mighty to let them be more powerful and ingenious than the true believers in this world, that their punishment, and the reward of the faithful may be greater in the next."* The fact of the superiority of Christians he could not deny, but his way of accounting for it is not that which will long prevail in the world.

The truth is, that wherever among barbarous tribes, or nations half civilized, the Christian scholar chooses now to go, the presumption goes before him that in all that contributes to the progress of society and the welfare of the race, he is superior to those to whom he goes. Every vessel that goes from a Christian to a heathen port; every steamship that ploughs the ocean, is an important agent in showing the superiority of the Christian religion to all other religions, and facilitating the reception of the message of salvation which the Christian missionary bears to distant shores. There is science making use of the magnetic needle; looking with unerring accuracy to the stars; triumphing over winds and waves; and directing civilized men to a distant land. There, too, may be science conveying a printing-press to some barbarous clime; bearing the telescope, the quadrant, the safety-lamp, the cotton-gin to some distant country; and there, too, conveyed by the triumphs of science across the deep, is the herald of salvation borne onward to tell the nations of a common Saviour, and a common heaven. Wherever, therefore, one goes from a Christian land to any other part of the world, he goes preceded by the presumption that he occupies a higher grade in civilization, in refinement, and in art, than those to which he goes, and is in possession of that which may be of immense advantage to every part of the world. This remark is of special importance as applicable to the Christian missionary. In the highest sense, and in every sense, he goes out as an instructor-prepared to carry out in

Layard's Ruins of Nineveh, i. 130.

all respects the injunction of his Saviour, "Go, therefore, and teach all nations."

Our last thought is, that the world is growing better than it was. It is better than it was in the times when Greece and Rome flourished; than it was in the times of the Christian fathers; than it was when councils were held at Carthage, at Nice, at Clermont; than it was in the days of chivalry; than it was in the times of Elizabeth or James; than it was in the days of the Pilgrims; than it was a quarter of a century ago. There are those who do not believe this; and there is a class of orators and writers-usually old men-who are always endeavouring to prove that things are growing worse. This kind of argument and gloomy foreboding we always expect to find among those who are too indolent to keep up with the march of the world; among those who are conscious of a waning spiritual power; among those who, by neglecting to improve themselves, have lost their influence, and who see others gaining the ascendency; and often among those who have advanced far in the journey of life. The belief that the world is growing worse, is frequently among the first indications of approaching age, and it is one of the sadnesses of that condition of life, that they who are becoming old see around them only evidences of deterioration and decay, and that their minds are embittered by contrasting those evidences of decay with the brighter things which the world possessed when they were young. We would have every man adopt it as a settled truth to be adhered to all along his journey of life; in all times of change, and disappointment, and sorrow; when the sun shines, and when clouds come over the sky; when in the hey-day of youth, in the soberness of middle life, and when the shades begin to lengthen; when he goes forth from college halls on the Voyage of life, and when near its close he looks back over the career which he has run; in the church, or in the state;

in reference to our own country, and in reference to all lands, that the world is growing better-that our own country is making advances-that the church is increasing in numbers, in purity, and in knowledge-and that there is a sure and steady progress toward the universal triumph of Christianity, and of civil and religious liberty.

XII.

The Progress and Tendency of Science.*

It can

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN OF THE SOCIETY:THE subject on which we propose to address you at this time is, THE PROGRESS AND TENDENCY OF SCIENCE. not be new to you to go over the history of science; but it may be useful to contemplate some of the achievements which it has made, and, from the vantage-ground which we have gained, to contemplate some of the struggles of the past, and to look on the precise position which we occupy as we enter on public life. It is much to know what has been done; it is much to know where we can most successfully direct our efforts in future years.

Using the word SCIENCE in its widest signification, our aim will be to make some suggestions on its former history, and on its tendency in regard to some of the great questions which pertain to the welfare of man.

The difference between man in a state of nature and in a state of advanced science, is almost as great as that between distinct orders of beings. In the one case, the most striking feature pertaining to the subject now before us is, that every thing is an object of wonder. The visible world is to him. filled with prodigies, and the invisible world with imaginary beings. Objects and events now familiar to us from our childhood, and which to us create no apprehension, fill his mind

* An oration delivered before the Connecticut Alpha of Phi Beta Kappa, at New Haven, August 18, 1840.

with dread and amazement. Every new event becomes a prodigy to him, whose cause he knows not, and whose tendency he has no means of anticipating. Disease attacks him from causes which he does not understand, and carries its fearful desolations through his frame in a manner which he can neither trace nor retard. The thunder rolls, and the lightning plays in the sky or rives the oak, in a manner which he cannot comprehend, and by an invisible influence which he cannot explain; and he learns to look upon a dark cloud without alarm, (if he ever does,) not because he understands the phenomena, but from the fact that he often witnesses these terrific wonders without personal injury. An earthquake or a volcano is equally an object of dread whose cause is unknown. An eclipse is a prodigy. He knows not when to anticipate it; he knows not its cause; he knows not what is its design; but as it sheds

"Disastrous twilight

O'er half the nations, and, with fear of change,
Perplexes monarchs,"

it seems to him to be a proof of the anger of the gods, and he trembles with alarm.

To his view, the stars of night shine with unmeaning splendour, or they merely excite inquiry whether they exert an occult influence over the fates of men. On land, unacquainted with the causes of the changes which he witnesses; seeing around him revolutions which indicate the presence of some invisible being; or meeting events everywhere which to him are prodigies, he stands alarmed and trembling amid these wonders. To him the invisible world becomes soon peopled with mysterious beings of malignant influence. Numerous orders of genii and gods are believed to preside over all things. The dead of past times are supposed to reappear and to speak to men with a shrill and fearful voice. Thus Homer, speaking of the shade of Patroclus, says: