Ex Libris 
 C. K. OGDEN 
 
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 UNIVERSITY SERMONS 
 
 NEW AND OLD.
 
 UNIVERSITY SERMONS 
 
 NEW AND OLD. 
 
 A SELECTION OF SERMONS PREACHED 
 
 BEFORE THE UNIVERSITIES OF 
 
 OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE, 
 
 1861 1887. 
 
 
 BY 
 
 C. J. VAUGHAN, D.D. 
 
 DEAN OF LLANDAFF, MASTER OF THE TEMPLE, 
 AND LATE FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 Hlon&on : 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
 AND NEW YORK. 
 
 1888 
 [All Rights reserved}
 
 PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. & SONS, 
 AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THE title-page will have explained sufficiently 
 what this Volume is and is not. 
 
 During the last seven and twenty years the 
 kindness of my own University has repeatedly 
 called me to Cambridge as one of its Select 
 Preachers : and since the two Universities have 
 introduced the custom of interchanging their 
 Pulpits I have more than once held the same 
 office at Oxford also. 
 
 The Sermons thus preached were for many 
 years published afterwards in a succession of 
 small Volumes, of which several passed through 
 more than one Edition, and some are now out 
 
 1C9CS11
 
 vi Preface. 
 
 of print. Since 1878 I have ceased to publish 
 them, though a few have found their way into 
 other Volumes. 
 
 The present work is a selection from the 
 whole series of University Sermons, whether 
 before published or not. Each of the smaller 
 Volumes mentioned above has contributed one 
 Sermon or more : two or three Sermons are 
 reprinted from elsewhere : several have not be- 
 fore appeared in any permanent form. All are 
 given in the order in which they were preached. 
 
 In preparing the Volume for publication, I 
 have found not only many defects, but also some 
 repetitions not perhaps to be wondered at in 
 the case of Addresses delivered at considerable 
 intervals to like Congregations, and sometimes 
 easily to be accounted for by my being called 
 again and again to advocate one particular cause, 
 that of Church Extension in the town and 
 suburbs of Cambridge, on the opening Sundays 
 of the Academical year. These appeals were too 
 closely interwoven with the main topics of the 
 Sermon to admit of being struck out, even if I
 
 Preface. vii 
 
 had not thought it better to adhere in all respects 
 to the form of the original delivery. 
 
 Another misgiving, which must be felt, I 
 suppose, more or less by all Preachers, arises 
 from the difficulty, often the impossibility, of 
 tracing up thoughts to their original sources, 
 whether in reading or hearing. It may be hoped 
 that, where there is no room for the suspicion of 
 a conscious or intentional plagiarism, the mere 
 assimilation of thought may be readily pardoned 
 by those whose beneficent influence thus gains 
 by diffusion. 
 
 I regard the publication of this Volume as 
 closing a large and long chapter of my life. My 
 periodical visits to Cambridge (some forty in 
 number) as Select Preacher were for years the 
 events and epochs of my Ministry. My sojourns 
 on these occasions in the houses of honoured 
 friends in various Colleges of the University are 
 among my pleasantest and most sacred memories. 
 To one of these friends, my pupil and my suc- 
 cessor at Harrow, my thoughts are specially
 
 viii Preface. 
 
 turned at this time, when a new happiness has 
 just been added to his Mastership of that great 
 College of which I became a member the year 
 after he was born. My love for Cambridge, the 
 passion of my boyhood, constant through youth 
 and manhood, is still strong in old age. May 
 the same affection, brightened and purified, 
 animate now a younger generation, inspiring 
 a worthier and more fruitful, though it can 
 scarcely be a more loyal or a more loving 
 service. 
 
 LLANDAFF, 
 
 September, 1888.
 
 I. 
 
 SUSPENSE. 
 
 St Luke xii. 29. 
 
 Neither be ye of doubtful mind. 
 
 THERE is a thing well known in human life, of which 
 all of us, in some form or another, and in many forms, 
 have already had experience. We have seen, for ex- 
 ample, a vast concourse of people waiting and watching 
 in the streets of a town for the arrival of some illustrious 
 or royal person, whose coming is to be the signal for the 
 commencement of a ceremony or spectacle awakening 
 great public interest, or perhaps whose own presence is 
 itself the thing looked for; the object of a concentrated 
 devotion, or else of a curiosity scarcely less powerful and 
 absorbing. We have seen them stand through long 
 hours, careless of rain and wind, tolerant even of delay, 
 provided that delay end not in entire disappointment. 
 We have noticed the effect of such an expectation upon 
 a population at other times industrious and unexcitable. 
 We have seen how it stops the wheels of business, 
 silences the cravings of appetite, and serves to impede 
 the very flight of time. 
 
 We may turn the picture, and see the same thing at 
 work, not in masses of men, but in individual instances; 
 not in matters of pleasurable excitement, but in cases 
 v. 3} I
 
 2 Suspense. [i. 
 
 of intense and thrilling anxiety. In a distant land a 
 favourite son has been seeking his own fortunes, or 
 serving his family and his country, in some post of civil 
 or military responsibility: the last mail has brought 
 tidings of a wound or a fever under which he was lying ) 
 a month ago, between life and death: it must be a whole 
 fortnight before it is possible to hear of him again : 
 already he may be in his grave : and his parents and 
 sisters must endure through long nights and days the 
 agonizing doubt, torturing themselves with conflicting 
 guesses, and ignorant whether 'is' or 'was' be the tense 
 in which to speak of one whose image is engraven on 
 their memory and whose love is twined round their 
 heart. Well can we conjecture, if we have not known it 
 for ourselves, the effect of such an anxiety upon the life 
 that has to be lived under it. How flat and colourless 
 has become every common occupation. How has every 
 interest faded, and every other care ceased. How diffi- 
 cult is it now to find even in prayer itself that relief 
 which in other circumstances it has so often secured. 
 How strange to pray about one who may already be in 
 the unseen world yet how impossible to pray about any 
 other thing or any other person. Little more can be 
 done than to bow beneath God's hand and suffer: to 
 submit to live is as much as faith can rise to, and He 
 who seeth in secret will accept the imperfect sacrifice. 
 
 This thing of which the effects are so different, accord- 
 ing to the material on which it chances to operate, is 
 yet, in its own nature, one and the same: we have one 
 name for it, and we could not improve upon it: we call 
 it 'suspense;' a state of suspense. 'Do not leave me in 
 suspense:' 'It is not fair to keep people in suspense:'
 
 i.] Suspense. 3 
 
 ' I can bear anything better than suspense : ' such are 
 the expressions by which we frequently give vent to our 
 consciousness of the agitating, wearying, enfeebling, 
 irritating effects of that condition of human life to which 
 we have thus far pointed. 
 
 Would to God, my brethren well may it be said in 
 all seriousness and in much sadness that suspense had 
 no other scope than that hitherto described ; that its 
 operation were confined to those outward circumstances 
 of life, in which it may possibly have a salutary influ- 
 ence, teaching, if it can teach nothing else, a lesson of 
 patience, and yielding afterwards, if not at the time, 
 some peaceable fruit of righteousness in them that are 
 exercised thereby. 
 
 'Neither be ye of doubtful mind;' or, according to the 
 marginal reading, 'live not in careful suspense:' such is 
 our Lord's charge in the text. And He spoke it pri- 
 marily addressing Himself, as He commonly did, to the 
 poor of anxiety about food and clothing; of that ever- 
 recurring question, 'What shall I eat, and what shall I 
 drink, and wherewithal shall I be clothed?' which fills 
 up so large a portion of the threescore years and ten of 
 the labourer and the mechanic. If I were speaking now 
 to an ordinary congregation, such as that which is else- 
 where committed to my charge, I might dwell with 
 advantage upon this first and most obvious aspect of the 
 words before us ; reproving earthly anxiety from the 
 arguments which the context would furnish, its futility, 
 its needlessness, its faithlessness, and its folly. But here 
 a different use of the text forces itself upon our notice. 
 
 Suspense has a wide and powerful action upon the 
 things of this life. We are in suspense oftentimes: now 
 
 i 2
 
 4 Suspense. [i. 
 
 about some desired prize, now about some apprehended 
 danger; now for another, now for ourselves; now about 
 the doubtful success of some honest toil, now about 
 casualties and possibilities over which we have no con- 
 trol. But not thus only. There is such a thing as sus- 
 pense in the world of thought also. Suspense largely 
 enters into men's religious opinions. And shall I be 
 thought harsh or uncharitable if I say certainly it is 
 not in that spirit, but in one of deep concern and 
 lively sympathy, that I say it that it is characteristic 
 of these times, in no common degree, to be in suspense 
 both about faith and duty? Does not He who alone 
 knows what is in man behold perhaps, as He looks 
 down upon this congregation, many a mind halting be- 
 tween two opinions even as to Himself, the Propitiation 
 and the Redeemer much more, as to everything short 
 of this one? What word could more accurately describe 
 the intellectual condition, at least, of very many, as to 
 the revelations of the Bible, than that which He has 
 Himself selected to describe a forbidden state of mind 
 as to things earthly? Live not, He says, in suspense: 
 and the word in the original is one word ; the same 
 which denotes a substance hovering in the air or fluctua- 
 ting upon the waters, as opposed to that which has a 
 sure support and standing-place on the firm and solid 
 earth. There are many persons in every age, it may 
 be certainly in our own whose whole life is passed in 
 this balancing, floating, wavering state of mind as to the 
 truth of God, as to the revelations of the Bible. 
 
 And there are some things about which suspense is at 
 least harmless. In early life, more particularly, a pro- 
 miscuous positiveness is as unchristian as it is unpleasing.
 
 i.] Suspense. 5 
 
 A man who is sure about everything may be suspected 
 of having proved nothing. It is always easy to borrow 
 opinions in the gross from other men ; always easy to 
 take what is called a party line, to adopt the views of a 
 book, a paper, a teacher, or a school, and thenceforward 
 to see with another's eyes and speak with another's 
 tongue. This saves much trouble ; enables an inferior 
 mind to wear the plumes of a superior ; precludes the 
 necessity of much anxious thought, and (what is in itself 
 no small comfort to the weak) secures to us companions 
 if not followers. We see too much of this also in our 
 days. It is the abuse of decision, as the other is the 
 abuse of enquiry. It is the precipitancy of unscrupu- 
 lousness, at best of weakness ; sometimes it is the indi- 
 cation of a radical unsoundness of character, or the 
 awkward disguise of a deep latent scepticism. 
 
 It is not amiss to be in suspense about some things 
 even in religion : it is not well to be positive about every- 
 thing even in matters of duty. Our Lord would have 
 every man to be well persuaded in his own mind, not in 
 another's. And well persuaded in his own mind a man 
 cannot be without thought and without examination : 
 I might almost say, without having once questioned, if 
 not doubted. To take a thing for granted more especi- 
 ally if it be one of those highest things of all, in which 
 man lives is not to exercise faith, but to indulge cre- 
 dulity. 
 
 All these things it is right to say, in order to prevent 
 a serious misuse of the great principle laid down in the 
 text. The text does not forbid enquiry, and the text 
 does not encourage presumption. But this surely it says 
 to us, It is ill for a man to live in suspense as to the
 
 6 Suspense. [u 
 
 essentials of the Gospel. We admit that there may be 
 whole provinces and regions of thought into which it is 
 not necessary for every man to enter. We admit that 
 there may be verses and chapters of the Bible, statements 
 of fact and statements of doctrine, which have been 
 variously interpreted by various minds, and as to the 
 true meaning of which a man may without injury to his 
 soul live and die in suspense. But we strongly and 
 earnestly protest against the carrying of this concession 
 into the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel. There 
 are truths which to reject is to refuse to eat the bread, to 
 breathe the air, to see the light, which God has given 
 for the life of man's soul. There are truths which to 
 doubt is to dispense with, and which to dispense with is 
 to deny. Of such a nature is, above all others for I 
 will go at once to the root of the matter the Scriptural 
 doctrine of the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 Is Jesus Christ the Son of God? Is He one with the 
 Father ? Did He come from God and return to God ? 
 Did He bear my sins in such sense that for His sake 
 all sin can be forgiven ? Is He now alive ? Does He 
 hear prayer ? Has He all power in heaven and in 
 earth? Does God for His sake give His Holy Spirit to 
 them that ask Him ? Do the Gospels contain a true re- 
 cord of His life and of His death, and the Gospels and 
 Epistles a faithful account of His teaching ? Did Christ 
 in a true and real sense bring to us a revelation ? not a 
 mere repetition, with more or less of added force and 
 clearness, of the conclusions of reason or of the instincts 
 of conscience ; but something which He knew because 
 He came down from heaven, something which was His 
 as it is not ours, something which God sends and by
 
 i.] Suspense. 7 
 
 which God will judge ? It is quite evident that the 
 question of faith or suspense upon these topics is a 
 question, literally, of vital moment. A man who be- 
 lieves these things will live in one way, and a man who 
 is in suspense about them must live in another way. 
 For I speak not to those who call nothing life but its 
 outward acts : those who hear me all recognize a life 
 which has its spring within, and feel that it is in its 
 relations to God above that its workings towards man 
 below find their motive and their value. And therefore 
 I say here, without doubt of its acceptance, that a man 
 who believes in Christ as the Son of God, as the Pro- 
 pitiation for sin, as the living Saviour, as the Revealer 
 of God, as the Giver of the Spirit, not only ought to 
 live, but must and will live, quite differently from the 
 man who is in suspense about Him in all or in some of 
 these particulars. It is not that the former has done 
 with enquiry : it is not that he blindly accepts even what 
 the best of men tell him as to the meaning of Christ's 
 words : it is not that he thinks himself debarred from 
 the freest examination of the credentials of each item of 
 doctrine, or of the text or the authorship or the circum- 
 stances of the passage or of the book itself in which that 
 particular doctrine is supposed to be contained. But 
 the difference between him and the other, in these re- 
 spects, is, that the one does and the other does not 
 enquire and examine as a believer ; as one- who only- 
 waits to be sure that his Lord has spoken, and spoken 
 certainly this and not that, before he receives into his 
 mind and into his soul that revelation which he has thus 
 tried and certified. 
 
 Nor is it, I must beg you to observe, that even the
 
 8 Suspense. [i. 
 
 great central and essential truth of all has been accepted 
 blindly or credulously. There are doubtless those and 
 happiest of all men are they who have been nurtured 
 from their childhood not only in the ' admonition ' but in 
 the faith of Christ ; who know not when they first began 
 to believe, because faith has been in them like the shining 
 light which shineth gradually more and more unto the 
 perfect day. Shall we call even this a credulous or a 
 blind persuasion ? Great as are the intellectual creden- 
 tials of the Gospel, there is a greater still than they; 
 and that is, the satisfaction of the heart in it, and the 
 power of it upon the life : show us the man who has 
 been made what he is, in all kindliness and truthfulness 
 and diligence and purity, by growing up in the faith of 
 Christ, and we will welcome him as one who has the 
 soundest and surest of all reasons for believing, nay, as 
 one who not only has, but in turn is, a sufficient proof of 
 the truth and of the greatness and of the risen life of 
 Jesus. That man does not believe blindly. He, above 
 others, can tell whom and why he has believed. We 
 may well envy him his evidences. But another, who 
 lacks these, or possesses them less perfectly, may yet 
 have had his own. There are those we thank God for 
 it who have come to faith later, but by a way sure and 
 certain, though less peaceful and perhaps more circuitous. 
 There are those the history of this University is full of 
 such examples who, amidst the manifold workings of 
 intellectual life within at the opening of manhood, have 
 found it necessary to entertain the greatest question of 
 all, not only in the form, What must they do to be saved? 
 but rather perhaps in another shape, What is truth, 
 eternal truth, Divine truth ? has God indeed spoken in
 
 i.] Suspense. 9 
 
 anything save conscience ? is there a Revelation, and, if 
 there be, what says it ? And out of these first question- 
 ings, honestly entertained and earnestly grappled with, 
 there has arisen a conviction not to be shaken again 
 for ever, that in deed and in truth the Word of Revela- 
 tion (as we possess it) is no cunningly-devised fable ; 
 that in it there is the true message, disclosing the true 
 Messenger; that He to whom every line points, even in 
 places where it names Him not, is the very light and life 
 of man, and that he who follows Him shall not abide 
 and shall never walk in darkness. O set this man set 
 either of these two men in contrast with the man still 
 in suspense ; and who does not exclaim, Let me live his 
 life let me die his death ? 
 
 I know that the other may be a pleasing man : his very 
 deficiency is, as man judges, half a virtue. Suspense in 
 matters of religion begins oftentimes in a mere excess 
 of candour. ' There is so much to be said on both sides 
 of everything. All evidence is so doubtful : all motives 
 are so mixed : all conduct is such a compound : it is so 
 difficult to arrive at certainty in things ancient, in things 
 resting on written testimony, in things largely mingled 
 with miracle, in things involving suspensions of ordinary 
 laws by Divine interference and interposition. It may 
 be true : I hope, even more than I fear, that it may be 
 true. I admire the character of Christ : I love His 
 tenderness towards human infirmity, His condescension 
 towards the young, the ignorant, and the sinful, His 
 unwearied patience, His holiness of life, His expansive 
 and inexhaustible charity. Perhaps He was more than 
 this : perhaps there was something in His death beyond 
 the mere example. Yes, I can imagine something of
 
 io Suspense. [i. 
 
 a propitiation, something of a sacrifice : not a substi- 
 tution, but still something which human language, in 
 its necessary imperfection, might style a mediation and 
 an atonement. Yes, it may be so : sometimes I can 
 almost trust in it. But, on the whole, it is safer perhaps 
 to take a slightly different ground : I will rely upon 
 God's mercy : I will hope that He who made us made 
 not so many of us for nought : I will cherish the hope 
 that, if I do my best, if I am kind and generous and 
 serviceable to others, if I do what I can to live a good 
 life, if I am a useful member of society, and if I look, 
 all along, to God's providence and protection and 
 guidance and mercy, all will be well with me at the 
 last ; I may lay me down in peace and take my rest ; 
 I will enjoy God's gifts, and trust Him with the future.' 
 
 Thoughts such as these, my brethren, are the religion 
 of many : they are their best thoughts. Suffer the word 
 of exhortation. ' Is this quite the language of the 
 Bible ? ' A few phrases from the Bible are mixed up 
 in it : but open that book does it seem quite to sanction 
 this easy, this confiding view of life ? Does it hang well 
 together with, ' Strive to enter in at the strait gate ; for 
 many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall 
 not be able ? ' No, such views may be the religion of 
 a shut Bible, but they are not the religion of a Bible 
 opened : God give us all something better than that to 
 live by and to die with. 
 
 Suspense as to the essentials of faith is a state always 
 of spiritual indolence. Not indeed if it be the in- 
 voluntary suspense of a man eagerly seeking light ; 
 doubting in earnest ; that is, doubting only till he can 
 find his way, and honestly asking it. Out of sncli
 
 i.] Suspense. 1 1 
 
 suspense there may well grow full decision. And, even 
 while it lasts, God and His angels may be spectators 
 and helpers of the conflict : over such doubting there 
 may soon be joy in -heaven. But I speak of the man 
 who acquiesces in suspense. I speak of that state in 
 which a man, willingly or else through mere carelessness, 
 goes on through a whole period of life, perhaps through 
 the whole of life, doubting without questioning ; cherish- 
 ing without resolving his difficulties ; taking a candid 
 view (as it is called) of each point presented to him, 
 without feeling that life and death may hang, for him, 
 upon the issue. How sadly, how painfully, does it fall 
 upon the ear of a Christian man, to hear matters touch- 
 ing the very life of souls discussed in common society 
 in the midst and in the tone of politics or of scandals ; 
 to see the precious casket of Divine truth passed from 
 hand to hand for trivial or jesting comment, as though 
 within it were no perfume of life unto life or else of 
 death unto death. What an indication of the utter 
 absence of vigour and earnestness is that condition of 
 suspense not of hostility to the Gospel, not of total 
 unbelief, but just of suspense in which so large a part 
 of our generation lives, we must fear, and dies. 
 
 In particular, let me say that a state of suspense in 
 religion must necessarily be a prayerless life. ' That 
 your prayers be not hindered ' is given in Scripture as 
 a motive for living in peace one with another : is it not 
 a just motive also for terminating the suspense of faith ? 
 'How shall they call,' asks the Apostle, 'on Him in 
 whom they have not believed ? ' ' He that cometh to 
 God,' another Scripture says, ' must believe that He 
 is.' We may be quite sure that a man who neither has
 
 1 2 Suspense. [i. 
 
 made, nor is engaged in making, his decision as to the 
 true person and work and will of his Saviour, is a man 
 who knows nothing of the power and of the grace of 
 prayer. If he hates his suspense, if he is ashamed of it, 
 if he feels its irksomeness and (indeed we may say it) 
 its bondage, then probably he does attempt prayer : he 
 kneels down at the accustomed times, and with many 
 wanderings and many strugglings asks for the ac- 
 customed things, for forgiveness and help, using the 
 accustomed names for Him to whom, and for Him 
 through whom, and for Him for whom, Christians are 
 wont to pray: but, alas, how poor, himself being the 
 judge, is the thing thus performed how dry and barren 
 the ground beneath him, how dull and dark the heaven 
 above. Yes, even as it is written, so may it be said of 
 him, ' Thou, O God, hast covered Thyself with a cloud, 
 that his prayers should not pass through.' More often, 
 as about other things, so about prayer itself, he is still 
 in suspense ; thinks it a pleasing and a soothing custom, 
 admits its salutary reaction upon the person who prays, 
 but is careful to remind both others and himself that 
 it is irrational to suppose that prayer can affect the 
 Divine counsels, and finds, according to the invariable 
 rule of God's spiritual procedure, that, what he himself 
 expects not, he himself does not receive. 
 
 My brethren, if in any of the words used to describe 
 this condition there has been aught of coldness or of 
 harshness, be well assured that it has been most invo- 
 luntary. No one, I should imagine, who at all knows 
 himself certainly no one who knows anything of Christ 
 can view the state indicated without much of sym- 
 pathy as well as much of sadness. And when our ears
 
 L] Suspense. 13 
 
 have been vexed with any of those clamorous and indis- 
 criminating revilings by which religious zeal is too ready 
 to overbear all freedom of thought or speech on matters 
 of Christian doctrine, we find ourselves turning almost 
 with refreshment to one of those candid minds which 
 seem incapable of sweeping judgments, balance nicely 
 conflicting arguments, and express themselves, even 
 with regard to essential truths, in a tone of caution and 
 almost of hesitation. More especially is this the case in 
 youth : a generous impulse drives men at that age to the 
 defence of the assailed: and it is well if, in their just 
 abhorrence of unfairness and intolerance, they forget not 
 sometimes to distinguish between the Gospel as it speaks 
 in Scripture and the Gospel as it is misused by man. 
 At such times there is an aggravated danger of suspense 
 about the truth. At such times it is doubly necessary 
 that we be reminded of the distinction between candour 
 and indifference, and urged to take heed lest, in holding 
 the truth in reason and speaking the truth in love, we 
 be ceasing to hold it in decision and to speak it in 
 power. 
 
 I probably address some to-day, who, if the language 
 employed has not entirely failed of impression, are con- 
 scious that they, they themselves, are 'of doubtful mind/ 
 as the text expresses it are in a state of fluctuation 
 and suspense as to the word and work, the person and 
 authority, of our Lord and Saviour. 
 
 To such I would say, first of all, Never allow your- 
 selves to acquiesce in this state. If it is yours, admit it : 
 but never rest in it; and, let me add, as a hint not with- 
 out its use, never take credit for it. Never allow your- 
 self to be thought well of for a candour of which the
 
 14 Suspense. [i. 
 
 two largest ingredients may be indolence and cowardice. 
 Yes, I repeat the word cowardice: the worst sort of 
 cowardice: fear of consequences; fear of that to which 
 decision of doubts might possibly summon you in the 
 way either of opinion or of conduct. Do not for one 
 moment regard it as a fit state for a responsible and 
 immortal being to be living in, to be practically uncer- 
 tain whether he has a Saviour, or where, if so, He is to 
 found. 
 
 And next I would say, Face your difficulties. Be not 
 timid towards them. Some men deal with religious 
 doubt as some men deal with bodily disease: they dare 
 not ascertain it: they had rather let it gather strength 
 by delay than submit it to that treatment which, if taken 
 in time, will certainly heal. Be not ye thus unwise. 
 Bring your mind to account. Take the measure of your 
 difficulties. As you examine them, some will disappear. 
 Register the rest. Put them by. Three months hence, 
 when you look at them again, they will be fewer. But, 
 whatever you do, let them not gather strength by your 
 timidity. Give them not the added importance of mys- 
 tery. Force them to a reckoning. See how large they 
 are, or how small. Make them produce their witnesses. 
 And then listen to counter-evidence. If there are some 
 objections to belief, are there none to unbelief? In par- 
 ticular, I would urge you to a decision with reference 
 to the great question of all. Minor matters can wait. 
 Even some doctrines of the Gospel, in the state of mind 
 now referred to, can wait, and with advantage. But the 
 great question of all waits not, or waits only with infinite 
 risk. Who and what is Jesus Christ? That question 
 must be answered. If He is what Christians think Him,
 
 i.] Suspense. 1 5 
 
 I ought to be making use of Him every day. Each 
 prayer that ignores Him, each day in which prayer 
 through Him is silent, is an affront to God, on the 
 supposition that He is. Settle that question. You can 
 do so as well now as at any future day; and the present 
 only is your own. Other men have had to do this before 
 you; have had to do it, and have done it, at your present 
 time of life, by careful and earnest thought, definitely, 
 decisively, and for ever. Even so do ye. Balance the 
 question, and strike the balance. Remember, in many 
 things we are compelled to act, and to believe too, upon 
 less than absolute certainty: be not unreasonable in your 
 demands: God gives proof enough, but He relieves us 
 not, in this world, from the necessity of using what He 
 gives, of putting it together, of pondering it, of trying it 
 well by study and reflection, and of forming a judgment 
 upon it on the whole. Remember too. certainty, assur- 
 ance, conviction, grows, like other things, by use: act 
 now, believe now, upon a balance of judgment, and by 
 degrees you will advance from belief to knowledge. 
 'Then shall I know, even as also I am known.' 
 
 Lastly, if you be a man in suspense about the Gospel, 
 be the more resolute to be practical. Do not nurse your 
 doubts in a meditative seclusion. Carry them out. Let 
 yours be an active life. Go and visit the poor. See 
 what life is, and what its real wants are. Observe for 
 yourself what a needy suffering man requires for his 
 soul's comfort; what a dying man requires to carry him 
 through the dark valley. You will thus learn more of 
 theology in an hour than in the learned studies and 
 meditations of a year. And, if the state of your religious 
 convictions is not yet perhaps such as to make it honest
 
 1 6 Suspense. [i. 
 
 for you, or possible, to offer instruction in these things to 
 the ignorant, or consolation from these sources to the 
 suffering, then turn to the body: pity disease, relieve 
 pain, give to the hungry: try to make some abode of 
 poverty less wretched, some bed of sickness less desolate: 
 and thank God when by any means private or public 
 by your own unaided exertion, or through some chari- 
 table Institution like that for which I ask your alms this 
 day 1 He enables you, even in one instance, to imitate 
 the work of Him who upon earth went about doing 
 good, and of whom it is written that, in every sense, 
 bodily, mental, or spiritual, in which the words can be 
 uttered, 'Himself took our infirmities, and bare our 
 sicknesses.' 
 
 1 A Collection was made after this Sermon in aid of the Funds of 
 Addenbrooke's Hospital.
 
 II. 
 
 CHOICE OF PROFESSIONS. 
 
 Acts xxii. 10. 
 What shall I do, Lord? 
 
 THE words are addressed to a Person, and they ask 
 of that Person the guidance of a life. The speaker, a 
 moment ago, was travelling in hot haste from Jerusalem 
 to Damascus, with an object full in view, and every 
 energy of his soul bent on its accomplishment. Zealous 
 for God's honour, and believing it to be at stake ; con- 
 sidering the new religion to be a dangerous error, and 
 deeming no mode of extirpation so effectual as that of 
 vigorous persecution ; he has obtained from the chief 
 priests authority to persecute, and carries with him a 
 commission which will place at his command the liberty 
 and the life of those who have presumed to innovate 
 upon the national faith. Such was the character, such 
 the present mission, of him whose words are before us. 
 Not a character likely to be affected by idle imaginations 
 or vain visions. Not a mission likely to terminate in its 
 very opposite, or to be followed by a life spent in preach- 
 ing the faith which as yet he is labouring to destroy. 
 But one moment has upset and reversed all. A bright 
 light from heaven, shining above and distinguishable 
 from the blaze of a fiery Eastern sun ; and then the 
 v. 2
 
 1 8 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 voice of words ; one grave question, mysterious in its 
 source but resistless in its authority ; a question proposed 
 in a language of earth, but speaking of one persecuted 
 in heaven ; this has sufficed to change the whole course 
 and current of a life; this has at once turned activity 
 into prostration, zeal into fear, pride into abasement, and 
 fury against others into anxiety for himself. ' I fell unto 
 the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, 
 Saul, why persecutest thou me ? And I answered, Who 
 art Thou, Lord ? And He said unto me, I am Jesus of 
 Nazareth, whom thou persecutest. And I said, What 
 shall I do, Lord ? And the Lord said unto me, Arise, 
 and go into Damascus ; and there it shall be told thee of 
 all things which are appointed for thee to do.' 
 
 My brethren, the more we reflect upon this marvel- 
 lous history, the more real does it become to us, the more 
 striking in its incidents, the more ample in its instruction 
 for ourselves. 
 
 We are assembled together on Trinity Sunday ; that 
 great festival of our Church which sums up in one last 
 commemoration all the scattered items of doctrine which 
 have diversified thus far the course of the Christian year. 
 Trinity Sunday is, in brief, the Festival of Revelation. 
 It gathers into one whole all that we have been taught 
 of God ; solemnly charges us to remember the primeval 
 disclosure, 'The Lord our God is one Lord;' warns us 
 that we suffer not any diversity of operations to make 
 us lose sight of the unity of the Godhead ; bids us be 
 careful how we suffer in ourselves any such thought of 
 mediation or of atonement, of grace or of inspiration, as 
 might separate into three wills or three essences those 
 Holy Persons, of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost,
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 19 
 
 whom the Scriptures of truth everywhere recognize and 
 reveal ; and yet, on the other hand, reminds us how 
 necessary to the Christian's hope and to the Christian's 
 life is a true faith in each one of these ; how incomplete 
 and how formidable were the conception of a God who- 
 created, without the further disclosure of a Divine Person 
 who redeemed, and of a Divine Person who sanctifies. 
 Trinity Sunday is not, as some would make it, the com- 
 memoration of a formal doctrine, for which man has had 
 to invent a term, and in which the life of the soul is 
 scarcely interested or concerned. Rather is it the com- 
 memoration of the fulness of God, of the completeness 
 of His work for us, of His nearness to us, of His minute 
 as well as boundless care and love toward us ; that which 
 fills up what else would be most defective, that which 
 combines what else were most disjointed, brings into 
 harmony conflicting attributes, and gives distinctness 
 and personality to the mysterious and the abstract. 
 This it is which brings God home to us as a Father, and 
 enables us, whenever and however far we have wandered, 
 to say in our hearts with a resolute hope, ' I will arise 
 and return.' This it is which turns the character of 
 Christ, and the example of Christ, and the sufferings of 
 Christ, into a living and life-giving trust ; saying to us, 
 He who lived for you, and He who died, is in deed and 
 in truth your Lord and your God. This it is which 
 transforms the influence of the Spirit into the sympathy 
 of a Person ; of One who helps our prayers, strengthens 
 our infirmities, is grieved with our sins, and glad when 
 we are comforted. And this it is which, instead of 
 leaving us with three separate agencies, binds them all 
 for us into one ; calls them, not Three, but, a Trinity ; 
 
 2 2
 
 2O Choice of Professions. \\\. 
 
 assures us that the will of the Saviour and the will of 
 the Comforter is not less the will of the Father ; that 
 the Father gave the Son because He loved us, and that 
 the Father and the Son will come to us in the Spirit and 
 make an abode in us not as Three but as One. Trinity 
 Sunday is the Festival of Revelation ; and Revelation 
 itself is the Revelation, not of three Persons only, but of 
 one God. 
 
 And He it was, even this one God, speaking, as He 
 always speaks, by the mouth of the everliving Saviour, 
 before whom Saul of Tarsus lay low upon the earth, 
 and said, 'What shall I do, Lord?' O, my brethren, it 
 is the thing which we need, every one of us, to be able 
 to look up to heaven and behold a Person there ; to turn 
 from a creed of lifeless abstractions, and to receive in its 
 stead the revelation of a living God ; to be able to say, 
 not only, I believe in the omnipotence of God, in His 
 eternity, in His holiness and justice and truth, but, I 
 believe in God : not only, I believe in the incarnation of 
 Christ, in His atonement, in His mediation and interces- 
 sion, but, I believe in Jesus : not only, I believe in the 
 influence of the Holy Spirit, in His operation, in His 
 converting and quickening grace, but, I believe in the 
 Holy Ghost. We want to be able to look up to heaven, 
 and know that behind that screen, that veil, that cloud 
 for it is nothing more there is One to whom we are 
 something and who is something to us ; One to whom 
 we may speak, speak in the heart, and be sure that He 
 hears ; One of whom we may ask a question, and know 
 that it will be answered ; One to whom we may apply, 
 and not doubt that He will help devote ourselves, and 
 know that He accepts the sacrifice. It is in this turning
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 2 1 
 
 from the doctrine to the Person, in this sight of Him 
 who is invisible, that the essence of conversion, and the 
 power of spiritual life, really consists. Then at last may 
 it be said of each one of us, as it was said, in the very 
 crisis of his history, of him of whom the text tells us, 
 ' Behold, he prayeth.' For then, then at length, will 
 prayer have become a power and a reality, being ad- 
 dressed to One who is, and who is known, by one who 
 wants, and who expects. 
 
 ' What shall I do, Lord ? ' The words are few, but 
 they are significant and they are pregnant words. On 
 St Paul's lips, at that moment, they meant, 'I see my 
 past life to have been, with all its propriety of conduct 
 and with all its zeal for God, a folly and a madness ; I 
 see my boasted privileges a delusion, my treasured know- 
 ledge a lie ; I see that what I thought obedience was 
 rebellion, and what I deemed a mortal sin was in truth 
 the very will of God. And now, Lord, in this uprooting 
 of all that was, be Thou my Guide into that which shall 
 be : I know not teach Thou me what is truth : I 
 know not teach Thou me what is duty : in this hour 
 of confusion and utter darkness, be Thou the lamp of 
 my path, the light of my steps. Lord, what wilt Thou 
 have me to do ? ' 
 
 And the same words had for him thenceforward a 
 fresh meaning with every successive circumstance of 
 life from his conversion to his martyrdom. We will 
 not stay to trace it through changes in which St Paul 
 was but the type of all Christians. When the path 
 of duty is beset with unexpected difficulties, or when 
 it seems to branch off, this way and that, in ambiguous 
 directions ; then, again and again, has been heard in
 
 22 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 every generation from a thousand hearts, the cry for 
 guidance and for decision, ' What shall I do/ Lord ? ' 
 And when at some new turn in life's journey it has 
 become necessary to choose between conflicting claims, 
 to do this and refuse that ; and the voice of conscience 
 is indistinctly heard, and the arguments of the natural 
 judgment evenly balanced, so that we know not how 
 to walk and to please God in a conjuncture felt to be 
 critical and big with consequences ; then too has the 
 cry gone up, and never in vain from sincere and trusting 
 hearts, into the ear of One not seen but loved, ' What 
 shall I do, Lord ? O Lord, I am oppressed : undertake 
 for me ! ' 
 
 My brethren, there is one question which presses 
 heavily, or which ought to do so, at that point of life 
 at which many members of this congregation stand to- 
 day. There is one question which concerns, not a par- 
 ticular act of life only, but the whole of life ; a ques- 
 tion upon the answer to which will depend, for each 
 one of you, the occupations in which, and the circum- 
 stances amongst which, this brief but momentous being 
 shall be used and spent. You will all perceive that 
 I speak of what is called the choice of a profession. 
 A ' profession : ' that branch of knowledge which you 
 shall profess to have made your own ; that department 
 of human affairs which you shall profess to understand ; 
 that employment, be it what it may, for which you shall 
 profess yourself to be qualified. And the ' choice ' 
 of a profession. Considerable latitude is allowed, in 
 these days, to all young men entire and absolute 
 freedom to most young men in determining for them- 
 selves that line in which they will serve their generation
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 23 
 
 and exercise the talents with which God has endowed 
 them. It is due to us, it is due to you, that it should 
 be so. It is the right of a responsible being to be left 
 free in this momentous choice. No man may deliver 
 his brother, no father his' son, in the day of God's judg- 
 ment : therefore no man should prescribe to his brother, 
 no father to his son, when childhood and boyhood are 
 ended, in what particular duties, under what particular 
 influences, he shall spend those years of activity for 
 which he solely and singly will have to give account. 
 
 For great indeed are the issues of that choice. Not 
 more various are individual gifts, than individual ten- 
 dencies, liabilities, and temptations. A profession suit- 
 able to one may be misery, may be ruin, to another. 
 I speak not here though the consideration can never 
 be unimportant of the chances of success or failure 
 in the race of professional distinction. I speak rather 
 of the chances of the soul in this life and for eternity. 
 And I say that there are constitutions of mind and 
 spirit as diverse in their openness to particular in- 
 fluences for good or evil as are bodily constitutions in 
 their proneness to particular forms of disease. As the 
 physician will prescribe for one a warm climate and for 
 another a bracing, sending this man for health to a 
 region of the world which to that man would be death 
 itself; even so there are employments, callings, whole 
 professions, which for one man may be perilous in the 
 extreme, and for another harmless or even salubrious. 
 Woe to him, therefore, who lets himself drift into a 
 profession, without much serious reflection and great 
 searchings of heart. Woe to him who suffers accident, 
 persuasion, inclination alone, to preside over such a
 
 24 Choice of Professions, [11. 
 
 choice. Nay, even gifts, even powers, even great and 
 marked capacities for a particular calling, are not of 
 themselves decisive. These things are elements in the 
 question, but they are not the whole of it. They all 
 demand to be taken into account, but they have no 
 right, singly or together, to settle it. I know that 
 natural faults, constitutional tendencies, pronenesses to 
 particular forms of evil, are neither created nor de- 
 stroyed by circumstances : it is not a profession that 
 makes nor a profession that can eradicate one of them. 
 But one profession may foster, may encourage, may 
 develope a particular evil tendency, and another may 
 check, suppress, counteract it. And, alas, how few 
 think of these things in choosing. How many, for 
 example, have gone to the Bar, not although, but 
 because, they saw in themselves, or their friends ad- 
 mired in them, a promptitude of resource or an in- 
 genuity of invention which might successfully distort 
 truth and make the worse appear the better cause. 
 And how many have gone into the Army, not though, 
 but because, they were already too much addicted to 
 a habit of mental indolence, and saw before them in 
 that one direction a possibility of passing decently 
 through life without exertion. If the one had foreseen 
 all that was involved in his choice, he would have felt 
 his readiness of speech and his quickness of invention 
 a reason against rather than for the calling to which he 
 was inclined. And if the other had foreseen all that 
 was involved in his choice, he would have felt it his 
 duty rather to force himself into mental exertion at the 
 risk of inferior success, than to supersede that outward 
 necessity for it from which he more than other men
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 25 
 
 would have profited. But who does foresee all that 
 hangs upon this first decision ? Or who, almost, regards 
 with due seriousness his inability to foresee ? Who, my 
 brethren, amongst you who are now on the threshold 
 of active life, is really pondering as in God's sight the 
 choice of his earthly calling, taking the measure, so far 
 as he is able, of his own gifts and failings, estimating 
 duty in the light not of time only but of eternity, and, 
 under a deep conviction of his own ignorance and 
 blindness, asking, day by day, of One above, the very 
 question of the text, ' What shall I do, Lord ? Lord, 
 what wilt Thou have me to do ? ' 
 
 It is not much, perhaps, that man can do to answer 
 this question for another. And yet it seems as though 
 the ministry of God's Word, in this place at least, ought 
 not always to be silent on a matter so pressing and so 
 momentous. You will not indeed expect a clergyman, 
 and a parochial clergyman, to be a wholly impartial 
 judge of the conflicting claims of English professions. 
 His life is given to one work; and he knows, of course, 
 better than others, how much that one work wants men. 
 It is natural that he should feel, when he visits once again 
 these scenes of his youth ; more especially, when he is set 
 to preach where once he listened, to endeavour to do in 
 the humblest degree for others that which was once done 
 for him from the same pulpit by great men numbered now 
 (in many cases) among the dead; what it would be for his 
 beloved Church if the ranks of her ministry could be 
 largely replenished from the very best and most gifted of 
 those to whom he speaks ; if such a sense of the capabi- 
 lities of this service, of its dignity, of its power, and of 
 its happiness too, could be here awakened, as should
 
 26 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 make it indeed an ambition to embrace it; not a thing 
 to which here and there knowledge and ability may con- 
 descend, but rather that which shall be the desire and 
 the aspiration of the very ablest minds and the very 
 noblest spirits, even as he believes it to be the most direct 
 and the most immediate service of Him from whom 
 every gift comes, and to whose glory all should redound. 
 
 I speak not to disparage other callings, even in their 
 bearing upon religion. None knows better than a paro- 
 chial clergyman how feeble, how ineffective, in any 
 place, much more in the world at large, must be that 
 ministry which is not seconded by the zeal and comforted 
 by the sympathy of Christian laymen. But here, and on 
 this day, bear with me if, in the later words of him whom 
 the text recalls to us, I venture to 'magnify my own office.' 
 Trinity Sunday is a day of Ordinations. Wherever the 
 Church of Christ has spread itself throughout the whole 
 earth, this day is adding to its ranks new soldiers, new 
 officers, of the Cross. It cannot be unseasonable to-day 
 to speak to you, as time and strength may permit, of the 
 capabilities and of the requirements of this special ser- 
 vice. If by God's blessing upon the words spoken but 
 one heart should be stirred to desire this commission, or 
 but one difficulty removed out of the way of him who 
 has been fearing or hesitating to seek it, it will not be 
 for nothing that I have been permitted to visit you, nor 
 will it be without rejoicing that I return to my appointed 
 place of labour. 
 
 i. The capabilities, I said, of the Christian ministry. 
 Who can overrate them ? What is it to have that Word 
 of God, to which others can but occasionally have 
 recourse in brief moments of devotion, given to us for
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions, 27 
 
 our study, our meditation, and our stewardship, all the 
 day? What is it to have that charity which with others 
 can be but the employment of rare intervals of absorbing 
 and engrossing business, given to us as the very work of 
 life? to have the chosen occupation of our Lord Himself 
 'who went about doing good' consigned to us as our 
 office and our profession ? What is it to have a recog- 
 nized position amongst men as their friend, adviser, and 
 helper, in things pertaining to God? to be allowed, and 
 even expected, to fly to 'those who in this transitory life 
 are in trouble, sorrow, need, sickness, or any other adver- 
 sity,' with a message of cheering and consolation from 
 God Himself? What a help should this be to ourselves 
 in living a life of faith and hope: what an aid in walking 
 seriously, thoughtfully, consistently: what an assistance 
 in maintaining always that 'conscience void of offence' 
 which, whether as Christ's ministers or as Christ's ser- 
 vants, is essential as much to happiness now as to hope 
 hereafter. 
 
 And who shall limit the capabilities of one special 
 office of our ministry the much despised ordinance of 
 preaching? I know indeed that preaching may be a 
 very poor thing ; a form to the speaker, and therefore a 
 weariness to the hearer. With many, sermons are a very 
 byword of dulness: God forgive those whose careless- 
 ness and coldness, far more than any incapacity, have 
 made them so. But I know also for I have felt it 
 what a sermon may be. I have heard sermons delivered 
 from this very place which made the heart burn and the 
 ears tingle ; sermons of which the lapse of a quarter of a 
 century has failed to dull the recollection either of sense 
 or sound. I speak to some this day who have within
 
 28 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 them thoughts and ideas, convictions and aspirations 
 too, which they feel that they cannot rest without com- 
 municating. They look on already with no indifferent 
 eye upon the cares and woes, the confusions 'and the 
 perplexities, of human life. They have found for them- 
 selves and they know it a standing-place amidst 
 doubts, and a covert from storms, by which they behold 
 others still vexed and buffeted. They have sought, and 
 at last have found, that in Christ Himself, crucified first, 
 then risen, there is peace and rest and healing. They 
 have found, and others have not found. What will it be 
 to them to be commissioned in due time to preach? to 
 have an audience gathered for them, without obtrusion 
 or presumption of their own, and to be secure of a hear- 
 ing? O, what will preaching be in such hands? Where 
 will be dulness and tameness, where will be poor 
 thoughts and a languid utterance in the preacher, where 
 will be drowsiness, inattention, and weariness in those 
 that hear, when mind and heart and soul are full of their 
 subject, and when a definite and cherished aim gives 
 point and directness to every word spoken ? Depend 
 upon it, preaching, however it may fail of its effect, has 
 every possible chance still given to it. The machinery 
 is ready for use : it needs but the hand to move, but the 
 spirit to animate it. There is stillness, there is patience, 
 there is expectation, in many there is desire too, a hun- 
 gering and thirsting after edification, to which it ought 
 to be a delight to minister, which it is a sin of sins 
 wilfully to disappoint. Let more men of thought and 
 culture, more men of mark and power, above all, more 
 men of purpose and devotion, give themselves to the 
 work; and one who knows something of our town and
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 29 
 
 something of our country congregations may be listened 
 to when he promises that such preaching shall never 
 lack attention, that such preaching shall never lose its 
 labour. 
 
 But I would tell of the capabilities of the Christian 
 ministry in its more private workings. It is a great 
 mistake I had almost said it is a great impiety to 
 represent the ministry as needing no gifts, or as needing 
 gifts only for its preaching. In these days, at all events, 
 there is no gift however eminent which need be thrown 
 away in a parish however obscure. Wherever the en- 
 counter is made hand to hand between the ministry of 
 Christ and the ministry of Satan, between truth and 
 falsehood, between faith and infidelity, between right- 
 eousness and sin, there is room, and there is a demand, 
 for all gifts. It is only for vague and general and dis- 
 tant dealing that small powers or small efforts can be 
 deemed sufficient. Let a Christian minister single out 
 his man and it is only in single combat that some of 
 the greatest victories of the ministry can be won let 
 him propose to himself as a definite object the turning 
 of some sinner from the error of his ways ; the recovery 
 of some drunkard to sobriety, of some adulterer to 
 chastity, of some profane man to reverence, of some 
 infidel to faith and to worship; and assuredly he will 
 find it necessary to try every resource with which skill 
 and persuasiveness can furnish him, as well as that 
 higher and more availing weapon still, which can be 
 taken only by effectual fervent prayer out of the very 
 armoury of God. But with these aids the words will 
 ever and anon be verified, 'Resist the devil, and he will 
 flee from you.' Again and again will God give the
 
 30 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 victory, not to human pride or human skill, but to the 
 working of His Holy Spirit in the heart first, and then 
 by the lips, of His commissioned ministering servant. 
 And men are finding out in these days that no mere 
 machinery of evangelization no mere building of 
 churches, and no mere multiplication of services will 
 do Christ's work effectually, without a constant personal 
 search of the lost, and a warm individual sympathy with 
 the struggling. The Church will not reach at all those 
 who most need her, unless she goes after them: it is a 
 later part of the work, one which testifies of its all but 
 accomplishment, when they seek her. Judge ye, my 
 brethren, whether this sort of work can be done without 
 a large expenditure of ministration ; whether one man in 
 a parish of five or of ten thousand souls can avail any- 
 thing in this labour; the toil of battling singly with 
 hearts unwilling to be conquered, of reclaiming one by 
 one lives sunk and lost in sin. 
 
 Strange seems it strange would it seem, knew we 
 not the cause that to vigorous and enterprising men 
 any calling should be more attractive than one so full of 
 human interest, so imperious in its demand for human 
 energy. A lawyer may be admirably furnished with 
 every gift of knowledge and of eloquence, and yet he 
 may spend some of the best years of manhood in waiting 
 for a client. A physician may possess science which 
 would qualify him for high advancement, and yet linger 
 long without being summoned to the bedside of one 
 patient. A soldier may be shut up for months together 
 in some gloomy barrack, or live through a forty years' 
 peace and die without once seeing service. But a clergy- 
 man has from the day of his ordination clients and
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 31 
 
 patients, battles and sieges, enough and to spare. He 
 waits not for the chances of an opening ; he needs not, 
 for his high calling, the advantages of a connection or a 
 patron : around his doors are gathered the souls which 
 ask his service, within his parish rages the battle in which 
 he is to win his crown. Happy he who sees these things, 
 and suffers not his ministry to lack its true reward by 
 turning aside to a recompence low and illusory. Let 
 other professions seek their success in comforts, riches, 
 and honours of this life : he misses both worlds, who first 
 enters a calling of which the very title is holy, and then 
 desecrates it by the pursuit of objects as earthly in their 
 nature as they are precarious and almost casual in their 
 attainment. 
 
 2. And well may the Apostle's question sound in our 
 ears, 'Who is sufficient for these things?' Is it indeed 
 so, that any man of vigorous mind or of ample know- 
 ledge may at once transfer himself to that ministry of 
 which we have thus spoken ? Is nothing wanted but 
 vigour ? nothing but a humane care for others ? nothing 
 but a disinterested aim and a willingness to forego ease 
 and honour? Must there not be something yet beyond 
 these things, if a man would make full proof of his 
 ministry ? Yes, there is one thing, on which if we dwell 
 not it must be because its necessity is obvious ; a true 
 faith in God through Christ ; a real devotion to Him ; 
 and a life cleansed and consecrated by His indwelling 
 Spirit. It would be a disastrous day for the Church of 
 Christ, on which the door of its special service were 
 thrown wide open to all comers who could just profess 
 a desire for the amelioration of the condition of the poor 
 by the elevation of their social position or the rectifica-
 
 32 Choice of Professions. [11. 
 
 tion of their moral standard. These objects point not to 
 Ordination : they belong rather to lay callings : happy 
 are those times, happy is that country, which, like our 
 own, can point to many honoured persons, in private, 
 professional, or public life, who are diligently pursuing 
 them. For a clergyman's work there is required not 
 only a charitable spirit, not only a humane intention ; 
 not faith only, not devotion, not blamelessness of life 
 only ; but preparation yes, my brethren, a special pre- 
 paration. Narrow as much as you will the compass of 
 theology ; cast out of it all that you may of collateral 
 and subsidiary information; you must at least leave to 
 it the Bible and its interpretation ; you must at least 
 secure your congregations from ignorance and from error 
 as to the subject-matter of our teaching : and who that 
 knows anything of the Bible can be unaware of the 
 amplitude of that field of study which is contained within 
 these closest and narrowest bounds ? 
 
 But there is much more than this, which ought to fall, 
 and which I am persuaded does fall, within the scope of 
 the theological discipline of this University. In these 
 times there is need that our clergy be not only pious 
 but well-read and (which is sometimes a different thing) 
 well-educated men. It is not right that in our great 
 manufacturing towns of the north it should be in the 
 power of a hired emissary of infidelity, to defy with 
 impunity, Sunday after Sunday, by public placard, the 
 ministers of the Gospel. It is not right that working 
 men, ignorant perhaps but intelligent and honest- 
 hearted, should be left to grapple as they may, unaided 
 by their pastor, with the scoffs and taunts of the infidel. 
 These things are a new sign of the times, and men must
 
 n.] Choice of Professions. . 33 
 
 be educated in the full view of them. Nor is it right 
 that, apart from the open avowal of an antichristian 
 purpose, it should be in the power of any writer, un- 
 answered and unexposed, to dress up old objections as 
 if they were new, and to trouble the minds of unlearned 
 believers by assertions which a deeper knowledge would 
 show perhaps to be inaccurate or unfounded. These 
 things make a great demand upon those to whom the 
 charge of clerical education is entrusted. They ought 
 to be intimately and industriously acquainted with the 
 present condition of the minds of thinking men. They 
 ought to have the tenderest sympathy with real difficul- 
 ties, and to treat with manly respect anxious doubts 
 which they do not share. They must beware above all 
 things of seeming to stifle enquiry or to dread discovery. 
 They must religiously abstain from all half-answers. 
 No man loses the respect of the young by confessing 
 himself unacquainted with a fact at issue, or unable on 
 the instant to repel attack. But every man loses, and 
 deserves to lose, the respect of listeners young or old, if 
 he so far presumes upon the ignorance of his hearer as 
 to put him off with an answer which he himself who 
 speaks does not feel to be conclusive. These things are 
 of the very alphabet of education. And these things, 
 practised by the teacher, will in turn be imitated and 
 handed on by the learner. A clergyman thus trained 
 by example in habits of candour and of truthfulness 
 will go forth to his Parish, when the time comes, to bear 
 and to forbear ; in meekness instructing the ignorant, in 
 simplicity reassuring the doubter, in the power of a true 
 faith convincing or else refuting the gainsayer. 
 
 And shall I be pardoned if I presume to say here 
 
 v - 3
 
 34- Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 how important I deem it that clerical education, so far 
 as it consists in learning, should be carried on in our 
 Universities rather than in smaller and more special 
 training-fields? We do not want which is the very 
 best that can be hoped from such methods to see one 
 man's mind stamped whole upon a section of the clergy. 
 The freer intercourse which a University offers of mind 
 with mind, the larger choice and mutual correction of 
 instructors, not to mention the ampler gifts of learning 
 and ability which such a place affords in its teachers, 
 are invaluable aids in the study of a true theology. 
 Other systems may have their advantage I doubt not 
 that it is so in peculiar cases : there are men for whom 
 the temptations of college life have been too strong, 
 and who need to be taken aside from it to learn truth 
 and to practise duty in what is for them a safer atmo- 
 sphere : but the University, in my opinion, would prove 
 herself most unfaithful to the work with which God has 
 entrusted her, .if she allowed it to be said that her best 
 students must turn elsewhere for their theology, because 
 she refused to them either opportunities of instruction 
 or a stimulus to their use. 
 
 But has not theology its art as well as its science ? 
 Does it come naturally to any man, when once he is 
 master of scriptural doctrine, to manage a parochial 
 school, to organize parochial visiting, to catechize the 
 young, to visit the sick, or to prepare and to preach 
 sermons ? It may be so with some few men. There 
 may be those who are gifted with these great aptitudes, 
 and whom a special training in these matters would 
 rather cramp than aid. But surely this is not a common, 
 certainly it is not the normal, condition of a candidate
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 35 
 
 for Holy Orders. Certainly it is not the course pursued 
 by a student of law, or tolerated in a student of medicine. 
 To expect it in this one instance is to expect a miracle. 
 To act upon this expectation is to hand over one Parish 
 after another to be experimented on by an untaught 
 empiric, and to prevent one clergyman after another from 
 ever rising out of the awkwardnesses of a perpetual 
 beginner, or (at best) the eccentricities and mannerisms 
 of a self-instructed genius. Surely these are powers 
 best and most safely acquired in the observation of 
 their exercise. And where is the experienced Pastor 
 who would not gladly take under his general direction, 
 from time to time, three or four candidates for Holy 
 Orders ? Great joy would it carry to the heart of one 
 parochial clergyman for him I can answer to receive 
 applications of such a nature ; to find that there were 
 men of blameless character, of steady purpose, of open 
 mind, and of true devotion, who were willing to take 
 up their abode in his Parish, before Ordination, to see 
 what he could show them, and to render to him such 
 services, in his schools and amongst his poor, as church 
 order may permit and mutual convenience arrange. 
 Then and not till then would he feel that his Parish 
 was efficiently worked, and he would cherish the hope 
 that what was thus given to him would be repaid in 
 some measure by opportunities of widening experience, 
 and growing in the knowledge alike of man and of God. 
 I can make no apology for having used this last 
 opportunity of addressing you, my beloved brethren, in 
 bringing before you a subject which lies very near my 
 heart. I long to see that reproach rolled away, which is 
 said to rest at this time upon the Church of England, 
 
 32
 
 36 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 that she is not giving in any large proportion her most 
 distinguished sons to the ministry of the Word and 
 Sacraments. I know that in this place she has given 
 many of them : forgive me if in ignorance I seem to dis- 
 parage their numbers. But how is it with the younger 
 generation here present before me ? Are there no 
 stronger inducements drawing a large proportion of you 
 elsewhere? Are there none, whose talents, whose cha- 
 racters, whose antecedent purposes, seem to destine them 
 for the ministry, yet who, for some reason or (might I 
 say) for no reason, are now looking off from it and shap- 
 ing for themselves a widely different career ? Are there 
 none who might almost say, 'Thy vows are upon me, O 
 Lord ' so profound was the desire of a mother's heart, 
 so earnest once their own resolution, to seek this and no 
 other calling yet who now have erased from their brow 
 that sacred mark, and would fain be anything else rather ? 
 My brethren, why is this? I ask it of you seriously, 
 anxiously, affectionately, what has influenced, what has 
 changed you ? Is it anything in the Articles or formu- 
 laries of the national Church, which suggests to you 
 some scruple? I cannot counsel you to go against your 
 conscience in the smallest matter: but I would ask, what 
 pains have you taken to get satisfaction upon this point? 
 Have you taken counsel with elder men, men of thought, 
 of piety, of experience? Remember, though you must 
 not profess that which you do not think, yet, on the 
 other hand, there is a call on the positive side as well as 
 the negative; a call to adhere to the work which God 
 had seemed to mark out for you, unless the scruple 
 which has occurred to you be as rational as it may be 
 fanciful, as important as it may be trifling, and as perma-
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 37 
 
 nent as it may be transitory. Or is it that you dread to 
 incur that yoke of bondage which is sometimes laid too 
 heavily upon the clerical by the lay members of our 
 common Church? Is it that you dread to be taunted 
 at some future day with insincerity if you should ever 
 dare to think or to speak with freedom; to find yourself 
 made an offender for a word, and called untrue to your 
 profession if you cannot utter every passing Shibboleth 
 of a conventional theology? We cannot, alas, promise 
 you an exemption from the common lot of all men : nor 
 can we indeed encourage you in the flattering notion 
 that subscription binds you to nothing, or that a man 
 may be a clergyman of the Church and yet teach Uni- 
 versalism, Deism, Pantheism, or what he will. But this 
 we will say to you, Act now upon your present honest 
 convictions, and trust God with the opinions as with the 
 fortunes of your future. Dread not the irrevocability of 
 the pastoral vow, if only your conscience now tells you 
 that Jesus Christ is, and is Lord both of the dead and 
 living. It may be formidable in prospect to undertake 
 a responsibility absolutely life-long : but each day that 
 you live you will less and less wish to evade it, if only 
 God gives you grace so to live as you will wish that you 
 had done when you lie down to die. 'No man having 
 put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for 
 the kingdom of God:' then look not back. Day by day, 
 if you faint not, you will rejoice more and more in the 
 choice once made: 'and when the chief Shepherd shall 
 appear, you shall receive the crown of glory that fadeth 
 not away.' 
 
 And here, my brethren, I would have ended : but I 
 receive, even as I write, a touching intimation of yet one
 
 38 Choice of Professions. [n. 
 
 other, perhaps a humbler, hindrance which sometimes 
 besets the entrance upon clerical life. There are those 
 present amongst you, who can scarcely struggle on 
 through the pecuniary difficulties of an education for 
 Holy Orders. In one case made known to me, though I 
 vouch not for exact details, twelve years have been spent 
 in efforts, frustrated again and again by poverty alone, 
 to gain an entrance into the ministry of the Church. 
 A single Term yet remains one only and the goal is 
 reached. But, alas, the means to reside through that 
 one Term are not to be found, and here, on the very eve 
 of attaining the long-cherished object, disappointment 
 is to be again endured. Does not this fact read a solemn 
 lesson to some who are squandering, perhaps, at this 
 time, in idle or luxurious living, wealth which might 
 have comforted this brother's heart, and added a faithful 
 minister to the Church which Christ purchased with His 
 own blood? If any one's heart is touched by the thought 
 thus suggested, let him carry the lesson into his own life. 
 Why should not some of those who hear me give of their 
 abundance, privately and unostentatiously, in aid of 
 their fellow-students who are in need? Could any proof 
 of sincerity, could any exercise of practical self-denial, 
 be more valuable than this ? It will indeed be twice 
 blessed. It shall bless him that receives, and it shall 
 bless with a double blessing him who gives. You will 
 not lack a safe and certain channel for the distribution 
 of such bounty to your brethren : let it be dispensed 
 through those who here fill a parent's place both towards 
 you and them. Gladly will they I well know it aid 
 you in any such work of charity. But O, my brethren, 
 I would seek yet more, as the Apostle says, you than
 
 ii.] Choice of Professions. 39 
 
 yours, and urge you to let the thought thus presented to 
 you of another's estimate of this high calling, of another's 
 zeal and toil and patience in the struggle to attain it, 
 enhance your own appreciation of this ministry, and 
 quicken your own energies in ensuing it. And may God 
 Himself pour out largely of His blessing upon this place, 
 that it may be indeed fruitful in souls devoted to His 
 love, and in lives dedicated to His service.
 
 III. 
 
 WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? 
 
 St Matthew xxii. 42. 
 What think ye of Christ? 
 
 WE have spoken of turning to Christ, and we have 
 spoken of living to Christ. We have spoken of a vail 
 interposed between us and Christ, and of a self which 
 usurps a service due to Christ only. 
 
 But is there not a yet earlier question to be answered, 
 before either of these acts can be done, before either of 
 these obstacles can be removed ? Who is this Person of 
 whom we speak so confidently as the Light and the Life, 
 as the Master and the Lord, of man ? What think we, 
 what know we, of Christ ? 
 
 This is the question of questions, for every age, and 
 for our own. Before this question every other fades and 
 slinks away. Questions of genuineness and authenticity, 
 questions of criticism and interpretation, the question (I 
 say it without scruple) of inspiration itself, all these are 
 as nothing in comparison of the question, asked once on 
 earth of a company of scoffing Pharisees, asked now 
 from heaven of a congregation of professed believers, 
 'What think ye of Christ?' 
 
 The Apostle Peter gives this charge to Christians 
 generally and surely it lies not less heavily upon a
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 4 1 
 
 commissioned instructor of Christians 'Be ready always 
 to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason 
 of the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear/ 
 Are there not here present to-day some whose inmost 
 hearts are asking of me a reason of the hope that is 
 in them ; a reason of the hope which still lingers within, 
 though, like the remaining good in the Church of Sardis, 
 it be indeed 'ready to die?' Yes, we live in days of 
 great unsettlement, and objections which once came 
 only from without the Church, from open enemies or 
 self-styled free-thinkers, are urged now from within, in 
 tones of grave earnestness or pathetic sadness, by men 
 who fill the Christian ranks or even carry the Church's 
 banner. And those whose minds are still ductile, 
 gradually taking that impress which is in after years 
 to stereotype itself into character, are solely perplexed 
 and embarrassed in forming a decided opinion amidst 
 this agitating strife of tongues. Too often they post- 
 pone that decision until a day shall come, which comes 
 not, when a final judgment shall have been passed upon 
 conflicting arguments. The time is gone by, the time is 
 not come, for authoritative judgments. No earthly 
 court now speaks so as to be 'an end of all strife:' when 
 the heavenly court gives sentence, it will be too late; 
 'time will be no more;' the great 'night will have come 
 when no man can work.' In the midst therefore of this 
 restless, this unending debate, as to things true and 
 false, things divine and human, we must act and we 
 must suffer ; judging, not infallibly, but with an honest 
 and a patient judgment, each man for himself, upon 
 assertions claiming his assent, and demands challenging 
 his obedience. And we doubt not that He who has
 
 42 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 here placed us, who has ordained that our lot should 
 fall not upon a period of blind assent to traditional 
 opinions, but upon a century of bold speculation and 
 unbridled self-will, has both designed this for our trial, 
 and will bless it to our final good. 
 
 A trial it is : let no man miscall it. And a trial which 
 must be endured, not evaded. We cannot say to en- 
 quiry, ' Thus far shalt thou come, and no further : assail 
 my outworks, but touch not my citadel.' We cannot 
 say, ' I may at least assume thus much ; I need not dis- 
 tress myself by discussing that ; every science has its 
 axioms and its postulates ; the first axiom of my theo- 
 logy shall be the Divinity of Christ, and the first postulate 
 of my theology shall be the authority of Scripture.' He 
 who would be well 'instructed ' in these days ' unto the 
 kingdom of heaven ' must have his reasons, be they ever 
 so brief, even for these first elements of truth. And I 
 know nothing more comforting, nothing more reassuring, 
 in days of darkness, than to run over in the mind these 
 reasons for believing. There was a time when it was 
 the fashion to disparage evidences. A sermon on the 
 proofs of Christianity would have been treated as at once 
 chilling and superfluous. We have lived to judge differ- 
 ently. We want all our armour out again : every sepa- 
 rate piece has its use : and we shall be well contented to 
 be laughed at as old-fashioned, if we may but feel our- 
 selves thoroughly equipped against ' all the fiery darts of 
 the wicked one.' 
 
 It is in the humble hope of contributing something, 
 however insignificant, to this work of comforting and of 
 strengthening, that I stand to-day in this great congre- 
 gation, and ask of them, ' What think yc of Christ ? ' Can
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 43 
 
 you tell me who He is, and what ? Can you give me 
 any good reason for believing that there is such a 
 Person ? ' He that cometh to Him must believe that 
 He is :' if the heart would turn to the Lord, it must first 
 be assured of His being ; if a man would live to the 
 Lord and die to the Lord, he must first be persuaded 
 that that Lord exists, and that He is this in person and 
 character, and not that. Blessed be God, enquiry need 
 not be doubt: enquiry made, as St Peter says, 'with 
 meekness and fear,' is the very opposite, the very anti- 
 dote, of doubt : God gives us a reason for believing, and 
 to enquire is but to explore and to ascertain it. 
 
 Now I am thinking to-day of a case which I know to 
 be extremely common ; a mind thoroughly confused and 
 shaken as to the great verities of the Gospel. In some 
 places I might almost fear the effect of this confession. 
 It might be dangerous, as well as painful, to speak of 
 such unsettlement as possible. But not here. Here you 
 know how to be tender to such an experience. Those 
 who read widely and think deeply, those whose office it 
 is to guide or whose present business it is to form opinion, 
 will not count it shocking, though they may sorrow over 
 it, that in certain moods of mind or in certain stages of 
 developement there should be a temporary break-down 
 of all confidence in things most authoritatively taught, 
 most ardently desired, or most deeply cherished. And 
 men in that condition are oftentimes driven into silence. 
 They can scarcely express their state without giving pain 
 and without incurring misconception. Two friends 
 may be passing through the same trial : they talk freely 
 upon every other topic, but upon this they are silent. 
 What would not either give for the sympathy of the
 
 44 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 other ? But no ; he dare not give a whole confidence, 
 and he will not give a half. He must struggle on, grope 
 on, suffer on, all alone. 
 
 But there is just one person who ought to understand 
 him, and from whom he ought to get help. The mini- 
 stry of God's House, in one part of its office, that of 
 preaching, is designed not only to build up the faithful, 
 but also to soothe the fearful, and to reassure the doubter. 
 Sometimes the preacher does well to pause in his expo- 
 sition of truth or his enforcement of duty, and say, 'But 
 there is one amongst you who cannot receive this saying, 
 because he is distressed and shaken by a fundamental 
 doubt ; by an involuntary misgiving as to the very 
 Person for whom his allegiance is thus confidently de- 
 manded. Let me talk to him from this place : his heart 
 will open to me the more readily because he knows that 
 I know him not : and yet, God helping me, I will read 
 his heart to him, though his name is unknown to me/ 
 And now what shall he say to him ? how shall he assist 
 him in laying again the first foundations ? Need he be 
 ashamed to stoop very low ; to speak of things almost 
 puerile in their elementariness ? Not so, if he be as his 
 Master. ' Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands : 
 and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: 
 and be not faithless, but believing.' Even so must we 
 do ; pointing to the seen, and passing through that to 
 the unseen ; starting from things earthly, and rising by 
 a gradual progress towards things heavenly, things 
 divine. 
 
 You are here, we might say to him, called by the 
 name of Christ. A Christian is a follower of Christ. 
 Christianity, the religion of Christ, is a fact in the world.
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 45 
 
 You yourself are a witness, by no choice of yours, to its 
 existence, as a name and as a power, upon this solid 
 earth. The Christian religion, like every other religion, 
 had a Founder. Its very enemies tell us His name, His 
 date, His country, His end. His very enemies tell us 
 the rapid spread of His religion notwithstanding that 
 discouraging, that ignominious beginning. You yourself 
 are a proof of it. Eighteen centuries after that event 
 you are here named after Him, addressing your worship 
 through and to Him. All around you, you yourself, 
 would take it as an affront were that appellation refused ; 
 were it said, You are no Christian. All the most solemn 
 acts of your nation proceed upon the supposition that 
 the nation is Christian ; in other words, that Christianity 
 is true. These things are facts. What then ? do they 
 prove conclusively that the religion is true ? have there 
 been, are there, no false religions claiming and receiving 
 the obedience of nations ? What do we say then ? We 
 say that the fact, the accident if you will, of your being 
 by race and name a Christian, makes it imperative upon 
 you, as an act of reason, to inform yourself, to come to 
 some individual judgment, as to Him whose name you 
 bear. Am I safe in trusting to Him for access to God, 
 for pardon of sin, for support in death, for eternal life ? 
 Who is this Jesus, by whose name I am named, and in 
 whose strength pious men in this country live and die ? 
 
 If I would know anything of one of the great men of 
 the past, I must read his history. If there exists a bio- 
 graphy of him ; still more, a contemporary or nearly con- 
 temporary biography of him ; I study it with deep atten- 
 tion. If there be more than one such record, I read each, 
 and I compare them one with another. If this comparison
 
 46 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 discloses some contrarieties, it becomes a matter of pro- 
 found interest to adjust the balance of testimony, and to 
 harmonize as I may the seeming discord. Such varie- 
 ties there are in all histories, in all biographies. And 
 the more, in proportion to the eminence of the person 
 and the excitement of the scenes in which he moved. 
 The memoirs of the first French Revolution are full of 
 these discrepancies. In many matters of detail you 
 cannot arrive at certainty, because you cannot reconcile 
 conflicting evidence, as to the real lives or real deaths of 
 the unhappy sovereigns and princes who figure in that 
 disastrous tale. But does any one infer from this con- 
 fusion that there were no such persons, or that their 
 general character and history is unknown to us ? The 
 very interest felt by the writer in the events described, 
 the excitement and agitation and anguish connected 
 with the sight of insults and cruelties and tortures in- 
 flicted upon those whom he loved and honoured and 
 revered, has a tendency to blur the distinctness or even 
 to impair the correctness of his recollection of minor 
 details : insomuch that two eye-witnesses of the same 
 occurrence will describe it with considerable discrepan- 
 cies ; and yet each with the most truthful intention, and 
 each with a generally faithful effect. You see this not in 
 books only, but in oral accounts of transactions just 
 ended. And much as you regret the difficulty, in some 
 cases the impossibility, of arriving at exact accuracy in 
 the knowledge of every small detail, you would be 
 thought, and justly thought, not unreasonable only but 
 insane, if you made this a plea for doubting the main 
 fact in question, or disputing the general aspect of the 
 characters and agents involved.
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 47 
 
 Apply the same principle to the biographies which 
 you possess of Jesus Christ. They are four in number. 
 We do not assume at this stage of our enquiry either a 
 divine inspiration of these Books, or an entire exemption 
 from the ordinary risks of error. I will read the life of 
 Christ as I read any other life. I will form my first idea 
 of Him as I would form my first idea of any personage 
 of history. I will allow as much as any one asks of me 
 for discrepancies and contrarieties amongst these biogra- 
 phies. I. will narrow my ground until I have given no- 
 thing more to this record in which nevertheless every 
 hope of my soul is bound up than I give every day to 
 the narratives of the present or the histories of the past. 
 Only I will refuse to give less to it. I will refuse to 
 apply to the Gospels a principle which it would be mad- 
 ness to apply to any other evidence or to any other 
 record. Nothing is oftentimes so irrational as rationa- 
 lism, and nothing so credulous as incredulity. It is not 
 to be endured it is not to be accounted for on any sup- 
 position save one that scepticism should dogmatize 
 upon our faith as it could not do without madness upon 
 any other matter either of fact or opinion, and despoil 
 us of the very hope that is in us by rules which in any 
 other application would be preposterous if not ludicrous. 
 
 Take into your hand one of these four biographies 
 of Jesus Christ. Come afresh, as far as possible, to the 
 contemplation. Put yourself, as far as possible, out of 
 the light of previous faith and previous knowledge. If 
 I had this only, what should I think of Christ ? Stand 
 in the first place at some distance from the picture: lose 
 its separate lines, and view it only in its effect. If this 
 were all I knew, what should I think of Christ ?
 
 48 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 i. I am struck first of all by His conformity with 
 the name by which He commonly described Himself, 
 that of ' the Son of Man.' I am struck, in every sense, 
 by His humanity. Such a Man, such a real Man, in 
 every sense ; so manly, so manful, so humane, so human. 
 Such a strength, such a tenderness, such help, such sym- 
 pathy, such power, such love. So I run on ; and I love 
 to do so, because I am persuaded that it is in such 
 general reflections as these that the foundation of faith 
 is laid. We must begin with the Son of Man, before we 
 can hope to end with the Son of God. ' What think ye of 
 Christ ? whose Son is He ?' We must speak of Him as 
 David's Son, before we can rise to the contemplation of 
 Him as David's Lord. 
 
 Let me draw out this first conception into a few par- 
 ticulars. I am perplexed where to begin : let me begin 
 anywhere ; it matters not 
 
 (1) What a force of will. Who ever said of Him that 
 He was not firm, first of all, with Himself? Who ever 
 pretended to say that He was not holy, self-governed, 
 His own master, resolute to deny Himself that which 
 was wrong, absolute in His refusal ever to indulge Him- 
 self to the neglect of duty, perfect in His control over 
 the power of temptation ? Stand forth, ye His enemies, 
 and cast a stone, if you can, at the spotlessness of His 
 character. 
 
 (2) What a perfect sincerity. When did He ever 
 stoop to the language of complaisance or flattery ? In 
 what instance did He ever call a word or an act by a 
 false name ? How boldly did He rebuke vice. If I 
 might say it (and you know that I do say it) with entire 
 reverence, what an example was He of our English
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ? 49 
 
 virtues. That perfect straightforwardness, that freedom 
 from artifice and from finesse, that directness of purpose, 
 and that plainness of speech O let us not fail to recog- 
 nize in Him who is called in prophetic language ' the 
 Desire of all nations,' the desire, the satisfaction, the 
 resting-place, of this. 
 
 (3) Yet, on the other hand, what a tenderness of feel- 
 ing, what a gentleness of spirit. It is not often that 
 strength and sweetness meet in one person : when they 
 do meet, the union, even the imperfect union such as we 
 see it sometimes in man, is irresistibly attractive. But 
 when were these two qualities ever so united as they 
 were in Christ ? The sight of suffering of bodily suf- 
 fering, of mental suffering, of spiritual suffering touch- 
 ed Him to the quick. And yet His own life was a life 
 of suffering made up of all these. He Himself hunger- 
 ed ; no stone would He turn into bread for His own re- 
 lief. But when He saw the multitudes distressed for food 
 in a desert place, instantly He had compassion, and 
 could not bear to let them depart without a bountiful, 
 if it were even a miraculous supply. He was houseless 
 and homeless ; He was lonely in heart ; He was falsely 
 accused ; He was scorned and taunted and maligned : 
 all these things He received as His daily portion, and 
 saw in them the very cup of sorrow which His Father 
 gave for His drinking. But when He saw another's soul 
 sad or suffering or sorrow-laden, the sympathy which He 
 asked not for Himself was ever ready on His part for 
 another. 
 
 (4) And thus we reach the unselfishness of His cha- 
 racter. What a life of self-denial, of self-sacrifice, of 
 self-forgetfulness, was His. What a long and weary 
 
 V. 4
 
 50 What- think ye of Christ ? [m. 
 
 day was each one of the days of that life. From early 
 morning till late evening He was ministering to others ; 
 teaching, healing, listening to sorrows and relieving them, 
 opening heavenly things to the ignorant and the earthly- 
 minded, and then turning to make earth itself less dreary 
 to the care-worn and the broken-hearted. He never said 
 to any one that He was too hungry or too weary or too 
 sad at heart to attend to him and that instantly. On 
 His way to the house of mourning He is thronged and 
 pressed by conflicting applications. Never did He ex- 
 press impatience of any importunity : never did He ask 
 a moment's respite from the oppressive monotony of 
 supplication. 
 
 (5) And look, once again, at the humility of the cha- 
 racter ; the absence of all parade and all display in its 
 benevolence. Many men and many women, living a life 
 of devoted charity, have been the heralds of their own 
 virtues : with whatever professions of humility, they have 
 taken pains to let others hear of their deeds : sometimes 
 they have been visibly elated by their own triumphs, 
 and have shown a sensitiveness to reproof or disparage- 
 ment contrasting somewhat painfully with loud profes- 
 sions of self-knowledge and of self-abasement. How 
 unlike in all this to Him whose servants they call them- 
 selves. Those repeated charges to the subjects of His 
 marvellous cures, that they should not make Him known ; 
 that habit of withdrawing Himself from admiring crowds 
 and refusing popular demonstrations ; that description 
 of Him, in the words of prophecy, by an eye-witness of 
 His ministry, 'He shall not strive nor cry, neither shall 
 any man hear His voice in the streets;' do not these 
 things add a yet further mark of perfection to that un-
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 5 1 
 
 exampled character, and crown with a distinctive glory 
 the person of this Son of Man ? 
 
 (6) And then we pass to the elevation of Christ's 
 character. What a superiority we see in Him to all the 
 infirmities and to all the littlenesses of human nature. 
 How did He rise above all considerations of earthly 
 position and advantage. What an indifference did He 
 show to the inconveniences and to the slights of poverty. 
 With what a majesty of conscious independence did He 
 confront the arrogance alike of temporal and of spiritual 
 authority : giving honour where honour was due : but 
 asserting for Himself that freedom of speech and of will, 
 which is the attribute and birthright of man. How did 
 He dignify and ennoble the state of the poor, and equal- 
 ize (in the only just sense) all ranks and conditions of 
 men in reference to the two chief tribunals, of God and 
 of conscience. And how did He show in His own 
 example the perfect compatibility of this moral and 
 spiritual equality with the most entire obedience to law 
 and the most becoming respect for station and office. 
 For this reason, it may be, amongst others, He chose for 
 Himself upon earth the condition of the working man 
 and of the poor, that He might show forth at once the 
 duty and the dignity of that largest class of mankind ; 
 its duty in obedience, its dignity in free-will ; its duty in 
 observing order and in paying respect to power, its 
 dignity in being inwardly, in heart and in soul, not the 
 servant of man but of God only. 
 
 (7) And this elevation of character was maintained 
 even in Him, instrumentally, by devotion. His days 
 were given to charity, His nights to prayer. Soon will 
 that grace decay which is not fed by communion with 
 
 42
 
 52 What think ye of Christ? [in. 
 
 God. Soon will a life of benevolence become a mere 
 routine ; soon will living for others become the death 
 of the soul ; soon will independence degenerate into 
 waywardness, and elevation of character into exaltation 
 of self; unless time be found or made for self-recol- 
 lection, self-examination, meditation, and prayer. Of 
 Jesus we read sometimes that 'He went out into a 
 mountain alone, and continued all night in prayer to 
 God.' Sometimes that ' He withdrew Himself into the 
 wilderness and prayed.' Sometimes that, after a long 
 and busy day of charity, ' He rose up in the morning 
 a great while before day, and departed into a solitary 
 place, and there prayed.' Such was, humanly speaking 
 and it is in that aspect that we are now contemplating 
 Him the secret of His life. Thus it was that He lived 
 above the world while still in it, and continued to be (as 
 it is written) ' the Son of God in heaven,' even while He 
 was also 'the Son of man who came down from heaven.' 
 And we see in all this, not only an example for our 
 imitation, but also which is our present subject mat- 
 ter for our admiration and for our reverence. There 
 is that in us, even by nature, which does reverence de- 
 votion, if we can be quite sure that it is separated 
 from hypocrisy. Our own hearts, fallen though they 
 be from an original righteousness, or tampered with 
 though they may have been by the arts of unbelief 
 and sin, do recognize in a life of secret communion 
 with God a mystery which they adore, as well as a 
 power which they acknowledge ; and then only regard 
 with entire approval a life of active beneficence, 
 when they can believe it to be set in motion by 
 a spring of divine mechanism, and kept in motion
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ? 53 
 
 by a repeated application of the power in which it 
 originated. 
 
 (8) And where there is a combination (where else 
 indeed but here shall we find it ?) of all the several 
 elements which have been enumerated ; strength and 
 tenderness, sincerity and gentleness, unselfishness arid 
 humility, elevation of character and devotion of spirit ; 
 there we are prepared to contemplate with unmixed 
 admiration the exhibition, in the last place, of an ex- 
 haustless patience. In some cases patience is no virtue. 
 There is a patience which has degenerated into tame- 
 ness, into timidity, into an absence of feeling, or a ser- 
 vitude of the will. There is a patience which submits 
 where it ought to resist, and would rather dishonour 
 God than affront man. But this is where there has 
 been an absence of other qualities essential to the true 
 perfection of the human character. This is where in- 
 dependence and elevation and self-control and devotion, 
 force of will and magnificence of heroism, have not 
 been present but absent. If there have been these 
 also, then indeed patience, the steady unflinching re- 
 solute endurance of pain and anguish in the cause of 
 right, becomes, men themselves being the judges, a 
 virtue and the very crown of virtues. Thus it is that 
 the heart of man has ever been touched by the thought 
 of the sufferings of Christ. We are not speaking yet 
 of what we deeply and earnestly believe to have been 
 the chief use, the glorious effect, of these sufferings ; 
 we are speaking of the character which shone forth in 
 them. And we do not believe that any device or any 
 sophistry of the unbeliever will ever make a man's 
 heart proof against the thought of the patience of
 
 54 What think ye of Christ ? [HI. 
 
 Jesus. The record of those last scenes of His earthly 
 life; of His latest conversation with His disciples, of 
 His agony in the garden, of His betrayal, His deser- 
 tion, His long examinations before the chief priest, 
 before Pontius Pilate, before king Herod, of His in- 
 vincible silence under false accusation, of His meek 
 endurance of unjust contempt, of shameful scourging 
 and insolent spitting, of the pain and the weariness 
 and the thirst and the faintness and the protracted 
 torture of crucifixion, of His prayer for His enemies, 
 of His thought for His desolate mother, of His final 
 commendation of His departing spirit to that heavenly 
 Father who yet seemed to Him, in the darkness of 
 the hour, to have forsaken and forgotten Him ; will 
 make itself felt, I believe, whenever it is heard by the 
 ear of man ; will certainly, at particular moments (and 
 those the most critical moments) of human life, be 
 turned to as the chief, the only stay ; will conquer 
 from age to age, as it has conquered in the past 
 eighteen centuries, the stubbornness of the will and 
 the alienation of the heart from God, and make good 
 over and over again the well-known words of the 
 Apostle Paul to the Corinthians, ' We preach Christ 
 crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto 
 the Greeks foolishness ; but unto them which are called, 
 both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and 
 the wisdom of God.' 
 
 2. And thus we should pass, in this rapid survey, 
 from the character to the doctrine, from the holiness 
 of the Man to the wisdom of the Teacher. Take one 
 single Gospel ; take but one single chapter of that one 
 Gospel ; let your eye rest separately upon each utterance
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ? 55 
 
 which it ascribes to Jesus ; reflect, as you read, upon the 
 acknowledged humility of His earthly origin ; ask your- 
 self over and over again the old question of His enemies, 
 ' How knoweth this man letters, having never learned ? 
 From whence hath this man this wisdom?' mark His 
 spiritual insight into duty ; how He carries the holy law 
 into the heart of man ; how He sets conscience to work 
 upon the demands of God ; how He brings every feeling 
 to the test of practice, 'Ye shall know it by its fruits;' 
 how He calls us to decision, to consistency, to unity 
 within, and to forbearance and peace and charity with- 
 out; how He urges entire confidence in God's power and 
 goodness and mercy, and assures us that what we ask 
 shall be done for us ; how He unmasks our latent dupli- 
 cities, and bids us beware of hypocrisy as of the one 
 thing which ' He cannot away with ; ' how He calls to 
 Himself the anxious and the doubting and the ignorant 
 and the sin-laden, and offers to every man according to 
 his need rest in Him ; how He pities the difficulties, 
 inward and outward, of the struggling, the tempted, the 
 half-believing soul, and offers to each the very balm, the 
 very healing, to each one most appropriate ; how He 
 sounds the very depths of our being, and brings out of 
 an inexhaustible storehouse just those thoughts and 
 those promises which we feel, could we but grasp them, 
 would rectify every distortion, and make up every breach, 
 and satisfy every longing and every yearning of our 
 wandering and storm-tossed souls. 
 
 And as I read on and ponder the words such as 
 ' never man spake,' I discover in them a claim and a 
 self-assertion which would be irreconcilable with His 
 already known character if it were not strictly true. I
 
 56 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 linger upon words which tell of Him from His own lips 
 as giving His own life 'a ransom for many,' His own 
 flesh 'for the life of the world,' His own body uplifted 
 on the Cross ' to draw all men unto Him.' I hear Him 
 saying that it is the will of God Himself ' that all men 
 should honour the Son even as they honour the Father/ 
 that the Father 'has committed to the Son all judgment,' 
 and that the voice of the Son is that resistless sound 
 which shall summon forth the dead to 'a resurrection 
 of life ' or else ' a resurrection of judgment' At last 
 the whole of this marvellous disclosure is summed up in 
 the one single utterance, ' I and my Father are one.' I 
 should start back in horror from such declarations, if 
 they proceeded from any mouth save this alone. But 
 here I find myself listening without repugnance, and 
 receiving without the will to contradict. By degrees the 
 voice of the Speaker has so penetrated my soul, that I 
 am persuaded He could not speak in error, and would 
 not speak in blasphemy. One so humble, so retiring, so 
 self-forgetting ; One whose very voice no man ever heard 
 in the streets ; would not claim for Himself the power to 
 atone for human sin or to sit in judgment upon human 
 destiny, would not claim for Himself, above all, coeter- 
 nity and coequality and absolute oneness with God, un- 
 less the very truth itself prompted the utterance, and 
 made it impossible that the claim should be withheld. 
 
 Yes, my brethren, the doctrine of Jesus is the very 
 complement of His character; and he who has first 
 been drawn towards Him as the Son of Man begins to 
 find, as he reads on, that there is something here beyond 
 ' the manner of man ; ' the breath of God is on His lips, 
 as the fragrance of heaven xvas about His steps.
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 57 
 
 3. Such was He in goodness, such in wisdom : and 
 is there not yet a third part of God's attesting seal ; I 
 say not the greatest it is not given us to compare 
 infinites I say not the most beautiful or the most 
 attractive ; but yet a part, and (let men speak as they 
 will) an essential part, of the testimony which can alone 
 prove a Revelation ; the seal of power ? I put this last, 
 not first. Power alone, viewed in its exercise below, is 
 an ambiguous test : there may be, we learn it from 
 Scripture, an imitation, a successful imitation, of God's 
 power ; and there may be a counterworking, not without 
 results, of God's power, by God's enemy. We hear in our 
 own days marvellous tales of power; power exercised 
 over human frames by human hands or human wills ; 
 power over lifeless matter, power over departed souls. 
 We just hear these things, and wonder: we neither 
 believe them nor disbelieve : they do not at present 
 fit in either into our philosophy or into our religion. 
 But this we can see, and see already ; that these 
 wonders, even if they rose into miracles, lack the dis- 
 tinctive mark of that which we so designate in the 
 Gospels : these things are not the seal of God set to 
 anything; they are entirely dissociated both from wisdom 
 and goodness; they come not to attest a revelation; they 
 are strange isolated phenomena, and there they end. 
 But when Jesus Christ wrought one of His miracles ; 
 when He calmed the raging storm, or cast out from a 
 tortured soul its possessing devil ; He did it as one who 
 had a mission from God to man, as one who had 
 already proved that mission by the two other, the two 
 infallible tokens, of a divine goodness and a divine 
 wisdom. From Him a miracle was not a wonder only
 
 58 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 but a sign ; a sign which pointed to something ; even to 
 the source of His mission, its motive, its character, and 
 its end. And when I see what He was in wisdom, and 
 when I see what He was in goodness ; when I hear what 
 He came for, and when I behold what He has accom- 
 plished ; I do not wonder that He manifested also an 
 almighty power : rather should I have wondered if He 
 had lacked, or failed to use, that third credential: His 
 miracles, to my mind, need no evidence but the very 
 commonest and most simple ; they hang together and 
 are of a piece with all the rest : what would have been 
 incredible in another is natural in Him ; inasmuch as it 
 was to be expected that He whom I have already seen 
 to have God's wisdom and whom I have already seen 
 to have God's goodness with Him should have with 
 Him also, and for the selfsame purpose, God's almighty 
 strength. 
 
 And as I witness that strength exercised in life ; ex- 
 ercised in every conceivable department of nature and 
 of human circumstance ; exercised upon the winds and 
 waves, exercised upon the food that supports and upon 
 the disease which undermines life ; exercised upon the 
 soul 'which Satan has bound' and upon the body which 
 has even ' seen corruption ; ' so I perceive that over that 
 superhuman strength death itself, His own death, has no 
 final, no continued control : I find that, as in life He 
 had ever refused every sign but one to an evil and faith- 
 less generation, and that one the resurrection of His own 
 body a temple He called it within three days and 
 nights from His dissolution ; so after death He was able 
 to make good that promise, to fulfil that sign, to ' show 
 Himself alive after His passion' to witnesses the most
 
 in.] What think ye of Christ ? 59 
 
 competent, not as a disembodied spirit, but as a man 
 complete in both parts of His nature, and yet invested 
 with a glory not of this world, and made ready for a 
 return into those heavenly places from which He de- 
 clared Himself to have first descended. All this which 
 I could not have believed of another I find conceivable 
 and credible in Him. I have learned by this time to 
 judge of Him as possessed of a character more than 
 human, a nature absolutely divine. And therefore as I 
 rise from point to point in the long series of His acts 
 and words below, I seem to have reached naturally and 
 without astonishment this crowning miracle of the Re- 
 surrection. I add it to His evidences without sense of 
 discord or of contrariety. And when I am asked at 
 length, ' What thinkest thou of Christ ? whose Son is 
 He ? ' I can answer with an unhesitating confidence, ' I 
 believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.' 
 
 ' What think ye of Christ ? whose Son is He ? ' Till 
 that question is answered in each one of us, there is no 
 rest and no strength for any man. If we set out in the 
 race of life without answering it, we are the sport of 
 every passing wind, in the deepest interests and the 
 highest destinies of our being. Every word breathed 
 against the authority of a divine revelation or the reality 
 of a divine inspiration is enough to topple down the 
 whole fabric of a traditional faith, and to destroy the 
 sand-built habitation of a conventional hope. Happy is 
 the man who has so assured himself, by God's grace, of 
 the mission, the truth, and the Divinity of his Saviour, 
 that he can consider every other question, whether of 
 opinion or practice, under His guidance, in His pre- 
 sence. Then, if he has anything to modify, by later
 
 60 What think ye of Christ ? [in. 
 
 experience or deeper reflection, in his first ideas of 
 theology, whether in regard to the relation of Scripture 
 to science, or of the human to the divine element in 
 inspiration, he does so under Christ's direction, and is a 
 believer and a Christian still. Perhaps, if he looks more 
 closely into the matter, he will find that what is supposed 
 adverse to the Bible is in reality in perfect harmony 
 with it, and will eventually turn to it for a testimony. 
 He will not be forward to surrender without reason, but 
 neither will he be perverse in retaining against reason, 
 any supposed outwork of the truth he loves. His faith 
 in Christ Himself, the result first of enquiry, and then 
 secondly of intercourse of carefully noting the evidences 
 of the Gospel, and then of daily communing with the 
 Saviour whom the Gospel reveals is built upon a ' rock 
 that is ' indeed ' higher than he,' at whose feet the storms 
 of controversy may spend themselves, but upon whose 
 head, through all time, the ' eternal sunshine settles.' ' He 
 knows in whom he has believed, and is persuaded that 
 He is able to keep that which he has committed to Him 
 against that day.' God grant us all, beloved brethren, 
 this faith and this hope, in life and in death, for His Son 
 our Lord Jesus Christ's sake.
 
 IV. 
 
 THE REMEDIAL DISCIPLINE OF DISEASE AND 
 DEATH. 
 
 1 Corinthians xi. 3032. 
 
 For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many 
 sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be 
 judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the 
 Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world. 
 
 EVERY school has its work and its discipline; it is 
 so with the school of God. 
 
 We have spoken on two occasions of life's work : to- 
 day (as the special occasion bids us) we are to speak 
 a few plain words upon God's discipline. 
 
 And we choose for this purpose one of those unique 
 texts of which we spoke at the outset of this brief 
 course : a text embedded in a passage of undying 
 interest, in reference to the most distinctive and the 
 most sacred of Gospel ordinances, the holy Sacrament 
 of the body and blood of our Saviour Christ ; but itself 
 too so marvellous in its disclosure of unexpected dealing 
 so solemn in its warning, and withal so bright with 
 blessed hope that it courts examination and rewards 
 diligent study, if the presence (not unsought) of the 
 inspiring Spirit be with us in the reading, the hearing, 
 and the pondering.
 
 62 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 The idolatry of antiquity is one of the many opposite 
 dangers which beset the Church of all time. Just better, 
 it may be, than the lust of innovation or the vanity of 
 self-satisfaction, it is yet itself an error, and it may run 
 on into a sin. It is an ingratitude to God for many 
 present advantages, it is a disparagement of the guiding 
 and developing hand of His Providence, it is almost a 
 denial of the assurance of Christ, ' Lo, I am with you 
 alway,' if we imagine (as many have done) that the 
 Church sprang full-grown and perfect from the new 
 birth of Pentecost, and degenerated from that original 
 maturity in proportion as she advanced, by years or 
 by centuries, from her nativity and her baptism. We 
 learn a different lesson from the inspired page itself. 
 It is not enough to show that a certain thing was 
 believed in primitive Ephesus, or done in primitive 
 Corinth, in order to prove that the one was true or 
 the other right ; that either the one or the other was 
 according to the will of God, or a portion of the in- 
 tegral 'faith delivered once for all to the saints.' 
 
 The chapter now before us lifts the veil from one 
 surprising feature of the Church of Corinth in Apo- 
 stolical times. 
 
 If there be an institution guarded and fenced by a 
 peculiar reverence, it is the ordinance of Holy Com- 
 munion. Even to a fault it has been so. Men care- 
 less in life and unbelieving in opinion utterly indif- 
 ferent how they profaned or trifled with ought else in 
 the Christian faith or worship have yet shrunk, with 
 a superstitious dread, from tampering with the Lord's 
 Supper. To that one sacred memorial they have trans- 
 ferred all the reverence and all the scrupulosity which
 
 iv.] of Disease and Death. 63 
 
 ought to have been diffused over everything ordained by 
 the word or consecrated by the touch of Christ. If 
 only they abstained from defiling by a worldly or sinful 
 contact that one last bequest of dying love, they thought 
 it but a small thing to desecrate the ordinance of 
 common prayer : nay, they thought it but a small 
 thing to break the command through life, or to postpone 
 the command till death, to ' do this,' to eat of the bread 
 and drink of the cup, in remembrance of the Cross and 
 Passion. It was no hypocrisy, they thought, to meet in 
 the congregation for worship ; no untruth to repeat 
 creeds which for them meant nothing, or to join in 
 Litanies which for them asked nothing ; no profaneness 
 to exchange smiles or whispers in the sanctuary, to turn 
 sermons into ridicule, or to point their sarcasms and 
 wing their jests with Scripture ; provided only they 
 regularly turned their backs upon the table spread for 
 Communion, and stood aloof from that one single act to 
 which they confined their whole idea of religious pro- 
 fession and ceremonial sanctity. 
 
 How far this feeling predominant in the Church of 
 England within the recollection of many, and not with- 
 out a certain rough use in keeping consciences alive and 
 the very idea of sanctity extant amongst men may 
 have been formed or fostered by the language (in some 
 parts) of this very chapter, it is needless to enquire and 
 unprofitable to know. But it is certainly remarkable 
 that the one point on which the conscience of the 
 1 8th century was awake was a point on which the con- 
 science of the first age (in some communities) was 
 already dormant. Here was the Church of Corinth, in 
 St Paul's own lifetime, desecrating the Lord's Supper by
 
 64 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 disorder and intemperance. Associating with it in sign 
 of- brotherly Christian union a common meal to be 
 begun or closed by the celebration of the sacred rite of 
 Communion itself they made it first of all an oppor- 
 tunity of displaying the worst selfishnesses of class and 
 the worst discords of party, and they ended by an exhi- 
 bition of excess and intoxication, everywhere wretched 
 and shameful, but here shocking too and horrible. 
 
 It is in the course of his reproof of this profanation 
 that St Paul introduces the words of the text. 
 
 You must have forgotten, he says, the time and the 
 object of the institution of this ordinance of Communion. 
 You must have forgotten that the time was the night in 
 which Christ our Lord was betrayed, and the object the 
 commemoration of His death for sin. ' Take, eat,' He 
 said : ' This is my body... This cup is the new testament 
 in my blood... As often' therefore 'as ye eat this bread 
 and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till He 
 come.' Judge ye whether this act can be done ' un- 
 worthily' done, as he afterwards explains the words, 
 with no discernment of the Lord's body, no perception 
 of the difference between this and common bread, this 
 and common wine and no injury and no punishment 
 follow. ' He that eateth and drinketh ' (in this sense) 
 ' unworthily, eateth and drinketh,' not indeed, as our 
 Version gives it, ' damnation,' but still 'judgment,' and 
 God's judgment, ' to himself, as not discerning (dis- 
 tinguishing) the Lord's body. For this cause many are 
 weak and sickly among you, and many sleep.' These 
 are examples of the 'judgment' spoken of. For pro- 
 faning thus the Lord's Supper, there had been amongst 
 them special visitations of the divine displeasure, in
 
 iv.] of Disease and DeatJi. 65 
 
 divers forms of weakness and sickness, nay (in some 
 cases) even of premature death. And why, he asks, 
 why these inflictions ? For lack of a self-discipline 
 which would have rendered needless the discipline of 
 God. 'If we judged ourselves;' if we (more exactly) 
 ' discerned ' or ' discriminated ' ourselves it is the very 
 word used above for 'discerning the body ;' if we would 
 but look into our own selves, exercising there that 
 power of discrimination between right and wrong which 
 God has given to all of us in conscience ; if we would 
 only sit in judgment ourselves within, entering, with a 
 diligent introspection, into the state of heart and life, so 
 that we might drag to the light of day our hidden 
 obliquities, and with a resolute will cast them out of 
 us and spare not; then 'we should not be judged:' 
 taking into our own hands in this life the Judge's office, 
 we should, with His gracious approval let us say it 
 with reverence take it out of His : He who ' doth not 
 willingly afflict ' would see affliction to be needless, and 
 suffer us to walk in the clear sunny day of a Father's 
 reconciled countenance. ' If we would judge ourselves, 
 we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we 
 are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be con- 
 demned with the world.' That judgment which we 
 might avert, that judgment of God which a severe self- 
 judgment might altogether have prevented and set 
 aside, is yet, even when it falls, not a ' damnation : ' 
 rather is it a 'chastening that we should not be con- 
 demned ; ' a fatherly discipline exercised betimes in this 
 life, that we may still be owned in the great day as 
 among the ' washed and justified and sanctified ; ' the 
 baptismal cross not obliterated, the seal of the Spirit 
 
 V. 5
 
 66 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 not erased. Pain and sickness, suffering and death 
 itself, may be, in God's hand, a remedial discipline ; the 
 careless inconsistent Christian may even be ' delivered 
 unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh,' and yet all 
 this may have in view an ulterior mercy ; ' that the spirit 
 may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.' 
 
 The subject is not more interesting than it is in- 
 structive. 
 
 i. For, first of all, what does it say to us as to God's 
 concern in individual lives and destinies ? 
 
 We sometimes speak, and more often feel, as though 
 a life mentioned in holy Scripture were made, by the 
 very fact of that sacred contact by its admission, I 
 mean, in the manner of example or warning, to a place 
 in the record of inspiration of a wholly different order 
 and kind from a life such as men live now ; as though 
 it must have had a value and an elevation and a 
 grandeur more worthy of God's notice and of God's 
 interest than the doings or the sufferings, the fortunes 
 or the destinies, of a mere commonplace being like our 
 own. I know that the fallacy vanishes in the stating : 
 we see that it is an illusion, and yet to-morrow we shall 
 feel it still. I desire to fasten upon our minds, while 
 we can, this obvious yet ill-learnt lesson ; the equality 
 of all persons in God's regard : the absence, in His 
 sight, of any such distinctions as those between great 
 and small, sacred and common, Scripture characters and 
 characters of common daily English life: and to draw 
 from it this inference, so simple in sound yet so deep 
 in its penetration, that there is not one person at this 
 moment present, in these seats and these galleries, 
 in the management of whose life, as a matter of indi-
 
 iv.] of Disease and Death. 67 
 
 vidual guidance and discipline, God Himself, 'the God 
 of the spirits of all flesh,' is not as directly, as imme- 
 diately interested as ever He was in the spiritual affairs 
 of these men and women at Corinth, upon whom, His 
 own Word tells us, He sent weakness and sickness and 
 even death, to punish their sins and to save their souls. 
 Yes, my friends, there was nothing peculiar in interest, 
 and there was scarcely anything exceptional in treat- 
 ment, in the cases of those Corinthians. These young 
 lives, here making preparation for the work of time and 
 for the solemn alternative of eternity, are just as precious, 
 every one of them, in the regard of God, as though they 
 had been brought into the Gospel covenant through the 
 preaching of an Apostle, disciplined for heaven by a 
 ministry of miracle, or placed on record in the Scripture 
 page for the instruction and edification of latter days 
 of the Church. I believe that the thoughtful amongst 
 you, who mark the turnings of life and take heed to 
 the signals of grace, could give were the heart opened, 
 as it is not to man, in frank confession an account 
 of God's dealings with you personally, in the few years 
 already gone by, such as would satisfy you, if it con- 
 vinced not others, of a hand guiding and guarding, a 
 will purposing and ruling, yea a Spirit suggesting, 
 striving, and influencing, as minutely as if you alone 
 were its care, as really as if your ears could even hear 
 the voice behind you, saying, 'This, this is the way: 
 walk thou in it.' 
 
 'Whoso is wise will ponder these things : and he shall 
 understand the loving-kindness of the Lord.' 
 
 2. Again, I would beg you to notice the value here 
 assigned to a position within the Church of Christ. 
 
 52
 
 68 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 These Corinthians were full of faults, and the hand 
 of God was upon them in punishment. For their sins 
 'many were weak and sickly among them, and many 
 slept.' And yet, just because they were inside the 
 Church, all this judgment was a chastening. Just 
 because they were men who had listened to the Gospel 
 call, and had come out from the mass of mankind to 
 enter the Christian fellowship, and on the strength 
 of that profession of faith had been subjected to the 
 rite of initiation, and were now baptized men, par- 
 taking in Christian ordinances and submitting them- 
 selves to Christian teaching, they had 'hope in their 
 end :' what they suffered, they suffered not as punish- 
 ment only, but distinctively as discipline : if they even 
 died under the rod of chastening, it was in the hope 
 that they might not be condemned with the world. We 
 need the thought, every one of us, not to make us 
 careless, but to make us thankful. There is a differ- 
 ence a real and radical difference between the inside 
 and the outside of that Church which is Christ's body. 
 If we even wish it, we cannot obliterate that mark. 
 'That which cometh into your minds' God forbid that 
 it should come there' shall not be at all, that ye say, 
 We will be as the heathen :' you cannot be as the 
 heathen. Worse or better : better certainly in position : 
 and what is that but saying, partakers of a heavenly 
 calling which will not let you alone ; possessors of a 
 hope, and heirs of a heaven, which God the Holy 
 Ghost will remind you of, and press upon you, and 
 make a sting and a goad to you if you will not have 
 it for your joy and your crown ? Such is your con- 
 dition. Redemption is yours, because the world is
 
 IV 
 
 .] of Disease and Death. 69 
 
 redeemed : but Redemption is yours beyond this, be- 
 cause you have been baptized, and because you were 
 thereby brought into that right and that ownership and 
 that use of the divine relationship, which never again, 
 save by open apostasy, can you be deprived of while 
 life is in your body. And because you are thus within 
 the Christian fellowship, therefore all that befalls you 
 has in it at least the possibility and the peradventure of 
 salvation. 'That you be not condemned with the world' 
 is inscribed upon every disappointment, every bereave- 
 ment, every sorrow, every cross; inscribed upon pain 
 and sickness, inscribed upon desolation and death ; till 
 the day of grace be ended, and a God with whom there 
 is no respect of persons must sit in judgment finally 
 upon your soul. 
 
 Such is the reality, of which there are many counter- 
 feits, of a Christian church-membership. It is not that 
 it entitles you, faithless or believing, to a share of ' the 
 inheritance of the saints in light : ' but it is, that it sets 
 you within the school and home of God ; gives you the 
 right to every promise, and the possession of every influ- 
 ence for good ; places you within the sound of the inward 
 teaching, and makes every incident, joyful or adverse, 
 of earthly existence, a positive intentional discipline of 
 divine love. 
 
 ' He therefore that despiseth despiseth not man 
 but God, who hath also given unto us His Holy 
 Spirit.' 
 
 3. Thirdly, and in particular, the text assigns a 
 tender and merciful character to the graver and more 
 penal exercises of the divine government over human 
 lives. Pain is one of God's ministers death itself may
 
 70 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 be one of God's ministers for the salvation of His 
 Church from the condemnation of the world. 
 
 (i) That intermixture of loss and gain, of grief and 
 joy, of injury and reparation, which pervades human 
 life, has its exact counterpart in the Book of God. 
 
 Fallen man had to gather his one hope out of the 
 words of a curse. ' It shall bruise thy head ' was com- 
 municated for man's comfort in the same breath which 
 said to the serpent, 'And thou shalt bruise his heel.' 
 And when that hope reached its fulfilment in the cross 
 of Jesus Christ, then was it seen that the two things, the 
 curse and the blessing, were to be completed and con- 
 summated together : in the very wounding of man's heel 
 was to be accomplished the crushing of the serpent's 
 head. Even so has it been in all the minor fulfilments, 
 before and since, of that comprehensive prophecy. In 
 the suffering has lain the healing. Out of pain has 
 sprung health, out of sorrow joy, and out of death life. 
 Pain, sorrow, death, each in its turn has been God's 
 minister to His Church for good. 
 
 We have seen this exemplified in a thousand ways. 
 
 The indirect benefits of pain are many. We owe to 
 pain the existence of whole departments of salutary 
 ministration. The office of the Christian nurse, the office 
 of the Christian physician, a large part of the office of 
 the Christian clergyman, is the creature of pain. Such 
 institutions as that for which I ask your help to-day 
 institutions in which a self-denying charity ministers day 
 by day to suffering man owe their existence to pain. 
 Every private home becomes in its turn a hospital: pain 
 enters, and with it a new influx of love, a new effort of 
 self-forgetfulness, and a new strength of unity. The
 
 iv.J of Disease and Death. 71 
 
 Lord Jesus Christ Himself would have ministered upon 
 earth in vain, if there had been no suffering hearts to 
 claim His sympathy, and no diseased bodies to feel His 
 power. 
 
 We have called these the indirect benefits of pain. It 
 exercises virtues in man, it called forth graces from the 
 Saviour, which, but for it, must have lain dormant. 
 
 Not less evident are the more direct uses of suffering; 
 those of which the Apostle wrote, ' For this cause many 
 are weak and sickly among you chastened of the Lord, 
 that they should not be condemned with the world.' 
 
 The first effect of pain is reality. Nothing so brings 
 a man to himself. The vain man, the conceited man, 
 the affected man, the incessant jester, the actor of a part, 
 the wearer of a mask, the assumer of a character let 
 sharp pain come upon him becomes natural instantly. 
 You see him then, he sees himself then, as he is. The 
 habit of years drops off from him in a moment : the 
 touch of pain has stripped him bare, and he lies open 
 before God and man in the secret strength or weakness 
 of reality and truth. 
 
 And the second effect of pain is humility. Not that 
 poor feigned thing which men in health call humility : 
 the general confession, ' I am a sinner/ with its usual 
 gloss, when it is hard pressed, ' We are all sinners : ' not 
 this : but that humility which springs out of a momen- 
 tary glimpse of God ; that humility which is impressed 
 upon me by the giant grasp of one who is evidently 
 stronger than I ; by the conviction, wrung from me by 
 suffering, that I can no more will away or charm away 
 this consciousness of agony than I can say to the sun, 
 ' Stand thou still,' or to the ocean, ' Thus far shalt thou
 
 72 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 come, and no farther.' The truth of my own helplessness 
 is forced upon me at last, and with it the reality of the 
 divine strength. 
 
 And then out of this springs oftentimes, under God's 
 influence, a third thing, which is called in holy Scripture 
 a seeking and feeling after God. If I am absolutely at 
 the mercy of One who is stronger than I of One in 
 comparison with whom ' I am a worm and no man '- 
 were it not well that I should enquire, ' Who is He, and 
 what ? Has He who is thus strong over me any will 
 concerning me ? Does it concern Him that I should be 
 this or this ? that I should feel thus or thus towards 
 Him? that I should live this life or that life? that I 
 should desire and seek and do whether this or that ? ' 
 
 And so, if the Word of God, or one rightly instructed 
 in it, be at hand at this moment to guide, there will 
 oftentimes arise out of pain (under grace) a fourth con- 
 sequence : a humble listening to the voice which speaks 
 from heaven ; a reverent attention to the call to peni- 
 tence ; a serious pondering of the past steps in evil ; a 
 bitter sorrow for that which has displeased God ; a thank- 
 ful acceptance of the offer of mercy which is in Christ 
 Jesus; and a resolute setting out, afresh or for the first 
 time, in the way of Gospel holiness and of the divine life. 
 These things have we seen : the history of the minis- 
 try is full of them : and as often as they are seen, they 
 illustrate again the saying of St Paul, ' Many are weak 
 and sickly among you' on purpose 'that they should not 
 be condemned with the world.' 
 
 These things may arise in the common course of 
 God's Providence, when suffering overtakes the care- 
 less, and the alacrity of perfect health and spirits is ex-
 
 IV 
 
 .] of Disease and Death. 73 
 
 changed, more or less gradually, for the couch of pining 
 sickness. 
 
 Or they may arise more exactly in the manner here 
 indicated by St Paul ; when God is pleased to send some 
 definite sickness as the scourge of some definite sin, and 
 to let pain follow upon transgression as its appropriate 
 penalty and retribution. 
 
 And no doubt, if our eyes were opened, like the eyes 
 of the prophet's servant in Dothan, to see the mountain 
 of life full of those chariots and horses of fire which are 
 the signals of God's active presence, we should perceive, 
 oftener than now, some connection of cause and effect, 
 certainly of provocation and retribution, in the distresses 
 and diseases of our mortal being : we should know that 
 in deed and in truth God is still living and moving in 
 human life as the judge and the avenger ; stopping one 
 here, and one there, in the career of hidden ungodliness, 
 and making Nature herself His executioner in the ap- 
 pointment to each of some righteous recompense of 
 punishment. We should perceive that, in our own case 
 at least, God has not left us even for a lifetime to our- 
 selves, but has interposed the arm of His chastisement 
 secretly to all but one person because He saw us walk- 
 ing in some way that was not good, and because never- 
 theless ' He loved us, and would do us good at our latter 
 end.' 
 
 (2) But there stands behind this a word yet more 
 remarkable, which tells us that for the same cause, and 
 with the same purpose of mercy, 'many even sleep.' 
 In short, not pain only, but death itself, may be a 
 minister of God for good. 
 
 I know nothing, in the whole compass of Scripture,
 
 74 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 at once more marvellous and more reconciling than 
 this. 
 
 We read, I think, the Old Testament records of 
 judgment, with a sort of tacit preconception that, when 
 God slew, He also condemned. Many have been the 
 half-suppressed feelings of inward dissatisfaction, with 
 which men have studied the fate, for example, of the 
 disobedient prophet. Nature said within them that 
 the sin of the deceived man, who believed his brother- 
 prophet's lying utterance when he ought to have clung 
 tenaciously to God's earlier and unrevoked charge to 
 himself, was less after all than the sin of the deceiver, 
 who destroyed him by his lie, and then went to cry over 
 him, ' Alas, my brother ! ' And yet the one is ruth- 
 lessly seized by the executioner of vengeance, and the 
 other lives out all his days, and goes, respected and 
 honoured, to the sepulchre of his fathers. Cast back, 
 Christian friends, upon all such records the light of the 
 revelation before us. If this man was what we make 
 him faithful in the main tenor, deceived in the special 
 instance be sure that the Judge of all the earth certainly 
 did right, and remember St Paul's saying, ' Many are weak 
 and sickly among you yea, many even sleep chastened 
 of the Lord, that they should not be condemned.' 
 
 And many have been the illustrations of the same 
 saying, afforded to us both in the history of nations and 
 in the records of personal experience. When we are 
 tempted to ask, 'Why should the sins of a whole 
 dynasty of wicked French Kings be visited with un- 
 exampled severity on the last and best ? ' might we not 
 let in the light of eternity upon the dark and piteous 
 scene, and answer, ' Peradventure because God was
 
 iv.] of Disease and Death. 75 
 
 pleased thus to correct a frivolity and a self-indulgence 
 which imperilled the soul, and gave the mind to distress, 
 and the body to the executioner's axe, for the very 
 reason assigned by St Paul, that the spirit might be 
 saved in the day of the Lord Jesus ? ' 
 
 Who can doubt that the same discipline, severe but 
 gracious, has been exercised on a less august stage in a 
 thousand times ten thousand instances ? How often 
 has the confession been heard on a penitent's deathbed, 
 ' I desire not prolonged life : I feel myself weak to resist 
 temptation : I had rather, if it please God, be taken 
 away now from evil to come.' And how often has 
 that prayer been answered. How often has the trem- 
 bling cry for mercy, the evident sign and token of 
 repentance, the earnest trust in Jesus, and the longing 
 desire for the heavenly presence, been all that was 
 vouchsafed in evidence of the reality of a conversion. 
 It has pleased God, in tender compassion, that the 
 sincere resolution should never be put to the proof; that 
 the dying sorrow for sin, and the dying trust in the 
 Saviour, should be left as the only testimony to the 
 sinner's earnestness of repentance. And shall we coldly 
 look on, in such a case, and say, ' I have no faith in 
 deathbed conversions : I have no proof that, if that 
 dying man had lived, he might not have returned to his 
 sin and died therein ? ' No but have you no faith 
 yourself in the wisdom and lovingkindness of your 
 God ? no confidence that He, who doeth all things well, 
 judged better herein than you, and perhaps was thus 
 fulfilling the very word written here in the text, ' For 
 this cause many sleep that they should not be con- 
 demned with the world ? '
 
 76 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 God's thoughts are not our thoughts. His mercy 
 is ampler than our puny measurements can compass. 
 I believe, if it were only on the strength of this record, 
 that there is a remedial agency in sickness, a remedial 
 efficacy (under God) oftentimes in death, which largely 
 augments the number of the heirs of salvation, and 
 replenishes the 'great multitude which no man can 
 number' with recruits of whom earth knows not, and 
 whose names only the opening of the book of life shall 
 reveal. To these, how many soever they be, shall belong 
 the mysterious joy of those words of the apostle Peter, 
 'That they might be judged according to men in the 
 flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.' 
 
 4. The lessons of the text are yet far from ex- 
 hausted : and one at least must be added, upon the 
 instrumentality here ascribed to the body in furthering 
 the purposes of God's mercy concerning the soul. 
 
 The experience of most of those who hear me bears 
 hard, I doubt not, on the body. They have found it the 
 constant drag upon duty, and the perpetual inlet of 
 temptation. No sin can be committed save through the 
 body : more than this, almost every sin is not only acted 
 but conceived through some suggestion of the organs of 
 sense. Therefore it is no wonder if their estimate of the 
 body is both low and unfriendly. The Christian man 
 owes the body a grudge for what he is. Some Christian 
 men have deliberately set themselves to weaken it by 
 austerities. They have thought their spiritual wellbeing 
 to be exactly proportional to the humiliation and at- 
 tenuation of the body. We cannot wonder, we can 
 scarcely blame: and yet we think that holy Scripture 
 teaches us a better discipline and a more excellent way.
 
 iv.] of Disease and Death. 77 
 
 (i) For first of all it reminds us of the glorious 
 prospect opened before us, in which the body, revived 
 and reconstructed, shall be an essential part of the 
 redeemed and rescued man. Instead of bidding us 
 look forward to the ' unclothing,' it bids us direct all 
 our anticipations to the wondrous reinvestiture and 
 ' clothing upon.' ' The hope of Israel ' is, not death, 
 but resurrection. The soul disembodied may repose 
 and recruit itself from the toils and wounds of its 
 earthly travail and conflict ; may bathe itself in the 
 water of life, and bask awhile, for refreshment and 
 revival, in the sunshine of a Saviour's smile. But the 
 soul disembodied if we rightly read the inspired 
 sayings cannot yet recommence its work for God : 
 capable of contemplation, capable of praise, capable of 
 adoration, it is incapable still of ministration : not till 
 the spiritual body, incorruptible and glorious, is added 
 to the soul in Resurrection, can that work begin be 
 it what it may in which eternity is to be spent; that 
 work in which man, complete in both his parts, shall 
 emulate the angelic activity ; like the angels, ' excel- 
 ling in strength;' doing (not as now) God's command- 
 ment, hearkening (as never before) to the voice of 
 God's words. 
 
 Now therefore this body, which has in it the seed 
 and germ of such an immortality, must be looked 
 upon with reverence and treated with honour. ' Know 
 ye not,' St Paul asks, 'that your body is' already, is 
 now, ' the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you ? 
 wherefore glorify God in your body.' Let every man 
 ' know how to possess himself of his vessel ' now ' in 
 sanctification and honour.' Resurrection casts its
 
 / 8 The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 shadow before, and asserts for the body of humiliation 
 some share of that respect which belongs of right to 
 the body of glory. 
 
 This is one half of the revelation of God concern- 
 ing man's body. 
 
 (2) The other half of that revelation is here. This 
 body, this inlet and medium, too often, of temptation, 
 is also in God's hand the instrument of a fatherly 
 discipline. That discipline, as far as it is penal, is 
 God's, not yours. You are to keep your body in tem- 
 perance, sometimes even by the help of special acts 
 of a necessary and religious self-denial, that it may do 
 the soul's work and prove itself the Spirit's temple. 
 This you must do : but you are not to undertake 
 God's office, or presume to punish yourself through 
 the body. Leave that work, so far as it shall be 
 needful, to God alone. He, if and as He sees it to 
 be needful for you, will chasten and discipline you 
 through the machinery of the body. If pain comes, 
 see God's hand in it. Connect it, if there be cause 
 to do so, with some definite sin : even then accept it 
 with a thankful sorrow. If there be no such cause 
 revealed to you by a diligent self-scrutiny, then con- 
 nect pain with general sinfulness ; with the inheritance 
 of a fallen nature, too surely acting itself, day by day, 
 in thoughts and words and deeds of at least an un- 
 willing infirmity. Accept it in this form with humility 
 and thankfulness : feel that you deserve it, feel that 
 you need it, see its gracious object, pray that it may 
 bring you to the desired end. And even so, when 
 death is in sight, think then of the words, ' Many 
 even sleep judged and chastened, that they be not
 
 iv.] of Disease and Death. 79 
 
 condemned : ' into God's hand commend your expiring 
 soul, and, if He hide Himself with the cloud, call 
 Him, even as Christ did, your Father still. 
 
 5. My friends and more especially I would speak 
 now to my younger brethren it may be that the 
 subject which has engaged our latest thoughts has 
 appeared to some of you wanting in appropriateness 
 and application. You are here not in pain, not in 
 sickness, with no sign or token of approaching death : 
 why speak to you of these solemn matters, which seem 
 at present to be so far removed from your thought 
 and vision ? I will tell you why I speak of them. 
 Not though, but because, they are so far removed 
 from your thought and vision. I would have them 
 press upon you in all their strangeness ; in the fulness 
 of their contrast and contrariety to the life which is 
 yours now. I can conceive few things more salutary to 
 a young man conscious of that vitality of every power 
 and every faculty, which makes existence itself an 
 ecstasy than that he should bring before himself from 
 time to time by a determined effort those stern realities 
 of our human being of which we have now spoken: 
 God's discipline of pain and sickness, God's discipline 
 of a suffering death. Let him enter, on one of these 
 days of health and cheerfulness while life smiles upon 
 him, and Nature herself seems to sympathize with his 
 gladness the walls of that Hospital to which we are 
 to give to-day, and which stands, as it were, by the 
 highway of our everyday life to remind us of a con- 
 dition most opposite to our own, to which nevertheless 
 the very accident of an accident might at any moment 
 reduce us. Let him stand there for a few moments
 
 8o The Remedial Discipline [iv. 
 
 the thoughtful observer of the scene which presents 
 itself. His pity will be stirred in him by the sight 
 of every form and kind of suffering: little children 
 clinging to a mother's bosom, as if enquiring of her 
 what ails them and why: strong men brought down 
 in a moment from a life of productive industry to the 
 helplessness of accident or the wandering of fever : 
 young wives waiting their turn for admission into the 
 chamber of sickness, or listening with agonized eager- 
 ness for that physician's judgment which they must 
 receive as the loved one's doom. It is good for him 
 assuredly to be there. He will return from that visit 
 a wiser if perhaps a sadder man. He will raise his 
 heart to God in thankfulness for an undeserved ex- 
 emption thus far from the stroke of pain. He will ask 
 himself how the touch of sickness sharp and sudden, 
 or else gradual wasting sickness would find or affect 
 him. Is his heart so disciplined already beneath the 
 will of God by a daily continuance in prayer and well- 
 doing that he would hear with submission, hear without 
 terror, the summons to a bed of sickness or an early 
 grave ? And thus he will have obeyed, in part, the 
 profitable hint of the apostle, 'If we would judge 
 ourselves, we should not be judged.' 
 
 Christian friends, it is impossible for one advanced 
 far beyond you in life's long journey, to contemplate 
 without emotion his younger and less experienced 
 comrades. He must know if his life has not been 
 screened from anxiety beyond the common lot of 
 all men how slippery is the surest standing, how 
 fallacious may be the brightest promise, in one who 
 is now preparing to set out for himself in that career
 
 iv.] of Disease and Death. 81 
 
 the end of which must be life eternal or eternal death. 
 He must think of the solemn words, ' The last shall 
 be first, and the first last : for many are called, but few 
 are chosen.' And he knows, if he be a Christian man, 
 one and but one safeguard; open to all, infallible for all, 
 yet, alas, certain to be refused by many; that which 
 lies, half shown, half hidden, in the words of the text, 
 ' If we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.' 
 Yes, a heart opened daily with diligent thoughtfulness 
 before the throne of grace a life daily watched and 
 tended by the sought and promised influence of the 
 Holy Spirit of God this, this is a security, the one 
 security, alike against God's judgment here and God's 
 condemnation hereafter: for this life is lived under 
 God's protection, this heart is 'fulfilled with the 
 heavenly benediction.' 
 
 Day by day let us carry our thoughts onward into 
 the remote future, and forecast the one question and 
 the one answer which will alone interest then. When 
 all of life is gathered up for us within the curtains 
 of a death-bed, the one only question of moment will 
 be, 'In whom have I believed?' and the one only 
 answer of peace will be, ' Thanks be to God, who giveth 
 me the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.' Gifts 
 of mind and body, stores of knowledge and wisdom, 
 powers once exercised for self-aggrandisement or even 
 for the good of man, stirring incidents of political life, 
 or sweet comforts of domestic love, all will then have 
 passed back, for us, to the earth from which they were 
 taken. One thing, one only, will survive the wreck of 
 all : a soul redeemed and ransomed by the blood of 
 Christ, a soul indwelt and quickened by the Eternal 
 V. 6
 
 82 Remedial Discipline of Disease and Death, [iv. 
 
 Spirit. God in His mercy grant us this: and then, 
 come ease or pain, come gladness or sorrow, come 
 success or disappointment, come life or death, all shall 
 be well: for 'we are Christ's and Christ is God's.'
 
 V. 
 
 UNIVERSALITY AND INDIVIDUALITY OF CHRIST'S 
 GOSPEL. 
 
 St John xii. 32. 
 And /, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. 
 
