A A o cz "JD ^'J^ 9 7 lAL 9 LIB 2 4 4 1 rc Ed 1^ iJiJI 11 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES SERMONS PBEAOHED AT TRINITY CHAPEL, BRIGHTON BY THE LATB REV. FREDERICK W. ROBERTSON, M. A., THE INCCUBEHT. SECOND SERIES, TENTH AMERICAN, FROM THE FIFTH LONDON EDITION. BOSTON: T I C K N () H AND F I E I. 1> S . M nrrci.xvr. 5 # ^ at So THE CONGREGATION WORSHIPPING IN TRINITY CHAPEL, BRIGHTON, FBOM AUGUST 15, 1847, TO AUGUST 15, 1863 THESB RECOLLECTIONS OF SERMONS PREACHED BT THEIR LATE PASTOR ARE DEDICATED WITH FEELINGS OF GRATEFUL RESPECT. <~?,.« rrc^Jr?/: LGv'G9 PREFACE TO THE FIRST ENGLISH EDITION. In the preface to the First Volume I explained the circumstances under which these Sermons were preserved, and it is not therefore necessary for me to do more now than allude to that preface, in pub- lishing this Second Volume. But I cannot forbear taking this opportunity of gratefully acknowledging the numerous tributes to my dear Brother's useful- ness which I have received since the First Volume was issued. Two years have now passed since those earnest and eloquent lips were silent in death; yet I am assured that his teaching is still remembered with love and gratitude; and I have a confident hope that the publication of these Sermons, imperfect as they are, and confessedly inadequate to the full representation of the grace and power which char- !• (5) 6 PREFACE TO THE FIRST ENGLISH EDITION. acterized his ministry, will be a means of continuing the blessed work which he did in his lifetime, and thus many who never saw his face may receive a lasting benefit from his teaching. STRUAN HOBERTSON. Rodney Housb, Cheltenham. ^ CONTENTS. MEMOIR Page 13 SERMON I. [Preached June 22, 1851.] CHRIST'S JUDGMENT RESPECTING INHERITANCE.* LuKB xii. 13-15. — •' And one of the company said unto him, Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me. And he said unto him, Man, who made me a judge, or a divider over you ? And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness : for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which ho possesseth." 17 SERMON II. [Preached January 6, 1850.] THE STAR IN THE EAST. Matt. ii. 1, 2. — " Now when Jesus was bom in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying. Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him." 46 * This Sermon should have followed next after Sermon XVII. in Volume I. (The Message of the Church to Men of Wealth), to which it ia the sequel, completing the argument. (7) ?/ CONTENTS. SERMON III. [Preached FebrUary 10, 1850.] THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. Matt. ii. 23-25. — *' And when Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the minstrels and the people making a noise, he said unto them, Give place ; for the maid is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn. But when the people were put forth, he went in, and took her by the hand, and the maid arose." Page 60 SERMON IV. [Preached March 10, 1850.] BAPTISM. Gal. iii. 26-29. — "For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female : for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." 75 SERMON V. [Preached March 17, 1850.] BAPTISM. 1 Peteh iii. 21. — "The like figure whercunto, even baptism, doth also now save us." 92 SERMON VI. [Preached October 13, 1850.] ELIJAH. 1 Kings lix. 4. — " But he himself went on a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper-tree ; and he requested for himself that he might die ; and said. It is enough : now, Lord, take away my life ; for I am not better than my fathers." 106 CONTENTS. § SERMON VII. [Preached January 12, 1851.] NOTES ON PSALM LI. Written by David, after a double crime : Uriah put in the forefront of the battle, — the wife of the murdered man taken, &c. . « . Page 117 SERMON VIII. [Preached March 2, 1851.] OBEDIENCE THE ORGAN OF SPIRITUAL KNOWLEDGE. John vii. 17. — " If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doc- trine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself." . . . 128 SERMON IX. [Preached March, 30, 1851.] RELIGIOUS DEPRESSION. Psalm xlii. 1-3. — "As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, God. My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God ; when shall I come and appear before God ? My tears have been my meat day and night, while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God 7" 141 SERMON X. [Preached April 6, 1851.] FAITH OF THE CENTURION. Matt. viii. 10. — " When Jesus heard it, he marvelled, and said to them that followed. Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in IsraeL" 149 SERMON XI. [Preached July 27, 1851.] THE RESTORATION OF THE ERRING. Gal. vi 1,2. — " Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness ; consid- ering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one another's bur- dens, and so fulfil the law of Christ." 160 t0 CONTENTS. SERMON XII. [Pteached Christmas Day, 1851.] CHRIST THE SON. Hkb. i. 1. — " God, who at sundry times, and in divers manners, spak« in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son." Page 172 SERMON XIII. [Preached April 25, 1852.] WORLDLINESS. 1 John ii. 15-17. — " If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof ; but xie that doeth the will of God abideth forever." 182 SERMON XIV. [Preached November 14, 1852.] THE SYDENHAM PALACE, AND THE RELIGIOUS NON-OBSERVANCE OF THE SABBATH. KoM. xiv. 5, 6. — " One man esteemeth one day above another; another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord j and he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks." 198 SERMON XV. [Preached January 2, 1853.] THE EARLY DEVELOPMENT OF JESUS. Luke ii. 40, — "And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled witji wisdom; and the grace of God was upon him." 213 CONTENTS. ^i SERMON XVI. [Preached January 9, 1853.] CHRIST'S ESTIMATE OF SIN. LuKK xix. 10 — " The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which, was lost" Page 229 SERMON XVII. [Preached January 16, 1853.] THE SANCTIFICATION OF CHRIST. JoHK xvii. 19. — " And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth." 244 SERMON XVIII. [Preached January 23, 1853.] THE FIRST MIRACLE. I. THE GLORY OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER. John ii. 11. — " This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his disciples belieyed on him." 261 SERMON XIX. [Preached January 30, 1853.] THE FIRST MIRACLE. II. THE GLORY OF THE DIVINE SON. John ii. 11. — «* This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of GalUee, and manifested forth his glory; and his disciples belieyed on him." 277 SERMON XX. [Preached March 20, 1853.] THE GOOD SHEPHERD John x. 14, 15. — " I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I th« Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. " . , 2^4 12^ CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXI. [Preached Easter-day, March 27, 1853.] THE DOUBT OF THOMAS. John xx. 29. — "Jesus saith onto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed ; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have beUeved," Page 312 CHAPTER XXII. [Preached May 8, 1853.] THE IRREPARABLE PAST. Mark xi v. 41, 42. — "And he cometh the third time, and saith unto them, Sleep on now, and take your rest : it is enough, the hour is come ; behold, the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise up, let us go ; lo, he that betrayeth me is at hand." .... 829 MEMOIR. Frederick Wiljam Robertson was born in London, the 3d February, 1816. He had Scotch blood in his veins ; his grandfather held a commission in the 83d or Glasgow Regiment, during the American war. Of his early life we know little ; it seems to have been passed in considerable vicissitude. One fact is interesting for its clear foreshad- owing of the man : when four years old he derived his chief pleasure from books ; to the last he was an ardent, zealous student. He passed some years of his childhood at Leith Fort, where his father, a Captain of Artillery, was stationed. At nine we find him at the Grammar School of Beverley. Removed from this, he accompanied his pa- rents to the Continent, residing chiefly in France ; and at fifteen he entered the New Academy in Edinburgh, where, under Archdeacon Williams, he distinguished himself in Greek and Latin verse. After a year of the Academy, he attended the philosophical classes at the University, and prepared himself for the study of the Law.* The profes- sion was uncongenial, his dislike to it grew upon him, and in a few months it was abandoned for the Army, to which he had a strong predilection. He was of a military ancestry and a military family. To the end it was the heart of a soldier that beat within the delicate and shattered frame. " Those who have en- joyed his confidence, even of late years, can well under- stand the boyish ardor and enthusiasm with which he contemplated a military life. Despite extreme nervous sensibility, and an almost feminine delicacy of feeling, he • Dr. Terrot, now Bishop of Edinburgh, acted as his private tutor. 2 (13) 14 MEMOIR. was at heart brave, manly, intrepid, with a quick sym- pathy for all that was noble, courageous, and unselfish — with, as he himself expressed it, an ' unutterable admira- tion of heroic daring.' " Those who have read his Lec- tures on Poetry will not readily forget the ardor with which he relates the chivalry of our soldiers in Scinde, the strong sympathy by which he interprets the thoughts they only felt, the fine burst of enthusiasm with which he defends war against the abuse of peace societies : " Take away honor and imagination and poetry from war, and it becomes carnage. Doubtless. And take away public spirit and invisible principles from resistance to a tax, and Hampden becomes a noisy demagogue. . . . Carnage is terrible. The conversion of producers into destroyers is a calamity. Death, and insults to woman worse thail death, and human features obliterated beneath the hoof of the war-horse, and reeking hospitals, and ruined com- merce, and violated homes, and broken hearts — they are all awful. But there is something worse than death. Cowardice is worse. And the decay of enthusiasm and manliness is worse. And it ia worse than death — ay, worse than a hundred thousand deaths — when a people has gravitated down into the creed, that the ' wealth of nations ' consists not in generous hearts — ' Fire in each breast, and freedom in each brow ' — in national virtues, and primitive simplicity, and heroic endurance, and preference of duty to life ; not in men, but in silk, and cotton, and something that they call ' capital.' Peace is blessed. Peace, arising out of charity. But peace, springing out of the calcula- tions of selfishness, is not blessed. If the price to be paid for peace is this, that wealth accumulate and men decay, better far that every street in every town of our once noble country should run blood ! " There must be many who yet remember the thrill of the words with which he prefaced Wordsworth's noble sonnet, " It is not to be thought of that the flood: " — " The moment was like that of the deep silence which precedee a MEMOIR. 16 thunder-storm, when every breath is hushed, ana every separate dried leaf, as it falls through the boughs, is heard tinkling down from branch to branch ; when men's breath was held, when men's blood beat thick in their hearts as they waited, in solemn and grand, but not in painful — rather in triumphant — expectation, for the moment when the storm should break, and the French cry of Glory ! should be thundered back again by England's sublimer battle-cry of Duty!" That he retained this soldier-spirit is, in a man of his fervent piety, a proof that it is not an ungodly spirit. Colonel Garainer thought it no blot on the escutcheon of his faith that he went out to fight at Prestonpans ; heroic Hedley Vicars received his mortal wound as he led a bay- onet charge. And had Mr. Robertson entered the army with the " deep religious convictions " he entertained, he would, by the grace of God, have wielded the same healthy Christian influence as an officer, though in a much narrower sphere, which he did wield as a clergyman. God, however, had better things in store for him. He had been placed, at the request of King William IV., upon the Commander-in-Chief's list. Some delay occurred be- fore he received his commission. His friends took advan- tage of it to urge the higher claims of the Church ; among others, the present Bishop of Cashel pressed him to de- vote himself directly to the service of God. He was strongly moved, but not decided. He left it to his father to choose : the result was that he matriculated at Oxford. Four days after his matriculation, he received the offer of a cornetcy in the 2d Dragoon Guards ; but his course had been taken, and he would not turn back. We need not point out the perfect confidence between father and son which this incident reveals, nor the humility and unselfish- ness of Mr. Robertson. They were manifested as touch- ingly and strikingly at another crisis of his history. They characterized his life. There is but scanty record of his terms at Oxford. Ho 16 MEMOIR. was a hard student, and acquired a high reputation ; but, from a singular diffidence, he refused to go up for honors, though urged by his tutors, and twice requested, under peculiarly flattering circumstances, by the Examiners. Mr. Ruskin was one of his associates, and doubtless stimulated his keen relish for art. And from a passage in his Lec- tures, it appears that even then he cultivated the habit of close observation, the perception of the nicer shadea of feeling, which distinguished him in riper years : "At Blenheim, the seat of the Duke of Marlborough, there ia a Madonna, into which the old Catholic painter has tried to cast the religious conceptions of the Middle Ages, virgin purity and infi- nite repose. The look is upwards, the predominant color of the picture blue, which we know has in itself a strange power to lull and soothe. It is impossible to gaze on this picture without being conscious of a calming influence. During that period of the year in which the friends of the young men of Oxford come to visit their brothers and sons, and Blenheim becomes a place of favorite resort, I have stood aside near that picture, to watch its efiFect on the dif- ferent gazers, and have seen group after group of young undergradu- ates and ladies, full of life and noisy spirits, Unconsciously stilled before it, the countenance relaxing into calmness, and the voice sinking to a whisper. The painter had spoken his message, and human beings, ages after, felt what he meant to say." While at Brazenose he witnessed two scenes which left an ineflFaceable impression on his memory, to which he re- ferred long after with lively emotion. He saw the triumph of " Arnold, the type of Enghsh action, and Wordsworth, the type of English thought." The two men who had quietly revolutionized England — who had been greeted at the outset with hostility and scorn — who, with firm, pa- tient manliness, and in the living conviction of the truth they loved, had held on their way against reproach, cal- umny, inveterate prejudice, public opinion — were crowned in the same theatre with enthusiastic applause. It sunk deep into the heart of the student. There lay in it a sig- MEMOIR. 