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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Old Wine and New, by Joseph Cross
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Old Wine and New
+       Occasional Discourses
+
+Author: Joseph Cross
+
+Release Date: October 18, 2011 [EBook #37794]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD WINE AND NEW ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Andrew Sly, Al Haines and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+OLD WINE AND NEW:
+
+
+Occasional Discourses.
+
+
+BY
+
+THE REV. JOSEPH CROSS, D.D., LL.D.,
+
+AUTHOR OF "EVANGEL," "KNIGHT-BANNERET," "COALS FROM THE ALTAR,"
+"PAULINE CHARITY," AND "EDENS OF ITALY."
+
+
+
+
+NEW YORK:
+
+THOMAS WHITTAKER,
+
+2 and 3 Bible House.
+
+1884.
+
+
+
+
+
+  Copyright, 1883,
+  By JOSEPH CROSS.
+
+
+  Franklin Press:
+  RAND, AVERY, AND COMPANY,
+  BOSTON.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+DEDICATORY EPISTLE.
+
+
+To THOMAS WHITTAKER, Esq., Publisher, New York.
+
+My Dear Friend: In former times and other lands, when one
+wrote a book, he inscribed the volume to some distinguished
+personage--a bishop, a baron, a monarch, a magnate in the world of
+letters--through whose name it might win its way to popular favor, and
+achieve a success hardly to be hoped for from its own merit. Such
+overshadowing oaks seemed necessary to shield from sun and storm the
+tender undergrowth; and the dew that lay all night upon their branches
+the breezy morning shook off in showers of diamonds upon the humbler
+herbage at their roots. In an age pre-eminently of self-reliance and a
+country characterized no less by personal than political independence,
+authors have learned at length to walk alone, marching right into the
+heart of the public with no patronage but that of the publisher; and if
+a book have not the intrinsic qualities to bear the scorching beams and
+freezing blasts of criticism, down it must go amidst the _debris_
+of earth's abortive ambitions and ruined hopes. Not so much from
+conscious need of help as from high esteem of the noblest personal
+qualities, therefore, I beg leave upon this page to couple with my own
+a worthier name. Two years ago, when I placed in your trusty hands the
+manuscript of Knight-Banneret, I had the least possible idea
+of the harvest which might grow from so humble a seed-grain cast into a
+very questionable soil. The result was an encouraging disappointment;
+and Evangel soon followed, enlarging the horizon of hope; and
+Edens of Italy sent a refreshing aroma over all the landscape;
+and Coals from the Altar kindled assuring beacon-fires for the
+adventurer; and Pauline Charity, supported by Faith and Hope,
+walked forth in queenly state. During the publication of these several
+productions, so pleasant has been our intercourse--so great your
+kindness, candor, courtesy, magnanimity, hospitality, and every other
+social virtue--that I look back upon the period as one of the happiest
+of my life; and now, at the close of the feast, hoping that our last
+bout may be the best, I cordially invite you to share with me Old
+Wine and New.
+
+Yours till Paradise,
+  JOSEPH CROSS
+
+Nov. 1, 1883.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+Dear Reader: In the preface to Pauline Charity, did
+not the writer promise thee that volume should be his last? Some months
+later, however, at the bottom of the homiletical barrel, he found a few
+old acquaintances, in threadbare and tattered guise, smiling
+reproachfully out of the dust of an undeserved oblivion. He beckoned
+them forth, gave them new garments, and bade them go to the printer.
+And lo! here they are--twenty-two of them--in comely array, with
+fresh-anointed locks, knocking modestly at thy door.
+
+If any of the former groups from the same family were deemed worthy of
+thy hospitality--if any of the twenty-two Evangelists
+gladdened thy soul with good tidings--if any of the twenty-two
+Knights-Banneret stimulated thy zeal in the holy conflict--if
+any of the twenty white-hooded sisters of Charity warmed thy
+heart with words of loving kindness--if any of the sixty seraphs,
+winged with sunbeams, laid upon thy lips a Coal from the
+Altar--if any of the twelve cherubs, fresh from the Edens of
+Italy, led thee through pleasant paths to goodly palaces and
+blooming arbors--turn not away unheard these twenty-two strangers, but
+welcome them graciously to the fellowship of thy house, and perchance
+the morrow's dawn may disclose the wings beneath their robes.
+
+But if tempted to discard them as the vagrant offspring of a senile
+vanity thrust out to seek their fortune in the world of letters, know
+thou that such temptation is of the Father of lies. For not all of
+these are thy patriarch's Benjamins--sons of his old age. The leader of
+the band is his very Reuben--the beginning of his strength. Another is
+his lion-bannered Judah, washing his garments in the blood of grapes.
+In another may be recognized his long-lost Joseph, found at last in
+Pharaoh's chariot. And several others, peradventure, more ancient than
+thy father, though bearing neither gray beard nor wrinkled brow. And
+the consciousness of a better ambition than vanity ever inspired
+prompts their commission to the public, to speak a word in season to
+him that is weary--to comfort the mourners in Zion, giving them beauty
+for ashes, the oil of joy for weeping, the garment of praise for the
+spirit of heaviness, and filling the vale of Bochim with songs in the
+night. Nay, if the mixture of metaphors be not offensive to thy
+fastidious rhetoric, these brethren are sent down into Egypt to procure
+corn for thee and thy little ones, O Reader! that ye perish not in the
+famine of the land.
+
+"Go to! the tropical language is misleading. We open the door to thy
+children, and find nothing but a hamper of Wine--twenty-two
+bottles--some labelled Old, and others New."
+
+As thou wilt, my gentle critic! Perhaps twenty-two jars of water only.
+Yet healthfully clear, and sweet to the taste, it is hoped thou wilt
+find the beverage; and if the Lord, present at the feast, but deign to
+look at it, thou mayest wonder that the good wine has been kept till
+now.
+
+Of Edward Irving, when he died fifty years ago, a London editor wrote:
+"He was the one man of our time who more than all others preached his
+life and lived his sermons." To preach one's life were hardly
+apostolical, though to live one's sermons might be greatly Christian.
+At the former the author never aimed; of the latter there is little
+danger of his being suspected. Yet this book is in some sort the record
+of his personal history. For a farewell gift to the world, he long
+contemplated an autobiography--had actually begun the work, written
+more than a hundred pages, and sketched a promising outline of the
+whole; when, in an hour of indigestion, becoming disgusted, he dropped
+the enterprise, and made his manuscript a burnt offering to the
+"blues." As a substitute for the failure, these discourses represent
+him in the successive stages of his ministry, being arranged in the
+chronological order of production and delivery, with dates and
+occasions in footnotes--the only autobiography he could produce, the
+only one doubtless to be desired. Should grace divine make it in any
+measure effectual to the spiritual illumination of those who honor it
+with a perusal, he will sing his _Nunc Dimittis_ with thankful
+heart, and wait calmly for the day when every faithful worker "shall
+have praise of God." Farewell.
+
+J. C.
+
+Feast of All Saints, 1883.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+Discourse.
+
+     I. Filial Hope. 1829
+    II. Rest for the Weary. 1830
+   III. My Beloved and Friend. 1833
+    IV. Refuge in God. 1838
+     V. Parental Discipline. 1840
+    VI. Joy of the Law. 1842
+   VII. Sojourning with God. 1858
+  VIII. Building for Immortality. 1859
+    IX. Wail of Bereavement. 1862
+     X. Wisdom and Weapons. 1863
+    XI. Love tested. 1866
+   XII. Manifold Temptations. 1866
+  XIII. Contest and Coronation. 1866
+   XIV. Calvary Token. 1866
+    XV. Heroism Triumphant. 1868
+   XVI. Fraternal Forgiveness. 1869
+  XVII. Christ with his Ministers. 1872
+ XVIII. Kept from Evil. 1873
+   XIX. Contending for the Faith. 1874
+    XX. The Fruitless Fig-Tree. 1876
+   XXI. Christian Contentment. 1883
+  XXII. "Ye know the Grace." 1883
+
+
+
+
+OLD WINE AND NEW.
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+FILIAL HOPE.[1]
+
+Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we
+shall be; but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him;
+for we shall see him as he is.--1 John iii. 2.
+
+
+"I am to depart, you to remain; but which shall have the happier lot,
+who can tell?" So spake Socrates to his friends just before he drank
+the fatal hemlock. In all the utterances of the ancient philosophy
+there is no sadder word. The uncertainty of the hereafter, the
+impenetrable gloom that shrouds the state of the departed, sets the
+contemplative soul shivering with mortal dread. Like the expiring
+Hobbes, more than two thousand years later, the grand old Athenian felt
+himself "taking a leap in the dark." In his case, however, there was
+more excuse than in that of the modern unbeliever. The dayspring from
+on high had not yet visited mankind. The morning star was still below
+the horizon. Four centuries must pass before the rising Sun of
+righteousness could bring the perfect day. The Christ came, the true
+Light of the world; and life and immortality, dawning from his manger,
+culminated upon his sepulchre. Redeeming Love has revealed to us more
+of God and man than all the sages of antiquity ever knew; and our
+reviving and ascending Redeemer has shed a flood of radiance upon the
+grave and whatever lies beyond. In the immortal Christ we have a
+sufficient answer to the patriarch's question--"If a man die, shall he
+live again?" In his mysteriously constituted personality taking our
+nature into union with the Godhead, by his vicarious passion ransoming
+that nature, and then rising with it from the dead and returning with
+it to heaven, he assures all who believe in him of an actual alliance
+with the living God and all the blissful immunities of life eternal.
+And thus the apostle's statement becomes the best expression of our
+filial hope in Christ: "Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it
+doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that, when he shall
+appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is."
+
+The ground of our glorious hope as disciples of Christ is found in our
+gracious state as sons of God. But is not this the relation of all men?
+Originally it was, but is not now. By creation indeed "we all are his
+offspring," but not by adoption and regeneration. Sin has cut off from
+that original relation the whole progeny of Adam, and disinherited us
+of all its rights and privileges. The paternal likeness is effaced from
+the human soul. Alienated from the life of God, men have become
+children of the wicked One. Only by restoring grace--"a new creation in
+Christ Jesus"--can they regain what they have lost. To effect this,
+came forth the Only Begotten from the bosom of the Father, and gave
+himself upon the cross a ransom for the sinful race. Whosoever
+believeth in him is saved, restored, forgiven, renewed after the image
+of his Creator in righteousness and true holiness. Jesus himself
+preached to Nicodemus the necessity of this new birth, and "born of
+God" is the apostolic description of the mighty transformation. More
+than any outward ordinance is here expressed--more than mere morality,
+or reformation of life--a clean heart created, a right spirit renewed,
+the inception of a higher life whereby the soul becomes partaker of the
+Divine Nature. All this, through faith in Christ, by the power of the
+Holy Ghost. Now there is reconciliation and amity with God--"an
+everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure." More; there is
+sympathy, and sweet communion, and joyful co-operation, and spiritual
+assimilation, and oneness of will and desire, and free access to the
+throne of grace in every time of need. "And because ye are sons, God
+hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying--Abba,
+Father." "And if children, then heirs--heirs of God, and joint-heirs
+with Jesus Christ." And oh! what an inheritance awaits us in the
+glorious manifestation of our Lord, when all his saints shall be
+glorified together with him! For, "it doth not yet appear what we shall
+be; but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for
+we shall see him as he is."
+
+
+Our sonship, you see, is the ground of our hope. Our hope, you will now
+see, is worthy of our sonship.
+
+At present, indeed, our glorious destiny is not apparent. By faith we
+see it, dim and distant, as through the shepherds' glass; in hope we
+wait for it with calm patience, or press toward it with strong desire;
+but what it is--"the glory that shall be revealed in us"--we know not,
+and cannot know, till mortality shall be swallowed up of life. It is
+spiritual; we are carnal. It is heavenly; we are earthly. It is
+infinite; we are finite. It is altogether divine: we are but human.
+Some of God's artists, as St. Paul and St. John, have given us gorgeous
+pictures of it, which we gaze at with shaded eyes; but while we study
+them, we cannot help feeling that they fall far short of the copied
+original. In our present state, what idea can we form of the condition
+of the soul, and the mode of its subsistence, when dislodged from the
+body? Nay, what idea can we form of the natural body developing into
+the spiritual, and all its rudimental powers unfolding in their
+perfection? Or, to speak more accurately and more scripturally, what
+idea can we form of the resurrection body, awaking from its long sleep
+in the dust, re-organized and re-invested--with new beauties, perhaps
+new organs, new senses, new faculties, all glorious in immortality? And
+the enfranchised intellect, who can guess the grandeur of its
+destiny--what new provinces of thought, new discoveries of truth, new
+revelations of science, new disclosures of the mysteries of nature and
+of God? And the spirit--the ransomed and purified spirit--who can
+imagine what perfection of love, what affluence of joy, what transports
+of worship and of song, what society and fellowship with the saints in
+light, it shall enjoy when it has entered its eternal rest? We know not
+how the statue looks till we see it unveiled; and the whole creation,
+as St. Paul writes to the Romans, is waiting for the unveiling of the
+sons of God. Now they are his hidden ones--hidden in the shadow of his
+wings, in the secret place of his tabernacle--their life hidden with
+Christ in God--their character and true glory hidden from the
+world--their ineffable destiny and reward hidden from themselves, till
+their dear Lord shall appear, and they also shall appear with him in
+glory. And well is it that our knowledge of the better world to come is
+so obscure and imperfect--necessarily obscure and imperfect, because
+God hath graciously revealed only what was essential to our salvation;
+for if he had revealed all that he might have revealed--if we could
+foresee and comprehend all that awaits us in the blessed everlasting
+future--we might have been so dazed and delighted with the splendors of
+the vision, as to be incapable of business, unfit for society, and
+better out of the world than in it. Wisely, therefore, God hath veiled
+the future, even from his saints. The oak is in the acorn, but we
+cannot divine its form, and must await its manifestation in the tree.
+Yet this we know, saith the apostle--and surely this ought to satisfy
+our highest ambition of knowledge--"that when he shall appear, we shall
+be like him, for we shall see him as he is."
+
+Appear he certainly will. Let us not lose sight of this blessed hope.
+It is his own promise to the disciples on the eve of his departure: "I
+will come again, and receive you unto myself; and where I am, there ye
+shall be also." And the angels of the ascension reiterate the assurance
+to them, as they stand gazing after him from the Mount of Olives: "This
+same Jesus, who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like
+manner as ye have seen him go into heaven"--that is, visibly,
+personally, gloriously, in the clouds, with the holy angels. And what
+saith the apostle? "Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many;
+and to them that look for him, he shall appear the second time, without
+sin, unto salvation"--the second advent as real as the first, and as
+manifest to human sight. To such statements no mystical or figurative
+meaning can be given, without violence done to the language. Not in the
+destruction of Jerusalem was the prediction fulfilled; nor has it since
+been fulfilled, nor ever can be, in any revival or enlargement of the
+Church; neither does Jesus come to his disciples at death, but through
+death they pass to him. Come at length he will, however, and every eye
+shall see him sitting upon the throne of his glory. The redemption of
+our humanity by price pledges a further redemption by power, which
+cannot be accomplished without his personal return to the ransomed
+planet. "And we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him,
+for we shall see him as he is."
+
+That likeness to our Lord must be both corporeal and spiritual. St.
+Paul speaks of the whole Church as "waiting for the adoption--to wit,
+the redemption of the body;" and elsewhere states that the Saviour for
+whom we look "shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like
+unto his own glorious body"--spiritualizing the natural, sublimating
+the material, endowing the physical organism with powers like his own,
+and adorning the long-dishonored dust with the radiant beauty of
+immortality. Yet more wonderful must be the change wrought upon the
+intellectual and spiritual nature. To be like "God manifest in the
+flesh"--what is it but to realize a mental development and maturity far
+transcending all that the wisest ever attained to in this mortal state,
+perpetual union of our redeemed humanity with the Divinity, and a
+blissful process of assimilation going on forever? Christ is light
+without darkness; and to be like him implies a clearness of
+understanding and a certitude of truth free from all prejudice,
+distortion, and blinding error. Christ is divine charity incarnate; and
+to be like him is to love as he loved--with the ardor, the intensity,
+the self-forgetfulness, which drew him to the manger and led him to the
+cross. Christ is immaculate holiness made visible to men; and to be
+like him is to be as spotless, as faultless, as free from iniquity,
+perversity, hypocrisy, impurity, as He who could challenge the world
+with the demand--"Which of you convinceth me of sin?" Christ is every
+moral excellence combined and blended in human character; and to be
+like him is to be subject to all those high principles and noble
+impulses which give him infinite preeminence as a model to mankind, and
+make him in angelic estimation "the fairest among ten thousand and
+altogether lovely." Christ is the King whom God the Father hath exalted
+above all powers and principalities even in heavenly places; and to be
+like him is to reign with him, partners of his glory upon an
+imperishable throne, when all the dominions of earth shall have passed
+away as a forgotten dream. All this, and much beside that no human
+imagination can conceive, is manifestly comprehended in the apostolic
+statement, that "he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and
+admired in all them that believe"--men and angels, the whole universe,
+beholding in every disciple a perfect _facsimile_ of the glorified
+Master. And thus the declaration is triumphantly verified: "We know
+that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him
+as he is."
+
+Spirit is invisible. In his essence, we shall never see God. That men
+might see him, he became incarnate in human flesh. Except in the person
+of Jesus Christ, his creatures will never see him. But even Christ is
+far away, gone back to heaven, and seen only by faith. Often, no doubt,
+his disciples wish they could see him with their eyes of flesh; but
+they never will till his promised personal return. With the apostle,
+they are ever thinking and speaking of him whom, not having seen, they
+love; in whom, though now they see him not, yet believing, they rejoice
+with joy unspeakable and full of glory. But often, looking at him even
+by faith through the disturbing and distorting media of prejudice and
+passion, they make sad mistakes about him, about his complex nature,
+his divine perfections, his human character, his former work in the
+flesh, his present mediation with the Father, his spiritual relation to
+the Church, his headship over the redeemed creation. We can appreciate
+another only through his like within ourselves, our sympathy with his
+moral qualities. Wanting such sympathy, vice never appreciates virtue,
+the carnal never discerns the spiritual, the selfish never understands
+the benevolent and disinterested. Failing to discover the true
+substratum of character, they mistake motives, ridicule peculiarities,
+and give no credit for qualities which they cannot perceive. Thus,
+through the imperfection of our sympathy with the Saviour, or the utter
+want of such sympathy, even when we regard him by faith, we see him not
+as he is. Ask the world, "What think ye of Christ?" you will get a
+great variety of answers. One will tell you he is a myth, a phantom, a
+creation of genius, that never had a real historic existence. Another
+will call him a pretender, an impostor, a false prophet, utterly
+unworthy of human credit and confidence. Another pronounces him an
+amiable enthusiast, and a very good man; but self-deceived as to his
+mission and ministry, and not a teacher sent from God. Another deems
+him a wise moralist, enunciating principles and precepts such as the
+world never heard before; and in his life, an example of all that is
+pure and excellent; but not essential and eternal God, nor a vicarious
+sacrifice for human sin. But here is one who regards him as supremely
+divine, and yet "the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the
+world;" and, by the nail-prints in his palms and the thorn-marks on his
+brow, so shall he be recognized when he cometh in his kingdom, and the
+nations of the quickened dead go marching to his throne. All mistakes
+about him will thus be corrected; and those who have seen him only
+through a glass darkly, shall see him face to face; and all who have
+loved and honored him as their Saviour, and trusted in him as their
+wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, awaking in his
+likeness from the dust, shall begin the antiphon which preludes the
+eternal song: "This is our God! we have waited for him, and he will
+save us! This is the Lord! we have waited for him, we will be glad and
+rejoice in his salvation!" Oh that we all may then be found like him,
+and see him as he is!
+
+
+
+[1] The author's first sermon, preached at Pompey Hill, Onondaga
+County, N.Y., on the sixteenth anniversary of his nativity, July 4,
+1829--written afterwards, and often repeated during the fifty-four
+years of his ministry--the thought here faithfully reproduced, the
+language but little changed.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+REST FOR THE WEARY.[1]
+
+Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give
+you rest.--Matt. xi. 28.
+
+
+A fine legend is related of St. Jerome. Many years he dwelt in
+Bethlehem, the town of his dear Lord's nativity. Hard by was the cave,
+formerly occupied as a stable, in which the blessed Babe was born. Here
+the holy man spent many a night in prayer and meditation. During one of
+these--waking or sleeping, we know not--he saw the divine Infant, a
+vision of most radiant beauty. Overwhelmed with love and wonder, the
+saint exclaimed: "What shall I give thee, sweet child? I will give thee
+all my gold!" "Heaven and earth are mine," answered the lovely
+apparition, "and I have need of nothing; but give thy gold to my poor
+disciples, and I will accept it as given to myself." "Willingly, O
+blessed Jesus! will I do this," replied the saint; "but something I
+must give thee for thyself, or I shall die of sorrow!" "Give me, then,
+thy sins," rejoined the Christ, "thy troubled conscience, thy burden of
+condemnation!" "What wilt thou do with them, dear Jesus?" asked Jerome
+in sweet amazement. "I will take them all upon myself," was the reply;
+"gladly will I bear thy sins, quiet thy conscience, blot out thy
+condemnation, and give thee my own eternal peace." Then began the holy
+man to weep for joy, saying: "Ah, sweet Saviour! how hast thou touched
+my heart! I thought thou wouldst have something good from me; but no,
+thou wilt have only the evil! Take, then, what is mine, and grant me
+what is thine; so am I helped to everlasting life!"
+
+
+This, my dear brethren, is what Jesus, with unspeakable compassion,
+offers to do for us all. He would have us bring the several burdens
+under which we toil and faint, and lay them down at his feet. Pardon
+for guilt he would give us, peace for trouble, assurance for doubt and
+fear, and for all our fruitless agony divine repose. See how miserably
+men mistake his gospel, when they regard it merely as a set of
+doctrines to be believed, of duties to be performed, of ceremonies to
+be observed, instead of a mercy to be received, a blessing to be
+enjoyed, a salvation offered for our acceptance. It is indeed the
+unspeakable gift of God, the sovereign remedy of all our ills; in
+which, as rational and immortal beings, fallen in Adam, but redeemed by
+Christ, we have an infinite interest. There is a tenderness in the
+invitation, combined with a moral sublimity, demanding for its
+utterance the melody of an angel's tongue, with the accompaniment of a
+seraph's harp; and we ought to listen to the words of Jesus to-day with
+a faith, a love, a joy, such as Simon, James and John never knew, nor
+the pardoned sinner of Magdala, sitting in rapt wonder at the Master's
+feet. "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will
+give you rest."
+
+
+How suitable was this address to those who first heard it, laboring and
+heavy laden with the costly rites and burdensome observances of the
+Levitical law! Those rites and observances required a large portion of
+their time and a larger expenditure of money; yet of their real nature
+and meaning the common people knew very little, and therefore felt them
+to be a burden which neither they nor their fathers were able to bear.
+Types and symbols they were of better things to come; but they could
+not take away sin, nor quiet a troubled conscience, nor give any
+assurance of the reconciliation and favor of Heaven. For this, God must
+be manifested in human flesh, the Prince of peace must come and set up
+his kingdom among men, by the blood of his sacrifice redeeming us from
+the curse of the violated law, and securing an eternal salvation to all
+them that obey him. Jesus here assures the Jews that he is what John
+the Baptist has already proclaimed him--"the Lamb of God that taketh
+away the sins of the world." It is as if he had said: "Come away from
+your bloody altars and sacrificial fires. These are but the shadows, of
+which I am the substance; the prophecies, of which I am the fulfilment.
+In me they all find their meaning and their virtue, and by my mission
+as the promised Saviour they are set aside forever. Come unto me, and I
+will give you rest."
+
+
+Some there were, no doubt, among the hearers of Jesus, who were
+laboring and heavy laden with vain efforts to justify themselves by the
+deeds of the law. The Jews imagined that by doing more than their duty
+they could make God their debtor, and by extra acts of piety and mercy
+insure their own salvation as a matter of sheer justice. And even among
+Christians, who profess to take Christ as their only Saviour and his
+merit as the only ground of their justification before God, are there
+not many who are not altogether free from this Pharisaic leaven,
+endeavoring by their moral virtues and perfect obedience to make amends
+for the errors and delinquencies of the past? But creature merit is
+absurd, sinful merit impossible, and "by the deeds of the law shall no
+flesh be justified." The creature belongs to the Creator; and loving
+the Creator with all his soul, and serving the Creator with all his
+energies, and continuing that love and service without fault or failure
+throughout all the immortal duration of his being, he merely renders to
+God his own, and is still an unprofitable servant. But the sinner,
+already in arrears of duty to the Creator, can never, by yielding to
+God what is always due even from sinless creatures, satisfy the demands
+of the law upon its transgressor; and without some other means and
+method of pardon, which the divine wisdom alone can reveal, the old
+debt remains uncancelled upon the books, and no power can avert the
+penalty. Moreover, the sinner by his sin becomes incapable of offering
+to God any true love or acceptable service without divine grace
+prevening and co-operating to that end, so that no possible credit can
+accrue to human virtue and obedience, but all the glory must redound to
+God. Christ calls us away from all such futile hopes and fruitless
+endeavors. "I am your Saviour," he saith; "by no other name can you be
+saved; by no other medium can you come to the Father; through no merit
+but mine can you obtain absolution from your guilt; through no
+sacrifice or intercession but mine can you know that peace and purity
+for which you have hitherto striven and struggled in vain; come unto
+me, and I will give you rest."
+
+
+And still another class, found in every large gathering of men and
+women, especially wherever the dayspring from on high hath dawned,
+there must have been among these hearers of the divine Preacher--those,
+namely, who were laboring and heavy laden with the conscious burden of
+their guilt. True it is, indeed, that such as are going on still in
+their trespasses do not commonly feel their sins to be a burden. They
+rejoice in them, and roll them as a sweet morsel under their tongues,
+talking of them as if it were a fine thing to be foolish and an honor
+to be infamous. But when the law of God is effectually brought home to
+the understanding and the heart--when they see themselves in the light
+of the divine holiness, and the whole inner man seems converted into
+conscience--then they feel that sin "is an evil and exceeding bitter
+thing," and cry out with the terrified Philippian, "What must I do to
+be saved?" or exclaim with the awakened and illuminated Saul, "Oh!
+wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this
+death?" or, smiting a guilty breast, pray with the publican of the
+parable, "God be merciful to me a sinner!"
+
+                  "As writhes the gross
+  Material part when in the furnace cast,
+  So writhes the soul the victim of remorse!
+  Remorse--a fire that on the verge of God's
+  Commandment burns, and on the vitals feeds
+  Of all who pass!"[2]
+
+And remorse is accompanied with terror, and fearful apprehensions of
+the wrath to come. Condemned already, the affrighted sinner sees a more
+formidable sword than that of Damocles hanging over his head. Amidst
+all his carnal pleasures and social enjoyments, he is like that prince
+of Norway, who went to his wedding festival well knowing that it would
+end in his execution; and at the altar, and in the gay procession, and
+over the table loaded with luxuries, and through palatial halls strewed
+with flowers and ringing with music and merriment, saw everywhere and
+heard continually the preparations for the fatal hour. The agony of
+such a situation how can we imagine? I once knew an awakened sinner who
+described himself as enclosed in the centre of a granite mountain, no
+room to move a muscle, no seam or crevice through which one ray of
+light could reach him--picture of utter helplessness and absolute
+despair! Ah! my brethren! He who made the granite may dissolve it, or
+reduce the solid mountain to dust! And is there any guilt or misery
+from which the Mighty to save cannot deliver the soul that trusts in
+him? Your sin may be great, but his mercy is greater. Your enemies may
+threaten, but has he not conquered them and nailed them to his cross?
+To whom, then, will you apply for help, but to your divine and
+all-sufficient Saviour? Go not to human philosophy,
+
+  "Which leads to bewilder and dazzles to blind,"
+
+but cannot satisfy the mind nor tranquillize the conscience. Go not to
+the ritual law of Israel, which could never make the comers thereunto
+perfect; nor to the blessed saints and martyrs, none of whom can avail
+you as mediators between your sinful souls and God; nor depend upon
+sacraments and sermons, for these can aid you only as they bring you
+into spiritual contact with Christ, the light and life of the world.
+Hear him calling--rise and obey the call--"Come unto me, all ye that
+labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."
+
+
+Rest is a pleasant word--how pleasant to the husbandman, toiling on
+through the long summer day! how pleasant to the traveller, pressing
+forward with his load to the end of his tedious journey! how pleasant
+to the mariner, after tossing for weeks on stormy seas, stepping upon
+his native shore and hasting away to his childhood's home! how pleasant
+to the warrior, when, having won the last battle of his last campaign,
+he returns with an honorable discharge to his mother's cottage among
+the hills! Rest is what we all want, and what Jesus offers to the weary
+and heavy laden soul. I saw a young lady bowed down with grief at the
+memory of her sins; and when I spoke to her, she looked up with a smile
+that made rainbows on her tears, and said: "O sir! I have had more
+happiness weeping over my sins for the last half hour than I ever had
+in sinning through all my life!" And if
+
+  "The seeing eye, the feeling sense,
+  The mystic joys of penitence,"
+
+have in them so much sweetness for the soul, what shall we say of
+
+  "The speechless awe that dares not move,
+  And all the silent heaven of love!"
+
+It is the rest of conscious pardon and satisfied desire; the rest of
+faith, seeing the invisible and grasping the infinite; of hope,
+reposing in the infallible promise and anticipating a blissful
+immortality; of resignation, losing its own will in the will of God,
+and leaving all things to the disposal of the divine wisdom and
+goodness; of perfect confidence and trust, saying with St. Paul: "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." Christ is the
+love of God incarnate in our nature; and where shall the loving John
+find rest, but in the bosom of the Eternal Love? And, tossed by many a
+tempest, or racked with keenest pain, why should not the weary and
+heavy-laden disciple of the divine Man of sorrows sing like one of his
+faithful servants whose flesh and spirit were being torn asunder by
+anguish:--
+
+  "Yet, gracious God, amid these storms of nature,
+  Thine eyes behold a sweet and sacred calm
+  Reign through the realm of conscience. All within
+  Lies peaceful, all composed. 'Tis wondrous grace
+  Keeps off thy terrors from this humble bosom,
+  Though stained with sins and follies, yet serene
+  In penitential peace and cheerful hope,
+  Sprinkled and guarded with atoning blood.
+  Thy vital smiles amid this desolation,
+  Like heavenly sunbeams hid behind the clouds,
+  Break out in happy moments. With bright radiance
+  Cleaving the gloom, the fair celestial light
+  Softens and gilds the horrors of the storm,
+  And richest cordial to the heart conveys.
+  Oh! glorious solace of immense distress!
+  A conscience and a God! This is my rock
+  Of firm support, my shield of sure defence
+  Against infernal arrows. Rise, my soul!
+  Put on thy courage! Here's the living spring
+  Of joys divinely sweet and ever new--
+  A peaceful conscience and a smiling Heaven!
+  My God! permit a sinful worm to say,
+  Thy Spirit knows I love thee. Worthless wretch!
+  To dare to love a God! Yet grace requires,
+  And grace accepts. Thou seest my laboring mind.
+  Weak as my zeal is, yet my zeal is true;
+  It bears the trying furnace. I am thine,
+  By covenant secure. Incarnate Love
+  Hath seized, and holds me in almighty arms.
+  What can avail to shake me from my trust?
+  Amidst the wreck of worlds and dying nature,
+  I am the Lord's, and he forever mine!"[3]
+
+
+Hear ye, then, the loving words of Jesus. The invitation is unlimited;
+the grace is free for all. No sin is too great to be forgiven, no
+burden too heavy to be removed, no power in earth or hell able to keep
+you back from Christ. However dark your minds, however hard your
+hearts, however dead your spirits, hear and answer: "I will arise and
+go!"
+
+  "Just as I am, without one plea,
+  But that thy blood was shed for me,
+  And that thou bidst me come to thee,
+      O Lamb of God, I come!"
+
+Lo! with outstretched arms he hastes to meet you, with tokens of
+welcome and the kiss of peace.
+
+  "Ready for you the angels wait,
+  To triumph in your blest estate;
+  Tuning their harps, they long to praise
+  The wonders of redeeming grace."
+
+All heaven, with expectant joy, awaits your coming. Come, and satisfy
+the soul that travailed for you in Olivet! Come, and gladden the heart
+that broke for you upon the cross! Come, and at the nail-pierced feet
+find your eternal rest!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached in Syracuse, N.Y., 1830; at Weston-super-Mare,
+Somersetshire, Eng., 1857.]
+
+[2] Pollok.
+
+[3] Isaac Watts in his last illness.
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+MY BELOVED AND FRIEND.[1]
+
+This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of
+Jerusalem!--Song of Sol. v. 16.
+
+
+By the ablest interpreters and critics of Holy Scripture, the Song of
+Solomon has generally been regarded as an epithalamium, or nuptial
+canticle. But, like many other parts of the sacred volume, doubtless,
+it has a mystical and secondary application, which is more important
+than the literal and primary. The true Solomon is Christ, and the
+Church is his beautiful Shulamite. In this chapter, the Bride sings the
+glory of her divine Spouse, and our text concludes the description. But
+what is thus true of the Church in her corporate capacity, is true also
+of her individual members; and without its verification in their
+personal experience, it could not be thoroughly verified in the organic
+whole. Every regenerate and faithful soul may say of the heavenly
+Bridegroom: "This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of
+Jerusalem!"
+
+
+Christ for a beloved--the Son of God for a friend! What nobler theme
+could occupy our thoughts? what sublimer privilege invest the saints in
+light?
+
+
+So constituted is man, that love and friendship are necessary to his
+happiness, almost essential to his existence. Accumulate in your
+coffers the wealth of all kingdoms, and gather into your diadems the
+glories of the greatest empires. Bid every continent, island and ocean
+bring forth their hidden treasures, and pour the sparkling tribute at
+your feet. Subsidize and appropriate whatever is precious in the solar
+planets or magnificent in the stellar jewellery of heaven, and hold it
+all by an immortal tenure. Yet, without at least one kindred spirit to
+whom you might communicate your joy, one congenial soul from whom you
+might claim sympathy in your sorrow, the loveless heart were still
+unsatisfied--
+
+  "The friendless master of the worlds were poor!"
+
+
+Among the children of men, however, love and friendship, in one respect
+or another, will always be found defective, liable to many
+irregularities and interruptions, painful suspicions and sad
+infirmities, which mar their beauty, tarnish their purity, and imbitter
+their consolations, turning the ambrosia into wormwood and the nectar
+into gall. Sometimes they are manifest only in words, and smiles, and
+hollow courtesies, and other external tokens; while the heart is as
+void of all true affection and confidence as the whitewashed sepulchre
+is of life and beauty. Beginning with flattery, they often proceed by
+hypocrisy, and end in betrayal. Or if there be sincerity in the outset,
+it may prove as impotent as childhood, as changeful as autumn winds, or
+as fleeting as the morning cloud. Or if not destroyed by some trivial
+offence, or suffered to die of cold neglect, their ties are clipped at
+length by the shears of fate, and no love or friendship is possible in
+the everlasting banishment of the unblest.
+
+
+But amidst all the sad uncertainties of human attachments, how pleasant
+it is to know that "there is a Friend who sticketh closer than a
+brother"--a Beloved whose affection is sincere, ardent, unchanging,
+imperishable--who can neither deceive nor forsake those who have
+entered into covenant with him--from whom death itself will not divide
+us, but bring us to a nearer and sweeter fellowship with him than we
+are capable now of imagining! Enoch walked with God till he was less
+fit for earth than for heaven, and St. John leaned upon the heart of
+Jesus till his own pulse beat in unison with the divine. Drawn into
+this blissful communion, every true disciple becomes one spirit with
+the Lord. Christ calls his servants friends, receives them into his
+confidence, and reveals to them the secrets of his kingdom. Not ashamed
+to own them now, he will confess them hereafter before his Father and
+the holy angels. "They shall be mine," saith he, "in that day when I
+make up my jewels." And the happy Bride, dwelling with ineffable
+delight upon the perfections of her Spouse, and anticipating the
+fulfilment of his promise when he cometh in his glory, concludes her
+song of joy with the declaration--"This is my beloved, and this is my
+friend, O daughters of Jerusalem."
+
+
+What, then, are the conditions on which such intimacy of the soul with
+Christ is to be established? Nothing is required but what is in the
+very nature of things necessary. Prophet, Priest and King, he can take
+into amicable alliance with him only such as respect and honor him in
+these relations. The prophet cannot be the beloved and the friend of
+those who refuse to hear his word; nor the priest, of those who reject
+his sacrifice and intercession; nor the king, of those who are still in
+arms against his gracious government. We must love him, if we would
+have his love; we must show ourselves friendly, if we would enjoy his
+friendship. Having died to redeem us, he ever lives to plead for us,
+and by a thousand ambassadors he offers us his love and friendship;
+but, no response on our part, no sympathy or co-operation, how can we
+call him our beloved and our friend? "Can two walk together except they
+be agreed?" There must be reconciliation and assimilation. We must
+submit to Christ's authority, and co-operate with his mercy. We must
+love what he loves, and hate what he hates. His friends must be our
+friends, and his enemies our enemies. The world, the flesh, and the
+devil, we must for his sake renounce; reckoning ourselves dead indeed
+unto sin, and alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Does not
+St. Paul tell us that as many as have been baptized into Christ have
+put on Christ?[2] What does he mean? That in baptism we not only enter
+into covenant with Christ, but also assume his character, and profess
+our serious purpose to walk as he walked, conformed to his perfect
+example, and governed by the same divine principles. As when one puts
+on the peculiar habit of the Benedictines or the Franciscans, he
+declares his intention to obey the rules and copy the life of St.
+Benedict or St. Francis, the founders of those orders; so, in putting
+on the Christian habit when you are baptized, you avow yourself the
+disciple of Christ, and openly declare your death thenceforth to sin
+and your new birth to righteousness. And without any thing in your
+heart and life corresponding to such a reality, how can you say of
+Jesus--"This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of
+Jerusalem!"
+
+
+But where there are no attractive qualities, there can be neither love
+nor friendship. Something there must be to inspire affection and
+confidence. In our divine Beloved resides every mental grace and every
+moral virtue. Our heavenly Friend is "the fairest among ten thousand
+and altogether lovely." Of the excellency of Christ all the charms of
+nature afford but the faintest images, and poetry and eloquence falter
+in the celebration of his praise. I ask your attention here to a few
+particulars.
+
+Jesus is always perfectly sincere. With him there are no shams, no mere
+pretences, no unmeaning utterances of love or friendship. All is real,
+all is most significant, and there are depths in his heart which no
+line but God's can fathom.
+
+And his ardor is equal to his sincerity. "Behold how he loved him!"
+said the Jews when they saw him weeping at the tomb of Lazarus. "Behold
+how he loveth them!" say the angels when they witness the far more
+wonderful manifestations of his friendship for the saints. Let the
+profane speak of Damon and Pythias, and the pious talk of David and
+Jonathan; there is no other heart like that of Jesus Christ, no other
+bond so strong as that which binds him to his disciples.
+
+And his disinterestedness is commensurate with his ardor. In human
+friendships we often detect some selfish end; Christ seeks not his own
+glory or profit, but sacrifices himself for our salvation. No earthly
+affection is greater than that which lays down life for a friend;
+Christ died for us while we were yet enemies, upon the cross prayed for
+those who nailed him there, and from the throne still offers eternal
+life to those who are constantly crucifying him afresh and putting him
+to open shame. And in all his gracious fellowship with those who love
+him, it is their good he seeks, their honor he consults, their great
+and endless comfort he wishes to secure.
+
+And not less wonderful are his patience and forbearance toward them.
+How meekly he endured the imperfections of the chosen twelve as long as
+he remained with them in the flesh! How tenderly he bore their
+misconceptions of his purpose, their misconstructions of his language,
+their fierce and fiery tempers, their slowness of heart to believe! How
+beautifully his patience carried him through all his life of suffering,
+and sustained him in the bitter anguish of the cross! And since his
+return to heaven, how often, and in how many ways, have his redeemed
+people put his forbearance to the proof! Try any other friend as you
+try Jesus, and see how long he will endure it. But our divine Beloved
+will not faint nor be weary, till he have accomplished in us his work
+of grace, and brought us in safety to his Father's house.
+
+And who ever matched him in beneficence and bounty? "He is able," saith
+the apostle, "to do exceeding abundantly above all we ask or think."
+His ability is as large as his love, and that is immeasurable and
+inconceivable. Other friends, loving us sincerely, may want power to
+help us; he hath all power in heaven and earth. They may be far away in
+the time of need; he saith--"Lo! I am with you alway, even unto the end
+of the world." As the vine gives its life to the branches, as the
+shepherd gives his time and care to the sheep, as the monarch gives
+riches and honors to his favorites, as the royal spouse gives himself
+and all he has to his chosen bride, so gives Christ to his elect,
+making them joint-heirs with himself to all that he inherits as the
+only begotten Son of God--unspeakable grace now, eternal glory
+hereafter! "All things are yours, and ye are Christ's, and Christ is
+God's!"
+
+And what confiding intimacy find we in this heavenly friendship! The
+father, the brother, the husband, live in the same house, occupy the
+same room, eat and drink at the same table, with their beloved; Christ
+comes into our hearts, takes up his abode there, and feasts with us,
+and we with him. "Shall I hide from Abraham," said Jehovah, "the thing
+that I do?" "therefore Abraham was called the friend of God." "The
+secret of the Lord is with them that fear him," saith the Psalmist,
+"and he will show them his covenant." "Henceforth I call you not
+servants," said Jesus to the twelve, "but I have called you friends,
+for whatsoever I have received of my Father I have made known unto
+you." "Eye hath not seen," writes St. Paul, "nor ear heard, neither
+have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared
+for them that love him; but God hath revealed them to us by his Spirit;
+for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God." Every
+true disciple, like Ignatius, carries the Crucified in his heart, and
+knows and comprehends with all saints, the lengths and breadths and
+depths and heights of the love that passeth knowledge, being filled
+with the fulness of God.
+
+And all this is unfailing and everlasting. Having loved his own who
+were in the world, Christ loved them unto the end, loved them still
+upon his cross, and ceased not to love them when he left them and
+returned to the Father, but remembered his promise to pray for them,
+and to send them another Comforter who should abide with them forever,
+and finally to come again and receive them unto himself, that where he
+is they might be also. Nearly nineteen centuries are past since he
+ascended whence he came, and still the promise holds good, and the
+lapse of ages has not diminished his affection, and to-day he loves his
+friends as tenderly as when he talked so sweetly with the little flock
+at the Last Supper and along the path to Olivet. Death, which dissolves
+all other friendships, confirms this forever. "I have a desire to
+depart," wrote the heroic Christian prisoner from Rome--"I have a
+desire to depart, and to be with Christ, which is far better." Not long
+had the dear old man to wait. One morning--the 29th of June, A.D.
+68--the door of his dungeon opened, St. Paul went forth, walked a mile
+along the way to Ostia, with his hands bound behind him knelt down, the
+sweep of a sword gleamed over him like the flash of an angel's wing,
+and the servant was with his Lord!
+
+
+Thus, dear brethren, we see the incomparable qualities of our Beloved,
+the divine excellences of our Friend. Perfect wisdom is here, perfect
+knowledge, perfect prudence, perfect justice, perfect purity, perfect
+benevolence, perfect magnanimity, with immutability and
+immortality--whatever is necessary to win and hold the heart--all
+blending in the character of Christ. Is he not the very friend we need?
