doubt whether the Spiritual has an existence at all. Others will doubt,
if it does exist, whether man can accomplish anything in it. It is
invisible, impalpable, unknown. It cannot be substantial, it cannot
be real,--at least to man as at present constituted. Its elements and
conditions cannot be controlled by his spirit. That spirit cannot
control itself,--how much less go forth and work solid wonders in that
phantom realm! There can be no success in this that will be coequal with
the other; nor a coequal grandeur. There is no such thing as keeping
pace with it. The heart cannot grow better, society cannot be built
higher, mankind cannot become happier, God will not draw nearer, the
hidden truth of all that universe will never be more ascertained than
it is,--can never be accumulated and stored away among other human
acquisitions. It is utterly, gloomily impracticable. In this respect we
shall forever remain as we are, and where we are. So they think.

And now we venture to contradict it all, and to assert that there
is, there must be, just such a corresponding field, and just such a
corresponding progress, or else (we say it reverently) God's ways are
not equal. So great is our faith. Like Columbus, therefore, we dream
of the golden Indies, and of that "unknown residue" which must yet be
found, and be taken possession of by mankind.

We look far out to where the horizon dips its vapory veil into the sea,
and beyond which lies that other hemisphere, and ask,--Is there no world
there to be a counterpoise to the world that is here? Has the Creator
made no provision for the equilibrium of the soul? Is all that infinite
area a shoreless waste, over which the fleets of speculation may sail
forever, and discover nothing? Or is there not, rather, a broad
and solid continent of spiritual truth, eternally rooted in that
ocean,--prepared, from the beginning, for the occupation of man, when