TABLE OF CONTENTS

"And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory."

Among the great mysteries of godliness is this, that God, which is Jesus, Christ, was preached unto the Gentiles. If this is a great mystery, wherein lies the solution? The solution lies in the work and labors involved in the reconciliation of all things, whether things in earth or things in heaven. This work has been made manifest through the revelation of Paul and the Scriptures of the prophets. Preaching the gospel of Christ to the Romans, and the Ephesians, and the Thessalonians cannot fill the measure of so great a mystery in godliness; therefore the magnitudes involved must be brought to the light that the strength of the text and of the Scriptures may appear. The geologist in his works has a tangible base of operation; the astronomer has the stars and planets, and with mechanical appliances he determines the mechanical orbits of the same, for they are obedient to fixed laws; but the preacher of the gospel of Christ is met with parable and dark sayings on every hand: he deals with that which is hidden from the foundation of the world, and the task, therefore, is one of almost disheartening difficulty; but when the vail is wholly lifted and altogether taken away, the light will shine with tenfold brilliancy, even after the stars have disappeared and the rocks have melted.

Take the magnitude of the work into consideration, and the cipher-like position of man as a primary object will immediately become manifest; therefore, if man puts himself upon his own proper base, he will hesitate to place his imperfect deductions above the light of revelation. Let the geologist, with his great store of facts and confirmatory evidences, strike through sacred parable, and he will find almost limitless ages set forth for the formation and cooling of the globe on which we live. The law of formation is not a law of confusion: hence by the earth the astronomers can indicate the comparative age and condition of the stars and planets. Let the ethnologist seek, and he will find conclusive evidence of the existence of man far beyond the Adam of our race. It seems as though man, despairing of a solution of the hidden mysteries of the Sacred Writings, turns to the readier and clearer chart marked out on the face of nature; but, by a clear and harmonious interpretation of the Scriptures, the divine stands upon a rock, and he cannot be moved.