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I HAVE been bold in my title; and, in order to convey a distinct idea, have promised what I cannot do more than most imperfectly perform.

My paper is a paper for the day. We live in a time when the interest in religious thought, or in thought concerning religion, is diffused over an area unusually wide, but also when the aspect of such thought is singularly multiform and confused. It defies all attempts at reduction to an unity, and recalls the Ovidian account of chaos :

"Nulli sua forma manebat, Obstabatque aliis aliud, quia corpore in uno Frigida pugnabant calidis, humentia siccis, Mollia cum duris, sine pondere habentia pondus." *

At every point there start into action multitudes of aimless or erratic forces,

* Ov. Metam. i. 17. NEW SERIES.-VOL. XXIV., No. 2

crossing and jostling one another, and refusing not only to be governed, but even to be classified. Any attempt to group them, however slightly and however roughly, if not hopeless, is daring; but, as they act upon us all by attraction and repulsion, we are all concerned in knowing what we can of their nature and direction; and an initial effort, however feeble, may lead the way to more comprehensive and accurate performances.

I shall endeavor, therefore, to indicate in a rude manner what seem to be in our day the principal currents of thought concerning religion; and as, in a matter of this kind, the effect can hardly be well considered without the cause, I also hope in a future paper briefly to touch the question, how and why these currents have been put into their present sharp and unordered motion.

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