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I am glad to know that my conclusion is shared by Dr. Fairbairn, who, speaking of the worker in our great cities, and of his alienation from religion, says, “The first thing to be done is to enrich and ennoble his soul, to beget in him purer tastes and evoke higher capacities”.

I will conclude by calling notice to the much or the little which is being done to open the people’s eyes by means of higher education. I fear it is “the little”. There are many classes and many teachers for spreading skill, there are some which increase interest in nature; there are few—very few—which bring students into touch with the great minds and thoughts of all countries and all ages—very few, that is, classes for the humanities. For want of this the souls of the people are poor, and their capacities dwarfed; they cannot see that modern knowledge has made the Bible a modern book, or how the bells of a new age have rung in the “Christ that is to be”.

For thirty-four years my wife and I have been engaged in social experiments. Many ways have been tried, and always the recognized object has been the religion of the people—religion, that is, in the sense which I have defined as that faith in the Highest which is the impulse of human progress, man’s spur to loving action, man’s rest in the midst of sorrow, man’s hope in death.

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