 THE chief weight of this marvellous utterance of 
 this sentence of ten words, for it is no more in the 
 Greek is suspended upon two of them : the one mark- 
 ing a single event, the other a continuous consequence ; 
 the one passive, the other active ; the one telling of 
 something which was to be done to Christ, the other 
 of something which Christ was to do ; the one of a 
 suffering which was to be the groundwork of an action, 
 the other of an action which was to spring from the 
 suffering. Christ must first 'be lifted up' and then 
 Christ ' will draw.' The Person lifted up, shall become, 
 by that lifting, the magnet of universal man. 
 
 St John interprets for us, or we might have doubted 
 the meaning of this lifting up. 
 
 Elsewhere the lifting up of Christ is the Ascension. 
 ' Being by the right hand of God exalted ' it is the 
 same word is St Peter's description, on the great day 
 of Pentecost, of that ascension which had in it the 
 virtue of all the gifts of grace. And so again, when 
 a few days afterwards the Apostles stood to answer 
 
 62
 
 84 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 for themselves before the Sanhedrin, this was their 
 account of the completion and consummation of the 
 work of Redemption, ' Him hath God exalted (lifted 
 up) with His right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour.' 
 
 But in St John's Gospel the exaltation is always the 
 Crucifixion. 'As Moses lifted up the serpent in the 
 wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.' 
 'When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then shall ye 
 know that I am He.' And in this place again, 'I, if I 
 be lifted up from the earth '...And 'this He said, signi- 
 fying what death He should die.' 
 
 It is a marvellous paradox, this appropriation of the 
 word 'exaltation' to a death of shame and anguish. It 
 seems of itself to tell us, ' My thoughts are not your 
 thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the 
 Lord.' 
 
 Turn to the other word. Lifted up on the cross, 
 I will ' draw ' all men unto me. It is a very strong word. 
 It is the word applied in the last chapter of this Gospel 
 to the dragging to shore of the heavy and now almost 
 breaking net. It is the word used in the i6th chapter 
 of the Acts of the rough usage of two devoted men by 
 the infuriated mob at Philippi : ' they caught Paul and 
 Silas, and drew (dragged) them into the market-place 
 unto the rulers.' It expresses no gentle hand of soft 
 persuasion, but an overmastering force and a resistless 
 power. It is almost, ' I will drag all men to myself/ 
 The influence of the cross of Christ shall be like one of 
 those natural forces of attraction or gravitation which 
 allow no question, brook no delay, and will take no 
 refusal. 
 
 We have touched upon two of the weighty words of
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 85 
 
 the brief verse before us : but the immediate purpose of 
 its selection leads me to emphasize yet two more : ' all ' 
 men unto ' me.' 
 
 Endeavouring to illustrate one particular aspect of 
 the Gospel that it is a ' wholesome,' that is, a healthy 
 doctrine ; and understanding by health the balance of 
 the powers not the preponderance of one, but the 
 equilibrium of all the principles and functions of life ; 
 I have dwelt, on a former occasion, upon three pairs 
 of opposite characteristics noticeable in Christ's words : 
 naturalness and spirituality ; grandeur and self-control ; 
 truthfulness and tenderness. To-day I would add, by 
 itself, yet one other like combination 
 
 The Universality and the Individuality of Christ's 
 Gospel. 
 
 To reconcile the interests of the individual with the 
 interests of the society, is one of the most difficult 
 problems of government, whether in an institution or in 
 the state. 
 
 The general and the particular are seldom in entire 
 harmony : sometimes the universal predominates, some- 
 times the individual : in the later days of society, more 
 often the former the interests of the citizen becoming 
 more and more subordinated to the real or supposed 
 interests of the state, and day by day a more mechanical 
 principle applied to all the processes of industrial, social, 
 and political life. 
 
 But as no human system can be in a satisfactory 
 condition if no attempt be made to harmonize the 
 individual and the universal ; as the wellbeing of any 
 human constitution may be measured by its nearer or 
 more distant approach to the realization of that har-
 
 86 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 mony ; so we should expect in a divine Gospel that 
 it would prove its origin (in part) by this characteristic, 
 that it holds in equilibrium the two opposite principles 
 of universality and individuality, neglecting neither, 
 comprehending both, and thus reflecting in itself that 
 highest of all the attributes of God Himself a presence 
 stretching everywhere through space and time, and yet 
 as minute in its supervision as it is magnificent in its 
 expansion. ' Thy kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, 
 and Thy dominion endureth throughout all ages ' ' He 
 giveth fodder unto the cattle, and feedeth the young 
 ravens that call upon Him.' 
 ' I will draw all men unto me.' 
 
 i. Universality is one attribute of Christ's 'wholesome 
 words.' 
 
 'But now we see not yet all' men drawn to Him. 
 It is the saddest of the present experiences of the faith- 
 ful. The Gospel is not yet earth-wide. Not yet are 
 'the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of 
 our Lord and of His Christ.' He does not yet reign 
 everywhere over a willing and trusting people. It is 
 perhaps the only real difficulty in the argument for 
 Christ's Gospel. This slow growth, this limited in- 
 fluence, this always tardy and sometimes retrograde 
 movement, this imperfect sway, this reluctant, resisted, 
 inconsistent reception what shall we say of it ? The 
 centuries are running their weary round, and Christ has 
 not drawn all men to Him. The fact lies like a weight 
 upon Christian hearts, and many have been their devices 
 for shaking it off. 
 
 Some would try a doctrine of compromise. They 
 would make the Gospel more conciliatory. Let it be
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 87 
 
 understood, they would say, that the Gospel has no 
 hostility to the world's amusements, to the world's 
 associations, to the world's ambitions. It is a narrow 
 and arbitrary rule which separates between Christian 
 and Christian, makes a Church within a Church, and 
 would have Christ's real servants known from the 
 nominal by being still, and in a sense never intended, ' a 
 peculiar people.' The force of ridicule is added to the 
 force of reasoning, and one barrier after another is 
 broken down, until it almost seems as if there were no 
 manner of life too pleasant, too luxurious, too mundane, 
 too trifling, for the children of God and the expectants 
 of heaven. This is one way of giving universality to 
 the Gospel. And though it rests upon some true as- 
 sumptions and corrects some mischievous fallacies, yet 
 we feel at once that it is on the wrong tack altogether 
 for its purpose : if this had been Christ's way of drawing 
 all men to Him, He would not have refused so positively 
 the proposal of the tempter, who said to Him, ' All this 
 power will I give Thee, and the glory' at once of a 
 world-wide kingdom 'If thou wilt' but fall down and 
 ' worship me, all shall be Thine.' 
 
 Others would try a doctrine of philanthropy. They 
 would make the Gospel a mere influence of social 
 kindness. They would eliminate from it all its reve- 
 lations (strictly so called) and leave it only that in 
 which it expresses the instincts of human nature in 
 the direction of kindliness and good-will. They would 
 make Christ draw all men to Himself by merely echoing 
 the better voice of fallen humanity, and thus awakening 
 in man's bosom a response out of itself. The promotion 
 of all manner of works of beneficence, the institution
 
 88 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 of hospitals and dispensaries, the extension of education 
 in all quarters, and the diffusion amongst all ranks of 
 an instructive literature these things, which are the 
 indirect or at best the secondary influences of Christ's 
 Gospel, they would make its primary object : and thus 
 they would make that 'drawing' of which the text 
 speaks, the simple attraction of men to a Man by 
 the exhibition of a virtue which they can appreciate 
 just because they have already in themselves its ele- 
 ments and its instincts. Whatever we may think of this 
 view of the universality of the Gospel, however much we 
 may admire its professed endeavour to give success to 
 one part of Christ's mission, we must yet say, as 
 believers in Revelation, that there needed not for this 
 work either Bethlehem or Gethsemane or Calvary, and 
 that certainly it leaves no room and no meaning for 
 that other like saying of the same divine Master, 
 ' No man can come to me, except the Father which 
 hath sent me draw him.' A man's own 'drawing' might 
 have sufficed, if this were all. 
 
 And others, in their zeal for the universality of 
 the Gospel, have tried what we may call a doctrine 
 of postponement. They see that Christ's drawing is 
 not yet universally effectual. They see that the very 
 sound of the Gospel is not yet in all lands, and that, 
 even where the sound is, the power is not. They will 
 cut the knot. That which is not in this life shall be 
 hereafter. Universality is with them Universalism. 
 That truth which has been refused here, that holiness 
 which has been despised here, that grace which has 
 been resisted, that Saviour who has been trodden under- 
 foot in this life, shall yet be felt and seen, shall yet be
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 89 
 
 sought and found, when the sun of this opportunity has 
 gone down and set behind them. Christ's effectual 
 drawing shall for many be hereafter. The ' great gulf 
 fixed,' of which His own Parable told, shall not be 
 impassable : either through purgatorial flames, or per- 
 haps without them, all shall be well at last with the 
 wicked, and they who would not be saved here shall 
 yet have a chance, shall yet have a compulsion, of 
 salvation there. 
 
 And where is he amongst us, who, if he could allow 
 himself to speak \vhere God has not spoken, would not 
 thankfully cherish the hope thus avowed ; would not 
 feel the burden of life sensibly lightened, if he might 
 believe that, in this large sense, the Gospel shall be 
 ' preached also to them that are dead,' and that they 
 who are 'judged according to men in the flesh,' may 
 yet peradventure 'live according to God in the spirit?' 
 that the time might yet come, were it but in the most 
 distant and shadowy of all futures, when every resisting 
 will should be not only subjugated but transformed, 
 and Christ should reign over a universe of worshipping 
 and adoring intelligences, fallen angels themselves con- 
 verted to swell the diapason of praise ? Yes, we could 
 wish this, if it were the will of God. Yes, we could 
 preach this, if it were a part of the 'wholesome word.' 
 As it is, we can but say that it is no part of God's 
 Revelation, no part of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ. We can but say that they who presume thus 
 to speak must have received some ' other Gospel,' which 
 we, which the churches of God, have not received, and 
 are deeply responsible for their interpolations of the 
 living and life-giving word. Not thus can we dare
 
 9O Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 to mend the Gospel. ' Are there not twelve hours in 
 the day?' then 'the night cometh.' Rather would we 
 be found among those who leave our Lord Jesus Christ 
 to tell us that which He had Himself first 'seen' in 
 heaven. Rather would we quicken our own souls and 
 the souls of others with the thought of the shortness 
 of life, and the solemn, the everlasting issues which 
 that life must decide. Rather would we feel with the 
 Psalmist, 'I am horribly afraid for the ungodly that 
 forsake Thy law;' or with that holy man of a later 
 generation, who spent hours of solitude week by week 
 in tears and lamentations over the reprobation of the 
 lost over a mysterious eternity of anguish reserved 
 for those who put from them through life the proffered 
 salvation, and do final despite to the Spirit of grace. 
 
 The universality of Christ's Gospel is not this. It 
 would not be a Gospel of health if this were so. We 
 cannot trust ourselves thus to eliminate fear from a 
 nature which God endowed with it. We want fear, 
 every one of us, every day. The ' wholesome words ' 
 are full of it. 
 
 And yet He says, 'I will draw all men unto me.' 
 There is a universality still. 
 
 A universality, first of all, of intention. God 'will 
 have all men to be saved.' 
 
 A universality, in the second place, of invitation. 
 ' Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.' 
 If ye have not life, it is because 'ye will not come to 
 me.' 'Go out into the highways and hedges, and 
 compel them to come in.' 
 
 A universality, in the third place, of potency. The 
 cross has in it the virtue of a literally universal drawing.
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 91 
 
 If any one perish, it is not because the grace has fallen 
 short, not because the vessel of the divine compassion 
 is emptied, not because the atonement was partial, not 
 because the Gospel efficacy is worn out or used up. 
 'And yet there is room 5 .' 
 
 But the universality spoken of is something yet 
 beyond this. It is of an effectual drawing that Christ 
 speaks in the text : not of mere will, not of mere 
 entreaty, not of mere potency, but of actual strength 
 and success too. And therefore we add, fourthly, a 
 universality of kind. Christ lifted up on the cross 
 draws to Himself all kinds of men ; men of all races, 
 men of all classes, men of all occupations, men of all 
 characters, men of all circumstances, men of all histories. 
 
 The magnet of Christ crucified has an attraction for 
 ' all sorts and conditions of men.' 
 
 Take just an example or two, most applicable to 
 ourselves. 
 
 Christ draws to Himself men of all characters. 
 
 One man is made for knowledge. Day after day he 
 is adding to his stores of wisdom. He lives in books. 
 In the absorbing interest of that life whether it be the 
 study of nature, or the study of man whether it be the 
 marvellous disclosures of science, or whether it be the 
 scarcely less wonderful discoveries to be made by 
 applying the microscope of a keen and practised criti- 
 cism to the words of wise men of old and their dark 
 sayings in the delight of such a life, each day is too 
 short for its work, and the pains of toil are unfelt in its 
 rewards. Now does Christ draw to Himself that man ? 
 Has the magnet of the cross any attraction for that 
 life ? Tell me, ye who know what it is to invoke upon
 
 92 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 the day's researches the wisdom of the all-wise, the 
 blessing of the most merciful to feel and know that it 
 is in His light that you are seeking light, and that, when 
 the light of earth fades, you have a light still before 
 you above the brightness of the firmament. And you 
 too who know it not : O, is there not something com- 
 fortless in that illumination of mind which is thick 
 darkness withal to the soul ? something unsatisfactory 
 in that progress which a slight accident, a day's fever, 
 failing sight, at last decaying intellect, may stop once 
 for all, and stop for ever ? Lifted up on the cross, 
 Christ would draw you to Him, that He may make 
 your light sevenfold and your life immortal. 
 
 And another man is all practical. Beyond the abso- 
 lute requirements of this place, he cares little for study. 
 His delight is in society, in all active pursuits, in all 
 manly exercises. His view of life is altogether practical. 
 He expects to be, he intends to be, he resolves to be, a 
 man of influence and energy in his generation. Well- 
 was not that life also within the scope of Christ ? Did 
 not Christ come to redeem that life also not by bidding 
 it go out of itself, but by showing it how to abide there 
 with Him ? This University was not created only for 
 students and scholars : it was designed as a training- 
 place for all careers, as a discipline for all characters. 
 For none has it been more valuable, in this aspect, than 
 for those who were to do the work of life in common 
 English callings, and who were to begin that work 
 here. These men are the salt of this place : the in- 
 fluence of its scholars and its mathematicians is secon- 
 dary and more remote : it is they who mould the life 
 it is they who set the tone, and leaven the lump. Has
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 93 
 
 Christ no attraction for these ? Nay, these are His own 
 witnesses, His own workmen : through them He would 
 affect the principles, and even breathe upon the souls, 
 amongst which they here live and move and have their 
 being. Let Him draw them to Himself. Seek Him 
 daily seek Him in earnest, honest, manly prayer and 
 see if He will not use you. Not by the affectation of 
 singularity, and not by the assumption of superiority, 
 but just by the shining through of light burning within, 
 you may do a work here, such as clergymen cannot do, 
 such as saints might envy. 
 
 Men too of all histories. 
 
 The life behind you is short, but it may have been 
 eventful. I address some today who have early fallen 
 some too who through grace have been thus far pure. 
 Each of these has something special to find in the cross 
 of Christ. The one want it most of all : for the others it 
 has perhaps the greater beauty. 
 
 Some have been unfortunate in their early training. 
 Their very homes were not pure. Their first school was 
 an initiation into mysteries of evil. Their last school 
 was a succession of falls and repentances. They had 
 little moral courage, and no help from the strength of 
 others. Here they find themselves, as might be ex- 
 pected, not among the strong ; rather receiving than 
 communicating ; and, as is the manner with such his- 
 tories, peculiarly vacillating this day resolving, to- 
 morrow sinning, the third day repenting, the fourth day 
 wavering again ; and thus month by month and year by 
 year till the near end comes God grant it be not thus 
 till the far end likewise. I think the cross of Christ 
 ought to attract these. ' In remembrance that Christ
 
 94 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 died for thee In remembrance that Christ's blood was 
 shed for thee ' yes, there is an attraction there for a 
 man of this history. 
 
 And what is an attraction for the man of this history 
 is an affinity for his opposite. The sinful man feels the 
 attraction of the cross of Christ; but it has perhaps for 
 him its repulsion too. It is a delightful thing to be for- 
 given: but then, to be cleansed ? to be bound to be clean ? 
 Ah ! if it could have stopped with the blood, which is 
 the first witness ! But the water, which is the second 
 witness and the Spirit, which is the third witness 1 
 what of these ? But the clean history can bear even 
 these : is not afraid of them ; sees their beauty, and can 
 desire them. Let it desire them for it too needs 
 them: it also, without them, is unstable as water, and 
 may become the very sport of sin. 
 
 We have read the text as though it were, ' all 
 kinds of men.' It has been so. The Gospel of Christ 
 crucified has been tried everywhere; and everywhere, 
 though not yet with all men everywhere, it has been 
 found indeed ' the power of God.' It has been of avail 
 to make the idle man diligent, the selfish man loving, 
 the proud man humble, the immoral man chaste, and 
 the churl bountiful. It has made the scholar's study 
 an oratory, and the hospitable home a sanctuary. It 
 has turned the ambitious statesman into a self-sacrificing 
 philanthropist, and (hardest perhaps of all) the indolent 
 self-indulgent clergyman into a devoted pastor, going in 
 and out before his people, and giving life itself for souls. 
 Christ lifted up on His cross has drawn all kinds of 
 men unto Him. 
 
 1 See i John v. 6, 8.
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 95 
 
 May we hope does He bid us to hope that in 
 so reading His words we have read them yet imper- 
 fectly? that, in literal truth, the day shall come, when 
 'all nations shall flow to Him?' when the prayer of the 
 Church, offered through long ages, shall have been 
 perfectly answered, 'That it may please Thee to have 
 mercy upon all men ' ' That thy way may be known 
 upon earth, Thy saving health among all nations?' 'The 
 nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light 
 of it : and the kings of the earth do bring their glory 
 and honour into it. And the gates of it shall not be 
 shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there.' 
 ' A little one shall become a thousand, and a small one 
 a strong nation : I the Lord will hasten it in his time.' 
 
 2. Universality is one attribute of the wholesome 
 words : individuality is the other. If all men, then 
 every man. Universality alone is not health but disease. 
 Universality alone may be a merely superficial influence; 
 a Christendom, not a Church ; a uniformity of profession, 
 not a unity of spirit. Not only as a matter of history 
 have all the great influences of this Gospel age been 
 wrought through the convictions and through the self- 
 devotions and through the life's energies of individual 
 men : not only is it through the individual that masses 
 have been wrought upon, and leavened (where they have 
 been leavened) with the pervading power of the Gospel : 
 not only thus : it is equally true that the mass acted 
 upon has been a mass of individuals, and that then only 
 has the effect wrought been either permanent or sig- 
 nificant, when the individual soul has been converted, 
 and the individual life transformed. The race can only 
 be evangelized through the members. To excuse re-
 
 9 6 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 pentance, to excuse faith, to excuse holiness, is, in other 
 words, to excuse happiness, to excuse salvation, to excuse 
 heaven. The Gospel kingdom, when it comes, must 
 come not in name but in power: they who are drawn 
 to Christ crucified must be drawn spiritually; and there- 
 fore drawn personally, and one by one. Universality is 
 one attribute of the Gospel : but individuality is the 
 other : and health is in the combination and balance 
 of the two. 
 
 For this quality, like the former, may be not health 
 but disease. There have been those in all ages not 
 least in our own who have exaggerated the individual. 
 They have made it, not the beginning only, and not the 
 end only, but the whole, of the Christian life, to save the 
 soul. Starting from that primary law of the physical as 
 well as the spiritual being, known as the instinct of self- 
 preservation, they have represented it in religion, as they 
 never could have represented it in nature, as the sum 
 total of a life's work. That which ought to have been 
 just not left undone, kept in the background, and rather 
 presupposed than spoken of, they have made the one 
 aim and scope of the Gospel, the one single purpose for 
 which any man should come to Him who ' to this end 
 died and rose and revived, that He might be Lord both 
 of the dead and living.' 
 
 Hence, first, a morbid self-consciousness : a perpetual 
 scrutiny of the reality and growth of the spiritual life ; a 
 refusal to rest upon what has been done, in quiet con- 
 fidence, and to walk day by day the little round of 
 obvious duty lest peradventure we should after all 
 be deceived ; lest (stranger still) we should be guilty of 
 an aboriginal presumption, in trusting at all that we are
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 97 
 
 Christ's people, bought by His blood, and spoken to in 
 His Gospel. Many a soul's life has been chilled, be- 
 numbed, thrust back, perhaps extinguished, by this 
 incessant dwelling in the charnel-house, and groping 
 among the ' dead men's bones ' of a fallen nature in- 
 herited and a helpless infirmity yielded to. 
 
 Hence, secondly, a morbid exclusiveness : a perpetual 
 wearing of armour, not against the spiritual foe, but 
 against foes (real or fancied) of flesh and blood ; a re- 
 pulsing of natural sympathy, lest it should beguile into 
 spiritual compromise ; and a dwelling only amongst 
 persons likeminded, who, if not likely to be tempters, 
 are very likely to be flatterers and pacifiers and tor- 
 pedos of the soul. Many a life has been drugged into 
 uselessness by the specious (yet scarcely specious) reso- 
 lution to go nowhere save into the society of the religious, 
 lest peradventure, instead of doing good, I receive evil. 
 How shall Christ's cause on earth be ever advanced, if a 
 cord is thus to be drawn round the habitations of His 
 people; if the motto 'Stand by thyself is to be the 
 watchword of the Christian, and the desire for spiritual 
 safety is to take the place altogether of effort and enter- 
 prise, of lofty self-forgetfulness and Christlike self- 
 sacrifice ? 
 
 Hence, thirdly, a morbid presumptuousness : a per- 
 petual introduction of the divine name into the thoughts 
 and actions of the personal life, as though I were some- 
 thing select, something peculiar, something more than 
 other men are not perhaps meritoriously accepted, but 
 then arbitrarily and capriciously favoured. Let those 
 who have listened to the language or studied the bio- 
 graphies of persons trained in this school of doctrine 
 
 v - 7
 
 98 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 testify whether too often there lurks not the Pharisee's 
 thanksgiving behind the Publican's confession ; the self- 
 confident thought, ' God, I thank Thee that I am not as 
 other men are,' resting itself upon the very humility of 
 the petition, ' God be merciful to me a sinner.' O for 
 one breath, we say, of that most human, most evan- 
 gelical, most divine, supplement of St John 'And not 
 for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.' 
 ' God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Him- 
 self ' God so loved the world, that He gave His Son.' 
 
 Hence, fourthly and lastly, in too many cases a morbid 
 asceticism. For so it is that extremes of doctrine, like 
 extremes of other opinion, oftentimes meet and are at 
 one ; and an eager and pugnacious Evangelism has been 
 not so much the remote ancestress, as the living sister, 
 of a devoted and bigoted Romanism. How is this ? 
 Because a morbid individuality a deification of the per- 
 sonal safety an idolatrous regard to the welfare, which 
 is in other words the luxurious isolation, of the individual 
 soul lies at the very root of either system ; and the 
 natural haven of the man or the woman who claims 
 exemption from the common sympathies and common 
 associations of a baptized Church and a world in 
 common redeemed is a seclusion nowhere so real and 
 nowhere so consistent as in the monastic cloister. These 
 things take different shapes, and bear very diverse 
 names : but trace them to their source, and you will see 
 them one the forgetfulness of a universal Redemption, 
 and the exaltation of spiritual ease above Christian 
 duty. 
 
 Is there not then an individuality which is evan- 
 gelical indeed ?
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 99 
 
 There is. It is soon told in words : it is the first duty 
 and the first happiness of every man to realize it in 
 fact. 
 
 It has respect to three chief things. 
 
 First, it is the business of each one of us to apprehend 
 the Gospel of a free, a personal absolution. 'If Jesus 
 Christ took upon Himself the sins of all men, then He 
 took upon Himself my sins, even mine ' is an argument 
 not more logically true than individually binding. There 
 must be a personal transaction between God and the 
 soul on this basis. There must be a solemn giving of 
 the individual soul exactly as it is seen to be and felt 
 to be in history and in circumstance into the hands 
 of God Himself, on the ground of a revelation made by 
 Him in the Gospel as to a free and total forgiveness 
 of all sin through the alone merits of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ. For lack of this, many men are ' all their life- 
 time subject still to bondage,' even though they say 
 with their lips, and hold tenaciously as a doctrine, ' I 
 believe in the forgiveness of sins.' Yes, but of whose 
 sins ? the sins of others, or your own ? 
 
 Again, it is the business of each one of us to appre- 
 hend for himself the Gospel promise of a holy and 
 divine Spirit to dwell personally in him as the life of 
 his life and the soul of his soul. God 'will give the 
 Holy Spirit to them that ask Him:' then, if that be 
 true if that be true I have only to ask and I shall 
 receive. This too is a transaction between God and 
 the man, which must by its very nature be individual 
 and even secret. No frequency of attendance on the 
 prayers and ordinances of the Church will do this for 
 us : such attendance, to be worth anything, presupposes 
 
 72
 
 ioo Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 and rehearses this. God is a lover of acts : and there 
 are acts of the soul as well as acts of the life. 
 
 Thirdly and I will add none else it is the business 
 of each one of us, having thus stamped upon himself by 
 an individual act the seal of his consecration the double 
 seal of a divine absolution and a divine indwelling 
 then to go forth as a forgiven man and as a spiritual 
 man, not indeed to presume upon what he has done 
 not indeed to contradict by daily inconsistency, or to 
 sin away by daily trifling, the relation towards God 
 into which he has thus solemnly entered but still, I 
 will say it without fear of misconstruction, as much 
 as possible to forget himself; to forget himself in his 
 Saviour's service, and to forget himself in giving his 
 very life for his brethren. Let the individual life, thus 
 far, and in this holy sense, be merged and lost in the 
 relative. Let no cowardly misgiving haunt him, lest 
 perhaps he be going amongst those who share not to 
 the full, or perhaps share not at all, his convictions 
 and his aspirations. Let him go, not asking where he 
 is safest, but who most want him. Let him go, calling 
 in beforehand, and calling in throughout, the forgiving 
 grace and the inhabiting Spirit. Let him go, not to 
 display himself, but to glorify God ; leading others, who 
 mark his kind words, his wise counsels, his gracious 
 spirit, his peaceful countenance, to think of his God 
 with more reverence, and of his Saviour with more 
 love. And God 'will keep the feet of his saints:' He 
 will not suffer one who thus mixes amongst men to 
 be suddenly surprised or 'greatly moved.' Thus through 
 him not least shall the Almighty Lord make good His 
 Divine saying
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel, 101 
 
 'I, lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto, 
 me.' 
 
 In addressing myself, as I ever desire to do, more 
 especially to the younger half of this congregation, it 
 has appeared to me that the individual part of the 
 subject was of yet more appropriateness than the uni- 
 versal. If I might presume to interpret the present life 
 of this University by the memories of a former genera- 
 tion, I should apprehend that the principal danger lay 
 in an overgrowth of the social life and a comparative 
 neglect of the personal. College life ought to be in 
 great part corporate : it is too often (which is a different 
 thing) gregarious. The one shows itself in earnestness 
 to bear the individual part in promoting to the utter- 
 most the wellbeing of the whole. The other shows 
 itself in a selfish use even of the collective being ; in 
 an eagerness to make society minister to self, instead 
 of surrendering self (as far as may be) to the service 
 of society. 
 
 But these remarks which have perhaps a wider 
 application than that to which this last word must 
 confine itself have a special appropriateness to the 
 religious life of this beloved home. I think that there 
 is a danger of this also being too much gregarious and 
 too little personal. In these days of early manhood, \ve 
 are disposed to take Revelation for granted to join in 
 Christian worship and listen to Christian teaching 
 to conform ourselves, less or more, to habits of feeling 
 and practice 'received by tradition from our fathers' 
 rather than to enter into that personal intercourse, of 
 which I have faintly spoken, with God Himself, by way 
 of settling for life the faith which is to be our compass,
 
 IO2 Universality and Individuality [v. 
 
 and the hope which is to be our guiding star. This 
 kind of belief may suffice us while we are propped by 
 numbers and stimulated by friendly sympathies. It 
 will not suffice us in the next stage. It will not suffice 
 us when we come to teach, to toil, to struggle, to 
 combat, to suffer, to die. When you go forth hence, 
 into the parish which is to be your work-field, into the 
 metropolis which is to be your battle-ground into the 
 secret study in which you are to investigate all truth, 
 into the wilderness of doubt and disputation in which 
 you are to be 'with the wild beasts, tempted of Satan '- 
 into the home in which you are to know sorrow, to 
 endure bereavement, to feel the touch of anguish ; at 
 last, all alone, to face death then this gregarious faith 
 will be a treacherous reed to lean upon : it will only 
 'go into your hand and pierce it:' woe is unto us 
 then, if we cannot say betimes, ' Now I believe, not 
 because of the word of others, but because I have 
 heard Him myself, and know that this is indeed the 
 Christ, the Saviour of the world.' 
 
 Suffer the word of affectionate exhortation which 
 would bid you, here in your College life, to habituate 
 yourselves early to a thoughtful solitude. Let no 
 day pass without its calm serious moments of self- 
 examination and confession, of earnest prayer and holy 
 communing. I would dare to say, in words plainer 
 still founded upon observation and experience of that 
 life which is now yours secure to yourselves im- 
 moveably the first fresh hours of the blessed Sunday 
 for absolute privacy: let the thoughts suited to the 
 day ingrain themselves in you before you seek or 
 receive the society of any one : it will give a sweet-
 
 v.] of Christ's Gospel. 103 
 
 ness to the day, and a consecration to the week, such 
 as nothing else can 
 
 'As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended 
 upon the mountains of Zion: for there the Lord com- 
 manded the blessing, even life for evermore.'
 
 VI. 
 
 OBLIVIONS AND AMBITIONS OF THE LIFE OF 
 GRACE. 
 
 Philippians iii. 13. 
 
 Forgetting those things ivhich are behind, and reaching forth mi to 
 those things which are before. 
 
 ST PAUL has several metaphors for his apostolical 
 life. 
 
 Sometimes he is a servant ; executing the orders, day 
 by day, of a living and speaking Master. 
 
 Sometimes he is a steward ; charged with the keys of 
 an exhaustless storechamber, and dispensing to the 
 members of a vast household what he calls the mysteries, 
 that is, the indiscoverable but now revealed secrets, of 
 divine and life-giving truth. 
 
 Sometimes he is a herald ; making proclamation of 
 peace with God through the death, and through the life 
 after death, of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
 Sometimes he is a builder ; raising upon the one only 
 foundation the superstructure of collective and indi- 
 vidual lives, 'growing into an holy temple,' at last into 
 ' an habitation of God through the Spirit.' 
 
 Sometimes he is a husbandman ; tilling the fallow 
 ground of nature, and sowing it with the good seed of 
 grace and the Gospel.
 
 vi.] Oblivions and Ambitions, &c. 105 
 
 Sometimes he is a priest ; offering up the perpetual 
 sacrifice of a devoted life and an evangelized world. 
 
 Sometimes he is a soldier ; enlisted into Christ's 
 army, fighting not against flesh and blood but against 
 spiritual foes, demolishing the strongholds of pride and 
 sin, and waging an incessant warfare against the various 
 developements and the successive confederations of 
 evil. 
 
 Sometimes, as in the passage now before us, he is an 
 athlete contending for a prize ; a runner in that long 
 and contested foot-race, of which the course is the life of 
 earth, and the goal the life of heaven. 
 
 He tells us here how the race began. Christ Himself 
 ' apprehended ' him ; laid upon him the strong arm as of 
 an almighty compulsion, and constrained him to make 
 for the mark which He set full in his view. Ever since 
 the day when Christ called to him from on high stopped 
 him at the gate of Damascus, struck from his hand the 
 weapon of persecution, and shrivelled up in his bosom, 
 as by a lightning flash, the commission of the high 
 priest ever since that day, which had turned his former 
 gains into losses, and made him count his own righteous- 
 ness a mere refuse and abomination ' for the excellency 
 of the knowledge of Christ Jesus his Lord,' he has been 
 running the race set before him, ' not as uncertainly,' 
 but with a definite adherence to its rules and a resolute 
 determination for success ; not ' counting himself to have 
 apprehended,' not relaxing his efforts as he nears the 
 goal, but straining every sinew and nerve to the utter- 
 most, if so be he may at last reach the winning-post and 
 attain the imperishable wreath which hangs thereon. 
 ' This one thing I do ; forgetting those things which are
 
 io6 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 behind,' that part of the course which has already been 
 traversed, ' and reaching forth unto/ straining every 
 power to the uttermost after, 'those things which are 
 before,' that remainder of space which lies still between 
 me and the goal, ' I press toward the mark ' I press on 
 according to (by the rule and direction of) the mark or 
 goal 'for the prize of the high calling,' what is else- 
 where termed ' the heavenly calling ' ' of God in Christ 
 Jesus.' 
 
 This is St Paul's account of his own Christian life. 
 And just as in another Epistle he applies the same 
 similitude generally, and says to his Corinthian con- 
 gregation, ' So run, that ye may obtain ; ' even thus to 
 the Philippians he points in like manner the moral of his 
 own example, and says, ' Let us therefore, as many as 
 be perfect, be thus minded.' 
 
 Here then we have before us another of the ' whole- 
 some words of our Lord Jesus Christ ; ' that which may 
 well form the text of a practical and (I trust) salutary 
 meditation on 
 
 The Oblivions and the Ambitions of the Life of 
 Grace. 
 
 ' Forgetting those things which are behind, and reach- 
 ing forth unto those things which are before.' 
 
 In the combination of these two maxims lies one of 
 the most striking illustrations of the healthiness of the 
 Gospel. 
 
 i. Memory, wise men say, ought to be the sieve of 
 knowledge ; 'captious,' but (in part) ' intenible.' Too often 
 memory retains the worthless, but lets the precious go. 
 In some few instances, memory keeps everything : words, 
 wise and unwise ; facts, trivial and important ; dates of
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 107 
 
 great battles and insignificant accessions ; looks, gestures, 
 small blunders, unfortunate speeches ; all indiscrimi- 
 nately, and all equally. This is as bad as having no 
 memory ; let such a man pray that he may forget. Even 
 the Gospel teaches oblivion. ' Forgetting,' St Paul says, 
 ' those things which are behind.' It is a point to which 
 he evidently attaches great importance. He makes it, 
 we may almost say, one half of Christian living. The 
 oblivions of the Gospel are one part, and the ambitions 
 of the Gospel are the other. 
 
 It is quite true, that there is a morbid as well as a 
 healthy forgetfulness. 
 
 For example. 
 
 A man may forget past warnings. The fool despises 
 correction, and the sinner forgets it. God has dealt with 
 him in part by discipline. He has made him rue the 
 day when he took the first step in sin. That idle look, 
 that wrong thought, that purposeless or half unmeant 
 word, led on to sin : you were sorry you said you had 
 learned experience by suffering but you did the same 
 again. God corrected you and you ' refused to receive 
 correction.' ' Because I have purged thee, and thou 
 wast not purged, thou shalt not be purged from thy 
 filthiness any more, till I have caused my fury to rest 
 upon thee.' 
 
 And a man may forget past mercies. What is the 
 past life of any of us but a continuous, an unbroken 
 succession of undeserved blessings ? And, alas, what is 
 the past life of many of us, but a continuous, an un- 
 broken succession of those forgetfulnesses which are 
 unthankfulnesses too ? 
 
 These are not ' the things behind ' which St Paul
 
 io8 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 makes it a point of duty to forget. On the contrary, he 
 is never weary of recurring to the greatness of that long- 
 suffering with which Christ has dealt with him, amidst 
 provocations for which he makes it no justification, 
 though he may record it as a fact, that they were com- 
 mitted ' ignorantly in unbelief.' 
 
 The time is short, and therefore we will contract for 
 today the enumeration of morbid exaggerations or 
 isolations of the rule here before us, and go straight to 
 the thing pointed at ; mentioning in two particulars the 
 Christian use of what may be called (however inac- 
 curately) the divinely implanted faculty of forgetfulness. 
 
 There is first, then, an oblivion of the irreparable. 
 
 Let us not be misunderstood. There is an aspect in 
 which even the irreparable ought not to be forgotten. 
 St Paul never lost the remembrance of an irretrievable 
 past. The long years of his Judaism, with all that it 
 led to and issued in that orthodoxy which he learned 
 to call blasphemy, and that zeal which he came to 
 reckon among the chief of sins this time past of his 
 life, though done with as to its guilt, was daily recalled 
 by him for humiliation ; dwelt upon to enhance the 
 divine longsuffering, though dismissed as to any doubt 
 which it might suggest of the divine absolution. 
 
 And in these last words lies the difference between a 
 dangerous and a health}' forgetfulness of the irreparable. 
 
 There is such a thing, no doubt, as a presumptuous 
 disregard of past sin. Because God has forgiven, it 
 follows not that we must forget. There is a 'going 
 softly all our days ' suitable to the case of him who has 
 been much forgiven. There is a posture before God, 
 and there is a carriage towards man, befitting, and no
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 109 
 
 more than befitting, one who has fallen into great trans- 
 gression. That man ought never again to be accused 
 of levity or suspected of vanity. That man ought to 
 hold his mercy by a more lowly tenure, and to cherish 
 his grace with a more anxious scruple. And if he does 
 not so there is no safety. The foe watches, if he watches 
 not : the tempter is behind the door still, and will enter 
 at the first sign of a sleeping porter, and an unlocked, 
 unbarred, unchained door. 
 
 The oblivion of the irreparable is not this. What I 
 have been must not be forgotten ever : it ought always 
 to be the groundwork of feeling, the stimulus of action, 
 and the undersong of praise. The maxim, ' The greater 
 the sinner the greater the saint,' is at once a lie and 
 a blasphemy. There is such a thing as a light or even a 
 boastful treatment of a sinful past, which is not evan- 
 gelical language, and not safe for the sinner. 
 
 But there is, on the other hand, an oblivion of the 
 irreparable which is at once true and salutary. The 
 past is. No regrets, no tears, no repentances, can make 
 it undone. Then accept it, recognize it, start from it. 
 Do not expect to be that which your individual history 
 forbids that you should be. God sees you as you 
 are : see yourself so. God knows by what gradual 
 steps of sin you have fallen to this estate : God 
 knows by what gradual steps of repentance you 
 have risen to this. Such as you are, be such such 
 when you kneel before your God such when you go 
 abroad amongst men. ' Forget the things behind.' That 
 which you cannot be, by reason of your sin, dismiss it. 
 That which you cannot be, by reason of your sin, forget 
 it. If there is something which you cannot be, there
 
 1 10 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 is something also which you can be. If you cannot be 
 a saint, you may be a penitent : if you cannot ' sit on 
 the right hand' or 'sit on the left,' -at least you may 
 yet be a ' hired servant ' at least you may yet be ' a 
 doorkeeper in the house of your God.' Rest there, 
 and be thankful. Merely to dwell among the thoughts 
 of what might have been is unreal and therefore un- 
 profitable. Learn this lesson difficult like all lessons 
 truly learned in the school of Christ the oblivion of the 
 irreparable. 
 
 Learn secondly, and on the other hand, the oblivion 
 of the attained. That is it of which St Paul here 
 speaks. He 'counts not himself to have apprehended:' 
 in that sense chiefly he forgets the things behind. 
 
 The experience of life makes us almost weary of the 
 records of Christian experience as now received. If I 
 had my choice, a man is tempted to say, I would dwell 
 rather with the irreligious. There at least I shall find 
 reality I shall find naturalness I shall find humility. 
 There conceit is not, nor ill-concealed pride, nor 
 self-complacency dressing itself in an ostentation of 
 thankfulness. There we hear nothing about humble 
 instruments, nor about being privileged to do a work 
 for God. There are no publications of the triumphs 
 of self-sacrifice, nor of the wonderful achievements 
 wrought by the first appearance in the home of the 
 ungodly of the saintly man or the gifted woman. Ah ! 
 how different was it in the first days. Where in 
 St Paul's Epistles do we find anything which offends 
 thus the palate of taste, or thus grates 'upon the ear 
 of modesty ? There, on the contrary, we find an utter 
 self-forgetfulness, a remembrance honestly made of sins,
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. \ 1 1 
 
 and a hearty sense that Christ is all, and that whatever 
 is is of Him. We have got the words, and too much of 
 them ; but we have lost the feeling and the thing 
 signified. The minister of Christ must tell his triumphs 
 on the platform ; and the woman who may not preach 
 Christ in churches must preach herself through the 
 medium of the narrative, the memoir, or the auto- 
 biography. 
 
 'Forget,' St Paul says, 'the things behind.' If God 
 has enabled you to win back your own soul from evil, 
 or to save a brother's soul from death, thank Him for 
 it and then forget it. If you who were once the 
 slave of sin have become through divine grace able 
 to see and to follow the light of life and of immortality, 
 stay not to reflect upon it: press on, linger not, that you 
 may not only enjoy the foretaste but also win the 
 crown. When St Paul forgot the things behind, think 
 what there was in it. He had ' seen Jesus Christ,' and 
 received from His own lips the apostolical mission. 
 He had left all and followed Him. He had demolished 
 by a stroke the whole fabric of an almost completed 
 self-righteousness, and set out quite afresh in a race 
 of self-denial, self-sacrifice, and self-crucifixion. And 
 yet he forgot all this. What have we to forget ? Where, 
 in our case, is the edifice of the natural virtue ? where, 
 in our case, is the achievement of the spiritual grace ? 
 If it be there, it is to be forgotten : if it be not there, 
 who shall measure the depth of the just, the Christian 
 self-abasement ? 
 
 In what sense can I let each one ask himself be 
 said to be engaged in this competition, this candidate- 
 ship for a heavenly prize ? to be indeed running a race,
 
 ii2 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 and to have a part of the course behind ? Is there not, 
 for me at least, in such language, a feeling of insincerity, 
 almost of profaneness ? In what sense has Christ yet 
 apprehended me ? Or if that indeed be true, in some 
 slight degree, of all the baptized, at least in \vhat 
 sense can I either forget a Christian past or disclaim 
 a Christian attainment ? 
 
 ' Holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling,' let 
 these questions not go unanswered! Assist the answer 
 by another question What know I of a Gospel am- 
 bition ? 
 
 2. Every feeling and every instinct of man's nature 
 finds its recognition and its correction in the Gospel of 
 Jesus Christ. It is so with fear, it is so with love; it is so 
 with anger, it is so with ambition. Thus not least the 
 Gospel itself is proved to be a word for all men, by 
 being a word for the whole of each. 
 
 Look at that impulse which is here dealt with. What 
 is life without ambition ? What is man without am- 
 bition ? Show me the mind which feels not its stimulus, 
 and I can designate the life at once as tame, spiritless, 
 and wellnigh joyless. 
 
 I should expect to find something about ambition in 
 the Bible. Yes, of course serious warnings against its 
 excess, against its restlessness, against its misdirection. 
 But not warnings only. I should expect to find such a 
 principle of action, such an engine of influence, such a 
 colour and zest and spring of life, adopted too and used 
 and ennobled by the Gospel. I cannot think that Christ 
 would let it die out from human life, or lie rusting and 
 disparaged in the breasts of His people. 
 
 I know indeed that there is a morbid use of ambition.
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 113 
 
 Morbid even in this world's estimate. To call a man 
 ambitious is but doubtful praise. To represent him 
 as influenced chiefly by ambition, in his pursuit of 
 objects or in his exercise of talents, would be to damage 
 him in the eyes even of worldly judges. Ambition 
 is sometimes called, is often felt to be, vulgar. If it has 
 respect only to position, only to rank, only to office, 
 only to power, much more only to emolument, men feel 
 that it does not elevate, that it may even debase and 
 spoil the character. Certainly One who came to us 
 from heaven would not sanction, would not fail to 
 reprove, such ambitions. In His eyes earth's prizes 
 could not glitter. He who had seen God, He who 
 had made the world and all things therein, who (even 
 upon earth) was still, as to His divine nature, ' in 
 heaven, in the bosom of the Father,' could not bid 
 us to fall down and worship any object of sense and 
 time, any image of man's erection not the honour, not 
 the applause, not even the calm judicial approval (for its 
 own sake) of 'a man that shall die.' All such ambitions 
 must be morbid, when the light of God falls on them. 
 
 But ambition itself is not sinful. Sinful in its ex- 
 aggeration, sinful in its misdirection, sinful in its 
 isolation, it is not sinful in itself: it budded in Paradise, 
 it shall bloom in heaven. 
 
 Three times the word itself the plain word 'ambition,' 
 which is 'the love of honour' occurs in the pages of Holy 
 Scripture. Translators shrank from expressing it : they 
 diluted or paraphrased its strong decisive utterance 
 called it in one place 'studying,' in another 'striving,' in 
 another 'labouring' either because they liked not the 
 sound, or because they were perplexed by its context. 
 V. 8
 
 H4 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 For strange indeed to our conception is the place of 
 the word, and its application, in Scripture. 
 
 It can surprise no one that it is St Paul who ap- 
 propriates it. We should look for something about 
 ambition in the utterances of that earnest, noble, aspiring 
 soul. The man who wrote, ' I press toward the mark,' 
 is the man to tell us of a motive, and to explain to 
 us how that which is ambitious in nature shall refine 
 and spiritualize itself into a Christian grace. He applies 
 the word to three subjects, and his example will teach 
 us to apply it to a fourth. 
 
 In his earliest Epistle he uses it, and bids the 
 Thessalonians not only (as we read it) to ' study' but 
 to ' be ambitious to be quiet.' 
 
 By a marvellous yet most intelligible paradox he 
 sets before Christian men first of all the ambition of 
 tranquillity. He boldly ties ambition to its very opposite. 
 If there is a life which we should describe as void of 
 ambition, it is the still tranquil existence of a man 
 contented with the station in which God has placed 
 him, and finding in its round of common duties the 
 very goal and rest of his aspirations. Yet this is the 
 life which St Paul connects with ambition. ' Be am- 
 bitious to be quiet, and to do your own business.' 
 
 I address many, even in this centre of youthful 
 activity, who are not, in the common sense of the 
 word, ambitious. Their ideas of happiness are not 
 connected with a career of professional success or 
 political renown. They have no intention of rising 
 into general notice by any of the ordinary roads to 
 honour. They expect to be, they are satisfied to be, 
 what former generations of their house have been, men
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 115 
 
 living upon their own, and contented (that is, as the 
 word means, 'contained') within it. Whether they have 
 much, or whether they have little, it bounds their desire, 
 and they would have it so. A quiet life, they say, is to 
 their taste : they are not ambitious. 
 
 If an older man might offer his counsel, in the fore- 
 view of a life which may God crown (as He is evermore 
 ready to do) with His peculiar blessing, could he fail to 
 say this to them ? A quiet life is of all lives the 
 happiest: but a quiet life must not be a torpid life, 
 must not be a purposeless life, must not be a self- 
 indulgent nor a selfish life. And it might easily 
 become any one or all of these things. Take St Paul's 
 hint. Carry an ambition into it. Learn from his words 
 the ambition of tranquillity. Let your quiet life be an 
 object with you. Take the measure of its happiness 
 beforehand : know what it is ; what in duty, what in 
 capability, what in its course, what in its end : and then, 
 as such, propose it to yourself betimes : study it, plan it, 
 aspire to it, pray for it. Let tranquillity be an ambition, 
 and it will sparkle with a new lustre and carry with 
 it the antidote to its own evil. 
 
 There is another ambition of which St Paul tells 
 and that is the ambition of approbation. Here indeed 
 we are, at first sight, on commoner ground. This is 
 what ambition often seeks : perhaps, if traced to its 
 source, this is always its meaning. ' Wherefore we 
 labour,' St Paul says to the Corinthians but the real 
 word is again, 'we are ambitious whether present or 
 absent, to be accepted of Him.' The former ambition 
 was, in sound at least, the lowest of all : this surely, 
 even to the ear of sense, is lofty enough, magnificent
 
 ii6 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 enough, for the most aspiring. Ambition is here brought 
 face to face, not with duty only, but with religion, with 
 revelation, with God Himself. Ambition is the love of 
 honour : here St Paul, echoing his Master's words, says, 
 ' Receive not honour one from another' that sort of 
 honour which drags you and binds you down to earth, 
 which makes faith impossible, which becomes at last an 
 impassable barrier between the soul and God receive not 
 honour one of another, but seek ye with all your seeking 
 ' the honour that cometh from God only.' Present or 
 absent ' at home in the body,' or ' at home with the 
 Lord' let this be your ambition, to be acceptable, to 
 be well pleasing, to Him. 
 
 That which was on St Paul's lips so full of meaning 
 and so instinct with life has become on ours the mere 
 echo of a distant voice, carrying in it neither persuasion 
 nor indeed reality. The purpose, the effort, the desire, 
 to please Christ is little more with most men than an 
 unexpressive and unimpressive phrase for duty: we just 
 accept it as such, but it does not move us, it scarcely 
 reproves. 
 
 And yet what are we if this be so? Not runners, 
 surely, in the Christian race, if the thought of Christ's 
 approval is no more to us than this. With St Paul the 
 approbation of Christ was an ambition it was tJie 
 ambition in other words the interest, the zest and 
 sparkle, of his whole being. Might but his ambition 
 kindle ours. This approbation of Christ in presence 
 or absence, is it not something desirable, something 
 attractive, something (could we but have it) wonderfully 
 satisfying ? It is the only thing of which a man can 
 make sure. Other objects of ambition come and go :
 
 vi.J of the Life of Grace. 1 1 7 
 
 they are remote, or they are ambiguous, at least they are 
 precarious, at least they are perishable: life may not 
 reach them, death must withdraw them. But it is other- 
 wise with the approbation of Christ. 'In His favour 
 is life.' 'In His light' men first and only 'see light.' 
 His smile penetrates within, stirs the very life of being, 
 and opens to the grateful soul the promise, the prospect, 
 yea, the foretaste and the fruition of heaven. It is not as 
 a stern solemn duty, it is as an ambition, that we should 
 set before this congregation the thought of the appro- 
 bation of Christ. 
 
 There is a well-known Church, in one of the most 
 squalid parts of London, in which the minister, I am 
 told, gathers around him on Sunday evening, after 
 the service is ended, a little circle of youthful, almost 
 childish, listeners, to whom it is no offence to address 
 literally the inspired saying, ' Let him that stole steal 
 no more.' It is assumed that they come from and will 
 return to the haunts not of destitution only but of 
 crime. Those haunts are their home : they have none 
 other. How are these strange auditors for strange 
 they must appear to our notions of a congregation how 
 are these strange listeners attentive, intelligent, impres- 
 sible how are they pleaded with ? By the love of 
 Jesus Christ by the desire for His love by the am- 
 bition of His approbation. For the sake of Jesus, 
 crush that rising thought of wickedness, that returning 
 lust of dishonesty. For the sake of Jesus, be hungry 
 rather than steal. For the sake of Jesus, do that little 
 act of kindness carry that morsel of bread to the 
 starving, sit by that sick brother mend that coat, 
 patch that shoe, for the love of Jesus. It is a noble
 
 ii8 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 mission, to awaken such an ambition at once so new, 
 and so natural in such bosoms. God grant that no 
 folly of Ritualism 1 and no falsehood of Romanism may 
 be suffered to enter in and mar that work. 
 
 But shall that ambition which is found so powerful 
 a motive in hearts depraved and lives degraded shall 
 that ambition of approbation, which can keep young 
 criminals out of prisons, and redeem from hell itself 
 souls bespoken as it were and labelled for perdition 
 shall it find no place in lives and in hearts like those 
 now .appealed to, where crime is still a horror, and 
 every generous impulse has its native home ? If you 
 would ever know what is the comfort of the divine 
 love, what the energy and fire of the divine life below, 
 begin at once to refer the passing day, with all its 
 little items of business and pleasure its studies, its 
 amusements, its relaxations, its companionships to the 
 direction, to the arbitration, to the approval and blessing, 
 of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Be ambitious, in 
 sight and out of sight, to be accepted with Him. Ask 
 Him, morning by morning, as a real and living Person, 
 to ' order your going ' for the day, and to ' make your 
 way acceptable to Himself.' Night by night, carry- 
 back to Him the day's report not unstained (it may 
 be) by sin, not unblotted with tears of repentance yet 
 still the record of a sincere purpose to please Him, and 
 still therefore a record not despised by Him nor rejected. 
 There is yet a third ambition of which St Paul speaks 
 to the Romans. It is the ambition of distinctiveness 
 of a separate work, and a definite mission. 
 
 1 [I leave the words as they were spoken in 1866: they jar a little upon 
 me in 1888.]
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 119 
 
 Thus he speaks. 'Yea, so have I strived' but again 
 the word is, ' so am I ambitious to preach the Gospel, 
 not where Christ was named, lest I should build upon 
 another man's foundation: but as it is written, To whom 
 He was not spoken of, they shall see ; and they that 
 have not heard shall understand.' It is the nearest 
 approach of any in Scripture to that kind of ambition 
 which we call personal. At the first hearing we are 
 inclined almost to say, Does St Paul choose his work ? 
 is he not willing to take any work to go first, or to go 
 second, or to go last, to a particular place or land, as 
 God sends him? No doubt. But he is sent thus and 
 not thus. He is intended to go first where he goes at 
 all. It might have been otherwise : but that is God's 
 will concerning him. It is thus, he tells the Corinthians, 
 that he knows the limits of his province. He knows 
 by this sign that they belong to it namely, that he 
 got to them first. That was the proof to which he 
 appeals of his right to their obedience. And that 
 which in one aspect was a mission, was in another 
 aspect an ambition. St Paul encouraged in himself, 
 he did not mortify, this ambition (not of distinction 
 but) of distinctiveness. He was ambitious to have a 
 work peculiar to himself, and a province which should 
 be all his own. 
 
 And we think that his language which is, in other 
 words, the expression of the will of God sanctions and 
 justifies some such feeling as this now. We think that 
 men would do the work of God better if they availed 
 themselves of His gracious permission to choose their 
 work, to plan it, and to keep to it. It ought to be one 
 of the most serious (I had almost said, one of the most
 
 i 2O Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 solemn) functions of a young man's education most of 
 all, of that closing portion of it which has its place in 
 the University to ponder the question, not only what 
 particular profession, but also what special department 
 of that particular profession, will best suit his disposition, 
 turn his education to account, promote his welfare and 
 happiness, and call into exercise those faculties and 
 those talents with which God in the sovereign distri- 
 bution of His gifts has been pleased to endow him. 
 I would have no man leave this place without a definite 
 ambition concerning his work in life. Subject indeed 
 we must needs be at the beginning, in the midst, and 
 to the last day of life to a controlling, an overruling, 
 an often disturbing and disappointing Providence. God 
 must dispose : he who forgets this ruins all. But it is 
 not God's will that we should be the mere sport of 
 circumstance, waiting upon events to decide for us, and 
 sitting still to see what happens. ' Every man hath his 
 proper gift of God ; one after this manner, another after 
 that:' and amongst these gifts is the power of reason- 
 ing upon them ; of deciding, under God, to go this way 
 or that, to work here or there, to do this or that, to be 
 this or that and, having so decided, therein humbly 
 yet trustfully to abide. There is divine warrant in 
 Scripture for an ambition of distinctiveness. 
 
 St Paul's ambition was to preach Christ where He 
 was not yet named. The corresponding ambition in 
 a Christian heart now would be to find some neglected 
 place, and to give a life to its evangelization. It may 
 be in what is, in itself and for some men, the noblest 
 of callings, a missionary life. It may be in a line of 
 duty, at first sight far less enterprising, but making
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 121 
 
 (if it be possible) in the long run a yet heavier demand 
 upon the energy, upon the perseverance, upon the de- 
 votion. 
 
 It is a great honour to a place of education to have 
 sent out evangelists. One devoted life, even one sacri- 
 ficed life, is worth a thousand lives husbanded to old age in 
 commonplace respectabilities. When Cambridge sent out 
 Henry Martyn to die, at one and thirty, in the peopled 
 solitude of Tocat, it was no waste : that sacrifice had 
 in it the seed and germ of countless self-devotions : 
 that life came back hither, to stir a thousand lives into 
 the imitation of its own heroism. 
 
 And when now we are mourning over a more recent 
 bereavement, and recalling here to mind, amidst the 
 loved scenes of his youth, the resolute diligence, the 
 blameless example, the delightful converse, the stedfast 
 friendship, of one who became afterwards the Metro- 
 politan Bishop of India inclined almost to repine at 
 the thought of a removal so sudden, so cheerless, so 
 premature without a deathbed and without a sepulchre ; 
 yet let us check the thankless murmur, and remind our- 
 selves rather that here was a distinctive work granted to 
 life, and a distinctive death sent to close it : a great 
 work, thoroughly grasped and powerfully handled ; and 
 a noble, almost a martyr's end, setting the seal of 
 perpetual remembrance upon the honoured cherished 
 name, and rousing, we doubt not, many a heart, amongst 
 disciples and strangers, to go forth to live his life, and 
 (if God will) to die his death. 
 
 To have educated such men, and to have given such 
 men as these back to God, is a great glory, and a great 
 grace too, vouchsafed to an illustrious seminary of
 
 122 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 Christian learning. These things enkindle afresh at 
 Christ's altar the torch of apostolical zeal, and hand 
 it on, with new life and new hope, to generations yet 
 to come. 
 
 But, after all, there are home-ambitions not less 
 apostolical : only the more safe, if the less illustrious. 
 
 When, sixty years ago, a young student left this 
 University, crowned with its honours, and betook him- 
 self to a dull, almost repulsive, manufacturing midland 
 village, there to spend and be spent, through half a 
 century, for a people, often thankless, of whom he was 
 to be by turns the pastor and the schoolmaster and the 
 physician and the nurse always and in all things the 
 friend ; toiling for them by night and day, till the in- 
 exhaustible spirit was at last prisoned in a worn-out, 
 crippled, dying body ; and to be laid at last between 
 two buttresses of his church, between the graves of 
 two lost sons, in sure and certain hope of the resurrection 
 of the just ; I say that that life was quite as distinctive 
 in its work, quite as apostolical in its single purpose 
 and in its self-sacrificing devotion, as if it had been 
 transplanted to the other side of the globe, and breathed 
 out, through accident or fever, in the burning wastes of 
 Asia Minor, or in the sea-like stream of the rushing 
 eddying Ganges, in the professed service of the Church's 
 missions. 
 
 It is an omen of good to this University, that such 
 ambitions are still rife here ; that men are still to be 
 found in our Colleges, who will set before themselves in 
 youth, and cherish through advancing years, the noble 
 purpose of making Christ known in England, in places 
 where otherwise His Gospel would have been, if not a
 
 vi.] of the Life of Grace. 123 
 
 name unheard, at least a power unfelt and lifeless. We 
 must not speak of the living, as we may and ought 
 to speak of the dead : otherwise I would tell of one 
 man, known to many of us, who has given himself, 
 already for a quarter of a century, to the service of one 
 remote, obscure, and almost nameless hamlet ; has re- 
 claimed it from a practical heathenism for the Gospel, 
 and made it, by his own single devotion, complete in all 
 the appliances of an English parish, and in all the 
 blessings of an evangelical church. 
 
 These are the ambitions which we would propose to 
 you, in the foreview of a life which must be spent some- 
 where, and in the disposal of which God gives to many 
 of you an almost unrestricted choice. To be the evan- 
 gelist of some English village seems to me to open one 
 of the most glorious as well as most self-sacrificing 
 ambitions which can be offered to a young man full 
 of energy, full of faith and love and of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Today I am to speak to you of one particular work ; 
 a work close to our own doors, and having a peculiar 
 claim upon the sympathies of this congregation. There 
 is a spiritual destitution there is a famine of the Word 
 and of the ministrations of grace in one large and 
 populous district of this University town. You are 
 asked to make provision by your almsgiving this day 
 for the support and for the extension of Christian minis- 
 trations amidst that too long neglected population. I 
 would place this call, if it might be so, within the scope 
 of that ambition of distinctiveness, of which we have 
 last spoken. Let us bring to a point any good im- 
 pressions which God's Word today may have made 
 upon us. Let us resolve that this one collection, to be
 
 124 Oblivions and Ambitions [vi. 
 
 made at the doors of the church this afternoon, shall 
 amount to the whole stipend, for one year, of one 
 additional clergyman. Let the almsgiving of this 
 service amount to a hundred pounds. What is that 
 sum to ask of this congregation ? I hear with sorrow 
 but I hear also with some incredulity that the gene- 
 rosity of this University on occasions like this is not 
 what it used to be ; that some occupants of these seats 
 and galleries are not ashamed now, as once (I think) 
 they would have been, to pass by the plates held for their 
 offering ; or else to put into them that sort of gift which 
 not only 'doth cost them nothing,' but rather affronts 
 than honours the sacred name of charity. I pray you, 
 wipe out the reproach. Let not the meannesses of more 
 ignorant congregations find encouragement in a church 
 like ours. Nay, I have seen myself in northern churches, 
 filled only with labouring men, an alacrity and bounty 
 in giving which might put to shame a congregation of 
 princes. I will hope, and I will even entreat, that the 
 gatherings of this day may be on a scale in some degree 
 commensurate with the ability of the givers and with 
 the importance of the object. 
 
 Finally, and in one word only, there is the ambition, 
 not of tranquillity, not of approbation, not of distinctive- 
 ness, but of attainment ; not of a definite work, but of 
 a safe end. St Paul lives thus that he may end well. 
 ' If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of 
 the dead.' Let this aim be ours, and we shall win. Set 
 before yourselves this resolution early in life, and later 
 in life, and to the last day of life ' I must reach the 
 goal.' I must not be amongst those who trifle away the 
 precious hours, and never set out in earnest in the race
 
 vi.J of the Life of Grace. 125 
 
 set before them. I must not be amongst those, yet 
 more unhappy still, who for a time ' run well,' and then 
 ' are hindered ' that they should not win their crown. 
 ' So run, that ye may obtain.' If there be first in us this 
 mind this ambition, this resolution, this determination, 
 of success all will be well. All else will find its place, 
 if we can only say with St Paul, ' This one thing I do, 
 forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching 
 forth unto those things which are before 
 I press toward the mark.'
 
 VII. 
 
 INDOLENCE. 
 
 Hebrews vi. 12. 
 
 That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith 
 and patience inherit the promises. 
 
 ST JUDE bids us to 'contend earnestly for the faith 
 once delivered to the saints.' He speaks of Christian 
 people as an army of ' holy (consecrated) men,' to whose 
 keeping there has been entrusted a sort of sacred banner, 
 a standard of divine loyalty and allegiance, for the 
 safety of which they are made responsible to their King. 
 This banner is 'the faith;' that revelation of truth 
 (spoken of last Sunday) which is presented to the in- 
 dividual faith as its object of apprehension. This faith, 
 'once (that is, once for all) delivered,' is in jeopardy. 
 It has to be 'contended for;' nay, St Jude's word is, 
 ' contended over ' as though it were already struck 
 down, ' laid low, even to the ground,' and the business of 
 the faithful few were to cover, to protect, to fight over it. 
 It is a strong figure ; certainly as true and as forcible in 
 our days as in his. And it could not have been in- 
 appropriate to make this the text of these sermons ; to 
 bid the occupants of this church, older and younger 
 alike, to fight the battle of the imperilled faith of the 
 Church in this their day. Where, if not in an English
 
 vii.] Indolence. 127 
 
 University, can we look for champions of God's truth 
 for the fighting men of His Church in reference to 
 doctrine ? Nevertheless we have not chosen this par- 
 ticular topic. Not because we disparage its importance ; 
 not because we think that anywhere it could be more 
 suitable : but for these two other reasons. First, because 
 it could not even here come home to all men : there 
 must be even in this congregation many who feel that 
 they have no aptitude, and therefore no call, to come 
 forth as the disputants and controversialists of their day, 
 even on God's behalf. And secondly, because there is 
 always a risk in this service, a spiritual risk : there is so 
 much in it which is unwholesome ; such a tendency to 
 personality ; such a temptation to wrath and wrangling ; 
 such a liability to seek triumphs rather than to win 
 souls ; such a fatal readiness to put doctrine in the place 
 of practice, and opinion in the place of life ; above all, 
 so terrible a likelihood of overlooking oneself, and, in 
 the zeal of a supposed anxiety for the faith, forgetting 
 that one ' weightier matter,' which is faith itself. 
 
 Therefore, instead of bidding each man, and each 
 young man, in this congregation, to become a disputant 
 for the faith, however seriously and sorely imperilled in 
 this late (perhaps latest) period of the Church's trial, we 
 have said this rather, Look to your own faith : guard it, 
 watch over it, your choicest, your most precarious pos- 
 session : and in so doing you will best be accomplishing 
 that which St Jude, and the Spirit who spake in him, 
 meant, for us, when he charged the men of his day to 
 contend and to struggle over the faith itself. 'We wrestle 
 not against flesh and blood : ' we wrestle against spiritual 
 foes; and it is the first stratagem of their subtle, their
 
 128 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 most experienced warfare, to turn off the attention of 
 the soul from the true key of the position, from the 
 actual point of attack. 
 
 We have proposed then in the plainest and most 
 practical way to do what an old king of Judah proposed 
 to his enemy the king of Israel, namely, ' to look our 
 foe in the face ; ' to think with ourselves what are some 
 of those adversaries to our faith in other words, to our 
 own personal insight into, and interest in, the things of 
 God with which we must enter into conflict day by day 
 if we would be believing men ; if we would ourselves 
 ' fight the good fight of faith,' and ' lay hold on eternal 
 life.' 
 
 We have placed first in this list the spirit of Un- 
 reality ; that habit of holding for truths many doctrines 
 which we have never grasped and never handled, of 
 going out to battle in armour which we ' have not 
 proved,' of worshipping God in words and forms which, 
 for us, at the time, mean nothing which, if in one sense 
 the opposite, is in another sense an opponent, one 
 amongst many, of that spiritual vision, that sight of the 
 unseen, that soul's intuition, which is the definition of 
 faith. 
 
 To-day we will change the subject, and speak, under 
 the guidance of the text, of another enemy of the personal 
 faith, which is the spirit of Indolence. ' That ye be 
 not slothful, but followers (imitators) of them who 
 through faith and patience now inherit the promises.' 
 The words themselves give the contrast. 'Not slothful, 
 but men of faith.' Indolence, sluggishness, is a foe of 
 faith. 
 
 .And where, my brethren, shall we begin, and where
 
 vii.] Indolence. 129 
 
 end, in grappling with this foe ? What department of 
 the being is his stronghold ? or from what region of 
 body, soul, or spirit is he fenced out ? 
 
 i. It can never be unnecessary not even here to 
 dwell, though it must be summarily and in enigma, upon 
 the warfare of sloth in the body. 
 
 We do not wish to estimate over-highly that ' bodily 
 exercise' of which St Paul says in all senses though 
 chiefly in a very different sense from this that it ' profit- 
 eth little.' We do not join in that flattery of flesh and 
 bone, that worship of muscle and sinew, that idolatry of 
 strength and agility, which has been carried, we think, 
 much too far in our Schools and Universities. We must 
 be bold to speak of it, if we are Christians nay, if we 
 are rational beings in terms more measured and less 
 exalted. The highest height of bodily prowess is es- 
 sentially lower than the humblest developement of intel- 
 lectual strength. And the loftiest flight of intellectual 
 ambition never rises into the very lowest heaven of 
 spiritual grace. These are gradations, not of man's 
 making, but of God's ordaining. Soul first, then mind, 
 last body. Do not expect for it is impossible to re- 
 arrange for yourself the primeval law, to invert the ever- 
 lasting order, of the material, the mental, and the 
 spiritual. Do not allow yourself to live as if you could 
 do so. God has settled these things : we must judge, 
 and we must act, accordingly. We cannot admit that 
 either Universities or Schools exist for the sake of 
 games ; and still less that that later age, that maturer 
 manhood, in which (if anywhere) man must be served and 
 God honoured below, can devote to sports of the field 
 and be blameless its ' life and breath and all things.' 
 V. 9
 
 1 30 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 But, though this is true, and the remembrance of it 
 urgent, it is to a different peril that I would turn your 
 thoughts now. Better any diligence than any sloth. 
 Better the 'strenuous idleness' of bodily exercise than 
 the sluggish purposeless lounging which is the alter- 
 native for many. Not even that absorption of the 
 faculties in corporeal energy, not even that devotion of 
 precious hours to interests which ' perish with the using/ 
 is so fatal to faith as the stagnation of all the powers in 
 a dull monotonous idling. The one may be excessive, 
 may be irrational, may be the postponing of higher 
 objects to lower, may be (so far) a dereliction of duty, 
 a forgetfulness of the future, a blindness to the invisible 
 and the everlasting: but it does not so unstring the 
 mind, it does not so drug and paralyze the whole being, 
 as that other habit, of doing nothing, thinking nothing, 
 and caring for nothing, which is as hopeless in prospect 
 as it is fruitless and objectless in the present. The man 
 of activity may find his scope and even his mission 
 hereafter in the great world-wide work-field. Ill would 
 it have been for us, in the Crimean war, in the Indian 
 mutiny, if we had had no soldiers and no civilians 
 whose youth had been disciplined in games, whose 
 courage and whose endurance had been practised in the 
 hunting-field. Soul ranks above mind, and mind above 
 the body : but lowest of all in the scale of human 
 existence in brute animal life there is no such specimen 
 is that man who does nothing in acknowledgment of 
 the creation gift ; whose eye is not only bounded by the 
 horizon of time, but closed, absolutely closed, to every 
 interest of his being. 
 
 Do you ask why this meanest of all sloths should be
 
 VIL] Indolence. 131 
 
 called a foe particularly of faith ? I will answer, with- 
 out hesitation, First, because it is expectant of nothing. 
 I might say of it, as of Unreality before, that it is not 
 only one opponent, it is the very opposite, of faith for 
 faith is active expectation, and sloth is indolent content- 
 ment. And secondly, because this kind of sloth is 
 peculiarly friendly to vices which are murderers of faith. 
 These men are the plague-spots of society : in low life 
 they fill its gaols in higher life they secretly stain our 
 very ' feasts of charity.' 
 
 2. But I will go a step onward, and urge the charge 
 ' that ye be not slothful ' upon minds also. 
 
 It is undeniable that there are even in our homes of 
 learning even amongst those who must be described, 
 by courtesy at least, as scholars and students a vast 
 number of unoccupied minds. There are men who take 
 no interest (to use the conventional though far too 
 respectful phrase) in the studies of the place. It is 
 difficult to see how this excuse, if such it ever was, can 
 be admissible now. Surely it is a tradition of the past, 
 rather than a suggestion of the present. It comes down 
 to us from a time when there was in this University but 
 one recognized line of study, but one system of in- 
 struction and one possibility of reward, and when it 
 might happen that there was such a natural inaptitude, 
 so absolute an incapacity, for the cultivation of that one, 
 as drove a man altogether out of the only course marked 
 out for intellectual effort. Who can say this now ? 
 Who that is not born incapable of thought can be at a 
 loss in these days to find in this place a career and a 
 goal ? I would most earnestly charge it upon my 
 younger and my youngest hearers to-day, that they 
 
 92
 
 132 Indolence. [ v 1 1 . 
 
 allow themselves in no such plea for sloth. The man 
 who can find no interest in the studies of this place has 
 himself only to blame for it. Let each one, whose line 
 of study is not yet definitely chosen, choose his line 
 instantly. Let him take counsel upon it with himself 
 at least, always the best of counsellors if there be first 
 but an honest mind and let this very week witness the 
 desired obedience in him to the apostolical charge, that, 
 in mind at least, we be not slothful. 
 
 But there is a sluggishness of mind oftentimes even 
 in those who are not absolutely standing idle. 
 
 For example, there is in almost all of us a proneness 
 to inattention. The eye passes over the line, reaches the 
 foot of the page, arrives in due course at the end of 
 chapter and volume and nothing remains of it. Of all 
 the reproaches which arise against a man in his chamber 
 of study there is none more bitter than these two the 
 sight of his own books unread, and the sight of his own 
 books read. The one accuses him of waste, the other 
 accuses him of inattention. We are slothful in not 
 reading we are slothful also in reading. I would beg 
 you to grapple with the demon of indolence betimes in 
 this form of inattention. Examine yourself in your 
 reading. Make each book, each page, each sentence, 
 give account of itself to you. This which your Uni- 
 versity does for you in her place, do also you can 
 better do it in yours. 
 
 Again, there is in most men a habit too of desultori- 
 ness. We see it in the day, and we see it in the life. 
 Some have spent one year or two years in this place, 
 and they have not yet resolved upon their line of study. 
 They know not in which, or whether in any, of the
 
 VIL] Indolence. 133 
 
 recognized branches they will seek honours. Thus they 
 miss all in asking which. And so in details. From 
 book to book, from subject to subject, from one study 
 and from one accomplishment to another, we are still 
 passing and repassing, and there is nothing done, and 
 nothing gained, in any. ' Unstable as water, thou shalt 
 not excel.' 
 
 Once more, still speaking of mind, there is a general 
 dreaminess and listlessness and vagueness yet more 
 common perhaps than either of the former. Sometimes 
 health has to do with it. And yet even health is more 
 under a man's control than we like to believe it. A little 
 wilfulness in habits and hours, in such small things as 
 diet, sleep, and exercise, will make a man an invalid 
 whom God never made so, and whom God must reprove 
 and visit and judge for being so. And even excess in 
 study will account for this. A man cannot fix his 
 thought, cannot concentrate his effort, from mere extra- 
 vagance of labour, or from mere superfluity of anxiety 
 in other words, from want of wisdom or want of faith 
 and so he is 'slothful in business' just from over- 
 business just because he has not been (in the Christian 
 sense) ' fervent ' also ' in spirit, serving the Lord.' 
 
 3. Let us turn then as these last words counsel 
 us to that kind of indolence of which the Apostle 
 actually wrote the warning, ' That ye be not slothful.' 
 
 It is true, each man is one, not many. We may 
 divide, for the sake of distinctness, this total which is 
 the man we have scriptural authority for doing so 
 into two, or into three, parts : but we must not forget 
 that the living, thinking, moving person is one and the 
 same through all these, and if sloth acts in one part
 
 1 34 Indolence. [VH. 
 
 it acts in all, and acts in the unit being of which each 
 part is an aspect. If the body is slothful, the man is 
 slothful ; and if the mind is slothful, the man is sloth- 
 ful : and that will be our answer to any one who 
 should object that neither body nor mind have, to do 
 with faith. But let us come no\v to that of which there 
 can be no question the action of sloth in the soul 
 that is, in the unit being in its direct aspect towards 
 God. 
 
 (i) And here we shall observe it first in its dealing 
 with divine truth. 
 
 There ought to be no doubt that Revelation is not 
 given to save a man trouble. If it be true that in 
 matters of life ' man's extremity is God's opportunity,' 
 so in matters of knowledge it is true likewise that, where 
 man ends, God begins. Man can think, and God would 
 have him think : man can reason and ponder and reflect 
 and exercise judgment, and God would have him do 
 each one of these things in regard to truth spiritual, 
 eternal, and divine. If Revelation came to supersede 
 effort to make it needless, wrong, presumptuous, to use 
 God's natural gift of thought upon God's supernatural 
 gift of enlightenment from above Revelation itself 
 would lose one sure mark of its origin and one chief 
 object of its coming. ' Canst thou by searching find 
 out God ? ' No but, if God declares Himself, it is to 
 show me how to search so that I may find. The know- 
 ledge of God is not a science, but an acquaintanceship : 
 it is not the knowledge of a book, it is the knowledge of 
 a Person. And that knowledge presupposes toil and 
 patience and progress, a setting out and an arrival, all 
 the more, not the less, because God has vouchsafed to
 
 VIL] Indolence. 135 
 
 give it for our direction. Thus of all impediments to 
 spiritual knowledge none is greater than sloth. The 
 entrance of sloth into religion is fatal even to the re- 
 ception of truth. 
 
 Watch it in its influence. 
 
 It makes one man a bigot. If it is not necessary, if it 
 is not safe, to think if Revelation was given as a solid 
 lump of doctrine, to be laid up in the napkin of an 
 indolent assent, or used as a missile against infidels, 
 or brought out at set times, on Sundays and holy days, 
 for parade or ornament let me take it on trust from the 
 family in which I was born, or the sect or the party into 
 which disposition or accident has thrown me, and let me 
 count it a mark rather of attainment than of irreligion to 
 be confident in my interpretation of its meaning, and ve- 
 hement in my denunciation of all who differently read 
 it. This is the very 'history of religious partizanship. 
 One man, taught of God or untaught, ponders and 
 meditates, at last speaks and writes : his thought, his 
 conclusion, is taken on trust by thousands, who just call 
 themselves by his name, and follow, or think they 
 follow, where he leads or led. It is sloth which really 
 marshals the ranks, and turns the thoughtful utterance 
 of one into the senseless violent gabble of the many. 
 
 It makes another man a sceptic. We do far too much 
 honour to doubt when we dignify it by the title of free- 
 thinking. Certainly there are those who have reasoned 
 themselves into unbelief; as there are those who have 
 through much learning, truly or falsely so called, con- 
 fused and hopelessly entangled an intellect never per- 
 haps the clearest. But of this I am assured that, for 
 one man who disbelieves the Gospel through overmuch
 
 1 36 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 thinking, thousands and tens of thousands doubt about 
 it through the precipitancy of indolence. Sloth loves 
 suspense. Not to reject the Gospel for this might 
 alarm ; not to call myself an infidel for this still 
 requires some courage ; but to leave all doubtful, to 
 recognize the certainty of nothing, to lay no result 
 by in the storehouse of conviction, and to treat no 
 principle as established beyond the reach of assault 
 this is the counsel of sloth in reference to all truth : and 
 when you point to this man and that man, of taste, 
 of eloquence, of intellect, who has never given in his 
 adhesion to the Gospel of Christ, I shall still think that 
 in matters of the soul indolence may have been his 
 counsellor, and that he who was diligent in business 
 and sagacious in politics may yet have been sluggish in 
 answering the greater question, ' What must I do to be 
 saved ?' 
 
 And certainly, if these are the effects of indolence in 
 its more marked and definable workings, there is an 
 influence which it exerts day by day, in reference to 
 the reception of divine truth, in the hearts of all who 
 are compassed with human infirmity. We read in this 
 Epistle of a ' dulness of hearing" but it is the same 
 word (in the original) as that on which the text turns 
 a ' slothfulness,' or ' sluggishness, of ear' which makes 
 men unfit to enter into the deeper mysteries of Scripture 
 and the Gospel. Which of us knows not something 
 of that deadening by sloth of the spiritual ear ? Where 
 in us is that quickness, that alertness, that alacrity in 
 catching the sound of God's voice in the Bible, which 
 was never so touchingly expressed as in that answer 
 put by the old man into the child's mouth at Shiloh,
 
 vii.] Indolence. 137 
 
 'Speak, Lord: for thy servant heareth?' What record, 
 what disclosure, what command, what expostulation of 
 Scripture does not come to us clouded and dimmed and 
 muffled and stifled, rather as the muttering echo of a 
 far-off thunder than as the articulate speech of a Person 
 dealing with us and conversing with us from an opened 
 heaven? This too is of sloth. We do not arise and 
 bestir ourselves we do not go forth, like patriarchs 
 and prophets of old, to stand under the open sky and 
 'hearken what God the Lord shall say concerning us' 
 we sit still at home, and expect the word to come to 
 us, ready labelled for use, legibly directed for applica- 
 tion we treat it as a dead letter, and expect it to turn 
 itself for us by sleight or magic into a living voice 
 when, in reality, the change which must pass upon it 
 is a change in ourselves, and he who would find God in 
 his Bible must begin by seeking Him in his soul. 
 
 (2) And thus we have passed by a natural, an almost 
 imperceptible transition, from the province of thought to 
 the province of devotion, from the reception of divine 
 truth to the exercise of divine communion. And need 
 we spend words or moments in showing to any one how 
 indolence acts day by day in this truest and deepest 
 part of the life that which has a direct relation to God 
 Himself? What is it which, as a simple literal fact, 
 keeps many young men, and many active and vigorous 
 and (in other respects) not self-indulgent men, from 
 beginning each day with an earnest, thoughtful, de- 
 liberate act of self-dedication and devotion ? Shall we 
 be afraid to name it by its name in this house of God's 
 worship? Shall we not say plainly, It is sloth 'dull 
 sloth ' sloth in its meanest, poorest, most corporeal
 
 138 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 aspect we suffer ourselves to sleep on when we should 
 be waking, and leave no room for God between the 
 infirmity of the flesh and the importunity of the world ? 
 
 But the spirit of indolence, in this form of indevotion, 
 is not expelled even by worship. Who does not vex 
 himself with the miserable experience, not now of that 
 sloth which prevents, but of that sloth which spoils 
 prayer ? What other occupation of life is gone through 
 with the languor, with the drowsiness, with the half- 
 attention, with the divided distracted thought, which 
 besets the act of praying ? ' I will arise,' one said, ' and 
 go to my Father:' we 'arise' not we 'go' not: we say 
 rather, ' I will sit still, and see whether God will come to 
 me: it matters not I will pay my paltry due of worship, 
 and, if nothing comes of it, I shall be blameless.' And 
 nothing does come of it. The prayer so prayed asked 
 nothing and God, who is spirit, saw nothing, heard 
 nothing, recognized nothing, in it. ' There is none,' the 
 prophet says, 'that calleth upon Thy name' why? 
 Because there is none, he adds, ' that stirreth up himself 
 to take hold of Thee.' Prayer, true prayer, requires 
 more of effort, more of exertion, than any other act 
 of the life : every other has something to assist it ; the 
 mere presence, the mere scene, the mere object, helps 
 the doing : in prayer, there is nothing to aid ; everything 
 is against it : the pressure of things seen, the atmosphere 
 of earth and sense surrounding, all fight against that 
 speaking to the Invisible : unbelief prompts the thought, 
 'There is no one listening:' sloth weighs down the arm 
 that should be lifted, and says, : It is in vain let alone 
 see whether some answer may not come without the 
 asking.' Therefore the expression is not one whit too
 
 VIL] Indolence. 139 
 
 strong, ' that stirreth up himself,' as you would rouse a 
 smouldering fire, or waken a man from that sleep which 
 is death's brother, not merely to approach, not merely 
 to address, but actually, with the strong hand of the 
 soul, ' to take hold of Thee.' This is that soul's effort 
 of which the Old Testament tells, in mysterious type 
 and shadow, when the way-worn patriarch, left alone by 
 the brook, wrestled all the night long with an unknown 
 Person, to whom he said, after all those lingering hours, 
 ' I will not let Thee go, except Thou bless me.' This is 
 that agony of mental struggle, of which the garden of 
 Gethsemane, on the night of the Passion, witnessed the 
 divine example ; and of which that Master's latest-born 
 apostle wrote to one of his churches, ' I would that ye 
 knew' it would give you an idea of my love, not other- 
 wise to be gained ' what great conflict I have for you, 
 and for them at Laodicea' and not for these alone, but 
 even ' for all those who have not seen my face in the 
 flesh.' Over such prayers as these the demon of indolence 
 had no power. God give us all grace, my brethren, 
 ourselves to ' go and do likewise.' Let us, in this 
 sense, become 'followers of those who through faith 
 and patience' fought the good fight before us, and 
 conquered. Depend upon it, there is one sign which 
 has ever marked the true heir of salvation ; and that 
 is, earnestness in praying. All else may have varied : 
 one man has shown one grace, or one kind and class of 
 Christian graces, and another another ; one has fallen 
 short in this perfection, and another in that; one has 
 been burdened with this infirmity, and another with 
 that : but I do not believe that there is one occupant, 
 at this moment, of the Paradise of God unseen, of whom
 
 1 40 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 this could not be said, ' He was a man of prayer.' Sloth 
 assailed him, and sin assailed him, and Satan assailed 
 him, not least but most of all when he prayed: he 
 knew what it was to shrink from the effort, he knew 
 what it was to feel that ' wrestling ' which alone 
 'prevails' difficult, severe, daunting to flesh and blood: 
 but he knew also that to such wrestling alone heaven 
 at last opens, that through such wrestling alone heaven 
 is at last won ; and therefore he persevered day by day, 
 and God gave him the victory: of him it was true, on 
 the whole or he had not been where he is that he 
 'always prayed and never fainted.' 
 
 (3) Finally, as in the regions of thought and of 
 worship, so also in that region which the context 
 specially contemplates, the region of Christian action, 
 there is a special warfare to be waged with the spirit 
 of sloth. 
 
 ' God is not unrighteous,' so runs the passage, ' to 
 forget your work and labour of love. And we desire 
 that every one of you do show the same diligence unto 
 the end. That ye be not slothful.' It is thus, by a 
 diligent earnest continuance in well-doing in other 
 words, in a life of active charity that the departed 
 saints are to be imitated. 
 
 It might seem as though I were forgetting the peculiar 
 circumstances of the congregation when I seek to give 
 prominence to this particular topic to-day. Last Sunday 
 you were invited to an act of almsgiving: to-day it 
 is not so. And, apart from some direct object of that 
 kind, it may not be evident at first sight what can be 
 the practical bearing of a call from this pulpit to a life 
 of charity. Shall I be thought to exaggerate if I
 
 VIL] Indolence. 141 
 
 venture to say that I know of no audience to which such 
 a call could be more appropriate ? It is not only that 
 you run some special risks of forgetting it : it is not 
 only that your life in this place is proverbially prone to 
 selfishness : it is not only that a double strength of 
 Christian resolution is needed to make you, at this age 
 and in these circumstances, that which yet you must be 
 if you would ever hear the glad summons, ' Come, ye 
 blessed of my Father for I was in distress, and ye 
 ministered to me.' It is not only the difficulty of the 
 duty which proves its urgency : nor yet the certainty 
 that in some future stage of your life, the very next 
 stage to this, you must enter upon a work of unselfish 
 well-doing if you would be Christians : far, far more 
 than this. I am going to assert that here, if anywhere, 
 a life of charity is possible, and that here, if anywhere, 
 the evil spirit of sloth is busy to preclude it. 
 
 I speak not only, though I would ever speak with 
 respect and sympathy, of those direct efforts in behalf of 
 Christ and Christ's Gospel, of Christ and Christ's poor, 
 of Christ and Christ's little ones, which are ever counter- 
 acting never more than now the more selfish and 
 antichristian influences of a life and a society like ours. 
 I speak not of these only or chiefly. And yet I would, 
 in passing, bear my testimony to the blessed rebound 
 and reaction of good upon characters thus disciplined in 
 the University for serving God afterwards in their gene- 
 ration. I would recall with grateful affection names 
 once known here in connection with these youthful 
 enterprises of charity, and made illustrious afterwards in 
 the Church by a maturer devotion, at home and abroad, 
 to the cause of truth and the service of mankind : and I
 
 142 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 would venture to ask some of those who now, in their 
 stead, fill these galleries, whether they might not, more 
 of them, bethink themselves of some parish school or 
 parish district in this town to which they might offer a 
 spare hour, on Sunday or week-day, for the benefit 
 of others and for their own ; learning practically be- 
 times what is the condition, physical, intellectual, moral, 
 spiritual, of that world into which God has brought 
 them in which will lie, for a life-time, their work and 
 their duty and their suffering and drawing down, upon 
 their own studies, and upon their own brighter and 
 more joyous existence, a blessing not of earth but of 
 heaven. 
 
 But even this exhausts not the capabilities for good, 
 the special capabilities, of a life in this place of educa- 
 tion. If the spirit of charity be in you, it will never 
 want a work. Glorious things have been done here 
 in secret, without once stepping forth, even in the cause 
 of charity, into the outer world which surrounds us. 
 Sicknesses of mind, and sicknesses of body sharp, 
 sudden, trying emergencies of suffering come here, as 
 they come everywhere on this earth of sin and the 
 fall ; and often there is none to minister on the instant 
 but a friend. Happy he, whose heart is so attuned and 
 so disciplined by faith and love, by constant self-control 
 and habitual self-denial, that he may be ready at once 
 with the word of wisdom and the act of kindness 
 ready to sacrifice rest, exercise, study, health itself, to 
 minister, through long nights and days, to the sin- 
 stricken conscience or beside the bed of sickness and 
 death. 
 
 These special calls are of necessity rare and ex-
 
 vii.] Indolence. 143 
 
 ceptional : but not by these alone are the offices of 
 charity bounded. Where is he, for example, who has 
 not some one amongst his own friends, of whose spiritual 
 or moral wellbeing he cannot as a Christian feel him- 
 self assured some one perhaps whom he knew in other 
 days, at school, or at home ; some one whom friends or 
 relations have requested him to notice, ignorant, it may 
 be, of the dispositions of either, or of the mutual fitness 
 of the two ; some one whom he sees (as the expressive 
 phrase is) to be going on ill, living wastefully, idly, or 
 worse yet, and whom it is both easy to shake off and 
 not easy to attract or help ? Surely such experiences 
 are common, as of old time : and I bid you to apply to 
 them the counsels of the text. Enter with serious 
 thought into the character, into the disposition, into the 
 faults and trials, of the person thus brought nigh to 
 you. Despise him not for God made him. Despair 
 not of him for for him Christ died. Set before you, as 
 a definite object, his improvement, his progress, his 
 soul's health. Pray for him, watch over him, influence 
 him as God enables. Where is the world so full of 
 such opportunities as this is ? Where else, where in later 
 life, will you find yourself so placed as here, within 
 reach of other lives and other souls, still tender with 
 youth, still ductile and pliable to the touch of friend- 
 ship, brought nigh to you not by official duty but by 
 community of circumstances ? Seize, I pray you, while 
 it is yours, the flying moment. ' Buy up,' as St Paul 
 expresses it, 'the opportunity' the one, the momentous 
 opportunity remembering always that time is short and 
 that ' the days are evil.' 
 
 And if ever, in this as in all else, the evil spirit of
 
 144 Indolence. [vn. 
 
 indolence should whisper to you, ' Am I my brother's 
 keeper ? ' if sloth should bid you think of yourself, your 
 own ease, your own amusement, your own interest, your 
 own profiting, and not another's then think of all those 
 who before you have thus been tempted, and yet by 
 God's grace have conquered those who, in the succes- 
 sive generations of this University, have here ' exercised 
 themselves unto godliness,' and gone forth, one by one, 
 into the struggles of an ampler yet scarcely more trying 
 arena, the stronger and the better and the wiser for 
 having here proved the strength and practised the 
 wielding of the weapons of God's armour think of 
 these, and pray for grace to keep the apostle's charge 
 ever before you 
 
 ' That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who 
 through faith and patience inherit the promises.'
 
 VIII. 
 
 IRREVERENCE. 
 
 Hebrews v. 7. 
 And was heard in that He feared. 
 
 'WAS heard,' the Greek text says, ' from His reverence.' 
 The word expresses that spirit of caution or scrupulosity 
 with which a man takes into his hand an object of 
 peculiar value or sacredness fearing to spoil, fearing 
 to desecrate. As a substantive, it occurs once only 
 besides in the New Testament, and is there rendered 
 by our translators 'godly fear 1 .' 'Let us have grace, 
 whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence 
 and godly fear.' But the adjective and the verb 
 are of less rare occurrence. Simeon is described as 
 'just and devout:' the word is the same 'reverent' 
 ' Devout (reverent) men carried Stephen to his burial, 
 and made great lamentation over him.' In the catalogue 
 of the men of faith in this Epistle Noah is described as 
 ' moved with fear,' with a feeling of devout reverence, 
 to prepare his ark, whereby he ' became heir of the 
 righteousness which is by faith.' In the Septuagint 
 the same word is used, in some signal passages, as the 
 rendering, I believe, of two Hebrew verbs conveying the 
 several ideas of 'trembling' and of 'silence.' ' Moses hid 
 his face, for he was afraid to look upon God' 'trembled,' 
 
 1 [The text of the Revised Version changes the place of the word, and 
 the rendering of it in that altered place is 'reverence.'] 
 
 V. 10
 
 146 Irreverence. [vm. 
 
 St Stephen says, with a more exact regard perhaps to 
 the original, ' and durst not behold.' And thus God 
 Himself expostulates with His rebellious people in the 
 Book of Jeremiah. 'Fear ye not me? saith the Lord: 
 will ye not tremble at my presence ?' And the prophets 
 Habakkuk and Zechariah are interpreted by the same 
 word in the Septuagint Version, when they say, the 
 one, ' But the Lord is in His holy temple : let all the 
 earth keep silence before Him' and the other, 'Be silent, 
 O all flesh, before the Lord : for He is raised up out of 
 His holy habitation.' 
 
 These examples give some additional force and fulness 
 to the thought here presented, 'And was heard from His 
 reverence;' heard by reason of that spirit of awe, which 
 trembles, and which keeps silence, where God is ; which 
 made the eastern exile put off his shoes when God 
 spake with him ; which made the psalmist himself 
 write, as though in express contradiction to his own 
 act in handing over his inspired song to the chief 
 musician, ' Praise is silent for thee, O God, in Sion.' 
 The deepest praise of all is a silence too : even as the 
 profoundest prayer is that which breathes itself in ' un- 
 uttered groanings,' the very voice of God's Spirit, 'heard 
 in that it feared.' 
 
 We have not touched yet the most memorable thing in 
 this brief text; that the person spoken of is the Lord Jesus 
 Christ Himself. It is He who ' in the days of His flesh 
 offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying 
 and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from 
 death,' and it is He who 'was heard by reason of His 
 reverence.' 
 
 We can scarcely fail to sec in this verse an allusion
 
 VIIL] Irreverence. 147 
 
 to the agony in the garden of Gethsemane. At all 
 events, that was an instance a chief, a crowning in- 
 stance of the thing spoken of. Does any dull prosaic 
 mind raise the objection, ' Christ was not saved from 
 death Christ, on that occasion, was not heard ?' It 
 is a striking example of our manner of reading God's 
 Word, and of our manner of interpreting God's dealing. 
 Is there no answer to prayer but the literal ? Is there 
 no hearing of prayer but that which just tamely puts 
 into the hand the very thing asked ? Is there no 
 answering by contraries, and yet answering the more 
 completely? Is there no 'saving out of death,' which 
 was not a 'saving from death?' no 'strengthening with 
 strength in the soul,' far more blessed, and far more 
 glorious, than the mere excusing from suffering ? All 
 these questions and yet one more must be pondered 
 before we presume to say that the text was not written 
 of Gethsemane. 
 
 I say, ' and yet one more.' For indeed it may be 
 doubted whether the prayer of Christ our Lord in the 
 garden was a prayer for deliverance from the cross ; 
 was, in other words, an outburst of human shrinking 
 from pain and shame and mortal extremity, of which 
 at least we should have to say that it was at variance 
 with all else that we read concerning Him for calmly 
 and uncomplainingly, and with solemn longings also, 
 He had set before His disciples, as before Himself, the 
 necessity of that end, and the glory thus only to be 
 attained both by Him and them ; whether it was not 
 rather against the blackness of a spiritual darkness, 
 against the crushing weight upon the soul of the burden 
 of a world's sins, separating Him then, as afterwards 
 
 10 2
 
 1 48 Irreverence. [vin.. 
 
 upon the cross, from that blessedness of conscious com- 
 munion with the Father which had been His stay and 
 solace heretofore whether, I say, this was not the 
 'cup/ this the 'hour,' for the 'passing' of which Christ 
 prayed, and whether it did not pass, for the time at 
 least, when there came that conscious, that visible 
 answer of which St Luke tells, ' There appeared an 
 angel unto Him from heaven, strengthening Him.' 'He 
 was heard in that He feared.' 
 
 These are mysteries too deep for us, straggling, totter- 
 ing, sin-laden souls, to expect to penetrate. We will leave 
 them in their solemn recesses, and turn to one other, 
 the last remaining, preliminary to our designed appli- 
 cation of the text to-day which is, the enquiry, How 
 are such words as these to be understood of the divine 
 Lord ? how can we reconcile them with that revelation, 
 upon which the availableness of the cross itself is 
 suspended, the oneness of the Son with the Father, the 
 true divinity let us use the plain word, the proper 
 deity of Him who died for us and rose again ? ' He 
 was heard for His reverence.' ' He learned obedience/ 
 the next verse says, ' by the things which He suffered.' 
 
 We can grasp each half of the Christian verity ; \vc 
 can apprehend the Godhead, we can comprehend the 
 Manhood : but we cannot put them together ; we cannot 
 frame into one whole the parts of which our faith is 
 made up. Be it so. We could almost say that it was 
 thus with inspired men. We read in this same Epistle 
 of a Person ' by whom God made the worlds ' what is 
 that but an act of deity ? We read of a Person who 
 ' upholds all things by the word of His power' what is 
 He by whose agency creation itself including time
 
 viii.] Irreverence. 149 
 
 and space, extension and duration, sun, moon, and stars, 
 worlds seen and unseen, systems, our own and other, of 
 orderly movement and inconceivable vastness was 
 called into existence, and is hourly, daily, annually, 
 perennially, maintained in existence what is He, let 
 us know, but God, very God ? We have no third term 
 by which to designate Him. Omnipotence, omni- 
 presence, omniscience, existence before time, universal 
 agency, the keystone and condition of all being what is 
 this but God ? We know not of degrees of deity : that 
 which has these properties, that which exercises these 
 powers, is deity : it is our idea, it is almost our defi- 
 nition were it reverent to define of God Himself. 
 Therefore I say there is no doubt who and what this 
 Person is of whom it is written, in words now before 
 us, that ' He was heard for His reverence.' God give 
 us all grace to hold fast this faith these two parts of 
 the faith, if we cannot as yet piece them into each other 
 the humanity and the deity, the Ecce Homo and the 
 Ecce Deus, out of which, in their combination, springs 
 the faith of saints, when they say, in the adorations of 
 time and eternity, ' My Lord and my God.' Of this 
 Person it is here written, that ' He was heard in that He 
 feared.' For He too, for the sake of us men and of our 
 salvation, condescended to give, in human flesh, an 
 exact pattern of the perfect man ; so that we, we who 
 live in times nearer or more distant, even to the end 
 of all time, might know ' how to walk so as to please 
 God;' even by becoming like Him, in spirit and life, 
 who did truly divest Himself, by a miracle of self- 
 sacrifice, of the exercise of the attributes of an in- 
 alienable deity, and did consent to live upon earth,
 
 1 50 Irreverence. [vm. 
 
 through childhood, youth and manhood, as a prophet 
 and a minister and a sufferer too, as though He were 
 only a man perfectly inspired and indwelt of the Holy 
 Ghost. Of Him it is written that His prayer below- 
 most of all, His latest prayer, His prayer of anguish and 
 agony was ' heard because of His reverence.' 
 
 We are speaking in these sermons of the Foes of 
 Faith; of those tendencies and inclinations of the fallen 
 nature we might even go further, and call them 
 St Paul, certainly, would have called them those work- 
 ings and influences of a personal spirit of evil which 
 are directly antagonistic in us to the life of faith. We 
 have spoken of a spirit of Unreality, making profession 
 unmeaning, and carrying a practical falsehood into 
 truth itself: we have spoken of a spirit of Indolence, 
 relaxing the very sinews of the spiritual being, and 
 making thought and worship and conduct alike vague 
 and desultory and purposeless : to-day we have another 
 foe in view it is the spirit of Irreverence. 
 
 And nothing seemed so likely to shame us into self- 
 reproach and self-abasement concerning it as the con- 
 trast presented in the text by the example of Christ 
 Himself. He, 'equal to the Father as touching His 
 Godhead ' He who, even on earth, was still, as to His 
 divine nature, ' in heaven, in the bosom of the Father ' 
 yet, when He prayed, ' was heard in that He feared/ 
 What are we, that we should stand upright, when our 
 divine Lord Himself not only ' kneeled down,' but even 
 ' fell on the ground,' before that God with whom He was 
 one His soul ' sorrowful unto death ' beneath that load 
 of a world's sin which the world itself carries so lightly 
 and fears not ?
 
 vin.] Irreverence. 151 
 
 The spirit of Irreverence. What is it ? Whence comes 
 it ? And how, under God, shall we cast it out ? 
 
 i . We have seen what reverence is : we have seen it 
 in Christ. We know then its opposite. Irreverence is 
 the not fearing, the not being awed into silence, the not 
 bending the knee of the soul before Him ' in whom we 
 live and move and have our being.' And we see this 
 evil spirit everywhere. We have seen it in the open 
 profaneness of the scoffer at holy things. We have seen 
 it in the insolent defiance of the ' busy mocker ' who asks, 
 ' Who is the Lord ? ' and ' where is the promise of His 
 coming ? ' We have heard it in the light jesting quota- 
 tion, of words, either sacred, or nothing. We have heard 
 it in the wicked horrible oath ; in the appeal, on 
 occasions trivial and trifling, to One who, if He is, must 
 judge. We have seen it, alas, in the actual profanation 
 of our churches, of our college chapels, to purposes 
 of shameless levity or worse things yet in the very 
 hearing of words of revelation, in the very performance 
 of acts of worship. This is irreverence let loose and 
 running riot. 
 
 If this were all, I would not speak of it here. This 
 audience shudders at the very mention of atrocities like 
 these in the churches and in the universities of Christian 
 England. And yet this congregation itself feels, if it 
 listens, if it reflects, that it too knows something of 
 this foe of faith ; knows it in the secret of the soul, if 
 not as we trust not in the utterance of the lips. 
 
 Where indeed is the spirit of irreverence not working ? 
 in which of all us ? in what part, in what act, of any one 
 of us ? 
 
 We can trace it, if we will look steadily for it, in the
 
 152 Irreverence. [viu. 
 
 lurking-dens of the heart, 'in the chambers of the 
 imagery.' Every movement of the mind, concerning 
 Providence, concerning duty, concerning Revelation, is 
 an irreverence if God is not remembered in it. 
 
 Who has not cherished thoughts of discontent and 
 murmuring in regard to his place in life and his adapta- 
 tion to it ? Yes, I know well what are the thoughts of 
 many young men as to their rank and circumstances, 
 as to their talents and prospects, as to their gifts of look 
 and manner, as to their acceptance with friends and 
 strangers as to deeper things than these, their dis- 
 position and temperament their proneness to this par- 
 ticular vice, their sluggishness towards this special 
 virtue. In all these things there is in all hearts a 
 tendency to say to the Creator Himself, ' Why hast 
 Thou made me,' or why hast Thou placed me, ' thus ? ' 
 
 And if we pass from irreverence concerning the 
 original moulding and ordering of this being to irre- 
 verence as to that which befalls it; when we see how 
 those who are dependent upon God for every thing 
 presume to call in question His dealings and His provi- 
 dences to find fault with this event and that condition, 
 with disappointments' and defeats and losses and sick- 
 nesses and deaths which they must feel, if they reflect 
 at all, to come straight and direct from the hand of 
 God ; when we not only see these things, but feel them 
 ourselves at the heart's core find ourselves, when we 
 are tried, just as unbelieving, as undutiful, as refractory, 
 as the worst ever questioning, complaining, repining, 
 all but blaspheming, so soon as the will is thwarted in 
 the smallest matter; I know \ve must say that it is 
 impossible for us to cast the first stone : we can but lay
 
 VIIL] Irreverence. 153 
 
 the hand upon the mouth, and confess ourselves irre- 
 verent with the vilest. 
 
 Or if, yet once more, we track our own footsteps into 
 the divine presence-chamber, and notice how we for I 
 speak now of us all deal with God Himself in what He 
 says to us and in what we say to Him in other words, 
 in the two matters of faith and worship ; I am persuaded 
 that here too we shall have to confess the power over us 
 of this same wicked spirit : we shall find that the very 
 idea of 'sitting at Jesus' feet to hear His word,' of 
 receiving information as true because He gives it, of 
 bending the mind and the heart to the receptivity of the 
 little child and are not these things due, if God vouch- 
 safes to teach ? is lost, is exploded, is almost ridiculed, 
 in the mind within us : other notions have cast it out, 
 so that now we neither have, nor yet miss, this primary 
 condition of divine instruction this reverent devout 
 answer of the thrice-summoned understanding, ' Speak, 
 Lord : for Thy servant heareth.' 
 
 And if we speak to God, as we profess to do when we 
 pray, what is the posture, what is the attitude, of the 
 heart nominally drawing nigh ? Where is that sense 
 of an auditor, that consciousness of a presence, without 
 which the whole thing is nugatory, or worse ? Where is 
 that ' coming ' as to a ' throne of grace,' where is that 
 ' drawing near with a true heart,' where is that heart- 
 service, as contrasted with the service of the lips, of 
 which, not Scripture only, but conscience tells, as the 
 first preliminary to an act of real devotion ? And where 
 is that self-recollection as to the subjects and topics 
 of the particular address, that summing up of the wants, 
 and that carrying of them as real things to a real
 
 1 54 Irreverence. [vin. 
 
 Person actually present and certainly listening, without 
 which, if there may possibly be adoration, there cannot 
 be petition, and for lack of which we are silenced 
 instantly when Christ comes to us with His grave, calm, 
 searching question, ' What wilt thou that I shall do unto 
 thee ? ' 
 
 We will not pursue the same question in its appli- 
 cation to the perseverance or the persistency of our 
 worship. We will not ask how much of any one public 
 service is gone through at the full stretch of devotion, 
 or how many thousands and tens of thousands of 
 wandering thoughts cross the mind in the course of it 
 to confuse and spoil and ruin the act of professed com- 
 munion with Him in whose sight earthly things are only 
 so far significant as they may help or hinder the safe 
 arrival of the imperilled man in the home and sanctuary 
 which is to be his rest for ever. All these are of the 
 same spirit of irreverence which is our subject to-day: 
 all are proofs of the manner in which we have departed 
 in this latter day of the Church from the primitive 
 model ; from the example, above all, of Him, our divine 
 Master, of whom it is written that ' He offered up His 
 supplications with strong crying and tears, and was 
 heard for His reverence was heard in that He feared.' 
 
 The first step towards recovery is the knowledge of 
 disease. And I think that we may assume, on the part 
 of all who hear to-day, their sympathy in the misery, in 
 the shamefulness, of the condition described. Many 
 even of our younger hearers feel themselves already 
 lonely and desolate by reason of this unconsciousness 
 of God's presence, which may be taken as the definition 
 of irreverence. There are times doubtless hours of
 
 viii.] Irreverence. 155 
 
 each day, longer periods too of a life as yet untroubled 
 and prosperous during which the unconsciousness of 
 God as a Person living and present may be borne with- 
 out uneasiness ; nay, may even be a relief from im- 
 mediate fear and pain. But I am equally certain that 
 to have no one, when you do suffer, to whom you can 
 instantly have recourse for sympathy to have no one, 
 when you do want comfort, to go to on the instant for 
 solace is a great misery, a wretchedness above words. 
 And I venture to think that no one's day even now 
 can be quite happy if it cannot be begun with the 
 express benediction of a heavenly Father ; and that no 
 one's night even now can seem quite restful if it cannot 
 be committed, consciously and expressly, to the charge 
 and safe-keeping of a Friend who neither sleeps nor 
 slumbers ; and that no one, feeling it, as most men feel 
 it, right and needful to worship, can really like to kneel 
 down beside his bed and not feel that he speaks to 
 any one, or to come forth to a church service and not 
 know by any sign within that he has reached God's 
 house, or that his prayers and praises go anywhere, or 
 can by possibility draw down upon a thirsty spirit and a 
 barren life the dew and the sunshine of a personal, a 
 divine love. I say that irreverence is a misery even 
 now. And what will it be ? What when old age 
 comes, when sorrow, when loss, when sickness, when 
 death? 'What will ye do in the end thereof?' Who 
 would not then give all that earth has, of possession or 
 promise, if it might but be said of him, as of the divine 
 Master before him, ' He was heard in that He feared ? ' 
 
 2. Deeply impressed with this experience of the 
 workings of irreverence in every part and particular of
 
 156 Irreverence. [vin. 
 
 our being, we shall all ask ourselves, Whence comes it ? 
 How is it that a creature, owing everything to the 
 Creator, can by possibility fall into this condition of for- 
 getfulness, of unconsciousness of Him, which is so full of 
 misery and wretchedness ? And some answers might 
 be given, true, but insufficient. 
 
 One might say, ' It is because I was compelled to 
 worship. Before mind or thought could be exercised 
 upon it, I was made to bend the knee and to say the 
 words of an utterly unrealized, an absolutely unintelli- 
 gible devotion. I was not asked what I knew or what 
 I believed: I was taken to church I was made to pray. 
 What could such prayer amount to ? And now, when 
 I am a man, I am still, by the rules of this place, con- 
 strained, not on Sundays only but on weekdays also, to 
 take part, by no choice of mine, in a form of worship 
 presupposing faith and making no small demand upon 
 individual devotion. It is this which fosters, if it did 
 not create in me, a spirit of irreverence. Leave me free, 
 let me worship when I will, force not utterances which 
 to me are conventional : this is only to preclude, by 
 forestalling, that which, to be worth anything, must be 
 from the heart; leave me free, and I shall be more likely 
 to attain to that which certainly I shall not attain thus.' 
 
 This is the language possibly of some hearts to-day. 
 We understand, though we admit not, the plea. It is a 
 difficult question, this, of what is disagreeably called 
 compulsory worship. Several points have to be con- 
 sidered. How many, we might ask, would worship at 
 all if all were free ? How many, we might ask still 
 more reasonably, have cause to be thankful that their 
 worship is encouraged, is fostered, is rendered unosten-
 
 VIIL] Irreverence. 157 
 
 tatious and unhypocritical, by being thus made a law 
 and a rule ? Are there not some who, beginning by 
 obedience, end by love ? Are there not some who 
 would not come, yet, coming, learn to pray ? Can we 
 forget in this place one, afterwards a master in our 
 Israel, who owed conversion itself, under God, not to 
 compulsory worship alone, but even such were the 
 times to compulsory communion ? He who was brought 
 to his first convictions of sin and salvation through an 
 academical rule which (in that form) few would justify 
 may at least be quoted as an example of what honesty 
 and resolution can do in bringing good out of dis- 
 advantageous circumstances, and may encourage some 
 who are now struggling with unequal steps after him to 
 grapple like him with their difficulties in the name and 
 strength of One who is ' the same yesterday and to-day 
 and for ever.' 
 
 But indeed, my brethren, none of you supposes that 
 these things are, or make, the real obstacle to that spirit 
 of reverence of which the text speaks. These things 
 are the mere shell and husk of an evil which lies deeper 
 and is of the soul. 
 
 It is easy to tell of some particular influences which 
 assist, if they do not create, this irreverence of which 
 we are speaking. 
 
 The first of these is levity. 'They made light of it,' 
 says the Gospel. ' Made light ' of the king's invitation, 
 of the Gospel call. ' Made light,' we will venture to 
 read the saying, of every thing. There was nothing 
 which they could not twist into a subject for jesting. 
 Not the purest, most sacred affection ; not the deepest, 
 the most sincere conviction ; not the noblest, the most
 
 158 Irreverence. [vm. 
 
 self-forgetting devotion. It is the fashion of the times, 
 far beyond any other times of which history or literature 
 keeps the record, to seek amusement in human infirmity. 
 That, perhaps, is not new, strictly interpreted : human 
 weaknesses have always afforded laughter to the playful 
 and sarcasm to the cynic: the new thing is, to find some- 
 thing ridiculous in human suffering, human feeling, 
 human piety, human life. Nothing is left, even to the 
 young, for admiration pure and simple : all good is 
 either ridiculous, or hypocritical, equally and alike. How 
 can a man go from such reading, from such conversation, 
 from such views of life, and fall on his face instantly 
 before the purity and before the wisdom and before the 
 love of Almighty God ? The heart of reverence has 
 died out in him he is no believer in verities, he is a 
 scoffer at the good, at the beautiful, at the true. 
 
 And a second ingredient in irreverence is vanity. 
 A man must be humble who would be devout. The 
 ancient prophet, the ancient lawgiver, the ancient 
 psalmist, lay low before his God, because he first felt 
 himself poor and vile and naked. Nothing is more 
 marvellous than the humility of those saints. Men 
 whose shoes' latchet modern thought and modern genius 
 is not worthy to loose men whose prayers and whose 
 hymns are the heirloom of the ages, and whose names 
 are held in honour where intermediate existences are 
 obliterated they could revere, because they were 
 destitute of self-conceit: they could humble themselves 
 before God, because they first knew and felt themselves 
 to be nothing. How is it now? Thousands and tens 
 of thousands of puniest intellects, of men not worthy 
 to be named, I do not say among inspired writers,
 
 viii.] Irreverence. 159 
 
 whether of history or psalmody or prophecy, but not 
 even amongst the third-rate or the tenth-rate thinkers 
 of this age or of any, are yet presuming to sit in 
 judgment upon God and God's Word, as to what He 
 ought to do and it to be, and refusing to take one step 
 towards a firm faith or a manful confession until they 
 can explain to their own satisfaction every mystery, and 
 put a rational gloss upon every revelation, of the Gospel. 
 The first condition of reverence is humility: where this 
 is not, vainly shall we look for the prayer, vainly for the 
 acceptance, of Him who 'was heard in that He feared.' 
 
 And is it indeed too much to ask of man that he 
 should be humble ? to bid him who knows that he neither 
 made himself, nor can sustain himself in being, nor can 
 shield himself from one fracture or one paralysis or 
 one fever, nor can answer one single question fully as 
 to the mechanism of his own frame or the causation 
 of his own perceptions, nor can tell you one single 
 thing, out of his own philosophy, concerning that which 
 was in the beginning or shall be in the eternity which 
 is to come to humble himself, alike in thought and in 
 worship, before One who holds him ' in the hollow of 
 His hand,' and certainly must have arranged with abso- 
 lute authority the time and the place and each circum- 
 stance of his being ? 
 
 A third of these counteractions of reverence is 
 excitement. Excitement is of all kinds and all degrees; 
 from that lowest and most brutal which touches mind 
 through body, and rouses into unnatural activity powers 
 which eventually it is to drug into idiotcy, up to that 
 which has for its subject the political interests of a 
 nation, and too often, at a season like the present, makes
 
 160 Irreverence. [vin. 
 
 men estimate characters and state facts and judge of 
 motives not according to truth, not by rules of justice 
 and judgment, but by the bearing of each upon certain 
 ends which they have proposed to themselves as either 
 important to society, or as conducive in some way to 
 a party triumph in which they are to have a share. 
 Hence many results upon which a thoughtful observer 
 looks with concern : not least an idolatry, a deification, 
 of objects which a Christian knows to be at the best 
 earth-bounded and temporal : not least a shutting out, 
 for the time, of those higher and highest contemplations 
 without which there can be no place in any for divine 
 reverence, for godly fear. 
 
 My brethren, I have not yet touched that one higher 
 spring out of which all these turbid waters flow, and 
 without the mention of which the briefest analysis of 
 irreverence would be utterly incomplete and deceptive. 
 We must speak of it plainly, as the Word of God bids 
 us : it is the alienation of the fallen from the God of 
 their life and the God of their satisfaction : it is the 
 repugnance which is in all of us by nature to a close 
 dealing with Him from whom we have broken loose : 
 it is that mingled fear and shame and enmity which 
 settles down upon the heart of the sinner, and of 
 which the record of the first sinner's experience gives 
 us the token and the parable, when it describes him, 
 after he has broken the commandment, as ' hiding him- 
 self from the presence of the Lord God amongst the 
 trees of the garden.' That hiding was the devil's counter- 
 feit (so to say) of reverence; all that the sinner, impenitent 
 and unforgiven, can know of it; just a shrinking away, 
 timorous and blindfold, from a face and a voice which
 
 viii.] Irreverence. 161 
 
 is still, could he but know it, the sinner's only rest and 
 only healing. 
 
 3. Such is one of those foes with which faith, the 
 sight of the invisible, the consciousness of God, the 
 soul's divine vision, must daily and hourly battle in 
 such as would be saved. How it militates against faith 
 must be obvious to every one. It would be idle repe- 
 tition to show it. Rather let us spend a few latest 
 moments to-day in suggesting one or two practical 
 counsels as to the manner in which faith must combat 
 irreverence. Let us speak them with all plainness. The 
 battle is one of detail : it is only by attention to par- 
 ticulars that it can be won. 
 
 Be reverent, then, first, in worship. How difficult this 
 is, we have seen, we have felt. But he who would not 
 be a profane man must be reverent at least in worship. 
 When if not then ? then, when we are gone actually to 
 meet God then, when we are actually speaking to Him, 
 asking for things, declaring this and that as our know- 
 ledge of Him, our feeling towards Him, our desire 
 concerning Him when, if not then ? Surely that irre- 
 verence which can trifle with God in worship is an 
 irreverence inexcusable and double-dyed : alas, is it not 
 also, God being the witness, the commonest of all, and 
 the least conscious ? 
 
 Be reverent, secondly, in speech. It is bad to have 
 bad thoughts : it is worse to utter them. Worse, because 
 then they infect others. Worse, because then they use 
 speech, which is man's ' glory,' for the very purpose of 
 doing God dishonour. Worse, because then they fix 
 and stereotype themselves (so to say) upon the man 
 no longer darts -and brands injected by the great foe, 
 V. II
 
 1 62 Irreverence. [vm, 
 
 only lying for a moment within before we seize and 
 eject them, but rather weapons of our own, taken by us 
 and used and wielded for our own purposes, as parts 
 of ourselves. Not for nothing, be we well assured, did 
 our Lord utter the memorable, the half-paradoxical 
 saying, It is 'the things which come out that defile the 
 man.' The things which come out must be his own. 
 There can be no doubt as to the ownership and pro- 
 prietorship of these. Therefore we say, with all earnest- 
 ness, Guard your speech from irreverence. If a witty 
 thought occurs to you, and you long to utter it ; if the 
 freedom of delightful conversation stimulates within you 
 the power of mirth and the power of jesting, and you 
 complain of the stiffness and dulness of being evermore 
 fenced and guarded when you are amongst friends ; 
 still, if there be in the repartee one fragment of a 
 parodied text, or in the story that you would tell one 
 profane expression, refrain : as you love reverence, re- 
 frain. This is that abstinence which is better than 
 fasting, that self-control which sobers and which dis- 
 ciplines : such self-denials, small as they may be in 
 themselves, by degrees make men, Christian men able 
 to go forth to mightier exploits in the strength of an 
 armour, a divine panoply, which in these little things, in 
 these youthful days, they have already proved and found 
 sufficient. ' By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by 
 thy words thou shalt be condemned.' 
 
 Be reverent, finally, in thought. There is a grace 
 which we sometimes fear is dying out could any grace 
 quite die out in the Church of this latter day ; and 
 that is the grace of meditation. Saints of old ' kept 
 things and pondered them in their heart:' saints now,.
 
 viii.] Irreverence. 163 
 
 if saints there be, talk of things and dissipate them with 
 their lips. Where is he amongst us who knows what it 
 is to meditate to commune with his own heart con- 
 cerning God and Christ, concerning life and death, 
 concerning truth and eternity to ' commune with his 
 own heart in his chamber, and be still ? ' But it is out 
 of such communing that reverence springs ; the worship 
 of reverence, and the speech of reverence, and the soul 
 of reverence too. Without it there is no root in our 
 religion : the growth is all outward : the world scorches 
 it : 'in the time of temptation it falls away.' Without it 
 there may be forms, there may be ceremonies, there 
 may even be throes and paroxysms of devotion : but 
 there will be no steady, even, wholesome developement 
 ' first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in 
 the ear' such as marked the lives of Christian people 
 in generations now passed or passing away. There is 
 no exercise of mind and heart so difficult, none so 
 rewarding. That counting over in the soul the treasures 
 of grace that profound research into the mind and will 
 and work of God as He has revealed it to us in the 
 word 'written for our learning' that secret sacred 
 intercourse, as of a man with his friend, with the unseen 
 and invisible One, whom to know, whom to love, whom 
 at last to dwell with, is eternal life this, this is de- 
 votion. He who goes forth from this exercise into the 
 world of business, into the world of society, into the 
 world of literary, scientific, political, ecclesiastical activity, 
 goes forth to remember God goes forth (it is the other 
 half of duty) to remind of God. Of that divine con- 
 verse, as it is written of the lawgiver of old, he carries 
 forth upon the .very countenance an impress and a 
 
 II 2
 
 164 Irreverence. [vm. 
 
 memorial : ' the skin of his face shone because God had 
 talked with him.' Such be our ambition, such our 
 effort, such, in God's measure, pur attainment also. 
 Thus in one and in another, as the record of a life 
 is written in eternity, shall the blessed words come at 
 last to be verified, in faint reflection of an unapproach- 
 able glory 
 
 ' He was heard in that he feared.'
 
 IX. 
 
 WISDOM BUILDING AND FOLLY PLUCKING DOWN. 
 
 Proverbs xiv. 1. 
 
 Every "wise woman buildeth her house : but the foolish plucketh it 
 down with her hands. 
 
 Two persons are here before us two characters, two 
 employments, and two results. 
 
 We might have found a text of like import from the 
 New Testament, and told in St Paul's words, how deeply 
 it concerns us all to be ' not unwise, but understanding 
 what the will of God is' to 'walk circumspectly, not as 
 fools, but as wise.' 
 
 But the two halves of God's Word form one whole : 
 each fits into, completes, explains each : backward and 
 forward through both circulates the life-blood of truth 
 and grace : Christ is all and in all : the ancient law- 
 giver ' chose the reproach of Christ,' when he refused 
 ' the treasures of Egypt : ' it is written of the super- 
 natural rock which supplied the desert-thirst of Israel, 
 that ' that rock was Christ.' 
 
 The Book before us is practical. Precept and ex- 
 hortation, maxim of sagacity and aphorism of wisdom, 
 this is what we find in it : we look not here for revela- 
 tion strictly so called, but we do look, and not vainly,
 
 1 66 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 for that inspiration, which seldom rises higher and never 
 appeals more forcibly to the conscience of mankind 
 than when it utters that 'prophetic strain' which is the 
 latest attainment of an ' old experience.' The Book of 
 Proverbs does not claim more for itself than the use of 
 thirty centuries will concede to it, when it ' speaks to us 
 as unto children,' and says, ' My son, let not these things 
 depart from thine eyes ; keep sound wisdom and dis- 
 cretion : so shall they be life unto thy soul, and grace 
 to thy neck. Then shalt thou walk in thy way safely, 
 and thy foot shall not stumble : when thou liest down, 
 thou shalt not be afraid ; yea, thou shalt lie down, and 
 thy sleep shall be sweet.' 
 
 Many of these proverbs demand study look unin- 
 telligible seem to be of the earth may be read in two 
 ways : in some degree perhaps this is so with the text. 
 Its first aspect, its more commonplace and prosaic 
 sense, might be this : wisdom succeeds, and folly fails, 
 in the long run of life, certainly of posterity : wisdom 
 builds, and folly destroys, the home and household and 
 habitation. It would thus become like the perverted 
 (not the real) saying of St Paul, ' Godliness has the 
 promise of the life that now is ;' as though a man had 
 only to be good and he will be fortunate ; as though 
 God's children were to be known from other men in this 
 life for their exceptional successes, honours, and triumphs. 
 St Paul meant doubtless that godliness has not to wait 
 entirely for death and the grave to enjoy its blessing, 
 but possesses even in this life that peace passing under- 
 standing, that peace with God, with the conscience, and 
 with the world, which is the 'shadow cast before' of an 
 everlasting peace in the home which hath foundations.
 
 ix.] Folly plucking down. 167 
 
 In like manner we will read the text in its somewhat 
 deeper yet not less literal meaning, and make it say this 
 to us : There is a house to be built a divine Architect 
 has designed it, and two rival builders are competing for 
 its erection. Wisdom is one of these that believing 
 foresight, that serious earnestness, that spirit of progress, 
 which looks ever to God, and which God has blessed. 
 Folly is the other that imprudent improvidence, that 
 volatile frivolity, that spirit of standing still and looking 
 back, which never did an honest day's work on God's 
 earth, and which ever leaves that earth in the curse of 
 its threatened thorns and thistles. If wisdom's tender 
 be accepted, if wisdom takes the contract, the house will 
 be built. The plan will be adhered to, the materials 
 will be substantial, skill will second toil, and tier by tier, 
 and story by story, the building will grow, surely if not 
 swiftly, towards the headstone. If, on the contrary, 
 folly's loud boasting, fallacious promise, and wily bid- 
 ding be successful, she will but take her tools to destroy : 
 she may seem to be busy at times there may be a 
 pretence of getting on and going forward but, on the 
 whole, and when the matter is judged by results, you 
 will find that she has not been building but demolishing : 
 even the thing once done comes to be undone : on 
 the whole, in the long run, you will find, in each in- 
 stance, the proverb verified, ' Every wise woman build- 
 eth her house : but the foolish plucketh it down with her 
 hands.' 
 
 If you ask what God and the Word of God mean by 
 wisdom and folly what St Paul meant by the two 
 words when he wrote, ' not as fools but as wise ' what 
 our Lord meant when he said, 'The children of this
 
 1 68 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 world are in their generation wiser than the children of 
 light' the answer will embrace three particulars. On 
 the side of wisdom these : forethought, earnestness, per- 
 severance. On the side of folly, in like manner, these : 
 improvidence, irresolution, and unsteadiness. 
 
