations from Brahma, like mirage from the rays of the sun. “ All living things are only the one self fictitiously limited to this or that fictitious mind or body and return into the self as soon as the fictitious limitations disappear.” One can not insist too strongly on the distinction between the highest abstraction of philosophy and the highest abstraction of religion; for many eminent writers failing to appreciate this distinction have fallen into the error of identifiying the monism of the Upanishads with the monotheism of the Bible. How infinitely they differ I need not indicate, but I wish to 104 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. emphasize the fact that, in proportion as the ancient Hindus gave u| the idea of God as a living, energizing, sympathizing person, they lost gro> nd, from a religious point of view. For personality, with all its limitation, though far from exhibiting God as he is, is yet truer, grander, and more ele¬ vating, more religious than those barren, vague, meaningless abstractions in which men babble nothing under the name of infinite. Personal conscious existence of which man can dream, for it is that which knows, not that which is known. Is the supposition that the ancient Hindus elaborated the divine attribute'and functions from the impressions of sense and the reflections of reason consistent with the order of thought found in the Veda? Man in the mental as well as the physical world has to proceed slowly and conquer gradually by the “sweat of his brow.” Therefore, if the Vedic Aryans thought out the divine functions and attributes, they did so gradually and one ought'to see one concept following another in the process of evolution, and the*, fully developed concept at the end. The reverse, however, is the order of things in the Veda. There one finds the concepts of the divine functions and attributes fully developed in the Manthras,. the oldest por¬ tions of the Veda; whereas, in the Upanishads, the latest portions, we find them dissipated one after another till nothing is left but Nirguna Brahma, Brahma without iqualities, predicates, or determination — a something to be defined by “No,” “No.” The loftiest conception of God, in conjunction with the most intense consciousness of sin, found expression in Veruna, the oldest god of the undivided Aryans. During the long interval between Veruna and Brahma that conception was gradually corrupted, and wfith it the ethical conscious¬ ness of sin became well nigh extinct. There is no reason to believe that that corruption began with the Veda age, but, on the contrary, there are many indications that it had begun much earlier. BothVaruna and Dyaus (another primitive god) appear in the Manthras as fully developed mytho¬ logical beings. Varuna is associated with the Adityas, and Dyaus is married to Prythivi. Now, if mythology be, as Professor Max Muller says, “a dis¬ ease of language which presupposes a healthy state,” it is obvious that a long time was necessary to confound the God of heaven with the material heaven, and to transform the latter into mythological form which found expression in Varuna and Dyaus. Two things are then evident: That the higher we push our inquiries into the ancient religion of India, the purer and simpler we find the con¬ ception of God, and that in proportion as we come down the stream of time the more corrupt and complex it becomes. We conclude, therefore, that the ancient Hindus did not acquire their knowledge of the divine attributes and functions empirically, for in that case we should find at the end what we now find at the beginning. Hence, we must seek for a theory that will account alike for the acquisition of that knowledge, the godlike conception of Varuna, and its gradual depravation which culminated in Brahma. And what theory will cover these facts as well as the doctrine of a “primitive revelation”? If we admit on the authority of the Bible that God revealed himself originally to man, the knowledge of divine functions and attributes possessed by the ancient Hindus would be a reminiscence. And, if we admit on both the authority of the Bible and consciousness, the sinful tendency of human nature which makes the retention of divine knowledge either a matter of difficulty or aversion, it is easy to conceive that the idea of God, as a spiritual personal being, would gradually recede and ultimately disappear from memory, while his attributes and functions would survive like broken fragments of a once united whole. God is a spirit distinct from nature, and the difficulty is to restrain that characteristic in spite of the powerful tendency of the mind to contemplate existences as having the property of extension in space and protension in RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE HINDUS. 105 time. And when this characteristic is forgotten and material objects sub¬ stituted in its place, the divine attributes and functions naturally pass over to these objects and by association are remembered. There is a great law in the spiritual as well as the natural world by which an organism neglecting to develop itself or failing to maintain what has been bestowed upon it, deteriorates and becomes more and more adapted to a degenerate form of life. Under the operations of this law the ancient Hindus and all other nations neglecting to cultivate spiritual religion lost the knowledge of God as a personal being separate from nature bestowed upon them; and dissected thediifinite one into many finite ones, or in the words of scripture they “changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than the Creator who is blessed forever.” This being the case, we must believe that when applying the divine attributes and functions to the personified elements of nature, the ancient Hindus were using language the full meaning of which they did not under¬ stand. For had they understood it, they could not fail to perceive the con¬ tradiction involved in ascribing infinite attributes Jo more than one being. The language is an echo of a pure worship in a primeval home. It is appli¬ cable to God alone. It is meaningless when applied to anyone or anything else. It is the language of monotheism, and monotheism was a primitive religion. Professor H. H. Wilson says : “ There can be no doubt that the funda¬ mental doctrine of the Vedas is monotheism.” And Professor Max Muller says : “ There is a monotheism that precedes the polytheism of the Veda. The idea of God, though never entirely lost, has been clouded over by error. The names given to God have been changed and their meaning has faded away from the memory of man. M. Adolph Pictet in his great work, ‘ Les Origines Europiennes,’ gives it as his opinion that the religion of the un¬ divided Aryansiwas a monotheism more or less vaguely defined.’ And both Pictet and Muller maintain that traces of the primitive monotheism are visible in the Veda, that the ‘remembrance of a God, one and infinite, breaks through the mists of idolatrous phraseology like the blue sky that is hidden by a passing cloud.’ ” Lastly, is it not philosophically true that polytheism presupposes mono¬ theism? Is it true, as some suppose, that polytheism is older than mono¬ theism? Is it not likely that the simple belief is older than the more complex? Can the concept many precede the concept one? Is not plurality the aggregate of units? What is the development of thought as seen in children? Is it not from one to two, from the singular to the plural, from the simple to the complex, from unity to diversity, and then by generaliza¬ tion to abstract unity? We conclude, therefore, that the knowledge of the divine functions and attributes possessed by the Vedic Aryans was neither the product of intui¬ tion nor experience, but a “ survival,” the result of a “ primitive revelation.” The Vedic doctrines of cosmology and anthropology lead to the same conclusion. RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE HINDUS. MANILAL NI DVIVEDI OF BOMBAY. Hinduism is a wide term, but, at the same time, a vague term. The word Hindu was invented by the Mohammedan conquerors of Aryavata, the historical name of India, and it denotes all who reside beyond the Indus. Hinduism, therefore, correctly speaking, is no religion at all. It embraces within its wide intention all shades of thought, from the atheistic Jainas and Bauddhas to the theistic Sampradaikas and Samajists and the 106 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. rationalistic Advaytins. But we may agree to use the term in the sense of that body of philosophical and religious principles which are professed in part or whole by the inhabitants of India. I shall confine myself in this short address to unfolding the meaning of this term, and shall try to show the connection of this meaning with the ancient records of India, the Vedas. Before entering upon this task permit me’however, to make a few pre¬ liminary observations. And first it would greatly help us on if we had set¬ tled a few points, chief among them the meaning of the word religion. Re¬ ligion is defined by Webster generally as any system of worship. This is, however, not in the sense in which the word is understood in India. The word has a three-fold connotation. Religion divides itself into jjhysics, ontology, and ethics, and without being that vague something which is? set up to satisfy the requirements of the emotional side of human nature, it resolves itself into that rational demonstration of the universe which serves as the basis of a practical system of ethical rules. Every Indian religion—■ for let it be understood there is' quite a number of them—has therefore some theory of the physical universe, complemented by some sort of si)irit- ual government, and a cdde of ethics consistent with that theory and that government. So, then, it would be a mistake to take away any one phase of any Indian religion and, pronounce upon its merits on a partial survey. The next point I wish to clear is the chronology of the Puranas. I mean the chronology given in the Puranas. Whereas the Indian religion claims extravagant antiquity for its teachings, the tendency of Christian writers has been to cramp everything within the narrow period of 6,000 years. But for the numerous vagaries and fanciful theories these extremes give birth to this point would have no interest for us at the present moment. With the rapid advance made by physical science in the West numerous testi¬ monies have been unearthed to show the untenableness of Biblical chronol¬ ogy, and it would be safe to hold the mind in mental suspense in regard to this matter. The third point is closely connected with the second. Every¬ one has a natural inclination toward his native land and language, and par¬ ticularly toward the religion in which he is brought up. It, however, be¬ hooves men of impartial judgment to look upon all religions as so many different explanations of the dealings of the Supreme with men of varying culture and nationality. It is impossible to do justice to these themes in this place, but we will start with these necessary precautions that the following pages may not appear to make any extraordinary demands upon the intelligence of those brought up in the atmosphere of the so-called “ Oriental research ” in the West. We now address ourselves to the subject before us. At least six differ¬ ent and well-marked stages are visible in the history of Indian philosophic thought, and each stage appears to have left its impress upon the meaning of the word Hinduism. The six stages may be enumerated thus: (1) the Veda; (2) the Sutra; (.3) the Darsana; (4) the Purana; (5) the Samapradava; (6) the Samaja. Each of these is enough to fill several volumes, and all I attempt here is a cursory survey of “Hinduism” in the religious sense of the word. 1. Let us begin with the Vedas. The oldest of the four Vedas is admit¬ tedly the Rigveda. It is the most ancient record of the Aryan nation, nay, of the first humanity our earth knows of. Traces of a very superior degree of civilization and art, found at every page, prevent us from regarding these records as containing only the outpourings of the minds of pastoral tribes ignorantly wondering at the grand phenomena of nature. We find in the Vedas a highly superior order of rationalistic thought pervading all the hymns, and we have ample reasons to conclude that the childish poetry of primitive hearts, Agni and Vishne and Indra and Rudra, are indeed so many names of different gods, but each of them had really a threefold aspect. RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE HINDUS. 107 Viahne, for example, in his temporal aspect, is the physical sun; in his corporal aspect he is the soul of every being, and in his spiritual aspect he is the all-pervading essence of the cosmos. In their spiritual aspect all gods are one, for well says the well-known text, “Only one essence the wise declare in many ways.” And this conception of the spiritual unity of the cosmos, as found in the Vedas, is the crux of western oriental research. The learned doctors are unwilling to see more than the slightest trace of this conception in the Veda, for, they say, it is all nature worship, the invo¬ cation of different independent powers which held the wandering mind of this section of primitive humanity in submissive admiration and praise. However well this may accord with the xjsychological development of the human mind, there is not the slightest semblance of evidence in the Vedas to show that these records belong to that hypothetical period of humac progress. In the Vedas there are marks everywhere of the recognition of the idea of one God, the God of nature, manifesting himself in many forms. This word, “God,” is one of those which have been the stumbling-block of philosophy. God, in the sense of a personal creator of the universe, is not known in the Veda, and the highest effort of rationalistic thought in India has been to see God in the totality of all that, is. And, indeed, it is doubt¬ ful whether philosophy, be it that of a Kant or a Hegel, has ever accomplished anything more. It hereby stands to reason that men who are so far admitted to be Kants and Hegels, should, in other respects, be only in a state of childish wonderment at the phenomena of nature. I humbly beg tu differ from those who see in monotheism, in the recog¬ nition of a personal God apart from,nature, the acme of intellectual devel¬ opment. I believe that is only a kind of anthropomorphism which the human mind stumbles upon in its first efforts to understand the unknown. The ultimate satisfaction of human reason and emotion lies in the realiza¬ tion of that universal essence which is the all. And I hold an irrefragable evidence that this idea is present in the Veda, the numerous gods and their invocations notwithstanding. This idea of the formless all, the Sat—i. e., esse-being—called Atman and Brahman in the Upanishads, and further explained in the Darsanas, is the central idea of the Veda, nay, the root idea of the Hindu religion in general. There are several ideas for the opposite error of finding nothing more than the worship of many gods in the Vedas. In the first place. Western scholars are not quite clear as to the meaning of the word Veda. Native commentators have always insisted that the word Veda does not mean the Samhita only, but the Brahmanas and the Upanishads as well; whereas. Oriental scholars have persisted in understanding the word in the first sense alone. The Samhita is, no doubt, a collection of hymns to different powers, and, taken by itself, it is most likely.to produce the impression that monotheism was not understood at the time. Apart, however, from clear cases to the contrary, observable by any one who can read between the lines, even in the Samhita, a consideration of that portion along with the other two parts of the Veda will clearly show the untenableness of the Oriental¬ ist position. The second source of error, if I may be allowed the liberty to refer to it, is the religious bias already touched upon at the outset. If, then, we grasp this central idea of the Veda, we shall understand the real meaning of Hinduism as such. The other conditions of the world will unfold themselves, by and by, as we proceed. We need not go into any further analysis of the Veda, and may come at once to the second phase of religious thought, the Sutras and Smritis, based on the ritualistic portion of Vedic literature. 2. Sutra means an aphorism. In this period we have aphoristic works beaming upon ritual, philosophy, morals, grammar, and other subjects. Thougn this period is distinct from the Vedic and subsequent periods it is 108 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS- entirely unsafe to assume that this or any other period occurred histori¬ cally in the order of succession adopted for the purpose of this essay. Between the Veda and the Sutra lie the Brahmanas, with the Upanishads and Aryanakas and the Smritis. The books called Brahmanas and Upan¬ ishads form part of the Veda, as explained before, the former explaining the rTualistic use and application of Vedic hymns, the latter s/stematizing the unique i3hilosophy contained in them. What the Brahmanas explained allegorically, and in the quaint phraseology of the Veda, the Smritis, which followed them, explained in plain, systematic, modern Sanskrit. As the Veda is called Siruti, or something handed down orally from teacher to pupil, these latter works are called Smritis, something remembered and recorded after the Smritis. The Sutras deal with the Brahmanas and Smritis on the one hand, and with the Upanishads on the other. These latter we shall reserve for consideration in the next stage of religious development, but it .should never be supposed that the central idea of the All as set forth in the Upanishads had at this period, or indeed at any period, ceased to govern the whole of the religious activity of India. The Sutras are divided principally into the Grhva, Sranta, and Dharma Sutras. The first deals with the Smritis, the second with the Brahmanas, and the- third with the law as administered by Smritis. The first set of butras deals with the institution of Varnas and Asramas and with the various rites and duties belonging to them. The second class of Sutras deals with the larger Vedic sacrifices, and those of the third deals with that special law subsequently known as Hindu law. It will be interesting to deal “en masse” with these subjects in this place—leaving the subject of law out of consideration. At first let us say a few. words about caste. In Vedic times the whole Indian people is spoken of broadly as the Aryas and the Anaryas. Arya means respectable and fit to be gone, from the root, R, “ to go,” and not an agriculturist, as the Orientalist would have it, from a fanciful root ar, to till. The Aryas are divided into four sections called Varnas, men of white color, the others being Avarnas. These four sections comprise respectively priests, warriors, merchants, and cultivators, artisans, and menials, called Brahmanas, Ksatrivas, and Sudras. These divisions, however, are not at all mutually exclusive in the taking of food, or'the giving in marriage of sons and daughters. Nay, men used to be prompted or degraded to supe¬ rior or inferior Varnas according to individual deserts. In the Sutra period we find all this considerably altered. Manis speaks of promiscuous intercourse among Varnas and Avarnas leading to the creation of several Jatis, sections known by the incident of birth, instead of by color as before. This is the beginning of that exclusive system of castes which has proved the bane of India’s welfare. Varna and Jati are foremost among many other imx3ortant features which we-find grafted on Hinduism in this period. We find in works of this jjeriod that the life of every man is dis¬ tributed into four periods—student life, family life, forest life and life of complete renunciation. This institution, too, has become a part of the meaning of the word Hinduism. The duties and relations of Varnas, Jatis and Asramas are clearly defined in.the Sutras and Smritis, but with these we need not concern ourselves except in this general manner. I can, however, not pass over the well-known subject of the Samskaras, certain rites which under the Sutras every Hindu is bound to perform if he pro¬ fesses to be a Hindu. Those rites, twenty-five in all, may be divided into three groups, rites incumbent, rites optional and rites incidental. The incumbent rites are such as every householder is bound to observe for securing immunity from sin. Every householder must rise early in the morning, wash himself, revise what he has learned and teach to others without remuneration. In the next place he must worship the family gods and spend some time in silent communion with whatever power he adores. RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE HINDUS. 109 He should then satisfy his prototypes in heaven—the lunar Pitris—by offerings of water and seamen seeds. Then he should reconcile the powers of the air by suitable oblations, ending by inviting some stray comer to dinner with him. Before the householder has thus done his duty by his teachers, gods and Pitris and men, he can not go about his business without incurring the deadliest guilt. The optional rites refer to certain ceremonies in connection with the dead, whose souls are supposed to rest with the lunar Pitris for about a thousand years or more before reincarnation. These are called Sraddhas, ceremonies whose essence is Sraddha faith. There are a few other cere¬ monies in connection with the commencement or suspension of studies, and these, together with the Sraddhas, just referred to, make up the four optional Samskaras, which the Smritis allow everyone to perform according to his means. By far the most important are the sixteen incidental Samskaras. I shall, however, dismiss the first nine of these with simple enumeration. Four of the nine refer respectively to the time of first cohabitation, conception, quickening, and certain sacrifices, etc., performed with the last. The other five refer to rites performed at the birth of a child, and subsequently at the time of giving it a name, of giving it food, of taking it out of doors, and at the time of shaving its head in some sacred place on an auspicious day. The tenth, with the four subsidiary rites connected with it, is the most important of all. It is called Upanavana, the “taking to the gurnu,” but it may yet better be described as initiation. The four subsidiary rites make up the four pledges which the neophyte takes on initiation. This rite is performed on male children alone, at the age of from five to eight in the case of Brahmans, and a year or two later in the case of others, except Sudras, who have nothing to do with any of the rites save marriage. The young boy is given a peculiarly-prepared thread of cotton to wear con¬ stantly on the body, passing it cross-ways over the left shoulder and under the right arm. It is a mark of initiation which consists in the imparting of the sacred secret of the family, and the order, to the boy, by his father and the family gurnu. The boy pledges himself to his teacher, under whose protection he henceforth begins to reside, to carry out faithfully the four vows he has taken, viz., study, observance of religion, complete celibacy, and truthful¬ ness. This period of pupilage ends after nine years at the shortest, and thirty-six years at the longest period. The boy then returns home, after duly rewarding his teacher, and finds out some suitable girl for his wife. This return in itself makes up the fifteen Samskaras. The last, but not the least, is the vivaha—matrimony. The Sutras and Smritis are most clear on the injunctions about the health, learning, competency, family connections, beauty, and, above all, personal liking of principal parties to a marriage. Marriages between children of the same blood or family are prohibited. As to age, the books are very clear in ordaining that there must be a aistance of at least ten years between the respective age of wife and husband, and that the girl may be married at any age before attaining puberty, preferably at ten or eleven, though she may be affianced at about eight or nine. Be it remembered that marriage and consummation of mar¬ riage are two different things in India, as a consideration of this Samskara, in connection with the first of the nine enumerated at the beginning of this group, will amply show, several kinds of marriage are enumerated, and among the eight generally given we find marriage by courting as well. The marriage ceremony is performed in the presence of priests and gods represented by fire on the altar, and the tie of love is sanctified by Vedic mantras, repetition of which forms indeed an indispensable part of every rite and ceremony. The pair exchange vows of fidelity and indissoluble love and bind themselves never to separate, even after death. The wife is liO THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. supposed henceforth to be as much dependent on her husband as he on her, for, as the wife has to complete the fulfillment of love as her principal duty, the husband has, in return, the entire maintenance of the wife, tem¬ porarily and spiritually, as his principal duty. When the love thus fostered has sufficiently educated the man into entire forgetfulness of self, he may retire, either alone or with his wife, into some secluded forest and prepare himself for the last period of life, complete renunciation—i. e , renunciation of all individual attachment, of personal likes and dislikes, and realization of all in the eternal self-sacrifice of universal love. It goes without saying that widow remarriage as such is unknown in this system of life, and the liberty of woman is more a sentiment than something practically wanting in this careful arrangement. Woman, as woman, has her place in nature quite as much as man, as man, and if there is nothing to hamper the one or the other in the discharge of his or her functions as marked out by nature, liberty beyond this limit means shadows, disorder, and irresponsible license. And, indeed, nature never meant her living embodiment of lone woman to be degraded to a footing of equality with her partner, to fight the hard struggle for existence, or to allow love’s pure stream to be defiled by being led into channels other than those marked out for it. This is in substance the spirit of the ancient Sastras when they limit the sphere of woman’s action to the house, and the flow of her heart to one and one channel alone. 3. We arrive thus in natural succession to the third period of Aryan religion, the Darsanas, which enlarge upon the central idea of Atman, or Brahma, enunciated in the Veda and developed in the Upanishadas. It is interesting to attend to the Charvakas, the materialists of Indian philosophy, and to the Jainas and the Buddhas, who, though opposed to the Charvakas, are anti-Brahmanical, in that they do not recognize the authority of the Veda and preach an independent gospel of love and mercy. These schisms, however, had an indifferent effect in imparting fresh activity to the rationalistic spirit of the Aryan sages, lying dormant under the growing incumbrances of the ritualism of the Sutras. The central idea of the All as we found it in the Veda is further developed in the Upanishadas. In the Sutra period several Sutra works were composed setting forth in a systematic manner the main teaching of the Upanishads. Several works came to be written in imitation of these subjects closely connected with the main issues of philosophy and meta¬ physics. This spirit of philosophic activity gave rise to the six well-known Darsanas, or schools of philosophy. Here again it is necessary to enter the caution that the Darsanas do not historically belong to this period, for not¬ withstanding this, their place in the general development of thought and the teachings they embody are as old as the Veda or even older. The six Darsanas are Nyaya, Vaiseshika, Sankhya, Xoga, Mimansa, and Vodanta, more conveniently grouped as the two Nyayas, the two Sankhyas and the two Mimansas. Each of these must require at least a volume to itself, and all I can do in this place is to give the merest outline of the conclusions maintained in each. Each of the Darsanas has that triple aspect which we found at the outset in the meaning of the word religion, and it will be convenient to state the several conclusions in that order. The Nyaya then is exclusively concerned with the nature of knowl¬ edge and the instruments of knowledge, and while discussing these it sets forth a system of logic not yet surpassed by any existing system in the West. The Vaiseshika is a complement of the Nyaya, and while the latter discusses the metaphysical aspect of the universe the former works out the atomic theory and resolves the whole of the nameable world into seven categories. So, then, physically the two Nyayas advocate the atomic theory of the universe. Ontologically they believe that these atoms move in accordance hjeligious belief of tbe Hindus. Ill with the will of an extra-cosmic personal creature called Isvara. Every being has a soul called Jiva, whose attributes are desire, intelligence, pleas¬ ure, pain, -merit, demerit, etc. Knowledge arises from the union of Jiva and mind, the atomic manas. The highest happiness lies in Jiva’s becom¬ ing permanently free from its attribute of misery. This freedom can be obtained by the grace of Isvara, pleased with the complete devotion of the Jiva. The Veda and the Upanishadas are recognized as authority in so far as they are the word of this Iswara. The Sankhyas differed entirely from the Naiyayikas in that they repu¬ diated the idea of a personal creator of the universe. They argued that if the atoms were in themselves sufficiently capable of forming themselves into the universe, the idea of a God was quite superfluous. And as to intel¬ ligence the Sankhyas maintained that it is inherent in nature. These philosophers, therefore, hold that the whole universe is evolved by slow degrees, in a natural manner, from one primordial matter called mulapra- kriti, and that purusa, the principle or intelligence, is always co-ordinate with, though ever apart from mulaprakriti. Like the Naiyayikas, they believe in the multiplicity of purusas—souls—but unlike them they deny the necessity as well as the existence of an extra-cosmic God. Whence, they have earned for themselves the name of atheistic Sankhyas. They resort to the Vedas and Upanishads for support so far as it may serve their purpose, and otherwise accept in general the logic of the ten Naiyayikas. The Sankhyas place the summum bonum in “life according to nature.” They endow primordial matter with three attributes—passivity, restless¬ ness, and crossness. Prakrit! continuous in endless evolution under the influence of the second of these attributes, and the purusa falsely takes the action upon himself and feels happy or miserable. When a purusa has his prakriti brought to the state of passivity by analytical knowledge (which is the meaning of the word Sankhya), he ceases to feel himself happy or miserable and remains in native peace. This is the sense in which those philosophers understand the phrase, “ life according to nature.” The other Sankhya, more popularly know as the Yogo-Darsana, accepts the whole of the cosmology of the first Sankhya, but only adds to it a hypo¬ thetical Isvara and largely expands the ethical side of the teaching by setting forth several physical and psychological rules and exercises capa¬ ble of leading to the last state of happiness, called Kanivalya—life accord¬ ing to nature. This is theistic Sankhya. The two Mimansas next call our attention. These are the orthodox Darsanas par excellence, and as such are in direct touch with the Veda and the Upanishads, which continue to govern them from beginning to end. Mimansa means inquiry, and the first preliminary is called Purva-Mimansa, the second Uttara-Mimansa. The object of the first is to determine the exact meaning and value of the injunctions and prohibitions given out in the Veda, and that of the second is to explain the esoteric teachings of the Upanishads. The former, therefore does not trouble itself about the nature of the universe or about the ideas of God and soul. It tells only of Dharma, religious merit, which, according to its teaching, arises in the next world from a strict observance of the Vedic duties. This Mimansa fitly called the purva, a preliminary Mimansa, we may thus pass over without any further remark. The most important Darsana of all is by far the Utra or final Mimansa, popularly knowns as the Nedanta, the philosophy taught in the Upanishads as the end of the Veda. The Vedanta emphasizes the idea of the All, the universal Atman or Brahman, set forth in the Upanishads, and maintained the unity not only of the cosmos but of all intelligence in general. The All is self-illumined, all thought (gnosis), the very being of the universe. Being implies thought, and the All may in Venuanta phraseology be aptly described as the essence of thought and being. The Vedanta is a system of absolute idealism in 112 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. which subject and object are rolled into one unique consciousness, the realization whereof is the end and aim of existence, the highest bliss—Moksa. This state of Moksa is not anything to be accomplished or brought about —it is in fact the very being of all existence, but experience stands in the way of complete realization by creating imaginary distinctions of subject and object. This system besides being the orthodox Darsana is philosoph¬ ically an improvement upon all previous speculations. The Nyaya is superseded by the Sanhya, whose distinction of matter and intelligence is done away with in this philosophy of absolute idealism, which has endowed the phrase “ life according to nature ” with an entirely new and more rational meaning. For in its ethics, this system teaches not only the brotherhood but the Atma-hood Abheda, oneness, of not only man but of all beings, of the whole universe. The light of the other Darsanas pales before the blaze of unity and love lighted at the altar of the Veda by this sublime philosophy, the shelter of minds like Plato, Pythagoras, Bruno, Spinoza, Hegel, Schopenhauer in the West, and Krisna, Vyasa, Sankara and others in the East. We can not but sum up at this point. Hinduism adds one more attri¬ bute to its connotation in this period, viz., that of being a believer in the truths of one or other of these Darsanas, or of one or other of the three anti- Brahmanical schisms. And with this we must take leave of the great Darsana sages and come to the period of the Puranas. 4. The subtleties of the Darsanas were certainly too hard for ordinary minds and some popular exposition of the basic ideas of philosophy and religion was indeed very urgently required. And this necessity began to be felt the more keenly as Sanskrit began to die out as a speaking language and the people to decline in intelligence, in consequence of frequent inroads from abroad. No idea more happy could have been conceived at this stage than that of devising certain tales and fables calculated at once to catch the imagination and enlist the faith of even the most ignorant, and at the same time to suggest to the initiated a clear outline of the secret doctrine of old. It is exactly because Orientalists don’t understand this double aspect of Pauranika myths that they amuse themselves with philogical quibbles and talk of the religion of the Puranas as something entirely puerile and not deserving the name of religion. We ought, however, to bear in mind that the Puranas are closely connected with the Vedas, the Sutras, and the Darsanas, and all they claim to accomplish is a pop¬ ular exposition of the basic ideas of philosophy, religion, and morality set forth in them. In other words, the Puranas are nothing more nor less than broad, clear commentaries on the ancient teaching of the Vedas. For example, it is not because Vyasa, the author of the Puranas, forgot that Vishnu was the name of the sun in the Veda that he talked of a separate god of that name in the Puranas, endowing him with all mortal attributes. This is how the Orientalistic method of interpretation would dispose of the question. The Hindus have better confidence in the insight of Vyasa, and could at once see that inasmuch as he knew perfectly well what part the sun plays in the evolution, maintenance, and dissolution of the world, he represented him symbolically as God Vishnu, the all-pervading, with Laksimi, a personifica¬ tion of the life and prosperity which emanate from the sun for his comfort, with the anauta—popularly the snake of that name, but esoterically the endless circle of eternity—for his couch, and with the eagle, representing the many antaric cycle, for his vehicle. There is in this one symbol suf¬ ficient material for the ignorant to build their faith upon and nourish the religious sentiment, and for the initiate to see in it the true secret of Vedic religion. And this nature of the Puranas is an indirect proof that the Vedas are not mere poetical effusions of primitive man nor a conglomera¬ tion of solar myths disguised in different shapes. RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE HINDUS. 113 The cycles just referred to put me in mind of another aspect of Pura- nika mythology. The theory of cycles known as Kalpas, Manvantaras, and Yugas is clearly set forth in the Puranas and appears to make exorbitant demands upon our credulity. The Kalpa of the Puranas is a cycle of 4,320,000,000 years, and the world continues in activity for one Kalpa, after which it goes into dissolution and remains in that condition for another Kalpa, to be followed by a fresh period of activity. Each Kalpa has four¬ teen well-marked subcycles called Manvantaras, each of which is again made up of four periods called Yugas. The name Manvantara means time between the Manus, and Manu means “with one mind,” that is to say, humanity, the whole suggesting that a Manvantara is the period between one humanity and another on this globe. Whence it will also be clear why the present Manvantara is called Vaivasvata, “belonging to the sun,” for, as is well established, on that luminary depends the life and being of man on this earth. This theory of cycles and subcycles is amply corroborated by modern geological and astronomical researches, and considerable light may be thrown on the evolution of man if with reason as our guide we study the aspect of the Puranas. The theory of Simian descent is confronted in the Puranas with a theory more in accord with reason and experience. But I have no time to go into the details of each and every Puranika myth. I can only assure you, gentlemen, that all that is taught in the Puranas is capable of being explained consistently in accord with the main body of ancient theosophy expounded in the Vedas, the Sutras, and the Darsanas. We must only free ourselves from what Herbert Spencer calls the religious bias and learn to look facts honestly in the face. I must say a word here about idol worship, for it is exactly in or after the Pauranika period that idols came to be used in India. It may be said without the least fear of contradiction, that no Indian idolator, as such, believes the piece of stone, metal, or wood before his eyes to be his God in any sense of the word. He takes it only as a symbol of the all-pervading, and uses it as a convenient object for purposes of concentration, which, being accomplished, he does not hesitate to throw away. The religion of the Tantras, which plays an important part in this period, has considerable influence on this question, and the symbology they taught as typical of several important processes of evolution, has been made the basic idea in the formation of idols. Idols, too, have, therefore, a double purpose — that of perpetuating a teaching as old as the world, and that of serving as con¬ venient aids to concentration. These interpretations of Pauranika myths And ample corroboration in the myths that are met with in all ancient religions of the world; and these explanations of idol worship have an exact parallel application to the wor¬ ship of the Tau in Egypt, of the cross in Christendom, and of the Kaba in Mohammedanism. With these necessarily brief explanations we may try to see what influence the Puranas have had on Hinduism in general. It is true the Puranas have added no new connotation to the name, but the one very important lesson they have taught the Hindu is the principal of universal toleration. The Puranas have distinctly taught the unity of the All, and satisfactorily demonstrated that every creed and worship is but one of the many ways to the realization of the All. A Hindu would not condemn any man for his religion, for he has well laid to heart the celebrated couplet of the Bhagavat: “Worship, in whatever form, rendered to whatever God, reaches the Supreme, as rivers, rising from whatever source, all flow into the ocean.” 