High as man is placed above the creatures around him, there is a higher and far more exalted position within his view; and the ways are infinite in which he occupies his thoughts about the fears, or hopes, or expectations of a future life. I believe that the truth of that future cannot be brought to his knowledge by any exertion of his mental powers, however exalted they may be; that it is made known to him by other teaching than his own, and is received through simple belief of the testimony given. Let no one suppose for a moment that the self-education I am about to commend, in respect of the things of this life, extends to any considerations of the hope set before us, as if man by reasoning could find out God. It would be improper here to enter upon this subject further than to claim an absolute distinction between religious and ordinary belief. I shall be reproached with the weakness of refusing to apply those mental operations which I think good in respect of high things to the very highest. I am content to bear the reproach. One of his friends wrote: “When he entered the meeting-house he left his science behind, and he would listen to the prayer and exhortation of the most illiterate brother of his sect with an attention which showed how he loved the word of truth, from whomsoever it came.” [Sidenote: AS ELDER AND PREACHER.] “The most remarkable event,” says Dr. Bence Jones, “of his life in 1840 was his election as an elder of the Sandemanian Church. During that period when in London he preached on alternate Sundays.” This was not an entirely new duty, for he had been occasionally called upon by the elders, from the date of his admission in 1821, to exhort the brethren at the week-day evening meetings, or to read the Scriptures in the congregation. Bence Jones says that, though no one could lecture like Faraday, many might preach with more effect. The eager and vivacious manner of the lecture-room was exchanged for a devout earnestness that was in complete contrast. His addresses have been described as a patchwork of texts cited rapidly from the Old and New Testaments; and they were always extempore, though he prepared careful notes on a piece of card beforehand. Of these, samples are given in Bence Jones’s “Life and Letters.” His first discourse as an elder was on Matt. xi. 28–30, dilating on Christ’s character and example. “Learn of Me.” The ground of humility of Christians must be the infinite distance between them and their Pattern. He quoted 1 John ii. 6; 1 Peter ii. 21; Phil. iii. 17; 1 Cor. xi. 1; and 1 Cor. xiv. 1. An exceedingly vivid view of Faraday as elder of the Church was given in 1886[61] by the late Mr. C. C. Walker, himself at one time a member of the Sandemanian congregation in London; a congregation, moreover, which included several persons of distinction--Cornelius Varley, the engraver, and George Barnard, the water-colour painter.