 A man might foresee clearly, and not set himself to 
 provide. A man might go to work eagerly, and not 
 keep to it. Forethought is not wisdom unless it be 
 earnest to act, and earnestness is not wisdom unless it 
 be constant. To foresee ought to be to provide, and to- 
 put the hand to the plough ought to be not to look 
 back. Wisdom, in the Scripture sense, has these three 
 characteristics : and folly, in the Scripture sense, is then 
 complete when it lacks all. 
 
 Corresponding to these three qualities of the builder 
 are the three conditions of building. To build, you 
 must have a plan. To begin to build without drawing a 
 design would in earthly things be ridiculous. Next,, 
 and most obviously, building requires toil. The plan 
 will not execute itself. The hand must work out what 
 the head originates. Thirdly, the proof of the building 
 is growth. Not suddenly, yet surely not by unaccount- 
 able strides, but step by step the walls rise, and the 
 roof is framed, and the edifice is completed for habita- 
 tion : this is the course and order of building, cor- 
 responding with the qualities and characteristics of the 
 builder the plan implying forethought, the work earnest- 
 ness, and the growth perseverance : wisdom builds the 
 house, because these are her qualities; folly plucks it 
 down, because she has them not. 
 
 We have spoken of the competing builders, and of the 
 act of building or plucking down. What now is the house?
 
 ix.] Folly plucking down. 1 69 
 
 It would be a sufficient and a scriptural answer, if we 
 replied briefly, The house spoken of is the man. The 
 word ' edification,' whenever it occurs in Scripture, in- 
 volves this metaphor. To edify is to build up. And 
 when St Paul speaks, for example, of a person ' edifying 
 himself/ or else ' edifying the church ' when he speaks 
 of ' things wherewith one may edify another,' or desires 
 that ' all things be done unto edifying ' he says, in 
 effect, that each man, each congregation, the Church 
 collectively, is a house ; a house in process of building, a 
 house which may still, in each case, either be built or 
 pulled down : he reminds us, almost in words, that, as 
 Christian wisdom builds her house, so folly, even (were 
 the phrase permissible) Christian folly, may pluck it 
 down with her hands. It would be enough to say that 
 the house spoken of is the man ; the individual man, or 
 else the corporate and the collective. 
 
 But it may serve to give distinctness to the solemn 
 warning of the text, if I bid you look at some two or 
 three houses which each one of us is, professedly at least, 
 engaged in building. 
 
 I. And, first, there is the house of the mind. 
 
 If there be one thing special in this particular con- 
 gregation, it is this it is an assembly, by duty and 
 office, of mind-builders. This University has under- 
 taken to build up minds. These galleries are crowded 
 with young men who are here for the purpose of 
 edifying, of building up, their minds for every good and 
 high use for which a mind has been given us of God. 
 I hope and believe that there is not one man amongst 
 them all, present here before God, who does not seriously 
 recognize this as the particular thing which he has come
 
 170 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 to the University to do. Other things have their place 
 and their use: we disparage not either that 'bodily 
 exercise ' which is ' profitable for a little,' or that social 
 intercourse which refreshes and stimulates life, or any 
 one of those lawful recreations which in due subordi- 
 nation have each their place and their blessing. But 
 we earnestly, we cannot too earnestly, remind you that 
 what you are come hither to do is to build ; and that 
 the house which you are come to build is the house 
 of the mind. For other things you might have gone 
 -elsewhere some things you might have accomplished 
 anywhere : the reason why you are here is this, Your 
 minds are in building, and here you can find for that 
 responsible building alike the architectural design, the 
 necessary material, and the fostering help required. 
 
 The first requisite of all building is the plan. We 
 may say that the University undertakes to furnish the 
 design. There was a time when this University built all 
 its houses on one plan. For a long succession of years, 
 years of great honour and usefulness, Cambridge sub- 
 jected all her sons to a mathematical training. This 
 was her idea of the way to build minds. It was a 
 narrow idea granted : but it was a manly, a robust, 
 and, so far as it went, a thorough training. Great men 
 were made either by it, under it, or (if so you will have 
 it) in spite of it. The mighty men of one honoured 
 profession were in large preponderance its pupils. By 
 degrees, yet slowly and tentatively, other studies crept 
 in. One great college always set classics and meta- 
 physics side by side with mathematics in her latest and 
 highest examination. Presently classical prizes, clas- 
 sical scholarships, at last a classical tripos, occupied the
 
 ix.] Folly plucking down. 171 
 
 attention of one fourth, one third, ultimately (I suppose) 
 almost one half, of her students. Of late the extension 
 has been wider and ampler still. Every science, every 
 study that can make any remotest pretension to the 
 title of a science, has its curriculum open to it in this 
 University. 
 
 It would ill become me to express either opinion or 
 caution upon a subject which occupies the regard of the 
 leaders of education in this place men at once re- 
 sponsible and experienced. I only allude to the facts, 
 because I would show their bearing upon the topic 
 before us. The University no longer builds on one 
 design but on many. In the same degree does it shift 
 upon its members a responsibility of selection which 
 once was her own. Each young man who enters the 
 University has now something to do even with the plan of 
 his building. He has to choose for himself in which line of 
 study he will find his work and his attainment. Even 
 here he is not left without counsel. Previous instruction, 
 earlier education, the bent of the disposition, the pre- 
 rogative of school, aids him in the choice. Nevertheless 
 a choice it is : and it sometimes happens, not only that 
 an unwise choice is made, but that much precious time 
 is wasted in making it, and sometimes a vacillating 
 backward step is taken, later in the career, confessing 
 rather than repairing an original error of judgment. 
 
 Nevertheless, my brethren, forget not that it is the 
 bounden duty of each one to build on some plan, and to 
 begin to build early. We can make no allowance for 
 the loss of a year, or the sacrifice of a term, in merely 
 looking around in hesitancy and indecision. Still less 
 can we justify the intending builder in wasting precious
 
 172 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 time in the idle pleasure of feeling himself free free 
 from school compulsions, free to make or to mar his new 
 liberty as he will. If a plan is the first condition of 
 building, toil, honest toil, is the second ; and perseverance, 
 brave and stedfast, is the third and the most decisive. 
 
 I need not tell any one here present how in this 
 department wisdom builds; or how, in the house of 
 the mind, folly may pluck down with her hands. We 
 have seen examples of both, neither rare nor exceptional. 
 We have seen, on the one hand, that judicious choice 
 of the main study, that earnest yet temperate addiction 
 to it, that stedfast daily perseverance in spite of diffi- 
 culties, discouragements, and disadvantages too, which 
 have again and again, in their combination, brought a 
 success more than proportioned to the original material 
 of talent. We have seen men of no shining gifts, by 
 the exercise of sense and diligence and tenacity of 
 purpose, raised to a point of knowledge and ability 
 which cleverer men may affect to disparage yet can 
 scarcely fail in their hearts to envy. We have seen, 
 on the other hand, miserable instances it is no affec- 
 tation to call them so of folly plucking down. We 
 have seen a young man enter this University with con- 
 siderable repute brought from his school with some 
 soundness of training and some acquirements of scholar- 
 ship we have seen him, through a silly vanity fancying 
 itself to have attained, or an affectation of facility 
 more fatal than dulness, or a mere desultory sauntering 
 through the pleasant paths of dissipation and trifling, 
 gradually lose, little by little, even that which he had ; 
 each examination serving as a mile-post of the retrogres- 
 sion, and the end revealing, to every eye but his own, the
 
 ix.] Folly plucking down. 173 
 
 shame and disgrace of the deterioration. Days have been 
 suffered to slip by, unused, unobserved, unconfessed, un- 
 repented of each day of neglect the parent of another, 
 till term and vacation, residence and degree, are lost 
 in one chaos of confusion, bewildering to the eye which 
 looks out over it towards a future. Depend upon it, my 
 brethren, this sort of waste has a remorse and a retri- 
 bution, from which an older man, if his entreaties could 
 avail anything, would fain save his young brothers. 
 A day will come when you will be wishing that you 
 knew anything when you would gladly cut off the 
 right hand, might you but win back by that sacrifice 
 the very power to acquire knowledge. But, alas, while 
 wisdom beside you was surely building her house, folly 
 within you was plucking hers down with her hands. 
 
 2. There is a house, too, of the life. And I speak 
 now of life as lived here below, without carrying your 
 thought onward into the invisible and eternal. 
 
 Every one of us has a life the most weighty word, the 
 most mysterious possession, the most responsible charge. 
 
 It is well that we should sometimes and it cannot be 
 done too early force ourselves to take into view this 
 life of ours as one whole. 
 
 We know not indeed beforehand its length, measured 
 by years ; but our Lord Himself teaches us that years 
 do not make the completeness of a lifetime : the man 
 who lives to fourscore years, and the boy cut off in first 
 promise, has equally, in God's sight, had his day, his full 
 day of twelve hours, though, when a mechanical cal- 
 culator computes them, the component hour of the one 
 life was longer by ten times or twenty times than that of 
 the other. For these unknown possibilities the builder,
 
 174 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 the architect too, of the life must of course lay his 
 account : but it is not in these accidents that ' men 
 live,' not ' in these things is the life of their spirit' The 
 house built on wisdom's plan is a complete house for 
 all its diminutive size as man judges : we may forecast, 
 we may plan, we may work, we may build whether for 
 thirty years or for eighty, it shall be indifferent and 
 wisdom, alike in her design and in her execution, shall 
 be justified, alike and equally, of her children. 
 
 It is well that you should expand your view betimes 
 beyond the confines of this scene, into that maturer 
 and maturest manhood for which at present you are 
 preparing. I would counsel every young man to make 
 choice early of his profession. The profession is, so 
 to say, the design of that house which is the life. By 
 it he is to maintain the outward life. By it he is to 
 build up his home. In it he is to exercise the faculties 
 of his nature, and to use the attainments of his education. 
 In it he is to glorify God and to do good in his gene- 
 ration. Therefore it is a matter almost of life and 
 death to make choice, amongst many possibilities, of 
 the work which shall fill his lifetime. Wisdom will 
 forecast, even in these things, the plan of her future. 
 
 Yet is this choice, my brethren, but a small matter, 
 in comparison with the preparation. You are sowing 
 now for a reaping even in time. Every act now done 
 is forming a habit : there are habits of mind, we know, 
 of thought and judgment, of desire and imagination, as 
 well as of conduct ; and each habit, according as it is 
 wise or foolish, right or wrong, good or evil, must be 
 cither your friend or your tyrant, your helper or your 
 tormentor, in the lifetime which is to follow.
 
 ix.] Folly plucking down. 175 
 
 I would not be an alarmist, still less an exaggerate^ 
 in these matters : I know that God is almighty to break 
 for us even the chain of tyrant habit, and set free the 
 slave of sin into the glorious liberty of His children. 
 But these changes are the wrenches and violences of 
 grace : they come not to every man : they come not to 
 thousands and tens of thousands who yet are watering 
 their pillow night by night with tears of bitter, of fruit- 
 less remorse. None but a fool or a madman will count 
 upon them shaping his course in one direction, if per- 
 adventure one of God's mighty strong winds, from the 
 east or from the west, may force his life's vessel here- 
 after into another. Wisdom builds, on a plan, with 
 earnestness, with perseverance ; so begins to build as 
 she would wish to finish. 
 
 Wisdom builds builds from the first and folly 
 plucks down with her hands. 
 
 Who does not profess to wish that his life may be 
 honourable and of good report both with God and man ? 
 Who does not profess to wish that he at all events 
 whatever fortune may do against him, or rivalry, or 
 malignity of others he at all events may be guiltless of 
 undermining his own prosperity ? Who, amongst the 
 youthful tenants of these galleries, would not shudder at 
 the thought of bringing misery upon his own, shame 
 upon the mother that bare him ? And yet, my brethren, 
 it is no matter of course that such a future of life is for 
 none of us. We stand here at 'the spring of the waters,' 
 ere they have finally taken their start for this ocean or 
 that. To-day the heart is tender, and the inclination 
 right, and the intention (God grant it) pure, and 
 happiest of all if it be so the prayer fervent to the
 
 176 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 throne of grace for the guiding hand and the prevent- 
 ing, accompanying, following Spirit. Yet none of these 
 things guarantee the house of the life from a disastrous 
 standstill, from a ruinous demolition. We have seen all 
 these things certainly all save one of them present in 
 early days in a man afterwards infamous. There have 
 been men of mark, of culture, of genius, men born in 
 Christian homes, admired and loved in their school and 
 in their college, with the world at their feet, and the 
 way level before them towards this triumph or that : yet 
 inasmuch as over their building folly not wisdom has 
 presided because they suffered sloth or temper or 
 passion to ensnare them because they planned not, 
 toiled not, endured not because at last they neither 
 feared God nor regarded man they have made havoc 
 of every gift and flung away every opportunity ; shame, 
 crime, misery, suicide itself, have reversed and obliterated 
 the hope of their beginning : wisdom would have built 
 the house of life, but they chose the tender of folly, and 
 folly plucked it down with her own hands. 
 
 3. We should have missed the very point of the 
 text if we did not briefly add one further illustration, 
 and see, finally, in the house spoken of, the house of 
 the everlasting hope. 
 
 Every one must have some idea even the atheist is 
 not without it of the state after death. There is a 
 peradventure of immortality even in him. But what 
 manner of immortality ? When you reflect upon the 
 differences between life and life between your own life 
 in pain or remorse, and your own life as it is in comfort 
 and repose you feel at once that it is not enough to 
 be : it is nothing to be able to prove that probability is
 
 ix.] Folly p kicking down. 177 
 
 on the whole in favour of an everlasting existence, unless 
 you also know something of the nature of that existence 
 of its joys and sorrows, its companionships and its 
 occupations. 
 
 Have you so much as settled the plan of this house of 
 the hope ? What is your idea of the thing to be built ? 
 You cannot set to work upon it until you have the 
 design. What do you purpose to be when you die ? 
 On what footing do you intend to face the judgment ? 
 What plea shall you urge for yourself at the bar of 
 God? 
 
 Until this is settled you can do nothing. Wisdom 
 will not aid you unless you will trust her. She bids 
 you settle with yourself, first of all, the great preliminary 
 shall you rely for acceptance, for future happiness, for 
 everlasting life, upon that which you are or by that time 
 may have made yourself? Shall you say then, as 
 thousands are saying now, I have not sinned like this 
 malefactor or that, I have done no wrong, I have de- 
 frauded no man ? Shall you say, I have decently filled 
 my place, I have done a few easy kindnesses, I have 
 scattered a few costless pence, I have worshipped week 
 by week where Christians gathered ? Shall you say, I 
 drifted down the river, I took each day as it came, I 
 accepted what was given me, I made enjoyment worship, 
 and contentment godliness absorb me, O God, if there 
 be a God, into the sum of being, into the ocean of the 
 universal life ? Or will you, will you, say, as the Christian 
 faith bids you, 'A sinner, and the chief of sinners, I put 
 my whole trust in the sinner's Friend in Him who 
 took upon Him, being God, to deliver man and, being 
 God, must know what was needed and, being God, 
 V. 12
 
 178 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 must have done that which He enterprised on Him, on 
 Him alone, I fix my hope He, He, is my Saviour 
 God be merciful to me a sinner ? ' 
 
 Then, if this be so, there is a design ; the house of the 
 everlasting hope has its plan. Wisdom, satisfied thus 
 far, would next set thee on thy work. How wilt thou 
 build on this foundation ? 
 
 Evidently there is no excuse from working, in this 
 mighty, this magnificent reliance. Christ came not to 
 make thee indolent, selfish, sinful ; to open to thee a 
 gratuitous heaven, suddenly to be entered, with soiled 
 foot, roving or earth-bound eye, defiled mind and impure 
 heart. This were no heaven : this were some sensual, 
 wicked, devil-like paradise, earth over again in all save 
 its useful activities and bracing enterprises. Christ has 
 bidden thee work : the house of the everlasting hope 
 demands energy in its builder. 
 
 Life itself is not long enough to do the thing set thee : 
 to bring every thought into obedience ; to make God 
 thy one object ; to recommend Christ, by pureness and 
 meekness and love unfeigned, to a generation ; above 
 all, to become absolutely pure in heart, capable there- 
 fore of the beatific sight of the Invisible One. 
 
 This is thy work if thou be a Christian. Let wisdom 
 build, and she shall also finish. 
 
 But O saddest, most pitiable sight folly plucking 
 down, as wisdom builds. This too we have seen, not 
 once only. We have seen early instruction, we have 
 seen a childhood spent (like that of the sons of Eli) 
 in the very court and precinct of the sanctuary, we have 
 seen a ready-made but unrealized faith, we have seen 
 forms and habits of prayer and devotion, passing on, in
 
 ix. J Folly plucking down. \ 79 
 
 the next stage of life, into a barren memory, a bare 
 name, of lost belief: we have seen such a man, familiar 
 with each text and phrase of holy Scripture, able to 
 turn each one, with playful versatility, to the purposes 
 of oratory or jesting so versed in each argument of 
 the believer that none has any longer for him either 
 persuasion or offence he has long laid each aside as 
 either self-evident or else insoluble, one equally with the 
 other destitute of the salt of conviction, of the balm of 
 comfort. He has lived thus and, so far as we know, 
 he has died thus knowing too much, knowing too 
 little ; the husk and shell of divine truth his, the kernel 
 and life of it never tasted, loved never. Wisdom was 
 not suffered to build, though the plan perhaps was 
 studied or dreamed over : folly seized the tools, and 
 plucked down with her hands even the stones that were 
 laid. 
 
 My brethren, let us not trifle thus with the house of 
 the great hope. Let us lay deep the foundation, than 
 which no man can really lay any other. Let us, like 
 Nehemiah's workmen, with one of our hands build, and 
 with the other hand hold a weapon. Let us seize 
 earnestly, let us hold tenaciously, any fragment of 
 divine truth which conscience attests and the soul can 
 echo : let us piece each to each, with a new realization, 
 until the whole stands out at last in its breadth and 
 in its satisfaction : at the end of all, God Himself shall 
 consciously enter, and fill the house of our soul's hope 
 with the glorious illumination of His presence. 
 
 There remains yet one word, to connect the subject of 
 discourse with the object of charity. 
 
 For the fourth time in the course of eight years I am 
 
 12 2
 
 180 Wisdom building and [ix. 
 
 to bespeak your alms for the maintenance of spiritual 
 ministrations in the destitute suburbs of Cambridge. 
 There is no cause which I could advocate with more 
 confidence. It appeals to every feeling of our nature 
 and ever}' principle of our Christianity. Certainly there 
 is no place on this earth where ignorance of the first 
 elements of God's truth could be less tolerable, more 
 offensive, than at the doors of this great University. If 
 the light of this place be darkness if, that is, the light 
 which is so bright within have no reflection, no ex- 
 pansion, at the distance of one street from its centre 
 how great, how intense, is that darkness. Well may we 
 fear its reaction upon the society, upon the community, 
 upon the church, which permits it. You will not permit 
 it. I see with regret that the annual almsgiving on 
 this occasion is most variable and precarious, fluctuating 
 between 38 and (if my memory serves me) all but 
 jiOO. How can any organization maintain itself which 
 is liable to these ebbs and flows ? My brethren, such 
 offerings as these ought not to depend, for abundance or 
 scarcity, upon the accident of the preacher. They are 
 matters for principle rather than for excitement. They 
 ought to flow equally from thankful hearts, to whose- 
 soever hands the trust of calling for them be committed. 
 I dare to ask you to let this be one of the years, not of 
 scarcity, but of plenty. What would it cost the members 
 of this great congregation to furnish by their bounty 
 this day the whole stipend, for one year, of one Curate ? 
 Let the call be heard and let it be answered. Its 
 emphasis you cannot evade. It ought to lie upon the 
 conscience of this congregation to see that a proximity, 
 not perhaps always without a danger of its own, to
 
 ix.] Folly plucking down. 181 
 
 this great centre of England's young vitality be at least 
 able to secure this that no yard and no lane, no home 
 and no heart, within one mile of Cambridge, be un- 
 visited, unwarned, uncheered, uncomforted, by the feet 
 of them who bring the glad tidings of an everlasting 
 rest and peace. 
 
 My brethren, our church of England is at this time 
 on her trial in this great critical matter of wisdom and 
 folly. She too has her house to build, and the time was 
 when she seemed almost to have made her contract 
 with folly. How was a church to build herself a sure 
 home on the only spot worth occupying the heart of 
 England's people which was satisfied to drone forth its 
 weekly discourses within the four walls of an edifice, 
 comfortless, damp, and repulsive, where the poor man 
 felt himself unwelcome, and the rich man sat alone ' in a 
 good place ; ' to enjoy revenues, meant for God's service, 
 in a selfish vain-confidence, glorying in the name of 
 churchman, and looking down with disdain upon what 
 was often a most unwilling nonconformity ? How was 
 such a church doing her part towards 'occupying' her 
 mighty talent, the trust of God's goodness for the 
 edifying and comforting of His people ? Surely the 
 marvel is, not that that church should be threatened, 
 but how it should have survived. 
 
 Those days are past or swiftly passing. In time, we 
 will hope, to save her from the utter ' plucking down ' 
 of which the text speaks, our church has aroused herself 
 to invoke the aid of wisdom. She is now building her 
 house ; and in proportion as she so builds, she is mighty 
 and shall yet prevail. There is an affection for her 
 deep down in English hearts, which may be latent or
 
 1 82 Wisdom building, &c. [ix. 
 
 dormant in her selfish prosperity, but which will be 
 fanned into a vigorous flame by her reawakening to new- 
 ness of life. When she sets herself, as she is now doing, 
 after the example of her great Lord, to seek and to 
 save, by personal effort, that which was lost to carry 
 her sweet message into disconsolate souls, searching 
 them out by personal ministry that she may heal and 
 bless then she will find her walls rising again, if it 
 be ' in troublous times : ' the Lord whom she earnestly 
 seeks will come again to His temple, and God's offering 
 shall once more be acceptable to Him, offered by holy 
 hands and consecrated by self-devoted lives.
 
 X. 
 
 READINESS. 
 
 Ephesians vi. 15. 
 
 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace, 
 
 ST PAUL from his Roman prison is looking forth 
 upon all time and two eternities. Nowhere is his view 
 so entirely free as in this queen of epistles. Whatever 
 the reason, he is free even from personal memories. 
 He stays not to recall what must have been a more than 
 commonly populous retrospect. That three years' stay 
 at Ephesus, longer probably than any other (save 
 perhaps at Tarsus and Antioch) since he became a 
 Christian, is treated here as if it were forgotten. Like 
 the twelve, like the seventy, in the trial -missions of 
 the days of Christ's flesh, he is so full of his message 
 that he can ' salute no man by the way.' The absence 
 of personal reminiscences has led some critics in all 
 times to conclude that the epistle could not be for 
 Ephesus. It was an inference hasty in many ways. 
 The salutations in St Paul's letters are by no means 
 proportioned to his intimacy with his correspondents. 
 The epistles to the Corinthians, amongst whom he had 
 spent a year and six months, are destitute of them. 
 The epistle to the Romans, a church which he had not 
 then visited, is full of them. It is evidently a falla- 
 cious test and an unsound criticism. The epistle to the
 
 184 Readiness. [x. 
 
 Colossians, accompanying this, and containing one 
 passage which seems to say (though it does not really 
 say) that he had never seen them, has half a chapter of 
 greetings. It is certainly noticeable, but only this, that 
 the sister epistle, that before us, is perfectly general, 
 with one single exception, from the first line to the 
 latest. It may be, according to one plausible hypo- 
 thesis, that it was a circular letter, intended for several 
 churches, and therefore designedly left impersonal. 
 There may have been a blank in the first verse, to be 
 variously filled up or left blank. Yet in the parallel 
 epistle, expressly directed to be read in other churches 
 besides that to which it is addressed, no such scruple 
 operates. The salutation of Archippus, the commen- 
 dation of Onesimus, is no bar to the transmission of 
 the letter to Laodicea, or to its public reading in the 
 house of Nymphas. We must look somewhat deeper 
 for the cause of the phenomenon. We have here an 
 Epistle (if I might use the expression) charged and 
 saturated with inspiration. In this one instance ' the 
 sword of the Lord' is scarcely 'the sword of Gideon/ 
 The human element is here almost lost in the divine. I 
 know scarcely one book of holy Scripture which in this 
 respect rivals it. If all Scripture had been like this,, 
 there would have been room for a theory of inspiration 
 which (as it is) needs modification. Not only is a man 
 full of the Holy Ghost writing that is true everywhere 
 but he is writing as such and such alone. He scarcely 
 touches the earth which he illuminates. He is lost 
 in the mysteries of the unseen, and testifies by that 
 absorption to the supremacy of things divine. His 
 eye explores the eternity in which the Creator dwelt
 
 x.] Readiness. 185 
 
 alone, and gathers strength for conflict and martyrdom 
 from those inscrutable counsels which took note of 
 things and beings that were not, wrote indelible names 
 in a book of life, and drew the boundary lines of future 
 existences of which every moment and every circum- 
 stance was as clearly foreseen and as minutely pre- 
 destined as though ages and generations had not to run 
 their round before the first foundation of the first of 
 them should be laid in time. 
 
 You can estimate, from this faintest sketch of the 
 opening verses of the epistle, the improbability (if I 
 might so speak) of there being one local allusion or one 
 personal greeting in the latest. When St Paul descends 
 at last from ' the holy mount ' of his more than apoca- 
 lyptic intuition, it is but to tell how these divine deter- 
 minations were realized and wrought out in time ; how 
 the election became a calling, and the calling a sealing, 
 and the sealing a possession, and the possession a 
 glory ; how the Christ of predestination became the 
 Christ of incarnation, and the Christ of humiliation, and 
 the Christ of resurrection, and the Christ of ascension, 
 and the Christ of dominion, and the Christ of ' headship 
 over all things to the church ; ' how the dead in sins 
 are quickened and raised and exalted already in Him 
 lifted into a new life, re-made for a paradise not of 
 manual but of spiritual culture, brought back from an 
 exile of estrangement and godlessness into a home of 
 reconciliation and communion yea, forming, them- 
 selves, a holy and magnificent temple, of which Jesus 
 Christ is the chief corner-stone, and God, through 
 eternal ages, God in the Spirit, the light and the 
 presence.
 
 1 86 Readiness. [x. 
 
 What room in such an epistle for reminiscences and 
 associations of earth ? What place, we almost feel, for 
 images and metaphors, temples of Diana, wonders of 
 the world, amidst unearthly scenes and bodies celestial ? 
 We seem to be conscious, as we read this one letter, of a 
 sort of reluctance to descend even to what is commonly 
 called the practical. The word, I know, is inaccurate. 
 Nothing is so practical as the spiritual. Nothing touches 
 the spring of conduct like doctrine if by ' doctrine ' we 
 understand God revealing Himself to what this epistle 
 calls ' the eyes of the heart.' But, adopting the dis- 
 tinction, we say that St Paul finds here an unusual 
 difficulty in turning to the practical. In the third 
 chapter he tries to do so, and fails. ' For this cause I 
 Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles ' he 
 is going to say, ' beseech you that ye walk worthy of the 
 vocation wherewith ye are called.' A whole chapter 
 intervenes. Again he loses himself in matters deeper 
 and higher ; rises once more into a region divine ; 
 extricates himself through prayer and praise, and re- 
 sumes at last in the fourth chapter the interrupted and 
 suspended application. Even now it is but to enunciate 
 principles, themselves running up again into mystery. 
 This is what makes the epistle before us so dear, so 
 precious, to the Christian. This is what makes it the 
 model of the evangelist and the directory of the pastor. 
 It is a standing protest in the churches against that 
 dull, dry, dismal detail of duties, against that morality 
 falsely so called,' under which the church of England, 
 for example, through the eighteenth century languished, 
 slumbered, and sinned. St Paul knew that out of the 
 heart are the issues of the life ; and if he discoursed
 
 x.] Readiness. 187 
 
 upon duty, if he discoursed upon the relation of wives 
 and husbands, of masters and slaves, he so spake as to 
 make each a wellspring of revelation, bringing Christ 
 into all, and kindling into a sacrifice of living devotion 
 each act and each circumstance of the mortal being. 
 
 All this he has done. With the coupling-chain on 
 his arm with the rude rough Praetorian, some Thra- 
 cian perhaps or Illyrian, the companion perforce of his 
 prayers and his exhortations he has dictated thus far 
 to his amanuensis these words of life and godliness : 
 and now the ' finally ' is come. From his prison at 
 Rome he will equip the soldier of all time. How far 
 he is influenced in the choice of his figures by the neigh- 
 bourhood of the camp or the presence of the soldier, we 
 presume not to say ; remembering that in earlier days 
 and other scenes he had (more lightly and briefly) 
 sketched the same parallel in writing to Thessalonica. 
 The passage has been read to-day throughout Christen- 
 dom as the epistle for the one and twentieth Sunday 
 after Trinity ; and I have chosen from it one clause 
 for your meditation on this opening Sunday, full of 
 hopes and responsibilities, of the academical year, 
 earnestly praying that God may write it upon many of 
 these hearts, and make it the motto from this day forth 
 of many a young life, here taking its decisive colour and 
 impress for a manhood of action and an immortality of 
 consequence. 
 
 ' And your feet shod with the preparation of the 
 Gospel of peace.' 
 
 The girdle of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, 
 the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword 
 of the Spirit, all would be incomplete without the
 
 1 88 Readiness. [x. 
 
 sandal of preparation. We read in Scripture of ' rough 
 places ; ' we read in Scripture of ' slippery places : ' 
 there are both of these on the great battle-field which 
 is the world. If we would ' withstand in the evil day/ 
 if we would ' stand, having done all,' we must complete 
 the equipment with the sandal of preparation. 
 
 The word ' preparation ' is ambiguous : the eToipaa-ia 
 of the Greek is not so. It occurs only here in the New 
 Testament, and has some slight varieties of sense in 
 the Old. But there is ample authority for the inter- 
 pretation which I would give to it to-day. 'Preparation' 
 is ' readiness.' The charge is, that we have the feet 
 shod with the 'preparedness,' the 'readiness,' of the 
 Gospel of peace. 
 
 ' Ethelred the Unready' is the well-remembered title 
 of one chapter of English story. It might be the title 
 of many lives as God and man read them. It was not 
 that there was a conscious deliberate purpose to betray 
 the cause of patriotism or religion, of truth or right, 
 of the Church or the Gospel. The Ethelreds are of 
 course against the Dane. In one sense, it is the worse. 
 A thirty-five years' reign was just the mischievousness 
 of the Unready. When he dies, there will be a better 
 man. He stops the way. And yet he is there. He 
 has a right to his life, and he has a right to his throne. 
 It is scarcely a parable, brethren it is the very case 
 itself still. 
 
 The illustrations would be endless, if we were not 
 helped by the context to narrow them. The scene is 
 laid, not in still life, but in a battle. We have but 
 to think therefore of our own lives in their aspect of 
 conflict. And we speak, of course, of spiritual conflict;
 
 x.] Readiness. 189 
 
 of that sort of struggle which we only incur by being 
 Christians. What is this but the very life to which 
 we were pledged at our baptism ' manfully to fight 
 under Christ's banner ' ' to continue Christ's faithful 
 soldier unto the life's end?' I know how easy it is 
 to evade this warfare. I know how far smoother it 
 seems to render a man's life, to forget altogether this 
 pledge, this 'sacramentum,' and believe himself only, 
 always, everywhere, among friends. I know how 
 courtesy and complaisance and charity and even 
 humility may be turned to account in this direction; 
 how it may be made almost a duty to gloss over 
 differences, and round off angularities, and presuppose 
 agreements, and make allowance for imperfections, and 
 hope the good and refuse to see the evil till at last 
 the very idea of conflict is exterminated and eradicated 
 from the life. And God forbid that we should be quick- 
 sighted to a brother's failings, and blind to Christ's 
 ' image and superscription ' stamped indelibly, however 
 faintly discernible, upon each precious spiritual coin 
 once minted in His treasury. It is the very keenness 
 of this consciousness of the ownership which makes us 
 strong and earnest in combating that which would 
 deface it. It is because we see Christ's purchase, it 
 is because we see one of God's spirits, inside each 
 body; encased and enshrined in each most frail, most 
 imperfect, most sinful life, which meets us on earth's 
 common trivial highway it is therefore that we would 
 wrestle with the spirit-hosts of evil which have occupied 
 and desolated it. We know that what God speaks of 
 is always the reality. No kingcraft or priestcraft, no 
 Gregory or Constantine, can stay by change of name
 
 1 90 Readiness. [x. 
 
 or form the internecine strife, earth-wide and age-long, 
 between good and evil. It lies deeper than national 
 conversions or European reformations. It rages still, 
 in hearts and lives. And though the blessing of even 
 a nominal Christendom is above gold and precious 
 stone, it does but leave where it was the spiritual 
 strife and the individual responsibility: it does but 
 render more obscure, more perplexed, more difficult, 
 the personal warfare, because it gives added force to 
 the burning words of St Paul, ' We wrestle, not against 
 flesh and blood.' 
 
 You see then the double risk, in this complication of 
 the struggle, of that unreadiness which is our subject. 
 The separate encounters, of which the life's sum is the 
 defeat or victory' of the Christian, are generally unex- 
 pected, sudden, and impalpable. They come to us, not 
 so much in the form of open sinners, bitter scoffers, or 
 avowed infidels, warning us off by their look, or sound- 
 ing the alarm by their utterance. They come to us, 
 not like the profligates in the Proverbs, saying, ' Let 
 us lay wait for blood, let us lurk privily for the 
 innocent cast in thy lot among us, let us all have 
 one purse:' on the contrary, so far as the persons 
 of our warfare are concerned, they are men like us, 
 or better than we ; full of kindly sentiment, full of 
 knowledge and ability, men whom it is pleasant 
 to meet, honourable to know. And to stand aloof 
 as though either our faith or our conduct gave us the 
 advantage over them, to treat them with suspicion, 
 to read them moral lectures, to reprove them for 
 carelessness or heterodoxy, to wear armour in their 
 presence as though they were our enemies, would be
 
 x . ] Readiness. 191 
 
 not only a misery but a folly and a presumption, 
 destroying the hope of profiting them, and dishonour- 
 ing by the very spirit and temper the cause and Gospel 
 of the Saviour. And yet, my brethren, from this very 
 converse we return home again and again conscious 
 that we have practically betrayed or denied Him. 
 In our hearing, soldiers of Christ as we call ourselves, 
 words were spoken, principles were avowed, judgments 
 were passed, acts were estimated, not in accordance 
 with Christ's rules, nay, on suppositions, tacit yet 
 evident, which would have made His cross and His 
 crown alike superfluous and nugatory. We sat by, 
 not with the excuse (itself insufficient) of mortal terror, 
 of imminent martyrdom, if we should say the word for 
 Christ ; no, in security, in calm, in indifference ; or, if not 
 that, then in awkward irresolution, in the surprise of 
 unpreparedness ; because we expected no such trial, 
 because we never thought that that sort of thing was 
 the Christian conflict, because we took it for granted 
 that society was recreation, because we would not spoil 
 an enjoyment, our own or another's, by what we called 
 to ourselves ' dragging in religion.' Yes, but, to go 
 a little deeper, for this other and truer reason, because 
 we had omitted to prepare ourselves for all risks by 
 a habit and temper of watchfulness; because we had 
 refused to listen betimes to St Paul's counsel before 
 us, 'Stand therefore having your feet shod with the 
 preparation of the gospel of peace.' Therefore we 
 lost our opportunity. The word of quiet, firm, self- 
 controlled correction was not in time to be spoken. 
 In conversation there are ' no footsteps backward/ 
 The stream hastens by, and in vain do we watch on
 
 192 Readiness. [x. 
 
 the brink for the ' sacred waters ' to ' flow upward.' 
 Meet emblem of the fugitiveness of all opportunity! 
 Solemn memento of the responsibility of circumstance! 
 Awful warning, too, of that which shall be the retrospect 
 of a life's unreadiness ; the harvest past, the summer 
 ended, and we ourselves unsaved ! 
 
 There is another aspect of the precept, which suggests 
 itself forcibly before this audience. 
 
 We would not exaggerate it is foolish as well as 
 wrong to do so the special perils of our generation. 
 We cannot compare. We see but the present. Past 
 and future are alike and equally out of our ken. 
 But we must be blind and deaf and stupid if we do 
 not take account of the positive. We hear, we read, 
 we know, that there is a shaking of faiths, an unsettle- 
 ment of foundations, existing and extending itself, in 
 reference to matters lying yet deeper than our very 
 Christianity ; such elements and rudiments, for ex- 
 ample, of religion, as the possibility of prayer, the 
 immateriality of the soul, and the personality of God 
 Himself. And we know also that on the side of this 
 advanced scepticism men appeal confidently to what 
 they call science; loudly proclaiming the incompati- 
 bility of proved and incontrovertible fact and law 
 with the most fundamental principles of (at all events) 
 revealed religion. 
 
 You will not imagine that I am proposing to enter 
 into such questions to-day. We are assembled in this 
 house of prayer on the basis and presupposition not of 
 religion only but of revelation. As a Christian I speak 
 to you : as Christians you listen. Evidences, whether 
 of miracle or prophecy, whether of Christian morals
 
 x.] Readiness. 193 
 
 or Christian character, whether of the suitableness of 
 the Gospel to man's want, or of the perfection, in 
 life and mind, of Him who is the Gospel, appear to 
 me to be more properly unfolded in books or lectures, 
 where there is no risk of disturbing or distressing 
 worshippers whose faith is stedfast. 
 
 My purpose is different. I would seize the moment 
 which is given me to urge upon you the risk of un- 
 readiness in reference to these gigantic battles of our 
 generation. You are here with one single object : to 
 make preparation. Before you lies an unexplored, an 
 inscrutable future. You may succeed or fail in your 
 ambitions ; you may be famous or obscure in your 
 generation ; you may be happy or sorrowful in your 
 home; you may die late or early: these things none 
 can forecast. But as your day will most surely have 
 in God's sight its twelve hours in full tale ; as every life 
 is in God's sight complete ; as character and influence 
 and destiny will unquestionably shape themselves, and 
 He, the Judge of all, will be able to write infallibly 
 on your gravestone, ' He did good,' or ' He did evil ;' 
 so amongst other things, nay, as the root of all, you 
 will have a mind, one way or the other, concerning 
 truth and faith and the Gospel. If not for Christ on 
 the whole, on the whole you will be against Him. This 
 is what each man can contribute his own conviction, 
 his own influence, his own life to the sum of the 
 Christian evidences. It is a serious thought, a great 
 responsibility. Now there is no doubt that the whole 
 weight of some men is lost by their unreadiness. They 
 are so ill educated that they simply go for nothing 
 in the great battle. Their arguments for revelation are 
 
 V. 13
 
 194 Readiness. [x. 
 
 the mere sputterings of rage and fear. They tell against, 
 not for the truth ; men smile at them, pity them, and 
 pass them by. How different with those who have indeed 
 ' shod ' themselves for the fight. How noble the am- 
 bition, here proposed to you in the name of Christ 
 older men envy you as they exhort to make yourselves 
 wise in all this world's learning; to enter with all earnest- 
 ness of self-devotion into the mysteries of nature and of 
 existence; to be quite sure and therefore absolutely 
 fearless in your search that truth and tJie truth must 
 be at one; that nature, which is God's common working, 
 cannot really contradict miracle, which is God's ex- 
 ceptional yet not less orderly working; that science 
 can be perilous (in a religious sense) only to the irre- 
 ligious ; that to the man who will take God with him in 
 his search God will reveal Himself, for the satisfaction 
 of his own soul, and for the reassurance and recon- 
 ciliation (it may be) of other seekers who but for him 
 might have floundered into atheism. O for a few 
 earnest hearts and such there are, I doubt not, I 
 know, in this congregation who shall take this for 
 their province ; so to trust, and doubt not, the fidelity 
 of their God as to give themselves to track His foot- 
 steps in earth and sea and sky, in plan and law and 
 system and providence, on purpose that they may be 
 ready to grapple with the arrogances of a 'science 
 falsely so called,' and both to reanimate the doubting 
 and to convict and confute the gainsayers. 
 
 This University has been fertile in such intellects; 
 men who have brought science herself to God's foot- 
 stool and made her bend a willing knee to Him who 
 gave her at once her implements and her subjects.
 
 x.] Readiness. 195 
 
 They pass to the grave, one by one; scarce one or 
 two of the giants of Cambridge philosophy lingering 
 still in the loved precincts where first they fearlessly 
 studied, and afterwards as fearlessly illustrated, the 
 wonderful works of God. They pass to their rest, 
 clamoured down already by new strifes of tongues, 
 yet safe themselves in God's tabernacle, and bequeath- 
 ing the reality of their work to others. Happy they 
 on whom the mantle shall fall the mantle of their 
 ' readiness ' and of their devotion. 
 
 We know well enough that such men must be rare. 
 ' Every man hath his proper gift of God ; one after this 
 manner, another after that.' There is no honest toil 
 which is not a part of God's preparation. Literature as 
 well as science can equip for God's conflict. It is igno- 
 rance, it is undiscipline, it is uneducation, \vhich makes 
 us flee when none pursueth. A mind practised in study, 
 whatever be its department, is not awed into doubting 
 by the self-assertion of the infidel. It can weigh, and 
 wait, and judge. And not only that For one man 
 who could be made with any culture an effective 
 champion, in speech or writing, of revelation, a thousand 
 are capable of being shod with that Gospel readiness of 
 which the text makes mention. Brethren, it might 
 make angels weep to see the waste here too often made 
 of priceless gifts ; gifts such as God gives, in these Uni- 
 versities, to England, and to no other nation on the face 
 of His earth. You have before you, every one, a life- 
 time short at the longest, and then an eternity un- 
 measured by millenniums. As you prepare, so will you 
 
 live ; as you live, so will you die. Fearful the spectacle 
 
 i 
 
 132
 
 196 Readiness. [x. 
 
 of young lives risking, chancing, gambling away them- 
 selves: daring to undertake the charge of other lives, 
 whether as masters, landowners, legislators, or ministers ; 
 daring to face trouble, doubt, difficulty, temptation ; 
 daring to settle their faith and to shape their destiny; 
 without preparation long and anxious for responsibilities 
 so tremendous. Listen, brethren, listen to-day to St 
 Paul's counsel. Put on the sandal of readiness not in 
 the form (for of that there is too much) of presumption 
 and positiveness, of prejudice and self-conceit, of swift- 
 ness to speak and incapability of doubting but of that 
 preparedness, for life and for death, which is only, which 
 is surely, to be found in what the text calls ' the Gospel 
 of peace ; ' that Gospel which Christ brought from 
 heaven, stamped with God's fourfold seal, of holiness, of 
 wisdom, of power, of love, and then committed to the 
 safe keeping of a church for which He shed His blood ; 
 that Gospel which is the peace of God, knitting all the 
 scattered fragments of mind and will and soul into one, 
 and bringing all into harmony with that mind and will 
 and spirit above, which is the love and the life and the 
 light of men. Let not one day pass without trying the 
 truth of that Gospel in earnest, resolute, importunate 
 prayer. Ask God to lift up His light upon you, and 
 convince you of the being and the power, of the atoning 
 death and the risen life, of Jesus. Ask Him so to reveal 
 His Son in you that it shall be no guess and no perad- 
 venture that He is your Lord and your God. Pray 
 Him to keep you stedfast in this faith, and every day to 
 frame and fashion your whole life, in thought and speech 
 and act, after it. Ask of Him grace to try the strength
 
 x.] Readiness. 197 
 
 of the Gospel, here and now, by facing your besetting 
 sin in the name and by the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Fight 
 it out with the devil in some definite decisive battle 
 within, after which you shall be able to say, ' I know in 
 whom I have believed ;' ' He is faithful that promised ; ' 
 ' I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth 
 me.' One such experience is it not to this that St 
 Paul here challenges us ? one such experience is more 
 to the soul that has it than all the books of all the 
 theologians. The habit of such experiences grows at 
 last into an evidence sure and stedfast, strong enough to 
 form a practical answer to all who would say to you, 
 The Gospel is a fable, Christ is not risen, prayer is a 
 mockery, God is an abstraction and a name. You 
 answer, Whether He be a name or no, I know not ; one 
 thing I know, that, whereas I was tied and bound by the 
 chain of my sins, now I am free and at large and vic- 
 torious, so long and only so long as I live in communion 
 with a Father and Saviour and Comforter, whom I treat 
 as living and hearing and answering, as tender to com- 
 passionate and as strong to save. If it be so if it be 
 indeed so that good and evil, falsehood and holiness, 
 are in league for my ruin ; that through a faith which is 
 a delusion I reach a strength which is virtue ; that by 
 means of prayer which is idle as the wind I find myself 
 able to become pure and peaceable and diligent and 
 self-forgetting if all this be so, then out of this wreck 
 and discord of my being I can but choose the less of two 
 evils, live the better life even in error, and bow myself to 
 the inevitable conditions of a creature the accident of an 
 accident. But if this cannot be if good and evil cannot
 
 198 Readiness. [x. 
 
 thus conspire if the lie cannot be holy, if the wicked 
 thing cannot be true, then is my evidence sure and my 
 hope stedfast. If the Gospel of peace gives me the 
 victory, then by that sign I know the Author God is 
 with it and in it of a truth.
 
 XI. 
 
 PRAYER. 
 
 Daniel vi. 10. 
 
 Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into 
 his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward 
 Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and 
 prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime. 
 
 AND was this superstition ? Was this the lingering 
 bigotry of an obsolete Judaism, surviving the trans- 
 plantation into a land of larger culture and higher 
 civilization ? This man of king's courts and great em- 
 ployments, chief minister of successive dynasties, in 
 whom eastern astrologers recognized a 'light and 
 understanding and wisdom like the wisdom of the 
 gods ' was he showing himself a silly fanatic when he 
 thus braved the wrath of his royal master by disobeying 
 the edict which prohibited worship ? Shall one who 
 admires the courage ridicule the enthusiasm ? Shall 
 we praise the conscientiousness which faced martyrdom 
 at the call of fancied duty, and condemn the infatuation 
 which saw a duty in devotion ? 
 
 Brethren, these are questions asked openly in the 
 world, in the church, of this day ; and they are questions 
 which unsettle, where they overthrow not, the faith of 
 many ; and they are questions which cannot, like most
 
 20O Prayer. [xi. 
 
 questions, wait for their answer, inasmuch as they are 
 fundamental, crucial, vital, touching the very spring of 
 being, and coming (so to say) between the man and his 
 God. 
 
 We shrink, and perhaps ought to shrink, from a topic 
 so momentous ; feeling how much the comfort and well- 
 being of souls may be jeoparded by its wrong or un- 
 skilful handling. We have thought to turn aside from 
 it into provinces less perilous and less responsible. But 
 every thing seems to beckon us this way, and to make 
 every other subject insignificant by comparison. Pray 
 then, we and you, that we may touch it, how r ever feebly, 
 however partially, at least with reverence and with 
 sympathy ; guided by the God ' who heareth prayer ' 
 to that which shall quicken and not hinder the prayers 
 of His people. 
 
 There might seem indeed to be an impropriety, al- 
 most an indelicacy, in dealing in any manner with this 
 most intimate, most secret intercourse between God and 
 the soul. Praying is the object of preaching : but can it 
 be its subject ? most of all, in the form of an enquiry 
 into the reality, the lawfulness, the possibility, of 
 praying? A deep awe should indeed rest, in all such 
 questionings, upon the ear that hears and the tongue 
 that speaks. Far, far from this meditation be the light- 
 ness and the smartness and the asperity of worldly 
 controversialists, of the strife of wrangling tongues. 
 Put off the shoe from the foot, thou who wouldest 
 discuss the mystery of mysteries, man's access to and 
 converse with his Maker. ' Is it nothing to you, O ye 
 that pass by,' if all the generations of God's Church, 
 from the creation to the advent, shall have lived and
 
 XL] Prayer. 201 
 
 died on a faith which was a delusion ? Here at least, 
 inside the church, with memories dear and sacred of 
 lives and deaths, near and far off, of which prayer was 
 the soul ; with an ancestry, more than of family, knitting 
 us to saints and heroes of whom the world was not 
 worthy; we need not fear levity or coldness or in- 
 difference in the listening. That which we could not 
 bear to discuss with persons uninterested we will 
 ponder together here on the knees of the soul. 
 
 It is wonderful how full Scripture is, when we read it 
 in this aspect, of the word and of the fact of prayer. 
 This one day, how full is everything of it. And what 
 wonder ? The very life of religion is prayer. Unlike in 
 all else, all God's saints have been men of prayer. It 
 has been their life. Explain it as you may, here is 
 a fact of which philosophy, of which candour, of which 
 common sense, of which common justice must take 
 notice. Here is a phenomenon as plain, as certain, as 
 striking, as sunrising or sunset. The antiquity of prayer 
 its existence, as a habit, as a custom, in the remotest 
 age of which we have one record ; the universality of 
 prayer, as a primary duty of every man who has 
 imagined himself to have so much as one spark or one 
 echo of a revelation ; the importance attached to prayer, 
 in the mind and in the life of all religious men ; the 
 prevalence of prayer, in proportion to the emergency of 
 circumstance and the vehemence of feeling, in the best 
 and noblest and truest of men ; the power of prayer, 
 judged but by its results in moulding character and 
 affecting action and even transforming life ; the benefit 
 of prayer, its enemies themselves being judges, in 
 calming, softening, sobering, sweetening, strengthening^
 
 2O2 Prayer. [XL 
 
 elevating the spirits and souls of the righteous ; these 
 are all so many facts, which the unbeliever himself 
 cannot gainsay, though he may profess to account for 
 them on principles most unsatisfactory to the Christian. 
 
 Remember also that this antiquity and universality of 
 prayer in God's Church has been realized in the midst 
 of many conflicting influences which might have been 
 expected to overcome it. Prayer, if in one sense an 
 instinct, is in another aspect a mystery. That I should 
 be able, kneeling on this paltry insignificant earth, to 
 hold communication with ' the high and holy One that 
 inhabiteth eternity ; ' to think my thought, to confess 
 my sin, to wish my wish, into the ear of an Almighty 
 listening God ; to bring my little, fleeting, dying life 
 into the presence, into the regard, into the loving foster- 
 ing supervision of Him who made earth and sea and 
 sky, and in whom, moment by moment, 'all things 
 consist ; ' this surely is a conception so little obvious or 
 a thing of course that it must have needed more than 
 argument, more than persuasion, much, very much more 
 than accident, to recommend it so convincingly to the 
 judgment and heart of mankind. And when to this 
 mysteriousness we add the difficulty, felt and acknow- 
 ledged by all who have tried it, of the work of praying ; 
 the reluctance of the natural fallen being to seek the 
 face of God ; the resistance of flesh and blood, much 
 more of sin and conscious unworthiness, to the effort of 
 arising in the far country to return home to One justly 
 displeased ; the exertion required, alike of intellect and 
 affection and will, on each particular occasion of earnest 
 importunate supplication ; we may well marvel more 
 and more at the moral force which has vanquished this
 
 XL] Prayer. 203 
 
 difficulty, and made prayer not only the rule of every 
 religion, but the practice of all the religious. One thing 
 more we must add, if we would be true to human ex- 
 perience : and that is, the many discouragements and 
 disappointments of praying ; the oft-repeated long- 
 frustrated endeavour after a grace seen but in the 
 distance ; the patient importunate seeking, the late, the 
 tardy, the partial, the imperfect attainment. When the 
 sum of these impediments is taken, and we see neverthe- 
 less that prayer is, and is mighty, and is in all the 
 earth ; then we can appreciate, in some measure, the 
 cogency of the evidence, and feel that it needs more 
 than assertion, and more than conjecture, and more 
 than theory, to destroy it. 
 
 And yet, my brethren, prayer would be undermined 
 in one moment if that which some have dared to say 
 of it were substantiated. If it were a sufficient account 
 of this phenomenon, to say with the unbeliever, that the 
 power of prayer begins and ends with faith in itself; 
 that all its beneficial effects, which the infidel does not 
 gainsay, are reducible to the influence of the act of 
 praying upon the mind of the worshipper ; that it 
 is not that any answer comes, but that thfe asking 
 reacts usefully upon the spirit of the asker; that it 
 tends to promote calmness and patience and fortitude 
 and benevolence, to suppose oneself communicating 
 with the invisible God and Lord of life; that a man 
 who imagines himself heard is solemnized and tran- 
 quillized and comforted, enabled to go about his work 
 and to meet his trials with a gentler, braver, kindlier 
 disposition ; and that thus prayer is its own answer, 
 and the common idea of an Auditor above is just as
 
 2O4 Prayer. [xi. 
 
 good as the impossible reality this would be indeed 
 to cut up by the roots the whole habit and the whole 
 conception. No true man will any longer pray, if you 
 once convince him that prayer is an imposture however 
 beneficial, a fraud however pious. We shall say, ' A 
 corrupt tree cannot bring forth good fruit,' nor can the 
 lie be tolerated because it is convenient. 
 
 Therefore it becomes a matter of life and death to 
 us to know the truth in this matter. ' Give light, and 
 let us die.' If God has not given us the right to pray ; 
 if God has not made prayer the soul's breath, nor access 
 to Himself the prerogative of a spirit which He has 
 created ; tell us not that, though a fancy, though an 
 illusion, it is productive of good, and that, if it does 
 us good, if it refreshes us, if it amuses us, we are at 
 liberty to practise it while we can. As in the affairs 
 of earth, so surely, not least in the concerns of the soul, 
 our maxim must be, first, midst, and last, Be true, be 
 true, be true. 
 
 We can suppose that few of these hearts have been 
 always free from all misgiving as to the use, the right, 
 and the efficacy of prayer. Times of depression, 'cloudy 
 and dark days' Ezekiel calls them, come to all of us, 
 when truths most surely believed seem to crack and 
 give way under us. We have hinted at some of the 
 causes which may thus operate upon our faith in 
 prayer. When the weight of earth and flesh and time 
 lies heavy upon us ; when all around conspire to say 
 to us, the things alike and the persons which make 
 up our life, Nothing is real but the visible, and nothing 
 is important but the material ; when each separate limb 
 of the soul is so clogged and weighted, that it cannot
 
 XL] Prayer. 205 
 
 drag itself, save by a compulsion which makes the act 
 nugatory, to the arduous task of communing with One 
 whom eye hath not seen, dwelling in the light un- 
 approachable; when some particular chain of sin is 
 tying and binding us, and we know in the heart and 
 in the soul that that sin must be laid down at the 
 very porch of heaven's temple if we would not preclude 
 our own entrance and affront the majesty which is our 
 hope ; at such times a thousand voices clamour within 
 us, each eloquent with some new argument against the 
 good of praying, each bidding us turn some other way 
 in quest of that benefit, in mind, or body, or estate, 
 for which Scripture and the church and pious custom 
 had encouraged us to make application at the throne 
 of grace. 
 
 At these moments, my brethren and I think we 
 must have known them there is scarce one cavil or 
 taunt of the unbeliever which has not awakened an 
 echo in the most earnest and faithful heart. 
 
 Sometimes it is the presumption the impertinence, 
 I had almost said of praying, which forces itself upon 
 the attention. Can I really suppose that the great 
 First Cause, the universal Fountain of being, can have 
 leisure to attend to this want or pain or unrest which I 
 myself who would have it relieved yet feel in my 
 own consciousness to be less than nothing to any one 
 out of myself? Is it not great ignorance of my place 
 and my desert, as a very insignificant inmate, for a very 
 short life-time, of a very insignificant planet, to suppose, 
 or to act as if I thought, that my happiness or my 
 misery could be of any consequence at all to the 
 almighty One who inhabiteth eternity, and whose
 
 206 Prayer. [xi. 
 
 name is Holy ? It is not always self-evident, 
 though it is a deep and substantial principle, that 
 all such hesitation is in fact the imputation to 
 God Himself of an estimate of importance and in- 
 significance which belongs altogether to finite intel- 
 ligences. When we thus speak, however humbly 
 and reverently, of things great and small in God's 
 regard ; of things too trifling, and of other things 
 not too trifling, for His notice even if the one class 
 of subjects be the management of universes, and the 
 other class of subjects be the aches and tears of a 
 child we are forgetting that it is the attribute of the 
 infinite and self-existent One to measure not with 
 man's measure the relative or the positive ; that to 
 God nothing can be great but Himself; and that, so 
 far from its being beneath His dignity to take account 
 of created interests and sufferings, it is, in reality, the 
 highest glory of Him before whom suns and stars, 
 angels and archangels, are in themselves 'less than 
 nothing, and vanity,' that He visits with His conso- 
 lation the prisoner in his dungeon, the widow and 
 fatherless in their affliction ; that He marks the first 
 rising to return of the prodigal exile, and thrills joy 
 through the very heaven of His holiness over one 
 sinner that repenteth. 
 
 Sometimes it is from another quiver that the dart 
 of doubt is suggested. You are asking God, so the 
 cavil shapes itself, to 'make a new thing in the earth;' 
 to interrupt, in your behalf, the orderly laws of His 
 working ; to do that which, if often done, would intro- 
 duce uncertainty and confusion into everything, and 
 replace the ' Fiat lux ' of creation by an opposite
 
 XL] Prayer. 207 
 
 mandate, ' Let there be confusion.' How can God 
 grant this prayer of yours, for the health (say) or the 
 life of your friend, in disregard of that general con- 
 nection of cause and effect which exists between a 
 poison and a fever, between exhaustion and death ? 
 How can God, in this other case, hearken to the 
 entreaty that it will please Him to counteract the 
 regular operation of His winds and His waves, of His 
 storms and His calms, on purpose that a particular 
 person in whom you happen to feel an interest may be 
 restored in safety to your home and to your embrace ? 
 How can God, in this other case, consistently with His 
 moral laws, which are at least as real as the natural, 
 prevent, at your intercession, some careless boyhood 
 running on into a sensual youth, some sensual youth 
 into a corrupt manhood and a ruined old age, until, 
 as ' lust conceiving brought forth sin,' so ' sin finished 
 shall bring forth death?' Nay, how can God the 
 thing which even they who doubt about prayers con- 
 cerning weather and sickness regard as the proper 
 subject for supplication how can God, for your mere 
 asking, interpose between your own sin of the past, and 
 its just, its natural consequence in the weakness and 
 misery of the present ? When you beg of God a pure 
 heart, you yourself having made that heart by your own 
 self-indulgences a very ' cage of unclean birds ;' when 
 you beg of God a heavenward spirit, you yourself having 
 cribbed and cabined that spirit, by your own obstinate 
 indifference, within the four narrow walls of earth and 
 time ; you are, in fact, asking Him to break His mighty 
 self-enforcing law of moral and spiritual consequence, 
 and to encourage both in yourself and in others that
 
 208 Prayer. [XL 
 
 fatal habit of venture and speculation in the things of 
 the soul which it must be the first object of religion 
 of revelation first and foremost, if a revelation there 
 be to discountenance and to preclude. 
 
 These are terrible thoughts so much as to shape into 
 utterance. But they cannot be entirely new to any 
 of us. And although they wear an air of reason, and 
 with many pass for unanswerable, I venture to think 
 that they are as shallow as they are shocking. If by 
 'law' we mean what (in this connection) we ought to 
 mean, God's habit of acting, God's way of going on, 
 as observed by us where we can trace it, as made known 
 to us by whatsoever means ; it is impossible to speak 
 of any particular supposed act of God as breaking 
 this law, until we know for certain every chapter and 
 every clause of it ; know for certain (in other words) 
 that this very act in question was not conceivably a 
 part of it. How if, for example, the prevalence of 
 prayer was one ingredient in that irresistible will ? 
 How if God, unto whom 'all His works are known 
 (we read) from the beginning,' was pleased to link 
 together in the eternal counsels the prayer which 
 should ask and the result which should be realized? 
 How if prayer itself be a part of the predestination 
 that predestination which (we grant) none can with- 
 stand and none can modify? Something of this kind 
 seems to lurk in those memorable words of God by 
 Ezekiel, ' I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it 
 I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel, 
 to do it for them.' The promise is ready, but the 
 prayer must fetch it. 
 
 And is there indeed any immorality, any breach of
 
 XL] Prayer. 209 
 
 God's law spiritual, in the granting of those other 
 prayers spoken of prayers for the reformation of a 
 life, mine own or another's ; prayers for the cleansing of 
 a sin-stained heart, for the elevation of an earth-bound 
 spirit ? O, if there be anything immoral in prayer, 
 in the name of God abandon it. But if the highest of 
 all morality be that which gives back a soul to its God ; 
 which uncoils the binding rope of habit, and makes a 
 whole man free with the liberty which is in Christ 
 Jesus ; tell us not that we are risking God's law by 
 bidding you to believe in a superhuman work of heal- 
 ing, or that we are encouraging in others a gambling 
 with the spiritual life by relying with all our trust upon 
 a God mighty to bring us sinners to repentance. Who 
 ever in the history of this race was made profligate by 
 the hope of a late, a bitter repentance ? Who ever 
 found the efficacy of prayer so sudden or so luxurious 
 as to embolden him to relax in the confidence of it 
 one struggle or one battle or one agony of the self- 
 mastering and the self-amendment ? 
 
 There remain behind, unnoticed for lack of space and 
 time, a thousand possible misgivings as to the available- 
 ness of prayer. We cannot count that old doctrine 
 a conceit which tells us of an enemy trembling for 
 his dominion often as he sees one of us kneeling, like 
 Daniel, to make supplication. Sometimes the mere 
 panic is enough Prayer is an enthusiasm. What if 
 it be ? And what if ' enthusiasm ' itself means the 
 having God in us ? Sometimes, Prayer is a nullity. 
 Thou kneelest here, in thy study or in thy chamber ; 
 thou kneelest and utterest words thin as air pleasing 
 if they be wishes amiable, pious, hopeful, if they be 
 V. 14
 
 2io Prayer. [xi. 
 
 aspirations : but the great God is not here : He is in 
 a far-off heaven : the blue vault of sky, the white-washed 
 ceiling of thy room, bounds, confines, and flings back thy 
 supplication. Sometimes, Prayer is a superfluity. God 
 has decided this or that concerning thee ; perhaps kindly, 
 perhaps in anger : it is settled : why meddle with thy 
 destiny? Sometimes, Prayer is a mistrust. God has charge 
 of thee : dost thou doubt Him ? will He not do better for 
 thee than thou canst direct Him ? hath He not said, 
 ' Stand still, and see my salvation ?' Sometimes, some- 
 times said I not, always Prayer is a trouble. It is so 
 long ere I can set in motion the wheels of this chariot 
 so many wandering thoughts first, so many plans inter- 
 vening of business and recreation, so many fears and 
 doubts assailing, ' Who am I ? and what and where is 
 my God ?' so many 'bitter thoughts, of conscience born,' 
 telling of prayers defeated by sin, telling of prayers 
 paralyzed by sin, telling of prayers vitiated by sin 
 O weary, weary, weary round of words, trodden each 
 day, no day advancing me towards my goal, nay, not 
 even if that goal be but the facility, the delight, of 
 praying. 'Ye said also, What a weariness is it ! and 
 ye have snuffed at it, saith the Lord of Hosts.' 
 
 Brethren, we would draw you back, God helping us, 
 towards this thing which is indeed your life. We 
 tremble lest there be in any of us an evil heart of un- 
 belief as concerning this duty yes, let us use the old 
 word till we can feel it, this privilege, this blessing of 
 prayer. There can be no life toward God without it. 
 Brethren, there can, we believe, be no death toward 
 God with it. Very various arc the workings of life : 
 death has none. Expressions, experiences, ideas, doc-
 
 XL] Prayer. 211 
 
 trines, estimates of good and true and important, these 
 differ, unspeakably differ, in good men, Christian men, 
 4 saints of the Most High ' (to use this prophet's word 
 for them), who nevertheless all, in their measure, 'shall 
 possess,' do possess, ' the kingdom.' We do not think 
 that they differ much in one thing : all pray. If we 
 would be of them, if we would live good lives, lives 
 above chance and change, above accident and circum- 
 stance, above disappointment and defeat and bereave- 
 ment, above temper and temperament and temptation, 
 we must pray. And shall I dare to confess it I care 
 little how you pray, or for what you pray. ' Whereto 
 ye have attained, by it walk,' by it pray, according to 
 your light and according to your conscience. ' If in 
 anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal 
 even this unto you.' If you have too much limited the 
 field of prayer, if you have not yet felt the compass 
 of God's permission to enquire of Him, if either scoffing 
 words or misgiving thoughts have kept you from the 
 comfort and strength of consulting God and invoking 
 God and importuning God about everything; be not 
 dismayed : pray as you can, pray as you feel and know 
 and are minded, and God, in His boundless love and 
 pity, will tell you more and more, little by little, of the 
 fathomless depths of His sympathy and of His strength. 
 It is sometimes the art of the sceptic to dwarf down 
 prayer to petition. Prayer, he assumes, is asking certain 
 definite gifts from One whose favour is valued because 
 His power is infinite. It is further assumed that the 
 gifts asked are of this life health and prosperity, re- 
 covery and restoration, length of days and abundance 
 of possessions ; these are the subjects, the only ap- 
 
 14 2
 
 2 1 2 Prayer. [xi. 
 
 preciable subjects, of that petition which is prayer. 
 Prove then, he says, in the most precise, literal, busi- 
 ness-like manner, whether prayer is of use. Ask the 
 lives of one room-full of fever-stricken people, and ask 
 not the lives of the rest. If you decline the ordeal, you 
 are self-condemned. If you believed in the power of 
 prayer, you would ' give the sign.' Even thus was it in 
 the days of Jesus Christ. Very hard it might seem to 
 those Pharisees, very unsympathizing, or else very 
 suspicious, that He would not display in the sky the 
 token which would have wrought conviction. ' The 
 kingdom of God,' He said, ' cometh not with observa- 
 tion.' 'The kingdom of God is within you :' if you will 
 not see it there, you can see it nowhere. Even so 
 we all feel the impropriety, the inconclusiveness, the 
 irreverence (whether meant or not) of the proposed test 
 of prayer. Prayer is not the synonym of petition. Peti- 
 tion itself is not chiefly of earth. Prayer is speaking to 
 God, whatsoever be the voice, the language, the subject of 
 discourse : it may be confession, it may be adoration, it may 
 be thanksgiving, it may be petition. If it be petition, it 
 may be entreaty, it may be deprecation, it may be inter- 
 cession, it may be for the life, it may be for the soul. 
 Who pretended that a sudden, disjointed, isolated request,, 
 uttered once in a way, apart from the spirit, apart from 
 the life's tone and tenor and habit, had any promise, 
 any faintest hint of an answer ? Prayer is the soul's 
 language in the ear of a God known to be present. 
 A man may pray who asks nothing, who but dwells 
 in the secret place of the Most High, silent from 
 petition, counting it enough to abide under the shadow 
 of the Almighty, the All-loving. Enlarge your concep-
 
 XL] Prayer. 213 
 
 tion of this thing. Know that you can pray, even if 
 you have a scruple about prayer for temporal blessings ; 
 even if you see not your way to prayer for wind and 
 rain, for staying the course of a fever, or diverting the 
 incidence of a thunderbolt. Call no man an unbeliever 
 who does not expect and dare not implore special inter- 
 positions of a hand which he knows to be working and 
 can trust to work well. He misses something perhaps 
 of the consolation of the ' Christian altogether;' and yet 
 his soul may be resting on the impregnable rock, and 
 his life guarded, half unawares, by ministering spirits 
 from God's presence. The reality of prayer is the 
 meeting of the two spirits the ' I ' and the ' I AM '- 
 unto communication, unto converse, unto interchange 
 (with reverence be it spoken) of thought and speech, 
 of life and love. Where this is, prayer is ; though 
 nothing be asked and nothing be given, save that 
 ineffable grace of the Divine Presence, from which the 
 earthly countenance shines, and men take knowledge 
 of the man that he has been with Jesus. Then, in 
 due season, then, in God's time, the transference will 
 be easy and natural from the walking with God here 
 to the seeing His face hereafter. 
 
 Brethren, it cannot be wicked to pray. It is no in- 
 truding into things forbidden. It is the visiting a home 
 which was ours in our infancy, which shall be ours for 
 ever when the childhood of our perfection shall at last 
 be attained. Prayer is going home. Prayer is coming 
 to Him who is our rest. Prayer is awakening out 
 of earth's sleep, letting in the light of day upon night's 
 dark dank chamber, and beginning to live. Use it 
 .evermore as your refreshment and your recreation.
 
 214 Prayer. [xi. 
 
 ' Bodily exercise,' this day's lesson tells us, ' profiteth 
 little:' the life toward God, of which prayer is the 
 intensest, most vital moment, ' is profitable for all 
 things.' See that you make it so. Make it tell upon 
 the life that now is. Prove it now herewith not by its 
 power to work wonders, to make sick men suddenly 
 whole, or ' a plague of rain and waters ' a firmament 
 swept and sparkling but by its effect upon your life's 
 life ; by its chasing the demon of lust and the demon of 
 cruelty and the demon of a diabolical selfishness, and 
 making you the helper of the weak, and the comforter 
 of the downcast, and the example of the wavering, 
 and the delight of your friends, and the joy of your 
 home. When you find that prayer does something of 
 this kind for you ; that it will not dwell with sin, that 
 it makes you strong for the soul's battle, that it is in 
 you a reality and a power and a love ; then you, and 
 others with you, will have a proof not to be gainsaid, 
 a proof worth ten thousand portents, whose gift is 
 prayer ; you will know that such a boon, so pure, so 
 peaceable, so beneficent, can have but one source, one 
 origin; is indeed from above; cometh down, like wisdom, 
 like hope, like charity, from ' the Father of lights, with 
 whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.'
 
 XII. 
 
 ILLUMINATION. 
 
 Ephesians i. 18. 
 The eyes of your understanding being enlightened. 
 
 IT is the prayer of St Paul for his beloved church of 
 Ephesus. For persons of whose churchmanship, of 
 whose Christ-membership, he has no doubt. Already 
 called, believing, sealed with the Spirit. St Paul hears 
 of their faith, hears of their love, ceases not to give 
 thanks for them as he mentions them in his prayers 
 those wonderful, heaven-searching, earth-compassing 
 prayers, which neither distance, nor isolation, nor im- 
 prisonment, nor (hardest to bear) compulsory inactivity, 
 nor presence, by day and night, of a rude heathen 
 soldier chained to him, could interrupt or embitter : 
 and yet, when he tells us what those prayers were for 
 these Ephesians, we might almost think, in our haste 
 and in our formal rigid theology, that they were such as 
 implied, not their immaturity only, but their shallowness 
 and hollowness, in the life of Christ : for he prays that 
 God may give them, as a blessing still needed, ' a spirit 
 of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Himself, 
 the eyes of their understanding being enlightened.' 
 
 There lies thus on the surface of the text a lesson of 
 humility and a lesson of wisdom. Let us never count
 
 2 1 6 I I hi m ination. [x 1 1 . 
 
 ourselves to have attained. Let us never think it too 
 late to pray for illumination. Let us never resent, never 
 repudiate the word which speaks to us as unto babes 
 (still) in Christ. And for others so many of us as are 
 or shall be ministers of Christ let us learn, in our 
 preaching, in our counselling, in the tone of our address, 
 in the manner of our shepherding, that spirit of hope 
 and of brotherhood, that sense of the universal pro- 
 pitiation and of the individual incorporation, which shall 
 make the very sound of our Gospel an encouragement 
 and an attraction, saying this to the most backward and 
 the most earth-bound in the congregation, Because ye 
 are Christ's, therefore be Christians : because ye are 
 chosen and called and sealed, therefore pray, therefore 
 struggle, therefore hope : because ye are children of 
 light, therefore walk in it, the eyes of your understand- 
 ing being enlightened. 
 
 There can, I believe, be no question that the proper 
 reading of the text will give us ' heart ' for ' under- 
 standing.' 'The eyes of your heart being enlightened.' 
 The peculiarity of the expression seems to have oc- 
 casioned the alteration. And yet what a word is it, 
 when it is restored to us. How beautiful, how sug- 
 gestive, how bright in thought. ' The eyes of your 
 heart illuminated,' to know two things : the first, ' the 
 hope of God's calling;' in other words for the 'and' 
 which makes three co-ordinate clauses ought, I believe, 
 to be cancelled ' the riches of the glory of God's in- 
 heritance in the saints;' the second, 'the exceeding 
 greatness of the power put forth upon us who believe,' 
 a power measured only by that which raised Christ 
 Himself from death, and exalted Him both to universal
 
 XIL] Illumination. 217 
 
 dominion and to the headship over all things to the 
 Church. 
 
 ' The eyes of your heart being enlightened.' 
 It would be a mistake to carry into the Bible that 
 nicety of mental distribution which is sometimes de- 
 ceptive even in human metaphysics. We are aware that 
 4 heart ' in the language of the Bible is larger and more 
 inclusive than in our modern acceptation. It means 
 sometimes in Scripture all that is in man. ' From 
 within, out of the heart of man, proceed evil thoughts,' 
 as well of blasphemy and foolishness, as of passion and 
 lasciviousness. Still that there is a difference, usually 
 recognized in the Bible, between ' heart ' and ' under- 
 standing,' will be evident in a moment if you try in 
 some particular instance to interchange the two. 'With 
 my whole heart have I sought Thee.' ' I cried with my 
 whole heart.' ' In the integrity of my heart have I done 
 this.' ' Give unto Solomon my son a perfect heart.' 
 ' See that ye love one another with a pure heart 
 fervently.' ' Who shall ascend into the hill of the 
 Lord ? He that hath clean hands and a pure heart.' 
 4 Blessed are the pure in heart : for they shall see God.' 
 ' The eyes of your heart being enlightened.' 
 The heart, brethren, no less than the understanding, 
 has its thoughts, has its voice, has its hands, has its eyes. 
 What is this but to say that the one indivisible being, 
 the ' myself of the man, has a real, an active, an 
 energetic existence and that in all manner of ways 
 in the province of the affections ? The point before us 
 and we will keep to it is, the discernment, the insight, 
 the intuition, of the affections. The heart has eyes. 
 The eyes of the heart are as keen, are as piercing, are
 
 218 Illumination. [xn. 
 
 as quick and as far-sighted, in their sphere and that 
 sphere is a universe as the eyes of the body or the 
 eyes of the intellect Who has not found them so ? 
 I dare almost to say that without the heart the intellect 
 itself is torpid ; that without loving there is no knowing 
 anywhere. 
 
 Certainly it is so in study. What can be so dull, 
 so lethargic, so stupid, as mere quickness, sharpness, 
 cleverness, hating its subject ? I need not carry back 
 your thoughts to those first days of lessons, in nursery 
 or school-room, when all was blank despairing darkness 
 because the love of knowledge was not yet awakened, 
 either in its pure disinterestedness, which is the promise 
 of wisdom, or in that ambition of reward, which some- 
 times helps and sometimes counterfeits it The ex- 
 perience is yours still There are subjects of lecture 
 and of examination which you dislike and therefore 
 fail in : there are others which the same mind readily 
 grasps and rapidly appropriates, because it finds in 
 them a congeniality and an attractiveness, so that the 
 eyes of the understanding are for them the eyes also of 
 the heart. If you would know a science, you must love 
 it. If you would know a book, you must read it with 
 the eyes of the heart. Dislike it all the time, and you 
 will never know it Love is knowledge. 
 
 And who has not had experience, in life, of this 
 phenomenon a head entirely educated by the heart ? 
 There was one who, in boyhood, in youth, through 
 school days and academical, was looked upon as a 
 laggard and a dullard in everything intellectual ; below 
 and behind his equals in age, in all that distinguishes 
 youth or gives promise for the manhood. But there came
 
 x r i . ] Illumination. 2 1 9 
 
 to that man, under the good hand of God, the impulse 
 of a new, a mighty affection perhaps in the form of 
 a human love, perhaps of a divine and soon the whole 
 being seemed to be lifted to a higher level, into a 
 livelier and more buoyant atmosphere. Activity, suc- 
 cess, usefulness, distinction, the respect of the world, 
 the devotion of his own, the blessing of the needy, the 
 visible approval of One above, began to mark his 
 onward way ; and a life, not of meritorious toil only, 
 but (which is our present point) of real intellectual 
 elevation, of opinion wise and large, of judgment pro- 
 found and persuasive, was the result here below, the 
 direct, the undoubted result, not of the expulsive, but 
 rather of the impulsive power of a new affection. 
 
 If this be true of the knowledge of things, what shall 
 we say of that of persons ? There certainly the eye 
 of knowledge must be the eye of love. Tell us not 
 of people quick-sighted to the faults of their brother ; 
 of men said to be discerning because they are suspicious, 
 good judges of character because with them every cha- 
 racter is bad. That is a devil's knowledge, from which 
 God keep us all. Doubtless every character has its 
 bad side. The amiable are sometimes weak, and 
 the strong are sometimes thank God, not always 
 unamiable. The religious are sometimes censorious, 
 and charity is sometimes seen thank God, not 
 always in divorce from orthodoxy. I doubt not that 
 evil spirits see these inconsistencies see perhaps little 
 else in us and make sport of them. But he who 
 would see another truly, see him through and through, 
 must see him, in his measure, as God sees him with 
 the eyes of the heart, which are the eyes of love. Ho\v
 
 220 Illumination. [xn. 
 
 often has it happened to you to judge a man unfavour- 
 ably. You could see nothing but his awkwardness, or 
 his roughness, or his ugliness, or his unmannerliness. 
 Yet a friend of yours loved that man wished that you 
 judged him favourably told you that he was to be 
 loved. Could you but have got over your prejudice, 
 could you but have willed to like him, you would have 
 valued him, because then first you would have known 
 him, too. The eyes of the understanding are nothing 
 without the eyes of the heart. 
 
 Judge ye therefore, brethren, how little the intellect 
 can furnish towards the knowledge of God. We would 
 not undervalue God forbid theology, the key and 
 the crown and the queen of sciences. We cannot echo 
 that senseless nineteenth-century cry, which would 
 make light of theology, pretending to exalt piety ; 
 which would say, 'We all know: any one can preach: 
 why study the fathers ? why institute a theological 
 school or a theological tripos ? theology, if it means 
 anything, means religion, and religion, if it is not an 
 imposture, means piety, and piety means feeling, and 
 feeling means sentiment, and sentiment is a mere 
 incense, a fragrant dust, aromatic and fugitive and evan- 
 escent.' Nevertheless we do know that a man might 
 be a theologian and not a Christian. Why? Because 
 the eyes of the intellect are diverse and separate from 
 the eyes of the heart, and he who would know God can 
 know Him only with these. God, as the hope of our 
 calling ; God, as the inheritance of the saints ; God, 
 as the resurrection-power, first to Christ, then to the 
 Christian of course no theology taught in lecture- 
 rooms or tested by examinations will bring us to Him,
 
 xii.] Illumination. 221 
 
 will make us know Him. One moment of prayer is 
 worth them all because prayer is the voice of the 
 heart, and the heart alone can become acquainted with 
 a Person. That knowledge begins and grows and is 
 perfected in converse, in contact, in intercourse and 
 interchange, in sympathy and fellowship and com- 
 munion ; not least when hope and power are the two 
 subjects of the study the hope of an everlasting co- 
 existence, the power of an assimilating presence. ' If 
 any man love God, the same ' knoweth let me rather 
 say with St Paul it is more reverent, it is more true 
 'the same is known of Him.' 'The eyes of your heart 
 being enlightened.' 
 
 There is a second condition of seeing. The organ 
 of sight is created, and yet there is not vision. Light is 
 wanting. St Paul prays that the eyes of the heart may 
 be enlightened. 
 
 There must be; first, a revelation of the invisible. The 
 light unapproachable must itself approach. 
 
 Who amongst us believes in revelation ? I know we 
 reverence the name and the idea. The ancient book 
 which enshrines it is dear still to the heart of England. 
 Yet suffer, brethren, and put not from you, the word of 
 enquiry. Do you believe that God, over and above 
 the book of nature, in which he that runs may read 
 what St Paul calls ' His eternal power and Godlike- 
 ness' over and above the gifts of reason and conscience, 
 by which discoveries may be made, true discoveries, of 
 the wonder-working hand, and the right-loving will, 
 of a power, a Person, who evidently lets us not alone 
 has interposed to communicate directly thoughts and 
 facts and 'concerning' directions, as to Himself, and as
 
 222 I Humiliation. [xn. 
 
 to His creatures ? Do you believe in a revelation, real, 
 direct, and original, of which God, God in Christ, is at 
 once the subject and the author ? 
 
 This is an enquiry lying deeper and reaching further 
 than the genuineness or the authenticity of any number, 
 or of the whole volume, of the books of Scripture. 
 Revelation and inspiration are two things, not one. 
 It is great confusion, and it is a great wrong, to inter- 
 change them. It is quite conceivable that there might 
 have been one of the two and not the other ; that God 
 might have revealed Himself in prophets and in His 
 Son, and yet not have inspired one word of the record. 
 'The light that lighteth every man, coming into the 
 world,' might have shone in all its lustre and yet the 
 other and separate light, of a word written and legible, 
 never have been kindled. We do a cruel wrong to 
 others, we lay a needless and wanton burden upon 
 ourselves, when we make faith in revelation, and faith 
 in inspiration, convertible and interchangeable terms. 
 A man might be a devout believer in the Gospel of 
 grace and salvation, and yet not an implicit receiver 
 of each verse or each chapter or each book of Scripture 
 as equally, and as a matter of course, directly inspired 
 by God. Let the two questions be kept distinct, and 
 God will answer each, in His time and in His way, to 
 the devout and earnest and honest enquirer. 
 
 But the former of the two questions is vital. Hath 
 God revealed Himself to us in His Son ? I do not ask, 
 Was the character of Christ beautiful, and the doctrine 
 of Christ sublime, and the life of Christ exemplar}-, 
 and the death of Christ noble and martyr-like and self- 
 sacrificing ? None of these things would prove a
 
 XIL] Illumination. 223 
 
 difference in kind, however great in degree, between 
 Him and some few of those master-spirits which have 
 appeared at intervals of a few generations or a few 
 centuries to astonish and to abash and to elevate 
 mankind. What we ask is, 'Was God in Christ re- 
 conciling the world to Himself?' Had Christ words 
 of eternal life, brought with Him from heaven, for 
 fallen, sinful, dying, immortal men ? This is a question 
 which will not wait It is your life. Theories of 
 inspiration, particular things in the Bible, authorship 
 of its books, Old Testament miracles, I dare to call 
 each and all of these secondary to that of the com- 
 mission and the authority and the divinity of Jesus 
 Christ. When you are a Christian, then you will have 
 a thousand questions to ask interesting, important, 
 momentous questions, for which a lifetime is not long 
 enough : but you will ask them of a God known in a 
 Saviour ; you will ask them on your knees before a 
 Person in whose light alone you hope to see light 
 
 But there is not in all of us this first knowledge. 
 St Paul's prayer in the text is wanted here, in a sense 
 in which it was not wanted at Ephesus. Brethren, we 
 must not assume even our Christianity. We must not 
 take for granted this first illumination. The eyes of 
 the heart still need to be enlightened in thousands 
 and tens of thousands inside the church. We still, in 
 Isaiah's strong figure, 'grope at noonday in darkness, 
 like men that have no eyes.' The experience of one, 
 taken almost at hazard from a beautiful biography of 
 yesterday, is the experience of multitudes of listeners 
 in these galleries. 
 
 ' I have always felt that there was a something
 
 224 Illumination. [xn. 
 
 between me and God ; that there was a barrier I had 
 no power over, which seemed to stop as it were my 
 communication with Him, to hide Him from me. 
 When I attempted to pray, it was often with a feeling, 
 Where shall I find Him ? a sort of vagueness about the 
 whole thought of Him. I am aware now that I did not 
 believe in the reality of any deeper feeling. . . . Now, 
 it is but faint, yet I have a feeling within it is not a 
 thought, a belief, but a feeling. ... I look to myself 
 so ugly in the past, that I wonder any one could love 
 me. . . . When I .read in my Bible, every word seems 
 as if it applied to me personally; words that were before 
 an empty sound, seem to pierce through me. All my 
 previous religious impressions seem to have left the root 
 of the matter untouched ; now I am sure that I am 
 being drawn to God, and that He will lift me up to 
 rest wholly on His promises and to taste His peace. . . . 
 I feel quite fearful lest the delicacy of the new feeling 
 should be hurt or damped. It is certainly very myste- 
 rious. I feel a constant wonder at myself at what I 
 am sure is no delusion, and yet is so distinct from any 
 previous impression. It is not a difference in degree 
 it is an awakening to life ; a removing of what before 
 seemed to be between me and God, as if He was hid 
 from my eyes.' 
 
 ' The eyes of your heart being enlightened.' My 
 brethren, ' every man hath his proper gift of God,' and 
 even His spiritual dealing is infinitely various. It is 
 idle, it is worse than idle, to try to force all men 
 through a round of successive experiences, each having 
 its defined form, its assigned chapter in the manual 
 of the soul's pilgrimage. It may be the will of God
 
 XIL] Illumination. 225 
 
 that some of His spirits should dwell in a lower heaven 
 of faith ; should never in this life see Him with this 
 clear, this distinct intuition ; should have all their joy, 
 if not all their peace, reserved for the year and the 
 day and the hour of the beatific vision. These things 
 may be may be as a trial of faith, may be for other 
 reasons, or may be as a discipline of loving correction 
 for long foregoing years of indifference, frivolity, or sin. 
 They who dwell much in the secret place of the Most 
 High, serving with veiled face and feet, ' longing, yea, 
 even fainting' for a brighter light and a more open 
 vision, may well accept it as a cross to be borne if they 
 must still cry, with the patriarch, ' O that I knew where 
 I might find Him ! that I might come even to His seat ! 
 Behold, I go forward, but He is not there; and back- 
 ward, but I cannot perceive Him : on the left hand, 
 where He doth work, but I cannot behold Him ; He 
 hideth Himself on the right hand, that I cannot see 
 Him : but He knoweth the way that I take : when He 
 hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.' 
 
 Only, only, brethren we would charge it upon you 
 in the name alike of truth and hope suffer not any 
 sophistry, not even if it call itself by a theological name, 
 to persuade you that you are in the light when you 
 know that you are in darkness. Some of God's saints 
 have walked all their days in the dimness of a twilight 
 hope and a flickering peradventure. But they felt it 
 at the heart's core, and they made it a discipline of 
 humility unto godliness. How different had it been 
 with them if they had declared that they were in the 
 light, that they had all, that all which they had not 
 was either a fancy or an impossibility, because they 
 V. 15
 
 226 Illumination. [xn. 
 
 had been baptized, and because church usage made 
 </>Gmo7i6<? a synonym for baptism. Yet even church 
 writers, when they write guardedly, can distinguish 
 between the two ; can show that they know the 
 difference between the type and the antitype ; can 
 say, 'Mark, the illumination is before the baptism;' 
 and, ' Without the illumination of the Spirit no man 
 can attain to the knowledge of the truth.' Phrases and 
 figures, half devotional, half rhetorical, harmless in days 
 when Christianity was suffering, may become dangerous 
 to truth, because dangerous to spirituality, when they 
 are stereotyped, in an age or a world of promiscuous 
 profession, into formulas of doctrine or definitions of 
 theology. Let us accept with devout thanksgiving the 
 place within God's church, within Christ's body, to 
 which baptism has admitted us. Let us acknowledge 
 the greatness of that mercy which has ' prevented ' us 
 with benediction ; which has sealed upon the individual 
 the world-wide redemption, and given us to draw the 
 first breath of consciousness in an atmosphere of evan- 
 gelical grace. 'Thy congregation shall dwell therein;' 
 in the dew and the rain and the sunshine of a love 
 perfectly free and a hope guaranteed by promise. It 
 is every thing to know that not one day nor one hour 
 need intervene before we begin to live the life which is 
 hidden with Christ in God. That we need not wait 
 for one sign, inward or outward, that God has taken 
 us for His own and sealed us with His seal. That we 
 are already His people and the sheep of His pasture ; 
 entitled to say to Him, 'Our Father;' entitled to plead 
 the will which is our sanctification. These things are 
 ours : let us not ' curse our blessings ' by ' dreaming that
 
 xii.] Illumination. 227 
 
 we eat ' to ' awake with appetite.' Let us read aright 
 the signs within. If we find no pleasure in the Word 
 of God and prayer ; if we know not what it is to speak 
 inside the soul to a living, a present, a listening God ; 
 if in the services of God's house, if in the sacrament 
 of holy Communion, we can but galvanize ourselves 
 into a so-called devotion by gestures and postures which 
 never get beyond a violent self-determination to believe 
 that there is some One before us to whom obeisance 
 is due, while yet with that Person, if Person He be, 
 we never enter, spirit to spirit, into real communication, 
 into conscious converse it is idle to say that the eyes 
 of the heart are enlightened because in sleeping infancy 
 we were sprinkled with the baptismal water, made par- 
 takers of Christ, and inserted into that holy church 
 which is His body. The blessing of that initiation is 
 great ; but it lies not in making it supplant the very 
 grace itself which it testifies. 
 
 Brethren, if any heart feels itself this day unillumi- 
 nated, not yet lit up and kindled by that living grace 
 which is the one satisfaction of the true, let it pray for 
 itself St Paul's prayer, let it resolve, let it determine 
 redemption, church-membership, the book which is 
 God's legible word, the sacraments which are God's 
 visible hand, all justify this resolution, this determina- 
 tion to end this unrealized state at once. Not one 
 year, not one month, not one week, not one day, not one 
 hour from this present, shall find or leave me as I am. 
 I have the right of illumination given me I will use it. 
 I will ask, I will seek, I will knock, on the ground of the 
 promise. Lord, lift Thou up the light of Thy counte- 
 nance upon this heart. Lord, if Thou art and I know 
 
 152
 
 228 Illumination. [xn. 
 
 that Thou art ; if Thou hearest prayer and I know 
 that Thou hearest ; I will come to Thee as such, as that 
 which Thou art, and I will not leave Thee, I will not let 
 Thee go, except Thou bless me. O long, long before 
 this opening term has closed again long before these 
 dark, cloudy, watery days of November have changed 
 themselves into the healthier frosts of Christmas you 
 shall have been heard, and you shall have been answer- 
 ed ; the eyes of your heart enlightened with the spiritual 
 presence, and you yourself made anew into the resolute,, 
 the humble, the often rejoicing, always hoping Christian. 
 Yes, we exaggerate to ourselves the length of time 
 and the outlay of toil yet neither could be too great 
 with such an object required to gain a hearing at the 
 throne of grace. An answer there will be, I dare ta 
 say it, instantly. An answer a light, a peace, a hope^ 
 yes, a joy so soon as there is what God calls an asking. 
 We limit, God limits not. God never says, 'Go, and 
 come again, and to-morrow I will give.' 'If any of you 
 lack wisdom,' if any of you lack light, 'let him ask of 
 God, that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth 
 not.' Only 'let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.' 
 ' The eyes of your heart being enlightened.' 
 The duty is again this year laid upon me, and I 
 accept it with thankfulness, of urging upon this great 
 congregation the claims of a charity than which 
 none can lie nearer to your doors a few moments, I 
 trust, will suffice to recommend it also to your hearts. 
 This University, itself in so many senses a focus of 
 light ; light intellectual light, I know, also, light in- 
 creasingly, moral, religious, spiritual dwells, like the 
 church in the world, in the midst of darkness. It is
 
 XIL] Ilhimination. 229 
 
 needless to assign causes; but I suppose that no dark- 
 ness is much denser than that which hangs, or did hang, 
 upon the suburbs of Cambridge. I say not whether any 
 portion of this cloud of sin and sorrow is drawn from 
 the very midst of us: the fact is not gainsaid there 
 is a cloud dank and pestilential, receding a little, driven 
 backward by pastoral effort, yet existing still and your 
 aid is asked to transfigure it. Something, much, has 
 been done during these past ten years, since first I was 
 entrusted with this office something, much, by the de- 
 voted work of men of your own body, who had before 
 them the choice of all work, and chose this, the least 
 attractive and the most disheartening something, much, 
 has been done, visible to man, how much more to God, 
 to carry a Gospel of light and love into the homes of 
 poverty, into the very nurseries and seedplots of vice, 
 .and so to prove once again that that Gospel has in 
 it might it be heard, might it be heeded the secret 
 of all light and of all love, between man and man, 
 because first between man and his God. 
 
 Yes, brethren, think not that you are urged to an 
 impossible or a chimerical effort, when you are asked 
 to give for the evangelization of these suburbs. A work 
 is in progress there, due in large part to this association, 
 which for the Gospel's sake, which for Christ's sake, 
 ought to be spoken of. In a district, once (I had almost 
 said) infamous, numbering now 11,000 inhabitants, there 
 are already three churches, containing more than 2000 
 worshippers on the evening of each Sunday, there are 
 more than 400 communicants, 1600 children in church 
 Sunday schools, more than 100 candidates for the 
 annual confirmation will you say that the money here
 
 230 Illumination. . [xn. 
 
 gathered is wasted or thrown away when such are its 
 fruits ? Is it not worth something some self-denial,, 
 some foregoing of superfluities, some sacrifice of luxury 
 whether in amusement or entertainment to be able to 
 touch but with one finger a work so pure, so merciful, so 
 twice blessed ? 
 
 This work depends still in large part upon your 
 annual offerings on this one occasion. Brethren, it 
 would move your serious regret, did you know, could 
 you know, how great a discouragement you have some- 
 times dealt to this holy, this divine mission, by your 
 indifference, I am sure your mere inattention, to the 
 appeal thus made to you. Most of all, by the uncer- 
 tainty, the precariousness, the almost capriciousness, of 
 your response. One year this occasion gave a collection 
 of 98 : another year of 78 : another year of ^48. 
 Fifty pounds cut off at one stroke, by a multitude of 
 young, unthinking, unreflecting, not unkind hearts, dis- 
 regarding, just ' passing by on the other side,' this urgent 
 case of most real because most secret distress. No doubt 
 we preachers lack the skill oftentimes to touch you. 
 O, but you should supply, you should not punish, our 
 unadroitness. How can any organization adapt itself 
 to such ebbs and flows of charity? One year you give, 
 and another year you cut off, quite without notice, half 
 the year's stipend surely not a redundant recompense 
 of one minister amongst these heathen Christian brothers. 
 I pray you, let this be one of the good days one of the 
 bountiful givings. I ask of you a hundred pounds 
 to-day. O, if each one of you would give his least 
 possible offering, such a congregation could scarcely 
 fall short of the sum of a couple of thousand shillings.
 
 XIL] Illumination. 231 
 
 I do rely upon your sympathy to-day. None of you 
 will pass those plates. And think, ere you give, who 
 it is that asks of you. Not man, but Jesus Christ 
 Christ, in His poor Christ, in His little ones Christ, 
 who told you the parable, the scarce parable, of the 
 division, and the principle of the division, at the last 
 great day, when the King shall come in His glory, 
 and before Him shall be gathered all the nations. Take 
 that day, that scene, that revelation, into account, and 
 then give what you will I fear not for the reckoning. 
 
 Yet one thing more I would ask of you, while the 
 heart is yet full, and while this remarkable spectacle 
 is still stirring it to its depths. There is one particular 
 suburb of Cambridge, rilled with poor, growing daily, 
 cut off from mother churches on the right hand and on 
 the left, and destitute absolutely of any permanent 
 house for its worship. It has nothing but a frail 
 temporary tenement ; open to every blast of heaven's 
 wind ; incapable of holding, itself, one-tenth part of the 
 people. The time has come when that church must be 
 built : and I am strong in the hope that this day shall 
 lay the first stone of it in the hearts of this audience. 
 I venture to ask a special, a separate effort in this 
 behalf. Take it not from what a larger, a more com- 
 prehensive enterprise requires in this day's almsgiving. 
 You are giving here for all the suburbs of this University 
 town. I ask of you, beyond and beside this, that some 
 five-and-twenty of the best and youngest of my hearers 
 this day will offer themselves as special collectors for a 
 church in New Chesterton. I ask of you that in this 
 coming week such a beginning may be made of this 
 work as shall cheer the hearts of those devoted Christian
 
 232 Illumination. [xn. 
 
 men who are giving life and all its powers no common 
 powers of understanding and heart and soul to the 
 ministry of Christ in that district. Think not that they 
 are idle or that their poor destitute people are idle 
 in this behalf, that you may be burdened. More than 
 :8o are gathered in that poor room in one year by the 
 offerings of the people themselves. But they cannot 
 no, not if they gave their all they cannot do this one 
 thing they cannot build. O ye whose hearts are 
 'enlightened' to the beauty and the glory of Jesus 
 Christ, who for our sakes became poor for our sakes 
 left heaven, and bore shame and spitting and scourging 
 and crucifixion, that we might live with Him here, and 
 afterwards reign with Him in glory count it not a 
 great thing, as though some strange or some hard thing 
 were asked of you, to build Him one house, for His 
 name and for His kingdom, for His worship and for 
 His sacraments. Rather praise and -magnify Him for 
 setting you on His work, for vouchsafing to employ you 
 here, and for promising you His everlasting rest, when, 
 after serving Him in serving your generation, you shall 
 one by one safely and peacefully fall on sleep.
 
 XIII. 
 
 THE PERPETUAL PRESENCE. 
 
 St Matthew xxviii. 20. 
 
 And, /<?, I am with you a/way, even unto the end of the world. 
 
 THIS is the church's charter. By this instrument we 
 hold our all. If this be true, the gates of hell cannot 
 prevail against us. If Christ, the crucified and the risen, 
 is in deed and in truth present still, present for ever, with 
 us who believe, then to be a Christian, a Christian all 
 through and altogether, must be strength and safety 
 and happiness, must be life and glory and immortality, 
 assured by the word of One who cannot lie, of One who, 
 raised from death, dieth no more. 
 
 The words themselves are strong, beyond the strength 
 of this version ; beyond the strength indeed, taxed to 
 the uttermost, of our vigorous Saxon tongue. Each 
 word is emphatic. ' Lo.' The 'eyes of the heart' may 
 behold and see the Speaker. ' I ' the pronoun is not 
 (as it might be) implied, but uttered and emphasized 
 in the Greek. ' I,' whom you once saw daily and 
 companied with in the flesh ' I ' whom you have seen, 
 these last days, come back to you, in identity of person 
 and character, from the grave and gate of death 'am' 
 not, 'will be,' as though by some new beginning of 
 relationship, transferring into a vague dim future the
 
 234 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 whole thing spoken of: the present Person, in His 
 present being, He it is that promises. There shall be 
 no breach of continuity, no disruption or dislocation of 
 the connection that is : 'I am ' that which I shall be, 
 and that existence, which is thus without seam or suture, 
 is, for you, a coexistence and a companionship. ' I am 
 with you.' And that ' alway.' The Greek says, ' all the 
 days ;' as though to prepare us for their being many, 
 and to assure us that they are numbered, and to bid 
 us take them one by one, making each a little lifetime, 
 and seeing in this sum of little lifetimes the aggregate 
 of the church's opportunity and the church's trial. ' I 
 am with you all the days even unto the end of the 
 world ' ' the consummation of the age ' the accom- 
 plishment of that period which is time, and so the 
 introduction of that other period which is eternity. 
 
 The words are weighty with thought, and the occasion 
 of their utterance was unique in history. It was a meet- 
 ing between two worlds ; between flesh and spirit ; 
 between life and resurrection ; between men in the 
 prison-house of sense and a Man in the emancipation 
 of immortality. It was a meeting by appointment. 
 The province, the district, the spot itself, had been 
 marked out. Galilee, the scene of so many journey- 
 ings and so many ministrations ' a mountain,' ' the 
 mountain,' as though perhaps the very mount of the 
 beatitudes or the transfiguration had been 'appointed' 
 by Jesus Himself for this momentous meeting. And 
 now the eleven, as St Matthew says with (possibly) 
 a larger company around or behind them, those ' five 
 hundred brethren ' of whom St Paul speaks to the 
 Corinthians as having witnessed one of the appear-
 
 XIIL] The Perpetual Presence. 235 
 
 ances are gathered together, in preparation for that 
 solemn conference of which they know not as yet the 
 subject or the object. He appears. At first perhaps in 
 the distance, on the mountain top, in sudden startling 
 manifestation as when He entered the chamber at 
 Jerusalem, the doors still shut, and made His first 
 greeting ere they knew Him present. He appears. 
 They see Him : they worship : all worship : and yet 
 memorable, blessed words ' some doubted.' Some 
 is it not so written ? even of the worshippers. More 
 merciful than our human systems, the Bible recognizes 
 the possibility. A man, a true man, may believe, may 
 behold, may even worship and yet doubt. What is 
 this but the anxious agonized cry, ' Lord, I believe : 
 help Thou mine unbelief?' Yes, if we would be God's 
 theologians, we must be natural as well as spiritual. 
 We must thread the mazes of that intricate labyrinth, 
 the heart of man, 'yea, even of the regenerate man/ 
 and record that which we find though it contradict 
 rule for our reproof, for our correction, for our edu- 
 cation in righteousness. 
 
 They doubt, yet they worship. Doubt, because the 
 sight is wonderful, and the eye is dazzled as it beholds. 
 Doubt, because their all is at stake, and they would not 
 lose it by precipitancy. Doubt, because the joy is 
 overwhelming, and the heart misgives itself, Can it be 
 real. 
 
 He then, the merciful Lord, draws near and speaks to 
 them. Such doubting, my brethren, waits but for con- 
 verse. Such doubting may survive sight, it will not 
 survive speech. ' The words that I speak unto you, 
 they are spirit and they are life.' More especially is
 
 236 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 the voice of Christ reassuring when it sets a man upon 
 work. Fear not, ye who know something of this kind 
 of doubting, which is the mere flutter and trembling of 
 the soul before a truth felt to be vital fear not to 
 accept Christ's commission, setting you your life's work, 
 and authorizing you to do it as for Him. ' All power 
 is given unto me in heaven and on earth : go ye,' in 
 the strength of it, and ye shall make the world mine. 
 
 It is not with the details of the church's commission 
 that I would occupy your time to-day. And yet every 
 clause is laden with instruction. There is the basis 
 the resurrection-empire of Jesus Christ. He speaks 
 not of the original rights of His deity, but of the 
 acquired powers of His risen manhood. ' We see 
 Jesus ... for the suffering of death crowned with glory 
 and honour.' ' Wherefore,' as the reward of humiliation, 
 'God also hath highly exalted Him.' Unto me, not as 
 God, but as the crucified and the risen, is given all 
 power in heaven and on earth. 
 
 On this rock rises the church. It is to be a church 
 of movement. Its journeyings are to be coextensive 
 with earth. Missionary, or nothing such is the alter- 
 native. ' Go ye, and make all the nations disciples.' 
 He who said aforetime, ' The field is the world,' here 
 interprets. Sweep all mankind into the Gospel net. 
 Stay not for that time is not yet, and that office is not 
 yours stay not to discriminate or to judge. ' Make all 
 the nations disciples.' The very form of initiation is 
 prescribed. Baptism is the portal. Baptism into the 
 triune name. The name one, yet threefold. ' Neither 
 confounding the persons, nor dividing the substance.' 
 4 Into the name' which is the revelation of God so
 
 xiii.] The Perpetual Presence. 237 
 
 that the life, the soul, the man, shall be concentrated, 
 contained, and enveloped in it. This initiation is not 
 an end, but a beginning. It subjects to teaching. 
 A teaching continuous, thorough, minute, distinctively 
 Christian. A teaching which recognizes Christ as 
 supreme and the doctrine of Christ as authoritative. 
 If ye call me ' Lord, Lord,' ye must ' do the things 
 which I say.' ' Teaching them to observe all things, 
 whatsoever I have commanded you ; and, lo, I am with 
 you alway, even unto the end of the world.' 
 
 ' I am with you alway.' 
 
 Try, brethren, struggle, pray, to realize this promise, 
 this pledge, this fact 
 
 The Perpetual Presence. 
 
 Surely, surely, we have here more than a farewell ; 
 more than the last adieu, however tender or solemn, of 
 a departing friend to his household or his family. Such 
 a parting may have in it many things reminiscences, 
 anticipations, even promises of an undying remem- 
 brance, even promises (it has been so) of a return, in 
 vision or apparition, from the world of the unseen. But 
 this particular expression, ' I am,' or even ' I will be,' 
 ' with you alway,' was never used, I will dare to assert 
 it, in the last conversation between a departing friend 
 and his best-beloved. There is a distinct claim of 
 divinity, of deity, in the words. Nothing short of 
 omnipresence could make this true : and need I say 
 that, where one attribute of God is, there are all attri- 
 butes ? Christ bids them go everywhere, evangelize all 
 nations, busy themselves in all lands, preaching, bap- 
 tizing, teaching, and this not for a month or a year, but 
 till the end come, till the consummation of time ; and
 
 238 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 in the foreview of this extension and this expansion 
 of the work He adds, ' And, lo, I am with you 
 alway.' 
 
 We have here in one clause and it is never super- 
 fluous, least of all in these days, to mark such co- 
 incidences the whole of St John Gospel, Epistles, 
 Apocalypse, in one. Men will tell you that St John's 
 Christology (as they call it) was an afterthought ; a later 
 and a morbid growth of Christianity; the idolatry of 
 a beloved Master, invested by distance of time and 
 by confusion of idea with a character which He never 
 assumed and with a nature which He would have dis- 
 claimed as blasphemy. Brethren, we cannot thus dis- 
 pose of the proper deity of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 When you have discarded St John, you find yourself 
 confronted by St Matthew. St Matthew will tell you 
 that, wherever two or three are gathered in Christ's 
 name, there is He in the midst of them. St Matthew 
 will tell you that the Son of Man hath power to forgive 
 sins, and that He gave His life a ransom for many. 
 St Matthew will tell you that among His latest words, 
 if they were not the latest, was that promise which takes 
 to Himself deity ' Go ye into all the world . . and lo, 
 I am with you everywhere and alway.' St John 
 himself can say nothing stronger, however he may aid 
 us in developing and in deciphering. 
 
 But we should lose a great part of the comfort, and 
 all the distinctiveness, of this saying, if we read it 
 with some interpreters as discriminating between the 
 humanity and the divinity of Jesus, and promising 
 the presence of the latter in the necessary loss and 
 disappearance of the former. It is by such artifices of
 
 XIIL] The Perpetiial Presence. 239 
 
 dogma that the church is robbed of her bread. When 
 Christ says 'I,' He means Himself and the whole of it. 
 The presence promised is the Emmanuel presence, divine 
 and (I had almost said, divine because) human. It 
 is quite true that the phrase ' I am with you ' implies 
 naturally a divine presence. It was thus that God 
 spake of old time to patriarchs and prophets, summing 
 up all that is sustaining, all that is comforting, all that 
 is elevating, in the one phrase, ' Certainly I will be with 
 thee.' It is thus that the church concentrates all her 
 best and purest and loftiest wishes for her children 
 gathered under her wing for worship, in the briefest, 
 the most touching of benedictions, ' The Lord be with 
 you.' And the response is like unto it, 'And with thy 
 spirit.' 
 
 ' I am with you alway.' 
 
 Let us ponder together some of the features of this 
 perpetual presence. It has evidently a collective and 
 an individual realization. And the church has ever 
 been in danger, more than in danger, of losing the one 
 of these or the other. An excessive collectivity has 
 pampered her into superstition. An excessive indi- 
 viduality has starved her into infidelity. The one 
 forgets the one spirit : the other loses sight of the 
 one body. And the wisdom of God has tempered 
 these two together ; making the separate life the 
 condition of the corporate, yet in such sense that the 
 healthiest working of the separate life is found, not 
 in the keenness of its unit self-consciousness, but in the 
 completeness of its self-forgetfulness in the corporate. 
 
 When Christ says, ' I am with you alway,' He 
 addresses Himself to a community. It matters little
 
 240 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 to the truth of this remark whether those present were 
 the eleven or the five hundred. In either case, it was 
 not a word spoken in the separate ear of St John or 
 St Peter; not the ' Lovest thou me more than these?' 
 and not the ' If I will that he tarry . . . what is that 
 tothee?' These individual utterances have their place 
 and their time, their lesson also for all time, as to 
 the divine dealing with souls. But when He says 
 'with you,' He speaks to a community. The promise 
 of the presence is made primarily to a body. 
 
 To the apostles, you will say. Blessed be God, yes. 
 To those ' holy and humble men of heart ' by whose 
 labour and ministry the light of the Gospel was made 
 to shine throughout the world. To those preachers and 
 writers of truth, all truth and nothing but truth, to 
 whom, the longer we live, the more profoundly we 
 think, the more diligently we study, the more every day 
 shall we feel our obligation. We see what the presence 
 was to the church, if it had even stopped with the 
 apostles. We see what inspiration was, little as we 
 can define it, when we set it over against the very first, 
 the very best, of those fathers of the church who had it 
 not. But we cannot thus limit the compass of the ' with 
 you.' We cannot read ' the end of the world,' the ' con- 
 summation of the age,' as meaning any event or any 
 moment which has yet been. Certainly the fall of Jeru- 
 salem did not satisfy it. The fall of Jerusalem gives no 
 sense to the same phrase as it occurs in the parables of 
 the tares and the net, where it is distinctly declared to 
 represent the time of the advent and the judgment, of 
 the severance of the wicked from among the just, and 
 the shining forth of the righteous as the sun in the
 
 XIIL] The Perpetual Presence. 241 
 
 kingdom of their Father. If that is not yet, then 
 neither was the perpetual presence only for the 
 apostles. 
 
 Brethren, I would not willingly utter one word in 
 this place that could jar upon any ear or revive one 
 slumbering controversy. It shall be enough to say that 
 'you' here is the church. One man shall understand 
 by the church an apostolical succession ; shall think 
 that the promise, spoken here to the eleven, had in its 
 direct view a perpetuity of guiding and ruling ministers, 
 tracing their orders in clear unbroken line to the 
 apostles, and representing such of their functions as 
 were not plainly miraculous to the faithful of all lands 
 and times. Another man shall understand by the 
 church her gatherings in general councils, where, in 
 imitation (at least) of that first assembly at Jerusalem to 
 which, as a matter of history, we owe it that Christianity 
 was not made for all time a developement or a sect of 
 Judaism, it may be no presumption to adopt the im- 
 posing phraseology, ' It seemed good to the Holy Ghost 
 and to us.' We do not dispute such interpretations, be- 
 cause we see in each and in all a truth, if it be but a 
 partial one ; an example, if it be but a single one, of ful- 
 filment by Christ Himself of the promise of the presence. 
 We know the importance attached by inspiration itself 
 to the orderly ministrations, to the regular offices, of 
 Christ's holy church. The Pentecostal gift itself is 
 made by St Paul, in the 4th chapter of his epistle to 
 the Ephesians, to consist in the grant, by the ascended 
 Lord, of ' apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and 
 teachers, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work 
 of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.' 
 V. 16
 
 242 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 He that despises such ministries despises not man but 
 God. 
 
 Only, my brethren, we cannot consent to any such 
 interpretation of this august promise as should forma- 
 lize, nominalize, or localize it. We cannot allow it to be 
 so read as to make it a promise to one church out of 
 the many churches of Christendom. It must not be 
 made to depend for its application upon particular 
 designations, whether Greek, Latin, or English, of church 
 officers or church governments. Even upon earth 
 Christ was ever met by the questions, ' Where, Lord ? ' 
 and ' When, Lord ? ' and ' Speakest Thou unto us, or 
 even to all ? ' And now that He is not here in the 
 body to answer such limiting cramping enquiries with 
 His own strong 'Verily' 'Wheresoever the carcase is' 
 ' The kingdom cometh not with observation ' ' Say 
 not, Lo, here, or, Lo, there ' of course such narrow- 
 nesses breed and multiply, till they cause the gospel 
 itself to be evil spoken of. We must say, reverence 
 and truth alike demanding it, When Christ said ' with 
 you,' and meant ' with the church,' He spoke, as that 
 beautiful prayer expresses it, of ' the whole congregation 
 of Christian people dispersed throughout the world ; ' 
 and when He promised infallibility if that promise be 
 a part, and we think that it is, of this mighty world- 
 wide and age-long engagement He spake of that 
 indeed, that real ' semper, ubique, ab omnibus,' which is 
 the ' consensus ' of ' all who in every place call upon the 
 name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both theirs and ours' 
 that indeed ' catholic faith ' which a man has who 
 believes in Christ as His Saviour, though he may 
 enunciate it with lisping, stammering, babbling tongue,
 
 xiii.] The Perpetual Presence. 243 
 
 or mean by it little more than the grand old baptismal 
 confession, ' I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of 
 God.' This is that ' public opinion,' that ' common 
 sense,' of all Christendom, which is the blessed unity 
 amidst ten thousand diversities a unity of which the 
 home is God's heaven, and its tongue the harmony of 
 God's universe. 
 
 We speak not to disparage creeds or articles, and not 
 to make light of accuracy in the things of God. It is 
 not by washing out all colour, and it is not by chiselling 
 away all feature, from our Christianity, for the sake of 
 precipitating a complimentary fraternity, that we shall 
 promote the real interests of either truth or charity. It 
 is well that each man should enquire and search dili- 
 gently for himself into God's revelations, and that he 
 should grasp tenaciously and feel strongly and maintain 
 earnestly the thing, the exact thing, which he has 
 learned and has been assured of. Only we ask that, as 
 no man but a fool imagines himself to be the only wise, 
 so each man should be willing to believe that another, 
 expressing himself differently, may have in his heart 
 and in his soul the same truth with him, or another 
 truth equally vital. Then, instead of unchurching or 
 unchristianizing one another, we shall have this far 
 higher, far nobler, far more Christ-like satisfaction we 
 shall believe, where we see not, that the very gospel lies 
 deeper, spreads wider, rises higher, than one little 
 section of the vast human brotherhood ; that Christ is 
 in more places than one, has a voice for more hearts 
 than one, yea, a voice of more sounds than one, like that 
 4 voice of many waters' which St John heard in Patmos ; 
 that His promise, ' I am with you alway,' is neither to 
 
 1 6 2
 
 244 The Perpetual Presence. [xin. 
 
 Greek nor Roman nor Briton, still less to Anglican or 
 evangelical or non-conformist, but to the common 
 human being veiled under each ; and that hereafter, in 
 that which Scripture calls (were it but for this cause) 
 the day of our ' refreshing,' God will indeed ' gather 
 together all things in Christ, both that are in heaven 
 and that are in earth.' 
 
 ' Lo, I am with you alway.' 
 
 What then, we must ask briefly, are some of the 
 characteristics of this perpetual presence in the church, 
 and in the soul ? The words must be few : may they 
 be suggestive. 
 
 First, it is a special presence. There is a presence 
 in the universe. ' In Christ all things consist :' with- 
 draw Him, and there is chaos. It is not of this presence 
 that He speaks. I know not that we all believe in any 
 other. I know not that we have taken into our thoughts 
 this fact Christ is with His church as He is not with 
 the world. There is a mind and a will, there is a power 
 and a work, inside this community which a man enters 
 by believing, distinct from that which orders sky and 
 sea, replenishes earth with life, and keeps the stars in 
 their courses. This special presence is that which 
 accounts for the very start and progress and success of 
 Christianity. What could be so improbable before the 
 experience as that a religion born in rude, rough, remote 
 Galilee should ever cross a sea or make one proselyte ? 
 What could be so improbable beforehand as a Christen- 
 dom a portion of the globe characterized, as to its 
 civilization, as to its moral and social and political life, 
 by the influence of Jesus Christ ? What could be so 
 improbable as that this religion, not patronized by
 
 xiii.] The Perpetual Presence. 245 
 
 royalty, and not propagated by the sword, could even 
 survive its first exposure to the scorn of established 
 philosophies and the persecution of powerful des- 
 potisms ? We say, it was an enterprise, not audacious 
 only, but inconceivable, save to omnipotence. We as- 
 scribe its success to the word of its author, ' Lo, I am 
 with you alway.' 
 
 Secondly, it is a spiritual presence. 'The Comforter, 
 which is the Holy Ghost,' once 'dwelt with,' now He 
 'dwells in,' the church. The corporeal presence is gone, 
 that the spiritual may come. 'The flesh profiteth no- 
 thing ' not if it be the very flesh of Jesus ; that flesh 
 which Judas and Herod and Pontius Pilate, scoffing 
 scribe and Roman executioner, looked upon and handled 
 and were profited nothing ' it is the spirit that quicken- 
 eth.' Strange, that any should wish back the carnal 
 presence when they have the spiritual. This is that 
 presence of which Christ said, ' I will not leave you 
 comfortless ; I will come to you. Because I live, ye 
 shall live also.' This presence has influences direct and 
 constant, which are the life of the body. What would 
 the word be, the book or the voice, without the pre- 
 sence ? What would the sacraments be, the water or 
 the supper, without the presence ? What would prayer 
 be, public prayer or private, without the presence the 
 presence of the assisting Spirit, and the presence of the 
 interceding Lord ? It is the presence which changes 
 idle sounds, bare materials, fleeting wishes, into realities, 
 into instrumentalities, into very ' powers of a world to 
 come.' 
 
 Thirdly, it is a manifold presence. Every gift and 
 every grace is due to it. Every office and every function
 
 246 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 of the universal church is due to it. Not action only, 
 but counteraction ; not institution only, but adaptation ; 
 not formation only, but reparation these, too, are parts 
 of it. The orderly workings of grace are mighty and 
 wonderful : what shall we say of the hand which minis- 
 ters to the church's exceptional wants, as they arise out 
 of the manifold changes and chances of worldly circum- 
 stance, of human thought ? How often has the Christian 
 of one land or one age imagined that the last hour had 
 struck of his faith or of his church. He has seen one 
 fortress after another stormed by the foe ; one doctrine 
 after another impugned, betrayed, trampled upon, by 
 men commissioned to teach ; a growing indifference to 
 all religion, not amongst the profane or the profligate, 
 but in minds cultivated and disciplined, loving truth and 
 abhorring evil. His heart has misgiven him for his 
 country's future ; and he has sometimes asked himself, 
 in the language, if not in the tone, of the scoffer, ' Where 
 is the promise ? ' And yet, my brethren, the power of 
 the presence has not been withdrawn : the medicinal, 
 the remedial, the reparative hand has interposed in its 
 season, making doubt itself minister to humility, and 
 bringing out of the refiner's fiercest fire but a brighter 
 and a more precious gold. 
 
 Fourthly, and above all else, it is a sanctifying pre- 
 sence. Men may cavil at revelation, fight over doctrine, 
 ask all their days, ' What is truth ? ' There is one thing 
 they dare not malign and that is holiness. If the 
 presence were protective only keeping alive in the 
 earth, as ' a sign spoken against/ a spiritual religion, offer- 
 ing happiness, offering heaven, on the condition of faith 
 in a Saviour it might attract the weary and sorrowful,
 
 xiii. J The Perpetual Presence. 247 
 
 it would not appeal, as now, to the conscience and heart 
 of mankind. Truly has it been said, Over and above 
 the four written gospels there is a fifth written not 
 with ink and pen the gospel, already eighteen chapters 
 long, and each chapter is a century, of Christian lives 
 and Christian deaths. I believe that this is practically 
 the evidence which weighs most with this age. You 
 can explain away, by the help of a strong will and a 
 powerful motive, the evidences of miracle and prophecy 
 and gospel success : but there lies still, at the bottom of 
 the heart, the sight of some life, the memory of some 
 death, which was either a mere delusion calm as it 
 was, and grave, and strong, and consistent or else was 
 caused, made what it was, changed perhaps into what it 
 was, by the help, by the power, by the presence, of Him 
 who lived and died and revived, of Him who said, and 
 who has fulfilled it, ' I am with you alway.' The pre- 
 sence is proved by its effect. It is a light, it is a power, 
 it is a life, it is a love : men do know for themselves 
 what is the secret of their life, and other men take 
 knowledge of it whether it is powerful and whether it is 
 pure. If Christ can transform a life, if Christ can com- 
 fort a death, then I may doubt about many things, I 
 may postpone many decisions, I may leave some matters 
 for the light of ' that world,' I may submit to the pain 
 and the misery of some harassing suspenses but one 
 thing I can see, that this is indeed the Saviour I need : 
 one thing I can resolve, that through life's ambiguous 
 windings, through the valley of death's dark shadow, 
 He shall be with me, His rod and His staff shall 
 comfort me. 
 
 ' I am with you all the days till the end of the world.'
 
 248 The Perpetual Presence. [xm. 
 
 And is this 'day' not one of them ? Is the presence 
 lost ? is the promise forfeited ? Is it lost, ask your- 
 selves, to the church ? is it forfeited by the church ? 
 to the church, by the church, ask yourselves, of this 
 land ? O, we know, we know too well, her many mis- 
 takes, her many shortcomings, her many negligences, 
 her many sins. If it were a pleasure to us, or if it could 
 be a duty, we could count her faults by hundreds and 
 by thousands. We could tell of schisms and heresies, 
 we could tell of sects and separations, we could tell of 
 neglected parishes and mission-fields unoccupied, we 
 could tell of wasted gifts and lost opportunities and 
 ruined lives, we could tell of unfaithful ministries and 
 retrograde movements and reviving superstitions. But 
 have these faults, these unfaithfulnesses, any or all of 
 them, defeated and vitiated the promise ? Has there 
 not been, side by side with all these, a mighty counter- 
 acting and counterbalancing force of good ? Shall 
 any man presume to say that this or that measure, this 
 or that enactment, if it be carried through, will have 
 lost Christ to His church ? Is it indeed so, that the 
 perpetual presence is tied to a particular form of words, 
 to the public utterance of a particular form of words, so 
 that, if that be altered or silenced, then Christ will be 
 gone ? Shameful, arrogant, presumptuous thought ! The 
 presence is a life, not a word : nothing but habitual 
 wilful sin loses it for the man, and nothing short of utter 
 spiritual death forfeits it for the church. 
 
 Christ is with us still, in this church of England 
 never more vividly or more vitally. Never was there a 
 deeper love for Him, for His word, for His sacraments, 
 for His little ones. Never, since He ascended, had
 
 xiii.] The Perpetual Presence. 249 
 
 He a more devout or a more devoted people. Can 
 you point to any generation, to any century, in which 
 it would have been better for you, spiritually better, 
 to have been born ? Can you conceive a greater 
 freedom to know, to worship, and to confess ? Can 
 you conceive a larger, a grander sphere for Christian 
 action and for Christian communion ? If the word 
 is now ' tried to the uttermost/ is not that very trial 
 winning for it a more attentive hearing, a profounder 
 study, and a deeper because more intelligent veneration ? 
 Is not division itself (haply for this purpose permitted) 
 not only stimulating each section of the church to an 
 earnest and not necessarily ungenerous rivalry of good, 
 but also practising us in the twin graces of hope and 
 charity bidding us to look beyond uniformity for the 
 reality of unity, and to recognize in other modes alike 
 of government and of worship efforts at least, however 
 imperfect, after a more primitive rule and a more 
 spiritual devotion ? 
 
 ' I am with you,' Christ says, ' all the days ' and this 
 is one of them. 
 
 Brethren, if the promise endures for the church, how 
 is it with this its famous school and training-place ? 
 Has any change here effected, within or from without, 
 robbed this University of a divine presence ? 
 
 I know that here also, as in the church, there are 
 symptoms which a hasty diagnosis might interpret 
 unfavourably. We have not escaped here the infection 
 of free thinking, of sceptical opinion, of ' oppositions of 
 science falsely so called.' This University would not 
 be national if it were otherwise. A college is not a 
 monastery, it is a little world. It is a specimen of
 
 250 The Perpetual Presence. [xin. 
 
 English life, for good and evil. It could not, it would 
 not, bar its doors against the entrance of any thought or 
 any enquiry. Therefore those unsettlements of human 
 opinion which are rife everywhere have their represen- 
 tation and their reflection here. But their presence does 
 not shut out Christ's. Rather does it stir into livelier 
 action the faith which is His, and which finds itself 
 in urgent need of all its aids and of all its weapons, 
 if so be it may both keep its own integrity and as- 
 similate the still floating elements which surround it. 
 Here assuredly, if anywhere, enquiry should be free, 
 because here, if anywhere, the means of its satisfaction 
 are at hand. 
 
 And you know, brethren, and we know, that never 
 in the history of this University were the influences of 
 Christian zeal and Christian example larger, stronger, 
 or more persuasive, than now. The means of religious 
 instruction, the encouragements to religious study, in- 
 stead of being curtailed, are greatly multiplied here since 
 the days of my youth. Christ's presence is here mani- 
 fested in ways of which no tests and no subscriptions 
 fetters, always, only to the scrupulous can take know- 
 ledge. Delightful, most delightful, to those who love 
 the highest welfare of their University, are the tidings 
 of a large and growing association of students, formed 
 on the broad and strong basis of Christian communion, 
 for the express purposes of strengthening the spiritual 
 life here, and of sending forth hence, into the various 
 fields of the church's home and foreign activity, men 
 qualified, both in knowledge and devotion, to serve 
 Christ faithfully in the service of their generation. 
 
