M.^m ^ LIBRARY OF THE University of California. I Mrs. SARAH P. WALSWORTH. Received October, i8g4. ^Accessions No. S^^J f<^. Class No, THE TRUE VINE. THE TRUE VINE; THE ANALOGIES OF OUR LORD'S ALLEGORY. REV. HUGH MACMILLAN, LL.D., F.R.S.E., ii AUTHOR OF "bible TEACHINGS IN NATURE," "HOLIDAYS ON HIGH LANDS, " THE MINISTRY OF NATURE," ETC. ETC. THIRD EDITION. ^^ Of THB***^ ;tJ2ri?iasiTFi MACMILLAN AND CO. 1875. All rights reserved. yvis'3> SttnleS at tkt Hnttetsitj ftKe, IV MACLEHOSE AND M A C D U G A L L, GLASGOW. ^UKIVBESITT] ;liipo: PREFATORY REMARKS. " La Nature est une image de la Grace." — Pascal. T T is a well-known fact, that the sunbeam is invisible until it impinges upon earthy particles. In like manner, the light of Divine Truth would be invisible to us were it not reflected by images derived from the common things around us. As the optician fashions out of the materials of nature, instruments which will help him to penetrate the hidden arcana of nature, so the student of Scripture may construct from the objects of the material world — from the studies of the scientific man — analogies which will enable him to understand, in some measure, the deep things of the spirit in man, and the deep things of God. Each science is an additional lens, as it were, vi PREFA TOR V REMARKS. to bring the spiritually distant near, and to enlarge the spiritually minute. Comparative Physiology finds in the vegetable king- dom, on account of the simplicity of its structure, the key to the explanation of the higher animal structures — those profound analogies of organization which so strikingly attest the unity of creation. And may we not believe that there is also a Comparative Theology which finds in plants the analogies of the still higher mysteries of the spiritual world? There is surely a deeper reason than a mere utilitarian one, for the dual form — the animal and vegetable — in which organic life displays itself. God has closely connected the spiritual life of man with this strange plant-life, which runs parallel with his own. At the very be- ginning, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden of Eden represented to him all the unexplored mysteries of the moral and intellectual universe, and contracted within the narrowest compass the whole vast, delusive range of temptation. The tree of life was a faithful type, or pictured image of the blessed immortality consequent upon doing the will of God. And when man fell, his altered state was still as closely connected with plant-life. PREFA TOR V REMARKS. vii God enjoined the cultivation of the thorny ground, that in it man might see reflected, as in a mirror, the Divine culture of himself, and, through it, be able to rise to the spiritual toil in the higher seed- field of the kingdom of heaven. Through the " Gate Beautiful " of the vegetable kingdom we gain admission into the Spiritual Temple. For the unfolding of spiritual truth, the world of plants, in some respects, is better adapted than any other department of nature. Abundant proofs of this will be seen in the following pages. For the re- presentation of the union of believers with Christ, for example, the vegetable, by the very peculiarity of its structure, is better fitted than the animal. St. Paul compares this union to that subsisting between husband and wife; but husband and wife are two separate individuals, and have a mutually independent life. He also compares it to the union subsisting between the head and the body; but the head and the members are only parts and organs of one and the same individual. But when our Lord says, " I am the Vine, ye are the branches," the union thus indicated is not only the closest possible — as close as that of the head with the body — but, as will be PREFATORY REMARKS. described fully in Chapter Third, it is also the union of separate independent individuals — like that of husband and wife in the intimacy of the marriage relation. The human-unions have indeed the advan- tage of conscious rational life — which the plant-union altogether lacks — and thus have a higher value; but, within the limits of its own capacity, the plant reveals to us more clearly the precise nature of the union. An additional peculiarity of the plant may also be noticed, which admirably qualifies it for s)rmbolising this mystical union. Animals grow by the substitution of new cells for the old, which are eliminated from their structure ; plants grow by the addition of new cells to the old, which are hermetically sealed up in their structure. The existence of the animal depends upon the incessant and total change of the very substance of its fabric; whereas the bulk of the tree remains fixed and unalterable till the lease of the entire organism has run out — there being no provision in the plant for the renewing of tissues once completed. Vegetable growth goes on slowly, by repetition of the same parts; and what is added to the plant is never lost. In this contrast between tlie animal and the plant, we see how much more PRE FA TOR V REMARKS. ix beautifully the plant symbolises the mode in which the Spiritual Vine grows, not by the substitution of living believers for dead, but by the addition of living believers to dead; we see the inseparable union of living and dead believers in Christ — and are impressively taught that nothing is lost in Him. No more vivid and expressive type of immortality can be found in material nature than a tree. A tree is the most enduring of all things. The rock and the mountain are the helpless prey of every wind that blows and raindrop that falls. The golden finger of the sun- beam cannot touch them, however lightly, without helping to crumble away some portion of them. They have no power of resistance — no principle of renewal ; and therefore, in the course of time they must inevitably succumb to all the forces of nature leagued against them, and disappear. But the tree has a principle of life and self-growth, which all nature helps to maintain and increase. The sunbeam touches it only to add to its stature and beauty, and the rain-drop falls upon it only to fill its veins with more and fuller life. And it is so constructed, — as we have seen, — that every addition of material which each summer makes to it, is retained, and goes to increase its size and strength. It is capable TjsriviiV PREFA TOR V REMARKS. of going on indefinitely — producing a constant repeti- tion of similar parts. It never presents indications of having passed the limit of its natural growth. It never assumes the appearance of natural old age. What re- mains living of the oldest tree, — though most of its trunk is a mere bleached, crumbling skeleton, — still forms every year new wood and bark, — still extends its roots and branches. Its leaves are as large and perfectly-formed, and the circulation of its sap as vigorous as in the days of its youth. For hundreds — ay, for thousands of years it lives on fresh and blooming, while all else is changing around. Season after season, — generation after genera- tion, it renews its foliage, while individuals, and families, and whole races, that have dwelt under its shadow, and have eaten of its fruit, have passed away. There are trees still flourishing in our own country that bridge across the middle ages, and have lived through the whole history of England. I have seen a yew-tree that put forth its infant shoots when Solomon was studying the cedars of Lebanon and the hyssop on the wall — that had reached its prime when the Druids were offer- ing their mysterious sacrifices under its shadow ; and is still, after the lapse of more than three thousand years, — though reduced to a mere fragment, — putting forth PREFA TOR V REMARKS. xi every summer, leaves, and flowers, and fruit, as perfect as in its palmiest days. But for purely accidental causes, any or every tree — so far as its organization is concerned — might endure as long as the world itself, and go on growing and enlarging to any conceivable size. There is nothing in its own structure to limit the bulk of its form and the length of its days. In its own nature it is perennial. Is not the T^-ee of Life then a most significant symbol ? Is not the prophecy of Isaiah invested with a higher value when looked at in this light ? — " As the days of a tree so are the days of My people." Are not the words of our Lord full of new meaning when we thus consider the trees how they grow ? — " I am the Vine, ye are the branches." The analogies contained in the following pages are not exclusively drawn from the grape-vine. The great majority are derived from this source, in order to make the treatment of the subject as homogeneous as possible ; but the whole range of the vegetable kingdom is laid under contribution for appropriate illustrations. The work is meant to be, not merely an exposition of the fifteenth chapter of St. John's Gospel, but also a general parable of spiritual truth from the world of plants. It describes some of the more prominent and apparent PREFATORY REMARKS. points in which the varied realm of vegetable life comes into contact with the higher spiritual realm, that includes it within its vast periphery ; and shows how rich a field of promise lies before the analogical mind in this direction. I wish to draw special attention to this general comprehensive design of the book, lest it should be regarded by those who seek to view everything in its just limits, colouring and proportions, as open to the objection that the work goes beyond the material — that the illustrations are more than the thing illustrated. Some interesting and valuable suggestions have been received from Mr. Soltau, Professor Harvey, Archbishop Trench, Dr. Thomas Balfour, and Mr. Leo Grindon — all of whom have written, with deep insight, upon the subject of the typical meaning of nature, and the con- nection of the world of sense with the world of faith. This new edition has been carefully revised. Many passages which appeared in the former have been omitted altogether, and others considerably altered; while a large amount of new matter has been added in the shape of explanatory footnotes and fresh illustrations in the text, which it is hoped will increase the value of the volume. I am conscious that it has still many imperfections which I cannot PREFATORY REMARKS. remedy. The mellow, rounded, graceful shadow pro- jected against a wall by the living, flexible human figure, is not more different from the stiff, hard, gro- tesque shadow cast by a statue, than is the ideal as it exists in my own mind from the reality which I have been able to execute. Such as it is, however, I put forth anew this monograph upon a favourite subject, hoping that, like Newton's apple, it may help to suggest wider an'd grander thoughts to others than belong to itself H. M. August., 1872. CONTENTS. VP. VKGB. I. THE TRUE VINE, * II. THE HUSBANDMAN, 3^ III. THE BRANCHES, 73 IV. THE FRUIT, 126 V. THE MEANS OF FRUITFULNESS, . . . .173 VI. ABIDING IN THE VINE, 243 VII. THE FR UITLESS BRANCHES, 285 foirivsiisiTY] THE TRUE VINE. CHAPTER I. TBE TRUE VINE. "I am the true Vine."