The list of Sir Oliver Lodge's writings is long and varied, ranging from school text-books in elementary science through The Ether of Space, School Reform, Life and Matter, Reason and Belief, to The Survival of Man. With most of these writings I have no direct acquaintance, but on the mere evidence of their titles one may with reasonable safety venture certain particulars toward an estimation of their author. He must have intellectual vigor, he must have an instinct for vital questions, he must have the power of popular exposition, and, finally, he cannot be overcautious in the formation and expression of his opinions. All of these particulars would, I believe, be found also in any consensus of judgment that his fellows in science might pass upon his scientific work. This, if not unmixed praise, is much to say for a man, and it may be added that in general he speaks out from a sense of well-being natural to one of cheerful and sturdy temper who has achieved fame, station, ten children, and the confident hope of immortality for all of us. Is it then to be wondered at that he says things which multitudes are glad to hear, and holds a position almost unique in the esteem and confidence of the public at large?

Three recent movements in Canada towards a clearer expression of Christian unity have special significance—the co-operation of the Theological Colleges affiliated to McGill University, the organization of the Church Unity League, and the negotiations for the organic union of the Congregational, Methodist, and Presbyterian Communions.

The conception of a preliminary period of ritual preparation for occasions of special sanctity is common to many religions, including that of the Old Testament, where the touching of holy things or coming into the divine presence requires a period of previous abstinence from anything involving ceremonial defilement. In 1 Sam. 21 5 and Ex. 19 10, 15 this period is of “three days.” The longer period of “six days” is required for the supreme occasion when Moses meets Yahweh face to face on Sinai (Ex. 24 16), and this interval becomes as it were stereotyped in the most distinctive of Jewish institutions, the periodic seventh day “the sabbath of the Lord thy God,” to which the preceding six days of toil lead up. The Jew labors and does all his work in the first six days of the week in order that he may rest and enjoy the fruit of his toil the seventh day, just as in the creation Yahweh's activity had led up to a period of satisfied contemplation of all that He had made as “very good.” In like manner the later speculators of both Synagogue and Church expected the toil and turmoil of the six ages of “this world,” each of one thousand years’ duration, to lead up to the blessed repose and fruition of “the age to come,” ushered in by the “thousand years” of Messiah.

I remember a certain country church in a Western State as it was about forty years ago. It was a plain, wooden structure with uncushioned seats, uncarpeted floors, and with plain glass windows through which the farmers could keep an eye on their horses, hitched to the racks outside. The men and boys sat on one side of the central aisle, while the women and girls sat on the other, and there were about as many on one side as on the other. The congregation was made up mostly of farmers and their families, who came to church in farm wagons, drawn by work horses. The father and mother in each case usually sat on the spring seat, while the children and the hired men sat on seat-boards, sometimes indulging in the luxury of a cushion made by folding a quilt. Within the church the elderly men sat in the “Amen corner,” and the elderly women sat in the opposite corner. The small boys, for some reason which I did not then understand, sat with their fathers instead of with other boys of their own age.