5. And thus, gentlemen, we come to the fifth period, the Sampradayas. The word Sampradaya means tradition, the teaching handed down from teacher to pupil. The whole Hindu religion, considered from the beginning 114 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. to the present time, is one vast field of thought, capable of nourishing every intellectual plant, of whatever degree of vigor and luxuriance. The one old teaching was the idea of the All, usually known as the Advaita or the Vedanta. In the ethical aspect of this philosophy, stress has been laid on knowledge (gnosis) and free action. Under the debasing influence of a for¬ eign yoke, these sober paths of knowledge and action had to make room for devotion and grace. On devotion and grace rest their principal ethical tenets. Three important schools of philosophy arose in the period after the Puranas. Besides the ancient Advaita we have the Dvaita, the Vis- uddhadvaita, and the Visishthadvaita schools of philosophy in this period. The first is purely dualistic postulation, the separate yet co-ordinate exist¬ ence of mind and matter. The second and third profess to the Unitarian, but in a considerably modified sense of the word. The Visuddhadvaita teaches the unity of the cosmos, out it insists on the All having certain attributes which endow it with the desire to manifest itself as the cosmos. The third system is purely dualistic, though it goes by the name of modified Unitarianism. It maintains the unity of chit (soul), achet (matter), and Isvara (God), each in its own sphere, the third number of this trinity governing all and pervading the whole, though not apart from the cosmos. Thus widely differing in their philosophy from the Advaita, these three Sampradayas teach a system of ethics entirely opposed to the one taught in that ancient school called Dharma in the Advaita. They displaced Jnana by Bhakti, and Karma by Prasada; that is to say, in other words, they placed the highest happiness in obtaining the grace of God by entire devotion, physical, mental, moral, and spiritual. The teach¬ ers of each of these Sampradayas are known as Acharyas, like Sankara, the first great Acharya of the ancient Advaita. The Acharyas of the new Sampradayas belong all to the 11th and 12th centuries of the Christian era. Every Acharya develops his school of thought from the Upanishads, the Vedanta Sutras, and from that sub-sublime poem, “The Bhagvadgita,” the crest jewel of the Maha Bharata. The new Acharyas, following the example of Sankara, have commented upon these works; and have thus applied each his own system to the Veda. In the Sampradayas we see the last of the pure Hinduism, for the sacred Devanigari ceases henceforth to be the medium even of religious thought. The four principal Sampradayas have found numerous imitators, and we have the Saktas, the Saivas, the Pasupatas, and many others, all deriving their teaching from the Vedas, the Darsanas, the Puranas, and the Tantras. But beyond this we find quite a lot of teachers: Ramananda, Kabira, Dadu, Nanaka, Chaitanya, Sahajananda, and many others holding influence over small tracts over all India. None of these have a claim to the title of Acharya or the founders of a new school of thought, for all that these noble souls did was to explain one or another of the Sampradayas in the current vernacular of the people. The teachings of these men are called Panthas —mere ways to religion as opposed to the traditional teachings of the Sampradayas. The bearing of these Sampradayas and Panthas, the fifth edition as it were of the ancient faith, on Hinduism in general is not worthy of note except in the particular that thenceforth every Hindu must belong to one of the Sampradayas or Panthas. 6. This brings us face to face with the India of to-day and Hinduism as it stands at present. It is necessary at the outset to understand the principal forces at work in bringing about the change we are going to describe. In the ordinary course of events one would naturally expect to stop at the religion of the Sampradayas and Panthas. The advent of the English followed by the educational policy they have maintained for half a century has, however, worked several important changes in the midst of the people, not the least important of which are those RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE HINDUS. 115 which effect reli^fion. Before the establishment of British rule and the peace and security that followed in its train, people had forgotten the ancient religion and Hinduism had dwindled down into a mass of irrational superstition reared on ill-understood Pauranika myths. The spread of edu¬ cation set people to thinking and a spirit of “reformation” swayed the minds of all active-minded men. The chance work was, however, no reformation at all. Under the aus¬ pices of materialistic science, and education guided by materialistic princi¬ ples, the mass of superstition then known as Hinduism was scattered to the winds and atheism and skepticism ruled supreme. But this state of things was not destined to endure in religious India. The revival of Sanskrit learning brought to light the immortal treasures of thought buried in the Vedas, Upanishads, Sutras, Darsanas and Puranas, and the true work of reformation commenced with the revival of Sanskirt. Several pledged their allegiance to their time-honored philosophy. But there remained many bright intellects given over to materialistic thought and civilization. These could not help thinking that the religion of those whose civilization they admired must be the only true religion. Thus they began to read their own notions in texts of the Upanishads and the Vedas. They set up an extra-cosmic yet all-pervading and formless creature whose grace every soul desirous of liberation must attract by com¬ plete devotion. This sounds like the teaching of the Visishthadvaita Sam- pradaya, but it may safely be said that the idea of an extra-cosmic personal creation without form is an un-Hindu idea. And so also is the belief of these innovators in regard to their negation of the principle of reincarna¬ tion. The body of this teaching goes by the name of the Brahmo-Somaj, which has drawn itself still further away from Hinduism by renouncing the institutions of Varnas and the established law of marriage, etc. The society which next calls your attention is the Aryasamaja of Swami Dayananda. This society subscribes to the teaching of the Nyaya-Darsana and professes to revive the religion of the Sutras in all social rites and observances. This Samaja claims to have found out the true religion of the Aryas, and it is of course within the pale of Hinduism, though the merit of their claim yet remains to be seen. The third influence at work is that of the Theosophical Society. It is pledged to a religion contained in the Upanishads of India, in the Book of the Dead of Egypt, in the teachings of Confucius and Lao, Tse in China, and of Buddha and Zoroaster in Thibet and Persia, in the Kabala of the Jews, and in the Suflsm of the Mohammedans: and it appears to be full of principles contained in the Advaita and Yoga philosophies. It can not be gainsaid that this society has created much interest in religious studies all over India, and has set earnest students to studying their ancient books with better lights and fresher spirits than before. Time alone can test the outcome of this or any other movement. The term Hinduism then has nothing to add to its meaning from this period to the Samajas. The Brahmo Somaj widely differs from Hinduism and the Aryasamaja or The¬ osophical Society does not profess anything new. To sum up, then, Hinduism may in general be understood to connote the following principal attributes: (1.) Belief in the existence of a spirit¬ ual principle in nature and in the principle of reincarnation. (2.) Observ¬ ance of a complete tolerance and of the Samskaras, being in one of the Varnas and Asramas, and being bound by the Hindu law. This is the general meaning of the term, but in its particular bearing it implies: (3.) Belonging to one of the Daranas, Sampradayas, or Panthas or to one of the anti-Brahmanical schisms. Having ascertained the general and particular scope and meaning of Hinduism, I would ask you, gentlem-en of this august parliament, whether there is not in Hinduism material sufficient to allow of its being brought in 116 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. contact with the other great religions of the world by subsuming them all under one common genius? In other words, is it not possible to enunciate a few principles of uni¬ versal religion which every man who professes to be religious must accept, apart from his being a Hindu or a Buddhist, a Mohammedan or a Pharsee, a Christian or a Jew? If religion is not wholly that something which satisfies the cravings of the emotional nature of man, but is that rational demonstration of the cos¬ mos, which shows at once the why and wherefore of existence, provides the eternal and all-embracing foundation of natural ethics and by showing to humanity the highest ideal of happiness realizable, excites and shows the means of satisfying the emotional part of man; if, I say, religion is all this, all questions of particular religious professions and their comparative value must resolve themselves into simple problems workable with the help of unprejudiced reason and intelligence. In other words, religion, instead of being a mere matter of faith, might well become the solid province of . reason, and a science of religion may not be so much a dream as is imagined by persons pledged to certain conclusions. Holding, therefore, these views on the nature of religion, and having at heart the great benefit of a common basis of religion for all men, I would submit the following simple principles for your consideration: 1. Belief in the existence of an ultramaterial principle in nature and in the unity of the all. 2. Belief in reincarnation and salvation by action. These two principles of a possible universal religion might stand or fall on their merits apart from the consideration of any philosophy or revelation that upholds them. I have every confidence no philosophy would reject them, no science would gainsay them, no system of ethics would deny them, no religion which professes to be philosophic, scientific, or ethical ought to shrink back from them. In them I see the salvation of man and the possibility of that universal love which the world is so much in need of at the present moment. ARGUMENT FOR THE DIVINE BEING. W. T. HARRIS, UNITED STATES COMMISSIONER OF EDUCATION. When Rev. Jenkin Lloyd Jones, chairman of the afternoon session, presented to the audience yesterday afternoon, W. T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education, he compli¬ mented him upon his earnestness in the quest of truth, and added that, although the learned gentleman belonged to the United States, he had all the credentials necessary to class him with Brahmans of the highest caste. The first thinker who discovered an adequate proof of the existence of God was Plato. He devoted his life to thinking out the necessary condi¬ tions of independent being, or, in other words, the form of any whole or totality of being. Dependent being implies something else than itself as that on which it depends. It can not be said to derive its being from another dependent or derivative being, because that has no being of its own to lend it. A whole series of connected dependent beings must derive their origin and present ARGUMENT FOR THE DIVINE BEING. 117 subsistence from an independent being—that is to say, from what exists in and through itself and imparts its being to others or derived beings. Hence the independent being, which is presupposed by the dependent being, is creative and active in the sense that it is self-determined and determines others. Plato in most passages calls this presupposed independent being by the word idea, ex sos, or idea. He is sure that there are as many ideas as there are total beings in the universe. He reasons that there are two kinds of motion — that which is derived from some other mover, and that which is derived from self — thus the self-moved and the moved-through-others include all kinds of beings. But the moved-through-others presupposes the self-moved as the source of its own motion. Hence the explanation of all that exists or moves must be sought and found in the self-moved. (Tenth book of Plato’s laws.) In his dialogue, named “ The Sophist,” he argues that ideas or independent beings must possess activity, and, in short, be thinking or rational beings. This great discovery of the principle that there must be independent being if there is dependent being is the foundation of philosophy and also of theology. Admit that there may be a world of dependent beings, each one of which depends on another, and no one of them nor all of them depend on an independent being, and at once philosophy is made impossible and theology deprived of its subject-matter. But such admission would destroy thought itself. Let it be assumed, for the sake of considering where it would lead, that all existent beings are dependent; that no one possesses any other being than derived being. Then it follows that each one borrows its being from others that do not have any being to lend. Each and all are dependent and must first obtain being from another before they can lend it. If it is said that the series of dependent beings is such that the last depends upon the first again, so that there is a circle of dependent beings, then it has to be admitted that the whole circle is independent, and from this strange result it follows that the independence of the whole circle of being is something transcendent—a negative unity creating and then annulling again the par¬ ticular beings forming the membersthe series. • This theory is illustrated in the doctrine of the correlations of forces. The action of force number one gives rise to force number two and so on to the end. But this implies that the last of the series gives rise to the first one of the series, and the whole becomes a self-determined totality or independ¬ ent being. Moreover, the persistent force is necessarily different from any one of the series; it is not heat, nor light, nor electricity, nor gravitation, nor any other of the series, but the common ground of all, and hence not particularized like any one of them. It is the general force whose office it is to energize and produce the series—originating one force and annulling it again by causing it to pass into another. Thus the persistent force is not one of the series, but transcends all of the particular forces; they are derivative; it is original, independent, and transcendent. It demands as the next step of explanation the exhibition of the necessity of its produc¬ tion of just this series of particular forces as involved in the nature of the self-determined or absolute force. It involves, too, the necessary conclusion that a self-determined force which originates all of its special determina¬ tions and cancels them all is a pure Ego or self-hood. For consciousness is the name given by us to that kind of being which can annul all of its determinations. For it can annul all objective deter¬ mination and have left only its own negative might while it descends creatively to particular thoughts, volitions, or feelings. It can drop them instantly by turning its gaze upon its pure self as the creator of those determinations. This turn upon itself is accomplished by filling its object¬ ive field with the negation or annulment—this is its own act and in it realizes its personal identity and its personal transcendence limitations. 118 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. Hence we may see that the doctrines of correlation of forces presupposes a personality creating and transcending the series of forces correlated. If the mind undertakes to suppose a total of dependent or derivative beings it ends by reaching an independent, self-determined being which, as pure subject, transcends its determinations as object, and is therefore an Ego or person. Again, the insight which established this doctrine of independent beings or Platonic “ ideas ” is not fully satisfied when it traces dependent or deriv¬ ative motion back to any intelligent being as its source; there is a further step possible, namely, from a world of many ideas to an absolute idea as the divine author of all. For time and space are of such a nature that all beings contained by them—^namely, all extended and successive beings are in necessary mutual dependence, and hence in one unity. This unity of dependent beings in time and space demands one transcendent being. Hence the doctrine of the idea of ideas—the doctrine of a divine being, who is rational and personal, and who creates beings in time and space and in order to share his fullness of being with a world of created beings—created for the special purpose of sharing his blessedness. This is the idea of the supreme goodness, and Plato comes upon it as the highest thought of his system. In the Timaeus he speaks of the absolute as being without envy and therefore as making the world as another blessed God. In this Platonic system of thought we have the first authentic survey of human reason Human reason has two orders of knowing—one the know¬ ing of dependent beings and the other the knowing of independent beings. The first is the order of knowing through the senses; the second the order of knowing by logical presupposition. I know by seeing, hearing, tasting, touching things and events. I know by seeing what these things and events logically imply or presuppose that there is a great First Cause, a per¬ sonal reason who reveals a gracious purpose by creating finite beings in time and space. This must be or else human reason is at fault in its very foundations. This must be so or else it must be that there is dependent being which has nothing to depend on. Human reason, then, we may say from this insight of Plato, rests upon this knowledge of transcendental being—a being that transcends all determinations of extent and succession such as appertain to space and time, and therefore, that transcends both time and space. This transcendent being is perfect fullness of being, while the beings in time and space are partial or imperfect beings in the sense of being embry¬ onic or undeveloped, being partially realized and partially potential. At this point the system of Aristotle can be understood in its harmony with the Platonic system. Aristotle, too, holds explicitly that the beings in the world which derive motion from other beings presuppose a first mover. But he is careful to eschew the first expression self-moved as applying to the prime mover. God is himself unmoved, but he is the origin of motion in others. This was doubtless the true thought of Plato, since he made the divine eternal and good. In his metaphysics (book eleventh, chapter seven) Aristotle unfolds his doctrine that dependent beings presuppose a divine being whose activity is pure and knowing. He alone is perfectly realized—the schoolmen call this technically “pure act”—all other being partly potential, not having fully grown to its perfection. Aristotle’s proof of the divine existence is sub¬ stantially the same as that of Plato—an ascent from dependent being by the discovery of presuppositions to the perfect being who presupposes nothing else—than the identification of the perfect or dependent being with think¬ ing, personal, willing being. This concept of the divine being is wholly positive as far as it goes, ARGUMENT FOR THE DIVINE BEING. 119 and nothing of it needs to be withdrawn after further philosophic reflec¬ tion has discussed anew the logical presuppositions. More presuppositions may be discovered—new distinctions discerned where none were perceived before—but those additions only make more certain the fundamental theory explained first by Plato and subsequently by Aristotle. This may be seen by a glance at the theory of Christianity, which unfolds itself in the minds of great thinkers of the first six centuries of our era. The object of Chris¬ tian theologians was to give unity and system to the new doctrine of the divine—human nature of God taught by Christ. They discovered one by one the logical presuppositions and announced them in the creed. The Greeks had seen the idea of the Logos or eternally begotten son, the Word that was in the beginning and through which created beings arose in time and space. But how the finite and imperfect arose from the infinite and perfect the Greek did not understand so well as the Christian. The Hindu had given up the solution altogether and denied the problem itself. The perfect can not be conceived as making the imperfect—it is too | absurd to think that a good being should make a bad being. Only Brah¬ man the absolute exists and all else is illusion—it is Maya. How the illusion can exist is too much to explain. The Hindu has only postponed the problem and not set it aside. His philosophy remains in that contradiction. The finite including Brahma himself, who philoso¬ phizes, is an illusion. An illusion recognizes itself as an illusion^—an illu¬ sion knows true being and discriminates itself from false being. Such is the fundamental doctrine of the Sankhya philosophy, and the Sankhya is the fundamental type of all Hindu thought. The Greek escapes from this contradiction. He sees that the absolute can not be empty, indeterminate, pure, being devoid of all attributes, with¬ out consciousness. Plato and Aristotle see that the absolute must be pure form—that is to say, an activity which gives form to itself—a self-deter¬ mined being with subject and object the same, hence a self-knowing and self-willed being. Hence the absolute cannot be an abstract unity like Brahman, but must be a self-determined or a unity that gives rise to duality within itself and recovers its unity and restores it by recognizing itself in its object. . The absolute as subject is the first—the absolute as object is the second. It is Logos. God’s object must exist for all eternity, because He is always a person and conscious. But it is very important to recognize that the Logos, God’s object, is Himself, and hence equal to Himself, and also self- conscious. It is not the world in time and space. To hold that God thinks Himself as the world is pantheism—it is pantheism of the left wing of the Hegelians. To say that God thinks Himself as the world is to say that He discovers in Himself finite and perishable forms, and therefore makes them objective. The schoolmen say truly that in God intellect and will are one. This means that in God His thinking makes objectively existent what it thinks. Plato saw clearly that the Logos is perfect and not a world of change and decay. He could not explain how the world of change and decay is derived except from the goodness of the Divine Being who imparts gratui¬ tously of His fullness of being to a series of creatures who have being only in part. But the Christian thinking adds two new ideas to the two already found by Plato. It adds to the Divine First and the Second (the Logos), also a Divine Third, the Holy Spirit, and a fourth not divine, but the process of the third—calling it the processio. This idea of process explains the existence of a world of finite beings, for it contains evolution, development, or derivation. And evolution implies the existence of degrees of less and more perfection of growth. The procession thus must be in time, but the time process must have eternally gone on because the third has eternally proceeded and been proceeding. 120 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. The thought underneath this theory is evidently that the Second Per¬ son or Logos in knowing himself or in being conscious knows himself in two phases, first, as completely generated or perfect, and this is the holy spirit and, secondly, he knows himself as related to the First as his eternal origin. In thinking of his origin or genesis from the Father he makes objective a complete world of evolution containing at all times all degrees of development or evolution and covering every degree of imperfection from pure space and time up to the invisible church. This recognition of his derivation is also a recognition on the part of the First of his own act of generating the Second^—it is not going on, but has been eternally completed, and yet both the Divine First and the Divine Second must think it when they think of their relation to one another. Recognition is the intellectual of the First, and Second is the mutual love of the Father and the Son, and this mutual love is the procession of the Holy Spirit. But the procession is not a part of the Holy Trinity; it is the creation in time and space of an infinite world of imperfect beings developing into self¬ activity and as self-active organizing institutions-—the family, civil society, the state and the church. The church is the New Jerusalem described by St. John, the apostle, who has revealed this doctrine of the third person as an institutional person—the spirit who makes possible all institutional organism in the world and who transcends them all as the perfect who energizes in the imperfect to develop it and complete it. Thus stated, the Christian thought is expressed in the symbol of the Holy Trinity, explains fully the relations of the world of imperfect beings and makes clear in what way the goodness or grace of God makes the world as Plato and Aristotle taught. The world is a manifestation of divine grace—a spectacle of the evolu¬ tion or becoming of individual existence in all phases, inorganic and organic. Individuality begins to appear even in specific gravity and in ascending degrees in cohesion and crystallization. In the plant it is unmistakable. In the animal it begins to feel and perceive itself. In man it arrives at self- consciousness and moral action and recognizes its own place in the universe. , God, being without envy, does not grudge any good; he accordingly turns, as Rothe says, the emptiness of non-being into a reflection of himself and makes it everywhere a spectacle of his grace. Of the famous proof of divine existence, St. Anselm’s holds the first place. But St. Anselm’s proof can not be understood without recurring to the insight of Plato. In his Proslogium St. Anselm finds that there is but one thought which underlies all others—one thought universally presup¬ posed, and this he describes as the thought of that than which there can be nothing greater. “Id quo nihil majus cogitari potest.” This assuredly is Plato’s thought of the totality. Everything not a total is less than the totality. But the totality is the greatest possible being. The essential thing to notice, however, is that St. Anselm perceives that this one thought is objectively valid and not a mere subjective notion of the thinker. No thinker can doubt that there is a totality—he can be per¬ fectly sure that the plus the not me include all that there is. Gaunillo, in the lifetime of St. Anselm, and Kant in recent times have tried to refute the argument by alleging the general proposition—the conception of a thing does not imply its corresponding existence. The proposition is true, except in the case of this one ontological thought of the totality of the thoughts that can be logically deduced from it. The second order of knowing, by presumptions, implies an existence corresponding to each con¬ cept. St. Anselm knew that the person who denied the objective validity of this idea of the totality must presuppose its truth right in the very act of denying it. If there be an Ego that thinks, even if it be the Ego of a ARGUMENT FOR THE DIVINE BEING. 121 fool (insipiens) who says in his heart, “ There is no God,” it must be certain that its self plus its not self makes a totality and that this totality surely exists. The existence of his Ego is or may be contingent, but the totality is certainly not contingent but necessary. This is an ontological necessity and the basis of all further philosophical and theological thoughts. St. Anselm does not, it is true, follow out this thought to its contempla¬ tion in his Proslogium nor in his Monologium. He leaves it there with the idea of a necessary being who is supreme and perfect because he contains the fullness of being. He undoubtedly saw the further implication, namely, that the totality is an independent being and self-existent because it is self-active. He saw this so clearly that he did not think it worth while to stop and unfold it. But he did speak of it as a necessary existence contrasted with a contingent existence. “ Everywhere else besides God,” he says, “ can be conceived not to exist.’’ Descartes, in hie third Meditation, has repeated with some modification the demonstration of St. Anselm. He holds, in substance, that the idea of a perfect being is not subjective, but objective—we see that he is dealing with the necessary objectivity of the idea of totality. The expression, “ perfect being,” is entirely misunderstood by most v/riters in the history of philosophy—it must be taken only in the sense of independent being- being—for itself—being that can be what it is without support from another—hence perfectly self-determined being. The expression, “perfect,” points directly to Aristotle’s invented word, entelechy, whose literal mean¬ ing is the having of perfection itself. The word is invented to express the thought of the independent presupposed by dependent being. Perfect being, as Aristotle teaches, is pure energy—all of his potentiali¬ ties are realized—^hence it is not subject to change nor is it passive or reci¬ pient of anything from without—it is pure form, or rather self-formative. Kead in the light of Plato’s idea and Aristotle’s entelechy, St. Anselm and Descarte’s proofs are clear and intelligible, and are not touched by Kant’s criticism. In his philosophy of religion and elsewhere, Hegel has pointed out the source of Kant’s misapprehension. Gaunilo instanced the island Atlantis as a conception which does not imply a corresponding reality. Kant instanced a hundred dollars as a conception which did not imply a corresponding reality in his pocket. But neither the island Atlantis, nor any other is and neither a hundred dollars—in short, no finite dependent being is at all a necessary being, and hence can not be deduced from its concept. But each and every contingent being presupposes the existence of an inde- ' pendent being—a self-determined being—an absolute divine reason. St. Anselm proved the depth of his thought by advancing a new theory of the death of Christ as a satisfaction, not of the claims of the devil, but as the satisfaction of the claims of God’s justice for sin. Although we do not trace out his full thought in the Proslogium we can see the depth and clearness of his thinking in this new theory of atonement. For, in order to understand it philosophically, the thinker must make clear to himself the logical necessity for the exclusion of all forms of finitude of dependent being from the thought of the Divine Reason who knows Himself in the Logos. To think an imperfection is to annul it—hence God’s thought of an imperfect being annuls it. ‘This logical statement corresponds to the politi¬ cal definition of the idea of justice. Justice gives to a being its dues—it completes it by adding to it what it lacks. Add to an imperfect being what it lacks and you destroy its indi¬ viduality. This is justice instead of grace. Grace bears with the imper¬ fect being until it completes itself by its own act of self-determination. But, in order that a world of imperfect beings, sinners, may have this field of probation, a perfect being must bear their imperfection. The divine Logos must harbor in his thought all the stages of genesis or becoming and 122 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. thereby endowed beings in a finite world, with reality and self-existence. Thus the conception of St. Anselm was a deep and true insight. The older view of Christ’s atonement as a ransom paid to Satan is not so irrational as it seems, if we divest it of the personification which figures the negative as a co-ordinate person with God. God only is absolute per¬ son. His pure not-me is chaos, but not a personal devil. In order that God’s grace shall have the highest possible manifestation, he turns his not-me into a reflection of himself by making a series of ascending stages out of dependence and nonentity into independence and personal individ¬ uality. But the process of reflection by creation in time and space involves God’s tenderness and long-suffering —it involves a real sacrifice in the Divine Being—for he must hold and sustain in existence by His creative thought the various stages of organic beings—plants and animals are mere caricatures of the divine—then it must support and nourish humanity in its wickedness and sin—a deeper alienation than even that of minerals, plants, and animals, because it is a willful alienation of a higher order of beings. Self-sacrificing love is, therefore, the concept of the atonement; it is, in fact, the true concept of the divine gift of being of infinite things; it is not merely religion, it is philosophy or necessary truth. But it is very import¬ ant so to conceive nature as not to attach it to the idea of God by them in Himself; such an idea is pantheism. Nature does not form a person of the trinity. It is not the Logos, as supposed by the left wing of the Hegelians. And yet, on the other hand, nature is not an accident in God’s purposes as conceived by theologians, who react too far from the pantheistic view. Nature is eternal, but not self-existent; it is the procession of the holy spirit and arises in the double thought of the first person and the Logos or the timeless generation which is logically involved in the fact of God’s con¬ sciousness of himself as eternal reason. The thought of God is a regressive thought—it is an ascent from the dependent to that on which it depends. It is called dialectical by Plato in the sixth book of the Republic. “ The Dialectic Method,” says he, “ ascends from what has a mere contingent or hypothetic existence to the first prin¬ ciple by proving the inefficiency of all except the first principle.” This is the second order of knowing — the discovery of the ontological presuppositions. The first order of knowing sees things and events by the aid of the senses, the second order of knowing sees the first cause. The first order of knowing attains to a knowledge of the perishable, the second order attains to the imperishable. The idea of God is, as Kant has explained, the supreme directive or regulative idea in the mind. It is, moreover, as Plato and St. Anselm saw, the most certain of all our ideas, the light in all our seeing. IDEALISM THE NEW RELIGION. DR. ADOLF BRODBECK OF HANOVER, GERMANY, “A REPRESENTA¬ TIVE MODERN SCIENTIST.” ft The blunt declarations concerning both the old religions and the new gospel, which he champions, created a decided sensa¬ tion. In his preliminary remarks, Dr. Brodbeck announced that some of his views would appear strange to many, and in this he spoke truly. He was the representative, he said. Idealism the new religion. 123 of a new form of religion that was spreading rapidly, not only in Germany but in all other civilized countries. Although the disciples of the new religion had been severely persecuted by their enemies, they were happy, because they still believed in God, and tried hard to be good. It is an open secret that millions of people in our civilized countries have partially given up Christianity and, with it, religion. Millions of others cling to the old belief only because there is nothing better there. Again millions are believers in Christianity or other religions because they have been educated in those lines and do not know better. The time has come for a new form of religion in which the painful discord between mod¬ ern civilization and old beliefs disappear and bright harmony is placed instead. What is good can be left, other things can be reformed, thus bringing fresh life into dead forms; other things again are to be abolished entirely, and, lastly, new factors have to spring up. It would, however, be a great mistake to think that only against Christianity the new religion is directed; it is directed against all other religions as far as they differ from the new religion. We are not heathens, not Jews, nor Mohammedans, nor Buddhists, nor Christians, and, more especially, neither Catholics, nor Protestants, nor Methodists, nor holders of any other form of Christianity. We also do not revive any old religion that may have existed or still exists. The new relig¬ ion is also not a mixture or synopsis of previous religions. The new religion is also not a philosophical system of any kind. It is not atheism, not pan¬ theism, not theism, not deism, not materialism, not spiritualism, not natur¬ alism, not realism, not mysticism, not freemasonry; nor is it any form of so-called philosophical idealism. It is not rationalism and not supranaturalism; also not scepticism or agnosticism. It is not optimism and not pessimism; also not stoicism and not epicureism; nor is it any combination of those philosophical doctrines. It is also not positiveism and not Darwinism or evolutionism. It is also not moralism, and is also not synonymous with philanthropism or humani- tarianism. In short, the new religion is something new. Its name is idealism. Its confessors are called idealists. The aim of this new religion is soon explained. Its chief aim is idealism; that is, the striving for the ideal, the perfection in everything for the ideal of mankind, especially of each indi¬ vidual; further, for the ideal of science and art, for the ideal of civilization, for the ideal of all virtues, for the ideal of family, community, society, and humanity in all forms. All those who work already in this line, or are willing to work for it, are our friends, and, in fact, our members. Every political man who does his best for the benefit of his people is our friend. Every earnest and sincere scientist is our assistant. Every noble artist is our helpmate. Every honest business man and manufacturer, every respectable and hard-work¬ ing man or woman, are our co-workers. All good children are our best friends, and we are theirs. A noble father, a careful mother, are inclosed in our holy circle. The honest poor, the sick, and widows and orphans, the deserted and lonely people are especially welcome, and shall benefit from our practical idealism, which means not consolation for the future, but practical help for this life. All masters and teachers, tutors and governesses, are our fellows, if they work in the spirit of our idealism. Even all priests of all religions are our friends, so far as they theoretically and practically agree with our principles. 