 O, with such omens, such tokens of good, 'we will not
 
 XIIL] The Perpetual Presence. 251 
 
 fear, though the waters roar and be troubled, though 
 the mountains shake with the swelling thereof.' Great 
 are the responsibilities, great the perils greater, for all 
 true men, the encouragements. Work, hope, prayer 
 these three and the victory is ours. ' There is a 
 river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of 
 God.' 'Jesus came and said unto them, All power is 
 given unto me in heaven and in earth. . . . And, lo, I 
 am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.'
 
 XIV. 
 
 THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS. 
 
 2 Corinthians ii. 10, 11. 
 
 To whom ye forgive anything, I forgive also : for if I forgave any- 
 thing, to whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in the 
 person of Christ j lest Satan should get an advantage ofus: 
 for we are not ignorant of his devices. 
 
 THE sentence is complicated, but the sense is plain. 
 With that delicate perception, that refined consideration, 
 that perfect courtesy, which is characteristic of him, 
 St Paul is exemplifying here a principle which at a 
 later time he avowed to Philemon, ' Though I might be 
 much bold in Christ to enjoin thee that which is con- 
 venient, yet for love's sake I rather beseech thee.' He 
 would give precedence to these Corinthians in that act 
 of clemency to which he invites them. His forgiveness 
 accompanies, almost follows, theirs. ' I am as ye are,' 
 he says to the Galatians : my heart beats with yours : 
 there is an entire identity of judgment and feeling 
 between me and you. Or, if in any point I have 
 outrun you in decision or action, it has been (i) 'for 
 your sake,' and it has been all (2) ' in the person,' or 
 * in the sight, of Christ.' 
 
 The subject of the passage is forgiveness. Five times
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 253 
 
 over the words, ' forgive,' ' forgave,' occur in the English 
 version of a single verse. And it is remarkable that 
 the forgiveness spoken of, though shown by a man to a 
 fellow-man, is not here, as it usually must be in that 
 case, the forgiveness of a personal injury. The thing 
 forgiven is not a wrong, but a sin. The forgiveness 
 therefore is the interpretation, the declaration, and the 
 application, of a forgiveness divine, not human. If 
 we desired a commentary upon the famous words in 
 St John's gospel, 'Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are 
 remitted unto them,' I would turn to this passage. 
 In spirit, though not in the letter, St Paul is exercising 
 that wonderful function. I say, not in the letter : 
 for there are two words in the Greek for 'forgiving' 
 one expressing a dismissal of sin, which belongs to God 
 only; the other a condonation of sin, which may be 
 either man's or God's : and whereas the former word 
 is used in the commission recorded by St John, the 
 latter is the phrase employed here by St Paul. 
 
 It is worthy perhaps of a passing notice, that the 
 use of the divine word for ' forgiving ' in that passage of 
 St John, though it may well be felt to enhance the 
 dignity and even the mystery of the commission, is 
 at the same time a proof how entirely the absolution 
 committed to the disciples is of a ministerial and even 
 a declaratory nature : only on that supposition could the 
 thought be tolerated, that God's own a<eo-t9 a^apnwv 
 was consigned, in any sense, to human hands. 
 
 But St Paul uses the other and less awful word for 
 ' forgiveness.' The same word which he employs when 
 he bids his converts, at Ephesus or Colossae, to ' forbear 
 one another, and forgive one another, if any man have a
 
 254 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 quarrel against any.' The same word by which our 
 Lord describes the generosity of the creditor who, when 
 his two debtors had nothing to pay, ' frankly forgave 
 them both.' So far St Paul uses here the language of 
 a personal rather than (if I might so put it) an official 
 forgiveness. 
 
 And in this act he makes the congregation participate. 
 It is not to be an absolution pronounced from above, 
 from some superior standing-place of apostolical isola- 
 tion : he speaks with, not for, the church : ye (he says) 
 ought to forgive : the thing to be forgiven is no wrong 
 done to me : so far as it was a wrong, it was a wrong 
 to the church, and it is for the church to forgive it. 
 But in its truer light, as a sin, the absolution of the 
 minister is uttered really by the church, as the echo on 
 their part, whose spokesman he is, of an absolution 
 pronounced in heaven upon those who repent. 
 
 So important is the task which I have laid upon 
 myself for this afternoon that I must not spend the 
 time in entering at greater length into the circumstances 
 of the text or of the epistle. I will merely remind you, 
 in briefest summary, of the steps by which we have 
 passed to the point at which we stand. 
 
 There has been, first, an act, or a succession of acts, 
 of scandalous immorality. And let me say for it is 
 essential to a right understanding of the sequel that 
 there is no power, in heaven or earth, which can unmake 
 an act. By no possible or imaginable process, of human 
 effort or of divine omnipotence, can a sin be unsinned 
 again. Whatever else may become of the deed or of its 
 doer, this cannot be. The thing done is done for ever. 
 It is a truism, but it must be said. The most remote,
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 255 
 
 the most secret, the most venial sin can no more be 
 undone again than a battle or a murder. 
 
 There has been, secondly, a severe sentence passed 
 upon this sin. You may read it still in the former 
 epistle to Corinth. It was a sentence mysterious in 
 its terms it speaks of ' delivering the man to Satan for 
 the destruction of the flesh :' but evidently it was one 
 of pain and shame and spiritual forfeiture one which 
 took away all that made life reputable and joyous, one 
 which fastened upon it the label of ignominy, and 
 pointed at it the finger of scorn and contempt. At 
 the same time, there was in this severe sentence one 
 redeeming word. It expressly spoke of a remedial purpose 
 and an eventual hope. 'That the spirit might be saved in 
 the day of the Lord Jesus.' The life blighted and withered 
 here might blossom into everlasting fruit there. I know 
 how slow the heart is to accept heaven instead of earth ; 
 to grasp with any sort of reality the idea of a compen- 
 sation so incommensurable, of a restoration so remote. 
 Still it was there ; and for thousands and tens of 
 thousands of earth's children prisoners, captives, exiles, 
 outcasts it has been the one ray, and it has gilded 
 sufficiently a comfortless scene and a disconsolate sky. 
 
 There has been, thirdly, in the case before us, a 
 realization of this hope. In the individual, a godly 
 sorrow has replaced the guilty indifference ; a sorrow of 
 which the chief danger now is, that it may be excessive. 
 At the same time, a healthy public opinion has grown 
 up in the society in reference to the sinner and the sin. 
 The conceit of a gifted but giddy community has sub- 
 mitted itself to the unwelcome discovery of its in- 
 consistency and its deadness. The tottering authority of
 
 256 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 their apostle has reasserted itself, and the moment for 
 gentler dealing is come. There has been no unmaking 
 there could not be of the sin : but a reparative agency 
 has wrought effectually, and the moral and spiritual 
 purposes of severity are answered. 
 
 Thus at the point at which this second letter meets 
 us, amidst many doubtful and discouraging tokens 
 which give to its later chapters a tone somewhat 
 strongly contrasted with the tenderness of the earlier, 
 there is in the heart of the writer a powerful decision 
 in favour of mercy to the transgressor. The apostle, 
 as well as the man the apostle, 'in the sight of 
 Christ ' springs forward to absolve. He has seen that 
 sternness persisted in will be an influence not for good 
 but for evil. As the interpreter of God's dealmg, as 
 the steward and dispenser of God's mysteries, he now 
 hastens to the repentant sufferer with the balm of 
 an eager, loving, pleading solicitude, of which the one 
 argument is the divine mercy, and the one resistless 
 charm the revelation of a free forgiveness. 
 
 ' I believe in the Forgiveness of Sins.' 
 
 Brethren, I make no apology for the commonness, 
 the elementariness, of my subject. Or, if an apology, 
 only this ' It is your life.' All else may wait but the 
 great question, ' Forgiven, or unforgiven ?' waits not. 
 Or, if it waits, let it be only because the hope is so 
 bright that it seems too good for us ; because sinners 
 such as we are must knock awhile at the gate, dreading 
 above all things a precipitancy which may become 
 disappointment, or a confidence which may fail us 
 again in death or judgment. 
 
 i. In pondering this mighty thesis not without
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 257 
 
 some reference (though we will not obtrude it) to the 
 thoughts and sayings of this wilful yet most pathetic 
 age the first thing which must strike us is the in- 
 conclusiveness I will not admit more of what is called 
 natural religion as to the hope of a divine forgiveness 
 for committed sin. 
 
 Some have gone so far as to say that nature knows 
 no forgiveness ; that in the awful, however magnificent, 
 sweep of laws of natural cause and consequence, there 
 is no sign and no trace of any principle but that of 
 a relentless exaction of the last farthing of the bond. 
 And whereas some have turned this unforgiveness of 
 nature into an argument against a revelation of grace, 
 others it is a new language to some of us, though the 
 voice speaks from the grave have forged from it a 
 bitterly railing accusation against nature herself. You 
 have read it in the public papers of the last week. 
 ' Next to the greatness of these cosmic forces, the 
 quality which most forcibly strikes every one who does 
 not avert his eyes from it is their perfect and absolute 
 recklessness. They go straight to their end, without 
 regarding what or whom they crush on the road. 
 Optimists, in their attempt to prove that whatever is is 
 right, are obliged to maintain, not that nature ever 
 turns one step from her path to avoid trampling us 
 into destruction, but that it would be very unreasonable 
 in us to expect that she should. Pope's " Shall gravi- 
 tation cease if you go by?" may be a just rebuke to any 
 one who should be so silly as to expect common human 
 morality from nature. But if the question were between 
 two men, instead of between a man and a natural phe- 
 nomenon, that triumphant apostrophe would be thought 
 V. 17
 
 258 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 a rare piece of impudence... In sober truth, nearly all 
 the things which men are hanged or imprisoned for 
 doing to one another are nature's everyday perform- 
 ances.' 
 
 Such language can expect no friendly reception in 
 a University which must resent an insult to nature 
 as an insult to itself. It cannot be necessary before 
 this audience to reassert the old truisms, of the benefi- 
 cence of general laws in nature's working their in- 
 dispensableness alike to the welfare, the happiness, and 
 the virtue, of those who live under them not more the 
 impossibility, than the unfriendliness, on the whole, of 
 a perpetual turning aside to counteract for the indi- 
 vidual the consequences of his own presumption, or to 
 humour the caprices of a perpetually shifting self-will. 
 It cannot be necessary to remind this congregation of 
 such thoughts as are enshrined in one of the immortal 
 masterpieces of English oratory: 'Tempests occasion- 
 ally shake our homes and dissipate our commerce : but 
 they scourge before them the lazy elements which with- 
 out them would stagnate into pestilence.' Nor can it 
 be needful to appeal to the impressions of those before 
 whom I stand, as to the preponderance, on the whole, 
 of enjoyment over suffering, in any existences of which 
 they have had observation, under a system which 
 certainly is our law, and with which it must be our 
 misery (if it be not rather a great sin) to be at variance. 
 None of us have had reason to dream of a malevolent 
 intention in nature ; though of a thousand instances all 
 have had experience, in which the ignorance or obstinacy 
 of man has tortured her, much against her design, into 
 mischiefs and calamities really of his own making.
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 259 
 
 Here, in this house of God, a different line of thought 
 is the more suitable. Here we maybe allowed to lament 
 together that utter dissociation and divorce of nature 
 from nature's God which could alone rescue such ex- 
 pressions, even to the author's own consciousness, from 
 the charge of absolute blasphemy. In one single aspect 
 I can view them with satisfaction as a tribute to the 
 essential unity of truth and the truth ; as an example 
 of the intellectual consequences of drifting away from 
 the faith of the gospel, from the faith (let me say) 
 of either testament faith, that is, in a God personally 
 revealed to the mind and heart of His creatures. So 
 soon as you part with one element of truth, you fall out 
 with the whole of it. Take nature (as we speak) by her- 
 self, and you have something to say for this repulsive and 
 odious view of her. We think that a sound mind, even 
 thus, would repudiate it. But certain we are that these 
 calumnies against nature could not be written down, 
 \vould be scouted everywhere and in all companies 
 as silly backbitings, if side by side with physical obser- 
 vation there were set other truths, other realities : I will 
 instance but three : the being of God the fact of sin 
 the revelation of immortality. 
 
 If there be a God, living and acting, concerned in 
 the government of His worlds, interested in the true 
 prosperity of His creatures, then at once it is made 
 rational that we should believe in Him even where 
 (as the prophet says) He ' hideth Himself.' 
 
 If there be that which one would think he must 
 be wilfully blind who sees not an existence of evil, 
 explain it as you will ; a taint, a bias, a disease, a 
 degeneracy, which infects and corrupts and draws down 
 
 172
 
 260 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 humanity, so that the moral being, let alone, will run 
 to ruin needs education, needs discipline, needs punish- 
 ment, to save it from a perdition, not written in books, 
 though the book were a Bible, but self-confessed in 
 faces, in habits, in lives in misery, in remorse, in 
 crime in a 'torment before the time,' in a death first 
 and second if all this be so, how can you know that 
 the severities of nature herself are no part of this 
 educational, this disciplinary, this punitive process ? 
 
 Once again, if it be so if it be indeed so 
 that there is a life after death a life boundless and 
 endless a life beautiful, satisfying, delightful a life 
 realizing the ideals of this life, and fulfilling that 
 which has here, at best, but been (as an apostle writes) 
 partial ; if by any chance the trials and sufferings of 
 the present should prove to be connected beneficially 
 with the enjoyments and perfections of the life ever- 
 lasting ; if in God's sight (it is almost a necessary 
 consequence) this short existence is a mere moment 
 in comparison with the whole of man's being, and pain, 
 disease, bereavement, or, on the other side, pleasure, 
 honour, human love, are all so many trifles and toys 
 in comparison with the glories and felicities of 'that 
 world' what becomes then of this indictment against 
 nature ? May she not be, even in her hurricanes, even 
 in her earthquakes, even in her explosions, collisions, 
 and pestilences, a minister of God to thee, and to thee, 
 and to thee, for good cutting short thy imperfect 
 pleasures that she may stereotype them into perfec- 
 tion wafting thee, through a moment's tempest, into 
 a region and an atmosphere in which the God of nature 
 has said to all disturbing influences, 'Peace, be still?'
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 261 
 
 Brethren, the Christian hypothesis if it be no 
 more deserves at least consideration at the hands of 
 thinkers and speculators. For this reason, amongst 
 other and stronger ones because it certainly does 
 explain and reconcile a multitude of conflicting phe- 
 nomena ; because, if it be true, it does give an almost 
 exhaustive exposition of the dealings of nature and 
 providence reconciling us to short lives and disap- 
 pointing careers and blighted affections as no reasoning 
 can saying to us, with a levelling expostulation, 'Were 
 there not twelve hours even in that day?' and again, 
 with a reconciling explanation, ' One day is with the 
 Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one 
 day.' Learn to judge not a human but a divine 
 judgment learn to live the things above, where Christ 
 sitteth and instantly you and nature shall be friends 
 again. Nature has been set against revelation reve- 
 lation now shall set us at one with nature. 
 
 2. But indeed, brethren, though we say not that we 
 could with certainty infer forgiveness from nature 
 any more than we ourselves could ever see the proof 
 of our immortality in the butterfly yet it is so, we 
 confess it, that we ourselves have been more struck 
 personally with the forgivingness of nature than with 
 her relentlessness. Even physical nature (if we might 
 so unphilosophically distinguish) has presented herself 
 to us as wonderfully forgiving. We have seen some- 
 thing of her patience ; how she has not exacted the 
 uttermost farthing even from those who most tried 
 and practised upon her forbearance ; how she has not 
 accepted the first rebuff from those with whom she 
 pleaded for their lives; how she has overlooked many
 
 262 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv, 
 
 a folly and many a license, as though reluctant to 
 strike striking late and under compulsion. O confess, 
 ye who fill those galleries today, has not nature herself 
 been gentle, been forgiving, to you ? How many a 
 hairbreadth escape has she allowed us, when we played 
 on the edge of the precipice, daring her to give the 
 fatal impulse. Mark too the marvellous love of nature, 
 in her processes of recovery and of reparation. How 
 often has the physician said, with more than his usual 
 accuracy, that now all must be left to nature. And 
 has not nature responded ? Have none of you hung 
 for a night and a day between death and life ? None of 
 us can have forgotten one life, dear to England, which 
 trembled long in the balance, and in whose gift back to 
 us medical skill itself laid claim to the very smallest 
 share. 
 
 We take an onward step in our subject, when we pass 
 from the forgivingness of physical nature to the for- 
 givingness of the moral and the spiritual. 
 
 Enter into that house; mark the perpetual discord 
 which is there between two natures ; the one, harsh, 
 petulant, suspicious, censorious hasty, provoking, 
 jealous, cruel ; the other, gentle and forbearing, peace- 
 able and taking wrong, incapable of retaliation, on the 
 watch to overcome evil with good. I have called them 
 both 'natures:' but I ask now, on which of the two 
 sides is nature herself that indeed original instinct 
 which looks upon all God's creatures and christens each 
 either good or evil ? Who can doubt that, apart from 
 the irritations of the daily combat and variance, we 
 all pronounce the forgiving spirit not only the beautiful, 
 but the 'humane,' the 'human?' Who evdr blamed
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 263 
 
 or ridiculed the yearning heart which pursued the 
 prodigal into his exile, met him a great way off on 
 his returning, and sealed his forgiveness with the 
 embrace of home ? We say that nature, though she 
 has it not in her commission to reveal forgiveness, yet 
 testifies to its consistency I had almost said, to its 
 naturalness if it be revealed. We say that there is 
 no doubt whatsoever on which side nature would be 
 if she were called into the witness-box between im- 
 placability and forgivingness. All admire that softening, 
 that relenting, of heart towards enemies and persecutors, 
 to which they themselves may yet be unequal. All 
 confess themselves vanquished, not victorious, if they 
 yield to the rancour of a false pride which yet may find 
 its palliations. No man ever yet called relentlessness 
 a virtue, or enrolled amongst the worthies of history a 
 man whose last breath was an imprecation of vengeance. 
 We read in these things the testimony of our moral 
 nature in favour if it should reveal itself of the for- 
 givingness of her God. We cannot admit that nature 
 herself, even physical nature, much less moral nature, 
 is either hostile or neutral to the crowning revelation 
 of the gospel. 
 
 3. And yet, brethren, for that revelation nature 
 waits and is silent. Hers is an approving, not an 
 originating, testimony. As with immortality, so with 
 forgiveness, we should have been left at best in suspense, 
 if Christ had not spoken. On either side there is some- 
 thing. In the case of immortality if there is on the 
 one part a mind and a soul looking before and after, 
 a desire of knowing and of being, unsatisfied within the 
 narrow confines of flesh and sight and mortal existence ;
 
 264 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 there is on the other part a gradual progress towards an 
 equally gradual decay, and an anticipative clouding of 
 faculties which seemed, at their height, capable almost 
 of the infinite. Even so, in this matter of the forgive- 
 ness of sins if nature bids us admire, she half forbids 
 us to count upon, the indefinite extension of a restorative 
 and reparative mercy. She has her deluges of wrath 
 side by side with her rainbows of hope ; and she leaves 
 us to the last in ambiguous vacillation between the two 
 conflicting peradventures of goodness and severity. 
 
 Christ Himself, when He came to tell us of secrets 
 seen first in heaven and testified because known, placed 
 this doctrine of forgiveness highest amongst the mys- 
 teries of the kingdom. In comparison with it, He 
 called the doctrine of the Spirit an earthly thing beside 
 a heavenly. Operations of grace, however mysterious, 
 leave a witness behind them. The intemperate man 
 become sober, the immoral man chaste, the churl 
 bountiful, is an evidence you may run as you read 
 it of a change and a sanctification. But of forgiveness, 
 of the change from a conscience clogged with its sins 
 to a conscience at peace with its God through the 
 application of the blood of sprinkling of this there 
 is no direct witness ; it is proved only by the secondary 
 testimony of a life transformed and a spirit sanctified. 
 We can ask no man to believe for certain in the for- 
 giveness of sins, who has not first taken Jesus Christ to 
 be his guide and his illumination. When he has done 
 this, no truth is more absolute. It stands on the fore- 
 front of the gospel. It stands side by side, in the one 
 liturgy of inspiration, with the prayer for our daily 
 bread. With equal confidence we ask for supplies of
 
 xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 265 
 
 grace and cancellings of transgression. If Christ be 
 true, forgiveness is certain. 
 
 And yet, when we think what sin is what a sin is 
 what sin has made of a world, what a sin has made of a 
 life does it not prepare us for something extraordinary, 
 something above man, beyond reason, to introduce, to 
 render possible, such a marvel of grace as its forgive- 
 ness ? Who shall dare to say that, if this fact of sin, 
 this fact of my sin, which cannot be unmade, is yet to 
 be blotted out, so that its natural consequences shall not 
 result from it, but shall be reversed and countermanded, 
 there may not have been something necessary, in the 
 secret necessities (I mean) of deity, to enable and even 
 to justify it? This unknown something nowhere ex- 
 plained to us, probably inexplicable, yet stated again 
 and again (as we read it) in the book of God this 
 unknown something is the atonement. I durst not 
 say knowing ever so remotely what sin is, knowing 
 perfectly well what a sin is, how malignant, how re- 
 morseless, how revengeful I durst not say that some- 
 thing, something which we call atonement, something 
 of a divine self-gift and self-sacrifice, may not have been 
 indispensable to its obliteration. And even of this 
 method, as of the fact (they are two different things) 
 of this forgiveness of sins, I say once again that this 
 much-maligned nature does not contradict it, gives 
 even some signs of it, if she cannot, and I know she 
 cannot, declare herself commissioned of God to reveal it. 
 
 4. Finally, we say this the text still guiding us 
 that the doctrine of a free forgiveness is a moral 
 doctrine. It is easy to echo the cavil, If sin can be 
 forgiven, we may sin on and not die. Most truths are
 
 266 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 open to cavil. Certainly St Paul's gospel was so in 
 every part, and in this. He thought it enough to say of 
 such scoffers not that he could not argue, but he knew 
 with whom to argue was useless ' Whose damnation is 
 just.' There is indeed a way of preaching and a way of 
 holding forgiveness which is not moral. There is a 
 suavity of manner and a laxity of statement there is a 
 facility of reception and a carelessness of conduct 
 which, if this doctrine had been of man, would long ago 
 have expelled and exterminated it from the earth. But, 
 inasmuch as it is not of man but of God, it has survived 
 all these death-blows. What is really injurious to holy 
 living is a load of unforgiven sin. What really makes 
 a man a dead weight upon this toiling suffering earth is 
 the having inside him a mass of unexplored, uncon- 
 fessed, unpardoned secrets, which perpetually drag him 
 down and enfeeble and fetter him when he would run 
 the race set before him and press toward the mark. 
 St Paul knew this, when he wrote the words, ' I forgave 
 lest Satan should get an advantage of us.' What was 
 he afraid of? Was there not much to be said in favour 
 of counsels of prudence ? Take heed, it might have 
 been said to him, lest the enemy say, This new Christi- 
 anity is indulgent to lax living. Take heed lest you 
 expose your gospel to the reproach of the scorner by 
 taking back this adulterer into the fold of its charities. 
 Fathers of the church, one age later, could argue 
 plausibly against the readmission of the lapsed : policy 
 was with them, expediency was with them, theology 
 was half with them only not nature, only not Christ. 
 St Paul had studied more deeply the one book and the 
 other the book which registers consequence, and the
 
 ' xiv.] The Forgiveness of Sins. 267 
 
 book which reveals heaven. He knew what hope is, 
 and he knew what despair is, in the experiences of life 
 and the soul. He had marked the softening yet 
 strengthening influences of one of Christ's absolutions 
 of that unconditioned unconditioning ' Go in peace,' 
 which ever has for its echo in the breast of the 
 pardoned, that other word, as grand as it in its promise 
 and in its power, ' Go and sin no more.' We doubt if 
 any man was ever really misled by a gospel of infinite 
 grace. The deceiver can deceive the self-deceiver can 
 deceive himself with anything: but he who can mis- 
 construe forgiveness into license must do so under that 
 peculiar delusion in which will leads and intellect 
 follows. 
 
 No : the true morality of the gospel lies not more in 
 precept, exhortation, or warning not more in the 
 sermon on the mount or in the parable of the rich 
 man and Lazarus than in its proclamation of pardon 
 for the lost and of a ' God justifying the ungodly.' How 
 shall I dare to start again in God's service, with that sin 
 of last night defiling my conscience ? How shall I 
 venture again into that church, to that holy table, 
 where a week ago I prayed for sanctification, and whence 
 I went forth but to fall day by day, trifle, and sin ? He 
 hath showed thee, O man, a fountain opened for sin and 
 for uncleanness thither hasten, wash, and be clean. 
 O, it will not encourage sinning not in the honest, not 
 in the honourable, not in the generous to behold the 
 Lamb of God dying for thee, and to be assured that on 
 that cross atonement was made for this sin, for every 
 sin and that sin thine. Rather will that knowledge 
 stir and quicken in thee every lingering faculty, every
 
 268 The Forgiveness of Sins. [xiv. 
 
 faintest vestige, of good ' He died for all, that they 
 which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, 
 but unto Him who died for them and rose again.' 
 
 Go forth, Christian, from this contemplation, a happier, 
 a more decided, a holier man. Let there be no delay in 
 making full trial of thy gospel. Call thy ways to re- 
 membrance, and in the full sense of transgressions and 
 backslidings innumerable take to thee the larger mightier 
 grace of a forgiveness prevalent for them all. Go forth 
 from that laver of an infinite purification to live to the 
 praise of Him who hath so loved thee. So live, that 
 thou give no occasion to the enemy to blaspheme. ' By 
 pureness, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love un- 
 feigned, by the armour of righteousness on the right 
 hand and on the left,' so commend thy gospel, and so 
 win thy crown.
 
 XV. 
 
 EXAGGERATION AND EXCITEMENT. 
 
 Ephesians vi. 14. 
 Stand therefore, having your loins girt about 'with truth. 
 
 IF the Christian life were rightly represented in some 
 of the popular theologies of our day, this paragraph of 
 Scripture could not have been written. The scene which 
 St Paul opens to us is a battle-field. It is evident that 
 in that prison at Rome he has ' seen the vision of the 
 Almighty ' with new distinctness. The time was, when 
 human antagonists occupied much of his thought and of 
 his energy. You cannot read his epistles to Corinth or 
 to Galatia and conceive of him as ' not wrestling with 
 flesh and blood.' In those days of his unbounded 
 activity, he encountered at every turn living impersona- 
 tions of principles which he abhorred, and he applied to 
 the men, without scruple or sparing, denunciations which 
 he felt to be suitable to the evil inspiration which pos- 
 sessed them. 
 
 We do not suppose him to be here implying any 
 recantation of earlier expressions, or any reconsideration 
 of those modes and methods of controversy which he 
 had employed in other days and under different circum- 
 stances. To the very end of his life he was a keen 
 controversialist; and sanctioned by his great example
 
 270 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 the use of plain words and strong phrases where the 
 Spirit that was in him revealed the presence of an 
 enemy of Christ and His righteousness. 
 
 But we seem to be admitted, in this wonderful epistle 
 to the Ephesians, into some of the special experiences 
 of a season of constraint and seclusion. We can imagine 
 him finding himself, like other spiritual men in like cir- 
 cumstances, by no means let alone by reason of isolation 
 and solitude. If, on the one side, he was admitted into 
 a nearer and closer intimacy with heavenly realities than 
 had been possible even for him in the unrestful life of 
 perpetual tumult and toil which had been hitherto as- 
 signed him ; on the other, he may have been beset and 
 buffeted by new forms of hostile malignancy, opening 
 before him a breadth and depth of view, not before 
 realized, of the subtlety and the nearness of agencies 
 and agents of evil. Instead of enjoying any immunity, 
 in his time of enforced silence and inactivity, from the 
 assaults of spiritual foes, he may have discovered now, 
 and therefore recorded, that presence, everywhere and 
 at all times, of an organized system and living empire of 
 evil, which demands for its counteraction, not only a 
 vigilance which never sleeps and a prayer which never 
 tires, but also, and above all, an investiture with what 
 he describes as the panoply of God Himself, to enable 
 us to ' withstand in the evil day, and, having done all, 
 to stand.' 
 
 The revelation indeed of a kingdom of darkness 
 stands everywhere in Christ's gospel beside the other 
 revelation of a kingdom of light. And as it unquestion- 
 ably tallies with many phenomena of the human ex- 
 perience, so is it the only real key to many of those
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 271 
 
 mysteries of grief and iniquity which form the chief 
 difficulty for Christian philosophy in its endeavour to 
 justify the ways of God to men. If there be in exis- 
 tence a vast and potent kingdom of evil, against which 
 a God of love and holiness is waging a resolute war, 
 but of which the final overthrow and downfall is not 
 yet ; then we can refrain from that ingenious cobweb- 
 spinning of unreal consolations in which some amiable 
 hands have busied themselves without advancing by one 
 step the real reconciliation between the idea of a God of 
 omnipotent strength and the idea of a God of infinite 
 love. Rather let us be bold to say, when some horrible 
 sin has wrought out. its perfect work in the misery of 
 innocent thousands, It was not the will of God God 
 was not in it it was conceived, it was brought forth, it 
 was cradled, it was matured, in the other realm, in the 
 bureaux and ministries not of good but of evil 'how 
 long, O Lord, dost Thou not judge and avenge,' when 
 the machinations and the stratagems of Thy foe are so 
 many, so mighty ? ' An enemy hath done this.' ' We 
 wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against princi- 
 palities, against powers, against the world-rulers of this 
 darkness, against spiritualities of wickedness in high 
 places.' 
 
 The formidableness of the foe is one thought here, 
 and it were well if we felt instead of disparaging it. We 
 know not by what stages of time or by what steps of 
 procedure it may be necessary in the nature of things 
 that a God of love and omnipotence should pass to the 
 reconquest of a rebel creation. The attempt to re- 
 present that reconquest as done as soon as willed done 
 easily, done instantaneously, if there be omnipotence as
 
 272 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 well as love in the wilier is an example of that con- 
 fusion between brute force and moral which has been so 
 prolific of error in the controversies of theologians. Let 
 us be just at all costs to the evidence of fact and to the 
 deposition of conscience. It is idle to read the thing 
 that is by the light of a wish or an imagination. Evil is 
 very strong at present in a world which has admitted 
 it : there is but one thing mightier and the battle is 
 still raging between them, though the word that cannot 
 lie has prophesied the issue. 
 
 The other prominent thought is peculiar, I believe, to 
 this epistle. In the second chapter we read of 'the 
 prince of the power of the air ' as managing the opera- 
 tion of evil in ' the children of disobedience.' Here, we 
 find the seat of his empire defined as 'the heavenly 
 places ; ' not (of course) in the very highest sense of 
 those words, as the ' heaven of heavens ' in which God 
 dwells, and into which Christ entered by ascension ; 
 but in that wider and vaguer sense of heaven, in which 
 it is synonymous with the air or atmosphere, and in 
 which we read indiscriminately in Scripture of 'the 
 birds of the air ' and of ' the fowls of the heaven.' It is 
 in that lower, that earthlier heaven that St Paul places 
 the habitation of the evil spirits, as though to give 
 energy to the idea of their nearness to us, of their pre- 
 sence with us, as in the very air we breathe of their 
 impalpableness too, as incorporeal and immaterial foes, 
 to be encountered only in the power of that superhuman 
 faith, which grasps the intangible and sees the invisible. 
 If such be the power, and such the secrecy, of the 
 enemy with whom we wrestle, only God's armour can 
 avail for the battle in which even ' to withstand ' is not
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 273 
 
 all : there is an evening too, and an eternal morrow, to 
 be thought of : ' having done all, to stand.' 
 
 'Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with 
 truth.' 
 
 Truth reality the thing that is the opposite and 
 the antagonist (in every form and shape) of the lie, ' the 
 thing nothing,' the pretended being that is not this 
 truth has, of course, two aspects. In one aspect, truth 
 belongs to the object contemplated. In another aspect, 
 truth belongs to the mind contemplating. It has there- 
 fore two contraries, the mention of which will give us 
 the best idea of it : falsehood is one hypocrisy is the 
 other. Both are unrealities, untruths : but the one is 
 unreality in the object, and the other is unreality in the 
 person viewing it. 
 
 Now it is quite intelligible it commends itself to 
 experience as well as reason that St Paul places truth 
 first among the particulars of the divine panoply. 
 There are some adversaries who may possibly be con- 
 fronted without discomfiture in counterfeit or unproved 
 armour. For an encounter between two men of the 
 world, in those battles which are fought every day in the 
 arenas of business, politics, or fashion, it is conceivable 
 that a show of earnestness may answer almost as well 
 for the time as its reality, and that the object round 
 which the fight rages may be quite as probably a shadow 
 as a substance. It is not so in that war to which St 
 Paul here summons us. When the life or death of the 
 soul, the happiness or misery of an eternity, is the thing 
 at stake ; and when the enemy to be vanquished is not 
 carnal but spiritual, meeting us as in the air we breathe 
 and the circumstance which is our life ; then it is plain 
 v. 1 8
 
 274 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 that the first condition of the availableness of a weapon 
 must be truth, must be reality, in both and in all its 
 senses : no mockery would be more frightful than that 
 which should say to us, ' Stand therefore, having your 
 loins girt about with falsehood Stand therefore, having 
 your loins girt about with hypocrisy.' 
 
 It would be an injustice as well as an affront to 
 this audience to address to it, in this most superficial, 
 this coarsest interpretation, St Paul's charge in the 
 text, to have the loins girt with truth. But there is 
 a sense in which no English audience in this our day 
 least of all, a congregation which has in it so many 
 of the future ministers of the church of God can be 
 spoken to without profit concerning the claims of truth. 
 There is a vice of this age which seems to me to be one 
 chief peril of our theology, and which is of near kin 
 to that first opposite of truth, which is falsehood I 
 mean Exaggeration. And there is a vice of this age, 
 which seems to me to be one chief peril of our religion, 
 and which is of near kin to that second opposite of 
 truth, which is hypocrisy I mean Excitement. In 
 reference to these two, I shall venture, with all plain- 
 ness of speech, but (I trust) also in all humility and 
 in all charity, to urge upon you, in this closing address, 
 the solemn admonition of St Paul, 'We wrestle, not 
 against flesh and blood, but against spiritual foes ' 
 nearer and mightier : ' stand therefore, having your 
 loins girt about with truth.' 
 
 i. In days like ours, when 'the world has lost his 
 youth," when an indescribable weariness, as of a thrice- 
 told tale, has settled down upon hearers and readers 
 in every department of traditional thought and old
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 275 
 
 opinion, one of the readiest revivals of interest is found 
 in the region of exaggeration. Some principle, some 
 doctrine, some duty, having its root (or it would not 
 answer the purpose) in truth and the' Bible, is set by 
 itself, enforced and dwelt upon, garnished with new 
 embellishments, made into the truth and the whole 
 of truth : everything is referred to it, every one is 
 judged by it : loud assertion, confident assumption, 
 ingenious illustration, arrogant disdain, unscrupulous 
 argument, each lends its weight and its impulse to the 
 growing and gathering system : at last it becomes 
 powerful in voices and numbers, and takes its defined 
 place as one of those last new things in religion by 
 which a languid and drowsy church is roused into 
 the semblance (at least) of a livelier life and a fresh 
 devotion. This has been the history, in all times, of 
 the origination of religious sects and parties. Not 
 falsehood, but exaggeration often the disinterment of 
 a buried truth, itself an integral part of God's reve- 
 lation, overlaid, hidden, forgotten for years in the 
 ministry or in the theology of a particular church, 
 discovered again by the toil of one mind or through 
 the agony and anguish of one soul, found to be 
 living and life-giving, then isolated, distorted, deified, 
 made a badge and a discord, carrying (in its turn) 
 mischief into lives and schism into churches not 
 falsehood, but exaggeration, has done this again it 
 has been seen that, if Christianity would stand in the 
 battle, the loins must be 'girt about with truth.' For 
 our purpose, exaggeration is weakness, the 'spirituali- 
 ties ' with which we wage war are quick to discern and 
 to find it out. 
 
 1 8 2
 
 276 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 It is not only or chiefly on this large scale as the 
 parent of heresies and schisms that we are concerned 
 with the working of exaggeration today. Let us look 
 at it as it comes near us, in the teaching and practice 
 which, on this side or that, professes and believes itself 
 to be that of Christ and the church. 
 
 And here our very purpose would be defeated, our 
 own principle would be belied, if we drew our illustra- 
 tions from one line of teaching, from one form of 
 practice, alone, and gave a moment's encouragement 
 to the thought that in an opposite line or form of 
 either lay the reality or the whole of truth. Suffer 
 me to speak here as I am a man of no party 
 a man believing that no party in the church either 
 wholly lacks, or exclusively possesses, the truth itself 
 'as it is in Jesus.' Let me freely speak to you that 
 which is in my heart, fearless of misconstruction, con- 
 cerning things which all know, and which must have, 
 in themselves, apart altogether from party consider- 
 ations, a definite right and wrong. 
 
 I will venture, so guarding myself, to say one word 
 on that solemn and sacred topic, the sacraments, the 
 two sacraments, instituted by Christ for His church. 
 None surely can gainsay the sanctity of an ordinance 
 of which our Master said, ' He that believeth and is 
 baptized shall be saved ' or again, ' Take, eat this is 
 my body... Drink ye all of this : for this cup is the new 
 testament in my blood, which is shed for many.' But 
 how if we are made to overlook, or throw into the 
 shade, the companion texts to these 'Except ye be 
 converted, and become as little children, ye cannot 
 enter into the kingdom of God;' and, 'It is the spirit
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 277 
 
 that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing?' How if, 
 every thought of distinction and difference being thrown 
 aside, we be compelled to declare every process of grace 
 which made baptism, to primitive converts of mature 
 age, the very point and moment of transition from 
 death unto life, to have taken place, in mystery and 
 miracle, within the soul of an infant child so that, if 
 after baptism he lives carelessly as boy or youth, he 
 has sinned not against light or grace only, but distinctly 
 against a Holy Ghost once actually received into the 
 temple of his own heart ? Is there not, in such state- 
 ments, an exaggeration which is unreality, and which 
 brings with it a conscious embarrassment when we 
 would gird ourselves with it for the actual conflict with 
 evil ? Were we not bound to recognize some dis- 
 tinction between two legitimate applications of the 
 same scriptural metaphor in other words, between a 
 regeneration which is a change of life and a regene- 
 ration which is a change of state a transfer (is that 
 a small thing ?) from the world of nature and of 
 the fall into the world of privilege and promise and 
 grace ? 
 
 It is thus with the other holy sacrament. I do not 
 mean for one moment to imply that any teaching 
 represents it as an indiscriminate guarantee of salvation. 
 None assuredly would more anxiously fence its re- 
 ception with every argument of caution and warning 
 than they who attribute to its right reception a unique 
 and incomparable communication of grace. But is there 
 no risk, in some language held concerning it, of an 
 isolation of this holy ordinance, in kind as well as in 
 degree, from every other exercise whatsoever of the
 
 278 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 divine life? Is there no opening for the taunt, You 
 make it the whole of religion to receive the sacrament ? 
 Shall we feel no risk of exaggeration in a view of this 
 one means of grace which would remove it out of 
 I had almost said, would set it at variance with the 
 book of Gospel doctrine and Gospel precept as a whole, 
 and frame for it by itself a separate theology out 
 of isolated expressions sometimes quite evidently 
 emotional and not doctrinal of the uninspired writers 
 of a post-apostolic age ? 
 
 We turn in another direction. 
 
 There is growing amongst us a representation of 
 evangelical doctrine, which threatens to caricature the 
 very gospel itself of our Lord and Saviour. Not only 
 do we hear as the church has always heard state- 
 ments of the doctrine of grace which are, in expression 
 at least, daringly, recklessly antinomian ; parodies of 
 St Paul's language, to Romans and Ephesians, as to 
 the valuelessness of good works, their utter paltriness 
 and defilement at the best, in the sight of a heart- 
 searching God their absolute nothingness at the best 
 in earning an acceptance forfeited by innumerable sins, 
 and not to be won back by an obedience, itself impos- 
 sible, yet at all events only just self-sufficing, leaving 
 nothing over for retrospect or supererogation : much, 
 much beyond this runs the last vagary, in England 
 and America, of this inveterate tendency of the old 
 nature in the regenerate. We are taught now that 
 prayer itself is more than half a sin ; that anything 
 which doubts or misgives itself as to the sufficiency of 
 the conversion or the progress of the sanctification 
 any self-sorrow, any self-effort, any self-control or self-
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 279 
 
 denial is, to the same extent, unbelief towards Jesus 
 whose engagement is, whose guarantee is, certain, ab- 
 solute, indefeasible salvation for all who have once given 
 themselves into His love and His protection. Superfluous 
 then, if not erroneous, according to this latest light of 
 an instantaneous salvation, must be three fourths, or 
 nine tenths, of the teaching of Jesus Christ and His 
 apostles. Superfluous, nay, misleading, the words on 
 which I am addressing you, ' Stand therefore, having 
 your loins girt about with truth.' Yet here too, even in 
 this strange phantom of doctrine, is less of falsehood 
 than of exaggeration : there are texts to be found, which 
 might seem to say even this : only not Scripture as a 
 whole only not the voice of God in the average and on 
 the balance of its utterances. 
 
 Exaggerations like this have many phases and many 
 provinces. A multitude of them centre in this all- 
 important point the individual hope and life. We have 
 lived through many forms and many fashions of it. 
 We can remember when a salvation by works, pure and 
 simple, was by no means matter of hypothesis or of 
 history; when the serious teaching of men of devout 
 mind was necessarily devoted to the overthrow of the 
 fabric of the self-righteousness, itself shrunk by that 
 time to a mere shell and husk of decorum, with its 
 public worship on Sunday and its thrice-a-year com- 
 munion. Then we saw the substitution for this, of a 
 grave anxious doctrine of conversion with its orderly 
 tabulated stages, and its certificate of admission, for 
 those who had duly passed through them, into a sort of 
 new communion and fellowship, a church within a 
 church, fenced by a code of understood prohibitions,
 
 280 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 and by a free-masonry of mysterious recognitions. Last 
 of all, we have lived into a period of instantaneous illu- 
 minations acceptances, in mission or confessional, of a 
 free salvation, and admissions by this sudden process, of 
 a day or an hour, into a privileged society of persons 
 trusting in themselves that they are safe beyond con- 
 flict, and bidding others, by the same leap of a moment, 
 to follow them. Thus meet once more the extremes of 
 faith and works. Thus creeps in again the old Adam of 
 a most unevangelical exclusiveness, and the construction 
 of a new fabric, not of works but (this time) of feelings, 
 of which it is confidently hoped that the top may reach 
 heaven. 
 
 Brethren, I protest in the name of the God of the 
 Bible against this latest product of exaggeration. A 
 few texts, torn from their context, may prop or bolster 
 it : but it is a building of human construction, and it 
 must perish ' in the day of the great slaughter, when 
 the towers fall.' 
 
 Our hope shall rest not upon ordinances, not upon 
 feelings but upon that which God has done for us in 
 the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 We shall refuse to build after Him we shall build upon 
 Him. We shall say to the young man who asks of us 
 the way of salvation, ' All things are yours life and 
 death, the world and heaven, things present and things 
 to come all are yours for you are already Christ's, 
 and Christ is God's. Wait not for any thing to come to 
 pass around or within you. Christ's by redemption, 
 Christ's by the gospel call, Christ's by the individual 
 baptism, as such begin to live as such prepare to die. 
 Take the language of God in holy Scripture according
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 281 
 
 to its general tone and tenor. If a particular passage 
 seems to contradict this, ponder, compare, and pray. 
 Let it not stop you in your resolution to live the life 
 of God. That cannot be its meaning. At last there 
 shall arise upon it for thee God's marvellous light.' 
 
 Brethren, Christian brethren, gird yourselves betimes 
 with truth. You will want it all. There are tokens, 
 real and unmistakable, in this England, of a terrible 
 schism. Not a schism I care not (I had almost said) 
 for that between liturgies and no liturgies, between 
 rival denominations, between church and dissent : these 
 things may be religious schisms ; divisions more of name 
 than of thing ; indications of earnestness, which a perti- 
 nacious charity may conquer back, if it please God, into 
 a substantial, at least an eventual, unity. The schism 
 of which I speak is a schism between the church and 
 her pastors between the ministers and the ministered 
 unto between the clergy and the laity of England. 
 This is why I speak to you as I have spoken today. 
 Exaggeration is the bane : truth, truth, is the antidote. 
 If once there should arise among the ministers of our 
 national church a practical, however unconscious, seve- 
 rance from the bonds of sober judgment and of common 
 sense ; if once they should begin to assume to them- 
 selves an independence of those unwritten but most real 
 laws, of moderation and naturalness and good taste, 
 which are just as much Christ's as any revelation which 
 He brought with Him afterwards out of heaven ; there 
 is an end of this ministry thenceforth in its blessed, its 
 beneficent influence within, and without also, the con- 
 fines of our communion. 
 
 There is but one way of preventing God grant there
 
 282 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 be still time, and still the heart, to prevent this fatal, 
 this ruinous breach : and it is that which the text points 
 out Ministers of Christ ministers of the church of 
 the future gird yourselves round about with truth. 
 Suffer not in yourselves that most dangerous habit, of 
 over-stating just a little, for effect's sake, that which you 
 deliver as your gospel. Rather habituate yourselves to 
 that exact, that accurate utterance of the very thing 
 itself which you are assured of, which may indeed lose 
 you for the moment the applause of the crowd, but 
 which will enter for everlasting habitation into the 
 heart's heart of the thoughtful. Say not, in your own 
 excuse or in excuse for your party, that a little exag- 
 geration is harmless ; that no one man, no one party, is 
 responsible for the preservation of that equilibrium of 
 the whole church and of the whole truth, for which God 
 will take care, and which is rather the resultant of all 
 forces than the operation of one. Least of all give way 
 to that dreadful, that self-made necessity, of lashing up 
 your own flagging energy by the enunciation of strong 
 sayings, impressive perhaps to others, but to yourself at 
 this moment unreal. Beware of those cloudy and mys- 
 terious hintings of sacerdotal power, which can be ex- 
 plained away (I know) to-morrow into nothing, but 
 which common English listeners will assuredly interpret 
 today into every thing. The minister of Christ, were it 
 but for his country's and for his church's sake, must be 
 careful above all men to gird himself round and round 
 with truth. 
 
 2. We leave ourselves but a fragment of space for 
 the other foe of truth, which we have called excite- 
 ment. Doubtless you will say, and we shall not dispute
 
 xv.J Exaggeration and Excitement. 283 
 
 it, Excitement is not only pleasant and enjoyable in a 
 life social and mental ; not only does it bring a zest 
 and a sparkle into the vapid waters of earth, and com- 
 municate to all her activities a stir and an impulse with- 
 out which they must soon stagnate into deadness 
 excitement has its use, over and above all these, even in 
 the economy of grace. St Paul himself implies this, 
 \vhen he sets, in this epistle, the ' fulness of the spirit ' 
 over against the ' excess of wine.' He means evidently 
 that that craving which is in us by nature for the 
 exhilaration of the whole frame into a quicker and 
 livelier action, and which seeks its vent too often in 
 sensual indulgence, shall not lack its satisfaction in the 
 Christian, whose privilege it is to find in the spiritual life, 
 without stint and without remorse, all that sin professes 
 to offer of intensifying and vivifying stimulus. We can- 
 not admit that this passage is decisive as to the whole- 
 someness of any particular form of excitement which 
 may offer itself, under cover of it, for the use of the 
 church of God. 
 
 The life of the church of this day is in very large 
 part a life of excitement. There is a very general 
 consent to make it so. On the one side, we find a 
 great multiplication of religious meetings and ecclesias- 
 tical assemblies. The life of a prominent churchman is 
 lived largely in public. Convocation, with its com- 
 mittees in intermediate session diocesan synods, dio- 
 cesan conferences the annual church congress, with 
 its increasing numbers and widening subjects ruri- 
 decanal chapters, with or without the addition of the 
 older and less pretentious clerical meetings furnish, 
 amongst them, a list of engagements, of which, without
 
 284 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 expressing any opinion upon their positive or relative 
 value, this must be said that they offer a tempting 
 alternative, for men of ready speech and natural ability, 
 to that life of secluded study and parochial absorption 
 which was, within the recollection of some of us, the 
 only career of an English pastor who had a conscience 
 and who would do his duty. 
 
 Side by side with these new attractions for the 
 clergyman, he on his part has opened to his people 
 a multitude of interests before unknown. Not to 
 mention an increase of regular services, on Sunday 
 and week-day, for which the prayer-book had made 
 provision, and to which parishioners had a right ; we 
 have witnessed a fertility and ingenuity of invention, in 
 the matter of public festal and penitential worship, 
 which has gradually spread and multiplied, until the 
 only fear is lest it should too much overlay and crush 
 that spirit of private and secret devotion which was the 
 only outlet, a quarter of a century ago, for the spiritual 
 exercises of a heart quickened to God and a life dedi- 
 cated to His service. 
 
 But the tendencies of which we speak are not thus 
 bounded. It is the avowed object, not of one, but 
 of both the great parties in our church, to stimulate 
 to the uttermost and in every way the spiritual life. 
 Midnight services mission services sermons and in- 
 structions aimed at this one point, of awakening 
 exhortations to private confession on the one side, 
 encouragements on the other side to promiscuous ex- 
 temporaneous prayer on both sides (for here I perceive 
 little difference) hymns couched in the most fervent 
 and burning language, sung in crowded churches to
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 285 
 
 the most popular and catching tunes ; these are among 
 the instrumentalities, new with the generation, for 
 arousing the languor and stimulating the energy of 
 souls : and many clergymen, with a judgment but 
 half approving, are goaded into such excitements, by 
 a dread of reproach, or for the chance of what may come 
 of it because they feel that the tide of the times is too 
 strong for them, or because they would not run the risk 
 of counteracting (if it be so) the current of grace. 
 
 Brethren, it would ill become one man, and that 
 the least worthy, to doubt where others are confident, 
 or to set himself to check in the church what may 
 be a sign of the advent as well as a token of grace. 
 But I will dare to remind you that excitement is at 
 all times a two-edged sword having a reaction of death 
 as well as an action of life. Excitement may stir the 
 sleeping soul, from its dream of safety and selfishness, 
 into that waking vision which is the sight of God. 
 Without excitement, the life may sleep on, and the 
 glare of instant judgment be its first serious summons 
 to reflection and righteousness. On the other hand, 
 excitement cannot be the life of any man. In itself 
 it is, if not the mocking counterfeit, yet at best the 
 distant echo of truth. Try yourself by its residuum. 
 What is left of it when the fever-fit is over? What 
 is left of it, to do battle with 'the spiritualities of evil' 
 to enable you 'to withstand in the evil day, and, having 
 done all, to stand?' 
 
 Advancing life makes us daily more grateful, as 
 for the correction of exaggeration vouchsafed to us 
 in the Bible, so for the counteraction of excitement 
 secured to us rn the prayer-book. I venture to think
 
 286 Exaggeration and Excitement. [xv. 
 
 that the calm and grave tone of our liturgy is the 
 soundest and healthiest utterance for every public 
 meeting for worship. I do not know the feeling or 
 the aspiration which cannot find in those pages its most 
 appropriate language. I know it is on record in the 
 biographies of Christians that the loftiest and most 
 experienced souls have declared the worship of the 
 congregation according to the prescribed forms of the 
 church of England to have afforded them their most 
 transporting moments of personal communion with God. 
 There is that in those well-known, those long-tried, 
 those thrice-consecrated pages, which forms at once 
 the protecting shelter of a young and timid devotion 
 guarding it from all reproach and all suspicion of a 
 presumptuous or hypocritical forwardness and also the 
 guidance and help of a maturer and more established 
 piety which treads the way of God with a firmer and 
 surer footing when it is following in the track of saints 
 militant once, now glorified. If more than this must 
 be, let it be rather when the chamber door is shut 
 behind thee, and thou art alone in the presence of 
 God and His Spirit 
 
 ' Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with 
 truth.' 
 
 Brethren, we picture to ourselves for we have seen 
 it in youth the life which should reproduce here that 
 to which St Paul calls us. It is a life preparing for, 
 not precipitating, the maturity which lies beyond it. 
 It is the life of a learner, not a teacher ; of a worshipper, 
 not of a priest He whom I present to you for a model 
 is carefully guarding his own life from idle follies, from 
 youthful lusts. He knows himself to be sowing for the
 
 xv.] Exaggeration and Excitement. 287 
 
 great reaping 'shame and contempt,' or else 'the 
 brightness of the sun.' He is a student, in secret, of 
 his Bible he reads, and marks, and prays. Whatso- 
 ever he is assured of, he speaks that, that, and nothing 
 more. He dreads above all things the idle talk of re- 
 ligion, which 'makes others offenders,' and offends itself. 
 Yet he suffers not unchecked in his presence the un- 
 charitable, the impure, or the irreverent speech. He is 
 brave, because he is honest, and because his profession 
 has not outrun reality. Diligent in work, blameless in 
 conduct, earnest to know, resolute to make progress 
 sympathizing out of a pure heart with the erring, out 
 of a true heart with the doubting afraid of no evil 
 tidings, from scientific camp or sceptical, because 'his 
 heart standeth fast, believing in the Lord' thus he 
 occupies the ten talents of this (for him) holy and 
 happy training: 'in the courts of God's house he is 
 planted, and he shall bring forth more fruit in his age.'
 
 XVI. 
 
 SCORN A BREACH OF THE SIXTH COMMANDMENT. 
 
 Matthew v. 22. 
 
 Whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. 
 
 WE have here an example of the legislation of Jesus 
 Christ. His kingdom must have its laws. This necessity 
 is not superseded either by the freeness of the grace 
 which saves, or by the freedom of the life into which it 
 gives entrance. The Christian man has no thought of 
 meriting either the favour of God now or the acceptance 
 of God hereafter. But the very fact that he is saved by 
 grace implies that he is to walk in newness of life ; and 
 for instruction in the meaning of that word ' newness ' 
 he must look to the Lord of the 'life' to Him who has 
 said, in reference not only to the mysteries of the future 
 but to the duties of the present, 'Behold, I make all 
 things new.' 
 
 The forgiven man needs instruction. For want of 
 it, though it lies there in the gospel for want of it, 
 though to prayer and meditation it would unfold itself 
 in minute direction for want of it, though the Saviour 
 lives to minister the Spirit, and casts out none who 
 come to Him he lives immeasurably below the standard 
 of the great confession, stumbles day by day along a 
 path which might bask in light, and pays the penalty
 
 xvi.] Scorn a breach of, &c. 289 
 
 in a thousand regrets and remorses which make a 
 perpetual demand upon the treasury of the inex- 
 haustible grace. 
 
 Now the legislation of Jesus Christ might have taken 
 an altogether new departure. It might have begun with 
 new terms and new definitions : it might have discarded 
 existing rules, and struck out a path for itself, in which 
 the words ' grace ' and ' spirit ' and ' love ' might have 
 taken the place of all mention of particular sins and 
 particular duties. Such a course might have been more 
 evidently original : it might have brought to an earlier 
 or more direct issue the conflict between law and 
 gospel : it might have been more satisfactory at first 
 sight to persons whose bitter experience recorded the 
 weakness of nature and of the fall in the face of 
 commands and prohibitions addressed to an erect 
 posture and a free will. 
 
 But no reader of the gospels, no student of the 
 sermon on the mount, can say that our Lord passed 
 the sponge over existing systems, and avowed His 
 intention to subvert either natural or revealed religion 
 as He found it ready to the hand of a teacher come 
 from God. In His first and most systematic discourse 
 upon divine and relative duties, He takes the decalogue 
 as His subject; selects some of its separate command- 
 ments for comment and illustration ; and shows the 
 operation upon it of a higher law of life, in which 
 the letter is subordinated to the spirit, but which makes 
 no pretence of replacing the actual and the practical 
 by anything that is unreal, visionary, or transcendental. 
 
 The decalogue was the transcript of natural duty; 
 expressing, in strong bold outline, what man owes 
 v. 19
 
 290 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 as a creature to his God, and as a fellow-creature to his 
 fellows. This law can never be superseded : but it 
 may be illuminated, it may be transfigured, it may be 
 breathed upon and breathed into and re-inspired by its 
 Author. 
 
 ' Not to destroy, but to fulfil,' was the office of Christ 
 towards the law and the prophets. Not to demolish, 
 but to fill not to take down the fabric of the old, but 
 to bring into it the presence which shall occupy each 
 chamber with a life at once divine and most human 
 this is the legislation of Jesus Christ, and the text 
 is one of its most beautiful and characteristic examples. 
 He comes to rescue this commandment, the sixth of the 
 decalogue, from the literalism of the scribe, from the 
 fantasticality of the Pharisee, and to lift it into the 
 spirituality the thoroughness, that is, and the practical- 
 ness of the new, the gospel life. 
 
 He begins by bringing together (as in some following 
 instances) the commandment and the gloss. The strong 
 sturdy prohibition, 'Thou shall not kill' one of the ten 
 thunders of Sinai, so stern and tremendous that ' they 
 who heard entreated that no word might be added '- 
 had fallen into the manipulating hands of a later 
 Rabbinism, and received the feeble appendage of a 
 liberalizing enactment, 'And whosoever shall kill shall 
 be liable to the judgment.' Thus translation might 
 hesitate, not without apology, between the 'to' and 
 the ' by ' in this Greek dative. ' It was said ' to ' them 
 of old time' is true of ' Thou shalt not kill.' ' It was 
 said' by 'them of old time* might suit better the clause 
 about liability to the judgment. We have indeed, if 
 we examine it, not one nor two but three speakers
 
 xvi.] the Sixth Commandment. 291 
 
 in the sentences here before us. There is the divine 
 word there is the human gloss there is the God-Man 
 interpreting the one and removing the other. God 
 spake, man added to it, 'but I say unto you.' 
 
 We pause for a moment upon the majesty of the 
 claim here advanced. It is the assertion of a right 
 to supersede all human authorities : it is the assertion 
 of a right to stand side by side in authority with the 
 divine Legislator Himself. The divinity of Jesus 
 Christ waits not, as some would persuade you, for 
 later developements ; waits not even for the fourth 
 gospel and for the evangelist St John. It breathes 
 in each page of the first gospel ; in the sermon on the 
 mount, with its ' I say unto you ;' in the parable of the 
 tares, 'The Son of Man shall send forth His angels.... 
 The field, His field, is the world ;' in the revelations of 
 the last day, ' The Son of Man shall sit on the throne of 
 His glory and before Him shall be gathered all nations.' 
 
 'Whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the 
 judgment.' The nearest court of resident Levites 
 shall sit in judgment on him, and shall condemn. 
 This was all that the scribe had to say upon 
 this sixth statute of the decalogue. All was dull 
 bare prose : there was the crime, and there was 
 the punishment the act done, and that which came 
 of it. Who troubled himself to go deeper ? Who busied 
 himself about the sin, when he had dealt with the crime? 
 Who cared to dive into the depths of the heart, who 
 cared to penetrate into the recesses of the life, and 
 interest himself about the poor disconsolate creature 
 of God that had sinned and must die ? Still more, who 
 cared to draw out of his sad record something that 
 
 19 2
 
 292 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 should be of use to fellow-men, to keep them off 
 the shipwreck-rocks which had been death and hell 
 to men of one blood and of one nature with themselves ? 
 
 Not the scribe nor the Pharisee. Their little office 
 was magnified when they had settled who should sit 
 upon this case, and where. But Jesus Christ, ' the Man 
 of sorrows, acquainted with grief could He stop there? 
 Did He not care who sinned, or who died for it, pro- 
 vided the court were correct, the process exact, the 
 punishment certain ? Therein lies the difference be- 
 tween Him and them. ' I judge no man. I came to 
 save the world.' And to save is to forewarn. Beware 
 then of this or that within thee which will drive thee 
 upon this quicksand. ' I say unto thee,' interpreting the 
 sixth commandment of the decalogue, ' Whosoever is 
 angry with his brother' yes, 'his brother,' if he is a 
 man he has committed murder. Anger is murder. 
 Cautious scribes have interpolated here the reservation, 
 'without a cause;' just as other scribes have inserted 
 'easily' before 'provoked' in the divine paean of 
 charity. They recalled perhaps the saying, ' Be ye 
 angry and sin not;' and thought that moral indignation 
 ought to be expressly exempted from the condemnation 
 of anger. But moral indignation needs no such saving 
 clause. Moral indignation never shed blood; or, if it 
 did, it was not murder. No, the anger of which Christ 
 speaks under the head of killing, is, of course, sinful 
 anger. Let the local court, let the seven Levites or the 
 three and twenty Levites, deal with that. 
 
 But the peculiarity, the originality, of our Lord's 
 statute of murder, lies here not in the mention of 
 anger, but in the ' Raca ' and the ' More ' which follow it.
 
 xvi.] the Sixth Commandment. 293 
 
 Anger is of course unchristian. The lowest court can 
 judge of that. There is no need to carry its questions 
 to the capital. The justice-room of the nearest borough 
 can deal with them. Not because they are trivial, but 
 because they are obvious. Who does not see that selfish, 
 violent, ungoverned anger is a breach of the sixth com- 
 mandment when Christ's light is let in upon it ? Let us 
 go on let us go deeper. Let us go to the 'Raca' and 
 to the ' More.' 
 
 The word ' Raca ' has had several interpretations. 
 It may mean it probably does mean 'empty' or 
 'silly.' Some have found for it a more precise appli- 
 cation. They have given it the sense of one who errs 
 in doctrine, and have found encouragement for this 
 suggestion in the reference of the case to the council 
 or Sanhedrin. Some have gone on to take ' fool ' in its 
 occasional derived sense of ' atheist.' ' The fool hath 
 said in his heart, There is no God.' And thus we should 
 have that climax of insult of which we hear too much 
 in these days; and the man who calls his brother 'Raca' 
 will call him 'heretic,' and the man who calls his 
 brother ' fool ' will call him ' atheist,' and we shall have 
 a graduated scale of affront and calumny, by no means 
 indeed imaginary or unreal, but introducing perhaps one 
 of those too exact, too antithetical parallels, which forget 
 the dignity of the divine Speaker in the smartness and 
 sharpness of a human repartee. 
 
 We may not be able accurately to distinguish by shade 
 of colour the ' Raca ' from the ' More.' Enough that 
 they are distinguished in the word of truth before us. 
 Lighter, less harsh, less contemptuous, evidently, the one 
 is than the other. We can all feel a difference there
 
 294 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 is one between calling a man simpleton and calling 
 a man fool. We can imagine our Lord saying, Who- 
 soever shall say ' simpleton ' shall (in gospel antitype) 
 go before the Sanhedrin : it is an offence against love, 
 an offence therefore against the God of love it shall 
 not go unpunished. Whosoever shall say ' fool ' shall 
 go straight (in gospel antitype) to the Gehenna, the 
 valley of Hinnom, in which idolatrous Israelites once 
 sacrificed to Moloch, and which a royal iconoclast 
 defiled afterwards with burnt bones of men. 
 
 Never let us strain holy Scripture, the words of 
 Jesus Christ, into a rigid compliance with rules of 
 artificial rhetoric. Let us acquiesce in a climax less 
 than perfect, in an antithesis less than startling. There 
 is a wisdom above man's wisdom even in ' the foolish- 
 ness' an apostle has gone before us 'the foolishness 
 of God,' as well as a strength above man's strength in 
 His 'weakness.' 
 
 This we can see and it is enough that between the 
 first example and the second of the motives of murder 
 we have passed from one region, from one climate, into 
 another. And if between the second example and the 
 third it is not so; if the ' Raca ' and the 'Mor' are 
 separated rather by degree than by kind; if a gulf is 
 fixed between the one and the two, and but a hair's 
 breadth be discernible between these two ; yet is our 
 moral clear and our guidance certain : we have passed 
 from the motive of anger into the motive of contempt, 
 and the two contempts are at least distinguishable, 
 while the fact that 'scorn can kill' is brought out with 
 terrible emphasis in the combination of the two. 
 
 To make scorn worse than anger in the region of
 
 xvi.] the Sixth Commandment. 295 
 
 malevolent passion at all events, to hunt the malevo- 
 lent passion from the covert of wrath into the cavern 
 of contempt is at once an instructive lesson, and a 
 striking feature of the gospel. It was said to the 
 ancients, as they quaked before the mountain of the 
 terrific presence, ' Thou shalt not kill.' ' But I say 
 unto you,' the church bought with my blood, 'Who- 
 soever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be liable 
 to the council ; and whosoever shall say, Fool, shall be 
 in danger of hell fire/ 
 
 We are not to suppose that it is the word 'fool' 
 which is the thing really prohibited. Such an inter- 
 pretation would be an example of that Pharisaism 
 against which the text itself is directed. Christ Him- 
 self used the word. ' Ye fools and blind ' was one of 
 His own appellations of the Rabbis of that day. This 
 indeed would not of itself sanction our use of it. He 
 who knew what was in man had a right to all words 
 and to this amongst them. There is here before us an 
 instance of the power of the Bible of our own English 
 Bible upon the language and upon the conscience of 
 the people. The word of this text is under a ban. 
 Men who do not think much of Jesus Christ, men whose 
 conscience is not sensitive to right and wrong, pay an 
 unconscious homage to the prohibition of one par- 
 ticular term of contumely; would shrink from using, 
 would not be suffered to use in decorous society, one 
 to another, the arrogant, the insolent, the exasperating 
 word ' fool.' But it is of the thought rather than the 
 word that our Lord speaks. Whosoever shall think of 
 his brother ' thou fool ' shall be a transgressor, shall be 
 a murderer, in the eye of God.
 
 296 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 There is no scorn in the gospel. It might be 
 said indeed, Is there then unreality ? is there com- 
 plaisance ? is there flattery? is there a double tongue 
 and a false pretending ? How, without this, can I help 
 thinking ' thou fool ' of half the men and the women 
 who meet me in society? 
 
 We are not to call folly wisdom, any more than 
 we are to 'put darkness for light or sweet for bitter.' 
 It is implied everywhere in the Bible that a diagnosis 
 of folly is possible ; that we are not intended to be 
 credulous, to be promiscuous, to be either blind or 
 false, in our observation of character or in our inter- 
 course with mankind. There is a truthfulness of seeing 
 and estimating, there is an instinct, and a duty also, 
 of self-preservation, which presupposes a sort of judgment 
 upon characters, and without which it would be idle to 
 have it written in Scripture it is one text amongst 
 many to a like purpose ' He that walketh with wise 
 men shall be wise, but the companion of fools shall 
 be destroyed.' 
 
 But who does not feel that this is a different thing 
 altogether from scorn ? 
 
 Scorn is, first, arrogance, and then cruelty. 
 
 It is the second of these which gives it its place 
 here, as a breach, in spirit, of ' Thou shalt not kill.' 
 
 But even this rises out of the other. Cruelty itself 
 is first pride. What enables thee to injure thy brother ? 
 What makes it possible, makes it endurable, to thee, to 
 make that other life wretched, or to stamp it out ? 
 What but that thou art greater and nobler, more 
 valuable and more necessary, than that other ? Who 
 stops to ask himself, What have I that I did not
 
 XVL] the Sixth Commandment. 297 
 
 receive ? who made me thus, and another thus ? Scorn 
 forecloses such questionings : the ' thou fool ' in the 
 heart makes the life selfish and the dealing dis- 
 dainful. 
 
 Yes, there is a deeper thing than anger even in the 
 slaying. The wrath would not rise, for some wrong 
 done to the self-love, for some standing in the way of 
 my interest or of my honour or of my love, for some 
 supposed slight put upon me or affront offered or 
 rivalry threatened, if there were not first in me that 
 idea of importance, that notion of superiority, that 
 conceit of self, of which the natural vocative for the 
 other being is, 'thou fool.' Then the self-thwarted 
 becomes the self-avenger, and the little insignificant 
 unimportant life must go down before the one which 
 is so large and so essential. 
 
 Thus it is that the prohibition before us ranges itself 
 under the statute of murder. Scorn is murder. Witness 
 the examples of which India under English rule is fertile. 
 The ruling race, in its heart, says ' fool ' to the native. 
 The arrogant thought cherished becomes insolence, 
 becomes violence, becomes homicide, under provoca- 
 tion, and marvels if it must be tried for it. But why 
 cross the seas for our examples ? Where is not the 
 contemptuous thought ready to be oppression, ready to 
 be murder, if it had scope ? That superfluous, that 
 trivial, that inferior life, what matters it ? let me insult 
 it, let me trample upon it, let me put it out, if it is 
 very much or very obstinately in my way. 
 
 We have sought to bring into view the first meaning 
 of the precept its connexion with the sixth command- 
 ment its scrutiny of the motives of murder. But we
 
 298 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 feel, as we speak, that there is a deeper truth and a yet 
 more instructive lesson behind. 
 
 Anger and contempt point towards murder, while we 
 think only of the body. But is not He who thus traces 
 murder to its source enlarging also its definition ? It 
 might seem to require some ingenuity to connect the 
 red hand of the murderer with the inward thought of 
 the heart, ' thou fool.' But not so when we think 
 what it is, in Christ's sight, to kill. Not when we 
 remember His own saying, ' Fear not them which kill 
 the body.' There is something else which can be killed. 
 There is the life's life of the man. There is the bright 
 vigorous intellect, ever bracing itself for new marches 
 and new conquests, and needing for their achievement 
 an atmosphere in which it can breathe, and a sky under 
 which it can enjoy. There is the warm loving heart, 
 eager for affection, quick to offer, quicker to respond ; 
 the heart of which sympathy is the life and coldness 
 the destruction. There is the informing, animating, 
 quickening soul ; the thing in each one of us which 
 struggles upward, makes for the light, wills the good, 
 feels the force of right, accuses itself for its failures, rises 
 or would rise from its falls, feels that it has a purpose in 
 being, would not perish without having done its work, 
 would not be extinguished till it has both shone and 
 kindled, would not depart hence till it knows the 
 'whither' and the 'to whom.' Surely, when our Lord 
 Jesus Christ made the 'Raca' and 'More"' murderers, 
 He was teaching a new lesson as to the real and the 
 unreal killing. He was elevating our idea of life and 
 death, quite as much as He was showing how contempt, 
 no less than anger, may prompt to homicide.
 
 xvi.] the Sixth Commandment. 299 
 
 In this point of view, how instructive becomes the 
 prohibition of so much as the thought, ' thou fool.' 
 What is it which depresses and beats down the intellect, 
 when it would march and learn and know? Who are 
 the unsuccessful teachers, the inefficient lecturers, in our 
 schools and universities ? Are they not the conceited 
 self-satisfied men, who cannot put themselves even 
 in imagination on the level of the learner, who make 
 him feel himself accosted as a fool, and by being so 
 accosted made so ? Who are they to whom we owe the 
 earliest and (after all) the most substantial acquirements, 
 the very tools and implements of all subsequent pro- 
 gress, of all later attainment ? Who but the loving 
 sister or mother who fostered the nascent intellect by 
 an encouragement which put growth into it ? 
 
 And what is it which stunts and dwarfs and deforms 
 the yet higher life in all of us, the life of feeling and the 
 life of love ? What is it which has sometimes turned 
 the generous warm-hearted boy into a fastidious, dis- 
 contented, loveless misanthrope ? What but the con- 
 tempt with which his earliest tenderness was treated 
 by the being upon whom it was lavished not wisely but 
 too well ? 
 
 But what is it which kills the soul longing to live 
 the life which hath immortality, longing to receive, 
 longing to communicate, blessing ? Is it not this 
 the calm quiet 'thou fool' which just looks at us the 
 evil eye ; which silently, civilly, courteously implies the 
 ridiculousness of our even attempting, even wishing, to 
 be either this or that to any one living thing that moves 
 or creeps or crawls upon this earth ? Or, if we look 
 within, and think not of the desire to benefit, but of the
 
 300 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 soul's hunger and thirst after righteousness ; is it not, 
 here again, scorn scorn not spoken, but given to be 
 understood which quenches inside us the smoking 
 flax of grace, the spirit for brave resolve, the trust in 
 One not against but for us ? Who is it that helps me 
 to be better ? Is it not the man who believes in me 
 or, if this cannot quite be, the man who expects, the 
 man who hopes, for me ? Yes, the man who knows 
 or makes room for my poverty, my ignorance, my fault, 
 my sin, yet, because He also knows of a love stronger 
 than hate, and a strength prevalent in weakness, feels, 
 and lets me feel, that there is an omnipotence in the 
 self-despair ? 
 
 We see then, by the opposite, that the man who 
 thinks scorn of me is maleficent towards me if not 
 malevolent ; that he who so much as thinks at me 
 ' thou fool ' may be the murderer in me of that which 
 is my life. 
 
 The Scripture precept makes no exception when it 
 says, ' Honour all men.' It counsels not unreality, com- 
 plaisance, or flattery. It says not, There is in all men 
 something to admire, something to compliment, some- 
 thing of which to say, ' It is good, it is beautiful, let 
 it alone.' But it says this, There is no living thing 
 made to live, kept in life, by the Self-existent and the 
 All-wise to which any other living thing shall be 
 justified, shall be even true, in saying ' contemptible ' 
 or in saying ' fool.' In each living man there is some- 
 thing to honour, were it but the fact that he has his 
 life from God. In each there is something to respect, 
 could we but find it ; something to hope for, could we 
 but discern it ; something to work from, could \ve but
 
 xvi.] the Sixth Commandment. 301 
 
 get at it. Were it but the misfortune of home or 
 education, of circumstance or companionship, of tem- 
 perament or temper, of defective powers or mind de- 
 formed, surely the more privileged, the more advantaged, 
 ought rather to honour than to contemn. This it is 
 which makes ministry possible ; yea, the ministry of 
 the dying bed, or the ministry of the condemned cell. 
 The image of God, discoloured, defaced, sin-stained, 
 sin-corroded, is there still beneath all ; beneath the 
 wickedness, the cunning, the falsehood and filthiness, of 
 a whole life of sinning: and it is the secret, it is the 
 power also, of the God-taught, instead of scorning, 
 instead of saying to this lost brother, 'thou fool,' to 
 find out that image, and to make it find out itself. 
 
 Suffer, brethren, the word of exhortation. Wherever 
 there is power, wherever there is advantage, there is 
 the capacity at least, and the temptation, of scorning. 
 Our Lord addressed Himself to no imaginary, no 
 improbable audience, when He bade His disciples to 
 beware, as they loved Him, of the rising thought of 
 scorn. We have called it the temptation of power; 
 yet with equal truth it might be called the very touch- 
 stone and criterion of weakness. The young schoolboy 
 can despise his fellow for having a less fleet foot or a 
 less cunning hand than his own ; can even make a 
 mock at the halting gait of the cripple, or the faltering 
 speech of the paralytic. He lives to learn the unkind- 
 ness, the ungenerousness, the unmanliness, of such con- 
 tempts: the growth of real strength corrects instead 
 of fostering the self-conceit of inexperience. It ought 
 to be thus in all things. It ought to be thus with 
 all contempts:' they ought to be outgrown with the
 
 302 Scorn a breach of [xvi. 
 
 growth of the man ; they will be so with the growth of 
 the real man the man of mind and heart, of soul 
 and spirit. But this growth is often capricious, often 
 intermittent ; and infantine babyish judgments survive 
 into full stature and even into hoar hairs. 
 
 There is a scorning which parades itself in smart 
 writing, and which recommends a tone of contempt as 
 an accomplishment of the intellectual. There is an 
 affectation of sneer and sarcasm, but too easily caught, 
 and but too attractive to the young. There is a quick 
 eye for the ludicrous, and a ready tongue for satire, 
 and a lively imagination to extend the bounds of the 
 ridiculous till the landmark is removed altogether 
 between profane and sacred, which are irresistibly al- 
 luring to some natures, infinitely more sparkling and 
 more impressive than the speech of simple truth and 
 the judgment of honest charity. 
 
 Even they who rise above these coarser influences 
 of the scorner have a danger of their own in that very 
 superiority. How severe oftentimes is the verdict of 
 a moral young man upon a weaker or less disciplined 
 comrade. How little mercy does he show to the 
 promise which comes to nothing, to the effort which 
 failed to succeed, to the faint hand which (in Scripture 
 phrase) ' smote thrice and stayed.' How readily does 
 he pronounce upon the hopelessness, the good-for- 
 nothingness, of a character which yet has to live out 
 its days, and has to go afterwards to the judgment. 
 Let him lay to heart the warning of Jesus Christ, that 
 he who says to his brother, ' Raca ' or ' Fool,' may even 
 be that brother's slayer. These are just the severities 
 which make hell enlarge herself. Let the brother of
 
 xvi.] the Sixth Commandment. 303 
 
 firmer mould and more established virtue be the helper 
 and not the sentencer of the lagging dallying companion. 
 The day may come, even to him, when he shall find his 
 own utmost strength ' like the tow when it toucheth 
 the fire' in the face of some yet invisible influence which 
 shall try his very life of what sort it is. 
 
 But not virtue alone, religion also, has its scorning. 
 We can understand, we can respect, if we cannot 
 sympathize with, every honest conviction of doctrine 
 or ritual : we cannot respect the arrogance which makes 
 another an offender for a word, catches at the mis- 
 pronunciation of some shibboleth of protestantism, 
 or looks down upon a hair's breadth departure from 
 the tradition of a (so called, but often self-styled) 
 Catholicism. It is the ' Raca ' and the ' More,' in 
 these matters, which bewray them : right or wrong in 
 themselves, they are wrong certainly in the positiveness 
 and in the disdain. 
 
 'Whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger 
 of hell fire.' 
 
 O, if the Eternal Son O, if the Holy Spirit of God 
 had said to fallen man, lying in his vice and lying in his 
 ruin, ' thou fool,' where had been hope, where had been 
 redemption ? Jesus Christ saw in him the Father's 
 handy-work, knew that the Creator could re-create, 
 and came forth from Him to do it. The Holy Ghost 
 saw the ruined being lifted and re-created, yet needing 
 the perpetual presence, the unwearied indwelling ; and 
 though the thing to be indwelt was hospital and prison 
 and mad-house in one, He hesitated not to give up the 
 two milleniums or the six milleniums of a divine
 
 304 Scorn a breach of, &c. [xvi. 
 
 heaven, that He might wrestle with the obdurate, and, 
 one by one, bring again the lost. 
 
 And the Father the holy and almighty yet most 
 merciful Father He was in the One, He was in the 
 Other : He gave, He sent : He sympathizes, and He 
 will save: and thus the precept, ' Thou shalt not kill,' 
 becomes the fact, 'This my son was dead and is alive' 
 angels in heaven are enabled to sing a new song over 
 sinners repenting, and one man after another falls on the 
 long sleep, saying, ' I know whom I have believed : I 
 shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness.' 
 
 Divine scorn is a contradiction in terms : let us make 
 it to be so with the human.
 
 XVII. 
 
 THE SYMPATHY OF GOD A NECESSITY 
 
 OF MAN. 
 
 St Mark iv. 38. 
 
 Master, carest Thou not that we perish ? 
 
 IN a dangerous storm on the capricious inland sea 
 of Gennesaret, a little boat, occupied by thirteen 
 persons, is crossing from the western to the eastern 
 shore. The waves are beating into the ship, so that it 
 is now full of water : and One, evidently the leader 
 of the little company, is in the hinder part of the 
 vessel, not helping, not cheering, not sympathizing 
 with the rest; no asleep. It is .He who suggested 
 the crossing ; He, who, when the evening of a long 
 toilsome day was come, had said, ' Let us pass over 
 unto the other side.' In some sense then He was 
 to blame for the peril. Why had He not foreseen the 
 winds and the waves, and postponed the voyage at least 
 till the morning ? They had trusted Him not wisely 
 but too well: and now, instead of feeling for them in 
 their distress, He lies there taking His rest ; lies there 
 asleep. The sting of the danger is in that sleep. If 
 He were awake, and alive to their trouble, they could 
 have borne it. They were always ready to follow 
 Him ; sometimes, they thought they could die with 
 v. 20
 
 306 The Sympathy of God [xvn. 
 
 Him. But that He should be indifferent to their alarm, 
 that He should be able to sleep through it, this was 
 unkind, this was unlike Him. Half in astonishment, 
 half in reproach, they at last awaken Him with the 
 question, ' Master, carest Thou not that we perish ?' 
 
 Miracle and parable are but differences of name in 
 many places of the gospels ; and it is so here. That 
 crossing, that storm, that sleep, that awakening, all 
 were typical : real as facts, significant as emblems. 
 They have all been acted again and again in human 
 lives, in spiritual histories. Redemption itself is just 
 that a world's misery, a world's sense of neglect, a 
 divine sleep, a divine awakening : ' the times of that 
 ignorance God winked at;' at last He interposed for 
 deliverance, rebuked the wind and the sea, and would 
 have all men everywhere to be saved. 
 
 'Master, carest Thou not that we perish?' is one of 
 those graphic and pathetic touches which we owe to 
 this second gospel. The other evangelists are con- 
 tented to say, 'Master, Master, we perish;' or, 'Lord, 
 save us ; we perish.' St Mark, preserving (it may be) 
 a reminiscence of St Peter, who was himself present 
 on the occasion, gives that which we seem to recognize 
 at once as the exact expression ; represents, at all 
 events, the precise point of the feeling, in this ' Carest 
 Thou not ?' is it nothing to Thee whether we live or 
 die? hast Thou no thought for us who have left all 
 for Thee ? 
 
 There can be no doubt that, even amongst human 
 beings, it is an immense aggravation of any calamity 
 to feel that it is not cared for. To suffer unregarded, 
 neglected, unloved, with cold careless eyes looking
 
 xvii.] a Necessity of Man. 307 
 
 on, or closed in idle sleep which one touch of sym- 
 pathy would have prevented, is a thing differing in 
 kind as well as degree from any suffering which has 
 love or even pity as its companion. 
 
 The expostulation of Gethsemane, ' Couldest not thou 
 watch with me one hour?' was the utterance (in part 
 at least) of a human distress. ' Made in all things like 
 unto His brethren,' the Man of sorrows was expressing 
 in that pathetic interrogation the very thought breathed 
 once, with apparent but only apparent reason, to Himself, 
 'Carest Thou not that we perish?' Even He, proving 
 in all things His deity by His humanity, was human 
 also in this, that He accepted, that He even yearned 
 for sympathy, and could say, in the agony of the sin- 
 bearing, to one from whom He might have looked for 
 compassion, Carest thou not for this ' horror of great 
 darkness,' for this fear of death which is fallen upon 
 me? 
 
 All have known at some time the double sadness of 
 a bereavement which, for any reason or for none, has 
 lacked sympathy. Sometimes there has been a cha- 
 racter veiled from all but its very nearest and dearest. 
 Surrounding friends, even friends near as a brother, 
 have not been admitted to the privacy, or have not 
 been congenial to the disposition, of the person whose 
 departure has created, just for one heart, a perpetual 
 desolation. And how has it jarred upon that one heart 
 to hear the vague condolences, to receive the inadequate, 
 the half unreal lamentations of those who compassion- 
 ate indeed but cannot sympathize with the individuality 
 of the orphanage or the widowhood which must go with 
 the one mourner to the grave. 
 
 20 2
 
 308 The Sympathy of God [xvn. 
 
 Thus is it in all experiences : we see it even in the 
 vilest. The hisses and execrations, even the curses not 
 loud but deep, of a condemning mob, have had power 
 to add bitterness to the last horrors of a public execution. 
 For these have been the infallible evidences that no 
 man compassionates ; that over those fathomless, those 
 gloomy waters there plies no vessel of commiseration. 
 These have brought home to the dying criminal the 
 awful conviction more awful than any death that 
 no man cares that he perishes. 
 
 On the other hand, there is no fear and no anguish 
 and no form of death which may not be soothed and 
 mitigated by the presence of a generous, heart-deep, 
 selfless sympathy. It is no stretch of imagination to 
 hope that some softening influence may have com- 
 municated itself to the hearts of those shipwrecked 
 mariners of yesterday, in the sight of pier and beach 
 swarming with agonized beholders, powerless indeed 
 to help but strong to feel, and assuring them by look 
 and sign that there were those who cared if they 
 perished. And it is no imagination at all, but the 
 simple record of certainty, that those brave miners of 
 a Welsh valley, whose very names are become within 
 these last weeks household words for England, found 
 hunger itself assuaged by the first sound of hands and 
 voices busy for their deliverance ; found in the being 
 cared for, long days ere that caring could ensure the 
 rescue, a relief from the chief horror, of desertion and 
 desolation, such as bore up through nine days of 
 suspense the sinking spirits, and would have made 
 death itself less than intolerable, just by reason of the 
 same peculiarity of human nature, to which indifference
 
 xvii.] a Necessity of Man. 309 
 
 is the sting of suffering, and sympathy the very life 
 of life. 
 
 It is this known instinct of nature which makes the 
 last offices of nurse and physician, of pastor and friend, 
 so powerfully ministerial to the bed of inevitable in- 
 exorable death. It is this which has added the last 
 touch of misery to deaths died in abandonment or exile, 
 where there has been none to catch the last sigh, to 
 breathe the name of home, or to point the eye and 
 the heart upward to that opening heaven where the 
 Son of Man standeth at the right hand of God. 
 
 But in the instance before us there was a more than 
 human sympathy missed and craved for. And thus 
 it carries our thoughts into a region above that of 
 earthly brotherhood, and suggests some reflections, not 
 unsuitable (I trust) to the occasion, upon the com- 
 plaints and expostulations of humanity itself in the ear 
 of 'a God that hideth Himself and a Saviour seeming 
 to slumber. 
 
 It cannot be denied that there are many facts and 
 many experiences in the life of this world, which irre- 
 sistibly suggest the question whether God can be 
 waking, or, if wakeful, caring. To try to enumerate 
 such phenomena is as needless as it would be painful. 
 We cannot but read this sleep of Jesus Christ, in 
 the boat tossed by the waves, with His disciples stand- 
 ing by, wondering and half murmuring, as intended 
 to represent the world-wide age-long mystery to which 
 we are pointing. 
 
 It does seem wonderful, not only or chiefly that there 
 should be pain, disease, and death, in the earth earth 
 being what it is in the matter of sin : for we cannot but
 
 310 The Sympathy of God [xvn. 
 
 feel that it would be more wonderful still, a real offence 
 to faith, a real stumbling-block to virtue, if a sinful were 
 not also a suffering creation : but how, in the confession 
 of the book of God itself, all the foundations of the 
 earth are thrown out of course by the existence of 
 sin upon it, and by the perversenesses, mismanagements, 
 and self-contradictions, which are the growth and fruit 
 of that primary fact of evil. ' Carest Thou not,' we are 
 tempted to say to the divine Ruler Himself, that, 
 whether it be by a moral murder or by a moral 
 suicide, we Thy creatures are perishing ? 
 
 And even if this mystery of the existence of evil 
 were explained or palliated, it would still be wonderful 
 how evil should be allowed to spread and diffuse itself, 
 where there was either no freedom of choice on the 
 part of its victim, or even a will to resist if the strength 
 were but present. We see the ancestry of evil tainting 
 to remote generations an offspring which had nothing 
 left for its inheritance but the memory of crime and 
 sorrow. We see a leprosy of shame and vice corroding 
 the very walls of houses, in which nevertheless women 
 and children must drag out their miserable being, though 
 to do so is to be involved in consequences of which they 
 are not originators but victims. Nay, we see, here and 
 there, efforts made, difficulties encountered, battles waged, 
 in the vain endeavour of some helplessly entangled life to 
 rid itself of those fetters of evil which it had no share in 
 riveting. How can all this be we vex ourselves with the 
 question if indeed there is a God at once of holiness, 
 love, and power, superintending, ruling or even over- 
 ruling, a world which He caused to be and which He 
 keeps in being ? ' Carest Thou not,' we find ourselves
 
 XVIL] a Necessity of Man. 3 1 r 
 
 asking, as we suffer or as we look on, ' Carest Thou 
 not that we perish?' Is it possible that neither the 
 violence nor the malignity nor the blasphemy of 
 wicked men should evoke the interference, were it but 
 for the protection of the innocent, of a God living and 
 waking, a God on the side of right, and a God resistless 
 in power ? 
 
 These questions are as old as the fall, and we have 
 learned in some measure the lesson of patience con- 
 cerning them. But when the experience comes into 
 a man's own life, he finds himself still asking, 'Carest 
 Thou not that I perish ?' Painful it might still be to 
 suffer pain and suffering are but names for each 
 other painful it must be to live uneasy days, in body 
 or spirit, through poverty and its circumstances, through 
 disease and loneliness, through fears and fightings on 
 spiritual subjects, through cavils of doubters, and taunts 
 of scoffers, and all the thousand tortures of a busy and 
 inventive infidelity: painful this must be, whatever its 
 shape and form : yet even this is not the worst thing. 
 If I could see in all this a kindly purpose an end and 
 an aim like that spoken of by the patriarch, 'When 
 He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold' I could 
 bear anything. I can understand that I want a sharp 
 discipline, of scourge and cross, to cure me of my levity 
 and my vanity. I can understand that I want earth's 
 lamps darkening, one by one, to make the light of heaven 
 precious or even real to me. The dreadful, the in- 
 tolerable thing is, to be left alone in this process ; to 
 be allowed to fancy myself the sport of chance, the 
 plaything of destiny; to see no hand guiding and no 
 finger pointing any whither, and therefore to be con-
 
 312 The Sympathy of God [xvn. 
 
 stantly driven, by stress of searching winds and lashing 
 waves, to look towards the unseen Presence, and say, 
 ' Carest Thou not that I perish ?' 
 
 We might go still further, and say that the sympathy 
 of God is more vital to us even than His omnipotence. 
 The disciples accepted the perishing in other words, 
 the non-intervention of Christ to save : what they could 
 not accept was His not caring. In its influence upon 
 the heart, to care is more than to save. Love is more 
 than power, even in the divine. We must not make 
 light of any one of the attributes : it is the combination 
 of all the attributes which indeed forms our very con- 
 ception of God. To suppose God all else, and yet 
 limited in point of power, cannot seriously be allowed 
 without robbing ourselves of His deity. But it is 
 permissible to go all lengths in pressing one by one 
 upon our hearts all His perfections. And to-day we 
 have before us His sympathy. We are dwelling upon 
 the thought how essential it is that He should care 
 for us; how absolutely nothing can make up to us 
 for the absence of that care. Far better would it be 
 for us, as spiritual and immortal beings, to imagine 
 that there might be some opposing and thwarting 
 impediment in the way of the present exercise of God's 
 attribute of omnipotence, than that there should be 
 any defect or any coldness in His love. If we could 
 believe that the true explanation of the present con- 
 fusion was this that the power of evil, though 
 doomed, is not yet actually subdued and subjugated to 
 the might of God ; that there is a real warfare going 
 on, such as the Apocalypse paints to us, between two 
 empires of light and darkness ; that, so far from being
 
 XV 
 
 ii.] a Necessity of Man. 313 
 
 asleep or being indifferent, God is conducting a 
 campaign, as for defeat or victory, against the united 
 rebel forces of dragon, beast, and false prophet ; and 
 that, though the final issue is certain, the last field 
 is not yet fought, nor captivity yet led captive this 
 would go far to reconcile us to the conditions and the 
 experiences of the present ; for it would at least secure 
 to us His lively wakeful sympathy with every soul's 
 struggle and every life's agony of our own : it would 
 explain to us, as far more than a parable, that revelation 
 of joy in heaven over each sinner that repenteth, of 
 ministering spirits sent forth thence to watch over the 
 heirs of salvation : it would lay to rest, thoroughly and 
 for ever, that bitterest and cruellest of all suspicions, 
 ' Master, carest Thou not that we perish?' 
 
 And when a man has made up his mind at all costs 
 to believe in the divine care for him and when we say 
 'at all costs,' we mean at the cost of supposing some 
 temporary limit to the present exercise of the divine 
 power itself he will find, as he casts himself, day by 
 day, upon that love and that compassion, that, for 
 him at all events, however it may be for the universe, 
 the power is already sufficient too. He may still be 
 unable to add one jot or one tittle to the old arguments 
 about the existence of evil ; he may count it more 
 reverent, as well as more true, to say, ' Such knowledge 
 is too wonderful for me, I cannot attain to it;' but he 
 will find that the difficulty is no longer, for him person- 
 ally, a moral difficulty; he will find that prayer does 
 bring him the needed comfort and the needed help as 
 his day, so his strength is beginning with the axiom, 
 ' Thou, God, carest,' he passes on into the experimental
 
 3 H The Sympathy of God [xvn. 
 
 conviction, 'There is none like unto Thee, O Lord: 
 there is not one that can do as Thou doest.' 
 
 This is the present privilege of all who, for good or 
 ill, cast in their lot decisively with Jesus Christ. Though 
 for these, as for others, the theory of life is still dark and 
 baffling, the practice is like the light shining more and 
 more till the perfect shall come. On the hypothesis 
 (as men speak) of the gospel, the reading of the great 
 riddle is but a question of time. For each particular 
 life committed to it the mystery is unveiled already. 
 ' Yet a little while, and He that cometh shall come,' 
 makes patience patience and hope patience, hope, 
 and courage, these three the sum and substance, the 
 sufficient stay also, of the life that is. For others it is 
 not so. On the life that has undertaken itself, its 
 own charge, its own guidance, its own solution, the 
 shadow lies heavily, and must lie, and the sun goes 
 down in gloom. Whatever may be the eventual con- 
 solation of the race, that life has placed itself outside 
 it. It has no evidences to add to the stock of hope, 
 it has no encouragements to carry to the account of 
 patience. To it the one only enquiry must be that of 
 the text. As it marks the deepening anxieties of men 
 and nations as it hears of tottering faiths and despair- 
 ing deathbeds as it watches for the morning that comes 
 not, and elaborates constitutions, divine and human, 
 which refuse to march it can but look upward into the 
 inscrutable impersonal heaven, and ask, Thou, if there 
 be One in hearing if all be not vague chance, shifting 
 change, or inflexible law if there be any One above, 
 intelligent however silent, 'carest Thou not that we 
 perish ?'
 
 XVIL] a Necessity of Man. 315 
 
 The question might have been asked with some force 
 of reason may be propounded still for such as believe 
 not were it not for that divine intervention of which 
 we have but just passed from the annual commemora- 
 tion. The very reckoning of our years, little as we 
 may notice it, reproves and forbids the expostulation 
 of the ' not caring.' It may be possible to exaggerate, 
 certainly to misrepresent, the effects, as already realized 
 on earth, of the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ : it 
 is impossible to overstate the argument of the sympathy 
 and of the love. We may marvel at the slow march of 
 the gospel towards the conquest of nations; at the back- 
 ward steps, here and there, of its beneficent influences ; 
 at the regathering of clouds of sin and misery once 
 dispelled ; at the imperfect success everywhere of that 
 message of peace and holiness which ought by this time 
 to have spread a new life over the face of the whole 
 earth. We may feel, and we ought to feel, the re- 
 sponsibility of this failure as lying individually upon all 
 who profess, but do not live, the gospel. We may go 
 so far as to say that mankind is still perishing, though 
 the light of day has searched out the chambers of 
 imagery, and made it no longer excusable to sit or to 
 walk in darkness. Like the disciples on the sea of 
 Galilee, we may feel ourselves in jeopardy, the gospel 
 having failed to work in us its saving work, and rather 
 revealing than dispersing the gloom of sin and death. 
 
 One thing we cannot say that our Master cares 
 not. If He had not cared to save, would He have 
 left the glories of Heaven to be born of a woman, to be 
 made one of us, to share our weaknesses, temptations, 
 and sorrows, to be despised and rejected by His own.
 
 316 The Sympathy of God [xvn. 
 
 to stoop at last to death, even the death of the cross ? 
 Certainly He cares if we perish. Say, if you must say 
 it, with the scoffer, that He attempted the impossible, 
 that He miscalculated the comparative forces of an- 
 tagonist good and evil, that He failed in His great 
 adventure, that He lived and died in vain. Say, if you 
 must say it, with the scoffer, that He was conscious 
 of failure, that He felt Himself defeated, that He died 
 broken-hearted. At least you cannot accuse Him of 
 not caring. He took it upon Him to deliver man, He 
 came upon earth, He endured the contradiction of 
 sinners, He submitted to the last agonies, that He 
 might help, that He might redeem, that He might 
 regenerate, those who cared not for one another, those 
 who cared not for themselves. 
 
 And though we can, if we will, perish in spite of 
 Him ; though a salvation by force is no salvation, and 
 a soul that will slay itself can, and a fallen nature can 
 always remain so, or sink lower and lower by successive 
 acts of willing till it reaches that awful, that mysterious 
 ruin to which holy Scripture gives the name of 'the 
 second death ' this need not be. The salvation of 
 Jesus Christ is a sufficient salvation : ' to the uttermost ' 
 is its watchword : not by force, nor in spite of us, but 
 with the consent of a will made willing, He can justify 
 and sanctify, He can strengthen and bless and save. 
 
 If ever He should seem to sleep through our sorrows, 
 or to be indifferent to our prayers, this is but to try our 
 faith, to sober our lightness, to quicken our earnestness : 
 soon will He arise and rebuke the wind and the sea : 
 at last, for one and for another, ' He maketh the storm a 
 calm, so that the waves thereof are still.'
 
 XVIL] a Necessity of Man. 317 
 
 'Carest Thou not?' has a voice for the disciple as well 
 as for the Lord. It reproves the lazy loitering, the 
 purposeless sauntering, the silly dreaming, in which so 
 many of us pilgrims and voyagers pass this responsible, 
 this anxious lifetime. Not to care that we perish is 
 suicide not to care that our brother perishes is murder. 
 Christ cared, God cared, that we might care : and yet, 
 as I look within, as I look around me, I find almost 
 nothing that expresses, almost nothing that is con- 
 sistent with this anxiety. I see lives given to this one 
 thing, the making themselves easy and soft and luxurious. 
 I see minds relaxing themselves by every sentimental, 
 sensational, sensual study. I see souls, not so much 
 bravely encountering questions of doubting, on purpose 
 that they may know and on purpose that they may 
 judge, but rather indolently suspending everything, as 
 though doubt were wisdom as though it were an 
 evidence of power to be fertile in cavilling, cruel in 
 unsettling. O if we would be thoughtful ! O if we 
 would be considerate ! O if we would work ! O if 
 we would care ! 
 
 ' Give me one serious man ' was the French states- 
 man's challenge. ' Give me one,' we will echo it, ' who 
 cares if he himself cares if his brother perishes.' 
 
 Standing this day on the margin of an undiscovered 
 future ; hearing Jesus Christ say to us this morning, 
 'Let us cross to the other side;' knowing, yet not 
 knowing, what that other side means a condition, at 
 all events, of mind and heart, different from, yet made 
 by, the present let us gather all our energies for the 
 mystic, the allegorical crossing. Let us resolve, like the 
 disciples before us, two things that we will obey the 
 summons as His, and that we will take Him with us.
 
 318 The Sympathy of God, &c. [xvn. 
 
 This if we do, we need fear no evil ; no, not if the weeks 
 of this term should contain in them the transition from 
 health to sickness, from life to death. 
 
 No stranger can visit unmoved those solemn me- 
 morials, of marble slab or painted window, which keep 
 fresh in your cathedral church the loved names of 
 young men called suddenly, by accident or fever, from 
 amidst the energetic movements of academical life 
 into the stern realities of an everlasting hereafter. They 
 live still there, and here : there, we trust, resting, 
 serving, knowing, learning, worshipping, aspiring ; here, 
 in salutary admonition for those that come after, bidding 
 them to be ready always, remembering their Creator in 
 the days of their youth. 
 
 This may be, for any one of us, ' the other shore ' 
 to which Christ to-day is calling us : it may be so, even 
 if no one thinks it. 
 
 But at all events change will be busy in this con- 
 gregation, even within the short space of one term. 
 O how many may have passed, by a few short steps, 
 before its close, from faith to scepticism, from prayer 
 to silence, from comparative innocence to a guilty 
 conscience. Who can pretend to be confident, who can 
 dare to be light-hearted, as he launches forth to-day for 
 a shore veiled in mist, over a sea big with storm ? 
 
 Let us all thank God that there is One who cares if 
 we perish. Let us pray Him so to keep us in every 
 going out and coming in so to watch over us in the 
 hours of toil, of converse, of resting so to order all 
 things for us, study, thought, influence, companionship 
 that we may never perish, but continually grow in grace 
 and in the knowledge of Himself our Lord and our 
 God.
 
 XVIII. 
 
 A NARROW PLACE AND NO TURNING. 
 
 Numbers xxii. 26. 
 
 A narrow place, where was no way to turn either to the right 
 hand or to the left. 
 
 THE goal is in view. Balaam is approaching the city 
 of Balak. The waste road begins to be bordered by 
 vineyards, and the vineyards are exchanged for the 
 narrowing lanes and alleys of the suburbs. All is 
 well. The first scruples of conscience, the preliminary 
 objections of religion, the troublesome warnings of the 
 night vision, have been successfully surmounted ; and 
 now the famous diviner, with his convoy of princes, sees 
 before him in near prospect the rewards, in wealth and 
 honour, of his exciting enterprise. Nothing can now 
 hinder, nothing can long postpone, the royal favour, the 
 national gratitude, for which he has suffered something 
 and risked his all. There is a flutter of elation, an 
 intoxication of delight, proper peculiar, I had almost 
 said to that victory of the worse self over the better. 
 The struggle is over, the die is cast, the offended 
 conscience hides its wrath in its tent, the after-taste 
 of bitterness, the hell of remorse, bides its time and 
 follows after. We are in the pleasant pause between
 
 320 A Narrow Place [xvni. 
 
 the lusting and the sinning, not in the painful pause 
 be ween the sinning and the suffering. 
 
 It was thus, we imagine, with Balaam, as he rode 
 forward that day with God's license (as he read it) 
 to 'go with the men.' We shall not enter to-day 
 for our purpose is different into the character of this 
 strange being this wonderful compound and mixture 
 of a man or into the ethics of God's dealing with him. 
 Writers and preachers have dwelt in all times upon the 
 history of Balaam, as it stands forth on the sacred page 
 in its mingled mystery of scruple and daring, of a heart- 
 purpose of sinning and a conscientious reluctance to sin 
 without permission. We see in Balaam the type of all 
 who (in the phrase of a later Scripture) first set up their 
 idol and then come to the prophet ; who first put a 
 stumbling-block before them and then enquire of God 
 how not to stumble. Such a man gets his answer, short 
 and sharp, from the oracle of those 'first thoughts' which 
 in matters of duty are commonly far more trustworthy 
 than the second. ' Thou shalt not go with the men. 
 Thou shalt not curse the people, for they are blessed.' 
 He gives up the journey. But there is a restless 
 querulous longing, which, though it has given up the 
 journey, has not given up the lusting nor the murmur- 
 ing. New messengers, 'more, and more honourable'- 
 new solicitations, stronger and more imperious are 
 allowed to re-open the question ; and then conscience, 
 which has spoken once plainly, shall speak the second 
 time in riddle and almost by contraries. ' If the men 
 come, rise up and go with them.' Whose was the fault 
 if that second answer was penal ? Who was it who 
 treated God as though He were such an one as himself,
 
 XVIIL] and no Turning. 321 
 
 and thought to win by importunity a license which had 
 been refused to simple enquiry? 
 
 Brethren, this third Sunday after Easter brings before 
 us, in the new order of lessons, the marvellous episode 
 of Balak and Balaam ; a mere enigma, as to its spiritual 
 import, in many congregations but in this congregation 
 vocal, eloquent, monitory, alike to the elder and to the 
 younger. I take one single point in the narrative, and it 
 cannot be expressed more forcibly than in the words 
 read as the text. 
 
 Three several times the angel has stood in the way ; 
 impressing the awe of his apparition upon lower natures, 
 upon irrational creatures, only not upon its human scope 
 and object. What a parable of the insensibility of sin- 
 how it renders a man blind to sights, and deaf to sounds, 
 which are visible and audible to any one and anything 
 that is innocent. ' The dumb ass ' pays the homage of 
 fear to its Maker. Only the prophet only ' the man 
 whose eyes are open, who hears God's words and sees 
 the vision of the Almighty ' he alone is deaf and blind. 
 Why ? Because the spell of a sin is upon him. Is it not 
 written, ' According to Thy fear, so is Thy wrath ? ' The 
 thing done, the thing meditated, may have displeased 
 the Lord : the anger may be astir, the wrath may be 
 powerful : to use the prophetic imagery, the deep may 
 utter his voice, the right-aiming thunderbolts may be 
 abroad, the sun and the moon may stand still in their 
 habitation : yet the sinner can sin with a light heart 
 through all, because he who fears not God regards not 
 God's anger. The brute beast saw where the seer saw 
 not. Instinct ranks below reason : yet instinct uncor- 
 rupted is above reason corrupted, even in its perspica- 
 
 V. 21
 
 322 A Narrow Place [XVIIK 
 
 city, even in its intuition. If reason will debase herself 
 will use (she need not) her prerogative and privilege of 
 sinning then the steed and the rider change places in- 
 stantly in intelligence, and the morbid subtlety of the 
 rational sinks, even in range of vision, below the un- 
 sophisticated simplicity of the animal. The dumb ass 
 sees what Balaam sees not. 
 
 But the patience of the divine antagonist is not yet 
 exhausted. Once, twice, and thrice, He goes forth to 
 withstand. Now the adversary ' goes further, and stands ' 
 at last ' in a narrow place, where there is no way to turn 
 either to the right hand or to the left.' This will be a 
 decisive battle. No longer able to 'turn aside into the 
 field,' or to ' thrust herself unto the wall,' the ass now 
 ' falls under Balaam ' and yet he sees nothing. The 
 eye so cunning in its foreview of destiny, so keen to 
 descry the coming fortunes of Edom and Amalek, is 
 dim and blind to the personal vision, to the champion 
 whose controversy is with him. Not till ' the Lord 
 opens the eyes of Balaam ' can he discern the angel in 
 the way, and the drawn sword in his hand. 
 
 Yet why that drawn sword ? Do you suppose that 
 God fears the malediction of that soothsayer upon the 
 chosen people ? Could any words from that sin-clouded 
 soul do injury, against the will of God, to the march of 
 that cause which had in it, however veiled and shrouded, 
 the world's welfare and the salvation of mankind ? 
 Surely we read here the will of God that not one sinner 
 should perish; His merciful pleading with a man bent 
 on his own ruin ; His special intercession with a man of 
 great gifts, that he turn them not into woes and into 
 curses; but also His gracious dealing with men of all
 
 XYIII.] and no Turning. 323 
 
 sorts and of all times, through the countless instrumen- 
 talities of Providence and of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 ' A narrow place, where was no way to turn either 
 to the right hand or to the left.' That is my parable. 
 
 It will scarcely be denied that there is in all of us a 
 sensitive shrinking from what may be described as the 
 coming to close quarters with God Himself. 
 
 It is so, first and above all, in the soul. A twilight 
 life satisfies us. That middle thing, between night and 
 day, is the utmost of our faith and of our hope. We 
 have settled nothing. Nothing is beyond the reach of 
 doubt. I cannot go forth with this weapon or with that, 
 for I have not proved it. Suspense is my best. I have 
 not given up Christ. I have not decided against the 
 atonement, or the resurrection, or the judgment. I 
 have not made up my mind that, there is no Holy 
 Spirit, or no Christ, or no God. O no. Sometimes I 
 am half persuaded that there is : then I doubt again. 
 Meanwhile nothing passes or can pass within me, be- 
 tween my soul and its God, on the basis of revela- 
 tions which to me are peradventures. My spiritual 
 life is of necessity a blank. My worship, in secret or in 
 the congregation, is a mere concession and compromise. 
 I am terrified lest enquiry should land me in infidelity, 
 and therefore I pacify myself, I lead a quiet life, by the 
 help of a few forms. I keep infidel books shut ; I expel 
 atheistical doubts as intruders ; I speak slightingly or 
 condemningly of unorthodox writers, lest I should be 
 shaken or distressed or suspected, and in the hope that 
 a respectable Christianity may last my time. 
 
 Who shall tell in how many cases the attraction of 
 multiplied sermons and services, in how many cases 
 
 21 2
 
 324 A Narrow Place [xvm. 
 
 the attraction of charitable employments and religious 
 societies, in how many cases the attraction of contro- 
 versial reading and semisecular preaching, lies just 
 here ; namely, in the shelter thus afforded to a condition 
 of real distance and aloofness from God Himself? That 
 disease to which nothing can effectually minister but a 
 resolution of the man's own will to break through at all 
 costs every dividing barrier, and to deal with God as a 
 real Person whom to know is eternal life, is soothed and 
 palliated, to a heart ill at ease, and a conscience not yet 
 laid on sleep, by a multiplication of observances which 
 are a tribute (at least) to religion, and of activities 
 bearing the likeness (at least) of the Christian. Still the 
 direct dealing tarries: 'the narrow place' of the per- 
 sonal encounter is not yet reached. 
 
 These are soul's avoidances of the divine contact. 
 Others are of the life. 
 
 Many are they whose one struggle it is to elude 
 decision. While they can 'turn aside,' into field or 
 vineyard, from the obstructing angel in the highway, it 
 is well with them. They would settle no matter. That 
 which presents itself in the light of duty paralyzes them. 
 To do, or to leave undone, because it is right, and for no 
 other reason, principal or subordinate, whatsoever, is an 
 offence to them. It is inconvenient, it is discourteous, it 
 is uncivil, for anything to address them in that tone. 
 Many questions of duty, these say as the former said, 
 all questions of faith are not to be faced, they are to 
 be encompassed. ' Edom said, Thou shalt not go 
 through wherefore Israel went round.' They will not 
 encounter the question, whether this which they do is 
 right, lest they should be constrained to forego it. All
 
 xviii.] and no Turning. 325 
 
 the world does it : it would be eccentric, it would be 
 arrogant, to be singular: take it for granted. This is 
 the history of all dishonesties in trade and of all laxities 
 in professions. It is not only in the region of belief, it 
 is quite as much in the province of action, that we dwell 
 amidst a multitude of open questions. We do every 
 day a number of things, about the wisdom or unwisdom, 
 about the right and the wrong of which we are in 
 suspense. We let them pass for the present : some day 
 we will settle them. The whole detail of our lighter 
 and less serious employments, the whole sphere of 
 relaxation, of society, of expenditure of time on amuse- 
 ments and of money on self-indulgences, is this un- 
 certain, conjectural, haphazard world for thousands. 
 Meanwhile we follow the multitude to do good, or to 
 do evil. 
 
 These postponements of determination involve con- 
 sequences. They lead to a desultory, vacillating, sham- 
 bling life, if not to the one thing worse. A thoughtful 
 man feels that even mistakes, even errors of judgment, 
 are less serious than that sort of life which is the acci- 
 dent of an accident. Without affecting a judicial 
 solemnity on every small particular of doing or not 
 doing, he makes up his mind upon a few principles, says 
 nothing about it, but keeps them till he finds better. 
 The opposite character disparages rules, has no wish to 
 be consistent in trifles, would rather live from hand to 
 mouth in things insignificant, and sometimes wins ap- 
 plause or conciliates liking by the loose easy way in 
 which he deals with the little moralities which are so 
 influential in their bearing upon the general colour of 
 the life.
 
 326 A Narrow Place [xvm. 
 
 Nor is it only in small things that this indecision 
 reveals itself. Human life is full of it in reference to 
 the gravest realities of sin and duty. Men who are both 
 orthodox in opinion and unimpeachable in dealing may 
 yet exemplify this very duplicity in that secret exis- 
 tence which lies altogether (we are fond of saying) 
 between a man and his Maker. It is the very definition 
 of bosom sins. They are sins kept back from God as 
 much as from man. They are often indeed prayed 
 against even as Balaam could not let his avarice be 
 unmentioned between him and God but their peculi- 
 arity is, that somehow we always get leave for them. 
 Either they are so trivial, or so natural, or so powerful, 
 or so very very pleasant, that they must have indulgence. 
 We could not go on with religion at all, if it was sternly 
 severe with them. We like Christianity itself it is a 
 fearful thing to utter because, read as we read it, it 
 seems to hold out a hope of countless forgivenesses : at 
 last, at worst, of a deathbed repentance. 
 
 Now God is the adversary of all these subterfuges. 
 He must be so. It is half the work of the Bible so to 
 present Him. His attribute of truth makes Him so. 
 His attribute of holiness makes Him so. His attribute, 
 above all, of love makes Him so. When we start on 
 our journey, having persuaded ourselves that we have 
 His license for sinning, He must or He would not be 
 God 'go forth to withstand.' The drawn sword is very 
 terrible, but it is more than armistice or olive-branch if 
 we will have it so. God wills not the death of the 
 sinner, and therefore He must meet him while it is day. 
 
 It is as though he sought us first of all in places 
 where we might evade Him. That face-to-face in-
 
 xviii.] and no Turning. 327 
 
 -evitable encounter is so terrible that He would spare us 
 if we will let Him. Many a 'smiting of the steed,' and 
 many a ' crushing of the foot/ is witness to these minor, 
 these avoidable meetings. Yes, we are angry with friend 
 and menial, we show discontent in our countenance, and 
 visit it upon our companions, when we have a suspicion 
 that God is out in our way, and that He is against us. 
 The gentlest admonition, the tenderest hint of warning, 
 suffices to rattle up the sleeping lions of pride and wrath 
 against the innocent one beside us, who meant nothing 
 but love. 
 
 And yet the long-suffering of God is not ended. He 
 would have won us or He would have enticed us back 
 but we would not. Now He must ' go further.' 
 
 I cannot express, as I would, the lifelikeness of the 
 story. Not all the profane jests which have been 
 lavished on it have made it less solemn to me or less 
 sacred. This ' narrow place,' what is it ? What is it, I 
 mean, in human life, and in the thing for the sake 
 of which ' all Scripture was given by inspiration of 
 God ? ' 
 
 I will tell of three ' narrow places ' in human life, 
 where God cannot be evaded. 
 
 i. And the first of these is suffering. I am well 
 aware that I stand before a congregation exceptionally 
 circumstanced. A large proportion of that audience 
 which I would ever in this place keep prominently, pre- 
 dominantly in my view, might say, with an emphasis 
 scarce elsewhere to be rivalled, ' The lot is fallen unto 
 me in a fair ground ; yea, I have a goodly heritage.' It 
 is not here that a sermon upon affliction would be the 
 most suitable, though we forget not how early may be
 
 328 A Narrow Place [xvin. 
 
 the visit of pain to the life most favoured, or how keen 
 oftentimes are the sorrows of that age to which of 
 necessity they come as strangers. 
 
 There is no one here present who has not had some 
 foretaste of suffering. I ask you to recall that moment 
 of pain, mental or bodily that one day or one hour of 
 sharp torture, whether it was an agonized nerve of the 
 body, or whether it was an accusing pang of conscience,, 
 or whether it was the funeral of a parent or sister, or 
 whether it was the unutterable fear of the doom of a 
 lost soul recall it, I say, for one instant, in order to 
 answer this question, Was it not the characteristic of 
 that suffering to make you real to unmask every lie in 
 which you had been walking, and to say to you, Two 
 words are true God, and the soul ? This is why we 
 make suffering one of the three ' narrow places ' out of 
 which there is no side-turning in which, hand to hand, 
 the battle of existence must be fought out. 
 
 The suffering of one man is no suffering to another. 
 The loss of a dog or a bird may be anguish to one. 
 The loss of father or brother may be no anguish to 
 another. But all have some vulnerable part a 'heel' 
 at which the poisoned dart may find entrance and it is 
 of this that I speak, whatever it be for you, when I 
 speak of God meeting a man in suffering. 
 
 A great writer has beautifully drawn out the mystery 
 of suffering in its bearing upon conversion and the 
 Christian life. What would sin become without suffer- 
 ing ? Imagine a world in which no barrier, no dyke or 
 dam were opposed to the full-flowing river, to the ocean 
 spring-tide, of vice and corruption. Suffering is that 
 obstacle. You cannot sin beyond a certain point and
 
 XVIIL] and no Turning. 329 
 
 what that point is you cannot foresee without some 
 penalty or some retribution. 
 
 To one man the narrow place where the drawn sword 
 meets him is the terrible trial of disappointment. Early 
 perhaps in his educational career he was marked out as 
 the one man for honour. Every voice gave him by 
 anticipation the chief prize and the foremost place. 
 He suffered no presumptuous confidence to make him 
 idle ; every faculty was exerted, every sacrifice was 
 made, the day of hope dawned a sudden illness barred 
 him from the race, or an unforeseen rival stepped in and 
 took his crown. Such experiences stop not with youth. 
 An illustrious advocate, whose fame was equal at the 
 bar and in parliament, was cut off by pining sickness 
 just as his hand was upon the great 'bauble:' he, and 
 not he only in that profession, had to learn that ' the 
 Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men He putteth 
 down one, and He setteth up another.' 
 
 To another a yet sharper stab is needed to make him 
 feel. The narrow place for him is dishonour. Above 
 all things that man dreaded the finger of scorn. He 
 thought himself safe from it so high was he in uni- 
 versal repute, so carefully had he stopped up each hole 
 and each cranny of discovery. In secret he sinned, and 
 in secrecy he trusted. The will was weak till at last it 
 was wicked: one thing only kept in check the maturity 
 of his wrong doing not the fear of God, but the fear of 
 the world. Then, if he will have it so, that shall be his 
 suffering. In that ' narrow place ' God must meet with 
 him, and the very beast which he bestrides shall fall 
 under him with terror. Happy if in that darkest hour 
 he shall recognize the true character of the antagonism
 
 330 A Narrow Place [xvin. 
 
 of God how that it is not more compelled by sin than 
 motived by love. 
 
 To another, cast in a finer nobler mould, there is no 
 suffering like that which is spiritual. He has played 
 too long with scepticism. He has felt anxiously and 
 sensitively the difficulties of believing. He has post- 
 poned decision. He has never discarded, but he has 
 never substantiated, his Christianity. It has sufficed for 
 him, in the sunshine of ease and prosperity, to go with 
 the multitude, to pray shallow prayers, and to utter 
 unmeaning praise. But now he wants it all. Some- 
 thing has brought it to issue. Is it true? will it bear 
 his weight? can he live by it? can he die by it? 
 still more urgently, can he be holy by it? will a 
 prayer be heard, uttered on the strength of it ? There 
 is no turning aside, to right or left, from this one awful 
 question ; and no suffering on this earth is comparable 
 in intensity to its decision. Happy he who in that 
 cloudy and dark day, shall discern the person of his 
 adversary; shall see in Him the God of love, come to 
 convince, to convert, to save. 
 
 2. But I cannot, in this congregation, pretend to be 
 unaware that the ' narrow place ' in which God con- 
 strains the decision of His creatures concerning Himself 
 is most often indeed the fiery trial which we call temp- 
 tation. 
 
 There are men, I suppose, who pass through this life 
 ignorant of any temptation but that negative, colourless, 
 unimpassioncd thing, which bids them to-day, and again 
 to-morrow, to be indolent, languid, and worldly-minded. 
 But without disregarding such tendencies as if they were 
 matters of indifference to the everlasting state, we would
 
 xvni.] and no Turning. 331 
 
 think rather at this moment of another and surely a 
 larger class of our fellow-men, to whom temptation 
 comes in a shape distinct and unmistakable, a hand-to- 
 hand battle, and an instant and perceptible defeat or 
 victory. 
 
 We have known men of business, trusted with the 
 property of a multitude of defenceless families, to whom 
 the question has come suddenly, and must be answered 
 on the instant, between an honesty immediately ruinous 
 to themselves and a dishonesty eventually destructive to 
 thousands. We are not unaware of the plausibilities by 
 which the latter course may excuse itself; plausibilities 
 of vague hope and fortunate accident which might make 
 fraud advantageous and frankness calamitous. We 
 would not be hard upon those who have found them- 
 selves unequal to such an emergency, and have been 
 visited with a retribution upon which none can gaze 
 with stoicism. Only we say that such an alternative 
 was exactly one of those 'narrow places' where God 
 meets a man, to constrain him to a decision between sin 
 and duty. It is enough to give seriousness to the life 
 we live and to the very world we dwell in, to know that 
 such issues are daily decided, publicly or in secret, with 
 results so wide and so important for good or evil. 
 
 But that which happens once in a lifetime to a few, 
 is in substance the oft-recurring trial, through forty or 
 fifty or sixty years, of a vast multitude of men such 
 as we are. We are all prone to sin and the question, 
 to sin or not to sin, is presented to us, day by day and 
 night by night, in forms perfectly definite, and of 
 which memory may suggest to us a thousand examples. 
 We love to slur over the mental process by which
 
 33 2 A Narrow Place [xvin. 
 
 we pass to the commission. But, as it is true that ' no 
 temptation takes us but such as is common to man,' so 
 also it is true that ' with every temptation ' God, if we will 
 look to Him, ' makes a way of escape.' If we sin, we sin 
 thus far deliberately, that we have an alternative proposed 
 to us, and that we choose the wrong. In every temp- 
 tation God presents Himself, and there is no evading 
 the question between sin and obedience. Pray that our 
 eyes may be opened, in that anxious, that brief moment, 
 within which the will passes to the one conclusion or the 
 other often with the full consciousness that it is weigh- 
 ing and judging to see the divine adversary, whose 
 enemy in reality is the sin not the sinner, and to pray 
 Him on the instant to guide our decision, making us 
 then and there victorious through Him that loved us. 
 
 3. There remains yet one 'narrow place' in which we 
 must all meet God. The hour of death. 
 
 The experiences of the past week have made very 
 real to us the parable of that ' narrowness ' from which 
 neither to the right nor to the left is any way open. 
 Those five men imprisoned for nine days in that dark 
 subterranean chamber of which the giant forces of 
 earth, air and water held and kept the key what were 
 they but examples, in very deed, of a helplessness, of an 
 impotency, which must one day be our own, whensoever 
 and by whatsoever instrumentality it shall please God to 
 bring us, one by one, to the last end of this wonderful, 
 this mysterious state of being ? 
 
 We speak very ignorantly of that untried future, and 
 the fewest words concerning it may be the wisest. But, 
 as many of us have been called, in the course of God's 
 providence, to stand on its threshold, in some sorrowful
 
 xviii.] and no Turning. 333 
 
 parting, or even in an approach of our own to the actual 
 experience ; so we must all within a few years taste 
 death for ourselves, and ought not to do so without 
 many previous endeavours to grasp those thoughts of 
 it which are profitable for the living. 
 
 'A narrow place, where was no way to turn either to 
 the right hand or to the left' 
 
 Very new to the strong man, very repugnant to the 
 nature of any man, must be that compulsion, that 
 passivity, that involuntariness, to which the text points. 
 To have, for the first time, 'no way to turn' neither 
 exercise of choice, nor application of remedy, nor appeal 
 to help; to know for ourselves the force of our Lord's 
 saying to St Peter, 'Another shall gird thee, and carry 
 thee whither thou wouldest not;' to be unable to command 
 one moment either to do one thing left undone, or to 
 cancel by act or entreaty one single thing done, through all 
 this life-time ; to be compelled to go, quite alone, into a 
 world of which we know next to nothing, with only 
 God, long disobeyed and dishonoured and sinned a- 
 gainst, to look to and to trust in; this must be formidable 
 when it comes close to us, however we may put it aside 
 or sleep over it in the dim distance. 
 
 But there is one thing which all say who have had to 
 do with deathbeds with any deathbeds, I mean, which 
 are not utterly (as some are) stolid and stupid and 
 that is, that the look of a sin is quite different to the 
 dying from that which it wore for the living ; that the 
 reality of it, and the freshness of it, and the wickedness 
 of it, and the terror of it and the way in which distances 
 of time and space are annihilated, and the thing itself 
 is seen, just as -it was done, multiplied by a thousand
 
 334 -d Narrow Place and no Turning, [xvni. 
 
 doings, and magnified by a thousand aggravations never 
 dreamed of in life is something inconceivable without 
 experience, something which burns itself into the very 
 soul of that loving pity which is absolutely incapable of 
 lightening or mitigating. 'A narrow place, where was 
 no room to turn to the right hand or to the left' 
 
 A cry once reached me from a very young man's 
 deathbed and I would to God that I could make it 
 audible to-day in some listening ear, as it never can 
 perish again from my own ' If a man sins again and 
 again and then prays again and again and then sins 
 again and again what can happen ? ' 
 
 Let us ponder that question so characteristic of the 
 ' narrow place/ and the no exit and no turning, which 
 has been our subject. Let us trifle no longer with that 
 last end, nor with the journey which leads to it Let 
 us see that the life and the death be of one piece and 
 one colour faith in Christ washing white the one, faith 
 in Christ making bright the other. ' Blessed are they 
 that have here washed their robes, that there they may 
 have right to the tree of life.'
 
 XIX. 
 
 INDIVIDUAL INDEPENDENCE A COROLLARY OF 
 REDEMPTION. 
 
 1 Corinthians vii. 23. 
 
 Ye are bought with a price : be not ye the servants of men. 
 
