The Judge's Church.

And, now, having drawn attention to what we consider to be the excellencies and principal defects of the Judge's treatment of the relations between science and religion, are we in a position to accept his final conclusion—viz., the change which he deems necessary to bring the Church into harmony with the requirements of modern thought? I think that we cannot at all events entirely agree with his final conclusion. He advocates a change from the Christian religion to what he calls the religion of Christ. But what this religion of Christ is to be we nowhere get any clear indications either from his lecture, or from the traditionary opinions of Christ himself, which have been banded down to us from his own time. It seems to me that what Judge Higinbotham calls the religion of Christ may be divided into two portions, one of which we may accept as true or as partly true, but the other we cannot help rejecting as false. These two portions I consider to be Christ's system of theology and Christ's system of morality. Judge Higinbotham himself indicates the division when he says that Christ's system "states the central principle or dogma of the existence of one God and his relationship to man, together with the primary and secondary rules of human conduct on and springing out of that relationship." further says that the proposition, "God is a spirit, is the single central dogma of Christ's-theology," and this proposition he further page 11 tells us is also tbe highest generalisation towards which the latest and grandest discoveries of science seem to be conducting the human mind." Those of you who agree with the opinions expressed in this review, will deny that science points to any such thing, but will say that the old twist still distorts the Judge's opinions. This is the vitiating point of his system. If he bad thrown overboard Christ's theology, and merely accepted the moral teachings of Christ as the basis of his religion we should have been more inclined to agree with him. With the existence of God and his relationship to man, science and therefore morality—morality at the same time the guide and the outcome of society—has nothing whatever to do. I concieve that a religion, to be a true religion, must contain no elements of error. All that the Judge's system means is, that he endeavours to expunge creeds, forms, and ceremonies from the Chistian Chuches, assuredly a great work, but at the same time he endeavours to preserve the false principle that underlies the system of theology—namely, belief in an intelligent Supreme Being, and a belief in our responsibility to Him. This is sufficient to prevent us from giving our entire approval to the Judge's proposed reform—but even through our disapproval we see a glimmer of hope. It is the practical part of Christ's system that is the important part to us—the portion which extols the dignity of man. It is this part that has preserved its ascendency, although unconsciously, because it is the portion that is true. I do not think that theology would have flourished for a single century, if it bad not been for the human part of Christ's religion. It is society and man's relation to society that is the all important principle for man to consider; and it is because the religion of Jesus Christ contains the adumbrations of this doctrine that it has stood so long in its position of pre-eminence before the world. And when we consider that it was this doctrine that found expression in the life of Jesus, if not in his opinions, surely we can appreciate tbe greatness of the man.