124 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. All the rich and wealthy are our friends, if they practically agree to our religion. The new religion is not agressive, but creative and reforming. It has nothing to do with anarchism or revolutionism. It works not with force, but with organization, example, doctrine. If attacked, it defends itself with all means permitted by our principles, and if undermined by secret agitation or open crime it does not give way. Faithful to idealism unto death is our device. Our enemies are the dogmatic in all forms; our ene¬ mies are also all who are opposed to idealism; that is, especially the lazy and unjust. We hate hypocrisy in all its forms, cruelty and vice, and crimes of all sorts. We are not for absolute abstaining from stimulants, as long as science has not absolutely decided against them; but we are friendly to all temperance societies. We are not in favor of extremes; in most cases virtue is the middle between extremes. We do not profess to have any certain knowledge of things beyond this life. We believe that there is an absolute power over which we have no control. The true essence of this power we do not know. With some reserve the words “providence,” “almighty,” “creator,” might be used; but we do not believe that there exists an absolute personal being as a kind of individual, as this is against true philosophy and is a form of anthropomorphism. We do not make any man or woman to be a god, nor do we believe in a god becoming man ; but we assume that there are great differences in men, and that some do more for the benefit of mankind and true civilization than others, but it is not advisable to ascribe that to special merits of such a person. If somebody is born a genius and finds favorable conditions of development, it is not his merit. We believe in the great value of a good example for.followers more than in doctrines. But we do not worship any¬ body, nor any single object, nor any product of human imagination as being God. We do not know how things originated, or if they did originate at all, so we also do not know what will be the last end and aim of everything existing, if there is anything like last end and aim at all. At any rate those are open questions, and science is allowed to discuss them freely. We do not believe that there is a resurrection of human individuals. We do not believe that there is immortality of the individual as such. We leave it to science to decide how far there can be anything like existence after death. We do not believe in heaven as the dwelling of individuals after death ; astronomy is against such a belief. We do not believe in hell, nor a per¬ sonal leader of it, nor in purgatory. But we acknowledge willingly the relative truths of those and similar dogmas. We do not believe that once everything was good and perfect in this world. We do not believe that all evils came into the world through man’s fault, although a great many of them did. We do not consider the world irreparable. We take everything as it is and try to improve it if possible. We do not believe in the possi¬ bility of absolute perfection of anybody or anything. We do not think that every good deed finds its proper reward, nor do we think that every wrong deed is properly punished. But as a whole we believe that doing good deeds brings about good things, and that wrong¬ doing is a failure in the end. What is once done can never be undone by any x^ower; the only thing is that it can be practically forgotten and, in some cases, thS bad consequences avoided. We believe that what is meant by duty, responsibility, and similar words does not depend on the theoretical question if there is free will or not, or in what sense and degree there is free will. We do not know where we came from nor where we go; we only know that we are here on this planet, and that we must take things as they are, and that we must do our best in everything, and in doing this we are happy as far as happiness reasonably can be expected to be attained by man. IDEALISM THE NEW RELIGION, 125 We do not hate Darwinism or similar theories, but will leave it entirely to science to decide in those and similar questions. We do not expect too much from this life and world, so we are not disappointed at the end. Prayer we admit only as reverent immersion in the great mystery of this life and world, and as devotion to the unchangeable laws of the world, and as practical acknowledgement of the belief that in doing good we are in true accord with the good spirit in us, in men, and in the world in general. Prayer for anything that is against the natural course of things we think unreasonable. In the same way as prayers, also, all religious songs and hymns ought to be treated. If there are no schools idealism tries to establish them; a general know¬ ledge of nature and history is most desirable for everybody as a foundation for all other knowledge, and harmonious education of all essential sides of our being, bodily and mentally, we consider the ideal of education. But this does not exclude special and earnest preparation for the different pur¬ poses of civilized life, either theoretical or technical, or practical, or a com¬ bination of either. We warn against overwork in education. We do not hide established facts from everybody. But we think that certain things ought not to be taught before the proper time of their appreciation has come. In social as well as in political things we believe that there must be order and liberty combined. We do net think that all members of human society are equally able for social or political roles. We do not believe that good as well as bad qualities of body and mind can be transferred naturally from one generation to the other. We think that the ideal of social and political, of scientific and artistic, of industrial and commercial and any other branch of civilized life can best be attained if exclusively individual qualifications and no others give man his degree in the organism of civilized life. We believe that many things in our civilization are and will be imper¬ fect. But it is unwise to change or abolish something as long as we are unable to put something decidedly better instead. We are not in favor of war if it ever can be avoided without disregarding honor and duty of honor¬ able existence. We are friendly to all organizations for general peace and for peaceful and useful intercourse of all nations of the world. We believe that the new religion, called idealism, can and ought to be adopted by all nations and people; that it does not depend on climate, nor on certain degrees of civilization. But we believe that in different coun¬ tries and times it will be individualized differently. Especially we believe that the forms of organization, of worship, prayers, hymns, of preaching and similar things, will assume different aspects in different countries and times without interfering with the unity in essential points. We do believe that hard work is not a curse, but a benefit for man, for the worker himself as well as for others. We believe that the ideal, the perfection of man, is not only a matter of knowledge, but also of practical good work. To strive theoretically and practically in everything for that which is true and good is the ideal of man; that is our firm belief. W^e believe that self-respect is necessary; this is the true egoism, if there must be egoism. We believe that love is also necessary for everything. But we believe that love alone, either to God or to our fellow-creatures or to both, is not a sufficient fundamental principle tor thorough religion. We believe that making money is useful for many things, and even necessary for those who have none, at least as long as money exists at all. But we believe that this is not an aim in itself, but that it’should be only a means for honest living and doing good and fostering all kinds of progress in human things. We believe that man is not born only to suffer, nor only to work, but also to enjoy reasonably this life. We believe that bodily exercise is necessary during our whole life, and part of the new religion. We believe that, as a rule, only in a sound body a sound soul can exist, or 126 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. that what is meant by the word soul. We believe that solemn ceremonies and certain regular days are something reasonable and useful, as long as they are not considered the essence of religion, but are symbols and orna¬ ments of idealism. We believe that everything goes always according to certain laws in nature, in history, in each individual; even that which we call an accident. But we are not fatalists nor quietists. We believe in the actual value of our own activity. We believe that all men, male and female, are born of a mother, live shorter or longer, and die at the end of their life and thereby finish their individual circle. We do not fear death, nor do we fear life. We believe that everything should be done to make children happy and healthy as long and as much as they ever can be, and we hold that this is a special task of our religion. We strive and work hard for all that we believe. We try everywhere to make that better which is good, to avoid that which is bad, and to mend that which can be mended. We believe that everything must be done to keep up health in ourselves, and in all others, as far as possible, and to help and restore, if possible, the sufferers. We believe that many things are mysterious, and will, probably, always be so; but we believe, also, that science has a right and duty to investigate everything, and to state openly the case. We believe that enthusiasm is a great thing and a part of true religion, namely, enthusiasm for the wonders of nature, for great men and women^for noble and fine arts; and enthusiasm for the ideal in everything, for the ideas of perfection, truth, justice, beauty, holiness, and similar ideas. We believe that the better a man’s character is, the better is his work; the same with a woman. We believe that personal improvement in all respects is the base of all other improvements and progress. We believe that the power of being good is increasing steadily by constant work on ourselves, but we think that up to the last moment of our life this work must be kept up, if we are not to be in danger of falling back. We believe that a change for the better is in some persons a matter of a moment, or a few hours or days; in others a matter of weeks, months, or years, according to individuality and circumstances. We believe that for some people it is easier to be good or to become good and to remain good than for others. We believe that true religion must be practiced privately as well as openly and together with others. All our activity for good, for perfection, can be considered as the work of an absolute or some working in us, and, so to speak, for us. We believe that without self-restraint of each individual no union, no harmony, can exist among men. We believe that in some cases even wealth and life must be sacrificed for the benefit of man, but it is not every man’s desire to be so heroic. We believe that those who possess the greatest power of self-restraint are the fittest for ruling over others. We believe that the harder the struggle for self-improvement is, the greater the moral value of an individual is. Natural things we do not consider sinful in themselves, but only if they imply an injustice against others, or if they are against the principles of health or moral dignity. We believe that the purer a person’s mind and manners the better he or she is fitted for investigation of the mysteries of science, art and of life, and for working for the benefit of man. We believe that true religion can exist very well without any hope of a future individ¬ ual existence after death, and we even think that true religion excludes such a hope. We believe that it is not always necessary to go back in prayer to the absolute ground of everything that ever was, is, and will be; as for most people it is impossible to realize such a grand idea, and even for the wisest and best it is seldom that they can reach it approximately. Therefore it is also allowed to pray in the above stated sense to individualizations of Idealism the new religion. 127 the absolute ground and fullness of everything—for instance to the sun, which is in many ways our lifegiver; to the earth, to the idea of the human race, to the ideal of our nation, family, or men, or women, to virtue, science, art; but all that only as far as those things and powers can be supposed to be true revelations of God. In short, we believe that no name given by man will ever express the infinite secret. We believe that everything now existing does change, but can not abso¬ lutely be destroyed Thus we believe that even our sun, earth, moon, will once be destroyed, but probably in order to begin in new shapes a new existence. But as to all that we leave to science to decide, if possible, when and how it will take place. At the close of the exercises, Chairman Jones said, “I think you will agree with me that the hospitality of this platform has been vindicated, and that the aim of the Parliament of Religions to study all exhibits of the spectrum has been realized to-day. Werer the testimony of any one missing, the spirit and intent of this parliament would have fallen short of its highest ideal. ” '<4i * € V ' t, * *’' * Tlir?,^;) If*v f* MOST REV. DIONYSIOS LATAS Archbishop of Zante, Greece. A ■t ? n c CHAPTEE HI. THIRD DAY, SEPTEMBER 13th, THE NATURE OF MAN. The extensive programme of the third day^s proceedings of the parliament required three sessions, and many phases of religious thought and life were under review. Especial interest centered in the discourses of P. 0. Mozoomdar, Archbishop Latas, and Pung Kwang Yu. The archbishop gave a fascinat¬ ing account of the early history of Christianity in Greece. At times it was difficult to follow him, but his musical barytone voice rang through the vast auditorium, and his earnest gestures elucidated whatever was uncertain in his speech. The address of Kinza Euige Hirai on the “Position of Japan Towards Christianity,” was loudly applauded, and when he had finished. Dr. Barrows grasped his hand and Jenkin L. Jones threw his arms around his neck, the audience waving hats and handkerchiefs in the excess of enthusiasm. In presenting the eminent Chinaman, Pung Kwang Yu, Dr. Barrows spoke of him as representing an empire toward which America has not been just. An outburst of applause, for several minutes, followed the statement, and the Chinese diplomat arose and bowed his acknowledgments. When the address of Eight Eev. Eenchi Shibrata was read by Dr. Barrows, the distinguished stranger, clothed in the light silken robes of the flowery kingdom, stood beside the speaker. With each outburst of applause the high-priest made a light bow, and then resumed his statue-like attitude. The sacred mountain of Japan, dedicated to the Shinto gods, was represented by a fine painting that hung at the back of the platform. When the 133 134 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. reading closed, a wave of applause broke forth all over the house, Distinguished men and women gathered round Mr. Shibrata and shook his hand, and women climbed over tables to pay their compliments to the worthy Oriental. In the whirlwind of enthusiasm everybody in the hall wanted to shake his hand, and he tendered the audience an informal reception for twenty min-utes. The Hall of Columbus, at the third session, was crowded to its extreme limit. The morning session was opened with a significant and touching scene. Followers of Christ, Jews and Greeks, Brahmans and Buddhists, devotees of Confucius and Mohammed, all joined in cinging “Nearer My God to Thee.’^ Dr. J. H. Barrows presided in uho morning. Rev. Dr. W. C. Roberts in the afternoon. The first session was opened with silent prayer, after which Protap Chuder Mozoomdar, of Cal¬ cutta, led in the universal prayer, “ Our Father Who Art in Heaven.” Mr. Mozoomdar was introduced as one whose heart is in sympathy with the great work of unification of the human brotherhood and who has shown deep interest in this great movement by the long journey he has made and by the activity of his life in the cause of the new religion. VOICE FROM NEW INDIA. REV. P. C. MOZOOMDAR. Mr. President., Representatives of Nations and Religions: I told you the other day that India is the mother of religion; the land of evolution. I am going, this morning, to give you an example, or demonstrate the truth of what I said. The Brahmo-Somaj of India, which I have the honor to represent, is that example. Our society is a new society; our religion is a new religion, but it comes from far, far antiquity, from the very roots of our national life, hundreds of centuries ago. Sixty-three years ago the whole land of India — the whole country of Bengal — was full of a mighty clamor. The great jarring noise of a hetero¬ geneous polytheism rent the stillness of the sky. The cry of widows; nay, far more lamentable, the cry of those miserable women, who had to be burned on the funeral pyre of their dead husbands, desecrated the holiness of God’s earth. We had the Buddhist, goddess of the country, the mother of the people, ten-handed, holding in each hand the weapons for the defense of her chil¬ dren. We had the white goddess of learning, playing on her Vena, a ptringed instrument of music, the strings of wisdom, because, my friends, VOICE FROM NEW INDIA. 135 all wisdom is musical; where there is a discord there is no deep wisdom The goddess of good fortune, holding in her arms, not the horn, but the basket of plenty, blessing the nations of India, was there; and the god with the head of an elephant, and the god who rides on a peacock—martial men are always fashionable, you know, and the33,000of gods and goddesses besides. I have my theory about the mythology of Hinduism, but this is not the time to take it up. Amid the din and clash of this polytheism and so-called evil, amid all the darkness of the times, there arose a man, a Brahman, pure bred and pure born, whose name was Rajah Ram Dohan Roy. In his boyhood he had studied the Arabic and Persian; he had studied Sanskrit, and his.own mother was a Bengalee. Before he was out of his teens he made a journey to Thibet and learned the wisdom of the Llamas. Before he became a man he wrote a book proving the falsehood of all polytheism and the truth of the existence of the living God. This brought upon his head persecution, nay, even such serious displeasure of his own parents that he had to leave his home for awhile and live the life of a wan¬ derer. In 1830 this man founded a society known as the Brahmo-Somaj; Brahma, as you know, means God. Brahmo means the worshiper of God, and Somaj means society; therefore Brahmo-Somaj means the society of the worshipers of the one living God. While on the one hand he estab¬ lished the Brahmo-Somaj, on the other hand he co-operated with the British government to abolish the barbarous custom of suttee, or the burning of widows with their dead husbands. In 1832 he traveled to England, the very first Hindu who ever went to Europe, and in 1833 he died, and his sacred bones are interred in Bristol, the place where every Hindu pilgrim goes to pay his tribute of honor and reverence. This monotheism, the one true living God — this society in the name of this great God — what were the underlying principles upon which it was established? The principles were those of the old Hindu scriptures. The Brahmo-Somaj founded this monotheism upon the inspiration of the Vedas and the Upanishads. When Rajah Ram Dohan Roy died his followers for awhile found it nearly impossible to maintain the infant association. But the spirit of God was there. The movement sprang up in the fullness of time. The seed of eternal truth was sown in it; how could it die? Hence in the course of time other men sprang up to preserve it and contribute toward its growth. Did I say the spirit of God was there? Did I say the seed of eternal truth was there? There! Where? All societies, all churches, all religious movements, have their founda¬ tion, not without, but within the depths of the human soul. Where the basis of a church is outside, the floods shall rise, the rain shall beat, and the storm shall blow, and like a heap of sand it will melt into the sea. Where the basis is within the heart, within the soul, the storm shall rise, the rain shall beat, and the flood shall come, but, like a rock, it neither wavers nor falls. So that movement of the Brahmo-Somaj shall never fall. Think for yourselves, my brothers and sisters, upon what foundation your house is laid. In the course of time, as the movement grew, the members began to doubt whether Hindu scriptures were really infallible. In their souls, in the depth of their intelligence, they thought they heard a voice, which, here and there, at first in feeble accents, contradicted the deliverances of the Vedas and the Upanishads. What shall be our theological principles? Upon what principles shall our religion stand? The small accents in which the question first was asked became louder and louder, and were more and more echoed in the rising religious society, until it became the most prac¬ tical of all problems—upon what book shall true religion stand ? Briefly, they found that it was impossible that the Hindu scriptures should be the only records of true religion. They found that the spirit was 136 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS, the great source of confirmation, the voice of God was the great judge, the soul of the in dweller was the revealer of truth, and, although there were truths in the Hindu scriptures, they could not recognize them as the only infallible standard of spiritual reality. So, twenty-one years after the foundation of the Brahmo-Somaj, the doctrine of the infallibility of the Hindu scriptures was given up. Then a further question came. The Hindu scriptures only not infallible! Are there not other scriptures also? Did I not tell you the other day that on the imperial throne of India Christianity now sat with the Gospel of Peace in one hand and the scepter of civilization in the other? The Bible had penetrated into India; its pages were unfolded, its truths were read and taught. The Bible is the book which mankind shall not ignore Recognizing, therefore, on the one hand, the great inspiration of the Hindu scriptures, we could not but on the other hand recognize the inspiration and the authority of the Bible. And in 1861 we published a book in which extracts from all scriptures were given as the book which was to be read in the course of our devotions. Our monotheism, therefore, stands upon all scriptures. That is our theological principle, and that principle did not emanate from the depths of our own consciousness, as the donkey was delivered out of the depths of the German consciousness; it came out as the natural result of the in-dwell¬ ing of God’s spirit within our fellow believers. No, it was not the Christian missionary that drew our attention to the Bible; it was not the Moham¬ medan priests who showed us the excellent passages in the Koran; it was no Zoroastrian who preached to us tPe greatness of his Zend-Avesta; but there was in our hearts the God of infinite reality, the source of inspiration of all the books, of the Bible, of the Koran, of the Zend-Avesta, who drew our attention to his excellencies as revealed in the record of holy experience everywhere. By his leading and by his light it was that we recognized these facts, and upon the rock of everlasting and eternal reality our the¬ ological basis was laid. What is theology without morality? What is the inspiration of this book or the authority of that prophet without personal holiness—the clean¬ liness of this God-made temple and the cleanliness of the deeper temple within. Soon after we had got through our theology the question stared us in the face that we were not good men, pure minded, holy men, and that there were innumerable evils around us, in our houses, in our national usages, in the organization of our society. The Brahmo-Somaj, therefore next laid its hand upon the reformation of society. In 1851 the first inter¬ marriage was celebrated. Intermarriage in India means the marriage of persons belonging to different castes. Caste is a sort of Chinese wall that surrounds every household and every little community, and beyond the limits of which no audacious man or woman shall stray. In the Brahmo- Somaj we ask “ shall this Chinese wall disgrace the freedom of God’s chil¬ dren forever?” Break it down; down with it, and away. Next my honored leader and friend, Keshub Chunder Sen, so arranged that marriage between different castes should take place. The Brahmans were offended. Wiseacres shook their heads; even leaders of the Bramo- Somaj shrugged up their shoulders and put their hands into their pockets. “These young firebrands,” they said “are going to set fire to the whole of society.” But intermarriage took place, and widow marriage took place. Do you know what the widows of India are? A little girl of ten or twelve years happens to lose her husband before she knows his features very well, and from that tender age to her dying day she shall go through penances and austerities and miseries and loneliness and disgrace, which you tremble to hear of. I do not approve of or understand the conduct of a woman who marries a first time, and then a second time, and then a third time, and then a fourth time—who marries as many times as there are VOICE FROM NEW INDIA. 137 seasons in the year. I do not understand the conduct of such men and women. But I do think that when a little child of eleven loses what men call her husband, and who has never been a wife for a single day of her life, to put her to the wretchedness of a life-long widowhood and inflict upon her miseries which would disgrace a criminal, is a piece of inhuman¬ ity which can not too soon be done away with. Hence intermarriages and widow marriages. Our hands were thus laid upon the problem of social and domestic improvement, and the result of that was that very soon a rupture took place in the Brahmo-Somaj. We young men had to go—we, with all our social reform—and shift for ourselves as we best might. When these social reforms were partially completed there came another question. We had married the widow; we had prevented the burning of widows; what about our personal purity, the sanctiflcation of our own consciences, the regeneration of our own souls? What about our acceptance before the awful tribunal of the God of infinite justice? Social reform and the doing of public good is itself only legitimate when it develops into the all- embracing principle of personal purity and the noliness of the soul. My friends, I am often afraid, I confess, when I contemplate the condi¬ tion of European and American society, where your activities are so mani¬ fold, your work is so extensive that you are drowned in it and you have little time to consider the great questions of regeneration, of personal sanctification, of trial and judgment and of acceptance before God. That is the question of all questions. A right theological basis may lead to social reform, but a right line of public activity and the doing of good is bound to lead to the salvation of the doer’s soul and the regeneration of public men. After the end of the work of our social reform we were therefore led into this great subject. How shall this unregenerate nature be regener¬ ated; this defiled temple, what waters shall wash it into a new and pure condition? All these motives and desires and evil impulses, the animal inspirations, what will put an end to them all, and make man what he was, the immaculate child of God, as Christ was, as all regenerated men were? Theological principle first, moral principle next, and in the third place the spiritual principle of Brahmo-Somaj. Devotions, repentance, prayer, praise, taith; throwing ourselves entirely and absolutely upon the spirit of -God and upon His saving love. Moral aspirations do not mean holiness; a desire of being good does not mean to be good. The bullock that carries on its back hundredweights of sugar does not taste a grain of sweetness because of its unbearable load. And all our aspirations, and all our fine wishes, and all our fine dreams, and fine sermons, either hearing or speaking them—going to sleep over them or listening to them intently—these will never make a life perfect. Devotion only, prayer, direct perception of God’s spirit, communion with Him, abso¬ lute self-abasement before His majesty; devotional fervor, devotional excitement, spiritual absorption, living and moving in God—that is the secret of personal holiness. And in the third stage of our career, therefore, spiritual excitement, long devotions, intense fervor, contemplation, endless self-abasement, not merely before God, but before man, became the rule of our lives. God is unseen; it does not harm anybody or make him appear less respectable if he says to God, “I am a sinner; forgive me.” But to make your confessions before man, to abase yourselves before your brothers and sisters, to take the dust off the feet of holy men, to feel that you are a miserable, wretched object in God’s holy congregation—that requires a little self-humiliation; a little moral courage. Our devotional life, therefore, is twofold, bearing reverence and trust for God and reverence and trust for man; and in our infant and apostolical church we have, therefore, often immersed ourselves into spirit¬ ual practices which would seem absurd to you if I wore to relate them in your hearing. 138 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. The last principle I have to take up is the progressiveness of the Brahmo-Somaj. Theology is good; moral resolutions are good; devotional fervor is good. The problem is, how shall we go on ever and ever in an onward way, in the upper path of progress and approach toward divine perfection? God is infinite; what limit is there in His goodness or His wisdom or His righteousness? All the scriptures sing His glory; all the prophets in the Heaven declare His majesty; all the martyrs have reddened the world with their blood in order that His holiness might be known. God is the one infinite good; and, after we had made our three attempts of theological; moral, and spiritual principle the question came that God is the one eternal and infinite, the inspirer of all humankind. The part of our progress then lay toward allying ourselves, toward affiliating ourselves with the faith and the righteousness and wisdom of all religions and all mankind. Christianity declares the glory of God; Hinduism speaks about His infinite and eternal excellence; Mohammedanism, with fire and sword, proves the almightiness of His will; Buddhism says how joyful and peace¬ ful He is. He is the God of all religions, of all denominations, of all lands, of all scriptures, and our progress lay in harmonizing these various systems, these various prophecies and developments into one great system. Hence the new system of religion in the Brahmo-Somaj is called the New Dispen¬ sation. The Christian speaks in terms of admiration of Christianity; so does the Hebrew of Judaism; so does the Mohammedan of the Koran; so does the Zoroastrian of the Zend-Avesta. The Christian admires his prin¬ ciples of spiritual culture; the Hindu does the same, the Mohammedan does the same. But the Brahmo-Somaj accepts and harmonizes all these precepts, sys¬ tems, principles, teachings, and discipline, and makes the minto one system, and that is his religion. For a whole decade, my friend, Kashub Chunder Sen, myself, and other apostles, have traveled from village to village, from province to province, from continent to continent, declaring this new dis¬ pensation and the harmony of all religious prophesies and systems unto the glory of the one true, living God. But we are a subject race; we are unedu¬ cated; we are incapable; we have not the resources of money to get men to listen to our message. In the fullness of time you have called this august Parliament of Religions, and the message that we could not propagate you have taken into your hands to propagate. We have made that the gospel of our very lives, the ideal of our very being. I do not come to the sessions of this parliament as a mere student, not as one who has to justify his own system. I come as a disciple, as a fol¬ lower, as a brother. May your labors be blessed with prosperity, and not only shall your Christianity and your America be exalted, but the Brahmo- Somaj will feel most exalted; and this poor man who has come such a long distance to crave your sympathy and your kindness shall feel himself amply rewarded. May the spreatl of the new dispensation rest with you and make you our brothers and sisters. Representatives of all religions, may all your religions merge into the Fatherhood of God and in the brotherhood of man, that Christ’s prophecy may be fulfilled, the world’s hope may be fulfilled, and mankind may become one kingdom with God, our Father. FOUNDATION OF THE ORTHODOX GREEK CHURCH. ARCHBISHOP OF ZANTE. After the immense audience had sung, under the leadership of Dr. Niccolls, “ Nearer My God, To Thee,” the Most Rev. FOUNDATION OF THE ORTHODOX GREEK CHURCH. 139 Dionysios Latas, Archbishop of Zante, was introduced and spoke extemporaneously as follows: Reverend Ministers of the Eminent Name of God, the Creator of the World and of Man: Ancient Greece prepared the way for Christianity, and rendered smooth the path for the diffusion and propagation of it in the world. Greece undertook to develop Christianity and formed and system¬ atized a Christian Church; that is the Church of the East, the original Christian Church, which for this reason historically and justly may be called the Mother of the Christian Churches. The original establishment of the Greek Church directly referred to the presence of Jesus Christ and his apostles. The coming of the Messiah, from which the God was to orig¬ inate in this world, was at a fixed point of time, as the Apostle Paul said it was to be. The fullness of this point of time ancient Greece was pre¬ destined to point out and determine. Greece had so developed letters, arts, sciences, philosophy, and every other form of progress that in comparison with it all other nations were exhausted. For this reason the inhabitants of that happy land used rightly and properly to say: “Whoever is not a Greek is a barbarian.” But while at that time under Plato and Aristotle, Greek philosophy had arrived at the highest phase of its development, Greece at that very period, after these great philosophers, began to decline and fail. The Macedonian and Roman armies gave a definite blow to the political independence and national liberty of Greece, but at the same time opened up to Greece a new career,of spiritual life and brought them into immediate contact and intercommunication with other nations and peoples of the earth. Tracing the efiPect of Grecian philosophy of the Neo-Platonic school upon the faith which came from the East, the arch¬ bishop continued: When the Roman Empire began to fall Christianity had to undertake the great struggle of acquiring a superiority over all other religions that it might demolish the partition walls which separated race from race, nation from nation. It is the work of Christianity to bring all men into one spiritual family, into the love of one another, and into the belief of one supreme God. Mary, the most blessed of all humankind, appears and brings forth the expected divine nature revealed to Plato. She brings forth the fulfillment of the ideals of the gods of the different peoples and nations of the ancient world. She brings forth at last that One whose name, whose shadow came down into the world and overshadowed the souls, the minds, the hearts of all men and removed the mystery from every philosophy and philosophic system. In this permanent idea and the tendencies of the different peoples in such a time and religion, I may say two voices are heard. One, though it is from Palestine, re-echoed into Egypt, and especially to Alexandria, and through parts of Greece and Rome. Another voice from Egypt re-echoed through Palestine, and through it over all the other countries and peoples of the East. And the voices from Palestine, having Jerusalem as their focus and center, re-echoed the voice back again to the Grecians and the Romans. And there it was that this doctrine fell amidst the Greek nations, the Grecian element of character, Greek letters, and the sound reasoning of different systems of Greek philosophy. Surely in the regeneration of the different peoples there had been a divine revelation in the formation of all humankind into one spiritual family through the goodness of God. In one family equal, without any distinctions b^etween the mean and the great, without distinction of climate 140 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. or race, without distinction of national destiny or inspiration, of name or nobility, of family ties. And all the beauties which ever clustered around the ladder of Jacob, or were given to it by the men of Judea, were given by the prophets to the Virgin Mary in the cave of Bethlehem. But Greece gave Christianity the letters, gave the art, gave as I may say the enlighten¬ ment with which the gospel of Christianity was invested, and jjresented itself then, and now presents itself before all nations. After presenting other historical facts bearing upon early Christianity, the archbishop continued: It suffices me to say that no one of you, I believe, in the presence of these historical documents will deny that the original Christian, the first Christian Church was the Church of the East, and that is the Greek Church. Surely the first Christian Churches in Asia Minor, Egyx)t, and Assyria were instituted by the Apostles of Christ and for the most part in Greek com¬ munities. All those are the foundation stones on which the present Greek Church is based. The apostles themselves preached and wrote in the Greek letters and all the teachers and writers of the gospel in the East, the con¬ temporaries and the successors of the apostles were teaching, preaching and writing in the Greek language. Especially the two great schools, that of Alexandria and that of Antioch, undertook to develop Christianity and form and systematize a Christian Church. The great teachers and writers of these two schools, whose names are very well known, labored courageously to defend and determine forever the Christian doctrine and to constitute under divine rules and forms a Christian Church. The Greek Christian, therefore, may be called historically and justly the treasurer of the first Christian doctrine, fundamental, evangelical truths. It may be called the art which bears the spiritual manna and feeds all those who look to it in order to obtain from it the richness of the ideas and the unmistakable reasoning of every Christian doctrine, of every evangelical truth, of every ecclesiastical sentiment. After this, my oration about the Greek Church, I have nothing more to add than to extend my open arms and embrace all those who attend this meeting of the ministers of the world. I embrace, as my brothers in Jesus Christ, as my brothers in the divinely inspired gospel, as my friends in eminent ideas and sentiments, all men; for we have a common Creator, and consequently a common father and God. And I pray you lift with me for a moment the mind toward the divine essence, and say with me, with all your minds and hearts a prayer to Almighty God. And then the magnificent old Greek archbishop lifted his hands and his eyes heavenward and to the invisible God, who at the moment seemed almost visible, and led the great assembly in prayer. He said; Most High, omnipotent King, look down upon humankind; enlighten us that we may know Thy will, Thy ways. Thy holy truths Bless and mag¬ nify the reunited peoples of the world and the great people of the United States of America, whose greatness and kindness have invited us from the remotest parts of the earth in this their Columbian year to see with them an evidence of their progress in the wonderful achievements of the human mind and the human soul. MAN FROM A CATHOLIC POINT OF VIEW. 141 MAN FROM A CATHOLIC POINT OF VIEW. VERY REV. WILLIAM BYRNE, D. D. Man, according to the Catholic idea, is the crown and perfection of all things in the visible creation. He is created with a noble purpose and a high destiny, in the image of God and after His own likeness. He is endowed with the power of intellect and will, setting him above all created things of earth and making him godlike in his nature. He longs to reach the higher and better things to which, by an imperative and ever-urgent law, he necessarily aspires. He has cravings of the soul which no created thing is adequate to satisfy. The greater his natural endowments, the higher their cultivation, the broader his knowledge, the more ample and penetrating his intellectual swing and reach, the deeper and more exhaust¬ ing will be the sense of a purpose unfulfilled, of unsatisfied yearning and baffled hope. Splendid intellectual gifts and exceptional mental training; moral refinement, culture, and wealth; social pre-eminence and command¬ ing political power; great civic achievements, the resounding trumpets of war, and the most coveted prize of fortune—all these-but serve to accentu¬ ate and render more sensitively acute those wasting longings and the fruitless reaching out after an object that will satisfy the cravings of the soul and satiate the hunger of the heart. The Catholic says man has a high destiny that he can reach, a noble purpose that he can achieve; that he may enjoy here on earth a serene peace and constantly look forward to the surpassing joy of living forever in the smile of God and ecstasy of His love. That such conviction, how¬ ever, and confident hope have never been reached, nor can be, by the unaided powers of man, the cry of discontent and fruitless endeavor that has gone up from the heart of man from the beginning, and the bootless groping in the dark in search of an oracle to answer the questions of the soul, dispel its mists, and tranquilize its misgivings, abundantly prove. Man will be religious. It is a necessity and the law of his being, and if he can not rise to God, he will strive to draw down God to himself. “ Lord, teach me to know myself, teach me to know Thee,” was the prayer that went up from the soul of the great Bishop of Hippo, and the prayer to which he gave utterance has ever been the universal cry of the heart to man —to know one’s self, to know God. God and self are