+How, without him, can we bear to live or dare to die? What are riches,
+culture, power, splendor, without his love? What can our poor human
+friends do for us in the hour of death? What could worlds of such
+friends do for us in the day of judgment? "In the name of the Lord is
+strong confidence, and his children shall have a place of refuge." Flee
+away, ye heavens! Dissolve, thou earth! and vanish! It is my Beloved
+that cometh with his chariots! It is my Friend that sitteth upon the
+throne!
+
+Oh! my brethren! Christ Jesus loves to make new friends, though he
+never abandons the old. Let us accept his gracious overtures, and join
+ourselves unto the Lord in an everlasting covenant. The poorest and
+vilest of us all would he take home to his heart, and love him freely
+and forever. The most unworthy of all the human race would he gladly
+introduce to the fellowship of saints and the innumerable company of
+angels, and seat the pardoned sinner at his side upon the throne. Oh!
+when I enter the metropolis, and hail the immortal millions of the
+blood-washed, and kneel to kiss the nail-pierced feet of the King,
+while all the harps and voices that have welcomed me go silent for his
+gracious salutation, with what rapture, as I rise, shall I look round
+upon the happy multitude and say--"This is my beloved, and this is my
+friend, O daughters of Jerusalem!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at a wedding festival, 1833.
+
+[2] Gal. iii. 27.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+REFUGE IN GOD.[1]
+
+Be thou my strong rock, for a house of defence to save
+me.--Ps. xxxi. 2.
+
+
+On a superb arch in one of the halls of the Alhambra, the traveller
+reads as he enters: "I seek my refuge in the Lord of the morning." The
+sentiment is worthy of Holy Scripture, whence doubtless it was taken by
+the writer of the Koran. More than two thousand years earlier than
+Mohammed, Moses had said to the beloved tribes, just before he ascended
+to his mountain death-bed: "The eternal God is thy refuge, and
+underneath thee are the everlasting arms." And how often does King
+David, environed with dangers and oppressed with sorrows, comfort
+himself with the assurance of an almighty protection and support! "Thou
+art my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in
+whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my
+high tower." "In the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion;
+in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up
+upon a rock; and now shall my head be lifted up above mine enemies that
+are round about me." "Thou hast been a shelter for me, and a strong
+tower from the enemy; I will abide in thy tabernacle forever, I will
+trust in the covert of thy wings." "Thou art my hiding-place: thou wilt
+preserve me from trouble; thou wilt compass me about with songs of
+deliverance." And so in a hundred other passages of his psalms, and
+notably in the words we have chosen as the basis of this discourse: "Be
+thou my strong rock, for a house of defence to save me." In all such
+utterances, there seems to be some reference to the Hebrew cities of
+refuge, whither the manslayer fled from the avenger of blood, where he
+remained unmolested till he could have an impartial hearing, and
+whence, if found innocent of premeditated murder, he finally came forth
+acquitted amidst the congratulations of his family and friends. Here is
+the double idea of escape from persecution and security from
+punishment; and with reference to both these, the psalmist seeks his
+refuge in the Lord of the morning.
+
+
+The first idea is refuge from persecution. David's persecutions were
+varied, and violent, and long continued. How sadly he tells the story,
+and pours out his melting soul in song! Deceitful and bloody men, full
+of all subtlety and malignity, compassed him about like bees, like
+strong bulls of Bashan, like a troop of lions from the desert. Daily
+they imagined mischief against him, and consulted together to cast him
+down from his excellency. They laid to his charge things which he knew
+not. To the spoiling of his soul, they rewarded him evil for good. With
+hypocritical mockers in feasts, they gnashed upon him with their teeth.
+As with a sword in his bones, they reproached him; saying continually,
+"Where is now thy God?" In his adversity they openly rejoiced, and with
+his misfortunes made themselves merry. They persecuted him whom God had
+smitten, and talked to the grief of him whom the Most High had wounded.
+With cruel hatred they hated him; yea, they tore him in pieces, and
+ceased not.
+
+With these woful complaints agree the recorded facts of his life. One
+while we see him pursued like a partridge upon the mountains by the
+royal army, with his royal father-in-law at its head; from whom he
+escapes only by frequent flight, concealment in caverns, and weary
+sojourn at the court of a pagan king. And later in life we behold him
+driven from his throne, and chased from house and hold, by his own
+insurgent son; while Shimmei comes forth to curse the weeping fugitive,
+and cast stones at the Lord's anointed; and Ahithophel, his former
+familiar friend and courtly _confidant_, with whom he has often
+taken sweet counsel and walked in the house of God, lifts up the heel
+against him, and basely goes over to the standard of the conspirators.
+
+No wonder he exclaims, as with the sigh of a breaking heart: "Save me,
+O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul. I sink in deep mire,
+where there is no standing; I am come into deep waters, where the
+floods overflow me. I am weary of my crying; my throat is dried; mine
+eyes fail, while I wait for my God. They that hate me without cause are
+more than the hairs of my head; they that would destroy me, being mine
+enemies wrongfully, are mighty.... Thou hast known my reproach, and my
+shame, and my dishonor. Reproach hath broken my heart, and I am full of
+heaviness. And I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and
+for comforters, but I found none."[2] "I mourn in my complaint and make
+a noise, because of the enemy, because of the oppression of the wicked;
+for they cast iniquity upon me, and in wrath they hate me. My heart is
+sore pained within me, and the terrors of death are fallen upon me;
+fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and horror hath overwhelmed
+me. Oh that I had wings like a dove! for then would I flee away, and be
+at rest; lo! then would I wander far off, and remain in the wilderness;
+I would hasten my escape from the windy storm and tempest."[3]
+
+Vain wish, O disquieted and trembling soul! No wings, no distance, no
+solitude, can save thee. Nearer at hand thou shalt find thy refuge,
+even in the Lord of the morning. And well knows the persecuted king
+where to look for succor and consolation. "O Lord, my God! in thee do I
+put my trust. Save me from them that persecute me, and deliver me; lest
+he tear my soul like a lion, rending it in pieces, while there is none
+to deliver."[4] "Show thy marvellous loving-kindness, O thou that
+savest by thy right hand them that put their trust in thee from those
+who rise up against them! Keep me as the apple of thine eye, hide me
+under the shadow of thy wing, from the wicked that oppress me, from my
+deadly enemies who compass me about."[5] "Plead my cause, O Lord! with
+them that strive with me; fight against them that fight against me.
+Take hold of shield and buckler, and stand up for my help; draw out
+also the spear, and stop the way against them that persecute me. Say
+unto my soul, I am thy salvation."[6]
+
+How expressive is all this of utter helplessness, and reliance upon the
+living God! What fervent prayer is here! what faith in a personal power
+and a special providence which no human agency can baffle or resist!
+Proud mortals! talk no more of the strong will, the valiant arm, the
+dauntless courage, and your own self-sufficiency! "Cursed is the man
+that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm." "Trust ye in the Lord
+forever, for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength." What is the
+strategy of generals and the prowess of armies, to him "who rideth upon
+the heavens in thy help, and in his excellency on the sky"? Faith as a
+grain of mustard-seed is better than all your military science, and the
+prayer of the humblest peasant is mightier than embattled millions. The
+prayer of faith divides the sea, cleaves the granite, marshals the
+troops of the tempest, and makes the angels of God our allies. "When I
+call upon thee, then shall mine enemies be put to flight; this I know,
+for God is on my side." Such is David's confidence; such, my brethren,
+be ours! Is not every attribute of Jehovah in league with the devout
+believer, and all his infinite resources pledged to the support of his
+servants? And without any doubt of a divine hearing or fear of ultimate
+failure, every persecuted Christian may pray to the God of David: "Be
+thou my strong rock, for a house of defence to save me."
+
+
+The second idea is refuge from punishment. The chief element of David's
+distress is a painful consciousness of guilt. It is conscience that
+wrings the wormwood for him into every cup of sorrow. It is remorse for
+past transgression that turns his tears into gall and makes his
+persecutions intolerable. Pure and innocent, he might defy his enemies,
+he might glory in tribulations. But he is forced to regard the wicked
+as God's sword for the punishment of his sins; and in all his pleadings
+we hear the voice of the penitent--sad confessions, bitter
+self-reproaches, touching appeals to the mercy of Heaven. "Lord, what
+wait I for? My hope is in thee. Deliver me from my transgressions; make
+me not a reproach of the foolish.... Remove thy stroke away from me; I
+am consumed by the blow of thy hand."[7] "Deliver me out of the mire,
+and let me not sink. Let not the water-flood overflow me, neither let
+the deep swallow me up. Hear me, O Lord! for thy loving-kindness is
+good. Turn unto me, according to the multitude of thy tender mercies;
+and hide not thy face from thy servant, for I am in trouble. Hear me
+speedily."[8]
+
+A good man, we all know, may be surprised by temptation, and so fall
+into grievous sin. Thus some of God's holiest servants have committed
+enormous crimes. Not the single or occasional act, however, constitutes
+character; but the habit of a man's life--his dominant impulse and
+prevailing tendency. To judge St. Peter, for example, by the one
+solitary instance of defection, were manifestly unfair; when his whole
+course, up to that moment, and ever afterward, was marked by
+uncompromising fidelity to the Master, with the most heroic daring and
+enduring in his service. Far more just were it to estimate the man by
+the tears which he wept when the reproving glance brought home the
+guilt to his conscience, and by his subsequent earnest endeavors to
+undo the evil he had done and honor the Saviour he had denied.
+
+Apply this principle to the royal penitent. Who ever more truly loved
+God, or more honestly sought to serve him? Was not holy obedience the
+tenor and tendency of his life? If he erred in numbering the people--if
+he took Uriah's wife to his bosom, and slew the husband to conceal the
+crime--it was under the power of peculiar temptation, which we, having
+never experienced, are quite incapable of estimating; and those
+deplorable deeds are the only recorded exceptions--the manifest violent
+contradictions--to a long life of singular piety, purity and
+uprightness. And now, made sensible of his sin, mark you how bitterly
+he grieves for it, and how earnestly he groans for its forgiveness:--
+
+"Have mercy upon me, O God! according to thy loving-kindness; according
+to the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions.
+Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For
+I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against
+thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight; that
+thou mayest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou
+judgest.... Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I
+shall be whiter than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the
+bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. Hide thy face from my sins,
+and blot out all mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God!
+and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence,
+and take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy
+salvation, and uphold me with thy free Spirit. Then will I teach
+transgressors thy ways, and sinners shall be converted unto thee.
+Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God! thou God of my salvation! and
+my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness."[9]
+
+What keen remorse and penitential shame are here! Was there ever a more
+ingenuous confession, a more thorough contrition, a more profound
+humility, or a more utter self-despair? The royal sinner seems to see
+the sin in all its hideousness, and to hate it with unutterable hatred.
+He seeks no subterfuge, attempts no extenuation; but charges the guilt
+home, with all its aggravations, upon his own soul. Never can he
+forgive his folly, nor weep tears, enough to express his sorrow for the
+fault.
+
+Would to Heaven we might all thus feel our guilt, and haste to the
+shelter of the divine mercy! Sinners--great sinners--are we all. Is
+there one of us that has not sinned more deeply than David ever did?
+And, instead of being an exceptional act, our sin has been the habit of
+our lives. Justice, with double-flaming sword, is hard upon our heels.
+What shall we do, or whither turn, for safety? To thee, O Crucified
+Love! we come; and, with broken hearts, cast ourselves down at thy
+feet. All other saviours we renounce: all other merits we disclaim; all
+other sacrifices we abjure. Thou of God art made unto us wisdom,
+righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Perishing, we implore
+thy mercy. Take us to the arms that were stretched upon the cross. Hide
+us in the heart that was opened by the soldier's spear. When we faint
+in the valley of the shadow of death, let us feel the assuring pressure
+of the nail-pierced hand. When the heavens are flaming above and the
+earth is dissolving beneath, "be thou our strong rock, for a house of
+defence to save us"!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached in Ithaca, N.Y., 1838.
+
+[2] Ps. lxix. 1-4, 19, 20.
+
+[3] Ps. lv. 2-8.
+
+[4] Ps. vii. 1, 2.
+
+[5] xvii. 7, 8.
+
+[6] xxxv. 1-3.
+
+[7] Ps. xxxvii, 7, 8, 10.
+
+[8] Ps. lxix. 14-17.
+
+[9] Ps. li. 1-4, 7-14.
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+PARENTAL DISCIPLINE.[1]
+
+His sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not.--1
+Sam. iii. 13.
+
+
+Few things in the Bible are more beautiful than the child-life of
+Samuel. A gift of the loving God to a devout but sorrowful woman, his
+mother gladly gave him back to the Giver, and he ministered before the
+Lord in the sanctuary at Shiloh. At that time Eli was both high-priest
+and magistrate in Israel. As a man of God, and to him much more than a
+father, Samuel seems to have loved him very tenderly and honored him
+very highly. To ease himself somewhat of his onerous duties, perhaps,
+Eli had raised his two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, to the dignity of the
+priesthood. In the exercise of their sacred trust, the young men had
+committed great excesses and abuses. From all sides the fact came to
+the ears of their father. Sweetly and gently he remonstrated with the
+offenders, but neglected to hold them back with the strong hand of
+parental authority. Probably from the first there had been some radical
+defect in the moral discipline of the family. An amiable and indulgent
+father, Eli had neglected the severer duty which his sacred office,
+even more than his paternal relation, imposed upon him. To make him
+sensible of his great delinquency, the guilt of his sons must be
+brought home upon his hoary head.
+
+  "Divinely called and strongly moved,
+  A prophet from a child approved,"
+
+Samuel is commissioned to announce to him the heavy tidings, that God
+will judge his house forever, because "his sons made themselves vile,
+and he restrained them not."
+
+In the outset, we cannot help observing the difference between the sons
+of Eli and his little ward. Samuel received his first lessons from the
+lips of a godly mother in the quiet home at Ramah. From his earliest
+consciousness he knew that he was to be a Nazarite, consecrated wholly
+to the service of Jehovah. His special training afterward in the house
+of the Lord was well adapted to fit him for the grand career before
+him. The gross misconduct of some who ought to have set him the best
+example must have wounded deeply his innocent heart, while it impressed
+him strongly with the deadly evil of sin and the mischief resulting
+inevitably from the relaxation of morals among the rulers of the people
+and the ministers of religion. Growing up in daily contact with the
+mysteries and symbols of the divine service, the sacred ritual which
+was to Hophni and Phinehas merely an empty form was to him replete with
+the spirit and power of holiness, elevating his thoughts, purifying his
+feelings, and moulding his whole character to its noble design. The
+names and things with which he was constantly occupied conformed him
+gradually but unalterably to God's gracious purpose, and made him the
+steadfast and uncompromising servant of the Most High--the man to
+reprove, rebuke, exhort, instruct the people--to retrieve losses,
+restore justice, reform abuses, assuage excitements, reduce chaos to
+order, establish the schools of the prophets, and wield a controlling
+power over the throne. Such a ministry required a character of steady
+growth, and the personal influence of a consistent and holy life. None
+of your modern revivals could ever have made a Samuel.
+
+True it is, indeed, that some of God's most eminent servants--as St.
+Paul and St. Augustine--were converted in manhood, after a wasted youth
+of sin and crime; yet such instances are no real exceptions to the
+rule, that God directs the training of his servants from childhood,
+shaping his instruments by every act of his providence. St. Paul was
+thoroughly educated in the rabbinical learning of his day, and well
+acquainted with Greek literature and Greek philosophy, and so far
+prepared for his Christian apostleship to both Jews and Gentiles; and
+the logical and rhetorical studies of St. Augustine unconsciously made
+him the great Christian dialectician that he was, while the sensual
+indulgences of his earlier years intensified his knowledge both of the
+power of sin and the efficacy of divine grace which he was to preach to
+others. Generally, the Lord's most honored servants, like Samuel, have
+been chosen from their childhood, and nourished up for their special
+ministry under the hallowed influence of his truth and worship. Some of
+them, it is true, were afterward for a while occupied in other
+callings, before they went to their divinely appointed labor. Moses was
+a shepherd in the very wilderness through which he was to lead the
+Lord's beloved, and on the very mountain where he was to receive for
+them a law from the lips of God. David also was a shepherd, and a
+musician, and a warrior, and a fugitive, and an outcast from his
+country; and by all these conditions and experiences was he trained for
+his future pre-eminence, as the king of Israel, and the psalmist of the
+sanctuary, and the man after God's own heart. And Chrysostom was a
+lawyer, and Ambrose was a civilian and a prefect, and Cyprian was a
+professor of rhetoric, before they entered upon their nobler life-work
+for Christ and the Church. In all these cases, to which many others
+might be added, God's good providence wisely ordered the discipline of
+his servants, through knowledge, and sorrow, and conflict, and a great
+variety of experiences, out of which were developed those characters
+and qualities which were essential to their success in the high calling
+for which they were designed. And so with the holy Baptist, chosen to
+be the immediate harbinger of the Messiah; and the Galilaean fishermen,
+whom he afterward ordained as his apostles; and Timothy, appointed the
+first bishop of Ephesus; and Luther, the destined sword of Heaven to
+Papal Rome. And so it was with Samuel, from his very birth consecrated
+to God, growing up in the house of the Lord, becoming the prophet and
+judge of his people, the invincible champion of truth and
+righteousness; with such heroic energy maintaining the authority of the
+divine law, rebuking iniquity in high places, withstanding the current
+of the national degeneracy, and like an angel of God pronouncing the
+doom of a fallen monarch, that "all Israel even from Dan to Beersheba
+knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord."
+
+
+To return to Eli and his sons. The father's fault seems to have been
+too much indulgence, too much tenderness, perhaps too much timidity, to
+restrain his consecrated lads from their wicked practices. The power he
+had, but would not assert it. The father's authority in his family at
+that age of the world was absolute and unquestionable. This fact leaves
+Eli's conduct without excuse. He remonstrated with the offenders, but
+far too feebly. Their crimes were of the very worst character, and
+aggravated by their sacred profession and holy environments; yet he had
+for them but a few soft and gentle words, scarcely strong enough to be
+called a reproof, without any assertion of authority as father,
+high-priest, or judge. One of our best biblical critics renders the
+text: "His sons made themselves accursed, and he frowned not upon them."
+
+But while we animadvert upon the guilty negligence of Eli, let no
+parent plead the different customs of our day, the higher civilization
+of the race, or the diminished degree of parental authority, as an
+excuse for his own delinquency. Every father and mother are responsible
+for the moral restraint of the children that God has given them, and
+fearful beyond all estimate must be the consequences of disregarding
+the duty. Such is the tendency of human nature to evil, that it begins
+to show itself ordinarily at a very early period of life, and the
+utmost care should be taken to check it in its first manifestations.
+For this purpose it may be necessary to interpose the strength of the
+parental will in curbing the will of the child. Those who are taught
+from their infancy to submit their own will to the will of father or
+mother are more likely in later life to yield themselves to the will of
+God. The wise mother of the Wesleys has left on record these words for
+our guidance in this important matter: "In order to form the mind of
+the child, the first thing to be done is to conquer the will and bring
+it into an obedient temper. This is the only strong and rational
+foundation of a religious education, without which both precept and
+example will be ineffectual. As self-will is the root of all sin and
+misery, so whatever cherishes this in children insures their after
+wretchedness and irreligion, and whatever checks and mortifies it
+promotes their future happiness and piety." Who will presume to
+question this statement? And if correct, is not Robert Hall's remark
+equally true--that "indulgent parents are cruel to their children and
+to posterity"?
+
+But who can calculate the consequences? The fallow ground left unsown
+is soon sown by the winds with every vagrant seed of evil. One sin
+leads to another, the less generally to the greater; and by the
+inception of a single wrong principle in childhood, the young man who
+might have been a model of virtue becomes a curse to society, and the
+young woman who ought to have proved a priceless jewel turns out a mere
+package of dry goods if not something worse. True, these moral wrecks
+may possibly be recovered by converting grace; but such cases are
+extremely uncommon, and when they do occur they are regarded as
+miracles of mercy; and often, alas! the effect is as evanescent as the
+morning cloud and early dew. Generally, those who have grown up without
+religious restraint go on still in their trespasses, living without God
+and dying without hope.
+
+"As in individuals, so in nations," writes the Rev. Charles Kingsley,
+"unbridled indulgence of the passions must produce, and does produce,
+frivolity, effeminacy, slavery to the appetite of the moment, a
+brutalized and reckless temper, before which prudence, energy, national
+feeling, any and every feeling which is not centred in self, perishes
+utterly. The old French _noblesse_ gave a proof of this law which
+will last as a warning beacon to the end of time.... It must be so. The
+national life is grounded on the life of the family, is the development
+of it; and where the root is corrupt, the tree must be corrupt also." A
+fearful truth for the contemplation of Christian patriotism! Imagine an
+utter indifference to the morals of the rising generation all at once
+to prevail throughout the country, and all efforts for the spiritual
+culture of the young suddenly to cease; would not the frightful ruin
+rush over the land with the rapidity of an avalanche and the ubiquity
+of a deluge, instant and everywhere, in your highways and your byways,
+at your altars and your hearths, sweeping before it every thing pure
+and lovely--every thing valuable to existence, precious to
+recollection, or cheering in the visions of hope?
+
+
+This side of the subject is not pleasing; let us look at the obverse.
+No moral maxim is sounder than that of the royal sage: "Train up a
+child in the way that he should go, and when he is old he will not
+depart from it." The principles of virtue early implanted insure the
+future saint and hero. A thoroughly good character impressed upon youth
+cleaves to the man forever.
+
+Exceptions, indeed, there may be--very saddening and disheartening
+exceptions. It does sometimes happen that those who seem at least to
+have been brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord
+subsequently decline from the way of wisdom and become vicious in their
+lives. But such cases are too rare to affect the rule. And in these
+instances, is it not likely that we are deceived often by appearances?
