of an idea is not so much any opinion as to the unseemliness of the
stages through which it has passed as it is the value of the idea when
once it has come to ripeness. The test of the grain is its final value
for food. The scriptural truths are to be judged by no other test than
that of their worth for life.

In the light of the teaching of Jesus himself there is no reason why we
should shrink from stating that the revelation of biblical truth is
influenced by even the moral limitations of men. Jesus said that an
important revelation to man was halted at an imperfect stage because of
the hardness of men's hearts. The Mosaic law of divorce was looked upon
by Jesus as inadequate. The law represented the best that could be done
with hardened hearts. The author of the Practice of Christianity, a book
published anonymously some years ago, has shown conclusively how the
hardness of men's hearts limits any sort of moral and spiritual
revelation. It will be remembered that William James in discussing the
openness of minds to truth divided men into the "tough-minded" and the
"tender-minded." James was not thinking of moral distinctions: he was
merely emphasizing the fact that tough-minded men require a different
order of intellectual approach than do the tender-minded. If we put into
tough-mindedness the element of moral hardness and unresponsiveness
which the prophet must meet, we can see how such an element would
condition and limit the prophet.

Again, Jesus said to his disciples that he had many things to say to
them, but that they could not bear them at the time at which he spoke.
Some revelations must wait for moral strength on the part of the people
to whom they are to come. Suppose, for example, in this year of our Lord
1917, some scientist should discover a method of touching off explosives
from a great distance by wireless telegraphy without the need of a