the two cardinal objects of man’s knowledge to which all his intellectual efforts converge and upon which they terminate. Once reason has dawned on him and the mind opens and expands to the significance and deep meaning of all he sees round about him, to the order and beauty, the variety and splendor, and the lavish profusion of visible blessings, a knowledge of which is borne in upon him by eye and ear, and every avenue of sense, he asks himself and must ask himself the question: Whence all these strange surroundings bearing upon them the tokens of a higher intelligence and the evidence of law and order, purpose and design? And he must ask himself the still more momentous question: Whence do I come? Whither am I going? Am I, as the pantheist says, the most perfect manifestation of the divine essence, spirit of its spirit, and intellect of its intellect? Or, to go to the other extreme of the scale less fiattering to the pride and vanity of man, am I but matter and sense, with a soul wholly dependent upon and the product of the digestive organs and a complex system of nerves with functions center¬ ing in the brain? The supernatural element in man is precisely what the world is losing sight of in its eager and absorbing pursuits of what gratifies sense and brings to the natural man an exhilirating, insidious, and evanescent enjoy¬ ment ; and, without the supernatural, there can be no adequate explana¬ tion of man’s existence here on earth, no interpretation of life that will 142 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. satisfy the reason, no object that will give full swing to the powers of the soul or bring peace and serene contentment to the heart. This has been the Catholic view of man from the beginning, and its importance can not be overestimated. It lies at the very root of religion, and any error or shadow of error here vitiates and distorts the entire circle of relations of man to his God. The ideas of man and God are correlative and inseparable—they come and go together, and a defective knowledge of the one necessarily implies an imperfect understanding of the other. The power of apprehending and understanding the relations between cause and effect, of adapting and adjusting means to an end is, if not the very defini¬ tion of intelligence and free will, at least their adequate description. And in this man is like unto God, whose presence, shut out from us by the veil of the visible universe is luminously revealed in the laws by which that universe is governed, and in the order and beauty which bring the opera¬ tion of these laws within the domain of sense, and through sense to the intelligence of man. Such, according to the Catholic idea, is the nobility, such the dignity and pre-eminence of man. He is set as a king over the created things of earth, yet responsible for the use of them to the God who gave him so loyal a supremacy. Intellect and will and the immortality of the soul are, the Catholic says, the three natural endowments which in man are the image of God. These perfections all men have in common with Adam. But Adam had a super- added perfection. He was, as the Council of Trent says, “holy and just,” or pleasing to God. This supernatural perfection is called, and is as a mat¬ ter of fact, sanctifying grace, which made Adam’s likeness to God pure, more perfect and transcending than any natural gift, no matter how excel¬ lent, in that it lifted him above his own nature into a higher and diviner life and established him in the love and friendship of God. We are told by St. Paul that as one man by his offense wrought the condemnation of all, so did our Lord by his justice work the justification of all. What Adam forfeited Christ regained. What Christ regained, St. Paul tells us,, is the privilege of being the sons of God, and joint heirs with Christ, and of this, he says, the Holy Ghost giveth testimony. Christ, therefore, restored what had been lost, purchased with his blood; what had been forfeited by sin. Through him man regained the sonship and friendship of God, and is, or can be if he will, constituted in the supernatural life of grace. Hence these privileges, being a restoration of what had been, were t^he prerogatives of Adam. That man was so lifted up into a serener atmosphere and a diviner life, and made in a sense godlike, is not merely an opinion of theologians, but an integral part of the teaching of the Church. And this brings out clearly the distinction and difference between pan¬ theism and the teaching of Catholic theology. The fundamental error of pantheism is the necessary identity and equality of the divine nature and the human, and the consequent deification of man; whereas. Catholic the¬ ology teaches that the participation of the divine nature, through grace, is in no wise due to man, is no part of the integrity of his nature, and could not become man’s by any effort or exercise of his aptitudes and powers. But that which is not due to him, and which he could of himself in no way attain, is the free, spontaneous, and gracious gift of God. God put Adam on trial, as He had done the angels. He put his humility to the proof. He gave him an opportunity to show himself worthy his inheritance and manifold benedictions. He exacted but a nominal acknowledgement, by which He reserved His right, His very generosity and goodness, which should have filled the heart of Adam with an unceasing song of praise and thanksgiving, and an abiding memory of his surpassing privileges, seem, if I may use the word, a temptation to his weakness, in spite of the many stays and supports by which his will was steadied and strengthened. Forgetting his lowly estate, and unmindful of his blessings MAN FROM A CATHOLIC POINT OF VIEW. 143 he wantonly transj^ressed the light command that had been laid upon him as a test of his fidelity and gratitude. And man’s first sin was committed and the human race, in its head, was cut off from the friendship of God and cast out from an inheritance of countless benedictions. Original jus¬ tice was forfeited, and so it, as its opposite, succeeded original sin, which thereby became the heritage of all mankind. The transgression of the law in Adam was our sin. We are not, indeed, guilty of Adam’s actual and personal sin, since our wills had no part in its commission; nor can original sin in Adam’s descendants be called sin in the strict and rigorous sense of that word. These terms denote the state to which Adam’s sin reduced his children. The act by which sin is committed is one thing; but the state to which man is reduced by the commission of that sin is quite another. The one was transitory in character; the other is permanent, and man is rightly called a sinner as long as he abides in a state which is the consequence of sin. Adam, by his act of disobedience, turned from God and forfeited his supernatural prerogative of sanctifying grace, and his posterity, in conse¬ quence, is born into the state of deprivation or original sin, which was the penalty of his offense. Excepting that the blessed Virgin, who, by special privilege and because of her high office, had the fullness of grace from the first moment of her existence, all the children of Adam at their birth an • under the disability of his transgression. He was the head of the humai. family, and in him was contained the whole human race. Man having forfeited the supernatural life, it was impossible for him by his own efforts to again enter upon it. It was simply beyond his powers. His condition was one of deprivation, of what was not a part of his nature, to which, as man, he had no right or claim, and which he could not regain by any power of his own. Yet it must not be supposed that man’s nature was by such loss corrupted or poisoned in its root. His intellect was still intact in all its natural powers, though less luminous, less pene¬ trating, and more liable to error because of the absence of the supernatural light that had been put out in the soul. His will was vacillating and unsteady, yet free and potent to choose between right and wrong, good and evil. He was incapable in his foreign state, of making reparation for his offense or recovering sanctifying grace. God might have left man in this condition of exile with the evidences and tokens upon him of high lineage and noble descent, yet disinherited and stripped of his supernatural gifts and with only the hope of such reward as his natural virtues might merit. But in His great mercy, which is beyond bound or measure, God restored to him his forfeited privileges and gave him the means of again living a supernatural life and of entering into the eternal inheritance for which such life is a preparation. “His exceeding charity,” says St. Paul, “where¬ with he loved us when we were dead in sin, hath quickened us together in Christ, by whose grace you are saved.” Again: God could have waved His right to a satisfaction involving the death of his divine son, but this He did not see fit to do. In His infinite wisdom He required an atonement adequate to the offense committed, and this could be made only by one equal in dignity to Himself. And this is precisely what was accomplished in the incarnation of the son of God. Heaven and earth touched, “mercy and truth met, justice and peace kissed;” God and man were linked together in the bonds of indissoluble union. The sufferings and blood of Christ, though only His human nature suffered, had a divine value, because the acts take on the character of the person, and the person who suffered was divine. By this mystery of love the right of man to enter again into his forfeited inheritance was purchased. In Christ the heavenly harmony of our nature was restored. Christ, of His own free will and divine condescension, wrought the redemption of the human race, and He is therefore free to convey its fruits to man in any way He in His wisdom sees fit. The primary and sovereign 144 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. ruio of 1x4 iof and practice in all things pertaining to the economy of God with man is, the Catholic holds, the will of Christ, and not what seems lit ting or best, or most reasonable to us. The will of Christ, once it is known, must be the supreme rule and guide. Hence, relying on the words of Christ and his apostles, and on the living voice and universal and unbroken tradition of the church from the beginning, the Catholic says that Christ instituted certain specific rites, now called sacraments, as means and instruments to convey the fruits of the redemption to the soul; that the initial sacrament, by which the supernatural life is born in man, is bap¬ tism, and that this life is nourished, increased, and perfected by the in-dwelling of the Holy Ghost in the soul, by the generosity of our own hearts and wills, and by the graces conveyed through the other six sacra¬ ments and the aids they supply, according to the dispositions, the needs, and the conditions of men and of society. Through this supernatural gift man takes on a new nature and begins a new life. But this life, so precious and so full of promise, so elevated, ennobling, and refining, giving so luminous an interpretation of man and his surround¬ ings, and leading on to life eternal, may be enfeebled by neglect of its privileges, and wholly lost by mortal sin. Sin and sanctifying grace are as opposite as darkness and light. The presence of sin is the extinction of the spiritual life. In the moment that mortal sin enters the soul through deliberate consent of will, the in-dwelling spirit of God and sanctifying grace depart, and the soul is spiritually dead. The treasure of great price thus bartered for some bauble of lust or pride, by a merciful and gracious dispensation of Christ may be restored through an act of perfect love of God or through divinely inspired sorrow and the grace of the sacrament of penance. For one guilty of sin committed after baptism, the sacrament of penance does precisely what baptism does for one yet in original sin—in this sense, that it restores and renews the supernatural life in a soul that is spiritually dead. It is clear, then, that the Catholic idea of man is this: That he is instinctively sux^ernatural in his capacities and powers, his attitudes and cravings, his aspirations and aims, and that he was so constituted froimthe beginning; that no created object can fill the void of his heart or still the cry of his soul; that he can not work out his evident destiny or accomplish the purpose of his creation without being grafted into the Spiritual Vine, which is Christ, and drawing from it the sap and the sustenance of his spiritual existence. To the Catholic the supernatural is the true and only adequate interpretation of man’s life; to him every thought, word, and action has a supernatural and momentous significance, the knowledge and will of the agent being the measure of their malice or their merit. To him they have no real value unless they are in conformity with the law of God, luminous in his intellect, written in his heart, and articulate in his con¬ science. His whole being is encompassed by the supernatural and by a sense of responsibility to his Creator and God. He believes that the intellect, if not taught of God through the living and magisterial voice of the church, the pillar and ground of the truth, will cease to be a light and a guide to the will, and, being once perverted, will be the cause and source of count¬ less errors of judgment and practical life. To him divine truth and a divinely appointed teacher are a first principle. To the Catholic, the acceptance of God as a divine teacher, and a belief in His revelation, lie at the basis of religion and are the beginning of all justification. Faith, and the truths it contains as proposed by the church, the custodian of divine truth and its living voice and infallible interpreter, an exact, precise, dogmatic faith, a living, active, energetic and practical faith, pervades his whole being and influences and gives character to his least as well as his most significant action. And next, as a consequence of faith and the body of truth it contains, come the commandments of God, RABBI K. KOHLER, N«w Ywk. HUMAN BROTHERHOOD, 145 or those rules'of conduct which guide and direct him in justice and truth and in his manifold duties and varied relations to God and man. And then, to follow the logical order, comes grace, in which every man born into this world lives and moves; which encompasses him as an atmosphere; which God gives in amplest measure to every man who sincerely wishes to be con¬ verted and live; which is an antecedent condition to the supernatural life, its beginning, its cause, its sustaining principle, and its perfection, and which unites man to God as a child to his Etennal Father by a bond as inti¬ mate as is possible between the Creator and His creature. By this rule, says the Catholic, shall man live; by this rule shall he be judged. HUMAN BROTHERHOOD AS TAUGHT BY THE RELIGIONS BASED ON THE BIBLE. DR. K. KOHLER OF NEW YORK. Thanks to our common education and our religious and social progress and enlightenment, the idea of the unity of man is so natural and familiar to us that we scarcely stop to consider by what great struggles and trials it has been brought home to us. We can not help discerning beneath all differences of color and custom the fellow-man and brother. We perceive in the savage looks of the Fiji Islander, or hear in the shrill voice of the South African the broken records of our history; but we seldom realize the long and tedious road we had to walk until we arrived at this stage. We speak of the world as a unit—a beautiful order of things, a great cosmos. Open the Bible and you will find creation still divided into a realm of life above and one below—into heaven and earth, and only the unity of God comprising the two otherwise widely separated and disconnected worlds, to lend them unity of purpose, and finally bring them under the sway of one empire of law. Neither does the idea of man, as a unit, dawn upon the mind of the uncivilized. Going back to the inhabitants of ancient Chaldea, you see man divided into groups of blackheads (the race of Ham) and red¬ heads (Adam); the former destined to serve, the other to rule. And follow man to the very height of ancient civilization, on the beautiful soil of Hellas, where man, with his upward gaze drinks in the light and the sweet¬ ness of the azure sky to refiect it on surrounding nature, on art and science, you still find him clinging to these old lines of demarcation. Neither Plato nor Aristotle would regard the foreigner as an equal to the Greek, but con¬ sider him forever, like the brute, fated to do the slave’s work for the born master—the ruling race. Let us not forget that prejudice is older than man. We have it as an inheritance from the brute. The cattle that browse together in the field and the dogs that fight with each other in the street will alike unite in keeping out the foreign intruder, either by hitting or by biting, since they can not resort to blackmailing. So did men of different blood or skin in primitive ages face one another only for attack. Constant warfare bars all intercourse with men outside of the clan. How, then, under such con¬ ditions, is the progress of culture, the interchange of goods and products of the various lands and tribes brought about to arouse people from the stupor and isolation of savagery? The Ethiopians have still no other name for man than that of Sheba- Sabean. Obviously the white race of conquerors from the land of Sheba refused the black-heads they found on entering Ethiopia the very title of man, not to mention the rights and privileges of such. Yet how remarkable to find the oldest fairs on record held in that very land of Sheba, in South 146 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. Arabia, famous from remotest times for its costly spices and its precious metals. Under the protection of the god of light the savage tribes would deposit their gold upon the tables of rock and exchange them for the goods of the traders, being safe from all harm during the festive season of the fair. Under such favorable conditions the stranger took shelter under the canopy of peace spread over a belligerent world by the specter of commerce. What a wide and wonderful vista over the centuries from the first fairs held in the balsam forests of South Arabia to the World’s Pair upon the fairy¬ land created by modern art out of the very prairies of the Western hemi¬ sphere. And vet the tendency, the object is the same—a peace league among the races, a bond of'covenant among men. It is unwise on the part of the theologian to underrate the infiuence of commerce upon both culture and religion. Religion is at the outset always exclusive and isolating. Commerce unites and broadens humanity. In widening the basis of our social structure and establishing the unity of mankind, trade had as large a share as religion. The Hebrews were a race of shepherds, who were transformed into farmers on the fertile soil of Canaan. In both capacities they were too much attached to their land, being dependent either upon the grass to pasture their flocks or upon the crops to feed their households, to extend their views and interests beyond their own territory. When, therefore, Moses gave them the laws of right¬ eousness and truth upon which humanity was to be built anew, he did not venture to preach at once in clear and unmistakable terms the great fun¬ damental principle of the unity and brotherhood of man. He simply caught them: Hate not thy brother in thine heart. Bear no grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, I am the lord.” He would not tell them: “ Hove all men on earth as thy brethren,” for the reason that there could be no brotherhood so long as both the mate¬ rial and religious interests collided in every way, and truth and justice themselves demanded warfare and struggle. Monotheism was more than any other religion an isolating power at first. It was in times of prosperity and peace, when Jews were first brought into contact with the great trading nation of Phoenicia, that the idea of man widened with the extension of their knowledge of the earth, and they beheld in the people of the hot and the cold zone, in the black and blende- haired men, in the Caucasian and African races, offsf lings of the jame human ancestors, branches of the same parent stock—children of Adam. At the great fairs of Babylon and Tyre, where the merchants of the various countries and remote islands came with their worldly goods for their selfish ends, a higher destiny, the great hand of Divine Providence, was weaving the threads to knit the human race together. And in one of those solemn moments of history*some of the lofty seers of Judah caught the spirit and spelled forth the message of lasting import: “Once all the nations will send their treasures of gold and s^jices and their products of human skill and wisdom on horseback and dromedaries, on wagons and ships, to the city of Jerusalem, yet not for mere barter and gain, but as tokens of homage to the Man of Israel whose name shall be the sign and banner of the great brotherhood of man.” This is the idea pervading the latter part of Isaiah. No sordid trading after the fashion of Canaanites, but truth and knowledge will be freely offered on the sacred heights of Jerusalem. Such was the vision of Zachariah, prompted by the sight of the fairs held in the holy city. (See Movers Phonizion, 11, 3,145.) It was the idea of the great truce of God amidst the perpetual strife of the nations which they conceived of and forecast when announcing the time when “ swords shall be turned into plowshares and war shall be no more.” Cut loose from the rest of the Biblical writings, many a ijassage con¬ cerning God and man still has an exclusively national character, betraying narrowness of view. But presented and read in its entirety, the Bible HUMAN BROTHERHOOD 147 begins and ends with man. Do not the x^rophets weep, pray, and hope for the Gentiles as well as for Israel? Do not the Psalms voice the longing and yearning of man? What is Job but the type of suffering, struggling, and self-asserting man? It is the wisdom, the doubt, and the pure love of man that King Solomon voices in prose and poetry. Neither is true priesthood nor prophecy monopolized by the tribe of Abraham. Behold Melchisedec, Salem’s priest, holding his hand to bless the patriarch. Do not Balaam’s prophetic words match those of any of Israel’s seers? None can read the Bible with symx^athetic spirit but feel that the wine garnered therein is stronger than the vessel containing it; that the Jew who speaks and acts, preaches and prophesies, therein represents the interests and princij^les of humanity. When the Book of Books was handed forth to the world it was offered in the words of God to Abraham to be a blessing to all families of man on earth; it was to give man one God, one hope, and one goal and destiny. Only the monotheistic faith of the Bible established the bonds of human brotherhood. It was the consciousness of God’s in-dwelling in man or the Biblical teaching of man’s being God’s child that rendered hum¬ anity one. Even though the golden rule has been found in Confucius as well as in Buddha, in Plato as in Socrates, it never engendered true love of man as brother and fellow-worker among their people beyond their own small cir¬ cles. The Chinese sage, with his sober realism, never felt or fostered the spirit of self-surrender to a great cause beyond his own state and ruler. And if the monk Gautama succeeded by his preaching on the world’s vanities, in bridling the passions and softening the temper of millions, planting love and compassion into every soul throughout the East, and dotting the lands with asylums and hospitals for the rescue of man and beast, he also checked the progress of man while loathing life as misery without comfort, as a burden of woe without hope of relief, dissolving it into a purposeless dream, an illusion evanescing into nothing. Neither Pindar nor Plato ever conceived of a divine plan of the doings of man. No Thucydides nor Herodotus ever inquired after the beginnings and ends of human history or traced the various people back to one cradle and one offspring. Not until Alexander, the Macedonian, with his con¬ quests interlinked the East and the West, did the idea of humanity loom ux) before the minds of the cultured as it did before Judea’s sages and seers. Only when antiquity’s xwide was lowered to the dust and xjhilosopher and priest found their strength exhausted, man, suffering, sorrowing, weexiing, sought refuge from the approaching storm, yearning for fellowshixj and brotherhood in the common woe and misery of a world shattered within and without. But then, neither stoic, in his over-bearing pride and self¬ admiration, nor the cynic, with his contemptuous sneer, could make life worth living. It was the Bible offered first by Jew, then by Christian, and, in some¬ what modified tones, by Moslem, that gave man with the benign ruler of the ages also a common scope and x^lan, a common x^rosxject and hope. While to the Greek—from whom we have borrowed the very name of ethics —goodness, righteousness, virtue were’objects of admiration like any xjiece of nature and of art, beautiful and pleasing, and like itself a xfiaything, the Bible made life with all its efforts solemn and sacred, a divine reality. Here at once men arose to be co-workers of God, the successive ages became stages of the world’s great drama, each country, each home, each soul an object of divine care, each man an image of the Divine Father. There is no partiality with God. The weaker member of the human household, therefore, must be treated with greater compassion and love, and every inequality adjusted as far as our xwwers reach. “If thou seest one in distress, ask not who he is. Even though he be thine enemy, he is still thy brother, appeals to thy symx)athy, thou canst not hide thine eyes; 148 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. I, thy God, see thee.” Can, alongside of this Mosaic law, the question be yet asked: Who is my neighbor ? Thou mayest not love him because he hateth thee. Yet, as fellow-man, thou must put thyself into his place, and thou darest no longer harm nor hate him. Even if he be a criminal, he is thy brother still, claiming sympathy and leniency. Sinner or stranger, slave or sufferer, skejjtic or saint, he is son of the same Father in heaven. The God who hath once redeemed thee will also redeem him. Are these princii)les and maxims of the New Testament? I read them in the Old. I learned them from the Talmud. I found their faint echo in the Koran. The Merciful One of Mohammed enjoins charity and com¬ passion no less than does the Holy One of Isaiah and the Heavenly Father of Jesus. We have been too rash, too harsh, too uncharitable in judging other sects and creeds. “We men judge nations and classes too often by the bad examples they produce; God judges them by their best and noblest types,” is an exquisite saying of the rabbis. Is there a race or a religion that does not cultivate one great virtue to unlock the gates of bliss for all its followers? Hear the Psalmist exclaim: “This is the gate of the Lord; the righteous enter into it.” No priest, nor Levite, nor Israel's people enjoy any privilege there. The kind Samaritan, as Jesus puts it in his jjarable; the good and just among all men, as the rabbis express it (Sifra Achre Moth. 13) find admission. No monopoly of salvation for any creed. Right¬ eousness opens the door for all the nations. Is this platform not broad enough to hold every creed? Must not every system of ethics find a place in this great brotherhood with whatever vir¬ tue or ideal it emphasizes? Is here not scope given for every honest endeavor and each human craving for whatever cheers and inspires, enno¬ bles and refines man, for every vocation, profession, or skill; for whatever lifts dust-born man to higher standards of goodness, to higher states of blessedness? Too long, indeed, have Chinese walls, reared by nations and sects, kept man from his brother, to rend humanity asunder. Will the principle of toleration suffice? Or shall Lessing’s parable of the three rings plead for equality of church, mosque, and synagogue? What, then, about the rest of the creeds, the great Parliament of Religions? And what a poor plea for the Father, if, from love, he cheats his children, to find at the end he has but cheated himself of their love. No; either all the rings are genuine and have the magic power of love, or the Father is himself a fraud. Trust and love, in order to enrich and uplift, must be firm and immutable, as God himself. If truth, love, and justice be the goal, they must be my fel¬ low-man’s as well as mine And should not every act and every step of man and humanity lead onward to Zion’s Hill, which shall stand high above all mounts of vision and aspiration, above every single truth and knowledge, faith and hope, the Mountain of the Lord? MUCH TO ADMIRE IN ALL MEN. DR. W. C. ROBERTS, OF NEW YORK. The honorary chairman of the afternoon session was Rev. Dr. W. C. Roberts of New York, formerly president of the Lake Forest University. He made a brief speech at the opening of the meeting, in which he said: The brotherhood of man is to me a most precious thought. It has been my pleasure to travel over the four quarters of the globe, to mingle CONFUCIANISM. 149 with a large number of nationalities, and I have found, in all of them, something to admire, something to emulate, and among them many to love. And, therefore, it is that I take great interest in this Religious Congress, where I have the pleasure of seeing the representatives of different nation¬ alities. I have been on their soil in many cases and have been kindly re¬ ceived; and, therefore, I am delighted to see that they are received kindly on our soil. It has been asked of me more than once how I could recon¬ cile the idea of a Congress of Religions with the Christian religion. I had no difficulty whatever with this. God has given two reflations, one in nature that displays His power and Godhead, and the other in His rational creatures, where we find much concerning His own moral character. And we find that these friends who have come to us from China and India and the islands of the sea have been studying this very revelation of God in our nature, and I am inclined to think that, with their keen interest, they have gone deeper into the study than we have, because we have accepted the verbal revelation that has been given us and have let that suffice for many things. They have not that and, therefore, have gone more thoroughly into the other phase of divine revelation. In so far, therefore, as they give the right interpretation of that revelation of God in human nature, those of us who are called Christians are with them. We can not disagree with them as long as they give the right interpretation of God’s writing in our nature. There we are on a common platform together. Those of us who are Chris¬ tians only differ from them in the interpretation again. We believe we have a clearer revelation from heaven that throws light on that revelation con¬ fined with them to nature, and if we understand it in that light we feel that we may get in advance of these friends who have been studying through the ages, man’s revelation in man. We believe our interpretations are based on the revelation God has given us and, therefore, we have only something above and beyond that other revelation. The two phases are here and they are united on this platform; and so I am delighted to find the whole revelation of God represented by these friends that have come to us from abroad and those that belong to our own land. CONFUCIANISM. PUNG KWANG YU, A SCHOLAK OF CHINA, A DISCIPLE OF CONFUCIUS, SECRETARY OF THE CHINESE LEGATION AT WASHINGTON. All Chinese reformers of ancient and modern times have either exer¬ cised supreme authority as political heads of the nation or filled high posts as ministers of state. The only notable exception is Confucius. “Man,” says Confucius in the Book of Rites, “is the product of heaven and earth, the union of the active and passive principles, the conjunction of the soul and spirit, and the ethereal essence of the five elements.” Again he says: “Man is the heart of heaven and earth, and the nucleus of the five elements, formed by assimilating food, by distinguishing sounds, and by the action of light.” Now, the heaven and earth, the active and passive principles, and the soul and spirit are dualisms resulting from unities. The product of heaven and earth, the union of the active and passive principles, the conjunction of the soul and spirit, are unities resulting from dualisms. Man, being the connecting link between unities and dualisms, is therefore called the heart of heaven and earth. By reason of his being the heart of heaven and earth, humanity is his natural faculty and love his controlling emotion. 150 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. “Humanity,” says Confucius, “is the characteristic of man.” On this account humanity stands at the head of the five faculties, humanity, recti¬ tude, profjriety, understanding, and truthfulness. Humanity must have the social relations for its sj^here of action. Love must begin at home. What are the social relations ? They are the sovereign and subject, parent and child, husband and wife, elder and younger brothers and friends. These are called the five relations or natural relations. As the relation of husband and wife must have been recognized before that of sovereign or subject, or that of parent or child, the relation of husband and wife is, thernfore, the first of the social relations. The relations of husband and wife bear a certain analogy to that of “ kien ” and “ kium.” The word kien may be taken in the sense of heaven, sovereign, parent or husband. As the earth is subservient to heaven, so is the subject subservient to the sovereign, the child to the parent and the wife to the husband. . These three main¬ stays of the social structure have their origin in the law of nature, and do not owe their existence to the invention of men. The emotions are but the manifestations of the soul’s faculties when acted upon by external objects. There are seven emotions, namely: Joy, anger, grief, fear, hate, and desire. The faculties of the soul derive their origin from nature and are therefore called natural faculties; the emotions emanate from man and are therefore called human emotions. Humanity sums up the virtues of the five natural faculties. Filial duty lies at the foundation of humanity. The sense of propriety serves to regulate the emotions. The recognition of the relation of husband and wife is the first step in the cultivation and develoi)ment of humanity. The principles that direct human progress are sincerity and charity, and the principles that carry it forward are devotion and honor. “ Do not unto others,” says Confucius, “ whatsoever ye would not that others should do unto you.” Again he says: A noble-minded man has four rules to regulate his conduct: To serve one’s parents in such a maimer as is required of a son; io serve one’s sovereign in such a manner as is required of a subject: to serve one’s elder brother in such a man¬ ner as is required of a younger brother; to set an example of dealing with one’s friends in such a manner as is required of fiaends. This succinct statement x)uts in a nutshell all the requirements of sin¬ cerity, charity, devotion, and honor; in other words of humanity itself. Therefore, all natural virtues and established doctrines that relate to the duties of man in his relations to society must have their origin in humanity. On the other hand the princijjle that regulates the actions and conduct of men from beginning to end can be no other than projjriety. What are the rules of propriety? The Book of Rites treats of such as relate to ceremonies on attaining majority, marriages, funerals, sac¬ rifices, court receptions, banquets, the worship of heaven, the observance of stated feasts, the sj)here of woman, and the education of youth.. The rules of propriety are based on rectitude and should be carried out with understanding, so as to show their truth, to the end that humanity may appear in its full splendor. The aim is to enable the five innate qualities of the soul to have full and free play, and yet to enable each in its action to promote the action of the rest. If we were to go into details on this sub¬ ject and enlarge on the various lines of thought as they present themselves we should find that myriads of words and thousands of paragraphs would not suffice, for then we should have to deal with such problems as relate to the observation of facts, the systematization of knowledge, the establish¬ ment of right principles, the rectification of the heart, the disciplining of self, the regulation of the family, the government of the nation, and the pacification of the world. Such are the elements of instruction and self- education which Confucianists consider as essential to make man what he ought to be. CONFUCIANISM. 