+May not the religious culture have been radically defective in its
+principle or culpably incomplete in its process? Was not the child
+committed to incompetent hands, that marred the character they should
+have made; or abandoned to the influence of an evil world, and exposed
+to the contagion of bad example, before his virtuous principles were
+sufficiently confirmed and fortified? An accurate knowledge of all the
+facts would no doubt develop some capital defect in the education;
+would show something essential omitted, or something of evil mingled
+with the good, some base alloy blended with the pure metal, some infant
+viper coiled unseen among the buddings and bloomings of spring.
+
+But I have the confidence to affirm that apostasy from the principles
+of a good Christian education very seldom occurs--so seldom, indeed,
+that the instances might almost be pronounced anomalous. It is a maxim
+attested by general if not universal experience, that upon the
+qualities acquired in childhood depends the character of manhood and
+old age. Childhood is the period of docility and impressibility, when
+habits of thought and feeling are formed with the greatest facility;
+and such habits, once formed, are extremely difficult to destroy; and
+the good wrought in the soul at that tender age, growing with its
+growth and strengthening with its strength, is almost invariably
+retained to the latest hour of life.
+
+Ordinarily, no doubt, we are guided more by habit than by reason. To
+walk in the old way is much easier than to strike out a new. In this
+respect, taste follows the same law as thought and action. If the child
+has formed a taste for virtue, the potent law of habit insures its
+perpetuity. The virtuous taste prompts to virtuous deeds, and the
+virtuous deeds confirm the virtuous taste. Thus, by a reflex action,
+virtue proves its own conservator. Daily the habit grows stronger and
+the motive more efficacious. Daily the heart is more and more fortified
+against the assaults of temptation. Daily the world loses something of
+its fascination, its false maxims something of their plausibility, its
+apologies and solicitations something of their persuasive power.
+
+As with the body, so with the spirit. Habitual inaction enfeebles the
+faculties, and renders their occasional operation inefficient and
+fruitless. On the contrary, by habitual exercise one becomes capable of
+performing with ease what were otherwise laborious and difficult, if
+not quite impossible. Thus the young, accustomed to resist their evil
+passions, will afterward keep them in due control without any very
+strenuous struggle; and the seeds of a pure morality, sown in early
+life, will strike their roots deep into the soil, and spring up in
+perpetual blossom and fruitage. The person is thenceforth virtuous, not
+without effort, but certainly with less effort than if he had never
+accustomed himself to virtue. The habit of virtue has made virtue
+amiable, and her service becomes a labor of love, her yoke easy and her
+burden light.
+
+In speaking thus of the power of habit, which has been called "a second
+nature," I would not exclude from the process of education the agency
+of divine grace, nor lose sight of it as a necessary factor to the best
+results. Divine grace, indeed, has much to do with the formation of the
+habit, and must co-operate with every agency employed in the work.
+Without divine grace, there is nothing wise, nothing strong, nothing
+holy; and after all the efforts of parents, pastors, teachers--however
+great or however small the measure of success attained--we lift our
+hands to Heaven and sing:--
+
+  "Thou all our works in us hast wrought,
+    Our good is all divine;
+  The praise of every virtuous thought
+    And righteous word is thine.
+
+  From thee, through Jesus, we receive
+    The power on thee to call;
+  In whom we are, and move, and live--
+    Our God, our all in all."
+
+
+An infidel objected to sending his little daughter to the Sunday
+school, "because," said he, "they learn things there which they never
+forget." The infidel was a philosopher. Knowledge is indestructible.
+The fact or the principle once acquired is never lost. The soul's past
+thoughts, feelings, impressions, and operations, are its inalienable
+property. They are engraven upon an imperishable tablet, and no power
+can efface the record. Though some parts of our experience may be but
+dimly and vaguely remembered, and much that we have learned may seem to
+be irrevocably forgotten, yet the mind is in possession of a law which,
+when brought into action, will completely restore the entire train of
+its former phenomena. They are not dead, but sleeping; and we know not
+what event at some future day may be the trump of their resurrection.
+The seed that lies buried in the earth through the long and dreary
+winter will germinate in spring-time and fructify in summer. Therefore
+let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap if
+we faint not.
+
+Christian parents! it is yours to begin at the cradle a work whose
+blessed influence shall extend beyond the tomb. By the principles you
+impart to your little ones, you insure the virtue and the Christianity
+of generations to come; you kindle lights to burn amidst the world's
+darkness when the faint glimmering of your own is gone; you adorn the
+living temple of the Lord with pillars of strength and beauty which
+shall challenge angelic admiration when all the colonnaded glories of
+earth's capitals are calcined by the fires of doom. To such an
+achievement, what are all the treasures of monarchs, and all the
+splendors of empire, and all the applause of heroism, and all the
+renown of authorship, and all the fascination of eloquence, and all the
+entrancing power of song?
+
+Who has any fear of God, any love of country, any affection for his
+children, any regard for the welfare of posterity? By all these I
+implore you, and by every other consideration that ought to move the
+heart of man, awake to the work which Heaven enjoins and every instinct
+of nature urges upon you! Your time, money, knowledge, influence--how
+can they be better employed than in the Christian culture of the young
+immortals committed to your care? In the beautiful form you cherish,
+there is something far more beautiful--a jewel worth immeasurably more
+than the casket which contains it--a spirit that must live and think
+and feel when this planet shall have become a chaos, when out of that
+chaos shall have arisen the new _cosmos_ over which Christ is to
+rule in righteousness forever. Shall this precious thing perish through
+your faithlessness to so sublime a trust? Shall harps be wanting in
+heaven, and white-robed ministrants before the throne, through the
+recreancy of any bearing the Christian name and honored with the title
+of father or mother? What is reason's estimate of the parental
+tenderness which provides so laboriously for the body, but totally
+neglects the soul--which regards so sedulously the interests of time,
+but utterly overlooks the concerns of eternity? To see your little ones
+wandering unrestrained in the broad way to ruin, or trained for this
+world only, as if there were not another beyond--oh! is it not enough
+to make their guardian angels turn away their faces and weep beneath
+their wings?
+
+The Church is here to help you, but she requires your co-operation. The
+Sunday school is here to second your endeavors, but little can that do
+without your countenance and contribution. Men of Israel, help! Christ
+calls upon you from his cross to help. Juvenile vice and blasphemy
+through all your streets seem imploring you to help. Will you respond
+to the appeal? The result may be a blessing to your own house. The
+recollection will warm your heart amidst the chills of death. Sweet
+little minstrels with crowns shall rehearse the story to you when the
+cemetery and the sea are delivering up their dead. Not less, perhaps,
+than the eloquent preacher in the great congregation, the humble
+teacher of an infant-class may be shedding light into the dark places
+of the earth--may be scattering flower-seeds and raindrops over the
+face of the desert. Even more, it may be, than the consecrated minister
+at the altar of God, the liberal contributor to this beneficent agency
+is kindling a holy fire which shall burn when the stars have gone
+out--is touching the strings of a harp that shall send its melodies
+through eternity. O merciful God! when the seventh trump is sounding,
+and the quickened dead are gathering before thy throne, let it not be
+said of any in this assembly--"His sons made themselves vile, and he
+restrained them not"!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at a Sunday-school convention, 1840.
+
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+JOY OF THE LAW.[1]
+
+In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried,
+saying--If any man thirst, let him come unto me and
+drink.--John vii. 37.
+
+
+At three great annual festivals all the men of all the tribes of Israel
+were required to appear before the Lord in Jerusalem. One of these was
+the Feast of Tabernacles, kept in commemoration of the sojourn of their
+fathers in the wilderness, and as a special thanksgiving to God after
+the ingathering of the autumnal harvest. Its duration was strictly
+seven days, from the 15th to the 22d of the month Tisri; but it was
+followed by a day of holy convocation, distinguished by sacrifices and
+peculiar observances of its own, which was sometimes called the eighth
+day. During the seven days the people dwelt in booths formed of the
+branches of the palm, the pine, the olive, the myrtle, and other trees
+of thick foliage; and these temporary huts lined every street of the
+city, and covered all the surrounding hills. The public
+burnt-offerings, and the private peace-offerings as well, were more
+numerous than those of any other of the great national festivals. The
+bullocks sacrificed were seventy; but besides these were offered every
+day two rams, fourteen lambs, and a kid for a sin-offering. The long
+lines of booths everywhere, and the sacrificial solemnities and
+processions, must have furnished a grand spectacle by day; and the
+lamps, the torches, the music, the joyful gatherings in the
+temple-courts, must have given a still more festive character to the
+night. No other feast of the Hebrews was half so joyous as the Feast of
+Tabernacles; and therefore it was eminently fitting that it should be
+observed, as it was, with much more than its ordinary interest at the
+dedication of Solomon's Temple, again by Ezra after the restoration of
+the sacred structure, and a third time by Judas Maccabaeus when he had
+expelled the Syrians and re-established the true worship of Jehovah.
+
+The seven days accomplished, the eighth was ushered in with the glad
+sound of trumpets, summoning the multitudes to the holy convocation.
+During the seven days they had offered sacrifices for the seventy
+nations of the earth, as well as for themselves; the eighth was
+Israel's own day, and the sacrifices offered were exclusively for the
+people of the covenant, adding to the daily offerings already mentioned
+a bullock, a ram, seven lambs, and a goat for a sin-offering. As soon
+as the morning trumpets sounded, the booths were all dismantled, and
+the thronging thousands from every quarter hastened to the temple. The
+sacrifice was already on the altar, and the high-priest stood by in his
+more than regal array, with his numerous white-robed ministers. A
+priestly procession entered at the Water-gate, bringing water in a
+golden vessel from the neighboring Pool of Siloam. Approaching the
+altar, the bearer ascended the sacred slope, and delivered his burden
+into the hands of the high-priest; while the trumpets sent forth a
+joyous peal, to which the people responded with a shout that shook the
+city. Part of the water, mingled with wine, was then poured into the
+grooves of the altar around the morning sacrifice, and the rest was
+distributed among the attendant priests, who drank it amidst the
+grateful acclamations of the multitude; and finally the great choir,
+chanting to every instrument of music, poured forth the song of
+Isaiah--"With joy shall ye draw water from the wells of salvation!"
+This was called "the Joy of the Law;" and there is a rabbinical proverb
+to the effect, that he who has never witnessed it has never seen
+rejoicing. It was intended as a commemoration of the miracle of the
+smitten rock in Horeb, which the apostle tells us prefigured Christ;
+and it must have been just after this grand solemnity, or in connection
+with its impressive evening compline, that "Jesus stood and cried,
+saying--If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink."
+
+
+Here are four things full of instruction for us--the time, the speaker,
+the manner, and the invitation. In these we shall find the very marrow
+of the gospel, worth more to our souls than all the revelations of
+science and all the speculations of philosophy. Let us give them
+earnest and devout attention, and may God grant us the aid of his grace!
+
+First, the time is to be noticed. "In the last day, that great day of
+the feast"--when there was present a vast concourse of the people.
+Three million have been counted in attendance at the Feast of
+Tabernacles. What an audience, what an inspiration, for an orator! How
+would Cicero have triumphed before such an assembly! Jesus needed no
+such impulse. His mind was ever full of light, his heart overflowing
+with love. He wanted but the opportunity to pour forth his divine
+speech upon the people, and surely he never had a better than now. How
+did his doctrine distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender
+herb, and the showers upon the grass! Great lesson for his servants,
+who ought to make their Master their model, and let no good occasion
+slip for pouring the light of life into benighted souls!
+
+"In the last day, that great day of the feast"--when they were occupied
+with the most interesting observances of the national solemnity.
+Another might have said: "They will not hear me; they are too much
+absorbed to listen." Jesus was a better philosopher. Conscious of his
+own power, he knew perfectly the hearts of men. Never could his hearers
+recall the Joy of the Law, without recollecting the voice, the figure,
+the beaming countenance, of the strange young rabbi from Galilee, who
+stood forth in the midst of the great congregation, and dropped such
+heavenly words into their hearts. "Who was he? What meant he? Could any
+mere mortal have spoken so? Is the Messiah at length come? Let us seek
+him again, and hear more from those marvellous lips!" Another grand
+lesson for his servants, who ought to study to environ their teachings
+with associations which cannot fail, with every happy hour, by every
+happy memory, to recall the truths they have uttered and revive the
+impressions produced by their preaching.
+
+"In the last day, that great day of the feast"--when the pleasant
+season was drawing to its close, and the people were ready to disperse
+and return to their respective homes. The last words of a dear
+departing friend linger long in the memory. The last utterances of a
+dying father or mother cannot soon be effaced from the mind of the
+child. The last sermon of a loved and honored pastor, before he leaves
+us to feed another flock, may impress us more profoundly than any thing
+he ever said to us before. The mere fact that it is the last time, that
+we may never see that face again, never again hear that familiar voice,
+brings home the truth with a vivid power, which can hardly fail to make
+it effective, even with those who have hitherto heard with
+indifference. Many who are now listening to our Lord will never listen
+to him again. Before another Feast of Tabernacles they may be in their
+graves, or he in heaven. To some present he may have preached many
+sermons, but will never preach another. It is their last opportunity,
+which seals up their account to the judgment. How must the thought have
+wrought upon a mind like his! what earnestness given to every word!
+what tenderness to every tone! Touching lesson again for us, my
+brethren! who ought to preach every Lord's Day as if it were our last!
+as if Death stood beside us saying--"Shoot thou God's arrows, and I
+will shoot mine!" as if the peal of doom were already ringing in our
+ears, and the graves around us delivering up their dead!
+
+
+Next, the speaker is to be observed. It is Jesus, the Saviour, heralded
+by prophets, escorted by angels, proclaimed by the Eternal Father with
+an audible voice from heaven. A divine teacher, he comes to preach the
+acceptable year of the Lord--an incarnation of the Father's love, to
+unfold the secrets of the Father's heart to sinners, and make known the
+purpose of his tender mercy in their salvation. Throughout Galilee, and
+Judaea, and some of the neighboring provinces, he has already gone,
+preaching the kingdom of heaven and calling the people to repentance.
+He speaks as one having authority, and not as the scribes. Everywhere
+miracles attest his mission, and demonstrate his doctrine. The wisdom
+of his words is too much for the cunning sophistry of his enemies, and
+an eloquence of sublime simplicity forces conviction upon unwilling
+minds and takes the hearts of thousands captive. And now, in the
+temple, on one of the most popular occasions of religious worship and
+festivity, he is speaking to the people of things pertaining to their
+eternal peace. Can any who hear him ever forget those gracious
+utterances? "Happy souls!" methinks I hear you say, "happy souls, to
+have listened to such a teacher! Could I have been there! Could I have
+heard but once for half an hour! How eagerly would I have listened! how
+gladly responded to his invitation!"
+
+Alas, my friends! how our own hearts deceive us! Had we been present,
+we should probably have done very much as most of the Jews did, and
+some of us might have shown still greater blindness of mind or hardness
+of heart. Have we not to-day the same gospel preached to us? Are not
+those who occupy our pulpits the accredited ambassadors of Christ? Is
+it not his word they speak, his claims they urge, his love they
+proclaim, and his salvation they offer? And how receive we the message
+and respond to the demand? With hearty faith, and grateful tears, and
+earnest obedience? Nay, do not many of us despise our own mercy, and
+reject the gracious counsel of God, not knowing the day of our
+visitation? Even we who profess faith in Christ and call ourselves his
+disciples--are we made wiser and better by the weekly recurrence of the
+blessed opportunity? "God hath in these last days spoken unto us by his
+Son." Every gospel sermon delivered to us is a message from the throne
+of heaven. It is as if Christ every Sunday morning descended afresh
+from the Father, and stood before us in the pulpit, and stretched forth
+to us the hands once nailed to the shameful cross; with many
+amplifications and additional arguments repeating what he said in the
+temple on "the last day--that great day of the feast." "See, then, that
+ye refuse not him that speaketh: for if they escaped not who refused
+him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape if we turn away
+from him that speaketh from heaven."
+
+
+Thirdly, the manner is to be considered. "Jesus stood and cried." The
+attitude is instructive. Jewish teachers generally sat. So did Jesus on
+the Mount. Here he stands--stands ready to bestow--stands ready to
+depart. Ready to bestow, he is ever standing--more ready to bestow than
+we to receive. Delighting in mercy, he waits to be gracious. All the
+day long he stretches out inviting hands to the perishing. All the
+night he lingers with dew-sprinkled locks at the door. Now, if ever, is
+the accepted time; now, if ever, the day of salvation. While Jesus
+waits, there is hope for the worst. But he who stands may soon depart.
+Mercy is limited by justice. Probation is bounded by destiny. If we
+heed not its compassionate plea, even love must leave us, hopelessly
+hardened in our sin. Jerusalem rejected her Messiah, and perished in
+spite of his tears. "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great
+salvation?"
+
+"Jesus stood and cried." This last word is suggestive. The orator much
+in earnest speaks loudly. Demosthenes thundered from the _bema_.
+Cicero's speech rang like a trumpet-call through the forum. One Hebrew
+prophet in his commission is directed to cry aloud, spare not, lift up
+his voice like a trumpet. Another, pre-announcing the Messianic mercy,
+like one who has found a spring in the desert and shouts to his
+comrades of the caravan, sends out his call upon the wind: "Ho! every
+one that thirsteth! come ye to the waters!" Had Jesus desired to limit
+his salvation to a few unconditionally elected favorites, would he not
+have restricted the invitation? With such a policy, walking quietly
+through the crowd, seeking out his elect here and there, calling them
+privately in undertones to their peculiar privilege, would certainly
+seem to have been in better keeping than an undiscriminating stentorian
+cry from a conspicuous position to the multitude. But, intending the
+mercy for all, he offers it to all. Does he mock them with an
+invitation which is insincere? Oh! better we know the love divine! The
+water of life is not the private property of a churl, streaming from a
+statue in a little park, surrounded by a lofty granite wall, with an
+iron gate locked against the public, while a few favored individuals,
+as selfish as himself, are furnished each with a key; but an open
+fountain in the field, without inclosure or obstruction, clearer than
+the Clitumnus and more copious than the San Antonio, issuing like the
+outlet of a subterranean ocean from the base of the everlasting hills;
+while the Son of God, more glorious than the morn upon the mountains,
+stands over it crying with voice that reaches every nation: "If any man
+thirst, let him come unto me and drink!"
+
+
+Finally, the invitation is to be regarded. Who here is not athirst?
+Some thirst for riches, some for honors, some for pleasures, a few
+perhaps--may grace enlarge the number--for the water of salvation. Gold
+cannot satisfy the soul; the more we have, the more we crave. The world
+has not enough of glory in its gift to fill the aching voids of
+ambition; elevation evokes aspiration, and at the last summit the cry
+is still "Excelsior!" One after another, all sensuous enjoyments pall
+upon the taste; and fluttering like butterflies from flower to flower,
+and sipping like honey-bees every sweet of field and forest, we learn
+at length with a sated Solomon that all is vanity. The gilding of an
+empty cup can never satisfy the thirsty soul. "We were made for God,"
+says St. Augustine, "and our hearts are restless till they repose in
+him." For God, even the living God, David thirsted long ago; and here,
+incarnate in our nature, stands the Divine Object of his desire, crying
+to the world: "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink!"
+
+But there is something, see you not? for the thirsty soul to do. Christ
+cannot save us till we come. He is indeed, as St. Paul calls him, "the
+Saviour of all men, especially of them that believe"--of all men,
+because he has opened the fountain for all and invited all to the
+fountain--especially of them that believe, because they accept the
+invitation and come to him for supply. Whoever, whatever, wherever you
+are--however great your obstructions, and however numerous and enormous
+your sins--called, you may come; coming, you will receive; receiving,
+you shall be satisfied forever. "Rivers of living water," Jesus offers
+every believer in him. See the adaptation--"water"--to assuage your
+thirst, to refresh the weary soul, to revive him who is fainting and
+dying. Observe the quality--"living water"--not a stagnant pool, but a
+salient spring, a fountain that never fails, a well of water within
+springing up unto everlasting life. Behold the abundance--"rivers of
+living water"--not one great stream, but many--an inexhaustible supply,
+having its source in a shoreless and unfathomable sea--
+
+  "Its streams the whole creation reach,
+        So plenteous is the store;
+  Enough for all, enough for each,
+        Enough forevermore!"
+
+
+But the coming is not all. Come and what? Come and see? Come and
+explore? Come and investigate? Come and analyze the water, and discuss
+its qualities, and speculate about its probable effects? Come and
+praise the fountain, and commend it to others, and enjoy its cool
+retreats, and admire its beautiful environs, and congratulate your
+friends upon its conveniences, and applaud the benevolence that opened
+it for the benefit of all? Nay, come and drink. Not all the water from
+the smitten rock could save the Israelite that would not drink. Not all
+the river of the water of life flowing through the City of God can
+quench the thirst of the soul that declines it. Personally you must
+appropriate the mercy. Personally you must experience its restoring
+power. Salvation is not a theory, but a fact; not a speculation, but a
+consciousness; not an ethical system to be reasoned out by superior
+intellect, but a divine blessing to be taken into the believing heart.
+It is a new life received from the Fountain-Life of the world. Gushing
+from the throne of God and the Lamb, "clear as crystal," with a
+copiousness and an energy which no dam can stay nor dike restrain, it
+offers its refreshment to all, free as the air, the dew, the rain, or
+the sunlight of heaven. Drink, and you shall never thirst again. Drink,
+and find your immortality in the draught!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached in Rochester, N.Y., 1842.
+
+
+
+
+VII.
+
+SOJOURNING WITH GOD.[1]
+
+Ye are strangers and sojourners with me.--Lev. xxv. 23.
+
+
+I have a dear friend to-day on the Atlantic. Four days ago, in New-York
+Harbor, I accompanied him to the floating palace that bears him to
+Europe; and put a book into his hand, which may furnish him some
+entertainment on the voyage, and some service perhaps in the land of
+art and beauty for which he is bound. Next Lord's Day he hopes to spend
+in London; and thence, after a short pause, to proceed to Rome, where
+he means to remain three months or more. A summer in that city is to an
+American somewhat hazardous on the score of health, and the facilities
+for seeing and exploring are far less favorable than they are in the
+winter. Yet, as this is the only season he can command for the purpose,
+he is willing to encounter the dangers and dispense with some of the
+advantages, for the sake of a brief sojourn in the grand old metropolis
+that dominated the world in the days of the Caesars, and has since ruled
+it with a rod of iron in the hands of the popes.
