HARVARD THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES riarvard Vespers. Addresses to Harvard Students Preachers to the University. 18861888. BOSTON: ROBERTS BROTHERS. 1888. Copyright, 1888, BY ROBERTS BROTHERS. frets o/Geo. //. Ellis, 141 Franklin Street. PREFATORY NOTE. THE addresses in this volume were given by the Plummer Professor and the Preachers to Harvard University at the Ves- per Services which have been held during the past two years. They are reprinted from phonographic reports which appeared weekly in The Christian Register. It has been thought best to retain the direct extemporaneous form in which they were taken down by the stenog- rapher, instead of submitting them to formal literary revision. An address of Rev. Dr. A. P. Peabody, who conducted one of the services, is included. Given as these brief addresses were to young men in the course of their student life, their application is restricted to no single college. In the hope that they may be found helpful to young men everywhere in promot- ing the religious life, the Preachers to the University have kindly consented to their publication. s. j. B. 641526 CONTENTS. 1. THE Two BAPTISMS. Dec. 16, 1886. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 9 2. CHRIST AND THE BLIND MAN. Jan. 13, 1887. PHILLIPS BROOKS, 19 3. THE SOIL AND THE SEED. Jan. 20, 1887. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 25 4. GOD OUR ROCK. Jan. 27, 1887. EDWARD EVERETT HALE, 32 5. CHRIST AND NATHANAEL. Feb. 3, 1887. PHILLIPS BROOKS, 37 6. SEMBLANCE OR REALITY. Feb. 10, 1887. ALEXANDER MCKENZIE, 46 7. THE SINCERITY OF GOD. Feb. 17, 1887. GEORGE A. GORDON, 51 8. OPENING THE DOOR. Feb. 24, 1887. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 58 9. THE CHRISTIAN COMMONWEALTH. March 3, 1887. EDWARD EVERETT HALE, 67 10. THE TEMPTATION OF JESUS. March 10, 1887. PHILLIPS BROOKS, 72 6 Contents n. IRREMEDIABLE Loss IN SIN. March 17, 1887. GEORGE A. GORDON, 82 12. MY FATHER'S BUSINESS. March 24, 1887. ALEXANDER MCKENZIE, 89 13. JESUS IN EPHRAIM. March 31, 1887. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 99 14. NICODEMUS. Dec. i, 1887. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 111 15. A LIFE OF PURPOSE. Dec. 22, 1887. ALEXANDER MCKENZIE, 121 16. MAKING ALL THINGS NEW. Jan. 5, 1888. PHILLIPS BROOKS, 130 17. MORAL HEROISM. Jan. 12, 1888. GEORGE A. GORDON, 137 1 8. THE EYE OF GOD. Jan. 19, 1888. ANDREW P. PEABODY, 146 19. GOD is A SPIRIT. Jan. 26, 1888. ALEXANDER MCKENZIE, 153 20. THE SIMPLICITY WHICH is IN CHRIST. Feb. 2, 1888. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 160 21. FISHERS OF MEN. Feb. 9, 1888. PHILLIPS BROOKS, 168 22. SEEK, AND YE SHALL FIND. Feb. 16, 1888. GEORGE A. GORDON, 176 23. THE PARABLE OF THE POUNDS. Feb. 23, 1888. EDWARD EVERETT HALE, 184 Contents;* 7 24. COMING TO ONE'S SELF. March i, 1888. FRANCIS G. PEABODY, 192 25. JUDGMENTS OF LIFE. March 8, 1888. PHILLIPS BROOKS, 203 26. REMEMBERING GOD. March 15, 1888. GEORGE A. GORDON, 212 27. ENLARGEMENT OF LIFE. March 22, 1888. EDWARD EVERETT HALE, 218 28. THE MASTER'S GUEST-CHAMBER. March 29, 1888. ALEXANDER MCKF.NZIE, 226 HARVARD VESPERS. i. THE TWO BAPTISMS. IN the weeks just before Christmas, a large part of the Christian Church remembers especially the work of John the Baptist. He makes not only the im- mediate preparation for the advent of Christ, but he is also, with the exception of Jesus himself, the most dramatic and impressive of New Testament characters. Two qualities unite in him, each of which is rare, but both of which together are almost never seen. The one was his self- confidence : the other was his self-subordi- nation. It takes a bold man to begin a new reform, but it takes a much bolder man to revive an old and discarded move- ment ; and this last boldness was that of io of John the Baptist. For three hundred years the prophetic voice had been alto- gether silent, and now with an amazing confidence it speaks again. It is the same prophetic message. John is the lineal descendant of Micah and Habak- kuk ; but the beginners of prophecy never spoke so unsparingly and absolutely as did this new voice among them. Such was his self-confidence. But with it came a wonderful self-subordination. A re- former is often brave, but he is seldom humble. A prophet seldom announces that his message is incomplete. Yet here is John, summoning his nation to repentance as a master speaks to his servants, but at the same time foretelling one among them who is greater than he. He is but a voice crying, " Prepare ye the way of the Lord." All Jerusalem and Judea flock to him at the Jordan, and there he tells them of one unnoticed young man in their midst whose shoes' latchet he is not worthy to unloose. It is a wonderful union of conflicting attri- butes, and there is a legend that the Christian Church commemorates it in its very date of Christmas. For many years, 13aptisms'. 11 years, as we know, it was the death and the resurrection of Jesus which held at- tention ; and the time of his birth was unobserved. Finally, the tradition says, the winter solstice was the time assigned, when the days grow longer and the nights grow less, that thus in the coming of the Sun of righteousness there might be ful- filled the word of the brave and humble John : " He must increase, but I must decrease." This reference of the whole work of the Baptist to the higher work which was to follow it is summed up in one striking contrast, the contrast which John him- self presents, of the two baptisms. "I baptize with water," says John, "but he that cometh after me is mightier than I : he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire." Here is the transition from the forerunner to the fulfiller, from John to Jesus. The baptism by water is obviously the symbol of John's preaching of repentance. It is the washing of life clean of its stains. A man heard the word of John, " Repent, repent," and, de- siring repentance, bathed in the Jordan. Washing the body meant washing the