17 nificant prophecy for himself. He reaped the darkness and the wrong ; the glory and the light came too late. Immediately after leaving college he was ordained, and discharged the duties of a curate at Winchester for about twelve months, when "his health began to decline, and he went on the Continent to recruit his shattered energies." In his absence he visited much of the beautiful scenery that is accessible to an enthusiastic, and, notwithstanding his nervous delicacy, hardy traveller. It was no doubt a time of exquisite enjoyment. His sermons abound in rapid sketches that unfold his intense delight in natural beauty, and which are remarkable no less for their poetry of ex- pression, than their fidelity, and the vividness they assume from the notice of trifles, characteristic, but commonly unheeded. He was married at Geneva, and soon after returned to England. During the next four years he acted as curate of Christ Church, Cheltenham ; and at the beginning of 1847 he removed to St. Ebbs, Oxford. It was while oflBciating here for two months that he received the ofier of the Church at Brighton, with which his name and work will be always associated. " At St. Ebbs he re- ceived a stipend for his services miserably inadequate to their value ; yet when the incumbency of Trinity Chapel, Brighton, with the comparatively splendid income to be derived from it, was pointed out to him, he only expressed a willingness to sacrifice his own personal convenience and emolument to the cause in which he labored, and left it to the Bishop of Oxford to send him wherever his lord- ship thought he would be most useful. The Bishop ad- vised his coming to Brighton, and he prepared to do so." Between the Army and the Church, he left the choice with his father; between St. Ebbs and Brighton, with his Bishop There was the same humility, childlikeness, unselfishness : but in this instance more direct consecration to God, a 2* 18 MEMOIR. higher pitch of self-sacrifice. He entered on his work at Brighton August 15, 1847. Hitherto he had been a quiet, faithful, laborious curate, doing his parish work zealously and unobtrusively, "bene- fiting greatly those under the influence of his ministry." Genial and lovable, he had many friends. There were some to admire his rare powers ; and a few even bold enough to follow his originality, though it led them very far out of the beaten tracks of thought. In Brighton it was different. Trinity Chapel was well known. It was occupied by one of the most aristocratic and intel- lectual audiences in England. His eloquence and original- ity could not fail to be marked. And if the congregation was intellectual, he was preeminently so. The Chapel be- came crowded. Sittings were scarcely ever to be had. For six years the enthusiasm never slackened ; it grew and spread silently and steadily, and when he died broke out in a burst of universal sorrow. He was in no way misled by it. He was thankful for being listened to, for he felt he had a message from God to deliver. But he put no faith in mere excitement, the eager upturned face, the still hush of attention. "What is ministerial success?" he asks. — " Crowded churches — full aisles — attentive con- gregations — the approval of the religious world — much impression produced ? Elijah thought so ; and when he found out his mistake, and discovered that the applause on Carmel subsided into hideous stillness, his heart well- nigh bi'oke with disappointment. Ministerial success lies in altered lives and obedient humble hearts ; unseen work recognized in the judgment-day." That success was abundantly vouchsafed to him. It was the testimony of one who knew him well : — "I cannot count up conquests in any place or by any man so numerous and so vast, — conquests achieved in so short a period, and in many in stances over the hearts and consciences of those whom, MEMOIR. T$ from their age or pursuits, it is always most difficult to reach, — as were the conquests of that devoted soldier of the cross of Christ whose followers you were." * Mr. Robertson left no means untried by which to win sinful men and women to the love of Christ. He sought them in their homes, in their haunts of vice, suffering no pain nor trouble of his own to hinder him, deterred by no fear of misconception, never losing sight of them, pleading with them with the irresistible force of an ardent nature sanctified and intensified by the Holy Spirit. Even in hia undergraduateship, there were many who received througl him light, strength, and the knowledge of a Saviour ; and their number kept pace with the widening sphere of his influence. Yet there was a dark side to all this, a shadow that blighted where it fell. The originality, the manly out- spoken thoughts, the freedom from conventionalism and cant phrase, the firm grasp of truth, the bold utterance of it without respect of persons or parties, — all this, which had attracted no great notice in the curate at Winchester or Cheltenham, became as noted as the popularity of the incumbent of Brighton. From this time he was attacked with coarse abuse, his words were twisted, his meaning misrepresented. He was pursued with a venom which only religious men and religious papers know how to use ; his simplest acts were turned into an engine to assail him ; he was held up to odium by bad names, persecuted with a relentless cruelty that embittered his life. He did not complain. " It seems to me a pitiful thing," he once said, " for any man to aspire to be true and to speak truth, and then to complain in astonishment that truth has not crowns to give, but thorns." f But he had a feeble body, and a • From a Funeral Sermon by the Rev. James Anderson, the excellent Preacher of Lincoln's Inn. t Second Address to the Working Men. 20 MEMOIE. nervous system which was exquisitely acute ; and, " hu« manly speaking, his death was hastened by anxiety and intense susceptibility, acting upon an exhausted frame, unfit to cope longer with the trouble and suffering so plen- tifully strewn in his path." * To a man who was thought- less enough to charge him with gaining considerable self- applause and great popularity with the multitude by affecting to look down from a cool, philosophic height on the struggle and heat below, he wrote a touching letter, in which he thus sorrowfully describes his own position : " He will find himself [he is supposing his accuser in his place], to hie painful surprise, charged on the one side for his earnestness with heresy, and on the other for his charity with latudinarianism. .... He will find his atteni2Dt to love men, and his yearnings for their sympathy, met by suspicion of his motives, and malignant slanders upon his life ; his passionate desire to reach ideas instead of words, and get to the root of what men mean, he will find treated, even by those who think that they are candid, as the gratification of a literary taste, and the affectation of a philosophic height above the Btrife of human existence. I would not recommend him to try that philosophic height which he thinks so self-indulgent, unless he has the hardihood to face the keenest winds that blow over all lonely places, whether lonely heights or lonely flats. If he can steel his heart against distrust and suspicion, — if he can dare to be pro- nounced dangerous by the ignorant, hinted at by his brethren in public, and warned against in private, — if he can resolve to bo Btruck on every side, and not strike again, giving all quarter and asking none, — if he can struggle in the dark with the prayer for light of Ajax on his lips, in silence and alone, — then let him adopt the line which seems so easy, and be fair and generous and chival- rous to all." The rancor of his opponents did not even cease with life, — it followed him to the stillness of the tomb. In papers which met the eye of his afflicted relatives while the earth was yet fresh upon his grave, weighty doubts were expressed about the possibility of his salvation. The * Preface to the Lectures on Poetry. MEMOIR. 21 Christian mind of Britain has taken its own view of the matter. Edition after edition of his Sermons is exhausted. His name stands high, and it is rising surely to its fitting place. He is spoken of with strong difference of opinion sometimes, — but even then with respect and admiration ; and his Sermons are already assumed to be a landmark in the religious thought of his country. There was encour- agement, too, during these brief six years. On the Christ- mas morning after his settlement in Brighton, he found a set of handsome prayer-books on the reading-desk, pre- sented by the servants who attended his Chapel. The year before he died, he received an address from the young men, no less affectionate than cheering to the heart of the pastor. He was able to say, in his reply: " I know that there are many who were long in darkness and doubt and saw no light, and who have now found an anchor and a rock and a resting-place I feel deeply grateful to be enabled to say that, if my ministry were to close to-morrow, it has not been in this town altogether an entire failure." And, through all his trials, the love, and earnestness, and ready helpful sympathy, of his congrega- tion, were an unspeakable comfort. To his preaching we have previously referred in some detail. We shall not return to it now, though we feel painfully how much has been left unsaid. It was marked by an intense realization of the truth of Christ, and an equally intense realization of the life of Christ. He inter- preted Scripture with a marvellous insight. A clear light often flashes from passages which another man would have loft or made dark enigmas. The inward gifts which God bestowed on him in such large measure are manifest in every page of his writings. They were wedded in exqui- site harmony to many outward graces, — those which lend effective aid to the persuasion of the preacher. He had "a noble and attractive mien;" "an utterance the most 22 MEMOIR. exquisitely melodious and thrilling ; " a face that reflected every shifting play of feeling ; a figure frail, and made frailer by disease, but erect and manly ; a refined delicacy, a winning grace. He spoke with an impassioned elo- quence, of which his posthumous Sermons can give but faint conception. Men the most widely opposed to him, scoffers and careless sceptics, when they entered his church, were arrested by the torrent-flow of thought, the poetic imagery, the fiery glow of the words ; yet more than all, perhaps, they were thrilled by his mysterious knowledge of the human heart, the depth and purity of his love for God. He was an extemporary preacher. His manner was to have " a few words pencilled upon a card or scrap of note-paper, and sufficing by way of ground- work ; yet his spontaneous efforts were, in point of com- position, as highly finished as if they had been set down and committed to memory." His style was simple, but not in the sense commonly received of sentences (no mat- ter about the thoughts) running after each other on easy words of two syllables ; for, though his language waa plain, apt, and never redundant, the thoughts were pro- found, the reasoning close, the whole tone intellectual. It required patient and trained effort of mind to follow him and take up his fulness of meaning. His congregation was composed of the highly educated, and he preached to them as a man of education and refinement. It was his special vocation. Yet the poor were never sent hungry away. His later Sermons are pervaded by a tone of sad- ness : " Not ono of u8 but has felt his heart aching for want of sym- pathy. We have had our lonely hours, our days of disappoint- ment, and our moments of hopelessness ; times when our highest feelings have been misunderstood, and our purest met with ridi- cule. Days when our heavy secret was lying unshared, like ice upon the heart. And then the spirit gives way ; we have wished that all were over, — that we could lie down tired, and rest, lika the children, from life." MEMOIR. 23 He dwells on "the lofty sadness which characterized the late ministry of Jesus, as He went down from the sunny mountain-tops of life, into the darkening shades of the valley where lies the grave." His thoughts turn with a weary melancholy to the care- lessness with which men live and die : " Have you ever seen those marble statues in some public square or garden, which art has so fashioned into a perennial fountain, that through the lips, or through the hands, the clear water flows in a perpetual stream, on and on forever, and the marble stands there — passive, cold — making no effort to arrest the gliding water ? "It is so that time flows through the hands of men, — swift, never pausing, till it has run itself out : and there is the man petri- fied into a marble sleep, not feeling what it is which is passing away forever." He speaks oftener of the hollow nothingness of the tem- poral and visible : "Things are passing, — our friends are dropping off from us. strength is giving way ; our relish for earth is going, and the world no longer wears to our hearts the radiance that once it wore. We have the same sky above us, and the same scenes around us ; but the freshness that our hearts extracted from everything in boyhood, and the glory that seemed to rest once on earth and life, have faded away forever. Sad and gloomy truths to the man who is going down to the grave with his work undone. Not sad to the Chris- tian ; but rousing, exciting, invigorating. If it be the eleventh hour, we have no time for folding of the hands ; we will work the faster. Through the changefulness of life ; through the solemn tolling of the bell of time, which tells us that another, and another, and another, are gone before us ; "through the noiseless rush of a world which is going down with gigantic footsteps into nothingness, let not the Christian slack his hand from work ; for he that doeth the will of God may defy hell itself to quench his immortality." The prophetic anticipation of the end was unconsciously tinging his thoughts ; the iaurden and pain of life forced ati utterance ; and still, in this last extract, we see how 24 MEMOIR. bravely his faith bore him up, firm, bold, unshrinking, unto death. Mr. Robertson's work was by no means confined to the pulpit. By the working men he was regarded as a frank and faithful friend. Already, in 1848, he was actively engaged with a Working Men's Institute, the idea of which had been early in his mind. It was intended for a poorer class than were embraced by the Athenaeums and Mechanics' Institutes, and the subscription was only a penny a week. In October of that year, one thousand three hundred members were enrolled. They besought him to deliver the opening address, and their anxiety over- came his objections. No one who has carefully perused that address can wonder at the afiection the men bore to him, at the sway he held over their hearts, at the place his memory still freshly retains. For two years the Insti- tute had great success. A small section of the members then advocated the introduction of sceptical publications. The society was threatened with dissolution. Mr. Robert- son manfully came forward and delivered a second address, with the hope of restoring peace. " Brother men, mem- bers of the Working Men's Institute," he began, "you asked me to stand by you at the hopeful beginning of your institution ; I could not desert you in the moment of danger, and the hour of your unpopularity I am here to identify myself in public again with you, — to say that your cause is my cause, and your failure my failure." The introduction of infidel prints was maintained on three grounds, — rights of fi-ee inquiry, rights of liberty, and rights of democracy. On these three he met its advocates with excellent sense, warm, honest feeling, and sound principle. But "the society," we learn, "failed to right itself; and in July, 1850, it was formally dissolved. He counselled a second experiment, and another society ; or rather, as he regarded it, the old one, purified by experi- MEilOIE. 25 ence, rose into being." It forsook, greatly to his regret, the good old title of Working Men, and assumed that of Mechanics ; but it has flourished longer than its predeces- sor, and is still in full vigor. Politics, in the higher sense, had the same powerful attraction for Mr. Robertson that they had for Dr. Arnold. He took a deep interest in all national questions. Nor was his interest merely theoreti- cal. In every movement in Brighton connected with social life and progress he was active and prominent. And on one social question, which underlies all others, the relation of classes, — the adjustment of the rights of the rich and the rights of the poor, — he spoke with a wisdom, and courage, and love, which had a notable influ- ence in his own sphere, and from which we may now hope for far wider and even more permanent results. In 1852, Mr. Robertson delivered to the members of the Mechanics' Institution two Lectures on the Influence of Poetry on the Working Classes. They are necessarily brief, but every line is suggestive. We do not know that there is anywhere so true an estimate of our modern poe- try ; while the exquisite snatches of criticism on Shakes- peare, Wordsworth, and Tennyson, reveal a power which, in these days of hasty reading, and flippant, shallow remark, we can ill afibrd to lose. Early in the spring of 1853, ho followed up this subject by a remarkable lecture on the poetry of his favorite Wordsworth. The lecture was never published. It was preserved only in the notes of a reporter. But, did our space permit, we could not forbear quoting from that source, imperfect as it is, his fine per- ception of Wordsworth's calling, the relation he bore to the mighty heart of the nation. He reviewed the qualifi- cations necessary for appreciating Wordsworth's poetry^ his character and life, so far as they bear upon it. He reserved for another opportunity what he considered more important than either, — the question of how far Words- 3 26 MEMOIE. worth's theories and principles are true, how fai exagger- ated, and how far he worked them out. That opportunity never came. During the lecture his friends remarked with alarm the hectic flush that rose upon his cheek, the evident effort by which the will triumphed over bodily suffering. " His exertions in the pulpit were at this period almost overpowering, and the intense study to which he had long accustomed himself became agonizing in the extreme." Before April he was compelled to relinquish his duties for a time, and seek change of air and relaxation. The end was drawing near. Slightly recruited, but unwilling to remain longer from his post, he returned to Brighton in the third week of his leave. The effort was too great. With failing health and increasing pain, he continued to discharge every duty of his office. The congregation sought assistance for him ; the vicar did not approve of the man they selected, and refused to appoint him. Alone, and " sinking rapidly," Mr. Robertson struggled on, a spectacle of quiet, unselfish heroism that might well shame many a brother of the cross. One week, his sufferings became rapidly more acute ; his preparation for the coming Sunday laid on him the burden of a sharper agony. He gave way, at last. That Sunday a stranger took his place.