+
+In "the historic city" he will meet with much to entertain a mind like
+his--highly cultivated and richly stored with classic lore; and for all
+that he wishes to accomplish, he will find his opportunity far too
+brief. But he will not be at home there--a transient and unsettled
+visitor. Every thing will be different from what he has been accustomed
+to in his own country--government different--society different--manners
+and customs different--churches and worship different--dress, diet and
+language different--architecture, public institutions, general aspect
+of the city, and natural scenery on all sides, quite different from any
+thing he ever saw before. And while he daily encounters new objects of
+absorbing interest--new wonders of art--new treasures of antiquity--new
+illustrations and confirmations of history, and feels the charm of a
+thousand beauties to which he has not been accustomed, the very
+contrast will make him confess that he is a stranger and sojourner, and
+think frequently of his home beyond the sunset, and sigh for the
+fellowship of the dear hearts far over the western sea.
+
+And should he go farther, and visit the ruined lands of the Nile--the
+Jordan--the Euphrates, and wander over the silent wastes that once
+smiled with golden harvests, glowed with gorgeous cities, and teemed
+with tumultuous populations; everywhere--on the burning sands of the
+desert--in the savage solitudes of the mountains--amidst the crumbling
+memorials of ancient civilizations and religions--in the tent of the
+Arab, the wayside encampment, and the comfortless caravansera--he will
+constantly require the pledge of chieftains, the protection of princes,
+the safe conduct of governments, and the covenanted friendship of the
+rude nomadic tribes among whom he makes his temporary abode.
+
+
+This is the idea of our text: "Ye are strangers and sojourners with
+me." It is God speaking to his chosen people, about to take possession
+of the promised land, instructing them concerning their polity and
+conduct in their new home and relations. One of the specific directions
+given them is, that they are not to sell the land forever, because it
+belongs to him, and they are his wards--tenants at will, dwelling on
+his domain, under his patronage and protection. For six years he leased
+to them the land, so to say; but every seventh year he reclaimed it as
+his own, and it was to be neither tilled nor sown; and after seven such
+sabbatic years, in the fiftieth year, which was the year of Jubilee,
+every thing reverted with a still more special emphasis to the divine
+Proprietor; and the people were not permitted to reap or gather any
+thing that grew of itself that year even from the unworked soil, but
+were to subsist on the product of the former years laid up in store for
+that purpose. All this to teach them that the domain was Jehovah's, and
+they were only privileged occupants under him--that he was their
+patron, protector, benefactor, while they were strangers and sojourners
+with God.
+
+
+In a general sense, these sacred words describe the condition of all
+men. All live by sufferance on the Lord's estate, fed and sustained by
+his bounty. Whether we recognize his rights and claims or not, all we
+have belongs to him, and the continuance of every privilege depends
+upon his will. You may revolt against his authority, and fret at what
+you call fate; but his providence orders all, and death is only your
+eviction from the trust and tenure you have abused. What is your life,
+and what control has any man over his destiny? A shadow on the ground,
+a vapor in the air, an arrow speeding to the mark, an eagle hasting to
+the prey, a post hurrying past with despatches, a swift ship gliding
+out of sight over the misty horizon--these are the Scripture emblems of
+what we are. Every day is but a new stage in the pilgrim's
+progress--every act and every pulse another step toward the tomb. The
+frequent changes of fortune teach us that nothing here is certain but
+uncertainty, nothing constant but inconstancy, nothing real but
+unreality, nothing stable but instability. The loveliest spot we ever
+found on earth is but a halting-place for the traveller--an oasis for
+the caravan in the desert. The world itself, and all that it contains,
+present only the successive scenes of a moving panorama; and our life
+is the passage of a weaver's shuttle--a flying to and fro--a mere
+coming and going--an entry and an exit. For we are strangers and
+sojourners with God.
+
+
+But what is in a general sense thus true of all, is in a special sense
+true of the spiritual and heavenly-minded. As Abraham was a stranger
+and a sojourner with the Canaanite and the Egyptian--as Jacob and his
+sons were strangers and sojourners with Pharaoh, and the fugitive David
+with the king of Gath--so all godly people acknowledge themselves
+strangers and sojourners with God. This is the picture of the Christian
+life that better than almost any other expresses the condition and
+experiences of our Lord's faithful followers--not at home here--ever on
+the move--living among aliens and enemies--subject to many privations
+and occasional persecutions--every morning hearing afresh the summons,
+"Arise ye and depart, for this is not your rest"--practically
+confessing, with patriarchs and prophets, apostles and martyrs, "Here
+we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come." The world knew
+not their Master, and knows not them. If they were of the world, the
+world would love its own; because they are not of the world, but he has
+chosen them out of the world, therefore the world hateth them. Wholly
+of another character--another profession--another pursuit--aiming at
+other ends, and cheered by other hopes--the carnal, selfish,
+unbelieving world cannot possibly appreciate them, and they are
+constantly misunderstood and misrepresented by the world. Regarding not
+the things which are seen and temporal, but the things which are unseen
+and eternal, they are often stigmatized as fools and denounced as
+fanatics. Far distant from their home, and surrounded by those who have
+no sympathy with them, they show their heavenly citizenship by heavenly
+tempers, heavenly manners, heavenly conversation, all hallowed by the
+spirit of holiness. So one of the Fathers in the second century
+describes the Christians of his time:
+
+"They occupy their own native land, but as pilgrims in it. They bear
+all as citizens, and forbear all as foreigners. Every foreign land is
+to them a fatherland, and every fatherland is foreign. They are in the
+flesh, but they walk not after the flesh. They live on earth, but they
+are citizens of heaven. They die, but with death their true life
+begins. Poor themselves, they make many rich; destitute, they have all
+things in abundance; despised, they are glorified in contempt. In a
+word--what the soul is in the body, Christians are in the world. The
+soul inhabits the body, but is not derived from it; and Christians
+dwell in the world, but are not of it. The immortal soul sojourns in a
+mortal tent; and Christians inhabit a perishable house, while looking
+for an imperishable in heaven."
+
+To such heavenly-mindedness, my dear brethren, we all are called; and
+without something of this spirit, whatever our professions and
+formalities, we do but belie the name of Christian. "If ye then be
+risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ
+sitteth, on the right hand of God; set your affections on things above,
+not on things on the earth; for ye are dead, and your life is hid with
+Christ in God; when Christ who is our life shall appear, then shall we
+also appear with him in glory."
+
+
+Bowed down with many a burden and weary because of the way, how much is
+there to cheer and comfort us in God's good word to his suffering
+pilgrims--"Ye are strangers and sojourners with me"!
+
+There is the idea of friendly recognition. As the nomad chief receives
+the tourist into his tent, and assures him of his favor by the
+"covenant of salt;" so God hath made with us an everlasting covenant of
+grace, ordered in all things and sure; since which, he can never disown
+us, never forsake us, never forget us, never cease to care for his own.
+
+There is the idea of pleasant communion. As in the Arab tent, between
+the sheik and his guest, there is a free interchange of thought and
+feeling; so between God and the regenerate soul a sweet fellowship is
+established, with perfect access and unreserved confidence. "The secret
+of the Lord is with them that fear him," and his delight is in his
+saints, who are the excellent of the earth.
+
+There is the idea of needful refreshment. "Turn in and rest a little,"
+saith the patriarch to the wayfarers; and then brings forth bread and
+wine--the best that his store affords--to cheer their spirits and
+revive their strength. God spreads a table for his people in the
+wilderness. With angels' food he feeds them, and their cup runs over
+with blessing. He gives them to eat of the hidden manna, and restores
+their fainting souls with the new wine of the kingdom.
+
+There is the idea of faithful protection. The Arab who has eaten with
+you will answer for your safety with his own life, and so long as you
+remain with him none of his tribe shall harm a hair of your head.
+Believer in Jesus! do you not dwell in the secret place of the Most
+High, and abide under the shadow of the Almighty? Has he not shut you,
+like Noah, into the ark of your salvation? Is not David's rock your
+rock, your fortress, your high tower, and unfailing city of refuge?
+
+There is the idea of infallible guidance. The Oriental host will not
+permit his guest to set forth alone, but goes with him on every new
+track, grasps his hand in every steep ascent, and holds him back from
+the brink of every precipice. God said to Israel: "I will send my angel
+before thy face, to lead thee in the way, and bring thee into the land
+whither thou goest." Yea, he said more: "My presence shall go with
+thee, and I will give thee rest." Both promises are ours, my brethren;
+and something better than the pillar of cloud and fire, or the manifest
+glory of the resident God upon the mercy-seat, marches in the van of
+his pilgrim host through the wilderness, and will never leave us till
+the last member of his redeemed Israel shall have passed clean over
+Jordan!
+
+There is the idea of a blessed destiny. Their divine Guide is leading
+them "to a good land, that floweth with milk and honey"--"to a city of
+habitation"--"a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is
+God"--"a house not made with hands, eternal, in the heavens"--the
+Father's house of "many mansions," where Christ is now as he promised
+preparing a place for his people, and where they are at last to be with
+him and behold his glory. Oh! with what a sweet and restful confidence
+should we dismiss our groundless fears of the future, saying with the
+psalmist--"Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive
+me to glory!" The pilgrim has a home; the weary has a resting-place;
+the wanderer in the wilderness is a "fellow-citizen with the saints and
+of the household of faith;" and often have we seen him in the evening
+twilight, after a long day's march over stony mountain and sultry
+plain, sitting at the door of the tent just pitched for the night, with
+calm voice singing:
+
+  "One sweetly solemn thought
+  Comes to me o'er and o'er--
+  I'm nearer to my home to-night
+  Than e'er I was before--
+  Nearer the bound of life,
+  Where falls my burden down--
+  Nearer to where I leave my cross,
+  And where I take my crown!"
+
+and with the next rising sun, like a giant refreshed with new wine,
+joyfully resuming his journey, from the first eminence attained gazing
+a moment through his glass at the distant glory of the gold-and-crystal
+city, then bounding forward and making the mountains ring with the
+strain:
+
+  "There is my house and portion fair,
+  My treasure and heart are there,
+        And my abiding home;
+  For me my elder brethren stay,
+  And angels beckon me away,
+        And Jesus bids me come!"
+
+
+The saintly Monica, after many years of weeping at the nail-pierced
+feet, has at length received the answer to her prayers in the
+conversion of one dearer to her than life; and is now ready, with good
+old Simeon, to depart in peace, having seen the salvation of the Lord:
+"As for me, my son, nothing in this world hath longer any charm for me.
+What I do here, or why I should remain, I know not. But one wish I had,
+and that God has abundantly granted me. Bury me where thou wilt, for
+nowhere am I far from God!"
+
+Dark to some of you, O ye strangers and sojourners with God! may be the
+valley of the shadow of death; but ye cannot perish there, for He whose
+fellowship is immortality is still with you, and you shall soon be with
+him as never before! Black and cold at your feet rolls the river of
+terrors; but lift your eyes a little, and you see gleaming through the
+mist the pearl-gates beyond! There "the Captain of the Lord's host" is
+already preparing your escort!
+
+          "Even now is at hand
+          The angelical band--
+          The convoy attends--
+  An invincible troop of invisible friends!
+          Ready winged for their flight
+          To the regions of light,
+          The horses are come--
+  The chariots of Israel to carry us home!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached in Charleston, S.C., soon after a year's sojourn beyond
+the sea, 1858.
+
+
+
+
+VIII.
+
+BUILDING FOR IMMORTALITY.[1]
+
+So they built and prospered.--2 Chron. xiv. 7.
+
+
+In the fairest of Italian cities stands the finest of terrestrial
+structures--a campanile or bell-tower, twenty-five feet square, two
+hundred and seventy-three feet high, built of white and colored marble
+in alternate blocks, covered with a royal luxuriance of sculpture
+framed in medallions, studded everywhere with the most beautiful
+statuary disposed in Gothic niches, and finished from base to
+battlement like a lady's cabinet inlaid with pearl and gold. It would
+seem as if nothing more perfect in symmetry, more exquisite in
+workmanship, or more magnificent in ornamentation, could possibly be
+achieved by human genius. Pure as a lily born of dew and sunshine, the
+approaching tourist sees it rising over the lofty roof of the Duomo,
+like the pillar of cloud upon the tabernacle; and when he enters the
+Piazza, and finds it standing apart in its majestic altitude, and
+looking down upon the vestal loveliness of the Tuscan Santa Maria, he
+can think only of the Angel of the Annunciation in the presence of the
+Blessed Virgin. Whoever has gazed upon its grand proportions, and
+studied the details of its exquisite execution, will feel no
+astonishment at being told that such a structure could not now be built
+in this country for less than fifty millions of our money; nor will he
+wonder that Jarvis, in his "Art Hints," has pronounced it "the noblest
+specimen of tower-architecture the world has to show;" that Charles the
+Fifth declared it was "fit to be inclosed with crystal, and exhibited
+only on holy-days;" and that the Florentines themselves, whenever they
+would characterize any thing as extremely beautiful, say it is "as fine
+as the Campanile."
+
+
+Gentlemen, you have reared a nobler edifice! Nobler, not because more
+costly, for your pecuniary outlay is as nothing in the comparison.
+Nobler, not because the material is more precious, and the architecture
+more perfect; for what is a pile of brick to such a miracle in marble?
+or where is the American builder that would dream of competing with
+Giotto? Nobler, not because there is a larger and richer-toned bell in
+the gilded cupola, to summon the inmates to study and recitation, or to
+morning and evening worship; for the great bell of the Campanile is one
+of the grandest pieces of resonant metal ever cast; and its voice,
+though soft as flute-tones at eventide coming over the water, is rich
+and majestic as an angel's song. Far nobler, however, in its purpose
+and utility; for that wonder of Italian architecture is the product of
+Florentine pride and vanity in the days of a prosperous republic--a
+less massive but more elegant Tower of Babel, expressing the ambition
+of its builders; and though standing in the Cathedral Piazza, its chief
+conceivable objects are mere show and sound; while the end and aim of
+this edifice is the development of mind, the formation of character,
+the creation of a loftier intellectual manhood, the reproduction of so
+much of the lost image of God as may be evolved by the best media and
+methods of human education.
+
+
+The excellence of your structure, then, consists mainly in this--that
+it is only a scaffold, with derricks, windlasses, and other apparatus
+and implements, for building something immeasurably more excellent.
+Here the thinking power is to be quickened, and the logical faculty is
+to be awakened and invigorated. This is to be effected, not so much by
+the knowledge acquired, as by the effort called out for its
+acquisition. The teacher is to measure his success, not by the number
+and variety of terms, rules, formulas and principles he has impressed
+upon the memory, but by the amount of mental power and independence he
+has imparted to his pupil. True, in educating the mind, knowledge of
+some sort must be acquired; but the thoroughness of the education
+depends no more upon the quantity of the acquisition, than the health
+of the guest upon the abundance of the banquet. The mental food, as
+well as the material, must be digested and assimilated. It follows that
+those exercises which require close and consecutive thinking, thorough
+analysis, clear discrimination and accurate definition, are best
+adapted to develop the higher faculties of the mind. Mathematics,
+metaphysics, dialectics and philology must form the granite basis of
+your building, sustaining the solid tiers of rich and varied marbles.
+
+
+Then comes the aesthetic culture. First the substantial, afterward the
+ornamental--this is the natural order, to reverse which were to begin
+building the tower at the top. The very idea of the ornamental supposes
+something substantial to be ornamented. No man will attempt to polish
+the sponge, or paint a picture on the vacant air, or rear a stone
+cathedral on a sunset cloud. There is no lily-bloom without the
+sustaining stalk, nor magnolia grandiflora without the sturdy and
+stately tree. "Wood, hay, stubble," are not fit materials for jewelry;
+but "gold, silver, precious stones," may be wrought into a thousand
+forms of beauty, sparkling with myriad splendors. The solid marble
+superstructure resting upon its deep foundations of granite, firm as
+the seated hills, can scarcely be too finely finished or too
+sumptuously adorned. Upon a thorough mental culture sit gracefully, and
+quite at home, philosophy, history, poetry, eloquence, music,
+painting--all in literature and the arts that can refine the taste,
+refresh the heart, and lead the fancy captive. To the mind thus
+disciplined and adorned, a pleasant path is opened to the broadest and
+richest fields of intellectual inquiry, where it may range at will with
+the freedom of an angel's wing, charmed with beauties such as Eden
+never knew, thrilled with melodies such as the leaden ear of ignorance
+never heard, rejoicing in a fellowship of wisdom worthy of the
+enfranchised sons of God, and realizing the truth so finely expressed
+by the greatest of German poets:--
+
+    "Only through beauty's morning gate,
+    Canst thou to knowledge penetrate;
+    The mind, to face truth's higher glances,
+    Must swim some time in beauty's trances;
+    The heavenly harping of the muses,
+  Whose sweetest trembling through thee rings,
+    A higher life into thy soul infuses,
+  And wings it upward to the soul of things."
+
+
+But is there not something still better, which ought to be an element
+in every process of human education? What is man? Merely an
+intellectual animal? Nay, but he has a spirit within him allied to
+angels and to God. The higher nature calls for culture no less than the
+lower. To the development and discipline of the rational and aesthetic
+faculties must be subjoined "the nurture and admonition of the Lord."
+Otherwise we educate only the inferior part of the man, and leave the
+superior to chance and the Devil. Make scholars of your children, but
+do not omit to make them Christians. Lead them to Parnassus, but let
+them go by the way of Calvary. Conduct them to Olympus, but let them
+carry the dew of Olivet upon their sandals. Make them drink deeply from
+the wells of human wisdom, but deny them not the living water whereof
+if one drink he shall never thirst again.
+
+Why should a "wise master-builder" hesitate to connect religion with
+science and literature in the edification and adornment of the soul?
+Does not religion favor the most thorough mental discipline and
+contribute to the harmonious development of all the spiritual powers?
+Does not Christianity stimulate the mind to struggle against
+difficulties, ennoble the struggle by investing it with the dignity of
+a duty, and render the duty delightful by the hope of a heavenly
+reward? "Knowledge is power;" but what knowledge is so mighty as that
+which Christ brought from the bosom of the Father? Poetry and
+philosophy have their charms; but what poetry is like that of the Holy
+Spirit, and what philosophy like that of redeeming love? God's holy
+evangel enlarges and strengthens the mind by bringing it into contact
+with the sublimest truths, and making it familiar with the profoundest
+mysteries. It rectifies our perverted reason, corrects our erroneous
+estimates, silences the imperious clamour of the passions, and removes
+the stern embargo which the corrupt heart lays upon the aspiring
+intellect. It sings us the sweetest songs, preaches to us the purest
+morality, and presents for our imitation the noblest examples of
+beneficence and self-denial. Under its blessed influence the soul
+expands to grasp the thought of God and receive the infinite riches of
+his love.
+
+And shall we wrong our sons and daughters by withholding from them this
+noblest agency of the higher mental and spiritual culture--
+
+  "The fountain-light of all our day,
+  The master-light of all our seeing"--
+
+and turn them over, with all their instinctive yearnings after the
+true, the good, the pure, the divine, to the blind guidance of a
+sceptical sciolism, and the bewildering vagaries of a rationalistic
+infidelity? "No," to use the language of the late Canon Melville, "we
+will not yield the culture of the understanding to earthly husbandmen;
+there are heavenly ministers who water it with a choicer dew, and pour
+upon it the beams of a brighter sun, and prune its branches with a
+kinder and more skilful hand. We will not give up the reason to stand
+always as a priestess at the altars of human philosophy; she hath a
+more majestic temple to tread, and more beautiful robes to walk in, and
+incense rarer and more fragrant to offer in golden censers. She does
+well when boldly exploring God's visible works; she does better when
+she submits to spiritual teaching, and sits with Mary at the Saviour's
+feet."
+
+Gentlemen, it is impossible to overstate the importance of religious
+culture in the work of education. Every interest of time and eternity
+urges it upon your attention. Your children are accountable and
+immortal creatures. "Give them divine truth," says Channing, "and you
+give them more than gems and gold; give them Christian principles, and
+you give them more than thrones and diadems; imbue their hearts with a
+love of virtue, and you enrich them more than by laying worlds at their
+feet." Your doctrine may distil as the dew upon the grass, and as the
+small rain upon the tender herb; but in some future emergency of life,
+the silent influence shall assert itself in a might more irresistible
+than the stormy elements when they go forth to the battles of God. If
+the work be faithfully done, the impression produced shall not be that
+of the sea-fowl on the sand, effaced by the first wave of the rising
+tide; but the enduring grooves cut by the chariot-wheels of the King of
+Trembling as he rides through the mountain ranges, and the footprints
+of his fiery steeds left deep in the everlasting rocks.
+
+
+Forward, then, with your noble endeavor! You are building for eternity.
+You are rearing temples of living stones which shall survive all the
+changes and chances of earth and time, and look sublimely down upon the
+world's catastrophe. Up! up with your immortal campanile! It is
+compacted of imperishable gems, cemented with gold from the mines of
+God. No marble sculpture may adorn its niches and cornices; but angel
+forms shall walk its battlements in robes of living glory. No hollow
+metal may swing in its vaulted _loggie_, sending sweet echoes over
+the distant hills, and charming the song-birds to silence along the
+flowery Val d'Arno; but richer and holier melodies, ringing out from
+its heavenly altitudes, shall mingle with the music of the spheres, and
+swell the many-voiced harmony of the City of God!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at the opening of a new college edifice, 1859.
+
+
+
+
+IX.
+
+WAIL OF BEREAVEMENT.[1]
+
+Have pity upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of
+God hath touched me.--Job xix. 21.