151 Now, man is only a species of naked animal. He was naturally stricken with fear and went so far as to worship animals against which he was help¬ less. To this may be traced the origin of religious w^orship. It was only man, however, that nature had endowed with intelligence. On this account he could take advantage of the natural elements, and his primary object was to increase the comforts and remove the dangers of life. As he passed from a savage to a civilized state he initiated movements for the education of the rising generation by defining the relations and duties of society, and by laying special emphasis on the disciplining of self. Therefore, man is called the “ nucleus of the five elements and the ethereal essence of the five elements formed by assimilating food, by distinguishing sounds and by the action of light.” Herein lies the dignity of human nature. Herein we recognize the chief characteristic that distinguishes man from animals. The various tribes of feathered, haired, scaled, or shelled animals, to be sure, are not entirely incapable of emotion. As emotions are only phenomena of the soul’s different faculties, animals may be said to possess, to a limited degree, faculties similar to the faculties of man, and are there¬ fore entirely devoid of the pure essence of nature. From the beginning of the creation the intelligence of animals has remained the same, and will doubtless remain the same until the end of time. They are incapable of improvement or progress. This shows that the substance of their organi¬ zation must be derived from the imperfect and gross elements of the earth, so that when it unites with the ethereal elements to form the faculties, the spiritual qualities can not gain full play, as in the case of man. “ In the evolution of the animated creation,” says Confucius, in connection with this subject, “ nature can only act upon the substance of each organized being, and bring out its innate qualities. She, therefore, furnishes proper nour¬ ishment to those individuals that stand erect and trample upon those indi¬ viduals that lie prostrate.” The idea is that nature has no fixed purpose. As for man, he also has natural imperfections. This is what Con- fucianists call essential imperfections in the constitution. The reason is that the organizations which different individuals have received from the earth are very diverse in character. It is but natural that the faculties of different individuals should develop abilities and capabilities which are equally diverse in degrees and kinds. It is not that different individuals have received from nature different measures of intelligence. Man only can remove the imperfections inherent in the substance of his organization by directing his mind to intellectual pursuits, by abiding in virtue, by following the dictates of humanity, by subduing anger, and by restraining the appetites. Lovers of mankind, who have the regeneration of the world at heart, would doubtless consider it desirable to have some moral panacea which could completely remove all the imperfections from the organic substance of the human species, so that the whole race might be reformed with ease and expedition. But such a method of procedure does not seem to be the way in which nature works. She only brings out the innate qualities of every substance. Still it is worth while to cherish such a desire on account of its tendency to elevate human nature, though we know it to be impossible of fulfillment, owing to the limitations of the human organization. Man is then endowed with faculties of the highest dignity. Yet there are those who so far degrade their manhood as to give themselves up to the unlimited indulgence of those appetites which they have in common with birds, beasts, and fishes, to the utter loss of their moral sense without being sensible of their degradation, perhaps. In case they have really become insensible then even heaven can not possibly do anything with them. But if they, at any time become sensible of their condition, they must be stricken with a sense of shame, not unmingled, perhaps, with fear and trembling. If, after experiencing a sense of shame, mingled with fear 152 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. and trembling, they repent of their evil doings, then they become men again with their humanity restored. This is a doctrine maintained by all the schools of Confucianists. “Reason,” says Confucius in his notes to the Book of Changes, “con¬ sists in the proper union of the active and passive principles of nature.” Again he says: “What is called spirit is the inscrutable state of ‘yin’ and ‘yang,’ or the passive and active principles of nature.” Now, “yang” is heaven, or ether. Whenever ether, by condensation, assumes a substantive form and remains suspended in the heavens, there is an admixture of the active and passive principles of nature, with the active principal predomi¬ nating. “Yin,” or the passive principle, of nature is earth or substance. Whenever a substance which has the property of absorbing ether is attracted to the earth there is an admixture of the active and passive principles of nature, with the passive principle predominating. As the sunrises in the East and sets in the West, its going and coming making one day, so the quantity of ether which the earth holds varies from time to time. Exhaltation follows absorption; systole succeeds diastole. It is these small changes that produce day and night. As the sun travels also from North to South and makes a complete revolution in one year, so the quantity of ether which the earth holds varies from time to time. Exhalation follows absorption; systole succeeds diastole. It is these great changes that produce heat and cold. The movements of the active and passive principles of the universe bear a certain resemblance to the move¬ ments of the sun. There are periods of rest, periods of activity, periods of expansion, and periods of contraction. The two principles may sometimes repel each other, but can never go beyond each other’s influences. They may also attract each other, but do not by this means spend their force. They seem to permeate all things from beginning to end. They are invisible md inaudible, yet it can not be said for this reason they do not exist. This is what is meant by inscrutability, and this is what Confucius calls spirit. Still it is necessary to guard against confounding this conception of spirit with that of nature. Nature is an entirely active element and must needs have a passion element to operate upon in order to bring out its energy. On the other hand, it is also an error to confound spirit with matter. Matter is entirely passive and must needs have some active ele¬ ment to act upon it in order to concentrate its virtues. It is to the action and reaction, as well as to the mutual sustentation of the essences of the active and passive principles that the spirit of anything owes its being. In case there is no union of the active and passive principles, the ethereal and substantive elements lie separate, and the influences of the heavens and the earth can not come into conjunction. This being the case, whence can spirits derive their substance? Thus the influences of the heavens and material objects must act and react upon each other, and enter into the composition of each other, in order to enable every material object to incor¬ porate a due proportion of energy with its virtues. Each object is then able to assume its proper form, whether large or small, and acquire the prop¬ erties peculiar to its constitution, to the end that it may fulfill its functions in the economy of nature. For example, the spirits of mountains, hills, rivers, and marshes are invisible; we see only the manifestations of their power in winds, clouds, thunders, and rains. The spirits of birds, quadrupeds, insects, and fishes are invisible; we see only the manifestations of their power -in flying, run¬ ning, burrowing, and swimming. The spirits of terrestrial and aquatic plants are invisible; we see only the manifestations of their power in flow¬ ers, fruits, and the various tissues. The spirit of man is invisible, yet when we consider that the eyes can see, the ears can hear, the mouth can distin¬ guish flavors, the nose can smell, and the mind can grasp what is most minute as well as what is most remote, how can we account for all this ? CONFUCIANISM. 153 In the case of man, the spirit is in a more concentrated and better dis¬ ciplined state than the rest of the created things. On this account the spirit of man after death, though separated from the body, is still able to retain its essential virtues, and does not become easily dissipated. This is the ghost, or disembodied spirit. The followers of Taoism and Buddhism often speak of immortality and everlasting life. Accordingly they subject themselves to a course of dis¬ cipline, in the hope that they may by this means attain to that happy Buddhistic or Taoistic existence. They aim merely to free the spirit from the limitations of the body. Taoist and Buddhist priests often speak of the rolls of spirits and the records of souls, and make frequent mention of heaven and hell. They seek to inoculate that the good will receive their due reward and the wicked will suffer eternal punishment. They mean to convey the idea of course, that rewards and punishments will be dealt out to the spirits of men after death according to their deserts. Such beliefs doubtless had their origin in attempts to influence the actions of men by appealing to their likes and dislikes. The purpose of inducing men to do good and forsake evil by presenting in striking contrast a hereafter to be striven for and a hereafter to be avoided is laudable enough in some respects. But it is the perpetuation of falsehood by slavishly clinging to errors that deserve condemnation. For this reason Confucianists do not accept such doctrines, though they make no attempt to suppress them. “We can not as yet,” says Confucius, “perform our duties to men, how can we perform our duties to spirits?” Again he says: “We know not, as yet, about life; how can we know about death?” “From this time on,” says Tsang-tz, “I know that I am saved.” “Let my consistent actions remain,” says Chang-tz, “ and I shall die in peace.” It will be seen that the wise and good men of China have never thought it advisable to give up teaching the duties of life and turn to speculations on the conditions of souls and spirits after death. But from various passages in the Book of Changes it may be inferred that the souls of men after death are in the same state as they were before birth. Why is it that Confucianists apply the word “ ti ” to heaven and not to spirits? The reason is that there is but one “ ti,” the Supreme Ruler, the governor of all subordinate spirits, who can not be said to be propitious or unpropitious, beneflcent and maleflcent. Inferior spirits, on the other hand, owe their existence to material substances. As substances have noxious or useful properties, so some spirits may be propitious, others unpropitious, and some benevolent, others malevolent. Man is part of the material universe; the spirit of man, a species of spirits. All created things can be distributed into groups, and individuals of the same species are generally found together. A man, therefore, whose heart is good must have a good spirit. By reason of the influence exerted by one spirit upon another, a good spirit naturally tends to attract all other propitious and good spirits. This is happiness. Now, if every indi¬ vidual has a good heart, then from the action and re-action of spirit upon spirit, only propitious and good influences can flow. The country is blessed with prosperity; the government fulfllls its purpose. What happiness can be compared with this? On the other hand, when a man has an evil heart his spirit can not but be likewise evil. On account of the influence exerted by one spirit upon another, the call of this spirit naturally meets with ready responses from all other unpropitious and evil spirits. This is misery. If every individual harbors an evil heart, then a responsive chord is struck in all unpropitious and evil spirits. Evil influences are scattered over the country. Misfortunes and calamities overtake the land. There is an end of good government. What misery can be compared with this? Thus in the administration of public affairs a wise legislator always 154 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. takes into consideration the spirit of the times in devising means for the advancement and promotion of civilization. He puts his reliance on cere¬ monies and music to carry on the good work, and makes use of punishment and the sword as a last resort, in accordance with the good or bad tendency of the age. His aim is to restore the human heart to its pristine innocence by establishing a standard of goodness, and by pointing out a way of sal¬ vation to every creature. The right principles of action can only be dis¬ covered by studying the waxing and waning of the active and passive elements of nature, as set forth in the Book of Changes, and surely can not be understood by those who believe in what priests call the dispensations of providence. Human affairs are made up of thousands of acts of individuals. What, therefore, constitutes a good action, and what a bad action ? What is done for the sake of others is disinterested ; a disinterested action is good and may be called beneficial, w hat is done for the sake of one’s self is selfish ; a selfish action is bad and naturally springs fiom avarice. Suppose there is a man who has never entertained a good thought and never done a good deed, does it stand to reason that such a wretch can, by means of sacrifices and prayers, attain to the blessings of life? Let us take the opposite case and suppose that there is a man who has never harbored a bad thought and never done a bad deed, does it stand to reason that there is no escape for such a man from adverse fortune except through prayers and sacrifices? “My prayers,” says Confucius, “were offered up long ago.” The meaning he wishes to convey is that he considers his prayers to consist in living a virtuous life and in constantly obeying the dictate i of conscience. He therefore, looks upon prayers as of no avail to deliver any one from sickness. “He who sins against heaven,” again he says, “has no place to pra/.” What he means is that even spirits have no power to bestow bless¬ ing ? on those who have sinned against the decrees of heaven. The wise and the good, however, make use of offerings and sacrifices simply as a means of purifying themselves from the contamination of the world, so that they become susceptible of spiritual influences and be in .sympathetic touch with the invisible world, to the end that calamities may be averted and blessings secured thereby. Still, sacrifices can not be offered by all persons without distinction. Only the emperor can offer sacrifices to heaven. Only governors of provinces can offer sacrifices to the spirits of mountains and rivers, land and agriculture. Lower officers of the govern¬ ment can offer sacrifices only to their ancestors of the five preceding gen¬ erations, but are not allowed to offer sacrifices to heaven. The common people, of course, are likewise denied this privilege. They can offer sacri¬ fices only to their ancestors. All persons, from the emperor down to the common people are strictly required to observe the worship of ancestors. The only way in which a virtuous man and a dutiful son can show his sense of obligation to the authors of his being is to serve them when dead, as when they were alive, when departed as when present. It is for this reason that the most enlightened rulers have always made filial duty the guiding principle of government. Observances of this character have nothing to do with relig¬ ious celebrations and ceremonies. Toward the close of the Ming dynasty the local authorities of a certain district invited a priest from Tsoh to live in their midst. The people began to vie with one another in their eagerness to worship the new-fangled deities of Tsoh. Shortly afterward an invitation was extended to a priest from Yueh to settle there also. Then the people in like manner began to vie with one another in their eagerness to worship the new-fangled deities of Yueh. The Tsoh priest, stirred up with envy, declared to the people that the heaven he taught was the only true heaven, and the deities he served ZENSHIRO NOGUCHI, Japanese Buddhist THE U3Rf,RY OF THE ySlVERSltt Of ILLINOIS /-. ,v- •>-. • i. THE MODEL MAN. 155 were the only true deities, adding that by making use of his prayers they could obtain the forgiveness of their sins and the blessings of life, and if they did not make use of his prayers even the good could not attain to happiness. He at the same time denounced the teachings of the Yueh priest as altogether false. The Yueh priest then returned the compliment in similar but more energetic language. Yet they made no attack on the inefficiency of prayers, the reason being that both employed the same kind of tools in carrying on their trade. To say that there are true and false deities is reasonable enough. But can heaven be so divided that one part may be designed as belonging to Tsoh and another part to Yueh? It is merely an attempt to practice on the credulity of men, to dogmatize on the dispensation of providence, by saying that no blessings can fall to the lot of the good without prayer, and that prayer can turn into a blessing the retribution that is sure to overtake the wicked. THE MODEL MAN, BISHOP ARNETT. I think after the discussion of to-day I have a higher conception of the brotherhood of men and the fatherhood of God than I ever had before. I have a higher conception of the unity of the human family. There is one thing I witnessed in particular, that is that we all understood each other. I have learned that it is possible for us to sit in one place and one individual stand up and communicate to us, and that each of our hearts burned within us, whether it was Jew or Japanese. One trouble of the world has been to find a model man, and the trouble has been inside of Christianity. Outside the various religions of the world, each had their own model man; some were high and some were low, some were short and some were wide; but each had its model man, and when we come inside the commonwealth of Christianity we find the same difficulty, and I found that the foundation of the model man was love to God and love to his fellow-man. Then I learned that there was no color in this model man. There were none of them white and none of them black, but they were all model men. And I learned to-day that there is no color in character. That virtue has no color. Now, then, I have come to this conclusion: That it makes no difference what your color is if you are a good man. If you are a good man you are a good man, and if you are a bad man you are a bad man. It is worth a lifetime to me to have learned that one thing. I have found out, after studying these ten model men, the various religions repre¬ sented on this stage, and that little model man that came from Japan. I tell you he was a Tartar. And he told me that it is not so much what I said as what I do. It is not so much what I had for myself as what I had for others. I found that there are three rules that these men are governed by. The first is: As I want men to do unto me, do I even so unto them. Did you ever hear of that rule? Then I found another rule: As men do unto me, do I even so unto them. Did you ever hear of that? Then I found another thing. I found out, at the close of these meetings to-night, that the higher and better rule is: “As I would have men do unto me, do I even so unto them.” And I think we will go away from this Parliament of Religions holding the golden rule in our hands. Now then, my brethern, let us take these lessons. I want you to do to me, whenever you can, just what you are doing now. For the last three days I have lived in the happiest home I ever lived in in my life. It is the home of toleration and common respect for the religious faiths and beliefs of Greek, Jew, and Gentile. ].56 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. WOULD WIN CONVERTS TO BUDDHISM. ZENSHIKO NOGUCHI, WHO ACCOMPANIED THE JAPANESE BUDDHIST PRIEST AS AN INTERPRETER. I take much pleasure in addressing you, my brothers, on the occasion of the first World’s Religious Congress, by your kind indulgence, with what comes to my mind to-day without any preliminary jjreparation, for I have been entirely occupied in interpreting for the four Hijiris who came with me to attend this congress. As you remember Columbus for his discovery, and as you brought to completion the wonderful enterprise of the World’s Fair, I also have to remember one whose knocks at the long-closed door of my country awak¬ ened us from our long and undisturbed slumber and led us to open our eyes to the condition of other civilized countries, including that in which I now am wondering at its greatness and beauty, especially as it is epito¬ mized in the World^’s Fair. I refer to the famous Commodore Perry. I must do for him what Americans have done and do for Columbus. With him I have one, too, to remember whose statue you have doubtless seen at the World’s Fair. His name was Naosuke II., the Lord of Hikone and the great chancellor of Bakufu. He was, unfortunately, assassinated by the hands of the conservative party, which proclaimed him a traitor because he opened the door to the stranger without waiting for the permission of his master, the emperor. Since we opened the door about thirty-six years have passed, during which time wonderful changes and progress have taken place in my coun¬ try, so that now, in the midst of the White City and the World’s Fair, I do not find myself W'ondering so much as a barbarian would do. Who made my country so civilized? He was the knocker, as I called him, Commo¬ dore Perry. So my i^eople owe a great deal to him, and to the America who gave him to us. I must, therefore, make some return to him for his kindness, as you are doing in the World’s Fair to Columbus for his discovery. Shall I offer to you, who represent him, Japanese teapots and teacups? No. Pictures and fans? No, no, no; a thousand times, no. Shall I then open a world’s fair in my own country in honor to his memory? No. Then what is to be done? These things that we have just laid aside as inadequate are only materials, which fire and water can destroy. In their stead I bring some¬ thing that the elements can not destroy and it is the best of all my posses¬ sions. What is that? Buddhism! As you see, I am simply a layman, and do not belong to any sect of Buddhism at all. So I present to you four Budd¬ hist sorios, who will give their addresses before you and place in your hands many thousand coi)ies of English translations of Buddhist works, such as “ Outlines of the Mahayana, as Taught by Buddha;'" “ A Brief Account of the Shin-shu,” “A Shin-shu Catechism,” and “The Sutra of Forty-two ‘Sections and Two Other Short Sutras,” etc. Besides these, 400 volumes of the complete Buddha Shaka’s “Sutra” are imported for the first time to this country as a present to the chairman of this congress by the four Buddhist sorios. These three Chinese translations, which of course Japan- cr.e can read, are made from the original Sanskrit by many Chinese sorios POSITION OF JAPAN TOWARD CHRISTIANITY. 157 in ancient times. I hope they will be translated into English, which can be understood by almost all the people of the world. I regret to say that there is probably no Mahayana doctrine, which is the highest order of Buddhist teaching, translated into English. If you wish to know what the Mahayana doctrine is, you must learn to read Chinese or Japanese, as you are doing in the Chatauqua system of educa¬ tion, otherwise Chinese or Japanese must learn English enough to trans¬ late them for English reading people. Whichever way it be, we religionists must do this, for the sake of the world. I have devoted some years, and am now devoting more years, to learning English, for the purpose of doing this in my private capacity. But the work is too hard for me. For exam¬ ple, I have translated Rev. Professor Tokunaga’s work, without any help from foreigners, on account of the want of time. I am very sorry I have not enough copies of that book to distribute them to you all, for I almost used them up in presents on my way to this city. Permit me to distribute the ten last copies that still remain in my trunk to those who happened to take the seats nearest me. How many religions and their sects are there in the world? Thousands. It is to be hoped that the number of religions in the world will be increased by thousands more? No. Why? If such were our hope we ought to finally bring the number of religions to as great a figure as that of the pop¬ ulation of the world, and the priests of the various religions should not be allowed to preach for the purpose of bringing the people into their respec¬ tive sects. In that case they should rather say; ‘‘Don’t believe whatever we preach, get away from the church, and make your own sect as we do.” Is it right for the priest to say so? No. Then, is there a hope of decreasing the number of religions? Yes. How far? To one. Why? Because the truth is only one. Each sect or religion, as its ultimate object, aims to attain truth. Geometry teaches us that the shortest line between two points is limited to only one; so we must find out that one way of attaining the truth among the thousands of ways to which the rival religions point us, and if we can not find out that one way among the already established religions we must seek it in a new one. So long as we have thousands of religions the religion of the world has not yet attained its full development in all respects If the thousands of religions do con¬ tinue to develop and reach the state of full development there will be no more any distinction between them, or any difference between faith and reason, religion and science. This is the end at which we aim and to which we believe that we know the shortest way. I greet you, ladies and gentlemen of the World’s Parliament of Relig¬ ions, the gathering together of which is an important step in that direction. THE REAL POSITION OF JAPAN TOWARD CHRISTIANITY. KINZA RINGE M. HAEAI, THE LEARNED JAPANESE BUDDHIST. Some of the Christian missionaries on the platform con¬ tracted and their heads shook in disapproval. But the Budd¬ hist directed his stinging rebukes at the false Christians who have done so much to impede the spreading of the gospel in 158 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. There are very few countries in the world so misunderstood as Japan. Among the innumerable unfair judgments, the religious thought of my countrymen is especially misrepresented, and the whole nation is con¬ demned as heathen. Be they heathen, pagan, or something else, it is a fact that from the beginning of our history Japan has received all teachings with open mind; and also that the instructions which came from out¬ side have commingled with the native religion in entire harmony, as is seen by so many temples built in the name of truth with a mixed appellation of Buddhism and Shintoism; as is seen by the affinity among the teachers of Confucianism and Taoism, or other isms, and the Buddhists and Shinto priests; as is seen by the individual Japanese, who pays his other respects to all teachings mentioned above; as is seen by the peculiar construction of ■^he Japanese houses, which have generally two rooms, one for a miniature Buddhist temple and the other for a small Shinto shrine, before which the family study the respective scriptures of the two religions; as is seen by the popular ode: Wake noborn Fumoto no michi ioa Ooke redo, Ona ji takne no, Tsuki wo mini kana, Which, translated, means: “Though there are many roads at the foot of the mountains, yet if the top is reached the same moon is seen,” and other similar odes and mottoes, which are put in the mouth of the ignorant coun¬ try old woman, when she decides the case of bigoted religious contention among young girls. In reality Synthetic religion, or Entitism, is the Japanese specialty, and I will not hesitate to call it Japanism. But you will protest and say: “Why, then, is Christianity not so warmly accepted by your nation as other religions ? ” This is the point which I wish especially to present before you. There are two causes why Christianity is not so cordially received. This great religion was widely spread in any country, but in 1637 the Christian missionaries, combined with the converts, caused a tragic and bloody rebellion against the country, and it is understood that those missionaries intended to subjugate Japan to their own mother country. This shocked all Japan, and it took the gov¬ ernment of the Shogun a year to suppress this terrible and intrusive com- mption. To those who accuse us that our mother country prohibited Christianity—not now, but in a past age—I will reply that it was not from religious or racial antipathy, but to prevent such another insurrection, and to protect our independence, we were obliged to prohibit the promulgation of the gospels. If our history had had no such record of foreign devastation under the disguise of religion, and if our people had had no hereditary horror and prejudice against the name of Christianity, it might have been eagerly embraced by the whole nation. But this incident has passed and we may forget it. Yet it is not entirely unreasonable that the terrified suspicion, or you may say superstition, that Christianity is the instrument of depre¬ dation should have been avoidably or unavoidably aroused in the Oriental mind, when it is an admitted fact that some of the powerful nations of Christendom are gradually encroaching upon the Orient, and when the following circumstance is daily impressed upon our minds, reviving a vivid memory of the past historical occurrence. The circumstance of which I am about to speak is the present experience of ourselves, to which I especially call the attention of this parliament, and not only this parliament, but also the whole of Christendom. Since 1853, when Commodore Perry came to Japan as the ambassador of the President of the United States of America, our country began to be better known by all Western nations and the new ports were widely opened POSITION OF JAPAN TOWABD CHRISTIANITY. 159 and the prohibition of the gospels was abolished, as it was before the Chris¬ tian rebellion. By the convention at Yeddo, now Tokio, in 1858, the treaty was stipulated between America and Japan and also with the European powers. It was the time when our country was yet under the feudal gov¬ ernment; and on account of our having been secluded for over two centuries since the Christian rebellion of 1637, diplomacy was quite a new experience to the feudal officers, who put their full confidence upon Western nations, and, without any alteration, accepted every article of the treaty presented from the foreign governments. According to the treaty we are in a very disadvantageous situation; and amongst the others there are two prominent articles, which deprive us of our rights and advantages. One is the exter¬ ritoriality of Western nations in Japan, by which all cases in regard to right, whether of property or person, arising between the subjects of the Western nations in my country, as well as between them and the Japanese, are sub¬ jected to the jurisdiction of the authorities of the Western nations. Another regards the tariff, which, with the exception of 5 per cent ad valorem, we have no right to impose where it might properly be done. It is also stipulated that either of the contracting parties to this treaty, on giving one year’s previous notice to the other, may demand a revision thereof on or after the 1st of July, 1872. Therefore, in 1871, our govern¬ ment demanded a revision, and since then we have been constantly request¬ ing it, but foreign governments have simply ignored our requests, making many excuses. One part of the treaty between the United States of Amer¬ ica and Japan concerning the tariff, was annulled, for which we thank with sincere gratitude the kind-hearted American nation; but I am sorry to say, that, as no European power has followed in the wake of America, in this respect our tariff right remains in the same condition as it was before. We have no judicial power over the foreigners in Japan, and as a nat¬ ural consequence we are receiving injuries, legal and moral, the accounts of which are seen constantly in our native newspapers. As the Western people live far from us they do not know the exact circumstances. Prob¬ ably they hear now and then the reports from the missionaries and their friends in Japan. I do not deny that their reports are true; but if a person wants to obtain any unmistakable information in regard to his friend he ought to hear the opinions about him from many sides. If you closely examine with your unbiased mind what injuries we receive you will be astonished. Among many kinds of wrongs there are some which were utterly unknown before and entirely new to us—heathen, none of whom would dare to speak of them even in private conversation. One of the excuses offered by foreign nations is that our country is not yet civilized. Is it the principle of civilized law that the rights and profits of the so-called uncivilized or the weaker should be sacrificed? As I under¬ stand it, the rights and the necessity of law is to protect the rights and wel¬ fare of the weaker against the aggression of the stronger; but I have never learned in my shallow studies of law that the weaker should be sacrificed for the stronger. Another kind of apology comes from the religious source, and the claim is made that the Japanese are idolaters and heathen. Whether our people are idolaters or not you will know at once if you will investigate our religious views without prejudice from authentic Japanese sources. But admitting, for the sake of argument, that we are idolaters and heathen, is it Christian morality to trample upon the rights and advantages of a non-Christian nation, coloring all their natural happiness with the dark stain of injustice? I read in the Bible, “ Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also;” but I can not discover there any passage which says, “ Whosoever shall demand j ustice of thee, smite his right cheek, and when he turns smite the other also.” Again, I read in the Bible, “ If any man will sue thee at law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also;” but I can not discover there any passage which says. 160 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. “If thou shalt sue any man at the law, and take away his coat, let him give thee his cloak also.” You send your missionaries to Japan, and they advise us to be moral and believe Christianity. We like to be moral, we know that Christianity is good, and we are very thankful for this kindness. But at the same time our people are rather perplexed and very much in doubt about this advice. For we think that the treaty stipulated in the time of feudalism when we were yet in our youth, is still clung to by the powerful nations of Christen¬ dom; when we find that every year a good many Western vessels engaged in the seal fishery are smuggled into our seas; when legal cases are always decided by the foreign authorities in Japan unfavorably to us; when some years a Japanese was not allowed to enter a university on the Pacific coast of America because of his being of a different race; when a few months ago the school board in San Francisco enacted a regulation that no Japanese should be allowed to enter the public schools there; when last year the Japanese were driven out in wholesale from one of the territories of the United States of America; when our business men in San Franc isco were compelled by some union not to employ the Japanese assistants or laborers, but the Americans; when there are some in the same city who speak on the platforms against those of us who are already here; when there are many men who go in processions hoisting lanterns marked, “Jap must go;” when the Japanese in the Hawaiian Islands are deprived of their suffrage; when we see some Western people in Japan who erect before the entrance to their houses a special post upon which is the notice, “No Japanese is allowed to enter here,” just like a board upon which is written, “ No dogs allowed;” when we are in such a situation is it unreasonable—notwithstanding the kindness of the Western nations, from one point of view, who send their missionaries to us—for us intelligent heathen to be embarrassed and hesi¬ tate to swallow the sweet and warm liquid of the heaven of Christianity? If such be the Christian ethics, well, we are perfectly satisfied to be heathen. If any person should claim that there are many people in Japan who speak and write against Christianity, I am not a hypocrite and I will frankly state that I was the first in my country who ever publicly attacked Chris¬ tianity—no, not real Christianity, but false Christianity, the wrongs done toward us by the people of Christendom. If any reprove the Japanese because they have had strong anti-Christian societies, I will honestly declare that I was the first in Japan who ever organized a society against Christianity—no, not against real Christianity, but to protect ourselves from false Christianity and the injustice which we receive from the people of Christendom. Do not think that I took such a stand on account of my being a Buddhist, for this was my position many years before I entered the Buddhist Temple. But at the same time I will proudly state that if any one discussed the affinity of all religions before the public, under the title of Synthetic Religion, it was I. I say this to you because I do not wish to be understood as a bigoted Buddhist sectarian. Really there is no sectarian in my country. Our people well know what abstract truth is in Christianity, and we, or at least I, do not care about the names if I speak from the point of teaching. Whether Buddhism is called Christianity or Christianity is named Buddhism, whether we are called Confucianists or Shintoists, we are not par¬ ticular, but we are very particular about the truth taught and its consistent application. Whether Christ saves us or drives us into hell, whether Gautama Buddha was a real person or there never was such a man, it is not a matter of consideration to us, but the consist¬ ency of doctrine and conduct is the point on which we put the greater importance. Therefore unless the inconsistency which we observe is renounced, and especially the unjust treaty by which we are entailed is Good will and peace among men. 161 revised upon an equitable basis, our people will never castaway their preju¬ dice about Christianity, in spite of the eloquent orator who speaks its truth from the pulpit. We are very often called barbarians, and I have heard and read that Japanese are stubborn and can not understand the truth of the Bible. I will admit that this is true in some sense, for though they admire the eloquence of the orator and wonder at his courage, though they approve his logical argument, yet they are very stubborn, and will not join Christianity as long as they think it is a Western morality to preach one thing and practice another. But I know this is not the morality of the civilized West, and I have the firm belief in the highest humanity and noblest generosity of the Occidental nations toward us. Especially as to the American nation, I know their sympathy and integrity. I know their sympathy by their emancipation of the colored people from slavery. I know their integrity by the patriotic spirit which established the independence of the United States of America. And I feel sure that the circumstances which made the American people declare independence are in some sense comparable to the present state of my country. I can not refrain my thrilling emotion and sympathetic tears whenever 1 read the Declaration of Independence. You, citizens of this glorious free United States, who struck when the right time came, struck for “liberty or death,” you, v/ho waded through blood that you might fasten to the mast your banner of the stripes and stars upon the land and sea; you, who enjoy the fruition of your liberty through your struggle for it; you, I say, may understand somewhat our position, and as you asked for justice from your mother country, we, too, ask justice from these foreign powers. If any religion teaches injustice to humanity, I will oppose it, as I ever have opposed it, with my blood and soul. I will be the bitterest dissenter from Christianity, or I will be the warmest admirer of its gospels. To the promoters of the parliament and the ladies and gentlemen of the world who are assembled here I pronounce that your aim is the realization of the Religious Union — not nominally, but practically. We, the 40,000,000 souls of Japan, standing firmly and persistently upon the basis of international justice, await still further manifestations as to the m^Drality of Christianity. GOOD WILL AND PEACE AMONG MEN, RIGHT REV. SHIBATA REIICHI, PRESIDENT OF THE JIKKO SECT OF SHINTOISM IN JAPAN. I feel very happy to be able to attend this Congress of Religions as a member of the advisory council and to hear the high reasonings and pro¬ found opinions of the gentlemen who come from the various countries of the world. As for me, it will be my proper task to explain the character of Shintoism, and especially of my Jikko sect. The word Shinto, or Kami-no-michi, comes from the two words “ Shin,” or “ Kami,” each of which means Deity, and “to,” or “ michi ” (way), and designates the way transmitted to us from our divine ancestors, and in which every Japanese is bound to walk. Having its foundation in our old history, conforming to our geographical positions and the disposition of our people, this way, as old as Japan itself, came down to us with its original form and will l ist forever, inseparable from the Eternal Imperial House and the Japanese nationality. According to our ancient scriptures, there were a generation of Kami or Deities in the beginning who created the heavens and the earth, together 162 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. with all things, including human beings, and became the ancestors of the J apanese. Jimmu-tenno, the grandson of Ninigi-nomikoto, was the first of the human emperors. Having brought the whole land under one rule he per¬ formed great services to the divine ancestors, cherished his subjects and thus discharged his great filial duty, as did all the emperors after him. So also, all the subjects were deep in their respect and adoration toward the divine ancestors and the emperors, their descendants. Though in the course of time various doctrines and creeds were introduced into the country. Confucianism in the reign of the fifteenth emperor, Ojin, Buddh¬ ism in the reign of the twenty-ninth emperor, Kimmei, and Christianity in modern times, the emperors and the subjects never neglected the great duty of Shinto. The present forms of ceremony are come down to us from time immemorial in our history. Of the three divine treasures transmitted from the divine ancestors, the divine 'gem is still held sacred in the imperial palace, the divine mirror in the great temple of Iso, and the divine sword in the temple of Atsuta, in the Province of Owari. To this day his majesty the emperor performs himself the ceremony of worship to the divine ances¬ tors, and all the subjects perform the same to the deities of temples, which are called, according to the local extent of the festivity, the national, the provincial, the local, and the birth-place temple. When the festival day of temples, especially of the birth-place, etc., comes, all people who, living in the place, are considered specially protected by the deity of the temple, have a holiday, and unite in performing the ancient ritual of worship and praying for the perpetuity of the imperial line, and for profound peace over the land and families. The deities dedicated to the temple are divine imperial ancestors, illustrious loyalists, benefactors to the place, etc. Indeed, the Shinto is a beautiful cultus peculiar to our native land, and is con¬ sidered the foundation of the perpetuity of the imperial house, the loyalty of the subjects, and the stability of the Japanese state. Thus far I have given a short description of Shinto, which is the way in which every Japanese, no matter to whatcreed—even Buddhism, Christi¬ anity, etc.