— John xv. i. PROFOUND and far-reaching meanings are often hid in words. Like boulders left on the strand, confirming a geologist's theory, they lie as it were on the shore of the present, and reveal to us strange glimpses of a former state of things. Among the most interesting of such terms is the woiA parable. It means literally a placing of one " thing beside another, not for the purpose of comparison but of completion. And so interpreted, what a significant testimony does it bear to the blind and ignorant condition of fallen man ! Pre- vious to the expulsion from Eden, nature was a mirror in which heaven was seen as clearly reflected as the blue sky in the depths of a placid lake. There were not two separate worlds, but one. The earthly shadow was always associated in the mind of Adam with its heavenly substance. He needed no parable or symbol to t^ach THE TRUE VINE. him the truths of the unseen and the eternal, for every- thing around him was symbolic of spiritual truth. Creation was one great revelation of God. This is abundantly evident from the fact that natural objects alone, as embodying spiritual truths, are mentioned in the beginning of Genesis; such as the garden, the tree of life, the tree of knowledge, the command *'Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth." But his iniquity separated between his soul and God, and then, as a necessary consequence, between the natural and the spiritual worlds. The eating of the forbidden fruit made him see double — resolved the one harmonious scheme of creation into two separate independent worlds, sweeping indeed round a common centre, and having a certain local contiguity, but never uniting with, or blend- ing into one another. It brought the scales of unbelief over the purity of his vision, dropped a thick veil between him and the glory and meaning of the inner shrine of nature. The key of knowledge was taken away from him who aspired to be as God. He lost the power of deciphering the hieroglyphics inscribed on sky and stream and hill. Spiritually as well as literally, he hid himself from God, and God hid Himself from him among the trees of the garden. Walking among objects fitted by their very nature to suggest spiritual realities to his mind, he saw nothing but the common appearances of nature, and had no thoughts beyond their earthly uses. The articulate message of God seemed to be mere thunder, and the personal vision of His glory a mere lightning flash. CHRIST THE INTERPRETER. Such was the blindness, because of spiritual defection, which had fallen upon man, God's high-priest, in the very temple where formerly eveiything was as full of meaning to him as was the furniture of the tabernacle to Aaron. To cure this blindness, the second Adam came into the world. As the Living Ladder, in His descent and ascent — not in a dream but in open reality — He united earth to heaven. As the Mediator — the Son of God and the Son of man — He reconciled man to God. As the Creator and the First-Born of every creature. He joined together once more the seen and the unseen, which man's sin had divorced. He showed that nature was His Father's house — a grand temple with divinely-pictured windows. Standing without, man saw nothing but the merest outline of dusky shapes, and had no idea of the combined scheme and purport of the picture. But the True Light brought him through spiritual insight into the interior, and there every ray revealed a harmony of unspeakable splendours. Con- stantly, in His discourses, Jesus revealed the hidden glory of all creation. Not more frequently did He appeal to the written revelation of the Old Testament which He himself had given, in the formula "It is written," than He appealed to the older unwritten revelation in the works which He himself had made, in the formula "The kingdom of heaven is like unto a sower; like unto a grain of mustard seed; like unto leaven," &c. Seated by Jacob's well, He spoke of the living water; in the wilderness, after the miraculous feeding of the multitude. He drew attention to Himself 4 THE TRUE VINE. chap. as the true bread; in the homes of men, whenever He cured disease, He revealed Himself as the spiritual physician. The literal and the figurative ran side by side in all His words and acts; the natural and the spiritual were associated, as in statements like these,—" Except a man be bom of water and of the Spirit;'^ "He shall baptise you with the Holy Ghost and with fireH^ His miracles showed that the common forces of nature, con- stantly at work around us, and divested of all their inherent wonderfulness by their very uniformity and familiarity, were all direct powers of the Heavenly Kingdom. In His parables He lifted the veil from the face of nature, formerly despised or ignored; disclosed, in . living reality, to our eyes its wonderful spiritual beauty and significance, and connected the common sights and incidents of daily life with the laws and objects of that spiritual kingdom which He has opened up to all believers. "He expounded all things to His disciples;" or, as the original word for exipoundedf epe/ue), means literally, He set free from its folds or wrappings,, the meaning hid in the parables of nature, of which his own were faithful transcripts. His cross on Calvary was the very focus of symbolism, in which every spiritual truth connected with the finished work of redemption was shadowed forth in some material, visible form. He wore our human nature as the sign of His intimate union and communion with us in suffering; He was nailed to the cross as the picture of His spiritual sacri- fice; the crown of thorns was the natural indication that by Him the original curse was overcome and removed; THE ROSETTA STONE. the eclipse of the sun and the mid-day darkness were the outward representation of the dark cloud of spiritual desertion under which for a time His glory was eclipsed. In short, just as the Hebrew inscription on the cross was explained to the Greek and the Roman by the Greek and Latin equivalent by its side; just as the meaning of all Egyptian hieroglyphics was made known by the Greek translation placed side by side with the common and sacred Egyptian characters of the Rosetta Stone; so the meaning of all the objects and processes of nature is explained to us in the human and Divine language of the Bible, and in the human and Divine sayings and actions of Him who is the Living Word. Christ is the Alpha and Omega of creation; and as these letters include all the intermediate letters of the alphabet, and are necessary to make up every word of human language, by which we express our thoughts, so without Christ, the Word of God, was not anything made that was made; without Him there could have been no expression at first of the thoughts and qualities of God; and without His appearance on earth there could have been no explanation of the significance of creation to fallen man. Throughout the earlier part of our Lord's ministr}^ He discoursed exclusively in parables. We are told that without a parable spake He not unto the multitude. He sought to win the most careless and ignorant to the apprehension of the truth ; and therefore employed the most simple and familiar illustrations, borrowed from the scenes around them, and the common events of their 6 THE TRUE VINE. chap. daily life. His audience was composed almost entirely of the rustic multitudes of Galilee — the "warlike race," as Josephus describes them, who clung to the literal faith of their fathers in simplicity and zeal, and who wished to take Christ by force and make Him a king. And therefore pictures and external illustrations were the only suitable vehicles for their instruction. He made the world of nature and of human life to those child-like simple-hearted people, who were in closest contact with the culture of the soil — a kinder-garten in which they were taught by objects. And it was only the very little ones — those who had no spiritual susceptibility — who regarded the objects themselves. Hence the gospels, which describe the Gahlean life of Jesus, abound in the parabolic element. This is their distinguishing characteristic. In them the ladder of Divine truth which reaches to heaven is set up on the earth. But towards the close of His ministry Jesus confined Himself almost exclusively to Judasa; and there He found a different class of people — more meditative than active, more prone to inquire than prompt to obey, trained to exercise their minds by reflection upon the mysterious problems of religion and of their own wonderful history. To suit these thought- ful minds, the form of Christ's teaching was altered. He adopted a more refined and abstract mode of instruction. To the closer circle of disciples, educated by intimate companionship with Himself, and growing in faith and in spiritual apprehension. He used a personal style of I I. LINKS BETWEEN THE GOSPELS. 7 thought and language. He conveyed to their minds the highest verities of the Christian faith in the form of dialogues, special discourses, and spiritual revelations; and hence the gospel of St. John, which records at fullest length this part of Christ's ministry, which moves almost wholly within the circle of Judaea — St. John himself being probably a native of Jerusalem, dwelling there in his own house, except when he went annually to the Sea of Galilee during the fishing season, — is distinguished for the absence of the parabolic element. But there are links in this gospel which connect the later form of Christ's teaching with the earlier. At the close of the eleventh chapter of St. Matthew, we hear words so like those of St. John, that they seem a quotation from his gospel. " All things are delivered unto me of my Father ; and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father ; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son \yill reveal Him." " Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." So, on the other hand, in the tenth and fifteenth chapters of St. John, and in the 24th verse of the twelfth chapter, " Verily, verily, I say unto you. Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it ; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal;" and in the 2TSt verse of the sixteenth chapter, "A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come ; but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is 8 THE TRUE VINE. chap. born into the world. And ye now therefore have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you." In all these sayings of St. John we are brought back to the simple illustra- tions of St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke, and hear parables, as it were transformed and suited to the new circumstances. The narrative of the Vine is not, properly speaking, a parable; for a parable veiled the truth in a material illustration, and required to be afterwards unveiled or explained by an interpretation from without, like writing with sympathetic ink which needs the application of heat to bring out its characters. It is rather an allegory, for it contains within itself its own explanation ; the lower object is put directly for the higher. It is not necessary that Christ should interpret the vine to us, be- cause the thing signified is interpenetrated with the thing signifying; the qualities of the one being attributed to the other, and the two thus blended into one form of speech. In the allegory of the Vine we have our Lord's first and last teaching harmoniously combined; the parabolic and the personal element beautifully blended; the ends of the Gospel united in a perfect circle of revelation. We see in it the complete fulfilment of the promise given to the disciples as recorded by St. Matthew, and but partially fulfilled at the time, — " Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God ; but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables. For whosoever hath, to him shall be given and he shall have more abundance, but whosoever hath ORIGIN OF THE IMAGE. not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath." The method of Christ's teaching seems to have de- pended largely on chances and occasions. Seeds of truth were blown from Him who is the Truth by every breeze of circumstance, like thistledown by the wind. The character of His words, and the mould in which they were cast, were suited to the moment. This seems to have been specially the case with the allegory of the Vine. It was doubtless suggested by some outward in- cident of the moment; not by the sight of a vineyard, as some suppose, for the imagery of St. John — the gospel not of action but of meditation — is derived not from the fields of nature but from the homes of men -, and Christ on this occasion was not in the open air, but in the upper chamber at Jerusalem. Some object in the room caught His eye while He was speaking to the disciples. Per- haps a portion of a trellised vine outside, peeping in through the latticed window, rustling in the evening breeze, or showing through its veined, transparent leaves the golden light of the setting sun ; or, more probably still, the wine-cup before Him on the supper-table, — in which the Jewish Passover was transformed into the Christian Sacrament, — ^may have started the train of asso- ciation which led naturally and easily from the juice of the grape, the symbol of His shed blood, to the vine that produced it, as the symbol of His own broken body. But while the form of Christ's teaching on this occasion was determined by the accident of the moment, it fell in, by a beautiful and Divine harmony, with the general /V" OF TMB -^'^Cj^ lO THE TRUE VINE. chap. analogy of Scripture teaching. The vine is one of the most familiar images in the Old Testament. We see it as an illustration of spiritual ideas as frequently within the sacred enclosure of Divine truth as we see it grow- ing as a natural object in the fields of nature. The in- spired writers cultivated it as assiduously for its higher uses, as the vine-dresser cultivates it for the sake of its natural uses. No less than five of our Lord's parables refer to it. The idea of the kingdom of God as a vine or a vineyard* runs throughout the whole Bible ; and when our Lord appropriated it as an earthly symbol of Himself, He but fulfilled the highest meaning of the prophetic blessing pronounced by the dying Jacob upon the head of his son Judah; "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gather- ing of the people be. Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice vine ; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes; his eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white with milk." The Land of Promise was a land of vine- yards; and Judaea especially, with its temperate climate, * The prairie, or open moorland, although sown by the wind with the seed of trees, is bare of woods, because animals devour the young plants as soon as they appear above ground, and there is no shelter from the wind. But when a space is walled round, the seeds spring up in it freely, and in its favouring climate speedily become tall trees. So is it in the Church : it is a garden enclosed, a vineyard walled round from the open and exposed common of the world, in whose genial shelter plants of righteous- ness, the planting of the Lord, may grow up and flourish in God's holy place. I. RELATION OF VINE TO JUDMA, n and elevated rocky slopes, was admirably adapted for the culture of the vine. A vineyard on a terrace or brow of a hill is the first object that strikes the eye of the traveller when he approaches Judaea from the desert; and the first of our Lord's parables which is suggested to his mind by the new scenery is that of the " Vine- yard." Indeed, Hebron, according to Jewish tradition, is supposed to be the spot where the vine was created, and from whence, as a centre of distribution, it spread out to other lands. It was from the Judaean valley of Eshcol that the spies brought the enormous cluster of grapes, regarded by the Israelites as a remarkable specimen of the fertility of the land. A vineyard on a hill, fenced and cleared of stones, was the natural emblem of the kingdom of Judah; and this heraldic symbol was engraved on the coins of the Maccabees, on the ornaments of the temple, and on the tombstones of the Jews. It is not without significance that the vine should be thus peculiar to Judaea. One of the most perfect of plants, it belongs to one of the most perfect of countries as regards its physical structure. Contrast the grapes of Eshcol with the richly variegated scenery of that valley, and its elaborate geological conformation, with the hard dry woody fruits of the dreary parched plains of AustraHa; a low type of fruit with a low type of country. There is a close typical relation between the character of a country and the character of its productions; and this relation ascends even into the world of man. As the monotonous plains and innutritions fruits of Australia 12 THE TRUE VINE. chap. reared the lowest savages; so the picturesque mountain scenery, and the rich nutritious grapes, pomegranates and olives of Palestine developed the noblest of the human races. Judaea was not only the true climate and primitive centre of the vine, it was also the cradle of civilization in Palestine; here were started the first germs of that highly-developed social life which the Israelites found among the aboriginal Canaanites at the conquest. It may seem degrading thus to connect human progress with physical causes; but the soul is not more dependent upon the body, than body and soul are dependent upon the outer body of natural circumstances. It is possible, by the administration of various medicinal substances, to awaken almost every emotion of which the human breast is capable — ^joy, sorrow, hatred, benevolence, exhilaration, despair. The mountain elevation of Jerusalem, — one of the highest cities in the world, — with its pure air and bracing genial climate, may have had much to do with the purity of its manners, and the sanctity that attached to everything in it; while, on the other hand, the profound depression in which Sodom and Gomorrah lay, — the deepest abyss on the face of the earth, — with its enervating tropical climate and its hot, stagnant air, may have had much to do with the awful corruption of morals which made these cities of the plain a proverb of wickedness. Thus is the profound saying of Ruskin, — "The dis- tinctions of species among plants seem appointed with more definite ethical address to the intelligence of man as their material products become more useful to him," ILLUSTRATIVE FITNESS OF VINE. 13 illustrated in the case of the vine in Judaea. But besides its local suitableness, there were many obvious fitnesses to recommend our Lord's choice of the symbol in His last discourse in Jerusalem. He wished to represent outwardly the permanent spiritual union of His disciples with Himself; and therefore a perennial and not an annual plant must be selected, a dicotyle- donous tree with branches, and not a monocotyledonous tree without branches. The image of the lily suited our Lord when His own personal loveliness, purity, and fragrance, and His own short-lived single life on earth were intended to be shadowed forth; and the image of the palm-tree, which has no branches, suited the disciples when their own individual excellence was portrayed : — "The righteous shall flourish like the palm-tree." But when the lasting union between Christ and His disciples is to be represented, these images are found inappro- priate. A plant must be selected from another order of the vegetable kingdom altogether, whose character- istic it is to produce branches, and live, and grow year after year. Further, the fruitfulness of Christ and the fruitfulness of believers in Him, is an idea that has to be outwardly symbolised; and hence the plant that can do this adequately must be a cultivated one — not a mere herb of the field, like corn, yielding fruit only on the top of a stalk, but a tree yielding fruit all round, on every branch and twig. Further still, the subordinate relation to and dependence of Christ upon His Father in the days of His flesh, is another idea which must be expressed by the symbol; and this idea manifestly 14 THE TRUE VINE. excludes all fruit-trees that are capable of standing alone and unsupported, such as the apple — the pomegranate, or the fig tree. The plant that is to convey this idea must be a trailing, climbing plant, which clings to some object of support, and is incapable of standing and growing up alone. Believers in Christ exhibit, with general features of resemblance to each other, consider- able personal differences of character and experience; and the plant which is to represent this quality must admit of considerable variability within certain distinct and well-recognised limits. All these qualifications, and others which will be stated further on, required in the allegory, meet in the vine, and in the vine alone. It is a cultivated, fruitful, perennial, branching, climbing plant; it is extremely variable under cultivation, every country and province having a special form, and new varieties being produced every year; and hence it admirably symbolises the relations of our Lord to the Father on the one hand, and to the disciples on the other. The vine does not belong to the earlier ages of the world's history. It is never found in the shape of fossil remains in geological strata, previous to the Upper Miocene. It belongs peculiarly to the human period, and was planted in the earth shortly before its occupancy by man. It came into the world along with the beautiful rose, and the fruitful apple, and the