THE EVOLUTION OF PROVIDENCE.

BY E. M. WHEELOCK, WASHINGTON TERRITORY.

Providence is inseparable from a creative God. It is implied in His being. He who created must also from moment to moment preserve, or His creation reverts to nothingness again. The signs of care in the universe fronting us on every side point to the Caretaker. Thus everywhere with the belief in Deity is found belief in Providence. It is a universal accompaniment of religion. There is a general instinctive belief in a Divine superintendence over the world, and all forms of faith are full of it. It is taught in every form of speech in the Scriptures, and it is the frequent theme of Jesus, who says, "Not a sparrow falls without the Father's notice, and the very hairs of your heads are numbered." The poets, ancient and modern, bear witness to this central doctrine of faith. Says Tennison:

"That nothing walks with aimless feet,

That not one life shall be destroyed,

Or cast as rubbish to the void,

When God has made the pile complete."

Indeed we must believe that a Being of infinite love and wisdom has an infinitely wise purpose in the creation of man, and that He is at all moments carrying that purpose into effect. It is a selfevident truth of religion.

But while the heart of man welcomes and cherishes the belief in a perfect Providence over all things and all men, and indeed can. not rest in any other, the intellect demurs and cannot follow out the clue. The understanding finds itself confronted with terrible. facts. It stands in a world full of uncared for wants, a struggling world, unregulated and troubled, not able to find or to follow the golden thread of its destiny.

In the realm of outward nature we are surrounded by fatalities which we are not able to control--extremes of heat and cold, drouths and floods, storms and earthquakes, pestilences and deserts. Every star is a conflagration-beautiful because distant. The forces of matter move with absolute recklessness. They go straight to their end without regarding whom they crush on the road. War and strife is the watchword of the whole of organic nature. There is a constant struggle of organisms. The worm crawls on the earth, the

butterfly hovering over the flower, the eagle in the clouds-all have their enemies. Every plant, tree, and shrub has its insect pests; every animal its tormenting parasite. A worm is at the root of every blossom.

So in the world of humanity, Strass, in describing it, makes use of this language:

"In the enormous machine of the universe, 'mid the incessant whirl and hiss of its jagged iron wheels, and in the deafening crash. of its ponderous stamps and hammers, in the midst of this whole. terrific commotion, man, a helpless and defenceless creature, finds himself placed, not secure for a moment that, on an imprudent motion, a wheel may seize and rend him, or a hammer crush him to powder."

Our dependent humanity, under the pressure of its dire distresses, flings itself upon the heart of the universe with a cry for help. But the destructive activities of nature are not stayed. They work on in their unpitying course. The clouds gather, the winds crash, the thunderbolt smites, the floods drown, the earth yawns and opens, and cities with their dwellers are buried. The prayer of human beings to be spared is not answered. The cup of hurts, heartbruises and sorrows must be drained to its last drop, even though the Son of Man Himself prays that it may be passed untasted by. Underneath all nature's order and beauty are woeful tragedies, unavailing cries for help, bitterness of soul and anguish of heart.

An earthquake kills men like flies. The cholera, small-pox, pestilence cuts them off as with grape-shot. Nature grinds hearts to pigments for the shifting canvasses of life. Every page of history is spattered with tears. The tragedy of pain and death spares no weakness and pities no innocence. Nero is on the throne and Jesus is on the cross, in every age and time "The spider sups upon the fly; the toad snaps up the spider; the snake is swallowing the toad, when the hawk pounces upon him; man is lying in wait for the hawk; other men watch for him, and death engulfs the whole." If the rain fails to the growing crop, or the potato bug destroys a nation's harvest, there is no interference with the natural result, and the tragedy ends in starvation. Men and women are held as cheap as the rotting food for lack of which they die. The laws of nature are impersonal, invariable and immutable. No prayers can turn their sharp and bitter edge. Nature is not exorable. She shows no sympathy toward her offsprings. An animal becoming decrepit,

is left to die by starvation, or is converted into a meal by the sturdier members of the pack. All her children are digestible; to eat and to be eaten is her eternal law. There is no pity in her plan. No process, event, or cruel circumstance is ever held at bay by the compassion of the overruling powers toward those who must bear the brunt. When the pinch comes man learns by practical experience, that there is no active tenderness on which he can call, to check the tragedy of earthquake, plague and storm The sleep of the tyrant may be as sweet as the infant's The sea will wreck a saint and bear a murderer home The snake stings the innocent. child. It is poetry, and not reality, which says the stars in their courses fight against Sisera; that the wall of Siloam fell on the worst sinners; that the sword of the guilty man fails in the duel and his foot is burnt by the hot plowshare.

innocent, and

Raphael once

Only in poetry does the fire refuse to burn the Purity lays her hand on the fawning lion's mane. composed a lovely picture of St. Marguerite, showing how, with no weapon but a lily, she walked safely through the yawning and serrated jaws of a dragon.

seat.