—he belongs, must walk. Let me explain briefly the nature and origin of a religious force of Shinto, i. e., of the Jikko sect, whose tenets I profess to believe. The Jikko (practical) sect, as the name indicates, does not lay so much stress upon mere show and speculation as upon the realization of the teachings. Its doctrines are plain and simple and teach man to do man’s proper work. Being a new sect, it is free from the old dogmas and prej¬ udices, and is regarded as a reformed sect. The scriptures on which the principal teachings of the sect are founded are Furukotobumi, Yamato- bumi and many others. They teach us that before heaven and earth came into existence there was one absolute deity called Ameno-mina-kanu-shi-no-kami. He has great virtue, and power to create to reign over all things; he includes everything within himself, and he will last forever without end. In the beginning the One Deity, self-originated, took the embodiments of two Deities; one with the male nature, and the other female. The male Deity is called Takai-mu-sibi-no-kami, and the female Kami-musubi-no-kami. These two Deities are nothing but forms of the one substance and unite again in the Absolnte Deity. These three are called the “Three Deities of Creation,” They caused a generation of Deities to appear, who, in their turn, gave birth to the islands of the Japanese Archipelago, the sun and moon, the mountains and streams, the divine ancestors, etc. So their virtue and power are esteemed wondrous and boundless. According to the teachings of our sect we ought to reverence the famous mountain Fuji, assuming it to be the sacred abode of the divine Lord, and as the brain of the whole globe. And, as every child of the heavenly Deity came into the world with a soul separated from the one original soul of Deity, GOOD WILL AND PEACE AMONG NEN. 163 he ought to be just as the Deity ordered (in sacred Japanese “kanngara”) and make Fuji the example and emblem of his thought and action. For instance, he must be plain and simple as the form of the mountain, make his body and mind pure as the serenity of the same, etc. We would respect the present world, with all its practical works, more than the future world; pray for the long life of the emperor and the peace of the country; and, by leading a life of temperance and diligence, co-operating with one another in doing public good, we should be responsible for the blessings of the country. The founder of this sect isHasegawa Kakugyo, who was born in Nagasaki, of the Hizen province, in 1541. In the eighteenth year of his age, Hasegawa, full of grief at the gloomy state of things over the country, set out on a pil¬ grimage to various sanctuaries of famous mountains and lakes, Shintoistic and Buddhistic temples. While he was offering fervent prayers on sacred Fuji, sometimes on its summit and sometimes within its cave, he received inspiration through the miraculous power of the mountain; and, becoming convinced that this place is the holy abode of Ameno-mina-kanu-shi-no- kima, he founded a new sect and propagated the creed all over the empire. After his death in the cave, in his 106th year, the light of the doctrines was handed down by a series of teachers. The tenth of them was my father, Shibata Hanamori, born at Ogi of the Hizen province, in 1809. He was also in the 18th year of his age when he adopted the doctrine of this sect. Amid the revolutionary war of Meiji, which followed immediately, he exerted all his powder to propagate his faith by writing religious works and preaching about the provinces. Now I have given a short sketch of the doctrines of our religion and of its history. In the next place, let me express the humble views that I have had for some years on religion. As our doctrines teach us, all animate and inanimate things were born from one heavenly Deity, and every one of them has its particular mis¬ sion; so we ought to love them all and also to respect the various forms of religions in the world. They are all based, I believe, on the fundamental truth of religion. The difference between them is only in the outward form, influenced by variety of history, the dispositions of the people and the physical conditions of the places where they originated. Lastly, there is one more thought which I wish to offer here. While it is the will of Deity and the aim of all religionists, that all His beloved chil¬ dren on the earth should enjoy peace and comfort in one accord, many countries look still with envy and hatred toward one another, and appear to seek for opportunities of making war under the slightest pretext, with no other aim than of wringing out ransoms or robbing a nation of its lands. Thus, regardless of the abhorence of the heavenly Deity, they only inflict pain and calamity on innocent people. Now and here my earnest wish is this, that the time should come soon when all nations on the earth will join their armies and navies with one accord, guarding the world as a whole, and thus prevent preposterous wars with each other. They should also establish a supreme court, in order to decide the case when a differ¬ ence arises between them. In that state no nation will receive unjust treat¬ ment from another, and every nation and every individual will be able to maintain their own right and enjoy the blessings of providence. There will thus ensue, at last, the universal peace and tranquility, which seem to be the final object of the benevolent Deity. For many years such has been my wish and hope. In order to facilitate and realize this in the future, I earnestly plead that every religionist of the world may try to edify the nearest people to devotion, to root out enmity between nations and to promote our common object. 1G4 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIOIONl^. CONCESSIONS TO NATIVE RELIGIOUS IDEAS. REV. T. E. SLATER OF BANGALORE, INDIA. The Hindus by instinct and tradition are the most religious people in the world. They are born religiously, they eat, bathe, shave, and write religiously, they die and are cremated or buried religiously, and for years afterward are devoutly remembered religiously. They will not take a house or open a shop or office, they will not go on a journey or engage in any enterprise without some religious observance. We thus appeal in our missionary effort to a deeply religious nature; we sow the gospel seed in a religious soil. The religion of a nation is its sacred impulse toward an ideal, however imperfectly apprehended and realized it may be. The spirit of India’s religions has been a reflective spirit, hence its philosophical character, and to understand and appreciate them, we must look beyond the barbaric shows and feasts and ceremonies, and get to the undercurrents of native thought. Hinduism is a growth from within; and to study it we have to lay bare that inward, subtle soul which, strangely enough, explains the outward form with all its extravagances; for India’s gross idolatry is con¬ nected with her ancient systems of speculative philosophy, and with an extensive literature in the Sanskrit language; her Epic, Puranic, and Tan- trika mythologies and cosmogonies have a theosophic basis. India, whose worship was the probable cradle of all other similar wor¬ ships, is the richest mine of religious ideas; yet we can not speak of the religion of India. What is styled “ Hinduism ” is a vague eclecticism, the sum total of several shades of belief, of divergent systems, of various types and characters of the outward life, each of which at one time or another calls itself Hinduism, but which, apparently bears little resemblance to the other beliefs. Every phase of religious thought and philosophic spec¬ ulation has been represented in India. Some of the Hindu doctrines are theistic, some atheistic and materialistic, others pantheistic—the extreme development of idealism. Some of the sects hold that salvation is obtained by xjracticing austerities and by self-devotion and prayer; some that faith and love (bhakti) form the ruling principle; others that sacrificial observ¬ ances are the only means. Some teach the doctrine of predestination; others that of free grace. It is hard for foreigners to understand the habits of thought and life that prevail in a strange country, as well as all the changes and sacrifices that conversation entails; and, with our brusque, matter-of-fact Western instincts, and our lack of spiritual and philosophic insight, we too often go forth denouncing the traditions and worship of the people, and in so doing, are apt, with our heavy heels, to trample on beliefs and senti¬ ments that have a deep and sacred root. A knowledge of the material on which we work is quite as important as deftness in handling our tools; a knowledge of the soil as necessary as the conviction that the seed is good. Let us glance now, in the briefest manner, at some of the fundamental ideas and aspects of Brahmanical Hinduism, that may be regarded as a preparation for the gospel, and links by which a Christian advocate may connect the religion of the incarnation and the cross with the higher phases of religious thought and life in India. It should be borne in mind, however, throughout, that this foreshadowing relation between Hinduism and Christianity is ancient rather than modern, that these “ foreshadowings ” of the gospel are unsuspected by the masses of the people; and, further, that the points of similarity between the two faiths are sometimes apparent rather than real; and that the whole inquiry becomes clear only as we realize that Hinduism has been a keen and pathetic search after a CONCESSIONS TO NATIVE RELIGIOUS IDEAS. 165 salvation to be wrought by man rather than a restful satisfaction in a redemption designed and offered by God. The underlying element of all religions, without which there can be no spiritual worship, is the belief that the human worshiper is somehow made in the likeness of the divine. And the central thought of India, which binds together all its conflicting elements, is the revelation of life, the pilgrim soul through all definite existences to reunion with the infinite. From t^he opening youthfulness, hopefulness, and self-sufficiency depicted in the songs of the Rig-veda, where the spirit is bright and joyous, and homage is given to the forms and powers of nature—the mirror of man’s own life and freedom—on through the dreary stage, where “ the weary weight of this unintelligible world ” and the soul wakes from the illusive dream of childhood to experience a bitter disappointment, to realize that the search ior individual happiness in the infinite or j^henomenal is a futile one, to find that the world is a vain shadow, an empty show, the reverence of the Indian has not been for the material form, but for pure spirit— for his own conscious soul—^whose essential unity with the divine is an axiomatic truth, and whose power to abide in the midst of all changes is the test of its everlasting being, the x^roof of its immortality. The ideal, then, before which the Indian agnostic bows is the spirit of man. The soul retires within itself, in a state of ecstatic reverie, the highest form of which is called Yoga, and meditates on the secret of its own nature; and, having made the discovery, which comes sooner or later to all, that the world, instead of being an elysium, is an illusion, a vexation of spirit, the speculative problem of Indian philosophy and the actual struggle of the religious man, have been how to break the dream, get rid of the impostures of sense and time, emancipate the self from the bondage of the fleeting world, and attain the one reality—the invisible, the divine. This can only be achieved by becoming detached from material things, by ceasing to love the world, by the mortification of desire. And though this “ love of the world ” may have little in common with the idea of the Apostle John, yet have we not here an affinity with the affirmation of Christianity, that “ the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor. iv, 18); that “the world passeth away, and the lust thereof” (1 John ii, 17); though the Christian completion of that verse — “but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever”—marks the funda¬ mental defect of pantheistic India and its striking contrast to the gospel. For the God of Hinduism is a pure Intelligence, a Thinker; not a Sover¬ eign Will as in Islam, nor the Lord of Light and Right as in Parseeism, still less having any paternal or providential character. Nothing is created by His power, but all is evolved by emanation, from the one eternal Entity, like sparks from fire. No commands come from such a Being, but all things flow from Him, as light from the sun, or thoughts from a musing man. Hence, while between God and the worshiper there is the most direct affin¬ ity, which may become identity, there exists no bond of sympathy, no active and intelligent co-operation, and no quickening power being exercised on the human will, and in the formation of character, the fatal and fatalistic weakness of Hindu life appears, which renders the gospel appeal so often powerless; the lost sense of practical moral distinction, of the requirements of conscience, of any necessary connection between thought and action, convictions and conduct, of divine authority over the soul, of personal responsibility, of the duty of the soul to love and honor God, and to love one’s neighbor as one’s self. Idolatry itself, foolish and degrading as it is, seeks to realize to the senses what otherwise is only an idea; it witnesses, as all great errors do, to a great truth; and it is only by distinctly recognizing and liberating the truth that underlies the error, and of which the error is the counterpart, that the error can be successfully combated and slain. Every error will 166 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. live as long, and only as long, as its share of truth remains unrecognized. Adapting words that Archdeacon Hare wrote of Dr. Arnold: “We must be iconoclasts, at once zealous and fearless in demolishing the reigning idols, and at the same time animated with a reverent love for the ideas that the idols carnalize and stifle.” Idolatry is a strong human protest against pantheism, which denies the personality of God, and atheism, which denies God altogether; it testifies to the natural craving of the heart to have before it some manifestation of the Unseen—to behold a humanized god. It is not, at bottom, an effort to get away from God, but to bring God near. Once more. The idea of the need of sacrificial acts, ‘ the first and primary rites”—eucharistic, sacramental, and propitiatary—bearing the closet parallelism to the provisions of the Mosaic economy and prompted by a sense of personal unworthiness, guilt and misery—that life is to be forfeited to the Divine Proprietor—is ingrained in the whole system of Vedic Hinduism. A sense of original corruption has been felt by all classes of Hindus, as indicated in the prayer. I am sinful, I commit sin, my nature is sinful. Save me, O thou lotus-eyed Hari, the remover of sin. The first man, after the deluge, whom the Hindus called Manu and the Hebrews Noah, offered burnt offering. No literature, hot even the Jewish, contains so many words relating to sacrifice as Sanskrit. The land has been saturated with blood. The secret of this great importance attached to sacrifice is to be found in the remarkable fact that the authorship of the institution is attributed to “Creation’s Lord” himself and its date is reckoned as coeval with the creation. The idea exists in the three chief Vedas and in the Brahmanas and Upanishads that Prajapati, “the lord and supporter of his creatures”— the Purusha (primeval male)—begotten before the world, becoming half immortal and half mortal in a body fit for sacrifice, offered himself for the devas (emancipated mortals) and for the benefit of the world, thereby mak¬ ing all subsequent sacrifice a reflection or figure of himself. The ideal of the Vedic Prajapati, mortal and yet divine, himself both priest and victim, who by death overcame death, has long since been lost in India. Among the many gods of the Hindu pantheon none has ever come forward to claim the vacant throne once reverenced by Indian rishis. No other than the Jesus of the Gospels—^“the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world”—has ever appeared to fulfill this primitive idea of redemption by the efficacy of sacrifice; and when this Christian truth is preaihedit ought not to sound strange to Indian ears. An eminent Hindu preacher has said that no one can be a true Hindu without being a true Christian. But one of the saddest and most disastrous facts of the India of to-day is that modern Brahmanism, like modern Parseeism, is fast loosing its old ideas, relaxing its hold on the more spiritual portions, the distinctive tenets, of the ancient faith. Happily, however, a reaction has set in, mainly through the exertions of these scholars and of the Arya Somaj; and the moref thoughtful minds are earnestly seeking to recover from their sacred books some of the buried treasures of the past. For ideas of a divine revelation—“ Word of God” —communicated directly to inspired sages or rishis, according to a theory of inspiration higher than that of any other religion in the world, is perfectly familiar to Hindus, and is, indeed, universally entertained. Yet the conclusion reached is this, that a careful comparison of religions brings out this striking con¬ trast between the Bible and all other scriptures; it establishes its satis¬ fying character in distinction from the seeking spirit of other faiths. The Bible shows God in quest of man rather than man in quest of God. It meets the questions raised in the philosophies of the east, and supplies their only true solution. SUPREME END AND OFFICE OF RELIGION. 167 The Vedas present “ a shifting play of lights and shadows; sometimes the light seems to grow brighter, but the day never comes ” For, on exam¬ ining them, we note a remarkable fact. While they show that the spirit¬ ual needs and aspirations of humanity are the same—the same travail of the soul as it bears the burdens of existence—and contain many beautiful prayers for mercy and help, we fail to find a single text that purports to be a divine answer to prayer, an explicit promise of divine forgiveness, an expression of experienced peace and delight in God, as the result of assured pardon and reconciliation. There is no realization of ideas. The Bible alone is the Book of Divine Promise—the revelation of the “ exceeding riches of God’s grace ”—shining with increasing brightness till the dawn of perfect day. And for this reason it is unique, not so much in its ideas, as in its vitality; a living and regulating force, embodied in a personal, his¬ toric Christ, and charged with unfailing inspiration. SUPREME END AND OFFICE OF RELIGION. WALTER ELLIOTT, OF THE PAULIST CONVENT, NEW YORK. The end and office of religion is to direct the aspirations of the soul toward an infinite good, and to secure a perfect fruition. Man’s longings for perfect wisdom, love and joy are not aberrations of the intelligence, oi morbid conditions of any kind; they are not purely subjective; blind Teach¬ ings forth toward nothing. They are most real life, excited into activity by the infinite reality of the Supreme Being, the most loving God, calling His creatures to union with Himself. In studying the office of religion we therefore engage in the investigation of the highest order of facts, and weigh and measure the most precious products of human conduct—man’s endeavors to approach his ideal condition. Reason, if well directed, dedicates our best efforts to progress toward perfect life; and if religion be of the right kind, under its influence all human life becomes sensitive to the touch of the divine life from which it sprung. The definition of perfect religious life is, therefore, equivalent to that of most real life; the human spirit moving towards perfect wisdom and joy by instinct of the Divine Spirit acting upon it, both in the inner and outer order of existence. But man’s ideal is more than human. Man would never be content to strive after what is no better than his own best self. The longing toward virtue and happiness is for the reception of a superior, a divine existence. The end of religion is regeneration. Otherwise stated, religion has not done its work with the effacement of sin and the restoration of the integrity of nature. It has indeed this remedial office, but its highest power is trans¬ formative; it is the elixir of a new and divine life. The supreme office of religion is regeneration. “The justification of a wicked man is his translation from the state in which man is born as a son of the first Adam into the state of grace and adoption of the sons of God by the second Adam, Jesus Christ, our Savior.” These words of the Council of Trent affirm that the boon of God’s favor is not merely restoration to humanity’s natural innocence. God’s friendship for man is elevation to a state higher than nature’s highest, and infinitely so, and yet a dignity toward which all men are drawn by the unseen attrac¬ tion of divine grace, and toward which in their better moments they con¬ sciously strive, however feebly and blindly. Religion, as understood by Christianity, means new life for man, different life, additional life. The Christian mind is thus to be discovered and tested by comparison with the highest standard: “Be ye perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect.” Before coming to the ways and means and processes of acquiring this 168 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. divine life we must consider atonement for sin. It may be asked: Why does Christ elevate us to union with His Father through suffering? The answer is that God is dealing with a race which has degraded itself with rebellion and with crime, which naturally involves suffering. God’s purpose is now just what it was in the beginning, to communi¬ cate himself to each human being, and to do it personally, elevating men to brotherhood with his own divine Son, making them partakers of the same grace which dwells in the soul of Christ, and shares hereafter in the same blessedness which he possesses with the Father. To accomplish this pur¬ pose God originally constituted man in a supernatural condition of divine favor. That lost by sin, Cod, by an act of grace yet more signal, places his Son in the circumstances of humiliation and suffering due to sin. This is the order of atonement, a word which has come to signify a mediation through suffering, although the etymological meaning of it is bringing together into one. Mediation is now, as ever before, the constant and final purpose of God’s loving dealing with us. Religion is jjositive. It makes me good with Christ’s goodness. Relig¬ ion does essentially more than rid me of evil. In the mansions of the Father, sorrow opens the outer door of the atrium in which I am pardoned, and love leads to the throne-room. If forgiveness and union be distinct, it is only as we think of them, for to God they are one. And this is to be noted: all infants who pass into heaven through the laver of regeneration have had no conscious experience of any Kind, and yet will enjoy the union of filiation forever. Nor can it be denied that there are multitudes of adults whose sanctification has had no conscious process of the remission of grave sin, for many such have never been guilty of it. To excite them to a ficti¬ tious sense of sinfulness is untruthful, unjust, and unchristian. Hounding innocent souls into the company of demons is false zeal and is cruel. The expiation of sin is the removal of an obstacle to our union with God. Nothing hinders the progress of guileless or repentant souls, even their peace of mind, more than prevalent misconceptions on this point. Freed from sin many fall under the delusion that all is done; not to commit sin is assumed to be the end of religion. In reality pardon is but the initial work of grace and even X)ardon is not possible without the gift of love. The sufferings of Christ as well as whatever is of a penitential influence in his religion, is not in the nature of merely paying a x)enalty,but is chiefly an offering of love. Atonement is related to mediation as its condition and not as its essence. We are washed in the Redeemer’s blood, bu*^, that blood does not remain on the surface; it penetrates us and sanctifies our own blood, mingling with it. We are not ransomed only, but ennobled. The process on man’s part of union with God is free and loving accept¬ ance of all His invitations, inner and outer, natural and revealed, organic and personal. Loving God is the practical element in our receyjtion.of the Holy Spirit. The fruition of love is union with the beloved. If to be regenerated means to be born of God, then what is to be sought after is newness of life by the immediate contact with life’s source and center in love. The perfection of any finite being is the closest possible identity with its ideal. The supreme end and office of religion is to cause men by love personally to approximate to the ideal, not merely of humanity, but of humanity made one with the Deity. The carrying out of this process by a dual nature, such as man’s is menaced by one of two dangers; either divorce from the bodily and external life of man, or slavery to it, and divorce from the spiritual. The former is false mysticism and the latter is formalism. Christ, the Son of God and the son of man, is the synthesis. His union of the inner and the outer life was made into harmony of insi)ired si)eech when the angel said to Mary, “ The Holy Ghost shall come ux)on thee, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee;” the incarnation, the becoming man of essen¬ tially syhritual being. KINZA RINGE M. HIRAI. Japanese Buddhist. IMMORTALITY. 169 As a method or process of human betterment, religion is the fullness of all outer and inner, visible and invisible aids to bring the mind and heart of man under the immediate influence of the Divine Spirit in the union of love. Organizations and authorities and discipline, sacraments and wor¬ ship are external channels, helps and incitements to love, instituted by the Son of God, as the extension of his own external divine life. Their end is to convey to the soul his inner divine life, and bring into participation in his immediate union with the Father and the Holy Ghost. His external order of church serves him everywhere and for all time, and his body served him while on earth, continuing and completing by a visible means the spiritual end, man’s deiflcation through divine love. The age, we are told, calls for men worthy of that name. Who are those worthy to be called men ? Men assuredly whose intelligences and wills are divinely illuminated and strengthened. This is precisely what is produced by the^ifts of the Holy Spirit; they enlarge all the faculties of the soul at once. The age is superficial; it needs the gift of Wisdom. The age is materialistic; it needs the gift of Intelligence. The age is captivated by a false and one-sided science; it needs the gift of Science. The age is in dis¬ order, and is ignorant of the way to true progress; it needs the gift of Counsel. The age is impious; it needs the gift of Piety. The age is sen¬ sual and effeminate; it needs the gift of Fortitude. The age has lost and forgotten God; it needs the gift of Fear. Men endowed with these gifts are the men for whom, if it but knew it, the age calls. One such soul does more to advance the kingdom of God than tens of thousands without those gifts. Religion taken, then, at the highest development, which is Christianity, is the elevation of man to union with God, in an order of life transcending the natural. It attains this end by elevating the soul to heavenly wisdom in divine faith, heavenly life in divine love. It will be seen that the ideal religious character is not formed by constant absorption in thoughts of the Deity’s attributes of sovereignty, but rather by meditation on all the attributes, loving-kindness being supreme. For the same reason, it is not obedience that holds the place of honor among the virtues; in forming the filial character love is supreme. Love outranks all virtues. The greatest of these is charity. It is not the spirit of conformity, but that of union, which rules the conduct of a son. It never can be said that it is by reason of obedience that men love, but it must always be said of obedience that it is by reason of love that it is made perfect. Obedience generates conformity, but love has a fecundity which generates every virt^ue, for it alone ^s wholly unitive. The highest boast of obedience is that it is the first-born of love. As the Humanity said of the Divinity, “ I go to the Father, because the Father is greater than I,” so obedience says of love, “ I go to my parent virtue, for love is greater than I.” Hence not the least fault we find with the religious separation of the last 300 years is, that it has unduly accentuated the sovereignty of God. IMMORTALITY. Rev. Phillip Moxon was introduced, and among other things said: It is impossible, of course, within the limits of this brief paper even to state the entire argument for the immortality of man. The most that I can hope to do is to indicate those main lines of reasoning which appeal to the average intelligent mind as confirmatory of a belief in immortality already existent. Throe or four considerations should be noticed at the outset: 170 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. First, it is doubtful whether any reasoning on this subject should be intelligible to man if he did not have precedent by at least a capacity for immortality. However we may define it, there is that in man’s nature which makes him susceptible to the tremendous idea of everlasting exist¬ ence. It would seem as if only a deathless being, in the midst of a world in which all forms of life perceptible by his senses are born and die in end¬ less succession, could think of himself as capable of surviving this universal order. The capacity to raise and discuss the question of immortality has therefore implications that radically make man differ from all the creatures about him. Just as he could not think of virtue without a capacity for virtue, so he could not think of immortality without at least a capacity for that which he thinks. A second preliminary consideration is that immortality is inseparably bound up with theism. Theism makes immortality rational. Atheism makes it incredible, if not unthinkable. The highest form of the belief in immortality inevitably roots itself in and is part of the soul’s belief in God. A third consideration is that a scientific proof of immortality is at pres¬ ent impossible in the ordinary sense of the phrase, “ scientific proof.” A fourth consideration is that immortality is inseparable from person¬ ality. The whole significance of man’s existence lies ultimately in its dis¬ creetness—in the evolution and persistence of self-conscious ego. THE SOUL AND ITS FUTURE LIFE. KEV. SAMUEL N. WAEEEN (eEAD BY DE. MEECEE OF CHICAGO). It is a doctrine of the New Church that the soul is substantial—though not of earthly substance—and is the very man; that the body is merely the earthly form and instrument of the soul, and that every part of the body is produced from the soul, according to its likeness, in order that the soul may be fitted to perform its functions in the world during the brief but important time that this is the jjlace of man’s conscious abode. If, as all Christians believe, man is an immortal being, created to live on through the endless ages of eternity, then the longest life in this world is, comparatively, but as a point, an infinitesimal part of his existence. In this view it is not rational to believe that that part of man which is for his brief use in this world only, and is left behind when he passes out of this world, is the most real and substantial part of him. That is more substan¬ tial which is more enduring, and that is the more real part of a man in which his characteristics and his qualities are. All the facts and phe¬ nomena of life confirm the doctrine that the soul is the real man. What makes the quality of a man? What gives him character as good or bad, small or great, lovable or detestable? Do these qualities pertain to the body? Every one knows they do not. But they are the qualities of the man. Then the real man is not the body, but is “ the living soul.” If there is immortal life he has not vanished, except from mortal and material sighh As between the soul and the body, then, there can be no rational question as to which is the substantial and which the evanescent thing. Again, if the immortal soul is the real mqn, and is substantial, what must be its form? It can not be a formless, vaporous thing and be a man. Can it have other than the human form? Reason clearly sees that if form¬ less, or in any other form, he would not be a man. The soul of man, or the real man, is a marvelous assemblage of powers and faculties of will and understanding, and the human form is such as it is because it is perfectly adapted to the exercise of these various powers and faculties. In other THE SOUL AND ITS FUTURE LIFE. 171 words, the soul forms itself, under the Divine Maker’s hand, into an organ¬ ism by which it can adequately and perfectly put forth its wondrous and wonderfully varied powers, and bring its purposes into acts. The human form is thus an assemblage of organs that exactly corre¬ sponds to and embody and are the express image of the various faculties of the soul. And there is no organ of the human form the absence of which would not hinder and impede the free and efficient action and putting forth of the soul’s powers. And by the human form is not meant merely, nor primarily, the organic forms of the material body. The faculties are of the soul, and if the soul is the man, and endures when the body decays and vanishes, it must itself be in a form which is an assemblage of organs per¬ fectly adapted and adequate to the exercise of its powers, that is, in the human form. The human form is, then, primarily and especially, the form of the soul — which, is the perfection of all forms, as man, at his highest, is the consummation and fullness of all loving and intelligent attributes. But when does the soul itself take on its human form? Is it not until the death of the body? Manifestly, if it is the very form of the soul, the soul can not exist without it, and it is put on in and by the fact of its creation and the gradual development of its powers. It could have no other form and be a human soul. Its organs are the necessary organs of its faculties and powers, and these are clothed with their similitudes in dead material forms animated by the soul for temporary use in the material world. The soul is omnipresent in the material body, not by diffusion, formlessly, but each organ of the soul is within and is the soul of the corresponding organ of the body. That the immortal soul is the very man involves the eternal preservation of his identity. For in the soul are the distinguishing qualities that con¬ stitute the individuality of a -man—all those certain characteristics, affec- tional and intellectual, which make him such or such a man, and distinguish and differentiate him from all other men. He remains, therefore, the same man to all eternity. He may become more and more, to endless ages, an angel of light—even as here a man may advance greatly in wisdom and intelligence, and yet is always the same man. This doctrine of the soul involves also the permanency of established character. The life in this world is the period of character building. It has been very truthfully said that a man is a bundle of habits. What manner of man he is depends on what his manner of life has been. If evil and vicious habits are continued through life they are fixed and confirmed and become of the very life, so that the man loves and desires nc other life, and does not wish to—^will not be led out of them—because he loves the practice of them. On the other hand, if from childhood a man has been inured to virtuous habits, these habits become fixed and established and of his very soul and life. In either case the habits thus fixed and con¬ firmed are of the immortal soul and constitute its permanent character. The body, as to its part, has been but the pliant instrument of the soul. With respect to the soul’s future life the first important consideration is what sort of a world it will inhabit. If we have shown good reasons for believing the doctrine that a soul is not a something formless, vague, and shadowy, but is itself an organic human form, substantial, and the very man, then it must inhabit a substantial and very real world. It is a gross fallacy of the senses, but there is no substance but matter, and nothing substantial but what is material. Is not God, the Divine, Omnipotent Creator of all things, substantial? Can omnipotence be an attribute of that which has no substance and no form? Is such an existence conceiv¬ able? But He is not material and not visible or cognizable by any mortal sense. Yet we know that he is substantial; for it is manifest in His wond¬ rous and mighty works. There is, then, spiritual substance. And of such substance must be the world wherein the soul is eternally to dwell- It is 172 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. the reality of the spiritual world that makes this world real—just as it is the reality of the soul that makes the human body a reality and a possi¬ bility. As there could be no body without the soul, there could be no natural world without the spiritual. Not only is that world substantial, but it must be a world of surpassing loveliness and beauty. It has justly been considered one of the most benefi- ceht manifestations of the divine love and wisdom that this beautiful world that we briefly inhabit is so wondrously adapted to all men’s wants and to call into exercise and gratify his every faculty and good desire. And when he leaves this temporary abode, a man with all his faculties exalted and relined by freedom from the incumbrance of the fiei ih—an incumbrance which we are often very conscious of—will he not enh r a world of beauty exceeding the loveliest aspects of this? The soul is human, and the world in which it is to dwell is adapted to human life; and it would not be adapted to human life if we did not adequately meet and answer to the soul’s desires. It is reasonable this material world should be so full of life and loveliness and beauty, when “ Nature spreads for every sense a feast,” to gratify every exalted faculty of the soul. And not the spiritual world wherein the soul is to abide forever. And the life of that world is human life. The same laws of life and hap¬ piness obtain there that govern here, because they are grounded in human nature. Man is a social being, and everywhere, in that world as in this, desires and seeks the companionship of those that are congenial to him — that is, who are of similar quality to himself. Men are thus mutually drawn together by spiritual affinity. This is the law of association here, but it is less perfectly operative in this world, because there is much dissimula¬ tion among men, so that they often do not appear to be what they really are, and thus by false and deceptive appearances the good and the evil are often associated together. And^so it is for a time and in a measure in the first state and region into which men come when they enter the spiritual world. They go into that world as they are, and are at first in a mixed state, as in this woi Id. This continues until the real character is clearly manifest, and good and evil are separated, and they are thus prepared for their final and per¬ manent association and abode. They who, in the world, have made some real effort, and beginning, to live a good life, but have evil habits not yet overcome, remain there until they are entirely purified of evil, and are fitted for some society of heaven; and those who inwardly are evil and have outwardly assumed a virtuous garb, remain until their dissembled goodness is cast off and their inward character becomes outwardly mani¬ fest. When this state of separation is complete there can be no successful dissimulation—the good and the evil are seen and known as such, and the law of spiritual affinity becomes perfectly operative by their own free volition and choice. Then the evil and the good become entirely separated into their congenial societies. The various societies and communities of the good thus associated constitute heaven and those of the evil constitute hell—not by any arbitrary judgment of an angry God, but of voluntary choice, by the perfect and unhindered operation of the law of human nature that leads men to prefer and seek the companionship of those most congenial to themselves. As regards the permanency of the state of