ns, and ignorance in regard to what
really is religion have caused countless millions to mourn--and worry;
indeed, far more to worry than to mourn. Religion should be a joyous
thing, the bringing of the son and daughter into close relationship
with the Father. Instead, for centuries, it has been a battle for
creeds, for mental assent to certain doctrines, rather than a growth
in brotherhood and loving relationship, and those who could not see
eye to eye with one another deemed it to be their duty to fight and
worry each other--even to their death.

This is not the place for any theological discussion; nor is it my
intent to present the claims of any church or creed. Each reader must
do that for himself, and the less he worries over it, the better I
think it will be for him. I have read and reread Cardinal Newman's
wonderful _Pro Apologia_--his statement as to why and how he entered
the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church, and it has thrilled me with
its pathos and evidence of deep spiritual endeavor. Charles Warren
Stoddard's _Troubled Heart and How It Found Rest_ is another similar
story, though written by an entirely different type of man. Each
of these books revealed the inner thought and life of men who were
worried about religion, and by worry I mean anxious to the point of
abnormality, disturbed, distressed unnecessarily. Yet I would not be
misunderstood. Far be it from me, in this age of gross materialism and
worship of physical power and wealth, to decry in the least a proper
degree of solicitude for one's personal salvation. The religious life
of the individual--the real, deep, personal, hidden, unseen, inner
life of a human soul--is a wonderfully delicate thing, to be touched
by another only with the profoundest love and deepest wisdom. Hence I
have little to say about one's own inner struggles, except to affirm
and reaffirm that wisdom, sanity, and religion itself are _all_
against worrying about it. Study religion, consider it, accept it,
follow it, earnestly, seriously, and constantly, but do it in a
rational manner, seeking the essentials, accepting them and then
_resting_ in them to the full and utter exclusion of all worry.

But there is another class of religious worriers, viz., those
who worry themselves about _your_ salvation. Again I would not be
misunderstood, nor thought to decry a certain degree of solicitude
about the spiritual welfare of those we love, but here again the
caution and warning aga