* He never preached again. He lingered in his room for two months in the torture of an excruciating disease. He bore it with- out a murmur, with calm resignation to His will who chas- tens those He loves. He constantly assured those about him of his happiness and peace. He had penetrated the meaning of the Saviour's life ; he was to follow Him through agony and death. On Sunday, the 15th of August, the congregation knelt before God in supplication for their dying pastor. That * By a singular coincidence, the stranger was Archdeacon "Williams, his former rector, who occupied the pulpit from this time till Mr. Robert- son's death, and preached the Afternoon Funeral Sermon. MEMOIR. 27 day six years before, they had felt for the first time the spell of his holy earnestness, they had sat entranced by the eloquent truth that flowed from his lips. During the day he was able to recline upon a sofa before an open win- dow ; towards night he grew suddenly worse. The pain was intense. He could not speak, save at intervals, when he cried, feebly, "My God, my God, — my Fathei", my Father." The yearning of his heart was soon fulfilled. His attendants sought to change his position. " I cannot bear it," he said ; " let mo rest. I must die. Let God do His work." They were the'last words he spoke. In a few minutes the lips that uttered them were sealed in death. There remains little moi-e to be told. At Brighton there was profound and general sorrow. On the day of the funeral the shops were closed, the houses were in mourn- ing. Strangers who had arrived inquired if one of the royal family was dead. Headed by one thousand five hundred of those who well remembered the address of " Brother men and fellow-workmen," the melancholy cor- tege wound through a crowd extending for more than a mile. " And women's tears fell fast as rain, And rough men shook with inward pain For him they ne'er should see again." But there was one quiet, unnoticed mourning, more touch- ing than the crowds of the procession, or the solemn awe that hushed the streets. In the. gray dawn of the morning after the funeral, a group was seen weeping over the new grave. It was a mechanic, with his wife and children, dressed in such emblems of woe as they could afford. When Mr. Robertson came to Brighton, that man and his •nfe were rank infidels. One day, as he passed Trinity hapel, he thought he would go in to hear what the new eacher had to say. The word was blessed to his salva- tion. He became a constant worshipper, and brought others to listen to the same teacher. We dare add noth- 28 MEMOIR. ing to this. To those who can feel, H is more eloquent than words. A monument to Mr. Robertson has been raised in Brigh- ton Cemetery. The working men sought to have a share in it. On one side they erected, "in grateful remembrance of his sympathy, and in deep sorrow for their loss," * a medallion, representing " their benefactor " seated in his library, in earnest conversation with three artisans. Within the railing of the monument there is a plot of gar- den ground. The same men asked and received permis- sion to keep it free from weeds, and to supply it with fresh flowers, ******** There are no materials for an exciting biography. There is an absence of striking incidents. But there is the power of a single, earnest, considerate life. Bare though it is, we cannot think of it unmoved. Nay, its very sim- ple modesty, in contrast with the great results that have followed it, the great fame that time is wreathing round it, is infinitely more impressive than the noise of a public triumph, or the stir and glare that surround a public name. It is the life that speaks to us from the silence of its retirement ; a voice to which all men, especially all clergymen, would do well to take heed. They will learn from it the hidden power of faith, the calm might that lies in communion with the truth, the nobleness and beauty and reward of a high self-sacrifice. They will learn from it to keep brave hearts when the clouds settle on their life, to trust that God will do His work, though not per- haps till their day is past; they will learn to hold steadfast by their work, though pain and sorrow are knocking loudly at the door ; they will utter with the thankfulness of full hearts the aspiration engraved upon his tomb, "Glory to the Saviour who was his all 1 " — Udinburgh Christian Magazine. * The words are taken from the inscription. SEEMONS. .1. [Preached June 22, 1851.] CHRIST'S JUDGMENT RESPECTING INHERITANCE.* Luke xii. 13-15. — " And one of the company said unto him, Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me. And he said unto him, Man, who made me a judge, or a divider over you? And he said unto them. Take heed, and beware of covetousness : for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which ho The Son of God was misunderstood and misinter- preted in his day. With this fact we are familiar; but we are not all familiar with the consideration that it was very natural He should be so mistaken. He went about Galilee and Judea proclaiming the downfall of every injustice, the exposure and confuta- tion of every lie. He denounced the lawyers who refused education to the people in order that they might retain the key of knowledge in their own hands. He reiterated Woe ! woe ! woe ! to the Scribes and ♦ This Sermon was accidentally omitted from its proper place after the 17th Sermon in Vol. I. — "The Message of the Church to Men of Wealth." It was preached on the following Sunday, and is the sequel to that Sermon. 3* (29) so Christ's judgment eespecting ikheritance. Pharisees, wlio revered the past, and systematical! j persecuted every new prophet and every brave man who rose up to vindicate the spirit of the past against the institutions of the past. He spoke parables which bore hard on the men of wealth. That, for instance, of the rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day ; who died, and in hell lifted up his eyes being in torments. That of the wealthy proprietor who prospered in the world ; who pulled down his barns to build greater : who all the while was in the sight of God a fool ; who in front of judgment and eternity was found unready. He stripped the so-called religious party of that day of their respectability ; convicted them, to their own astonishment, of hypocrisy, and called them whited sepulchres. He said God was against them ; that Jerusalem's day was come, and that she must fall. And now consider candidly : — Suppose that all this had taken place in this country ; that an unknown stranger, with no ordination, with no visible authority, — Dasing his authority upon his Truth, and his agreement with the mind of God the Father, — had appeared in this England, uttering half the severe things He spoke against the selfishness of wealth, against ecclesiastical authorities, against the clergy, against the popular religious party : — suppose that such an one should say that our whole social life is corrupt and false: suppose that, instead of " thou blind Pharisee," the word had been " thou blind Churchman ! " Should we have fallen at the feet of such an one, and said, Lo ! this is a message from Almighty God, and He who brings it is a Son of God ; perhaps, what He says Himself, His only Son, God, of God ? Christ's judgment eespecting inheritance. 31 Or, should we have rather said, This is dangerous teaching, and revolutionary in its tendencies ; and He who teaches it is an incendiary, a mad, democratical, dangerous fanatic? That was exactly what they did say of your Re- deemer in His day ; nor does it seem at all wonderful that they did. The sober, respectable inhabitants of Jerusalem, very comfoi table themselves, and utterly unable to conceive why things should not go on as they had been going on for a hundred years, — not smarting from the misery and the moral degradation of the lazars with whom He associated, and under whose burdens His loving spirit groaned, — thought it excess- ively dangerous to risk the 'subversion of their quiet enjoyments by such outcries. They said — prudent men ! — If he is permitted to go on this way, the Romans will come and take away our place and nation. The Priests and Pharisees, against whom he had spoken specially, were fiercer still. They felt there was no time to be lost. But, still more — His own friends and followers mis understood Him. They heard Him speak of a Kingdom of Justice and Righteousness, in which every man should receive the due reward of his deeds. They heard him say that this kingdom was not far off, but actually among them, hindered only by their sins and dulness from immediate appparance. Men's souls were stirred and agitated. They were ripe for anything, and any spark would have produced explosion. They thought the next call would be to take the matter into their own hands. 32 Christ's judgment respecting inheritances Accordingly, on one occasion, St. John and St. James asked permission to call down fire from heaven upon a village of the Samaritans which would not receive their message. On another occasion, on a single figurative mention of a sword, they began to gird themselves for the struggle : " Lord," said one, " behold, here are two swords." Again, as soon as He entered Jerusalem for the last time, the populace heralded his way with shouts, thinking that the long- delayed hour of retribution was come at last. They saw the conqueror before them who was to vindicate their wrongs. In imagination they already felt their feet upon the necks of their enemies. And because their hopes were disappointed, and He was not the Demagogue they wanted, therefore they turned against Him. Not the Pharisees, but the people whom He had come to save, — the outcast, and the publican, and the slave, and the maid-servant : they whose cause He had so often pleaded, and whose emancipation he had prepared. It was the People who cried, " Crucify Him, Crucify Him ! " This will become intelligible to us, if we can get at the spirit of this passage. Among those who heard Him lay down the laws of the Kingdom — Justness, Fairness, Charity — there was one who had been defrauded, as it seems, by his brother, of his just share of the patrimony. He thought that the One who stood before him was exactly what he wanted : — a redresses of wrongs ; a champion of the oppressed ; a divider and arbiter between factions ; a referee of lawsuits ; one who would spend his life in the unerring decision of all mi&» understandings. cheist's judgment respecting inheritance. 33 To his astonishment, the Son of Man refused to itter- fere in his quarrel, or take part in it at all. " Man, who made me a judge, or a divider over you ? " We ask attention to two things. I. The Saviour's refusal to interfere. II. The source to which He traced the appeal for interference. I. The Saviour's refusal to interfere. 1. He implied that it A^as not his part to interfere. " Who made me a Judge, or a Divider ? " « It is a common saying, that religion has nothing to do with politics; and particularly there is a strong feel- ing current against all interference with politics by the ministers of rehgion. This notion rests on a basis which is partly wrong, partly right. To say that religion has nothing to do with politics, is to assert that which is simply false. It were as wise to say that the atmosphere has nothing to do with the principles of architecture. Directly, nothing — indirectly, much. Some kinds of stone are so friable, that though they will last for centuries in a dry climate, they will crumble away in a few years in a damp one. There are some temperatures in which a form of build- ing is indispensable which in another would be un- bearable. The shape of doors, windows, apartments, all depend upon the air that is to be admitted or ex- cluded. Nay, it is for the very sake of procuring a habitable atmosphere within certain limits that archi- tecture exists at all. The atmospheric laws are dis- tinct from the laws of architecture ; but there ia not an architectural question into which atmospheric 34 CHRIST'S JUDGMENT RESPECTING INHERITANCE. considerations do not enter as conditions of the ques* tion. That whicli the air is to architeture, rehgion is to politics. It is the vital air of every question. Directly it determines nothing — indirectly, it conditions every problem that can arise, " The kingdoms of this world must tecome the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ." How, if His Spirit is not to mingle with political and social truths ? Nevertheless, in the popular idea that religion as such must not be mixed with politics there is a pro- found truth. Here, for instance, the Saviour will not meddle with the question. He stands aloof, sublime and dignified. It was no part of His to take from the oppressor and give to the oppressed, much less to en- courage the oppressed to take from the oppressor him- self It was His part to forbid oppression. It was a Judge's part to decide what oppression was. It was not His office to determine the boundaries of civil light, nor to lay down the rules of the descent of pro]> erty. Of course, there was a spiritual and moral prin- ciple involved in this question. But He would not suffer His sublime mission to degenerate into the mere task of deciding casuistry. He asserted principles of love, unselfishness, order, which would decide all questions ; but the questions themselves He would not decide. He would lay down the great political principle, " Render unto Csesar the things that be Caesar's, and unto God the things which are God's." But He would not determine whether this particular tax was due to Cccsar or not. So, too. He would say, Justice, hke Mercy and Tm*H Christ's judgment respecting inheritance. 35 18 one of the weightier matters of the law ; but He would not decide whether, in this definite case, this or that brother had justice on his side. It was for them- selves to determine that, and in that determination lay their responsibility. And thus religion deals with men, not cases ; with human hearts, not casuistry. Christianity determines general principles, out of which no doubt the best government would surely spring ; but what the best government is it does not determine — whether Monarchy or a Republic, an Aris- tocracy or a Democracy. It lays down a great social law : Masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal. But it is not its part to declare how much is just and equal. It has no fixed scale of wages according to which masters must give. That it leaves to each master, and each age of society. It binds up men in a holy brotherhood. But what are the best institutions and surest means for arriving at this brotherhood it has not said. In particular, it has not pronounced whether competition or coopera- tion will secure it. And hence it comes to pass that Christianity is the Eternal Religion, which can never become obsolete. If it sets itself to determine the temporary and the local, — the justice of this tax, or the exact wrongs of that con- ventional maxim, — it would soon become obsolete: it would be the religion of one century, not of all. As it is, it commits itself to nothing except Eternal Prin- ciples. It is not sent into this world to establish monarchy, or secure the franchise ; to establish socialism, or to 36 cheist's judgment kespecting inheeitance. frown it into annihilation ; but to establish a Charity, and a Moderation, and a sense of Duty, and a love of Right, which will modify human life according to any circumstances that can possibly arise. 