those who by established evil are fixed and determined in their love of evil life, it is not of the Lord’s will, but of their own. We are taught in His Holy Word that He is ever “gracious and full of compassion.” He would that they should turn from their evil ways and live, but they will not. There is no moment, in this or in the future life, when the infinite mercj of the Lord would not that an evil man should turn from his evil course and live a virtuous and upright and happy life; but they will not in that RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES. 173 world for the same reason that they would not in this, because when evil habits are once fixed and confirmed, they love them and will not turn from them. “Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Then may they also do good that are accustomed to do evil.” Heaven is a heaven of man, and the life of heaven is human life. The conditions of life in that exalted state are greatly different from the conditions here, but it is human life adapted to such transcendent conditions, and the laws of life in that world, as we have seen, are the same as in this. Man was created to be a free and willing agent of the Lord to bless his kind. His true happi¬ ness comes, not in seeking happiness for himself, but in seeking to promote the happiness of others. Where all are animated by this desire, all are mutually and reciprocally blest. Such a state is heaven, whether measurably in this world or fully and perfectly in the next. Then must there be useful ways in heaven by which they can contribute to each other’s happiness. And of such kind will bo the employments of heaven, tor there must be useful employments. There could be no happiness to beings who are designed and formed for useful¬ ness to others. What the employments are in that exalted position we can not well know, except as some of them are revealed to us, and of them we have faint and feeble conception. But undoubtedly one of them is attend¬ ance upon men in this world. Such in general, according to the revealed doctrines of the New Church is the future life of the immortal souls of men. RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES, JINANJI JAMSHODJI MODI. The greatest good that a Parliament of Religions, like the present, can do is to establish what Professor Max Muller calls •‘that great golden dawn of truth ‘that there is a religion behind all religions.’” The learned professor very rightly says that “Happy is the man who knows that truth, in these days of materialism and atheism.” If this Parliament of Religions does nothing else but spread the knowledge of this golden f ruth and thus make a large number of men happy, it will immortal¬ ize its name. The object of my paper is to take a little part in the noble efforts of this great gathering, to spread the knowl¬ edge of that golden truth from a Parsee point of view. The Parsees of India are the followers of Zoroastrianism, of the religion of Zoroaster, a religion which was for centuries both the state religion and the national religion of ancient Persia. As Professor Max Muller says: There were periods in the history of the world when the worship of Ormuzd threatened to rise triumphant on the ruins of the temples of all other gods. If the battles of Marathon and Salamis had been lost and Greece had succumbed to Persia, the state religion of the empire of Cyrus, 174 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. which was the worship of Ormuzd, might have become the religion of the whole civilized world. Persia had absorbed the Assyrian and Babylonian Empires; Jews were either in Persian captivity or under Persian sway at home; the sacred monuments of Egypt had been mutilated by the hands of Persian soldiers. The edicts of the king—the king of kings—were sent to India, to Greece, to Scythia, and to Egypt, and if “by the grace of Ahura- Mazda” Darius had crushed the liberty of Greece, the purer faith of Zoro¬ aster might easily have superseded the Olympian fables. With the overthrow of the Persian monarchy under its last Sassanian king, Yazdagard, at the battle of Nehavand in A. D. 642, the religion received a check at the hands of the Arabs, who, with sword in one hand and Koran in the other, made the religion of Islam both the state religion and national religion of the country. But many of those who adhered to the faith of their fathers quitted their' ancient fatherland for the hospitable shores of India. The modern Parsees of India are the descendants of those early settlers. As a former governor of Bombay said: “ Their position is unique—a handful of persons among the teeming millions of India, and yet who not only have preserved their ancient race with the utmost purity, but also their religion absolutely unimpaired by contact with others.” In the words of Rt. Rev. Dr. Meurin, the learned Bishop (Vicar Apos¬ tolic) of Bombay, in 1885, the Parsees are “ a people who have chosen to relinquish their venerable ancestors’ homesteads rather than abandon their ancient religion, the founder of which lived no less than 3,000 years ago— a people who, for a thousand years, have formed in the midst of the great Hindu people, not unlike an island in the sea, a quiet, separate, and dis¬ tinct nation, peculiar and remarkable, as for its race, so for its religious and social life and customs.” Professor Max Muller says of the religion of the Parsees: Though every religion is of real and vital interest in its earliest state only, yet its later development, too, with all its misunderstandings, faults, and corruptions, offers many an instructive lesson to the thoughtful student of history. Here is a religion, one of the most ancient of the world, once the state religion of the most powerful empire, driven away from its native soil and deprived of political influ¬ ence, without even the prestige of a powerful or enlightened priesthood, and yet professed by a handful of exiles—men of wealth, intelligence, and moral worth in western India-with unhesitating fervor such as is seldom to be found in larger religious communities. It'is well worth the earnest endeavour of the philosopher and the divine to discover, if possible, the spell by which this apparently effete r'digion continues to.oommand the attachment of the enlightened Parsees of India, and makes them turn a deaf ear to the allurements of the Brahmanic worship and the earnest appeals of Christian missionaries. Zoroastrianism or Parseeism—by whatever name the system may be called—is a monotheistic form of religion. It believes in the existence of one God, whom it knows under the names of Mazda, Ahura, and Ahura- Mazda, the last form being one that is most commonly met with in the latter writings of the Avesta. The first and the greatest truth that dawns upon the'mind of a Zoroastrian is that the great and the infinite universe, of which he is an infinitesimally small part, is the work of a powerful hand —the result of a master mind. The first and the greatest conception of that master mind, Ahura-Mazda, is that, as the name implies, he is the Omniscient Lord, and as such he is the ruler of both the material and immaterial world, the corporeal and the incorporeal world, the visible and the invisible world. The regular movements of the sun and the stars, the peri¬ odical waxing and waning of the moon, the regular way in which the sun and the clouds are sustained, the regular fiow of waters and the gradual growth of vegetation, the rapid movements of the winds and the regular succession of light and darkness, of day and night, with their accompani¬ ments of sleep and wakefulness, all these grand and striking phenomena of nature point to and bear ample evidence of the existence of an almighty power who is not only the creator, but the preserver of this great universe, who has not only launched that universe into existence with a premeditated RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES. 175 plan of completeness, but who, with the controlling hand of a father, pre¬ serves by certain fixed laws harmony and order here, there, and everywhere. As Ahura-Mazda is the ruler of the physical world, so He is the ruler of the spiritual world. His distinguished attributes are good mind, right¬ eousness, desirable control, piety, perfection, and immortality. He is the Beneficent Spirit from whom emanate all good and all piety. He looks into the hearts of men and sees how much of the good and of the piety that have emanated from Him has made its home there, and thus rewards the virtuous and punishes the vicious. Of course, one sees at times, in the plane of this world, moral disorders and want of harmony, but then the present state is only a part, and that a very small part, of His scheme of moral government. As the ruler of the world, Ahura-Mazda hears the prayers of the ruled. He grants the prayers of those who are pious in thoughts, pious in words, and pious in deeds. “ He not only rewards the good, but punishes the wicked. All that is created, good or evil, fortune or misfortune, is His work.” We have seen that Ahura-Mazda, or God, is, according to Parsee script¬ ures, the causer of all causes. He is the creator as well as the destroyer, the increaser as well as the decreaser. He gives birth to different creatures, and it is He who brings about their end. How is it, then, that He brings about these two contrary results? In the words of Dr. Haug: Having arrived at the grand idea of the unity and indivisibility of the Supreme Being, he (Zoroaster) undertook to solve the great problem which has engaged the attention of so many wise men of antiq.uity and even of modern times, viz.. How are the imperfections discoverable in the world, the various kinds of evils, wickedness and baseness, compatible with the goodness, holiness, and justice of God? This great thinker of remote antiquity solved this difficult question philo¬ sophically by the supposition of two primeval causes, which, though different, were united and produced the world of material things, as well as that of the spirit. These two primeval causes or principles are called in the Avesta the two “ Mainyus.” This word comes from the ancient Aryan root “ man,” to “ think.” It may be properly rendered into English by the word “ spirit,” meaning “ that which can only be conceived by the mind but not felt by the senses. ” Of these two spirits or primeval causes or principles one is creative and the other destructive. These two spirits work under the Almighty day and night. They create and destroy, and this they have done ever since the world was created. According to Zoroaster’s philosophy our world is the work of these two hostile principles, Spenta-mainyush, the good principle, and Angro-mainyush, the evil principle, both serving under one God. In the words of that learned Orientalist, Professor Darmestetter, “ all that is good in the world comes from thefformer; all that is bad in it comes from the latter. The history of the world is the history of their conflict; how Angro-mainyu invaded the world of Ahura-Mazda and marred it, and how he shall be expelled from it at last. Man is active in the conflict, his duty in it being laid before him in the law revealed by Ahura-Mazda to Zarathushtra. When the appointed time is come * * * Angro-mainyu and hell will be destroyed, men will rise from the dead and everlasting happiness will reign over the world.” These philosophical notions have led some learned men to misunderstand Zoroastrian theology. Some authors entertain an opinion that Zoroaster preached Dualism. But this is a serious misconception. In the Parsee scriptures the names of God are Mazda, Ahura, and Ahura-Mazda, the last two words being a compound of the first two. The first two words are common in the earliest writings of the GathS, and the third in the later scriptures. In the later times the word Ahura-Mazda, instead of being restricted like Mazda, the name of God, began to be used in a wider sense and was applied to Spentamainyush, the Creative or the Good principle. This being the case, wherever the word Ahura-Mazda was used in opposition to that of Angro-mainyush, later authors took it as the name of God, 17G THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. and noi a« the name of the Creative principle, which it really was. Thus the very fact of Ahura-Mazda’s name being employed in opposition to that of Angro-mainyush or Ahriman led to the not in that Zoroastrian scriptures preached dualism. Not only is the charge of dualism as leveled against Zoroastrianism, and as ordinarily understood, groundless, but there is a close resemblance )etween the ideas of the devil among the Christians and those of the Ahriman among the Zoroastrians. Dr. Haug says the same thing in the following words: The Zoroastricin idea of the devil and the infernal kingdom coincides entirely with tlie Christian doctrine. The devil is a murderer and father of lies according . to both the Bible and the Zend Avesta. Thus we see that, according to Zoroaster’s philosophy, there are two primeval principles that j^roduce our material world. Consequently, though the Almighty is creator of all, a part of the creation is said to be created by the good principle and a part by the evil principle. Thus, for example, the heavenly bodies, the earth, water, lire, horses, dogs and such other objects are the creation of the Good Principle, and serpents, ants, locusts, etc., are the creation of the Evil Principle. In short, those things that conduce to the greatest good of the greatest number of mankind fall under the category of the creations of the Good Principle, and those that lead to the contrary result, under that of the creations of the Evil Princi¬ ple. This being the case, it is incumbent upon men to do actions that would support the cause of the Good Principle and destroy that of the Evil one. Therefore, the cultivation of the soil, the rearing of domestic animals, etc., on the one hand and the destruction of wild animals and other noxious creatures on the other are considered meritorious actions by the Parsees. As there are two primeval principles under Ahura-Mazda that produce our material world, so there are two principles inherent in the nature of man which encourage him to do good or tempt him to do evil. One asks him to support the cause of the Good Principle, the other to sujjport that of the Evil Principle. The first is known by the name of Vonumana or Behemana, i. e., “ good mind.” The prefix “ vohu ” or “ beh ” is the same word as that of which our English “ better ” is the comparative. Mana is the same as the word “ maniyu ” and means mind or spirit. The second is known by the name of Akamana, i. e., bad mind. The prefix “ aka ” means bad and is the same as our English word “ache” in “ headache.” Now the fifth chapter of the Vendidad gives, as it were, a short defini¬ tion of what is morality or piety. There, first of all, the writer says: “Purity is the best thing for man after birth.” This you may say is the motto of the Zoroastrian religion. Therefore M. Harlez very properly says that, according to Zoroastrian scriptures, the “notion of the word virtue sums itself up in that of the ‘Asha.’” This word is the same as the San¬ skrit “rita,” which word corresponds to our English “right.” It means therefore righteousness, piety, or purity. Then the writer proceeds to give a short definition of piety. It says that “the preservation of good thoughts, good w’ords, and good deeds is piety.” In these pithy words is summed up, so to say, the w^hole of the moral philosophy of the Zoroastrian scriptures. It says that if you want to lead a pious and moral life and thus to show a clea»’ bill of spiritual health to the angel, Meher Daver, who watches the gates of heaven at the Chinvat bridge, practice these three: Think of nothing but the truth, speak nothing but the truth, and do nothing but what is proper. In short, w^hat Zoroastrian moral philosophy teaches is this, that your good thoughts, good deeds, and good words alone will be your intercessors. Nothing more will be wanted. They alone will serve you as a safe pilot to the harbor of heaven, as a safe guide to the gates of paradise. The late Dr. Haug rightly observed that “the moral philosophy of Zoroaster was moving in the triad of ‘thought, w'ord, and deed.’ ” These RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES. 177 three words form, as it were, the pivot upon which the moral structure of Zoroastrianism turns. It is the ground-work upon which the whole edifice of Zoroastrian morality rests. The following dialogue in the Pehelvi Padnameh of Buzurge-Meher shows in a succinct form what weight is attached to these three pithy words in the moral code of the Zoroastrians: Question—Who is the most fortunate man in the world? Answer—He who is the most innocent. Question—Who is the most innocent man in the world ? Answer—He who walks in the path of God and shuns that of the devil. Question—Which is the path of God, and which that of the devil? Answer—Virtue is the path of God, and vice that of the devil. Question—What constitutes virtue, and what vice ? Answer—(Humata, hukhta, and hvarshta} Good thoughts, good words, and good deeds constitute virtue, and (dushmata, duzukhta, and duzvarshta) evil thoughts, evil words, and evil deeds constitute vice. Question—What constitute (humata, hukhta, and hvarshta) good thoughts, good words, and good deeds, and (dushmata, duzukhta, and duzvarshta) evil thoughts, evil words, and evil deeds? Answer—Honesty, charity, and truthfulness constitute the former, and dishon¬ esty, want of charity, and falsehood constitute the latter. From this dialogue it will be seen that a man who acquires (humata, hukhta, and hvarshta) good thoughts, good words, and good deeds, and thereby practices honesty, charity, and truthfulness, is considered to walk in the path of God, and therefore to be the most innocent and fortunate man. Herodotus also refers to the third cardinal virtue of truthfulness men¬ tioned above. He says that to speak the truth was one of the three things taught to a Zoroastrian of his time from his very childhood. Zoroastrianism believes in the immortality of the soul. The Avesta writings of Hadokht Nushk, and the nineteenth chapter of the Vendidad, and of the Pehelvi books of Minokherad and Viraf-nameh treat of the fate of 6he soul after death. Its notions about heaven and hell correspond, to some extent, to the Christian notions about them A plant called the Homa-i-saphid, or white Homa, a name corresponding to the Indian Soma of the Hindus, is held to be the emblem of the immortality of the soul. According to Dr. Windischmann and Professor Max Muller, this plant reminds us of the “Tree of Life” in Ihe Garden of Eden. As in the Christian scriptures, the way to the tree of life is strictly guarded by the Cherubim, so in the Zoroastrian scriptures the Homa-i-Saphid, or the plant which is the emblem of immortality, is guarded by innumerable Fravashis— that is, guardian spirits. The number of these guardian spirits, as given in various books, is 99,999. Again, Zoroastrianism believes in heaven and hell. Heaven is called Vahishta-ahu in the Avesta books. It literally means the “best life.” This word is afterward contracted, with a slight change, into the Persian word, “Behesht,” which is the superlative form of “Veh,” meaning good, and corresponds exactly with our English word, best. Hell is Known by the name of “Achista-ahu.” Heaven is represented as a place of radiance, splendor, and glory, and hell as that of gloom, darkness, and stench, Between heaven and this world there is supposed to be a bridge named “ Chinvat.” This word, from the Aryan root, “ chi,” meaning to pick up, to collect—means the place where a man’s soul has to present a collective account of the actions done in the past life. According to the Parsee scriptures, for three days after a man’s death his soul remains within the limits of the world under the guidance of the angel Srosh. If the deceased be a pious man or a man who led a virtuous life his soul utters the words “ Ushta-ahmai yahmai ushta-kahmai-chit,” i. e., “ Well is he by whom that which is his benetit becomes the benefit of any one else.” If he be a wicked man or one who led an evil life, his soul utters these plaintive words: “ Kam nemoi zam? Kuthra nemo ayeni? i.e., “ To which land shall I turn? Whither shall I go? ” 178 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. On the dawn of the third night the departed souls appear at the “ Chin- vat Bridge.” This bridge is guarded by the angel Meher Daver, i. e., Meher the judge. He presides there as a judge, assisted by the angelsRashne and Astad,'the former representing justice and the latter truth. At this bridge and before this angel Meher, the soul of every man has to give an account of its doings in the past life. Meher Daver, the judge, weighs a man’s actions by a scale-pan. If a man’s good actions outweigh his evil ones, even by a small particle, he is allowed to pass from the bridge to the other end, to heaven. If his evil actions outweigh his good ones, even by a small weight, he is not allowed to pass over the bridge, but is hurled down into the deep abyss of hell. If his meritorious and evil deeds counterbalance each other he is sent to a place known as “ hamast-gehan,” corresponding to the Christian “ purgatory ” and the Mahommedan “ aeraf.” His merit¬ orious deeds done in the past life would prevent him from going to hell, and his evil actions would not let him go to heaven. Again Zoroastrian books say that the meritoriousness of good deeds and the sin of evil ones increase with the growth of time. As capital increases with interest, so good and bad actions done by a man in his life increase, as it were, with interest in their effects. Thus a meritorious deed done in young age is more effective than that very deed done in advanced age. A man must begin practicing virtue from his very young age. As in the case of good deeds and their meritoriousness, so in the case of evil actions and their sins. The burden of the sin of an evil action increases, as it were, with interest. A young man has a long time to repent of his evil deeds, and to do good deeds that could counteract the effect of his evil deeds. If he does not take advantage of these opportunities the burden of those evil deeds increases with time. The Parsee places of worship are known as fire temples. The very name, fire temple, would strike a non-Zoroastrian as an unusual form of worship. The Parsees do not worship fire as God. They merely regard fire as an emblem of refulgence, glory, and light, as the most‘perfect symbol of God, and as the best and noblest representative of His divinity. “ In the eyes of a Parsee his (fire’s) brightness, activity, purity, and incorruptibility bear the most perfect resemblance to the nature and perfection of the Deity.” A Parsee looks upon fire “ as the most perfect symbol of the Deity on account of its purity, brightness, activity, subtilty, purity and incorruptibility.” Again, one must remember that it is the several symbolic ceremonies that add to the reverence entertained by a Parsee for the fire burning in his fire temples. A new element of purity is added to the fire burning in the fire temples of the Parsees by the religious ceremonies, accompanied with prayers that are performed over it, before it is installed in its place on a vase on an exalted stand in the chamber set apart. The sacred fire burn¬ ing there is not the ordinary fire burning on our hearths. It has undergone several ceremonies, and it is these ceremonies, full of meaning, that renders the fire more sacred in the eyes of a Parsee. We will briefly recount the process here. In establishing a fire temple fires from various places of manufacture are brought and kept in different vases. Great efforts are also made to obtain fire caused by lightning. Over one of these fires a perforated metallic flat tray with a handle attached is held. On this tray are f)laced small chips and dust of fragrant sandalwood. These chips and dust are ignited by the heat of the fire below, care being taken that the perforated tray does not touch the fire. Thus a new fire is created out of the first fire. Then from this new fire another is again produced, and so on, until the proc¬ ess is repeated nine times. The fire thus prepared after the ninth process is considered pure. The fires brought from other places of manufacture are treated in a similar manner. These purified fires are all collected together upon a large vase, which is then put in its proper place in a sepa¬ rate chamber. RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES. 179 Now what does a fire so prepared signify to a Parsee? He thinks to himself: “When this tire in this vase before me, though pure in itself, though the noblest of the creations of God, and though the best symbol of the Divinity, had to undergo certain processes of purification, had to draw out, as it were, its essence—nay; its quintessence—of purity to enable itself t) be worthy of occupying this exalted position, how much more necessary, more essential, and more important it Is for me—a poor mortal who is liable to commit sins and crimes, and who comes into contact with hundreds of evils, both physical and mental—to undergo the process of purity and piety by making my thoughts, words, and actions pass, as it were, through a sieve of piety and purity, virtue and morality, and to separate by that means ir.y good thoughts, good words, and good actions from bad thoughts, bad words, and bad actions, so that I may, in my turn, be enabled to acquire an exalted position in the next world. Again, the fires put together as above are collected from the houses of men of different grades in society. This reminds a Parsee that, as all these fires from the houses of men of different grades have all, by the process of purification, equally acquired the exalted place in the vase, so before God all men—no matter to what’grades of society they belong—are equal, pro¬ vided they pass through the process of purification, i. e., provided they pre¬ serve purity of thoughts, purity of words and purity of deeds. Again, when a Parsee goes before the sacred fire, which is kept all day and night burning in the fire temple, the officiating priest presents before him the ashes of a part of the consumed fire. The Parsee applies it to his forePead, just as a Christian applies the consecrated water in his church, and thinks to himself: “Dust to dust. The fire, all brilliant, shining, and resplendent, has spread the fragrance of the sweet-smelling sandal and frankincense round about, but is at last reduced to dust. So it is destined for me. After all I am to be reduced to dust and have to depart from this transient life. Let me do my best to spread, like this fire, before my death, the fragrance of charity and good deeds and lead the light of righteousness and knowledge before others.” In short, the sacred fire burning in a fire temple serves as a perpetual monitor to a Parsee standing before it to preserve piety, purity, humility, and brotherhood. As we said above, evidence from nature is the surest evidence that leads a Parsee to the belief in the existence of the Deity. From nature he is led to nature’s God. From this point of view, then, he is not restricted to any particular place for the recital of his prayers. For a visitor to Bombay, which is the headquarters of the Parsees, it is therefore not unusual to see a number of Parsees saying their prayers, morning and evening, in the open space, turning their faces to the rising or the setting sun, before the glow¬ ing moon or the foaming sea. Turning to these grand objects—the best and sublimest of His creations—they address their prayers to the Almighty. All Parsee prayers begin with an assurance to do acts that would please the Almighty God. The assurance is followed by an expression of regret for past evil thoughts, words, or deeds, if any. Man is liable to err, and so, if during the interval any errors of commission or omission are committed, a Parsee in the beginning of his prayers repents for those errors. He says: O, Omniscient Lord! I repent of all my sins. I repent of all evil thoughts that I might have entertained in my mind, of all evil words I might have spoken, of all the evil actions that I might have committed. O. Omniscient Lord! I repent of all the faults that might have originated with me, whether they refer to thoughts, words, or deeds; whether they appertain to my body or soul; whether they be in connection with the material world or spiritual. To educate their children is a spiritual duty of Zoroastrian parents. Education is necessary, not only for the material good of the children and parents, but also for their spiritual good. According to the Parsee books, the parents participate in the meritoriousness of the good acts performed 180 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. by their children as the result of the good education imparted to them. On the other hand, if the parents neglect the education of their children, and if, as the result of this neglect, they do wrongful acts or evil deeds, the parents have a spiritual responsibility for such acts. In proportion to the malignity or evilness of these acts the parents are responsible to God for their neglect of the education of their children. It is, as it were, a spirit¬ ual self-interest that must prompt a Parsee to look to the good education of his children at an early age. Thus, from a religious point of view, educa tiorj is a great question with the Parsees. The proper age recommended by religious Parsee books for ordinary education is seven. Before that age children should have home education with their parents, especially with the mother. At the age of seven, after a little religious education, a Parsee child is invested with Sudreh and Kusti, i. e., the sacred shirt and thread. This ceremony of investiture cor¬ responds to the confirmation ceremony of the Christians. A Parsee may put on the dress of any nationality he likes, but under that dress he must always wear the sacred shirt and thread. These are the symbols of his being a Zoroastrian. These symbols are full of meaning and act as per¬ petual monitors, advising the wearer to lead a life of purity — of physical and spiritual purity. A Parsee is enjoined to remove, and put on again immediately, the sacred thread several times during the day, saying a very short prayer during the process. He has to do so early in the morning, on rising from bed, before meals and after ablutions. The putting on of the symbolic thread, and the accompanying short prayer, remind him to be in a state of repentance for misdeeds, if any, and to preserve good thoughts, good words, and good deeds, the triad in which the moral philosophy of Zoroaster moved. It is after this investiture with the sacred shirt and thread that the general education of a child generally begins. The Parsee books speak of the necessity of educating all children, whether male or female. Thus female education claims as much attention among the Parsees as male education. Physical education is as much spoken of in the Zoroastrian books as mental and moral education. The health of the body is con¬ sidered as the first requisite for the health of the soul. That the physical education of the ancient Persians, the ancestors of the modern Parsees, was a subject of admiration among the ancient Greeks and Romans is too well known. In all the blessings invoked upon one in the religious prayers, the strength of body occupies the first and most prominent place. Analyz¬ ing the Bombay Census of 1881, Dr. Weir, the Health Officer, said: Examining education according to faith or class, we find that education is most extended among the Parsee people; female education is more diffused among the Parsee population than any other class. * * Contrasting these results with education at an early age among Parsees, we find 12.2 per cent Parsee male and 8.84 per cent female children, under 6 years of age, under instruction; between 6 and 15 the number of Parsee male and female children under instruction is much larger than in any other class. Over 15 years of age, the smallest proportion of illiterate, either male or female, is found in the Par¬ see population. The religious books of the Parsees say that the education of Zoroastrian youths should teach them perfect discipline, obedience to their teachers, obedience to their parents, obedience to their elders in society, and obedi¬ ence to the constitutional forms of government should be one of the practical results of their education. So a Zoroastrian child is asked to be affectionate toward and submissive to his teachers. A Parsee mother prays for a son that could take an intelligent part in the deliberations of the councils of his community an-d government; so a regard for the regular forms of government was necessary. Of all the practical questions the one most affected by the religious precepts of Zoroastrianism is that of the observation of sanitary rules and principles. Several chapters of the Vendidad form, as it were, the sanitary RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES. 181 code of the Parsees. Most of the injunctions will stand the test of sanitary science for ages together. Of the different Asiatic communities inhabiting Bombay, the Parsees have the lowest death-rate. One can safely say that that is, to a great extent, due to the Zoroastrian ideas of sanitation, segregation, purification, and cleanliness. A Parsee is enjoined not to drink from the same cup or glass from which another man has drunk, lest he catch by contagion the disease from which the other may be suffer¬ ing. He is, under no circumstances, to touch the body of a person a short time after death, lest he spread the disease, if contagious, of the deceased. If he accidentally or unavoidably does, he has to purify himself by a cer¬ tain process of washing before he mixes with others in society. A passing fly, or even a blowing wind, is supposed to spread disease by contagion. So he is enjoined to perform ablutions several times during the day, as before saying his prayers, before meals, and after answering the calls of nature. If his hand comes into contact with the saliva of his own nlouth, or with that of somebody else, he has to wash it. He has to keep himself aloof from corpse-bearers, lest he spread any disease through them. If acci¬ dentally he comes into contact with these people, he has to bathe himself before mixing in society. A breach of these and various other sanitary rules is, as it were, helping the cause of the Evil Principle. Again, Zoroastrianism asks its disciples to keep the earth pure, to keep the air pure and to keep the water pure. It considers the sun as the great¬ est purifier. In places where the rays of the sun do not enter, fire over which fragrant wood is burnt is the next purifier. It is a great sin to pol¬ lute water by decomposing matter. Not only is the commission of a fault of this kind of sin, but also the omission, when one sees such a pollution, of taking proper means to remove it. A Zoroastrian, when he happens to see, while passing in his way, a running steam of drinking water polluted by some decomposing matter, such as a corpse, is enjoined to wait and try his best to go into the stream and to remove the putrifying matter, lest its continuation may spoil the water and affect the health of the people using it. An omission to do this act is a sin from a Zoroastrian point of view. At the bottom of a Parsee’s custom of disposing of the dead, and at the bottom of all the strict religious ceremonies enjoined therewith, lies the one main principle, viz., that, preserving all possible respect for the dead, the body, after its separation from the immortal soul, should be disposed of in a way the least harmful and the least injurious to the living. The homely proverb “ cleanliness is godliness ” is nowhere more recommended than in the Par¬ see religious books, which teach that the cleanliness of body will lead to and help the cleanliness of mind. We now come to the question of wealth, poverty, and labor. As Hero¬ dotus said, a Parsee, before praying for himself, prays for his sovereign and for his community, for he is himself included in the community. His religious precepts teach him to drown his individuality in the common interests of his community. He is to consider himself as a part and parcel of the whole community. The good of the whole will be the good—and that a solid good—of the parts. In the twelfth chapter of the Yasna, which contains, as it were, Zoroastrian articles of faith, a Zoroastrian promises to preserve a perfect brotherhood. He promises, even at the risk of his life, to protect the life and the property of all members of his community, and to help in the cause that would bring about their prosperity and wel¬ fare. It is with these good feelings of brotherhood and charity that the Parsee community has endowed large funds for benevolent and charitable purposes. If the rich Parsees of the future generations were to follow in the footsteps of their ancestors of the past and present generations in the matter of giving liberal donations for the good of the deserving poor of their community, one can say that there would be very little cause for the socialists to complain from a poor man’s point of view. It is these notions 182 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. of charity and brotherhood that have urged them to start public funds for the general good of the whole community. Men of all grades in society contribute to these funds on various occasions. The rich contribute on occasions both of joy and grief. On grand occasions like those of weddings in their families they contribute large sums in charity to commemorate those events. Again, on the death of their dear ones, the rich and the poor all pay various sums, according to their means, in charity. These sums are announced on the occasion of the Oothumna, or the ceremony on the third day after death. The rich pay large sums on these occasions to commemo¬ rate the names of their dear ones. In the Vendidad three kinds of chari¬ table deeds are especially mentioned as meritorious: To help the poor; to help a man to marry and thus enable him to lead a virtuous and honorable life, and to give education to those who are in search of it. If one were to look to the long list of Parsee charities, headed by that of that prince of Parsee charity' the first Parsee baronet, he will find these three kinds of charity especially attended to. The religious training of a Parsee does not restrict his ideas of brotherhood and charity to his own community alone. He extends his charity to non-Zoroastrians as well. The qualifications of a good husband, from a Zo roastrian point of view are that he must be (1) young and handsome; (2) strong, brave, and healthy; (3) diligent and industrious, so as to maintain his wife and children; (4) truthful, as would prove true to herself, and true to all others with whom he would come in contact, and is wise and educated. A wise, intelligent, and educated husband is compared to a fertile piece of land which gives a plen¬ tiful crop, whatever kind of seeds are sown in it. The qualifications of a good wife are that she be wise and educated, modest and courteous, obedient and chaste. Obedience to her husband is the first duty of a Zoroastrian wife. It is a great virtue, deserving all praise and reward. Disobedience is a great sin, punishable after death. According to the Sad-dar, a wife that expressed a desire to her husband three times a day—in the morning, afternoon, and evening—to be one with him in thoughts, words, and deeds, i. e., to sympathize with him in all bis noble aspirations, pursuits, and desires, performed as meritorious an act as that of saying her prayers three times a day. She must wish to be of the same view with him in all his noble pursuits, and ask him every day, “ What are your thoughts, so that I may be one with you in those thoughts? What are your words, so that I may be one with you in your speech? What are your deeds, so that I may be one with you in deeds? ” A Zoroastrian wife so affectionate and obedient to her husband was held in great respect, not only by the husband and household, but in society as well. As Dr. West says, though a Zoroastrian wife was asked to be very obedient to her hus¬ band she held a more respectable position in society than that enjoyed by any other Oriental religion. As Sir John Malcolm says, the ordinance of Zoroaster secured for Zoroastrian women an equal rank with the male cre¬ ation. The progress of the ancient Persians in civilization was partly due to this cause. “ The great respect in which the female sex was held was, no doubt, the principal cause of the progress they had made in civilization. These were at once the cause of generous enterprise and its reward.” The advance of the modern Parsee, the descendants of the ancient Persians in the path of civilization, is greatly due to this cause. As Dr. Haug says' the religious books of the Parsee hold women on a level with men. “ They are always mentioned as a necessary part of the religious community. They have the same religious rites as the men; the spirits of deceased women are invoked as well as those of men.” Parsee books attach as much importance to female education as to male education. Marriage is an institution which is greatly encouraged by the spirit of the Parsee religion. It is especially recommended in the Parsee scriptures on the ground that a married life is more likely to be happy than an RELIGIOUS SYSTEM OF THE PARSEES. 