fragrant mint, and the honey-laden bee, to make an Eden of nature for man's use and enjoyment. The former ages were flowerless; green, monotonous tree- I. ASSOCIA TION WITH HUMAN HISTOR Y. 15 ferns and tree-mosses, destined to become fuel for man, alone covered the land. But blossoms and fruits came with humanity, as outbirths and representatives of spiritual principles — thus testifying to the close correspondence between nature and the soul of man. Prophesied by all previous vegetable forms, whose structure ap- proached nearer and nearer to its type, the vine appeared in the fulness of the earth's time ; just as He whom it shadowed forth was announced in type and prophecy from the foundation of the world, and by all His forerunners in typical personages back to Adam, and appeared in the fulness of human history when the world was ready for His reception. And thus the symbol and the Person symbolised belong peculiarly to the human world, and were destined specially for human nourishment and satisfaction. Fruit trees form a peculiar link between the ages and the zones — between the dead and the living; and this is another feature of the vine's fitness for representing human qualities. They enlist our hopes and sympathies year after year ; and their aged branches, like withered hands and arms, hold out their ripened produce — the best that they can give, to successive generations. They are do- mesticated, and brought into relationship with each member of the family by their individual qualities. They have grown humanized, as Hawthorne says, by receiving the care of man, and by contributing to his wants. They are associated in a remarkable manner with the history of the human race. We can trace the gradual diffusion of mankind and their progressive advancement 1 6 THE TRUE VINE. chap. in civilization, by the distribution of certain favourite fruits over the surface of the globe, and the gradual im- provement of them by cultivation. Wherever man has penetrated he has carried with him, and planted in the new soil, the fruits upon which he depended for food or luxury. Most of our own fruits mark the different revolutions in. our national history, and the great changes in our social state. To the Roman invaders we are indebted for the cherry, which Lucullus brought to Rome from Pontus, as a memorial of his victory over Mithrid- ates ; and the peach, the plum, and the pear, introduced by them from Persia and Armenia, are evidences that our country was once a Roman colony. By the monks also, who accompanied the crusades to the Holy Land, many new and valuable fruit trees were brought from the East, and planted in the monastic gardens, from whence they gradually spread over the land. In the same manner, the Spanish priests caused almost all the fruits of tem- perate Europe to flourish amidst the productions of the torrid zone in South America. Missionaries have intro- duced European fruits into India, Southern Africa, and the islands of the South Seas. This historical connec- tion of fruits with the progress of civiHzation, is in no case so striking as in that of the vine. From Asia it passed into Greece and thence into Sicily; the Ph oceans carried it into the south of France; the Romans planted it in Spain and on the banks of the Rhine; while British enterprise introduced it into America, Madeira, Cape of Good Hope, and Australia, where it yields an abundant vintage. A strict correlation exists between the culture PREFIGURATION OF PLANTS, 17 of the vine, and the intellectual and spiritual develop- ment of humanity. Wherever the grape ripens, there flourish all the arts that chiefly tend to make life nobler and more enjoyable. The spread of the Christian religion, as a general rule, has been co-extensive and synchronous with that of the vine. To almost every region where the Gospel has been preached the vine has extended, so that wherever the allegory of our Saviour is read, there the natural object may be seen to illustrate it. In the symbol of the vine our Lord recognises the prefiguration in plants of animal forms and functions. This prefiguration opens up to us one of the most inter- esting and instructive fields of study, for it helps us to a right conception of the unity of nature. As a general rule, there is nothing to be found in the world of animals for which a parallel may not be found in the world of plants. The lower objects show distinctly and in detail what in the higher objects is obscured by their more complex organisation. We see in the trees and flowers around us interpreters of the mysteries of our own nature — mute prophecies of our own human form, char- acter and actions. If we consider the liHes how they grow, we shall find in them, as in a picture, set forth all the incidents and experiences that make up our own life. They cease their work like us, close their eyelids and sleep every night when the sun sets, and awake to renewed activity, like us, when the morning comes Their snowy blossoms, with their stamens and pistils, prefigure the purity and beauty of our human marriage ; 1 8 THE TRUE VINE. chap. and their fragrance the sweetness of our human love. We have a foreshadowing of human birth in the bursting of the pod and the escape of the seed; and of the mother's bosom in the supply of milk-like nourishment stored up in the seed with the germ, from which the young plant draws its food till it is weaned, and able to cater from the soil for itself. How beautiful is the parallel between the life of leaves and that of man, unfolding in the delicate greenness of spring, maturing in the vigour of summer, and fading away in the lan- guor and decay of autumn! In the stem, branches, and foliage of the vine, we discern the ideal plan or model on which our own bodies are constructed : the stem being the spinal column; the branches the ribs and members; the leaves the lungs; while the sap- vessels, filled with their nourishing fluid, correspond with the veins and their circulating blood. The func- tions, too, which all these parts and organs in the vine perform are precisely analogous to those which similar parts and organs perform in the economy of man. In- deed, we cannot speak in the most literal and matter- of-fact way of the vine, without implying the profound poetic truth of prefigurement, — without unconsciously philosophizing and using terms first framed to denote the members of our own bodies. Upon this wonderful resemblance of man to the flowers of the field and the trees of the forest every poetical mind has delighted to dwell, without knowing, perhaps, the reason. The Greeks of old pictured it in their beautiful fables of the Dryads, Daphnes, and Ariels. Jotham's parable of the PREFJGURA TION OF PLANTS. 19 trees, and our Saviour's parables from the vegetable kingdom, are examples of the same deep-seated feeling. Our modern language of flowers, with all its sentimental absurdities, is an unconscious recognition of it. How touchingly does Herrick describe it in the well-known verses on the daflbdils ! How it glows on almost every page of Wordsworth's poetry, who believed that flowers had feeling, and that man is a tree endowed with powers of self-knowledge and self-movement, or an ^^ arbor in- versa,'^ as the ancients called him ! Shelley speaks of " a wood of sad sweet thoughts." Every one who has passed through a forest has felt what may be called its intense human feeling. Its shadow hes upon the hushed heart like the presence of some unknown being. In its dim perspectives, leading to deeper solitudes, there seem to lurk strange weird mysteries and speech- less terrors, that keep eye and ear intent in vague ex- pectancy, as if waiting for some one. The trunks of the trees, with their knotted bark covered with hoaiy lichens, seem like a solemn senate. How vividly, in the ballad of the Erl King, does Goethe describe this human feel- ing of the forect, which, as we have seen, is not all mere fancy ! What a terrible use does Dante make of it in his description of the human forest in the infernal regions, — men metamorphosed into trees; branches, when broken, dripping blood and uttering a wild human wail ! The conclusion to which these con- siderations lead us is, that when we employ the vine as a symbol of human qualities, the congruity between them is of a deeper and truer nature than that of mere 20 THE TRUE VINE. chap. poetical selection or arbitrary metaphor. It lies in the very nature of things. It is founded upon the plan of creation, upon the mutual structural and functional relations of plants and animals as parts of one great \^ole. The vocabulary of St. John's gospel is eminently char- acteristic. It has several peculiar terms^ — such as the Word, the Light, the Life, the Truth, the World, Glory, Grace — which, perhaps more than all others, bear upon them the clear stamp of the Divine signet. They are key-words which open up new realms of thought to us ; as suggestive as the streak of dawn along the eastern hills. Like the jewels in the breastplate of the Jewish high-priest, they glow among the commoner terms with a mystic radiance which dispels the shadows of earth and time, and reveals the unseen and eternal. To these peculiar words may be added the word " true," which occurs no less than twenty-two times in the Gospel of St. John, as against five times in all the rest of the New Testament. This word illustrates in a remarkable way the meditative simplicity of St. John's writings, in which all the ideas reduce themselves to a few comprehensive terms. The full meaning of the word " true," as Archbishop Trench says, is not com- monly understood, owing to the fact that it is employed to represent, and so confound, two ideas which are most distinct; viz.