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the common good," say too many editors of metropolitan papers by their actions if not by their words. Not so said Garrison and Greeley and Lovejoy. If Sam Adams were living today and America was in the same straits as in 1773 to 1776, what could he do in behalf of liberty and independence? He would find his patriotic communications refused by the Boston press-yea, utterly rejected.

There has never been a period in the history of our country when such demorilization has appeared as today. Corporate robbers gathering millions. The government powerless to grapple with them. Railroads slaughtering more people yearly than fell in battle during the Civil war-published are accounts of the massacres as news of course. The newspapers utterly destitute of moral influence--altogether venal underhandedly working to subvert popular rule of cities and, in my belief, conspiring are the editors, in the interest of plutoracy, to bring in a dictatorship of the nation and government of the states by "Commission" as well as of the cities-and the people paralyzed. Will they recover? Will their strength return to them? It will.

YE 168TH LESSON.

The Shame Of Society.

The tobacco habit is a shameful vice. There is not an adult person in the United States who does not know this and no one not engaged in the production or sale of the poison and corrupted by avarice to the extent that he, for the sake of gain, will stultify himself and utter what he knows to be an untruth because there is "money in it" will deny that it is a vice and a great and dreadful evil. But how may it be overcome Only by a sense of shame. No good man will knowingly set a bad example on the street with pipe or cigar or cigarette in his mouth-to say nothing of him who is seen entering a drink hell and sets a bad example before the young by so doing. Shall one choose rather to become a hypocrite and practice the vice in secret? go into the sheds and outhouses-places of low-down filth to smoke and drink? Yes, if it is a positive necessity of his being and he must do those degrading things, as he is obliged to respond to nature's calls and he cannot quit the evil habits, so unnatural, so degrading, so demoralizing to the young and so shameful to the old. Let him hide in caves and dens while he poisons his blood by the use of nicotine or alcohol.

"Get behind the mountain top

To hide away from God"

as the inebriate would be glad to do--hide in some secret lair or water closet when he so belittles his manhood; keep it, by all means, from the knowledge of his wife and little ones, and be public spirited enough to conceal his dirty vices from the knowledge of the youth generally, if he is too weak to give up the bad habits.

But what do we see today? We see even clergymen (I know one prominent clergyman that does so)-does what? Sit in a room of the public court house of Des Moines, conversing with public officials and others, his feet perched high up on the top of a table and leaning back in his chair, smoking his pipe or cigar. And on the street, whom do the little boys and the little girls see exhibiting themselves as dirty consumers of the filthy and blood-poisoning drug? All men, and boys above the age of sixteen with few exceptions, befouling the air and poisoning their blood with tobacco smoke. Every grown man ought to be utterly ashamed of himself to be seen doing so.

And the time is near when he will be ashamed, and when 'twill

be held by the public authorities a much greater offense than now to spit on the sidewalk, for which one is liable to arrest and fine. But today the evil is so universal in its hold on society that no clergyman opposed to the vice, dares, for fear of the pews, utter a protest against the curse. He would be denounced, as, little more than seventy years ago, men were denounced that uttered their protest against the drink curse. Public sentiment was as nil against the drink evil before the year 1835, as against the tobacco evil now. But, among the better class of people, a great change of sentiment has taken place. Yet the drink evil still holds tenaciously on to life, as a drowning man to whatever object comes within reach. But foreign emigration (German influence especially) is the cause that its life is not wholly extinguished. But the sons of Germans hold not the same views with their fathers; and their grandsons are Americans and conform to what is right in this respect as readily as do the descendants of Colonial ancestors.

But the time is near when no self-respecting American will be seen making a shameful exhibition of so untoward a weakness and positive degeneracy before the rising generation as to enter the doors of a liquor hell or shamelessly indulge in the tobacco vice on the streets. The tobacco evil and the liquor evil are both doomed to extinction before the children born today have lived their three score years and ten. Nothing can be said in justification of those vices-vices? No; they are crimes. The demoralization resulting from these is the wide-open door to murder and all other criminality. And the shamelessness with which men flaunt those vices-yea, crimes on the streets, dishonoring decency is positive proof that we are yet in a state of barbarism, as will be written of us by future historians.

YE 169TH LESSON.

Intuition and Prophesy.

