The Seminary Guard
Studio Fallente Laborum.
VOL. I.] UNION SEMINARY, NEW BERLIN, PA., NOV., 1879. [N0.3.
The Coming Years.
The glorious coming years,
The strong, victorious years—
Our prophets see them far upon the way ;
With timbrel and with song,
Before the doubting throng,
They bear the standard of the welcome day.
The grand millenial years,
The fruitful harvest years,
So sure to blossom when we shall not see.
Contented we forego,
If each one seed may sow,
Which in that century shall be a tree.
O world of want and wrong,
O world despairing long !
Our hopes are strong for thee, our hands are full.
Our prayers, with labor wrought,
Have golden answers caught,
The promise is so vague and bountiful.
For every hopeful plan-
All help from man to man—
Room, where the hosts of true reform advance ;
The name of Right and Good,
Though little understood,
Shall keep their armies safe from sore mischance.
Than every throned ill
Our faith sits higher still-
High as the throne where Right with God appears,
So lifted over fate,
So strong to work and wait,
Are they who count on the Eternal years.
—Carl Spenser.
Religion—No. II.
Sufficient has been said in the former article in regard to false religions, hence will take true religion as our theme for the present number.
We depend exclusively upon the Bible for our knowledge of true religion, although some writers seem to be able to find a natural religion outside of the
Holy Scriptures—enough light for the benighted mind of man, to guide him safely in his religious investigation; but outside of divine revelation, man by
nature knows not God, and is in the mist of doubt in regard to the most important questions of region. As a proof of this, we have the collision of
the wisest heathen writers. True religion consists in the union of God and man. The opposite is properly expressed by the •m ungodly—without, absent from,
or unlike God. As we are taught in the Scripture, that sin separates man from God, the only way of introducing true religion, is to he freed from sin.
That there is a method of grace provided to deliver man from sin, is very plainly revealed, viz: repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Religion is a life, commenced in regeneration, and is only fully developed in glorification in heaven. The great moving cause of religion is the Holy
Spirit, without which religion would be a mere name. As already expressed, the object of religion is man's deliverance from sin. That man needs such a
deliverance is most painfully evident to every thinking mind. For a proof of this we would cite our penitentiaries, jails, courts of justice, and the
many minor instrumentalities that have for their object the restraining of man from the worst of vices to which he is constantly addicted, and last,
but not least, our daily observation and experience. There is little danger of exaggeration in our expressing what the result would be if religion
would be universally enjoyed. The multitude of evils from which the human family would be delivered, no mental mind can fully conceive. What has sin
done? Yea, what is it doing every day ? The candid confessions of the greatest saints and most pious of earth have many grievous things in regard to sin,
but what is the experience of the greatest sinners ! Who would not be cured from this malady, and be delivered from this source of almost infinite evils ?
The blessings which religion brings are more than the storehouse of nature can afford. They include the very unbosoming of God himself. A universal reign
of religion would soon turn this world into a paradise, and the riches, peace and joy for each one, would be inexpressible. Why, then, do men oppose
religion ? Why be so blind to our own interest, and not enjoy those blessed gifts which God has so graciously provided