 CHRISTIAN character is a Christian evidence. We all 
 feel it so in the present. For one man who is made 
 a Christian by argument, a thousand men have been 
 made Christians by what St Peter calls 'conversation 
 without word ;' conduct, that is, observed, felt, inter- 
 preted, without any direct preaching, or any express 
 reference to the proofs or precepts of the gospel. A 
 Christian mother, a Christian wife, a Christian daughter, 
 has been the evangelist of many a sceptical mind, of 
 many a careless life. It may be, with some who listen 
 to-day, that every obstacle to infidelity has been sur- 
 mounted but one, and that one is the bright example, 
 the sweet influence, the beautiful life, of a dear person 
 left at home yesterday, without whom immortality would 
 not be heaven, yet with whom he who would spend 
 eternity must spend it in the presence of Jesus Christ. 
 
 It is not only contemporaneous character which thus 
 turns for a testimony. There is one person, laid on 
 sleep eighteen hundred years ago, who is still a puzzle
 
 336 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 and a difficulty for the sceptic. His writings are still in 
 our possession, as surely authenticated as any com- 
 mentaries of Caesar or any letters of Cicero. They tell 
 us what he was and what he became ; how he began as 
 an enemy, and how he was changed into a disciple; what 
 was the Christianity which surrounded him, what was 
 the faith and the life of the church which he entered 
 and of the churches which he planted, what were the 
 thoughts and the hopes which bore him up under toils 
 and trials and temptations innumerable, in the experience 
 of isolation, disappointment, and imprisonment, in the 
 suspense of an ambiguous event, on the very eve of a 
 violent death. 
 
 St Paul's witness for Christ can only be neutralized 
 by one hypothesis. It is the hypothesis adopted by 
 Festus ' Paul, thou art beside thyself.' ' Has it ever 
 struck you,' said a most unwilling sceptic of to-day, 
 'that St Paul was mad?' Yes, it struck Festus, it has 
 struck many Festuses of this generation, that that busy 
 brain had overwrought itself, that excitement had done 
 its unsettling, its upsetting work upon a constitution 
 feeble perhaps originally in body, and liable, like that of 
 most thinkers and writers, to disturbing arid disarranging 
 influences in the province of the intellect. St Paul was 
 an enthusiast, and an enthusiast is a visionary, and a 
 visionary is next door (at least) to a madman there we 
 have the key to that history, that 'whirlwind out of the 
 north,' that 'great cloud,' that 'fire infolding itself/ to 
 use for a moment Ezekiel's imagery, which has had so 
 many influences and so many consequences in the world 
 of the church and in the world of mankind. 
 
 When I am staggered for a moment by an expla-
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 337 
 
 nation, which yet I feel to be no explanation, of the 
 phenomena to be accounted for, I open the volume of 
 St Paul's epistles at some place like this 7th chapter of 
 his letter from Ephesus to Corinth, and I ask myself, 
 Is this the visionary, is this the fanatic, is this the mad- 
 man, whose inquisition is proceeding ? Do I read in 
 this chapter the indicia of insanity in this calm, level, 
 well-balanced discussion of a perfectly matter-of-fact 
 subject, the subject, namely, of mixed marriages be- 
 tween heathens and Christians, and what is to be done 
 under the circumstances for the best interests of the 
 individuals concerned, of Christianity, of society, of 
 humanity itself? Let us imagine the reference of this 
 question to a mind really disordered. What could be 
 more plausible than to say, ' The entrance of the new 
 faith into a family must of course pass the sponge over 
 preexisting relationships. Man and wife cannot live 
 together if the one is to sit at meat in an idol temple 
 and the other is to go out before day (like the Bithynian 
 Christians of Pliny and Trajan) to ' sing a hymn to 
 Christ as God' and to bind himself by a 'sacrament' 
 to be altogether holy. Whatever the unbelieving partner 
 may wish or urge, the Christian at all events can have 
 no choice and no hesitation. Regardless of conse- 
 quences to spouse or children, he, or she, must go forth 
 from that dwelling, on pain of perdition, shaking off the 
 very dust from the feet/ I can scarcely doubt that this 
 would have been the language of some advisers ; nothing, 
 I believe, but the express direction of St Paul in this 
 chapter keeps it from being the language of some 
 advisers now, even as between Christian and Christian, 
 as between the more and the less worldly, as between 
 V. 22
 
 338 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 the more and the less devout, of two persons, both bap- 
 tized and both worshipping. Or, if to stay, to stay under 
 protest, and as a compromise, and with conditions laid 
 down, or with a perpetual look of ten thousand dis- 
 approvals. It needed great judgment, the exercise of 
 unusual discretion, the establishment and application 
 of very difficult principles and in this instance without 
 any direct aid (as he says himself) from revelation or 
 inspiration to lay down those great rules which he who 
 runs may read in this chapter. If the, unbelieving will 
 go, he must go, but he shall be the one to go ; the 
 Christian shall stay if he can stay : think of the children, 
 'sanctified' (as St Paul writes) in the one parent be- 
 lieving ; think of the husband, think of the wife, as the 
 case may be, who might have been saved ('how knowest 
 thou?') by thy staying, whom thou prejudgest, foredoom- 
 est, by thy going. 
 
 In the paragraph immediately before us St Paul has 
 passed from primary to secondary relationships, from the 
 domestic to the social, from questions springing out of 
 marriage to a question springing out of slavery. 
 
 Here also I cannot but think that we have before us 
 the workings of a remarkably sound and sensible mind. 
 
 In how many hands would Christianity have become 
 in those first days a revolutionary principle. ' Christian 
 master, emancipate,' ' Christian slave, escape,' this would 
 have been the language of many modern evangelists 
 if they could be relegated into the age when slavery 
 was an institution. 
 
 And it is perfectly true that slavery, which is, the 
 ownership vested in one man of the will and action 
 of another man, is an anti-Christian, because an in-
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 339 
 
 human institution; and Christianity will wage war with 
 it, will at any cost put it down, wheresoever it has free 
 course, whensoever it has had time to make its voice 
 heard and its reasoning listened to. But this influence 
 of the gospel would be mischievous unless it were 
 gradual. The action of Christianity is, first and above 
 all, a spiritual action : it regenerates before it reforms : 
 individual hearts first transformed, then social fashions 
 are ripe for transfiguration. 
 
 Meanwhile the gospel has a work to do, which can 
 be done everywhere and on the instant. It can bring 
 into every relation, whether defensible in theory or 
 indefensible, yet at least for the present existing, a re- 
 conciling, a harmonizing, a softening and an ennobling 
 power. It can even say, as St Paul says here, ' Art thou 
 called being a slave ? care not for it. He that is called 
 in the Lord, being a slave, is the Lord's freedman. 
 All are bought with a price let every man, wherein he 
 is called, therein abide with God.' 
 
 There is one clause in this context capable of two 
 meanings, and carrying some ambiguity consequently 
 into the interpretation of the whole. 
 
 'Art thou called being a slave? care not for it.' The 
 gospel makes even slavery honourable ; there is an 
 emancipation of the spirit, which no thraldom can fetter. 
 So far we follow him. 
 
 But does St Paul go on to say, as some read him, 
 'Nay, even if thou canst be made free, use slavery 
 rather?' This, we feel, would be an exaggeration, 
 rhetorical or sentimental, of which St Paul was incapable. 
 This' would just make the difference between sobriety 
 and excitement, between religion and fanaticism, be- 
 
 22 2
 
 34-O Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 tween truth and falsehood. St Paul, be quite sure, would 
 not counsel the slave to refuse liberty if he had the 
 choice. Though the argument carries him to the very 
 verge of this, he knows how to stop short of it. He can 
 say, If you are a slave, born so or made so, care not for 
 it ; even in your chains Christ has made you free. But 
 he will not say, Slavery is better than freedom : if free- 
 dom is offered, decline it. He will not say it, and he 
 does not. In a sentence otherwise ambiguous there 
 is a tense which decides. The imperative before us is 
 the imperative of action, not of duration. 
 
 ' Use it rather.' Use which rather the old slavery, 
 or the offered freedom ? The Greek, the Greek of 
 St Paul and the Greek of the scholar, fixes the mean- 
 ing. The 'use' before us is the momentary not the con- 
 tinuous using. ' Art thou called being a slave ? care not 
 for it ; yet, if thou canst be made free, avail thyself of 
 the chance by preference.' The same calmness, the same 
 balance, which marks St Paul everywhere, marks St 
 Paul here. The Paul of Festus, the Paul 'beside him- 
 self/ would have gone on to say, Slavery is better, more 
 humbling in itself, more instructive by its contrast. The 
 Paul of Scripture, the Paul 'at the feet of Jesus,' the Paul 
 of history and literature and world-wide influence, says r 
 Slavery if it must be, liberty if it can : Christ's freedman 
 anyhow, man's too if it may be. ' Ye are bought with a 
 price: be not ye,' if the choice is given you 'be not ye,' 
 even in name ' slaves of men.' 
 
 But St Paul's words here before us have a scope much 
 beyond this. 
 
 Kven in reference to the first subject they mean more 
 than this.
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 341 
 
 They say, In your estimates of conditions of life, in 
 your ideas of bond and free, be not slaves of words or of 
 men's opinion. Learn a higher lesson. See yourselves 
 in the light of spirit, of reality, of eternity, of heaven. 
 Reckon, not as man reckons, but as God reckons, even 
 in things which might seem to be all of earth, all of 
 time. The Christian slave is Christ's freedman ; the 
 Christian freeman is Christ's slave. We have a new 
 nomenclature, we Christians: we unname and we rename 
 all things. 
 
 Thus read, the text has indeed a lesson for all of us. 
 
 First of all, it sets in a very strong light that event, 
 that fact, that transaction, call it what you will, which we 
 speak of in the general thanksgiving, of which we have 
 just made mention in the bidding prayer, as the ' re- 
 demption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ.' 
 
 St Paul makes it the basis of our life. ' Ye were 
 bought for a price.' When Jesus Christ shed His blood 
 on Calvary, He was paying a price, He was purchasing 
 a possession. There were human instrumentalities, we 
 know, engaged in that -issue; Pharisees, Sadducees, 
 Herodians Judas, Caiaphas, Pilate. There were also 
 words and acts leading up to it ; a ministry exercised 
 for three years on a footing of independence, almost of 
 defiance ; irritating, exasperating, challenging, to consti- 
 tuted and self-constituted authorities ; works of mercy, 
 utterances of wisdom, claims of dominion, alike offensive 
 to the received ideas, to the popular prejudices, to the 
 religious principles, of the time and of the race. So 
 that, in a sense, the culminating point was reached in 
 the way of natural cause and effect. The crucifixion 
 was an execution : it was the putting away of a trouble-
 
 34 2 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 some person, it was the closing of a vexatious struggle, 
 it was the defeat of a formidable antagonist, it was the 
 reassertion of outraged rights. The will of the sufferer 
 was not consulted, was not expressed, at the moment of 
 the death. 'He was crucified,' St Paul himself writes, 
 ' through weakness.' Yes, and the very glory of the 
 sacrifice was that 'weakness;' that utter self-abandon- 
 ment and self-emptying ; that not clinging, as St Paul 
 elsewhere writes, to the divine 4 form,' to the divine 
 'equality,' but the taking, and the bearing, whatever it 
 might lead to, of the nature of a servant, of the likeness 
 of men. 
 
 Yet in that absolute self-surrender, in that permitting 
 to be carried out, without interference and without gain- 
 saying, the human resentments and the human passions 
 and the human cruelties of which the death on Calvary 
 was, in one sense, the natural result, Jesus Christ was, in 
 reality, making a purchase He was buying back a self- 
 lost, a sin-ruined world. All generations, all individuals 
 of mankind were contained in that purchase. ' Ye/ 
 St Paul writes people of another land and another 
 continent, Corinthians and Europeans of a quarter of a 
 century after the crucifixion ye, and if ye, then all 
 men everywhere and for ever 'were bought for a price/ 
 We scarcely need St Peter to interpret, 'Ye were not 
 redeemed with corruptible things, silver or gold... but 
 with the precious blood of Christ* 
 
 Then, if this be so, St Paul says, first/ Ye are not your 
 own.' That is one aspect of redemption. Then, if this 
 be so, St Paul says again, ' Be not ye ' for it would be a 
 fraud and a dishonesty, it would be the giving away of 
 that which is not yours to give 'be not ye slaves of
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 343 
 
 men.' That is the other aspect It is the one before us 
 in the text. 
 
 Brethren, the task of inference and enforcement 
 would be an easy one, were we but sure of all hearts 
 going along with us in the premise, 'Ye were bought 
 with a price.' O, if this were the life's principle of each 
 one; if this were the maxim engraven upon the door, 
 the motto hung above the bed, of every young man in 
 this audience BOUGHT WITH A PRICE how simple 
 would be the duty, how prompt would be the obedience, 
 how needless would be the preacher's office, there being 
 what the Bible calls ' such a heart ' in each one. Let us 
 think of one or two directions in which St Paul's words 
 would guide us. 
 
 Christ's, not man's such is the Christian. Not his 
 own, to keep or to give away such is that littleness 
 which is also greatness. Such is that submission which 
 is independence too. Such is that one service which is 
 perfected freedom. To belong to Jesus Christ is to be 
 a man to all else yes, rightly interpreted, to be a man 
 to Him. 
 
 I need not stay to guard against abuses of this saying. 
 I need not stay to caution any one against that idea of 
 independence, which would cut up by the roots subor- 
 dination, respect, reverence, discipline, education itself. 
 No one seriously thinks that St Paul, or St Paul's 
 Master, is against any one of these. We must look 
 elsewhere for the thing inculcated and the thing for- 
 bidden. 
 
 i. And first it appears to me that St Paul's words, 
 'Be not ye slaves of men,' have an important bearing upon 
 the exercise of the understanding. Bought with a price
 
 344 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 by One who claims not one part but the whole of you 
 not more the conduct than the will, not more the energies 
 than the affections, not more the soul (as men speak) 
 than the reason it cannot be safe, it cannot be right, 
 it cannot be honest, to resign into another's keeping 
 the exercise of the intellect upon matters of evidence 
 or matters of doctrine ; to make one man's view, or one 
 man's thought, or one man's faith, serve for ten or 
 twenty or a hundred others; to attach yourself to a 
 school or a party or a system, in such sense that you 
 yourself shall be absolved from the task of ' proving all 
 things ' as a necessary preliminary to the other duty 
 of 'holding fast' that which not others but you yourself 
 have found to be 'good.' 
 
 We are not ignorant indeed that an opposite course 
 has much to recommend it. A young clergyman, a 
 young theologian, may speak plausibly when he says, 
 ' I am ignorant, I am foolish, I am a child in these 
 matters : let me follow more learned, wiser, holier m'en. 
 I cannot greatly err, if I err in such company: their 
 society, their church, their heaven, will suffice me: at all 
 .events, it is better to go astray with such men, than to 
 be absolutely and altogether at sea alone.' 
 
 It is thus that the ranks of party are swollen, and the 
 independence of our Christian churchmanship is sacri- 
 ficed. If there is humility in such language, there is also 
 indolence, there is also impatience, there is also audacity. 
 I i.r is it not a bold venture, which, disparaging the 
 Creator's apportionment to me, in whatever measure, 
 of His gifts of reason and judgment, chooses another 
 person, whose gifts, being ampler, shall, not assist, not 
 supplement, but overwhelm and supersede and swallow
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 345 
 
 up mine ? You know, or you ought to know, that there 
 are good men on both sides, on all sides, of every thing : 
 you, deliberately or casually, make yourself over to the 
 good men of one. Is opinion then, is doctrine, so 
 immaterial, so indifferent to the soul's health, that you 
 can thus fling it about, thus consign it, thus put it into 
 commission, with a light heart ? Have you any right in 
 this matter, to do what you will with that which is not 
 your own ? Bought with a price, every part of you, 
 have you any right thus to make yourselves servants 
 of men ? 
 
 You fear perhaps the reproach, from within or 
 from without, of having a divided mind, a suspended 
 judgment. It is humiliating not to have your views ; 
 it is unfair upon others that they know not what to call 
 you. Brethren, I know but of one thing which presses. 
 There is one question which cannot wait 'What think 
 ye of Christ ?' Till that question is answered, the owner- 
 ship hangs in doubt: 'Whose am I? To whom shall I 
 go?' But, when the purchase is realized, there may be 
 rest even in doubting. To doubt about Christ is one 
 thing : to doubt in Christ is another thing. To doubt in 
 Christ, a man must already have believed. To wait 
 upon Him for light, is already, in the best sense, to have 
 seen light. Faith is a life till we have it, we cannot set 
 out. Till we believe, we cannot enquire we have none 
 to interrogate or to listen to. But the faith which is 
 indispensable is faith in a person : about things we may 
 doubt and yet live. Many men must live and die in 
 suspense seeing the good, seeing the true, seeing the 
 beautiful, in two opposites unable to strike the balance, 
 or to say in so many words, almost about any thing,
 
 346 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 That is the truth. Yet the true One, the personal 
 Truth, may be theirs all the time. Having Him, they 
 cannot walk in darkness. Ill were such suspense, such 
 doubting, exchanged for the most confident vaunt of 
 partisanship I am of Paul, or I of Apollos, or I of 
 Cephas yes, or I of Christ. 
 
 I know it is lonely few men know it better to be 
 thus indeed and in truth a man of no school and no 
 party. To have none to cheer or to echo my sayings; 
 to have none to say of me, ' He is a good man, a sound 
 man, one of us ;' to have to listen for truth everywhere, 
 and to gather it out of all corners; never to be able to 
 say, ' There, I have got it all I have builded my house, 
 I have hewn out its seven pillars admire its neat 
 structure, its fair proportions ' it is not the life of ease. 
 Let it drive me nearer to Him whose I am. He can 
 both whisper to me one by one His secrets, and also 
 give me strength as my day. 
 
 2. That which is true of the understanding is true 
 also of the conscience. 
 
 ' The dispensation of the fulness of times,' the gospel 
 of our divine Lord, marvellous in all else, is most 
 wonderful in this that it offers to the individual man 
 a direct personal contact with a revealed personal God. 
 'I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh... sons and 
 daughters shall prophesy. . .young men and old men 
 shall alike see visions of God... the very servants and 
 bondwomen shall become temples of God's Spirit.' No 
 longer shall there be a privileged order, whether of 
 priests or of prophets, intervening and mediating be- 
 tween God and the church, carrying His messages and 
 reporting their replies. ' I will dwell in them and walk
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 347 
 
 in them... I will be their God, and they shall be my 
 people.' 
 
 Fear not, brethren, any forgetfulness or any disparage- 
 ment, from this place, of those ministerial offices which 
 commissioned men still bear in the church of Jesus 
 Christ. The same apostle who asserts most boldly the 
 equality of all souls in the aspect of redemption and in 
 the aspect of sanctification is above other apostles the 
 champion of ecclesiastical order, and even makes this 
 the summary of the Pentecostal gift, ' He gave some to 
 be apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, 
 and some pastors and teachers.' The work of the 
 ministry, the edifying of the body, is carried on in the 
 gospel church by ordained and commissioned men. 
 
 Nevertheless we will say it with all boldness, as those 
 who are bound to speak that which they deeply feel 
 nevertheless, there is a sanctuary within each one of 
 us into which no minister and no brother can enter 
 without presumption and without profanation. It is 
 the conscience of the man in the sight of God : it is that 
 spirit of the man which no one knoweth but the man : 
 it is the secret shrine of motive and will, of memory and 
 responsibility and of the life's life. It may be instructed, 
 it may be informed, it may be influenced, it may be 
 moved ; but in every aspect save one it is free. No 
 dictation and no direction can intrude within its pre- 
 cincts ; for one is its Master, even Christ ; and all else, 
 even the ministers of Jesus Christ, are here not lords but 
 brethren. To establish over the individual conscience a 
 right of inspection or a right of discipline ; to lay down 
 rules for its habitual or periodical self-disclosure ; to say, 
 Without this there is no safeguard for the life and no
 
 348 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 security for the death this is to deny or to obscure the 
 great characteristic of the gospel ; this is to speak a 
 word against the all-sufficiency of the Holy Ghost as the 
 light and the guide, the remembrancer and the com- 
 forter, of Christ's people. 
 
 Not one word shall be spoken in the tone of vulgar 
 obloquy or vile suspicion, as regards either the motives 
 or the manuals of such as would bring back human 
 confession into the practice or into the preaching of the 
 church of England. It is not with the details, of fact 
 or of possibility; it is not with the modes, of enquiry 
 or of examination ; it is with the idea, it is with the 
 principle, that we have to deal, when we apply to this 
 subject the warning voice of the text, ' Bought, each and 
 all, with a price, make not yourselves servants of men.' 
 
 We understand something of the arguments, of the 
 reasons, for a confessional. It has much, very much, 
 to say for itself. We are not ignorant of the perils of 
 an unexplored conscience. We can feel for the igno- 
 rances, for the indolences, for the procrastinations of 
 self-judgment and self-discipline, which make havoc 
 of so many young lives, and which almost bid us say, 
 Better any treatment than this terrible letting alone. 
 \Ve sympathize with the honest effort, at no small cost 
 of trouble, at no small sacrifice of inclination, to help 
 towards a pure heart and a clean life those who may 
 perhaps fear the scrutiny of man more than they fear 
 the intuition of God, and be roused to repentance and 
 reformation by the help of motives, powerful at least, 
 if inferior. 
 
 Yes, if we might regard thiiTgs only on the human 
 side as good ideas, useful inventions, powerful instru-
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 349 
 
 mentalities, and the like we should be strongly tempted 
 to accept the institution of the confessional, or we 
 might accept the doctrine of purgatory, and think that 
 we had done something to mitigate difficulties or to 
 eke out Scripture. If we looked only at the greatness 
 of the disease, at the difficulty of the cure, we might 
 be disposed to advise any endeavour, however little we 
 might feel it to be sanctioned or authorized from on high. 
 But when we reflect upon it again and again ; when we 
 carry the matter to the Bible; when we feel the stress 
 laid upon two things there, the individual freedom and 
 the individual grace ; when we think too how easily 
 men may lose the muscle and sinew of their own 
 being by having perpetual recourse to the lifting and 
 the carrying of external assistance ; we seem to come 
 back with a sense of relief and of satisfaction to the 
 suggestions of our own church of England, which says, 
 If you are in trouble and cannot find, comfort ; if you 
 have postponed or intermitted communion because of 
 some weight lying upon your life ; or if in the approach 
 of death you feel something burdening your soul, and 
 are afraid lest you should be about to stand before God 
 with a lie in your right hand ; then ask the human help 
 of one whose office it is to guide, whose experience it is 
 to sympathize : open your grief to him, receive his 
 counsel : and then, if you feel that it would be comfort- 
 ing to have the promise brought home, to have the ' ye * 
 of the universal turned for once into the ' thou ' of the 
 particular, ask him to stand over you and speak to you 
 personally the reassuring word, ' Son, be of good cheer : 
 thy sins are forgiven thee.' 
 
 At common times, under usual circumstances, the
 
 350 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 church's directory is the pulpit, and the church's con- 
 fessional is the congregation. There, where the bow 
 is drawn of necessity at a venture, the arrow flies to 
 its mark, the more felt because unseen. There, when 
 the prayer of the preacher and the prayer of the hearer 
 have jointly invoked the guidance which is omniscient 
 wisdom, the ' voice behind ' will be heard again and 
 again, saying in each emergency of the spiritual being, 
 * This is the way, walk thou in it.' There too, in that 
 privacy of publicity which is the special privilege of ' the 
 church gathered in one place,' the heart's knowledge of 
 its own sin and its own sorrow will clothe a liturgy, 
 come down from past ages, with a meaning fresh and 
 lively and powerful ; will send up from the individual 
 worshipper a special and specific utterance to the 
 throne of grace, and receive back into itself an answer 
 of peace in which there shall be no ' if and no per- 
 adventure. 
 
 Independence of all save God is the prerogative of the 
 conscience. Not in pride, but in deep self-knowledge ; 
 knowledge of the difficulty of telling into any human 
 ear the very thing itself that is ; knowledge of the perils 
 of spiritual intimacy, alike on the one side and on the 
 other ; knowledge of the facility with which an indolent 
 will may pass from seeking help to trusting in man ; 
 knowledge, finally, of the infinite strength which comes 
 into us by being quite absolutely alone with God in our 
 confidences and in our struggles ; we shall feel, the 
 weakest of us with the strongest, that, on the whole, 
 and with a view to the eternal future, we are best as 
 we are, without confessor and without director save in 
 the Father and the Son and the Spirit, one God blessed
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 351 
 
 for ever : we shall come back to the text, and think that 
 it has a voice for us in this thing, ' Ye were bought, each 
 and all, with a price be not ye servants of men.' 
 
 3. In such matters we may speak with diffidence, 
 aware that another, even in the church of Christ, might 
 speak differently. But in one closing matter all will go 
 with me : it is when I turn myself to the recollection 
 of the 'life,' and say concerning 'it,' to a congregation of 
 responsible dying men, ' Bought with a price, be no 
 man's slave.' 
 
 Naturally we are all slaves, the bravest of us and the 
 most confident. Who has not heard and talked of the 
 tyranny of fashion how the manners and customs of 
 the world lord it over us, till we are indeed ' not our 
 own ;' creatures and drudges of an impersonal fugitive 
 something, which is a power outside us not making for 
 righteousness. 
 
 Even inside homes, with other presences powerfully 
 influencing, we feel this, all of us. And in matters 
 indifferent, if such indeed there are, we do well to follow 
 it. To be singular in regions not moral, not involving 
 duty, is at once a waste of power and a lack of sense. 
 We are right, in non-essentials, in mere externals, to do 
 even as others. 
 
 But here, brethren, in this strange yet noble life of a 
 great English University, this tyrant fashion bears with 
 crushing weight upon all of us. Sometimes it assails us 
 in the more open forms of laxity of speech or action, of 
 jesting with things sacred, of making light of morality, 
 of making a mock at sin. Sometimes it bids us possess 
 ourselves of that which we cannot pay for ' Every one 
 has it, Every one does so ' regardless of the many self-
 
 352 Individual Independence [xix. 
 
 denials which made it possible for us to be here, of the 
 many prayers which followed us, of the many tears 
 which will fall over our misdoing. Sometimes it simply 
 bids us trifle ; takes a trivial estimate of work, of a 
 career, of the future ; bids us neglect instruction, post- 
 pone reading, leave every thing serious to the chance 
 and \o the accident 
 
 And in all this we think ourselves free : doubly 
 free free even from the thing that is right even from 
 religion even from duty. 
 
 Free? St Paul calls us slaves slaves of men, slaves 
 one of another of the meanest of us, and the poorest, 
 and the vilest ' Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth : 
 walk in the sight of thine eyes, walk in the way of thy 
 heart: but know thou that for all these things God will 
 bring thee' not thy brother, not fashion, not the world, 
 but thee, thine own self ' into judgment.' 
 
 Therefore it is that I have chosen for you to-day the 
 text, ' Bought with a price be not slaves.' 
 
 ' Bought with a price.' Christ bargained for thee, bid 
 for thee, tried and toiled for thee, died, shed His very 
 blood for thee. Let not the scoffer rob thee of that 
 word : thou wilt want it one day. 
 
 O, if, when you lie down and when you rise up if, 
 when you go forth to the chapel or to the lecture- 
 room if, when you refresh and when you amuse your- 
 selves, in ways which need not be wicked, which only 
 become so when you forget God in them you would 
 just say to yourselves that word, 'I was bought with 
 a price,' Jesus Christ died for me, Jesus Christ shed His 
 precious blood for me you do not know what a charm 
 there would be in it. Toil rest, recreation blessing, the
 
 xix.] a Corollary of Redemption. 353 
 
 common holy, earth heaven try it, try it for a day. 
 Say to yourself, There was One who cared for me, had 
 me in His view, ages before I was born ; there is One 
 now who looks upon me with love, such love as is not 
 on this earth, so tender, so strong, so living ; and He 
 actually paid a price for me for me, so worthless, so 
 nothing. Yes, if you would do this, you know not 
 what a joy, what a sweetness, would enter into your 
 life. You would not care then, by comparison, what 
 others thought: it would be enough to know this, that, 
 working or resting, alone or in company, joyous or 
 sorrowful, living or dying, you are His. He has thought 
 you worth paying for which is to say, worth dying 
 for. Shall it be too much to ask of you, that you would 
 just accept that love, just cherish it, just live it, just 
 hand it on ? 
 
 ' Bought with a price, be not slaves of men.' Look 
 not upon their present smile or frown. Let them not 
 own you. They never died for you. Let them not 
 turn and twist you whither they will. Be a man 
 human, humane, manly, manful which is to say, a 
 Christian. 
 
 O noble independence the liberty of the man that is 
 God's, and that has God in him: the liberty which is 
 only not licence: the liberty of the son who abides in 
 the house for ever, not of the slave who has no inherit- 
 ance in the home, and no permanence.
 
 XX. 
 
 ONE THING THOU LACKEST. 
 
 St Mark x. 21. 
 
 Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto Mm, One thing 
 thou lackest. 
 
 THIS paragraph of the gospels is a striking example 
 of that harmony in variety which unfriendly critics love 
 to exaggerate into discrepancy. 
 
 Three of the evangelists have preserved the incident. 
 Each one adds something to the completeness of the 
 picture. The wealth of the enquirer is brought into 
 view by all of them ; but St Matthew alone tells us that 
 he was young, and St Luke alone speaks of him as a 
 ruler, while St Mark gives several most interesting 
 particulars of the interview itself the running and the 
 kneeling, the earnestness and the reverence, and the look 
 which Christ gave him, and the love which Christ felt 
 for him ; and then again the look which Christ threw 
 upon the disciples as He drew the moral, and the 
 repeated expressions of astonishment with which they 
 received His unexpected words as to the spiritual 
 dangers of worldly wealth. All this variety, so pic- 
 turesque and so natural, would be ill exchanged, we all
 
 xx.] One thing thou lackest. 355 
 
 feel, for a dry and sterile uniformity of narrative, taking 
 out of it all the life and all the play, and suggesting the 
 idea of an inspiration merely mechanical, out of which 
 the human element would have departed, and with it 
 (rightly understood) also the divine. 
 
 There is, however, in this instance, amongst many 
 variations which are entirely and beautifully harmonious, 
 just one which might appear at first sight to be of a 
 different character. 
 
 St Mark and St Luke give thus the question and 
 counter-question with which the conversation opens. 
 ' Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit 
 eternal life ? ' Jesus said, ' Why callest thou me good ? 
 There is none good but one, that is, God.' St Matthew, 
 according to the best manuscripts, expressly confirmed 
 by the testimony of Origen early in the third century, 
 prior therefore to any of our existing manuscripts of 
 the Greek Testament, gives the two clauses a very 
 different form. According to him the question was, 
 ' Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have 
 eternal life ? ' and the answer, ' Why askest thou me 
 about that which is good ? there is but One that is 
 good ; ' as though He would correct the enquiry about a 
 particular good thing to be done in order to win heaven, 
 by recalling the questioner to the one source and spring 
 of all good, in whom alone, sought and found and lived 
 in, can the true ' eternal life ' be entered by any man. 
 
 It might be suggested that some copyist, jealous for 
 the Saviour's honour, had substituted this reading for 
 the common one, which seemed to disclaim for our Lord 
 the title of ' good.' It is enough to say in answer 
 apart from the general precariousness of such con- 
 
 232
 
 356 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 jecturing that no such alteration has been made by 
 the same manuscripts in the other two gospels, and 
 that Origen himself calls attention to the variety in this 
 place between the two evangelists and the one. 
 
 But we can all see that this is an example, when 
 carefully looked into, not of contradiction, but (which is 
 a widely different thing) of unexplained consistency. 
 
 St Matthew omits the word ' good ' before ' Master,' 
 and throws the whole weight of the reply upon the 
 word ' good ' before ' thing.' The other evangelists say, 
 ' Good Master ; ' and ' what thing,' instead of ' what good 
 thing,' shall I do ? They represent the comment upon 
 1 good ' in the answer as referring to the appellation of 
 our Lord Himself in the question. Is there any thing 
 impossible or improbable in the supposition that both 
 accounts of the matter are true ? that the question may 
 have been (as indeed the English Version gives it in 
 St Matthew), ' Good Master, what good thing shall I 
 do...?' and that the answer may have touched upon 
 both the uses of ' good ? ' Why callest thou me good, 
 without knowing what thou sayest without knowing 
 that One only is good, and that, if I am good, it is in 
 virtue of a divinity which is not in thy thought ? And 
 again, Why askest thou about some particular good 
 thing to be done to merit life, when in reality ' good ' is 
 not a thing but a Person, and he who would enter into 
 life must do so by knowing and loving and becoming 
 like to Him ? 
 
 Thus the two narratives may complete, by supplemen- 
 ting, each other. Each may bear its part faithfully in 
 the preservation of the sacred whole. It is not given 
 us, as yet, to combine the narratives certainly : enough,
 
 xx.] One thing tho^l lackest. 357 
 
 if we see that one combination, at least is possible 
 nay, if we did not see it, we could trust the Word of 
 God still. 
 
 Who cannot feel, in this instance, the truthfulness, the 
 importance, of each form of the saying ? 
 
 When Christ says, ' Why callest thou me good ? ' He 
 certainly does not mean to accuse Himself of sin. On 
 proper occasions He could boldly face His enemies with 
 the question, ' Which of you convicteth me ? ' Nor does 
 He deny here that divinity which lies at the root of all 
 His sayings, as much in the first three gospels as in the 
 fourth ; as much in ' The Son of Man shall send forth 
 His angels,' or ' No man knoweth the Son but the 
 Father,' or ' Lo, I am with you alway,' or ' All power is 
 given unto me in heaven and in earth,' of St Matthew, 
 as in the ' I and my Father are one,' or ' The glory 
 which I had with thee before the world was,' of the 
 sealing testimony of St John. What our Lord does 
 correct in this questioner is the ignorant complimenting 
 which can bestow upon one whom he regards only as a- 
 human Rabbi, as a fellow-creature therefore and a 
 fellow-sinner with himself, a title which has its only 
 true place as an attribute of God Himself, and therefore 
 of One whom faith has learned to address with un- 
 doubting affiance as ' My Lord and my God.' To meet 
 this young ruler with the unexpected check, ' Ask thy- 
 self why thou callest me good ; recollect what good 
 means, and to whom alone it belongs ? ' was one part, 
 we believe, of that discipline in thoughtfulness which 
 his case demanded, and which is pursued with severe 
 gentleness in the whole treatment which follows. 
 
 And then, when Christ goes on to say, ' Why askest
 
 358 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 thou me about some good act of thine which is to earn 
 heaven ? recollect, One, and but One, is good, and in 
 Him, not in thyself or in thy little doings, is eternal 
 life ' do we not read here the correction of a thousand 
 mistakes and presumptions and ignorances which have 
 survived into our own time and into our own religion ? 
 Do we not hear Him saying to us, Build not upon the 
 sand, set not up your little towers of self-righteousness 
 and vainglory, but go to the fountain of life, seek 
 Him who is the author of all godliness, acquaint thy- 
 self first with Him and be at peace, then come and 
 offer thy gifts, not to win, but because thou hast won, 
 the grace of a free salvation ? 
 
 We have before us a history, a character, a life : one 
 which has repeated itself many times in human ex- 
 perience ; one which may be here to-day, not in the 
 book only, but in flesh and blood. 
 
 This young man, immortalized in the everlasting 
 word, was not a phenomenon, he was a type. 
 
 We see him so distinctly in his own question, ' What 
 shall I do that I may inherit eternal life ? ' Yes, here is 
 enquiry anxiety therefore, desire to be right, admission 
 that there may be a higher height, a loftier attainment, 
 than the life has yet reached ; respect too and reverence 
 for One who is neither priest nor Rabbi nor ruler, who 
 has neither rank, nor office, nor philosophy, nor oratory, 
 but only the two things, sincerity and sanctity, to re- 
 commend Him : this there is in the young man, and it 
 brings him where all are welcome who would know and 
 do; brings him running, brings him worshipping, and 
 sets him face to face with Jesus Christ. A solemn 
 moment for him whose life was then in the balance,
 
 xx.] One thing thou lackest. 359 
 
 and for thousands and tens of thousands who shall read 
 of it to the end of time. 
 
 And this spirit of enquiry, and this spirit of reverence, 
 was no sudden or violent impulse, separate from, and at 
 variance with, the days and years of the past. There 
 was a third thing in that character ; a memory of 
 morality, a habit of virtue. There was nothing to call 
 up a tell-tale blush on that countenance, if men spoke of 
 integrity, spoke of purity, spoke (in any form) of duty. 
 There is not a doubt thrown, throughout the narrative, 
 upon the truth, upon the consistency, of the profession, 
 ' All these have I kept.' At the very moment that he is 
 asking, ' What shall I do ? ' his heart is saying within 
 him, ' What lack I yet ? ' 
 
 A curious mixture, we might say, an improbable com- 
 bination, of humility and self-righteousness, if we had 
 never read a heart, if we knew not our own. This 
 youth, so earnest, so respectful, so moral, is yet a 
 dweller in the tents of the self-man ; he still dreams of 
 improving himself into perfection ; he still fancies that, 
 if the fabric of the self-righteousness can but be raised 
 one tier, one story, higher, its top may reach heaven 
 unaware that its foundation is in the sand ; unaware of 
 the great coming storm which shall mix earth and sky. 
 ' Ignorant of God's righteousness, going about to es- 
 tablish his own,' he has not one thought, as yet, of the 
 ' submission ' (as St Paul calls it) which is the first step 
 of life. 
 
 He thinks perhaps, when he asks that question, 
 ' What good thing shall I do ? ' of some little finishing 
 stroke, some last ornament and embellishment of per- 
 fectness, which 'may cost him an effort, but which at
 
 360 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 least need not undo or unmake any thing. He thinks, 
 we might say if the anachronism could be pardoned 
 of some large gift of money, to mission or hospital, 
 which shall yet leave him something ; of some pilgrim- 
 age, to shrine or sepulchre, from which yet there may be 
 a return ; of some penance, whether of infliction or of 
 abstinence, which may at least leave him living. There 
 is almost nothing, he says to himself in the distance, 
 which he would refuse to bear or to dare for his soul's 
 health : there is even a desire to suffer something 
 if he may but be perfect : name the price, he says 
 to his new Master, and I will pay it only tell me 
 the secret of a certified safety, of an absolute self- 
 satisfaction. 
 
 We might have been tempted, we scribes of the 
 kingdom, to throw ourselves instantly, with all the 
 weapons of an evangelical armoury, upon the radical 
 fault of this sort of questioning. We might have said, 
 ' I perceive that thou art yet in the gall of bitterness,' 
 tied and bound with the fetter of a fatal Pharisaical 
 self-deception. We might have precipitated, as a first 
 duty, the preaching of grace, and called him to seek, 
 'with strong crying and tears,' what St Paul bids us to 
 describe as 'justification of life.' 
 
 Very different, quite opposite to this, is the Saviour's 
 treatment. Instead of arguing, He accepts ; takes him 
 on his own ground; bids him save himself; arrays be- 
 fore him the ten commandments nay, not the ten; 
 just the six of the second table just those in which 
 the young man counts himself perfect ; and so elicits 
 from him the avowal of an entire self-complacency, ' All 
 these I have kept from my youth up,' and leads him to
 
 xx.] One thing thou lackest. 361 
 
 expect confidently the instant reply, ' Rich for heaven as 
 for earth, eternal life is thine.' 
 
 We pause with the character full in view, to con- 
 template it for a moment with the eye of man. We 
 confront with it two opposite schools of doctrine, and 
 hear the one saying, 'The man is worse than a pro- 
 fligate ; ' and the other, ' The man is safe, and only 
 wants perfecting.' The one says, Better any immorality 
 than the vice of self-righteousness. The other says, 
 Morality is the differentia of human being ; give me 
 virtue, and for all else let bigots fight. The one says, 
 No case so hopeless as that which has ' no need of 
 repentance ; ' which, not having consciously fallen, can 
 dispense with a Saviour ; saying, ' I am rich,' is deaf to 
 the counsel, ' Buy of me without price.' The other says, 
 The end of religion is virtue reach virtue any way, and 
 God cannot condemn. 
 
 Against the former of these views is the ' Jesus loved 
 him : ' against the latter is the ' went away sorrowful.' 
 It is better to be moral than to be profligate ; yet to be 
 moral is not salvation. We must not sever what the 
 text has joined in one 
 
 'Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, 
 One thing thou lackest.' 
 
 We shall not suppose, with a whole gospel against 
 us, that Christ here approves as sufficient a legality 
 which leaves out its own first table ; which contents 
 itself with half the decalogue ; which is, in the first 
 place, morality without religion, and which is, in the 
 second place, a morality of mere negation : not to have 
 defrauded, not to have stolen, not to have murdered, it is 
 enough enter thou into life, into glory.
 
 362 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 Nor shall we force the words given us by St Matthew, 
 ' If thou wilt be perfect,' into a sense utterly unevan- 
 gelical ' Salvation and perfection are ideas distinct and 
 different : if thou wilt enter into life, keep the com- 
 mandments ; if thou wilt be perfect, do something 
 besides.' According to this view, and in substance it is 
 the view of a vast and pretentious communion, there 
 are, first, commandments of necessity, and there are, 
 secondly, counsels of perfection : there are requirements 
 for the many, and there are ambitions for the few : it is 
 not necessary to be perfect ; something less will suffice : 
 a man may be saved with thus much, if without more he 
 may not shine. 
 
 When Christ says to this moral young man, 'Yet 
 lackest thou one thing,' we understand Him to say, 
 ' And that one thing is needful.' He who puts it from 
 him, as either unnecessary for him or unattainable, 
 counts himself unworthy of everlasting life. He who 
 refuses that one thing, and goes away sorrowful because 
 he is not accepted without it, certainly has not failed 
 only in some adornment or corollary of saintship : if 
 he does not come back for it, to Christ in flesh or to 
 Christ in glory, assuredly he has lost himself; having 
 his good things here, he has none to look for across 
 death and the grave. 
 
 Yet Jesus beholding him loved him. 
 
 There are few words more touching in all Scripture. 
 They mark so decisively the perfect humanity of Jesus 
 Christ. Not one that cannot sympathize no, but one, 
 in all things, 'of like passions with us,' only 'without 
 sin.' The holy Saviour had a 'loved' one among His 
 disciples. He did not command, He did not exemplify,
 
 xx.] One thing thou lackest. 363 
 
 a dead level, a dull monotony, even of feeling, even 
 of affection. There was for Him a friend among the 
 friends one chosen among the elect one heart with 
 which His heart beat yet more sensitively than with 
 other hearts all loved. 
 
 But there is more than this in the text. This young 
 man was a stranger to Him. Apart from the omni- 
 science of deity and this is not now the thing in 
 question He had no knowledge of him until now. And 
 now that He first sees him, can He altogether approve ? 
 Read together the two halves of the text, and the first 
 becomes more wonderful by the combination One 
 thing, the one thing, he lacked ; and yet Jesus, behold- 
 ing him, loved him. 
 
 That look, and that love, like all else in our Lord, 
 were full of instruction. Do you suppose that the 
 blessed Lord now in heaven looks with equal love upon 
 opposite characters amongst ourselves say, upon the 
 young man of pure life and clean heart and beautiful 
 feeling, and the young man whose very soul is ' a cage 
 of unclean birds,' whose tongue is profane, unchaste, or 
 cruel, whose conduct towards his own is selfish, un- 
 mannerly, hard, ungrateful ? Ought He we ask it with 
 reverence ought He so to do ? Ought Jesus Christ to 
 confound all differences even amongst those who still 
 lack one thing ? 
 
 Such teaching is as unscriptural as it is immoral. It 
 would make us shut the Bible if we read it there. It 
 would be an argument against Christianity which all the 
 evidences could not parry. It would be the indication 
 of a looseness and a roughness and a coarseness of 
 judgment, which 'could not be attributed without im-
 
 364 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 piety to the Judge of all men. Because we believe that 
 there is a discriminating quality and the gospel calls it 
 faith visible already, in the case of each one, as present 
 or absent, to the eye of God ; shall we go on to say that 
 without this or apart from this there is no essential 
 difference between vice and virtue ? ' Let the Judge of 
 all the earth do right,' however it may fit in with our 
 ideas or with our theologies. Be not rash in fixing 
 the great gulf wipe not out the ' Jesus loved ' in your 
 zeal to hurry towards the ' One thing thou lackest.' 
 
 What a view does this open to us of the love of Jesus 
 Christ now for many a young man, earnest, moral, 
 thoughtful, enquiring, whom yet He cannot excuse 
 cannot for his sake excuse from the choice and the 
 decision and the self-surrender, Go and sell then come 
 and follow. Yes, He loves, and we ought to love, the 
 beauty of the character, the openness of the mind, the 
 cleanness of heart and hand, the reverence of soul and 
 spirit. He loves, and we ought to love, the appreciation 
 of His wisdom, the recognition of His holiness, the 
 admiration of His sacrifice, in many who cannot yet 
 quite say to Him, My Lord and my God. He loves, 
 and we ought to love, the dutiful son, the kind brother, 
 the faithful friend, the diligent student, the bright ex- 
 ample the six commandments kept from the youth 
 up, the eagerness to know, from such as are worthy to 
 tell, whether indeed there be a yet more excellent way 
 into a joy and an immortality believed in. It is no sign 
 of jealousy for Christ's honour to withhold the love He 
 gave, or to mingle in one sweeping sentence the righteous 
 of earth and the wicked. The blessed Lord can dis- 
 criminate even His followers should do so between
 
 xx.] One thing thou lackest. 365 
 
 such a youth as we have sketched in these sentences, 
 and the frivolity, the idleness, the gluttony, the im- 
 morality, which make up its opposite. The heart- 
 searching eye pauses in its survey of the world and its 
 fulness to distinguish and to discern. He beholds and 
 He loves the thing that is good, even where that very 
 love constrains Him to the further saying, One thing 
 thou lackest. 
 
 ' One thing.' Often have we said, of friend or 
 neighbour, He has but one fault. Perfect in upright- 
 ness, in diligence, in devotion, he lacks temper, or he 
 lacks courtesy, or he lacks charity. Perfect in kindness, 
 in consideration, in humility, he lacks strength, or he 
 lacks courage, or he lacks exertion. Sometimes we 
 have to say a more serious thing. So faultless in 
 one aspect, in one half of the man so tender, so 
 generous, so unselfish, so useful he cannot quite be 
 .trusted when the question is of truth, or of sincerity, 
 or of integrity, or of virtue. He has one fault, and 
 it carries unsoundness into everything. We all know 
 that there are vices which no number of virtues can 
 counterbalance, in the judgment of the world, or in the 
 judgment of the Christian. 
 
 Thus the saying, ' One thing thou lackest,' is capable 
 of many applications, some of them qualifying, others 
 condemning. It depends upon the nature of the one 
 thing. There are defects, there are blemishes, there are 
 faults : there are also sins, and vices, and crimes. 
 
 We have touched upon the question, Which of the two 
 was it here? And we have been compelled to under- 
 stand the one want in this case as a fatal want, not 
 in the region of conduct, but in the region of spirit ; not
 
 366 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 in the region of the world's judgment, not even in the 
 region of the moralist's judgment, but in the sight of 
 God, in the foreview of heaven. 
 
 That which was lacking to this young man was, in 
 one word, devotion. Not devotion in the sense of de- 
 voutness, but devotion in the sense of self-surrender. 
 A young man who knelt down before Christ in the 
 public highway was certainly not wanting in reverence. 
 We can believe that, not in the spirit of ostentation but 
 of sincere piety, he was one who prayed, many a time 
 and oft, in the synagogues and in the streets. He was 
 on the very verge and margin of a higher devotion still. 
 This was his ' valley of decision,' and he is gone down 
 into it. This day he is to make that determination after 
 which he can never be quite the same. He is asking 
 the question of questions ; that question which was life 
 from the dead to Saul of Tarsus and to the jailor of 
 Philippi; that question which filled the church of Christ 
 on the day of Pentecost, and which has been to count- 
 less thousands from that year to this the turning-point 
 between two lives and two eternities. But in this case 
 there is a false ring, not of hypocrisy but of self-deception, 
 in the good words. 'What shall I do what good thing 
 shall I do that I may have eternal life?' We will not 
 be extreme to mark the word 'do:' it was in Paul's 
 question, it was in the jailor's question, it was in the 
 question of Pentecost and the three thousand. It was 
 only in the ear of Jesus Christ that the false ring was 
 perceptible, and He applied to it a test at once stern 
 and gracious. 
 
 God and Mammon are at issue in that heart. It is 
 attempting the impossible thing, to reconcile the two
 
 xx.] One thing t/wu lackest. 367 
 
 services and the two ownerships : and when it says, 
 'What shall I do?' it means, What shall I do that is 
 compatible with being young and rich and a ruler; 
 with being a man of means, and a man of the world ? 
 The question itself has a condition lying under it, and 
 that condition gives it the lie in the very asking. 
 Flattery would give a soft answer. Jesus Christ says, 
 'Sell that thou hast:' fling away thy riches, part with 
 thine all, keep nothing, strip thyself of house and land, 
 of purse and treasure, of importance and influence, of 
 power to give, and power to bequeath ; then (if we may 
 for the moment keep the reading) 'take up the cross,' 
 that accursed badge and implement of Roman tyranny, 
 not yet possessing its one tender and gracious associ- 
 ation take it up, as one that shall die upon it, and that 
 accepts the sentence. All is mysterious, all is repulsive, 
 all is terrific to the hearer one word alone lights up the 
 darkness ; one word alone blends severity with good- 
 ness ' Follow me.' Be my companion as I tread the 
 way of homelessness and poverty, of reproach and 
 ignominy, at last of torture, murder, martyrdom ; share 
 my reviling, desertion and repudiation by mine own ; 
 soothe with thy companionship sorrows which thou canst 
 and sorrows which thou canst not partake in ; listen day 
 by day to my teaching, drink in my revelation of a life 
 above and beyond this life; print my likeness upon thee, 
 that thou mayest represent and reproduce it when I am 
 unseen. This shall be the present recompense of the self- 
 devotion which I ask of thee. 'A thousandfold now in this 
 time' it shall be to thee for all that thou sacrificest, riches 
 and lands, kinsfolk and friends, honours and affections ; 
 'with' yes, I hide it not 'with persecutions: and in
 
 368 One thing tkou Lackest. (_xx. 
 
 the world to come,' just out of sight, just beyond death, 
 ' in the world to come ' promise above all promise 
 ' eternal life.' 
 
 This, brethren, is the ' love ' of Jesus Christ. It stops 
 not with gilding and refuibishing time, it sets open 
 eternity. ' One thing thou lackest ' thy soul must be 
 athirst till she has it union with the alone good One, 
 the having Him in thee, the being at one with Him now 
 and world without end. To have this thou must part 
 with all else : in act, if Christ bids thee ; in will, at all 
 events, because Christ calls thee. Art thou equal to 
 this ? Is thy hold upon the unseen such as to detach 
 thee from the visible ? 
 
 Brethren, it is the question proposed to us in all 
 things. It meets us when the life of the body is 
 buoyant and jubilant, and the tempter spreads before 
 us the pleasant excess, the luxurious wantoning, the 
 delicious delirious sensuality. It meets us at the great 
 turning-points of life, when the choice must be made, 
 of the profession, of the abode, of the companionship, 
 of the wedlock. It meets us in the rising within us 
 of the jest sparkling but profane, of the retort telling 
 but cruel, of the story amusing but scandalous, of the 
 judgment, on men or things, popular but iniquitous. 
 'This world' or 'that world' is written for us upon 
 everything: 'Rest and enjoy,' or else, 'Go and sell;' 
 have thy good things, or wait for them ; drink of earth's 
 cup, or else, ' take the cross, and follow.' 
 
 Who that knows himself shall much marvel at the 
 result of this appeal in the case of the rich young ruler ? 
 Was it not something, that he went away 'sorrowful ?' 
 Was it not something, that anger, that scorn, that fierce
 
 xx.] One thing thou lackest. 369 
 
 resentment, marked not the ruin of the hope and the 
 disappointment of the aspiration ? Might he not have 
 said, ' Thou dost indeed know how to quench the 
 smoking flax thou hast indeed the art of despising, 
 of frustrating, the day of small things? I was here 
 ready to the hand of judicious fostering, and thou hast 
 thrown me back into the burning from which tenderness 
 would have plucked me?' 
 
 He went away sorrowful. The love of Jesus was 
 wasted upon him for this time, and the gospels which 
 tell of the going tell of no return. The moral, at all 
 events, is thus written. It is not the second chance, 
 it is not the late hope, it is not the 'last first,' which 
 is here recorded for our learning: it is the peril of 
 refusing Christ's call; of saying to Him, 'I will not, 1 
 when He bids us follow; of preferring earth when He 
 offers heaven. 
 
 Brethren, Jesus Christ has sent us once again this 
 day the word of His grace, saying, Halt no more 
 between two opinions. Defer not for one day the vital 
 decision. Whatsoever it be which stands at this 
 moment between thee and thy soul, cast it from thee. 
 Sloth or cowardice, appetite or passion, bosom lust or 
 besetting sin, renounce, hate, expel it, at Christ's bid- 
 ding. Rise, He calleth thee ; take up thy cross at once, 
 and follow. 
 
 What would it be on the last day of life, what would 
 it be on the morning of the judgment, to feel in the 
 awakening conscience this conviction, 'One thing I 
 lack?' Too late to go back to fetch anything out of 
 the house; too late to supply one want or to wash 
 out one sin : much more to relay the foundations of the 
 v. 24
 
 370 One thing thou lackest. [xx. 
 
 whole being, to bring into it a new spring and a new 
 motive and a new aim of life. Who shall risk the 
 hearing then from the lips of the Judge, 'One thing 
 was needful, and that one thing thou lackest?' O let 
 us enter now into that greatest, gravest of questions, 
 'What must I do to be saved?' and may God, who 
 has all hearts in His hand, dispose each one of us to 
 say, and to mean the saying, ' I count all things but loss, 
 that I may win Christ.'
 
 XXI. 
 
 AN HUNDREDFOLD NOW IN THIS TIME. 
 
 St Mark x. 29, 30. 
 
 There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or 
 father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake 
 and the gospel's, 
 
 But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and 
 brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with 
 Persecutions j and in the world to come eternal life. 
 
 A PROMISING enquirer has just come to the Saviour ; 
 has come, and is gone again. Running, and kneeling, 
 as one in haste to be saved, and assured of the power of 
 Christ to save, a rich young ruler has proposed to Him 
 the question of questions, has received a clear answer, 
 and is gone away sorrowful. An exceptional case had 
 required an exceptional treatment : and He who laid 
 no such compulsion upon others of His followers, upon 
 the Zaccheuses and Philemons and Gaiuses of the king- 
 dom, has judged it necessary to lay the compulsion of 
 poverty here: 'Go thy way: sell whatsoever thou hast, 
 and give to the poor; and thou shalt have treasure in 
 heaven : and come, follow me.' 
 
 Something very beautiful there was in the character 
 thus severely handled ; for it is expressly mentioned, and 
 in this the case stands alone, that ' Jesus beholding him 
 loved him.' Yet not the less, but all the more for this 
 
 24 2
 
 372 An hundredfold [XXL 
 
 love, He dealt truly with him ; saw that he was worth 
 saving, and could only be saved thus : the world had 
 so tight a hold upon him, that no mere self-denial, in 
 the way of abstemiousness or almsgiving, would suffice 
 to detach him : by one stroke the chain must be broken, 
 the captive must be set free : if he really wished to be 
 saved, and if he really meant what he said when he 
 called Jesus 'good,' he will bow himself to the hard 
 necessity, and count it more than compensated by the 
 divine companionship of which this is the condition. 
 
 But to so lofty, so superhuman an estimate of loss 
 and gain this young man is not equal. He would have 
 joyfully heard how to combine two worlds : but if one 
 world only can be his, then it must be the world of 
 present enjoyments; of young interests, human flatteries, 
 and great possessions. 
 
 A reflection upon the terrible dangers of riches is the 
 first moral of the incident. The disciples indeed, more 
 experienced, some of them, in the opposite perils of 
 poverty, with its mean toils and down-dragging cares 
 and ready envyings, exclaim in astonishment, 'Who 
 then can be saved ?' If the rich, with their tranquil 
 days and easy fortunes, with every facility for the two 
 virtues of honesty and of thankfulness, can ' hardly enter ' 
 God's kingdom, how much less, surely, they whose whole 
 life is trial trial of patience, trial of rectitude, trial of 
 faith. Thus it is that each rank and each age and each 
 character regards its own as the very chief of all difficulties 
 and all hindrances, thinks any other class or condition 
 better off for salvation, and asks in despondency, if not 
 in recrimination, If that other, that opposite, can scarcely 
 be saved, how, how can I ?
 
 XXL] now in this time. 373 
 
 But there was one disciple who in those days of his 
 ignorance and self-reliance was ever ready to compare 
 himself advantageously with other men, and who saw 
 in the example of this young ruler going away sorrow- 
 ful an opportunity of vaunting the opposite conduct of 
 those who, like himself, had counted all things loss for 
 Christ. 'Peter began to say to Him, Lo, we have left 
 all, and have followed Thee.' 
 
 Our Lord begins His reply to this boast by a warm 
 and generous recognition of the greatness and blessed- 
 ness of their self-sacrifice. The tone may be faulty 
 self-assertion is ever unpleasing but not on this 
 account shall the Saviour for one moment depreciate 
 the devotion on which He shall build His church. 
 There is no man who has done what ye have done 
 and shall not here and hereafter have his reward. 'Now 
 in this time an hundredfold. In the world to come 
 eternal life.' 
 
 In the enumeration of the particulars of the hundred- 
 fold, we may notice, in passing, two omissions. They 
 are characteristic, we think, of the Master's teaching. 
 The one omission is that of the ' father,' the other 
 omission is that of the ' wife.' The one omission may 
 seem faintly to foreshadow the divine rule elsewhere 
 laid down, ' Call no man your father upon the earth ; 
 for one is your Father, which is in heaven.' ' Fathers 
 an hundredfold ' might have favoured the delusion of a 
 spiritual direction, a human authority, below, such as is 
 utterly at variance with the idea of a dispensation in 
 which, under the guidance of an indwelling Spirit, ' all 
 shall be ' individually and immediately ' taught of God.' 
 The mother, like the brother and the sister, may re-
 
 374 ^ n hundredfold [xxi. 
 
 appear, with multiplication, in the recompense : unity is 
 the very condition of the new, the spiritual fatherhood ; 
 not even in name or in figure can it be departed from. 
 
 The other omission is illustrative, I venture to think, 
 of the purity, of the delicacy, of the Saviour's teaching. 
 He will not even seem to open to His disciples a 
 Mahometan paradise. Sisters a hundredfold not so 
 much as in parable the other. 
 
 Large and generous as is the promise, for this life and 
 for that which is to come, love itself adds one caution to 
 this glowing picture. The end is not yet While earth 
 is still earth, hope and fear are still indispensable ministers 
 in the church and in the heart ' Many that are first 
 shall be last, and the last first.' Amongst the original 
 hearers there stands a Thomas that shall doubt, a Peter 
 that shall deny, a Judas that shall betray. A few years 
 hence, on the other hand, there shall be a Mark that 
 deserts in Pamphylia, yet will reenlist himself in 
 Antioch, and will live to be a comforter of apostles, yea, 
 an evangelist of the churches : a Saul, once (he says it 
 of himself) a blasphemer and a persecutor, yet made 
 ' willing in the day of Christ's power,' and chosen out of 
 all men to 'cause the light of the gospel to shine 
 throughout the world.' Yes, there shall be in this as 
 in all things ' first last and last first :' be not disdainful, 
 but charitable be not highminded, but fear. 
 
 St Matthew records at this point a whole parable 
 devoted to this theme. The labourer early called, early 
 obedient, must not despise, must not envy, the later call 
 or the later obedience of another. God gives not ac- 
 count to us of His dealing with His own. There is a 
 spirit of contempt and cavilling which may even forfeit
 
 xxi.] now in this time. 375 
 
 the crown. ' Last shall be first, and first last.' Not the 
 start but the arrival is the thing in question. ' He that 
 endures to the end shall be saved.' 
 
 We have then before us, as the principal subject, a 
 magnificent view of the compensations of discipleship. 
 
 Some have talked slightingly of the sacrifices made by 
 Peter and his companions. They are supposed to have 
 had little to give up. A crazy boat or two, a few 
 tattered nets this was their all. The word ' fisherman ' 
 carries to our ears, in spite of the hired servants and 
 the house in Capernaum, an almost inevitable impression 
 of low rank and poor circumstances. On the other hand, 
 it does not appear that at the time of this occurrence 
 their abandonment of home or employment was either 
 final or absolute. After the resurrection the disciples 
 are found in Galilee, resuming, at least occasionally, 
 their old occupations. 
 
 Nevertheless they rightly regarded the call to follow 
 Jesus as a call to give up everything for it. From that 
 moment they belonged to Another. Whithersoever He 
 led, they must follow. Never again would they be their 
 own for a single hour. It was a true instinct which 
 made Peter combine in consecutive clauses and as 
 equivalent phrases the 'left all' and the 'followed Thee.' 
 An entire detachment from all that had made and been 
 the old life was the very condition and meaning of the 
 new. To leave house and lands, brethren and sisters, 
 father and mother, wife and children, for Christ's sake 
 and the gospel's, was the solemn act of self-dedication, 
 the very sign and sacrament of discipleship, by which a 
 new convert cut himself off from the Judaism or from 
 the heathenism (as the case might be) in which he had
 
 376 An hundredfold [xxi. 
 
 heretofore lived and moved and had his being. It was 
 just what a man of the highest caste in India has to do 
 at this day if he can make up his mind (and no wonder 
 if in such cases it is a rare thing) to adopt Christianity. 
 Every commonest act of his life has been connected 
 with the worship of an idol deity : and to tell him that 
 you will excuse him from giving up caste, that you will 
 allow him to be a Brahmin and yet a Christian, is some- 
 thing much beyond the permission to bow himself now 
 and then in the house of Rimmon : it is a licence to 
 combine in perpetuity the service of Christ and the 
 service of Belial, to be an habitual partaker at once 
 of the table of the Lord and of the table of devils. The 
 man must leave all, if he is to follow Christ. 
 
 No doubt, when the Christian church began to plant 
 itself everywhere, with its congregations and commu- 
 nities regularly organized, so far from disturbing social 
 order or breaking up family connexions, it tended rather 
 to confirm and consolidate each. Every word of the 
 epistles implies the recognition of all existing relation- 
 ships, and the continuance of every believer in the 
 condition and circumstances in which he was called. 
 Husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and 
 slaves, all were to remain as Christ found them, only 
 bringing into each duty and each relation a consecrating 
 motive and a sanctifying principle. The gospel came 
 to transfigure, not to revolutionize; to remodel spiritually, 
 not ostensibly, the various functions and institutions of 
 society. Henceforth the literal leaving all was to be the 
 higher effort, the more ambitious enterprise, of certain 
 exceptional ministries. The man who amidst the refine- 
 ments of a well-appointed home or the proprieties of a
 
 xxi.] now in this time. 377 
 
 nicely ordered parish hears within him the voice of 
 Jesus Christ, bidding him to carry the gospel across sea 
 and land into some region where all is still confusion 
 and darkness, enters literally into the experience of 
 apostles of old, who could say humbly and thankfully 
 to the Saviour who chose and sent, ' Lo, we have left all 
 and have followed Thee.' Doubtless too there are many 
 who ought to hear this voice and will not. Doubtless, 
 both in the choice of professions, and in the subsequent 
 choice of places and circumstances of service, there is 
 still in us all a niceness and a fastidiousness, a self- 
 sparing and a self-pleasing, which is effeminate, cowardly, 
 and therefore anti-Christian. We use far too lightly the 
 word 'impossible.' We pick and we choose far too 
 daintily amongst alternatives presented. We refuse to 
 count amongst the alternatives all that is rough and 
 hard, and therefore perhaps the more Christ-like, in the 
 answers to that enquiry which yet we all profess to 
 open, or we could not write ourselves Christians, 'What 
 shall I do, Lord? What wilt Thou have me to 
 do?' 
 
 There are some present in this congregation whose 
 lives are not yet shaped as to the particular calling. 
 They cannot too soon or too seriously remember that, in 
 this age and in this country at least, literally ' the field 
 is the world.' The possibilities of service are unbounded. 
 Let no silly sneers, let no infidel taunts, prevail to 
 suggest to you that the gospel of Jesus Christ has lost 
 its old strength and life for evangelizing, that the 
 mission-field is effete and sterile, or that the living 
 Saviour has in any respect modified what have been 
 aptly called His church's marching orders, ' Go ye into
 
 An hundredfold 
 
 all the world make all the nations disciples' and then, 
 and in so doing, ' Lo, I am with you ahvay.' 
 
 But here, speaking from this pulpit, and after a week 
 so memorable in reference to this more apostolical work, 
 this indeed divine life, no tone of address seems so 
 suitable as that of intense thankfulness to the Author 
 and Giver of every perfect gift for the grace which He 
 has bestowed and for the prospect which He has opened. 
 The lives which have given and are giving themselves 
 to the Cambridge Delhi Mission are described, by those 
 who know, as the very salt and light of our society. 
 And yet we grudge them not to India. For we know 
 that, in this as in all sacrifices made for Christ's sake 
 and the gospel's, to keep is to lose, and to give is to 
 have. From every such self-dedication another springs, 
 and another, and another: life generates life, in spiritual 
 things, as surely as death breeds death : such men bear 
 away with them from amongst us influences which we 
 can ill spare, but (with Elisha of old) we ' see ' them as 
 they are taken, and lo, ' a double portion of their spirit ' 
 rests upon those who stay. 
 
 For the rest of us, for whom it is too late to rearrange 
 the life, or to whom it is not given to dream of mag- 
 nificent sacrifices, it must suffice and this shall not 
 lack its blessing to stretch after them the hands of 
 sympathetic interest and of bountiful aid ; to keep alive 
 amongst ourselves the flame of that zeal for gospel 
 progress which has borne them hence in person ; to see 
 that there be no lack of offerings head, heart, and 
 hand to cherish and to subsidize ; so that they may 
 never doubt, in their far-off" mission, the memory or 
 the love of that University whose sons and whose
 
 xxi.] now in this time. 379 
 
 ambassadors they are, and that there may be a con- 
 tinuous succession (God grant it) of devout and devoted 
 men to strengthen their hands living, and, as the need 
 shall arise, to be baptized for the dead. 
 
 In comparison with such enterprises of faith and 
 devotion, it may seem a small thing to speak of the 
 less definite but not less real self-dedications which are 
 certainly within our reach ; the leaving all, in heart and 
 will, for Christ's sake and the gospel's ; the marking 
 every treasure and every possession, intellectual or 
 material, with the true ' Corban,' which is, 'Holiness to 
 the Lord;' the so subordinating every taste and every 
 affection as that we shall remember and not forget Him 
 in each ; the bringing every thought and every attach- 
 ment into captivity (as St Paul writes) to Jesus Christ 
 and Him crucified. Whoso does this does all : he 
 too is a servant and an apostle : he too hath in spirit 
 left house and lands for Jesus : he too shall receive 
 an hundredfold in this life and in the life to 
 come. 
 
 This is the discipleship. Now for its compensations. 
 Our Lord divides them. There is a compensation in the 
 present 'now in this time.' The nature of it is remarkable. 
 'He shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, 
 and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and 
 lands.' The very language shows the promise figurative. 
 We have read it perhaps as quite vague 'shall receive 
 something instead, something which shall reconcile him 
 to the loss, of all these.' An inward peace, suppose 
 a sense of God reconciled an appreciation of the little- 
 ness of things temporal a growing deepening appre- 
 hension of things invisible and eternal.
 
 380 An hundredfold [xxi. 
 
 Is there not something besides something more 
 precise, more peculiar in this promise ? 
 
 Brothers, sisters, mothers, children an hundredfold, 
 each and all of these, now, in this time no mere 
 equivalent, in the dim shadowy future, for the sacrifice 
 of them here ? Surely the speech is concerning that 
 wonderful feature of the blessed gospel the brotherly, 
 sisterly, filial, parental love (as the case may be) which 
 is between Christians as Christians; that love which 
 Christ Himself inaugurated in the words which He 
 uttered in figure concerning Himself, 'Who is my 
 mother, and who are my brethren ? Whosoever shall 
 do the will of God, the same is my brother, and my 
 sister, and my mother.' It is so with His disciples. He 
 who once makes up his mind to be Christ's entirely and 
 in everything must expect, must be prepared, to leave 
 all for Him. All that was of nature, all that is of 
 choice father and mother, brother and sister, friend 
 closer than a brother, sweet presence of wife or child 
 all these, in will at least, perhaps in act, he will have to 
 surrender. They may fall off from him, in feeling, or 
 by death. He may have to sever the tie, because Christ 
 bids him go, or because they will not follow him for 
 Christ. But he shall have compensation. There is a 
 family no man can number it in earth and heaven, 
 of which he becomes a member when he becomes a 
 Christian. God is its Father, Christ is its Head ; holy 
 angels are its elder brothers ; saints, martyrs, and 
 apostles, all good men dead and living, are its inmates 
 and its kinsfolk ; earth is its compass, heaven is its 
 home : and whosoever believes in Christ, whosoever has 
 the Holy Spirit in him, enters at once upon the affections
 
 XXL] now in this time. 381 
 
 and the sympathies of all these : every Christian whom 
 he meets and whom he works with is his brother or 
 his sister : every Christian matron who cheers him by 
 her womanly kindness is his mother, and every Christian 
 boy whom he influences by his manly love is straightway 
 his child : extend, expand this kinsmanship through all 
 space and all time, and you will see why Jesus Christ 
 should say that the man who gives up or is willing to 
 give up the natural wins a hundredfold in the spiritual 
 is a richer man, even in relationships, than he was or 
 could be without Christ may well say, as he sets off 
 earth against heaven, I am the gainer beyond words 
 those things which were my prizes and my treasures, 
 ' I count them all but dross and loss for Christ.' 
 
 Delightful must it have been, to the great heart of 
 St Paul, w r hen his name was cast out as evil by family 
 and country, to find wheresoever he carried the Name 
 a new brotherhood and sisterhood created for him. 
 'Phoebe our sister... Andronicus and Junias my kins- 
 men... Gaius mine host, and Ouartus my brother... Rufus 
 chosen in the Lord, and her who is his mother and 
 mine ' thus he runs through, in a letter to one church 
 not yet visited, the list of his new, his Christian rela- 
 tions : we feel, as we read, the force of the ' hundredfold 
 now in this time:' we begin to understand the text 
 as something having indeed 'the promise of this life:' 
 we pause perhaps, and scarcely (I think) with tearless 
 eyes, at that one anonymous title, 'his mother and mine :' 
 one faithful woman in the Roman congregation her 
 name surely is in the book of life had the honour 
 above all honour to be a ' mother ' to that toiling, yearn- 
 ing, most loving, most loveable man.
 
 382 An hundredfold [xxi. 
 
 This is that 'love of the brethren' of which St John 
 writes that without it life itself is death. We talk much 
 of charity; we sing its praises as the synonym of good 
 nature, of toleration, of vagueness, too often of indiffer- 
 ence: too often we do not pass to it, as alone we can 
 safely pass, through this other through the love of the 
 brethren. 'Add,' St Peter says, 'to brotherly kindness 
 charity.' 'Supply' the one, he says in his own Greek, 
 ' through ' the other. Let the love of Christian for 
 Christian expand and spread itself till it embraces 
 Greek and barbarian, till it loves for the sake of Christ 
 even those unloving ones for whom nevertheless Christ 
 died. 
 
 But before even this true charity stands the family 
 love of the church. Let us make more of this. There 
 are lonely people on this great earth how could this 
 be if they knew of the text, if they read, if they pleaded 
 it? Health, position, circumstance, accident, may debar 
 them from its full fruition. They live perhaps alone, 
 and must live, so far as the speech and the sight go, not 
 only of the natural but of the spiritual brotherhood. 
 Still, when they think of it ; when they know that only 
 the speech or the sight is wanting; when they remember 
 the great universe, the visible and the invisible, instinct 
 and teeming with this sympathy, which is, being inter- 
 preted, God's love reflected and echoed everywhere in 
 the love of God can they not take courage ? Lost 
 brother and sister, lost father and mother, replaced a 
 hundredfold now in this time only just out of sight 
 hereafter to be manifested, in all the beauty and in all the 
 plenitude of the everlasting home shall it not comfort? 
 Every act of worship a meeting of this family; every
 
 XXL] now in this time. 383 
 
 prayer, every aspiration, an exercise of this sympathy, 
 a prognostication of this union well might St John 
 write, 'We know that we have passed into life, because 
 we love the brethren,' and then conversely, lest any 
 should torture himself as to his possession of this 
 evidential love, ' By this we know that we love the 
 children of God, when we love God.' Either of the two 
 loves so intertwined, so inseparable, are they shall 
 attest, shall prove them both. 
 
 The festival on which we are assembled is the festival 
 of brotherly love. Two apostles, brothers perhaps first 
 by birth, brothers (it may have been) of the Lord Him- 
 self by birth, have separately left all for His sake and 
 the gospel's ; and they have found themselves again 
 brothers,, to Him and to each other, not after the flesh 
 but after the spirit. The church has wedded the names 
 in one commemoration, as the perpetual symbol of the 
 consecrated ' two and two.' ' He sent his disciples,' He 
 sends them still, 'two and two before His face into every 
 city and place whither He Himself would come.' It is 
 thus that Cambridge has constituted her Delhi Mission. 
 I quote the words : ' Many advantages may be expected 
 from sending out an organized band of men prepared 
 to live and labour together in one foreign field con- 
 centration of effort and subdivision of labour, continuity 
 of teaching, economy of means, leisure for literary work 
 (in reaching through the press the educated classes of 
 India), and frequent opportunities of united devotion.' 
 
 These are the tones to brace and cheer 
 
 The lonely watcher of the fold, 
 When nights are dark, and foemen near, 
 
 When visions fade and hearts grow cold.
 
 384 An hundredfold [xxi. 
 
 Brethren, let us resolve you more especially whose 
 life is still young you who can do so much to give the 
 tone to the religion, to the theology, of a generation 
 which shall take our place on God's earth never to 
 narrow this love. Let us never refuse a share of it to 
 any one who will have it. Let us rejoice in the thought 
 that the kingdom is wider than our knowledge, grander 
 and more generous than our stipulations. ' Firstfruits of 
 His creatures,' this is our designation. Let us hope, 
 and let us pray, that, ' if the firstfruits are holy,' so shall 
 be ' the lump.' Lord, hasten it in Thy time. 
 
 In this vast field of thought much must be left 
 unnoticed. Of two things passed over I am conscious. 
 
 'With persecutions.' Note that characteristic candour 
 of the gospel, first exemplified by its Lord, which will 
 entrap no man into His service; which will set full in 
 view before each one of us the sorrows and the sacrifices, 
 and then say, Count well the cost ; but, if you do put 
 your hand to the plough, look not back. 
 
 Also that overwhelming word in which all is summed 
 up, 'And in the world to come eternal life.' This one 
 thing is less for speech than for silence. 'No man hath 
 ascended up into heaven,' that he should come back to 
 say to his brethren, 'I saw the holy city,' arid lo, it is 
 this, and this. 
 
 We must turn to things less high above out of our 
 sight, and remind you of a practical duty, which I have 
 to-day, as in many past years, to press earnestly upon 
 your attention. 
 
 The University dwells in a town, and the church of 
 the town is a suppliant to-day to the church of the 
 University. Christians with Christians plead not ever
 
 xxi.] now in this time. 385 
 
 in vain ; and assuredly the town, if in some sense 
 injuriously affected in past time by the near neighbour- 
 hood of much carelessness and some licentiousness, is 
 now deeply the debtor of the University, not more 
 for substantial prosperity than for noble magnificent 
 Christian example. 
 
 Of all the signs of spiritual vitality in our beloved 
 University I count none so conclusive as its efforts, 
 of the last half century and conspicuously of the last ten 
 years, in behalf of the spiritual life of the town. A few 
 days ago you were celebrating the jubilee of the Uni- 
 versity Sunday school for the poor children of Cambridge. 
 A touching festival of song and thanksgiving commemo- 
 rated on that occasion the advent and the sacrifice of 
 'God with us ;' and no heart that could feel was insensible 
 that day to the realization of the Emmanuel presence 
 in the work of those young men young when they 
 wrought in it, now of hoar hairs many of them, and 
 many fallen on sleep who gave of their precious hours, 
 of their intervals of anxious intellectual labour, in the 
 fifty years that are passed, to the enterprise of evangel- 
 izing Cambridge through its little ones and through its 
 homes. 
 
 In comparison with such proofs of a personal devotion 
 where shall we place the mere struggling to listen to a 
 popular voice, the mere crowding of churches where 
 either ritual, song, or preaching exercises a powerful 
 attraction upon sympathetic assemblies ? 
 
 To-day you are reminded of a movement of our own 
 
 generation to maintain additional ministers for the poor 
 
 parishes of Barnwell and Chesterton ; in other words, to 
 
 carry the preaching of the gospel into the streets and 
 
 v. 25
 
 386 An hundredfold [XXL 
 
 lanes of these suburbs by the instrumentality of faithful 
 men acting in entire conformity with the rules of apo- 
 stolical order. It is an evidence, second not even to 
 that which has been named, of the awakening zeal and 
 love of the University towards its less privileged neigh- 
 bours. I would bid you to study the records pf the 
 movement, to thank God for it, and then to help it 
 as you can with your sympathy, your alms, your 
 prayers. 
 
 I am bound to tell you that very much of its efficiency 
 for the year that is now running its course will depend 
 upon the offerings of your bounty to-day. Nothing 
 would be easier than for this congregation to place it 
 by a single effort beyond risk and beyond anxiety. 
 More than once I have ventured to ask you and once 
 at least you kindly listened to me to take care that the 
 collection at these doors should not fall short of a 
 hundred pounds. Less than this will leave us still in 
 suspense, still pondering the sad question which of our 
 grants to those four destitute parishes must be with- 
 drawn, diminished, or left in arrear. And think with 
 yourselves, dear brethren, how small a sacrifice it would 
 cost you, of anything that you really value as intelligent 
 Christian men, to make such an offering this afternoon 
 as would represent but two shillings apiece from the 
 great congregation which I look upon from this 
 pulpit. 
 
 It is very interesting, and to Christian hearts very 
 encouraging, to notice how the supply of one spiritual 
 want leads on to the demand for another; how, when 
 you have given a pastor, the people cry out for a 
 church, and by that second cry tell you that their souls
 
 xxi.] now in this time. 387 
 
 thank and bless you for having heard or for having 
 anticipated the first. 
 
 We have been reading last week the account of the 
 reopening of a great Cathedral, in which, at an interval 
 of five centuries, a new nave has been added to the old 
 choir, so that the fabric stands out at last in all the com- 
 pleteness and grandeur of its original design. On a 
 small scale indeed, but with a more urgent necessity, 
 we would ask you for a like work of perfecting in a 
 church of this town. The church of St Barnabas is 
 still a fragment, a naveless chancel : the people throng 
 that little area : they want space for worshippers that 
 would be will you help to give it them? Will you 
 come forward, those 'in whom such a heart is,' and 
 collect for this work, in your colleges, and among your 
 friends ? 
 
 O the blessedness of work done for Jesus Christ! 
 Done in sincerity, done in simplicity, done in love, it 
 shall not lack its reward. 'An hundredfold now in this 
 time in the world to come ' who shall measure it ? 
 
 When Jesus Christ uttered the glorious promise on 
 which we have dwelt, He thought it necessary to couple 
 it with one caution. I would humbly follow that divine 
 example, and say one closing word upon the verse 
 following the text 
 
 ' But many that are first shall be last, and the last 
 first.' 
 
 It is a caution, and it is an encouragement. Both 
 were needed then : Peter himself needed both ; the one 
 on the instant, when he was boasting ; the other, a few 
 weeks after, when he was bitterly weeping: can either 
 this or that be needless here to-day? 
 
 25 2
 
 388 An hundredfold [xxi. 
 
 'Many shall be first last.' Where is boasting? 
 
 How sudden, how insidious, is the entrance of the 
 foe. The very consciousness of standing is of the 
 nature of a fall. The very thought, ' God, I thank Thee,' 
 may be the Pharisee worship that prayerless thanks- 
 giving which goes not home justified. 
 
 There are those who once ran well : who or what 
 hath hindered them ? what special weakness, indolence, 
 temptation ? God knoweth yes, they know. To-day 
 they are laggards, sluggards, rebels, renegades. Shall they 
 rise again ? Shall that stupid sleep, that deadly lust, that 
 fatal infidelity, ever be shaken off, cast out, recovered 
 from ? Shall they one day be pleading O let it be this 
 night pleading in their own behalf the promise, 'Many 
 shall be last first?' 
 
 Whose memory can adduce no instance of this ? 
 That young boy, once so light-hearted and joyous 
 you saw him play, you heard him jest, in the days of his 
 ignorance : you were then the serious one ; you augured 
 ill perhaps for his hereafter: in early youth you lost 
 sight of him where is he now ? A Christian soldier, 
 a Christian missionary, a Christian martyr ; rejoicing in 
 Christ here, or sleeping in Christ for long years in some 
 rough Crimean or Indian or African grave. 
 
 But we all want the prophecy want it for the safe 
 standing, want it for the possible rising 'Many that are 
 last shall be first.' 
 
 What morning breaks upon me not among the hind- 
 most ? When is the morning prayer light-hearted, when 
 is the evening prayer jubilant, for any one of us ? O, if 
 the hope were only for the hopeful, if the race were only 
 to the swift, if the battle only to the strong, who, who
 
 XXL] now in this time. 389 
 
 could persevere ? It is the thought of Him who stooped 
 from His heaven of holiness and of glory to fetch the 
 distant nigh and to say ' Last first ' it is this which 
 keeps me so much as struggling. ' Lord, I believe ; help 
 Thou mine unbelief this is my best. He casts not 
 out this : He seems to bid even this look upward. 
 
 Then let us love Him for His great love. He came 
 not to call the righteous : then perhaps He came to call 
 even me.
 
 XXII. 
 
 THREE TYPES OF CHARACTER ENTHUSIASM, 
 RELUCTANCE, COMPROMISE. 
 
 St Luke ix. 62. 
 
 No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, 
 is fit for the kingdom of God, 
 
 THIS verse, like the third of the three narratives 
 which it closes, is found only in St Luke. It gives 
 great completeness to that exhibition of human character 
 in its dealing with Christ and the gospel which is the 
 subject of the paragraph. 'That the thoughts of many 
 hearts may be revealed ' is stated by the old man, hold- 
 ing in his arms the infant Saviour, as the purpose, no 
 less than the result, of that 'gainsaying' which, he 
 prophesied, should everywhere attend Him. We have 
 here the thoughts of three hearts revealed : and seeing 
 that human nature is the same in all times, and that the 
 treatment of Jesus Christ is in reality the test of all 
 lives, and that there are here before me a number of 
 young lives yet to be shaped and moulded as to their 
 course and as to their destination, I trust that a few 
 plain words may not be unseasonable this afternoon 
 upon the three characters delineated in this passage 
 of the book of God for perpetual conviction, correction, 
 and education in righteousness.
 
 xxii.] Three Types of Character, &c. 391 
 
 i. In the first instance we have an example of 
 that enthusiasm which Jesus Christ awakened, by His 
 teaching, character, and presence, in hearts capable of 
 appreciating the true, the great, the beautiful, the 
 divine. If St Luke gives the right place to this inci- 
 dent, we might imagine that it was our Lord's language 
 about the Samaritan village His rebuke to the two 
 brothers who would call fire from heaven to avenge its 
 inhospitable conduct His saying, 'Ye know not what 
 manner of spirit ye are of; for the Son of Man is not 
 come to destroy men's lives, but to save them' which 
 elicited this eager and chivalrous proposal, ' Lord, I will 
 follow Thee whithersoever Thou goest.' 
 
 But it needed not one particular manifestation of the 
 glory and beauty of Jesus Christ to account for that 
 outburst of devotion. It must have been the feeling of 
 a thousand hearts, as men tracked His footsteps along 
 the lanes and hill-sides of Galilee, and listened day by 
 day to the gracious words which proceeded out of His 
 mouth. We know what it is, in poor human experience, 
 to feel the whole soul stirred within us by the sight of a 
 life wholly given to the service of God in charity, or by 
 the hearing of words of loving entreaty from lips evidently 
 giving forth that which was a life before it was a doctrine. 
 We know how one man devoting himself to the cause of 
 Christ, in India, in Africa, in New Zealand, has had 
 power to draw after him by the magnet of sympathy 
 tens and hundreds of other men, whose souls were of 
 that higher order, in point of love and in point of purity, 
 which can respond to a call not of this world, and find 
 it none the less persuasive if it demands of them the 
 sacrifice of their all. Judge ye, from this experience,
 
 392 Three 7}fles of Character- [xxn. 
 
 what must have been, to hearts capable of it, the 
 influence of Jesus Christ present in person to point the 
 way, and able without presumption to propose Himself 
 to His hearers as at once the guide and the companion, 
 the light of the living and the life of the dead. 
 
 There are those can we doubt it ? amongst the 
 occupants of these galleries, who have many times in 
 these last ten or fifteen years felt just the impulse of 
 this young scribe. There have been days of cloudless 
 beauty, in the world of nature and in the world of 
 feeling, when they have longed for a satisfying love and 
 an open heaven. There have been days of strong con- 
 viction, of powerful impression, of resolute effort, when 
 they have aspired to a noble life, and none the less 
 if it should have in it the abandonment of luxury and 
 the treading underfoot of fame. There have been days 
 of deep sorrow, of felt loneliness, it may be of secret 
 self-shame, when they could have given their all, on the 
 instant, for one word with the holy and merciful Saviour, 
 who is said to have said on earth, 'Come unto me all ye 
 that are weary and heavy laden' and, 'If any man 
 thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.' 
 
 And they know and feel this day, in their heart and 
 in their soul, that such moments were not their worst 
 but their best ; not moments to be ashamed of, but 
 moments in which God was moving in them to quicken 
 the very life which would make them God-like. O 
 compare with such moments the intervening months 
 and years of stupid droning, silly trifling, or cowardly 
 sinning. Pray that such moments may come again to 
 you. Pray that the cry may rise again to your lips, as 
 you plan the long life, as you forecast the infinite
 
 xxii. J Enthusiasm, Reluctance, Compromise. 393 
 
 future, ' Lord, I will follow Thee whithersoever Thou 
 goest.' 
 
 And yet in this context that prayer is not welcomed. 
 We are reminded again and again, in reading the 
 gospels, first of the fragmentary, and secondly of the 
 parabolical character of the evangelic history. Men 
 come and go, appear and disappear, speak and are 
 silent, without one word to tell us the whence and the 
 whither, the significance of the speech or the signifi- 
 cance of the silence. It is so in all Scripture. We are 
 not intended to settle the question of questions for 
 dead men any more than for the living. Each actor 
 on the stage of the Bible has his part, and he plays 
 it. He speaks for admonition, in some way and in 
 some sense; but he tarries not to be interrogated con- 
 cerning his history as a whole, or concerning his destiny 
 in the judgment. 
 
 It is so with this scribe. Whether he spoke un- 
 advisedly and was rebuffed by Christ's answer or 
 whether he laid to heart the warning and yet stood 
 to his offer or whether he departed for the time, but 
 went to return this we know not. There is parable in 
 miracle there is parable too in history: as parable we 
 best read it, because then its lessons are for all time, 
 and the lifeless page becomes a voice vocal to the 
 living. 
 
 Thou sayest and they are good words 'Lord, I will 
 follow Thee.' But hast thou thought of this the unrest 
 of the Christian 'following?' 'Foxes have holes, birds 
 of the air have nests ; only the Son of Man hath not 
 where to lay His head.' 
 
 We must not add or diminish where Jesus Christ has
 
 394 Three Types of Character [xxn. 
 
 spoken. This is His own description of the homeless- 
 ness of His life of ministry. Once He had a home. 
 We picture Him to ourselves, during all those long 
 years of preparation for His work, the central object 
 in a home of humble industry but of sleepless love. 
 This home He had left, for charity and for ministry, 
 for man and God. Now He had no home. Such 
 attention as was shown, by Pharisee from one motive, 
 by the sisters of Bethany from another motive, He 
 accepted when it offered itself: but many days there 
 was none such, and that absence also of service He 
 accepted in its season. He who would follow Him 
 must share with Him the service, and the lack of service 
 hast thou counted the cost ? 
 
 Brethren, we read the parable of .the homelessness of 
 Jesus Christ as preparing us, His disciples now, for a 
 life, I will not say of restlessness, but I will say, of 
 unrest. It is the trial of trials to His people. Want 
 of home is nothing to it. O, it is the feeling of being 
 wanderers, not in the letter but in the spirit, which 
 makes the Christian life hard. For some indeed it 
 fulfils itself quite literally. There are those still 
 blessed be God for it who will go forth ' taking 
 nothing' purse, scrip, and staff forgotten that they 
 may just follow the footsteps of Jesus Christ. There 
 is a Bishop now in Australia I saw him consecrated 
 more than thirty years ago in Westminster Abbey he 
 has never seen England since that year : childless, wife- 
 less, homeless, he has just been the missionary bishop, 
 living for Christ and His people: now he is struck down 
 by paralysis he will die there. These are the men who 
 in act as well as in will, in the letter as well as in the
 
 XXIL] Enthusiasm, Reluctance, Compromise. 395 
 
 spirit, follow Christ whithersoever He goeth. ' The Son 
 of Man hath not where to lay His head' wilt thou follow 
 Him everywhere ? Think of it twice ere thou speakest 
 the 'whithersoever.' Think of it twice yes, but think of 
 it. It is a blessed life blessed, and rich in blessing. 
 
 We shall not escape the unrest by escaping the home- 
 lessness. All who speak the word, ' Lord, I will follow,' 
 must lay their account for this trial. You may think 
 you have found your rest : perhaps in some English 
 parsonage, beautiful and homelike ; within reach of 
 dear friends, and surrounded by an attached people. 
 Perhaps in a well digested system of traditional 
 theology ; text balanced by text, authorities well 
 weighed, and a long line of worthies attesting the 
 correctness of the Shibboleth and the completeness ot 
 the doctrine. Perhaps in the full assurance either of a 
 baptismal regeneration needing only to be lived up to, 
 or else of a conscious conversion to which you can 
 assign both place and hour, both source and course. 
 Thus you may be saying, The outward homelessness 
 may come to me, if God will ; but the inward rest is 
 sure : ' I shall never be moved ; Thou, Lord, of Thy 
 goodness hast made my hill so strong.' 
 
 Enjoy, while you may, Christian scribe, the rest and 
 the home, outward or inward. Yet mark Christ's words, 
 ' The Son of Man hath not where to lay His head.' 
 Read His words spiritually, and be prepared I say but 
 this be prepared to find thy moorings shifted and thy 
 cables severed ; to find, if thou wilt open thine ears, 
 many voices in them, compelling thee to enquire ; to 
 find, if thou wilt open thine heart, many voices in it, 
 saying, ' This is not thy rest : ' not here, not here is
 
 396 Three Types of Character [xxn. 
 
 absolute quietness ; not here, not here is the perfect 
 peace. The trial of the Christian is the homelessness 
 of Jesus. 'Always bearing about in the body' the 
 unrest of the Master, that the rest also of the Master 
 may be manifested in the storm-tossed soul. 
 
 Enthusiasm is one of the ' thoughts of hearts ' revealed 
 by contact with Jesus. He meets it with warning. None 
 shall come after Him by mistake or in misunderstand- 
 ing. 'The Son of Man hath not where to lay His head,' 
 and they that would follow Him must expect to fare 
 likewise. The true ' enthusiast,' which is to say, the 
 man who has the fire of God in him, will come, for 
 all that : nay, the very repulsion has attraction in it ; 
 ' the servant is not greater than his Lord,' and he would 
 not rest while his Lord wanders. 
 
 2. The next case is the direct opposite. St Luke 
 alone gives it its full significance by assigning the 
 initiative here to Christ. ' He said unto another, Fol- 
 low me.' And the man makes excuse. 
 
 Even upon earth there was sovereignty in the voice of 
 Jesus Christ. 'When thou comest in Thy kingdom,' were 
 words addressed to Him on the cross. ' Thou sayest 
 that I am a king,' was His own answer to His judge. 
 
 Thus was it in that call by which He gathered to 
 Him His twelve apostles. One day He passed by the 
 counting-house of a rich official; spoke the word, 'Follow 
 me,' to a man as little expecting it, as little prepared for 
 it, as any one of you, rising from his bed this morning, 
 was prepared for a summons to America or to China : 
 and there was that in the tone which carried authority 
 as well as persuasion, and the person addressed instantly 
 abandoned his gainful calling, and after one solemn
 
 XXIL] Enthusiasm, Reluctance, Compromise. 397 
 
 feast of farewell and welcome became one of His disciples, 
 one of the apostles, at last one of the evangelists, of the 
 Man who had not where to lay His head. Sovereignty 
 was in the summons, and the heart heard it. 
 
 Some such preferment was offered in the case before 
 us. The gracious, the awful 'Follow me' was spoken, 
 and the man accosted by it was bidden to enter that 
 innermost circle which was first to take the impress, and 
 then to represent the likeness, of God manifested in 
 the flesh. 
 
 The call which was not for the enthusiast was for him. 
 Wonderful discrimination ! This man wants what the 
 other required not, a startling demand for an instan- 
 taneous decision. This man was halting between two 
 opinions. Sovereignty itself speaks here to an ambigu- 
 ous subject. The grandest of careers is opened before 
 this life. But there is an impediment 
 
 We take the reply literally, and conceive of this person 
 as having left in his home the lifeless body of a father, to 
 which it is a primary duty to pay the rites of burial. It 
 may have been to soothe the sorrow of that recent part- 
 ing that he had mingled with the crowd surrounding the 
 Saviour. The voice of Jesus has ever had music in it 
 for the mourner : the brief pause between the death and 
 the funeral could not better be filled than by a visit 
 to the Man of sorrows, who made Himself felt also, 
 before He verbally claimed the title, as the resurrec- 
 tion and the life. 
 
 How natural then we must say it that the 'Follow 
 me ' should elicit the answer, itself submissive and 
 reverent, ' Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my 
 father.' Nature prompts, duty requires, religion orders,
 
 398 Three Types of Character [xxn. 
 
 that in death as in life a son should honour his father : 
 how can Christ, Himself the best of sons, Himself even 
 from the cross caring for His mother, hesitate to say, 
 'Go and do it,' even if He should add in the same breath, 
 ' Then return and follow?' Which of us has not felt the 
 severity of that hard saying, ' Let the dead bury their 
 dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God?' 
 Has the tenderness of Jesus Christ for once left Him ? 
 Has He who wept at the grave which He was instantly 
 to open no word of sympathy for this orphan son, 
 nothing but the harsh order to dash away his tears and 
 go and preach ? Even the ordained man, pledged once, 
 twice, and thrice to the church's ministry, counts it no 
 lack of service if he gives a Sunday of silence to the 
 memory of a lost wife or child, feels that this silence 
 may preach more eloquently to the living than a 
 hundred sermons, is itself a tribute of reverence to the 
 Master who both gives and takes away. Yet that 
 Master speaks here in other tones, ' Let the dead bury 
 their dead go thou, and preach.' 
 
 We presume not to say what special reasons there 
 may have been in this instance for a peremptoriness 
 which could brook no delay. But of this we are sure, 
 that Jesus Christ is here teaching us in parable, and 
 that we can all, if we will, hear Him. 
 
 There is one thing, He says, yet more important than 
 any competing or conflicting duty. That one thing is 
 the reign of God in man's heart, and the establishment 
 of that reign first of all in thine own. Be jealous of 
 anything which comes to thee saying, 'Christ may call, 
 but listen first to me.' This thing may take the shape 
 of duty. It may parade before thee wishes, conveniences,
 
 xxii.] Enthusiasm, Reluctance, Compromise. 399 
 
 comforts of friends, when the voice is strong in thee for 
 missionary service. It may expostulate with thee as 
 concerning old age, infirm health, tender affection, in 
 one who instrumentally gave thee being and has a right 
 in thee to every place but one. It may say, Wait but 
 the ten years, or the five years, which alone can separate 
 thee from the death and from the burial, and then follow 
 whithersoever He goeth. 
 
 And we know, brethren, how deep is the love of 
 Christ for earth's affections, which He created, which He 
 consecrated, which He felt. O, it is not because a 
 particular ministry or a particular mission is painful to 
 those near and dear to us, that therefore it is Christ's 
 call. He would not have one real duty neglected, or 
 one willing wound inflicted, or one wanton void created, 
 on the plea that He has spoken and must be obeyed. 
 Me'n deceive themselves sometimes in this direction, and 
 misname wilfulness sacrifice and cruelty Christianity. 
 
 But this is not so common as another delinquency; 
 which is, the ingenuity of discovering obstacles, the 
 fertility of multiplying impediments, in the way of 
 visible openings, clear calls, and conscious capacities. 
 It is not necessary that a whole family of sons should 
 all remain in sight of ever so dear a home. It is not 
 reasonable that they who reconcile themselves to the 
 gift of one child to military service or commercial enter- 
 prise, knowing that it may involve long, perhaps life- 
 long separations perils perhaps of premature death, 
 in the accidents, by sea and land, of distant duty 
 should only count it impossible to spare another to 
 Christ Himself; should only plead, 'Suffer him first 
 to bury his father,' when the devotion asked is 'for
 
 4OO Three Types of Character [xxn. 
 
 Christ's sake and the gospel's/ and the work to be done 
 is the seeking in far-off islands of ' Christ's sheep that 
 are scattered abroad.' 
 
 Then it is that the stern mandate, 'Let the dead bury 
 their dead,' awakens into a righteous imperiousness 
 even if we hear it say, There is one thing more urgent 
 than a funeral, there is one relationship closer still than 
 the filial, there is one tie of duty more binding yet than 
 any natural. Let the dead bury themselves rather than 
 cause oblivion of that : at least leave the dead in soul to 
 bury the dead in body : at least leave for ever to a 
 world dead in sin that office which is so dear to it 
 of the mutual burying, heart helping heart to forget 
 the eternal, life encouraging life to deify the temporal. 
 
 Yes, Christ's sayings, as the psalmist says of God's 
 judgments, 'are a great deep.' They have in them a 
 thousand meanings, ten thousand applications : and 
 then first do we at all sound the depths of this saying, 
 when we read death itself spiritually, and understand 
 it to warn us against that kind of burying which is 
 the heaping high and higher upon each other the mould 
 of corrupt affection and inordinate passion, of the worship 
 of wealth and the idolatry of intellect, of the perpetual 
 postponement of seriousness, and the most deceptive 
 yet most persuasive insinuation, 'We have made a cove- 
 nant with death, and with hell are we at agreement.' 
 
 This is the very occupation of earth and earth's 
 children. Against this is the trumpet of the gospel 
 vainly sounded in ears which accept the word that 
 they may take out of it the meaning. Against this 
 'burying of their dead by the dead' no protest is one 
 half so efficacious as that of a new life entering into
 
 xxu.] Enthusiasm^ Reluctance^ Compromise. 401 
 
 some separately convinced soul ; a new self-dedication 
 to Christ's absolute service, at home or abroad, of one 
 who has heard with the inward ear His 'Follow me,' 
 and has been made 'willing in the day of His power' to 
 obey. 
 
 Then it shall matter little comparatively to the great 
 cause, whether this land or that land shall employ the 
 service ; whether it be given to the first evangelization 
 or the second to the annunciation of Christ where He 
 is not yet named, or to the task, of no inferior mag- 
 nitude, of making Christ real where for generations He 
 has been nominal. ' Follow me ' is a voice of infinite 
 compass : it will define itself in its season it may be 
 more than once over to the singly listening soul. 
 
 3. Enthusiasm cautioned, reluctance stimulated 
 what third 'heart's thought' remains for Christ's dis- 
 cipline ? 
 
 It is a character wonderfully composite which St Luke 
 here presents to us. It partakes of both the former. 
 Like the first, it volunteers to follow: like the second, 
 it petitions for delay. 'And another also said, Lord, 
 I will follow Thee ; but let me first go bid them fare- 
 well which are at home at my house.' 
 
 We have named the first character Enthusiasm, and 
 we have named the second character Reluctance : we 
 must call the third character Compromise. 
 
 This man offers to follow Jesus. Something, though 
 in fainter and slighter degree, of the attraction which 
 drew the young scribe has been felt also here. The 
 holy doctrine of the Saviour has awakened an echo in 
 the conscience: the moral beauty of the Saviour has 
 found its appreciation in the heart. 
 
 V. 26
 
 402 Three Types of Character [xx.u. 
 
 'Lord, I will follow Thee. Despised and rejected, 
 wanderer and exile, I will follow Thee. Thou hast 
 words of eternal life; my soul is athirst for them: yes, I 
 will follow Thee.' What lacks he yet ? 
 
 We say nothing of the omission of the 'whithersoever 
 Thou goest:' we take that as implied. It is not omission 
 that we notice, but addition. There is a clause here 
 which was not in the first. The volunteer stipulates, the 
 enthusiast procrastinates. He will follow 'but' he must 
 do one thing first. 
 
 Like the two brothers in the paragraph above, he 
 might have invoked the precedent of Elijah, who, 
 instead of rebuking, encouraged Elisha in this sort of 
 preliminary farewell ; even when he had cast upon him 
 the prophetic mantle said, 'What have I done to thee ?' 
 and granted instantly the request of natural duty, 'Let 
 me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother, and 
 then I will follow thee.' Just such was the prayer, 
 ' Lord, I will follow Thee but let me first go bid them 
 farewell which are at home at my house.' 
 
 But the prayer is not granted. Doubtless the Searcher 
 of hearts saw something in this heart which made the 
 adieu perilous. At all events, He was teaching for all 
 time ; and the parable for all time is this, 'No man, 
 having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, 
 is fit for the kingdom of God.' 
 
 There may be an impulse of good, which is short of a 
 resolution : there may be a resolution of good, which is 
 short of a principle : there may even be a principle 
 of good, which breaks down in practice. 'The spirit 
 may be willing, and yet the flesh weak.' We can- 
 not trust ourselves with these farewells, at least till
 
 xxii.] Enthusiasm, ReUictance, Compromise. 403 
 
 one question has been answered, Who are ' they at 
 home?' 
 
 Even natural affection, the purest and the most 
 human, has had power to divert from Christ's service, 
 in some difficult, some enterprising form, the heart that 
 had j ust sworn the ' sacrament.' There are those who 
 have put their hand to the plough, and then looked 
 back. There are young men, 1 pledged from childhood 
 to the ministry, who have broken that pledge at the 
 University. There are young clergymen, self-destined, 
 self-devoted, to the highest ministry, the work of the 
 foreign evangelist, who have found the spell of home, 
 the spell of love, too strong for them, and in the very 
 going to bid farewell have been seduced into a per- 
 manent looking back. There are men, young and old, 
 who have consecrated themselves to the church of the 
 world have ' set to their seal,' as well as ' put their 
 hand,' to the engagement of a life's sacrifice and have 
 found it impossible, with their measure of grace, to hold 
 the purpose and to be faithful to it till death. The 
 sands of earth, the fields of the church, are covered 
 with the print of these backward footsteps : they have 
 taken the romance out of missions ; they have lowered 
 the standard of the very word devotion. 
 
 Yet these men may have done nothing wrong. They 
 may have been good men ; not only 'saved as by fire' 
 with 'the work burned/ but leaving something done 
 towards the everlasting temple. 
 
 Compromise is scarcely the name for these with- 
 drawals. We go back to our question, Who are they 
 at the house, to whom the farewell must be spoken ere 
 the man can follow Jesus Christ ? 
 
 26 2
 
 404 Three Types of Character [xxn. 
 
 I know well enough that it is not only natural 
 affection which bars the way of devotion. There is 
 a procrastination strangely blending with enthusiasm, 
 and it has all manner of motives and all manner of 
 excuses. 
 
 It may be too much to suppose it is too much 
 certainly to take for granted that all we are in any 
 true sense so much as pledged and plighted to follow. 
 The word has not yet been spoken between us and 
 Christ, ' Lord, I will follow Thee.' A thousand doubts 
 have sprung up, and they have not been grappled with, 
 who and what Christ is whether indeed He is, except 
 it be as a temporary dweller in the past a saintly 
 name, a perfect life, a bright, for us a too bright, 
 example. Therefore we can have no dealing with 
 Him : we cannot treat with Him on the footing of the 
 ' I ' and 'Thou :' we cannot speak to the non-existent; 
 we cannot follow, save in most distant, most shadowy 
 imitation, One whose footsteps, now at least, go no 
 whither. 
 
 And yet there is that in us all which would give 
 worlds for just such a one. If He is not, there is a 
 blank, there is a void, there is a darkness which may 
 be felt. Thus much of evidence He has : without 
 this witness He has not left Himself. We count 
 it a proof above proofs, that, made as we are made, 
 there is an idea in us, there is an instinct in us, 
 there is a want in us, of Jesus Christ. ' Lord, to 
 whom shall we go if Thou be not ?' is an outcry of the 
 creature, eloquent of the Creator: that pure, that sublime 
 appetite for the God-Man in other words, for an in- 
 carnation of the divine is an argument, for such as
 
 XXIL] Enthusiastic Reluctance, Compromise. 405 
 
 believe in love, that the Father has revealed Himself in 
 the Son. 
 
 Thousands believe this could therefore deal with 
 Jesus Christ as the risen, the living One and yet 
 interpose something before the doing so. It is to these 
 the text speaks. 
 
 There is something in your home which cannot stay 
 there with Jesus ; something to which you must say 
 farewell ere you follow Him. What is it ? 
 
 There is something each day (who has not found 
 it so ?) between us and duty ; most of all, between us 
 and spiritual duty the duty of refreshing and strength- 
 ening the spirit by communion with the Father, of 
 seeking Him whom to know is eternal life. Mere indo- 
 lence of heart, mere laziness of body a book, a letter, 
 a newspaper, a moment's converse with a friend some- 
 thing there is which prompts the saying, ' I will follow 
 Thee, but just this first :' and of this too, this small, 
 this insignificant postponement, Christ says, It is unfit, 
 it is unsuitable, for a disciple of the kingdom. 
 
 But at certain periods of life (who has not found it 
 so ?) there is something more than this between us 
 and duty. ' Fearfully and wonderfully made,' is the 
 Psalmist's estimate of the mechanism of this body: yet 
 more true is it of the life. When is anything quite done 
 with, that has once been ? One incident of the life's 
 past one weakness, one folly, one sin how impor- 
 tunate, how imperishable, how immortal, is it. Ghosts 
 of old habit, when shall I have laid you ? Demons of 
 old sinning, when shall I have exorcised you ? These 
 are the things I had almost said, these are the 
 persons ' at home at my house,' to which I would
 
 406 Three Types of Character, &c. [xxii. 
 
 fain say farewell ere I finally devote myself. And in 
 that saying farewell there is oftentimes a looking back- 
 ward. Compromise may lurk in the stipulation, and 
 he that would follow Jesus can only make sure of it by 
 following on the instant. 
 
 Finally, there is a moment in each life, when it is 
 called to a decision of what kind and of what spirit it 
 will be. It is this which gives its peculiar solemnity 
 to a scene and to an occasion like the present. For 
 it is here, it is now, that lives are determining them- 
 selves, for this world and for that which is to come. 
 We ourselves can recall sermons preached forty years 
 since from the pulpit of a great University, of which the 
 echo is in us to this day and to this hour. It is not 
 given to all men to speak words of everlasting impres- 
 sion : but the cause of the impression is the reality of 
 the crisis ; and the crisis is ever new, so long as the young 
 life shall be repeating itself year by year in the old 
 places so long as God shall be sending forth His 
 Spirit to renew, and bidding each man of each gene- 
 ration go forth to his work and to his labour till the 
 evening. May it please Him, by any instrumentality, 
 to put forth His omnipotent grace in the determination 
 of multitudes of these lives for a service the noblest of 
 all and the most delightful. May a new enthusiasm, all 
 of grace, kill in us the lethargy of the self-pleasing, and 
 the reluctance of the half-heart. May we count the cost, 
 and yet follow may we put our hand to the plough, 
 and never look back. Let the dead past bury its dead, 
 and let the living responsible present sow for the ever- 
 lasting future an immortality of joy and glory.
 
 XXIII. 
 
 THE PROPER ATTITUDE FOR RELIGIOUS 
 ENQUIRY. 
 
 Psalm cxxxi. 2, 3. 
 
 / do not exercise myself in great matters, which are too high for me. 
 But I refrain my soul, and keep it low. 
 
 THE words are beautiful and suggestive. They speak 
 for themselves, as to their suitableness to this great 
 festival, the crowning day of the church's year and 
 not less to the life of souls training here for the service 
 of a generation and for the capability of an immortal 
 being. 
 
 It will not be necessary to enter to-day into the vexed 
 question of the title, 'A song of degrees/ prefixed to 
 each one of the fifteen psalms which follow immediately 
 upon the hundred and nineteenth. Whether it is a 
 musical term, or a poetical term, or a local term; 
 whether it points to some peculiarity in the chant to 
 which the psalm was to be set or to some peculiarity 
 in the composition, rising from point to point upon some 
 predominant word, the keynote of the thought or to 
 some particular spot, whether stair or gallery, in the 
 temple courts where it was to be sung ; is a matter of 
 no moment to us to-day, when, if the choice be free to 
 us, we would rather look upon this as in a different sense
 
 408 Tke Proper Attitude [xxin. 
 
 ' a song of ascents ; ' one of the ' hymns of the going 
 up' whether of the delivered exile returning to Jeru- 
 salem from Babylon, or of the Galilaean pilgrim seeking 
 the holy city for one of the periodical feasts, and cheer- 
 ing the morning start or the noontide pause or the evening 
 resting with one of those songs of Zion which shall 
 answer for him the appropriate question, 'Wherewith 
 shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before 
 the high God ? Who shall ascend into the hill of the 
 Lord, or who shall rise up in His holy place ?' 
 
 And then the psalm will become one of the shadows 
 cast before of the divine teaching of Jesus. ' Two men 
 went up into the temple to pray,' and the one that 'went 
 down to his house justified ' was the man of a humble 
 spirit ; the man who ' stood afar off,' with downcast eyes, 
 and ' smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to 
 me a sinner.' 'My heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes 
 lofty: I have not walked in great things, things too 
 wonderful for me: but I refrain my soul, and keep 
 it low.' 
 
 The expressions are striking and exquisite. ' I have 
 calmed and hushed my soul.' I have ' calmed ' proper- 
 ly, I have ' levelled ' my soul : I have made it smooth 
 and even, like the field that has been furrowed by the 
 plough and is now laid level by the harrow, or like the 
 sea that has been tossed by storm and tempest and 
 is now soothed and stilled again into calm. And then, 
 once more, ' I have hushed my soul ' ' made it silent,' 
 is the exact thought, from its clamouring and its 
 murmuring ' like the weaned child upon the breast 
 of his mother;' taught his first lesson of denial and 
 disappointment, and now beginning to acquiesce in the
 
 XXIIL] for Religious Enquiry. 409 
 
 discipline, if he may but ' cling still, in fond helplessness, 
 to the bosom of his one friend.' Even thus such is the 
 strong figure of the original even thus my soul the 
 living moving heart of feeling and affection, represented 
 for the moment as distinct (like intellect or memory 
 or conscience) from the ' I myself I ' of the man my 
 soul rests, as it were, upon my bosom from all its 
 wanderings and all its soarings, and learns at last to 
 submit itself to that quieter, safer, holier employment, 
 which is the love of that which God has commanded, 
 and the desire of that which God has promised. ' I have 
 calmed and hushed my soul: as the weaned child lies 
 my soul upon me. Wait, O Israel, for the Lord, from 
 henceforth even for ever.' 
 
 ' I do not exercise myself in great matters, which are 
 too high for me.' 
 
 The text carries us into the region of thought. It 
 recognizes the responsibility of thinking. It presup- 
 poses the possibility of choosing and refusing in the 
 entertainment of subjects. It implies that there are 
 wholesome topics of thought, and unwholesome ; and 
 that a man is just as much bound to discriminate in 
 the things he thinks of as in the employment of his 
 hours, the formation of his habits, or the selection of his 
 friends. 
 
 In this general statement all probably will agree. 
 Doubtless there are here and there persons of excep- 
 tionally feeble will, who avow that they have no control 
 over their thoughts ; that they cannot avoid those 
 rovings and saunterings of the mind, which lead to 
 all manner of loose and corrupt imaginations, not to be 
 justified yet not to be prevented. The stern moralist
 
 4io The Proper Attitude [xxin. 
 
 and the gentle Christian agree in regarding such help- 
 lessness as either a crime or a madness ; the result 
 either of frightful neglect, or else of a moral malfor- 
 mation as mysterious as it is miserable. At all events, 
 no safe place can be found in human society for one 
 who professes himself impotent over the mind which 
 moulds and makes the life. 
 
 Most men know perfectly well that they can control 
 thought ; that they can 'command the porter to watch' 
 the comings in as well as the goings out, the entrances of 
 thought as well as the exits of action. 
 
 But the remarkable thing in the text is the enlarge- 
 ment of the responsibility of the self-control, from the 
 nature and quality, to what we may call the scale and 
 size, of the thoughts. 
 
 We can well believe that the holy and devout 
 psalmist did not suffer his heart to entertain licentious 
 and lascivious thoughts ; that he did not compose these 
 sweet songs, or wend his way towards Zion, with the 
 love of sin allowed in him, or with the power of sin 
 reigning. 
 
 He speaks not of low but of high thoughts, not of 
 grovelling but of soaring imaginations, as the disallowed 
 and discountenanced inmates. 
 
 And there can be no doubt that there is a danger in 
 this direction. There are not only evil desires, sinful 
 lustings, to make frightful havoc of the life and of the 
 soul: there are also speculations and rovings of thought, 
 which give no other warning of their nature than this, 
 that they belong to districts and regions beyond and 
 above us ; that they are fatal to the quietness and the 
 silence of the spirit : that they cannot be entertained
 
 xx 1 1 L] for Religioits Enquiry. 411 
 
 without reawakening those restless and unsatisfied 
 yearnings which were just beginning to still them- 
 selves on the bosom of the infinite love. 
 
 Of this sort, sometimes, are the ambitions of this life. 
 Ambition has a use as well as an abuse. St Paul himself, 
 who had counted all things loss for Christ, yet thrice in 
 his epistles speaks of ambition as his life. We use am- 
 bition in our education. We count anything better than 
 that stagnation of the being, which begins in idleness 
 and ends in sensuality. We waken up the drowsy 
 energies by proposing to them prizes of effort. We bid 
 them even 'strive for masteries.' Competition itself, 
 though it be the near kinsman of that 'emulation' which 
 St Paul puts among works of the flesh, is yet enlisted 
 among the soldiers of Jesus Christ, if so be it may 
 sublime itself at last into an effort which desires no 
 man's crown. 
 
 Nevertheless we all feel that there is an ambition 
 'which o'erleaps itself,' not more in the arrogance of 
 its successes than in the extravagance of its expecta- 
 tions. There are men who would have been not only 
 happier but greater if they had been less ambitious. 
 There are men whose humbler efforts would at least 
 have been respected, but whose more adventurous soar- 
 ings have ended only in ridicule. 
 
 Especially is this true in the province of the intellect. 
 We have known little men living with great men till 
 nothing could content them but being great themselves. 
 They have breathed an intellectual atmosphere till they 
 have imagined an inspiration. There was no man to 
 say to them, or they heeded not the warning, Learn of 
 the wise but ' be not many masters.' They began by
 
 412 The Proper Attittide [xxm. 
 
 reproducing, they ended in imitating. The very words 
 of the wise came not ' mended ' but damaged 'from that 
 tongue.' They stood on tiptoe, but they were dwarfs 
 still. The same men, contented with reality which 
 in their case was mediocrity might have done a useful 
 if not an illustrious work in the generation which they 
 were set not to illuminate but to serve. As men of 
 industry, men of information, men of sense, they might 
 have been eyes to the blind and feet to the lame. They 
 might have been teachers in schools of which they could 
 not be founders handers on of that torch of truth 
 which it was not given them to kindle. After all, the 
 debt of the passing generation must be more to toil than 
 to genius : this was their measure, this ought to have 
 been their goal. They ought to have said and they 
 would have been gainers by saying it ' I will not 
 exercise myself in great matters : they are too high 
 for me. I will calm and hush my soul.' 
 
 That which is true in the ambitions of this life, 
 whether professional or intellectual, is not less true in 
 religion. It might seem that the psalmist wrote of 
 this : it is for the sake of this certainly that we make 
 his words our text to-day. 
 
 They are exemplified within the church and without. 
 They are exemplified in the treatment of revelation 
 by believers, by doubters, by foes. The doctrine of the 
 Trinity has been turned oftentimes from a mystery in 
 the divine sense into a mystery in the human. The 
 soul should have calmed and hushed itself in that 
 presence, as before the revelation of a Father, a Saviour, 
 and a Comforter, not three Gods but one God ; each 
 Person necessary to the repose and to the activity,
 
 XXIIL] for Religioiis Enquiry. 413 
 
 to the comfort and to the life, of every one of us, as 
 we struggle along the path of difficulty into the clear 
 light and into the perfect peace of a world in which 
 God shall be all in all. Instead of this, speculation has 
 been busy, and controversy has been busy, and logic 
 has been busy, and rhetoric has been busy; and the 
 whole matter has been referred and relegated from the 
 tribunal of the soul to the tribunal of the intellect : 
 theologians have exercised themselves in matters too 
 wonderful for them : prayer has been intermitted for 
 wrangling, and every nutritious particle has been in- 
 dustriously exterminated out of the bread of life. 
 
 There has been something wrong, we all say, in a 
 process of which the result is thus disastrous. And we 
 cannot think that the fault lay in the thoroughness or 
 in the manifoldness of the investigation. It was not 
 meant, we are quite sure, that any part of the man 
 should be idle in the dealing with revelation. Reason 
 cannot be hostile, save by scandalous mismanagement, 
 to that which the God of reason has spoken. Indeed, 
 we demur altogether to the introduction into this subject 
 of those metaphysical partitions of the unit humanity, 
 which alone make it possible to set truth and the truth 
 at variance, by speaking of understanding and conscience, 
 of judgment and will, almost as of separate personalities, 
 and drawing sharp lines between their several juris- 
 dictions in the decision and action of the man. The 
 man is one and but one : he moves altogether if he 
 moves at all : and the fault lies, not in using this part of 
 himself when he ought to have used that, but rather in 
 the spirit in which he used either ; in the forgetfulness 
 perhaps of the 'necessary limitations of knowing, but still
 
 4 14 Tlie Proper Attitude [xxin. 
 
 more in the posture and attitude in which he set him- 
 self to know. ' My heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes 
 lofty. I have calmed and hushed my soul.' 
 
 It may be that theologians have something to answer 
 for in the sadder example to which we pass onward. 
 
 The life must have been secluded from common 
 experiences, the heart must be steeled against human 
 compassions, if the one has not known, if the other 
 has not wept over, some shipwreck of faith of which 
 we have here perhaps the explanation. The soul that 
 should have 'behaved and quieted itself has been 
 'exercised in great matters, in things too high for it:' 
 and the result is that utter sweeping away of the faith 
 and of the hope, which we can speak of in this house of 
 God, with full assurance of sympathy, as a calamity than 
 which there can be none greater. 
 
 There are minds who shall gainsay it ? unqualified 
 or disqualified for speculation. There are minds quick 
 and shallow; capable of doubt, incapable of decision. 
 There are minds undisciplined and uneducated, because 
 they have not had the chance, or because they have 
 flung the chance away. There are minds ignorant of 
 the great gulf, fixed in reason, fixed in the nature of 
 things, between doubting and disbelieving ; minds for 
 which the entrance of one doubt is the banishment of a 
 million of certainties ; minds destitute alike of the power 
 to weigh and the power to number, insomuch that a 
 sneer is as potent with them as a martyrdom, and one 
 sentence of an infidel magazine is answer enough and to 
 spare to the argument of eighteen centuries of Christian 
 lives and deaths. 
 
 To minds such as these is it not unfortunate we say
 
 XXIIL ] for Religious Enquiry. 415 
 
 but that now unfortunate, that the accident of the day 
 and of the hour should have brought the suggestion of 
 scepticism ? Those of us who have seen the thing will 
 say so ; those of us who have seen the faith or seen the 
 ministry of Jesus Christ abandoned and flung away 
 because the insolence of a ' gnosis falsely so called ' 
 came across the path of a young man and told him that 
 there can be no proof of that which you can neither 
 touch nor taste nor smell. Would it not have been 
 better for that intellect (so called) if it had never dabbled 
 in speculation ? Was it fit for it? Ought it not to have 
 been differently trained I had almost said, differently 
 constituted if it was ever to embark in it with ad- 
 vantage by which I mean, with any prospect of finding 
 the truth ? 
 
 But these are our times, and as they are we must deal 
 with them. It is idle to fold the hands in mournful 
 regrettings. God has 'set the bounds of the habita- 
 tion ' ' Sparta is our lot, and we must adorn it.' We 
 shall enter into no comparisons, save such as breathe 
 thankfulness, between the days that are and the days 
 that have been. The present is a disturbing force in 
 such calculations : we cannot stand far enough off, even 
 in imagination, to do justice to the picture. If we were 
 not able to counsel, neither would we complain. But the 
 subject which we have suggested is full of admonition 
 for each one of us, and for all. 
 
 It is impossible to live the life of this age, and not to 
 enquire. Close ear and eye, scepticism is in the air. 
 It was always in books, now it is in society. A whole 
 table was challenged lately by the question, ' Is there 
 any one so old-fashioned as to believe the Bible?' This
 
 416 Tke Proper Attitude [xxin. 
 
 was an insolence, this was an outrage. But it only 
 exaggerated, it only distorted, a fact. On that occasion 
 there was one man brave enough to answer, ' I do ' 
 and the courage told. But how shall a young man in 
 such times, educated or uneducated, exercise that calm- 
 ing and hushing, that behaving and quieting, which the 
 text speaks of? Who shall prescribe the right to 
 speculate, and the no right ? Who shall lay down the 
 conditions, present or retrospective, under which a rational 
 being, ordained or unordained, shall be at liberty to 
 exercise himself in great matters, too high for him or 
 for any man ? It cannot be done. And if you attempt 
 it, you are met instantly by the cavil, Then you would 
 leave every man in 'the tongue wherein, he was born:' 
 Mussulman, Brahmin, Buddhist, every man has his 
 religion : if the Christian is to be kept perforce within 
 the confines of his tradition, he must allow to others 
 the ' protection ' which is the necessity of his own. 
 
 Brethren, I speak in this place for this once more 
 to a powerful phalanx of young men. You have to go 
 forth into this outspoken, this insubordinate, this free- 
 thinking age. If you would, you cannot alter it. You 
 must hear its wild talk, you must move with it in its 
 bold swing. I can desire few things better for you than 
 that you should dread it. It is a terrible world into 
 which you arc going; terrible in its strength, terrible 
 in its daring. This age fears nothing neither heaven 
 above it, nor hell beneath. It has settled for itself that 
 the latter is not save as an embellishment of positive- 
 ness, save as an expletive of passion. It doubts much 
 about the former : it is more than half inclined to think 
 that nothing is but the material. It is encouraged in
 
 xxiii.] for Religions Enquiry. 417 
 
 these ideas by men of science, \vho ought to know that 
 they themselves are moved and swayed by other forces 
 besides the tangible. Theologians are not always con- 
 sistent in their maintenance of the principle that Jesus 
 Christ ' speaks that He doth know, and testifies that He 
 hath seen.' They too coquet with the sceptic ; offer to 
 meet him half-way, and find, when they have done so, 
 that he is in his cave still. 
 
 What I would presume to urge upon you in these 
 days of your youth is this. 
 
 First, that you feel the responsibility of those decisions 
 which will soon be forced upon you. Our age has one 
 mark, I think, of a late place in the world's history, that 
 there is a more resolute taking of sides for the great 
 struggle ; that there is less of that unmarked colourless 
 Christianity which called Christ Lord which counted 
 infidelity a discourtesy and atheism an insult yet had 
 no word to say when the nominal Master was either 
 dishonoured by immorality or trodden underfoot in His 
 brethren. This is a gain more than a loss. It makes, 
 the gospel more real. The troops are drawing off, this 
 way and that way, towards their positions. We are on 
 the eve of a great battle. 
 
 We never felt, as now, the importance of education. 
 You have heard to-day of minds unqualified or dis- 
 qualified for great matters. There is no excuse for 
 those who, having what you have here, go forth in this 
 state to life's battle. O, if you would learn now to 
 thank God for your reason to thank God for your 
 leisure to thank God for your books, for your 
 lectures, for your chapels, for your sacraments. These 
 are, for you, like those ' days of the Son of Man/ 
 V. 27
 
 4i 8 The Proper Attitude [xxin. 
 
 one of which afterwards you would give life itself to see 
 again. How fearful, fearful for both worlds, if you should 
 any of you go forth hence unskilled in judging between 
 the true and the false, unable to separate between the 
 precious and the vile, when the two present themselves 
 in the next stage of your being, and you must choose 
 between them for life and death, for the life and 
 death of more than your own soul. An educated 
 man might almost be defined as a man who is 'not 
 soon shaken in mind, whether by word or spirit or 
 letter,' because he has been taught by long discipline 
 both to ' prove all things ' and to ' hold fast that which 
 is good.' The herd of sceptics may be led by an 
 intellect they have no intellect, generally speaking, of 
 their own. They are at the mercy of loud talk and 
 confident statement: it flatters while it undermines: 
 it treats its hearers as simple, but it compliments them 
 as wise. 
 
