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most insidious efforts are now being put forth to remove the very foundations of Christianity. Among these is the assumption that the soul or spirit is nothing more than a result of the bodily organism, by which it is begotten, and with which it dies. Also that still more subtile figment, which resolves both soul and body into "force." So of the theories that would spread the pall of unconsciousness over the dead, that would annihilate personality, deny recognition, and dissolve the very heaven of glory into an airy, unsubstantial dream, by denying our essential humanity in the future state. Against these and kindred skeptical notions we have sought to furnish an antidote, recognizing, at all times, that there can be no true Philosophy of Human Nature, without the recognition of the Bible as the true interpreter of the suggestions of reason and the teachings of nature.

At the outset we found it impossible to turn aside to discuss the theories of modern speculatists, without becoming too prolix. The same reasons have kept us to the original plan in the volume. The form of address, and the style of composition, in some portions of the work, still bear the impress of the occasion and purpose for which those parts were written. We trust it will not prove any less valuable to the reader on that account. From a wide field of reading and study we have gathered our material, and then wrought it up so as to make it our own. To how many authors we are indebted, and in what proportions, it is impossible to say. We have endeavored to acknowledge, in the appropriate places, our indebtedness to each.

The preparation of this work has been a soul-nurture to the author. May it become such to the reader!

D. W. C.

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