In the press and stir of life we sometimes forget that the highest
emotions of which we are capable are those of joy, praise, and prayer.
Joy is a heavenward uplift of life--deep happiness of spirit. Praise is
an appreciation of the greatness and mercy of the Infinite. Worship is
the outpouring of the whole nature, an ascription of blessing, glory,
honor, and power and majesty to God. It flows from the religious
imagination, and is the supreme offering of the intellectual as well as
of the emotional life.

The Church is a body ministrant: it has received the accolade of
spiritual service. It stands among the world's forces, as one of giving,
not of gain. It holds within its scope both a teaching and a training
power. It is the school of the soul, the illuminator of the meaning and
discipline of life. Abélard is said to have attracted thirty thousand
students to Paris by his teaching. But the Church to-day calls into its
assemblies fully one-third of the millions of the world. They are held
by its tenets, guided by its ideals, thrilled by its hopes, and set to
its works of charity and mercy. The highest philanthropy is but a
scientific renewal and adaptation of work which has had its start,
primarily, in the Christian Church. Wealth is its vicegerent, and from
the adherents to the Church fall largely the contributions to great
philanthropic causes.

Take the work of Missions alone: Has there ever before been a body which
attempted to bring the whole world into its fellowship, to make known
everywhere its ideals, and to share with all living a spiritual
inheritance? "The Evangelization of the World by this Generation" is
one of the most sublime thoughts which has come to the race.

4. There is a large amount of ability in the world which the Church