Has life anything real? Is it worth living? When the little play is over, and the hour's music is ended, and the lights are out, and we go forth into the darkness of the final night--what then? Is it darkness for ever? or is there the light of an eternal day? Who knows? Is anything certain? Must nations and men and the evening-moth alike go down and perish for ever under the crush of an inexorable fate? Is there no rift in this cloud? Have we no anchor that will hold as the storm drives us on through the blinding mists and gloom to the eternal shore? Have we no sure word of promise to which we can cling when everything else around us and under our feet is giving way? _Is the Bible true?_ That is the simple but momentous question; it settles all other questions of most concern to men. To it, therefore, we find the most intense thought of thoughtful men converging. That from this there should emerge questions not easily solved is not to be wondered at: they emerge in every inquiry of human thought. The only thing to be asked is that these questions be dealt with candidly and fairly. To many minds the Bible is still on trial; it is only just that in its trial those rules and principles shall be observed which men everywhere expect and demand shall be observed for themselves when they or their interests are to be tried. This is the point of this essay. It is not, indeed, a discussion from the highest ground of inspiration; it does not claim to be. It simply deals with a certain class--a very large class, however--of alleged difficulties of the Bible, and it appeals to the candid reader to deal with them as fairly and by the same rules as he would have his fellow-men deal with him in a matter of life or death, or of any worldly interest. For this object only a few of the common rules of evidence have been taken. It is believed, however, that their application will cover a very large portion of the popular objections to the alleged inconsistencies and contradictions of the Bible. Undoubtedly, there are difficulties in the Bible; the question is whether these prove that it is not the work and word of God. On the other hand, it may be suggested whether they do not confirm it as the work of God, for they at once put it in harmony with all his other works. If the Bible were without difficulties, it would, for us, be out of the line with everything else that God has made or done. Nature and Providence are full of difficulties. There is nothing in the Bible harder of explanation and reconciliation than are the facts that meet us everywhere in God's creative and providential realms. If these difficulties do not prove that Nature and Providence are not, from beginning to end, the works of God, they do not on the face of them prove that the Bible is not such.