heart 12 heart clean of its stains. But what is this second baptism, which the Master would require, the baptism by fire? It means not only the cleansing as of out- ward water but the cleansing as of an inward flame. It is a fire lighted in the heart, which shall not only burn up the old life, but shall kindle the new. It means not only washing, but inflaming and inspiring ; not only purity, but pas- sion ; not only freedom from the power of evil, but baptism with the power of the Holy Ghost. Such is the step in which, John says, one passes from his disciple- ship to that of Christ. When a man has brought his life to repentance for that which has stained it, when he is ready to have it washed of its misdeeds, then he is indeed taking the first step toward the discipleship of Christ. He is standing by the Jordan bank, ready for the baptism of John. It is a great, a momentous, a cru- cial step. I suppose there were few who were brave enough to accept the ministry of the Baptist who were not thereby made ready for a hearing of the Messiah him- self when he came. Yet, none the less, it is but a preparing of the way of the Lord. Ctoo llBaptttfms;. 13 Lord. The baptism which is of Christ is by fire. It is when a man commits him- self, under the power of Christ, to a new passion; when there is kindled within him a flame of loyalty ; when he is led out of his own repentances and regrets into the enthusiastic service of a new and a worthy aim. To be changed from con- fession to devotion, from self-conquests to self-consecration, from purity to passion, from the resolution not to do wrong to the loyalty to what is holy, from the struggle against error to the zeal for truth, this is the baptism by fire. Set these two baptisms now for a mo- ment in contrast with each other as they affect our modern life. We see some- thing of them in our intellectual affairs. It is a great thing when the mind is bap- tized by water, cleansed from error and tradition and myth, and set freely and calmly before the truth. It is what hap pens to many a man in his academic life. Much that once seemed true shows its inadequacy. Mistakes are outgrown, sys- tems lose their hold, and the mind is no longer ensnared or enslaved. It is a pre- paring of the way for the regeneration of 14 S?arbar& of the mind. But let a. man suppose that in such a baptism his regeneration is com- plete, and he has received the worst harm which an education can do. He has been cleansed from error, but he has found no truth. He criticises, but he does not cre- ate. He can despise conviction, but he cannot do work which demands convic- tion. He has been baptized by water, but the baptism by fire has not touched his mind. Then, sometimes, into such a mind there comes by some blessed influ- ence a passion for some way of truth, a desire toward some definite encl ; and with that kindling of eagerness the mind is born again. The end illuminates the task. The purpose interprets the mate- rial. When a man is thus intellectually devoted, each new book seems written for his sake and makes its unintended contribution. He is no longer the dilet- tante or the cynic. He is the disciple of the truth. He has been baptized, not alone with water, but with fire. Or look at the two baptisms in our social life. We try to cleanse society by our legislation and our reforms, and we do well. But in all such removal of evils we 2Dtoo HBapttemsu 15 we are accomplishing not a completed, but a preparatory work. What saves a com- munity is not deliverance from evil, but a newly kindled desire for good. In our own community, for instance, it happens that we have just voted that we would have no traffic in intoxicating drink. To many of us it seems a good work well done. To many it seems like a genuine baptism of the town by water. But such an enterprise only brings with it a new danger, if duty is supposed to cease with one's vote. Such legislation is but a preparing of the way of the Lord. It must be succeeded by new and more positive work, by the provision of better places of resort, by a new spirit of self- sacrifice and service, or else the law it- self is sure to fail. After the baptism by water must come the baptism by fire. The disciple of John the Baptist may cast his vote, but the disciple of Jesus Christ must apply himself to the building of a Christian city. Yet these are but suggestions of the more serious meaning which the contrast of the two baptisms was intended to con- vey. What John and Jesus were thinking of 1 6 of was the salvation of men's souls from sin. Each step in t/lis solemn process is, they say, essential. There is but one way in which a man's soul can begin to be saved. It is the way of repentance. John the Baptist summons him to put away the things that separate him from God. But, when a man has thus accepted the baptism by water, he is not yet safe. He is like one who has climbed a preci- pice, and lies down to sleep upon its brink. His life has been left clean by the ebbing tide of his temptation ; but, if he does not forthwith bar out the waters, back they will come upon him as surely as the flood- tide of the sea. A man cannot live safely in this negative purity. His safety lies in the supplanting of the old passions by new and better ones, by the discovery of new interests which leave no room for the old. That is what the Christian life really means. It not only summons a man to repentance, but it supplies him with a new passion. A man catches sight of the personality of Jesus Christ beckon- ing to him from the heights of character and summoning him to his service, and a great new sense of personal loyalty and a 2Ctoo HBapttems* 17 a flame of personal trust are kindled in the disciple's heart. He has passed from the ministry of the Baptist to the ministry of the Saviour. It is not only the water that has washed him : it is fire that has touched his brow. Would God that this great transition, in which alone is safety, might happen to some of the souls who gather