 Not then to foreclose thinking, but to prepare for it, 
 is the work of all education that is worth the name. 
 And such preparation will above all things enforce that 
 preliminary ' calming and hushing' which the text tells 
 of. It will remind the young man that this is not the 
 first year of the century, and not the first year of the 
 race. It will bid him remember that he himself has a 
 past as well as a present, and that he cannot, if he 
 would, cut himself off from it. On any supposition it 
 must be necessary to take into account the circumstances, 
 over which he had no control, of his birth, of his parent- 
 age, of his nationality, of his religion. We would say it 
 to a Mahometan, we would say it to a Hindoo. There 
 is a presumption in favour of the thing that is. There is
 
 xxiii.] for Religious Enquiry. 419 
 
 an antecedent probability on the side of the polity, on 
 the side of the society, on the side of the opinion, in 
 which you were born. To change a faith is a tremendous 
 step : not without a moral compulsion ought it to be 
 taken. To change from faith to no faith is a more 
 fearful stride still : look around, above, within you it 
 is common prudence ere you adventure it. These con- 
 siderations are not decisive. If changes of faith were 
 wrong, we should have no gospel. If to leave the 
 religion of a man's fathers were wicked, we should 
 have no day in our calendar for the conversion of 
 St Paul. But seriousness, but awe, but reverence, but 
 humility these qualities are above all graces, when the 
 question is at issue, Shall I relay my very foundations ? 
 
 We will not say that there is always a want of 
 seriousness in the scepticism of to-day. Amongst much 
 playing at doubting there is also a struggle and a 
 death-grapple which is worthy of the crisis. There are 
 men living anxious lives, there are men ' standing in 
 jeopardy every hour,' there are men dying many deaths 
 daily, in the controversy, which they suffer no eye to 
 watch over, between the spirit of faith and the spirit of 
 doubting. We feel that, in the sight of infinite love, 
 such ,men may be worthier, nobler, holier far than the 
 easy, complacent, conventional worshipper, whose faith 
 stands really in the tradition of his elders, and has never 
 been made his own by the travail of fear and grief. 
 
 None the less may there be many a grievous error, 
 many a deep-lying fallacy, in the process of that search. 
 I will name two. 
 
 There are those who, so soon as a doubt enters, cease 
 instantly to pray. They count it an insincerity to call 
 
 27 2
 
 420 The Proper Attitude [xxm. 
 
 upon Him in whom they are not certain that they 
 believe. The memorable words, 'When they saw Him, 
 they worshipped Him, but some doubted,' are misread 
 by them or disregarded. They do not see that to cease 
 to worship is, not to doubt, but to cease to doubt. It is, 
 to have settled the very question which they profess to 
 be pondering. If there be a word of truth in the gospel, 
 the way of faith is the way of prayer, and the man who 
 has ceased to call upon the God of his life is no longer 
 so much as an enquirer whether God has spoken to us in 
 His Son. 
 
 There are some questions let who will mock the 
 saying there are some questions which it is treason to 
 humanity to open. Of such sort is the question of 
 worship. The question, in other words, whether I am 
 to myself sufficient or insufficient whether I am to my 
 own being the head and front, the source and spring, or 
 certainly and at all costs an inferior, a dependent, a 
 subject thing impotent over the beginning, impotent 
 over the continuance, impotent over the ending, of 
 this unknown something which I call the life. If I 
 knew not one word of the nature or the character or 
 the will of the power above me, the recognition of 
 dependence, which is the essence of worship, would 
 equally be my necessity, equally my duty. Better kneel 
 to an unknown God than kneel to nothing and to 
 no one. 
 
 To kneel is the beauty and glory, to kneel is the 
 truth and the hope, of the humanity that knows itself. 
 Let the cry go forth even into the darkness it shall 
 'calm and hush,' it shall 'behave and quiet,' the soul 
 that would enquire, the soul that would know. They
 
 XXIIL] for Religious Enquiry. 421 
 
 worshipped although yea, they worshipped because 
 they doubted. 
 
 Yet one other thing. Many, when the faith is shaken, 
 count it an insincerity to listen to any evidence but what 
 they call the logical. They resent it as almost a fraud 
 put upon them if any one offers the moral beauty of the 
 gospel, or the spiritual satisfaction to be found in it, or 
 the cumulative force of recorded effects and consequences 
 of believing, as furnishing, alone or all together, any 
 argument at all in behalf of the revelation of Jesus 
 Christ. Intellect alone, cold, hard, dry intellect, must 
 be the tribunal of truth. If mathematical demonstration 
 is impossible, then for them it shall be impossible to 
 believe. That conviction which the first Christian doubter 
 made to hang upon the sight and upon the touch, they 
 suspend upon the cogency of the Christian syllogism as 
 it stands for the nineteenth age. 
 
 We have entered our protest against this splitting and 
 parcelling of the being. The man is one and but one. 
 These separate personalities, of mind and heart, of 
 intellect and affection, who gave them their authority 
 and their superscription ? If God speaks, He will 
 speak, be sure, to the whole man. God is one, and 
 the man is one : as such will he be dealt with, as such 
 he must make reply. Intellect and heart and conscience 
 the power to judge, the power to admire, the power to 
 adore the instinct of truth, and the instinct of good, 
 and the instinct of beauty all these things must march 
 as one towards the investigation of the divine : the 
 thing which we believe must be the satisfaction of them 
 all, and each one must contribute its quota to the 
 evidence and its voice to the verdict.
 
 4 22 The Proper Attitude [xxni. 
 
 The counsel of the text is the counsel of wisdom, 
 when it makes reverence, when it makes humility, the 
 condition of all knowledge that is worth the name. 
 It is quite possible, by a little mismanagement, by a 
 little spoiling, of the soul, to make the spiritual life 
 intolerable. We may so educate and so discipline our 
 own soul as that health shall be the reward. We may 
 do the contrary. We may make ourselves fools, idiots, 
 sceptics, atheists, if we will to do so, and if we take 
 the way. 
 
 Plain words are the most suitable to solemn subjects. 
 This humble, this reverent estimate of our position and 
 relationship will show itself, first of all, in a willingness 
 to attend to small duties; to overlook nothing as beneath 
 notice ; to adapt ourselves to circumstances, mental as 
 well as providential ; to condescend (as Scripture says) to 
 things that are lowly; to expect happiness in duty rather 
 than in acquisition ; to live the life set us, rather than 
 to spread and stretch ourselves into an imagined universe 
 beyond. This principle does not forbid effort does 
 not discourage progress does not depress the endeavour 
 to make the very most of every talent, and to rise to 
 any height of honest usefulness to which the powers 
 given may be prospered by the blessing sought. All 
 these are indeed but the natural exercises of the com- 
 posed and tranquillized spirit. 
 
 Nor is the 'refraining and quieting' spoken of in- 
 consistent with the utmost stretch of enquiry into the 
 mysteries of nature, of humanity, of God. This too 
 is fostered and strengthened by it. The difference is 
 here that, while the man who 'exercises himself in 
 great matters ' is apt first to isolate and then to idolize
 
 xxiii.] for Religious Enquiry. 423 
 
 intellect ; to imagine that mental processes alone can 
 carry him into the deep things (if there be such) of 
 God Himself, and that whatsoever cannot be logically 
 demonstrated cannot be certainly true ; the other not 
 because he is afraid to seek, not because he dreads the 
 break-down of faith under the strain of reason, but 
 because he remembers that the being which he possesses 
 is a complex thing, and must not be disjointed and 
 taken to pieces in the very use of it for the highest of 
 all conceivable purposes, the study of truth and of God 
 summons all and each part of himself to accompany the 
 march, and refuses to regard that as proved, or that as 
 disproved, which (at most) is so by one piece or one bit 
 of him. Reason, and conscience, and heart, and soul too, 
 shall all enter into the search, and that which satisfies 
 not each and all of these shall not be for him either 
 truth, or religion, or heaven, or God. 'Knowledge 
 puffeth up it is love which edifieth. If any man think 
 that he knoweth anything, he knoweth nothing yet as 
 he ought to know. But if any man love God, the same' 
 knoweth or, let me rather say for, after all, divine 
 knowledge, to be real, must be rather receptive than 
 originative ' the same is known of God.' 
 
 'I have calmed and hushed my soul, as a child weaned 
 of his mother.' Try this self-discipline, doubters in this 
 congregation. Set yourselves humble duties. Live 
 much in acts of charity domestic, social, philanthropic. 
 Enter into lives pinched by poverty. Help boys and 
 young men to grapple with the stern realities of want, 
 neglect, solitude, temptation. Intellectual difficulties 
 must take rank after these. Go back to their ponder- 
 ing a more sympathetic and therefore a wiser man. See
 
 424 The Proper Attitude, &c. [xxm. 
 
 whether some of them have not been solved by the new 
 contact. Is not this gospel which looked so super- 
 fluous in the theatre and the ballroom, so assailable 
 by sap or storm in the study or the lecture-room is 
 it not indeed the one appliance, the very panacea, when 
 it is brought face to face with sorrow, with bereave- 
 ment, with pain, with death ? Then ask yourself ask 
 the whole of yourself understanding, heart, conscience, 
 soul whether the thing so appropriate, so strong, so 
 beautiful, so satisfying, may not were it but for that 
 reason be true.
 
 XXIV. 
 
 PURITY. 
 
 Titus i. 15. 
 
 Unto the pure all things are pure : but unto them that are defiled 
 and unbelieving is nothing pure; but even their mind and con- 
 science is defiled. 
 
 St Matthew v. 8. 
 Blessed are the pure in heart : for they shall see God. 
 
 'CAREFUL and troubled about many things' sub- 
 tleties of doctrine, curiosities of speculation, punctilios 
 of ritual ' one thing is needful.' Too often we frame 
 to ourselves substitutes for it : more often still, we turn 
 aside from its piercing scrutiny, its dazzling light, its 
 condemning judgment. Nevertheless the foundation of 
 God standeth sure, having this seal ' He that hath the 
 Son hath life ;' and, 'Without holiness no man shall see 
 the Lord.' 
 
 The two texts are two motives. With one voice they 
 enforce purity, but each by its own argument and with 
 its own persuasion. The one looks rather at the pre- 
 sent, the other at the future : the one sets before us 
 a practical effect of purity, the other a spiritual : the 
 one tells how it shall enable us to move healthily and 
 wholesomely among our fellows ; the other, how it shall 
 fit and qualify us for that beatific vision which is, being 
 interpreted, the inheritance of the saints in light.
 
 426 Purity. [xxiv. 
 
 It is needless that I should bespeak your attention 
 for the subject will secure that to a few plain words 
 this morning, spoken in misgiving and weakness, upon 
 this mysterious, this indeed awful theme. Medita- 
 tion is more than exhortation always, and not least 
 here, where 'the voice from the excellent glory' is so 
 solemnly audible, ' Put off thy shoes from off thy 
 feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy 
 ground.' 
 
 We will spend no time in preliminary comments upon 
 the place of the texts or the connection of the contexts. 
 The former text is from an epistle, the latter text is 
 from a gospel. The one is the saying of an inspired 
 man, the other is the saying of the Lord from heaven. 
 Of both the word 'pure' is the keynote. In the one 
 expressly, in the other by clear implication, the purity 
 spoken of is the purity of the heart. No formal, no 
 ceremonial, no ritual scrupulosity; no mere cleanness of 
 the hands from bribe or bloodshed ; no mere refraining 
 of the lips from the open utterance of evil ; no mere 
 keeping of the life from the actual commission, while 
 the love of sin reigns in the will which is the man. 
 The psalmist could distinguish between the ' clean 
 hands ' and the ' pure heart.' The precept of the least 
 evangelical of the apostles has a twofold injunction 
 'Cleanse your hands, ye sinners, and purify your hearts, 
 ye doubleminded.' 
 
 i. St Paul is addressing a beloved convert, charged 
 with the temporary oversight of the young church of 
 Crete ; a church planted, like the other early churches, 
 in an unkindly and uncongenial soil, but, unlike some 
 of them, amidst an exceptionally corrupt and unpromis-
 
 xxiv.] Pit rity. 427 
 
 ing people, over whom its one chance of influence 
 must lie in an exceptionally pure and bright ex- 
 ample. 
 
 Now there was a power at work in the Cretan con- 
 gregations, as everywhere, which St Paul looked upon 
 as the antagonist of the light and life which is in Christ 
 Jesus. Strange to say, it took the form of a sort of 
 ostentatious puritanism; it was an influence calling itself 
 moral, sensitively jealous for law and sanctity, and 
 dreading the gospel of grace as dangerous to virtue. 
 St Paul knew better. St Paul had tried both systems, 
 and he knew by experience that, whereas law is weak 
 through the flesh, grace is mighty through the Spirit. 
 He thought little of a righteousness isolating itself 
 from atonement, or a purity dispensing with sancti- 
 fication. The towers of these human builders may 
 rise with fair promise upon the plain of this world's 
 habitation, but they have only 'slime for mortar' 
 Babel is their name, and scattering is their story. 
 
 It is in the midst of stern words about these Judaizing 
 meddlers that the grand maxim of the first text breaks 
 in ' To the pure are all things pure.' Men may 
 dispute and wrangle, like that anonymous Jew of old 
 with John's disciples, 'about purifying:' but give not 
 heed to these 'Jewish fables' for such may Mosaic 
 ordinances become when God has superseded them ; 
 these ' commandments of men ' for such, and no more, 
 are the ' rudiments of the world,' when ' the fulness of 
 the time ' has replaced them by a completive revelation. 
 I will tell you where alone purity can be found ; in 
 the heart made clean by grace, in the life set free by 
 the Spirit. Be pure in heart, and all things are pure
 
 428 Purity. [xxiv. 
 
 to you. ' Give not heed to Jewish fables. To the pure 
 are all things pure.' 
 
 If to any one the first sound of the words should be 
 startling, as though St Paul were sanctioning by anticipa- 
 tion the antinomian inference, 'Live as you list; all things 
 are lawful: be born of God, or think you are, and sin is 
 sin no longer for the regenerate' such an impression will 
 be instantly removed by remembering who is the writer; 
 sufficiently corrected even by the contrasted clause 
 which follows, ' But to them that are defiled and un- 
 believing is nothing pure.' The purity of which St Paul 
 speaks is a purity loving only the pure, a purity abhor- 
 ring all that is evil. 
 
 We have here then an alternative before us. Look 
 on this picture and on that. ' I speak as to wise men ; 
 judge ye' between them. 
 
 To the defiled nothing is pure. Draw out the 
 thought into detail, and what says it ? 
 
 To a certain extent heathen moralists spoke before 
 St Paul. They could tell how an impure heart breathes 
 impurity into the whole atmosphere of the life. ' Out of 
 the heart are the issues of the life ;' because in the heart 
 arise the thoughts, and the thoughts generate acts, and 
 the acts establish habits, and the habits form the cha- 
 racter, and give it its final complexion of good or evil. 
 Thus, if the heart be defiled, the result must be the con- 
 tamination of the living and moving and acting man. 
 To the impure is nothing pure not one occupation 
 however innocent, not one companionship however de- 
 lightful, not one office however sacred, not one relation 
 however vital. The touch of that hand, its proffered 
 gift, its kindly pressure, its well-meant service, has de-
 
 xxiv.] Purity. 429 
 
 filement in it : contact becomes contagion, affection itself 
 becomes infection, where the taint of impurity festers 
 within. Not for nothing was it written in the law, that 
 the poor leper should warn off from himself the approach 
 of the whole, by wearing the mourning of the bereaved, 
 and by uttering, whithersoever he turned himself, the 
 desolate cry, ' Unclean, unclean.' It was a figure for 
 the time now and ever present how sin secretly 
 cherished becomes not more a disease than a pestilence; 
 how to the impure nothing is pure he carries defilement 
 and contamination with him. Nay, even deeds as to which 
 the man himself would once have exclaimed in indigna- 
 tion, 'Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?' 
 may become little by little not only possible but quite 
 natural, if the heart is but let alone by the strong, and 
 the one stronger, coercion, of a resolute determination 
 for virtue, and a superhuman indwelling of grace. Where 
 the first of these is not, there is no chance where the 
 second of these is not, there is no certainty of an un- 
 contaminated and uncontaminating life. ' To the defiled 
 and unbelieving,' for St Paul recognizes no infidel virtue, 
 'is nothing pure ;' not the generous confidence of friend 
 or brother, not the sacred trust of ward or pupil, not the 
 fair beauty of love, not the law-girt sanctities of wedlock. 
 Only to the pure are these things pure. 
 
 But St Paul goes far beyond this experience when 
 he speaks of an intellectual defilement as the pro- 
 duct of an impure heart. ' Even the mind,' he says, 
 ' is defiled.' He is not speaking, you observe, of the 
 use of the intellect in the service of impurity. His 
 remark is far more striking and more profound. He 
 speaks of the action of impurity upon the intellect
 
 430 Purity. [xxiv. 
 
 itself. That there have been in all civilizations, ancient 
 and modern, bad men of genius in other words, impure 
 hearts employing intellectual gifts in the propagation 
 of impurity is matter of lamentable notoriety to all who 
 know anything of the history of literature. This is 
 only the alliance of heart and mind for a bad purpose. 
 But St Paul speaks of the action of the one upon the 
 other. He bids us mark the deterioration of intellect 
 under the influence of an impure heart. Even in pro- 
 vinces not directly moral, even in provinces purely or 
 predominantly intellectual, we can trace the operation. 
 As a matter of course, the hand is less steady for 
 difficult or delicate work this morning, which last 
 night held the wine-cup; and the head deals less 
 acutely with a question of business or a subject of 
 discussion to-day, which was pursuing yesterday a vicious 
 intrigue, or bestowing 'the visions of the bed' upon 
 images of sensual indulgence. Let this kind of life be 
 lived on till mid age, and we question if the faculties 
 of the keenest, the most vigorous intellect will not have 
 lost alike the sharpness of their edge and the versatility 
 of their compass. Sometimes it is a melancholy spec- 
 tacle we can trace the gradual decline of the finer 
 powers of observation, taste, or expression, in essayist, 
 poet, or novelist, as the life settles more and more 
 steadily upon the lees of a low morality; and the 
 impure heart bewrays itself more and more to the 
 regretful reader by a coarser drawing and a more 
 vulgar colouring in the productions of what must still 
 be called genius. 
 
 There is one department of intellectual exercise 
 and it is the very highest of all in which the man of
 
 xxiv.] Purity. 431 
 
 impure heart will almost certainly make shipwreck. It 
 is that in which he addresses himself to the study of the 
 great controversy between faith and unbelief; to the de- 
 cision of the question of questions, ' What shall I think 
 of Christ ?' It would be as untrue as it would be disre- 
 spectful to make this ^the only explanation of the un- 
 believer's infidelity. Certainly in these times, however 
 it may have been in a bygone generation, unbelief and 
 immorality are no inseparable companions. We can 
 almost imagine that there may be a growth, morbid 
 perhaps but powerful, alike of self-control and of self- 
 exertion, in one who has cut himself loose from the 
 tradition of prayer and worship, and has undertaken, in 
 full view of no very friendly critics, his own manage- 
 ment, his own discipline, and his own perfecting. He 
 has to prove to those around him that he can dispense 
 with the help of God. An audacious enterprise we 
 count it ; but the very audacity is a stimulus the very 
 presumptuousness of the undertaking may be at once 
 whip and spur to virtue. We must not be suspicious 
 at the cost alike of reason and charity, or pretend that 
 in all cases vice is the one parent of scepticism. 
 
 But the converse of this we may hold without any 
 breach of charity. If infidelity is not always the off- 
 spring of impurity, certainly impurity is the natural 
 parent of infidelity. It is the interest of impurity to 
 disbelieve. From the days of the poet Cowper in the 
 courts of the Temple, as in all the days before those 
 and after, this has been the just retort of the infidel 
 to the Christian profligate, ' Your creed condemns you ; 
 be as I am in creed, and then you and your life, like 
 me and mine, will be at one.' Who shall gainsay the
 
 432 Purity. [xxiv. 
 
 cogency of that argument, whether it be urged by the 
 voice from without, or by the voice within ? Where 
 the heart is impure, the mind is defiled by it. If in 
 the knowledge of earth the heart can corrupt the head, 
 shall it be less so in the knowledge of heaven ? Shall 
 we wonder that the gospel may be true and yet the in- 
 tellect may miss it, if we find that, even in matters where 
 there is no motive and no bias towards error, the mind 
 is surely, if slowly, polluted and poisoned through the 
 heart ? 
 
 St Paul goes on to speak of the conscience (no 
 less than the intellect) as sharing the purity or else the 
 impurity of the heart. We might have supposed that 
 the conscience, which is the arbiter of conduct within 
 each of us, would be no more influenced by the moral 
 state of the man, than the judge is corrupted, in his 
 estimate of right and wrong, by the trial of any number 
 of prisoners on charges of fraud or violence. Approval 
 or disapproval, what St Paul elsewhere calls ' accusing 
 or excusing," has no obvious tendency to anything worse 
 than weariness. We might expect the trial of the man 
 by his conscience to go on day by day, with varying 
 result, or even with uniform result, of acquittal or of 
 condemnation, without incapacitating the tribunal itself 
 for a just and righteous decision in any number of cases 
 to be brought before it hereafter. We might have 
 expected that the bad man would have always an 
 uneasy life by reason of repeated convictions, of per- 
 petual condemnations, by the judge to whom he is 
 amenable, but from whom he cannot isolate himself for 
 a moment. There is nothing at all self-evident in the 
 statement of St Paul that the conscience itself shares
 
 xxiv.] Purity. 433 
 
 the defilement of the heart. That the admonitions of 
 the conscience are weakened by their disregard ; that 
 they become less and less audible, less and less 
 imperious, less and less alarming, by perpetual neg- 
 lect, is a matter of experience : that they are cor- 
 rupted by it, defiled by it, contaminated by it, is by 
 no means obvious. Yet this is the statement. The 
 impure heart makes the conscience itself impure. By 
 degrees, it not only loses its sensitiveness to right and 
 wrong as familiarity with vice and crime in a police 
 or divorce court may somewhat blunt the first sensi- 
 bility of a magistrate or a judge, who yet is inflexible 
 to evil : worse far than this it comes even to confuse, 
 to distort, and to invert its own vision, and to be no 
 longer a trustworthy oracle when the man for once 
 would consult it on some question of practical duty. 
 So long has it been unenquired of, or enquired of only 
 to be silenced, that at last it avenges itself upon the 
 applicant by ' answering him according to his idols; 1 and 
 the wicked king who asks, ' Shall I go up against this 
 Ramoth-Gilead, or shall I forbear?' receives for reply, 
 ' Go, and prosper;' or the dishonest prophet, who waits 
 to know 'what God will say to him more/ hears in the 
 night visions the explicit but ironical rejoinder, ' If the 
 men call thee, rise and go with them.' 
 
 This is that judicial hardening, as theologians call 
 it, which might with equal truth be denominated the 
 judicial defiling. To the man of impure heart all 
 things, not only action and habit, not only conduct or 
 feeling, but intellect also, and conscience also, are con- 
 taminated and polluted with him. 
 
 On the other'hand, 'To the pure all things are pure.' 
 v. 28
 
 434 Purity. |_ XXIV - 
 
 Would you be able to pass hither and thither on 
 God's earth, on God's business or man's, healthful and 
 health-breathing secure against harming, however un- 
 willingly; secure against incurring harm, however un- 
 wittingly? Would you never have to ask, 'Can I 
 adventure myself into that company, into that com- 
 panionship, where all is adverse to charity or piety, 
 to faith or virtue ? can I go there armed in God's 
 panoply, can I go there taking Christ with me, and 
 be quite sure that I shall return unscathed, and that I 
 shall leave a blessing behind me ?' Would you be able 
 to throw yourself into any enterprise whatsoever of love 
 or pity, without dread of inordinate affection or subtle 
 passion stealing into your work and poisoning at its 
 source your stream of good ? Would you be able to 
 bring to 'every study above all, to the highest a mind 
 calm and clear, an intellect unbribed and unbiassed, with 
 no motive but the thirst for truth, and no desire but to 
 hearken what the Lord God has to say? Would you be 
 able to rely absolutely upon the voice within to hear 
 what a prophet has called the 'word behind you,' say- 
 ing at each ambiguous turning, 'This is the way; walk 
 thou in it?' Would you have no reason to dread from 
 that voice an insidious hint, a treacherous direction, 
 landing you perhaps on the dark mountains of bewilder- 
 ment, or on the edge of that precipice which overhangs 
 ' the pit of the abyss?' Then must you keep the heart 
 with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of the 
 life not more the words and the deeds of good or 
 evil, than the processes of the mind that must 
 think, and the decisions of the conscience that must 
 judge.
 
 xxiv.] Purity. 435 
 
 2. Our Lord Jesus Christ touches a tenderer chord 
 when He places this amongst His beatitudes ' Blessed 
 are the pure in heart ; for they shall see God.' 
 
 The motive was a strong one, which said, ' To the 
 pure all things are pure.' Be pure in heart, and you 
 shall find, or else make, purity everywhere. Be pure in 
 heart, and intellect shall be pure, and conscience ; no 
 film shall cloud the mental vision, no stain shall sully 
 the mirror of duty. 
 
 But, ' Blessed are the pure in heart ; for they 
 shall see God ' this lifts the matter into a higher 
 region still, and tells how, not mind alone, not con- 
 science alone, but the very spirit and soul of the man, 
 hangs upon purity of heart for its welfare and for its 
 life. 
 
 ' They shall see God.' 
 
 You read it perhaps as a promise for the remote 
 future. Be pure in heart while you live, and when you 
 die you shall be in heaven. 
 
 We are not of them that would disparage the pursuit 
 of heaven. The instinct of life is strong in us ; not least 
 in those who profess indifference ; not least, always, in 
 those who say that they are in love with death. If it is 
 a virtue, or certainly not a vice, to be tenacious of the 
 half-life, can it be a crime to seek earnestly that con- 
 summation of the being which an apostle (rightly inter- 
 preted) calls the 'acquisition of the soul?' Then first 
 shall we know the fulness of being, when this corruptible 
 has put on incorruption, and mortality is swallowed up 
 of life. 
 
 He cannot be a mean man is it not a cruel trifling 
 with words to call him a selfish man ? who is resolute 
 
 282
 
 436 Purity. [xxiv, 
 
 at all costs to win heaven. Does it augur well, even 
 for greatness, to talk that cant of some theologies 
 except it be in the sense of one who knew no unrealities,, 
 and who revoked the thought as he uttered it ' I could 
 wish myself I was about to wish, but I will not 
 'accursed from Christ for my brethren?' Not so spoke 
 St Paul, when he spoke without parable : then it was r 
 ' I press toward the mark for the prize of the high 
 calling ' ' I follow after, if that I may apprehend that 
 for which also I was apprehended of Christ Jesus.' 
 
 Let no man be ashamed of an intense thirst for 
 heaven. Everything grand and disinterested and beau- 
 tiful springs directly out of it. This it was, Scripture 
 tells us, which motived the devotion of Abraham, and 
 the heroism of Moses, and all the righteousnesses of which 
 the world was not worthy ; this it was, the same Scrip- 
 ture tells, which made One greater than the sons of 
 men 'endure the cross, despising the shame,' because 
 beyond all and through all He saw ' the joy that was 
 set before Him,' the work of the humiliation accom- 
 plished, and the gate of life opened to all believers. 
 
 There is a sight of God in the far future. Brethren, 
 there is also a sight which is now. Certainly there 
 is a not seeing, a deprivation of the sight, in this 
 present. Cherish but for one moment an impure 
 thought instantly God is hidden. You may be on your 
 knees when the thought enters instantly the mercy-seat 
 is empty. If in this strange, this mysterious being 
 there has ever come into you, for ever so brief a 
 moment, an unruly passion, a forbidden lust; if it has 
 found entertainment, lodgment, tolerance, but for once, 
 but for one instant, in the chambers of imagery ; still
 
 xxiv.] Piirity. 437 
 
 more, if it has taken possession for we must not play 
 at preaching, as though angels, not men, were our 
 auditory if in boyhood or youth, if in manhood or age, 
 there has been a weak yielding to temptation, a fall 
 acted over again as erst in paradise ; I ask, and I know 
 the answer, was there not also, in the same instant, for 
 the same period, a driving out O, the old Bible is 
 not a dead letter a driving out from God's presence 
 even of the man that had once known it ; aye, and a 
 flaming sword turning every way, to bar against you 
 that tree of life, which is, being interpreted, the sight 
 of God ? 
 
 Thus it is with the not seeing, with the withdrawal of 
 the sight Can we appeal with equal confidence to an 
 opposite experience? Can I tell, still reading only these 
 memories before me, of some hour of glorious or at least 
 blessed victory some temptation, very real and very 
 definite and very obstinate, yet manfully repelled in the 
 strength of God and then angels, and more than angels, 
 coming to minister, to wash the wounds and recruit the 
 energies of the combatant that had kept his purity, that 
 had withstood in the evil day ? Was there not, in that 
 hour, a fulfilment of the saying, ' They shall see God ? ' a 
 vivid perception, then and there, of His reality, and of 
 His presence, and of His power, and of His love, who 
 said once to His servant, and still says to each one who 
 listens and waits for Him, ' My grace is sufficient for 
 thee ; my strength is made perfect in weakness ? ' 
 
 If there be in any of us the desire, hereafter or here, to 
 see God; to see Him in His beauty, and to see Him in 
 His goodness, and to see Him in His truth ; if we feel 
 that not to see Him is misery, that never to see Him
 
 43 8 Purity. [xxiv. 
 
 would indeed be ' the second death ' we must become 
 pure in heart. O, I know, I know too well, how stern, 
 how condemning, is that mandate of purity, falling upon 
 the ear, and wakening the memory, and quickening 
 the conscience, which is writing bitter things against 
 itself, and most justly, while it listens. You were re- 
 minded last Sunday how, when Jesus Christ, with that 
 poor sinful woman before Him, whom hostile Pharisees 
 had dragged there that they might have to accuse Him, 
 instead of passing upon her the sentence either of 
 acquittal or of condemnation, said only to them, ' He 
 that is without sin among you, let him cast the first 
 stone at her,' they all, one by one, from the oldest to 
 the youngest, ' convicted by their own conscience,' stole 
 away while He stooped and wrote ; aware that, if that 
 was the condition, not one could be the executioner. 
 That incident is a parable for all time. No gospel 
 record is more redolent of inspiration. Its authorship is 
 (for us at least) anonymous ; but a ' God-breathed scrip- 
 ture ' is, if anywhere, there. Other commandments may 
 be rehearsed before us, and though we ask God's mercy 
 for our breach of them, it is as a thing of course, if it be 
 not as a form, that we confess ourselves guilty. But 
 this one, the statute of purity, raises a blush on the very 
 heart. 
 
 Brethren, let us not misinterpret the commonness, I 
 had almost said the universality, of the self-condemna- 
 tion. Let us not lay to our souls the flattering unction 
 of the necessity of impurity, of the impossibility of being 
 pure. Let us not say, in this sense at least, ' Who can 
 bring a clean thing out of an unclean ? how can he be 
 clean that is born of a woman ?' Let us not say in our
 
 xxiv.] Purity. 439 
 
 hearts, We must acquiesce in something less than a 
 cleanness whiter than snow we must (for that is the 
 equivalent) despair of the purity that shall see God. 
 
 To despair of purity is one temptation : to heal im- 
 purity slightly is another. There are those whom pride 
 has kept clean ; there are those whom a fastidious taste, 
 a delicate nature, a cold disposition, a dread of conse- 
 quences, has preserved from this particular forrri of evil. 
 Let them not therefore write themselves pure with that 
 purity which shall see God. And there are those, once 
 again, whom the blessing of God upon a holy home, 
 upon wise and watchful training which preoccupied them 
 for this particular innocence, may enable, this day, with 
 a clear conscience, to plead the ' not guilty ' under the 
 indictment of this sermon. Yet even these last may 
 not be living, day by day and in all things, in that light, 
 which is also the sight, of God. 
 
 It is a more pathetic voice, however, than any of these 
 which pleads with us to-day for some help and some 
 guidance in the way of peace. It is the voice of one 
 who has gone very far from original righteousness, who 
 has lost the innocence of childhood, and not yet replaced 
 it with the one thing better the virtue of a Christian 
 manliness, and the strength of a divine grace. To him 
 it is the special office of the servant of the Lord to 
 minister ; telling him of ' a balm in Gilead,' of ' a phy- 
 sician there,' who came to die for us, and who lives to 
 save. ' Take with you words,' and go to Him words 
 of confession, words of sorrow, words of shame pray 
 for that ' hunger and thirst after righteousness ' which He 
 has set side by side with purity of heart among His 
 beatitudes ; pray for grace to place yourself once for all
 
 440 Purity. [xxiv. 
 
 on His side against your own faults and sins; pray for 
 strength as your day, for perseverance in the good fight, 
 for final victory as you draw your last breath. Re- 
 member that this prayer pledges you also to effort. 
 You must not parley with this terrible foe ; they least 
 of all, into whose heart he has once found entry. Seek 
 the companionship which is good for you ; eschew that 
 which is' evil. Endure hardness as the good soldier. 
 Make the body serve, never let it rule. Watch for the 
 sight of God. When you kneel praying, let Him not 
 go except He bless you. Wait for the opening of the 
 throne-room for that answer of peace, which is the 
 sight of God here. Pray without ceasing for that Holy 
 Spirit who is His own witness to the heart that lets 
 Him in. When you fall, rise again first to your knees, 
 then to put on once more the helmet of hope. Never 
 despair, never presume. ' By little and little,' such is 
 the promise, ' this kind of evil spirit goes out ' and he 
 rends a man sore in the dispossessing. 
 
 At last, though the body of humiliation cannot quite 
 be refashioned in this life into an immunity from the 
 assaults of this one temptation, there shall come a time 
 when it shall be recreated into the likeness of Christ's 
 body of glory ; when He who for us ' once suffered 
 Himself, being tempted,' shall appear the second time, 
 without sin, unto salvation. Then at last we shall be 
 like Him for we shall see Him as He is.
 
 XXV. 
 
 THE IMPOTENCE OF MAN IN ANTAGONISM 
 TO THE TRUTH. 
 
 2 Corinthians xiii. 8. 
 
 We can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth. 
 
 THIS wonderful man is bringing to a close the most 
 wonderful of his epistles. Nowhere else does he stand 
 out before us in so complete and so vivid a personality. 
 That marvellous union of strength and tenderness ; that 
 rapidity of transition from passion to pathos, and back 
 again ; that rugged, massive, vehement force of lan- 
 guage, broken here and there by passages, equally 
 natural, of matchless grace and beauty has found in 
 this second epistle to Corinth its fullest scope, its widest 
 sweep, its grandest opportunity. St Paul has had to 
 deal here with suspicions, with imputations, with accu- 
 sations, which threatened his very existence as an evan- 
 gelist and as an apostle. Every little change of plan, 
 in the most insignificant matters of all the time of a 
 journey, the order of a circuit has been distorted by 
 his enemies at Corinth into an instance of vacillation, 
 into an evidence of cowardice. Even his disinterested- 
 ness in refusing a pecuniary maintenance from congre- 
 gations which he served, from churches which he had 
 planted, was twisted into a proof of conscious unsound- 
 ness in his very footing and standing as an apostle of
 
 44 2 TJie Impotence of Man [xxv. 
 
 Christ There is no single point in his armour which 
 has not been tested by the stiletto of jealousy. The 
 whole letter bristles with allusions, which only the 
 microscope of intense study can make intelligible, to 
 taunts and cavils current amongst its readers, and need- 
 ing therefore no explanation, for them, to give meaning 
 and point to his answers. 
 
 It is a great comfort, amidst so many anonymous and 
 so many challenged authorships of books of the Bible, 
 to have just this one name, this one character, this one 
 person, placed above the reach of assault from the most 
 reckless and the most unscrupulous of freethinkers. 
 There is not a fact of the gospel, there is not a feature 
 of Jesus Christ, which is not presupposed, and which is not 
 reproduced, in this one undisputed epistle of the man Saul 
 of Tarsus, notorious in earlier days as a bitter foeman of 
 Christ and of the Christians, more notorious afterwards as 
 a convert to the faith which once he sought to exterminate 
 in both characters a historical person in the world of 
 action and in the world of letters ; of whom we can judge 
 to-day for ourselves with a knowledge far more inti- 
 mate and far more thorough than that which we possess 
 of Caesar or of Cicero yes, I will venture to say it, of 
 any man living or lately departed, famous in politics 
 or famous in literature. 
 
 The text occurs within seven verses of the end of the 
 letter. The tone of these last verses is that of a man 
 who feels that he has conquered. The lost ground at 
 Corinth has been recovered at the point of the sword, 
 and he speaks his last words with all the confidence and 
 with all the authority of one who is about to re-enter his 
 capital in triumph.
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Truth. 443 
 
 A word or two will give the key to the text and 
 context. 
 
 St Paul is on his way to Corinth, apparently (from 
 the letter, though not from the Acts) for the third time. 
 He is anticipating a visit peaceful on the whole, but 
 with some painful exceptions. A small minority is still 
 against him; inclined, from various motives, to ignore 
 or to resist him. The matter, he says, is not, only or 
 chiefly, personal. There is still a root of bitterness, he 
 fears, in the church's garden ; and he must deal with 
 it judicially. He has warned them, and he repeats the 
 warning, that, if he comes again, he will not spare. 
 They have asked a proof of his commission, and they 
 shall have it. The same voice which in earlier days 
 consigned Elymas the sorcerer to a temporary blindness, 
 and which, in this very church, by letter, delivered a 
 scandalous sinner to Satan for the destruction of the 
 flesh, shall speak again, if they will have it so, to make 
 sin suffering, with all the authority of the Lord of the 
 churches, who once indeed took upon Himself man's 
 weakness, and in it endured the cross, but who now, 
 raised from death, dieth no more, and in whom man's 
 weakness becomes instinct with divine strength. 'We 
 shall live with Him,' we shall share His vitality, ' in the 
 exercise of the very power of God Himself upon you.' 
 
 You would examine me examine yourselves. Can 
 you stand the test of sincerity and reality in your 
 Christian profession ? That is the question the question 
 always of concern and consequence to the man who is 
 readiest to judge and to condemn. For myself, he 
 says, and for my apostleship, you may be at ease. I 
 can stand the test, the test severe and awful, to which
 
 444 The Impotence of Man [xxv. 
 
 you would subject me Does Christ speak in me ? does 
 Christ bind and loose in heaven as I bind or loose 
 below ? 
 
 Yet, though I thus speak, know that I desire not the 
 opportunity of thus proving my apostleship. My prayer 
 is, that you do no evil that you be upright and pure 
 in your life and in your walk : and this, not that I 
 may have the credit of it; not that the state of the 
 church of Corinth may redound to my glory as its 
 pastor and its evangelist ; no, from this better and nobler 
 motive, the desire (without one side-look or selfish 
 regard) that you may be what you ought to be, though 
 that very integrity of yours shall rob me of the oppor- 
 tunity of asserting myself. It is only sin, against which 
 apostleship can prove itself in punishing do that which 
 is right, and the rod falls from my hand. Be it so. 
 Let me be a ' reprobate ' one whom men call so, and 
 who cannot refute them may you but be holy and 
 without blemish. 'For we have no power against the 
 truth, but only for it.' Be you with the truth, of gospel 
 faith and gospel living, and upon you the apostolical 
 powers, in the form of punishing, shall become instantly 
 as though they were not : the truth, and every man 
 that loves and does it, is exempt from the jurisdiction 
 which is punitive only to the evil. 
 
 This magnificent unselfishness is before us in each 
 feature and each lineament of the blessed apostle. He 
 cares not what happens to him what injustice of 
 contempt or calumny, what disparagement of powers 
 or motives, what loss of opportunity of self-vindication 
 or self-assertion may but his churches be strong in 
 faith and pure in conduct. If this disinterestedness,
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Truth. 445 
 
 going to the length of a willing self-effacement, were 
 but characteristic of all who put their hand in this our 
 day to the service of their country or to the ministry 
 of Jesus Christ ; what might not be hoped for in the 
 influence of the church upon the world a world keen- 
 sighted but not always malevolent ; grieved sometimes 
 that it cannot see with us the beauty of holiness and' 
 the certainty of a heaven ? Let it see this that the 
 Christian man and the Christian minister cares more 
 for the work than he cares for the workman and a 
 new page is written instantly in the book of evidence 
 a page full of grace, and a page full of persuasion. 
 
 But now I would take the text itself, and see what it 
 says to us, not so much in its application by St Paul, 
 as in its wide and grand principle. 
 
 'We can do nothing against the truth, but for the 
 truth.' 
 
 We shall read it as a lesson in human greatness and 
 littleness ; in the power, and the limitation of the power, 
 of the human being, in all its provinces and in all its 
 workings. 
 
 ' Truth ' is a word of large compass, but of uniform 
 definition. Truth is reality. Truth is that which is : 
 falsehood is 'the thing nothing' the non-entity that 
 which may seem to be, but is not. Whatsoever then 
 has reality in it the reality of substance and essence, 
 of stability and permanence has place within St Paul's 
 great axiom, 'We can do nothing against it, but only 
 for it.' 
 
 We may illustrate the maxim in three ways. 
 
 i. Truth has a meaning in reference to human science. 
 In the region of the material, that which has been
 
 446 The Impotence of Man [xxv. 
 
 established by diligent search, by careful observation, 
 by wide and large comparison, is true, has being, is an 
 integral portion of the thing that is and every reason- 
 able person so will regard it. To fight against it, to 
 clamour against it, to be frightened at it, lest it should 
 conflict with something else that is, however surely be- 
 lieved or however solemnly important, is not rational, 
 is not sensible, is not reverent. That fact, unless you 
 can disprove it by counter-evidence, by further search 
 or wider comparison, is as much a part of the truth, in 
 its own line and region, as anything else that God has 
 made or done or spoken. You can do nothing against 
 it. You must recognize, you must receive, you must 
 register it, till you can fit it in, or even if you never can 
 fit it in, among your other recognitions and your other 
 experiences. 
 
 Simple as all this sounds, there are those who cannot 
 accept 'it Each new discovery alarms them, even in 
 realms remote from the Bible. Investigation itself is 
 viewed with suspicion dogged at each step by the hint 
 of danger or by the imputation of unfriendliness. At the 
 exact point where knowledge stood when they were in 
 the cradle, there it must remain at least till they are in 
 the grave. The most violent of all breaches with the letter 
 of Scripture, such as those of Copernicus and of Galileo, 
 they have grown up with and they are used to : but 
 the stand must be made somewhere, and for them it 
 shall be made at the attainment of the last year or of 
 the present generation. 
 
 What calmness, what dignity, would it give to the 
 Christian, if he were able to say to himself, Truth and 
 the truth can never really be at variance. I know but
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Truth. 447 
 
 in part, and in very small part: but of this I am assured, 
 that the God of the Bible is the God also of nature, and 
 that that which He has really spoken in the one cannot 
 really contradict that which He has really made in the 
 other. Therefore I wait, and I rest, and I trust. Either 
 I have somehow misread my Bible, or there is an ex- 
 planation and there is a consistency somewhere out of 
 sight. Certainly I can do nothing against the truth. 
 
 It is quite otherwise with human theories. They are 
 not yet parts of the truth. They may never be so. They 
 are attempts to combine facts, or attempts to explain 
 facts, or (sometimes) attempts to manipulate facts: they 
 can only prove themselves by an enormous lapse of time 
 and an 'immense concurrence of coincidences. It is by 
 no means true that men can do nothing against t/iein, 
 for they have been disproved and they have been dis- 
 placed and they have been scouted, by the hundred and 
 by the thousand, all along the ages. 
 
 But facts once proved are a part of the truth of 
 which it is written that we can do nothing against, but 
 only for it. Happy is he who preserves his balance, 
 alike of faith and patience, amidst any number of sur- 
 prising, startling, and at first shocking discoveries in the 
 realm of real science which is, being interpreted, the 
 knowledge of the thing brought into being, the thing 
 kept in being, the thing controlled and directed and 
 managed in being, by God Himself, the Creator and 
 Preserver and Ruler of all. 
 
 We can do nothing against the truth : what can we 
 do for it ? 
 
 It is easy to see how the Christian student and the 
 Christian teacher may help the onward march of truth
 
 The Impotence of Man [xxv. 
 
 by an attitude towards it of respect and deference, of 
 interest and gratitude. They can assure the toilers in 
 the field of science that, so far from dreading and so 
 far from disparaging the results of their labour, they 
 recognize in them fellow-workers in the cause of God 
 and man ; they bid them God speed ; they are confident 
 that nothing but good can be the ultimate issue of the 
 most intense study, of the most fearless exploration, of 
 the handywork of God in the universe of His creation. 
 
 And of them on their part the Christian asks two 
 things only, and asks even these for the very truth's sake. 
 First, that science will continue this day, as in the years 
 that are past, to worship while she explores. Secondly,that 
 at all events she will exercise towards workers in other 
 fields that forbearance and that respectfulness which 
 they manifest towards her ; that she will never allow 
 herself, lest she bring into just disrepute her own pro- 
 vince of truth, to speak contemptuously or to speak 
 mockingly of their efforts or of their subjects as though 
 existence itself, as though at any rate certainty, were 
 cribbed and cabined in the visible and the tangible ; as 
 though there were no vast region at all within which 
 telescope and microscope give no vision when she 
 must know that she herself fills but a small place, 
 however important, among the realities of man's being, 
 unable to explain to him either his origin, or his nature, 
 or his destiny ; unable to ignore, yet powerless to com- 
 fort, his sorrows ; impotent to give either answer to his 
 questionings, satisfaction to his aspirations, peace to his 
 troubled conscience, or hope to his dying bed. Science 
 herself may be a fighter against the truth. She is so 
 instantly when she arrogates to herself the whole of it ;
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Truth. 449 
 
 assuming the non-existence of a world which may be 
 (for anything she can possibly know) as real as her own 
 the world of human spirit, and the world of the life 
 of God. 
 
 We are powerless against the truth : we are not 
 powerless, in God's strength, for it. 
 
 2. When our Lord spoke, as He sometimes did, of 
 ' doing the truth,' He taught us that the text has place 
 in the world not of knowledge but of life. There are 
 such things as reality and unreality, truth and falsehood, 
 in the realm of action. When we speak of a true man 
 and a false man, we are pointing in this direction. 
 Virtue is truth, in contrast with vice. Morality is truth, 
 in contrast with wickedness. The one is reality, sub- 
 stance, essence : the other is shadow, semblance, false- 
 hood. Good itself is truth, in contrast with evil, which 
 is always hollow, shallow, and evanescent. ' We can do 
 nothing against the truth, but only for it,' has an ap- 
 plication to that alternative which is before each one 
 of us each day in the management of himself. 
 
 There are men historical persons, some of them 
 who have thought, in this sense, to do something against 
 the truth. Men who have defied the morality of their 
 generation, outraged the proprieties of society, and 
 hoped by the force of position, or by the force of 
 genius, to put down virtue herself, to the extent at least 
 of their own persons and their own surroundings. They 
 have tried it have they succeeded ? Has it in the long 
 run answered, even for them ? Has not the judgment 
 of the very next generation, has not the judgment (on 
 the whole) even of their own, gone against them ? Has 
 not the truth been too strong for them ? In nothing 
 v. 29
 
 450 The Impotence of Man \ xxv. 
 
 has the application of the word ' truth ' to morals been 
 more powerfully attested, than in the failure of these 
 champions of a new licence, whether by example or by 
 writing, to move from its firm base, by one inch or by 
 one hair's breadth, the impregnable rock of the human 
 instinct as to the virtuous and the vile. 
 
 But, for one man who attempts this audacious enter- 
 prise, thousands and tens of thousands have hoped to 
 do something on a smaller scale and in a quieter way 
 against that truth which is virtue. Who, almost, in this 
 congregation, can look back to no day and no year of 
 his life when he was, in his own hidden self, the an- 
 tagonist (in this sense) of the truth ? Where is he so 
 happy shall I call him, or so self-ignorant ? who could 
 have stood up in that grim circle of Pharisaic accusers 
 to accept the challenge of the one sinless, ' He that is 
 without sin among you, let him first cast the stone ? ' 
 It was not only that particular assemblage it would 
 have been the same if it could have happened here 
 to-day which went out, convicted by its own con- 
 science, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last. 
 
 Then the appeal lies to all of us. And it is this. Did 
 you find, in that day or in that year of sinning, that 
 you were able, practically, to do anything against the 
 truth ? Did you find, or did any man ever find, that 
 he had any real success in that war ? Was it happiness, 
 was it peace, while the sin reigned in you ? Was there 
 not always something, call it what you might, which 
 embittered the day after, if not the night of, the sinning ? 
 Can you hesitate to say that you had proof a proof 
 coextensive and commensurate with your experience 
 of the matter that there was a power around you and
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Truth. 451 
 
 over you which on the whole (to use a modern phrase) 
 made for righteousness ? 
 
 No man grown to man's estate will feel the slightest 
 disposition to gainsay the old utterance, There is no 
 doubt on which side God is, in the great world-wide 
 and age-long war between vice and virtue. It is not 
 needful to bring into the question probabilities (though 
 they are great) of detection and punishment, of disgrace 
 and ruin, as the result and consequence of sinning. You 
 need not wait for these : possibly, just possibly, you 
 might wait long for them. But there is a witness never 
 waited for ; and that is ' the spirit of the man which is in 
 him.' He that would do anything against the truth of 
 virtue must needs go out of the world no, he must 
 needs go out of himself. It is only if it is even then 
 it is only by drugging and deadening conscience, through 
 a length and an obstinacy of sinning which makes the 
 man himself half beast half devil it is only thus that 
 you can succeed in doing anything against the truth, 
 even in your own single being. And who shall call this 
 a victory, which is to be won only by a moral suicide, 
 which knows neither repentance nor forgiveness, whether 
 in this world or in that which is to come ? 
 
 Brethren, we can do nothing against the truth which 
 is virtue. Can we do something for it ? 
 
 I address here, in large part, a congregation of the 
 young. In the same degree is this an assembly powerful, 
 if it will have it so, in the cause of the truth. It is com- 
 paratively little to see an old man, or to see a family 
 man, or to see a clergyman, virtuous. It is expected 
 of him. Men think too slightingly sometimes of the 
 difficulty for sorrie men of being virtuous ever. But the 
 
 29 2
 
 452 The Impotence of Man [xxv. 
 
 terror and the horror of being vicious under those 
 circumstances operates no doubt powerfully in aid of 
 higher motives, where the case is so. Who shall speak 
 of the ' power for the truth ' which is yours, young 
 brethren, in this place and at the age now present ? 
 Just in proportion as the life is young, and the snares 
 are many, and the observation is close and vigilant, is 
 the marvel for some, the admiration for some, the 
 persuasion for some, the envy (unspoken) for many, 
 if you stand stedfast if so much as the breath of 
 suspicion never touches you. Then can you plead 
 here and there for truth against the lie, and be listened 
 to. Then can you, without pleading and the eloquence 
 of silence is often the noblest influence one or two, of 
 your nearest and dearest, at that age when love is so 
 strong and devotion so ardent, to walk with you or 
 after you in the way of purity which is the way of 
 peace. You are powerless in the long run against the 
 truth ; but you are mighty and shall prevail if you are 
 for it. 
 
 3. When St Paul used the word 'truth,' he was not 
 thinking of science, he was scarcely thinking of virtue. 
 ' The truth ' for St Paul was the sum and substance of it 
 embodied in Jesus Christ, revealed in the gospel. Our 
 last word to-day must read the divine maxim before us 
 in that sense, with that interpretation. 
 
 ' We can do nothing against the truth, but for the 
 truth.' ' Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things 
 are pure, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things 
 are lovely' these, for St Paul and for all who are like- 
 minded with him, are contained and concentrated in the 
 gospel. And what he here says is, that over one who
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Triith. 453 
 
 lives the gospel the arm of judgment, even of apostoli- 
 cal judgment, is instantly arrested and paralyzed ' for 
 we can do nothing against the gospel but for it.' 
 
 Many are they in our own age, many there have been 
 in past generations, who think or thought that they 
 could (in this sense) do something against the truth. 
 Open antagonists and secret, outspoken infidels and 
 false brethren, have tried to bring the faith of Christ 
 into doubt, disrepute, or ridicule ; have assailed it from 
 within, by parading its discrepancies and its difficulties ; 
 have assailed it from without, by pronouncing the whole 
 thing, the whole conception, a self-contradiction and a 
 monstrosity. Now and then they have even seemed to 
 make a point, to strike down a champion, to lay low a 
 standard-bearer in some corner of the field, to have made 
 an impression, to have gained a victory. St Paul says, 
 All this may have been, may be again : men have seemed 
 to do something against the truth, chiefly because of the 
 timidity of professed believers, who flee when no man 
 pursueth, and count the faith slain when in reality it is 
 neither scarred nor touched. But, he adds, turn away 
 for a moment, and then look again is the truth over- 
 borne ? Is the gospel weaker to-day than it was five, 
 ten, fifteen centuries aforetime ? Were there ever more 
 diligent students of the Bible, were there ever more 
 earnest men of prayer, were there ever more holy lives, 
 were there ever more Christian deaths, than in this 
 eightieth year of this nineteenth age ? Are the im- 
 pugners of the faith satisfied ? Are they at peace in 
 themselves ? Can they look with any one hope to that 
 leap into darkness which for them is dying ? Do you 
 hear no laments over their own lost convictions, over
 
 454 The Impotence of Man [xxv. 
 
 their own departed days of believing and worshipping- 
 no envious lockings upon men that have hope and can 
 give reason for it no anxious, no pathetic longings that 
 their children may be Christians no self-desponding, no 
 self-despairing farewells to Christian brothers and sisters 
 nearing the rapid river, and able to gaze stedfastly as 
 they do so upon the golden gates of the celestial city 
 beyond it ? 
 
 Brethren, we do not deny that it is in the power of 
 any man, young or old, to be an antagonist of the 
 gospel. Any fool can parody verses of the Bible; can 
 say smart things against creeds or articles ; can raise a 
 laugh against the peculiarities of conscientious and 
 God-fearing men. And some of these things will stay 
 by us when we are gone forth into the world of 
 trial and difficulty; will rise before us in moments of 
 serious devotion ; will mix ludicrous images with our 
 prayers ; will make it harder to be good than it need 
 have been, even when the great turn has come in the 
 direction of faith and duty. 
 
 This you can do, if you will. Yes, you may read 
 infidel books, and reproduce among your friends their 
 arguments or their invectives. It is quite possible that 
 you might even make a believer into an infidel, and have 
 the misery of hearing, late on in life, that such or such 
 an associate or intimate of yours here has lived without 
 God in the world, and has died without hope in his end. 
 
 Such are the powers which we possess against the 
 truth which is the gospel. Thus far can we go, and no 
 further. We may stamp out its influence upon our own 
 heart or upon the heart of a brother. We are fearfully 
 and wonderfully made, as much in soul as in body.
 
 xxv.] in Antagonism to the Truth. 455 
 
 The will is the man and the will is free. Why God 
 does not bind it, for its own sake and for the sake of 
 another, is the real mystery along with the mystery of 
 evil itself : we must bow before it, and tremble. 
 
 But the truth itself, which is the gospel against that 
 you have no power, no, not one jot nor one tittle. 
 ' The word of God is not bound.' The only, only ques- 
 tion is, shall it emancipate, shall it gladden, shall it save 
 me ? Others, by thousands and tens of thousands, it is 
 stirring, it is charming, it is blessing and saving, day by 
 day. 
 
 If we can do nothing against, can we do nothing 
 for it ? 
 
 The gospel, like its Lord, is unselfish. It seeks not 
 yours but you. It does not want your help it wants 
 your happiness. Not till you have embraced it not till 
 you feel its light and its heat not till you find it what 
 the Psalmist calls your delight and your counsellor 
 will it accept anything of you. Generous, disinterested, 
 self-sacrificing Lord ! Not till Thou hast saved can we 
 serve Thee. 
 
 But then, when this is, we can do something, each 
 one, for the truth. We can add one little chapter, one 
 quiet page, to its evidences. We can show that it is 
 powerful, by yielding ourselves to its influence. We can 
 show, by our example, that its whole tendency is to- 
 wards that which is good, that which is happy, that 
 which is beautiful, its enemies themselves being judges. 
 Yes, we can say, with more than the lips, ' Come and 
 see,' when men ask you, Is there anything in it ? ' can 
 there any good thing come out of Nazareth ?' 
 
 So, when the last day of life comes, and with your will
 
 45 6 The Impotence of Man, &c. [xxv. 
 
 or against it you must stretch forth helpless hands, and 
 be girded for the mysterious journey; your last breath 
 shall be drawn, not in the disconsolate cry, ' O Galilean, 
 Thou hast conquered!' but rather in the confiding utter- 
 ance, hallowed by the dying lips of saints and martyrs, 
 ' I know in whom I have believed Lord Jesus, receive 
 my spirit.'
 
 XXVI. 
 
 HOME RELATIONS. 
 
 Ephesians iii. 14, 15. 
 
 Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named. 
 
 THERE can be no doubt that the right rendering is, 
 ' every family.' And there is a further point unavoidably 
 lost, in the word 'family' itself. St Paul says, 'For this 
 cause I bow my knees (in prayer) unto the Father, from 
 whom every fatherhood, in heaven and upon earth, is 
 named' derives that name of 'fatherhood.' The force 
 of the saying lies in the Trarrjp and the TraTptd. Every 
 human family is such in virtue of a divine Father. 
 Every little section of the great society, which is the 
 sum total of rational, moral, and spiritual being, is 
 combined and cemented into its separate unity by the 
 fact that it has a Father in heaven, the spring and 
 source of all being, and the designer and founder of 
 each single knot and group of being. 
 
 The text gives great dignity and even sanctity to 
 this night's subject. It is a subject never unsuitable 
 where a congregation of human beings, men or women,
 
 458 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 is gathered into one place. So much does home life lie 
 at the root of all life so primary an element is the 
 home in all that makes or is the life that the mention 
 of it, with its duties, or, to use a wider term, its relations, 
 must always be appropriate, must everywhere be sug- 
 gestive, must, I think, almost always and almost every- 
 where be stirring and reproving to the conscience of 
 those who listen and (let me add) of him who speaks. 
 
 But if everywhere, how much more here, how much 
 more this evening, where the hearers are young men 
 inmates still (for the most part) of homes where parents 
 still living dwell, and, more yet than this, have their 
 hearts full of a very recent parting, and would fain be 
 told something or reminded of something by which they 
 may still cherish and cultivate a relationship now for a 
 while to be of faith not of sight. 
 
 It is impossible not to be struck by the sight of this 
 congregation. This is, in a more than common sense, 
 a voluntary service. I cannot but feel it as a sign of 
 life in this great University, that such a service should 
 have been instituted by its elder, and accepted so 
 cordially by its younger members. May a blessing 
 from on high not be wanting to us, while we resume 
 these services to-night after a long interval, and would 
 fain give a profitable tone to their new start and to their 
 year's course. 
 
 Our subject is the brief compound Home Relations. 
 
 And one passing word may be given to the question, 
 What is 'home?' St Paul tells us that it is a society 
 which has God for its founder; and we have only to add 
 to this that it is a society of which each individual father 
 is the human centre. The parental presence is the home.
 
 xxvi.] Home Relations. 459 
 
 Place is no part of it. We may speak of the home of 
 our childhood, or the home of our youth, and mean by 
 this the particular house in which days full of delightful 
 memories were spent, and from which to have been 
 uprooted by circumstance adverse or prosperous was 
 a trouble and a sorrow never to be compensated but, 
 after all, the home itself moves with the parents, and the 
 essence of it is still amidst all change the parental 
 presence. 
 
 Now the home thus defined may be of various, even 
 of opposite characters. There are good homes and bad 
 homes. There are homes of beautiful example, tender 
 affection, and beneficent influence. There are homes of 
 mere self-indulgence, teaching no better lesson than that 
 of the utter unsatisfactoriness of a life lived to itself. 
 There are homes of pitiable discord, where the best 
 hope of the best of sons is that he may be the gentle 
 and persuasive mediator, determined to veil what he 
 cannot honour, and to do his difficult duty alike and 
 equally towards two incongruous characters whose one 
 chance of harmony lies in him. We have seen such 
 instances : we have seen the painful task nobly ac- 
 complished, whatever the final issue in success or 
 failure. 
 
 These last words show us that home does not cease to 
 be home because its characteristics are not home-like. 
 Home is the parental presence and neither unworthi- 
 ness nor ungodliness nor open evil can either abrogate 
 its rights or destroy its responsibilities. 'Home' has its 
 'relations' still, even where pain and grief are the sum of 
 them. 
 
 The question has suggested itself, whether Christianity,
 
 460 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 whether Christ Himself, makes much of home duties 
 whether the new relationship of redemption and grace 
 has not superseded, or thrown quite into the background, 
 the old tie of the human sonship. It cannot be denied 
 that many young converts have rushed to that con- 
 clusion. The new duty, of witnessing and testifying, 
 has been made to justify and even to sanctify the utter- 
 most disregard of parental requests, wishes, and feelings. 
 Nor can it be denied that a few strong expressions fell 
 from our Lord's own lips, which, standing alone and 
 taken literally, might seem almost to abolish the natural 
 for the spiritual relationship. ' If any man come to me, 
 and hate not his father and mother... he cannot be my 
 disciple.' Of course, a better instructed interpreter sees 
 in such expressions nothing more than a strong utter- 
 ance of the principle, that in comparison with duty to 
 Christ every other relationship must stand aside. And 
 we have no need to interpret for Him what He has 
 so emphatically interpreted for Himself in three ways, 
 to mention no others to-night (i) By His own example 
 of filial duty. ' He went down with them, and came 
 to Nazareth, and was subject unto them ' continuing, 
 till the age of thirty years, the humble dweller in a 
 village and cottage home, without one assertion of 
 divine claim or mission as making Him independent 
 of the commonest home relations. (2) By His keen and 
 indignant reproof of those who would withhold from 
 father or mother one single thing which might be for 
 profit or comfort to them, on the plea that it was 'Corban,' 
 that is to say, a consecrated offering. (3) Thirdly, and to 
 my mind far above all, by His taking the earthly re- 
 lationship of father and son as the one sufficient type of
 
 xx VL] Home Relations. 461 
 
 the superhuman relationship of man to his God always 
 speaking of God Himself under that title, and making 
 this the address of all the prayers of His people, 'When 
 ye pray, say, Our Father, which art in heaven.' With 
 such expressions of His mind and will, we need scarcely 
 carry on the enquiry into the writings of His apostles, 
 or wait for their strong and repeated enunciation of the 
 everlasting stringency of the fifth commandment of the 
 decalogue, ' Honour thy father and mother which is 
 the first commandment with promise.' 
 
 We cannot forget how the voice of divine inspiration 
 has made the condition of our home relations the 
 test of a standing or falling national virtue. The Old 
 Testament closes, the New Testament opens, with that 
 definition of the Elijah mission as the reprover and 
 restorer of all things, ' He shall turn the heart of the 
 fathers to the children, and the heart of the children 
 to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a 
 curse.' ' He shall go before Him in the spirit and power 
 of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, 
 and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just ; to make 
 ready a people prepared for the Lord.' The very sub- 
 stitution of the clause, 'and the disobedient to the 
 wisdom of the just,' for the original of Malachi, ' and the 
 hearts of the children to their fathers,' seems suggestive 
 at least of the connexion between filial estrangement 
 and a general ungodliness between a heart undutiful 
 and a heart irreverent a son alienated from his father, 
 and a man alienated from his God. ' He shall turn the 
 hearts of the children to their fathers,' is, in other words, 
 ' He shall turn the disobedient to the wisdom of the 
 just.' It is remarkable, in this connexion, that we do
 
 462 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 not find any express mention in the Baptist's ministry 
 of a special appeal to parents and children, such as he 
 addressed to the soldiers, the publicans, the Pharisees, 
 or the people at large. Parental and filial discord was 
 not so much one single example, it was a general 
 description rather, of the dislocation and disorganization 
 of society which he was sent to remonstrate with and to 
 heal. 
 
 Most true and certain it is, that the state of the homes 
 is the state of a population. If you would know what 
 society is, you must examine the family. The terrible 
 thing is, when you find in the lower classes of the 
 national life an early abandonment of the home, or a 
 stay within it on the footing of an absolute and avowed 
 independence. In many of our great towns, the daughter, 
 as well as the son, is a lodger : the contribution, which is 
 her bounden duty, to the family resources takes the form 
 of a rent for board and lodging, which, on the first word 
 of rebuke or restraint, she can, with or without notice, 
 simply carry elsewhere. The religion of the family, such 
 as it is, is not a family religion: each member of the 
 family goes his or her own way, on the day of rest, 
 to church or chapel, to this or that church, to this 
 or that chapel, in absolute disregard of the wish of the 
 parent or of the companionship of brother or sister. 
 The family life is a rope of sand, without recognition 
 and without cohesion. 
 
 Is not that a true word, a divine insight, which traces 
 all the faults and all the sins and all the crimes of that 
 nation to its root and source here ? Is it not the 
 estrangement of fathers from sons, and of children from 
 parents, which makes the world, our world, the wilder-
 
 XXVL] Home Relations. 463 
 
 ness it is ? Is it not at this point that the Elijah must 
 begin his restoring, that the Elisha must throw in his 
 healing salt, if the restoration is to be thorough, if the 
 cure is to be vital ? 
 
 These gross and vulgar forms of home dissension are 
 of course not those of our social standing. If the same 
 evil exists amongst us, it will manifest itself in a 
 different way under a veil and mask, probably, of 
 many lingering civilities and kindlinesses. Nevertheless 
 the principle of the same disorganization may be at 
 work even here. We cannot with any confidence at- 
 tempt the comparison, in this matter, of one age of the 
 world, or one generation of our own country, with 
 another. There were undutiful sons, we know, from the 
 first days undutiful sons in Canaan and the wilder- 
 ness undutiful sons in every country of heathendom 
 and of Christendom undutiful and unnatural sons, in 
 high places and low, in the last century of our own 
 England. And it would be gross exaggeration to say 
 that there are not thousands of homes, gentle and simple, 
 in our own country to-day, where the relationships of 
 parents and sons are exercised in beautiful harmony, 
 with all the reverence on the one side, with all the 
 tenderness on the other side, with all the love on both, 
 of which that most gracious, most divine institution is 
 capable. 
 
 And yet, is the restorer's office absolutely superfluous 
 to-day? Is there no such want amongst us as the turn- 
 ing of hearts to each other, in the relation of sons and 
 fathers? You will not say it no, not even you, though 
 I address here the most favoured class of all in many 
 respects, the most exemplary. We must not exchange
 
 464 Home Relations. [xxvi 
 
 compliments here we must try to reach hearts, to 
 ouch consciences. We know, by ourselves, from our 
 own observation, alas from our own experience, that it 
 is quite possible to have great estrangements, of heart 
 and feeling, quite decently and decorously glossed over, 
 (i) There is a selfish neglect of the home, in presence or 
 absence, quite possible, quite easy, without one dis- 
 respectful word spoken. (2) There is even a con- 
 temptuous treatment possible as though the young 
 knew better than the old, had a revelation all their 
 own of the thing that is manly and the thing that is 
 proper and the thing that is universal. (3) And 
 there is a slight, silly, trifling treatment possible 
 a general levity, of tone and manner, making all 
 serious counsel, making all grave conversation, making 
 all true sympathy, out of the question silencing all 
 that is deep or high, all that is really great and really 
 heavenward, in the intercourse between a man and his 
 father, between a man and his mother, between a man 
 and his brother, between a man and his sister, and 
 leaving behind it, after each sojourn and after each 
 visit, a sense of void and of vacuity, bitterly disappointing 
 to the home-heart that was yearning for confidence, 
 yearning for reality, yearning for help, to be received 
 and to be given, in the anxious critical journey (as it 
 is felt, on that side, to be) from birth to death, from 
 earth to heaven. 
 
 The result of these things is, in various shapes and 
 
 forms, that evil thing which the Elijah mission comes 
 
 to repair alienation or estrangement between the heart 
 
 of the parent and the heart of the son. 
 
 (i) Often it is, as I have described it, a careless
 
 xxvi.] Home Relations. 465 
 
 estrangement. There is no motive in it, no reason for 
 it, no avowal, perhaps no consciousness, of it it is 
 what might easily have been avoided, it is what might 
 possibly be removed, were there but just the thing, 
 which, alas, is the thing wanting, an earnest purpose, 
 a conscientious resolve. Meanwhile, all is playing, 
 trifling, jesting. Nothing is called by its own name. 
 The very relationship itself has a nickname for which 
 we plead that it means nothing, when, unhappily, that 
 is the very worst of pleas, making into an excuse the 
 very purposelessness which is the crime. 
 
 (2) Now and then, not quite rarely, it is a religious 
 estrangement. The son has taken up opinions, which 
 are not those of the home, on subjects of sacred import. 
 He may be right in so doing. That is, he may be con- 
 vinced in heart and soul of the truth of something 
 different from the system of doctrine or ritual in which 
 he was brought up. He may have given much time, 
 large reading, deep thought, earnest prayer, to the 
 discovery of the thing which God has spoken. He 
 cannot help the result it is his life. Then arises the 
 practical question. This new doctrine is not the doctrine 
 of the home : the home dislikes, protests against, will 
 have none of it. Unwise arguments, injudicious en- 
 treaties, overbearing commands, are heaped upon him. 
 Much and sorely against his will, alienation is forced 
 upon him. It is not his doing : he tried all gentle 
 methods, and they were in vain. But how often is it 
 otherwise. There was no modesty in the manner, there 
 was no humility in the language, there was no reluc- 
 tance (there ought to have been) to differ, there was no 
 moderation in the carrying out of the new, there was 
 v. 30
 
 466 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 no show of regret in the abandonment of the old. The 
 alienation is a religious alienation but it need not have 
 been : he might have avoided it, without cowardice and 
 without compromise. 
 
 (3) Far, far more often the estrangement is the direct 
 opposite of this. It is not a religious, it is a sinful 
 alienation. By some one of the thousand wiles or 
 assaults of evil the son has been led astray from the God 
 of his father. He has that in his bosom which cannot 
 dwell in the home : if it does, it must first disguise 
 itself. A guilty secret is there, such as innocent sisters 
 could not hear of and live. A deep sense of hollowness, 
 a burning wound of shame, makes it torture to be as he 
 is where he is. A distance wide as the poles asunder 
 severs him from days when home could be home to him. 
 The habit of dissimulation grows. At last he is a 
 stranger amongst next friends. The heart of the son 
 is alienated from the father where is the Elijah that 
 shall turn it back again ? 
 
 We ought to be able to answer that question. There 
 is a balm in Gilead for all sorrows may there but be 
 the Physician, the divine Physician, to apply it. But 
 first we must say a word or two as to what home 
 is in God's intention, and in the experience of His 
 children. 
 
 (i) Home is our haven. In early years it is a place 
 of safe-keeping. What should we have been without 
 that safeguard ? Have we ever stopped to commiserate 
 and to feel for the homeless ? Those poor children, bap- 
 tized in tears, who never had a home how must it be 
 u-ith them ? No sweet memories were theirs, of gentle 
 nurture, of kind smiles and loving words, of the presence
 
 xxvi.] Home Relations. 467 
 
 of good and the absence of evil can we wonder that 
 they fell into bad ways and vile habits ? What was 
 there to warn them off from them? What was there 
 to win them another way? What was there so much 
 as to distinguish for them between good and evil ? 
 God's holy ordinance, above and before all services or 
 sacraments, of a tender and loving home, this was 
 wanting to them and with it all that ' preventing with 
 the blessings of goodness ' of which a psalmist tells, 
 and of which we, the worst of us, have all had expe- 
 rience. 
 
 But that which home was to us in the infancy and 
 in the childhood, that it still is or still might be to 
 us, whether as the permanent residence or in the oc- 
 casional return. 
 
 Where is the young man who does not owe much, 
 who might not owe much more, to his holidays from 
 school, to his vacations from college ? How much did 
 we feel in our own past days for those Indian or 
 Australian public-school boys who had no home to 
 go to in the intervals of school-times. What a per- 
 ceptible lack was there for them of the blessed in- 
 fluences of the holidays. Premature citizens of the 
 world, they were made playthings of, they were made 
 guests of, they were made men of they were tolerated, 
 or they were caressed, or they were flattered they were 
 not and they could not be, in those intervals, recruited 
 and repaired and restored by the holy influences of a 
 home. 
 
 With us it is otherwise. When we return home, we 
 shake off the surroundings and the encumbrances of a 
 factitious existence, and go back into all the naturalness 
 
 302
 
 468 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 and all the reality of the rock from which we were 
 hewn. 'For a few short weeks,' said a voice silent now 
 for almost forty years, ' this fatal spell will now be taken 
 off from you, and you will live and breathe in freedom/ 
 O the reparative and the restorative influence, as it 
 might be, of those few short weeks ! Repent of your 
 neglect of them : use them hereafter, if God spares you, 
 to the full. 
 
 (2) Home is our confessional. Yes, before there was 
 altar or shrine, ministry or priesthood, home was. The 
 father of the household was its priest. God modelled 
 upon that exemplar all priesthood that was ever His 
 institution. Priesthood itself replaced not the home 
 still less that Christian ministry which leaves all Christians 
 priests. How many soever be the presbyters of the 
 church of England, still the confessional, as God 
 ordained it, is the home. Thither carry your secrets 
 there unbosom, and there leave them. Absolution is of 
 God only 'who can forgive sins but God alone?' I 
 speak of the human instrumentality and I say that for 
 one man whose best confessor is the clergyman, for a 
 hundred and a thousand men the best, the alone safe 
 confessor is in his home. 
 
 Yes, in the home. Many a secret which there is 
 danger, moral danger, spiritual danger in divulging in 
 a vestry or a chancel may be confided with nothing but 
 advantage to a brother, to a father best of all, to a 
 mother. Fear not the not being understood fear not 
 the being abhorred fear not the being indelicate, or the 
 doing harm. The purest of Christian matrons knows 
 something of the evil that is in the world she can 
 understand you. The purest of Christian matrons is a
 
 xxvi.] Home Relations. 469 
 
 mother too fear not lest her love should spurn from 
 her, for his sin, the son of her womb. A word, a half- 
 word, will tell all that she need know: unspoken, un- 
 speakable, will be the comfort, the relief, the emancipation, 
 for you. Of all the terrors of a mother concealment is 
 the most terrible. Confidence given will be joy more 
 than grief, even if it should tell of the most heinous 
 sin that man is capable of. Then, if there be but the 
 honest heart and without it there would not be the 
 confession infinite will be the help in regaining the 
 right way, from the knowledge that a mother sympa- 
 thizes, a mother counsels, and a mother prays. 
 
 (3) Yet one word more. Home is our friend. Very 
 delightful is other friendship : ask not of me any de- 
 preciation of it. ' There is a friend that sticketh closer 
 than a brother.' The mere fact that I have chosen him 
 partly proves and partly ensures the congeniality and 
 the sympathy. But yet I say it home is the friend. 
 It is the dear ones of birth and nature who will go 
 through the life with us. Friends may be severed, 
 beyond the reach of voice or sign : friends may form 
 their own new ties, or their own life-tie, and be partially 
 lost to us. The home and its belongings change not. 
 We go back to them, as to our own, after the longest 
 separations, after the widest wanderings. Hold fast by 
 your home. Even its relics and fragments are precious. 
 Even upon the 'broken pieces of that ship' we can 
 ' escape safe to land.' Nothing is like it. Cling to it. 
 It is your life. 
 
 It has been the object of this plain common sermon 
 to hold up to your thankful contemplation the privileges 
 and responsibilities of your home relationships. I shrink
 
 47 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 not from very humble particulars. I press upon you the 
 duty and the blessing of a constant correspondence by 
 letter with your homes. The old-fashioned Sunday letter 
 is a great institution alike of nature and grace. Give 
 time to it. Keep nothing back. You give infinite 
 pleasure. You clear and cleanse your life by it. You 
 keep the door open by it between you and your haven, 
 between you and your confessional, between you and 
 your friend. Everything that Sunday ought to be 
 harmonizes and sympathizes entirely with this use of 
 it. It is not instead of worshipping, nor instead of 
 hearing sermons, nor instead of happy converse with 
 God and man but it is a good sequel and corollary to 
 all these. I make it a sample of your use of the home 
 relationship as a whole. 
 
 I must add yet three concluding words. 
 
 (i) First, remember the home relations of others 
 besides yourself. Let the thought make you sympathetic. 
 Towards those beneath you in station, servants and 
 tradesmen, let it teach you consideration. Take pleasure 
 in entering into their home feelings. Those, more es- 
 pecially, who have left homes of their own to serve you, 
 how desirous should you be to help them in remembering 
 their own to rejoice in their home joys and to weep 
 with their home sorrows. Still more, let the thought 
 make you doubly watchful against drawing others into 
 sin. Do not, in wantonness or in selfishness, involve 
 another, beside or beneath you, in that miserable alien- 
 ation from home which we have spoken of as the 
 certain consequence of sinning. The poorest has a 
 home, however homely: the woman which is a sinner 
 had a home once: be not you instrumental in adding
 
 xxvi.] Home Relations. 471 
 
 one lock or one bar to that home, if it be now shut 
 behind her. 
 
 (2) Secondly, beware of so treating your own home 
 in the present as that it shall be the bitterest memory to 
 you in a day that shall be. If you knew what it is 
 to be what the psalmist speaks of as ' a man that 
 mourneth for his mother,' you would dread above all 
 things the having to feel in that season of heaviness 
 that by omission or commission of yours you ever 
 made that mother's heart to ache for you. While yet 
 there is time, for most of you, think of that last end, and 
 treasure not up unto yourselves sorrow in the cloudy 
 and dark day. 
 
 (3) My last word of all is spoken to a few in this 
 congregation, who, like us older men, have already 
 passed through that saddest and sorest of experiences 
 the loss of one or of both their parents. Does that, 
 think you, end the relationship ? God forbid. It does 
 but seal and crown and immortalize it. The fifth 
 commandment has still its echo for you. ' Lord, have 
 mercy upon us,' and not only so for this might be but 
 the remembrance of an irreparable past but, in the 
 view of an available future also, 'incline our hearts to 
 keep this law.' Yes, we have still to honour the father 
 and the mother departed. We have still to speak 
 reverently and thankfully of them, and nothing ever 
 that is not such. We have still to feel them near us 
 in our going out and coming in. We have still to 
 give thanks for them in the prayer for the church 
 militant. I do not say that we can pray for them 
 and yet I do feel that God will not cast out the prayer 
 which asks not indeed for a reversal of their condition
 
 47 2 Home Relations. [xxvi. 
 
 (God grant they need it not) but for His holy keeping, 
 for His sweet presence with them, for His continued 
 and continual advancement of them in all joy and 
 in all knowledge. Nothing is less Christian than 
 the relegation of the departed into an unapproachable 
 land of shadows where no loving thought, no tender 
 sympathy, no real and realized communion, can any 
 more reach them. Let your ' home relations ' take in 
 the dead. This shall give sweetness to your prayers, 
 reality to your hopes, and sanctity to your conduct 
 towards the living. 'Always to be praised, as well for 
 the dead as for them that are alive' such is our 
 description of God Himself in our commemoration of 
 the world's benefactors : and for ourselves no benefactors 
 can be equal to those who have been dear and loving to 
 us while they lived, and have guided us by their example 
 towards that everlasting home where they are now safe 
 and at rest till the day of Christ's coming.
 
 XXVII. 
 
 NECESSITY AND UNMARVELLOUSNESS OF THE 
 NEW BIRTH. 
 
 St John iii. 7. 
 
 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. 
 
 TRINITY Sunday is no festival of theologians or 
 mystics it is the festival of revelation and of the 
 Christian life. It gathers into one all the several par- 
 ticulars of fact and truth which have been the subject, 
 one by one, of their own feast days and fast days 
 through the first half of the church's year: it summons 
 us to their contemplation as a whole, and it bids us 
 to apply that sum and substance of divine revelation 
 to the heart's heart and to the life's life of which God 
 has given it to be at once the sustaining food and the 
 healing medicine. 
 
 I know not by what other choice of a gospel for 
 Trinity Sunday the church could more strongly have 
 marked the practical character or the individual bear- 
 ing of the revelation which it enshrines. 
 
 There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus 
 and he came to Jesus with a partial recognition of His 
 person and office. He came by night a ruler of the 
 Jews, a member of the Sanhedrin, could scarcely come 
 by day and return into the religious world of that time
 
 474 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvu. 
 
 as its accepted and honoured Rabbi. He came with 
 courtesy and with deference yet there is something 
 of superiority and even of patronage in the tone : 
 ' we know that thou art come from God as a teacher ' 
 we do thee that honour, we who are ourselves qualified 
 and constituted to judge. He came with a large ad- 
 mission and yet it is very far indeed from the con- 
 fession either of Messiahship or of divinity. We scarcely 
 possess the materials for estimating decidedly the position 
 of Nicodemus at that moment towards the humble and 
 youthful Person whom yet he already addressed as a 
 Rabbi for Jesus, instead of replying directly to the 
 great man's compliment, and counting it a gain (as 
 many in these days would have us to do) that He is 
 acknowledged as at least one part of that which He is, 
 meets him on the threshold with an abrupt, an un- 
 compromising, an almost repellent saying, 'Verily, verily 
 I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot 
 see the kingdom of God.' He saw in this visitor not 
 only (for that He sees in all men) a soul worth saving, 
 but also a character full of hope, may but the self- 
 importance be humbled and the worldliness purged 
 away by his being made to feel that the teacher come 
 from God has a personal message for him, and by his 
 being brought to his very knees to hearken what the 
 Lord God has to say concerning him. 
 
 It is thus that our Lord always begins His real work 
 in those whom He came to save. To the woman of 
 Samaria, trying to turn the conversation into a theo- 
 logical controversy as to the Jewish and the Samaritan 
 conceptions and localizations of worship, He suddenly 
 reveals the practical bearing of all His dealings in grace
 
 XXVIL] of the New Birth. 475 
 
 by the humbling and life-searching mandate, 'Go, call 
 thy husband and (with him) come back hither.' Upon 
 the rich young ruler, so pleasing, so moral, so open- 
 minded, yet withal so self-complacent, He flashes the 
 light of a first self-revelation in the words, ' If thou wilt 
 be perfect, sell all that thou hast, and then follow' 
 the homeless one, the despised and rejected and 
 crucified. Just so it is here. This 'Master of Israel' 
 has come to mete out modified praise, to yield a stinted 
 and qualified homage, to his Maker, Redeemer, and 
 Judge and he finds himself confronted with a word 
 not written in his theology, staggering alike to his 
 dignity and to his self-satisfaction, ' Except a man be 
 born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.' He 
 came to discuss, to dispute, to argue, to judge : he is 
 sent away to lay afresh the very foundations of his 
 innocent life to be born again, born from above, born 
 of water and of the Spirit. And when he would plead 
 not only the novelty or the mysteriousness, but the 
 impossibility, of the thing prescribed to him, he is 
 charged with a want of information and of intelligence 
 in his own professed calling ' Art thou a master of 
 Israel, and (even without my telling thee) knowest not 
 these things ?' 
 
 It is interesting to be taught by later pages of this 
 gospel that this method of dealing was (if we may 
 venture the expression) justified by the event. Nico- 
 demus, the visitor by night (as St John at least once 
 again calls him) had the courage at a later stage in the 
 history to speak a word for Jesus amidst the condemning 
 voices of the Sanhedrin ' Doth our law judge any man 
 before it hear him and know what he doeth?' and
 
 4/6 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvn. 
 
 after the crucifixion, when fear and shame might have 
 conspired to daunt him, to join with another secret 
 disciple in doing honour to the lifeless body in its 
 brief tenancy of the rich man's tomb. 
 
 But now we shall leave the particular occasion the 
 night-visit, and the character and later history of 
 Nicodemus and make the brief words, standing by 
 themselves, our text on this crowning festival of the 
 gospel, ' Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must 
 be born again.' The saying was for Nicodemus, yet the 
 singular changes into the plural in the very uttering : 
 ' I said unto thee but what I say unto thee, I say unto 
 all ' Yel not thou only, ' must be born again.' 
 
 The text has evidently two parts : first, the necessity 
 and yet, secondly, the unmarvellousness of the new 
 birth. 
 
 i. 'Ye must be born again.' 
 
 Nicodemus took the words literally, and might well 
 ask, ' How can a man be born, when he is old ?' We 
 know that the new birth is a metaphor, and are in more 
 danger of regarding it as an experience but too facile 
 and obvious a thing of external ordinance and cere- 
 monial propriety, which being once done for us or done 
 over us in days of unconsciousness and infancy, may 
 thenceforth be taken for granted or let alone as to any 
 demand made by it or any consequence to be realized 
 in ourselves. 
 
 The new birth is a metaphor, capable, as such, of 
 many applications. Cicero called his return from exile 
 a TraXtyyevecria. Jewish Rabbis called by the same name 
 the incorporation of a proselyte. Any extraordinary 
 change from a state of disadvantage or of adversity
 
 xxvii.] of the New Birth. 477 
 
 into its opposite might be described by ourselves (if 
 the passage before us had not made such uses of the 
 figure irreverent) as a regeneration or new birth. Our 
 Lord Himself actually speaks of that mighty trans- 
 figuration which shall accompany His advent as ' the 
 regeneration when the Son of Man shall take His seat 
 on the throne of His glory.' 
 
 It is no irreverence, but the simplest recognition of 
 a spiritual reality, which applies the term regeneration 
 to the sacrament of Christian baptism. It is a change, 
 not of name or form, not of hypothesis or peradventure, 
 but of vital significance, which comes over the 'infant 
 of days ' brought to the font and laver of baptism, to be 
 given into the charge and care of Jesus Christ for life 
 and for death, in obedience to His own parting in- 
 junction, and on the express ground of His death for 
 atonement and of His life for justification. In that or- 
 dinance every promise of God to mankind is sealed upon 
 the individual. As reason expands, as life developes, 
 as passion awakens, as temptation thickens, grace is 
 guaranteed sufficient for the day. An education com- 
 plete in all its parts, bodily, mental, spiritual, has become 
 the right of that life. Beside that font God has said 
 to His church, 'Take this child and train him for me, 
 and I will give thee thy wages.' A change, real and 
 significant, has passed over that cradle. A regeneration 
 beyond any human surprise of fortune, beyond any 
 inheritance of earthly wealth or title, has been given, 
 without money and without price, to that helpless, that 
 unconscious babe. And it would be a confusion of terms, 
 neither reasonable nor Christian, ever afterwards to 
 apply the particular word 'regeneration' to any spiritual
 
 478 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvn. 
 
 transformation, however sudden or however durable, 
 which may pass over that human being in his onward 
 course through the manifold vicissitudes of mortal 
 existence towards the resurrection of the dead whether 
 just or unjust. 
 
 And yet, brethren I pause to ask myself was this 
 regeneration by baptism the very thing, and the whole 
 of that thing, of which our Lord said in this memorable 
 nightly interview, 'Ye must be born again?' Was it 
 that Nicodemus, some months or years hence, when 
 the doors of the new kingdom should be set open by 
 Pentecost, must apply for that 'washing of water' which 
 till then must be of necessity an unmeaning and blank 
 name to him ? Was there not something for him to 
 carry away in his heart that evening, full of instant and 
 urgent, of practical because spiritual significance ? 
 
 And if we, living eighteen centuries after that great 
 day of Pentecost, have been all subjected, in un- 
 conscious infancy, by the charitable work of others, 
 to that washing with the lustral and consecrated water 
 which has become the condition and we would thank 
 God for it of this our English society and citizenship, 
 shall we say that therefore there remains nothing to be 
 done in us or by us to fulfil that momentous, that critical 
 precept, 'Ye must be born again ?' 
 
 Brethren, we cannot so read the words of our Saviour, 
 whether we think of Him or of ourselves of the reason 
 given for the necessity spoken of, or of our experience 
 of that want which only reality can satisfy. 
 
 Here, if anywhere, we must speak heart to heart and 
 spirit to spirit yearning, and even travailing in pain, 
 over the invisible future of lives so precious as these
 
 XXVIL] of the New Birth, 479 
 
 to their homes, to their country, to their church, and to 
 their God and we could not justify it to our ourselves 
 if we failed to carry the enquiry before us into a sphere 
 higher and deeper even than ordinance or sacrament, 
 asking quite simply, quite as of those who know and 
 can answer, Has that change taken place in you for 
 change it certainly is from that which is natural to 
 the fallen which introduces a man into a life within, 
 above, and beyond this life ; a life in which things and 
 persons unseen and eternal are real, are interesting, are 
 attractive ; in which he is conscious of existences that 
 can neither be touched nor grasped nor handled, but 
 which yet are a thousand times more true and more 
 substantial than the shapes and forms and relationships 
 amongst which he here on earth lives and moves and 
 has his being ? 
 
 We must not put the enquiry from us, as though it 
 applied only to persons standing, like Nicodemus him- 
 self, outside the pale of Christianity and of the church. 
 If in deed and in truth we are what Scripture calls 'new 
 creatures in Christ Jesus,' then we may give great thanks 
 to Him who, by such means as pleased Him and we 
 need scarcely ask by what means has given us His 
 unspeakable gift, and with it the meetness of which 
 St Paul speaks for the inheritance of the saints in light. 
 But if it is our case and we can all judge of it that 
 we have no real interest in anything higher than the 
 anxieties, ambitions, and affections of this present 
 world ; if, when we would pray, we find God Himself 
 as distant and as unreal as any most visionary, most 
 imaginary idea which flits across our dreaming or roving 
 thoughts ; if the work of Jesus Christ is mere doctrine
 
 480 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvn. 
 
 to us, and the prospect of death and of the life after 
 death never influences one single thing that we think or 
 say or do then it would be mere self-deception to think 
 that we have undergone the change spoken of in those 
 solemn warning words to Nicodemus, expressly extended 
 by Christ Himself to all successive generations of the 
 living, 'Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be 
 born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.' 
 
 There are men, not to be counted by thousands or 
 tens of thousands, whose lives are tossed to and fro, 
 from youth to old age, on a sea of misgiving and 
 perplexity by reason of this one want, of a real new 
 birth. How they stand towards God Himself, towards 
 life and death, things present and things to come, 
 there is no voice to tell them earth and heaven 
 are silent. Whether they have any right to pray or to 
 worship ; any right to the very bread they eat or the 
 raiment they put on ; any right to work or to enjoy, 
 to perform one duty or to fill one relation or to do one 
 act or utter one word of charity, in this absolute void 
 and chaos of the spiritual being this troubles them 
 when they think of it, and the thought sometimes is 
 forced upon them. It is in these days of the youth, 
 of the education and training for maturity, that such 
 thoughts are commonly busiest. Later on, they will 
 gradually vex themselves into a troubled and broken 
 repose: concerns of the passing hour will assert the 
 first place and claim the immediate attention : the 
 ambiguity of the spiritual standing will be carried about 
 with the man to his work and to his amusement, but 
 it \vill be as a dull rather than as an acute sensation, and 
 he will learn to make it suspend itself while he reads
 
 xxvii. J of the New Birth. 481 
 
 and visits, laughs and talks, sleeps his sleep or takes his 
 journey. None the less is the void there, though he has 
 schooled himself to bear with or to acquiesce in it. 
 
 Even the minister of holy things has not in every 
 case settled with himself this first question. He runs, 
 but he is not quite sure who sent him : he runs, but 
 he has not quite for certain his tidings ready. Hence 
 many a vacillation of speech and conduct hence many 
 an uncertain sound, many a faltering step, and many a 
 race hindered. 
 
 O, brethren, might we but settle this preliminary 
 while we are young ! It is this terrible misgiving about 
 the new birth, which gives advantage to folly and 
 fanaticism in lulling it. It is because we are not sure 
 of our standing, that we are so thankful to any one who 
 will settle it for us anyhow. A sudden flash of light out 
 of darkness a momentary glimpse of things high above 
 a passing impression 'something has occurred within 
 me I am converted I am changed I am saved ' and 
 yet, look again, or look tomorrow, 'I am where I was 
 and what I was there is nothing' all this excitement, 
 all this illusion, derives its force and its strength from 
 the longing of which we have spoken for a standing 
 place and therefore for a starting point for something 
 which shall say to me, Thou art born again, live from 
 henceforth the regenerate life. 
 
 O that the voice which speaks to the soiil might say 
 to one of us, Christ died for the whole world, and there- 
 fore for thee God sent the gospel into England, and so 
 called thee God caused thee to be born in a Christian 
 home, and so to be brought to holy baptism, and then 
 and there He sealed upon thee every promise and every 
 V. 31
 
 482 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvu. 
 
 possession of His children, made thee a member of 
 Christ, made thee the child of God, said to thee, Go 
 forth and be so everything that the saint of God hath 
 is thine : thou hast a right to pray, a right to the Spirit, 
 and a right to glory. 
 
 2. It may be well now to look for a few moments at 
 the other half of the text, that which sets before us, side 
 by side with the necessity, what we have called the 
 unmarvellousness, of the new birth. 
 
 We might have expected our Lord to speak of it as a 
 marvel above all marvels, that a child of flesh and of the 
 fall should become a child of grace and of the Spirit. 
 But He says, ' Marvel not.' Some very bright and en- 
 couraging thoughts lie in that word. 
 
 (l) And the first of these is, the reality of the want. 
 The new birth is an urgent necessity. In that necessity, 
 in that urgency, lies hope, for all who have not schooled 
 themselves into the saying, There is no God. 
 
 The reality of the want. Brethren, I cannot imagine 
 a reproach so harsh, so cruel, as that which should 
 declare the dullest, the most insensate of us all to be 
 satisfied as he is in other words, to acquiesce in his 
 state by nature. What is that state ? Our Lord says, 
 ' That which is born of the flesh is flesh.' We know 
 indeed that the word 'flesh' in Scripture means much 
 more than 'body.' St Paul enumerates 'the works of 
 the flesh,' and he includes among them many actions 
 and many qualities which have little or nothing to do 
 with the body. Elsewhere he even speaks of the mind 
 of the flesh, and says that to have it is death. Indeed 
 there is no part of the natural life which does not fall in 
 Scripture under the category of the flesh. Not only the
 
 xxvii.] of the New Birth. 483 
 
 luxuries and the amusements of this life not only the 
 ambitions which have their scope in this present but 
 even the affections which find their object on earth, and 
 even the intellectual pursuits which call out the energies 
 of so many however little they may seem to be con- 
 cerned with the body, are yet all, I believe, included 
 under the term 'flesh' when our Lord and His apostles 
 use that term as the opposite of ' spirit.' 
 
 Now, when we have given it this largest scope and 
 compass, is there any one who will declare from his own 
 experience that this life of flesh leaves no want, or only 
 a slight and subordinate want, unsupplied? Ask the 
 youthful student ask the brilliant winner of every prize 
 and every scholarship of his University ask the pro- 
 fessional man, who has risen step by step to the first 
 place among his rivals ask the successful lawyer, ask 
 the eminent physician, ask the talented artist, ask the 
 powerful statesman, is he satisfied ? is there no empty 
 place in his life and in his heart yes, even if you 
 give him also, what certainly comes not to all, peace 
 at home, health and happiness in the dwelling, ' much 
 good laid up for many years ' in the bright hopes and 
 early triumphs of his children ? Still is there not a 
 void ? If it were nothing more than the grim form 
 of death always in front of him, would not this be 
 enough to forbid contentment in that which (even in 
 this widest sense) is ' born of the flesh ?' 
 
 But how if we bring in the further thought say but 
 as a possibility or a peradventure of a state and a 
 being into which the putting off of this body may 
 usher us ? If there be a life after death and most of 
 us count this to be either a self-evident or at least a 
 
 312
 
 484 Necessity and Unmarvellotisness [xxvu. 
 
 well-evidenced certainty can we so much as dream that 
 that life can be safely entered upon by anything which, 
 however beautiful or however powerful, is, at last and at 
 its best, born of the flesh ? We must know that of ' that 
 world,' as our Lord wonderfully terms it, we have no 
 information, nothing whatever beyond the wildest guess- 
 ing, save in the gospel of His word and of His resur- 
 rection. It is easy, I know, to dream of a paradise 
 which shall be in all respects this earth over again 
 with the single exception of its pains and sorrows, 
 its circumscriptions, decays, and deaths. But this is 
 mere dreaming, and we know it. If we look at the 
 only descriptions of that world which the gospel of 
 Christ gives us ; if we read the three immortal chapters 
 which contain the consolations of the last supper ; if we 
 read the closing chapters of the whole Book, which 
 contain the very latest utterances of the Spirit to the 
 churches we must see that one thread of thought runs 
 through all, and that is the absorbing, the satisfying 
 presence of a Person, not visible to the eye of flesh, 
 whom to know, whom to love, whom to adore, whose 
 name to have in the forehead, whose glory to feel and 
 to feast upon and to bask in, is the very life itself of 
 such as shall be counted worthy to attain that manifested 
 perfection of being. 
 
 The want therefore which made itself felt below in 
 the form of a void and an unsatisfaction is in the 
 prospect of that other existence a want amounting to 
 destitution, a want which names itself in the Bible as 
 ' the second death.' 
 
 But now, if all this be so, if this want of the new 
 birth to give us happiness here, to make us capable
 
 xxvii.] of the New Birth, 485 
 
 of existence there, is thus urgent and thus imperative, 
 ought it very much to surprise us, ought it to be a 
 wonder above all wonders, if God has provided some 
 better thing, something lying altogether outside flesh, for 
 those whom He has thought it worth while to create, 
 and, when they had sinned, still to continue in being ? 
 This want, which flesh cannot fill, is it a marvel beyond 
 acceptance if God interposes to satisfy? If we could 
 not have ventured to anticipate such an intervention, 
 still can we not hail it, when revealed, as altogether 
 worthy of its Author? If the Saviour stands upon this 
 earth and proclaims to us a regeneration a new birth 
 of water and fire, of a purifying and an enkindling 
 Spirit ought it at any rate to arouse in us by its mere 
 marvellousness mistrust or incredulity ? Does it not 
 strike- us, on reflection, as being of one piece and one 
 colour with what, even in the far land of our truancy 
 and of our exile, our heart's heart tells us of the home 
 from which we have strayed, and of the Father, forsaken 
 but not forgotten, who dwells there ? 
 
 'Marvel not,' our Lord says to us marvel not, ye who 
 feel earth empty while it is earth only marvel not, ye 
 who believe in God, and mean by that name a God not 
 dead but living if the very want of which you are 
 conscious is a reason for its being supplied supplied, 
 as alone it can be, by a new birth offered you into a 
 world not of flesh but of spirit. 
 
 (2) But our Lord suggests a second reason for His 
 ' Marvel not.' He bids Nicodemus to recognize in some 
 of the commonest workings of nature the very analogy 
 and parable of the new birth. ' The wind bloweth where 
 it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, though
 
 486 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvu. 
 
 thou canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it 
 goeth so is every one that is born of the Spirit.' 
 
 Each element contributes to the pages of Scripture 
 an illustration of the power and office, the energy and 
 operation, of the Holy Ghost. 'Water and the Spirit' 
 is one of these it tells of cleansing and of refreshing. 
 'The Holy Ghost and fire' is another of these it speaks 
 of warming and cheering, of enlightening and enkindling. 
 'The wind bloweth...and so is the Spirit' wind, in 
 Greek and Latin and Hebrew, is the very name of the 
 Spirit : we scarcely know, in the words now touched 
 upon, whether to read, ' The wind bloweth,' or (with the 
 margin of the Revised Version) ' the Spirit breatheth '- 
 so entirely is the metaphor of the wind, with its freshen- 
 ing and reviving and health-bringing influences, the very 
 embodiment of the Spirit's office in the region of grace 
 and salvation. 
 
 Who shall say, our Lord asks Nicodemus, that it is 
 any argument against one of nature's forces, that there 
 is no tracing it in its course and no discerning it in 
 its working ? Who shall contradict alike common speech 
 and common reason by declaring that the wind is not 
 because he cannot see it ? ' Thou hearest the sound 
 thereof it is enough. The wind rustles and whistles 
 without, when your curtains are drawn for the evening 
 will you say, There is no wind blowing, because you 
 have shut it out, and, if you had not shut it out, would 
 have seen nothing ? You rise in the morning to find 
 your lawn strewn with shrivelled leaves and your 
 shrubbery with torn branches shall you pretend to be 
 ignorant what has done it, because you were asleep 
 when it was done, and, if you had been waking, yet
 
 XXVIL] of the New Birth. 487 
 
 would have seen nothing ? ' So is every one that is 
 born of the Spirit.' Thou hearest the sound thou seest 
 the consequence, in altered speech and purified feeling 
 and reformed conduct : marvel not ' if the working 
 was secret it cannot be more secret or more inscrutable 
 than is nature herself in operations which none but fools 
 or madmen can gainsay. 
 
 That unmarvellousness of the new birth which our 
 Lord illustrates from what we call external nature 
 might be argued under His guidance from mental 
 phenomena. Who pretends to be ignorant of the 
 power of influence, as we see it exercised every day 
 by man upon man, in forming his judgment, moulding 
 his character, and guiding his conduct ? Account for 
 it as you may, the mere accident (as we speak) of being 
 brought into companionship, for a short period of the 
 existence, with a being of like feelings and passions as 
 we are, may make all the difference for us between one 
 line and one course of life and another between the 
 choice of this profession and the choice of that nay, 
 between a whole career of virtue and happiness and a 
 whole career of misery and vice. We do not see that 
 influence, that flowing in of one mind into another mind, 
 of one man's idea of good and evil, of one man's principle 
 of judging and acting, into another's, so as to affect 
 and alter and at last replace it : yet parents have had to 
 feel it in its consequences as but too real and too power- 
 ful, and souls now in Hades are tracing their present 
 joy or their present sorrow to some definite human 
 life once for a time very close to their own, however 
 little deliberate, or however little conscious, while it was 
 so, may have been that gracious or that disastrous
 
 488 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvu. 
 
 outflowing and inflowing from the one being into the 
 other being. 
 
 This most active and powerful factor in human being 
 is the very type and parable of one lower and of one 
 higher. We cannot doubt, we who read the Bible 
 naturally, that there is such a thing as an influence 
 upon the soul from the principalities and powers of 
 darkness. There is a pit of the abyss, Scripture tells 
 us, with its mouth emitting fire and smoke into the 
 atmosphere of the human habitation. But it is with the 
 opposite influence that the text is concerned. That 
 power which the spirit of man has over the brother or 
 sister spirit, by the mere fact of its being of this sort 
 or that, apart from any direct design of influencing for 
 good or for evil, shall we suppose that the Creator 
 Spirit is destitute of for the regeneration and sanctifi- 
 cation of the work of His own hands ? ' Marvel not ' 
 if I speak to you of an agency real and effectual, which 
 you cannot see with your eyes nor hear with your ears 
 nor measure with your reason, but which yet does change 
 hearts and souls into that which by nature they were 
 not, transferring them from a life of flesh into a life 
 of spirit, and opening to them whole fields of thought 
 and action to which but for this supernatural influence 
 they would have lived and died strangers. 
 
 (3) Our Lord Himself suggests to us one other 
 reason for His ' Marvel not,' when He goes on to call 
 this new birth with all its eventful consequences an 
 'earthly' thing in comparison with a 'heavenly.' Just 
 thus does He, in another chapter of this gospel, after 
 describing what we should think the very greatest of 
 miracles the resurrection of dead souls to newness of
 
 XXVIL] of the New Birth. 489 
 
 life, go on to say, 'Marvel not at this,' wonderful as 
 it must appear to you there is a greater miracle behind 
 it, and that greater miracle is the resurrection of the 
 body. 
 
 ' Marvel not,' He says here, at the mystery of the 
 new birth, by water and the Spirit : in comparison with 
 one other mystery it is as an earthly thing beside a 
 heavenly. That other mystery is atonement the lift- 
 ing up upon the cross of the Son of Man to be the life 
 of a dead world. Of that other mystery it cannot be 
 said as it can be said of this, that it gives any direct 
 proof of itself by its effects, or that it has any clear 
 parallel in things natural or in things human. The work 
 of the Spirit, like the action of the wind, like the working 
 of influence between man and man, though inscrutable 
 in its operation, is traceable in its consequences. From 
 the sound you infer the action of wind, from the conduct 
 you infer the action of influence, from the effect upon 
 the man himself you infer in like manner the new birth 
 by the Spirit. Of the work of atonement, of the con- 
 nexion between the death of the Saviour and the for- 
 giveness of sins, you have no such evidence it is 
 altogether a secret thing, not in itself only, but in its 
 results. It is a revelation pure and simple, to be received 
 only on the word of Jesus Christ, who ' saw ' it in the 
 bosom of God, and brought it down with Him from 
 heaven to be the faith of mankind. Marvel not at the 
 work of the Spirit far more marvellous really is the 
 work of Christ. 
 
 Thus the third reason for the unmarvellousness of the 
 new birth is the greater marvellousness of another
 
 49 Necessity and Unmarvellousness [xxvu. 
 
 revelation which yet to all Christian people is as real 
 and as certain as the breath they draw. If you can say, 
 ' I believe in the forgiveness of sins,' much more can 
 you say, 'I believe in the Holy Ghost.' 'Art thou a 
 master of Israel, and knowest not these things?' how 
 then shall ye believe, if I go on to tell of that greatest 
 secret of all, which yet it were better not to have been 
 born than not to know and to be assured of? 
 
 This is not the common estimate, I know, even among 
 Christians, of the less and the greater, of the more and 
 the less mysterious. But is the inversion which we feel 
 to be now prevalent of Christ's estimate of the marvel- 
 lousness of the two cardinal revelations a sign alto- 
 gether of good ? No man, He seems to say, ought to 
 think the revelation of atonement easier to accept or 
 easier to apprehend than the revelation of regeneration. 
 And certainly no peril can be greater than the easy and 
 confident holding of the one, combined with the slight 
 and tentative grasp of the other. To take the forgive- 
 ness of sins almost as a matter of course, involving no 
 difficulty and demanding no effort while the grace of 
 the Holy Spirit is treated as a mystical and half optional 
 doctrine, not the postulate of being, and not the condition 
 of the life this is to rob our Lord's argument with 
 Nicodemus of its whole force and cogency, and at the 
 same time to betray a most inadequate conception alike 
 of the nature of sin and of the necessity of sanctification. 
 'Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born 
 again ' for there is a marvel of marvels behind it, which 
 is the mystery of the propitiation and of the inter- 
 cession.
 
 xxvii.] of the New Birth. 491 
 
 Blessed be His holy name, who thus facilitates and thus 
 simplifies His unspeakable gift. That we want it we know, 
 both for this and for that world. That it is conceivable, 
 having even its parables in nature and its similitudes in 
 humanity, we know. That there is one mystery more 
 mysterious still, which yet we all live by, Christ tells us 
 in the context. What shall we say then to these things? 
 Shall we be contented, year after year, to keep the feast 
 of which we partake not, and then to go away to live 
 for another week, and for the week of weeks which is 
 the span of being, the life born of the flesh ? Let us 
 not so trifle and play with that truth which must judge 
 us. Let us henceforth pray the prayer, and mean it, 
 Lord, cleanse the thoughts of my heart Lord, teach me 
 Lord, enlighten and comfort and quicken me by the 
 inspiration of Thy Holy Spirit. When some difficult duty 
 oppresses us, when some special sin wars in our mem- 
 bers, when a general languor and deadness makes the 
 Bible distasteful and seals against us the fount of prayer, 
 let us look upward to the place where Christ is, and wait, 
 if we lack words to ask, for the unspeakable gift. When 
 we have but for once tasted it when we have found 
 but for once, but in faintest feeblest experience, how the 
 hand and the foot, the voice and the pen, are really set 
 in motion by the inspiriting and inspiring Spirit we 
 shall want no persuasion to ask, to seek, and to knock 
 for Him. To one He may come earlier, more consciously, 
 more abundantly to another later, more ambiguously, 
 more scantily, as it were more reluctantly: yet to all 
 alike the promise is sure, not won by merit, but pledged 
 by grace, ' If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts
 
 49 2 Necessity and Unmarvellousness, &c. [xxvu. 
 
 unto your children, how much more will your heavenly 
 Father give His Holy Spirit to them that ask Him.' 
 Blessed words having hope in them for the vilest. 
 ' Ask, and ye shall have ' for 'He is kind to the un- 
 thankful and to the evil.'
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 THE WORTH OF THE SOUL. 
 
 St Matthew xiii. 46. 
 One pearl of great price. 
 
 THE difference between this parable and the one next 
 before it in the group of seven has often been dwelt 
 upon. In the one, the man stumbles upon the priceless 
 prize in the other, he is a seeker first. But with this 
 exception the two parables are alike. The hidden 
 treasure casually discovered, and then again hidden 
 by the finder himself till he can make sure, by purchase, 
 of the field containing, and so of the treasure contained 
 in it and the costly pearl, found in the search for 
 pearls, and recognized as worth buying at the cost of all 
 that the man has are but two figures for the same great 
 truth, that there is one thing in comparison with which 
 all else is insignificant, and to gain which no sacrifice is 
 either a waste or an imprudence. 
 
 In some cases our Lord Himself has interpreted the 
 details of His parables. The parable of the sower, the 
 parable of the tares, the parable of the net, are ex- 
 plained by Himself, either spontaneously, or in reply to 
 questions of the disciples. We could wish that we had 
 in the same direct form His readings of other riddles. 
 The request, ' Declare unto us the parable of the pearl
 
 494 The Worth of the Soul. [xxvm. 
 
 of great price' might have drawn from Him a decisive 
 statement, from which there could be no appeal, of the 
 particular point which He designed it to illustrate. 
 In the absence of such an authoritative interpretation, 
 we may read the figure variously, and not materially err 
 in doing so. 
 
 It is my purpose this afternoon to make the pearl of 
 great price the soul of the man, and to speak of the 
 inestimable worth of the soul, in its loss and in its 
 finding. In this treatment of the parable we shall have 
 abundant encouragement from Scripture. We shall 
 remember how our Lord Himself speaks of a man 
 'gaining the whole world and losing his own soul' as 
 the most terrible miscalculation of the true interests 
 which it can come into the mind to conceive. We shall 
 remember His use of the expression, the loss of a man's 
 soul, as made equivalent in the parallel passage of 
 another gospel to the loss of the man himself. We 
 shall remember His alternative, of the two ' souls,' or 
 the two 'lives,' of which the saving of the one is the 
 losing of the other. We shall remember how He speaks 
 elsewhere of the gaining of the soul as a thing still 
 future for any. ' In your patience ye shall gain your 
 souls/ is His encouragement to a life of Christian en- 
 durance. ' Who shall give you that which shall be your 
 own ?' is His appeal in behalf of a life of Christian 
 fidelity in the use of that substance (of whatever kind) 
 in this world, which for its precariousness and its 
 fugitiveness is, even while it lasts, rather another's than 
 ours, in contrast with that one thing which whosoever 
 hath shall have it inalienably and for ever. Even in 
 passages of Scripture where the authorized version has
 
 XXVIIL] The Worth of the Soul. 495 
 
 overlooked or obscured the difference, it will be found on 
 examination that the same idea lurks in the original. 
 ' We are not of them that draw back unto perdition, but 
 of them that believe to the gaining of the soul.' 
 
 When we read the parable before us by the light 
 of these revelations, we shall have before us a graphic 
 description of the most momentous event which can 
 occur to any man. There is a search for goodly pearls 
 which is characteristic of all who live otherwise than 
 as the beasts that perish. Define it as you may, every 
 man who is not utterly besotted or utterly trifling is 
 a seeker for something which he has not He may have 
 the vaguest of notions what that something is. When we 
 interpret his search, we may call it a search, conscious 
 or half-conscious, for happiness, for satisfaction, for that 
 which shall give play to every latent energy or rest 
 to every roving affection. Generation after generation 
 has been engaged in this search : youth and age, wealth 
 and poverty, knowledge and ignorance, each in its own 
 way, till it attains or till it despairs, is seeking goodly 
 pearls ; not all one pearl yet all with one hope, that 
 the object of pursuit, whatever it bCj may be found, and 
 may be found satisfying. 
 
 In the midst of these multitudinous, these innumerable 
 seekers, there is one who lights upon a pearl indeed of 
 great price. His own soul is revealed to him. He 
 discovers the reality and the capacity and the awful- 
 ness of that personal being which before he had taken 
 for granted, or had treated as made for time, as having 
 its scope and its career in things seen and temporal, or 
 had merely wondered at as curiously and mysteriously 
 constituted, but which now he begins to realize as not
 
 496 The Worth of tJie Soul. [xxvni. 
 
 an existence only but a responsibility, as having a 
 relationship, a manifold relationship, Godward and 
 manward, as having been definitely made for God, 
 redeemed by God, and to God to return. Having 
 found this one pearl of great price, he will sell all 
 that he has to buy it. The finding is not all at once 
 the gaining. The discovery of the soul is the first thing 
 the indispensable preliminary to the making it his 
 own. Having found, he goes, that he may sell and that 
 he may buy part with everything, and purchase this. 
 
 It will be seen therefore that the reading of the pearl 
 of great price as the human soul involves no real dis- 
 crepancy with other interpretations which may make it 
 point to the life of God or the salvation which is in 
 Christ Jesus. They are but different aspects of the one 
 great subject ; and at the very base of all lies the mighty 
 truth and the mighty fact which is our thesis to-day 
 The worth of the soul. 
 
 It cannot be denied that disparaging things have 
 come to be said of the phrase and of the idea. The 
 worth of the soul is an expression somewhat trite and 
 hackneyed. It has been obtruded upon impatient ears, 
 it has been made the watchword of a religious party, 
 it has been associated with narrow and feeble views, till 
 at last you hear men speaking almost with irritation 
 of the very thing itself saying, or half saying, What 
 is the soul? talk to me of the man, and I can understand 
 you the soul is, for me, either an unmeaning or a 
 somewhat misleading phrase. 
 
 There are excuses for this impatience. The com- 
 mission as our Lord gave it, ' From henceforth thou 
 shalt catch men,' has too often been lost sight of
 
 XXVIIL] The Worth of the Soul. 497 
 
 in a far more partial and less practical effort to lay 
 hold of one fragment of the man, just a feeling or an 
 emotion, a regret or a resolution, a fear or an aspiration, 
 and then count all done ; to attract one portion of the 
 man to one item of the Saviour's work or one note of 
 the Saviour's call, and neglect or disparage every other, 
 effacing all that is most robust and most thorough and 
 most practical, alike in the man who hears and in the 
 Person who speaks with him. We can excuse the 
 feeling which resents this ' limiting of the Holy One,' 
 this dwarfing down of the gospel, this exclusion of the 
 body and of the mind from the reach and touch of the 
 consecrating oil, this parcelling out of the unit being till 
 the very unity is lost sight of, till the spiritual part 
 is divorced alike from the understanding which thinks 
 and the reason which judges and the very life which 
 acts, and God Himself is represented as having created 
 in vain all but one tiny element of the complex creature 
 which He is said to will to save. 
 
 But all this, though it may account for some distaste 
 and even disgust for the abuse of the phrase, does not 
 disprove the frequency of its use in Scripture, nor make 
 it less necessary to clear that use from unscriptural 
 associations. 
 
 The soul is the man the personal being the life- 
 centre the ' I myself I.' It may be lifted up, or it 
 may be dragged down, absolutely without limit, ac- 
 cording as flesh or spirit prevail in its influencing. To 
 save the soul is to decide the alternative one way : to 
 lose the soul is to decide the alternative the other 
 way : the man is saved, or the man is lost, and the 
 magnitude of this ruin or of this salvation is the 
 V. 32
 
 498 The Worth of the Soul. [xxvm. 
 
 measure of the worth of the soul which is its 
 subject 
 
 Brethren, if we would know any peace from a deep- 
 lying and wide-spreading infidelity, it must be by a 
 firm and tenacious hold upon the priceless worth of the 
 soul. Often must the misgiving have presented itself to 
 any one who is capable of rational thought, Can it be 
 that heaven and earth, space and time, Creator and 
 Judge, have suspended common rules and laws of action 
 and consequence in order to rescue out of a self-made 
 ruin the insignificant atom which is the life's life of an 
 individual human being ? In the face of disclosures 
 daily made by telescope and microscope, by patient 
 observation and diligent search, of durations and mag- 
 nitudes, of complications and intricacies of orderly 
 working, such as once entered not into the heart of 
 man to conceive, does it not become more and more 
 improbable that this tiny planet, this feeble and short- 
 lived race, should have occupied such a space in the 
 divine attention as is implied in the terms, and in the 
 very definition of the terms, incarnation and redemp- 
 tion, atonement and justification, sanctification and 
 salvation ? We repel these doubts, we treat them as 
 temptations, we hold on our way repeating the old 
 formulas, we bandy the words scepticism and atheism 
 as charms against the being quite overborne and 
 silenced by the antagonism of our own intellects ; 
 but there is a feeling of miserable uncertainty all the 
 time, and the loudest tones of confident assertion are 
 sometimes the half-conscious witnesses to the unap- 
 peasable discomfort and dissatisfaction within. 
 
 Now there can be no question that such misgivings
 
 xxviii.] The Worth of the Soul. 499 
 
 as these would be diminished almost to vanishing by 
 such an impression of the intrinsic worth of the soul, 
 that is, of the spiritual and immortal man, as carried 
 Paul and his comrades, and all who have shared his 
 faith and his devotion in later ages of the church, 
 through a life of unresting effort to the goal of a 
 pilgrim's or martyr's death. If the soul is indeed not 
 only one curious and wonderful thing among many, but 
 the pearl of great price the peculiar, the unique marvel 
 and mystery which such expressions as the being created 
 in God's image, after God's likeness, make it expressions 
 which no sane person would apply to sun, moon, or stars, 
 to any system, or combination of systems, of matter, 
 however stupendous or however glorious then indeed 
 we can still every misgiving, we can turn it into awe 
 and adoration on the instant, as to any amount whatso- 
 ever of divine effort or even of divine sacrifice in the 
 preservation of this soul in its uprightness, or in the 
 restoration of this soul (if need so require) from its ruin. 
 Some things might be asserted of the uniqueness 
 of the human soul, which would break down on ex- 
 amination. We have to guard against our own ignorance 
 on the one side, and our own vanity on the other, in 
 estimating our exact position, our relative importance 
 certainly, amongst other existences and other creations. 
 Some things might be spoken even of the value of the 
 soul, not according to knowledge, if not against it. We 
 might, for example many have done so lay the 
 whole stress of the uniqueness upon the gift of reason. 
 Intelligence, men have said, is the divine image in the 
 one work of God's hand which possesses it. And then 
 we have to beat down the gift of instinct in the inferior 
 
 322
 
 5OO The Worth of the Soul. [xxvm. 
 
 creature, to exalt the human. Yet instinct is a wonder- 
 ful gift : in its own sphere it rivals, it may even transcend 
 reason. We think indeed that we can see points of 
 difference, which may even go the length of defeating 
 an argument for the immortality of the brute, drawn 
 by parity of reasoning from the immortality of the 
 man. The region within which instinct works, large 
 as it is, seems yet to be bounded by matter. If it enter 
 at all into the realm of the affections, still it may be 
 confined within the limits of flesh and blood ; and where 
 the deity of the animal is at best the human, the grave 
 may be the natural terminus even of a devotion mar- 
 vellously self-forgetting. Others have thrown the whole 
 weight of the uniqueness upon the cognate gift of speech 
 or upon the twin gifts, of the mind which reasons and the 
 speech which communicates. Yet even speech, wonderful 
 as it is in its mechanism, more wonderful in its influence, 
 is scarcely to be called the only possible vehicle of mutual 
 intelligence, and may itself hereafter be superseded by 
 some new power, more than telegraphic, more than 
 mesmeric, by which beings that have 'attained that 
 world' may think the thought into the mental ear one 
 of another, and despise as a day of small things the 
 lifetime of earth and sense which had language for its 
 one means of communication whether for purposes of 
 business or for interchange of feelings. 
 
 It is otherwise when we turn to the pages of 
 revelation, and seek there the proof of the incom- 
 parable worth of the soul. We find it on the first 
 page, we find it on the latest. We find it in that 
 expression already referred to, ' God said, Let us make 
 man in our image, after our likeness.' An earlier
 
 XXVIIL ] The Worth of the Soul. 501 
 
 day and hour of creative activity have filled earth, air, 
 and water with animal life. Now first it is written, Let 
 one being bear the divine image : in virtue of that 
 divine likeness let that one being have dominion over 
 all other being : ' the Lord God formed man of the dust 
 of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath 
 of life, and man became a living soul.' 
 
 We raise no cry of alarm as to the foundations of 
 faith or hope, or even as to the bulwarks of inspiration 
 and revelation, when we hear of any theory, however 
 startling or however precarious, of the developement 
 of created being by successive processes of evolution. 
 It is evident that there is something of figure the only 
 question is how much or how little in an account of 
 creation which speaks of mornings and evenings before 
 there is a sun to divide day from night, or a firmament 
 to divide the waters from the waters. We can allow 
 any number of centuries or millenniums to intervene 
 between the first verse and the following verses of 
 the Bible between ' In the beginning God created ' and 
 'God said, Let there be light,' or 'God said, Let the 
 earth bring forth grass,' or 'God said, Let us make man.' 
 Two things, two only, are vital to our religion : one of 
 these is, ' God created the heaven and the earth ; ' the 
 other is, ' God created man in His own image.' Even 
 if the outward form and shape was a developement or an 
 evolution, at least the characteristic and the differentia 
 was a creation pure and simple. It matters little by 
 how many successive steps or at what enormous temporal 
 intervals the original atom grew into the fearful and 
 wonderful thing which we look upon and handle. But it 
 is a matter of life and death to us, of more than this
 
 502 The Worth of the Soul. [xxvm. 
 
 dying life or this literal death, that there should have 
 been at some point that intervention of God Himself to 
 breathe into the human being that breath, not of mortal 
 or animal but of mental and spiritual life, by which 
 the human is distinguished from the irrational creature, 
 'the spirit of man that goeth upward' from 'the spirit of 
 the beast that goeth downward to the earth.' 
 
 We place here that uniqueness of the soul which 
 makes it the one pearl of great price. Other distinctions 
 may be more or less probable this one is certain. The 
 ^0705 which is reason, and the Xoyo? which is speech 
 the mind which can think and know, and the speech 
 which can communicate thought and knowledge may 
 have its imitations or its approximations in the endow- 
 ments, in various degrees less and greater, of inferior 
 races of creatures. Capacities of pain and pleasure, 
 physical and mental, may be shared in varying pro- 
 portion with animal lives which man takes into contact 
 with his own life, and which certainly have the power of 
 reciprocating his affection to the very length of giving 
 life itself in unstinting obedience or inconsolable grief. 
 But when God said, ' Let us make man in our image, 
 after our likeness,' He certainly spoke of a characteristic 
 with which no inferior creature (at all events) could 
 intermeddle. Not idly or at random was that plural 
 form given to that one divine counsel. We will not 
 indeed argue from that plural form the premature reve- 
 lation of the divine Trinity. Such arguments sound 
 dry and formal, tending rather to throw doubt upon, 
 than to elucidate, the dogma which they are quoted 
 to confirm. But in that plural form lurks the expla- 
 nation of the divine pfjfjui in which it is embedded.
 
 XXVIIL] The Worth of the Soul. 503 
 
 'Let us make... in our image... after otir likeness' is the 
 intimation of that divine unfathomable sympathy which 
 is to have its counterpart (with reverence be it spoken) 
 in the human. When our Saviour, in His anticipative 
 high-priestly intercession, uttered those words, before 
 He left the guest-chamber or on His way towards 
 Gethsemane, ' Father, I will that they also whom Thou 
 hast given me be with me where I am, that they may 
 behold my glory which Thou hast given me, for Thou 
 lovest me before the foundation of the world' then He 
 interpreted, where there is the ear to hear Him, the 
 mystery of that plural of the creating, 'In oiir image... 
 after our likeness... let us make man.' The image was 
 the image of a spiritual sympathy : the likeness was the 
 likeness of a divine love. 
 
 Can we wonder, if this be true, that the soul is spoken 
 of as a thing of inestimable, of incomparable worth 
 differing in kind from any most brilliant, most mag- 
 nificent, most stupendous work of nature a thing 
 which to find, which to save, is worth any other loss, 
 any conceivable sacrifice which to damage, which to 
 spoil, which to lose, is a sin and a crime and a horror to 
 which there is nothing like or equal in the possibilities 
 of being ? 
 
