By the courteous invitation of the President, Faculty, and Trustees of DePauw University, the writer had the privilege of delivering the first series of lectures under the foundation as endowed by his friend, the Rev. Marmaduke H. Mendenhall. The following comments are the only introductory words that need be given. The terms of the lectures were kept strictly within the radius of real life. The author does not claim to be a biblical scholar in any technical sense. Nor did he deem that the prima

The late Reverend Marmaduke H. Mendenhall, D.D., of the North Indiana Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, donated to DePauw University the sum of ten thousand dollars, the purpose and conditions of which gift are set forth in his bequest as follows: The object of this gift is “to found a perpetual lectureship on the evidences of the Divine Origin of Christianity, to be known as the Mendenhall Foundation. The income from this fund shall be used for the support of an Annual Lectureship,

Inasmuch as future lecturers on the Mendenhall Foundation may not have had the privilege of personal acquaintance with the founder, it is doubtless good that this first volume may record the outlines of his life and character. Marmaduke H. Mendenhall was born at Guilford, North Carolina, May 13, 1836. He died at Union City, Indiana, October 9, 1905. He was the son of Himelius and Priscilla Mendenhall, who, when their son was about one year old, came northward and settled near Peru, Indiana. Doct

It may be well to give in human form the outline which will be followed in these pages. The story is the story of millions of men on as many days. A man awoke one morning to the consciousness of himself. Looking about he saw the familiar sights of his own home, and soon he heard the voices of his wife and children. Ere long the little people were on their way to school. The man proceeded to his work, while his wife took up her domestic duties. He returned in the evening with the proceeds of his

The Bible and Life The Bible is a book of power. The man who would deny this statement would impugn his own intelligence. It is to-day the Book of the strongest nations. If the strongest nations selected it for their inspiration and guidance, that fact is significant. If, on the other hand, the Bible has trained the strongest nations, that fact is more significant. In either case power is lodged in the Holy Scriptures. The miracle is this: That a very ancient Book rules a very modern world. Vari

The Bible and Man The natural outline of a human life which has suggested the method of these lectures represents a man as awaking each morning to the consciousness of himself. Every man lives perforce in his own company. He walks with himself on every road of life. He sits with himself in its resting places. He lies down with himself in its slumbers. He is his own friend, and his own enemy. Omar Khayyám declares that he is his own heaven and his own hell. There is a story of a farmer who said t

The Bible and Home The significance of the home is seen in the fact that every human being is a son or a daughter. This ordinary statement at once insists on becoming extraordinary. It is difficult to think what life would have been, or even how it could have been, if children had been pushed upon the earth from some mysterious void and had been nurtured without the providential agency of fathers and mothers. So much do we realize the importance of the home that where it is impossible to maintai

The Bible and Education The man whose program of daily life suggests the outline of these chapters awakes in the morning to the consciousness of himself. He is soon aware of the presence of his family and catches the sense of home. Directly the children are made ready for school and join that romping procession that moves each day at the joint command of parents and teachers. In the normal Christian community this fact of school-going is all but universal. In such a community the illiterate pers

The Bible and Work The frank purpose of the present lecture is to discuss the relation of the Bible to the moral and spiritual aspects of work. The aim is not a study in economics. Without doubt the Bible stands for justice; and without doubt, also, the intent of the Bible is to make just men. But the great Book does not give an infallible table of wages; neither does it offer any sure rules whereby we can determine the working value of any particular individual. It declares that “the laborer is

The Bible and Wealth The word “wealth” as used in this discussion does not mean simply great riches; it rather means those outer and visible means which have a certain purchasing power and which gain their value from that fact. The word is relative at best. A wealthy man of fifty years ago would by many be deemed a poor man now; while, in the individual estimate, one man’s poverty would be another man’s riches. We have all discovered, too, that persons may be tested by their attitude toward litt

The Bible and Sorrow One who is jealous for the reputation of the Bible as a complete Book of life must sometimes feel that undue emphasis has been placed upon its messages for the sorrowing. If the jealousy does not entertain just this feeling, it has the resembling fear—that the biblical message for sorrow has been emphasized until it has hidden the message for gladness. As a necessary prelude to a discussion of the Bible’s relation to the sorrow of the world, we shall treat its meaning for th

The Bible and Practice When men separate the Bible from devotion and practice they are guilty of the final heresy in relation to the Book of Life. The previous pages have shown that the Bible has a real message for actual living. While the larger departments have been treated, it is still true that the message of the Scriptures for other sections of life is vital and fundamental. Whatever we may say about the message of the Bible in regard to chemistry, or biology, or geology; whatever we may sa