The
form of it is passing away; but there never was a time when there was
such a great and inspiring hope, not simply for myself and my friends,
not simply for my neighbors, not simply for my particular church. There
never was a time when there was such a great hope, including humanity
for this world and for the next, as that which inspires us now.
Nothing, then, in religion that is of any worth has the world forgotten
or is it likely to forget. All the old reverences and loves and trusts
and inspirations and hopes and tendernesses are here intermingled. They
are in the highest and noblest people; and they are being carried on
and refined and purified and glorified as the world goes on.
And now let me suggest one thought more that may be of comfort to some.
A great many people have been accustomed to associate so much of their
religion with the forms of their religious expression that they fancy
that the world's outgrowing these means that religion is being
outgrown. I said, you remember, when touching upon government as an
illustration of the working of the law of evolution, that governmental
forms were being outgrown just as fast as the world was becoming
civilized. If this world ever becomes perfect, government will cease to
be, in the sense of these external forms, simply because there will be
no need of it; just as you take down a staging when you have completed
a house. So I look forward to less and less care for the external forms
of the religious life.
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