 If the human soul, alone of all created existences of 
 which we know anything save by faintest glimpse and 
 rumour, has the capacity of knowing and loving and 
 feeling with God, and in closest union with this the 
 capacity of a deep and powerful sympathy with other 
 spiritual beings like itself in this aspect Godward ; has 
 not enough been suggested to prepare us for an ex- 
 ceptional dealing with it on the part of God Himself,
 
 504 The Worth of the Soul. [xxvin. 
 
 even if that exceptional dealing should involve whole 
 courses and systems of divine action to which there is 
 no parallel in other experience ? 
 
 'One pearl, of great price.' The whole Bible is a 
 commentary upon that text. The Bible is the biography 
 not of a soul but of the soul : the illustrious birth, the 
 beautiful childhood the terrible fall, the fearful disease 
 the severe discipline, the partial recovery, the frequent 
 relapse the astonishing sacrifice, the unspeakable gift, 
 the unwearied patience, the abounding grace at last 
 the perfect restoration, the glorious transformation, the 
 everlasting home : was it worth while, we stop to ask 
 ourselves, thus to devise and thus to elaborate a work 
 without parallel for a being such as we see in others, 
 such as we feel it in ourselves? And the answer, the 
 only adequate answer, is the story of that birth, of that 
 inbreathing of the breath of life, by which man became, 
 in a sense utterly different from that which would be 
 true of any other material or corporeal being, a living 
 soul. If this human being was so made as to be 
 capable of knowing God and even of resembling God 
 in His sympathy and in His love, then it was worth 
 while to buy it back at any price, to reconstruct it from 
 its ruin at any sacrifice. 
 
 We are able, in some measure, ourselves to judge 
 of its value. We can do so in two ways and in two 
 forms. We have ourselves seen what a soul may sink 
 to : we have ourselves seen also its possibilities of rising. 
 We have felt in ourselves the sorrows of which it is 
 capable sorrows as real as any that flesh and blood is 
 heir to, though they are soul's sorrows giving no account 
 of themselves to the stranger. We have known what re-
 
 xxviii.] The Worth of the Soul. 505 
 
 morse may be, though the deed of which it is the avenger 
 may have been but the word left unspoken or the prayer 
 left unsaid. We have known what the agony of mere 
 silence may be, though the silence be not the unkind- 
 ness of a friend, but the delayed or withholden answer 
 of an invisible Comforter. We have known what it is 
 to go and to come, to rise and to rest, to do the 
 daily work and hold the human converse, with a heavy 
 cloud over us, an earth of iron and a heaven of brass, by 
 reason of a conscious severance, or an unrealized inter- 
 course, between the spirit of the man and the God who 
 is its life. If these things were all, would they not give 
 some faint reason for hoping, even against hope, for a 
 divine interposition of which the soul is the subject ? 
 
 ' Fearfully and wonderfully made,' the psalmist says 
 of the bodily fabric of which God was in every part the 
 architect and the artificer. How much more fearful 
 and wonderful the mechanism of the soul. So delicate 
 and so sensitive so easily deranged and disordered 
 so instantly responsive to treatment kind or unkind, 
 wise or mischievous so difficult to repair, so tenacious 
 of evil habit, so rapid in transition from ecstasy to 
 agony, so boundless in prospect, so realistic in retro- 
 spect. But, far above all, so mysterious in its relationship 
 to God Himself. Which of all us has had no experience 
 ever, in childhood or boyhood, of a direct speaking and 
 hearing, asking and answering, between himself and the 
 invisible One? Who has never carried some burden to a 
 throne of grace, with results which he could as soon 
 doubt his own existence as ignore ? Explain it as he 
 may, he has felt at such times that God has a very 
 peculiar and a very personal interest in this soul's life
 
 4 
 
 506 The Worth of the Soul. [xxvin. 
 
 of which the experiences are so real, the vicissitudes so 
 critical. 
 
 Nor are these personal experiences capable of ex- 
 planation on a hypothesis of idiosyncracy or of halluci- 
 nation. The lives of otJiers are full of them. The 
 existence of the soul, in its distinctness alike from mind 
 and from matter, is an inference from observation as 
 much as from experience. Spiritual distresses, spiritual 
 comforts, spiritual joys and sorrows, have a reaction 
 upon the very life. If they are illusory, if they are 
 imaginary, altogether and in all persons, then nothing 
 is real but what can be touched, tasted, and handled. 
 History itself is not only affected but made by them. 
 Spiritual experiences created a Christendom : spiritual 
 experiences have made, unmade, and remade empires. 
 Homes are made deserts or made paradises by the 
 reaction upon them of prayer refrained from or of prayer 
 lived in. Angels ascending and descending have cheered 
 the dwelling of poverty, and made the bed of sickness 
 the very life-centre and joy-centre of the home. On the 
 other hand, the soul which will none of God which 
 keeps its doors locked and barred about it while the 
 Saviour stands, all the day long, without, knocking 
 bewrays its unnatural state by becoming the very cage 
 of unclean birds, or, if not this, at least the perpetual 
 check and hindrance of all high and heavenly aspi- 
 rations, either making this life the all in all of the being, 
 or discouraging the realization of another by the gloomy 
 suggestions of a practical atheism. 
 
 This being which has in it such possibilities, such 
 alternatives, of good and evil this being which can 
 be so wretched, which can be so mischievous, which can
 
 XXVIIL] The Worth of the Soul. 507 
 
 be so lost O, it is not insignificant, tell me not that 
 it is insignificant, in the eyes of its Maker. When I 
 confine my thought to the evil when I see how 
 potent, even in its ruin, is ' the spirit of the man which 
 is in him ' I can begin to understand why God Himself 
 who made should think it worth while to redeem I can 
 count it no incredible though it be an ineffable grace, 
 if God Himself should have come after this lost thing 
 into the wilderness of its solitude and its despair. 
 
 But when I turn my thought to the good from the 
 evil ; when, in some beautiful example brought within 
 my vision, I see what the soul may be, not in its 
 ruin but in its reconstruction ; when I see some grand 
 life, in cottage or palace, given wholly to God and His 
 work utterly forgetful of self, whether in the form 
 of indulgence or of glorying beautiful first at home, 
 bearing slight and discomfort, diffusing peace and joy, 
 out of weakness made strong, or in weakness lovely 
 then perhaps called to let its light shine in a larger 
 house, on a loftier candlestick ; when I see what the 
 soul may be, in even glorifying a Father in heaven 
 then indeed it seems to be already half explained to me 
 why God Himself should have become incarnate to 
 save for I see here results different in kind from the 
 testimony of suns or stars ' singing as they shine, The 
 hand that made us is divine' I see here no lustre, 
 no Shechinah, of a visible or material glory I see the 
 moral and spiritual image of Him who created, I see 
 also in the very sacrifice which bought back this living 
 soul a manifestation, diverse in its very nature from any 
 other, of the trinity of the attributes God is Light, 
 God is Life, and God is Love.
 
 508 Tke Worth of the Soul. [xxvni. 
 
 Many thoughts come to us as we stand once again in 
 this church, so full of memories for some, so full of 
 prospects for others, so full of anxious alternatives 
 for all. The subject chosen has been an elementary 
 but a comprehensive one. It lies at the root of all 
 religion the worth of the soul. To be possessed 
 with it is to be a religious man : to live it is to be 
 a Christian. It is because we have forgotten it that 
 we have sinned each sin which now haunts or cumbers 
 the memory each sin against another, each sin against 
 ourselves. O, if we had believed in the worth of the 
 soul, we should never have fallen into that evil habit 
 which has made such havoc of the past. If we had 
 believed in the worth of the soul, we should have 
 regarded the inner being with such reverence, we should 
 so have felt towards its purity, and so have felt towards 
 its integrity, and so have felt towards its responsibility, 
 that we could not have dared to sully it or to profane 
 it or to trifle with it by that year or that month or that 
 day of folly or of prayerlessness or of sinning. If we 
 had believed in the worth of the soul ; if we had believed 
 that the inner life of that brother or that sister I speak 
 now of the brotherhood and the sisterhood not of family 
 alone but of humanity was a thing of precious, of 
 priceless value, bearing the image and superscription of 
 God Himself bearing it still, however tarnished or 
 sullied or half-defaced possessing the endowment, not 
 of reason only or speech, not of will only or influence, 
 but also of accountability and immortality, of boundless 
 capacity for misery or happiness, of boundless capacity 
 also for divine intercourse and divine communion ; 
 assuredly we should never have adventured that sug-
 
 XXVIIL] The Worth of the Soul. 509 
 
 gestion or that persuasion, that word or that deed, by 
 which we put God out of sight, and made the idea 
 of sinning powerful, for that soul : we would rather have 
 cut off hand or foot than have any evil dealing with 
 that mysterious being, whose angel (we could almost have 
 guessed without Christ's saying it) must have been at 
 that very moment beholding the face of God in heaven. 
 
 This high or this low estimate of the worth of the 
 soul enters into every thing. This it is which makes 
 one life so mean, and another life so noble. This it is 
 which makes one man set before himself a high idea of 
 duty, and another count any sort of living to which 
 taste and temper, inclination and predisposition, prompt 
 him, the natural thing and the sufficient thing and the 
 unavoidable thing for him. This it is, which makes the 
 companionship of one man so helpful, and the com- 
 panionship of another man so unimproving or so de- 
 teriorating. It is not that the one man never smiles, or 
 is always recalling you in so many words to the recol- 
 lection of the momentous issues of death, judgment and 
 eternity. And it is not that the other man is necessarily 
 offensive in his language to piety or purity, or utters one 
 syllable against the faith once for all delivered. It is 
 only that the sense of the worth of the soul gives to 
 the one an unstudied and unconscious influence over you 
 for good, and the absence of that estimate drags down 
 the whole aim and scope of the other to a level little if 
 at all above that of the man who avows himself an 
 unbeliever. 
 
 Brethren, may the subject of this sermon abide with 
 some of you when the preacher is silent or in his grave. 
 May it give a quiet seriousness to this opening term,
 
 5io The Worth of the Soul. [xxvni. 
 
 to this opening life, for some of you. May it make one 
 or two, here and there, care for each other's souls when 
 they are together. Let the delightful friendships, here 
 as nowhere else cemented and exercised, have no sting 
 in them, when you are parted for life or in death, by 
 reason of your having cared for each other's bodies, 
 or cared for each other's minds, or cared for each other's 
 successes, or cared for each other's affections and not 
 cared for each other's souls. O, if the shadow, not dark 
 but bright, of a world out of sight but already projecting 
 its powers (as an inspired man writes) upon this present 
 might rest always upon our companionships and upon 
 our solitudes, upon our days and our nights, upon our 
 working hours and resting blessed would it be for us 
 beyond words, making the whole of being one, and the 
 whole of being the life of God and the light of heaven. 
 ' No man cared for my soul ' is the saddest of lamen- 
 tations be it yours to know that perfection of love, 
 divine at once and human, of which the realized worth 
 of souls is at once the safeguard and the inspiration, and 
 this consequently the epitaph, when it comes at last to 
 be written ' Lovely and pleasant in their lives, in their 
 death they were not divided.'
 
 XXIX. 
 
 LIFE THE SERVICE OF A GENERATION. 
 
 Acts xiii. 36. 
 
 After he had served' his own generation by the will of God, 
 he fell on sleep. 
 
 THE text is capable of three different constructions. 
 The authorized version gives it in the form just read to 
 you. ' David, after he had served his own generation 
 by the will (counsel) of God, fell on sleep.' The revised 
 version gives it in another way. ' David, after he had 
 in his own generation served the. counsel of God, fell on 
 sleep.' The margin of the revised version suggests a 
 third arrangement. ' David, after he had served his 
 own generation, by the counsel of God fell on sleep.' 
 Each one of these constructions has something to 
 recommend it. This is not the place or the time for 
 discussing them, and the general lesson is not affected 
 by the question. In all forms of the sentence, we have 
 the threefold thought, of a generation, a service, and 
 a counsel of God concerning it : and whether we say, 
 ' He served his generation by God's counsel, and then 
 fell on sleep ; ' or whether we say, ' In his generation he 
 served God's counsel, and then fell on sleep ; ' or whether 
 we say, ' He served his generation, and then by God's
 
 512 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 counsel fell on sleep ' it scarcely matters to the main 
 idea, and can but slightly affect the application to 
 ourselves. 
 
 The intention of St Paul in thus commenting on a 
 beautiful verse of the psalms, ' Thou shalt not suffer 
 Thine holy One to see corruption,' is to disparage the 
 human writer in comparison with his Son and Lord. 
 When David wrote those words, he wrote that which, 
 literally taken, was not true of himself. He was laid in 
 the grave like other men, and underwent the common 
 doom of dissolution and corruption. Therefore, St Paul 
 argues, over and above that modified sense of the say- 
 ing in which alone it could be true of any mere man, it 
 must, if it was not to be charged with an exaggeration 
 fatal to its inspiration, have had a meaning, complete 
 and exhaustive, in which it prophesied the resurrection 
 of Christ from a death of which He, the eternal Son, 
 could not be holden. 
 
 A contrast is thus , presented between one of the 
 greatest of men and the One greater than any. And 
 yet, in the very act of thus throwing David into the 
 shade in comparison with One who was not man only, 
 St Paul writes a lovely epitaph upon the chivalrous king 
 and sweet psalmist of Israel. ' He served his own 
 generation, and then fell on sleep.' There may be 
 longer, more detailed, more laudatory epitaphs the 
 fashion of the last century covered the walls of our 
 churches with elaborate and fulsome panegyrics, amongst 
 which this short sentence of St Paul's might have seemed 
 scanty and grudging in its meed of praise but the 
 truer taste and more reverent feeling of our own age 
 will appreciate the more expressive and in reality more
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 513 
 
 majestic brevity ' He served his generation, and fell on 
 sleep.' 
 
 Brethren, the text presents us with two pairs of 
 equivalents. Life is Service Death is Sleep. 
 
 The first thought which comes out to us from the 
 text read in any one of its three renderings is the 
 brief yet suggestive saying, Life is Service. 
 
 One rendering of the text calls life the service of a 
 generation. Another rendering calls life the service 
 (in one's generation) of God's counsel. But the most 
 ignorant of thinkers, the most hypercritical of scholars, 
 will see no conflict, scarcely a divergence, in this varia- 
 tion. The moment the idea of service has attached 
 itself to the idea of life, enough has been done to pre- 
 clude any practical uncertainty as to its nature or 
 object. Life this common, this universal, this taken- 
 for-granted fact, that I live and move and am ; this 
 being which I treat as if I had got it, found it, stumbled 
 upon it, for myself; this everyday possession, of time 
 and thought and faculty and action, which is presup- 
 posed in every plan and purpose and exercise of the 
 will to be told that this life is not self-contained, not 
 self-centred, not dominant and not independent, but, on 
 the contrary, that it is a ministry and a service as 
 much as if I were receiving the wages of a hireling or 
 wearing the livery of an employer is a surprise and a 
 shock at the first hearing, or would be so if it were heard 
 in the heart, heard as a revelation and heard as a call. 
 
 Would to God that the saying, ' Life is Service/ 
 might be written by the spirit of grace upon one of 
 these hearts today. What is it which defeats in this 
 place the very purpose for which we are here? What 
 
 V. 33
 
 514 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 is it which scatters to the winds, for so many of us, 
 all the instructions of truth and all the counsels of 
 wisdom ? What is it which makes the time spent in 
 this University a loss and a waste and a nullity for so 
 many? What lies at the root of all the idleness, all the 
 frivolity, all the self-indulgence, which is to be bewailed 
 afterwards through the long years of vain regretting 
 or toilsome amending which lie for so many between 
 this life and the grave ? O, if many answers, and all of 
 them true, might be given to these questions, could one 
 be found more thorough in its explanation than this 
 That young man had not yet awakened to the thought, 
 ' Life is Service,' and therefore he saw no harm and no 
 shame in so living for this present as if his time and his 
 talents, his body and mind, his soul and spirit, were all 
 his own his to waste in folly, his (if it so please him) 
 to consume in sin ? 
 
 Life is made here the synonym of service. ' Having 
 lived ' it might be ' having served ' it is. ' Having 
 served ' I am willing to stop there, not asking what or 
 whom. Nay, if you even filled my blank with the word 
 ' himself,' I would not complain of it if you will let me 
 interpret. Let 'himself mean the real self, the whole 
 of the man, not one part only the mind that thinks, 
 and the heart that loves, the soul that cannot die, and 
 the body that shall rise again serve even that and it 
 shall be life a life not to be despised a life that hath 
 immortality. 
 
 But how much better and more beautiful shall be the 
 aposiopesis, if it may suggest, in some sense I had 
 almost said, in any sense not self, but another. Let 
 the first thought of ' Life is Service ' be the thought of
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 515 
 
 any one outside me. Let it be the service of father or 
 mother, of brother or sister, of friend by friend. Set 
 before yourself some one, any one, as the object for 
 which you live. Thus it is that many a man, not yet 
 fully alive to his relationship to a Father in heaven, 
 has found force of character, has found relief from 
 utter vagueness or frivolity of living, in setting him- 
 self to be the best of sons, the kindest of brothers, 
 within the home of his own flesh and blood. Thus it 
 is that, when other feelings begin to stir in him, the 
 man has already risen to a higher life, has learned at 
 least to be thoughtful and serious and self-controlling, 
 who has become conscious of the powerful influence of 
 a pure first love, lifting him into the region of reverence 
 and into the region of devotion by the help of an inter- 
 mediate, representative to him of the love which has 
 all love in it. ' Life is Service ' is a principle which has 
 all manner of workings from the narrowest and most 
 circumscribed to the largest and loftiest of human 
 relationships or through the highest human to the 
 superhuman and the divine. 
 
 The text is large enough to hold all these. ' He 
 served his generation.' ' He served the will of God.' 
 * He served ' is the sum of it. 
 
 ' He served his generation.' The expression is vague 
 till we interpret it. To one of us it may seem a small 
 thing to have the possibilities of the life confined within 
 the limits of a single generation. We may have formed 
 a grander conception of the capabilities of a life 
 our own, or another's. We may have dreamed of far- 
 reaching consequences to a church or a country, to 
 literature or history, and thus to the world itself, from 
 
 332
 
 516 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 the fact that a certain person has lived and moved and 
 had his being upon the face of the earth from which he 
 was taken. And indeed, in one aspect, we do well to 
 take into account, for warning and quickening, the 
 capacities of this fearful and wonderful being ; to im- 
 press upon ourselves and others the mysterious, the 
 inscrutable influences of conduct, as involving conse- 
 quences quite without limit, for good or evil, both to 
 the life itself and to other lives surrounding or following. 
 Who shall pretend to say that the service of the gene- 
 ration may not have in it the service of a second or a 
 third or a tenth generation, by reason of the impression 
 made by its elevation, by its purity, by its benevolence, 
 by its wisdom, upon the very ideas and principles of 
 human living? 
 
 Nor is even this the whole of the truth. It is given to 
 a few men to leave a memory behind them in the shape 
 of immortal writings, powerfully affecting the thought of 
 whole nations and languages, sometimes starting afresh 
 into a novelty of influence at some great crisis of history, 
 and moulding the taste or the judgment of posterity by 
 a power only strengthened by lapse of time. Such men 
 are necessarily few and far between panel, qiios ^qnns 
 amavit but I know not that aught but good could 
 result from the early ambition to be one of them. It 
 has sometimes been made a topic of discussion in prize- 
 exercises and debating societies, whether the hope of 
 posthumous fame is or can be a genuine motive in the 
 minds and imaginations of the living. Men may deceive 
 themselves as to their own aims and impulses ; but cer- 
 tainly, if there be such a motive disjoined altogether 
 from the idea of a conscious and therefore an impossible
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 517 
 
 realization then, in proportion to its vitality and in 
 proportion to its purity, it will secure the developement 
 of some of the loftiest faculties of human nature 
 though it must ever fall short of one motive higher and 
 nobler still, the constraining love of Christ, which alone 
 can unite the whole man in the consistent endeavour to 
 serve the generation, or to serve the race, by represent- 
 ting Him, in word and deed, to the humanity which He 
 died to save. 
 
 And assuredly it is in this last direction alone that we 
 shall find the service of the generation too small and 
 too contracted a sphere for the energies and influences 
 of the man. Inspired men meaning now by inspiration 
 not the imagination and not the genius which has struck 
 out new paths for mind and thought to expatiate, but 
 the breath of God Himself revealing His secrets to the 
 individual soul that it may tell them forth to hearers 
 and readers, and live them in the sight of contem- 
 poraries and witnesses inspired men, and not least 
 St Paul himself, have indeed a message and a mission 
 not to one generation but to generations that shall 
 be born, even to the remotest age of the church and 
 of the world. 
 
 But, speaking of average men, and of men above the 
 average men who have not one of these exceptional 
 embassies, whether of transcendent genius or of divine 
 inspiration, to a world-wide and age-long audience it 
 is true painfully true, or instructively true, according 
 to the spirit in which it is heard and read that they 
 can, at the best, serve but one generation, and then 
 must see corruption. Great ability, great ' knowledge, 
 great sagacity, great personal influence, great oratory,
 
 518 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 great generalship, great statesmanship, all are of the 
 generation. There is nothing, in any one of these, of 
 a nature to live on after the death of the possessor. 
 We have seen all these by turns wield enormous 
 power and yet pass away. We have seen one great 
 commander give a land ' rest for forty years ' yet he 
 was not laid on sleep before other wars must arise, and 
 new battles be fought, on Indus or Nile, to reassure his 
 priceless boon of a national security. We have heard of 
 oratory which once shook senates and reversed policies 
 but there was no reporter then to keep alive the 
 memory and, after all, what, at the best, can a speech 
 be, without the speaker? In this place, it is not in- 
 appropriate to speak of knowledge as ephemeral. The 
 man who has only read, never written ; the man who 
 has spent his strength in amassing information from 
 libraries and observatories; the man who has written, 
 and written largely, and for a world of readers, while 
 he was here to hold them is as much lost to the 
 succeeding generation for there is a fashion, as well as 
 a progress, even in knowing as the brilliant talker who 
 was the fascination of society, or the persuasive eccle- 
 siastic of the pulpit or the confessional. 
 
 Commonly, if life reaches anything like its natural 
 limit, of the threescore and ten or fourscore years, all 
 these powers of which we have spoken wane and fade 
 before the reaching. Not to mention probabilities of 
 physical enfeeblement, the latter days of the life are, 
 from perfectly distinct causes, less brilliant than the 
 earlier less active, less conspicuous, less impressive, 
 less attractive, less influential. It is the rarest thing in 
 the world, if a man remains to the end so much as in
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 519 
 
 sympathy with his generation. New customs, of thought 
 and habit, not those of his own youth or manhood, spring 
 into fashion around him : the chances are, that they are 
 distasteful to him, that he never accepts, that he half 
 dreads and half despises them, that he never makes real 
 friends with the young, that he feels himself to have 
 outlived the world of his own tastes and his own 
 affections, and is made to call himself, in more than one 
 sense, a stranger and sojourner where he was once (it 
 may be) the model, if not the idol, of a considerable 
 circle and following. When at last the fulness of the 
 time is come, and he is laid to his fathers to see 
 corruption, it is but in a very few hearts that he 
 leaves either a void or an impression : let but six 
 months or six weeks pass and there is nothing of him 
 in the place which he once filled : a generation is rising 
 which never knew him : it is only by an effort of love 
 and duty that a few surviving friends assert his claim 
 either to honour or to recollection. ' He served his own 
 generation, and then fell on sleep.' This is all that can 
 be said of him. 
 
 Shall we count this a small thing ? Is it not enough 
 if it can be said with truth of any man ? If there is 
 here the reproof of human vanity, is there not also here 
 the repose of human restlessness ? If we might but see 
 God's hand and God's counsel in the assignment of what 
 St Paul called at Athens ' the bounds of our habitation,' 
 the exact scope and limit of our action and influence, 
 and be willing, when night comes, just to lie down to 
 sleep, under the guardianship that never slumbers, till 
 the dawn of that day in which God, not man, shall 
 be seen to be all in all could we desire more ? To
 
 520 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 serve one generation is not this large enough and 
 grand enough to satisfy any reasonable ambition ? We 
 fear rather lest some here should be saying, It is too 
 large and too grand for such as I am. 
 
 He served his own generation yes, it is much to say 
 of any man. A generation is a vast thing, an incon- 
 ceivable thing, while we so speak of it. We must break 
 it up into its elements before we can apprehend it. 
 A generation, in the mass and in the gross, is the whole 
 number of living and thinking beings alive at any one 
 time upon this great earth. How can a man imagine 
 himself to be serving all that multitude ? How can 
 he in his wildest dreams, conceive himself as being 
 anything to a host of individuals, to a congeries of 
 nationalities, like that ? St Paul says that David 
 served his generation how could that be said, save in 
 monstrous hyperbole ? Did David know, at the time, 
 that he was serving his generation in all the compli- 
 cations and in all the vicissitudes of his personal history? 
 For a large part of his life he was just a keeper of sheep 
 for his father on the solitary hill-sides of Bethlehem. 
 Then he was a minstrel in a comfortless loveless royal 
 home, wiling away by his harp the evil spirit from a 
 wayward half-lunatic king. Then for years he was a 
 hunted outlaw, escaping, with his life in his hand, from 
 Naioth to Gath, and from Adullam to Engedi serving 
 nothing and no one, he may have said within himself 
 debarred from the exercise of the meanest functions of 
 citizenship, from the very membership of a home, from 
 the very society of a village. Yet God saw all these 
 in succession as so many phases of the life-service, 
 and thought it no fancy and no exaggeration to describe
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 521 
 
 each one as a constituent part of the whole. Some of 
 the sweetest psalms of David were written in the useless 
 portion of his life could more be said to enlarge the 
 idea of service, or to show how little a man is able 
 so much as to estimate his own? 
 
 The service of the generation is indeed capable of 
 every possible variety. It is, to fill the post assigned, 
 with diligence, with seriousness, with unselfishness, with 
 God in sight. It may be done equally by prince and 
 peasant, by master and servant, by man and woman. 
 He to whom the five talents are committed, and he who 
 has but the one talent, must alike and equally ' occupy' 
 and make profit of them, knowing that differences of 
 station and differences of employment are essential to 
 the very idea of a body, a society, a state, a church. 
 None need say, Because I am not just this (particularly) 
 or just that, I have no place, or no important place, or 
 no equally important place, in the great community 
 which is my particular generation of mankind. No one 
 touches his generation at more than a few points 
 most people touch it but at one. That point of contact 
 is the place of service. He serves his generation, who 
 serves faithfully that particular town or village or 
 hamlet that particular neighbourhood or family or 
 home which is, for him, the little fragment or morsel 
 of the generation as a whole. 
 
 There is this also to reconcile us to the humbler and 
 less conspicuous places of service that, the smaller the 
 surface covered, the deeper commonly and the more 
 intense is the influence exercised. The ecclesiastical 
 superior who has three counties for his diocese will be 
 the first to acknowledge that his hold upon any one of
 
 522 Life tJie Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 the parishes of these three counties is infinitely less than 
 that of the devout and devoted village pastor who goes 
 in and out before his people, speaking to them the word 
 of life, and ministering by the bedsides of the sick and 
 dying. These are the compensations of the mighty 
 service, and of the generous Lord who takes it for 
 His own. 
 
 There is another sense also in which the thought of 
 life as service has a tranquillizing and even equalizing 
 influence. We have seen that the extent of space 
 covered by it is nothing so is it also with the duration 
 of time. Some of the most telling services of the 
 generation have been accomplished within the span 
 of a few years. You mourned yesterday the early 
 removal from the service of this University of one who 
 died at the age of one and thirty. Henry Martyn, the 
 Cambridge missionary, the hero (may I not call him so ?) 
 of English missionaries, died at the same exact point, at 
 the age of thirty years and one. Younger lives than 
 these, lives (shall I dare to say it?) closed finally in the 
 schoolroom or in the nursery, have had the ' twelve 
 hours ' of their ' day ' complete in tale and sum their 
 work was done, in its abiding influence upon a home 
 and upon its inmates, though the constituent hour of 
 their little day was but one year or one half-year long 
 in the prosaic interpretation of the world that measures 
 by arithmetic. We serve, I say it again, a generous 
 Master, and He accepts as the finished service the work 
 which it pleases Him to abridge. 
 
 ' He served his own generation." 
 
 Brethren, the thought of the generation is pregnant 
 with applications. It reminds us of the succession and
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 523 
 
 series of the inhabitants of each spot of this earth. 
 It reminds us that there is no standing still and no 
 looking backward, but a perpetual movement and reach- 
 ing forth, in the collective life of God's human family. 
 Each era and each century, each age and each gene- 
 ration, ought to be forwarder in the race of knowledge 
 and in the race of happiness and in the race of virtue 
 than the one foregoing. To serve one's generation is to 
 help it on. We ought to be ashamed of contributing 
 nothing to the existing sum, such as we found it, of 
 human notions and of human practices. Each true ser- 
 vant of his generation does, in some real though to him- 
 self unconscious way, help to make the next generation 
 after it better and happier. Certainly in this place of 
 brief generations we have seen, we have felt it so. 
 Something survives of each life of service. Something 
 is immortal of each beautiful life. Some one is assisted 
 in being good by each servant of the past. What has 
 not David done for them that came after ? The thought 
 never came to him but the thing was done. Who does 
 not turn in trouble to that man's compositions ? Who 
 stays to say to himself, David lived so many hundreds 
 of years before Christ, how then can he sound the depths 
 of Christian sorrow and Christian ecstasy? He was as 
 much the commissioned minstrel of the universal church 
 of God as Moses was its lawgiver or Isaiah its prophet. 
 And yet David was no. saint, if saintliness were per- 
 fection. His very faults, not hidden, not dissembled, 
 not glossed over, but confessed and written down by 
 himself as beacons of warning, have turned to the 
 church for a testimony. So treated, so trampled under 
 foot and risen from, his very sins were a part (let none
 
 524 Life tJie Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 distort my saying) of the service of his generation. They 
 have helped to justify God his 5ist psalm, St Paul 
 being the interpreter 1 , says so in dealing with men as 
 sinners. They have helped to save men that one 5 1 st 
 psalm has done so by furnishing them with 'words' for 
 coming to God as suppliants 2 . 
 
 O, if this thought, of serving the one generation, were 
 once rooted and grounded in us ; if the last suggestion, 
 of the manifoldness and the unexpectedness of the ways 
 and forms of serving, were but worked out by each one 
 in reference to his own experiences, the joyous and the 
 grievous, as it ought to be ; there would be an end 
 in us for ever of all restlessness and all mortification : 
 there would be a definiteness and a concentration of 
 purpose in us all : we should know exactly where we 
 stood, and how : we should feel it honour enough and to 
 spare for the like of us, if it could be written by the 
 finger of God at last on the tomb of our resting, ' He 
 served his generation... and fell on sleep.' 
 
 He served his generation and in doing so he ' served 
 God's counsel ' concerning himself. How reassuring 
 amidst all adverse appearances, how comforting amidst 
 all misgivings and all gainsayings, to know that God 
 has a will, has a counsel, concerning each life. We can 
 believe it, on the strength of last Sunday's meditation 
 upon the human soul as the ' one pearl of great price.' 
 There is a value, unique and incomparable, in the living 
 soul breathed by God Himself into this one work of His 
 own hands. On that supposition all is explained the 
 mystery of incarnation, the mystery of atonement, the 
 
 1 Romans iii. 4. Hosea xiv. i.
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 525 
 
 mystery of grace. On that supposition it is natural 
 that God should have a will concerning us ; and not 
 only a general will, 'even our sanctification,' but a 
 definite counsel also, framed for us in the eternity that 
 is behind. We are not the casual, accidental, haphazard 
 things that infidelity would make of us. God had a 
 purpose in creating each one or, if that expression 
 be challenged, then in so arranging His matters as that 
 each one of us should come to be. God had a counsel 
 concerning each one, in fixing the place and the time, 
 the conditions and circumstances of his being. These 
 lives, the least of them, have a dignity beyond the 
 patents of peers for they have been the subject, each 
 one, of an eternal purpose, of a divine counsel which it 
 must be their one glory to realize. David in his shepherd 
 vigils on the hills around Bethlehem David exiled and 
 outlawed by the king whom he loved through all 
 David meditating his psalms, immortal in their use for 
 churches and solitudes David at last anointed king, to 
 reign seven years in Hebron and thirty and three in 
 Jerusalem was the subject, all through these vicissitudes, 
 of a changeless will and counsel, which he persistently, 
 though with frightful aberrations, served through all. 
 So has it been with lesser lives and less illustrious 
 fortunes. We, we ourselves, in our childhoods and 
 manhoods, in our advancements and disappointments, 
 in our little enterprises and less achievements, have 
 been serving a counsel, and that of God. O, let us 
 feel as we ought the mighty honour. These lives are 
 trivial and uneventful, but they have been the subject of 
 thought in heaven let us live them well. Let us fulfil 
 their high destiny. Enough if of one of us this may be
 
 526 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 the record ' He served the counsel of God... and he fell 
 on sleep.' 
 
 Who shall tell us, concerning one of whom this is 
 God's record, that that sleep shall have no waking ? 
 The very words which tell of it, that it is a laying 
 or adding or gathering to our fathers, seem to make 
 the funeral itself a reunion ; seem to say of that darkest 
 moment of all the bereavement, when we carried the 
 loved body and laid it in the lowest pit, that it was but 
 a handing over of the lost one to the company and the 
 companionship of loved ones gone before was but the 
 opening of the doors of the bright home in which the 
 fathers dwell with God, and in which we ourselves, 
 when a few days or years are past, shall, if we be 
 found worthy, be amongst them and with them for ever. 
 To be gathered to our fathers is a sweet periphrasis for 
 the being buried. The grave itself, lonely as it looks, 
 is no solitude. Hades itself is a home a home of dear 
 names and pleasant faces the home of many gene- 
 rations, each one waiting to recognize, waiting to 
 welcome, the servant of the present. 
 
 In the light of such revelations death a falling on 
 sleep, burial a gathering to the fathers even the thought 
 of ' seeing corruption ' shall lose for us its terror. O, if 
 we would realize the incapacity of this frame of flesh 
 and blood for the companionship and for the inheritance 
 of saints in light; if we would try to enter into the 
 repeated ' must,' the reiterated ' cannot,' of the great 
 funeral chapter 'flesh and blood cannot inherit' 'this 
 mortal must put on ' we should not be enamoured 
 as we are of the frail, feeble, dying body. We should 
 groan and travail in pain for the revelation to us of the
 
 xxix.] Life the Service of a Generation. 527 
 
 great mystery, the divestiture of the natural, and the 
 investiture of the spiritual. We should be able to 
 anticipate, with something of the feeling of St Paul 
 and of St Paul's Master, the coming of that magnificent 
 emancipation, of which the one said, ' Even we ourselves 
 groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption ; ' and 
 the other, ' But I have a baptism to be baptized with' 
 the baptism of the great passion ' and how am I 
 straitened till it be accomplished.' 
 
 These hearts, the nobler among them at any rate, are 
 full of ambitions. There are nearer ambitions, and am- 
 bitions more remote yet even these last may be bounded 
 by time. We wish well to each one of them. It is not 
 good for a young man that his thoughts should have 
 no future in them, even for this life. It is no good sign 
 if a man dwelling for three years or five years within the 
 precincts of a University has no desire for its honours, 
 which are, being interpreted, its rewards of much toil 
 and much self-denial, many foregoings of pleasure and 
 many acceptances of things painful to flesh and blood. 
 Nor yet is it desirable that any young man should be 
 without longings which reach forth into the life beyond 
 youth ; that he should have no intentions, more or less 
 definite, of making his mark and leaving his name in 
 some one of the careers of professional or public toil 
 which England opens before him with such freedom 
 where and how and what to choose. 
 
 If St Paul were in this church today, his spirit 
 stirred within him as it would be by the sight of so 
 much life, so much opportunity, and so much promise, 
 we know from his own words that he would desire to 
 stimulate you to a great ambition. The word is his
 
 528 Life the Service of a Generation, [xxix. 
 
 own, in the faithful Greek and he has also interpreted. 
 He would call you in trumpet tones to the service of 
 your generation. He would tell you, as we cannot, how 
 glorious is any service which looks beyond self. Look, 
 he would say, upon your great England. Take the 
 measure, so far as one young heart can do it, of her 
 privileges, of her responsibilities, of her miseries, of her 
 dangers, of her sins. Choose out for yourself some one 
 department of activity to which you think your special 
 gifts, larger or smaller, point as your proper field of 
 duty and give yourself heartily to that service. Try 
 as much as possible to beat down self in it not to look 
 so much on your own things, but every man also on the 
 things of others. So live, he would say, all the life-day, 
 and then humbly and thankfully fall on sleep. 
 
 One thing more he would say to you for he has said 
 it in his books. He tells us there of three particular 
 ambitions, all of which he felt, and the third of which 
 was his life. This third was the ambition 'to be ac- 
 cepted of Christ,' whatever others might say of him. Is 
 that ambition new and strange to any of you, young 
 brothers, who have listened this afternoon ? If it be 
 new, give it its first entrance if it be not new, cherish it 
 for your life. O, what unity, what dignity, what sanctity, 
 is given at once to a life of which this is the motto and 
 this the superscription It is my ambition, present or 
 absent, to please Jesus Christ.
 
 XXX. 
 
 THE VIRTUE OF VIOLENCE. 
 
 St Matthew xi. 12. 
 
 The kingdom of heaven sujfereth violence, and the violent take it 
 by force. 
 
 St Luke xvi. 16. 
 The kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it. 
 
 THE two texts are more alike than the English 
 version makes them. Violence is the key-note of both. 
 So strongly does that word mark the text from St 
 Matthew, that a hasty reader might almost imagine the 
 verse to speak of hostility to the gospel. 'The kingdom 
 of heaven suffereth violence ' might seem to suggest the 
 idea of some fiery persecutor ' breathing out threatening 
 and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord.' And 
 the following clause, ' The violent take it by force,' 
 might appear to be the description of a siege or a 
 storm nay, might even be rendered, 'Violent men 
 plunder (or, make spoil of) it/ as the epistle to the 
 Hebrews, using a derivative of the same word, com- 
 mends them for 'taking joyfully the spoiling of their 
 goods.' 
 
 But the second text precludes any such misappre- 
 hension. ' The kingdom of God is preached, and every 
 v. 34
 
 530 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 man presses into it ' still the same word, ' enters it by 
 violence,' but with an unmistakable context, speaking 
 only of friendliness. 
 
 Violence then is here for once made a virtue. We 
 must put aside all such associations with the word as 
 the Pentateuch, the psalms, and the prophets give us. 
 'The earth was filled with violence, and God looked 
 upon it, and, behold, it was corrupt.' ' Him that loveth 
 violence His soul hateth.' ' Evil shall hunt the violent 
 man to overthrow him.' We must forget for a moment 
 the characteristic glory of the Redeemer Himself, that 
 ' He did no violence, neither was any deceit in His 
 mouth.' We must enter, as it were, a new province 
 of divine morality, in which a virtue and a vice have 
 changed names and changed places, and violence, not 
 gentleness, has become the predominant feature of such 
 as shall be saved. 
 
 We have before us one of those Scripture paradoxes 
 of which another stands very near it in the text from 
 St Luke where the conduct of an unscrupulous agent 
 is made to furnish a lesson, not of imitation certainly, 
 but yet not wholly of avoidance, to the disciples of 
 Jesus Christ. The unjust steward showed, even in his 
 dishonesty, a farsightedness of prudence, which it were 
 well if Christian people, while eschewing the dishonesty, 
 could always exercise in reference to their own higher 
 aims and nobler interests. In another place the Lord 
 of love, using language absolutely unparalleled, compels 
 even hatred into His service, saying, ' If any man come 
 to me, and hate not his father and mother, and wife 
 and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own 
 life also, he cannot be my disciple.'
 
 xxx.] The Virtue of Violence. 531 
 
 Such passages might give some encouragement to 
 the statement, opening certainly (if there were time for 
 it) an instructive discussion, that every vice is the per- 
 version or misapplication of a virtue insomuch that 
 the perfect man would be he who, while he changes 
 the direction, the motive, and the principle, yet refuses 
 to suppress or smother any one of the feelings or dispo- 
 sitions of which he is conscious as having their root in 
 the natural ground of his heart. 
 
 But we have enough to occupy our brief time this 
 afternoon in the single example given us in the two 
 texts. 
 
 The generous and intrepid herald of Jesus Christ is 
 now a prisoner, soon to become a martyr, for ' constantly 
 speaking the truth and boldly rebuking vice.' A mo- 
 mentary misgiving has distressed him in his solitude, 
 as it never had done in his activity. He sends two of 
 his disciples to Christ Himself with the question, 'Art 
 Thou He that should come?' A practical reply is 
 given to this question, and the messengers are dismissed 
 with it to their master. As they quit the scene, Christ 
 discourses to the multitude on the text of the Baptist 
 and his work. He bears emphatic testimony to the 
 greatness of the man and the dignity of the mission. 
 Yet there is a sense, He says, in which the humblest 
 Christian is greater than that greatest of the prophets. 
 John opened the kirtgdom to others, but he stood outside 
 it himself. It may seem a strong and even a harsh say- 
 ing. It ought at least to elevate our conception of the 
 privilege of being a Christian. It ought to make us 
 ask ourselves in what sense it can be said of us, and 
 how alone we can make it true, that we are greater men 
 
 342
 
 532 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 than the Baptist. The texts will help us in answering 
 this question. Three subordinate points of interest in 
 them claim a passing notice, (i) First, the ministry of 
 the Baptist, short as it was in duration, slight apparently 
 in its consequences, is made the turning-point of the 
 dispensations. ' The law and the prophets were until 
 John ; since that time the kingdom of God is preached.' 
 The spiritual history of the world was cleft in twain 
 by that brief mission. (2) Secondly, our Lord speaks 
 of that mission as already part of the past almost of 
 the far past. ' From the days,' He says, ' of John the 
 Baptist until now.' And yet, when He spoke, the fatal 
 birthday was not yet come the feast and the dance, 
 the rash oath and the ghastly execution. Time moves 
 quickly when God is making history : one day is some- 
 times as a thousand years, no less truly than the 
 converse. (3) Yet once more, there is a strength in 
 the expression, ' The kingdom of God is being preached, 
 and every man is pressing (with violence) into it,' which 
 makes it less the statement of a fact than the utterance 
 of a triumphant anticipation. ' Every man forcing his 
 way into the kingdom,' ere yet the great sacrifice was 
 offered or the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven ? 
 This is that tone of prophetic jubilation which breaks 
 in so often upon sadder themes of discourse as the 
 Saviour marches towards the Jerusalem of the last 
 conflict and the Calvary of the 'cross and passion. 
 'I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.' 'The 
 hour is come, that the Son of Man should be glorified.' 
 'I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men 
 unto me.' 
 
 But now let us fix all our thoughts upon that which we
 
 xxx.] The Virtue of Violence. 533 
 
 have called the key-note of the two texts the Virtue 
 of Violence ; its place in the ethics of Jesus Christ ; its 
 action in taking and keeping possession of that state 
 of dignity and of blessedness which is here called, as 
 it is so often called in the gospels, the kingdom of 
 heaven or of God. ' I appoint unto you a kingdom.' 
 ' He hath made us kings.' This kingdom is here 
 described by one of its characteristics. It suffers vio- 
 lence. Men of violence seize it by force. Though it 
 is a gospel, and speaks in softest and gentlest tones, 
 yet it is not by softness or gentleness, but by a sort 
 of moral violence, that men make their way into it. 
 
 Such descriptions do not stand alone, nor most 
 prominently, nor without much of contrast and counter- 
 poise, in the book of God. Humility and patience, 
 forbearance and charity, are far more frequently than 
 their opposites the subject of exhortation and praise. 
 A religion of violence is left for Mahomet and the 
 Koran : a vociferation which would storm heaven by 
 prayer is wisely relegated to the conventicles of the 
 fanatic. And yet, brethren, we may be quite sure, if 
 the two texts are the sayings of Christ, that there is 
 a vehemence, and even a violence, which is an ingredient 
 of the true religion, and the want of which is a serious 
 and even fatal defect in the (so called) religion of many. 
 
 We shall try to draw the character of the fiiaa-Tr/s, 
 or man of violence, as Christ here introduces him, in two 
 or three of his relations to the kingdom of grace. 
 
 We shall see him most distinctly by setting him in 
 each instance face to face with his opposite. Evidently 
 the violence which will take no denial, which forces its 
 way and storms the gate and presses toward the goal
 
 534 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 is mentally contrasted with a misplaced modesty, or a 
 hesitating indecision, or a vacillating doublemindedness, 
 unstable in all its ways, and absolutely disqualified for a 
 life, inward and outward, of resolution, effort, and enter- 
 prise. 
 
 There are two or three chief departments of the life 
 of the kingdom, in each of which we shall quickly 
 discern between the violent man and his opposite. 
 
 I. The royal life the life of ' the kingdom' is a 
 life, in part, of renunciations. It has to make sacrifices. 
 There are pleasures, there are pursuits, there are em- 
 ployments, which are incompatible with the new being. 
 To call them by their Scripture name, there are sins, 
 various in shape and form, different for different natures 
 pleasant, attractive, delicious sins or else, ugly and 
 odious, yet none the less inglorious and tyrannical 
 which cannot be retained if we would be sons of the 
 kingdom. Cannot we see why Christ should make 
 violence a virtue in respect to these ? The violent 
 man, determined to take the kingdom by force, goes 
 to war with his sins makes no excuse for them never 
 pretends to say that they are venial, or to say that they 
 are natural, or to say that they must be gently dealt 
 with, improved away by time or age, asked indulgence 
 for, whatever of them remains, at the footstool of One 
 who is ' very pitiful and of tender mercy.' He must 
 be rid of them and he knows it or he cannot enter 
 heaven. Therefore he brings the fire and sword of the 
 new kingdom into their encampments and into their 
 fastnesses; burns and slays without mercy, 'as though 
 they were his enemies ; ' cuts off from himself, so far 
 as is possible, all their avenues and approaches of
 
 xxx.] The Virtue of Violence. 535 
 
 tempting ; counts nothing worth keeping if it involves 
 truce, treaty, or compromise with them. The kingdom 
 'suffers violence' under him for he is a fttacrrris, and 
 will take it by force. 
 
 Set over against him, in this first aspect, the tender 
 and delicate combatant, the man of silken mail and 
 gossamer weapon, the man of fastidious tastes and 
 agreeable manners and easy compliances. Hear him 
 in his secret chamber accounting to himself for his 
 failures ; excusing himself to himself for his incon- 
 sistencies ; hoping against hope that the next time 
 he shall do better ; daring sometimes to entertain the 
 peradventure that the tale of gospel strictness may be 
 'of little meaning though the words are strong' that 
 room will be found, somewhere and somehow, for a 
 person like him, amongst the sturdier soldiers of the 
 cross, who perhaps have had fewer trials, or perhaps 
 have had a stronger ' natural force ' of good. 
 
 Who that ' looks on this picture and on that ' can 
 have a moment's hesitation in choosing between them ? 
 Certainly, if we look onward but a little in the lifetime 
 of each, and mark 'whereunto' either will 'grow' the 
 one going from strength to strength, advancing year by 
 year in vigour and nobleness, till at last, in the evening 
 of the long day, strength itself mellows into sweetness ; 
 the other gradually losing the charm (there is such a 
 thing) of weakness, keeping only (for these too are in it) 
 its contemptibleness and its self-contempt, till at last, 
 in some exceptionally cloudy and dark hour, it falls into 
 some snare of the devil, the world itself, so long lived 
 for, shouting the verdict of infamy we shall understand 
 why our Lord should here have made violence a virtue
 
 536 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 meaning by it that vehemence of the self-determination 
 which will not miss the heaven where only righteousness 
 dwells with God. 
 
 2. We will turn to a different province of the gospel 
 kingdom. It is that, not of what is commonly meant 
 by morals though indeed the boundary line may be 
 much too roughly and coarsely drawn between them 
 but of faith. 
 
 Every one knows, most men have felt at some period 
 of their lives, that the ' royal ' life is not easy in what 
 it demands of the reason. It professes to have a 
 revelation in other words, an unveiling of secrets a 
 disclosure by God Himself of certain invisible realities 
 which could not be ascertained without His interposition. 
 A life beyond death, and some little glimpse of its 
 nature at all events, the one particular, that it will 
 be a life lived in God's presence in a sense in which 
 this life is not so even for the Christian is one of these. 
 A divine sacrifice of loving and availing propitiation 
 the necessity presupposed, the fact asserted, the method 
 unexplained is another of them. A Holy Spirit, secret 
 in His operations, real in His influences, apprehensible 
 in His effects given for the asking, grieved by sin, 
 sealing the man for glory this is another, and we 
 might add to them. 
 
 Now the treatment of this professed revelation is very 
 various. It is in many ways a touchstone of character, 
 ' revealing the thoughts of hearts ' by their manner of 
 dealing with it. Our subject suggests two of these. 
 There is the gentle treatment, and there is the ' violent ' 
 treatment. There is the man who cannot hurry or be 
 hurried ; the man who must read what is to be said
 
 xxx.] The Virtue of Violence. 537 
 
 about it and will give his judgment tomorrow; the 
 man who (to take his own account of himself) is all 
 candour and impartiality, is perfectly open to argument 
 and evidence, feels that there is much to be said on both 
 sides and on all sides of everything, admires the character 
 of Christ, acknowledges the adaptation of the Gospel to 
 human need, would give much all, he says for a clear 
 conviction, but, on the other hand, is so afraid of being 
 precipitate, has seen so much of human exaggeration 
 and human credulity, feels so gravely the proneness of 
 mankind to enthusiasm and fanaticism, to the erection 
 of altars and the deification of heroes, that he dares 
 not to adventure the bold plunge for life or death, must 
 wait yet, and yet enquire, and yet reconsider, and, having 
 done all, yet doubt. And thus it comes to pass that, 
 if he is not against Christ and he would be irritated 
 and shocked to be so described no one could possibly 
 speak of him as on Christ's side. The weight of his 
 example, of his speech, of his influence, is lost at least 
 to the true cause, if it is not given to the false. Men 
 cannot ' take knowledge of him,' he cannot take know- 
 ledge of himself, ' that he has been with,' or that he is 
 for, ' Jesus.' 
 
 We can understand, here again, why Christ should 
 make violence a virtue even in believing. Certainly 
 He would not catch votes at any price would not 
 commend haste or rashness, or expect any man to 
 believe first and then enquire. You know how plainly 
 He dealt upon earth with persons who came to Him 
 ignorantly, or offered themselves prematurely as His 
 disciples. Let them thoroughly acquaint themselves 
 with the terms, let them thoughtfully count the cost,
 
 538 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 then let them come or not come as reason and 
 conscience and the sovereign will may direct them. 
 
 Yet even in this most difficult, most delicate, most 
 critical matter, of believing or not believing, there is a 
 timidity which is no prudence, and there is a vehemence 
 which is no presumption. The gospel of Jesus Christ, 
 if it is anything, is a life. It is not an opinion, it is not 
 a doctrine, it is not a thing to be stowed away among 
 a multitude of other things, ideas, theories, probabilities, 
 peradventures, which may be modified fifty times over 
 without a consequence, or forgotten altogether for months 
 or years without harm or loss. If it is anything, it is that 
 which must unmake and remake, guide and mould the 
 being. If it is anything, it is a life. It is the entrance 
 upon a new idea and plan of existence. It is the for- 
 mation of new companionships and the cultivation of 
 new sympathies. It is the setting out upon a new course 
 and race which has its goal in worlds unseen. It is the 
 putting off of the old self, and the investiture with ' that 
 new man which was created ' (as at this season) in the 
 resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and which 
 has to be ' put on,' in doing and suffering, in living and 
 dying, by each one of His redeemed. 
 
 All this being so, it is folly, it is madness, it is suicide, 
 to leave the question of faith or no faith to settle itself 
 by caprice or accident, or never to settle itself while 
 there is daylight to walk by. These matters are not 
 for dreams or for deathbeds. They are for the conscious 
 waking thoughts of living, feeling, resolving, and acting 
 men. They are for the life of the life they are for the 
 life above this life, which is also the life beyond. 
 
 Therefore there is commendation, in this province as
 
 xxx.] The Virtiie of Violence. 539 
 
 in the earlier, for the man of vehemence who will brook 
 no delay and no diversion in the settlement of the 
 question of questions how, on what principle, in what 
 allegiance, he is to live. Instead of playing with doubts, 
 instead of trifling with evidences, instead of saying to 
 himself, ' Tomorrow shall be as this day, and doubtless 
 much more abundant' in its opportunities for settling 
 what to think of Christ, this man gives himself no rest 
 till he has sent out mind and soul to interrogate the 
 God-Man 'Art Thou He that should come, or must we 
 look for another ?' art Thou the desire of hearts as well as 
 of nations, the mysterious object of all these yearnings 
 and longings which constitute the very differentia 
 of the being, made in God's likeness, and then fallen 
 from his uprightness or must I look onward, onward, 
 onward still, for my satisfaction, till some other and 
 more thrilling and more commanding voice shall say 
 within me, Come, thou that art weary and burdened, 
 and I will give thee rest ? 
 
 The man of violence must have his answer, and, when 
 he has it, he will embrace, he will avow, he will live it. 
 This one thing I do I follow after till I know and 
 then I follow after, till I attain. The kingdom of God 
 is preached in my hearing, and, if not otherwise, I will 
 take it by force. 
 
 3. ' The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence. Men 
 of violence take it by force.' We have touched upon 
 two points in illustration of the saying the conflict with 
 sin, and the struggle of believing. We must find room 
 for one topic more the life into which the man finds 
 entrance through faith. It is a life of two chief 
 activities. There is an activity God-ward, and there
 
 540 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 is an activity man-ward. The one is devotion, the other 
 is work. In both of these we see a wide difference 
 between the man of violence and his opposite. 
 
 (i) There is a figure with which we are very 
 familiar in reference to man's spiritual intercourse with 
 his Maker it is the figure of wrestling. The phrase 
 is derived no doubt from the mysterious narrative of 
 Jacob's night-long wrestling at Peniel, on the eve of an 
 anxious and perilous day, with one who is first called 'a 
 man,' but who afterwards reveals Himself in a character 
 far more august, as the possessor of a name not to be 
 searched into, and of a power of benediction uniquely 
 divine. The prophet Hosea goes before us in interpret- 
 ing, when he writes, ' He had power over the angel, and 
 prevailed : he wept, and made supplication unto Him : 
 he found Him in Beth-el even the Lord God of hosts." 
 St Paul uses the figure repeatedly of the dywv or 
 struggle ; and once at least he distinctly applies it to 
 vehemence in praying, when he writes to the Colossians, 
 ' I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for 
 you that your hearts may be comforted.' He speaks 
 not of active efforts in preaching or ministering for he 
 is at the time a prisoner at Rome but of a wrestling 
 with God Himself in prayer for the bestowal of spiritual 
 grace upon absent and distant churches. St Paul, in so 
 writing, describes himself as the y9ia<rr;}<? who will take 
 no denial, who is not afraid to borrow from the scene in 
 Peniel words of unparalleled vehemence, venturing to 
 say to God Himself, ' I will not let Thee go except 
 Thou bless me.' 
 
 We know, brethren, how easily this sort of vehemence 
 in praying may be made offensive, or even ludicrous,
 
 xxx.] The Virtiie of Violence. 541 
 
 in the parodies of coarse and vulgar fanatics. It is 
 not in the four hundred and fifty idolatrous prophets 
 on mount Carmel, crying from morning till evening, 
 ' O Baal, hear us,' and in the desperation of a long- 
 delayed answer cutting themselves with knives and 
 lancets till the blood gushed out upon them, that we 
 shall find our example, in this province, of the man of 
 violence who will take heaven by force. Rather is it 
 in the still garden, under the paschal moon, and 
 beneath the olive-trees of Gethsemane where suppli- 
 cation was offered, 'with strong crying and tears,' and 
 with a sweat like great drops of blood and where each 
 petition breathed had its et Bvvarov appended, and 
 where the first entreaty, that the cup might pass, is 
 soon replaced by the second ' If this cup may not 
 pass from me except I drink it, Thy will be done.' 
 It may seem an incongruous term to apply to that 
 most submissive, most filial devotion ; yet we should fail 
 indeed to convey any just idea of the Christian fiiaarrjs 
 if we hesitated to see his exemplar in the Saviour of 
 the agony, or to wish for him any other kind or any 
 higher degree of earnestness than that which there and 
 then was put forth. 
 
 Contrast with this earnestness, this conflict, this 
 wrestling, this vehemence and violence of supplication, 
 the far commoner case of the tame timid half-hearted 
 worshipper, who, not receiving all at once the very thing 
 asked for, or the conscious removal, on the instant, of 
 every doubt and every misgiving in the act of praying, 
 infers failure or accepts refusal, acquiesces in the not 
 having, and goes his way as if from a duty done though 
 the soul still thirsts and has appetite. Or contrast with
 
 542 The Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 Beth-el, or contrast with Gethsemane, that other kind of 
 praying, which, when it has seemed to invoke an access 
 of grace or even a visit from the holy One, rises up 
 hastily and goes out if there be but the faintest whisper 
 or signal of the divine presence, the slightest indication 
 that perhaps the prayer may be heard, and, according to 
 the promise, the Father and the Son may be on the way 
 to make their abode with the man. 
 
 Which of the two, think we, is the worthier worshipper 
 the man who suffers the tiniest obstacle, the mere 'earth- 
 born cloud ' of indolence or indifference, to daunt him 
 the man who never meant his own words and flees in 
 alarm from their realization or that other who reminds 
 himself of the fSiaa-rns of the Saviour's parable, and 
 kneels on and prays on and hopes on till the answer 
 shall come and the day-star arise on the heart ? 
 
 (2) We spoke too of an aspect of the ' royal ' life 
 man-ward the aspect of work, the aspect of the human 
 dealing. Is there, even here, place for the man of 
 violence ? 
 
 On the first hearing, perhaps, we may be inclined to 
 answer in the negative. The thought comes to us, 
 perhaps, of some Saul of Tarsus in the days of his 
 ignorance some self-constituted spiritual inquisitor 
 who thinks that he does God service by forcing his 
 own pronunciation or his own accentuation of the 
 Shibboleth upon casual or preoccupied hearers, and 
 declares a man lost and outcast because he demurs 
 to the jurisdiction or because he resents the imperti- 
 nence of the questioner. And we say, If this be 
 Christianity, I will none of it if this be faithfulness, 
 let me live and die outside its habitation.
 
 xxx.] The Virtue of Violence. 543 
 
 This, brethren, is not Christian, because it is not 
 Christlike. If this is the only vehemence, the only 
 violence, which the sense of the texts has room for, we 
 grant that there is no application for them in the region 
 of relative duty. 
 
 No, but pass in thought from Saul of Tarsus to Paul 
 the apostle, the confessor and at last martyr of Jesus 
 Christ, and see whether there was not still in him 
 not only a striking but a beautiful pattern of the 
 violence we are in quest of. Behold him compassing 
 sea and land, not to make proselytes but to save souls. 
 Hear him wishing himself, were it but lawful, to be 
 accursed from Christ for his brethren. Listen to that 
 cry wrung from his heart, as he passes in review his 
 many labours and sufferings, and bethinks himself of 
 one kind of pain more acute than any that can touch 
 the body, the anguish of a sensitive sympathy with 
 weakness, the anguish of a burning indignation against 
 wrong. ' Who is weak, and I am not weak ? who is 
 offended, and I burn not?' Yes, the /^aa-n}? speaks, 
 and it is the very ' violence ' which has made him great. 
 To that violence Europe owes her evangelization. 
 The gentle amiable beautiful philanthropist would have 
 let her sleep. 
 
 It has been so always. There is a force necessary, as 
 well as a sweetness, to the perfection of the Christian 
 character. All the great works have been done by it 
 Charming manners, conciliatory speeches, concessory 
 compromises, are not powers. They grease the wheels 
 of the world, but they do not propel the engines. There 
 has always been an independence, there has always 
 been an outspokenness, there has always been a willing-
 
 544 Th e Virtue of Violence. [xxx. 
 
 ness to stand alone, to go forth without the gate and the 
 camp of the conventional and the traditional, in the men 
 who have told upon their times, in the men who have 
 made history, in the men who have set forward on its 
 march the cause of good. This is the violence of 
 which the texts tell, in its positive activity. This is 
 that for lack of which most men men of business, pro- 
 fessional men, literary men, men of society just follow 
 the tradition, swim with the stream, 'are dead while they 
 live' as to anything individual, anything that shall be 
 permanent because of them. The want of this makes 
 politicians partisans and statesmen demagogues. We 
 want the fiiao-Trjs, to ask the man within him what to 
 do, and to make the man without do it For lack of 
 this violence because it dies out and does not replace 
 itself ' states, like individuals, after a certain period of 
 maturity, inevitably tend to decay.' 
 
 Inevitably? No. It is in the power of the congre- 
 gation present this afternoon to say that it shall not 
 be so with England. I might have stood in many a 
 congregation gathered this day for worship, and felt 
 that the text about men of violence was little better 
 than a mockery. It is not so here. The danger here is 
 not the destitution but the misdirection of violence. The 
 danger here is lest in any character there be a violence 
 over-strong because selfish lest there be a force of will 
 for the self-indulgence, for the self-assertion, for the self- 
 aggrandisement, for the self-isolating and self-idolizing, 
 which is refused to the self-conquest, refused to the self- 
 mastery, refused to the self-consecration, refused to the 
 self-sacrifice. 
 
 O, brethren, if the experiences of one man could be
 
 xxx.] The Virtue of Violence. 545 
 
 made by any process of assimilation the experiences 
 of another, how eloquent, how persuasive, would be the 
 sermons preached from this place by the old man to the 
 young. What could he not tell you of the consequences 
 of dallying with faults, of parleying with tempters, of 
 negotiating with sins ? What could he not say of the 
 terrible identity of the being, allowing no cutting off 
 of the past, no beginning quite afresh, no absolute having 
 done with 'the time past of our life ?' With what 
 emphasis would he speak to you of the incomparable 
 blessedness of the /3tao-T??9, who has fought it out with his 
 sins early, 'while the evil days come not' who has settled 
 betimes the mighty alternative between the infidel and 
 the Christian, and can say positively, while there is time 
 to do as well as to say, ' I know whom I have believed, 
 and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I 
 have committed unto Him against that day' who can 
 kneel down before a real God, ask what he will, and feel 
 that he has received who can move amongst his fellows 
 as one that has a life within, shining out naturally and 
 half unconsciously into the life without. Blessed be 
 God, it is not too late to say these things here let him 
 that heareth say the Amen. 
 
 v. 35
 
 XXXI. 
 
 LIFE A DIALOGUE. 
 
 Hebrews iv. 12, 13. 
 The word of God. with whom we have to do. 
 
 THE first text opens a sentence, and the second 
 closes it. The connexion of the two is not obvious : 
 the combination at first sight may appear capricious. 
 No rendering could express the antithesis which is their 
 real meeting-point, without some sacrifice of idiom and 
 even of clearness. Literally, the two texts are, the one, 
 'the word of God' the other, 'unto whom our word 
 is.' So that we have before us the two thoughts the 
 word of God to us, and, our word to God and the 
 reading of this riddle, the two ' words,' of God to man, 
 and of man to God, is the real object and subject of the 
 sermon. 
 
 We are here at the end of a long argument. Close 
 attention is required to follow the steps of it There are 
 missing (or rather, latent) links in it, to be supplied 
 mentally by the reader. But the general idea is simple. 
 There is a rest of God, which is the goal of the long 
 race of the human creation. It has been so from the 
 beginning. The rest itself is spoken of in the second 
 chapter of the Bible. It was realized by the old 
 patriarchs as their true city and country, while they 
 lived the tent-life here. It was typified in the promise
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 547 
 
 of Canaan : typified, but certainly not fulfilled ; more 
 certainly, not exhausted. Long ages after the entrance 
 of Israel into Canaan, a psalmist speaks (by clear 
 implication) of God's rest as still open still liable 
 to be forfeited, therefore still capable of being attained. 
 Nothing certainly has occurred since the psalmist's 
 day which could be supposed to have cancelled promise 
 by performance. The rest of God is still in reserve for 
 His true people. Let us give diligence to enter into it. 
 Let us not forfeit it, as one whole generation forfeited 
 Canaan, by unbelief. Thus we reach the double text 
 which tells of the impossibility of eluding God's judg- 
 ment by any differences of circumstance or by any 
 counterfeits of character. The word of God, His 
 utterance in judging, His discernment of character, His 
 estimate of conduct, is no dead or dormant thing, it 
 is living and active : it is sharper than any two-edged 
 sword : it divides and discriminates where man sees 
 only the inseparable : soul and spirit, the immaterial 
 part of us in one aspect and the same immaterial part 
 of us in another aspect, it can cleave in twain : thoughts 
 and feelings, exercises of intellect and exercises of af- 
 fection, it is apt and quick to distinguish between and 
 to pronounce upon. No created being can wear mask 
 or veil in that presence : all things are bare and naked, 
 all things are exposed and opened : the head that would 
 bend and bow itself, in conscious guilt and shame, before 
 the fierce light of the divine presence, is lifted (such 
 perhaps is the figure) and thrown back in full exposure 
 before the eye of the examiner and the judge, ' unto 
 whom' so the sentence ends 'our word is;' 'with 
 whom,' according to the beautiful paraphrase which no 
 
 352
 
 548 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 later version will wish or dare to improve away 'with 
 whom we have to do.' 
 
 A magnificent subject is before us. The two 'words.' 
 There is a word of God to us there is also a word 
 of ours to God. The two words. The divine word, and 
 the human. The word which speaks, and the word 
 which answers and makes reply. 
 
 I. 'The word of God.' 
 
 There are many such words. There is a word of 
 God in nature. ' The invisible things of God are seen,' 
 St Paul says and it is but a change of figure to say, 
 the inaudible things of God are heard 'ever since 
 creation, in the things that are made.' Order diversified, 
 which is a true description of nature, tells of a power 
 which is no brute force in other words, of a mind in 
 exercise upon it. There is a word of God in Provi- 
 dence. St Paul used a term 1 which means 'deeds' as 
 well as 'works' things done as well as things made. 
 Consequence modified, which is a true description of 
 providence, tells of a power working which is no me- 
 chanical agency in other words, of a mind purposing, 
 and realizing that purpose in ceaseless processes of 
 adaptation. There is not sound only, but voice in both 
 these; a voice implying a personality, and a voice pre- 
 supposing an auditor. If the definition of 'word' is 
 ' intelligence communicating itself,' here, twice over, 
 is a word of God, and here is an ear to which it 
 makes appeal. 
 
 The epistle from which the texts come carries us 
 beyond this vaguer and more general divine utterance 
 to another of which the very differentia is the person- 
 
 1 Romans i. 20, rots woi^fj.affii>
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 549 
 
 ality. God, it says, having of old time spoken in the 
 prophets, utterers of His truth in sundry modes and 
 manifold particulars, spoke to us at the end of 'these 
 days' at the dividing line (as it were) of present and 
 future, of time and eternity in One of whom the 
 title, the unique incommunicable title, is ' Son.' In this 
 grand opening sentence a new idea is introduced into 
 the phrase before us and into the divine dealing which 
 it embodies. For although we do not read into the 
 epistle to the Hebrews that more technical sense of 
 'word' in which it actually personifies the divine Son 
 in the gospel, epistle, and apocalypse of St John, 
 we are yet on the very verge and brink of it in the 
 text, and we are in the actual presence of that direct 
 communication of God with His creatures which implies 
 a person to conduct it. ' The word of God,' if not a 
 person, is yet a personal communication as much in 
 the voice that utters as in the ear that hears. 
 
 This word was a voice before it was a book. The 
 living life wrote itself upon other lives they in their 
 turn wrote it upon others, ere yet a page of gospel 
 Scripture was written on purpose that the distinction 
 between ' letter ' and ' spirit ' might be kept ever fresh 
 and vital ; on purpose that the characteristic of the new 
 revelation might never fade or be lost sight of how 
 that it is God speaking in His Son God speaking, and 
 God bidding man to make reply. 
 
 But where would the word have been by this time, 
 left to itself left, I mean, to echo and to tradition ? 
 To what depth might it not have sunk, of corruption 
 in the teachers, of ignorance in the taught ? If God had 
 left us without a book, where by this time had been the
 
 550 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 voice? It pleased Him by His holy inspiration to 
 move and to guide the pen of living men : and it 
 pleased Him by His providence wonderfully to watch 
 over the thing written: and it pleased Him, in days 
 when there was neither scholarship to revise nor 
 machinery to multiply the writing, to put such love 
 into hearts for those perishable fugitive scrolls of rude, 
 almost hieroglyphic manuscript, that they were treasured 
 up in cells and churches as the most precious of heir- 
 looms: and it pleased Him at last to stimulate into 
 93. marvellous inventiveness His own gift (grace we might 
 well call it) of human reason, so that the completed 
 volume of the once scattered ' biblia ' was multiplied by 
 the new miracle of the printing-press into the myriad 
 ' bibles ' which are now sown broadcast over the surface 
 of the inhabited globe: and thus by the twofold action 
 of the inspired word and the inspiring Spirit to bring to 
 pass that mighty revolution, of mind, heart, and soul, for 
 which we at least of this University shall never cease to 
 give thanks as the blessed and glorious reformation. 
 
 Shall we not sometimes take ourselves seriously to 
 task for the low and indifferent tone into which we have 
 too often suffered ourselves to fall as touching this book 
 severing ourselves thereby not more from the champions 
 of the reformation than from the fathers of the church, 
 and too often, in our zeal for ecclesiastical names and 
 forms, risking the very thing itself which makes it worth 
 while to be a churchman ? 
 
 ' There are,' St Paul says, ' so many kinds of voices in 
 the world ' say, a hundred, or say, a thousand ' and no 
 one of them is without signification.' Even the divine 
 voices are many. There is a word of God in nature,
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 551 
 
 and there is a word of God in providence: there is a 
 word of God in science, and there is a word of God 
 in history: there is a word of God in the church, and 
 there is a word of God in the bible. And yet all these 
 are external, as such, to the very 'spirit of the man which 
 is in him.' The word of God which is the real speech 
 and utterance of all these voices comes at last to the 
 man himself in conscience. I speak not now of that 
 more limited sense of conscience in which it is the 
 guiding and warning voice within, saying, 'This is the 
 way of duty, walk thou in it.' The word of God in_ 
 conscience is more, much more, than this. It is that of 
 which our Lord said, in reference to the volume of His 
 own evidences, 'Yea, and why even of yourselves' 
 without waiting for sign or portent 'why even of your- 
 selves judge ye not what is right ?' You can discern the 
 face of the earth and of the sky ; you can infer from 
 certain indications the approach of shower or heat : how 
 is it that ye cannot infer deity from the divine, the 
 Emmanuel presence from the Emmanuel character ? 
 The appeal was to conscience, not so much in its sensi- 
 tiveness to right and wrong as in its appreciativeness 
 of the false and the true, of God speaking this and God 
 not speaking that. 
 
 Thus it is that the word of God, as it at last reaches 
 the spirit and soul of the man, is the net result of a 
 thousand separate sayings, no one of which by itself is 
 the absolute arbiter of the being. It cannot become 
 this till it has made itself audible to the conscience. 
 Till then it is suggestive, it is contributory, it is evi- 
 dential it is not the verdict, nor the judgment, nor the 
 sentence, nor the ' word.'
 
 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 This is no encouragement to the dallying, to the 
 procrastinating, to the fastidiousness and the wayward- 
 ness, which is characteristic of the generation. On the 
 contrary, it is a trumpet-call to decision. It says, There 
 is a word of God somewhere. It cannot be found in a 
 dictionary or an index. It cannot be heard at second- 
 hand from fathers or councils. It cannot be ascertained 
 by a glance at holy Scripture, or by a tradition from 
 holy homes or holy persons. It must be heard in the 
 conscience but the conscience itself must be informed, 
 must be disciplined, must be educated, by many a hard- 
 fought fight with sin, and many an anxious interrogation 
 of the heart naked and opened. The word of God is a 
 personal word: it speaks to the personal being, as God 
 made and as God sees him. 
 
 We seem yet to lack one thing. The word speaks 
 in conscience speaks to the consciousness : but who 
 speaks it ? It is one of the loosenesses of a popular 
 theology, to make conscience both voice and ear to 
 confound (in other words) conscience and the Spirit. 
 Of all confusions, as of all ingratitudes, this surely is 
 the greatest. To leave out the Spirit, under that which 
 is primarily and distinctively the dispensation of the 
 Spirit; to leave out the Spirit, which is Christ's promised 
 presence in His own ; the Spirit, which for such as 
 know themselves is the one light and the one comfort 
 and the one safeguard of the fallen and ever falling 
 creature confusion is not the word for it : ignorance 
 is not the word for it : heterodoxy, heresy, is not the 
 word for it : it is folly, it is madness, it is suicide. 
 The word itself, to be audible as such, must have 
 become the Spirit's voice : then it takes of the things of
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 553 
 
 God and speaks them into the conscience, which is the 
 consciousness, of the man. 
 
 We have no time in this brief address for expla- 
 nations of difficulties, still less for answers to cavils. 
 One question, however, always meets us when we speak 
 of the individual divine teaching, the direct divine 
 communication. It is this. Men professing to be in- 
 dividually taught of the Spirit, men whose lives give 
 no contradiction to the claim, differ widely from one 
 another in their ideas and statements of truth. How 
 can the same Holy Spirit teach one man this doctrine, 
 and another that ? What is this but to introduce un- 
 certainty into all truth to give a perilous shake to the 
 creed of the church catholic, and a dangerous handle 
 to the conceit and vanity of the fanatic ? 'We are 
 not careful to answer.' We say boldly that true unity, 
 even of doctrine, is never to be found in identity of 
 speech. Words are poor exponents, at the best, in 
 things divine. The very archetype of any truth, as it 
 exists in the bosom of God, cannot be stereotyped in 
 the tongue of any people. Neither in Greek nor Latin 
 nor Hebrew, nor yet still less it may be in English or 
 French or German, can the phrase be found which shall 
 so express as to embody it. Consequently men will use 
 different terms for the selfsame item of revelation : if 
 they use not different terms, they will mean different 
 things by them: and He who 'hath the residue of the 
 Spirit' harmonizes all into one for those with whom 
 He deals in grace. Patience, brethren patience and 
 courage patience and hope. A time is coming when 
 all shall be one, who have here 'drunk of one Spirit.' 
 Till then let no superficial uniformity presume to affect
 
 554 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 the title of a spiritual unity. ' There is one body,' in the 
 sight of God, wheresoever there is ' one Spirit.' There, 
 in the sight of God : there, amidst all diversities of 
 speech and thought: there, in the sight of God, alone. 
 'It is written in the prophets, They shall be all (severally 
 and spiritually) taught of God.' 
 
 2. There is a word of God to us. There is also a 
 word of ours to God. 'Unto Him our word is.' 
 
 The particular point in the view of the holy writer was 
 that of accountability. God speaks in judgment, and we 
 speak to give account. 
 
 The first readers were on the eve of a terrible crisis. 
 They had to choose between Christianity and Judaism, 
 between religion and patriotism almost therefore be- 
 tween duty and duty. It was reasonable to speak to 
 them of the word which is a two-edged sword in dis- 
 criminating, and of the word which pleads guilty or not 
 guilty at the bar of judgment. 
 
 Brethren, we also are passing through a great crisis. 
 You will think that I speak of some political or national 
 crisis. But I do not. I speak of a crisis greater even 
 than these: greater (shall I dare the paradox?) just 
 because less great : greater, because individual. We 
 came hither to escape for a short hour alike from the 
 excitements and from the depressions of event and 
 circumstance, whether in the private sense or the 
 public, that we may take account, each one, of matters 
 lying within, above, and beyond all these; matters 
 which a false modesty might induce us to call infinite- 
 ly less important, but which make up by intenseness 
 for what they lack in extent nay, which are to the 
 other as is eternity to time.
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 555 
 
 Crisis means trial. The crisis of which I speak is that 
 lifelong trial, in which each one of us is standing before 
 God's judgment-seat, and upon the decision of which 
 depends for each one a future not to be measured by 
 years and not to be told in terms of human speech. 
 The text says of this crisis, of this trial, that it is the 
 interchange, so to say, of two 'words' the dialogue 
 (I had almost said) of two speakers the word of God 
 judging, and the word of the man making answer and 
 giving account. 
 
 ' With whom we have to do.' 
 
 How differently, if we gave utterance to the actual 
 experience, should we express the ' having to do ' of our 
 own life. 
 
 We should speak perhaps of the home at this 
 moment (for many) the absent or distant home, in 
 which nevertheless, for all who have a heart in them, 
 so much of the life's life is at this moment centred. 
 Or we should speak of the life of this place, with its 
 busy interests, its exciting competitions, its pleasant 
 companionships, its dear friendships. Certainly 'we have 
 to do' with these: it would be affectation to pretend 
 that they touch us not. 
 
 We have to do, all of us, with a world which ' is too 
 much with us;' a world, in these early days, of im- 
 mature judgments and defective principles, but none 
 the less strong and potent for us who live in it 
 singularly imperious in its edicts, and terribly severe 
 in its retaliations. It is the type of another world, 
 larger and older, but not more real or more vital, in 
 which we shall all of us some day be playing our parts; 
 a world which has its own code, differing in its different
 
 556 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 strata, of morality and honour, but before which the 
 common thing is to crouch and to grovel, to 'flee even 
 when no man pursueth,' and to imagine a thousand 
 voices of terrible blame or delicious praise which never 
 spoke and never whispered. 
 
 We could all understand saying of these or of any of 
 them that with them we have to do ' to them is our 
 word,' of accountability and of self-excuse. 
 
 But it is of God that the text speaks. Will you deny 
 that it is a hard, if it is a grand saying? Many thoughts 
 lie in it. Read it first in its first sense. Our word of 
 account is to God. O, if we could take the thought 
 home, what an effect would it have upon the life. What 
 an independence, what a dignity, would it give to it. 
 How would it put an end to that running to and fro 
 to give in our account, which makes so many lives 
 so servile and so contemptible. What pains do we 
 take to please, to give satisfaction, to win applause to 
 be admired if it may be so, at all events to avoid censure, 
 one of another. What haste do we make to explain, to 
 excuse, to apologize for, to daub with obtrusive white- 
 wash, our little dubious acts, our little unfortunate 
 speeches. What a forgetfulness do we see everywhere, 
 and first of all in ourselves, of the great principle of 
 the God ward word, of the 'with whom we have to 
 do,' of this text. What should we think of the servant 
 who carried to the next door his excuses for deficiencies 
 of duty? 'Who art thou that judgest another man's 
 servant ? To his own master he standeth or falleth.' 
 But which of us carries straight to God his apology, 
 his confession, his (if there be such a thing) explanation? 
 Nay, but which of us has first sought from God the
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 557 
 
 direction and the instruction itself which is the topic 
 and subject of the explanation ? We never thought 
 of it. We never realized the privilege of the direct 
 access. We never claimed the divine Trpoa-aywyrj which 
 is the passport of the presence-chamber. 
 
 If we would but have asked of God our text and our 
 subject, our word of counsel to the enquirer, our word 
 of reassurance to the doubter ; if we would but have 
 carried back to Him our account of the word spoken 
 in the pulpit, of the word spoken in the study, as though 
 in His name, as though for the guidance of souls that 
 He has made ; if in less things than these we would 
 form the habit prescribed in the text, ' To Him is our 
 word, with Him is our concern ' what a weight, 
 what an influence, what a sanctity, what an inspiration, 
 would be given to our common words, to our everyday 
 remarks and comments upon men and things: for then 
 we should carry about us that indefinable something, 
 which says, in tones more persuasive in proportion as 
 they are less obtrusive, This man knows and feels that 
 he has to do with God. 
 
 All this sets in a strong light the duty of doing it. 
 It shows us what is meant by self-examination, what is 
 meant by confession. 'With Him,' directly and personally, 
 ' we have to do.' Just to carry to God Himself, in the 
 nightly confessional where we meet the one Judge, just the 
 very thing itself which we did wrong, which we said wrong, 
 just in so many words, this very day which is now being 
 gathered to its parent days that is the Christian even- 
 song. So judging ourselves, we shall not be judged. Thus 
 anticipating, we shall also prevent, the judgment: for 
 us it will never come in its terrors, never come in its
 
 558 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 'clouds of heaven.' To Him is our word, not only 
 shall be. With Him we /iave, not shall have, to do. 
 'Ye are come/ this epistle says, 'to God the Judge of 
 all' and, in Him, 'to Jesus' also and, in Him, 'to the 
 blood of sprinkling.' 
 
 The word of account is the first thought of the 
 text. But it is not the only one. It is not perhaps the 
 most beautiful or the most attractive. The spirit of the 
 man has other words besides this to utter in the ear 
 with which it has to do. 
 
 The speech of God is to me, and my speech is to 
 Him. Might we but enter into this conception, what an 
 elevation, what a grandeur, would it give to the life. 
 The speech of God is to thee His discourse, His self- 
 disclosure, His mind uttering itself, His Spirit breathing 
 itself in converse. And my speech is to Him my 
 discourse, my self-disclosure, my uttered mind, my soul 
 expressing itself in audible thought. What is this but 
 to give to the life itself a new Christian name, at the font 
 of a spiritual baptism and to send it forth afresh into 
 all the relationships and all the occupations of the 
 being, having this for its title, Conversation with God ? 
 Conversation, not in any archaic or obsolete sense of 
 that word, but in its most modern, most colloquial 
 meaning the interchange of speech between two living 
 persons, each in turn the auditor, each in his turn 
 making reply. The speech of God is with me, and 
 my speech is with Him. 
 
 It will have been worth our while, brethren, to have 
 met this afternoon, if we may carry away with us this 
 one thought, Life itself is a conversation with God. 
 ' As a man talketh with his friend ' was God's own
 
 XXXL] Life a Dialogue. 559 
 
 account of His communication with the hero-saint of 
 Israel: then it was the privilege of the one or two now 
 it is the very birthright and citizenship of the promis- 
 cuous world of the redeemed. 
 
 We speak here to all sorts and conditions of the 
 spiritual being, however uniform may be the outward 
 state and circumstance of an academical audience. 
 ' The heart knoweth his own bitterness ' sad thoughts, 
 anxious thoughts, painful memories, sorrowful self- 
 judgments, may be agitating at this moment some 
 souls within these bodies. Is there not in the topic 
 before us comfort and brightness for all these ? 
 
 Which of all us shall any longer be the sport and 
 prey of depressed or disconsolate feelings, when the 
 voice of God is in his ear, saying, Hearken to me, 
 speak with me, and I will be thy life ? Which of us 
 shall any longer be at the mercy of his fellow for the 
 sparkle and zest of existence ? Who shall any longer 
 call himself lonely and isolated, a stranger to the 
 interests and excitements of other men, to the circles 
 in which talk instructive and charming is the privilege 
 of the popular, the sociable, and the entertaining ? Who 
 shall any longer complain of this place or that place, 
 this employment or that employment, this society or 
 that society, as dull, distasteful, or dreary when he may 
 hear, if he will, the voice of God, in more than the 
 allegory of paradise, walking in earth's garden in the 
 cool of the day hear Him enquire for him, call him by 
 name, and begin to talk with him of things which eye 
 hath not seen ? Nay, if the speech of God is with thee, 
 and thine with Him if, not the utterance only as from 
 a far-off sky, but the very converse of the divine with
 
 560 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 the human in all nearness and in all sympathy, has any 
 place or any experience in thee what word of emu- 
 lation or envy shall be misplaced or exaggerated on the 
 part of those who have all else but have not this 
 possessors of the ten talents of genius, power, or love, 
 destitute only of the gift of gifts, which is the conver- 
 sation of God ? 
 
 ' Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.' 
 We awake as from the dreaming of a bright and blessed 
 dream the ladder planted on earth, its top reaching to 
 heaven, and the Lord standing above it speaking to 
 find ourselves inmates of a commonplace prosaic dark- 
 ened earth, only the sadder for the fleeting insubstantial 
 vision. If life be indeed that which it has been called in 
 this text and this sermon, a conversation with God in 
 heaven, who can silence in himself the sad confession, 
 I am living deplorably, culpably, wickedly, below my 
 privilege and my birthright as a Christian ? 
 
 And we can account for it. For, although this con- 
 versation with God can be carried on, not only in quiet 
 seclusions and solitudes consecrated to the purpose, but 
 in the daily routine of business, amidst the hum or the 
 din of other voices, nay, amidst the very strife and war 
 of tongues, by such as God hides in His pavilion and to 
 whom He has confided His secret yet there are con- 
 ditions, one, two, and three, the breach of any one of 
 which stops and silences it at once. There must be a 
 ceasing from opposite and antagonistic voices : the man 
 whose speech is with God must not sully or defile his 
 own speech with talk which violates in any particular 
 the triple law of piety, purity, and charity: in the silence 
 of his own solitude he must not hold converse with in-
 
 xxxi.] Life a Dialogue. 561 
 
 visible presences of vanity, lust, or ungodliness : he must 
 not love the book which stimulates passion, he must not 
 conjure up memories of past sinning, nor imaginations 
 of possible sinning, however little (as he may persuade 
 himself) designed and meditated, in the future. Also he 
 must, not only by avoidances of evil such as have been 
 hinted at, but by positive effort and resolution of good, 
 earnestly set his face and his heart towards the divine 
 presence ; he must listen intently for the voice which 
 would speak with him, and say towards it, till he can 
 learn consciously to say to it, ' Speak for Thy servant 
 heareth.' 
 
 There is yet one condition more : we will end with it. 
 
 The speech of the man to his God must presuppose 
 and proceed upon the speech of God to the man. 
 
 The two 'words' of which the texts tell are not 
 independent words. The conversation is not between 
 two equals, either of whom must contribute his share 
 to the instruction and the enjoyment of the meeting. 
 The incommensurableness, in nature and dignity, of the 
 two speakers, while it forbids not freedom in the inferior, 
 forbids presumption nay, precludes it as a tone and a 
 feeling which would jar upon, and jangle out of tune, the 
 very melody and harmony of the converse. 
 
 God speaks, and man makes reply. It is not that on 
 equal terms and with equal rights God and the man 
 meet together to think out and to talk out the thing 
 that was and that is and that shall be. ' The world by 
 its wisdom knew not God.' ' Thou hast hid these things 
 from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto 
 babes.' The word of God came, and the word of man 
 made reply on the strength of it. This consecrates for 
 V. 36
 
 562 Life a Dialogue. [xxxi. 
 
 him the ' new and living way,' by which, not in hesitation, 
 not as a peradventure, but in calm faith and trust 
 not forgetting the realities of sin and the fall, but seeing 
 them at once recognized and overborne by a mightier 
 revelation of love the word of the man meets the 
 word of his God on the strength of that 'Word made 
 flesh ' which is the reconciler and the harmonizer of the 
 two. ' I looked, and behold, a door opened in heaven ; 
 and a voice saying to me, Come up hither.' 
 
 May it be so may God grant it that to some heart 
 here open before Him the thought of the two words, 
 the word speaking and the word making reply, may 
 have come with acceptance and with comfort this day. 
 May some life, hitherto halting perhaps between two 
 opinions, or sore let and hindered perhaps by besetting 
 sin, take the decided colour henceforth of a conscious 
 and delightful conversation with God. The moment 
 this is realized even dimly, even tentatively, even 
 intermittently there will rise out of darkness a mar- 
 vellous light : earth and heaven will then be of one piece 
 and one colour : already in more than promise, hereafter 
 in glorious fruition, ' thine eyes shall see the King in 
 his beauty, they shall behold the land that is very 
 far off.'
 
 XXXII. 
 
 INCOMPLETENESS A CHARACTERISTIC OF ALL 
 TRUE WORK. 
 
 St Matthew x. 23. 
 
 When they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another: for verily 
 I say unto you, ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, 
 till the Son of Man be come. 
 
 WE have here a precept, and a reason for it. Both 
 are difficult. The precept is unusual, and the reason 
 ambiguous. 
 
 The precept is a precept of flight. Far more heroic 
 would have been the command to face the foe, even 
 if he brought torture or death with him. Fanaticism 
 would have said, The virtue of virtues is courage, and 
 the glory of glories is martyrdom. The text is a counsel 
 of prudence. It says, There is a great work before you, 
 a work which requires workmen. The labourers are 
 few at the best, and they must not be made fewer by 
 wanton self-sacrifices. The cities of Israel are many, 
 and if one will not have you, perhaps another will. 
 Think of the work, think of the object, think of souls, 
 think of the Saviour. Think of these more than of 
 yourselves. Martyrdom itself may be a sublime selfish- 
 ness. Enthusiasm may exaggerate even sacrifice or 
 at least, the sacrifice of the life may be nobler, more 
 
 362
 
 564 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 heroic, more divine, than the sacrifice of the death. 
 Each as God wills but you must interpret the will 
 of God by the exigencies of the work. Flight may 
 be courage if it be flight for Christ and with 
 Christ. 
 
 Such precepts are among the evidences of the gospel. 
 They turn to it for a testimony. Because they show 
 that the gospel itself is no hare-brained or star-gazing 
 enthusiasm, but a religion sober, healthful, and sensible 
 taking account of circumstances, discriminating between 
 means and ends, embracing in its view time as well as 
 eternity, the life that now is as well as that which is 
 to come. 
 
 Such is the precept. A reason is given for it. ' For 
 verily I say unto you, ye shall not have gone over '- 
 or, more literally, ' ye shall not have finished,' or ' com- 
 pleted' 'the cities of Israel, till the Son of Man be 
 come.' 
 
 The general idea is plain. Do not court martyrdom. 
 Do not make it a point of duty to stay out a local perse- 
 cution. If one place refuses you, flee to another. The 
 cities of Israel are many. By tarrying uselessly in one, 
 you are destroying the opportunity of others. You will 
 not have finished them all till the night comes when 
 no man can work. 
 
 But this general thought, of the night coming before 
 the work of the day is complete, is expressed in an 
 equivocal way. 'Ye shall not have finished the cities 
 of Israel till the Son of Man be come.' 
 
 What coming of the Son of Man is in view? These 
 disciples were being sent out (it seems) on a sort of 
 experimental mission through a region through which
 
 xxxii.] of all true Work. 565 
 
 Christ Himself was about to follow them in person. It 
 is said in the case of the seventy, and it is implied in 
 the case of the twelve, ' He sent them two and two 
 before His face into every city and place whither He 
 Himself would come.' Thus the text might mean that 
 they must be expeditious, economical of time, on their 
 journey, or He, following in their footsteps, would over- 
 take them before the business on which they were sent 
 was done. 
 
 So narrow and prosaic an interpretation will satisfy 
 no one ; and yet it must be recognized in passing on to 
 a higher and more adequate. 
 
 We know that in the great prophecy of the 24th 
 chapter of this gospel, with its parallels in the gospels 
 of St Mark and St Luke, our Lord so describes the 
 great final advent as to veil it under the type of a 
 lesser and nearer. The destruction of Jerusalem, within 
 one generation from the time then present, was no un- 
 worthy symbol, for those who were then listening, of 
 that consummation of all things which, even to us 
 of this late age of the world, is still future. 'Ye shall 
 not have finished the cities of Israel till the Son of Man 
 be come' might mean that they must press forward 
 on their life-journey as heralds of Christ to the chosen 
 people, or they would be overtaken, ere that life-journey 
 was accomplished, by the catastrophe which must for 
 ever close the opportunities of grace for the national 
 Israel. 
 
 But this explanation also, like the former, though in a 
 less degree, is felt to be inadequate. The apostles were 
 not occupied till, the destruction of Jerusalem in 'going 
 over the cities of Israel.' The whole world was their
 
 566 Incompleteness a cJiaracteristic [xxxn. 
 
 province. The fall of Judaism as a local and national 
 religion was no advent of judgment or even of hindrance 
 to them. 
 
 There remains then but one view of the text which is 
 capable of doing justice to it. It is that which reads, in 
 the 'coming' spoken of, the great advent, and, in the 
 combination, ' Ye shall not have finished the cities of 
 Israel till that advent is upon you,' a warning, para- 
 bolical and typical in its language, applicable to all 
 Christian work and to all Christian workmen in every 
 land and age, and not least in our own. 
 
 ' Israel ' is a sacred name. It means far more than 
 Canaan or Palestine. It is a reminiscence of that 
 mysterious night-wrestling with God Himself, which 
 ended with the saying, 'Thy name shall be no more 
 Jacob, but Israel for as a prince hast thou power with 
 God and with men, and hast prevailed.' Thus ' Israel ' 
 became (so to say) the theocratic title of the privileged 
 race: and St Paul has warranted its application far 
 beyond the limits of Judaism when he says, 'As many 
 as walk by this rule, peace be on them, and mercy, and 
 upon the Israel of God.' Israel is now, in one aspect, 
 'the whole congregation of Christian people dispersed 
 throughout the whole world:' in another, brethren 
 blame not the thought which has divinity as well as 
 humanity to plead for it in another, it is the whole 
 created, fallen, and redeemed world of men ; loved by 
 God when He ' loved the world ' ' sons of Adam,' and 
 therefore ' sons of God.' 
 
 ' The cities of Israel ' are thus the homes and places 
 of concourse of the vast human race, concerning which 
 Christ has said, 'Go ye into all the world' 'Go ye and
 
 xxxii.] of all true Work. 567 
 
 make all the nations disciples ' let ' repentance and 
 remission of sins be preached among all nations, be- 
 ginning,' but only beginning, 'at Jerusalem.' It is of 
 this world-wide and age-long commission that the say- 
 ing is written, 'Ye shall not have finished the cities 
 of Israel until the Son of Man be come.' 
 
 If now with this clue we attempt to grasp the moral 
 of the text, it will be something of this kind. 
 
 The work of Christ in the world will never be finished 
 till He comes. Not only will the workmen, one by one, 
 be removed by death. The work itself will be cut short, 
 unfinished, by the advent of Christ. 'Ye shall not have 
 finished the cities of Israel, till the Son of Man be come.' 
 
 Certainly not were it only because the work of 
 Christ, which the second advent closes, is the carrying 
 of His kingdom into hearts, in counteraction of that 
 other kingdom which only His advent will put down. 
 While there are new lives being born every day and 
 every hour into the world, so long must the work of 
 evangelizing not only not be finished, it must be be- 
 ginning anew every morning, and they who have that 
 work (in any sense) in hand can never reach the moment 
 at which they can afford to sit still. ' He must reign, 
 till He hath put all enemies under His feet:' and that 
 reign is a resisted and therefore a struggling empire, 
 coming rather than come, through all the years and the 
 ages between the coronation of the great King and the 
 consummation of grace in glory. 
 
 If there is anything of sadness in the words, there is 
 far more of encouragement. 
 
 Who has not felt, and felt painfully, the circum- 
 scription and boundedness of his own career, whether
 
 568 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 in the more worldly region of ambition, or in the three 
 nobler and loftier regions of knowledge, of usefulness, 
 and of ministry? Who has not said many times, whether 
 of any particular study, or of any particular effort, or in 
 the retrospect of a life, 'I have spent my strength in 
 vain and for nought ?' Who, to speak of persons capable 
 of deeper thoughts and feelings, is not at this time 
 oppressed and overwhelmed by the sense of endlessness, 
 as he contemplates the mass of misery which has to be 
 relieved, the multitude of ignorant and degraded people 
 demanding, though for the most part in mute voices, the 
 help of humanity and Christianity to rescue them, the 
 complication, beyond counting or measuring, of diffi- 
 culties, political, social, national, besetting at this moment 
 the minds, hearts, and souls whose business it is to cope 
 with them ? Now I seem to read in these words of 
 Jesus Christ that sort of comfort which consists in recog- 
 nition in the not ignoring and not disregarding this 
 particular cause of depression to which I have given the 
 name of a sense of endlessness. Jesus Christ says here, 
 I tell you before it come, that the work of good with 
 the heaven and earth that are now is essentially inter- 
 minable : it will never be finished : 'ye shall not have gone 
 over all the cities of Israel till the Son of Man be come.' 
 
 Thus He ministers to our necessities by warning us 
 against several mistakes which are apt to spoil and ruin 
 true work. 
 
 One of these is the demand beforehand for a round- 
 ness and compactness of defined duty, which is not 
 often to be found and which certainly must not be 
 waited for. There are multitudes of well-disposed persons 
 standing about (as it were) in earth's market-place till
 
 xxxii.] of all true Work. 569 
 
 some particular employer of labour shall visibly and 
 audibly hire them. They must have a neighbouring 
 vineyard pointed out to them, they must have a regular 
 engagement, certain hours of work fixed, and so much 
 a day for doing it. All this is contrary to the idea of 
 work for Christ. It does not admit of this sort of 
 definition. If it is real work, in the estimate of heaven, 
 it is something which will never be exactly defined, in 
 prospect or retrospect. It will never be finished. It is 
 very pleasant if it so happens that now and then, for a 
 time, a particular task is set, which will take just so 
 many weeks or months and can then be given in 
 accomplished. But the very fact of its definiteness 
 proves that it is not the life-work and not the Christ- 
 work of which this text tells. That is never finished till 
 the Son of Man comes. 
 
 (1) One reason for this has already been suggested. 
 It lies in the mere sequence of human generations. 
 Births and deaths are incessant. Every birth introduces 
 new work, and every death removes, or ought to remove, 
 an old workman. If a generation were born in one day 
 and died in one day, it is conceivable that its work also 
 might be self-contained, and that the demand for a clean 
 sweep and a clear start might in some sense be complied 
 with. But this interlacing of lives is fatal to this super- 
 ficial neatness and completeness of management. 'One 
 generation goeth, and another generation cometh ;' but 
 they are both on the stage at once during a large part 
 of the lifetime of each, and the board is never cleared 
 for a new beginning. 
 
 (2) Another and a deeper reason lies in the nature of 
 the work.
 
 570 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxil. 
 
 The most real work of all perhaps the only kind of 
 work which is quite real is that intangible impalpable 
 thing which we call influence. The work that can be 
 finished is always more or less mechanical. You can 
 write so many letters on business, and go to rest having 
 finished them. You can attend so many meetings, 
 settle so many accounts, plead so many causes, give so 
 many judgments, and, just conceivably, leave no arrears. 
 You can pay so many visits to the sick, compose and 
 preach so many sermons, lecture so many times in the 
 week, and having gone the round, say, It is done. This 
 kind of work is capable of completion : it can be under- 
 taken, it can be recompensed, in due course it can be 
 retired from. But such work, so done, not only has an 
 end, it is also self-comprised and self-contained, and has 
 no direct action upon ' the cities of Israel ' which are the 
 scope and sphere of the Christian evangelist. 
 
 Influence is the thing which Christ looks for, and it is 
 an indefinite and so an interminable thing. When He 
 says, ' Ye shall not have finished till I come for you/ 
 He shows what in His estimate is real work. It is work 
 for others action upon the cities of the human Israel- 
 such as shall in some way help to prepare men for 
 Himself: and this is, in other words, the putting forth 
 of influence upon them for good that mysterious power 
 which is the 'flowing in' of one spirit upon another 
 spirit, the communication of thought and feeling and 
 purpose, real in the being from whom it comes, real in 
 the being into whom it enters. 
 
 How can work of this kind ever be finished ? Apply 
 the rule and the line to it, try to count, measure, or 
 weigh it, it slips from your hand, it escapes, it eludes, it
 
 xxxii.] of all true Work. 571 
 
 vanishes. Never while the breath is in the body can it 
 cease to operate : never is it more substantial, never is 
 it more potent, than in dying moments. When the last 
 call comes, it interrupts without finishing : cities of 
 Israel are still unvisited when the Son of Man comes 
 for His workman. 
 
 (3) We can see one other reason for this arrange- 
 ment, the incompleteness of all work that is worth the 
 name and it is, the security thus given for the salu- 
 briousness of labour. 
 
 There might be something of elation, something cer- 
 tainly of satisfaction, in the contemplation of work done, 
 if the man could see it all labelled and docketed so 
 many tasks performed, so many results harvested and 
 then carry his passport with him into a world of reward 
 and recompense. 
 
 And true indeed it is that, when the dead man has 
 died in the Lord, his works (in some sense) follow him. 
 But there lies the difference. They do not accompany, 
 they do not herald, the workman. They are not his 
 passports nor his credentials : they lag and loiter behind 
 him, still influencing and to influence a few that miss 
 and that mourn him; a few more than these perhaps 
 even a church or a nation stirred by his memory into a 
 brighter zeal and a deeper devotion. 
 
 But 'where is boasting? It is excluded.' By what 
 thought, by what fact, excluded ? By the thought, by 
 the fact, not so much of the many imperfections, faults, 
 and sins of the workman, but by this rather by the 
 thought, by the fact, of the multitude of the cities of 
 Israel, and of the impossibility of compassing them ; of 
 the incompleteness of all work that is worth the name,
 
 57 2 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 and of the surprise which interrupts it by the advent or 
 by the death. 
 
 What room, brethren, is left for self-complacency in 
 one who enters into the thought of the infiniteness of 
 possibility, and compares it with the limitation, with the 
 littleness, with the almost nothingness, of performance ? 
 
 All these 'cities of Israel' which hold so many homes 
 and souls of mankind, all these waiting for the evangel- 
 ist all to be visited or left unvisited, and with con- 
 sequences untold, by one who with all his toil and all 
 his zeal will yet most certainly be surprised by the 
 advent before he has 'finished' them who shall have 
 the presumption, who shall have the heart, to tell up 
 the steps he has taken, to count the successes he has 
 achieved, even if he has any such to report in the line of 
 Christ's work, when he thinks of the untrodden waste 
 which surrounds him, or of the sudden summons which 
 shall end, without finishing, his labour ? 
 
 The man who can reflect with complacency upon his 
 work if we were speaking of earthly things, we should 
 say shows the lowness of his standard, confesses him- 
 self devoid of genius because of aspiration : as we are 
 speaking of higher than earthly things, we must say 
 shows that he has not yet set his hand to the plough of 
 true labour, inasmuch as he 'counts himself to have 
 apprehended, 1 and therefore knows nothing of a work 
 which will be unfinished at the advent. 
 
 We are thus brought to regard incompleteness as one 
 of the characteristics of all work that deserves the name. 
 How far more do we augur of eventual renown from the 
 young speech or young poem which is full of faults 
 than from the smooth voluble easy achievement over
 
 XXXIL] of all true Work. 573 
 
 which criticism is dumb. How full of promise is the 
 embarrassment of the young minister who knows not 
 how to begin his pastoral duties asks himself, Who am 
 I, and what is my father's house, that I should wear the 
 ephod and lead the prayers of this people ? in com- 
 parison with the assured look and confident voice of 
 some comrade who thinks himself ten times his superior,, 
 as though 'the word of God had come out from him, 
 or had come unto him alone.' Incompleteness all can 
 allow for : unfinishedness, even till the advent, is Christ's 
 word for the true evangelizing. 
 
 It is comforting, as well as stimulating. Yes, to 
 have it explained to us that we shall never have finished 
 the cities of Israel, that we shall still have left much 
 undone, that the only thing is to be doing doing with 
 a right aim and a real devotion ; quite aware that not 
 all will come of our doing that we looked and hoped 
 for; willing just to say, 'I have laboured (to my own 
 thinking) in vain yet is my work with my God' this, 
 if not satisfaction, is encouragement : this puts man in 
 his place : this makes it wholesome for him to labour, 
 by making it impossible for him to 'burn incense to his 
 net.' 
 
 In this, as in all things, Christ Himself gave us an 
 example. What was His own work below with rever- 
 ence would we say it ? Had He Himself 'finished the 
 cities of Israel' when He left them for Calvary, or left 
 them from Olivet ? Was His a triumphant progress, 
 from strength, to strength, from glory to glory, culmi- 
 nating in the universal confession, at least from His 
 own nation, that Jesus was the Lord ? When numbers 
 are given us, the sum of the disciples on the great
 
 574 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 ascension day in Jerusalem was a hundred and twenty, 
 or the risen Lord showed Himself in Galilee to five 
 hundred brethren what are these as the product of a 
 divine life below, or as the sample of a world claimed 
 as His own ? 
 
 Nay, but even now, eighteen centuries afterwards, how 
 is it ? 
 
 It is written in prophetic Scripture, as the address of 
 God Himself to the exalted Christ at His right hand, 
 'Rule Thou (not over, but) in the midst among Thine 
 enemies.' The rule is real and strong but the rule 
 is not unresisted. 'A great door and effectual is opened' 
 but 'there are many adversaries.' 'We see not yet all 
 things put under Him but we see Jesus crowned,' and 
 the rest shall follow in its season. 
 
 Meanwhile 'the disciple is not greater than his Lord.' 
 It is a sign of discipleship that its work is incomplete. 
 
 But it must not therefore be a languid or a faint- 
 hearted work. The word which comforts stimulates too. 
 The cities of Israel are being visited : the work of good 
 is in progress : the leaven is leavening the lump : but 
 the end, and therefore the success, is not yet. See the 
 evangelist at work in the streets and lanes of the city. 
 See the long days and late nights which attest the 
 earnestness of the toilers in the work of humanizing 
 through evangelizing, of civilizing through Christianizing. 
 Little comes of it, you say : the tide of vice, misery, and 
 cruelty sets as strongly as ever over our great London 
 on both banks of its ancient river sample and specimen, 
 but too exact in its resemblance, of our beloved England 
 in its towns and its villages everywhere : what profit 
 is there, you begin to ask, of the evangelist ? 'Into this
 
 xxxii. ] of all true Work. 575 
 
 captious but intenible sieve he still pours in the waters 
 of his love' and of his devotion might he not let it 
 alone ? 
 
 O say not, we answer, that little or that nothing 
 comes of it. Say not that one reformed life, say not 
 that one rescued soul, that one happy home, that one 
 comforted deathbed, is nothing. It is treason to hu- 
 manity to say, in this sense, that not all is nothing. 
 Say only that, as Jesus Christ prophesied, the cities of 
 Israel will not be finished till He come. Say that 
 meanwhile there must be a ragged edge to all work that 
 deserves the name many a rent undarned in the seam- 
 less robe, many a sore heart and many a weeping eye 
 on an earth of which sin has made havoc. It must 
 needs be. It cost more to redeem a world it cost 
 more to create new heavens and a new earth than that 
 a few lives or a few centuries should finish it. Yet in the 
 very incompleteness is the omen of eventual perfectness. 
 That incompleteness tells of labour labour the more 
 heroic in that it lacks an instant recompense. That 
 incompleteness means the giving of thousands and 
 ten thousands of precious lives, which might have been 
 lavished on 'the three things that are in the world,' lust, 
 ambition, and covetousness, to a noble, a generous, a 
 magnificent enterprise the winning back of the cities 
 of Israel to the Lord from whom they have wandered 
 and, in the way to it, the devotion of themselves, heart, 
 soul, and spirit, to a service which looks for its wage to 
 a world beyond death. If this is incompleteness if, 
 without an unfinished toil here, there could not be such 
 elevation, such heroism, such devotion do we not see 
 .at once why all is not yet that shall be why there
 
 576 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 should be delay, why there should be disappointment, 
 why there should be hope long deferred and great patience 
 exercised were it but to try that gold sevenfold in the 
 fire, which 'shall be unto praise and honour and glory 
 at the appearing of Jesus Christ?' 
 
 One after another falls on sleep, not having ' finished 
 the cities of Israel,' but having done the work of an 
 evangelist in his day. 
 
 Birthdays of saints are their deathdays. Today is 
 the 75th anniversary of the death of one of them 
 saint, evangelist, confessor, I had almost said martyr, 
 in one. Well may Cambridge honour, if it needs not 
 to revive, his memory, by a special and deeply interesting 
 ceremony of the week upon which we have entered. 
 
 I count it a sign of the times, one of the bright and 
 beautiful features of a period not without its anxieties, 
 that the name of Henry Martyn has passed out of the 
 keeping of one party, however honourable in itself and 
 venerable in its associations, into the possession of the 
 catholic church of God in England, of which he was a 
 dutiful son in her doctrine, her ritual, and her discipline. 
 To the present Primate, I think, in large degree, we owe 
 it who, in his former diocese of Truro found himself 
 seated in Martyn's birthplace, and in his rising cathedral 
 of Truro determined to assert for him an honoured place 
 and an everlasting memorial. 
 
 Cambridge at least shall claim him for her own, and 
 praise God for him. 
 
 We must not anticipate topics which belong to 
 another occasion and to worthier speakers. But one 
 or two lessons seem to suggest themselves, in close 
 connexion with the subject chosen for this sermon, and
 
 xxxii.] of all true Work. 577 
 
 deeply impressive in their bearing upon this honoured 
 and beloved audience. 
 
 ' Are there not twelve hours in the day ? ' was our 
 Lord's reply, in proverb, to those who would have 
 diverted Him from duty by an alarm for His life. 
 At the age of three and thirty that sacred life was 
 cut short by crucifixion : only three years and a half 
 of it had been allowed for ministry. Yet that day 
 (who shall gainsay it ?) had its twelve hours in full 
 tale. The constituent hour was short, but the resulting 
 day was complete. 
 
 Human nature wearies itself in lamentation over what 
 it counts a short life measuring it, as alone human 
 nature can, by its days, months, and years. ' Premature ' 
 is its title for a death at the age of thirty, forty, or fifty. 
 But so they count not in heaven. The little life closed 
 at the age of ten years or twelve is complete in God's 
 reckoning, or it would not have been taken. It has 
 done its work. It has awakened some dormant af- 
 fection. It has borne a silent witness for purity. It 
 has turned the heart of a father to neglected wife or 
 misunderstood son. It has kindled the flame of divine 
 love in the heart of a nurse or in the heart of a governess. 
 
 Henry Martyn died at the age of one and thirty. 
 Into those few years were crowded, first the grammar 
 school of Truro, with its noble memories of Cardew the 
 master and Kempthorne the monitor ; then the early 
 start at Cambridge, developing into the senior wrangler 
 of nineteen ; then the awakening piety, under influences 
 of friendship and sorrow the most powerful factors the 
 father's death and. the sister's pleading, the dead Brainerd 
 and the living Simeon ; then the self-dedication of the 
 V. 37
 
 578 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 Ely Ordination, and the Sunday and week-day ministries 
 at Lolworth and in Cambridge ; then the resolution for 
 a missionary life, and the thrilling anguish of the sever- 
 ance ; then the nine months' voyage to India, with the 
 battle scenes of the Cape and the ' fighting with beasts ' 
 on shipboard ; then the four years' ministry at Dinapore 
 and Cawnpore, with its long toils in translating and its 
 eager efforts to evangelize; then the baffled hopes and 
 humble self-resignations ; then the cruel journeyings 
 through Persia and Asia; at last the desolate death at 
 Tocat, and the silence settling down upon the tomb in 
 the land of strangers. How mournful a commentary 
 upon the unfinished work among the cities of Israel ! 
 How incomplete, man must acknowledge, that work, 
 that toil, that achievement ! 
 
 But were there, or were there not, twelve hours in 
 that day ? Would that life, prolonged to threescore 
 and ten or fourscore years, first in the service of the 
 University, and then in the ministry of a college living, 
 with some pulpit and some platform pleadings for home 
 missions and foreign, have been, on the whole, fuller or 
 more productive ? Was it not worth while that that life 
 should be cut short, half or not half spent ? Had not 
 those one and thirty years a fragrance, an aroma, yes, 
 and a fruitfulness, out of all proportion to the respectable, 
 the useful, the exemplary long lives of a thousand 
 men ? Has not that life kindled a hundred lives ? 
 True, it had not gone over all the cities of Israel. 
 True, it had not finished anything. Even its labours 
 in translating, so earnest and so persevering, were not 
 perhaps an entire success. Sometimes perhaps its very 
 self-sacrifice was a little visionary: its cherished objects
 
 xxxii.] of all true Work. 5 79 
 
 were not perhaps always what the world, even the 
 religious world, would call quite worth while, viewed 
 (certainly) in the retrospect. But what then ? The 
 twelve hours were in that day: three quarters of a 
 century afterwards it is shining, burning, kindling still. 
 
 It was the hero-life of my boyhood. I would com- 
 mend it in my old age to a later generation of my 
 University. You will find in it a beautiful simplicity, 
 a touching tenderness, a powerful attraction. I do not 
 think you will find it dull : I do not think that you 
 ought to find it depressing. If you ever think so, listen 
 to the testimony of those who tell from their own 
 recollection of his love of literature and poetry, of his 
 delightful company, of his merry laugh. No, that young 
 senior wrangler, that hasty warm-hearted friend, that 
 intense lover who gave up even love for Jesus Christ, he 
 was no gloomy fanatic, he was no cold-blooded censor, 
 he was a man very human, yet lifting his humanity up- 
 wards, till it held communion and fellowship with Him 
 who took the manhood into God. 
 
 Listen then to two or three of his own testimonies, ye 
 who have still to shape and form your course, earthward 
 or heavenward. Some of them are early testimonies ; 
 many of them written from the very courts and gardens 
 which your steps tread now, from rooms still occupied 
 by some of yourselves, from the very interior of a life 
 singularly conservative, amidst all change, in its sur- 
 roundings. 
 
 ' When I look back on every day, I may say I have 
 lost it. So much time misspent, so many opportunities 
 lost of doing good, so little zeal for God, or love to 
 man ; so much vanity, and levity, and pride, and selfish- 
 
 372
 
 580 Incompleteness a characteristic [xxxn. 
 
 ness, that I may well tremble at the world of iniquity 
 within. If ever I am saved, it must be by grace.' 
 
 ' I rose at half-past five,' and walked a little before 
 chapel-hour. I endeavoured to maintain affectionate 
 thoughts of God as my Father, on awaking in the 
 morning. Setting a watch over my thoughts, and en- 
 deavouring to make them humble and devout, I find 
 to be an excellent preparation for prayer, and for a 
 right spirit during the day.' 
 
 ' I am convinced that Christian experience is not a 
 delusion : whether mine is so or not, will be seen at the 
 last day.' 
 
 ' Whenever I can say, Thy will be done Teach me 
 to do Thy will, for Thou art my God it is like throwing 
 ballast out of an air-balloon : my soul ascends imme- 
 diately, and light and happiness shine around me.' 
 
 ' Blessed be God, / feel myself to be His minister. 
 This thought, which I can hardly describe, came to me 
 in the morning. I wish for no service but the service of 
 God to labour for souls on earth, and to do His will in 
 heaven.' 
 
 ' How careful should I and all be in our ministry, not 
 to break the bruised reed ! Alas, do I think that a 
 schoolboy, a raw academic, should be likely to lead 
 the hearts of men ? What a knowledge of men, and 
 acquaintance with the Scriptures, what communion with 
 God, and study of my own heart, ought to prepare me 
 for the awful work of a messenger from God on the 
 business of the soul !' 
 
 ' I am born for God only. Christ is nearer to me 
 than father or mother or sister a nearer relation, a 
 more affectionate friend I rejoice to follow Him, and
 
 XXXIL] of all true Work. 581 
 
 to love Him. Blessed Jesus ! Thou art all I want 
 a forerunner to me in all I ever shall go through, as a 
 Christian, a minister, or a missionary.' 
 
 Yet once more his very last words dated from the 
 precincts of his death-city of Tocat on the 6th of October, 
 ten days before the last end. 
 
 ' No horses being to be had, I had an unexpected 
 repose. I sat in the orchard, and thought, with sweet 
 comfort and peace, of my God in solitude my company, 
 my friend and comforter. Oh ! when shall time give 
 place to eternity ? When shall appear that new heaven 
 and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness ? There 
 there shall in no wise enter in anything that defileth... 
 none of those corruptions which add to the miseries of 
 mortality shall be seen or heard of any more.' 
 
 Let me add, without comment, the closing words of 
 his pious and loving biographer. 
 
 ' There was something deeply affecting in the thought, 
 that, where he sank into his grave, men were strangers 
 to him and to his God. No friendly hand was stretched 
 out, no sympathizing voice was heard, at that time when 
 the tender offices of Christian affection are so soothing 
 and so delightful : no human bosom was there on which 
 he could recline his head in the hour of languishing. 
 Paucioribus lacrymis compositus es, is a sentiment to 
 which the feelings of nature and friendship respond. 
 Yet the painful reflection cannot be admitted, In no- 
 vissimA luce desideravere aliquid oculi tin. The Saviour, 
 doubtless, was with His servant in his last conflict, and 
 he with Him the instant it terminated.'
 
 XXXIII. 
 
 SOME LESSONS OF AGE. 
 
 Psalm xxxvii. 25. 
 / have been young, and now am old. 
 
 THE text introduces a single experience of the old 
 age of which it speaks. ' I have been young, and now 
 am old, and yet saw I never the righteous forsaken, nor 
 his seed begging their bread.' It is a personal ex- 
 perience : the writer only could be a judge of that. 
 How far it is the uniform or the universal experience, 
 might be an interesting question : but, if that question 
 were answered in the negative, there would be no real 
 contradiction of Scripture, for in these things there is no 
 doctrine and no revelation. And certainly the psalmist 
 does not say that the sons of good parents have a 
 charmed or privileged life, such that, whatever they 
 themselves may develope into, of folly or vice, they are 
 warranted against the consequence. He speaks of such 
 as walk in the righteous father's steps, and such, he says, 
 he has never seen or known to be driven to beg their 
 bread. In Christian days, and in theory at least, we 
 have enlarged our view of life to two worlds; and, with- 
 out affecting an unreal language as to things good and 
 evil, we try to think more of the great, and less of the 
 little future more of the eternal happiness which can-
 
 xxxiii.] Some Lessons of Age. 583 
 
 not be shaken, and less of the temporal prosperity which 
 was naturally the all in all of blessing and recompence 
 before immortality was brought to light by the Gospel. 
 
 But the applications of the text are manifold ; and, 
 without disparaging the psalmist's use of it, we may 
 perhaps say that there are other lessons which come to 
 mind even more forcibly, when we presume to preach on 
 his words, ' I have been young, and now am old.' 
 
 Between youth and age, in one sense, there is a great 
 gulf fixed. Certainly between the psalmist's youth and 
 age if king David was (as the title says) the poet of 
 this psalm there was a great gulf fixed. Between the 
 shepherd boy of Bethlehem and 'the man raised up on 
 high, the anointed of the God of Jacob' still more, 
 between the noble guileless youth and the sinner of the 
 great double sin which clouded the latter day of the life 
 there was so wide and so deep a chasm that the very 
 identity might seem to have been broken, and the conti- 
 nuity of the being snapt in twain. But it was not so. 
 'This /have been,' he says, 'and this /am.' 
 
 Between youth and age there is seldom an entire 
 intelligence or an entire sympathy. And yet surely the 
 old ought to have something interesting to say to the 
 young something which none but they can say and 
 which can be said in a tone the very opposite either of 
 coldness or of distance or of assumption. So addressed, 
 I have found the young very willing to listen. Far as 
 they are at present removed from the speaker, they are 
 quite conscious that the tide of their own life is setting 
 his way. Improbable as it may at present seem to them, 
 they know that one day they will have gone to him, 
 though he can never more return to them. Curiosity
 
 584 Some Lessons of Age. [xxxm. 
 
 bids them find out what they can about that undis- 
 covered country, from which a voice comes to them, 
 saying, When you reach it, you will find this and this its 
 feeling, its experience, its regret, or its aspiration. If, in 
 addition to this, anything can be said as to the best way 
 of making the journey anything as to the secret of 'a 
 good old age' what is to be done and what is to be 
 avoided in the start what provisions are indispensable, 
 what accoutrements would be helps and what encum- 
 brances, what companions would be congenial and what 
 insufferable, as the long route unfolds itself, and the ter- 
 minus is at last discernible in the distance there will be 
 no lack of listeners to such discourse, provided only that 
 the speaker is careful to follow the example here set him 
 by the psalmist, and to emphasize the identity of his 
 own past and present, 'I am old, but I have been 
 young.' 
 
 There is a sense, and a very solemn sense, in which 
 the gulf between youth and age is more imaginary than 
 real. We are all ready to suppose that we shall have 
 some notice that we shall not pass quite unconsciously 
 from young men into old. There will surely be some 
 note of warning : there will surely be a point day, 
 month, or year up to which we are in the one category, 
 and beyond which we are in the other. The very putting 
 the thought into words shows its futility. It is not so. 
 One age of life shades off into another : each particular 
 day is of the same piece and colour with yesterday and 
 with tomorrow: the only notice given us comes too late: 
 \vc hear some one casually speak of us as old men, and 
 we wake up with a start to resent or to realize. 
 
 The moral of the remark lies in it. We \vcrc ima-
 
 xxxiii.] Some Lessons of Age. 585 
 
 gining that there was a certain point of transition from 
 youth to age, and that at that point the faults and follies 
 of the one age would naturally fall off from us, to be 
 replaced (if at all) by another set of failings, much less 
 violent, far less serious, of which at all events we know 
 nothing at present, and which we must deal with as we 
 can if and when they come. At all events, we were 
 saying to ourselves, we shall have got rid, without effort 
 or trouble, of those 'youthful lusts,' as St Paul calls 
 them, which have been our chief plague and torment till 
 then; and the only fear is, lest we should die before that 
 more equable and reposeful age comes, and so before we 
 have shaken off those deadlier faults and vices which we 
 all know it would not be safe to carry with us to the 
 threshold of the life to come. 
 
 Alas, brethren, there is no such transition, and no such 
 barrier, and no such gulf fixed, as this kind of talk pre- 
 supposes. We may well doubt whether death itself will 
 break off anything but the power of sinning not its 
 binding chain, not its debasing guilt. Certainly old age 
 will not. The continuity is never broken. The tenor of 
 the life is one, and but one. If the young man has let 
 himself alone, the old man will b.e the same in all but 
 the excuses popularly made for him, and the interest and 
 the pathos attaching to every youthful thing. If the 
 strong hand of virtue, if the mightier force of grace, has 
 not cleansed and purified the young soul, there is no 
 moment at which old things will have passed away and 
 all things have become new : the child is father of the 
 man, and the man of the old man, and the old man of 
 the everlasting being which 'lifts up the eyes' to bliss or 
 woe 'in Hades.'
 
 586 Some Lessons of Age. [xxxin. 
 
 This is all very serious, and I think it is one chief 
 lesson which age, as it has opportunity, would press 
 upon youth. Young man, it says with terrible positive- 
 ness, Nullum tempus occurrit peccato No length of time 
 bars sin. A man may die a sinner a hundred years 
 old and a sinner, in all but the zest and all but the 
 sparkle, of the same sort and kind as when he was a boy 
 and a young man. No sin dies a natural death. It can- 
 not be conquered without a battle. It may be a battle 
 in which (in some sense) Satan casts out Satan. That 
 is when pride, or ambition, or fear of the world, or dread 
 of consequences, prevails against some particular evil 
 tendency, and, so to say, the body of sin lops off one of 
 its members. Such is the history of many reforms and 
 many amendments. Heaven keeps no register of them. 
 They are neither here nor there as to the everlasting life 
 of the man. This is one battle. Many never fight even 
 this battle. Many go on in their sins, weakly, miserably, 
 helplessly, till they are found out far on, or till they die 
 in them, late or early, and go hence to be no more seen. 
 
 There is another battle with sin, quite different in 
 history and character, in course and end. This is when 
 a man, knowing that there is no gulf fixed, by age or 
 lapse of time, between him and sinning knowing that 
 no man sleeps off or dreams off or simply outlasts or 
 outlives his sins and knowing that he must not risk 
 eternity on the chance of truth (whether taught by ex- 
 perience or taught by revelation) being after all a lie 
 tries upon himself the gospel remedy ; watches and 
 prays, and prays and watches, on the faith of God the 
 Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and, with many 
 failures and many defeats, yet withstands and is found
 
 xxxni.J Some Lessons of Age, 587 
 
 standing conquering one by one the sins of youth and 
 the sins of age, till he may cast his crown before the 
 throne and ascribe salvation to God and the Lamb. To 
 recommend this course to press its reasonableness, its 
 necessity, its urgency, upon such as have ears to hear 
 this is why age speaks to youth, and this is what it 
 would say 'Keep innocency, and take heed unto the 
 thing that is right, for this shall bring a man peace at 
 the last.' Or else this 'Blessed are they that have 
 washed their robes betimes, and made them white in 
 the blood of the Lamb, that they may have right to the 
 tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the 
 city.' 
 
 This is one lesson. But there is another. 
 
 'I made haste,' says another psalmist, 'and prolonged 
 not the time, to keep Thy commandments.' Long before 
 extreme age there will come a time when fatigue and 
 weariness are the law of the being. That play of limb 
 and frame, that activity for activity's sake, that love 
 of taking each step twice and thrice over for the very joy 
 of movement, which is characteristic of the child and the 
 boy growing into freedom, and which survives in the 
 robust games and athletic sports of the early manhood, 
 has long been exchanged for a more staid and sober 
 alacrity, ere it subsides for ever, on the first approach of 
 age, into that most opposite of experiences, to which 
 nothing is so welcome as the permission to sit still a 
 consciousness of incomplete invigoration ushering in the 
 day, and a sense of aching weariness heralding the 
 resting. At last the grasshopper is a burden and the 
 man who was once on fire for national reforms and 
 ecclesiastical innovations acquiesces without a sense of
 
 588 Some Lessons of Age. [xxxni. 
 
 inconsistency in the thing that is, or feels (if he be a man 
 of higher mould and making) that most distressing of 
 experiences a mind full of projects which he has no 
 strength to work out, and a life of which the many yes- 
 terdays have crushed out the few tomorrows, nothing 
 done of all that he once dreamed of, and himself no 
 longer among the labourers of the world-wide and age- 
 long workfield. 
 