Intuition is the soul-dynamo, or lightning-calculator. Its conclusions are reached by a rapid and unconscious process of reason that is unerring. It makes no mistakes. It sees the end from the beginning. It discards precedent. Some writers say intuition belongs to subconsciousness that knows all things-the future as well as the past. I do not doubt that there is developing a sixth sense, dormant in most persons, but active in some. After the change called death this sense, it is thought, is fully unfolded. Intuition, then supreme, there will be no limitation to our sense-perceptions. Our seeing and hearing, it is believed, will reach to the utmost bounds of the universe. As the electric waves pass around the globe in wireless telegraphy, so thought waves go to the farthest suns and their meaning is read by all souls that give attention. So are time and space annihilated, and all that has been and all that shall be is present to our perceptions. Telepathy in this life is but as a drop from the ocean. What a family of intelligences; no one absent-no one so far away as not to be heard and seen and his presence felt, though actually billions of miles distant. - Intuition, then, in earth-life, is seeing through a glass darkly; in spirit-life we "see face to face.' How it is that the future is opened to view is not thinkable unless we say that the whole is a unitpast, present, future-one and every part distinctly in view at the same moment-the "now" and so shall time and distance be annihilated. Understanding the law of evolution we know all of life, as Newton, by Geometrical calculation, knew the orbits of all world's. Natural law is as unerring as is mathematics. And when we have tasted a morsel of sugar or salt we know the taste of all the sugar or salt that has ever been or ever shall be. So of all things all shall be known in full that now we "know in part."

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So many things, once incredible, have proven true that all minds are becoming open to belief. To hear as now we do by telephone there was never born the man that could have believed this possible up to fifty years ago and later. Some say the departed can never return; but if they do return they can. Others say prophesy is impossible, but there have been and are seers. Joan of Arc heard voices. Socrates had a spirit monitor. And they were not the only persons that have been conscious of the same angelic guardianship. Yes, we know little now; but the time will come when what now is known "in part," shall be fully known.

Facts upon

Occult phenomena must be investigated scientifically. facts must be gathered and weighed and estimated with the greatest carefulness. And let all phenomena be so studid. We talk about genius. What is it? Intuitive knowledge as Napoleon had, and Burns. They possessed each a grain of the radium of eternity-a ray of the sunlight of the after-world. We say they were "sent." And they were. They were conscious of an extraordinary calling and mission. So was Columbus; so was Washington; so was Lincoln; so was Samuel Adams, Thomas Paine, Wendell Phillips, John Brown, Oliver Cromwell, John Milton-all men that have made the world the better, the wiser and the happier for their having lived in it were sensible of a divine calling.

I believe that no man unconscious of a mission has ever accomplished any great and good work. This consciousness is prophesy. The end is foreseen. Man, through evolution, acquired reason and so all will reach the sixth sense that a few already possess, as did Swedenborg. We are coming back to the belief in dreams as held anciently and not because of decadence, but because the ancients were right. "We know in part and we prophesy in part; but when that which is perfest is come, that which is in part shall be done away."

While it is true that science is breaking down the anarchy of thought that had resulted from the reaction following in the wake of the hanging of witches, yet the common people are, and ever have been, first to discover occult phenomena-first to accept the evidences of the senses, because they judge from the standard of common sense. The common people upheld Mesmer when even Dr. Franklin pronounced hypnotism a delusion. So, too, of "Rochester rappings" until now scientists at last, yielding to the facts, do not gainsay genuine psychic phenomena, and the evidence it affords of an after life.

YE 170TH LESSON.

The Chronometer of Truth.

We have come upon a time when a layman may be heard discourse even on topics that relate to religion. Creed has no place in the discussion any farther than is found in the sermon on the Mount. Ye old Schoolmaster of ye olden time believes the day not distant when the Hague will be the seat of the Capitol of the United States of the World; in which Capitol will assemble yearly (as at Washington, meet the representatives of all the states of the American union) the delegated representatives of every nation of the globe. All will co-operate for the good of each people and each for that of all peoples and peace and love and brotherhood will be the law. And a common religion will prevail universally; the Fatherhood of the Omnipotent Intelligence (God) and the Brotherhood of all the races and individuals of mankind. All good and all truth will be conserved. Many congresses of the "world's religions" will convene and all religions will be fused finally into the one religion above named since all do now fundamentally agree in essentials-the teachings of Buddha Zor

oastr, Confuscius and Jesus being ethically one. Ethics has superseded, throughout Christendom, "the plan of salvation" of mediavel Christianity, since Darwin opened to all the more ancient volume of revealed truth-the book of Nature, and no man has risen to question its divine origin. It is written on tablets of stone in the unmistakable handwriting of God. These remain exposed to scrutiny. All who run may read." They have not been withdrawn from sight or broken into pieces or lost as were the engarved tablets of stone. handed down from high to Moses on Sinai or of brass given to Minos, or of gold dug up by Joseph Smith, or the parchment rolls presented by the angel Gabriel to Mohammed. These later-discovered tablets lie, strata upon strata twenty-five miles and more in thickness, that God with his stylus of adamant has been engraving for hundreds of millions of years, and He is still going on with His wonderful, artistic picture-writing for the enlightenment of mankind. This great Bible of the Uncountable Ages of the Past has superseded the written Word in so far as the latter treats of the Kosmos.