2. In this refusal, again, it was implied that His kingdom was one founded on spiritual disposition, not one of outward Law and Jurisprudence. That this lawsuit should have been decided by the brothers themselves, in love, with mutual fairness, would have been much ; that it should be determined by authoritative arbitration was, spiritually speaking, nothing. The right disposition of their hearts, and the right division of their property thence resulting, was Christ's kingdom. The apportionment of their prop- erty by another's division had nothing to do with His kingdom. Suppose that both were wrong : one oppressive, the other covetous. Then, that the oppressor should be- come generous, and the covetous liberal, were a great gain. But, to take from one selfish brother in order to give to another selfish brother, what spiritual gain would there have been in this ? Suppose, again, that the retainer of the inheritance was in the wrong, and that the petitioner had justice on his side ; that he was a humble, meek man, and his petition only one of right. Well, to take the property from the unjust and give it to Christ's servant, might be, and was, the duty of a Judge. But it was not Christ's part, nor any gain to the cause of Christ. He does not reward His servants with inheritances — with lands, houses, gold. " The kingdom of God is not meat and drink ; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." Christ triumphs by wrongs meekly Christ's judgment respecting inheritance. 37 borne, even more than by wrongs legally righted. What we call poetical justice is not His kingdom. To apply this to the question of the day. The great problem which lies before Europe for solution is, or will be, this : Whether the present possessors of the soil have an exclusive right to do what they will with their own ; or whether a larger claim may be put in by the workman for a share in the profits ? Whether Cap- ital has hitherto given tp Labor its just part or not? Labor is at present making an appeal, like that of this petitioner, to the Church, to the Bible, to God. " Mas- ter, speak unto my brother, that he divide the inherit- ance with me." Now, in the mere setting of that question to rest, Christianity is not interested. That landlords should become more liberal, and employers more merciful, — that tenants should be more honorable, and workmen joaore unselfish, — that would be indeed a glorious thing, a triumph of Christ's cause ; and any arrangement of the inheritance thence resulting would be a real coming of the kingdom. But whether the soil of the country and its capital shall remain the property of the rich, or become more available for the poor, — the rich and the poor remaining as selfish as before ; — whether the selfish rich shall be able to keep, or the selfish poor to take, is a matter, religiously speaking, of profound indifference. Which of the brothers shall have the inheritance, the monopolist or the covetous? Either — neither ; who cares ? Fifty years hence, what wiU it matter? But a hundred thousand years hence it will matter whether they settled the question by mutual generosity and forbearance. 3. I remark a tiurd thing. He refused to be the 4 38 Christ's judgment respecting inheritance. friend of one, because He was the friend of both. lie never was the champion of a class, because He waa the champion of Humanity. We may take for granted that the petitioner was an injured man, — one, at all events, who thought him- self injured ; and Christ had often taught the spirit which would have made his brother right him : but Ho refused to take his part against his brother, just be- cause he was his brother, Chi^ist's servant, and one of God's family, as well as he. And this was His spirit always. The Pharisees thought to commit Him to a side, when they asked whether it was lawful to give tribute to Caesar or not. But He would take no side as the Christ : neither the part of the government against the tax-payers, nor the part of the tax-payers against the government. Now, it is a common thing to hear of the rights of man, — a glorious and a true saying; but, as commonl_j used, the expression only means the rights of a sec- tion or class of men. And it is very worthy of remark, that in these social quarrels both sides appeal to Christ and to the Bible as the champions of their rights, precisely in the same way in which this man appealed to Him. One class appeal to the Bible, as if it were the great Arbiter which decrees that the poor shall be humble, and the subject submissive ; and the other class appeal to the same book triumphantly, as if •t were exclusivel}^ on their side : its peculiar blessed- aess consisting in this — that it commands the rich to divide the inheritance, and the ruler to impose nothing 'hat is unjust. In either of these cases, Christianity is degraded, und the Bible misused. They are not as thev have Christ's judgment respecting inheritance. 39 been made — shame ! — for centuries, the servile de- fenders of Rank and Wealth, nor are they the pliant advocates of discontent and rebellion. The Bible takes neither the part of the poor against the rich exclusively, nor that of the rich against the poor ; and this because it proclaims a real, deep, true, and not a revolutionary brotherhood. The brotherhood of which we hear so much is often only a one-sided brotheiiiood. It demands that the rich shall treat the poor as brothers. It has a right to do so. It is a brave and a just demand : but it forgets that the obligation is mutual ; that, in spite of his many faults, the rich man is the poor man's brother, and that the poor man is bound to recognize him and feel for him as a brother. It requires that every candid allowance shall be made for the vices of the poorer classes, in virtue of the circumstances which, so to speak, seem to mako such vices inevitable : for their harlotry, their drunken- ness, their uncleanness, their insubordination. Let it enforce that demand ; it may and must do it in the name of Christ. He was mercifully and mournfully gentle to those who, through terrible temptation and social injustice, had sunk; and sunk into misery at least as much as into sin. But, then, let it not be for- gotten that some sympathy must be also due, on the same score of circumstances, to the rich man. Wealth has its temptations, — so has power. The vices of the rich are his forgetfulness of responsibility, his indo- lence, his extravagance, his ignorance of wretched- ness. These must be looked upon, not, certainly, with weak excuses, but with a brother's eye, by the poor man, if he will assert a brotherhood. It is not just to 40 Christ's judgment eespecting inheritance. attribute all to circumstances in the one case, and nothing in the other. It is not brotherhood to say that the laborer does wrong because he is tempted, and the man of wealth because he is intrinsically bad. II. The Source to which He traced this appeal for a division. Now, it is almost certain that the reflection which arose to the lips of Christ is not the one which would have presented itself to us under similar circum- stances. We should probably have sneered at the state of the law in which a lawsuit could obtain no prompt decision, and injury get no redress: or, we should have remarked upon the evils of the system of primogeniture, and asked whether it were just that one brother should have all, and the others none : or, we might, perhaps, have denounced the injustice of per- mitting privileged classes at all. He did nothing of this kind : He did not sneer at the law, nor inveigh against the system, nor denounce the privileged classes. He went deeper — to the very loot of the matter. " Take heed, and beware of covet- ousness." It was covetousness which caused the un- just brother to withhold; it was covetousness which made the defrauded brother indignantly complain to a stranger. It is covetousness which is at the bottom of all lawsuits, all social grievances, all political fac- tions. So St. James traces the genealogy. "From whence come wars and fightings among you? Come they not hence, even from your lusts which reign in your flesh?" Covetousness: the covetousness of all. Of the oppressed as well as the oppressor; for the cry, Christ's judgment respecting inheritance. 41 " Divide," has its root in covetousness just as truly as " 1 will not." There are no innocent classes ; no devils who oppress, and angels who are oppressed. The guilt of a false social state must be equally divided. We will consider somewhat more deeply this covet- ousness. In the original the word is a very expressive one. It means the desire of having more, — not of having more because the?e is not enough, but simply a craving after more. More when a man has not enough, — more when he has. More — more. Ever more. Give — give. Divide — Divide. ^This craving is not universal. Individuals and whole nations are without it. There are some na- tions the condition of whose further civilization is that the desire of accumulation be increased. They are too indolent or too unambitious to be covetous. Energy is awakened when wants are immediate, press- ing, present ; but ceases with the gratification. There are other nations in which the craving is ex- cessive, even to disease. Preeminent among these is England. This desire of accumulation is the source of all our greatness and all our baseness. It is at once our glory and our shame. It is the cause of our commerce, of our navy, of our military triumphs, of our enormous wealth, and our marvellous inventions. And it is the cause of our factions and animosities, of our squalid pauperism, and the worse than heathen degradation of the masses of our population. That which makes this the more' marvellous is, that of all nations on the earth none are so incapable of enjoyment as we. God has not given to us that delicate development which He has given to other 42 cheist's judgment respecting inheritance. races. Our sense of harmony is dull and rare ; oui perception of beauty is not keen. An English hoh- day is rude and boisterous. If protracted, it ends in ennui and self-dissatisfaction. We cannot enjoy. Work, the law of human nature, is the very need of an English nature. That cold shade of Puritanism which passed over us, sullenly eclipsing all grace and enjoyment, was but the shadow of our own melan- choly, unenjoying national character. And yet we go on accumulating, as if we could enjoy more by having more. To quit the class in which they are, and rise into that above, is the yearly, daily, hourly effort of millions in this land. And tfeis were well, if this word " above " implied a reahty ; if it meant higher intellectually, morally, or even physi- cally. But the truth is, it is only higher fictitiously. The middle classes already have every real enjoyment which the wealthiest can have. The only thing they have not is the ostentation of the means of enjoy- ment. More would enable them to multiply equipages, houses, books : it could not enable them to enjoy them more. Thus, then, we have reached the root of the matter. Our national craving is, in the proper meaning of the term, covetousness. Not the desire of enjoying more, but the desire of having more. And if there be a country, a society, a people, to whom this warning is specially applicable, that coun- try is England, that society our own, that people we. " Take heed and be'ware of covetousness." The true remedy for this covetousness He then pro- ceeds to give. " A man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesses." chbtst's judgment eespecting inheritance. 43 Now, observe the distinction between His view and the world's view of humanity. To the question, "What is a man worth? the world replies by enumerating what he has. In reply to the same question, the Son of Man replies by estimating what he is. Not what he has, but what he is — that, through time and through eternity, is his real and proper life. He declared the presence of the soul ; He announced the dignity of the spiritual man ; He revealed the being that we are. Not that which is supported by meat and drink, but that whose very life is in Truth, Integrity, Honor, Purity. " Skin for skin," was the satanic version of this matter: " AU that a man hath wiU he give for his life." " What shaU it profit a man," was the Saviour's an- nouncement, " if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul ? " For the oppressed and the defrauded this was the true consolation and compensation. The true conso- lation. This man had lost so much loss. WeU ; how is he consoled ? By the thought of retaliation ? By the promise of revenge ? By the assurance that he shall have what he ought by right to have ? Nay ; but thus — as it were : Thou hast lost so much, but thyself remains. "A man's life consisteth not in the abun- dance of the things which he possesses." Most assuredly Christianity proclaims laws which will eventually give to each man his rights. I do not deny this. But I say that the hope of these rights is not the message, nor the promise, nor the consolation, of Christianity. Rather they consist in the assertion of the true Life, instead of all other hopes ; of the substitution of blessedness, which is inward character, for happiness, which is outward satisfactions of desire. 44 Christ's judgment respecting inheritance. For the broken-hearted, the peace which the world cannot give. For the poor, the life which destitution cannot take away. For the persecuted, the thought that they are the children of their Father which is in heaven. A very striking instance of this is found in the con- solation offered by St. Paul to slaves. How did he reconcile them to their lot? By promising that Chris- tianity would produce the abolition of the slave-trade? No ; though this was to be effected by Christianity ; but by assuring them that, though slaves, they might be inly free — Christ's freedmen. Art thou called, being a slave ? Care not for it. This, too, was the real compensation offered by Christianity for injuries. The other brother had the inheritance ; and to win the inheritance he had laid upon his soul the guilt of injustice. His advantage was the property ; the price he paid for that advantage was a hard heart. The in- jured brother had no inheritance, but instead he had, or might have had, innocence, and the conscious joy of knowing that he was not the injurer. Herein lay the balance. Now, there is great inconsistency between the com plaints and claims that are commonly made on these subjects. There are outcries against the insolence of power, and the hard-hearted selfishness of wealth. Only too often these cries have a foundation of jus- tice. But be it remembered that these are precisely ths cost at which the advantages, such as they are, are purchased. The price which the man in authority has paid for power is the temptation to be insolent. He has yielded to the temptation, and bought his Christ's judgment respecting inheritanx;e. 45 advantage dear. The price wliich the rich man pays for his wealth is the temptation to be selfish. They have paid in spirituals for what they have gained in temporals. Now, if you are crying for a share in that wealth, and a participation in that power, you must be content to run the risk of becoming as hard, an'd self- ish, and overbearing, as the man whom you denounce. Blame their sins, if you will, or despise their advan- tages ; but do not think 'that you can covet their ad- vantages and keep clear of their temptations. God is on the side of the poor, and the persecuted, and the mourners, — a light in darkness, and a life in death. But the poverty, and the persecution, and the dark- ness, are the condition on which they feel God's pres- ence. They must not expect to have the enjoyment of wealth and the spiritual blessings annexed to pov- erty at the same time. If you will be rich, you must be content to pay the price of falling into temptation, and a snare, and many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in perdition ; and if that price be too high to pay, then you must be content with the quiet val- leys of existence, where alone it is well with us ; kept out of the inheritance, but having instead God for your portion, your all-sufficient and everlasting por» tion — peace, and quietness, and rest with Christ. II. [Preached January 6, 1850.] THE STAR IN THE EAST. Matt. ii. 1, 2. — " Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the king, behold there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying. Where is he that is born King of the Jews ? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him." Our subject is the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles. The King of the Jews has become the Sovereign of the world ; a fact, one would think, which must cause a secret complacency in the heart of all Jews. For that which is most deeply working in modern life and thought is the Mind of Christ. His name has passed over our institutions, and much more has His Spirit penetrated into our social and domestic existence. In other words, a Hebrew mind is now, and has been for centuries, ruling Europe. But the Gospel which He proclaimed was not lim- ited to the Hebrews ; it was a Gospel for the nations. By the death of Christ, God had struck his death- blew at the root of the hereditary principle. "We be the seed of Abraham," was the proud pretension of the Israelite ; and he was told that spiritual dignity rests not upon spiritual descent, but upon spiritual (16) THE STAR IN THE EAST. 47 character. New tribes were adopted into the Chris- tian union ; and it became clear that there was no distinction of race in the spiritual family. The Jew- ish rite of circumcision, a symbol of exclusiveness, cutting off one nation from all others, was exchanged for Baptism, the symbol of universality, proclaiming the nearness of all to God, His Paternity over the human race, and the Sonship of all who chose to claim their privileges. • This was a Gospel for the world ; and nation after nation accepted it. Churches were formed ; the King- dom which is the domain of Love grew ; the Roman empire crumbled into fragments ; but every fragment was found pregnant with life. It broke not as some ancient temple might break, its broken pieces lying in lifeless ruin, overgrown with weeds : rather as one of those mysterious animals break, of which if you rend them asunder, every separate portion forms itself into a new and complete existence. Rome gave way; but every portion became a Christian kingdom, alive with the mind of Christ, and developing the Christian idea after its own peculiar nature. The portion of Scripture selected for the text and for the Gospel of the day has an important bearing on this great Epiphany. The " wise men " belonged to a creed of very hoary and venerable antiquity ; a system, too, which had in it the elements of strong vitality. For seven centuries after, the Mahometan sword scarcely availed to extirpate it, — indeed, could not. They whom the Mahometans called fire-worship- pers clung to their creed with vigor and tenacity indestructible, in spite of all his efforts. Here, then, in this act of homage to the Messiah, 48 THE STAR IN THE EAST. were the representatives of the highest then existing influences of the world, doing homage to the Lord of a mightier influence, and reverently bending before the dawn of the Star of a new and brighter Day. It was the first distinct turning of the Gentile mind to Christ — the first instinctive craving after a something higher than Gentilism could ever satisfy. In this light our thoughts arrange themselves thus : I. The expectation of the Gentiles. II. The Manifestation or Epiphany. I. The expectation : " Where is He that is born King of the Jews ? for we have seen His star in the east, and are come to worship Him." Observe, 1. The craving for Eternal Life. The " wise men " were " Magians," that is, Persian priests. The name, however, was extended to all the eastern philosophers who professed that religion, or even that philosophy. The Magians were chiefly distinguished by being worshippers of the stars, or students of astronomy. Now, astronomy is a science which arises from man's need of religion: other sciences spring out of wants bounded by this life. For instance, anatomy presuj)- poses disease. There would be no prying into our animal frame, no anatomy, were there not a malady to stimulate the inquiry. Navigation arises from the necessity of traversing the seas to appropiiate the produce of other countries. Charts, and maps, and soundings, are made, because of a felt earthly want. But in astronomy the first impulse of mankind came not from the craving of the intellect, but from the necessities of the soul. THE STAR IN THE EAST. 49 If j'^ou search down into the constitution of your being till you come to the lowest deep of all, underly- ing all other wants you will find a craving for what is infinite ; a something that desires perfection ; a wish that nothing but the thought of that which is eternal can satisfy. To the untutored mind nowhere was that want so called into consciousness, perhaps, as beneath the mighty skies of the !^ast. Serene and beautiful are the nights in Persia, and many a wise man in earlier days, full of deep thoughts, went out into the fields, like Isaac, to meditate at eventide. God has so made us that the very act of looking up produces in us per- ceptions of the sublime. And then those skies in their calm depths mirroring that which is boundless in space and illimitable in time, with a silence profound as death and a motion gliding on forever, as if symbolizing eternity of life, — no wonder if men associated with them their highest thoughts, and conceived them to be the home of Deity. No wonder if an Eternal Des- tiny seemed to sit enthroned there. No wonder if they seemed to have in their mystic motion an invisi- ble sympathy with human life and its mysterious desti- nies. No wonder if he who best could read their laws was reckoned best able to interpret the duties of this life, and all that connects man with that which is invisi- ble. No wonder if in those devout days of young thought, science was only another name for religion, and the Priest of the great temple of the universe was also the Priest in the temple made with hands. As- tronomy was the religion of the world's youth. The Magians were led by the star to Christ ; their astronomy was the very pathway to their Saviour. Upon this I make one or two remarks. 6 60 THE STAE IN THE EAST. 1. The folly of depreciating human wisdom. Of all vanities the worst is the vanity of ignorance. It is common enough to hear learning decried, as if it were an opposite of religion. If that means that science is not religion, and that the man who can calculate tha motions of the stars may never have bowed his soul to Christ, it contains a truth. But if it means, as it often does, that leai-ning is a positive encumbrance and hir.- drance to religion, then it is as much as to say that the God of nature is not the God of Gi'ace ; that the more you study the Creator's works, the further you remove from Himself; nay, we must go further, to be consist- ent, and hold, as most uncultivated and rude nations do, that the state of idiocy is nearest to that of inspi- ration. There are expressions of St. Paul often quoted as sanctioning this idea. He tells his converts to beware, " lest any man spoil you through philosophy." Where- upon we take for granted that modern philosophy is a kind of antagonist to Christianity. This is one instance out of many of the way in which an ambiguous word, misunderstood, becomes the source of infinite error. Let us hear St. Paul. He bids Timothy " beware of profane and old wives' fables." He speaks of " endless genealogies," " worshipping of angels," " intruding into those things which men have not seen." This was the philosophy of those days : a system of wild fancies spun out of the brain, — somewhat like what we might now call demonolatry ; but as different from philosophy as any two things can dififer. They forget, too, another thing. Philosophy has become Christian; science has knelt to Christ. There is a deep significance in that homage of the Magians. THE STAB IN THE EAST. 51 For it in fact was but a specimen and type of that which science has been doing ever since. The mind of Christ has not only entered into the Temple, and made it the house of prayer : it has entered into the temple of science, and purified the spirit of philosophy. This is its spirit now, as expounded by its chief inter- preter : " Man, the interpreter of Nature, knows noth- ing, and can do nothing, except that which Nature teaches him." What is this but science bending before the Child, becoming childlike, and, instead of project- ing its own fancies upon God's word, listening rever- ently to hear what it has to teach him ? In a simiJcy spirit, too, spoke the greatest of philosophers, in words quoted in every child's book : " I am but a child, pick- ing up pebbles on the shore of the great sea of Truth." ! be sure all the universe tells of Christ and leads to Christ. Rightly those ancient Magians deemed, in believing that God was worshipped truly in that august temple. The stars preach the mind of Christ. Not as of old, when a mystic star guided their feet to Bethle- hem : but now, to the mind of the astronomer, they tell of Eternal Order and Harmony ; they speak of changeless law where no caprice reigns. You may calculate the star's return; and to the day, and hour, and minute, it will be there. This is the fidelity of God. These mute masses obey the law impressed upon them by their Creator's Hand, unconsciously; and that law is the law of their own nature. To un- derstand the laws of our nature, and consciously and reverently to obey them, that is the mind of Christ, the Bublimest spirit of the Gospel. I remark again : This universe may be studied in an 52 THE STAR IN THE EAST. irreverent spirit. In Dan. ii. 48, we find the reverence which was paid to science. Daniel among the Chaldees was made chief of the wise men, that is, the first of the Magians ; and King Nebuchadnezzar bowed before him, with incense and oblations. In later days we find that spirit changed. Another king, Herod, commands the wise men to use their science for the purpose of letting him know where the Child was. In earlier times they honored the priest of nature : in later times they made use of him-. Only by a few is science studied now in the sublime and reverent spirit of old days. A vulgar demand for utility has taken the place of that lowly prostration with which the world listened to the discoveries of truth. The discovery of some new and mighty agent, by which the east and west are brought together in a moment, awakens chiefly the emotion of delight in us that correspondence and travelling will be quickened. The merchant congratulates himself upon the speedier arrival of the news which will give him the start of his rivals, and enable him to out-race his competitors in the competition of wealth. Yet, what is this but the utilitarian spirit of Herod, seeing nothing more solemn in a mysterious star than the means whereby he might crush his supposed Rival? There is a spirit which believes that " godliness is gain," and aims at being godly for the sake of advan- tage ; which is honest, because honesty is the best policy ; which says. Do right, and you will be the better — that is, the richer — for it. There is a spirit which seeks for wisdom simply as a means to an earthly end, — and that often a mean one. This is a spirit rebuked by the nobler reverence of the earlier THE STAR IN THE EAST. 53 Qays of Magianism. Knowledge for its own pure sake. God for His own sake. Truth for the sake of truth. This was the reason for which, in earlier days, men read the aspect of the heavens. 2. Next, in this craving of the Gentiles, we meet with traces of the yearning of the human soul for light. The Magian system was called the system of Light about seven centuries B. c. A great reformer (Zoroaster) had appeared, who either restored the sys- tem to its purity, or created out of it a new system. He said that Light is Eternal, — that the Lord of the Universe is Light ; but, because there was an eternal Light, there was also an eternal possibility of the ab- sence of Light. Light and Darkness, therefore, were the eternal principles of the universe, — not equal principles, but one the negation of the other. He taught that the soul of man needs light, — a light ex- ternal to itself, as well as in itself As the eye cannot Bee in darkness, and is useless, so is there a capacity in the soul for light : but it is not itself light ; it needs the Everlasting light from outside itself. Hence the stars became worshipped as the symbols of this light. But by degrees these stars began to stand in the place of the Light Himself This was the state of things in the days of these Magians. Magianism was now midway between its glory and its decline. For its glory we must go back to the days of Daniel, when a monarch felt it his privilege to do honor to the priest of Light ; when that priest was the sole medium of communication between Deity and man, and through him alone " Oromasdes " made his revelations known ; when the law given by the Magian, revealed by the eternal stars, was 6» 64 THE STAR IN THE EAST. " the law of the Medes and Persians, which altereth not." For its lowest degradation we must pass over about half a century from- the time we are now con- sidering, till we find ourselves in Samaria, in the presence of Simon the Magian. He gave himself out for the great power of God. He prostituted such powers and knowledge as he possessed to the object of making gain. Half dupe, half impostor, in him the noble system of light had sunk to petty charlatanism : Magianism had degenerated into Magic. Midway between these two periods, or rather nearer to the latter, stood the Magian of the text. There is a time in the history of every superstition when it is respectable, even deserving reverence, when men be- lieved it ; when it is in fact associated with the highest feelings that are in man, and the channel even for God's manifestation to the soul. And there is a time when it becomes less and less credible, when clearer science is superseding its pretensions ; and then is the period in which one class of men, like Simon, keep up the imposture : the priests, who will not let the old superstition die, but go on, half impostors, half deceived by the strong delusion wherewith they believe their own lie. Another class, like Herod, the wise men of the world, who patronize it for their own purposes, and make use of it as an engine of state. Another still, who turn from side to side, feeling with horror the old, and all that they held dear, crumbling away beneath them, — the ancient lights going out, — jore than half suspecting the falsehood of all the rest, and, with an earnestness amounting almost to agony, leaving their own homes, and inquiring for fresh light. Such was the posture of these Magians. You can- THE STAR IN THE EAST. 55 not enter into their questions, or sympathize with tneir wants, unless you realize all this. For that desire for light is one of the most impassioned of our noble natures. The noble prayer of the ancient world (Vv ^e (faet teat odeaaov'jj " Give light, and let us die :" can we not feelit? Light — light! 0, if the result were the immediate realization of the old fable, and the blasting of the daring spirit in the moment of Revela- tion of its Grod, — yet give us light. The wish for light, the expectation of the manifestation of God, is the mystery which lies beneath the history of the whole ancient world. II. The Epiphany itself. 1. They found a king. There is something very significant in the fact of that king being discovered as a child. The royal child was the answer to their desires. There are two kinds of monarchy, rule, or command. One is that of hereditary title ; the other is that of Divine Right. There are kings of men's making, and kings of God's making. The secret of that command which men obey involuntarily is sub mission of the ruler himself to law. And this is th& secret of the Royalty of the Humanity of Christ. No principle through all His Life is more striking, none characterizes it so peculiarly as His submission to another Will. " I came not to do mine own will, but the will of Him that sent me." — " The words which I speak, I speak not of myself" His commands are not arbitrary. They are not laws given on authority only : they are the eternal laws of our humanity, to which He Himself submitted ; the obe- dience to which alone can make our being attain its 56 THE STAR IN THE EAST. end. This is the secret of His kingship, — " He b^ came obedient . . . wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him." And this is the secret of all influence, and all com- mand. Obedience to a law above you subjugates minds to you who never would have yielded to mere Avill. " Rule thyself, thou rulest all." 2. Next, observe the adoration of the Magians — very touching and full of deep truth. The wisest of the world bending before the Child. Remember the history of Magianism. It began with awe, entering into this world beneath the serene skies of the East : in Wonder and Worship. It passed into priestcraft and scepticism. It ended in Wonder and Adoration, as it had begun ; only with a truer and nobler meaning. This is but a representation of human life. " Heaven lies around us in our infancy." The child looks on this world of God's as one, not many — all beautiful — wonderful — God's — the creation of a Father's hand. The man dissects, breaks it into fragments ; loses love and worship in speculation and reasoning ; becomes more manly, more independent, and less irradiated with a sense of the presence of the Lord of all ; till at last, after many a devious wandering, if he be one whom the Star of God is leading blind by a way he knows not, he begins to see all as one again, and God in all. Back comes the Childlike spirit once more in the Christianity of old age. We kneel before the Child ; we feel that to adore is greater than to reason ; to love, and worship, and believe, bring the soul nearer heaven than scientific analysis. The Child is nearer God than we. And this, too, is one of the deep sayings of Christ; THE STAR IN THE EAST. 57 ♦ Except ye be converted and become as little chil- dren, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." 