^ the true as opposed to the false, and the true as distinguished from the typical or subordinate realization. Our forefathers, wiser in this respect than we, recognised this distinction, and ex- I. MEANING OF THE WORD TRUE. 21 pressed the former idea by the word true^ and the latter by the word very^ which has now become obsolete in that sense. The man who fulfilled the promise of his lips was a true man ; but the man who fulfilled the wider promise of his name was a very man, a man indeed. Goji is the true God, in the sense that He cannot lie — that He is the truth-speaking and the truth- loving God, whose every word is Yea and Amen ; but He is much more than that ; He is the true God, inas- much as He is all that the name of God implies, in contradistinction to idols or false gods, which have no existence save in the dreams of diseased fancy or degraded superstition. He is, as the old phrase is still retained in the Nicene creed, ^''very God of very God." In Greek the distinction is clearly indicated by the use of two words, alethes true, and alethinos very, which are never used indiscriminately. The word translated in our version is alethinos^ and should be rendered very^ for it indicates the contrast, not between the true and the false, but between the imperfect and the perfect — between the shadowy and the substantial, the type and the archetype, the highest ideal and a subordinate realization or partial anticipation. This last is the sense in which St. John almost exclusively employs the term. Christ is declared to be "the true light,"* not thereby * The seven-branched candlestick of the tabernacle may be said to have combined in itself the two emblems of the *'true vine" and the " true light," just as they were united in the bush of the desert that burned with fire and was not consumed. The sacred candlestick was in the shape of a tree ; its ornaments were derived from the vegetable kingdom j its knobs and bowls were almond 2 2 THE TRUE VINE. chap. indicating that all other lights are false or have no real existence, but that He is the "Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world," the central Sun whose light is reflected by every object and person as His satellites,— the Eye that made the eye, the Light that created the sun, the Light that shone in the pillar of fire, that made John the Baptist a burning and shining light, that walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, and holdeth the seven stars in His hand, and kindles all believers as lights in the world. Similarly, Christ is "the true bread" — not denying by this expression, that there was nourishing power in the manna in the wilderness, or that our daily bread is able to sustain our natural life, but merely indicating that these corrupted if kept, nourished only the body, and did not preserve those who partook of them from death; they were bread only in an inferior and subordinate degree — a shadow of Him who is bread in the highest and fullest sense of which if a man eat, he shall never hunger, and shall be nourished up into everlasting life. Thus we are able to enter into the full meaning of Christ's words, "I am the True Vine." And in this connection it is interesting to notice that the Saxon blossoms and fruit. There is a close analogy between trees and flames, between the "true light" and the "true vine." The vine is concentrated solar light, — the seven-branched candlestick which exhibits the light kindled by the sun in the shape of leaves, flowers, and fruit. Like the flame of a candle, the vine is nothing more than a temporary state through which material substance is passing, because of some original physical impression made upon it, and the present operation of external circumstances. ISRAEL NOT THE TRUE VINE. 23 word tree is etymologically cognate with true, signifying that which is firm, strong, or well-established. " The vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah His pleasant plant." Israel was a vine, — the vine which God brought out of Egypt,* as an unsuitable soil and climate for its production — too tropical, enervating, and debasing — and planted in the rocky soil and temperate climate of Palestine, amid hardy conditions and changeable cir- cumstances, fitted to train up a brave and God-fearing nation. But Israel was not the true vine of God. * The vine cannot endure a tropical climate, ceasing to flourish productively whenever the mean temperature of the year approaches 22° centigrade or 71° 6'' Fahrenheit. In Asia, Africa, and Europe it has never been cultivated,, with the view of converting its fruit into wine, outside the zone comprised between the thirtieth and fiftieth degrees of north latitude. In the warm climate of the valley of the Jordan it was rare, if not unknown ; and it appears to have been unproductive on the low lands adjoining the Medi- terranean. Spots that were favourable to the palm were unfavour- able to the vine. It might therefore be expected to flourish on the mountains of Judaea, and to fail on the plains of Jericho. The region of Palestine is almost or quite the farthest south in that quarter of the globe where the vine is luxuriant and productive ; the elevation of the hills and table-lands of Judsea being, as already mentioned, its true climate. We read indeed in the Old Testament that the vine was used for vintaging purposes in Egypt ; and numerous hieroglyphics attest that this was not an exceptional, but a common practice. The wine of Antilles, grown near Alexandria, was the choicest at the banquet of Antony and Cleopatra. But in that country the vine was grown only in the north, and in places exceptionally cool and moist, where by sheltering it from the rays of the sun and other precautions, the injurious influence of climate was prevented. At Cairo, with a mean temperature of 72°, the culture is insignificant. 24 THE TRUE VINE. chap. Though not altogether false and fraudulent, it was an inferior and subordinate realization, a partial and imperfect anticipation of the truth. It did not come up to God's ideal of a vine ; it fulfilled very imperfectly and unsatisfactorily the purposes of its existence. It was carefully tended by God's gracious husbandry ; but when the Husbandman came seeking fruit upon it, He found none, or only wild grapes. " Israel is an empty vine; he bringeth forth fruit unto himself." "Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed, how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me ? " " For their vine is of the vine of Sodom and of the fields of Gomorrah ; their grapes are grapes of gall; their clusters are bitter; their wine is the poison of dragons and the cruel venom of asps." But Christ was the True Vine of God ; He fulfilled to the utmost the purposes of His existence. The vine- yard of Israel was to be laid waste and destroyed. It was to be taken from the wicked husbandmen, and given to the husbandmen who should faithfully render the fruits in their season. But out of this Jewish vine- yard was to grow one Vine, which should endure when all the peculiar institutions of Judaism had perished, and become the starting-point of a new and higher religious growth. He who was bom and lived and died as a Jew, was to be known as the Son of man, in whom the horizon of humanity would be widened and en- nobled. The human tree, which hitherto had propa- gated itself, generation after generation, by means of buds alone, inheriting the sins and corruptions of nature I. THE COUNTERFEIT. 25 in a wearisome monotony and uniformity of sin, in Him blossomed and produced seed, by means of which a new variety of spiritual life and growth was introduced into the world. He realized the name of God's Vine in its highest form, in its ripest and completest de- velopment Whatever that name implied, whatever, according to that name. He ought to be, that He was to the full. " The idea and the fact were in Him, what they never could be in any other, absolutely com- mensurate." While the Law was given by Moses, grace and truth came by Jesus Christ ; the imperfect and the shadowy were given by the one, the perfect and the substantial by the other. Christ is the Truth in whom all types find their fullest realization, and reach their culminating glory. Christ is also the " True Vine," as distinguished from the false or counterfeit vine. One natural object in Scripture is frequently employed to shadow forth two spiritual truths — is used in a good and in a bad sense. Leaven, for instance, is likened by our Saviour to the kingdom of heaven ; it is also employed as the s)niibol of what is false and corrupting. So the vine, which is employed to denote Christ and His people, also denotes Antichrist and his confederates. "And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great wine-press of the wrath of God." There are many species of vine, but there is only one grape-vine ; so error is multiform, but truth is one. And just as the wheat is imitated by the tares — the poisonous darnel — which closely resemble it in 26 THE TRUE VINE. chap. every respect; so the True Vine is imitated by the vine of Sodom, with its poisonous fruit. Whatever we see in the kingdom of Hght is parodied and caricatured by the kingdom of darkness. The Christ of the one is the Antichrist of the other; the saints of the one are the hypocrites of the other. Whatever befalls the one in good is reflected by the other in evil. But there is another aspect still in which the phrase " True Vine/' as applied by Christ to Himself, may be viewed. The Greek word for " true " here, as I have already said, is alethinos. It is derived from the verb lanihano — to lie hid, to be concealed, — and from the particle a — being a contraction of apo — ^having a priva- tive power ; and therefore signifies, literally, unconcealed, — as if Christ had said, " I am the unconcealed Vine." This idea opens up a new set of relations. Israel was a concealed vine. Its full significance was not known until Christ, the True Vine, revealed it. It had a value, but, like a cipher, which means nothing until conjoined with a numeral, that value was indefinite until it was asso- ciated with Him who is the chiefest among ten thou- sand, and altogether lovely. The history of Christ sheds light upon the whole history of Israel. St. Mat- thew, in his opening chapter, draws our attention to the fact that the history of the type is repeated in that of the Archetype. Israel, the son of God as a nation, was rescued in its infancy from the bondage of Egypt God's Only-Begotten Son had a similar destiny ; for He too, in His infancy, was exposed to a tyrant's persecu- tion, and, by Divine interposition, rescued from it. St. THE TALLITH. 