here ! Would God that in the common life we lead together this twofold baptism might occur ! It would, indeed, be a great thing for our University if we could feel the bap- tism of John, if there might be among us a cleansing from vice, a purifying of conduct, a conquest of our follies, our conceits, and our sins. But by no such controversy with evil is our common life wholly secure. What we must pray for much more deeply is not the cleansing, but the kindling power. What we need is a great tide of high and broad spiritual interests, an enlarging power of generous loyalty, the sense that we are set here together for a common service and a com- mon end, and the responsibility, the self- respect, and the seriousness which start up thus within us like a flame. What must 1 8 J?arbarD must save us is a new power of enthusi- asm, a new degree of moral passion, the fire that is kindled in life when Christ touches the soul. In such a step, the life of an individual or a community is ful- filled. It has passed from the ministry of John to the discipleship of Jesus, from the baptism of water to the baptism of fire. It has kept its Advent season, and it is ready for the spirit of the coming Christmas Day. II. CHRIST AND THE BLIND MAN. JOHN ix. 14-38. WE find in this chapter of John two figures standing facing each other. One of them is the familiar figure of Jesus : the other is the strange figure of the poor man, perplexed and bewildered with the very manifestation of the wonderful mercy that has come to him, perplexed about the way in which he has received that mercy and the way in which it has been recog- nized by those about him. There is hardly a picture more pathetic than that of this poor man to whom Christ has given his sight, and who finds himself subjected to pains and perplexities and distresses that he had never known before. Having sat a beggar all these years by the side of the road, men had tolerated him ; but, the moment he was cured, they began to speak hard things of him, and to be parti- sans 20 sans over him. Perplexed and confused, and turning from those who said these hard things, and at the same time being drawn toward Jesus, not knowing what to do, he stood there in the bewilderment of his new life. Then Christ comes and stands in front of him. Infinitely interesting must be the first words that Christ says to such a bewil- dered life: "Dost thou believe on the Son of God ? " A personal question. Can we probe the whole meaning of the startling words that had come to this man in this question of the recognition of a personal deliverer who is hereafter to be his Master, his Lord ? Everything else that Christ might have said to the man, all the ques- tions that had been raised by the Phari- sees, were left unsaid for the present ; and there was only one question on the heart of Christ, whether there had come to the heart of that man the personal leader- ship through which his life henceforth was to be strong. There can be no real salvation to any man until it comes in a personal leader- ship, in a Master, by obeying whom the man's life is redeemed and saved. Truth comes Cfptet au& tlje BlinD span* 21 comes then in the acceptance of the nat- ure of one whom the truth fills, and in whom it is lodged. Law comes then in the personal will of one who is a worthy master, in whom we fulfil our own duty. Hope comes then as it shines out of the face of one who comprehends the future in his deep knowledge of the present, and opens that future to us which is so real to himself. Do you believe ? is the ques- tion to the human soul. Do you accept in your own soul the certainty of God's revelation of himself in human life, that henceforth you can walk with your eye upon that revelation of God and fulfil it in yourself as it is set before you in his Son, who is manifested to be the Leader and the Master of the world ? With such a Master, what is there that shall make our hearts afraid ? What darkness is there in which we cannot walk, with him to lead us ? What sorrow and trouble that we cannot face ? What perplexity which he may not clear up, so that we shall find a road in which we can walk, when lighted by Jesus Christ ? He is a Saviour and a Friend, when he saves us by making us go into the path in which he goes. Into 22 U?atbarD Into the heart of this man there had grown something of this kind. I think there can be no deeper sign of eagerness and earnestness than there is in the words in which he answered this question of the Master: "Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him ? " The words of Jesus become, first, interpretations of our own consciences ; and then they become a law for our lives. There came first the con- sciousness that it was a personal master that he needed. If that may come, then everything is clear. Then the Pharisee may question and jeer; for there is his master, who is to be the revelation of the Infinite Love. Then out from behind the gift there comes the giver, out from behind the mercy there comes the merciful one ; and Jesus, whom he had thought of as only the agent who had given him the light, says, "I who speak unto you am he." The true revelation of life comes to us when out from behind all the good things which we enjoy there comes the divine presence of Him who has given them to us; when out from behind our perplex- ities there comes the true solution ; when the Ctjrtet anO tlje Blind span* 23 the past becomes significant of the future, and every mercy we receive becomes a revelation of Him who has the future in his hands, and who has us through all eternity in his own soul, and whose love is waiting for those who are ready to receive it. Let us be content with no mercy, unless it reveals the merciful one; with nothing godlike, unless God is manifested through it. When that has come, then the Lord is around us ; and there is noth- ing which may perplex us as we go forth in our lives. Then Jesus, turning with that wistful look which we see again and again on his