fresh soil, where opportunity summons them to mould the experience of the old world into forms of life, more truly fulfilling the laws of heavenly order. A person could scarcely have a clearer sense of unfitness for any thoroughly worthy work, than that with which he commences this publication; but with all deference let it be added, that he does not feel alone in this consciousness of insufficiency; a goodly company of editors, authors, lecturers, speakers, and teachers of all kinds, throughout this country and Europe too, seem to be in fellowship. Indeed, it may well be doubted whether any period of history can be pointed out, when there was anything surpassing, if resembling in extent and degree, the convic. tion which this age has of its superficiality in character, intelligence, and performance. All men are not conscious, to be sure, of such incompleteness in themselves; but each says it of the other. We are a generation of Critics. Doubtless there are a few still professing to be wise; who, steadfastly looking on rusty timepieces, the pendulums of which have long since ceased to beat, loudly declare what hour it once was. Doubtless, there are others, who mistake the rapid-circling hands of a watch running down, whose main spring is broken, for the progress of time. But it needs only moderate sense and conscience, to be aware that our theologies and philosophies, our worship and governments, our home-lives and social relations, our science and industry, our letters and art, do not mark aright the rising of the Sun of Righteousness towards, higher noon. Our dials have lost their gnomons. There is a general make-believe assent, a latent denial, a ridicule of high pretensions, a suspicion of all who claim to have solved doubtful problems. Men like playful badinage better than assertions, which seem inflated in proportion to their solemnity; they turn to practical details from what look like the fog-banks of unsettled principles; and silence, with many of the wisest, is felt to be more eloquent than speech. But this is not because we are Sceptics. The mad age of Unbelief lies behind us, painful, hideous, like a fever dream. It is the presence of Faith, laboring in the souls of nations and men, not ready yet to be born in articulate expression and complete deeds, which makes us thus at once dissatisfied with dead usages and dogmas, and disgusted with mere embryo theories and plans.

There is a characteristic of the age, and especially of this country, which seems to cast light on present duties. It is the unexampled absence of leaders, of persons so plainly preeminent and far advanced that they constrain us to follow. With some observers, this is taken as a proof that we are mired in the bog of a lawless and irreverent equality. But others see here a promise, that Humanity is mounting to a broad table-land. Now and then, a man among us stands up on the stilts of his conceit or the rolling stone of some new notion, and, keeping his footing midst the multitude for a moment, cries out that he sees the way.

But

his sect, if he form one, soon leave him, and hurry on. There is a vague and yet profound consciousness that we are thrown, as men have not so much been heretofore, every one upon his own energies; and yet there is an equally deep and general feeling, that our strength is in united consciences, thoughts, wills, rather than in solitary efforts. The prayer of to-day is not, "Give us a Man, a Great Man, a Prince." He was given eighteen centuries ago; and wonderful is it to see, how on all sides appears a movement, rapidly increasing, to rally the bands, which scepticism had scattered, around Jesus Christ, as the divinely commissioned Head in the kingdom of Heaven on Earth. The prayer which now is swelling in all hearts is: "Give us Men, Great Men, Nations of Prophets and Princes, strong, each in his peculiar way, bound in one by mutual reverence and usefulness, worthy of this Son of God and Son of Man, who called his disciples Friends." In these crowds of authors, pressing forward through all manner of books, pamphlets, and periodicals -in these multitudes of speakers, who, on highways and byways, at the corners of the streets, in conventicles and social circles, are preaching their gospel-still more in the thousands of patient thinkers, who sit watching for the dawn with their fingers on their lips, may be seen, perhaps, the signs of that coming era, when men "shall no longer teach every man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, know the Lord, but when each shall know him, from the least to the greatest." Chaotic enough are now our impulses, opinions, and strivings; but the hour may be, heaven grant that it is, drawing nigh, when a voice of infinite harmonies shall sound throngh the darkness, "Let there be light."

Meanwhile, we should neither deny nor forget our present freedom and responsibilities. Through the willing souls of his children does the Infinite Father always speak. Alternations of thoughtful silence, with frankest utterance, not in the few, but the many; not in official, professional teachers merely, but in all; not through the pulpit or press alone, but through every avenue of communication, is what we Americans need, have a right to claim from one another, and partially, though under the incumbrance of foolish prejudices, already have. There is no arrogance, while admitting with one breath dulness and inadequacy, with the next to declare boldly, without apology or compromise, such vision or prophecy, reproof or counsel, as may seem timely. This equipoise, between humility and confidence, appears to be the true posture just now for all men. We are all in error; all learning together. It is not a season for claims to infallibility, nor for insipid concessions. The spirit abroad is too We want not trimmers, paying court at once both to old and new; but sincere men, standing lowly before their God, and erect among their peers, who will say, without either presumption or baseness, without pertinacity or explanations of inconsistency, what seems to them, for the

earnest.

moment, true.

This tone of blended reverence and hope the Present will strive to keep. Fortunately, the class is already large of those who are endeavoring to take this difficult position, and the instinctive sympa. thies and judgments of the best and truest come to their support.

Fully to tell, what all vaguely feel in relation to our prevalent piety, knowledge, and social action, without denial of good, still vital, while cutting off and casting aside what is plainly dead, without servility to the established or triumph in novelties which are yet untried, with sympathy for the past, as his relaxing fingers drop the sceptre, while we pay due welcome to the present who succeeds to reign, needs rare combination of conscience and genius. Rash joy, in what is new, is more disgusting than even bigoted fondness for ancient idols. Frivolity is as false as it is insolent, while garrulous tales of our ancestors' greatness have the charm at least of gratitude. Yet it is tiresome to be made to wear the cast clothes of forefathers, as if this age could yield no working and gala dress; and it paralyses courage to gaze on these armor-suits of buried giants, as if no brave acts could now be done. We have our labors and conquests, our discoveries and adventures, before us; and if we truly honor the past, it will teach us the lesson, "Work while it is day." No one man, no one nation, but only the combined voices of the Race, can give volume and clear articulation to the word of Conservative Reform, which all lips stammer to utter, which all ears long to hear. Therefore, in every sphere, however small, let each declare, that Love is the Law of Liberty, that Faith is for ever a Free Inquirer, that Doubt of enlarging Good is virtual Atheism, and Fear of Progress the unpardonable Sin. So let us attest the truth, that the Heavenly Father recreates his universe and regenerates his children, by causing their perennial Growth.