That will do for romance, but in real life

the dragon welcomes the lady to breakfast and gives her an inside Says Prof. Fisk : "In every part of the animal world we find implements of torture, surpassing in devilish ingenuity any thing ever seen in the chambers of the inquisition. Nature," he says, "introduces us to a scene of universal strife with no prospect of a good or happy outcome for any being." Pain is the universal law. Every tint on a butterfly's wing was painted there by an agony. Untold myriads of cruel deaths preceded every progression; every progression entered a new chamber of torture, the extremest being reached by man. Nature gives poisonous fangs to the rattlesnake as well as beauty to the humming bird. A more bloody battle than Gettysburg or Waterloo has been fought on each square mile of the earth's surface, since time began.

SIR WALTER SCOTT was made a Freemason in the Lodge of St. David, No. 36, Edinburgh, on the 2d of March, 1801. This Lodge dates from 1739 on the roll of the Grand Lodge of Scotland.

WHAT is slander? A verdict of "guilty" pronounced in the absence of the accused, with closed doors, without defence or appeal by an interested and prejudiced judge.-Masonic Home Journal.

A LADY'S IDEA OF MASONRY.

[The following was read at a dinner after the dedication of a new Masonic hall in Aurora, Ill., and was boisterously received.]

A Mason's life is one that's free

Not the life though of mortar and bricks,

But out of nights enjoying a spree,

And playing astonishing tricks;
While the she's at home are waiting,
Ne'er dreaming it all a dodge,
But thinking the sad belating

Is caused by "work at the Lodge,"
Where they meet upon the level,

To part upon the square,

And raise the very devil

While congregated there.

If a bachelor chap in his courting days,
Grows weary of being tied,
Both day and eve, almost always,
By his fair Dulcina's side-
The easiest way to escape awhile,

And in fact some day "to dodge,"
Is to seek the aid of a Mason friend,
And join a Masonic Lodge,
Where they meet, etc.

The women don't like Masons

Don't believe in them the least-
From the Tyler, at the entrance,
To the fellow in the East;
Lodge meetings are but covers

To hide some larking dodge-
Look out when mates and lovers
Have "business at the Lodge,"
Where they meet, etc.

Now, what'er the Mason's secrets-
Be they fetish, goat or ram,
Be their Order good or evil,
Worth a blessing or a

psalm—

Let them keep it snug and cozy,

Let them worship (in a horn),

Let them be sedate and prosy,

We'll yet meet them on "the level,"

And ere we part be "square,"

For at some Lodge-held revel,

The women will be there.

Then woe betide the sinner,
Who" spreads it " in the East;
Fear will make him rather thinner,

Though he may be fat-the beast,
And all their grand regalia-

Skin aprons, scarfs and jewels-
We'll seize upon as plunder,

For women ain't all fools,

Though they don't meet on a level,
And part upon the square,

They can raise the very devil

When they get a chance that's fair.

The Occult Sciences in the Temples of Ancient Egypt.

BY GEORGIA LOUISE LEONARD.

[Extracts from a Paper read at the " Fortnightly Conversation," Washington, D. D., May 5th, 1887.

The most conservative Egyptologists admit that this ancient peo ple possessed a very considerable knowledge of both mathematics and astronomy. Prof. Proctor speaks of them as being "astronomers of great skill," and says, "they were manifestly skillful engineers and architects, and as surely as they were well acquainted with the properties of matter, so surely must they have been acquainted with the mathematical relations upon which the simpler optical laws depend. Possibly they knew laws more recondite, but the simpler laws they certainly knew. In Appendix "A" to this author's work on The Great Pyramid, we are told, in relation to the amount of mathematical and astronomical knowledge in their possession, that in these particulars "modern science has made no real advance upon the science known to the builder of The Great Pyramid." In this connection the opinion of Prof. Henry Draper is interesting. Speaking of this great pyramid he says: "So accurately was that wonder of the world planned and constructed, that at this day the variation of the compass may actually be determined by the position of its sides."

Upon the ceiling of the beautiful temple of Denderah there is a representation of the zodiac. It has been claimed that this is a work of the Ptolemaic period; but an inscription found at Denderah distinctly states that the building had been restored in accordance with