face, ponders on his own mission in the world : " For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see, and that they which see might be made blind," the need of humility to accept the Master as he reveals himself to our needs, the need of such humility because our lives are to be fulfilled in the Infinite. True humility is the great power which takes possession of the infinite future and of the unmeasured powers of our human life. It is pride, and not humility, when a man says, "I can do little, for I am a man." 24 man." It is humility when a. man says, "I can do everything that is in the divine idea of man, because God has made man his own child, and is more and more fill- ing him with his own fulness." And so this man goes forward, follow- ing the Master, leaving behind him all petty quibbles about healing on the Sab- bath day, and the words of his parents, "He is of age, can speak for himself," and going forward into what life we can- not begin to guess, and here, as there in the eternal world, fulfilling it by the power of Jesus Christ, which has taken pos- session of him in his consecration to the Master. To such consecration may we look forward together, forward into whatever life God has for us here, into whatever richer life awaits us when the gates are opened and we have passed into eternal life. III. THE SOIL AND THE SEED. MATT. xiii. 1-23. I TURN from most of the types of life with which this wonderful Parable of the Sower deals, and ask you to think, for a moment, of but one. I pass by the seeds sown by the wayside. These way- side lives are those which are hard like a road, trodden down by business or fri- volity, so that there is no chance for relig- ion. Sometimes, no doubt, we know what this impenetrability is ; but it is certainly not in a hard and unreceptive mood that we are here to-day. I pass by the seed sown among thorns. These are the lives which are so overgrown and choked by other things that there is no room for religion. Sometimes, we know of this stifling of the soul ; but it is certainly not because we are wholly without room for religion that we are here. But 26 J?arbart) But when one has passed out of this spiritual hardness and out of these stifling thorns, when one has reached any clear- ness of religious desire, then comes an- other peril. It is the peril of instability, the absence of permanence, the lack of fixity in the religious life. It is not that we are unreceptive, it is not that we are choked ; but it is that when God the Sower scatters His seed over our hearts it does not find stable and permanent root, so as to grow and stand and withstand in its own strength of continuous conviction. These are they which receive the word among stony places. "The same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it. Yet hath he not root in himself; and, having no depth of earth, when the sun is up, he withers away." Now, what is it that brings about this absence of fixity and permanence in the spiritual life ? The parable names two things. One is lack of earth, the other is lack of root. Sometimes there is no depth of soil. A life is soft on the sur- face, but hard just below. It is quick with emotion, but shallow in sentiment. It finds in religion an excitement, a recre- ation ; il ana tije >ee&, 27 ation ; but its religion, like the rest of its resources, is a thin, superficial, and im- penetrating thing. There is no harder class to reach with any good than this, for there is nothing in which any seed can fasten itself. There is no depth of earth. Then there are other lives which have no fixity, because they have no root in themselves ; and the reason they have no root in themselves is that they are trying to have a root which is not in themselves. They are like those plants which we call parasites. The moment they begin to grow, they run along the ground to the nearest tree, and throw their tendrils round it and draw their life from it. Such parasitism is always a peril of academic life. A few self-confident men stand here over against a multitude of self-distrustful men ; and the life of the many tends to run for its opinions, its precedents, its beliefs and unbeliefs, to the life of the few. A glimpse of truth shines down upon a young man ; and, instead of letting it warm and deepen his own life, he runs to see what the books and the masters have to say. A suggestion of duty opens before 28 before a young man's soul ; and he turns to examine the traditions, the customs, and the prevailing sentiment of the place. It is, thus, at once the great blessing and the great peril of such lives as we lead here that we are brought into contact with leaders. It is a great thing to find a master, to discover one's humble place in the procession of learners, to have the corrective influence of the history of dis- ciplined minds. But all this is for evil, if it mislead a life out of its healthy method of growth, and make it draw its life from other roots than those which are its own. The learning of the past and the author- ity of the present fulfil their work only as they teach each mind to grow in its own way. The method of God with each soul is a new method. It cannot be borrowed from another mind. It is a revelation to the individual. A fixed and stable growth in personal conviction is not the life of a parasite : it is the growth from a root which is in one's self. Finally, how is this fixity obtained ? It demands, answers the parable, two fac- tors, the soil and the seed. The one is man's contribution : the other is God's. Many tl ano tlje >eefc* 29 Many people think that one element is enough, a cultivated soil. Let a man cultivate himself, and he will be strong. It is not necessarily so. Sometimes, self- culture contributes to fixity of life. Some- times, it seems to have less permanent hold on the things which remain than ignorance possesses. The fact is that culture does for a man what it does for a field. It prepares and deepens the soil for the coming of the sower. A