The old-time parchment scroll still stands, the admiration of all mankind, wherein its teachings inculcate the duties of man to his fellowmen the Hebrew teachings modified by the words of him who declared: "It was said by them of old time," etc., "but I say," etc. (the contrary). The gravel of cruelty being thus seperated from the sands of truth and love, which had been prepared by the grinding of the glaciers (brains of ancient sages) on the bedrock of superstition and ignorance.

The Bible of nature comprehends not only the lessons of Geology but those of psychology and of psychic facts, all truths revealed to the mind through intuition and all the senses-that of sight aided by telescope, microscope and the chemist's laboratory, etc.-all observed facts being weighed and their value estimated by the inductive process. The divine truths of the religions of mankind are derived from facts gathered from all things visible and invisible; from the mighty planets and suns to the ether that fills all space; from the huge Saurians to the minutest microbes; gathered from every conceivable source, sifted, compounded, error eliminated, corporate tyranny, ecclesiastical and secular, ignored or trampled under foot, that stands arrayed against progress, barricading the streets to hinder, or prevent, if possible, the marching of the army of truth that the minions of mammon may continue to unload the burden imposed by the God of Israel on every son of Adam ("by the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat bread”)— unload, I say, this common burden from their own shoulders on to the shoulders of the ignorant and weak.

We take a long breath and say: The old clock of error and superstition is run down and its wheels are worn and useless. A new clock, the chronometer of truth, kept true to the revolving earth, the sun and stellar zodiac by the electric apparatus of enlightened reason, has been set going. It will never run down or go wrong.

YE 171st LESSON.

Religion and Superstition.

What is religion?

Το

To define these correctly is a difficult task. say that it is what the past has universally regarded as religion is only to confound it with superstition. There are to-day, and ever have been, many so-called religions. All must have a common point of agreement to entitle them to the same name. "To look to the origin of things with awe is religion" says one. But does this not define superstition as well? Yes, if you add "and the uses of things with contempt." How many religions (so-called) are not superstitions according to this definition?

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I may not say. But one thing I may truly say, viz.: The Christian religion, as defined by both the words and actions of its founders is not superstition. And one discovers no "awe" in the religion that Jesus himself professed and practiced. Love was the life and soul of his religion; so, too, of that of his immediate disciples. The Apostle John said: "Fear hath torment. Perfect love casteth out fear. There is no fear in love." And St. Paul said: "Jesus came to deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage."

Fear of death is superstition. Love is the substance the essencethe all of the Christian religion; "good tidings of great joy," "good news" is the gospel of Jesus. When the Christian religion has become universal, when the world is really christianized, as the New Testament defines Christianity, then will the "Kingdom of God" as inaugurated on the day of the Pentecost, have superceded all other kingdoms, principalities and powers, and no man will have aught he calls his own, but all things will be common and distribution will be made to all men according as every man has need-a Christian commonwealth our own Columbia that is to be the United States of the World!

Christianity looks to the "uses of things." It makes nothing of a thing that has nothing in it. It sees nothing in a thing when there is nothing of it. "Making broad the phylacteries" counts for nothing in Christianity. The feeding of five thousand hungry mouths by the Master was a "Lord's Supper." He who gives a dinner to a hungry wayfarer (tramp) does it "in remembrance of him who had not place whereon to lay his head." It is religion. Any formalism as a substitute for giving bread to the hungry, clothing to the naked and shelter to the stranger and "for going about doing good" as Jesus did is superstition. "For as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto me," are his words. But the reader may halt at the words "unto the least of these my brethren" and ask "Is a hobo a brother of Christ?" It may be answered, "How about Lazarus? Does the New Testament bar beggars from God's kingdom any more than from Abraham's bosom?"

I would not speak lightly of ceremonials. But he that thinks a wafer will suffice, though he neglect the "weightier matters of the law," comes short. I knew a man "baptized both of water and of the Holy Ghost." He saved three men from drowning in the Des Moines river on three occasions by taking his life in his hands and "going down into the water." When he "came up out of the water" he brought with him each time a drowning man, rescued from a watery grave. In saving one he dived down stream under the ice of the rapid river in fifteen feet deep of running water and brought with him "out of the water" into air and life his man. For this act of Christ-love and Godinspired religion he received from the state of Iowa a gold medal.

It is time that men cease to wear labels or tattoo marks to give them precedence; and it is time that the tree be known by its fruit. "A good tree bringeth forth good fruit." The fruit of the spirit (of the Master) is love, joy, peace, etc. (Gal. V: 22, 23. Read also 19, 20 and 21st verses of the same chapter.) Yea, note the high moral standard of ethics of the entire New Testament. It is sublime. What is "the spirit" that beareth fruit? Is it not the "mind that was in Jesus Christ?" Let this mind be in you which was also in Jesus Christ." (Phil. XI:5.) "We have the mind of Christ." (1 Cor. XI: 16.)

YE 172d LESSON.

Christian Ethics and Ancient Culture.

Now that it is conceded by members of the ministerial associations of the Protestant churches generally that all that remain and are left