3. Lastly, In that Epiphany we have to remark the Magians' joy. They had seen the star in the east. They followed it — it seemed to go out in dim obscur- ity. They went about inquiring: asked Herod, who could tell them nothing; asked the scribes, who only gave them a vague direcfion. At last the star shone out once more, clear before them in their path. " When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceed- ing great joy." Perhaps the hearts of some of us can interpret that. There are some who have seen the star that shone in earlier days go out — quench itself in black vapors or sour smoke. There are some who have followed many a star that turned out to be but an ignis fatuus, • — one of those bright exhalations which hover over marshes and church-yards, and only lead to the cham- bers of the dead, or the cold, damp pits of disappoint- ment ; and, 0, the blessing of " exceeding joy," after following in vain, — after inquiring of the great men and learning nothing, of the religious men and find- ing little, — to see the Star at last resting over " the place where the young Child lies;" — after groping the way alone, to see the star stand still, — to find that Religion is a thing far simpler than we thought; that God is near us, that to kneel and adore is the noblest posture of the soul. For, whoever will follow with fidelity his own star, God will guide him aright. He spoke to the Magians by the star ; to the shepherds, by the melody of the heavenly host ; to Joseph, by a dream ; to Simeon, by an inward revelation. " Gold, 58 THE STAR IN THE EAST. and frankincense, and myrrh," — these, and ten times these, were poor and cheap to give for that blessed certainty that the star of God is on before us. Two practical hints, in conclusion. 1. A hint of immortality. That star is now looking down on the wise men's graves ; and if there be no life to come, then this is the confusion : that mass of inert matter is pursuing its way through space, and the minds that watched it, calculated its move- ments, were led by it through aspiring wishes to holy adorations, — those minds, more precious than a thousand stars, have dropped out of God's universe. And then God cares for mere material masses more than for spirits, which are the emanation and copy of Himself Impossible. " God is not the God of the dead, but of the living." God is the Father of our Spirits. Eternity and immeasurableness belong to thought alone. You may measure the cycles of that star by years and miles. Can you bring any measure- ment which belongs to time or space by which you can compute the length or breadth or the duration of one pure thought, one aspiration, one moment of love ? This is eternity. Nothing but thought can be immortal. 2. Learn, finally, the truth of the Epiphany by heart. To the Jew it chiefly meant that the Gentile, too, could become the child of God. But to us? — Is that doctrine obsolete ? Nay, it requires to be reiterated in this age as much as in any other. There is a spirit in all our hearts whereby we would monop- olize God, conceiving Him an unapproachable Being, — whereby we may terrify other men outside our own pale, — instead of the Father that is near to all, whom THE STAR IN THE EAST. 59 we have to approach, and whom to adore is blessed* ness. This is our Judaism : we do not believe in the Epiphany. "We do not believe that God is the Father of the world ; we do not actually credit that He has a star for the Persian priest, and celestial melody for the Hebrew shepherd, and an unsyllabled voice for all tlie humble and inquiring spirits in His world. Therefore remember, Christ has broken down the middle wall of partition ; He has revealed Our Father, proclaimed that there is no distinction in the spiritual family and established a real Brotherhood on earth. III. [Preached February 10, 1850.] THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. Matt. ix. 23-25. — " And when Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the minstrels and the people making a noise, he said unto them. Give place ; for the maid is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn. But when the people were put forth, he went in, and took her by the hand, and the maid arose." This is one of a pair of miracles, the full instruction from neither of which can be gained unless taken in connection with the other. On His way to heal the daughter of Jairus, the Son of Man was accosted by another sufferer, alHicted twelve years with an issue of blood. Humanly speak- ing, there were many causes which might have led to the rejection of her request. The case was urgent ; a matter of life and death ; delay might be fatal ; a few minutes might make all the difference between living and dying. Yet Jesus not only performed the mir- acle, but refused to perform it in a hurried way; paused to converse ; to inquire who had touched him ; to perfect the lesson of the whole. On His way to perform one act of Love, He turned aside to give His attention to another. (60) THE HEAL TNG OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. 61 The practical lesson is this : There are many who are so occupied by one set of duties as to have no time for others : some whose life-business is the sup- pression of the slave-trade, — the amelioration of the state of prisons, — the reformation of public abuses. Right, except so far as they are monopolized by these, and feel themselves discharged from other obligations. The minister's work is spiritual ; the physician's, tem- poral. But, if the formef neglect physical needs, or the latter shrink from spiritual opportunities on the plea that the cure of bodies, not of souls, is his work, 80 far they refuse to imitate their Master. He had an ear open for every tone of wail ; a heart ready to respond to every species of need. Specially the Redeemer of the soul. He was yet as emphatically the "Saviour of the body." He "taught the people;" but He did not neglect to multiply the loaves and fishes. The peculiar need of the woman, the father's cry of anguish, the infant's cry of helplessness, the wail of oppression, and the shriek of pain, — all were heard by Him, and none in vain. Therein lies the diiference between Christian love and the impujse of mere inclinations. We hear of men being " interested " in a cause ; it has some peculiar charm for them individually: the wants of the heathen, or the destitution of the soldier and sailor, or the con- version of the Jews, according to men's associations, or fancies, or peculiar bias, may engage their attention, and monopolize their sympathy. I am far from saying these are wrong: I only say, that so far as they only interest ^ and monopolize interest, the source from which they spring is only human, and not the highest. The differ- ence between such beneficence and that which is 62 THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. the result of Christian love is marked by partiality in one case, universality in the other Love is universal. It is interested in all that is human : not merely in the concerns of its own family, nation, sect, or circle of associations. Humanity is the sphere of its activity. Here, too, we find the Son of Man the pattern of our humanity. His bosom was to mankind what the Ocean is to the world. The Ocean has its own mighty tide ; but it receives and responds to, in exact proportion, the tidal influences of every estuary, and river, and small creek, which pours into its bosom. So in Christ: His bosom heaved with the tides of our humanity ; but every separate sorrow, pain, and joy, gave its pul- sation, and received back influence from the sea of His being. Looking at this matter somewhat more closely, it will be plain that the delay was only apparent. Seemingly there was delay, and fatal delay : while he yet spake, there came news of the child's death. But just so far as the resurrection of the dead is a mightier miracle than the healing of the sick, just so far did the delay enhance and illustrate, instead of dimming, the glory of His mission. But more definitely still. The miracles of Jesus were not merely arbitrary acts ; they were subject to the laws of the spiritual world. It was, we may hum- bly say, impossible to convey a spiritual blessing to one who was not spiritually susceptible. A certain inward character, a certain relation {rapport) to the Kedeemer, was required to make the mercy efficacious. Hence in one place we read, " He could not do many miracles there because of their unbelief" And His THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. ()S perpetual question was, "Believest thou that I am able to do this ? " Now, Jairus beheld this miracle. He saw the woman's modest touch approaching the hem of the. Saviour's garment. He saw the abashed look with which she shrunk from public gaze and exposure. He heard the language of Omniscience — "Somebody hath touched me." He heard the great principle enunciated that the only touch which reaches God is that of Faith. The multitude may throng and press : but heart to heart, soul to soul, mind to mind, only so do we come in actual contact with God. And, remembering this, it is a matter not of probability, but of certainty, that the soul of Jairus was actually made more capable of a blessing than before ; that he must have walked with a more hopeful step ; that he must have heard the announcement, " Thy daughter is dead," with less dismay ; that the words, " Fear not, only believe," must have come to him with deeper meaning, and been received with more implicit trust, than if Jesus had not paused to heal the woman, but hurried on. And this is the principle of the spiritual kingdom. In matters worldly, the more occupations, duties, a man has, the more certain is he of doing all imper- fectly. In the things of God, it is reversed. The more duties you perform, the more you are fitted for doing others : what you lose in time, you gain in strength. You do not love God the less, but the more, for loving man. You do not weaken your affection for your family by cultivating attachments beyond its pale, but deepen and intensify it. Respect for the alien, tenderness for the heretic, do not interfere with, but rather strengthen, attachment to your own country 64 THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. and your own church. He who is most liberal in the case of a foreign famine, or a distant mission, will be found to have only learned more liberal love towards • the poor and unspiritualized of his own land : so false is the querulous complaint that money is drained away by such calls, to the disadvantage of more near and juster claims. You do not injure one cause of mercy by turning aside to listen to the call of another. I. The uses of Adversity. II. The principles of a Miracle. I. The simplest and obvious use of sorrow is to remind of God. Jairus and the woman, like many others, came to Christ from a sense of want. It would seem that a certain shock is needed to bring us in con- tact with reality. We are not conscious of our breathing till obstruction makes it felt. We are not aware of the possession of a heart till some disease, some sudden joy or sorrow, rouses it into extraordi- nary action. And we are not conscious of the mighty cravings of our half Divine humanity, we are not aware of the God within us, till some chasm yawns which must be filled, or till the rending asunder of our affections forces us to become fearfully conscious of a need. And this, too, is the reply to a rebellious question which our hearts are putting perpetually : Why am I treated so ? Why is my health or my child taken from me ? What have I done to deserve this ? So Job passionately complained that God had set him up as a mark to empty His quiver on. THE HEALING OP JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. 65 The reply is, that gifts are granted to elicit ouf aflFections : they are resumed to elicit them still more ; for we never know the value of a blessing till it ia gone. Health, children, — we must lose them before we know the love wliich they contain. However, we are not prepared to say that a charge might not, with some plausibility, be brought against the love of God, were no intimation ever given that God means to resume His blessings. That man may fairly complain of his adopted father, who has been educated as his own son, and, after contracting habits of extravagance, looking forward to a certain line of life, cultivating certain tastes, is informed that he is only adopted ; that he must part with these temporary advantages, and sink into a lower sphere. It would be a poor excuse to say that all he had before him was so much gain, unmerited. It is enough to reply that false hopes were raised, and knowingly. Nay, the laws of countries sanction this. After a certain period a title to property cannot be interfered with : if a right of way or road has existed, in the venerable language of the law, after a custom " where- of the memory of man runneth not to the contrary," no private right, however dignified, can overthrow the public claim. I do not say that a bitter feeling might not have some show of justice, if such were the case with God's blessings. But the truth is this : God confers His gifts with distinct reminders that they are His. He gives us for a season spirits taken out of His universe ; brings them into temporary contact with us ; and we caU them father, mother, sister, child, friend. But, just as in some places, on one day in the year, the way or 6* 66 THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. path is closed iu order to remind the public that they pass by sufferance, and not by right, in order that no lapse of time may establish " adverse possession," so does God give warning to us. Every ache and pain, every wrinkle you see stamping itself on a parent's blow, every accident which reveals the uncertain tenure of life and possessions, every funeral beU that tolls, are only God's reminders that we are tenants at will, and not by right, — pensioners on the bounty of an hour. He is closing up the right of way, warn- ing fairly that what we have is lent, not given : His, not ours. His mercies are so much gain. The re- sumption of them is no injustice. Job learned that, too, by heart. '' The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away ; blessed be the name of the Lord." Again, observe the misuse of sorrow. When He came to the house. He found the minstrels and peo- ple making a noise. In the East, not content with natural grief, they use artificial means to deepen and prolong it. Men and women make it a separate pro- fession to act as mourners, — to exhibit for hire the cus- tomary symbols and wail of grief, partly to soothe, and partly to rivet sorrow deeply, by expression of it. The South and North differ greatly from each other in this respect. The nations of the North restrain their grief, — affect the tearless eye and the stern look. The expressive South, and all the nations whose origin is from thence, are demonstrative in grief They beat their breasts, tear their hair, throw dust upon their heads. It would be unwise were either to blame or ridicule the other, so long as each is true to Nature. Unwise for the nations of the South to deny the reaL iiy of the grief which is repressed and silent. Unjust THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. 