man who leaves his ploughed ground unsown has not fulfilled his work. He has depth of earth, but no crop. But let God the Sower come, moving across men's lives as Jesus saw the man striding through the furrows of Galilee, and then the soil that has been loosened and deepened by the processes of culture is the soil that gladdens the Sower's heart. Thus it is that culture and religion, the intellectual and the re- ligious life, man's work and God's, meet. Soil and seed, each has its part. Often, the seed grows in uncultured places ; but it grows best and deepest in the prepared mind. Let a man neglect the culture of his mind, and he is neglecting the prepa- ration for receiving his God. Let a man think 30 think that his self-culture is his crop, and his life is but a ploughed field without a harvest. The large results of life appear when the two elements meet, when the life of man has made itself ready for the life of God, and the descending life of God finds depths of earth within the life of man. Would God that it might be so with some of us to-day ! The processes of self- culture occupy us much. They have oc- cupied the hours of this day. What have we done ? We have been preparing the soil of life. We have been digging out its stones of error, and deepening its powers of receptivity. We ought to have gained, to-day, some increased depth of earth. And now for what do we wait ? We wait for God the Sower to scatter over us in these quieter moments of re- flection and communion His seeds of in- fluence, the infinitely minute thoughts, hopes, memories, ambitions, and ideals in which He utters himself, and which have such marvellous power of growth. Let the Sower come. Let our hearts lay them- selves bare for His visitation. Let Him turn us from our unstable, unfixed, and parasitic tl anti tljc >ee&* 31 parasitic living, that we may receive into prepared lives these germs of a stable growth, so that there may come to pass in us that growth which is like the normal growth of nature, quiet and slow, pa- tient and unassuming, out of a depth of prepared soil, out of a root which is in itself, and, finally, with the fruit after our varied capacity, some thirty, some sixty, and some, in God's own time, a hundred fold. T IV. GOD OUR ROCK. PSALM xviii. 31. HIS figure of God as a rock runs all the way through the Old Testa- ment. It is a favorite figure, not only with David, but with all these writers from the earliest to the latest of the prophets. The foundation of a man's life, that which he is to build on, is the Lord Almighty. Man's sense of God, of his connection with God, is to be the foundation of his life, is to be his rock. The figure is often an inconvenient one, as when the rock is made to travel from place to place. It is not always poetic ; but it is so certain that life must have a foundation, that these writers return to this figure again and again, often when it seems awkward. The ancient mythology had the world standing upon an elephant, and the ele- phant standing on a tortoise ; but what does our Hock* 33 does the tortoise stand on ? There must be a foundation. All life must have a foundation. With these Hebrew poets, the statement is absolute that a man's life is founded upon the Living God, upon his sense of the being of this God, " I Am," the Existent. This consciousness that one rests upon the original "exist- ence" is the foundation of life. In the New Testament, the Saviour takes it up, and urges it intensely and earnestly, and wishes us to live by this sense of God. At the end of the "Sermon on the Mount " is the man who builds his house upon a rock, that man is sure ; and also the man who builds upon the sand, that man is not sure. When Peter makes the great central statement to Jesus, " Thou art not a messenger, thou art the Son of God," Jesus says to him, " Yes, and this is the foundation that I build upon." Man is the Son of God; that is the foundation. My friends, we all of us come back to the same necessity : there must be a foun- dation. Why do I do this ? Why do I study to-day ? Why did I play yesterday ? Why am I going to New York? We work 34 work back and back through a series of reasons : there must be something behind it all. We must come to some founda- tion on which our life rests. If the Bible is authority, if Jesus Christ is authority, this foundation for the life of every man and woman is the sense of God ; and, more than this, the sense that we are the children of this God, that we partake of his nature. We come back to the feeling that we are his divine children. We are not the manufacture of his hands. We are not the mere creatures of his wisdom. We are the children born of his nature, and share that nature. Is God a creator ? So are we. Is God immortal? So are we. Can God love with infinite love ? So can we. We share the being of God, we live in his life. He is our Rock and our Foundation. We cannot enter upon a religious life without some sense or thought of this rela- tionship to him. That is what the Script- ures speak of as faith. In the Old Testa- ment, the word translated "faith" always bears an etymological reference to a rock foundation on which a man builds. He builds on a rock ; that is, he is certain that he our Kocfe* 35 he is founded on God, that he lives be- cause God lives. " I Am " is the name of God. "I Am" is the name of God's chil- dren. Man inherits his being from God, from whom he is born. If we take the Bible as authority, if we take Jesus Christ as authority, here is to be the foundation upon which we are to live, the Infinite Being whom we cannot help seeing and knowing. I look out upon Orion, and ask, What is beyond ? What is beyond Arcturus ? What is beyond the furthest space ? There is being, there is existence. So much is clear. Then the Saviour of mankind says to us that this Being is conscious Being, that this Being knows us and we may know him, that this Being loves us and we may love him. Our foundation, that which we build upon, is the Conscious