+
+
+Nothing is more important, yet few things are more difficult, than the
+proper control of our spirits in the time of trouble. There are two
+extremes to be avoided; stoicism and despondency. Stoicism feels too
+little; despondency, too much. The former hardens the heart; the latter
+breaks down the spirit. The one is a want of sensibility; the other, a
+lack of fortitude. This is an affected contempt of suffering; that, a
+practical abandonment of hope. Midway between the two lies the path of
+duty and happiness. St. Paul, quoting from King Solomon, warns us
+against them both: "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the
+Lord"--that is stoicism; "neither faint when thou art rebuked of
+him"--that is despondency. Israel is charged with the former: "Thou
+hast stricken them, but they have not grieved; they have made their
+faces harder than a rock." Job fell into the latter: "Have pity upon
+me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God hath
+touched me."
+
+No piece of history is more affecting than that of the perfect man of
+Uz. For the trial of his fortitude and his fidelity, the Almighty
+delivered him up, with certain restrictions, into the hand of Satan.
+The Sabeans and the Chaldaeans robbed him of his oxen, his asses, and
+his camels, and slew his servants with the edge of the sword. Fire from
+heaven consumed his flocks in the field, and all his children perished
+together in a tempest. He was smitten "with sore boils from the sole of
+his foot unto his crown; and he took him a potsherd to scrape himself
+withal; and he sat down among the ashes." His wife, the last on earth
+that ought to have been unkind to him, assailed him with bitter
+mockery; saying, "Dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse God and
+die!" Three friends, more faithful than the rest, came from afar to see
+and console him in his sufferings; and when they beheld the greatness
+of his grief they sat down with him in speechless astonishment; and
+surely that seven days' silence was better than any words of condolence
+they could have spoken. But when "Job opened his mouth and cursed his
+day," and related the sad story of all his troubles, they too became
+his censors, charging him with hypocrisy, and secret wickedness, and
+oppression of the poor and needy. These allegations stung him to the
+heart. Oh! was it not enough that God had forsaken him; that Satan had
+assailed him with all his weapons; that predatory bands had stripped
+him of his possessions; that the elements of nature had conspired
+against his prosperity; that his seven sons and three daughters had
+been taken from him in one day; that his body had become a mass of
+putrid disease, a loathsome living death; and that the wife of his
+youth looked upon him no more with affection, but treated him with cold
+indifference or haughty scorn? Must these wise and excellent men, the
+last friends left to him, join the cruel mockery, and accuse the
+upright of oppression, impiety, and every evil work? "The spirit of a
+man will sustain his infirmity; but a wounded spirit who can bear?" The
+good man's heart is crushed; he is ready to give up all for lost; and
+he pours forth his whole soul in this passionate appeal: "Have pity
+upon me, have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God hath
+touched me."
+
+
+It is permitted us to complain under such afflictions, provided we do
+not "charge God foolishly." There is no guilt in tears, if they are not
+tears of despair. It is no crime to feel our loss. Insensibility is no
+virtue--has no merit--wins no reward. Religion does not destroy nature,
+but regulates it; does not remove sorrow, but sanctifies it; does not
+cauterize the human heart, but enables us to "rejoice evermore," and
+teaches us to "glory in tribulations also." Abraham mourned for Sarah;
+Joseph mourned for Jacob; David mourned for Jonathan, and even for
+wicked Absalom; "devout men carried Stephen to his burial, and made
+great lamentation over him;" and Jesus, the pattern "Man of sorrows,"
+groaned in spirit, and wept at the grave of Lazarus. These
+chastisements are intended for our improvement; but if they are not
+felt, their end is not realized. If we have no sense of the stroke, how
+shall we submit to the hand that smites us? If our hearts are seared
+against all painful impressions, God is defeated in the purpose of his
+providence, and the best means of our salvation prove ineffectual; for
+he that is not sensible of his affliction will continue secure in his
+sin. The loss of one who is very dear to us--a husband and father, upon
+whom we depend so much for counsel, support, protection and
+happiness--must inflict a very deep wound; and who shall forbid that
+wound to bleed? None may say to the widow, "Weep not;" but He that can
+also say to the dead, "Young man, arise." Grief must have vent, or it
+will break the heart. Tears must flow, or they will fester in their
+fountains. It is cruel to deny one the relief of mourning, when
+mourning is so often its own relief. Sorrow calls for sympathy.
+Compassion is better than counsel. It is a great alleviation, when we
+can pour out our grief into another's bosom. Sympathy divides the
+sorrow, and leaves but half the load. "Bear ye one another's burdens,
+and so fulfil the law of Christ." This is what the troubled patriarch
+longed for, but could not find. His kindred were estranged from him,
+and all his inward friends abhorred him: his servants responded not to
+his call, and the wife of his bosom regarded him as an alien. No wonder
+that he exclaims, as if his heart were breaking, "Have pity upon me,
+have pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God hath touched
+me."
+
+But it is better to complain to God than to man. He will appreciate my
+complaint He knoweth my heart. He seeth my sincerity. He pitieth me
+with more than a father's pity. His word can still the storm and calm
+the sea. His look can turn my darkness into light. He hath invited me
+to call upon him in the day of trouble, adding, "I will deliver thee,
+and thou shalt glorify me." He hath said, "Come unto me, all ye that
+labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." The apostle
+saith, "Is any among you afflicted? let him pray." David saith, "I
+cried unto the Lord with my voice; with my voice unto the Lord did I
+make my supplication. I poured out my complaint before him; I showed
+before him my trouble. When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then
+thou knewest my path." There is a psalm--the CII.--on purpose for the
+afflicted, and this is its title: "A prayer of the afflicted, when he
+is overwhelmed, and poureth out his complaint before the Lord." The
+afflicted may complain; when he is overwhelmed he may complain even
+unto the Lord; yea, he may pour out his complaint before him, as one
+poureth out water; and here is an inspired formula of woe which he may
+employ in the divine presence without fear of extravagance or
+impropriety. Sorrow sometimes renders one speechless: "I am so
+troubled," saith David, "that I cannot speak." Oh! what a relief when
+we can empty our anguish into the ear and the heart of God! Such prayer
+is not incompatible with perfect submission to the divine will. "I was
+dumb, and opened not my mouth, because thou didst it;" dumb as it
+respects murmuring, but not as it respects prayer, for the next words
+are, "Remove thy stroke away from me; I am consumed by the blow of thy
+hand." Jesus in Gethsemane exhibits a pattern of perfect submission
+joined with fervent prayer. He "prayed earnestly," "in an agony," "with
+strong crying and tears;" thrice prostrating himself upon the ground;
+thrice imploring the Father, "If it be possible, let this cup pass from
+me;" but as often adding, "Nevertheless, not my will, but thine, be
+done."
+
+
+Oh! yes; you may complain, in the spirit of pious subordination; but
+you ought to guard against the excess of sorrow. To grieve too much
+were as great an evil as not to grieve at all. Where, then, is the
+proper limit, and when does sorrow become excessive, and therefore
+sinful? I answer:
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it renders you
+unmindful of your remaining mercies. It might be much worse with you
+than it is. You have forfeited all your comforts, yet God has withdrawn
+but few of them. Are those that remain worth nothing to you because
+others have been removed? Will you relish the less the fruit that is
+left, because some of it was blighted by untimely frost? You should set
+the higher value upon what you have, and enjoy the blessing with a
+grateful heart.
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it causes you to
+forget the grief of others. You are not the only sufferer in the world,
+nor is there any thing very peculiar in your afflictions. Thousands
+have experienced similar troubles, losses, bereavements. Some have
+parted with more than husband and father--have lost all at once, and
+are left to tread the dreary earth alone. You are doubtless acquainted
+with many with whom you would not now exchange conditions. And can you
+be so selfish as to forget all griefs but your own?
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it makes you
+indifferent to the public welfare. Poor old Eli was less afflicted by
+the death of his two sons than by the loss of the ark of the Lord,
+because with that was so intimately connected the prosperity of his
+people, the object dearest to his heart. A Spartan mother, who had five
+sons in the battle, stood at the gate of the city when a messenger came
+with tidings. "How prospers the fight?" she inquired. "Thy five sons
+are slain," answered the messenger. "I did not ask after my sons,"
+replied the patriotic woman, "but how prospers the fight?" "We have won
+the day," said the other, "and Sparta is safe." "Then let us be
+thankful to the gods," exclaimed the inquirer, "for our continued
+freedom." Her private griefs were swallowed up in her concern for the
+public good.
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it disqualifies
+you for the duties of your position.
+
+  "Nothing in nature, much less conscious being,
+  Was e'er created solely for itself."
+
+You live for others. Your friends have claims upon you. Your families
+and fellow-citizens require your beneficent activities. You cannot cast
+off this responsibility. It is written in your inmost nature. It is
+interwoven with the very constitution of human society. Wherefore the
+noble faculty of speech, the high prerogative of reason, the sweet flow
+of domestic sympathies, and the congregation of men in communities,
+with statutes and civil compacts, and distinctions of rank and office?
+All these indicate your duty to the human brotherhood; and if you
+grieve so as to unfit yourselves for that duty, you defeat the end of
+the divine benevolence.
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it blinds you to
+the grand purposes of Providence. Poor Job saith, "My soul is weary of
+my life," and again and again he desireth the quiet shelter of the
+grave. Yet do we find him piously inquiring into the reasons and final
+causes of the Almighty's mysterious dealings with him: "I will say unto
+God, Do not condemn me; show me wherefore thou contendest with me." We
+are well assured that "affliction cometh not forth of the dust, neither
+doth trouble spring out of the ground." All things are under the
+restraint and control of Infinite Wisdom and Love. In every pain you
+suffer, whether appointed or permitted only, God is seeking your good.
+It were a double loss, doubly aggravated, first to lose your friend,
+and then to lose the benefit of the loss. Is not the loss of the former
+sufficient, without adding to it, by your immoderate grief, the
+infinitely greater loss of the latter?
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it refuses the
+proffered consolations of friendship. When Jacob rent his robe, and put
+sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned many days for Joseph, and all his
+sons and daughters rose up to comfort him, he refused to be comforted,
+saying, "I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning." "In Ramah
+was a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning; Rachel
+weeping for her children, refuseth to be comforted because they are
+not." To decline the needed consolation when it is offered, is
+certainly a sin. There is some little excuse for the children of Israel
+in Egypt, when Moses spake unto them of the promised deliverance, and
+"they hearkened not unto him for anguish of spirit and for cruel
+bondage." The dying Rachel would have called her son Benoni, "the son
+of my sorrow," but that would have been too sad a remembrancer to Jacob
+of his beloved wife, and he called him Benjamin, "the son of my right
+hand."
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it will not accept
+relief even from the hand of God. He hath assured you that his grace is
+sufficient for you, and invited you to come to him for help in time of
+need. Yea, he is a present help in trouble; and he saith, "I will never
+leave thee nor forsake thee." To all who ask, he "giveth liberally, and
+upbraideth not." And will you not ask and receive, that your joy may be
+full? He hath not given you breath merely for sighs and groans, nor
+articulate utterance for ungrateful complaints of his providence. He
+hath afflicted you, perhaps, on purpose to draw you to himself; and
+will you thus defeat the designs of his mercy? Will you turn your back
+upon him when you need him most? Will you refuse to pray when prayer is
+most necessary for you? To whom will you go for aid, if not to God?
+Where will you find comfort, if not in his love? When will you seek the
+throne of grace, if not in time of trouble? Oh! how sweet is it to say
+with the psalmist, "In the multitude of my thoughts within me, thy
+comforts delight my soul."
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it preys upon your
+health and endangers your constitution. Grief unreasonably indulged
+soon devours the vigor of the physical system. This is an effectual
+method of suicide, not less guilty than a resort to the knife, the
+rope, the river, the pistol, or the poison. Some drink themselves to
+death, and others grieve themselves to death; who shall pronounce the
+former more criminal than the latter? Sorrow sometimes kills as
+suddenly as a bullet or a poniard through the heart; and sometimes it
+acts as a deadly potion, slow but sure. The food never nourishes, that
+is always mingled with tears. When your grief is so great, that no
+balmy airs, nor beautiful scenes, nor pleasant melodies, nor sympathies
+of friendship, nor solacements of society, nor consolations of
+religion, can soothe or refresh the soul, then your health is impaired,
+your strength gradually wastes away, the world loses too soon the
+benefit of your life, and you haste unsummoned to the judgment. This is
+the sorrow of the world which worketh death.
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it sours and
+imbitters the spirit against both God and man. This deplorable effect,
+instead of the peaceable fruits of righteousness, is often produced by
+affliction, when the providence is misinterpreted and perverted. Then
+the heart murmurs against God; saying with David, "I have cleansed my
+hands in vain;" or with Jeremiah, "My strength and hope are perished
+from the Lord;" or with Jonah, "I do well to be angry, even unto
+death." I have known persons indulge their grief to such a degree, that
+they loved nothing, enjoyed nothing, took interest in nothing, cared
+not for their nearest friends, grew indifferent to society, found no
+relief in solitude, turned away from the house of God, spurned his holy
+oracles, hated books, hated Nature, hated the very sunlight, neglected
+their own persons, and spent life in a continual groan. This is
+rebellion against Providence. "Why doth a living man complain, a man
+for the punishment of his sin?" How much better to say, "I know, O
+Lord, that thy judgments are right, and that in faithfulness thou hast
+afflicted me!"
+
+Your sorrow is excessive, and therefore sinful, when it continues so
+long as to become the settled habitude of the soul. The time for
+mourning has been limited by all wise nations, and the wisest have
+generally made it shortest. The Egyptians, who knew not God, mourned
+seventy days for Jacob; Joseph, his son, only forty-seven days. Israel
+mourned thirty days for Aaron, and thirty days for Moses, but only
+seven days for Saul. The inward sorrow, however, may last much longer
+than the outward show. The formal ceremony is soon laid aside; while
+the stricken heart carries its wound, still bleeding, to the grave. But
+the first poignancy of grief should not be allowed to continue too
+long, lest it produce the injurious effects of which I have already
+spoken. When it is not only indulged, but cherished as a luxury, it
+soon becomes sinful. When the mourner persists in nursing his woe, and
+feeds it with melancholy reflections in silence and seclusion, heeding
+neither the dissuasives of friendship nor the solacements of religion,
+he despises his own mercy and injures his own soul. Remember your
+departed friends with tenderness, but let your sorrow be subdued and
+holy, and aid the healing art of Nature with the balm of grace to
+shorten as much as may be the term of its continuance.
+
+
+"But it is my best Friend that hath smitten me. It is the stroke of my
+heavenly Father that hath wounded me. For God maketh my heart soft, and
+the Almighty troubleth me. He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken
+the crown from my head. He hath destroyed me on every side, and I am
+gone; and my hope hath he removed like a tree. Have pity upon me, have
+pity upon me, O ye my friends; for the hand of God hath touched me."
+
+Then it is a painful touch. It is grievous to be smitten by a friend,
+and the stroke of the father breaks the heart of the child. Your
+bereavement is indeed a fiery trial, a sword in the bones, a spear that
+pierceth to the soul. I pity your sufferings, and wonder not at your
+complaint.
+
+But it is a common touch. "What son is he whom the father chasteneth
+not?" Who hath not lost a friend? Who hath not sat in the shadow of the
+tomb? Even the immaculate Saviour suffered in the flesh. "It pleased
+the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief." And can you hope for
+exemption?
+
+And it is a righteous touch. The Creator is also the proprietor, and he
+has an unquestionable right to resume what he hath loaned. All are his;
+and shall he not do what he will with his own? Shall not the master of
+the garden gather his own fruits, the commander of the army dispose of
+his own men? What claim have you upon him for happiness? And how much
+more misery do you deserve than you have ever suffered!
+
+And it is a needful touch. The loving Father never inflicts a needless
+stroke. Your delinquency calls for chastisement. Your forgetfulness of
+eternity requires the stern admonitions of death. The creature that has
+usurped the Creator's place must be removed. The heart that has grown
+fast to the world must be torn away. The tree that has struck its roots
+so deep into the soil must be loosened before it can be transplanted.
+
+And it is a skilful touch. The musician is familiar with all the keys
+and powers of his instrument. The physician is well acquainted with the
+character of the disease and the qualities of the application. God's
+understanding is infinite, and his wisdom is infallible. He knoweth
+perfectly, when, and where, and how, and by what special means, most
+effectually to touch the human heart.
+
+  "Learn to lie passive in his hand,
+  And trust his heavenly skill."
+
+
+And it is a tender touch. "Faithful are the wounds of a friend." "Like
+as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear
+him; for he knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we are dust." "A
+bruised reed will he not break, and the smoking flax will he not
+quench." The wound must be probed, but the surgeon will do it gently,
+and soothe the pain with cordials. "He doth not afflict willingly, nor
+grieve the children of men;" but "for your profit, that ye may be
+partakers of his holiness." He correcteth his people with
+loving-kindness,
+
+  "Most merciful when most severe."
+
+
+And oh! is it not a blessed touch? It is the touch of a sword, which
+subdues the rebel will; the touch of a hammer, which breaks the stony
+heart; the touch of a fire, which separates the dross from the gold;
+the touch of a light, which illuminates the darkness within; the touch
+of a key, which opens the royal palace to the king; the touch of a
+fountain, which washes away sin and uncleanness; the touch of a
+sceptre, which assures of the monarch's gracious acceptance; the touch
+of a master, who asserts his claim and takes his property; the touch of
+a Saviour, rescuing the soul which he hath ransomed with his blood; the
+touch of a lapidary, polishing an immortal gem for Emmanuel's crown!
+God's dealings are mysterious but merciful. "Clouds and darkness are
+round about him; righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his
+throne." He saith to us, as he once said to Simon, "What I do thou
+knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter."
+
+  "A bruised reed he will not break;
+    Affliction all his children feel;
+  He smites them for his mercy's sake;
+      He wounds to heal."
+
+The Christian, like the Captain of his salvation, is made perfect
+through sufferings. His present griefs are the pledges of future joys.
+The gloomy night shall soon give place to an eternal day.
+
+Such are the ways of God. And shall my ignorance impeach his perfect
+knowledge, and my folly arraign his infinite wisdom, and my evil
+complain of his transcendent goodness, and my weakness refuse the aid
+of his almighty arm? "The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; therefore
+will I hope in him." Strange were it indeed to hear one say: "Alas! I
+am undone, for I have nothing left but God." But is not this
+practically the language of the believer who sinks into a state of
+despondency under providential bereavements? He that has God for his
+portion could not be enriched by the bequest of a kingdom, by the
+inheritance of a world. The heir of God is heir of all things.
+
+Zeno, who lost his whole fortune in a shipwreck, afterwards declared
+that it was the best voyage he ever made, because it led him to the
+study of philosophy and virtue. Happy for you, my friends, if your
+afflictions lead you to Christ! Happy, if, losing a friend, you find a
+Saviour! Receive, I beseech you, this chastisement as a new proof of
+your heavenly Father's love. Learn something from heathen Seneca, who
+said he enjoyed his friends as one who was soon to lose them, and lost
+them as if he had them still. Nay, learn rather from Him who bore your
+griefs and carried your sorrows; who, with the burden of all our
+accumulated woes pressing upon a sinless heart, exclaimed--"Father, not
+my will, but thine, be done!" Thus shall your loss disclose to you the
+pearl of great price, and enrich you with the imperishable wealth of
+the kingdom of God!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at a funeral, 1862.
+
+
+
+
+X.
+
+WISDOM AND WEAPONS.[1]
+
+Wisdom is better than weapons of war.--Eccles. ix. 18.
+
+
+We glory in the excellence of our arms. We boast of our superiority in
+this respect to the ancients. We attach great importance to such
+advantages, and rely upon them for the success of our campaigns. It is
+well. Let these things be properly estimated. But are we not in danger
+of overlooking what is much more essential to our prosperity? Is there
+nothing better than guns and bayonets? The royal Preacher gives the
+preference to wisdom. Wisdom is the right use of knowledge, the pursuit
+of worthy ends by proper means; and if we take the word in this its
+ordinary sense, the truth of the text will be obvious to all. But in
+the writings of King Solomon, as often in other parts of the Holy
+Scriptures, wisdom has another and higher meaning--piety, practical
+religion, conformity of heart and life to the law of God; and attaching
+this signification to the term, who can question the statement of the
+wisest of monarchs, "Wisdom is better than weapons of war"?
+
+
+We will begin with some simple illustrations of this proposition in its
+lower application to secular affairs, and thus prepare the way for more
+copious discourse concerning its higher application to spiritual
+matters. And may God mercifully grant me persuasive words, and you "a
+wise and understanding heart"!
+
+
+"Wisdom is better than weapons of war," because it gains its advantages
+at less expense. Weapons of war are very costly, and millions of money
+are required to insure their success. But wisdom wants no gold. "More
+precious than rubies," it is "without money and without price."
+
+"Wisdom is better than weapons of war," because it wins its victories
+without sacrificing human life. Weapons of war strew the field with
+mangled and ghastly corpses, and fill the land with widows and orphans
+and broken hearts. But wisdom sheds no blood. Its tendency is to
+preserve life, and not to destroy. It resorts to counsel instead of
+appealing to the sword, and subdues its enemies without endangering its
+friends.
+
+"Wisdom is better than weapons of war," because it leaves no wrecks or
+ruins as the landmarks of its progress. Weapons of war spread
+desolation and destruction on all sides; and buildings burned, and
+plantations devastated, and wealth scattered to the wind, everywhere
+attest the evils of international contention. But wisdom wastes no
+property. It accomplishes its beneficent purposes without injuring any
+man's estate. It turns no fruitful field into a wilderness, and
+disfigures the landscape with no smouldering heaps of demolished
+habitations.
+
+"Wisdom is better than weapons of war," because it gives no
+encouragement to the malevolent and wicked passions. Weapons of war
+produce hatred, contempt, revenge, a thirst for blood; converting men
+into fiends, and rendering earth the counterpart of hell. But wisdom
+makes no enemies. It conciliates. It attracts love, inspires
+confidence, and binds communities and nations together in fraternal
+amity. It breathes something of the spirit of Christ's evangel, and
+echoes the angelic proclamation--"Peace on earth, good-will toward men."