27 Matthew quotes the words of Hosea, "Out of Egypt have I called my Son," as fulfilled in the fortunes of the infant Saviour. And so was it with all the institutions of Israel. The law that came by Moses was weak and unprofitable ; it accomplished nothing ; it was a symbol having a concealed meaning — a schoolmaster leading to Christ. This was implied in the fact that, during prayer and the reading of the law in the synagogue, the priests always wore the Tallith^ or veil, in commemoration of that with which Moses covered his shining face, and in order, as St. Paul explains to us, not merely to shroud the glory of the law from weak and awe-stricken eyes^ but also to protect it from a too-penetrating scrutiny, which might have revealed, in the very history of its introduction, a higher object beyond itself. "Moses put a veil over his face, that the children of Israel could not steadfastly look to the end of that which is abolished." But the aletheia — the truth, the full mean- ing and purpose of the law — came by Jesus Christ, in whom were fulfilled the law and the prophets, — ^who is the end of the law for righteousness to all who believe. "When it" — that is, the heart of the people — "shall turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away." So, too, the Jewish tabernacle was a shadow of Christ, the True Tabernacle, who assumed our nature, and dwelt in our world. It had two coverings, — one of rams' skins dyed red, and another of badgers' skins, — not merely to protect it, on the march, from the sun or dust, but to indicate that it was a veiled or concealed symbol. Its inner glory was hidden by its rough bad- 28 THE TRUE VINE, ger-skin exterior, just as its real design was hidden by its common appearance — a tent like the tents of Israel. All its sacred furniture and vessels, we find in the fourth chapter of Numbers, were also wrapped, for the same reason, in coverings or veils of blue, and scarlet, and purple, and badgers' skins. "And upon the table of showbread they shall spread a cloth of blue;" "and they shall take a cloth of blue and cover the candlestick of the light; " and " they shall take away the ashes from the altar, and spread a purple cloth thereon," etc. When Christ appeared, He disclosed the meaning of those symbols of human uses and associations which the structure and objects of the tabernacle had been indicating. He removed the covering from them, as it were ; He Himself was the unconcealed tabernacle. What before had been seen in shadow now comes out clearly. The older saints had merely the shadow ; but we, with open face, looking into the New Testament as into a glass, see the very image. In a similar way the natural vine is a concealed vine. When created, as Dr. Balfour says, it had a symbolical meaning — ^a distinct reference to Christ. It was a living parable or riddle, speaking of Him age after age. But men could not understand its symbolical meaning; they misinterpreted its lessons ; they thought that it had no higher uses than the mere material, utilitarian ones, — to delight their eye with its beauty, to refresh their palate with its fruit, or to minister to their depraved senses in the intoxicating draught. It was only when Christ ap- peared that the parable was explained, and the mystery, NATURE A VEILED GLORY. 29 hid from ages and generations, revealed. When He said, " I am the True (or unconcealed ) Vine," then men understood for the first time the meaning that had all along been concealed in the vine. Then articulate expression was given to the secret which the vine, from the beginning of the world, by its dumb language ol signs, had been striving in vain to impart. Our Lord's first miracle at Cana of Galilee — the conversion of. water into wine — was efiected by the direct and imme- diate agency of the True Vine. It revealed the power which enables the natural vine in the vineyard to change the rains and dews of every summer into wine in its grapes. Jesus lifted the veil from the natural form, and disclosed, once for all, the spiritual Presence always working behind it. And what is thus asserted of the vine is equally applicable to bread, to light, to water, — to every natural object. They all had a con- cealed meaning — a reference to Christ — ^from the be- ginning; so that when He appeared, the whole was unconcealed or revealed. We are placed, as it were, in the presence of an Isis — a veiled glory. The hea- venly tabernacle is about us, but we know it not. We live, and move, and have our being in the midst of its eternal realities, but they are covered with the badger's skin of familiar uses and common-place enjoyments, veiled with the blue wrappings of sky and sea, and the purple and scarlet veils of mountain and flower. Our whole life is spent in the effort to see more of heaven in nature and in revelation. Now and then, while we work and pray, the covering is partially lifted, and we 30 THE TRUE VINE. chap. obtain a glimpse of the hidden effulgence. When we are conscientiously and earnestly endeavouring to ^nd out the design and significance of creation, in the light given to us by Him who is the absolute Truth, we are attaining to the knowledge of the truth, or the uncon- cealed; we are sharing in the dignity of communion with God. " It is the glory of God to conceal a thing ; but the honour of kings is to search out a matter."* We are accustomed to call such language as our Lord employs in the text figurative language, thereby implying that there is nothing in it but a fanciful ana- logy. But we have seen that such language is not really metaphorical, but is our Lord's simple, literal explanation of His own creative purposes. The truest language is necessarily what we call figurative, and only false when the spiritual is interpreted by the physical, instead of the physical by the spiritual. Our Lord does not say, " I am like the vine." That would have been to use a mere metaphor, or figure of speech — to lay hold of a mere fanciful or arbitrary resemblance be- tween Himself and the vine. But He says, '-^1 am the True Vine;" and this declares that the vine is the * Idolatry, instead of taking off the covering from the spiritual idea which nature contains, only darkens it by throwing over it an additional veil. The eidolon^ or idol-image, instead of being a medium for the worship of the true or unconcealed God, hides Him more completely from the view. So, too, all ritualism obscures the significance of the truth by its symbols — deals with the truth as the Mahometans do with the sacred ark called the kaaba of Mecca, which they cover every year with a new kesoua, or silken covering. The only way to unveil the truth is by spirituality of mind and purity of heart. SPIRITUAL SOURCE OF NATURE. 3^ actual shadow of His substance. He is not merely the ingenious Deviser and Designer, displaying in the vine His contrivances of skill, but its Archetype; He is the ideal, and the vine is the material representative. It is what we find it, not because God willed it to be so arbi- trarily, as because of His containing in His own nature the first principles of its whole fabric and economy. It is one of the things that are made in which are clearly seen the invisible things of God, — one of the inert images or forms in time of spiritual and eternal facts. In common with every object of the physical world, it is derived from an anterior spiritual world, and is the effect of a spiritual cause, which gives it its formative force, — preserves in this peculiar pattern its matter, that would otherwise pass indifierently from mould to mould, without taking the shape of any, — enables it to select its materials from earth and air, .and causes it to come back, and grow up, generation after generation, in its own peculiar and adopted form. This profound and interesting truth is expressly taught in the Mosaic ac- count of creation : — " These are the generations of the heavens and the earth, and of every herb of the field before it was in the earth, and of every herb of the field before it grewP These words tell us as plainly as lan- guage can, of the spiritual source of the physical world, — that before the earth was, green verdure already ex- isted, though not visible, — that every herb of the field is an outbirth from the unseen universe. The model, or pattern of all created things existed in the spiritual world, in the mind of Him who calleth those things that 32 THE TRUE VINE. chap. be not as though they were, just a^ truly as the patterns of the tabernacle existed in the spiritual world, and were shown to Bezaleel on the mount. The tabernacle of nature, no less than the tabernacle of Israel, is an earthly copy of things which have a most real and glori- ous existence in heaven. What qualities in Christ are adumbrated by the vine? What infinite reality in Him is indicated by the finite shadow ? This we cannot fully unfold. We know only in part, and can prophesy only in part. We see through a glass darkly. But some of the resemblances are obvious. The vine, take it all in all, is the most perfect of plants. Some plants possess one part, or one quality, more highly developed ; but for the harmonious development of every part and quality — for perfect balance of loveliness and usefulness, there are none to equal the vine. It belongs to the highest order of the vegetable kingdom, ranks in structure above the lily and the palm, occupies the same position among plants which man does among animals. Its stem and leaves are among the most elegant in shape and hue, its blos- soms among the most modest and fragrant, while its fruit is botanically the most perfect ; and, aesthetically, painters tell us, that to study the perfection of form, colour, light, and shade, united in one object, we must place before us a bunch of grapes. It is perfectly innocent, being one of the few climbing plants that do not injure the object of their support. It has no thorns — ^no noxious qualities; all its parts are useful. Its foliage affords a refreshing shade from the scorching PERSONAL ORIGIN OF NATURE. zz sunshine ; its fruit was one of the first oblations to the Divinity, and, along with bread, is one of the primary and essential elements of human food. It beautifies the landscape wherever it is allowed to wreath the trellised cottages with its garlands, and festoon the trees with its luxuriant drapery. In common with other plants, it purifies the air — feeding upon what we reject as poison, and returning it to us as wine that maketh glad the heart, and in the process maintaining the atmosphere in a fit condition for our breathing. In all these aspects the vine is the shadow of Him who is altogether lovely — who unites in Himself the extremes of perfection — who is con- tinually doing good — who beautified our fallen world by His presence, changed its wilderness into an Eden, and made the polluted atmosphere of our life purer by breathing it, and is now transforming our evil into good, and our sorrow into a fruitful and strengthen- ing joy. The words " I am the True Vine," moreover, distin- guish clearly between nature and that which is above it. To Pantheism nature is all — nature is God, or God is nature ; but the phrase, " I am the True Vine " reveals to us the existence of a Being who is distinct from, and superior to, the works of His hands ; traces the stream of effect up to a living origin, and discriminates the nature of that origin. It is the satisfaction of true reason, which, finding transitory beauty in the type, turns by its own law to gaze on the eternal beauty beyond, — which, hearing broken music in the echo, 34 - THE TRUE VINE. chap. yearns after the perfect harmony which caused the echo, — which, in short, will not be satisfied with any image, but cries after the Original. The pronoun " I " in it leads us up to the Personal Origin of all creation ; shows to us that creation is not eternal, but springs from a Person. The fact that we ourselves are persons indicates that only a Personal cause could have created us. A thing cannot originate a person ; only a person can create a thing. Physical causes possess no inherent power — are as incapable of maintaining, as of first producing, the system of the universe. Natural selection, evolution, development, cannot account for the origin and maintenance of nature ; they are merely, supposing them to be true, the