Being in which worlds move, in which trees grow, in which seasons pass, in which all things are. That is our Rock ; and religion is our effort to come into relation with this Being, to listen to what he says to us, to tell him what we would say to him. We may give wider definitions to religion in our duties to 36 to each other ; but what we call personal religion, the religion of a man's life, is the effort to draw nearer to God, to know him, to listen to what he has to say, to tell him what is in our heart. It is that which brings us here this afternoon or in the chapel service in the morning; it is to gain that, that we pray ; and it is that by which we trust him in the hour of joy or sorrow. We seek to know him, and build our lives upon this Rock of Ages. L V. CHRIST AND NATHANAEL. JOHN i. 43-51. ET me ask you to think for a few moments on the very interesting character brought before us in these verses, one of the most interesting of those characters in the Gospel which are drawn with a few touches, and yet stand out very clearly in the picture. They are very dis- tinctly before us, not because they are elaborately drawn, but because their nat- ures are so simple. Nathanael, one of these disciples, has a singular freshness, loveliness, and beauty about him, which, I am sure, always attracts us to him. I feel as if Jesus himself must have loved him peculiarly. He came so freshly and naturally to Christ, he entered so com- pletely into his ideas, and made himself so naturally and so readily his disciple. There was just enough questioning to in- dicate 38 dicate the activity of an earnest mind. At the same time there was a readiness to give himself to that Jesus who pre- sented himself to him, and seemed to be the light for which he had been yearning. These short conversations seem to be full of interest, as they lead us on from the beginning to the end of a young man's history, who in the first place is seen looking after the truth, and in the end is seen consecrating himself to Christ. Think how naturally these speeches fol- low each other. The first is the address of a young man to a fellow-student en- gaged in that occupation which draws men more and more closely to each other ; for there is nothing, I think, that can bring men so earnestly together as the com- mon search after truth. Common circum- stances, the common search for advantage, have something to do in bringing men together ; but, when you take men of kin- dred mind and heart, joined in the great search after truth, following it with the deepest enthusiasm with which men can follow, then how closely such souls are drawn to each other ! Philip and Nathan- ael had lived together, and sought together for Ctjrtet ana ^at&anael* 39 for the fulfilment of the prophecy written in the ancient history of Israel. Vague and unrealized it was before them, yet they felt it was to be fulfilled in some way and in some time. They had grown to- gether in this common wish. They had told each other of their common hopes. Each one had some glimpse of that which was coming ; and now, at last, one of them comes and says : " The search is at last satisfied : that for which we have been seeking is found. We have found him who was expected, who was foretold by the prophets." Philip comes and tells Nathanael, as if he would immediately share that which he had learned with one who was as dear to him as his own soul, as if the truth could not be his until he had imparted it. There can be no richer moment in any man's life than when he is able to help forward the search for truth, and to impart to others the truth which he has himself received. And so these young men stand out with great simplicity, and yet with great richness, in their relationship one with another, Philip finding Nathanael, and saying to him: "We have found him of 40 C?artoara of whom Moses in the law and the proph- ets did write. The Messiah has at last come." Then see how Nathanael receives Jesus at the representation of Philip. We see how intelligent he was, and yet how ready and receptive. He does not dispense with his criticism. He does not fail to say to his friend that his word does not entirely satisfy his anticipations. It was not from poor, despised Nazareth, but somewhere upon the heights of Jerusalem, that that new truth was going to shine. That a man who has been longing for the truth in one place should be disturbed when it shows itself in another ; that that which he thought was one of the conditions of finding the truth should prove, when the truth comes in some other way, not to be essential, that is very perplexing. A man would not be thoughtful and intelli- gent if it were not so. Yet, when Philip turns to Nathanael, and says, "Come and see; come and look upon this man, and see whether he be not the Messiah ; come and look upon his truth, and let it relate itself to your soul, and see whether it be not what we have been seeking for," then come Christ ana jjiatbanad. 4 l come forward the candor, the largeness,, the receptivity, of the man. He goes with his friend with an objection in his soul, but with a determination that it shall not stand in the way of his receiving the truth. No petty objection about Nazareth shall come between him and the Messiah. He will look into his eyes ; and, if Jesus reveals himself to his soul, and lays hold upon him with a grasp with which the Messiah may take hold of the Jew who has been waiting for him, he will become his disciple. And so he comes into his presence; and Jesus says, "Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile." Israel meant something divine to the Saviour. It meant some great idea. He was looking in vain in the faces about him to find it fulfilled. When this young man came to him here, with his earnestness and enthu- siasm and candor, seeking the truth, anx- ious to have his questions answered, and Jesus saw all this in his face, he said : " Here is the Israelite whom I have been looking for ; here is the true Jew who has