+
+"Wisdom is better than weapons of war," because its achievements are
+always of a much more valuable character. Weapons of war may overcome
+brute force, breaking the power of armies, subverting the thrones of
+monarchs, and arresting the course of incipient revolutions; while the
+mind remains unconvinced, the will unsubdued, and the heart still
+strong in its enmity. But wisdom eradicates the principle of hostility.
+It blasts the bitter fruit in the bud. It disarms enemies by making
+them friends. It occupies the mind, subjugates the will, and leads
+captive the heart. Therefore it is said, "He that winneth souls is
+wise."
+
+
+These illustrations of the text in its lower application must suffice.
+Proceed we now to the higher. Wisdom is true religion, evangelical
+godliness; and this, whatever view we take of it, will be found
+superior to weapons of war.
+
+We see its superiority in the excellence of its nature. Weapons are
+material: wisdom is spiritual. Weapons are terrestrial; wisdom is
+celestial. Weapons are worn upon the person: wisdom is seated in the
+soul. Weapons are wielded by the warrior: wisdom controls its
+possessor. Weapons are of earthly origin, human invention, Satanic
+suggestion: wisdom, like "every good and perfect gift, is from above,
+and cometh down from the Father of lights." It is a beam divine, by
+which we see the invisible. It is the breath of God, inspiring a new
+life, and imparting a new nature. It is an influence from the Infinite
+Spirit, quickening the dead conscience, and purifying the polluted
+heart. It is a gracious power, which subjugates, exterminates all that
+is hostile to holiness within, "bringing every thought into captivity
+to the obedience of Christ," and nerving every faculty to the conquest
+of the mighty host of spiritual foes that "beleaguer the human soul."
+
+We read its superiority in the importance of its objects. Weapons are
+employed both for aggressive and for defensive purposes: so is wisdom,
+but in a very different way. Are weapons used to gain freedom? So is
+wisdom, but it is the freedom of the soul. To acquire riches? So is
+wisdom, but they are the "durable riches of righteousness." To augment
+power? So is wisdom, but it is power over the passions and the habits.
+To repel invasion? So is wisdom, but it is the invasion of the Prince
+of darkness. To expel enemies? So is wisdom, but they are the enemies
+intrenched within us. To extend dominion? So is wisdom, but it is the
+dominion of the world's Redeemer. To subjugate nations? So is wisdom,
+but they are the nations fighting against God. To liberate captives? So
+is wisdom, but they are the captives of sin and Satan. To gratify
+revenge? So is wisdom, but it is revenge against the destroyers of our
+race. To secure commendation? So is wisdom, but it is the commendation
+of the Eternal Judge of quick and dead. To achieve glory and honor? So
+is wisdom, but it is the glory of a heavenly inheritance and the honor
+of an imperishable kingdom. These are objects worthy of angelic
+enterprise, and illustrative of the transcendent excellence of wisdom.
+
+We observe its superiority in the purity of its principles. Weapons
+foster and encourage evil passions in the human heart, and stimulate
+all its corrupt and vicious propensities; while wisdom eradicates them,
+originates the opposite virtues, and cultivates in all their "beauty of
+holiness" the gracious "fruits of the Spirit." On the one side we see
+pride; on the other, humility. On the one side, contempt; on the other,
+courteous respect. On the one side, distrust; on the other, ingenuous
+confidence. On the one side, restless ambition; on the other, tranquil
+contentment. On the one side, grasping avarice; on the other,
+open-handed beneficence. On the one side, bitter emulation; on the
+other, mutual aid and sympathy. On the one side, injustice and
+oppression; on the other, due regard for the rights of all. On the one
+side, deceit and wily treachery; on the other, unswerving truth and
+uncompromising fidelity. On the one side, turbulence, confusion and
+anarchy; on the other, the reign of divine law and angelic order. On
+the one side, savage brutality and diabolical cruelty; on the other,
+tears for all woes and help for all needs. On the one side, bitter and
+implacable malignity; on the other, the spontaneous flow of brotherly
+kindness and charity. On the one side, the desperate wrath and fury of
+revenge; on the other, meekness, gentleness, oblivion of injuries, and
+all the mind of Jesus. On the one side, an impious disregard of the
+Almighty's government; on the other, a profound reverence for his holy
+name, with an earnest desire to know and a settled purpose to do his
+blessed will. On the one side, an exemplification of the spirit and
+temper of hell; on the other, a practical illustration of those pure
+affections and hallowed influences which make men resemble the angels,
+and render our life "as the days of heaven upon earth." These are the
+ennobling principles of wisdom.
+
+We perceive its superiority in the grandeur of its alliances. Weapons
+may secure an alliance with the governments of the world, with its
+wealth and power, its learning and eloquence, its useful and decorative
+arts, the glory of its monarchs, the policy of its statesmen, the
+influence of its sages, and the splendid renown of its conquerors. But
+wisdom boasts of loftier alliances with "the saints that are in the
+earth, and the excellent in whom is all its delight;" "a holy nation, a
+royal priesthood, a peculiar people;" the _elite_ of the universe,
+the "sons and daughters of the Lord Almighty," "whose names are in the
+book of life," whose robes of light, and harps of gold, and thrones of
+power, and crowns of glory, and palms of victory, await them in the
+city of "many mansions," the "house not made with hands, eternal, in
+the heavens." It connects itself by invisible but indissoluble ties
+with the redeemed denizens of the "city of God," the purest and noblest
+men that ever lived and died, patriarchs and prophets, apostles and
+martyrs, philanthropists and reformers, "the salt of the earth," and
+"the light of the world,"
+
+  "Doers of illimitable good,
+  Gainers of inestimable glory."
+
+It claims community with the cherubim and the seraphim, spirits of
+light and love, the unshorn strength and unsullied purity of heaven. It
+lays hold upon the throne of God, and establishes an everlasting
+covenant with the Almighty, and interests the Ruler and Proprietor of
+the universe in its cause. Such an alliance secures divine sympathy,
+heavenly recognition, efficient co-operation, help for all needs,
+succor in all troubles, defence against all dangers, deliverance from
+all enemies, the triumphant success of all enterprises, and the
+enjoyment of "all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ
+Jesus." And with this magnificent endowment of privileges, unknown to
+the hero of the battle-field, Wisdom, strong in her weakness, rich in
+her poverty, happy in her misfortunes, tranquil amidst popular
+commotions, and fearless of ten thousand foes, sits singing in the
+house of her pilgrimage--
+
+  "Not from the dust my joys or sorrows spring;
+            Let all the baleful planets shed
+            Their mingled curses round my head,
+            Their mingled curses I despise,
+            If but the great Eternal King
+  Look through the clouds and bless me with his eyes."
+
+
+We confess its superiority in the character of its achievements. With
+arms men conquer inferiors or equals: through wisdom they overcome
+beings vastly greater than themselves--greater in number, in nature, in
+knowledge, in cunning, in courage, in energy, in endurance, in all the
+facilities and resources of warfare, except such as are furnished by
+the grace of God. With arms we vanquish human enemies: through wisdom,
+superhuman. With arms we vanquish external enemies: through wisdom,
+internal. With arms we vanquish visible enemies: through wisdom,
+invisible. With arms we vanquish mortal enemies: through wisdom,
+immortal. With arms we vanquish earthly enemies: through wisdom,
+heavenly principalities and powers dethroned and doomed. With arms we
+subdue provinces and subvert empires: through wisdom, overcome self,
+and bring our own rebellious nature under the government of God; and he
+who accomplishes this, saith Solomon, "is better than the mighty--than
+he that taketh a city." Alexander is said to have conquered the world.
+Vain boast! The world was not half conquered. But "he that is born of
+God," St. John tells us, "overcometh the world; and this is the victory
+that overcometh the world, even our faith." Faith is the theological
+synonyme of wisdom. Faith is the foundation of all true religion.
+Faith, wisdom, is real heroism. And it was through this the holy men of
+old achieved their splendid triumphs and won their immortal honors. And
+it is through this that the Christian still overcomes the world;
+overcomes its spirit; its false philosophy; its evil customs and
+fashions; its cunning strategy, and its open violence; the shallow
+sophistry of its unbelief, and the affected valor of its impiety; the
+fascination of its soft seductions and all the fury of its fierce
+revenge. Faith, with Hope and Charity for its allies, sprinkled with
+"the blood of the Lamb," and bold in "the word of its testimony," with
+the eagle's eye and the lion's courage, goes forth to the holy
+conflict; and all the missiles of malice, ridicule and infidelity--as
+cannon-balls by cotton-bales--are effectually repelled by the meekness
+and gentleness of its spirit; and the enemy at length succumbs to the
+virtue that he finds invincible. This is real victory! This is the
+sublime triumph of wisdom!
+
+We behold its superiority in the measures and motives of its warfare.
+Here is a perfect contrast. Arms triumph by physical force and energy:
+wisdom prevails by the persuasiveness of truth, the gentleness of
+charity, the beauty of holiness, and the spirit of the Lord. The
+soldier seeks the aid of science and strategy: wisdom adheres to the
+simplicity of the gospel, repudiating all art, concealment,
+disingenuous trickery, such as false colors, masked batteries,
+treacherous ambuscades, and challenges its enemies with an honest front
+upon the open field. The military hero is cheered on by the voice of
+popular applause: wisdom has no admiring multitudes, seeks no
+encouragement from the world, but pursues its spiritual warfare in
+silence and in secret,
+
+  "All unnoticed and unknown,
+  Loved and prized by God alone."
+
+There is much in "the pomp and circumstance of glorious war" to
+stimulate the combatants: wisdom has all the stern reality of the
+conflict, without any of its inspiring accompaniments--the martial
+strain, the glittering ranks, the floating banners, the roar of
+artillery, the shout of charging squadrons, and the clash of resounding
+steel. The mailed knight of the battle-field may gather strength from
+emulation: wisdom knows no emulation but that of love and good
+works--no fierce competition or contentious rivalry--striving only to
+excel in kindness of heart, sweetness of temper, and the moral likeness
+of the Son of God. You may be encouraged to the conflict by the hope of
+gain: wisdom has no expectation of earthly profit--no spoils to be won,
+no cities to be sacked, no mansions to be robbed, no bank-vaults to be
+rifled; but it forsakes all to follow Christ, and is content to
+practise his daily self-denial. You may look forward to worldly
+distinctions and honors: wisdom seeks no promotion short of the kingdom
+of heaven--no fame of heroism, no record in history, no celebration in
+song, no decoration of stars and wreaths, no triumphal arches, nor
+monumental pillars, nor statues in the temples of the gods. Nay, the
+times have been when those noble heroes who through faith subdued
+kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths
+of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword,
+out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to
+flight the armies of the aliens, though the world was unworthy of them,
+were deemed unworthy of the world; had trial of cruel mocking and
+scourging, of bonds and imprisonments; were tortured, not accepting
+deliverance; were tempted, stoned, burned, beheaded, crucified, sawn
+asunder; wandered about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, and concealed
+themselves in dens and caves of the earth; being destitute, afflicted,
+tormented. "But wisdom is justified of her children."
+
+We discover its superiority in the certainty of its final success. Arms
+may fail for want of discipline and skill: wisdom has drilled her
+soldiers, teaching their hands to war and their fingers to fight. Arms
+may fail for want of strength to wield them: wisdom girdeth us with
+strength unto the battle; and nerved by her influence, the feeblest in
+our ranks can run through a troop and leap over a wall. Arms may fail
+for want of competent officers: wisdom rejoices in the "Captain of the
+Lord's host," "the Lion of the tribe of Judah," with his eyes of flame,
+his vesture dipped in blood, many crowns upon his head, and a sharp
+two-edged sword proceeding out of his mouth, followed by the armies of
+Heaven, going forth conquering and to conquer. Arms may fail for want
+of sufficient defences: wisdom is environed with "a wall of fire," a
+living circumvallation of seraphim and cherubim; and "the name of
+Jehovah is a strong tower, into which the righteous runneth and is
+safe." Arms may fail for want of timely re-enforcements: wisdom can
+call to her aid at any moment "twelve legions of angels;" and, could we
+see their splendid array, the mountain is continually aflame with the
+artillery and cavalry of God. Arms may be rendered useless by the
+overwhelming forces of the foe: wisdom leads "a great multitude that no
+man can number;" any one of whom can chase a thousand, and two can put
+ten thousand to flight; as Gideon, with his three hundred, routed and
+destroyed the myriads of Midian. You may be unsuccessful in battle from
+a variety of inevitable accidents: wisdom never breaks her blade, nor
+bursts her musket, nor loses her bayonet, nor dismounts her artillery,
+nor drops a chance match into the magazine; and her batteries can never
+be stormed, nor her forces flanked, nor her trains captured, nor her
+ammunition exhausted, nor her officers out-generalled and circumvented
+by superior strategy. Your troops may lack the proper support of the
+government: Jehovah has pledged all his infinite resources to the aid
+of wisdom in "the good fight of faith;" and his word shall not fail
+till heaven and earth pass away. Your hopes may perish upon the very
+verge of victory: what soldier of wisdom ever left the field without
+the spoils of a vanquished foe? "Yea, in all these things we are more
+than conquerors through him that hath loved us." Success, therefore, is
+certain. "The victory is the Lord's, and he giveth it to whomsoever it
+pleaseth him." Let the enemy boast, and rage, and threaten! "Who hath
+hardened himself against the Lord and prospered?" The sea shall drown
+them; the earth shall devour them; the fire of heaven shall consume
+them; the stars in their courses shall fight against them; or they
+shall perish at the blast of an angel's breath under the very walls of
+the city of God! However the line of battle may waver for a season,
+however the fortunes of the field may vacillate between victory and
+defeat, the word of God is sure, and wisdom shall triumph at the last.
+
+We recognize its superiority in the ineffable glory of its issues.
+"Lamentation and mourning and woe" follow the triumph of arms, and the
+land bewails the unreturning brave: the victories of wisdom are
+universal blessings, cheering the earth and gladdening the skies; and
+wherever she prevails, the desert rejoices and blossoms as the rose;
+and "the voice of salvation and praise is in the tabernacles of the
+righteous, saying, The right hand of the Lord is exalted! the right
+hand of the Lord doeth valiantly!" The warrior may win a splendid
+spoil; and the capture of vast stores and precious treasures--the
+acquisition of cities, kingdoms, continents--may reward his valor:
+wisdom "winneth souls"--more costly than all the gems of Golconda, and
+all the gold of California--the most magnificent structures ever
+reared, and the most extensive empires ever formed. The victor may feel
+a proud gratification in his success, but it is necessarily mingled
+with much of unhappiness: the achievements of wisdom afford "fulness of
+joy, and pleasures forevermore"--joy without any mixture of sorrow,
+pleasures without any interval of pain. The commendation of superiors
+and the applause of the multitude are often imbittered to the conqueror
+by the envy of rivals and the malice of foes: but the "Well done, good
+and faithful servant!" of the Eternal Judge shall be re-echoed by the
+happy universe, and the saints and the seraphim shall compass you about
+with songs of deliverance, and every detractive tongue shall be shut up
+in the bottomless pit forever. History will record your heroism,
+eloquence will emblazon your victory, and poetry will perpetuate your
+praise; and the pencil, the chisel, the temple, the towering column and
+triumphal arch, will transmit your fame to future generations: but the
+Christian's memorial is in the New Jerusalem, "the new heavens and
+earth wherein dwelleth righteousness"--"a new name, which no man
+knoweth, save he that receiveth it"--a new creation, glowing with the
+image of its Creator, over which the morning stars shall sing together,
+and all the sons of God shall shout for joy. The renown of your heroic
+deeds may fill the world and flourish over your grave: but wisdom shall
+inherit "a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." The brass
+will tarnish, and the marble will moulder, and the voice of the orator
+will go silent, and the minstrel shall sing no more in the sepulchre;
+but wisdom's "praise is not of men, but of God;" "and they that be wise
+shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn many
+to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever." Pharaoh perished; but
+Moses is immortal. Ahab went down to the dust; but Elijah drove his
+steeds of flame through the sapphire firmament. Saul fell in his blood
+upon Gilboa; but the tuneful son of Jesse still leads the symphonies of
+the church in the wilderness, while the cherubim and the seraphim
+around the throne join in his choral hallelujahs. Egypt is a desert,
+and Babylon is a heap of ruins, and Nineveh looks sadly up from her
+ancient sepulchre by the Tigris, and the imperial Mother of Nations
+sits in melancholy widowhood upon the bank of the "yellow Tiber;" but
+Joseph, and Daniel, and the captive Tobit, and "Paul, the prisoner of
+Jesus Christ," have found "a city of habitation," "whose builder and
+maker is God"--
+
+  "Where age hath no power o'er the fadeless frame,
+  Where the eye is fire and the heart is flame!"
+
+The Roman conqueror returned in triumph, with large display of spoils
+and prisoners; and a magnificent array went forth to meet him, and the
+populace rent the heavens with shouts of welcome, and the wall of the
+city was torn down for his entrance, and splendid offerings sparkled at
+his feet, and stately structures over-arched his head, and rich odors
+perfumed the air, and sweet music enlivened the scene: oh! who shall
+tell of wisdom's coronation in the metropolis of the universe--the
+unnumbered millions of the ransomed, with palms and crowns and lutes,
+amid the radiance of angelic beauty too bright for mortal eyes, singing
+as the sound of many waters and mighty thunderings unto him that loved
+them and washed them in his blood!
+
+
+"Wisdom is better than weapons of war." Are you satisfied with the
+proof? Then rally to the standard of wisdom, join her forces, fight her
+battles, win her rewards, sing her transcendent glories, and share the
+blissful immunities and emoluments of her victorious veterans forever!
+Why do you hesitate? Are you afraid of the opinions or the speeches of
+others? Oh! for shame! You have plenty of martial courage; where is
+your moral courage? You can march up to the mouth of the cannon and
+rush upon the point of the bayonet; why quail you at the scoff of the
+infidel and the scorn of the blasphemer? Come out, come out, on the
+side of truth and righteousness! Enrol yourselves with the saints,
+under "the Captain of your salvation!" Defiant of earth and fearless of
+hell, put on your arms, and away to the field, and take part in the
+conflict, that you may have place in the coronation!
+
+      "Soldier, go--but not to claim
+  Mouldering spoils of earthborn treasure,
+      Not to build a vaunting name,
+  Not to dwell in tents of pleasure.
+      Dream not that the way is smooth,
+  Hope not that the thorns are roses,
+      Turn no wishful eye of youth
+  Where the sunny beam reposes.
+      Thou hast sterner work to do--
+      Hosts to cut thy passage through;
+  Close behind the gulfs are burning--
+  Forward! there is no returning.
+
+      "Soldier, rest--but not for thee
+  Spreads the world her downy pillow;
+      On the rock thy couch must be,
+  While around thee chafes the billow:
+      Thine must be a watchful sleep,
+  Wearier than another's waking;
+      Such a charge as thou dost keep
+  Brooks no moment of forsaking.
+      Sleep as on the battle-field--
+      Girded--grasping sword and shield:
+  Those thou canst not name or number
+  Steal upon thy broken slumber.
+
+      "Soldier, rise--the war is done:
+  Lo! the hosts of hell are flying!
+      'Twas thy God the battle won;
+  Jesus vanquished them by dying.
+      Pass the stream--before thee lies
+  All the conquered land of glory;
+      Hark! what songs of rapture rise!
+  These proclaim the victor's story.
+      Soldier, lay thy weapons down,
+      Quit the sword and take the crown;
+  Triumph! all thy foes are banished,
+  Death is slain, and earth has vanished!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached to soldiers in camp, 1863.
+
+
+
+
+XI.
+
+LOVE TESTED.[1]
+
+Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?--John xxi. 17.
+
+
+Were the dear Lord to appear personally in our midst this morning,
+addressing one after another by name, and putting the same question
+thus pointedly to all, who would answer in the negative? Who would
+frankly confess so base an ingratitude? Who of all this assembly would,
+by the acknowledgment of so flagrant an impiety, write himself down
+with the reprobate? However negligently or wickedly men live, few are
+willing to admit that they are utterly wanting in love to him who loved
+them to the death.
+
+But is love to Christ indeed so common? With a few exceptions of
+unbelief so blasphemous as to shock ordinary irreligion, are all men
+truly his friends? Are they so taken with his teaching, so enamoured of
+his virtue, so captivated by the beauty of his character, that they are
+ready to forsake all to become his disciples, and prove the sincerity
+of their attachment by the cheerful endurance of the severest
+sufferings? Do they generally accord to him his claims, practically
+observe his requirements, and devote all their energies to his service?
+Do they so believe in him as the one only Mediator between God and man,
+the one only name under heaven given among men by which they can be
+saved, that they renounce all others and cling with the tenacity of a
+death-grasp to his cross?
+
+Let us ask ourselves the question. Let us enter solemnly into
+conference with our own hearts. Let every one bring his consciousness,
+his recollection, the facts of his life, to the test. "Do I truly love
+the Lord Jesus? Will my love bear the ordeal of a faithful and
+impartial scrutiny? Is my conduct, public and private, such as to put
+the matter beyond all doubt and controversy? Should my crucified Friend
+come visibly into the church, take me by the hand, look straight into
+my eyes, and say, as he did to 'Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?'
+could I answer as promptly, as honestly, as emphatically, as the
+apostle did--'Lord, thou knowest that I love thee'!"
+
+No superfluous or unprofitable inquiry is this, my dear brethren; but a
+matter of infinite moment, addressing itself immediately to each
+individual soul. Had Jesus deemed it a question of little consequence,
+think you he would have put it thrice in so searching a manner to St.