modes in which a personal Agent operates, and cannot be the cause of their own obser- vance. The very genius of language, God's gift, and the indispensable medium of thought, recognises the fact that a person only can be really an agent — a mere thing not acting, but being acted upon. In the Greek and Latin language, as Dr. Whately remarks, "nouns of the neuter gender, considered as denoting things, and not persons, invariably have the nominative and ac- cusative the same, or rather may be said to have an accusative only, employed as a nominative, when the grammatical construction requires it." Our Saviour, too, in rebuking the fever, and the winds and waves, did not use a mere oratorical personification, but traced the disorders of nature up to their source in a person — brought them back to Satan and to fallen man as their ultimate cause. When, therefore, he says, "I am the I. UNION WITH CHRIST THE TR UE VIE W-POINT. - c True Vine," He reveals Himself as the personal Origin of all that the vine is and does. If all this be really as I have said, how can any one expect to be able to interpret the meaning of the vine, without the personal knowledge of the Living Being who is working and speaking to us through its instru- mentality? Its botanical structure and history, its aesthetic qualities and economical uses, we may know by the methods of science ; but its higher significance — the object for which it truly exists, and which con- nects it with the spiritual world, by whose laws it is what it is, and does what it does, — that in it which appeals not to the intellect, but to the heart and the spirit — must be altogether unknown to him who does not enter within the veil of creation, and in the Holy Place above the mercy-seat, where there are the hea- venly realities of earthly shadows, talk with God face to face as a man talketh with his friend. It is because many of our poets and scientific men have not been alone with God on the mount, receiving from Him the revelation of the laws of the universe, and beholding the patterns of earthly things in His book, that nature is as blank to them of spiritual meaning as the tables of stone before God's finger wrote upon them; that much of modern poetry is a mere reflex of humanity, and of modern science only a circle of continuous force con- tinually returning upon itself. '"If," as St. Paul says, " God has gathered together in one all tilings in Christ, both those which are in the heavens, and those which are on the earth, even in Him," then the highest gene- 36 THE TRUE VINE. chap. ralizations of science that fall short of Him want the unit that completes them, and gives to their ciphers an infinite significance. Without the knowledge of His person we cannot have the knowledge of His work in its fulness. The secret of the Lord is not with us. But once united to Him by a living and loving faith, we have the proper view-point of the universe. The Sun of Righteousness, and not the earth itself, is the centre of the system of nature ; and regarded from this helio- centric position, difficulties and mysteries, insoluble from the geocentric position, are cleared away. There is a very curious puzzle, which, when viewed in the ordinary way, is an utterly incomprehensible jumble of Hnes and forms ; but when a polished cylindrical reflector is placed at a particular point, the reflected image be- comes a perfect picture. In like manner does Jesus show, in its true order and beauty, what apart from Him appears hopeless confusion. In Him we have the Living Word that created and interprets all things. Creation and redemption are seen by eyes purged by His spiritual eye-salve, and hearts made pure and simple by His love, to be parts of one glorious system, which may not be disjoined, or unduly exalted the one above the other. The territory of nature is no more, as many still ignorantly and foolishly think, what Canaan was at first — a heathen land outside of the Gospel. Our Joshua or Jesus, has conquered it for His own Israel, and made it a Holy Land ; and . He now leads the Christian's thoughts and affections to dwell in it, and make it his home. The same great truths are seen to I. WORDS OF KEBLE. 37 be imprinted upon nature that shine forth with clearest light in redemption. Communion with nature is a sac- ramental communion. Everything shows forth the glory of the Redeemer; His righteousness is manifested ir, the great mountains, and His judgments in the greai deeps ; the liHes of the field speak of His loveliness ; the trees of the forest clap their hands to Him ; and the very stones cry out " Hosannas ! " " Two worlds are ours ! 'tis only sin Forbids us to descry The mystic heaven, and earth within, Plain as the sea and sky. Thou who hast given me eyes to see, And love this sight so fair. Give me a heart to find out Thee, And read Thee everywhere." CHAPTER II. THE HUSBANDMAN. ** And my Father is the Husbandman." — John xv. i. TT is a remarkable example of providential p re-ar- rangement, that the book which is most human and most Divine should have been written in circumstances and languages the best adapted to convey its truth to men. The Divine revelation was" given first in the deserts and mountains of the unchanging East, amid stereotyped customs and calm unvarying scenery ; then it passed to the busy cities of the West, and took its place as a heavenly leaven among ever-varying scenes of life, and continually-changing conditions of society. It was given first in oracles, proclaimed by prophets to the people, standing aloof and at a great moral height above them, and silencing the doubts and questionings of men's hearts by the unanswerable formula : " Thus saith the Lord." It then passed into the form of epis- tles, or familiar letters, written by apostles to brethren with whom they had intimate fellowship in the Divine truth, and who were placed on the same level with HEBRE W AND GREEK, 3 9 them, to meet a special occasion, and in immediate contact with actual life. The first part of it spreads over the long period of four thousand years, like a perennial plant repeating, generation after generation, the same parts of stem and foliage, but slowly preparing for, and progressing all the time towards, a great and definite crisis. The last part is completed in the short space of less than forty years, and is like the sudden blossoming of the plant, in which leaves, wound spirally round the stem at distant intervals, are compressed into the close rows of the petals of the flower, and brilliantly coloured by the intenser action of life. The Old Testa- ment Scriptures were given in the Hebrew tongue, whose words, though few and simple, are many-sided, contain depth below depth of meaning, and are capable of the widest range and application. The New Testa- ment Scriptures were given in the Greek tongue, whose extraordinary wealth of inflexions, flexibility of expres- sion, and boundless opportunity of style, translated the grand old Hebrew words of Divine truth into an easy and practical medium between man and man in the every-day intercourse and business of life. The Old Testament is a rich, ripe capsule, full of seeds of thought; the New Testament is the sowing and the germinating of these seeds in the field which man tills and tends. The Hebrew language of the one is like the rod in the prophet's hand, — stiff and unbending in its stateliness ; the Greek lang-uage of the other is like the rod cast upon the ground, and changed into a ser- pent instinct with life, and bending in all directions. 40 THE TRUE VINE. chap. In the one we have the general comprehensive precepts; in the other, the specific and practical applications of them. In the writers of the later Scriptures we have the necessary combination of Hebrew thought and life and Greek life and culture ; and in that peculiar Hel- lenistic dialect which they employed, the necessary tran- sition from the language of the East to the language of the West — the wedding of the most exact form of expression with the most spiritual mode of conception. These thoughts are suggested by the original names in Scripture for the vine. In Hebrew there are two words — gephen and sorek, or sorekah — employed to de- note this plant. The word gephen is of frequent occur- rence in the Bible, and is used, in a general sense, to signify a plant that resembles the vine in the habit of climbing or trailing by means of tendrils, although in other respects it may be very different. For instance, the gourd or colocynth plant, whose fruit is disagreeable to the taste, and poisonous, is called gephen sadeh^ translated in our version wild vine, because its leaves and tendrils bear a resemblance to those of the true vine. This plant is, beyond doubt, the gephen Sedom — the vine of Sodom, yielding the famous apples that tempt the eye with their beautiful appearance, and turn to ashes on the lips. By the Jews the word always specially applied to the cultivated or grape-vine was so7'ek or sorekah, — the name of the Philistine valley of Sorek where Delilah dwelt, being derived from a pecul- iarly choice kind of vine cultivated there, with purple grapes and minute soft pips, yielding a highly-esteemed II. TWINING HABIT OF THE VINE. 41 red wine. We find in the Greek language also two terms employed to distinguish between the vine as a climbing creeper and the vine as a cultivated fruit-bear- ing plant. In classic Greek, the word corresponding to the Hebrew sorek — most frequently used to signify the grape-vine — was oi7ie^ from whence comes our common word wine. But in the Hellenistic Greek of the New Testament, as in the text of this chapter, the word is ampelos — from amphi, round about, corresponding with the Hebrew gephen, and signifying, like it, any plant with the peculiar appearance and habit of the vine, however botanically different. By Theophrastus, for instance, the term ampelos was applied to the bryony — a climbing plant which twines round our own English hedges ; and the Virginian creeper is known to botan- ists by the generic name of Ampelopsis, derived from its vine-like habit of growth. It is not, I believe, with- out deep significance, that the word ampelos should be applied by Christ to Himself in the text, instead of oine. It is to the twining habit of the vine, rather than to its fruit-bearing property, that He directs attention, in the first place, as a symbol of Himself in His relation to the Father. An independent tree, like a palm, an apple, or a fig tree, capable of standing and growing erect without any help from any other plant, as I have said already, would not have expressed the dependence of the Son upon the Father ; and therefore a trailing, twining plant that needs support, like the vine, must be chosen to symboHze this idea. And it is -this dependent habit of the vine which forms the nexus of thought, joining the UlflVBIlSITT] 42 THE TRUE VINE. chap. two parts of the verse together — the phrase, " I am the True Vine," with the phrase, "and my Father is the Husbandman." Indeed, the conjunction and might not inaptly be compared to a tendril of the True Vine, by which He is connected with, and cHngs to, His Father the Husbandman. I. There are two ideas conveyed to us by the symbol of the True Vine in connection with the Husbandman, viz., dependence and cultivation. Let us look, in the first place, at the figurative representation of our Lord's de- pendent position in the days of His flesh. The vine cannot, as I have said, stand erect of itself like the oak or palm. It cannot grow independently ; it requires to be held up and sustained in its place by a prop. It is furnished with long delicate tendrils, which twine round and cling to the object of support, and thus raise it from the ground, sustain it in its rapid and extensive climb- ing, and support its heavy clusters of grapes, which would otherwise break, or helplessly weigh down the branches on which they grow. The ancient Jews fas- tened their vines to strong stakes, as is the modem custom in France and Germany ; and this mode of cul- tivation appears to be alluded to by Ezekiel : " Thy mother is like a vine in thy blood, planted by the waters : she was fruitful and full of branches, by reason of many waters ; and she had strong rods for the scep- tres of them that bare rule ; and her stature was exalted among the thick branches, and she appeared in her height with the multitude of her branches." But though a twining plant, the vine is no parasite — subsisting upon II. SIGNIFICANCE OF TWINING PLANTS. 