been waiting for my coming; here is the great family which the Son may bring to the 42 the Father, with that spirit which he brought into the world, as the Father's anointed Son." Every generation of life has its ideas which must be fulfilled. Israel has be- come a poor, stunted thing ; but it was full of an idea which it had had in all its history, and with which it was constantly replenishing itself. Jesus was going to make it complete. Jesus saw in Nathanael something of the fulfilment of that Israel to which he had come to manifest God. So it is in every life ; so it is with our church membership and our citizenship ; so it is in college and everywhere else. Those things which belong to us in our natural relationships are capable of much vaster fulfilment than we can give to them. When we fulfil them with a true life, then the idea is complete. When the cit- izen is the complete citizen, when the scholar is the complete scholar, when the man himself is the complete servant in the relation in which he is placed, then God can manifest himself to him in fuller life. This is the sacredness of the partial rela- tionships in which we stand. If we fulfil them with a large, complete, consecrated life, Cljrtet anD jjiatfjanael. 43 life, then the fullest manifestation of God may come to us in them, as it came to Nathanael in his place in Israel. Then Nathanael says to Jesus, "Whence knowest thou me ? " And Jesus says to Nathanael, "Before Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig-tree, I saw thee." It makes a deep impression upon Nathanael's mind that Jesus should have known him before he knew Jesus, that Jesus should have been conscious of him, with a life that was higher than that which he had carried unto the life and presence of Jesus. It is a thing which must always impress the soul. That I should go to God, and find God, and, when I find him, should realize that God knew me before I knew him, that is a thing which lays hold upon the human soul. You may go to a friend and brother, and try to make him see the glory of the Christian life, the glory of unselfishness ; but how can you impress him so completely as when you conduct him to the Master, and tell him that that Christ has been giving himself to him, and that there has never been a moment when that Christ has not been pressing himself upon his life ? That is the 44 H?artoard the richness of the Christian life, that it is simply laying hold on something which has been from the beginning of our exist- ence, something which has been pressing upon our lives. You remember those great words of Paul, in which he describes the fulness of his life. He had such a multitude of great phrases in which he put the richness of his life ; and this, I think, is one of them : " I follow after, if that I may appre- hend that for which lam also apprehended of Christ." That seems rich and great. Christ Jesus apprehended me, that I might apprehend Christ Jesus; that, realizing the divine force, the great powers that have been from the beginning at work upon my life, I may be able to respond to them, to lay hold on, to apprehend them as they have apprehended me. There are forces vaster than we know of that are apprehending us. God has put forth all the power that is needful to put forth. There is nothing for us to do but to re- spond with a large consecration, that we may grasp the highest manifestation of that divine love which it is possible for us to lay hold on. And then note the last word which Jesus Christ anD jftatljanacl. 45 Jesus says, when Nathanael has declared himself his disciple. Impressed by the manner in which he has entered into dis- cipleship, Jesus says : " Do not think that you have exhausted all ; do not think that this little beginning is the whole. Here- after, you shall see greater things than this." Know that every point of life which we have reached, just in proportion as it is pure and holy, is the beginning of the infinite life. Be sure that God has so much more for the soul as it goes on, becoming richer and richer ; that every new relationship of the soul with God is not merely a sign of thankfulness for that which is passed, but a new opening of our nature, into which God shall pour more and more of himself. In each new conse- cration, some new gift becomes possible, and for that new gift some new consecra- tion becomes necessary, and in that new consecration comes some new gift. So this everlasting reciprocity goes on, each new gift bringing new consecration, and each new consecration making a new gift possible. So the soul goes on entering into God, and receiving God unto himself. "Because I saw thee under the fig-tree, believest thou ? thou shalt see greater things than these." VI. SEMBLANCE OR REALITY. MARK viii. 10-24. OUR Lord had gone into the village of Bethsaida. They brought a blind man to him. He took him by the hand, and touched his eyes, and asked him if he saw anything. The answer was, "I see men as trees walking." He had not been born blind. He knew men, and knew trees. He knew that these were not trees, and he did not act toward them as if they were trees. He acted upon what he knew, and treated them as men. Judging merely by appearance, he might have been tempted to climb into them or cut them down; but, judging by the knowledge he had, he could greet them as men, and receive a greeting from them in return. This is the only one of our Lord's mir- acles which is divided. I do not know why it is divided, except to teach us the incompleteness Semblance or Healitv. 