67 in the denizen of the North, were he to scorn the violence of Southern grief, or call its uncontrollable demonstrations unmanly. Much must be allowed for temperament. These two opposite tendencies, however, indicate the two extremes into which men may fall in this mat- ter of sorrow. There are two ways in which we may defeat the purposes of God in grief — by forgetting it, or by over-indulging it. The world's way is to forget. It prescribes gayety as the remedy for woe ; banishes all objects which recall the past ; makes it the etiquette of feeling, even amongst near relations, to abstain from the mention of the names of the lost ; gets rid of the mourning weeds as soon as possible — the worst of all remedies for grief. Sorrow, the discipline of the Cross, is the school for all that is highest in us. Self-knowledge, true power, all that dignifies humanity, are precluded, the moment you try to merely banish grief. It is a touching truth that the Saviour refused the anodyne on the cross that would have deadened pain. He would not steep His senses in oblivion. He would not suffer one drop to trickle down the side of Hia Father's cup of anguish untasted. The other way is to nurse sorrow : nay, even our best affections may tempt us to this. It seems treason to those we have loved to be happy now. We sit be- neath the cypress ; we school ourselves to gloom. Romance magnifies the fidelity of the broken heart; we refuse to be comforted. Now, aU this must be dohe by effort, generally speaking. For God has so constituted both our hearts and the world that it is hard to prolong grief beyond 68 THE HEALING OP JAIRUS- DAtTGHTER. a time. Say what we will, the heart has in it a sur- prising, nay, a startling elasticity. It cannot sustain unalterable melancholy : and beside our very pathway plants grow, healing and full of balm. It is a suUen heart that can withstand the slow but sure influences of the morning sun, the summer day, the sky and flowers, and the soothing power of himian sym- pathy. "We are meant to sorrow ; but " not as those without hope." The rule seems to consist in being simply natural. The great thing which Christ did was to call men back to simplicity and nature ; not to perverted, but original nature. He counted it no derogation of His manhood to be seen to weep. He thought it no shame to mingle with merry crowds. He opened His heart wide to all the genial and aU the mournful im- pressions of this manifold life of ours. And this is what we have to do : be natural. Let God — that is, let the influences of God — freely play unthwarted upon the soul. Let there be no unnatural repression, no control of feeling by mere efibrt. Let there be no artificial and prolonged grief, no " minstrels making a noise." Let great Nature have her way. Or, rather, feel that you are in a Father's world, and live in it with Him, frankly, in a free, fearless, childlike, and natural spirit. Then grief will do its work healthily. The heart will bleed, and stanch when it has bled enough. Do not stop the bleeding ; but also do not open the wound afresh. n. We come to the ' principles on which a Miracle rests. 1. I observe that the perception of it was confined THE HEALING OF JAIEUS' DAUGHTER. 69 to a few. Peter, James, John, and the parents of the child, were the only ones present. The rest were excluded. To behold wonders, certain inward quali fications, a certain state of heart, a certain siiscep- tivity, are reqilired. Those who were shut out were rendered incapable by disqualifications. Absence of spiritual susceptibility in the case of those who "laughed Him to scorn," — unbehef in those who came with courteous scepticism, saying, " Trouble not the Master ; " in other words, He is not master of im- possibilities, — unreality in the professional mourners, the most hopeless of aU disqualifications. Their whole life was acting : they had caught the tone of condo- lence and sympathy as a trick. Before minds such as these the wonders of creation may be spread in vain. Grief and joy alike are powerless to break through the crust of artificial semblance which envelops them. Such beings see no miracles. They gaze on all with dead, dim eyes, — wrapped in conventionalisms, their life a drama in which they are but actors, modulating their tones and simulating feelings according to a received standard. How can such be ever witnesses of the supernatural, or enter into the presence of the Wonderful ? Two classes alone were admitted. They who, like Peter, James, and John, lived the life of courage, moral purity, and love ; and they who, like the parents, had had the film removed from their eyes by grief. For there is a way which God has of forcing the spiritual upon men's attention. When you shut down the lid upon the coffin of a child, or one as dearly loved, there is an awful want, a horrible sense of inse- curity, which sweeps away the ghttering mist of time from the edge of the abyss, and you gaze on the phan- 70 THE HEALING OP JAIRUS' DAUGHTER tom-wonders of the unseen. Yes, — real anguish qual. ifies for an entrance into the solemn chamber where aU is miracle. In another way, and for another reason, the num- bers of those who witness a miracle must be limited, Jairus had his daughter restored to life : the woman was miraculously healed. But, if every anxious parent and every sick suiferer could have the wonder repeated in his or her case, the wonder itself would cease. This is the preposterousness of the sceptic's demand. Let me see a miracle, on an appointed day and hour, and I will believe. Let us examine this. A miracle is commonly defined to be a contraven- tion of the laws of nature. More properly speaking, it is only a higher operation of those same laws, in a form hitherto unseen. A miracle is perhaps no more a suspension or contradiction of the laws of nature than a hurricane or a thunder-storm. They who first travelled to tropical latitudes came back with anec- dotes of supernatural convulsions of the elements. In truth, it was only that they had never personally wit- nessed such effects : but the hurricane which swept the waves flat, and the lightning which illuminated all the heaven or played upon the bayonets or masts in lam- bent flame, were but efiects of the very same laws of electricity and meteorology which were in operation at home. A miracle is perhaps no more in contravention of the laws of the universe than the direct interposi- tion of a whole nation, in cases of emergency, to up- hold what is right in opposition to what is established, is an opposition to the laws of the realm. For in stance, the whole people of Israel reversed the unjust decree of Saul which had sentenced Jonathan to death. THE HEALING OP JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. 71 But law is the expression only of a people's will. Or- dinarily wo see that expression mediately made through judges, office-bearers, kings : and so long as we see it in this mediate form, we are, by habit, satisfied that all is legal. There are cases, however, in which not an indirect, but a direct expression of a nation's will, is demanded. Extraordinary cases ; and, because extraor- dinary, they who can only, see what is legal in what is customary, conventional, and in the routine of written precedents, get bewildered, and reckon the anomalous act illegal or rebellious. In reality, it is only the source of earthly law, the nation, pronouncing the law without the intervention of the subordinate agents. This will help us to understand the nature of a mir- acle. What we call laws are simply the subordinate expression of a Will. There must be a Will before there can be a law. Certain antecedents are followed by certain consequents. When we see this succession, we are satisfied, and call it natural. But there are emergencies in which it may be necessary for the Will to assert itself, and become not the mediate, but the immediate antecedent to the consequent. No subor- dinate agent interposes, — simply the First cause comes in contact with a result. The audible expression of will is followed immediately by something which is generally preceded by some lower antecedent, which we call a cause. In this case, you will observe, there has been no contravention of the laws of Nature, — there has only been an immediate connection between the First cause and the last result. A miracle is the manifestation to man of the voluntariness of Power. Now, bearing this in mind, let it bo supposed that every one had a right to demand a miracle ; that the 72 THE HEALING OF JAIEUS' DAUGHTER. occurrence of miracles was unlimited ; that as often as you had an ache, or trembled for the loss of a relar tion, you had but to pray, and receive your wish. Clearly, in this case, first of all, the constitution of the universe would be reversed. The wiU of man would be substituted for the will of God. Caprice and chance would regulate all: — God would be de- throned : God would be degraded to the rank of one of those beings of supernatural power with whom Eastern romance abounds, who are subordinated by a spell to the will of a mortal, who is armed with their powers and uses them as vassals: God would be merely the genius who would be chained by the spell of prayer to obey the behests of man. Man would arm himself with the powers of Deity, and God would be his slave. Further still: This unlimited extension of miracles would annihilate miracles themselves. For, suppose that miracles were universal ; that prayer was directly followed by a reply ; that we could all heal the sick and raise the dead : this, then, would become the com- mon order of things. It would be what we now call nature. It would cease to be extraordinary, and the infidel would be unsatisfied as ever. He would see only the antecedent, prayer, and the invariable conse- quent, a reply to prayer — exactly what he sees now in the process of causation. And then, just as now he would say, What more do we want ? These are the laws of the universe : why interpose the complex and cumbrous machinery of a God, the awkward hy- pothesis of a will, to account for laws ? Miracles, then, are necessarily limited. The non- limitation of miracles would annihilate the miraculous THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. 73 Lastly, It is the intention of a miracle to manifest the Divine in the common and ordinary. For instance, in a boat on the Sea of Tiberias, the Redeemer rose and rebuked the storm. Was that miracle merely a proof of his Divine mission ? Are we merely to gather from it that then .and there, on a certain day, in a certain obscure corner of the world. Divine power was at work. It is conceiv- able that a man might credit that miracle ; that he might be exceedingly indignant with the rationalist who resolves it into a natural phenomenon, — and it is conceivable that that very man might trem- ble in a storm. To what purpose is that miracle announced to him? He believes in "'God existing in the past, ^ut not in the present ; he believes in a Divine presence in the supernatural, but discredits it in the natural. He recognizes God in the mar- vellous, but does not feel Him in the wonderful of every day : unless it has taught him that the waves and winds now are in the hollow of the hand of God, the miracle has lost its meaning. Here again, as in many other cases, Christ healed sickness and raised the dead to life. Are we merely to insert this among the " Evidences of Christian- ity," and then, with lawyer-like sagacity, harving laid down the rules of Evidence, say to the infidel, " Be- hold our credentials ; we call upon you to believe our Christianity " ? This were a poor reason to acount for the putting forth of Almighty Power. More truly and more deeply, these miracles were vivid manifestations to the senses that Christ is the Sav- iour of the body ; that now, as then, the issues of life and death are in His hands ; that our daily exist- 7 74 THE HEALING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. ence is a perpetual miracle. The extraordinary was simply a manifestation of God's power in the ordi- nary. Nay, the ordinary marvels are greater than the extraordinary ; for these are subordinate to them — merely indications and handmaids, guiding us to per- ceive and recognize a constant Presence, and remind- ing us that in every-day existence the miraculous and the Godlike rule as. [Preached March 10, 1850.] BAPTISM. Gal. iii. 26-29. — " For ye are all the children of God by faith in Chnst Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female : for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Wherever opposite views are held with warmth by religious-minded men, we may take for granted that there is some higher truth which embraces both. All high truth is the union of two contradictories. Thus predestination and free will are opposites ; and the truth does not lie between these two, but in a higher reconciling truth, which leaves both true. So with the opposing views of baptism. Men of equal spirituality are ready to sacrifice all to assert, and to deny, the doctrine of baptismal regeneration. And the truth, I believe, will be found, not in some middle, moderate, timid doctrine, which skilfully avoids extremes ; but in a truth larger than either of these opposite views, which is the basis of both, and which really is that for which each party tenaciously clings to its own view as to a matter of life and death. (76) 76 BAPTISM. The present occasion — the decision of the Piivy Council — only requires us to examine three views. I. That of Rome. II. That of modern Calvinism. III. That of (as I believe) Scripture and the Church of England. I. The doctrine of Rome respecting baptism. We will take her own authorities. 1. "If any one say that the sin of Adam is taken away, either by the powers of human nature, or by any other remedy than the merit of the One Mediator, our Lord Jesus Christ .... or denies that the merit of Jesus Christ, duly conferred by the sacra«- ment of baptism in the church form, is applied to adults as well as to children — let him be accursed." Sess. V. 4. " If any one deny that the imputation of original sin is remitted by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ which is conferred in baptism, or even asserts that the whole of that which has the true and proper character of sin is not taken away, but only not imputed — let him be accursed." " If any one says that grace is not given by sacra- ments of this kind always and to all, so far as God's part is concerned, but only at times, and to some, although they be duly received — let him be accursed." " If any one say that by the sacraments of the New Covenant themselves grace is not conferred by the efficacy of the rite (opus operatum), but that faith alone is sufficient for obtaining grace — let him be accursed." ' If any one say that in three sacraments — that BAPTISM. 77 IS, baptism, confirmation, and orders — a character ia not impressed upon the soul — that is, a certain spirit- ual and indelible mark (for which reason they can- not be repeated) — let him be accursed." Sess. vii,, cap. 7-9. " By baptism, putting on Christ, we are made a new creation in Him, obtaining plenary and entire remis- sion of all sins." It is scarcely possible to misrepresent the doctrine 80 plainly propounded. Christ's merits are instru- mentally applied by baptism ; original sin is removed by a change of nature ; a new character is imparted to the soul ; a germinal principle or seed of life is miraculously given ; and all this, in virtue not of any condition in the recipient, nor of any condition except that of the due performance of the rite. This view is held with varieties, and modifications of many kinds, by an increasingly large number of the members of the Church of England ; but we do not concern ourselves with these timid modifications, which painfully attempt to draw some subtle hair- breadth distinction between themselves and the above doctrine. The true, honest, and only honest represent- ation of this view is that put forward undisguisedly by Rome. When it is objected to the Romanist that there ia no evidence in the life of the baptized child different from that given by the unbaptized, sufficient to make credible a change so enormous, he replies, as in the case of the other sacrament, — The miracle is invisi- ble. You cannot see the bread and wine become flesh and blood ; but the flesh and blood are there, whether you see them or not. You cannot see the effects of 7* 78 BAPTISM. regeneration ; but they are there, hidden, whether visi- ble to you or not. In other words, Christ has declared that it is with every one born of the Spirit as with the wind — " Thou hear est the sound thereof. ^^ But the Ro- manist distinctly holds that you cannot hear the sound ; that the wind hath blown, but there is no sound ; that the Spirit hath descended, and there are no fruits where- by the tree is known. "* In examining this view, at the outset, we deprecate those vituperative and ferocious expressions which are used so commonly against the church of Rome ; — unbecoming in private conversation, disgraceful on the platform, they are still more unpardonable in the pulpit. I am not advocating that feeble softness of mind which cannot speak strongly because it cannot feel strongly. I know the value, and, in their place, the need of strong words. I know that the Redeemer used them: stronger and keener never feU from the lips of man. I am aware that our Reformers used coarse and vehement language ; but we do not im- bibe the Reformers' spirit by the mere adoption of the Reformers' language, — nay, paradoxical as it may seem, the use of their language even proves a degeneracy