 ' I have been young, and now am old ' and therefore 
 I know how long before death ends the stirring and 
 bustling work-day, not necessarily because the mind is 
 sleeping, not necessarily because the spirit is unwilling, 
 but because a depressing weariness has come over the 
 bodily frame, and that which has not been enterprised 
 during the morning and noonday hours must for ever 
 be left unattempted now that the sun slopes to its 
 setting. 
 
 Therefore I say, Yours, young men, is the time of 
 enterprise and the time of efficiency: waste not one 
 precious hour in giving yourselves to your task. The 
 fields of life and time are white to the harvest: offer 
 yourselves betimes to the great Lord, that you may not 
 be surprised by the late evening when no man can work. 
 Let the word ' Too young ' never cross the door of your 
 lips. Dread only lest the word ' Too old ' be wrung 
 from you by a sense of growing feebleness before you 
 have done one stroke of steady sturdy work for the 
 Lord who bought you. Begin, even now, even here, to 
 do something. Economize time, not for study only, but 
 for charity. Without one word or one thought of things 
 far beyond or high above you magnificent enterprises 
 of philanthropy or evangelizing, for which, if ever, the
 
 xxxiii.] Some Lessons of Age. 589 
 
 time is not yet look out for the nearest and humblest 
 task which is lying undone in your parish at home or at 
 your door here, and do that. If you feel that at the 
 present moment you are scarcely equal to any work of a 
 directly spiritual nature, then take up something merely 
 useful or merely kind take it up, not as the highest 
 thing, but as the humblest and therefore fittest. In these 
 days, of life of all kinds, you need not wait an hour to 
 find something to do for God and your brother some- 
 thing which friend or neighbour, layman or clergyman, 
 can tell you of, and which perhaps is languishing, and 
 making good hearts languish with it, just for lack of 
 such an offer of help as you are too shy or too timid to 
 utter. There is work for all good honest work for all 
 inclinations and for all capacities. 
 
 And this I say, brethren, the time is short Before 
 you know it, you will be passing into the ranks of the 
 middle-aged : and the reasons which are strong now 
 will be overwhelming then for declining to attempt 
 anything for snatching as you can 'a little sleep and 
 a little slumber and a little folding of the hands to 
 sleep' till the night of nights cometh when no man 
 can work. 
 
 The advance of years should teach wisdom. Some 
 reflections, some inferences from facts seen and noted, 
 are forced upon it. 
 
 Let me utter two of them the gravest possible, and 
 the most urgent. 
 
 (i) One is a reflection upon what I will call the 
 everlastingness of virtue. You would not smile at 
 the obviousness, the commonplaceness, of the saying, 
 if you could realize your arrival at the threescore years
 
 59O Some Lessons of Age. [xxxm. 
 
 and ten. You will have seen then the shipwreck of so 
 many hopes, the discomfiture of so many ambitions, the 
 disconsolateness of so many lives, the ruin of so many 
 homes, just by reason of men (so to say) entering the 
 lists with virtue. Sometimes it has been attempted 
 even by philosophies falsely so called, unnaming and 
 renaming sin itself; travestying it into a mere mistake, 
 if even that a mere misfortune, if even that a mere 
 imperfection or immaturity, marking a particular stage 
 in the growth of the man or of the race, to be developed 
 some day into a grace and into a robustness which, 
 without passing through that stage, could not have been 
 reached, could not have been realized. Sometimes it 
 has been attempted by some conspicuous alliance be- 
 tween vice and high station, or between vice and wit, or 
 between vice and genius hoping to bear down and 
 overmaster the received estimate, the old nomenclature, 
 of good and evil the world looking on, the while, in 
 suspense or in complaisance or in flattery, to see if 
 peradventure the effort can succeed, if by bridge, ford, 
 or tunnel the great gulf can be made passable. Some- 
 times, far oftener, far more hopefully because far more 
 insidiously, it has been attempted by a general relax- 
 ation and softening of the sharpness and severity of 
 morals, a tone of civility and compliment and spurious 
 charity, refraining from calling anything by its name, 
 dealing much in whisper and innuendo, yet none the less 
 fertile and prolific in scandal, to the utter destruction 
 of the peace of homes and the comfort of lives only 
 refusing to judge a righteous judgment, or so much as 
 to be serious over sins, vices, and crimes. 
 
 Against all this the experience of the threescore years
 
 xxxni. J Some Lessons of Age. 591 
 
 and ten enters its stern and solemn protest Six mil- 
 lenniums of history bear witness to the futility of the 
 endeavour to remove the landmark between vice and 
 virtue. Explain it as you may, there is around and 
 above us a mighty something which makes for righteous- 
 ness. Theories of indifference, fashions of immorality, 
 alliances of might against right, have upon them 
 what St Paul calls the 'evident token of perdition.' 
 ' Though they toss themselves, yet can they not pass 
 over ' that boundary of the ' perpetual decree ' which 
 fences virtue. The gulf between wrong and right is 
 still fixed. We must recognize it or perish. The thing 
 that is right is the thing that is and the man that is 
 against it is by that very fact 'dead while he liveth.' 
 ' I have been young, and now am old, yet saw I never 
 the righteous forsaken;' and, if for a moment I have seen 
 the wrongdoer 'flourishing like the green bay tree,' soon 
 * I went by, and lo, he was not I sought him, but his 
 place could nowhere be found.' 
 
 Think it not an unreal thing, brethren think it not, 
 on the other hand, a thing of course to be bidden this 
 day to make your choice for a life-time between wrong 
 and right, between vice and virtue. Let it be known 
 on which side you are. Let not cowardice, let not 
 courtesy, let not good-nature or the fear to wound, 
 prevail with you even for once to smile at or to smile 
 with evil. It is just these small compromises or small 
 remonstrances, which mark you, nay, which make you, 
 on one side or on the other side in the war of good 
 and evil. This is what gives a tone to the life : this 
 is what influences a generation. It shows the real bent 
 of the man. It affects the society in which he lives. It
 
 592 Some Lessons of Age. [XXXIIL 
 
 is thus that he forms his habit of viewing things and 
 this is even more, in relation to his general influence, 
 than his way of acting. I set before you this day death 
 and life ; ' the thing that is right,' and ' peace at the 
 last ' or ' the thing that is evil,' and ' the second death.' 
 
 (2) The everlastingness of virtue is one testimony 
 which age bears to youth. The other shall be, the ever- 
 lastingness of the gospel. 
 
 ' The everlasting gospel ' St John calls it, or one 
 utterance of it, in one passage of his great apocalypse. 
 No title can be more indelibly inscribed upon it for the 
 later age of human life. 
 
 The same St John, if we rightly read the words of his 
 first epistle, makes the full appreciation of Jesus Christ 
 the characteristic of a Christian old age. 
 
 The infancy of believing knows the atonement. Its 
 sins are forgiven, and it knows the Father. The young 
 man is predominantly militant. 'The word of God abides 
 in him, and he overcomes the wicked one.' It is reserved 
 for the old man it is his one twice-repeated character- 
 istic to ' know Him that is from the beginning,' the 
 Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 
 
 I think that this is so. ' I have been young, and now 
 am old" and I seem to see as I saw not once how 'such 
 a high priest,' just such, 'became us.' 
 
 O, brethren, when a man looks back upon his life 
 from its latter end, at last from its latest day; when 
 he feels the irreparableness side by side with the con- 
 demningness of the past, and has to enquire of himself 
 what is to be done what is to be done with this past 
 which yet is his present, with this present which he prays 
 God may not quite be his future I ask you what can
 
 xxxin.] Some Lessons of Age. 593 
 
 be his hope, what can be his peradventure of hope, if not 
 the very revelation of the gospel, and the very Saviour 
 who is its life? 
 
 Attempts are made, in all shapes and kinds, to adapt 
 this gospel to the so-called science and the so-called 
 progress of an age so far on as ours in date and so high 
 up as ours in attainment. We are encouraged to hope 
 that before long there will be a general agreement in 
 a Christianity relieved of miracle, disencumbered of 
 dogma a Christianity agreeing to live and to let live, 
 to fill a sociable place among the religions, and to leave 
 on one side those distinctive doctrines which do but 
 distress, distract, and dissipate. 
 
 Brethren, however such promises may look to the 
 young, they have no attraction for the man upon whom 
 the ends of the world are come. 
 
 A Christianity toned and diluted to the taste of what 
 calls itself modern thought must ever be a thing 'without 
 form and void.' Certainly it was not this which either 
 created or beautified a Christendom not this which has 
 nerved weak men and women and children for martyr 
 dom, or toppled down the old thrones of idolatry and 
 slavery, or purified (where it has been purified) the 
 pestilential atmosphere of tyranny and cruelty and 
 shameful licentiousness. Something grander and nobler, 
 something supernatural, was wanted to do what has 
 been done by the gospel how much more to do that 
 which it shall do, when it shall have made the king- 
 doms of the world in deed and in truth the one 
 kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and when, 
 as it is written, God shall at last have 'gathered together 
 V. 38
 
 594 Some Lessons of Age. [xxxin. 
 
 the all things, things in heaven and things on earth- 
 in the one Christ.' 
 
 There are two things which old age, if not youth, will 
 demand in its Christianity, and without which it will 
 none of it. 
 
 The first of these is a forgiveness pure and simple of 
 all that is past, through the alone merits and mediation 
 of Jesus Christ. ' Son, thy sins are forgiven thee,' is a 
 gospel 'new every morning' fresh, to its latest day, from 
 heaven. The angel, the more than angel, of the great 
 apocalypse can fly with it between earth and heaven, 
 and into the dry bones of self and the fall ' a spirit of 
 life from God ' will enter with it from the four winds. 
 Let me face, on the strength of this gospel, days when 
 flesh and heart faileth days when no longer aught can 
 be done, when all must lie low for ever under the mighty 
 hand of God. Let no conditions be appended to this 
 more than angelic proclamation neither of antecedent 
 fitness nor of subsequent perfection. These things, and 
 such as these, take the salt and the life out of it. Let me 
 just look to the cross, and live. 
 
 Along with this, the primary and fundamental pro- 
 clamation, from the great heaven, of mercy and absolu- 
 tion, there must be, in the gospel for the man who has 
 been young but now is old, the unveiling of a Person, 
 divine and human, able to sympathize, mighty to save, 
 whom to know is life, whom to serve is freedom. For- 
 giveness itself is flat and cold, without a Forgiver : 
 absolution, without an Absolver, is a thing when I want 
 a person. ' Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou 
 shalt be saved and thy house.' 
 
 'I have been young, and now am old' and I tell thec,
 
 xxxiii.] Some Lessons of Age. 595 
 
 young man, when thou shalt be standing where I stand, 
 thou wilt want this nothing else will suffice thee. There- 
 fore lay thine account for it now. So shape thy life, so 
 school thy thought, so wing thy prayer, that ' in the day 
 of the great slaughter, when the towers fall,' thou mayest 
 find 'the name which is above every name' a strong 
 tower ' run into it, and be safe.' 
 
 We believe that it is the business of this age, this 
 almost last decade of the iQth century, by its legaliza- 
 tion of open speech, if it be even the speech of the infidel 
 or the blasphemer, to bring into sharper contrast the 
 features of friend and foe, and to constrain a man, for 
 mere honesty's sake, to take a side in the mighty con- 
 troversy, to range himself (let us hope it) more decidedly 
 under Christ's banner against the three confederate 
 powers always confederate where Christ in person is 
 in the field of world, flesh, and devil first in the heart, 
 then in the life, then on the larger scale in which other 
 hearts and other lives are lost or won for heaven. 
 'There came and touched me one like the appearance 
 of a man, and He strengthened me, and said, O man 
 greatly beloved, fear not : peace be unto thee ; be 
 strong, yea, be strong. And when He had spoken unto 
 me, I was strengthened.' 
 
 Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. 'God 
 hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.' 
 
 Yet two words remain to be spoken. 
 
 In this University church today I should feel that 
 something was wanting if the preacher did not give one 
 word of respectful sorrow to the memory of our chosen 
 representative in the great council of the nation, the 
 honoured and lamented Beresford Hope.
 
 596 Some Lessons of Age. [xxxin. 
 
 Politics must be silent, absent, here. But they may be 
 silent or absent, and yet leave this man leave all that 
 was characteristic of him : for the characteristic of the 
 man all will agree was his independence. 
 
 It is a blameless and beautiful life to look back upon, 
 as I can look back upon it from undergraduate days 
 and remember nothing in it that would not bear the 
 scrutiny of the sunbeam. 
 
 The church may well mourn him. For he was her 
 devout and devoted son, her munificent benefactor, her 
 dauntless champion in honour and dishonour, in good 
 report and ill most of all, in the latter. 
 
 But I think that England mourns him too ; were it 
 but for this that he suffered not himself to be trampled 
 underfoot and ground to powder by the Juggernaut of 
 party; that he was willing to stand alone, if need be, 
 in the maintenance of principle, and never suffered prin- 
 ciple to be moulded or manipulated by considerations 
 of that sort of convenience which men seek to dignify 
 by the more respectable titles of expediency or policy. 
 
 We have other such men. These late days of trial 
 have brought them out as gold from the furnace. 
 
 But his was a religious, not merely a political inde- 
 pendence. He sought nothing and he gained nothing 
 by it, save the testimony of his conscience and the 
 respect of good men. 
 
 Peace be with him. May another likcminded with 
 him in sensitiveness of conscience, likeminded with him 
 in delicacy of honour, likcminded with him in tenacity 
 of purpose, likeminded with him in fervour of faith, 
 likeminded with him in munificence of piety, be found, 
 if it be by long search, to replace him. And may his
 
 xxxin.] Some Lessons of Age. 597 
 
 example 'provoke very many' to go forth from this 
 place to ' play the man ' in England. 
 
 Finally, I must ask you, as you leave the church 
 today, to ' remember the poor.' 
 
 Many times in the last quarter of a century I have 
 pleaded the same cause with those who have occupied 
 these stalls and filled these galleries. 
 
 Not always in vain. Once, in response to my pleading, 
 the definite sum of one hundred pounds was given on 
 the instant to these poor struggling churches of Barnwell 
 and Chesterton. 
 
 I cannot expect often, if ever, to plead this cause in 
 the future. ' I have been young, and now am old.' Let 
 me plead it yet once more with all my strength today. 
 
 ' I have been young, and now am old ' but one 
 feature of life changes not. ' The poor ye have always 
 with you ' if it were but to embody to you an invisible 
 Person ; if it were but to realize to you the Christ, 
 absent and present, who said once on earth, who says 
 now from heaven, ' Inasmuch as ye have done it unto 
 one of the least of these, ye have done it to me.' 
 
 These neighbouring churches, with their streets and 
 lanes of poor people, how beautiful it is, yet how natural 
 it ought to be in the spiritual sense of natural that 
 they owe to this University, largely to its younger 
 members, their living ministry, their very means of 
 grace. 
 
 You are practising here on this annual occasion for a 
 life of service. It may be, as men speak, a sacred life, 
 a consecrated life, a life calling itself ministry. It may 
 be this, or it may not be. But, at all events, ' what God 
 hath cleansed' the social life, the business life, the
 
 598 Some Lessons of Age. [xxxm. 
 
 professional life, the political life, whichever of these or 
 whatever it be ' what God hath cleansed, that call not 
 thou, make not thou, common.' 
 
 And you are practising by this act of charity for the 
 whole of the life-day its onward course, its meridian, its 
 waning, its sunset. You are realizing to yourselves, by 
 what is always so valuable, an act, and an act done in 
 God's special presence, the characteristic of all life that 
 is worth the name ' no man liveth to himself 
 
 Let this be your thought, beloved brethren, as you 
 resolve in your hearts that you will not give today that 
 which costs you nothing. Let your offering cost you 
 something some little self-denial of pleasure or luxury 
 in the week that comes after some little exercise of 
 that charity which ' seeketh not her own.' 
 
 And may He whose we are from whom and through 
 whom and to whom are all things, in whom we live and 
 move and have our being, carry you so safely, deai 
 friends and brothers, across the waves of this trouble- 
 some world, that finally you may come to the land of 
 everlasting life, there to reign with Him world without 
 end, through Jesus Christ our Lord. 
 
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 upon the separate sermons in this volume, as many of them are singularly 
 fresh and striking ; we can say only that few volumes ef sermons can 
 belter instruct preachers, or more edify those to whom preaching is 
 addressed." British Quarterly Review. 
 
 TOLERANCE. Two Lectures addressed to the Students of 
 several of the Divinity Schools of the Protestant Episcopal Church. 
 Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 TWENTY SERMONS. Crown 8 vo. 6s. 
 
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 moniser, not only in his oi.i<n country but on this side of the Atlantic ; and 
 when it is said that he has been compared to Robertson of Brighton ana 
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 are to be expected from him. . . . They will be eminently acceptable to a 
 large class of thoughtful and cultivated people, who, while caring little for 
 the dogmas and distinctions of sects, have not lost their faith in vital 
 Christianity as a grand illuminating or redeeming agency in the world. " 
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 Brunton. THE BIBLE AND SCIENCE. By T. Lauder 
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 The objects of the present work are to give a brief and popular sketch of 
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 ing the structure and formation of the earth's crust which were once 
 regarded as heretical and dangerous, but are now to be found in every 
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 THE NATURE OF THE ATONEMENT AND ITS 
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 THOUGHTS ON REVELATION, with Special Reference 
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 THE SEVEN GIFTS. Addressed to the Diocese of Canter- 
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 ' ' Under the title of ' The Seven Gifts, ' and in the form of seven primary 
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 suffice, if not for absolute realisation, at least for profitable contemplation 
 in these critical times. The Church of England has to set its house 
 in order, and the only question is how this is to be done, with what ideas, 
 
 and in what direction The Archbishop, with the eye of faith, sees 
 
 the old tree full of young life. It moves, it buds and blossoms, it bears 
 fruit ; who shall say it will not till it has been fairly tried? who can deny 
 it the right to live and act by its own instinctive laws ? who will venture to 
 incur infamy by hindering the work ? " Times. 
 
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 TRUTH IN TALE. Addresses chiefly to Children. Crown 
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 [In the Press. 
 
 Cassel. MANUAL of JEWISH HISTORY and LITERA- 
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 known.'" School Guardian. 
 
 Cazenove. HISTORIC ASPECTS OF THE A PRIORI 
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 a Postscript. Demy 8vo. 5-r. 
 
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 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Cellarius. A NEW ANALOGY BETWEEN REVEALED 
 RELIGION AND THE COURSE AND CONSTITUTION OF NATURE. 
 By CELLARIUS (Rev. T. W. FOWLE). Crn. 8vo. 6.?. 
 The present writer here addresses to his fellmv- Christians, more especially 
 laymen, those reasons which have from time to time appeared to himself to 
 afford a reasonably strong presumption that Nature and Rei-elation have 
 proceeded Jrom the same Author, and that, therefore, the materials of a 
 credible and rational religion are placed at the disposal of mankind. 
 
 Cheyne. THE BOOK OF ISAIAH CHRONOLOGICALLY 
 ARRANGED. An Amended Version, with Historical and Critical 
 Introductions and Explanatory Notes. By T. K. CHEYNE, M.A., 
 Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford. Crown 8vo. ^s. 6</. 
 
 Choice Notes on the Four Gospels, drawn from 
 
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 (St. Matthew and St. Mark in one voL price gs.) 
 
 Church. Works by the Very Rev. R. W. CHURCH, M.A., 
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 ON SOME INFLUENCES OF CHRISTIANITY UPON 
 NATIONAL CHARACTER. Three Lectures delivered in St. 
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 "Few books that we have met with have given us keener pleasure than 
 
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 Literary Churchman. 
 
 THE SACRED POETRY OF EARLY RELIGIONS. 
 Two Lectures in St. Paul's Cathedral. Second Edition. iSmo. 
 is. I. The Vedas. II. The Psalms. 
 
 ST. ANSELM. New Edition. Globe Svo. 5.?. 
 " // is a sketch by the hand ef a master, with ez-ery line marked by 
 taste, learning, and real apprehension of the subject." Pall Mall Gazette. 
 
 HUMAN LIFE AND ITS CONDITIONS. Sermons 
 preached before the University of Oxford, 1876 78, with Three 
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 " Each and all are earnest, scholarly cultured inquiries into some point 
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 Lectures delivered at Oxford and in St. Paul's Cathedral. New 
 Edition. Crown Svo. "js. 6d. 
 
 ADVENT SERMONS, 1885. Crown Svo. 4S.6J. 
 
 " These four Sermons are admirable specimens of Dean Church's refined 
 eloquence. The style is perfect of its sort ; it is rhetoric of the best kind. 
 . . . . Four remarkableyfine discourses . " Pall Mall Gazette.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 CHURCH (Rev. R. W.) continued. 
 
 THE DISCIPLINE OF THE CHRISTIAN CHARAC- 
 TER. Sermons preached in St. Paul's Cathedral. Second 
 Edition. Crown 8vo. 4^. 6d. 
 
 "This remarkable series of sermons." Guardian. ''One of the 
 noblest series of sermons which it has ever been our privilege to read. . . . 
 Surely it ought to be one of the most popular books of the day." Spectator. 
 
 Clergyman's Self-Examination concerning the 
 APOSTLES' CREED. Extra fcap. 8vo. is. 6d. 
 
 Colenso. THE COMMUNION SERVICE FROM THE 
 BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER; with Select Readings from 
 the Writings of the Rev. F. D. MAURICE, M.A. Edited by the 
 Right Rev. J. W. COLENSO, D.D., Lord Bishop of Natal. Sixth 
 Edition. i6mo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 Collects of the Church of England. With a beauti- 
 fully Coloured Floral Design to each Collect, and Illuminated 
 Cover. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. I2s. 
 
 Congreve. HIGH HOPES, AND PLEADINGS FOR A REA- 
 SONABLE FAITH, NOBLER THOUGHTS, LARGER CHARITY. 
 Sermons preached in the Parish Church of Tooting Graveney, Surrey. 
 By J. CONGREVE, M.A., Rector. Cheaper Issue. Crown 8vo. 5-r. 
 
 Cooke. RELIGION AND CHEMISTRY: A Re-state- 
 ment of an Old Argument. By J. P. COOKE, Erving Professor of 
 Chemistry and Mineralogy in Harvard University. New and 
 Revised Edition. Crown 8vo. "js. (>d. 
 
 Cotton. SERMONS PREACHED TO ENGLISH CON- 
 GREGATIONS IN INDIA. By the late GEORGE EDWARD 
 LYNCH COTTON, D.D., Bishop of Calcutta. Crown 8vo. 7-r. 6d. 
 
 Cross. BIBLE READINGS SELECTED FROM THE 
 PENTATEUCH AND THE BOOK OF JOSHUA. By the 
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 " Mr. Cross has endeavoured in this -work to provide a simple reading- 
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 Cunningham Works by the Rev. WM. CUNNINGHAM, B.D. : 
 
 THE EPISTLE OF ST. BARNABAS. A Dissertation, 
 including a Discussion of its Date and Authorship. Together with 
 the Greek Text, the Latin Version, and a new English Translation 
 and Commentary. Crown 8vo. "js. (>d. 
 
 CHRISTIAN CIVILISATION. With special reference to 
 India. Fcap. 8vo, 5-f.
 
 io THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 CUNNINGHAM (Rev. Vim.} continued. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF ASIA. A Methodical Sketch of 
 the Second Century. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 "Not merely is such a treatise interesting to the believer ; its interest 
 extends to all." Morning Post. " We think it on the whole a pains- 
 taking and accurate delineation of the development of the ecclesiastical 
 constitution of the Church." London Quarterly. 
 
 Cunningham. THE GROWTH OF THE CHURCH IN 
 ITS ORGANISATION AND INSTITUTIONS. Being the 
 Croall Lectures for 1886. By JOHN CUNNINGHAM, D.D., Author 
 of "Church History of Scotland," "The Quakers," "A New 
 Theory of Knowing and Known," etc. Demy 8vo. 9-r. 
 
 Curteis. Works by the Rev. G. H. CURTEIS, M.A., Canon 
 Residentary of Lichfield Cathedral, and Professor of New Testa- 
 ment Exegesis, King's College, London : 
 
 DISSENT IN ITS RELATION TO THE CHURCH 
 OF ENGLAND. Eight Lectures preached before the University 
 of Oxford, in the year 1871, on the foundation of the late Rev. 
 John Bampton, M.A., Canon of Salisbury. New Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. ^s. 6d. 
 
 THE SCIENTIFIC OBSTACLES TO CHRISTIAN BE- 
 LIEF. Being the Boyle Lectures for 1884. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The ability shewn in Canon Curteis 1 Bampton Lectures of 1871 would 
 have prepared us to expect great things from this, his (if we do not mistake) 
 next important publication since that time. But the admirable little volume 
 before us has even surpassed our expectations." Literary Churchman. 
 " An able and interesting volume." Church Times. 
 
 Dale. THE SYNOD OF ELVIRA, AND CHRISTIAN 
 LIFE IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. An Historical Essay. 
 By A. W. W. DALE, Fellow and Lecturer of Trinity Hall, Cam- 
 bridge. Crown 8vo. IQJ. 6d. 
 
 Davies. Works by the Rev. J. LLEWELYN DAVIES, M.A., 
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 THE EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL TO THE EPHESIANS, 
 THE COLOSSIANS, and PHILEMON. With Introductions 
 and Notes, and an Essay on the Traces of Foreign Elements in the 
 Theology of these Epistles. Second Edition. Demy 8vo. "js. 6d. 
 
 THE GOSPEL AND MODERN LIFE; with a Preface 
 on a Recent Phase of Deism. Second Edition. To which is 
 added, Morality according to the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper; 
 or, Three Discourses on the Names, ' Eucharist,' ' Sacrifice,' and 
 'Communion.' Extra fcap. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 WARNINGS AGAINST SUPERSTITION. IN FOUR 
 SKKMUNS FOR THE DAY. Extra fcap. 8vo. 2s. 6<l.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. n 
 
 DAVIES (Rev. J. i,.} continued. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN CALLING. Sermons. Extra fcap. 
 8vo. 6s. 
 
 SOCIAL QUESTIONS FROM THE POINT OF VIEW 
 OF CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY. Second Edition. Crown 
 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The chief aim of these discourses is to shew the inevitable shortcomings 
 of the philosophical theories of the day, -when they seek to establish governing 
 
 principles of mere morality without reference to revealed religion 
 
 There is original thought in the volume, with incisive arguments, "while 
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 ments of opponents who are nothing if not logical, and whose writings he 
 has carefully studied." Times. 
 
 Diggle. GODLINESS AND MANLINESS. A Miscellany 
 of Brief Papers touching the Relation of Religion to Life. By 
 JOHN W. DIGGLE, M.A., Vicar of Mossley Hill, Liverpool; late 
 Lecturer and Post-master of Merton College, Oxford. Crown 
 8vo. 6s. 
 
 ''Readers . . . may readily appreciate his reverence of spirit, his 
 thoughtjnlness, and the frequent beauty of his style." Scottish Le v der. - 
 " The work is pervaded by a spirit of the broadest catholicity antt iLe 
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 sympathies are in union with the topics treated of, but by all who have a 
 nice appreciation of cultured, scholarly, and graceful effort. " Liverpool 
 Mercury. 
 
 Donaldson THE APOSTOLICAL FATHERS: a Critical 
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 JAMES DONALDSON, LL.D. Crown 8vo. 7-r. 6d. 
 
 Drummond. INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF 
 
 THEOLOGY. By JAMES DRUMMOND, LL.D., Professor of 
 
 Theology in Manchester New College, London. Crown 8vo. 5*. 
 
 ' ' This book does pi-ecisely what is promised by its title, and does it, we 
 
 should say, very well. It is a guide-book, if the metaphor may be allowed, 
 
 to the theological region. . . It is enough to say that Professor Drummond 
 
 possesses in an eminent degree the virtues cardinal virtues, Jor any one 
 
 who would deal with this subject of lucidity and order, and that he has 
 
 all the breadth of view and power of sympathy needed by one whose 
 
 business it is, as far at least as this occasion is concerned, not to teach others 
 
 a particular theology, but to IMC/I them JUKU they may become theologians. " 
 
 Spectator.
 
 12 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Eadie. Works by JOHN EADIE, D.D., LL.D., late Professor 
 of Biblical Literature in the Theological Seminary of the United 
 Presbyterian Church : 
 
 THE ENGLISH BIBLE. An External and Critical History 
 
 of the various English Translations of Scripture, with Remarks on the 
 
 Need of Revising the English New Testament. 2 vols. 8vo. 2&r. 
 
 "Accurate, scholarly, full of completest sympathy with the translators 
 
 and their work, and marvellously interesting." Literary Churchman. 
 
 " The work is a very -valuable one. It is the result oj '-ast labour ; 
 
 sound scholarship, and large erudition." British Quarterly Review. 
 
 ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES TO THE THESSALONIANS. 
 A Commentary on the Greek Text. Edited by the Rev. W. 
 YOUNG, M.A., with a Preface by the Rev. Professor CAIRNS, 
 D.D. 8vo. izs. 
 
 Ecce Homo. A SURVEY OF THE LIFE AND WORK OF 
 
 JESUS CHRIST. Nineteenth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 "A very original and remarkable book, full of striking thought and 
 delicate perception ; a book which has realised with wonderful rigour and 
 freshness the historical magnitude of Christ's work, and which here and 
 there gives us readings of the finest kind of the probable motive of His indi- 
 vidual words and actions." Spectator. " The best and most established 
 believer will find it adding some fresh buttresses to his faith." Literary 
 Churchman. " If we have not misunderstood him, we hare before us a 
 writer who has a right to claim deference from those who think deepest 
 and know most." Guardian. 
 
 Ellerton. THE HOLIEST MANHOOD AND ITS LES- 
 SONS FOR BUSY LIVES. Sermons preached in Barnes Church. 
 By JOHN ELLERTON, M. A., Rector of Barnes. Crown 8vo. dr. 
 
 Elliot. THE STATE AND THE CHURCH. By Hon. 
 ARTHUR ELLIOT, M.P. Crown 8vo. 2s. (x/. (English (V//,v;/ 
 Series.) 
 
 Faith and Conduct : AN ESSAY ON VERIFIABLE 
 
 RELIGION. Crown 8vo. TS. 6d. 
 
 " This book, we should judge, is the product of a mind at once earnest 
 and wtll informed. The anthoi, -she is anonymous, a'ritfs with a very 
 serious appreciation of the need of an intelligent study of the great problems 
 of religion, and he insists, by his own example, upon the duty of the 
 educated Anglican layman to face these problems." Oxford Review. 
 
 Farrar. Works by the Venerable Archdeacon FARRAR, 
 
 D.D., K.K.S., Archdeacon ami Canon of Westminster, late I lead 
 Master of Maryborough < 'olh-ge: 
 
 THE FALL OF MAN, AND OTHER SERMONS. 
 
 Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 "Ability, eloquence, scholarship, and practical usefulness, are in tluse 
 Sermon* combined in .1 rv;_r nnu\u<tl Jfgi;;: " Ilritish Quarterly Review.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 13 
 
 FARRAR (Dr.) continued. 
 
 THE WITNESS OF HISTORY TO CHRIST. Being 
 
 the HulseanLectures for 1870. Seventh Edition. Crn. 8vo. 5-r. 
 The following are the subjects of the Five Lectures: (i) The Ante- 
 cedent Credibility of the Miraculous, (2) The Adequacy of the Gospel 
 Records, (3) The Victories of Christianity, (4) Christianity and the 
 Individual, (5) Christianity and the Race. The subjects of the four 
 Appendices are : (a) The Diversity of Christian Evidences, (b) Confucius, 
 (c) Buddha, (d) Comte. 
 
 SEEKERS AFTER GOD. The Lives of Seneca, Epictetus, 
 
 and Marcus Aurelius. Eleventh Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 "A very interesting and valuable book." Saturday Review. 
 
 THE SILENCE AND VOICES OF GOD : University 
 and other Sermons. Seventh Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " They are marked by great ability, by an honesty which does not hesi- 
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 respect." Pall Mall Gazette. 
 
 " IN THE DAYS OF THY YOUTH." Sermons on Prac- 
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 Eighth Edition. Crown 8vo. gs. 
 
 "All Dr. Farrar's peculiar charm of style is apparent here, all that 
 care and subtleness of analysis, and an even-added distinctness and clear- 
 ness of moral teaching, which is what every kind of sermon wants, and 
 especially a sermon to boys." Literary Churchman. 
 
 ETERNAL HOPE. Five Sermons preached in Westminster 
 Abbey, in 1876. With Preface, Notes, etc! Contents : (i) 
 What Heaven is, (2) Is Life Worth Living? (3) ' Hell,' What it 
 is not, (4) Are there few that be saved? (5) Earthly and Future 
 Consequences of Sin. Twenty-sixth Thousand. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 SAINTLY WORKERS. Lenten Lectures delivered in St. 
 Andrew's, Holborn, March and April, 1878. Third Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 EPHPHATHA ; or the Amelioration of the World. Sermons 
 preached at Westminster Abbey. With Two Sermons at St. 
 Margaret's, Westminster, on the Opening of Parliament. Crown 
 8vo. 6s. 
 
 MERCY AND JUDGMENT. A Few Last Words on 
 Christian Eschatology, with reference to Dr. Pusey's "What is of 
 Faith ? " Second Edition. Crown 8vo. los. 6d. 
 This volume contains a further dei>elopment of the doctrines propounded 
 in Canon Farrar's former work, 'Eternal Hope,' dealing in full with 
 the objections that have been raised to the validity of those doctrines. It is, 
 therefore, an indispensable companion to the prez<ious volume. 
 
 THE MESSAGES OF THE BOOKS. Being Discourses 
 and Notes on the Books of the New Testament. Second Edition. 
 8vo. 14.^. 
 
 " Dr. Farrar's ' Messages of the Books ' is a series of thirty discourses
 
 14 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 FARRAR (Dr.) continued. 
 
 actually delivered in the pulpit, one on each of the boots of the New Testa- 
 ment, with general introductions on the Gospels, on the form of the New 
 Testament Epistles, and on the thirteen Epistles of St. Paul. . . . Those 
 who know Dr. Farrar will not be surprised at the wealth of his materials 
 and the power with which heusesthem. Fewscholars,howeverwell-inforined, 
 can read this book without learning something from it." Guardian. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF INTERPRETATION. Being the 
 Bampton Lectures, 1885. Demy 8vo. i6s. 
 
 SERMONS AND ADDRESSES DELIVERED IN 
 AMERICA. With an Introduction by PHILLIPS BROOKS, D.D. 
 Crown 8vo. Js. (>d. 
 
 44 The sermons, of which fourteen are here given, preached by Dr. 
 Farrar in Canadian and American pulpits, are marked by all the glowing 
 eloquence, literary grace, and fearless utterance which have made his dis- 
 courses in Westminster Abbey famous. The fact, however, That he was 
 preaching on American soil lends a freshness and colour at times to these 
 discourses, which invests them with peculiar interest. " Literary World. 
 
 Fellowship : LETTERS ADDRESSED TO MY SISTER 
 MOURNERS. New Edition, with additional Letters. Extra fcap. 
 8vo. 3J. &/. 
 
 Fiske. MAN'S DESTINY. Viewed in the Light of his 
 Origin. By JOHN FISKE, M. A. , LL.B., formerly Lecturer on 
 Philosophy at Harvard University. Crown 8vo. 31. 6d. 
 41 We have seldom read more strong condemnations of atheism. Amidst 
 much of the pessimistic literature of the time this work comes with a cheering 
 voice. The author has great hope for the future. Strife and sortow shall 
 disappear. Peace and love shall reign supreme. These are the vieit's put 
 forward in a book which may l/e read with interest by those embarassed or 
 pained with modern problems." Methodist Times. 
 
 Forbes THE VOICE OF GOD IN THE PSALMS. By 
 GRANVILLE H. FORBES, Rector of Broughton. Crn. 8vo. 6s. 6d. 
 
 Fowle. A NEW ANALOGY BETWEEN REVEALED 
 RELIGION AND THE COURSE AND. CONSTITUTION 
 OF NATURE. By the Rev. T. W. FOWLE, Rector of Islip, 
 Oxford. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Fraser. SERMONS. By the Right Rev. JAMES FRASER, 
 D.D., Second Bishop of Manchester. In 2 vols. I. University 
 and other Sermons. II. Parochial and other Sermons. Edited 
 by the Rev. JOHN W. DlGGLE, M.A., Author of "Godliness 
 and Manliness." Crown 8vo. 6s. each. 
 
 " The selection is well made and s/ie-u's the best characteristics of the man 
 as well as the preacher ." Cambridge Review. " They are emphatically 
 among the sermons in which the preacher ' bcin^ dead yrt tftoJutk ' ; and 
 the preacher is one with whom it is good to be." Oxford Review. "/->/. 
 Fraser's books merit a place of honour in ei'ery theological library." 
 Literary World.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 15 
 
 Eraser Hughes. JAMES FRASER, SECOND BISHOP 
 
 OF MANCHESTER. A Memoir (18181885). By THOMAS 
 
 HUGHES, Q.C. With a Portrait. New and Cheaper/ Edition. 
 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " Whoever desires to study the character of a brave, earnest, God-fearing 
 
 man who was, in the highest sense of the word, useful in his generation, 
 
 should read the life of James Fraser as it is told in Judge Hughes' 
 
 admirable volume. " Athenaeum. 
 
 Freeman. DISESTABLISHMENT AND DISENDOW- 
 MENT. WHAT ARE THEY? By E. A. FREEMAN, D.C.L., 
 LL.D., Regius Professor of Modern History in the University of 
 Oxford. Popular Edition. Crown 8vo. is. 
 
 " It is an admirable example of that historical treatment of political 
 questions which is ever the most instructive, and which is likely to build up 
 
 a school of Liberalism at once patient and progressive Meanwhile 
 
 the issues are too serious to be settled by guesswork and the baseless 
 assertions of the Liberation lecturers. They and politicians of every shade 
 will approach the discussion with clearer minds after reading Professor 
 Freeman's pamphlet. " Oxford Magazine. 
 
 Gaskoin. CHILDREN'S TREASURY OF BIBLE 
 STORIES. By Mrs. HERMAN GASKOIN. Edited, with Preface, 
 by the Rev. Canon MACLEAR, D. D. 
 
 PART I. Old Testament. i8mo. is. 
 PART II. New Testament. i8mo. u. 
 PART III. The Apostles. i8mo. is. 
 
 " This very careful and well-written work is as good an introduction to 
 Biblical History as we remember to have come across. " Educational Times. 
 
 Greek Testament. THE NEW TESTAMENT IN 
 THE ORIGINAL GREEK. The Text Revised by B. F. 
 WESTCOTT, D.D., Regius Professor of Divinity, Canon of Peter- 
 borough, and F. J. A. HORT, D.D., Hulsean Professor of 
 Divinity, Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge : late Fellows 
 of Trinity College, Cambridge. Second Edition. 2 vols. Crown 
 8vo. los. 6d. each. Vol. I. Text. Vol. II. Introduction and 
 Appendix. 
 
 THE NEW TESTAMENT IN THE ORIGINAL GREEK, 
 FOR SCHOOLS. The Text revised by BROOKE Foss WEST- 
 COTT, D.D., and FENTON JOHN ANTHONY HORT, D.D. i2mo, 
 cloth. 4s. 6d. i8mo, roan, red edges, $s. 6d. 
 
 SCHOOL READINGS IN THE GREEK TESTAMENT. 
 Being the Outline of the Life of our Lord as given by St. Mark, 
 with additions from the Text of the other Evangelists. Arranged 
 and Edited with Introduction, Notes, and Vocabulary, by the Rev. 
 A. CALVERT, M.A. Fcp. 8vo. 4*. M.
 
 16 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 GREEK TESTAMENT continued. 
 
 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. Being the Greek Text 
 as revised by Drs. WESTCOTT and HORT. With Explanatory 
 Notes by T. E.'PAGE, M.A., Assistant Master at the Charterhouse, 
 and formerly Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge. Fcap. 
 8vo. 4?. 6d. 
 
 " We regret that we have not time or space to examine in more detail this 
 admirable little book. It contains, in the briefest space, all that can 
 be needed for the adequate understanding of the text, at least for the 
 ordinary student, and even the accomplished scholar could not fail to gain 
 something from glancing at the masterly way in which Mr. Page handles 
 the most vexed passages of this difficult book." Cambridge Review. 
 
 Hamilton. ABOVE AND AROUND : THOUGHTS ON 
 GOD AND MAN. By JOHN HAMILTON, Author of "Thoughts 
 on Truth and Error." I2mo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 Hardwick. Works by the Yen. ARCHDEACON HARDWICK : 
 
 CHRIST AND OTHER MASTERS. A Historical Inquiry 
 into some of the Chief Parallelisms and Contrasts between Christ- 
 ianity and the Religious Systems of the Ancient World. New 
 Edition, revised, and a Prefatory Memoir by the Rev. FRANCIS 
 PROCTER, M.A. Sixth Edition. Crown 8vo. ior. 6</. 
 
 A HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Middle 
 Age. From Gregory the Great to the Excommunication of Luther. 
 Edited by WILLIAM STUBBS, M.A., Regius Professor of Modern 
 History in the University of Oxford. With Four Maps constructed 
 for this work by A. KEITH JOHNSTON. Sixth Edition. Crown 
 8vo. I or. 6d. 
 
 "As a Manual for the student of ecclesiastical history in the Middlt 
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 book. " Guardian. 
 
 A HISTORY of the CHRISTIAN CHURCH DURING 
 THE REFORMATION. Ninth Edition, revised by Professor 
 STUBBS. Crown 8vo. IQJ. 6d. 
 
 This volume is intended as a sequel and companion to the ' History 
 of the Christian Church during the Middle Age.' 
 
 Hare. Works by the late ARCHDEACON HARE : 
 
 THE VICTORY OF FAITH. By JULIUS CHARLES 
 HARE, M.A., late Archdeacon of Leu 1 l>y Prof. 
 
 PLUMPTRE. With Introductory Notio^ l.y the late I'rof. MAURICE 
 and the late Dean STANLEY. New Kdition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 6<i. 
 
 THE MISSION OF THK COMFORTER. With Notes. 
 New Fdition, edited by Prof. E. H. PLUMPTRE. Crown 8vo. 
 7-r. 6d.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 17 
 
 Harper. THE METAPHYSICS OF THE SCHOOL. By 
 
 Thomas Harper, S.J. In 5 vols. Vols. I. and II., 8vo. l8j. each. 
 
 Vol. III. Part I. \2s. 
 
 " If the Clergy of either communion in this country could be brought 
 to study Father Harper' 1 s book, we should augur zvell for a sounder the- 
 ology even in the next generation." Church Quarterly Review. 
 
 Harris. SERMONS. By the late GEORGE COLLYER 
 HARRIS, Prebendary of Exeter, and Vicar of St. Luke's, Torquay. 
 With Memoir by CHARLOTTE M. YONGE, and Portrait. Extra 
 fcap. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Harwood. FROM WITHIN. By GEORGE HARWOOD, 
 
 Author of "Disestablishment," "The Coming Democracy," etc. 
 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " If Mr. HanvoocTs volume cannot be pronounced unconditionally and 
 unquestionably a very good book, it can most certainly be said to be a book 
 full of good things . . . The thinking is clear, philosophical, stimulating, 
 and the seventy of the argument is relieved by passages of great beauty." 
 British Weekly. '''For this great task it must be confessed that he pos- 
 sesses several important qualifications. He is gifted with an unusual 
 facility of expression. His style is limpid, though often coloured with 
 poetic fancy .... His discussion of the questions of the existence of evil, 
 and the immortality of the soul, are characterised by unusual freshness and 
 originality. Air. Harwood carefully avoids the manner and the termino- 
 logy of t fie schools, and he has contrived to write a book on the greatest of 
 all subjects which may be read with unflagging interest from cover to cover 
 even by persons who are not skilled in philosophical and theological 
 discussion." Literary World. 
 
 Hervey. THE GENEALOGIES OF OUR LORD AND 
 SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST, as contained in the Gospels of 
 St. Matthew and St. Luke, reconciled with each other, and shewn 
 to be in harmony with the true Chronology of the Times. By Lord 
 ARTHUR HERVEY, Bishop of Bath and Wells. 8vo. los. 6d. 
 
 Hort. TWO DISSERTATIONS. I. On MONOFENH2 6EO2 
 in Scripture and Tradition. II. On the " Constantinopolitan" 
 Creed and other Eastern Creeds of the Fourth Century. By F. J. A. 
 HORT, D.D., Fellow and Divinity Lecturer of Emmanuel Col- 
 lege, Cambridge. Svo. TS. 6d. 
 
 Howson BEFORE THE TABLE. An Inquiry, Historical 
 and Theological, into the True Meaning of the Consecration 
 Rubric in the Communion Service of the Church of England. 
 By the Very Rev. J. S. HOWSON, D.D., late Dean of Chester. 
 With an Appendix and Supplement containing Papers by the 
 Right Rev. the Bishop of St. Andrews and the Rev. R. W. 
 KENNION, M.A. Svo. Ts.6d.
 
 1 8 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Hughes. THE MANLINESS OF CHRIST. By THOMAS 
 HUGHES, Author of "Tom Brown's School Days." Second Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 4-r. 6d. 
 
 "He has given to the world a volume, which so truly, and in some places so 
 picturesquely and strikingly, represents the life of our Lord, that we can 
 only express the hope that it may find its way into the hands of thousands 
 of English working men." Spectator. 
 
 Illingworth. SERMONS preached in a College Chapel. 
 With an Appendix. By J. R. Illingworth, M.A., Fellow of 
 Jesus College, and Tutor of Keble College, Oxford. Second 
 Edition. Crown 8vo. $s. 
 
 " These sermons have a rare intensity and reality of tone. . . . It is full 
 of strength, and we should be glad to induce any one to read it." 
 Spectator. 
 
 Imitatione Christi, Libri IV. Printed in Borders after 
 Holbein, Durer, and other old Masters, containing Dances of 
 Death, Acts of Mercy, Emblems, etc. New Edition. Crown 8vo, 
 cloth extra. Js. 6J. 
 
 Jacob. BUILDING IN SILENCE, AND OTHER SER- 
 MONS. By J. A. JACOB, M.A., Minister of St. Thomas's, Pad- 
 dington. Extra fcap. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 James. SCHOOL IDEALS. Sermons preached in the 
 Chapel of Rossall School. By HERBERT A. JAMES, B.D., late 
 Head Master, Dean of St. Asaph. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 The Dean of St. Asaph lays down in his preface three principles which 
 have guided him in preaching to boys at Rossall the Sermons of which a 
 selection is here published. I. That the sermons shall deal with the 
 problems of school morality with which every schoolmaster is familiar. 
 2. That they shall be as interesting as possible. 3. That they shall be 
 adapted to the varied capacities of his congregation, parts of each sermon 
 being necessarily over the heads of the younger boys but much also within 
 the grasp of all. 
 
 Jeans. HAILEYBURY CHAPEL AND OTHER SER- 
 MONS. By the Rev. G. E. JEANS, M.A., Fellow of Hertford 
 College. Fcap. 8vo. 3-r. 6d. 
 
 11 To the private schoolmaster, too, who is anxious to get wholesome and 
 pleasant religious teaching for his pupils on Sunday evenings, this little 
 volume will be very acceptable. We especially like the tone and teaching 
 embodied in the sermon which deals with ' The Liberty of an English 
 School,' and all disciples of ' Tom Brown ' will be glad to get such fresh 
 and honest teaching as that embodied tn another sermon called ' Sursum 
 Corda. ' " Schoolmaster.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 19 
 
 Jellett THE ELDER SON, AND OTHER SERMONS. 
 
 Preached before the University of Dublin by JOHN JELLETT, D.D., 
 
 formerly President of the Royal Irish Academy. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The present volume contains a selection from sermons preached by the 
 
 author before the University of Dublin during a long series of years. They 
 
 are not arranged in chronological order, but partially with regard to their 
 
 subject-matter." Extract from Author's Preface. 
 
 Jennings and Lowe. THE PSALMS, with Introduc- 
 tions and Critical Notes. By A. C. JENNINGS, M.A., Jesus Col- 
 lege, Cambridge, Tyrwhitt Scholar, Crosse Scholar, Hebrew 
 University Prizeman, and Fry Scholar of St. John's College, 
 Carus and Scholefield Prizeman, Vicar of Whittlesford, Cambs. ; 
 assisted in parts by W. H. LOWE, M. A., Hebrew Lecturer and late 
 Scholar of Christ's College, Cambridge, and Tyrwhitt Scholar. 
 In 2 vols. Second Edition, revised. Crown 8vo. los. 6d. each. 
 
 Kay. A COMMENTARY ON ST. PAUL'S TWO 
 EPISTLES TO THE CORINTHIANS. Greek Text, with 
 Commentary, by the late Rev. \V. KAY, D. D. , Rector of Great 
 Leghs, Essex, and Hon. Canon of St. Albans ; formerly Principal 
 of Bishop's College, Calcutta ; and Fellow and Tutor of Lincoln 
 College, Oxford. Demy 8vo. 9.5-. 
 
 Kellogg. THE LIGHT OF ASIA AND THE LIGHT 
 OF THE WORLD. A Comparison of the Legend, the Doctrine, 
 and the Ethics of the Buddha with the Story, the Doctrine, and 
 the Ethics of Christ. By S. H. KELLOGG, D.D., Professor in the 
 Westein Theological Seminary, Alleghany, Pa., U.S.A., Eleven 
 years Missionary to India, Corresponding Member of the American 
 Oriental Society, Author of "A Grammar of the Hindi Language 
 and Dialects," &c. Crown 8vo. "js. 6d. 
 
 "Dr. Kellogg has undertaken a somewhat thankless, and yet a very 
 necessary work, and he has done it thoroughly and well. . . Dr. Kellogg 
 sets to work to find out, by a process of critical sifting, what the points of 
 likeness really are which justify the hypothesis that one story borrowed from 
 the other, and then discusses the question whether Christianity borrowed 
 from Buddhism, or the reverse." Guardian. 
 
 Kernal and the Husk, The. LETTERS ON SPIRI- 
 TUAL CHRISTIANITY. By the Author of " Philochristus " 
 and "Onesimus." Crown 8vo. $s. 
 
 This book is dedicated to the doubters of this generation and the believers 
 of the next. " This remarkable book may be regarded as a natural com- 
 plement of the author's previous works ' Philochristus ' and ' Onesimus.' 
 It is one of the most noteworthy productions of English theology. No 
 candid reader, of whatever school of thought, can rise from its pertisal 
 without being equally. interested and equally instructed." Academy.
 
 20 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Killen. THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY OF IRE- 
 LAND from the Earliest Period to the Present Time. By W. D. 
 KII.LEX, I). D., President of Assembly's College, Belfast, and 
 Professor of Ecclesiastical History. Two vols. 8vo. 2$s. 
 " Those who have the leisure will do well to read these two volume:. 
 
 They are full of interest, and are the result of great research." Spectator. 
 
 Kingsley. Works by the Rev. CHARLES KINGSLEY, M.A., 
 late Rector of Eversley, and Canon of Westminster : 
 
 THE WATER OF LIFE, AND OTHER SERMONS. 
 Seventh Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 THE GOSPEL OF THE PENTATEUCH ; AND DAVID. 
 
 New Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 GOOD NEWS OF GOD. I2th Edition. Crn. 8vo. 6s. 
 SERMONS FOR THE TIMES. 6th Edition. Cr. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 VILLAGE AND TOWN AND COUNTRY SERMONS. 
 
 Sixth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 SERMONS on NATIONAL SUBJECTS, THE KING OF 
 THE EARTH, AND OTHER SERMONS. New Edition. Crn. Svo. 6s. 
 
 DISCIPLINE, AND OTHER SERMONS. 4th edit. Cr. Svo. 6s. 
 WESTMINSTER SERMONS. Preface. Sthedit. Cr.8vo. 6s. 
 
 OUT OF THE DEEP. Words for the Sorrowful. From 
 the Writings of CHARLES KINGSLEY. Fourth Edition. Extra 
 fcap. Svo. 3J. 6d. 
 
 DAILY THOUGHTS. Selected from the Writings of 
 CHARLES KINGSLEY. By his WIFE. 2nd Edition. Cr. Svo. dr. 
 
 " This little -volume is a birthday book of a unique kind. . . . It bears 
 on every page the stamp of Kingsley's genius, Ms frank-hearted hatred of 
 wrong, and his whole-souled allegiance to truth and duty." Pall Mall 
 Gazette. " With all this evidence of loving care we have no fault to find. 
 It speaks of reverent desire to enshrine the best thoughts of him who has 
 gone in the best way." Spectator. 
 
 FROM DEATH TO LIFE. Fragments of Teaching to a 
 Village Congregation. With Letters on the "Life After Death." 
 By the Rev. CHARLES KINGSLEY, Rector of Eversley. Edited by 
 his WIFE. Fcap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 " The volume, though mainly composed of extracts, gives a clear idea of 
 ' r'.r thoughts on After-life, thoughts which were indicated in some 
 of his novels, hut which he never completely developed. They are imbued 
 with a deep Christian spirit, tint/ the style is In fid and simple, ret lining 
 all the qualities which the reader expects from the author. The problem 
 f>f the I. iff after Ileath /in- aroused ninny speculations ; none can l>e more 
 interesting and attractive than those oj Kingsley. " Morning Post. " Tkt
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 21 
 
 volume "will be welcomed by many who have learned to care deeply for and 
 love the noble man who -worked so hard and well on behalf of all anxious 
 souls that came in his way. . . . All who revere the memory of the good 
 Rector oj Eversley, will be thankful to read the earnest ivords which he 
 ivrote and uttered concerning this subject ' Death and Life. ' " Literary 
 World. 
 
 Kuenen Wicksteed. AN HISTORICO-CRITICO IN- 
 QUIRY INTO THE ORIGIN AND COMPOSITION OF 
 THE HEXATEUCH (PENTATEUCH AND BOOK OF 
 JOSHUA). By A. KUENEN, Professor of Theology at Leiden. 
 Translated from the Dutch, with the assistance of the Author, by 
 PHILIP H. WICKSTEED, M.A. 8vo. 145-. 
 
 Kynaston. SERMONS PREACHED IN THE COL- 
 LEGE CHAPEL, CHELTENHAM, during the First Year 
 of his Office. By the Rev. HERBERT KYNASTON, M.A., Princi- 
 pal of Cheltenham College. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Lightfoot. Works by Rt. Rev. J. B. LIGHTFOOT, D.D., 
 D.C.L., LL.D., Bishop of Durham: 
 
 ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. A Re- 
 vised Text, with Introduction, Notes, and Dissertations. Ninth 
 Edition, revised. 8vo. I2s. 
 
 While the Author's object has been to make this commentary generally 
 complete, he has paid special attention to everything relating to St. Paul's 
 personal history and his intercourse with the Apostles and Church of the 
 Circumcision, as it is this feature in the Epistle to the Galatians which 
 has given it an overwhelming interest in recent theological controversy. 
 ' ' There is no commentator at once of sounder judgment and more liberal 
 than Dr. Lightfoot." Spectator. 
 
 ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. A 
 Revised Text, with Introduction, Notes, and Dissertations. Ninth 
 Edition, revised. 8vo. 12s. 
 
 "JVo commentary in the English language can be compared with it in 
 regard to fulness of information, exact scholarship, and laboured attempts 
 to settle everything about the epistle on a solid foundation." Athenaeum. 
 
 ST. PAUL'S EPISTLES TO THE COLOSSIANS AND 
 TO PHILEMON. A Revised Text with Introduction, Notes, etc. 
 Eighth Edition, revised. 8vo. 12s. 
 
 " It bears marks of continued and extended reading and research, and 
 of ampler materials at command. Indeed, it leaves nothing to be desired 
 by those who seek to study thoroughly the epistles contained in it, and to do 
 so with all knmun advantages presented in sufficient detail and in conve- 
 nient form. " Guardian. 
 
 ST. CLEMENT OF ROME. An Appendix containing the 
 newly discovered portions of the two Epistles to the Corinthians, 
 with Introductions, Notes, and a i ran.slalionof the whole. Mv<. !v. 6</.
 
 22 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 LIGHTFOOT (T>r.)-continued. 
 
 PRIMARY CHARGE. Two Addresses delivered to the 
 Clergy of the Diocese of Durham, 1882. 8vo. 2s. 
 
 THE APOSTOLIC FATHERS. Part II. St. Ignatius St. 
 Polycarp. Revised Texts with Introductions, Notes, Dissertations, 
 and Translations. 2 vols. in 3. Demy 8vo. 48^. 
 
 " This is a work of that rare kind which gives the utmost satisfaction to 
 the scholar and the theologian. There is no need to look beyond it for any 
 information that pertains to its subject. The volumes are exhaustive. 
 Bishop Lightfoot appears to be a writer who 'leaves nothing in his 
 inkstand. ' " Guardian. " ft is characterised throughout by the admira- 
 ble thoroughness with which Bishop Lightfoot does all his literary work, 
 for I do not know any writer who inspires his readers with more fust con- 
 fidence that no -work has been scamped, that on every question all the 
 available evidence has been laid before them, and the arguments on both 
 sidts fairly presented. " Academy. 
 
 A CHARGE DELIVERED TO THE CLERGY OF 
 THE DIOCESE OF DURHAM, NOVEMBER, 25, 1886. 8vo. 2s. 
 
 Lowe. THE HEBREW STUDENT'S COMMENTARY 
 ON ZECHARIAH, HEBRE\V AND LXX. \Vith Excursus 
 on Syllable-dividing, Metheg, Initial Dagesh, and Siman Rapheh. 
 By W. H. LOWE, M.A., Hebrew Lecturer at Christ's College, 
 Cambridge. Demy 8vo. IQJ. 6d. 
 
 Maclaren. SERMONS PREACHED at MANCHESTER. 
 By ALEXANDER MACLAREN. Tenth Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 4?. 6d. 
 
 These Sermons represent no special school, but deal with the broad prin- 
 ciples of Christian truth, especially in their bearing on practical, every-day 
 life. A few of the titles are: " The Stone oj Stumbling," "L0i'f and 
 Forgiveness," "The Living Dead," "Memory in Another H'orld," 
 " Faith in Christ," "Love and Fear," " T/ie Choice of Wisdom," " The 
 Food of the World." 
 
 A SECOND SERIES OF SERMONS. Seventh Edition. 
 Fcap. 8vo. 4J. 6d. 
 
 The Spectator characterises then: as "vigorous in style, full of thought, 
 rich in illustration, and in an unusual degree interesting. " 
 
 A THIRD SERIES OF SERMONS. Sixth Edition. Fcp. 
 
 8vo. 4J. 6d. 
 
 1 ' Sermons more sober and yet more forcible, and with a certain wise and 
 practical spirituality about them it would not be easy to find." Spectator. 
 
 WEEK-DAY EVENING ADDRESSES. Delivered in 
 Manchester. Fourth Edition. Extra fcap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 THE SECRET OF l'o\\I K. \\n OTHER SERMONS. 
 
 Preached nt Mnnrlir ' 4-f. 6d.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 23 
 
 Maclear. Works by the Rev. Canon MACLEAR, D.D., Warden 
 of St. Augustine's, Canterbury, late Head Master of King's College 
 School : 
 
 A CLASS-BOOK OF OLD TESTAMENT HISTORY. 
 With Four Maps. New Edition. i8mo. 4^. 6d. 
 
 " 'The present volume" says the Preface, '''forms a Class- Book oj Old 
 Testament History from the Earliest Times to those of Ezra and Nehe- 
 mia/i. In its preparation the most recent authorities have been consulted, 
 and -wherever it has appeared useful, Notes have been subjoined illustra- 
 tive of the Text, and, for the sake of more advanced students, references 
 added to larger works. The Index has been so arranged as to form a 
 concise Dictionary of the Persons and Places mentioned in the course of the 
 Narrative. " The Maps, prepared by Stanford, materially add to the 
 value and usefulness of the book. The British Quarterly Review calls it 
 "a careful and elaborate, though brief compendium of all that modern 
 research has done for the illustration of the Old Testament. We know of 
 no -work which contains so much important information in so small a 
 compass. " 
 
 A CLASS-BOOK OF NEW TESTAMENT HISTORY. 
 Including the Connexion of the Old and New Testament. New 
 Edition. i8mo. 5-r. 6d. 
 
 The present volume forms a sequel to the Author's Class-Book of Old 
 Testament History, and continues the narrative to the close of St. PauFs 
 second imprisonment at Rome. The work is divided into three Books 
 /. The Connexion behveen the Old and New Testament. II. The 
 Gospel History. III. The Apostolic History. In the Appendix are given 
 Chronological Tables. The Clerical Journal says, "It is not often that 
 such an amount of useful and interesting matter on biblical subjects is 
 found in so convenient and small a compass as in this well-arranged 
 volume. " 
 
 A CLASS-BOOK OF THE CATECHISM OF THE 
 CHURCH OF ENGLAND. New and Cheaper Edition. i8mo. 
 is. 6d. 
 
 The present work is intended as a sequel to the two preceding books. 
 ' ' Like them, it is furnished with notes and references to larger works, 
 and it is hoped that it may be found, especially in the higher forms of our 
 Public Schools, to supply a suitable manual of instruction in the chief 
 doctrines of our Church, and a useful help in the preparation of Can- 
 didates for Confirmation." The Literary Churchman says, ft It is indeed 
 the work of a scholar and divine, and as such, though extremely simple, it 
 is also extremely instructive. There are few clergy who would not find 
 it useful in preparing Candidates for Confirmation ; and there are not a 
 few who would find it useful to themselves as well. " 
 
 A FIRST CLASS-BOOK OF THE CATECHISM OF 
 THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND, with Scripture Proofs for 
 Junior Classes and Schools. New Edition. i8mo. fxl. 
 This is an epitome of the larger Class-book, meant for junior students 
 and elementary classes. The book has been carefully condensed, so as to 
 contain clearly and fully the most important part of the contents of the 
 larger book.
 
 24 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 MACLEAR (Dr.} continued. 
 
 A SHILLING-BOOK of OLD TESTAMENT HISTORY. 
 New Edition. i8mo. 
 
 Tliis Manual bears the same relation to the larger Old Testament His- 
 tory, that the book just mentioned does to the larger "work on the Catechism. 
 It consists of Ten Books, divided into short chapters, and subdivided into 
 sections, each section treating of a single episode in the history, the title of 
 which is given in bold type. 
 
 A SHILLING-BOOK of NEW TESTAMENT HISTORY. 
 New Edition. i8mo. 
 
 A MANUAL OF INSTRUCTION FOR CONFIRMA- 
 TION AND FIRST COMMUNION, with Prayers and Devo- 
 tions. New Edition. 32mo. 2s. 
 
 This is an enlarged and improved edition of 'The Order of Confirma- 
 tion.' To it have been added the Communion Office, with A T otes and 
 Explanations, together with a brief form of Self-Examination and De- 
 votions selected from the works of Cosin, Ken, Wilson, and others. 
 
 THE ORDER OF CONFIRMATION, with Prayers and 
 Devotions. New Edition. 32mo. 6d. 
 
 THE FIRST COMMUNION, with Prayers and Devotions 
 for the Newly Confirmed. New Edition. 32mo. 6d. 
 
 THE HOUR OF SORROW ; or, The Order for the Burial 
 of the Dead. With Prayers and Hymns. 32mo. 2s. 
 
 APOSTLES OF MEDIAEVAL EUROPE. Cr. 8vo. ^s.6d. 
 
 "Afr. Maclear will have done a great work if his admirable little volume 
 shall help to break up the dense ignorance which is still prevailing among 
 people at large." Literary Churchman. 
 
 THE EVIDENTIAL VALUE OF THE HOLY EU- 
 CHARIST. Being the Boyle Lectures for 18791880, delivered 
 in the Chapel Royal, Whitehall. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 " There is much that is striking in tins volume. . . This valuable book. 
 Dr. Maclear enters very carejuliy into Christ's prophesies of his own 
 suffering and death. . . . All this Dr. Maclear puts in a very clear and 
 forcible way." Spectator. 
 
 Macmillan. Works by the Rev. HUGH MACMILLAN, LL.D., 
 F.K.S.E. (For other works by the same Author, see CATALOGUE 
 OF TRAVELS and SCIENTIFIC CATALOGUE.) 
 
 TWO WORLDS ARE OURS. Third Edition. Globe 
 8vo. dr. 
 
 THE TRUE VINE; or, the Analogies of our Lord's 
 Allegory. Fifth Kdition. Globe 8vo. 6s. 
 
 The Nonconformist says " // abounds in t-xi/nisitc bits nj dcMription, 
 and in striking fuel* clearly stated. " The British (Quarterly says "Readers 
 and preachers who are iin^ii-iitiju will find many oj his illustration!, as 
 valuable as they are beautiful. "
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 25 
 
 MACMILLAN (Dr. Hugh) continued. 
 
 BIBLE TEACHINGS IN NATURE. Fifteenth Edition. 
 Globe 8vo. 6s. 
 
 In this volume the author has endeavoured to shew that the teaching of 
 Nature and the teaching of the Bible are directed to the same great end ; 
 that the Bible contains the spiritual truths which are necessary to make us 
 wise unto salvation, and the objects and scenes of Nature are the pictures 
 by -which these truths are illustrated. "He has made the world more 
 beautiful to us, and unsealed our ears to voices of praise and messages of 
 Icrve that might othei~ivise have been unheard. " British Quarterly Review. 
 " Dr. Macmillan has produced a book which may be fitly described as 
 one of the happiest efforts for enlisting physical science in the direct service 
 of religion. " Guardian. 
 
 THE SABBATH OF THE FIELDS. A Sequel to 'Bible 
 Teachings in Nature. ' Fifth Edition. Globe 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " This volume, like all Dr. Macmillan 's productions, is very delight- 
 ful reading, ami of a special kind. Imagination, natural science, and 
 religious instruction are blended together in a very charming 'way. " 
 British Quarterly Review. 
 
 THE MINISTRY OF NATURE. Seventh Edition. Globe 
 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " Whether the reader agree or not with his conclusions, he will ac- 
 knowledge he is in the presence of an original and thoughtful writer. " 
 Pall Mall Gazette. " There is no class of educated men and women that 
 will not profit by these essays." Standard. 
 
 THE MARRIAGE IN CANA OF GALILEE. Globe 8vo. 6s. 
 THE OLIVE LEAF. Globe 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Mahaffy. THE DECAY OF MODERN PREACHING. 
 
 By Rev. J. P. MAHAFFY, M.A., D.D., Fellow of Trinity College, 
 
 Dublin. Crown 8vo. 3.?. 6d. 
 
 " Clever and sensible in most of its criticisms and suggestions." 
 Saturday Review. "An excellent book." Church of England Pulpit. 
 ' ' Thoroughly worth reading. " Scotsman. 
 
 Materialism: Ancient and Modern. By a late Fellow 
 of Trinity College, Cambridge. Crown 8vo. 2s. 
 
 Maurice. LIFE OF FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE. 
 Chiefly told in his own Letters. Edited by his Son, FREDERICK 
 MAURICE. With Two Portraits. Third Edition. 2 vols. 8vo. 36^. 
 
 Fourth and Popular Edition. 4th Thousand. 2 vols. Cr. 8vo. i6s. 
 
 " This book is one of profound interest, and, both from the fresh light 
 which it thrcnus upon certain aspects of the religious history of England, 
 and from the fresh means winch it affords us of understanding a singularly 
 beautiful character, it is cordially to be welcomed. . . . It is impossible to 
 rise from the readings of these volumes wilhout a feeling of increased respect 
 and indeed of reverence for their subject." Timc.x
 
 26 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Maurice. Works by the late Rev. F. D. MAURICE, M.A., 
 Professor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Cambridge : 
 
 The Spectator says "Peiu of those of our own generation whose names 
 will live in English history or literature have exerted so profound and so 
 permanent an influence as Mr. Maurice. " 
 
 THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST; or, HINTS TO A QUAKER 
 
 RESPECTING THE PRINCIPLES, CONSTITUTION, AND ORDI- 
 NANCES OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. Third Edition. 2 vols. 
 Crown 8vo. I2j. 
 
 LECTURES ON THE APOCALYPSE, or BOOK OF THE 
 REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE. Second Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 THE UNITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. A Synop- 
 sis of the First Three Gospels, and of the Epistles of St. James, 
 St. Jude, St. Peter, and St. Paul. Second Edition. 2 vols. 
 Crown 8vo. I2J. 
 
 THE PATRIARCHS AND LAWGIVERS OF THE 
 OLD TESTAMENT. Seventh and Cheaper Edit. Cr. 8vo. 4*. 6d. 
 TTte Nineteen Discourses contained in this volume were preached in the 
 chapel of Lincoln's Inn during the year 1851. 
 
 THE PROPHETS AND KINGS OF THE OLD TES- 
 TAMENT. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 THE GOSPEL OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. 
 A Series of Lectures on the Gospel of St. Luke. Second Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. A Series of Discourses. 
 Seventh Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 The Literary Churchman thus speaks of this volume: " Thorough 
 honesty, reverence, and deep thought pervade the work, which is every 
 way solid and philosophical, as well as theological, and abounding with 
 suggestions which the patient student may draw out more at length for 
 himself." 
 
 THE EPISTLES OF ST. JOHN. A Series of Lectures 
 on Christian Ethics. Fourth and Cheaper Edition. Cr. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 These Lectures on Christian Ethics were delivered to the students of the 
 Working Men's College, Great Ormond Street, London, on a series of 
 Sunday mornings. 
 
 EXPOSITORY SERMONS ON THE PRAYER-BOOK. 
 The Prayer-book considered especially in reference to the Romish 
 System ; and the Lord's I'rayt i. Crown 8vo. dr. 
 After an Introductory Sermon, Mr. Maurice goes over the rarwua parts 
 of the Church Service, expounds in fi.'hteen Sermons their intention ami 
 tignififiince, and shews honv appropriate they are as expressions of tlif 
 deepest longings and wants of all classes of men.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 27 
 
 MAURICE (Rev. F. D.) continued. 
 
 THEOLOGICAL ESSAYS. Fourth Edition, with new 
 Preface. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The book" says Mr. Maurice, "expresses thoughts which have been 
 working in my mind for years ; the method of it has not been adopted 
 carelessly ; even the composition has undergone frequent revision." 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICE DEDUCED FROM 
 THE SCRIPTURES. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6*. 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE WORLD, AND THEIR 
 RELATIONS TO CHRISTIANITY. Sixth Edition. Crown 
 8vo. 4^. 6</. 
 
 ON THE SABBATH DAY ; the Character of the Warrior, 
 
 and on the Interpretation of History. Fcap. 8vo. zs. 6d. 
 
 THE LORD'S PRAYER, THE CREED, AND THE 
 
 COMMANDMENTS. A Manual for Parents and Schoolmasters. 
 To which is added the Order of the Scriptures. i8mo, cloth 
 limp. 15. 
 
 SOCIAL MORALITY. Twenty-one Lectures delivered in 
 the University of Cambridge. Third and Cheaper Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 DIALOGUES ON FAMILY WORSHIP. Cr. 8vo. 4^.6^. 
 
 THE CONSCIENCE : Lectures on Casuistry, delivered in the 
 University of Cambridge. 3rd and cheaper Edition. Cr.Svo. qs.6d. 
 
 The Saturday Review says : " We rise from the perusal of these lec- 
 tures with a detestation of all that is selfish and mean, and with a living 
 impression that there is such a thing as goodness after all." 
 
 LEARNING AND WORKING. Six Lectures delivered 
 in Willis's Rooms, London, in June and July, 1854. THE 
 RELIGION OF ROME, and its Influence on Modern Civilisa- 
 tion. Four Lectures delivered in the Philosophical Institution of 
 Edinburgh, in December, 1854. Crown 8vo. 4*. 6d. 
 
 SERMONS PREACHED IN COUNTRY CHURCHES. 
 Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " Earnest, practical, and extremely simple." Literary Churchman. 
 " Good specimens of his simple and earnest eloquence. The Gospel inci- 
 dents are realized with a vividness which we can well believe made the 
 common people hear him gladly. Moreover, they are sermons which must 
 have done the hearers good. " John Bull. 
 
 Milligan. Works by the Rev. Professor MILLIGAN, D.D., 
 
 Professor of Divinity and Biblical Criticism in the University of 
 Aberdeen : 
 
 THE RESURRECTION OF OUR LORD. The Croal! 
 Lecture for 1879 80. New and Cheaper Edition. Cr. 8vo. $s.
 
 28 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 MILLIGAN (Prof.) continued. 
 
 THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. Being the Baird 
 Lecture, 1885. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. "js. 6d. 
 
 " The Bible student -will find special value in Dr. Milligarfs careful 
 analysis of the structure and the plan of the book before us." Literary 
 World. " The book is a valuable addition to bMical criticism." Spectator. 
 
 Moorhouse. JACOB. Three Sermons preached before the 
 University of Cambridge in Lent, 1870. By JAMES MOORHOUSE, 
 M.A., Bishop of Manchester. Extra fcap. 8vo. 3*. 6d. 
 
 Natural Religion. By the Author of "Ecce Homo." 
 Second Edition. Fourth Thousand, with New Preface. 8vo. Qs. 
 " This is one of those rart things in our modern literature a really 
 speculative book ; and the speculation, whatever else we may think of it, is 
 both ingenious and setious. It is work in the region not of dogmas or 
 controversies, but of ideas. Pall Mall Gazette. " The wider problem of 
 the present day if dealt with here with more originality, and at least as 
 much force, as the narrower one was in ' Ecce Homo ' ; /'/ may be even 
 thought that the steps taken here towards a solution are of more solid and 
 permanent value." Academy. 
 
 O'Brien. PRAYER. Five Sermons preached in the Chapel 
 of Trinity College, Dublin. By JAMES THOMAS O'BRIEN, D.D., 
 late Bishop of Ossory, Ferns, and Leighlin. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Palgrave. HYMNS. By FRANCIS TURNER PALGRAVE. 
 
 Third Edition, enlarged. i8mo. is. 6d. 
 
 This is a collection of twenty original Hymns, which the Literary 
 Churchman speaks of as "so choice, so perfect, and so refined, so tender 
 in feeling, and so scholarly in expression." 
 
 Pattison. Works by MARK PATTISON, late Rector of 
 Lincoln College, Oxford : 
 
 MEMOIRS. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. %s.(xi. 
 
 " No Oxford man can read this volume without the keenest interest ; no 
 historian of the University but must be thankful for its glimpses of the 
 period which changed the shrine, and stronghold, and model at once of 
 immai'eable Conservatism into one of the most unstable phenomena of an 
 unstable age .... Perhaps, indeed, he was the last specimen of one kind 
 of great scholar that this generation, and not a few generations to come, 
 will see." Saturday Review. 
 
 SERMONS. Crown 8vo. dr. 
 
 " These are sermons to make men think seriously and feel their way, and 
 to brace and invigorate those who feel they want a tonic or a keener air. " 
 Times. " They embody a consistent ivholt of opinion as far as it goes, 
 and they offer so many occasions for comment and touch incidentally on 
 such varitd and interesting questions in theology, philosophy, history, and 
 practical politics, thnt to deal with them in the limits oj n singlf notice 
 would be as presumptuous as it is impossible. .... This scanty book, a 
 small part of him who was much, is in itstlf, and compared to others, 
 truly x>,:it, an,f ^reat enough to Ih-e." Academy.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 29 
 
 Paul of Tarsus. An Inquiry into the Times and the Gospel 
 of the Apostle of the Gentiles. By a GRADUATE. 8vo. los. (>d. 
 
 ' ' No thoughtful reader will rise from its perusal without a real and 
 lasting profit to himself, and a sense of permanent addition tf. the cause 
 of truth." Standard. 
 
 Philochristus. MEMOIRS OF A DISCIPLE OF THE 
 LORD. Third Edition. Svo. 12s. 
 
 " The winning beauty of this book and the fascinating power with 
 which the subject of it appeals to all English minds will secure for it 
 many readers. " Contemporary Review. 
 
 Picton. THE MYSTERY OF MATTER ; and other Essays. 
 By J. ALLANSON PICTON, Author of 'New Theories and the 
 Old Faith. ' Cheaper Edition. With New Preface. Crown Svo. 6s. 
 
 Plumptre MOVEMENTS IN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. 
 Sermons preached before the University of Cambridge, Lent Term, 
 1879. By E. H. PLUMPTRE, D.D., Professor of Divinity, King's 
 College, London, Prebendary of St. Paul's, etc. Fcap. Svo. 3-r. 6d. 
 
 Potter. THE RELATION OF ETHICS TO RELIGION. 
 An Introduction to the Critical Study of Christianity. By ROBERT 
 POTTER, M.A. , Lecturer on Christian Evidences in Trinity Col- 
 lege, Melbourne ; Examiner in Logic and Philosophy in the 
 University of Melbourne ; Canon of St. Paul's, Melbourne. 
 Crown Svo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 Procter. A HISTORY OF THE BOOK OF COMMON 
 PRAYER : With a Rationale of its Offices. By FRANCIS PROCTER, 
 M.A. Seventeenth Edition, revised and enlarged. Crown Svo. 
 I or. 6d. 
 
 The Athenaeum says: "The origin of every part of the Prayer-book 
 has been diligently investigated, and there are fnv questions or facts con- 
 nected with it which are not either sufficiently explained, or so referred to 
 that persons interested may work out the truth for themselves." 
 
 Procter and Maclear. AN ELEMENTARY INTRO- 
 DUCTION TO THE BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER. 
 Re-arranged and Supplemented by an Explanation of the Morning 
 and Evening Prayer and the Litany. By F. PROCTER, M.A., and 
 Canon MACLEAR, D.D. New Edition. Enlarged by the addition 
 of the Communion Service and the Baptismal and Confirmation 
 Offices. iSmo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 The Literary Churchman characterises it as " by far the completest 
 and most satis far/on' book of its kind we knoiv. We wish it were in 
 the hands of every schoolboy and every schoolmaster in the kingdom."
 
 30 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Psalter (Golden Treasury). THE STUDENT'S EDITION. 
 
 Being an Edition of the Psalms of David chronologically arranged 
 with briefer Notes. Second Edition. i8mo. 3-f. 6d. 
 The aim of this edition is simply to put the reader as far as possible in 
 possession of the plain meaning of the writer. " It is a gem, " the Non- 
 conformist says. 
 
 Rays of Sunlight for Dark Days. A Book of Selec- 
 tions for the Suffering. With a Preface by C. J. VAUGHAN, D.D. 
 i8mo New Edition. 3^. 6d. 
 
 Dr. Vaughan says in the Preface, after speaking of the general run of 
 Books of Comfort for Mourners : "ft is because I think that the little 
 volume now offered to the Christian sufferer is one of greater wisdom and 
 of deeper experience, that I have readily consented to the request that I 
 would introduce it by a few words of Preface." The book consists of a 
 series of very brief extracts from a great variety of authors, in prose and 
 poetry, suited to the many moods of a mourning or suffering mind. 
 
 Reasonable Faith, A. Short Religious Essays for the 
 
 Times. By "THREE FRIENDS." Third Edition. Cm. 8vo. is. 
 
 " Here is built up an eloquent vindication of reverent freedom of thought 
 
 in regard to dogmatic theology which is deserving of the attention of all 
 
 who venture to think upon the subject." Scotsman. 
 
 Rendall. Works by the Rev. FREDERIC RENDALL, A.M., 
 formerly Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and late Assistant 
 Master of Harrow School : 
 
 THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS IN GREEK AND 
 ENGLISH. With Critical and Explanatory Notes. Cr. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " To say of the critical and explanatory notes, by which the text is illus- 
 trated, that they are largely original is but the slightest part of the praise 
 to which they are entitled. They are manifestly the work of a ripe and 
 judicious scholar, and in almost every case are highly suggesth-e .... 
 The work is, taking it as a whole, judicious, scholarly, and to a large 
 extent original." Scotsman. 
 
 THE THEOLOGY OF THE HEBREW CHRISTIANS. 
 Crown 8vo. $s. 
 
 " Mr. Rendall in this volume follows out certain lines of thought started 
 by him in his useful and scholar-like commentary on the Epistle to the 
 Hebrcivs. . . . He has gathered and grouped the various items of 
 information bearing on his subject with mtifh ingenuity, and brings out 
 his results clearly and brightly. Guardian. 
 
 Reynolds. NOTES OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. A 
 Selection of Sermons by HKNRY ROKKKT REYNOLDS, B.A., 
 PrcMilent of Cheshunt College, and Fellow of University College, 
 London. Crown 8vo. TS. 6d.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 31 
 
 Robinson. MAN IN THE IMAGE OF GOD ; and other 
 
 Sermons preached in the Chapel of the Magdalen, Streatham, 
 1874 76. By H. G. ROBINSON, M.A., late Prebendary of York. 
 Crown 8vo. Js. 6d. 
 
 Rushbrooke. SYNOPTICON : An Exposition of the 
 Common Matter of the Synoptic Gospels. By W. G. RUSHBROOKE, 
 M.L., Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge. Printed in colours. 
 In Six Parts and Appendices. 410. Part I. y. 6d. Parts II. and 
 III. is. Parts IV. V. and VI. With Indices, los. 6d. Ap- 
 pendices, los. (>d., or the complete work, in one vol. cloth, 35*. 
 
 Salmon. Works by the Rev. GEORGE SALMON, D.D.,Provost 
 of Trinity College, Dublin, and Chancellor of St. Patrick's 
 Cathedral : 
 
 GNOSTICISM AND AGNOSTICISM, AND OTHER SER- 
 MONS. Crown 8vo. 7*. 6d. 
 
 " The name of Dr. Salmon is of European reputation, and the -weight 
 it carries is all the greater because this reputation was originally gained in 
 another field of labour. Dr. Salmon's works have for many years been 
 the standard treatises for advanced students in somt of the highest branches 
 of modern mathematical science .... Apart from the authority which his 
 name commands, the tone of his argument exhibits the best aspects of 
 scientific thought. Two or three volumes of sermons, which he had pre- 
 viously published, were conspicuous examples of the introduction of this 
 
 scientific tone into theological discussion There is nothing startling 
 
 or even attractive about the opening methods of address ; but before you are 
 aware of it you are convinced of some solemn truth of theology or religion. 
 We hope Dr. Salmon will be encouraged to give us some more of these 
 sermons, for they are eminently calculated to influence and convince 
 thoughtful minds at the present day," Quarterly Review. 
 
 NON-MIRACULOUS CHRISTIANITY, AND OTHER 
 SERMONS. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Schaff. A COMPANION TO THE GREEK TESTA- 
 MENT AND THE ENGLISH VERSION. By PHILLIP 
 SCHAFF, D.D., President of the American Committee of Revision. 
 With Facsimile Illustrations of MSS. and Standard Editions of the 
 New Testament. Crown 8vo. 12s. 
 
 Scotch Sermons, 1880. By Principal CAIRO; Rev. J. 
 
 CUNNINGHAM, D.D. ; Rev. D. J. FERGUSON, B.D. ; Professor 
 
 WM. KNIGHT, LL.D. ; Rev. W. MACKINTOSH, D.D. ; Rev. 
 
 W. L. M'FARLAN; Rev. ALLAN MENZIES, B.D. ; Rev. T. 
 
 NICOLL; Rev. T. RAIN, M.A. ; Rev. A. SEMPLE, B.D. ; Rev. 
 
 J. STEVENSON ; Rev. PATRICK STEVENSON ; Rev. R. H. STORY, 
 
 D.D. Third Edition. 8vo. IGJ. 6d. 
 
 The Pall Mall Gazette says : " The publication of a volume of Scotch 
 Sermons, contributed by members of the Established Church, seems likely 
 to cause as much commotion in that body as ' Essays and Reviews ' did 
 in the Church of England."
 
 32 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Selborne. Works by ROUNDELL, EARL OF SELBORNE. 
 
 THE BOOK OF PRAISE : From the Best English Hymn 
 Writers. Selected and arranged by Earl SELBORNE. With 
 Vignette by T. WOOLNER, R.A. New Edition. i8mo. 4-r. 6d. 
 
 It has bten the Editor's desire and aim to adhere strictly, in all cases in 
 which it could be ascertained, to the genuine uncorrupted text of the authors 
 themselves. The names of the authors and date of composition of the 
 hymns, when known, are affixed, while notes are added to the volume, 
 giving further details. The Hymns are arranged according to subjects. 
 ' ' There is not room for two opinions as to the value of the 'Book of Praise. ' " 
 Guardian. "Approaches as nearly as one can concave to perfection." 
 Nonconformist 
 
 BOOK OF PRAISE HYMNAL. See end of this Catalogue. 
 
 A DEFENCE OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND 
 AGAINST DISESTABLISHMENT. With an Introductory 
 Letter to the Right Hon. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. Fourth and 
 Popular Edition. Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 This is a book that will command the attention of all who are interested 
 in the subject from whatever point of view. In the Introductory Letter to 
 Mr. Gladstone Lord Selborne examines minutely the present condition of 
 the relations between Church and State in other civilised countries. The 
 whole question of Disestablishment is then treated systt maticallv in its legal, 
 religious, and i>ractical aspects under three main heads : ( i ) The Church 
 and its Establishment ; (2) Church Endowments ; (3) The Adversaries 
 and their Case. " friends and foes of the Church of England will alike 
 turn with attentive interest to the Earl of Selborne s new book. 7 
 that the argument advanced in this important treatise is weighty, judicious, 
 temperate, learned, and cogent is only to say that it is the work of Lord 
 Selborne. It will fortify the friends of the Church in the convictions they 
 entertain, and it will also compel its adversaries to revise many of their 
 arguments an</ to re-consider their whole position. For this reason the 
 publication of this volume at this present juncture is singularly opportune. " 
 Times. 
 
 THE PRESENT POSITION AND FUTURE PROS- 
 PECTS OF Till: CIirRCIl IN WALKS. An Address de- 
 livered to the Students of St. David's College, Lampeter, in the 
 presence of the four Bishops of the Principality, Oct. 28th, 1887. 
 8vo. id. 
 
 ANCIENT FACTS AND FICTIONS CONCERNING 
 
 L 1 1 U K(. 1 1 !> A N I ) TITI I F.S. Crown 8vo. 7s. &/. 
 
 " // is a little to be regretted that I^rd Selborne has given to this work 
 the title\ 'Ancient Facts and Fictions concerning Churches and Tithes.' 
 77tis description does not do complete justice to his labours ; their import- 
 ance and vtiltie are not denoted . . . Should grtiit ifiifstions of ecclesiastical 
 hislo: ,-r'fr again come before the courts, they are likely to be dis- 
 
 cussed, if only in consequence of these volumes, with more precision and
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOK'S. 33 
 
 accurate knowledge than was shewn in cases to which we need not more 
 particularly refer .... Such is the nature and character of this little 
 volume, unpretending, learned, accurate, painstaking, impartial. It is 
 a valuable, almost necessary, supplement to Lord Selborne's previous work. 
 It will be an aid to the ecclesiastical historian ; and, not to its least merit, 
 it sheii's hcnu a scrupulous mind prepares itself for engaging in a 
 momentous controversy, " Times. 
 
 Sermons out of Church. By the Author of "John 
 Halifax, Gentleman." New Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 Speaking of this volume the Reviewers remark: " We have read this 
 book with no small pleasure. The atithor is well entitled to speak on 
 many of the questions she has raised here. In many ways her book is 
 timely." British Quarterly Review. " We may fairly advise young 
 housekeepers especially diligently to study the pages devoted to the Servant 
 question but called ' My Brother's Keeper' a simple, practical, wise 
 treatise on a difficult subject. " Spectator. 
 
 Service. Works by the Rev. JOHN SERVICE, D.D., late 
 Minister of Inch : 
 
 SALVATION HERE AND HEREAFTER. Sermons 
 and Essays. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 ' ' We have enjoyed to-day a rare pleasure, having just closed a volume 
 of sermons which rings true metal from title-page to finis, and proves that 
 another and very powerful recruit has been added to that small band of 
 ministers of the Gospel who are not only abreast of the religious thought 
 of their time, but have faith enough and courage enough to handle the 
 questions which are the most critical, ami stir men's minds most deeply, 
 with frankness and thoroughness." Spectator. 
 
 SERMONS. With Prefatory Notice and Portrait. Crown 
 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The reader not already acquainted with Dr. Service's writings will 
 be surprised here to find some very different from what he is wont to asso- 
 cia'e with the pulpit discourses of the Church of Scotland. There is much 
 earnestness and thoughtful ness in Dr. Service's Sermons." Academy. 
 
 PRAYERS FOR PUBLIC WORSHIP. Crn. 8vo. 4^. 6d. 
 
 "No one will read these prayers without being struck by the spirit of 
 reverential piety which is displayed in every page. The style is chaste and 
 beautiful. \Vhat work the publishers have had to do is done admirably." 
 Glasgow Herald. 
 
 Smith (R. Payne). PROPHECY A PREPARATION 
 FOR CHRIST. Eight Lectures preached before the University 
 of Oxford. Being the Bam pton Lectures for 1869. By R. PAYNE 
 SMITH, D.D., Dean of Canterbury. Second and Cheaper Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 3
 
 34 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Smith (R. T.). MAN'S KNOWLEDGE OF MAN AND 
 OF GOD. Being the Donellan Lectures for 1885. By R. T. 
 SMITH, Vicar of St. Bartholomew's and Canon of St. Patrick's, 
 Dublin. Crown 8vo. 6j. 
 
 The subject treated of in this -work is dealt with under the following 
 heads: (i) Inti eduction ; (2) Self-Kmnvledxe ; (3) Knowledge of Man ; 
 (4) We know God through Self- Knowledge ; (5) We know God in Nature 
 and Man ; (6) God Revealed. " This is a thoughtful book and reflects 
 
 much credit on its author as a metaphysician and ethical scholar 
 
 We consider this book, so far as it may succeed in gaining the ear of the 
 educated public, will be acknowledged a helpful contribution to Mental 
 Science." Dublin Evening Mail. 
 
 Stanley. Works by the Very Rev. A. P. STANLEY, D.D., late 
 Dean of Westminster : 
 
 THE ATHANASIAN CREED, with a Preface on the 
 General Recommendations of the RITUAL COMMISSION. Crown 
 8vo. 2s. 
 
 "Dr. Stanley puts with admirable force the objections which may be 
 made to the Creed ; equally admirable, we think, is his statement of its 
 ad-vantages. " Spectator. 
 
 THE NATIONAL THANKSGIVING. Sermons preached 
 in Westminster Abbey. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 ADDRESSES AND SERMONS AT ST. ANDREWS 
 in 1872, 1875 and 1876. Crown 8vo. 5J. 
 
 ADDRESS AND SERMONS. Delivered during a Visit 
 to the United States and Canada, in 1878. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The great value of this little volume is that it represents what Dean 
 Stanley thought and said under other conditions than those which here 
 prevail, and beneath influences more conducive to the development of liberal 
 theology than the shadoiu of an ancient English abbey. To all those who 
 desire to know the length and breadth and depth and height of a Broad 
 Churchman's mind we commend this book." Academy. 
 
 Steel. SERMONS PREACHED IN THE CHAPEL OF 
 HARROW SCHOOL AND ELSKWHF.RK. By the late Rev. 
 T. H. STEEL, M.A., .Wi-tant Master at Harrow, and formerly 
 Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. With a Memoir by Prof. 
 Nettleship. Crown 8vo. ^s. 6d. 
 
 Stewart and Tait. THE UNSEEN UNIVERSE ; or, 
 
 - peculations on a Future State. By BALFOUR STEWART, 
 !'. U.S.. I.I..D., and I We : I'. G. TAIT. Fourteenth Edition, 
 revised and enlarged. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 "A most remarkable and most interesting volume, which, probably 
 more thanjany that has appeared in modern times, will affect religious
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 35 
 
 thought on many momentous questions insensibly it may be, but very 
 largely and very beneficially." Church Quarterly. " This book is one 
 -i'hic/i -well deserves the attention of thoughtful and religious readers . . . 
 It is a perfectly saje enquiry, on scientific grounds, into the possibilities of 
 a future existence. " Guardian. 
 
 Stubbs. VILLAGE POLITICS. Addresses and Sermons 
 on the Labour Question. By Rev. CHARLES WILLIAM STUBBS, 
 M.A., Vicar of Granborough, Bucks. Extra fcap. 8vo. ' 3^. 6d. 
 
 " The sermons in this book are all worth reading They are full 
 
 of warm sympathy for the labourers and sound practical advice to all 
 classes concerned in the struggle." Guardian. 
 
 Tait. Works by ARCHIBALD CAMPBELL, late Archbishop of 
 
 Canterbury : 
 
 THE PRESENT POSITION OF THE CHURCH OF 
 ENGLAND. Seven Addresses delivered to the Clergy and Church- 
 wardens of his Diocese, as his Charge, at his Primary Visitation, 
 1872. Third Edition. 8vo. 3^. 6d. 
 
 SOME THOUGHTS ON THE DUTIES OF THE ES- 
 TABLISHED CHURCH OF ENGLAND AS A NATIONAL 
 CHURCH. Seven Addresses delivered at his Second Visitation. 
 8vo. 4J. 6d. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE. Its Catholicity; 
 its Conflict with the Atheist ; its Conflict with the Deist ; its 
 Conflict with the Rationalist ; its Dogmatic Teaching ; Practical 
 Councils for its Work ; its Cathedrals. Constituting the Charge 
 delivered at his Third Quadrennial Visitation, A. D. 1880. Second 
 Edition. Crown 8vo. $s. 6d. 
 
 Taylor. THE RESTORATION OF BELIEF. New and 
 Revised Edition. By ISAAC TAYLOR, Esq. Crown 8vo. 8s. 6d. 
 
 Temple. Works by the Right Rev. F. TEMPLE, D.D., Lord 
 Bishop of London : 
 
 SERMONS PREACHED IN THE CHAPEL OF RUGBY 
 SCHOOL. Third and Cheaper Edition. Extra fcap. 8vo. 4^. 6d. 
 
 This volume contains thirty-five Sermons on topics more or less inti- 
 mately connected with every-day life. The following are a Jew of the 
 subjects discoursed upon: " Love and Duty;' 1 '' "Coming to Christ;" 
 "Great Men;" "Faith;" "Doubts;" "Scruples;" " Original Sin ;" 
 "Friendship;" "Helping Others;" "The Discipline of Temptation;" 
 "Strength a Duty;" " IVorldliness ;" "III Temper;" "The Burial of 
 the Past."
 
 36 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 TEMPLE (Dr.) continued. 
 
 A SECOND SERIES OF SERMONS PREACHED IN 
 THE CHAPEL OF RUGBY SCHOOL. Third Edition. 
 Extra fcap. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 This Second Serifs of forty-two brief, pointed, practical Sermons, on 
 topics intimately connected itrith the every-day life of young and old, itn/l be 
 acceptable to all who are acquainted with the First Series. The following 
 are a few of the subjects treated of: "Disobedience," "Almsgiving, 
 " The Unknown Guidance of God," "Apathy one of our Trials," "High 
 Aims in leaders," "Doing our Best," "The Use of Knowledge," "Use 
 of Observances," "Martha and Mary," "John the Baptist," "Severity 
 before Mercy " ''''Even Mistakes Punished," "Morality and Religion," 
 "Children," "Action the Test of Spiritual Life," "Self-Respect," "Too 
 Late" " The Tercentenary." 
 
 A THIRD SERIES OF SERMONS PREACHED IN 
 RUGBY SCHOOL CHAPEL IN 18671869. Fourth Edition. 
 Extra fcap. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 This Third Series of Bishop Temple's Rugby Sermons, contains thirty-six 
 brief discourses, including the " Good-bye" sermon preached on his leaving 
 Rugl>y to enter on the office he now holds. 
 
 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN RELIGION AND 
 SCIENCE. Eight Lectures preached before the University of 
 Oxford in the year 1884, on the Foundation of the late Rev. John 
 Bampton, M. A., Canon of Salisbury. New and Cheaper Edition. 
 Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 ' ' The great merit and peculiar opportuneness of the book consists in its 
 skilful adaptation to the needs of the time . . . We conclude by expressing 
 a hope that Dr. Temple's book will be widely read, and by repeating our 
 opinion that over and above the speculative interest oj the topics he dis- 
 cusses )u has given to those who care to make a study of it a powerful and 
 effective antidote against the operation of those microbes which are now 
 threatening us with intellectual cholera" Spectator. 
 
 Thring. THOUGHTS ON LIFE-SCIENCE. By Rev. 
 EDWARD THRING, M.A. Second Edition, enlarged and revised. 
 Crown 8vo. fs. (>d. 
 
 Thrupp. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY AND 
 
 USK OF TIIK 1'SALMS. By tlu- Rev. j. F. Tnurri-, M.A , 
 late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Second Kdition. 2 vols. 
 8vo. 2$s. 
 
 Trench. THE HULSEAN LECTURES, 1845-1846. l!> 
 
 CIIKM.VIX TI:I.N<-II, I '.!>.. Mjmeiime Archbishop of Dublin. 
 
 Fifth Edition, revised. 8vo. 7-f. 6d. 
 
 This volume ci>i .Aw/ Sermons, eiy'Iit being on " The Fitness 
 
 of Holy Scripture /,v unfolding (he Spiritual Lijc of Men," the others 
 on "Christ, the Desire of all Nations; or, the unconscious Prophecies 
 of Heathendom. "
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 37 
 
 Tulloch. THE CHRIST OF THE GOSPELS AND 
 THE CHRIST OF MODERN CRITICISM. Lectures on 
 M. RENAN'S "Vie cle Jesus." By JOHN TULLOCH, D.D., late 
 Principal of the College of St. Mary, in the University of St. 
 Andrews. Extra fcap. 8vo. 45. 6d. 
 
 Vaughan Works by the Very Rev. C. J. VAUGHAN, D.D., 
 Dean of Llandaff and Master of the Temple : 
 
 CHRIST SATISFYING THE INSTINCTS OF HU- 
 MANITY. Eight Lectures delivered in the Temple Church. 
 Second Edition. Extra fcap. 8vo. 3-f. 6</. 
 
 " We are convinced that there are congregations, in number unmistakably 
 increasing, to whom such Essays as these, Jull of thought and learning, 
 are infinitely more beneficial, for they are more acceptable, than the recog- 
 nised type of sermons. " John Bull. 
 
 THE BOOK AND THE LIFE, and other Sermons, preached 
 before the University of Cambridge. 3rd edit. Fcap. 8vo. 41. 6d. 
 
 TWELVE DISCOURSES on SUBJECTS CONNECTED 
 WITH THE LITURGY and WORSHIP of the CHURCH 
 OF ENGLAND. Fourth Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 6s. 
 
 WORDS FROM THE GOSPELS. A Second Selection 
 of Sermons preached in the Parish Church of D'oncaster. Third 
 Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 4?. 6d. 
 
 The Nonconformist characterises these Sermons as ' ' of practical earnest- 
 ness, of a thoughtfulness that penetrates the common conditions and ex- 
 periences of life, and brings the ttuths and examples of Scripture to bear 
 on them ivith singular force, and of a style that cnves its real elegance to 
 the simplicity and directness -which have fine culture for their roots. " 
 
 LIFE'S WORK AND GOD'S DISCIPLINE. Three 
 Sermons. Third Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 2s. 6d. 
 
 THE WHOLESOME WORDS OF JESUS CHRIST. 
 
 Four Sermons preached before the University of Cambridge in 
 
 November, 1866. Second Edition. Fcap. 8vo. 3^. 6d f . 
 
 Dr. Vaughan uses the word "Wholesome" here in its literal and 
 
 original sense, the sense in which St. Paul uses it, as meaning healthy, 
 
 sound, conducing to right living ; and in these Sermons he points out 
 
 and illustrates several of the "wholesome" characteristics of the Gospel, 
 
 the Words of Christ. The John Bull says this volume is "replete uith 
 
 all the author's well-known vigour of thought and richness of expression." 
 
 FOES OF FAITH. Sermons preached before the Uni- 
 versity of Cambridge in November, 1868. Second Edition. Fcap. 
 8vo. 3^. 6d. 
 
 The "Foes of Faith" preached against in these Four Sermons are: 
 /. "Unreality." II. "Indolence." III. "Irreverence." IV. "Incon- 
 sistency."
 
 38 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 VAUGHAN (Dr.) continued. 
 
 LECTURES ON THE EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 
 Fourth Edition. Crown 8vo. Js. 6d. 
 
 Each Lecture is prefaced by a literal translation from the Greek oj 
 the paragraph which forms its subject, contains first <j minute explanation 
 of the passage on which it is based, and then a practical application oj 
 the verse or clause selected as its text. 
 
 LECTURES ON THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 
 Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo. icxr. 6d. 
 
 In this edition of these Lectures, the literal translations of the passages 
 expounded -will be found interwoven in the body of the Lectures themselves. 
 " Dr. Vaugharfs Sermons," the Spectator says, "are the /;/<>.>/ prac- 
 tical discourses on the Apocalypse with which we are acquainted. " Pre- 
 fixed is a Synopsis of the Book of Revelation, and appended is an Index 
 of passages illustrating the language of the Book. 
 
 EPIPHANY, LENT, AND EASTER. A Selection of 
 Expository Sermons. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. los. 6J. 
 
 THE EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. For English Readers. 
 PART I., containing the FIRST EPISTLE TO THE THESSALOMANS. 
 Second Edition. 8vo. is. fxl. 
 
 It is the object of this work to enable English readers, unaa/nainted 
 with Greek, to enter with intelligence into the meaning, connexion, and 
 phraseology of the writings of the great Apostle. 
 
 ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. The Greek 
 Text, with English Notes. Sixth Edition. Crown 8vo. Js. 6d. 
 
 The Guardian says of the work: "for educated young men his com- 
 mentary seems to fill a gap hitherto unfilled. . . . As a whole, Dr. I'aiig/tan 
 appears to us to have given to the world a valuable book of original and 
 careful and earnest thought bestowed on the accomplishment of a work 
 which will be of much service and which is much needed." 
 
 THE CHURCH OF THE FIRST DAYS. 
 Series I. The Church of Jerusalem. Third Edition. 
 II. The Church of the Gentiles. Third Edition. 
 ,, III. The Church of the World. Third Edition. 
 Fcap. 8vo. 4J. fxl. each. 
 
 The British Quarterly says : " These Sermons are worthy of all praise, 
 and are models of pulpit teaching." 
 
 COUNSELS for YOUNG STUDENTS. Three Sermons 
 preached before the University of Cambridge at the Opening of 
 the Academical Year 1870-71. Fcap. 8vo. 2s. &/. 
 
 NOTES FOR LECTURES ON CONFIRMATION, 
 with suitable Prayers. Fourteenth Edition. Fcap. 8vo. is. 6d. 
 
 ADDRESSES TO YOUNG CLERGYMEN, ddivm-d .it 
 Salisbury in September and October, 1875. Extra fcap. 8vo. 4^. 6</.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 39 
 
 VAUGHAN (Dr.) continued. 
 
 THE TWO GREAT TEMPTATIONS, the Temptation 
 of Man, and the Temptation of Christ. Lectures delivered in 
 the Temple Church, Lent 1872. Second Edition. Extra fcap. 
 8vo. 3*. 6d. 
 
 HEROES OF FAITH : Lectures on Hebrews xi. New 
 Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 THE YOUNG LIFE EQUIPPING ITSELF FOR GOD'S 
 SERVICE : Sermons before the University of Cambridge. Sixth 
 Edition. Extra fcap. 8vo. 3-r. (>d. 
 
 MEMORIALS OF HARROW SUNDAYS. A Selection 
 of Sermons preached in the Chapel of Harrow School. Fifth 
 Edition. Crown 8vo. los. 6d. 
 
 NINE SERMONS IN HARROW SCHOOL CHAPEL 
 (1849). Fcap. 8vo. $s. 
 
 "MY SON, GIVE ME THINE HEART;" Sermons 
 preached before the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, 1876 
 78. Fcap. 8vo. 5.?. 
 
 REST AWHILE : Addresses to Toilers in the Ministry. 
 Extra fcap. 8vo. 5-r. 
 
 TEMPLE SERMONS. Crown Svo. los. (xt. 
 
 This volume contains a selection of the Sermons preached by Dr. 
 Vaughan in the Temple Church during the twelve years that he has held 
 the dignity of Af aster. 
 
 AUTHORISED OR REVISED? Sermons on some of the 
 Texts in which the Revised Version differs from the Authorised. 
 Crown Svo. 7-f. 6d. 
 
 ST. PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. With 
 Translation, Paraphrase, and Notes for English Readers. Crown 
 Svo. 5 J< 
 
 " The plan of the body of the -work is simple enough. The Dean's 
 English translation is on the left-hand page, facing the Greek text on the 
 opposite one (the basis of the latter being Westcott and Horfs text}. Then 
 there are ample notes on nearly every verse, explanatory and critical, 
 intended for the English reader. These notes have evidently been prepared 
 with great care . . . We consider this treatise not only scholat-like in 
 executionwhich it necessarily would be but sound in its doctrine and 
 clear in its expositions.'" English Churchman. 
 
 LESSONS OF THE CROSS AND PASSION ; WORDS 
 FROM THE CROSS ; THE REIGN OF SIN ; THE LORD'S 
 PRAYER. Four Courses of Lent Lectures. New Edition. 
 Crown Svo. los. 6d. 
 
 This volume contains four courses of Lent lectures which were originally 
 issued in separate volumes.
 
 40 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Vaughan (E.T.) SOME REASONS OF OUR CHRIS- 
 TIAN HOPE. Hulsean Lectures for 1875. By E. T. VAUGHAN, 
 M.A., Rector of Harpenden. Crown 8vo. 6s. 6d. 
 
 Vaughan (D. J.) THE PRESENT TRIAL OF FAITH. 
 Sermons preached in St. Martin's Church, Leicester. By Canon 
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 Venn. ON SOME OF THE CHARACTERISTICS OF 
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 for 1869. By the Rev. J. VENN, M.A. 8vo. 6s. 6d. 
 These discourses are intended to illustrate, explain, and work out into 
 
 some of tJieir consequences, certain characteristics by which the attainment 
 
 of religious belief is prominently distinguished from the attainment of 
 
 belief upon most other subjects. 
 
 Warington. THE WEEK OF CREATION ; or, The 
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 ence. By GEORGE WARINGTON, Author of "The Historic 
 Character of the Pentateuch vindicated." Crown 8vo. 4^. 6d. 
 
 Welby-Gregory. LINKS AND CLUES. By the Hon. 
 Lady WELBY-GREGORY. Second Edition, revised, with -Notes, 
 Additions, and Appendix. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " // is a long time since ive have read a book so full of the life of a true 
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 Welldon. A VOLUME OF SERMONS. By the Rev. 
 J. E. C. WELLDON, M.A., Head Master of Harrow. Crown 8vo. 
 
 [/ the Press. 
 
 Westcott. Works by BROOKE Foss WESTCOTT, D.D., 
 Regius Professor of Divinity in the University of Cambridge ; 
 Canon of Westminster : 
 
 The London Quarterly, speaking of Dr. Westcott, says : " To a I 
 ing and accuracy which command respect and confidence, he unites what 
 are not always to be found in union with these (/utilities, ///- no less valuable 
 faculties of lucid arrangement and graceful and facile expres.; 
 
 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE 
 
 GOSl'ELS. Sixth Edition. Crown 8vo. lor. 6J. 
 The author's chief object in tins work has been to shew that there is 
 a true mean betweeti the idea of a formal harmonization of the Gospels
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 41 
 
 WESTCOTT (Dr.) continued. 
 
 and the abandonment of their absolute truth. After an Introduction on 
 the General Effects oj the course of Modern Philosophy on the popular 
 views of Christianity, he proceeds to determine in what way the principles 
 therein indicated may be applied to the study of the Gospels. 
 
 A GENERAL SURVEY OF THE HISTORY OF THE 
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 The object of this treatise is to deal with the New Testament as a whole, 
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 composed are considered not individually, but as claiming to be parts of the 
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 " is a scholarly performance, learned, dispassionate, discriminating, worthy 
 of his subject and of the present state of Christian literature in relation to it. " 
 
 THE BIBLE IN THE CHURCH. A Popular Account 
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 THE CHRISTIAN LIFE, MANIFOLD AND ONE. Six 
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 THE GOSPEL OF THE RESURRECTION. Thoughts on 
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 ON THE RELIGIOUS OFFICE OF THE UNIVER- 
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 " There is wisdom, and truth, and thought enough, and a harmony 
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 tion of more real value than many an ambitious treatise." Literary 
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 THE REVELATION OF THE RISEN LORD. Third 
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 THE HISTORIC FAITH : SHORT LECTURES ON THE 
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 ' ' It is impossible for Dr. Westcott to 'write anything that is not marked 
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 THE EPISTLES OF ST. JOHN. The Greek Text, with 
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 " The ruh stores of material collected and arranged in this volume will 
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 consideration .... The more we examine the previous volume the more 
 its exceeding richness in spiritual as well as in literary material grows 
 upon t!u' mind.'' Saturday Review.
 
 42 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 WESTCOTT 
 
 THE REVELATION OF THE FATHER. Short Lectures 
 on the Titles of the Lord in the Gospel of St. John. Crown 
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 English Churchman. 
 
 THOUGHTS FROM THE ORDINAL. Cr. 8vo. is. 6(t. 
 
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 DISCIPLINED LIFE. Three Addresses. Crown 8vo, 
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 CHRISTUS CONSUMMATOR : SOME ASPECTS OF THE 
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 SOCIAL ASPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
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 (5) The Church; II. Christian Aspects of the Organisation of Social 
 Life: (l) The Kingdom of God, (2) Medun'al Ejforts The Franciscans, 
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 THOUGHTS ON REVELATION AND LIFE. Being 
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 " Although in themselves fragments, the thoughts, expressed with so 
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 Glasgow Herald. 
 
 Westcott Hort. THE NEW TESTAMENT IN THE 
 
 ()R[<;i.\,\I. (JREEK. The Text Revised by R K. WKSTCOTT, 
 D. D., Regius Professor of Divinity, Canon of Westminster; and
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 43 
 
 WESTCOTT & HORT continued. 
 
 F. J. A. HORT, D.D., Hulsean Professor of Divinity, Fellow of 
 Emmanuel College, Cambridge ; late Fellows of Trinity College, 
 Cambridge. 2 vols. Crown 8vo. ioj. 6d. each. 
 
 Vol. I. TEXT. Vol. II. INTRODUCTION and APPENDIX. 
 
 " The Greek Testament as printed by the two Professors must in future 
 rank as one of the highest critical authorities amongst English scholars. " 
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 be determined at the present time, to arrive at the texts of the autographs 
 themselves so far as it is possible to obtain it by the help of existing materials 
 .... We attach much excellence to this manual edition of the Greek Test- 
 ament, because it is the best contribution which England has made in 
 modern times towards the production of a pure text . . . It bears on its 
 face evidences of calm judgment and commendable candour. The student 
 may avail himself of its aid with much confidence. The Introduction and 
 Appendix specially deserve minute attention." Athenaeum. 
 
 THE NEW TESTAMENT IN THE ORIGINAL GREEK. 
 An Edition for Schools. The Text revised by Profs. WESTCOTT 
 and HORT. I2mo, cloth, 4?. 6d. ; i8mo, roan, red edges, 5-f. 6d. 
 
 ' ' Messrs. Afacmillan have conferred a favour on those students who 
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 and by the use of paper which, though thin, is by no means transparent, 
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 larger work is here reprinted, and is followed by a summary of the docu- 
 mentary evidence from the text. The volume is completed by a list of quo- 
 tations from the Old Testament, which in the text are printed in uncial 
 characters. " Saturday Review. 
 
 Wickham. WELLINGTON COLLEGE SERMONS. 
 
 By the Rev. E. C. WICKHAM, M.A., Master, late Fellow of New 
 
 College, Oxford. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " The Master of Wellington College reasons with his young hearers of 
 industry, honesty, courtesy, justice, purity, of the secret and ; eward of 
 duty, and of irreparable follies, and he speaks much to the point." St. 
 James's Gazette. 
 
 Wilbraham. IN THE SERE AND YELLOW LEAF : 
 
 Thoughts and Recollections for Old and Young. By FRANCES M. 
 
 WILPRAHAM, Author of " Streets and Lanes of a City." With a 
 
 Preface by the BISHOP OF BEDFORD. Globe 8vo. 3^. 6d. 
 
 " Good sense and good feeling are conspicuous throughout the volume. 
 
 Tfiere are just the touches of humour and pathos that are wanted, neither 
 
 more nor less, and there is a very happy gift of illustration by anecdote 
 
 and analogy." Spectator.
 
 44 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Wilkins. THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD. An Essay, 
 by A.S. WILKINS, M.A., Professor of Latin in Owens College, 
 Manchester. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 3-r. 6d. 
 "It -would be difficult to praise too highly the spirit, the burden, the con- 
 clusions, or the scholarly finish of this beautiful Essay." British Quarterly. 
 
 Wilson (J. M.) Works by J. M. WILSON, M.A., late Fellow 
 of St. John's College, Cambridge, and Head Master of Clifton 
 College : 
 
 SERMONS PREACHED IN CLIFTON COLLEGE 
 CHAPEL, 1879 1883. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 "Mr. Wilson knows how to hit the blots of school life witJwut monoto- 
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 His secret is his reality; his hearers profess and call tliemsch'es Christians, 
 and it is the teacher's business to shew how the lowliest duties fl(nu from the 
 sublimest truths, how the paltriest vices are incompatible with the loftiest 
 profession. Mr. Wilson has further mastered the difficult art of being 
 plain-spoken without being undignified, of being at once commonplace and 
 elevated, practical and spiritual." Saturday Review. 
 
 ESSAYS AND ADDRESSES. An Attempt to Treat some 
 Religious Questions in a Scientific Spirit. Crown Svo. 4^. 6d. 
 
 ' ' What strikes us most, in perusing or re-perusing these essays, is the 
 sincerity and outspoken directness of the author. There is little of the 
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 the artistic chiaroscuro which makes Stanley the most delightful of 
 f litterateurs,' and the least satisfactory of theologians. In a certain sense, 
 Mr. Wilson might be called the Colenso of our generation ; by which com- 
 parison -we mean that, though in their vieivs and methods of inquiry the 
 two men are poles asunder, there is in both the same determination /<> r.w/' 
 out for themselves the religious problems of the day, and to submit alike to 
 sceptics and believers their solution. Hiwi'er much readers may differ 
 from Mr. Wilson's conclusions all must admire the author's honesty and 
 clear-headedness." Journal of Education. 
 
 Wilson. THE BIBLE STUDENT'S GUIDE to the more 
 Correct Understanding of the English Translation of the Old Test- 
 ament, by Reference to the Original Hebrew. By WM. WILSON, 
 D. D. , Canon of Winchester. 2nd Edit, carefully revised. 4to. 2$s. 
 The author believes that the present work is the nearest approach to 
 a complete Concordance of every word in the origin, il that has yet been 
 made; and as a Concordance it tuny l>e found of great use to the />'//</< 
 student, -while at the same time it serves the important object oj furnishing 
 the means of comparing synonymous words and of eliciting their / 
 ami distinctive meaning. 7'he knowledge of the Hebrew language is not 
 absolutely necessary to the profitable use of the work. 
 
 Wood. Till-. REGAL 1'oWKK OK THE CHURCH; 
 OR, T1IK Kr \HA.MI-.M-.\I.S UK nit-. CANON LAW. A Dissertation 
 
 l.v t! .IIIM.G. \Voon. i;.D., Emmanuel College, Vicar 
 
 of St. < 'k-mcnt\ < '.imlitidt;.-. Svo. 4?. 6d.
 
 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 45 
 
 Worship (The) of God and Fellowship among 
 
 Men. Sermons on Public Worship. By the late Prof. MAURICE, 
 and others. Fcap. 8vo. 3-r. 6d. 
 
 Wright (W. Aldis). THE BIBLE WORD-BOOK: A 
 
 Glossary of Archaic Words and Phrases in the Authorised Version 
 
 of the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. By W. ALDIS 
 
 WRIGHT, M.A., Fellow and Bursar of Trinity College, Cambridge. 
 
 Second Edition, revised and enlarged. Crown 8vo. TS. 6d. 
 
 " It appears to be, indeed, a very complete dictionary or rather glossary 
 
 of the archaic and obsolete -words and phrases to be found in our English 
 
 Bible, and the plan includes the Apocrypha and the Book of Common Prayer 
 
 . . . Much pains also is laid out on grammatical analysis. " Guardian. 
 
 Yonge (Charlotte M.) Works by CHARLOTTE M. YONGE, 
 
 Author of " The Heir of Redclyffe ": 
 
 SCRIPTURE READINGS FOR SCHOOLS AND FA- 
 MILIES. 5 vols. Globe 8vo. u. 6d. With Comments, T,S. 6d. each. 
 
 I. SKRIES. Genesis to Deuteronomy. III. SERIES. The Kings and Prophets. 
 II. SERIES. From Joshua to Solomon. IV. SKRIES. The Gospel Times. 
 V. SERIES. Apostolic Times. 
 
 Actual need has led the author to endeavour to prepare a reading book 
 convenient for study with children, containing the very words of the 
 Bible, with only a few expedient omissions, and arranged in Lessons of 
 such length as by expedience she has found to suit with children's ordinary 
 power of accurate attentive interest. The verse form has been retained be- 
 cause of its convenience for children reading in class, and as more re- 
 sembling their Bibles ; but the poetical portions have been given in their 
 lines. Professor Huxley at a meeting of the London School-board, par- 
 ticularly mentioned the Selection made by Miss Yonge, as an example of 
 how selections might be made for School reading. "Her Comments are 
 models of their kind." Literary Churchman. 
 
 THE PUPILS OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE. New 
 
 Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 " Young and old will be equally refreshed and taught by these pages, 
 in which nothing is dull, and nothing is far-fetched." Churchman. 
 
 PIONEERS AND FOUNDERS ; or, Recent Workers in 
 the Mission Field. With Frontispiece and Vignette Portrait of 
 Bishop HEBER. New Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 
 
 The missionaries whose biographies are given, are John Eliot, the 
 Apostle of the Red Indians; David Brainerd, the Enthusiast; Christian 
 F. Schwartz, the Councillor of Tanjore; Henry Martyn, the Scholar- 
 Missionary ; William Carey and Joshua Marshman, the Serampore Mis- 
 sionaries ; the Judson Family; the Bishops of Calcutta Thomas 
 Middleton, Reginald Heber, Daniel Wilson; Samuel Mar sden, the Aus- 
 tralian Chaplain and Friend of the Maori; John Williams, the Martyr 
 of Erromango; Allen Gardener, the Sailor Martyr; Charles Frederick 
 Mackenzie, the Martyr of Zambesi.
 
 46 THEOLOGICAL BOOKS. 
 
 Zechariah. THE HEBREW STUDENT'S COMMEN- 
 TARY ON ZECHARIAH, IIKP.UKW, AND LXX. With 
 Excursus on Syllable-Dividing, Metheg, Initial Dagesh, and Siman 
 Rapheh. By W. H. LOWE, M.A., Hebrew Lecturer at Christ's 
 College, Cambridge. Demy 8vo. IOT. 6d. 
 
 ' ' This is a useful and scholarly work. The notes are intended to in- 
 clude the wants of comparative beginners in Hebrew, but they contain much 
 also that will be of value to those who are more advanced ; they are always 
 sound, and direct the student's attention to just such points of importance 
 as he is likely to overlook. The volume abounds with suggestions and 
 cautions, for which every diligent reader of Hebrew will be grateful ; and 
 those who desire to strengthen and increase their knowledge of the language 
 cannot do better than peruse it attentively . . . Altogether we welcome Mr. 
 Lowe's volume as a real help to the study of Hebrew in this country. " 
 Academy.
 
 THE 'BOOK OF PRAISE" HYMNAL, 
 
 COMPILED AND ARRANGED BY 
 
 ROUNDELL, EARL SELBORNE. 
 
 In the following four forms : 
 
 A. Beautifully printed in Royal 32mo, limp cloth, price 6d. 
 
 B. ,, Small 18mo, larger type, cloth limp, Is. 
 
 C. Same edition on fine paper, cloth, Is. 6d. 
 
 Also an edition with Music, selected, harmonized, and composed 
 by the late JOHN HULLAH, in square 18mo, cloth, 3s. 6d. 
 
 The large acceptance which has been given to " The Book of Praise" 
 by all classes of Christian people encourages the Publishers in entertaining 
 the hope that this Hymnal, which is mainly selected from it, may be ex- 
 tensively used in Congregations, and in some degree at least meet the 
 desires of those who seek uniformity in common worship as a means 
 towards that unity whuh pious souls yearn after, and which our Lord 
 prayed for in behalf of his Church. ''''The office of a hymn is not to 
 teach controversial Theology, but to give the voice of song to practical 
 religion. No doubt, to do this it must embody sound doctrine ; but it 
 mtght to do so, not after the manner of the schools, but with the breadth, 
 freedom, and simplicity of the Fountain-head." On this principle has 
 Earl Selborne proceeded in the preparation of this book. 
 
 The arrangement adopted is the following : 
 
 PART I. consists of Hymns arranged according to the subjects of the 
 Creed "God the Creator," "Christ Incarnate," "Christ Crucified" 
 "Christ Risen," "Christ Ascended," "Christ's Kingdom and Judg- 
 ment" etc. 
 
 PART II. comprises Hymns arranged according to the subjects of the 
 Lord's Prayer. 
 
 PART III. Hymns for natural and sacred seasons. 
 There are 320 Hymns in all.
 
 A MAGAZINE FOR EVERY HOUSEHOLD. 
 
 The Times says : "A magazine which has no rival in England." 
 
 The Guardian says: "The volume of the English Illustrated Magazine for 
 
 1886 87 is full of good matter in the way both of writing and drawing The 
 
 result is that the annual volume is equally interesting to those who read and to those 
 who merely turn over the pages. It is a capital book for all tables and all times." 
 
 The Schoolmaster says : " We cannot speak too highly of the quality of the matter 
 or the general excellence of the illustrn; 
 
 The Journal of Education says : "The English Illustrated Magazine for 1887 
 is fully as good as the first volume for 1884, and higher praise we cannot award it. 
 The letterpress is indeed better. In the current number there are some beautiful 
 sketches of Westminster School." 
 
 The Literary World says : " It is unnecessary to enumerate more of the contents 
 of the 832 pages, as we have said enough to shew that the volume provides literary 
 and artistic entertainment of no mean order. He who invests in the work may rely 
 upon getting his money's full worth." 
 
 THE 
 
 1887. 
 
 A Handsome Volume, consisting of 832 closely printed pages, and con- 
 taining nearly 400 Woodcut Illustrations of various sizes, bound in 
 extra cloth, coloured edges, price 8s. 
 
 AMONG THE CHIEF CONTENTS OF THE VOLUME ARE THE 
 FOLLOWING COMPLETE STORIES AND SERIALS : 
 
 Marzio's Crucifix. By F. MAKI . >.\ 
 
 CRAWFORD. 
 A Secret Inheritance. By B. L. 
 
 KAKJEON. 
 Jacquetta. By the Author of "John 
 
 Herring." 
 Gerald. By STANLEY J. WEYMAN. 
 
 A Siege Baby. By J. s. Wi 
 
 An Unknown Country. By the 
 
 Author of "John Halifax, Gentle- 
 man." With Illustrations by F. 
 NOEL PATON. 
 
 MiSS Falkland. By CLEMENTINA 
 BLACK. 
 
 And CONTRIBUTIONS by K. A. FREEMAN, GEORGE MEREDITH. 
 MOWHRAY MOKKIS. STANLEY |. \V K.Y.MAN, \. C. SWINB1 
 D. CHK1MII, MIKKAY, GRANT ALLEN, \Y.M BEATTY-KINGSTON, 
 \V.\l.TKK ARMSTRONG, [AMES SIME. < iK.okc ;K DU MAU] 
 OSCAR BROWN 1 NO. KICMAKD J K.I- Kl .K 1 MS, ami other well-known writers. 
 
 Will, 1'irn'KK.S l,y I. AI.MA TAIU.MA, K.V. K. III'RNI'. |<>NK.S, 
 
 A.R.A..' LARA MONTALBA, I >K. \VT.Y BATES, \V. BISCOMBE GAKDN1 K, 
 
 . NOEL PATON, G. L SEYMOUR. CLOUGH 
 
 KUOMI.KY, DAYIU MURRAY, A.K.S.A., HUGH THO "tlier 
 
 %* Single numbers, 6d. ; by post, 8d. Yearly Subscription, including 
 Double Number and postage, &r. 
 
 MACMILI.AN ANT) CO., LONDON. 
 
 J. PALMl'.K, I'KINTIiK, CAMUKIDGE.