47 incompleteness of life and the inconsist- encies between the things we know and the things we see; to teach us to judge by our knowledge rather than by the out- ward appearance. We are familiar with the line that "things are not what they seem." It would be a very dismal truth, were we not able to enlarge it with an- other truth, that, whatever things may seem to us, we are not subject to the ap- pearances, but are able to control our con- duct by our knowledge of realities. This becomes true in many different relations in life. I have that knowledge of my friend which makes him perfectly trustworthy. I can depend upon him for everything; but, some day, he does some- thing that is not compatible with that friendship. Shall I give him up or trust him still? I have a conception of a hero, with a tall, commanding figure, with dig- nity upon his brow; but, when I see him, he is a short man, with low brow, and nothing of grandeur about him. Shall I give up my idea of heroism, or say, in spite of everything, that he is a hero still? I act from what I know. I interpret the appearance by that reality which I knew before 48 J?arbar& before I saw the appearance. Our familiar saying that we judge men by their actions is not more true than the other necessity, that we judge actions by their men. We are continually compelled to interpret that which appears by that which we saw be- fore the appearance. Carry this into the ethical relations of life. Duty seems to a man, when he is alone, meditating in his house by himself, to be the "stern daughter of the Voice of God" ; but, when he ventures out into the street, it has lost some of its grandeur, not exhibiting any such authority and not re- ceiving any such homage. When a man thinks about truth in the morning, the truth seems to him to be pure and sacred. He looks out upon life, feeling that his sword shall never be drawn but in her defence, repeating the words of John Pym, "I would rather suffer for speaking the truth than that the truth should suffer for want of my speaking." Then he goes out into life, and sees that truth is different in the maxims of men. Truth speaks, and men do not listen to it; and he finds him- self tempted not to listen with that defer- ence which he thought in the morning he should pay. Charity, Semblance or l&ealitp. 49 Charity, too, seems so divine in the morning. He thinks of the glory of liv- ing for others; and he says, The value of my life is in its service. He goes out again into the world, and he finds himself tempted to be selfish and grasping; and he forgets that he was not to live, not to strive, for himself. Shall he be governed by truth as it is on the street, by charity as it appears in the conflicts of the world? Or shall he be governed by duty as he knows duty, by truth as he knows it in the sincerity in which he has seen it, and by charity in that reality which he has found in his own closet? It is thus that we need to be on our guard, lest we take our conceptions from appearances, and do violence to the higher knowledge which we have. For man has the realization of the highest things in the life of the men to whom he pays his most reverent respect; he has the teachings of God's Word; he has the teachings of the spirit of truth and duty and charity, the teachings of an unseen spirit. And, if he is wise, he will be governed by what he knows, and will not treat men as trees, because in the mists of the world a man seems 50 seems to be a tree. He will govern him- self by the reality which he possesses rather than by the semblance which the world offers. There is a common impression that men seem to be better than they are. For one, I do not believe it. I think men are better than they seem. I think it is a rare man who shows the best of himself to the world, his deepest convictions, his highest conceptions of duty, his most pro- found belief in charity, and who lives out the deepest and holiest thoughts which he has in the midst of the world that needs, though it may not ask, this gift. If we are to give anything to the world, it must be by this strength of our personal devotion, throwing down in the midst of these shadows and semblances the reality of truth and duty and charity, as we have seen these things. For we are old enough and wise enough to make no serious mis- take in life. We know enough never to treat a tree as if it were a man, and always to treat a man as if he were not a tree. Realities, things as we know them, these are to possess us and to control our lives. VII. THE SINCERITY OF GOD. 2 COR. i. 12. PERHAPS of all the qualities in a noble character, this of sincerity is the most widely and deeply interesting. There are many men who do not care much for piety; that is, for the distinct recognition and worship of God. They do not care much for saints; that is, for those who walk by and commune with the unseen. There are many men who do not value as they should the qualities of gen- tleness, patience, and silent equanimity ; and yet all these men would be found to respond most heartily and most fully to this grand quality of sincerity. The reason seems to be this : that, for the just appreciation of the first named qual- ities, a certain degree of moral experience, of spiritual cultivation, seems necessary ; whereas, all that is needed for the ap- preciation 52 Jt>art)arD preciation of sincerity is simply the full equipment of a man, the possession of large human instincts. Bring a great singer, say Jenny Lind, before some large popular audience, and ask her to sing what she considers her best piece. It will be appreciated very intensely and very deeply by a few ; but it will be be- yond the majority in that gathering, it will presuppose more musical cultivation than they possess. But now ask her to sing a song from Moore or Burns ; and the appreciation is universal, deep, in- tense, and the response marvellous. The reason is that in the first case there is presumed more culture than exists. In the second case, all that is necessary for appreciation is human instinct, human sympathy. So with this quality of sin- cerity : all that is necessary to the appre- ciation of its worth is simply the heart and soul and nature of man. Now, this quality, so deeply interesting to young life, is defined for us by the apostle, in the very words that he uses, sincerity of God. He means, by sin- cerity, testing one's self by the light of God's life, and, in the test, finding one's self of