183 unmarried one; that a married person is more likely to be able to withstand physical and mental afflictions than an unmarried person, and that a married man is more likely to lead a religious and virtuous life than an unmarried one. The following verse in the Gatha conveys this meaning; I say (these) words to you marrying brides and to you bridegrooms. Impress them in your mind. May you two enjoy the life of good mind by following the laws of religion. Let each one of you clothe the other with righteousness, because, then, assuredly there will be a happy life for you. An unmarried person is represented to feel as unhappy as a fertile piece of ground that is carelessly allowed to lie uncultivated by its owner (Vend, iii., 24). The fertile piece, when cultivated, not only adds to the beauty of the spot, but lends nourishment and food to many others round about. So a married couple not only add to their own beauty, grace, and happiness, but by their righteousness and good conduct are in a position to spread the blessings of help and happiness among their neighbors. Marriage being thus considered a good institution, and, being recommended by the religious scriptures, it is considered a very meritorious act for a Parsee to help his coreligionists to lead a married life (Vend., iv., 44.) Several rich Parsees have, with this charitable view, founded endowment funds from which young, deserving brides are given small sums on the occasion of their marriage, for the preliminary expenses of starting in married life. Fifteen is the minimum marriageable age spoken of by the Parsee books. The parents have a voice of sanction or approval in the selection of wives and husbands. Mutual friends of parents or marrying parties may bring about a good selection. Marriages with non-Zoroastrians are not recom¬ mended, as they are likely to bring about quarrels and dissensions owing to a difference of manners, customs, and habits. We said above that the Parsee religion has made its disciples tolerant about the faiths and beliefs of others. It has as well made them sociable with the other sister communities of the country. They mix freely^ with members of other faiths, and take a part in the rejoicings of their holidays. They also sympathize with them in their griefs and afflictions, and in case of sudden calamities such as fire, floods, etc., they subscribe liberally to alleviate their misery. From a consideration of all kinds of moral and charitable notions inculcated in the Zoroastrian scriptures, Francis Power Cobbe, in his “ Studies, New and Old, of Ethical and Social Subjects,” says of the founder of the religion: Should we in a future world be permitted to hold high converse with the great departed, it may chance that in the Bactrian sage, who lived and taught almost before the dawn of history, we may find the spiritual patriarch, to whose lessons we have owed such a portion of our intellectual inheritance that wp might hardly conceive what human belief would be now had Zoroaster never existed. CHAPTER IV. FOURTH DAY, SEPTEMBER 14th. NECESSITY OF RELIGION. So many people attended the Parliament of Religions on the fourth day that overflow meetings, both morning and after¬ noon, were held in the Hall of Washington. As soon as the speakers finished their addresses in the Hall of Columbus they went into the other hall and read them again to another large and interested audience. On both platforms were gathered representatives of nearly every religion in the world. The [)apers presented covered a range of topics so wide that they can not well be classed under one general theme. Jenkin Lloyd Jones presided in Washington Hall in the morning and Dr. H. N. Thomas in the afternoon. At one of the most interesting periods during the morning session a photographer secured a view in the Hall of Columbus, to preserve for future genera¬ tions, a picture of the great event of such momentous interest to all mankind. Views similar to this were subsequently taken. In addition to the hall set apart for the elucidation of the Catholic faith, some of the Buddhist delegates were accorded a room in which to explain religion to all who might inquire. In place of an evening season at the Art Palace, the dis¬ tinguished delegates to the Parliament of Religions were tend¬ ered a reception by the Board of Lady Managers, in the Assembly Hall of the Woman’s Building, in Jackson Park. The reverend gentlemen were welcomed by Mrs. Potter Palmer, seated by whom was President Palmer, who welcomed the 184 CARDINAL GIBBONS BISHOP KEANB^S introduction. 185 foreign guests in the name of the National Commission. Rev. Dyonisius Latas, the Archbishop of Greece, being introduced by Mrs. Palmer, said: I have ascended the pulpits of my church perhaps more than one thousand times, but in ascending this platform at the World’s Columbian Exposition I feel myself especially honored. I feel very glad because every¬ where I go I meet the spirit of the greatness of my ancestors of the old Greece. I have been in the City of Washington and having before me the buildings of the city, I thought I was in old Athens. Here in Chicago, when I come within the precincts of the Columbian Exposition I think I am in Olympia. When I have before me these buildings and all these exhibi¬ tions of art, I think I am in the Acropolis before the Parthenon. Pung Quang Yu and P. C. Mozoomdar also made interesting addresses. In the Hall of Columbus, the exercises at the morning ses¬ sion were inaugurated by silent prayer. Dr. G. H. Barrows being chairman. The silence was suspended as Professor Richie, of New York, led in the universal prayer. BISHOP KEANE’S INTRODUCTION. On being introduced to read part of the paper prepared by Cardinal Gibbons, Bishop Keane said: Cardinal Gibbons has requested me to express his sincere regret that he is not able to be present this morning. He showed his sympathy in the Parliament of Religions by being here at the opening: he would gladly show his sympathy by being here every day during its continuance. He is here with you in spirit and affection, and his prayer is offered up to Almighty God that the parliament may lead to God’s own results. Now as it is the desire of the parliament, and as I trust it will be recognized all through, his eminence desires to adhere strictly to the programme, to treat only the theme suggested by the parliament to-day—that is to say, the relation between God and man, religion, the link between the Creator and the created. Whoever has watched the career of Cardinal Gibbons must have remarked that he is pre-eminently a practical man. He always takes a practical view of things; even in regard to the supernatural he always asks, “Willit work? ’’ Profoundly blessed as he is in what I may call the divine philosophy of religion, he prefers always to regard it with practical eyes. Knowing that religion is the gift of the Creator to His creatures, he knows that religion was given by the Creator in order to benetit and bless His creatures. So Cardinal Gibbons looks and asks: How does religion bless mankind? That is the way he is going to view the great subject this morning. How does the Christian religion, how does the Catholic Church as the divinely appointed exponent of Christian religion, bless mankind, enlightening man, punfying man, comforting man. improving man’s condition here below and leading him to happiness hereafter? It is in this practical light, there¬ fore, the cardinal will now answer the question, “The Needs of Humanity Supplied by the Catholic Religion.” 186 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. CARDINAL GIBBONS’ MESSAGE. The bishop then read Cardinal Gibbons’ paper as follows: We live and move and have our being in the midst of a civilization which is the legitimate offspring of the Catholic religion. The blessings resulting from our Christian civilization are poured out so regularly and so abundantly on the intellectual, moral, and social world, like the sunlight and the air of heaven and the fruits of the earth, that they have ceased to excite any surprise except to those who visit lands where the religion of Christ is little known. In order to realize adequately our favored situation we should transport ourselves in spirit to anti-Christian times and contrast the condition of the pagan world with our own. Before the advent of Christ the whole world, with the exception of the secluded Roman province of Palestine, was buried in idolatry. Every strik¬ ing object in nature had its tutelary divinities. Men worshiped the sun and moon and stars of heaven. They worshiped their very passions. They w^orshiped everything except God, to whom alone divine homage is due. In the words of the Apostle of the Gentiles: “ They changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the corruptible man, and of birds and beasts and creeping things. They worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.” But at last the great light for which the prophets of Israel had sighed and prayed, and toward which even the pagan sages had stretched forth their hands with eager longing, arose and shone unto them “that sat in darkness and the shadow of death.” The truth concerning our Creator, which had hitherto been hidden in Judea, that there it might be sheltered from the world-wide idolatry, was now proclaimed, and in far greater clear¬ ness and fullness, unto the whole world. Jesus Christ taught all mankind to know the one true God—a God existing from eternity to eternity, a God who created all things by His power, who governs all things by His wis¬ dom, and whose superintending Providence watches over the affairs of nations as well as of men, “ without whom not even a bird falls to the ground.” He proclaimed a God infinitely holy, just, and merciful. This idea of the Deity so consonant to our rational conceptions was in striking contrast with the low and sensual notions which the pagan world had formed of its divinities. The religion of Christ imparts to us not only a sublime conception of God, bu.t also a rational idea of man and his relations to his Creator. Before the coming of Christ man was a riddle and a mystery to himself. He knew not whence he came nor whither he was going. He was groping in the dark. All he knew for certain was that he was passing through a brief phase of existence. The past and the future were enveloi)ed in a mist, which the light of philosophy was unable to penetrate. Our Redeemer has dispelled the cloud and enlightened us regarding our origin ‘and destiny, and the means of attaining it. He has rescued man from the frightful laby¬ rinth of error in which paganism had involved him. The gospel of Christ as propounded by the Catholic Church has brought not only light to the intellect, but comfort also to the heart. It has given us “that peace of God which surpasseth all understanding”—the peace which springs from the conscious possession of truth. It has taught us how to enjoy that triple peace which constitutes true happiness, as far as it is attainable in this life — peace with God by the observance of His com¬ mandments; peace with our neighbor by the exercise of charity and justice toward him and peace with ourselves by repressing our inordinate appetites and keeping our passions subject to the law of reason and our reason illumined and controlled by the law of God. All other religious systems prior to the advent of Christ were national, CARDINAL GIBBONS' MESSAGE. 187 like Judaism, or state religions like Paganism. The Catholic religion alone is world-wide and cosmopolitan, embracing all races and nations, and peoples and tongues. Christ alone, of all religious founders, had the courage to say to his disciples, “Go, teach all nations.” “Preach the gospel to every creature.” “ You shall be witness to Me in Judea and Samaria, and even to the utter¬ most bounds of the earth.” Be not restrained in your mission by national or state lines. Let my gospel be as free and universal as the air of heaven. “ The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof.” All mankind are the children of my Father and my brethren. I have died for all, and embi’ace all in my charity. Let the whole human race be your audience and the world be the theater of your labors. It is this recognition of the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of Christ that has inspired the Catholic Church in her mission of love and benevolence. This is the secret of her all-ijervading charity. This idea has been her impelling motive in her work of the social regeneration of man¬ kind. I behold, she says, in every human creature a child of God and a brother and sister of Christ, and therefore I will protect helpless infancy and decrepit old age. I will feed the orphan and nurse the sick. I will strike the shackles from the feet of the slave and will rescue degraded women from the moral bondage and degradation to which her own frailty and the passions of the stronger sex had consigned her. Montesquieu has well said that the religion of Christ, which was insti¬ tuted to lead men to eternal life, has contributed more than any other institution to promote the temporal and social happiness of mankind. The object cf this Parliament of Religions is to present to thoughtful, earnest, and inquiring minds the respective claims of the various religions, with the view that they would “prove all things and hold that which is good,” by embracing that religion which above all others commends itself to their judgment and conscience. I am not engaged in this search for the truth, for, by the grace of God, I am conscious that I have found it, and instead of hiding this treasure in my own breast I long to share it with others, espe¬ cially as I am none the poorer in making others the richer. But, for my part, were I occupied in this investigation, much as I would be drawn toward the Catholic Ciiurch by her admirable unity of faith which binds together 250,000,000 of souls; much as I would be attracted toward her oy her sublime moral code, by her world-wide catholicity and by that unbroken chain of apostolic succession which connects her indis¬ solubly with apostolic times, I would be drawn still more forcibly toward her by that wonderful system of organized benevolence which she has established for the alleviation and comfort of suffering humanity. Let us briefly review what the Catholic Church has done for the eleva¬ tion and betterment of society. 1. The Catholic Church has purified society in its very fountain, which is the marriage bond. She has invariably proclaimed the unity and sanc¬ tity and indissolubility of the marriage tie by saying with her founder that “What God hath joined together let no man put asunder.” Wives and mothers, never forget that the inviolability of the marriage contract is the palladium of your womanly dignity and of your Christian liberty. And if you are no longer the slaves of man and the toy of his caprice, like the wives of Asiatic countries, but the peers and partners of your husbands; if you are no longer tenants at will like the wives of pagan Greece and Rome, but the mistresses of your household; if you are no longer confronted by usurping rivalslike Mohammedan and Mormon wives, but the queens of the domestic kingdom, you are indebted for this priceless i oon to the ancient church, and particularly to the Roman pontiffs who inflexibly upheld the sacredness of the nuptial bond against the arbitrary power of kings, the lust of nobles, and the lax and pernicious legislation of civil governments- 188 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. 2. The Catholic religion has proclaimed the sanctity of human life as soon as the body is animated by the vital spark. Infanticide was a dark stain on pagan civilization. It was universal in Greece, with the possible exception of Thebes. It was sanctioned and even sometimes enjoined by such eminent Greeks as Plato and Aristotle, Solon and Lycurgus. The destruction of infants was also very common among the Romans. Nor was there any legal check to this inhuman crime, except at rare intervals. The father had the i)Ower of life and death over his child. And as an evidence that human nature does not improve with time and is everywhere the same unless ijermeated with the leaven of Christianity, the wanton sacri¬ fice of infant life is probably as general to-day in China and other heathen countries as it was in ancient Greece and Rome. The Catholic Church has sternly set her face against this exposure and murder of innocent babes. •She has denounced it as a crime more revolting than that of Herod, because committed against one's own flesh and blood. She has condemned with equal energy the atrocious doctrine of Malthus, who suggested unnatural methods for diminishing the population of the human family. Were I not restrained by the fear of offending modesty and of imparting knowledge where “ ignorance is bliss,” I would dwell more at length on the social I)lague of ante-natal infanticide, which is insidiously and systematically spreading among us in defiance of civil penalties and of the divine law which says, “ Thou shaft not kill.” .3. There is no place of human misery for which the church does not provide some remedy or alleviation. She has established infant asylums for the shelter of helpless babes who have been cruelly abandoned by their own parents or bereft of them in the mysterious dispensations of Provi¬ dence before they could know or feel a mother’s love. These little waifs, like the infant Moses drifting in the turbid Nile, are rescued from an untimely death and are tenderly raised by the daughters of the Great King, those consecrated virgins who become nursing mothers to them. And I have known more than one such motherless babe who, like Israel’s law¬ giver, in after years became a leader among his people. 4. As the church provides homes for those yet on the threshold of life so, too, does she secure retreats for those on the threshold of death. She has asylums in which the aged, men and women, find at one and the same time a refuge in their old age from the storms of life and a novitiate to prepare them for eternity. Thus from the cradle to the grave she is a nursing mother. She rocks her children in the cradle of infancy and she soothes them to rest on the couch of death. Louis XIV. erected in Paris the famous Hotel des Invalides for the veteran soldiers of Prance who had fought in the service of their country. And so has the Catholic religion provided for those who have been disabled in the battle of a life a home in which they are tenderly nursed in their declining years by devoted sisters. The Little Sisters of the Poor, whose congregation was founded in 1840, ht?,ve now charge of 250 establishments in different parts of the globe, the aged inmates of those houses numbering 30,000, upward of 70,000 having died under their care up to 1889. To the asylums are welcomed not only the members of the Catholic religion but those also of every form of Christian faith, and even those without any faith at all. The sisters make no distinction of persons or nationality or color or creed, for true Christian¬ ity embraces all. The only question proposed by the sisters to the aptpli- cant for shelter is this: Are you oppressed by age and penury? If so, come to us and we will provide for you. 5. She has orphan asylums where children of both sexes are reared and taught to become useful and worthy members of society. 6. Hospitals were unknown to the pagan world before the coming of Christ. The copious vocabularies of Greece and Rome had no word evep to ex])ress that term. CARDINAL GIBBONS' MESSAGE. 189 rhe Catholic Church has hospitals for the treatment and cure of every .^rm of disease, She sends her daughters of charity and of mercy to the battlefield and to the plague-stricken city. During the Crimean War I remember to have read of a sister who was struck dead by a ball while she was in the act of stooping down and bandaging the wound of a fallen soldier. Much praise was then deservedly bestowed on Florence Nightingale for her devotion to the sick and wounded soldiers. Her name resounded in both hemispheres. But in every sister you have a Florence Nightingale, with this difference—that, like ministering angels, they move without noise along the path of duty; and, like the angel Raphael, who concealed his name from Tobias, the sister hides her name from the world. Several years ago I accompanied to New Orleans eight Sisters of Charity, who were sent from Baltimore to reinforce the ranks of their heroic com¬ panions or to supply the places of their devoted associates who had fallen at the post of duty in the fever-stricken cities of the South. Their depart¬ ure for the scene of their labors was neither announced by the press nor heralded by public applause. They rushed calmly into the jaws of death not bent on deeds of destruction like the famous 600, but on deeds of mercy. They had no Tennyson to sound their praises. Their only ambi¬ tion was—and how lofty is that ambition!—that the Recording Angel might be their biographer; that their names might be inscribed in the Book of Life, and that they might receive their recompense from Him who has said: “ I was sick and ye visited Me, for as often as ye did it to one of the least of My brethren ye did it to Me.” Within a few months after their arrival six of the eight sisters died, victims of the epidemic. These are a few of the many instances of heroic charity that have fallen under my own observation. Here are examples of sublime heroism not culled from the musty pages of ancient martyrologies or books of chivalry, but happening in our own day and under our own eyes. Here is a heroism not aroused by the emulation of brave comrades on the battlefield, or by the clash of arms or the strains of martial hymns, or by the love for earthly fame, but inspired only by a sense of Christian duty and by the love of God and her fellow-beings. 7. The Catholic religion labors not only to assuage the physical distem¬ pers of humanity but ^also to reclaim the victims of moral disease. The redemption of fallen women from a life of infamy was never included in the scope of heathen philanthropy; and man’s regenerate nature is the same now as before the birth of Christ. He worships woman as long as she has charms to fascinate, but she is spurned and trampled upon as soon as she has ceased to please. It was reserved for Him who knew no sin to throw the mantle of protection over sinning woman. There is no page in the gospel more touching than that which records our Savior’s merciful judgment on the adulterous woman. The Scribes and Pharisees, who had perhaps participated in her guilt, asked our Lord to pronounce sentence of death upon her in accord¬ ance with the Mosaic law. “Hath no one condemned thee?” asked our Savior. “No one, Lord,” she answered. “Then,” said He, “neither will I condemn thee. Go, sin no more.” Inspired by the divine example, the Catholic Church shelters erring females in homes not inappropriately called Magdalena Asylums and Houses of the Good Shepherd, not to speak of other institutions estab¬ lished for the’moral reformation of women. The congregation of the Good Shepherd at Angers, founded in 1836, has charge to-day of 150 houses, in which upward of 4,000 sisters devote themselves to the care of over 20,000 females who had yielded to temptation or were rescued from impending danger. 8. The Christian religion has been the unvarying friend and advocate of the bondman. Before the dawn of Christianity slavery was universal in 190 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. civilized as well as in barbarous nations. The apostles were everywhere confronted by the children of oppression. Their first task was to mitigate the horrors and alleviate the miseries of human bondage. They cheered the slave by holding up to him the example of Christ, who voluntarily became a slave that we might enjoy the glorious liberty of children of God. The bondman had an equal participation with his master in the sacraments of the church and in the priceless^consolation which religion affords. Slave-owners were admonished to be kind and humane to their slaves by being reminded, with apostolic freedom, that they and their servants had the same Master in heaven, who had no respect of persons. The minis¬ ters of the Catholic religion down the ages sought to lighten the burden and imx^rove the condition of the slave as far as social prejudice would per¬ mit, till at length the chains fell from their feet. Human slavery has, at last, thank God! melted away before the noonday sun of the gospel. No Christian country contains to-day a solitary slave. To jmraxjhrase the words of a distinguished Irish jurist, as soon as the bondman puts his foot in a Christian land he stands redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled on the sacred soil of Christendom. 9. The Savior of mankind never conferred a greater temporal boon on mankind than by ennobling and sanctifying manual labor and by rescuing it from the stigma of degradation which had been branded upon it. Before Christ appeared among men manual and even mechanical work was regarded as servile and degrading to the freemen of pagan Rome, and was conse¬ quently relegated to slaves. Christ is ushered into the world, not amid the pomp and splendor of imperial majesty, but amid the environments of an humble child of toil. He is the reputed son of an artisan, and His early manhood is spent in a mechanic’s shop. “ Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary?” The primeval curse attached to labor is obliterated by the toilsome life of Jesus Christ. Ever since He pursued His trade as a carpen¬ ter He has lightened the mechanic’s tools and has shed a halo around the workshoxj. If the x^rofession of a general, a jurist, and a statesman is adorned by the example of a Washington, a Taney, and a Burke, how much more is the calling of a workman ennobled by the example of Christ. What De Toc- queville said sixty years ago of the United States is true to-day—that with us every honest labor is laudable, thanks to the example and teaching of Jesus Christ. To sum up: The Catholic Church has taught man the knowledge of God and of himself, she has brought comfort to his heart by instructing him to bear the ills of life with Christian philosophy, she has sanctified the marriage bond, she has proclaimed the sanctity and inviolability of human life from the moment that the body is animated by the spark of life till it is extinguished, she has founded asylums for the training of children of both sexes and for the support of the aged poor, she has established hospitals for the sick and homes for the redemxjtion of fallen women, she has exerted her influence toward mitigation and abolition of human slavery, she has been the unwavering friend of the sons of toil. These are some of the blessings which the Catholic Church has conferred on society. I will not deny, on the contrary, I am happy to avow, that the various Christian bodies outside the Catholic Church have been, and are to-day, zealous promoters of most of these works of Christian benevolence which I have enumerated. Not to speak of the innumerable humanitarian houses established by our non-Catholic brethren throughout the land, I bear cheerful testimony to the philanthropic institutions founded by Wilson and Shepherd, by John Hopkins, Enoch Pratt, and George Peabody in the City of Baltimore. But will not our separated brethren have the candor to acknowledge that we had first possession of the field, that these benefi¬ cent movements have been inaugurated by us, and that the other Christian RELIGION CHARACTERISTIC OF HUMANITY. 191 communities in their noble efforts for the moral and social regenera ion of mankind have, in no small measure, been stimulated by the example and emulation of the ancient church. Let us do all we can, in our day and generation, in the cause of human¬ ity. Every man has a mission from God to help his fellow-being. Though we differ in faith, thank God, there is one platform on which we stand united, and that is the platform of charity and benevolence. We can not indeed, like our Divine Master, give sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf, and speech to the dumb, and strength to the paralyzed limb, but we can work miracles of grace and mercy by relieving the distress of our suffering brethren. And never do we approach nearer to our Heavenly Father than when we alleviate the sorrows of others. Never do we perform an act more godlike than when we bring sunshine to hearts that are dark and desolate. Never are we more like to God than when we cause the flowers of joy and gladness to bloom in souls that were dry and barren before. “Religion,” says the apostle, “pure and undefiled before God and the father, is this: to visit the fatherless and the widow in their tribulation and to keep oneself unspotted from this world.” Or to borrow the words of the pagan Cicero: “ Homines ad Deos nulla re propius accedunt quam salutem hominibus dando.” “There is no way by which man can approach nearer to the gods than by contributing to the welfare of their fellow creatures.” When the applause which followed the close of Cardinal Gibbons’ paper died away, Bishop Keane said: And thus it is that Cardinal Gibbons has stated the question of to-day’s parliament; thus it is that he has tried to ascertain by applying the test which the Son of God taught us to apply, “ by their fruit ye shall know them,” whether the religion of Jesus Christ and of his own church is, indeed, divine, because it fills humanity, fits into the whole of human life, and blesses, ennobles, purifies, and elevates it all. Therefore he says: “To the eye not only of speculative philosophy but of practical common sense the religion of Jesus Christ and of his own church is the religion of humanity.” RELIGION ESSENTIALLY CHARACTERISTIC OF HUMANITY. KEY. LYMAN ABBOTT, D.D., SUCCESSOR TO HENRY WARD BEECHER. To adequately elucidate the meaning of this phrase, which has been given me as my title, and to attempt to demonstrate the truth which it expresses, would require a wealth of scholarship which I do not possess and a length of time which it is impossible shall be accorded to any one topic on such an occasion as this. I shall not occupy your'time in any words of introduction or peroration, nor shall I attempt the truth of the proposition which I have been asked to speak to. I shall simply endeavor, in a series of statements, to elucidate and interpret, and, in some small measure, apply it. Religion, then—and you will pardon me if I speak in dogmatic phrase¬ ology; I am giving you my convictions, and it will be egotistic, as well as needless, for me to interpolate continually “this is what I think”—religion is essential to humanity. It is not a something or a somewhat external to man. It is an essential life of man. It is not a something apart from him 192 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. vvhich has been imposed upon him by priests or hierarchies here or any¬ where. It is not a fungus growth that does not belong to his nature. The power, the baneful power of superstition lies in the very fact that man is religious and that his religious nature, inherent in him, has been too often played upon by evil or ignorant men for base VDr selfish purposes. But this does not counterpart the truth that religion itself is an essential integral I)art of his own inherent nature. Religion is not a something or a some¬ what which has been conferred upon him by any cultus, by any hierarchy, by any set of religious teachers. It has not been handed down from the past to him. Religion is the mother of all religions, not the child. The White City at yonder end of Chicago is not the mrent of architecture; architecture is the parent of the White City. AndTlie temples and the priests and the rituals that cover this round globe of ours have not made religion, they have been born of the religion that is inherent in the soul. Religion is not the exceptional gift of exceptional geniuses. It is not what men have sometimes thought poetry or art or music to be, a thing that belongs to a favored few great men. It is the universal characteristic of humanity. It belongs to man as man. Religion is not a somewhat that has been conferred upon him by any supernatural act of irresistible grace either upon an elect few or an elect many. Still less is it a somewhat that has been conferred upon a few, so that the many, strive never so hard to conform their lives to the light of nature, unless aided by some supernatural or extraordinary acts of grace, can never attain to it. Religion belongs to man and is inherent in man. If I may be allowed to use the terminology of our own theology, it is not conferred upon man in redemption, it is conferred upon man in creation. It was not first brought into existence at Mount Sinai, it was not first brought into existence at Bethlehem. Christ came not to create religion, but to develop the religion that was already in the human soul. In the beginning God breathed the breath of life into man, and into every man, and all men have something of that divine breath in them. They may stifle it, they may refuse to olDey that to which it calls them, but still it is in them. They are children of God whether they know it or know it not. And to their God they are drawn by a power like that which draws the earth to the sun. Religion, that is, the power of perceiving the infinite and the eternal, is a characteristic of man, as man. Man is a wonderful machine. This body of his is, I suppose, the most marvelous mechanism in the world. Man is an animal, linked to the animal race by his instincts, his appetites, his passions, his social nature. He has all that the animal possesses, only in a higher and larger degree; but he is more than a machine, he is more than an animal. He is linked to more than the earth from which he was formed; he is more than the animal from which he was produced; he is linked to the divine and the eternal. He has in him a faith, a hope, and love—a faith which, if it does not always see the infinite, at all events always tries to see the infinite, groping after Him if happily he may find Him — a hope which if it be sometimes elusive, nevertheless beckons him on to higher and higher achievements in character and in condition — a love which, beginning in the cradle, binding him to his mother, widens in ever broadening circles as life enlarges, including the children of the home, the villagers, the tribe, the nation, at last reaching out and taking in the whole human race, and in all of this learning that there is a still larger life in which we live and move and have our being, toward which we tend and by which we are fed and are inspired. Max Mueller has defined religion — I quote from memory, but I believe I quote with substantial accuracy — as a perception of such a manifesta¬ tion of the infinite as produces an effect upon the moral character an^ RELIGION CHARACTERISTIC OF HUMANITY. 193 conduct of man. It is not merely the moral character and conduct: That is ethics. It is not merely a perception of the infinite: That is theology. It is such a perception of the infinite as produces an infiuence on the moral character and conduct of man: That is religion. My proposition then is this: That in every man there is an inherent capacity so to perceive the infinite, and to every man on this round globe of ours God has so manifested himself in nature and in inward experience, as that, taking that manifestation on the one hand and a power of per¬ ception on the other, the moral character and the conduct of man, if he follows the light that he receives, will be steadily improved and enlarged and enriched in his upward jjrogress to the infinite and the eternal. Man is conscious of himself and he is conscious of the world within himself. He is conscious of a perception that brings him in touch with the outer world. He is conscious of reason by which he sees the relation of things. He is conscious of emotions, feelings of hope, of fear, of love. He is conscious of will, of resolve, of jmrpose. ^>metinies painfully conscious of resolves that have been broken. Sometimes gladly conscious of resolves that have been kept. And in all of this life he is conscious of these things: That he is a perceiving, thinking, feeling, willing creature. He is also conscious of the world outside of himself. A world of form, of color, of material, of phenomena. They are borne in upon him by his perceiving faculties. And he is also conscious of a relation between him¬ self, this thinking, willing creature that he is, and this outward world that impinges upon him. He is conscious that the fragrance of the rose gives him pleasure and the fragrance of the bone-boiling establishment does not give him pleasure. He is conscious that fire warms him, and he is conscious that fire burns and stings him. He is conscious of hunger; he is conscious of t he satisfaction that comes through the feeding of himself when hungry. He is brought into perpetual contact with this outward world, so he becomes conscious of three things. First, himself; second, the not-self; third, the relation between himself and this not-self. And this relationship is forced upon him by every move¬ ment of his life. It begins with the cradle and does not end until the grave. Life is perpetually an impinging upon him, He himself is coerced whether he will or whether he will not, to ascertain what is the relationship, the true, the right, the just, the accurate relationship between this thinking, feeling creature that he calls self and this outward and material and phe¬ nomenal world in the midst of which he lives. In the pursuit of this inquiry he begins by attributing to all the phe¬ nomena that impinges upon him the continuous life that is within him. He thinks that all things are themselves persons. He very soon learns from his grouping together of this outward phenomena differently. He groups them in classes, he produces them in provinces, he becomes poly¬ theistic. He goes but a very little way through life before he learns there is a larger unity of life than at first he thought. He learns that all phe¬ nomena of life are bound together in some one common bond. He learns that behind all the phenomena of nature there is a cause, that behind the apparent there is the real, behind the shadow there is the substance, behind the transitory there is the eternal. The old teachers of the old religion, the old teachers of the Japanese religion, they, as well as the old teachers of the Hebrew religion, did see that truth which Herbert Spencer has put in axiomatic form in these later days: “Midst all mysteries by which we are surrounded, nothing is more certain than that we are in the presence of an infinite and eternal energy from which all things proceed.” Now he begins to study this energy, for the success of his life, the well¬ being of his life here, even if there were no hereafter, depends on his understanding what are his relations, not only to the related phenomena of life, but to the infinite and eternal energy from which all these phenomena 194 THE PARLIAMENT OF RELIGIONS. spring. And in the study of this energy he very soon discovers that it is an intellectual energy. All the phenomena of life have behind them thought relations. The world has not happened; life is not a chapter of accidents; the universe is not a heap of disjected membria; there is a unity which makes life what it is. It is summed up in the very word by which we endeavor to describe all things, “Uni Verse”—all forces combined in one. The relation of these phenomena one to the other he seeks to learn. He talks of laws and forces. Science is not merely the gathering of phenom¬ ena here and there, science is the discovery of the relations which exist between phenomena and which have existed through eternity. The scientist does not create those relations, he discovers them. He does not make the laws, he finds them. Science is ,a thought of man trying to find the divine reality that is behind all this transitoriness. Science is the thinking of the thoughts of God after him. He perceives art, the relations of beauty in form, in color, in music. He endeavors