INTRODUCTION
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 primary need of the students whom he addressed would be met by a discussion of theories of inspiration or of dates and authorships. College students have a passion for reality, and the most convincing apologetic for them is the argument from actual living.
Under the instruction of the founder the lectures are to be placed in permanent form for the students of the University and for the wider public. The lecturer having been rewarded by the close attention of hundreds of youthful hearers, the writer will have a still greater reward if those who heard the words as spoken in Meharry Hall are joined by the larger company who will listen for the voice of the Spirit in these pages.
Edwin Holt Hughes.
THE MENDENHALL LECTURES
FOREWORD
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, the design of which shall be the exhibition of the proofs, from all sources, of the Divine Origin, Inspiration, and Authority of the Holy Scriptures. The course of lectures shall be delivered annually before the University and the public without any charge for admission.
“The lecturers shall be chosen by an electing body consisting of the President of the University, the five senior members of the Faculty of the College of Liberal Arts, and the President of the Board of Trustees, subject to the approval of the Board of Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The lecturers must be persons of high and wide repute, of broad and varied scholarship, who firmly adhere to the evangelical system of Christian faith. The selection of lecturers may be made from the world of Christian scholarship without regard to denominational divisions. Each course of lectures is to be published in book form by an eminent publishing house and sold at cost to the Faculty and students of the University.”
George R. Grose,
President of DePauw University.