Interesting Lectures.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume IV, Issue 158, 28 January 1902, Page 3

Interesting Lectures.

For some time, to Mi* llannerman’s Bible class at the Forostros’ Rail, the Rev G .Barclay has been occasionally delivering addrese-'s of an interesting kind, the Rail on such occasions being as a rule well filled. On Sunday last his subject was “ The attitude of men of learning and culture towards religion and the Bible.” After noticing an impression prevalent in some quarters that few persons of intellect and erudition are in thorough sympathy with Ghristi anity, and premising certain divisions of the subject which he . would successively treat, he proceeded to instance a.number of well-known persons, distinguished in their position, influence and intallectualattainunnis, who were not antagonistic, to Revelations, nor to the great principles it disclosed. Mr Barclay asked his audience to note th it ha was not taking his examples from clergymen or theologians, or parsons who, so to speak, had any vested interests in the profession of religion, h ; 3 quotations would ho chiefly from litcrateurs, men of science, philosophies, writers on, ethics, students of etc., and whose judgments were 1 or a definite and deliberate character. Taking as his first head opinions as to the “ Bible,” he proceeded to quote Carlyle, Selden, Loche, Sir Walter Scott, Raskin, Bacon, Sir Matthew Hale, Pascoe, Haine, Renan, Goethe, Sir William Jones, Presidents Adams, Jackson and Grant, Wilberforce and a host of others. Interesting testimonies to the greatness and worth of the Bible were deduced from Dickens, Reads, Hall Caine and others. 'lt was from the parable of the Prodigal Son Caine got the idea of the “ Deemster ” from the story ofjJacob and {Esau, ho elaborated his “ Bondman,” while the story of Eli and hie sons suggested the “ Scapo-goat.” Taking as another branch of his subject, “ Views about Christ,” he read quotations from Rousseau, Lessing, Richter, L*cky, , Nipoleou, John Stuart Mill, etc. Of course there was no pretention that these were all Christians in any decided sense ; but perhaps, for this very reason, their testimony was all the more valuable. jVfr Barclay’s next lecture will turn on the question of “Science and the Bible.” The biographical notices of the nation's authors quoted, showing who they were, their eminence in learning and literature, and the positions in society which they hold, added much to the interest of the address.