A CONFESSION OF FAITH.

To publish a Credo, may well seem to imply pretension or dullness; for the guesses of a creature whose existence is bounded to a speck, limited to a moment, must be folly. Such a publication, too, subjects one to the charge of cant on some sides and heresy on others, and has this difficulty attending it, that no selection of words and phrases can make a meaning so plain as not to be misapprehended. And yet in these Babel times of various isms, it is but fair and courteous, that every one who offers himself in any sense as a guide, should point out the direction in which he aims to lead. Pledging myself, then, to no other consistency than conviction, and hoping, year by year, month by month, and day by day, to gain juster views, I am ready to confess that, briefly sketched, and without completeness or scientific accuracy, my present faith is as follows:

I believe,

I. THE DIVINE BEING, NATURE, SPIRITS.

1. That the Infinite, Eternal, all-blessed Being, who alone is God, from essential love, through ideas of truth, puts forth benign and beautiful creative power from everlasting to everlasting;

2. That, in harmonious series of existences, endless in numbers and varities, and sublimely related by successive growths, mutual dependence and analogy, he manifests his perfections in forever brighter glory;

3. That, through systems on systems, and worlds on worlds, he crowns his creations by giving birth to hosts of spirits, destined originally, through revelations, for ever brightening, to grow up in his likeness, and, by interchanges of good, to be united into families of immortal children, imaging in the heavens their holy Father;

4. That these spirits are born in races, the individuals of which are organised by transmitted qualities into living wholes, and occupy, upon the globes where they find their school, the position of mediators between the temporal and eternal worlds-through animal natures which concentrate the excellencies of lower creations, communing with the harmonies of the universe-through souls receiving inspiration of love and truth and beauty, from God-through powers of rational volition, and in intercourse with fellow-spirits recombining these influences, and diffusing them for the formation of society and the perfecting of nature; and, by this alternate action and reaction, assimilating life in perpetual new-birth.

I believe,

II. THE HUMAN RACE.

1. That the human race, upon this earth, thus constituted of nations and men, thus placed between God's inspiration and nature's limited forms of good, thus endowed with free intelligence, is led by Providence through a discipline, of which the past is the history and the present the experience, filled as it is with prophecy of a future, which, in the fullness of time, shall actualize its ideal;

2. That, in the process of this destined growth from instinctive harmonies to conscious and chosen conformity to God and good spirits, and the union thence ensuing, which is immortality, mankind have, through causes acting from past ages, and originating in themselves, yielded too

much to the impressions of nature; allowed the excessive development of the animal passions; exaggerated the element of self; confused the judgments, weakened the power of the spiritual faculties; broken true society; in various degrees become incapable of receiving life from heaven; and so interrupted the divine order, and introduced depraved social tendencies, diseases, and natural confusions, which react to multiply evil;

3. That the Eternal Father, in whom disinterestedness and rectitude, mercy and justice, are one in unbroken peace, whose action is the unlimited diffusion of good, has never left men to themselves; but has sorrowed in their failures, rejoiced in their successes, forborne with their perverseness, suffered with their sufferings, and, through every means, not violating their reason and prudence-through the beautiful harmonies contrasted with the dread convulsions of nature, through lovely relations amidst monstrous social struggles, through remembrances and anticipations of higher joys, breaking in upon the stern miseries of their self-imposed condition-has infused foreshadows of perfect union in perfect bliss ;

4. That the worships and legislations, wars and alliances, colonizations and empires of all ages, have been the steps of this progressive conquest of good over evil, by which mankind have been at once redeemed and educated, and that saints and sages, prophets and poets, heroes of high and humble spheres, martyrs of many grades, the gracious and lovely of all people, are the ministering servants of Providence in this grand work of salvation.

I believe,

III. THE JEWISH TRIBES AND JESUS CHRIST.

1. That, in this ministry of reconciliation, this establishment of religion, in which all families of the race conspire, the Jewish tribes, who combined in singular intenseness high aspiration, stubborn wilfulness, and coarse sensuality, have been used as a centre of spiritual influence, as they were a centre in physical position;

2. That, carefully guarding the purest traditions, profoundly conscious of God's inspiring presence, sternly announcing the divine law, illustrating in their fortunes his government, even amidst deepest degradation and guilt declaring his promises in glowing visions, they have revealed, as in a symbol, the progress of the human race, from Adam once blessed in Eden, through the woes of selfish division, to the far more blessed reunion of all nations in the city of peace, where God shall dwell with men and be their God;

3. That in the fullness of time, when the civilization of East and West had borne their fruits and were falling into decay, when floods of untamed, vigorous tribes were gathering to oversweep and cover with fresh soil the exhausted nations, when universal man stood watching in mournfulness and longing, was born Jesus; conceived in holiness by a devout mother, cradled in her solemn aspirations, nurtured on the prophetic hopes of his nation and age, filled, in his human nature, with the fullness of a superhuman life, a son of man transfigured by goodness, and made a Son of God-a divine man ;

4. That he was commissioned and anointed to be the image of the Father, the Adam of a spiritualized and reunited race, the prophecy of redeemed humanity, the desire of all nations, the way, the truth, the