from their spirit. You wiU find harsh and grosS ex- pressions enough in the Homilies ; but remember that when they spoke thus Rome was in the ascendency She had the power of fire and sword ; and the men who spoke so were candidates for martyrdom, by the expressions that they used. Every one might be called upon by fire and steel to prove the quahty of what was in him, and account for the high pretensions of his words. I grant the grossness. But when they spoke of the harlotries of Rome, and spoke of her adulteries, BAPTISM. I ft and fornications, and lies, which she had put in full cup to the lips of nations, it was the sublime defi- ance of free-hearted men against oppression in high places, and falsehood dominant. But now, when Rome is no longer dominant, and the only persecutions that we hear of are the petty persecutions of Protestants among themselves, to use language such as this is not the spirit of a darfng Reft^rmer, but only the pusillan- imous shriek of cruel cowardice, which ke§ps down the enemy whose rising it is afraid of. We will do justice to this doctrine of Rome. It has this merit, at least, that it recognizes the character of a church ; it admits it to be a society, and not an association. An association is an arbitrary union. Men form associations for temporary reasons ; and, arbitrarily made, they can be arbitrarily dissolved. Society, on the contrary, is made not by will, but facts. Brotherhood, sonship, families, nations, are nature's work — real facts. Rome acknowledges this. It per- mits no arbitrary drawing of the lines of that which caUs itself the church. A large, broad, mighty field , the Christian world ; all baptized ; nay, expressly, even those who are baptized by heretics. It shares the spirit, ins'tead of monopolizing it. PrgfcticaUy, therefore, in the matter of education, we should teach children on the basis on M^hich Rome works. We say as Rome says, You are the child of God ; baptism declares you such. Rome says as Paul says, " As many of you as are baptized into Christ have put on Christ." Consequently, we distinguish between this doctrine as held by spiritual and as held by unspiritual men. Spirituality often neutralizes error in views. Men are 80 BAPTISM. better often than their creeds. The Calvinist ought to be an Antinomian, — he is not. So, in holj-minded men, this doctrine of baptismal regeneration loses its perniciousness, — nay, even becomes, in erroneous form, a precious, blessed truth. It is quite another thing, however, held by unspirit- ual men. Our objections to this doctrine are : 1. Because it assumes baptism to be not the testi- mony to a fact, but the fact itself. Baptism proclaims the child of God. The Romanist says it creates him. Then and there a mysterious change takes place, inward, spiritual, eflfected by an external rite. This makes bap- tism not a sacrament, but an event. 2. Because it is materialism of the grossest kind. The order of Christian life is from within to that which is without, — from the spiritual truth to the material expression of it. The Roman order is from the outward to the creation of the inward. This is magic. The Jewish Cabalists believed that the pro- nunciation of certain magical words, engraved on the seal of Solomon, would perform marvels. The whole Eastern world fancied that such spells could transform one being into another, — a brute into a man, or a man into a brute. Books containing such trash were burnt at Ephesus, in the dawn of Christianity. But here, in the mid-day of Christianity, we have belief in such spells, — given, it is true that it is said, by God, — whereby the demoniacal nature can be exorcised, the Divine implanted in its stead, and the evil heart trans- formed unconsciously into a pure spirit. Now, this is degrading God. Observe the results • A child is to be baptized on a given day ; but when that day arrives, the child is unwell, and the cere- BAPTISM. §1 monj must be postponed another week or month. Again a delay takes plac^, — the day is damp or cold. At last the time arrives ; the service is read. It may require, if read slowly, five minutes more than ordi- narily. Then and there, when that reading is slowly accomplished, the mystery is achieved. And all this time, while the child is ill, while the weather is bad, while the reader procrastiaates, — I say it solemnly, — ■ the Eternal Spirit who rules this universe must wait patiently, and come down, obedient to a mortal's spell, at the very second that it suits his convenience. God must wait attendance on the caprice of a careless parent, ten thousand accidents, — nay, the leisure of an indolent or an immoral priest. Will you dare insult the Majesty on High by such a mockery as this result ? 3. We object, because this view makes Christian life u struggle for something that is lost, instead of a prog- ress to something that lies before. Let no one fancy that Rome's doctrine on this matter makes salvation an easy thing. The spirit of God is given, — the germ is implanted ; but it may be crushed, injured, des- troyed. And her doctrine is, that- venial sins after baptism are removed by absolutions and attendance on the ordinances ; whereas for mortal sins there is — not no hope — but no certainty ever after until the judg- ment-day. Vicious men may make light of such teach- ing, and get periodic peace from absolution, to go and sin again ; but to a spiritual Romanist this doctrine is no encouragement for laxity. Now, observe, after sin, life becomes the effort to get back to where you were years ago. It is the sad, longing glance at the Eden from which you have been expelled, which is guarded 82 BAPTISM. now by a fiery sword in this world forever. And, therefore, whoever is familiar with the writings of some of the earliest leaders of the present movement Rome-wards, — writings that rank among the mosttouch- ing and beautiful of English composition, — will remem- ber the marked tone of sadness which pervades them ; their high, sad longings after the baptismal purity that is gone ; their mournful contemplations of a soul that once glistened with baptismal dew, now " seamed and scarred " with the indelible marks of sin. The true Christian life is ever onwards, full of trust and hope : a life wherein even past sin is no bar to saintliness, but the step by which you ascend to higher vantage- ground of holiness. The "indelible grace of baptism," — how can it teach that ? II. The second view is that held by what we, for the sake of avoiding personalities, call modern Calvinism. It draws a distinction between the visible and the invisible church. It holds that baptism admits all into the former, but into the latter only a special few. Baptismal regeneration, as applied to the first, ia merely a change of state, — though what is meant by a change of state it were hard to say, or to determine wherein an unbaptized person admitted to all the ordinances would differ in state from a person baptized. The real benefit of baptism, however, only belongs to the elect. With respect to others, to predicate of them regeneration in the highest sense, is at best an ecclesiastical fiction, said "in the judgment of charity." This view maintains that you are not God's child until you become such consciously. Not until evi- dence of a regenerate life is given, not until signs BAPTISM. S^- of a converted soul are shown, is it right to speak of being God's child, except in this judgment of charity. Now we remark, 1. This judgment of charity ends at the baptismal font. It is never heard of in after-life. It is like the charitable judgment of the English law, which pre- sumes, or is said to presume, a man innocent till proved guilty : valuable enough s^ a legal fiction ; neverthe- less, it does not prevent a man barring his windows, guarding his purse, keenly watching against the deal- ings of those around him who are presumed innocent. Similarly, the so-called judgment of charity terminates with infancy. They who speak of the church's lan- guage, in which children are called children of God, as being quite right, but only in the judgment of charity, are exactly the persons who do not in after-life chari' tably presume that all their neighbors are Christians. " He is not a Christian." — " She is one of the world : " or, " one of the unregenerate." Such is the language applied to those who are in baptism reckoned children of God. They could not consistently apply to all adults the language applied in this text : " As many of you as have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ. Ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." 2. Next, I observe that this view is identical with the Roman one in this respect, that it creates the fact instead of testifying to it. Only, instead of baptism, it substitutes certain views, feelings, and impressions; and asserts that these make the man into a child of God. The Romanist says Baptism, the Calvinist says Faith, makes that true which was not true before. It is not a fact that God is that person's Father, till in 84' BAPTISM. the one case baptism, in the other faith, have made Him such. 3. Observe the pernicious results of this teaching in the matter of Education. Here again I draw the distinction between the practical consequences which legitimately ought to be and those which actually are deduced from it. Happily, men are better than their views. Hear the man speaking out of his theological system, and then hear him speaking out of the abun- dance of his heart. Hear the religious mother when the system is in view, and all are indiscriminately, except a certain few, corrupt, vile, with nothing good in them, heirs of ruin. But hear her talking unguard- edly of her own children. They have the frailties, weaknesses, common faults, of childhood ; but they have no vice in them ; there is nothing base or de- graded in her children ! When the embraces of her child are round her neck, it will require more elo- quence than you possess to convince her that she is nursing a little demon in her lap. The heart of the mother is more than a match for the creed of the Cal- vinist. There are some, however, who do not shrink from consistency, and develop their doctrine in all its con- sequences. The children follow out their instructions with fearful fidelity. Taught that they are not the children of God till certain feelings have been devel- oped in them, they become by degrees beAvildered, or else lose their footing on reality. They hear of certain mystic joys and sorrows ; and unless they fictitiously adopt the language they hear, they are painfully con- scious that they know nothing of them as yet. They hear of a depression for sin which they certainly have BAPTISM. 8® never experienced, — a joy in God, making his service and his house the gate of heaven ; and they know that it is excessively irksome to them, — a confidence, trust, and assurance, of which they know nothing, — till they take for granted what has been told them, that they are not God's children. Taught that they are as yet of the world, they live as the world, — they carry out their education, which ha^ dealt with them as children of the devil, to be converted ; and children of the devil they become. Of these two views, the last is by far the most cer- tain to undermine Christianity in every Protestant country. The first, at least, assumes God's badge an universal one ; and in education is so far right, prac- tically ; only wrong in the decision of the question how the child was created a child of God. But the second assumes a false, partial, party badge, — election, views, feelings. No wonder that the children of such religionists proverbially turn out ill. III. We pass to the doctrine of the Bible, and (I believe) of the Church. Christ came to reveal a name — the Father. He abolished the exclusive " my," and he taught to pray " our Father." He proclaimed God the Father, — man the Son : revealed that the Son of Man is also the Son of God. Man — as man, God's child. He came to redeem the world from that ignorance of the relationship which had left them in heart aliens and unregenerate. Human nature, therefore, became, viewed in Christ, a holy thing and divine. The Rev- elation is a common humanity, sanctified in God. The 85 BAPTISM. appearance of the Son of God is the sanctification of the human race. The development of this startled men. Sons of God ! Yes ; ye Jews have monopolized it too long. Is that Samaritan, heretic and alien, a child of God ? Yes, the Samaritan ; but not these outcasts of soci- ety ? Yes ; these outcasts of society. He went into the publican's house, and proclaimed that " he, too, was a son of Abraham." He suffered the sinful pen- itent to flood his feet with tears. He saw there the Eternal Light unquenched, — the eye, long dimmed and darkened, which yet still could read the Eternal Mind. She, tod, is God's erring, but forgiven, be- loved, and " much-loving " child. One step further. He will not dare to say, — the Gentiles ? — the Gen- tiles who bow down to stocks and stones ? Yes, the Gentiles too. He spake to them a parable. He told of a younger son who had lived long away from his father's home. But his forgetfulness of his father could not abrogate the fact of his being his son, and, as soon as he recognized the relationship, all the bless- ings of it were his own. Now, this is the Revelation. Man is God's child, and the sm of the man consists in perpetually living as if it were false. It is the sin of the heathen, — and what is your mission to him but to tell him that he is God's child, and not living up to his privilege ? It is the sin of the baptized Christian, — waiting for feel- ings for a claim on God. It was the false life which the Jews had led : precisely this, that they were living coerced by law. Christ had come to redeem them from the law, that they might recei fe the adoption of Bons. But they were sons already, if they only knew BAPTISM. 8T -i. "Because ye are sons, God hath sent' forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, whereby ye cry Abba, Father." To be a son of God is one thing ; to know that you are, and call him Father, is another, — and that is regeneration. Now, there was wanted a permanent and authorita- tive pledge, revealing and confirming this ; for, to mankind in the mass, invisible truths become real only when they have been made visible. All spiritual facts must have an existence in form for the human mind to rest on. This pledge is baptism. Baptism is a visible witness to the world of that which the world is forever forgetting, a common humanity united in God. Baptism authoritatively reveals and pledges to the individual that which is true of the race. Baptism takes the child and addresses it by name. Paul — no longer Saul — you are a child of God. Remember it henceforth. It is now revealed to you, and recognized by you, and to recognize God as the Father is to be regenerate (John i. 12). You, Paul, are now regenerate: you will have foes to fight, — the world, the flesh, and the devil, — but remember, they only keep you out of an inheritance which is your own ; not an inheritance which you have to win by some new feeling or merit in yourself It ts yours: you are the child of God ; you are a member of Christ ; you are an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven. Observe, then, baptism does not create a child of God. It authoritatively declares him. It does not make the fact ; it only reveals it. If baptism made it a fact, then and there for the first time, baptism would be magic. Nay, faith does not create a child 8S BAPTISM. of God any more than baptism, nor does it make a fact. It only appropriates that which is a fact already. For otherwise see what inextricable confusion you fall into. You ask a man to believe, and thereby be created a child of God. Believe what ? That God is his Father. But God is not his Father. He is not a child of God, you say, till he believes. Then you ask him tc believe a lie; Herein lies the error, in basis identical, of the Romanist and the Calvinist. Faith is to one what baptism is to the other, the creator of a fact ; whereas they both rest upon a fact, which is a fact whether they exist or not, — before they exist ; nay, without whose previous existence both of them are unmeaning and false. The Catechism, however, says : In baptism ... I was made a child of God. Yes ; coronation makes a sovereign; but, paradoxical as it may seem, it can only make a sovereign one who is sovereign already. Crown a pretender, that coronation will not create the king. Coronation is the authoritative act of the nation declaring a fact which was fact before. And ever after, coronation is the event to which all dates back ; and the crown is the expression used for all royal acts : the crown pardons, the prerogatives of the crown,