43 the juices of the plant to which it cUngs, or strangling it in its deadly embrace. Creepers, as a rule, have acquired this evil reputation. Most of the plants in the dense forests of Brazil are creepers : species of genera not given to climbing assume the habit in that region. There is even a Jacitara, or climbing palm. Parasitic plants are seen in every direction fastening with choking grip upon others, and making use of them with reckless indifference, in their selfish struggling upwards towards light and air. A painful impression is produced upon the mind by this keen competition of vegetable forces on a grand scale, especially when the moral character of the native population is seen reflected in it. How different, and how much more pleasing, is the aspect of calm repose and mutual helpfulness of European woods, where there are almost no parasites? How significant are their ivy, clematis, and honey-suckle, of the superior moral character of European nations ? The twining of the vine round its support is one of the most engaging sights in nature. It is a mimicry in the vegetable world of the clinging of weak human beings to the strong, of the wife to the husband. It prefigures the tender yearning impulse of the human heart to seek protection and sympathy in the cherishing love of relatives and friends. In return for the support which it receives, the vine adorns the object round which it twines with its beautiful foliage and graceful shoots. Nothing can be more charming than a tree festooned with the many-tendrilled vine, every leaf a model of elegance in form, and every bunch of grapes the beau- 44 THE TRUE VINE. chaf. ideal of a fruit. In Italy it is commonly trained round the homely elm, roofing the boughs with verdure, pro- ducing a profuse and varied mass of the richest green tints, the intense light shining through the transparent leaves, and investing the tree with the most exquisite beauty that art can superadd. As an ornament in architecture the vine wreath has been even more popular than the lotus of the Egyptian pillar, the palm-tree of the Indian shrine, or the ivy which forms the stone foliage of the Gothic cathedral. In art, vignettes are so called because all such little pictures were at one time surrounded by an engraved vine wreath. This feature of the vine applies in a most interesting manner to Christ. Self-existent and self-sustained as an independent palm-tree in the bosom of the Father, in the days of His flesh He became dependent as a clinging vine. The equal and fellow of God from all eternity. He became in the fulness of time God's minister and servant. Throughout the whole course of His earthly life. He emptied Himself of His glory; maintained this subordinate position, and employed language regarding it which has been perverted by the enemies of the truth to prove His absolute and eternal, and not His mere relative and temporary, inferiority to God. He appeared among men in the character of the perfect Son ; and therefore the chief feature of gospel teaching is found in the relation between Himself and His Father. The first recorded words which he uttered implied the consciousness of that relation, " Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business;" the first II. SUBORDINATION TO THE FATHER. 45 words from heaven by which He was introduced to men ratified that consciousness, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." It was the will of the Father that He obeyed, it was the works of the Father that He wrought, it was the doctrine of the Father that He taught, it was the nature of the Father that He revealed. It was not His own glory but the Father's that He sought. Devotion to His Father's will was not merely one principle or law, or obligation of His life ; it was the root of His whole being, blossoming out at every point and period of His life in acts of sub- mission and self-sacrifice. It was this obedience, as it has been justly said by an eminent writer, rooted in the will and in love, and based on the closest spiritual unity, that distinguished Jesus among men. His mighty works might have been done, and His words of wisdom might have been uttered, by other men. Similar works were actually done by St. Peter and St. Paul in His name; similar words of wisdom were uttered by the apostles through the inspiration of His Spirit. But no mortal man, however supematurally assisted and inspired, has ever approached the Lord Jesus in the perfection of His submission to His Father's will. We cannot imagine a more complete subordina- tion. " Verily, verily I say unto you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do." " My doctrine is not Mine, but His that sent Me." " But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father." Before bidding Lazarus come forth from the tomb, 46 THE TRUE VINE. chap. He said, " Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard Me." In His last prayer in the upper chamber He said, " Father, the hour is come, glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee." In the agony of the garden He said, " Father, if it be possible let this cup pass from Me, nevertheless not My will, but Thine be done." On the cross He said, " Father, forgive them for they know not what they do;" " Father, into Thy hands I commit My spirit." Many other passages might be quoted to show how completely Jesus denuded Himself in the days of His flesh, of that independence which belonged to Him as the equal and fellow of God. Well then could He say, " I am the True Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman." He trusted in His Father, twined round Him like a wreathing vine throughout the whole course of His life on earth ; and in the last bitter cry of the cross, in which all suffering culminated, "My God, My God, why hast thou for- saken Me !" He expressed most fully what His Father's aid had been to Him, and how dreadful was the loss of it. As a vine wreath adorns the prop to which it clings, invests it with new or superadded beauty, so Christ, in His perfect dependence upon the Father, glorified Him, revealed His character in greater beauty to men, un- folded His perfections in such an engaging way as to attract the love and devotion of human hearts. In the form of a perfect, sinless human being, in all points made like imto His brethren, in all points tempted as they are tempted, consorting for three-and-thirty years II. UNION WITH THE FA THER THROUGH CHRIST. 47 with men, He revealed the love, holiness, truth, wisdom and power of the Father, so that He could say, " He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." The blazing, burning effulgence of the Father's glory, shining through the transparent leaves of the True Vine, reaches us in a soft and mild radiance which our feeble human powers can bear. The otherwise irreconcilable attributes of God, as manifested in His dealings with us, are linked together and harmonized by the twining around them of the tendrils of the True Vine ; so that we now see mercy and truth meeting together, righteousness and peace embracing each other. And not only does He reconcile the attributes of God to each other by His dependence upon them, but He brings us who were far off nigh by the power of the same holy submission. The tendrils with which He clings to God Himself, embrace us and bring us into the same harmonious union — ^into the same blessed dependence. In right of His own relation He straightway associates in it those who receive Him. The whole course of His teaching tended to that intertwining of His own relation to God with that of the disciples, which is finally expressed on the eve of His departure: — "My Father and your Father, My God and your God;" and which was so fully accomplished in the disciples that they could say, " Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ." The consciousness predicted by Christ in the days of His flesh had been attained by the disciples after His departure. "At that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and I in 48 THE TRUE VINE. chap, you." Well then might Isaiah, in proclaiming the grand roll of the titles of Jesus, declare Him to be "Wonder- ful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father^ The last title is an apparent paradox, but its meaning is clearly unfolded in these words, "To as many as re- ceived Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God." And just as our Lord was dependent during His earthly life upon His Father, so was He dependent upon human beings and earthly things. He was a branch of the tree of humanity, budding and blossom- ing with all beautiful human affections, clinging with tendrils of human feelings to all that the heart of man clings to. He was born into our world of a human mother, accepted the feebleness and peculiar humilia- tion of human infancy. He lay upon the breast of a human mother, and depended upon her care and love in natural helplessness. He subjected Himself to all the limitations and privations of human existence — to its slowly-opening intellect and gradually-acquired expe- rience. He grew in wisdom and in stature, and in favour with God and man, by the very same natural and social influences which develop our childhood. He was not " too bright and good for human nature's daily food." And though He was a lonely man,