+Peter? Does not the repetition seem to imply a danger of mistake and
+self-deception? Yet the question obviously supposes the apostle might
+know with certainty whether he really loved or not. And if he, why not
+we? I will not put it to your consciousness, in which any man may be
+deceived; but the manifestation and fruits of love furnish certain
+practical tests, quite easy of application and far less liable to
+mistake; so that no soul, well instructed in the principles of
+Christianity, need remain in ignorance of so vital a matter.
+
+Here, however, before we proceed any farther, a word of explanation and
+caution seems necessary. The passion of love, as we all know well
+enough, is innate. We naturally love our friends and all that is
+pleasing and attractive to us. But to this general rule love to Christ
+Jesus is certainly an exception. So fallen and sinful are we, that we
+cannot love that which is holy, perfect, divine, without the
+enlightening and purifying Spirit of grace from above. So blinded is
+our sight, so depraved and perverted our moral taste, that Christ is to
+us as a root out of a dry ground, without form or comeliness, and there
+is no beauty that we should desire him. His sublime purity we cannot
+appreciate; his beauty of holiness we cannot endure. We must be
+regenerate, quickened together with Christ, raised from a death in
+trespasses and sins to a new life in righteousness. Possible it may be,
+indeed, for the infant, consecrated to Christ in baptism, to "lead the
+rest of his life according to this beginning;" from the very font,
+daily increasing in God's Holy Spirit more and more, until he come to
+Christ's everlasting kingdom. But if, as commonly happens, the fact
+prove otherwise--if there has been a defection from baptismal
+grace--there must be a return to the bond of the covenant, and a
+renewal by the power of the Holy Ghost, or there can be no true love to
+Christ. And those who now sincerely and supremely love him may know
+precisely when and where the blessed restoration took place, and the
+Sun of righteousness arose upon them with healing in his wings. And
+others, not baptized in childhood, may have a vivid recollection of the
+place and the moment in which they first discovered the light of the
+glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and the Redeemer began to be
+unspeakably precious to their souls. Love to Christ, therefore, is not
+natural, but supernatural--not the result of self-culture, but the
+product of divine grace--a new and heavenly principle shed abroad in
+the heart by the power of the Holy Ghost. The test of which let us now
+apply; and may God help us to do so with honest and faithful heart!
+"Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?"
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will think of him with pleasure. Love
+produces tender thoughts of the beloved. You cannot cease to think of
+them even when long absent. Can those who love the Saviour ever forget
+him? Will not their meditation of him always be sweet? How is it with
+you? Can you say with the psalmist--"The desire of our soul is unto thy
+name, and to the remembrance of thee"? Do you think often of Jesus, and
+dwell with delight upon his love? Do you meditate sweetly of him in the
+night-watches? Is the thought of him ineffably pleasing and joyful to
+your soul?
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will delight in communion with him.
+Love finds its greatest happiness in the presence of the beloved. Long
+absence is painful, and hopeless separation is intolerable. Every
+opportunity of communion with Christ, therefore, the saints value as a
+high privilege and seize with eager joy. The word in which he speaks to
+them is their sweetest music; the closet in which they meet with him is
+their highest Pisgah; the table at which he feeds them is the very
+antepast of heaven. Is this your experience? Do you love to speak with
+Christ in prayer? Do you joyfully listen to the messages of his grace,
+and read with pleasure the epistles of his love? Do you feast with a
+keen relish upon the heavenly manna and the new wine of the kingdom
+which he provides for you in the
+
+  "Rich banquet of his flesh and blood"?
+
+Can you appeal to him in the language of the psalmist--"Lord, I have
+loved the habitation of thy house, and the place where thine honor
+dwelleth"? and when deprived of its privileges, do you exclaim with
+him--"My soul longeth, yea even fainteth, for the courts of the Lord;
+my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God; when shall I come and
+appear before him?"
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will constantly aim and study to please
+him. With regard to any undecided course of action, you will not ask,
+"How will this please others?" but, "How will it please Christ?" Him
+whom your soul loveth, whatever the effect upon your neighbors, you
+will never be willing to displease. You would rather offend every
+friend you have on earth than the heavenly "Friend that sticketh closer
+than a brother." "Ye are my friends," saith he, "if ye do whatsoever I
+command you." And again he saith, "If any man love me, he will keep my
+words." Hearty obedience is the best proof of love. If you truly love
+him, your obedience will be prompt, earnest, constant, uniform,
+unquestioning and uncompromising. Try yourselves, my brethren, by this
+criterion. Is the word of Christ the supreme law of your life? In all
+things, do you seek his pleasure, and rejoice to do his will? Are his
+commandments grievous to you, or do you find his yoke easy and his
+burden light? Do you esteem his service a hard bondage, or the blessed
+freedom of the sons of God? Is it your meat and drink to do his will,
+as it was his to do the will of his Father? He is now challenging your
+affection, as Delilah challenged that of Samson: "How canst thou say, I
+love thee, when thy heart is not with me?"
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will rejoice even in suffering for his
+sake. What was it but love stronger than death to him who died for them
+that made the apostles glory in tribulations, sing hymns of praise at
+midnight in their dungeons, wear their chains and manacles more proudly
+than princes ever wore their jewels, and welcome the scourge and the
+cross which completed their conformity to the divine Man of sorrows?
+And why did Ignatius chant so cheerfully among the lions, and Polycarp
+pour forth his thanksgiving so joyfully as he stood unbound in the
+flames? And why did so many Christians, in the early persecutions of
+the Church, rush to the tribunal to confess their faith in Christ,
+hastening to share the fiery coronation of their bishops and their
+brethren? There is but one answer to these questions; and if you love
+Christ as they loved him, you will be ready to make any sacrifice or
+endure any suffering for his glory. Like Moses, who "esteemed the
+reproach of Christ greater riches than all the treasures of Egypt," you
+will "choose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to
+enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." Like the Hebrew captives in
+Babylon, you will prefer the company of the king's lions to the society
+of his courtiers, and the sevenfold heat of the Chaldaean furnace to the
+perfumed breezes that regale the royal gardens. Hard sayings are these
+to ears like yours? Have you no sympathy, then, with the Prince of
+sufferers? Are you not ready to take up your cross, and follow him to
+Calvary? If not, how can you say, "We love him because he first loved
+us"?
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will love those who are the special
+objects of his love. Love to him is one half of his religion; love to
+his followers is the other half. The latter is the fruit of the former,
+and the best evidence of its reality. "By this," saith our Saviour,
+"shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to
+another." And did he not pray for his little flock, that they might
+love one another as he had loved them? And does not his most loving
+apostle plainly tell us that this is the proof of our having passed
+from death to life? And does not St. Paul assure us that it is "the
+bond of perfectness" and "the fulfilling of the law"--more important
+than faith, knowledge, miracles, the grandest eloquence, the largest
+beneficence, and even martyrdom itself? How can you love Christ, and
+not love Christians? If you love the Father, will you not love his
+children? If you love the Master, will you not love his servants? Truly
+loving your Monarch, can you fail to love your loyal fellow-subjects?
+What proof give you, then, of your love to the brethren? Do you prefer
+their society to that of the world? Do you delight to converse with
+those who delight to converse with Christ and to converse with you
+about him? Is it a great pleasure to you to do them kind offices,
+supply their temporal needs, promote their spiritual well-being, and
+cheer and comfort them in the manifold sorrows of life? Is their
+interest as dear to you as your own, their reputation, and the
+salvation of their souls? If not, how can it be said that you love them
+as you love yourself? And, failing in this, where is the proof of your
+love to him who laid down his life for us all?
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will sympathize with him in his grief
+for those who love him not. Over the Jews who rejected him Jesus wept
+upon Olivet, and for the Romans who crucified him he prayed upon his
+cross. And when his loving heart broke beneath the burden of its
+anguish, think you he ceased to grieve for a guilty and ungrateful
+world? As he looks down from his mediatorial throne upon the multitudes
+who everywhere spurn the gospel of his grace and seek death in the
+error of their way--despising the riches of his goodness and
+forbearance and longsuffering, treasuring up wrath against the day of
+wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God--does he not
+still weep and pray for the perishing neglecters of so great salvation,
+and seek those who can weep and pray with him, in whose tears and
+intercessions he can pour forth the full measure of his loving sorrow
+for the undone? And, loving him, will you not respond to his
+compassionate lamentations, feeling as he feels for the impenitent
+ingrates who are despising their own mercy and trampling upon the
+precious blood of their redemption? How is it with you, dear brethren?
+Am I saying what sounds strange to you, if not absurd and preposterous?
+Have you never wept for the wicked as Elisha did when he foresaw the
+cruelties of Hazael, or as St. Paul did when he told his brethren of
+the enemies of the cross of Christ? Have you never said with David--"I
+beheld the transgressors, and was grieved; rivers of waters run down
+mine eyes because they keep not thy law"? Tell me not that you love
+Christ, while you have no sympathy with his love for sinners--no
+self-sacrificing zeal to save them, pulling them out of the fire!
+
+
+If you love the Lord Jesus, you will look for his glorious appearing
+and long for his eternal fellowship. This was the one great gladdening
+hope of the apostles and all the early Christians. Before his
+departure, their dear Master had promised them that he would come
+again, and receive them unto himself; and with perfect faith in his
+word, they joyfully waited and watched for his return in the clouds of
+heaven. And still the expectant bride is on the outlook for her absent
+Lord; and often we hear her from behind the lattice of her
+chamber-window calling--"Make haste, my Beloved! and be thou like the
+young hart upon the mountains of spices!" What Christian soul does not
+respond to the sweet words of Milton? "Come forth out of thy royal
+chambers, O Prince of all the kings of the earth; put on the visible
+robes of thy imperial majesty; take up that unlimited sceptre which thy
+Almighty Father hath bequeathed thee; for now the voice of thy bride
+calls thee, and all things sigh to be renewed!" What saint of Jesus
+does not thrill to the eloquent strain of Edward Irving? "Blessed
+consummation of this weary and sorrowful world! I give it welcome; I
+hail its approach with joy; I wait its coming more than they that watch
+for the morning! O my Lord, come away! hasten, with all thy congregated
+ones! My soul desireth to see the King in his beauty, and the beautiful
+ones he shall bring along with him!" Verily, "herein is our love made
+perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment, because as
+he is so are we in this world." But were he this very day revealed from
+heaven in flaming fire, should we take lute and timbrel and go forth to
+welcome him to his ransomed world, or fly to the rocks and mountains to
+hide from his presence and escape from his wrath? In a great earthquake
+which shook a vast city, when the people said it was the day of
+judgment and sought where they might take refuge from their Judge, a
+certain poor man began to cry out--"Oh! is it so? is it so? Then
+whither shall I go to meet my Lord? on what mountain shall I stand to
+see my Saviour?" Oh! to greet the Redeemer in his glory--who that loves
+him does not leap for joy at the expectation? "For the Lord himself
+shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel
+and the trump of God;" and the saints in their redeemed bodies "shall
+be caught up in the clouds to meet him in the air, and so shall we ever
+be with the Lord." Again the happy bride looks forth and cries--"The
+voice of my Beloved! behold, he cometh, leaping upon the mountains,
+skipping upon the hills!" And you, my dear brethren, if you truly love
+your Saviour, so far from dreading him as your judge, will hail him as
+your friend; when the sound of his chariot-wheels, heard from pole to
+pole, shall gladden the graves of his beloved; and the voice of
+rejoicing and praise, rising from the tabernacles of the righteous,
+shall roll its thunder-chant through all the realms of joy!
+
+
+Take, then, these _criteria_, and test your love to Christ. Surely
+the result will be worth the examination. For what transcendent
+importance, everywhere in Holy Scripture, is given to this divine
+principle! and in all ages, especially all Christian ages, what fine
+things have been said and sung of love! Not to recite the sublime
+statements of St. John and the inspired raptures of St. Paul, with
+which you are all familiar; the great bishop of Hippo calls it "that
+sweet and sacred bond of the soul, having which the poorest is rich,
+wanting which the richest is poor;" while the golden-mouthed orator of
+Antioch declares it "the grandest mastery of the passions, and the
+noblest freedom of the redeemed man." The prince of schoolmen, the
+Angelical Doctor, writes: "Divine love surpasseth science, and is more
+perfect than understanding; for we love more deeply than we know, and
+love dwelleth in the heart, while knowledge remaineth without." The
+greatest military chieftain of modern times remarked to his friend in
+St. Helena: "I have conquered nations by the sword; Jesus Christ
+overcame the world by love." A more heroic spirit--St. Catherine of
+Sienna--says: "Love was the cord that bound the God-man to the cross;
+the nails could not have held him there, had not love bound him fast."
+The martyr-monk of Florence--Savonarola--cheering his fellow-sufferers
+in the kingdom and patience of Jesus, assures them that love to the
+dear Lord "plucks the sting of death and disinherits the grave," and
+that he who thus conquers Satan in his final assault upon the soul "has
+won the battle of life." And here is the noble testimony of Thomas a
+Kempis: "Nothing is sweeter or purer than love; nothing is higher, or
+broader, or fuller; nothing more pleasant, or more excellent, or more
+heroic, in earth or heaven. Weary, it is not tired; oppressed, it is
+not straitened; alarmed, it is not confounded; sleeping, it is ever
+watchful; like a living flame and burning torch, forcing its way upward
+and overcoming all things." Finally, Eloquence takes wing, and soars
+with her sister Song; chanting in the strain of Sir Walter Scott--
+
+  "Love rules the court, the camp, the grove;
+  And men below, and saints above;
+  For love is heaven, and heaven is love!"
+
+or with Charles Wesley from his fire-chariot at the gates of pearl--
+
+  "By faith we are come to our permanent home;
+    By hope we the rapture improve;
+  By love we still rise, and look down on the skies,
+    For the heaven of heavens is love!"
+
+
+In conclusion, let me repeat what I said in the outset. The question of
+our Lord is a plain matter of fact, about which there need be no
+uncertainty; and every one of us, with careful self-examination, may be
+able to answer it at once. I have heard some honest Christians sing:
+
+  "'Tis a point I long to know;
+    Oft it causes anxious thought;
+  Do I love the Lord or no?
+    Am I his, or am I not?"
+
+Discard that verse, my brethren! Its theology is worse than its poetry.
+For a filial love, or a conjugal love, about which the wife or the
+child is uncertain, you would not give a farthing. Do not the anxious
+thought and the longing to know indicate at least some small degree of
+love? Not loving at all, you would care nothing about it, you would be
+quite indifferent to the question. Dim indeed the spark may be in your
+bosom; but bless ye the Lord that it is not utterly gone out, and
+answer his gracious inquiry with this better verse:
+
+  "Lord, it is my chief complaint,
+  That my love is still so faint;
+  Yet I love thee, and adore;
+  Oh for grace to love thee more!"
+
+So praying, the breath of the Holy Spirit will soon blow the spark into
+flame; and when the Master asks once more, "Lovest thou me?" with
+bounding heart you will reply: "Lord, thou knowest all things; thou
+knowest that I love thee!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached in London, Eng., 1866.
+
+
+
+
+XII.
+
+MANIFOLD TEMPTATIONS.[1]
+
+Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are
+in heaviness through manifold temptations, that the trial of your
+faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it
+be tried with fire, may be found unto praise and honor and glory at the
+appearing of Jesus Christ.--1 Pet. i. 6, 7.
+
+
+Why is not the Christian life a perpetual joy? Why do so many sincere
+Christians seem often melancholy and unhappy? The human heart is easily
+moved, and very little is necessary to set it vibrating with pleasant
+emotion. The voice of a happy child, the carol of a forest bird, the
+beauty of an opening rose, the glory of a sunset sky, the coming of a
+valued friend, the visitation of a vagrant dream, the recollection of a
+peaceful hour, the wind that chases away the misty cloud, even a word
+in season fitly spoken, may fill the soul with tranquil happiness or
+raise it to an ecstasy of delight. Why, then, should not the believer
+in Jesus rejoice evermore with joy unspeakable and full of glory? With
+the glad tidings which the gospel brings us, the love of God in Christ
+which it reveals, the assurance of redemption, the remission of sins,
+the communion of saints, the ministry of angels, the visions of
+paradise restored, the anticipated epiphany of our Lord in his glory,
+the advent of the New Jerusalem in all its golden magnificence, the
+restitution and renovation of this disordered _cosmos_, the
+awakening of the body from its long sleep in the sepulchre, and the
+life everlasting of the just in the many mansions of their Father's
+house, why do we not make the valley of Baca ring with the prelude of
+our eternal song? Strange, indeed, that all this should have so little
+power to cheer, and gladden the people of God in the house of their
+pilgrimage--that Christian enjoyment should seem in general so feeble
+and so fleeting, when it ought to flow on with the constant strength
+and increase of a great river to its repose in the amplitude of an
+unsounded sea.
+
+The apostle in the text solves for us the mystery. It is not that there
+is nothing in Christianity to cheer and elevate the feelings. In the
+great mercy of God, which hath begotten us again to a new and living
+hope by the certain resurrection of our crucified Lord--in the prospect
+of an imperishable inheritance reserved for us in heaven, and the
+perfect assurance of our divine preservation till that inheritance
+shall be revealed--we do indeed "greatly rejoice," exult with gladness,
+leap with exuberant joy; though now for a little while, as necessary
+for our spiritual discipline, we may be put to grief in "manifold
+temptations." Faith we have in these glorious disclosures of Christ's
+evangel, and that faith is genuine, efficient, sometimes quite
+triumphant; but at present, perhaps, the gold is in the furnace,
+enduring the test from which it shall soon come forth purified,
+beautified, fit for the coronal of our expected King.
+
+
+The word temptation sometimes means enticement, and sometimes trial. We
+are tempted when we are enticed to evil, whether by Satan, or his
+servants, or our own evil hearts; and we are tempted when our faith is
+tried, when our virtue is tested, when our character is put to the
+proof, whether by the malice of men or the providence of God.
+Evidently, the term here is to be taken in the latter sense. The
+temptations of which the apostle speaks are trials, such as those of
+Job, Jacob, David, the holy prophets and martyrs, all in every age who
+live godly in Christ Jesus. "Manifold temptations" are complicated
+trials--trial within trial--one infolding another--one overlapping
+another--many involved in one--all so interlaced and bound up together
+that we cannot analyze them, cannot even trace the threads of the
+tangled skein. The grief or "heaviness" which they produce does not
+necessarily indicate a want of trust in God, or of submission to his
+holy will. The firmest believer and most steadfast disciple may
+sometimes, through outward affliction, walk in darkness and have no
+light, even while he trusts in the name of the Lord and stays himself
+upon his God. Christ never doubted his Father's love, nor feared the
+issue of his mighty undertaking; yet when the hour and the power of
+darkness came upon him, he "began to be sorrowful," "sore amazed," and
+"very heavy." "Not my will, but thine, be done"--was the language of
+his guiltless lips, when bowed in his baptism of blood beneath a burden
+which might have crushed a world. So his suffering servants patiently
+endure their tribulations, glorifying God in the midst of the fire, and
+singing with the royal psalmist--"Why art thou cast down, O my soul!
+and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God, for I shall
+yet praise him for the help of his countenance!"
+
+
+Christianity offers us no exemption from the ills of life, but gives us
+grace to bear them, and sanctifies all to our highest good. It is as
+true now as in the days of David, "Many are the afflictions of the
+righteous;" and after more than eighteen centuries, the apostolic
+statement needs no qualification--"It is through much tribulation that
+we must enter into the kingdom of heaven." The thwarted scheme; the
+blighted hope; the ill-requited love; the frequent betrayal of
+confidence; the falseness or fickleness of trusted friendship; the
+cross of shame laid by another's hand upon the shoulder; the deep
+anxiety about the future, which robs the present of more than half its
+joys; the sudden failure of health, withering the bloom of youth, or
+bringing down the strength of stalwart manhood; the moral defection of
+one long loved and cherished, involving the irretrievable ruin of a
+character as dear to you as your own; the death-couch where, day by day
+and night by night, the mother fans the flickering spark of life in her
+darling child; the dear mounds in the cemetery, where affection fondly
+strews her memorial blossoms, and keeps them fresh and fragrant with
+her tears; many a secret grief, too sacred for the stranger to meddle
+with, and too tender to be breathed into the ear of the most familiar
+friend; and more than all, Christ's virgin bride weeping in sackcloth
+and ashes--a broken-hearted captive that cannot sing the Lord's song in
+the land of the idolater and the oppressor;--these are some of the
+fiery trials and manifold temptations by which a gracious Providence is
+disciplining us for our better destiny. But the ordeal is as varied as
+the shades of character and the aspects of human life. Now we have
+fears within; anon we have fightings without; then deep calleth unto
+deep at the noise of God's water-spouts, and all his waves and billows
+are gone over us. But the Lord rideth in the tempest and sitteth upon
+the flood; saying to the fiery steeds of the one and the angry waters
+of the other--"Hitherto, but no farther!" No chance is here; all is
+beneficent design and transcendent wisdom, restricting and controlling
+the agencies of our providential discipline as our spiritual interests
+may require. "Now," not always--"for a season," not forever--"if need
+be," not without the ascertained--are the Lord's beloved subjected to
+these terrible ordeals. The probation must precede the award. The shock
+of battle comes before the victor's triumph. Be not disheartened, but
+hold fast to your hope. The tide that is gone out will soon return. The
+revolving wheel that has brought you so low will soon lift you on high.
+But there is no rose without its thorn, nor dayspring unheralded by the
+darkness. Our light afflictions are but for a moment. Like summer
+showers they come and go, leaving the heaven brighter and the earth
+more beautiful. Many a sore chastening, over which we have wept with a
+sorrow almost inconsolable, has proved one of the greatest blessings
+that God ever granted us in this vale of tears. What is needful for us,
+he knows better than we. The refiner sits by his furnace; and the
+hotter the fire, the shorter the process and the more thorough the
+purification. The physician watches by his patient, with his hand upon
+the pulse, observing every symptom, and thrilling to every throb of
+pain. The trial cannot be too severe for his purpose, nor too long
+continued for our good. God wants to see how much joy, how little
+sorrow, he can mingle in our cup, with perfect safety to our spiritual
+health, and a long series of experiments may be required for the
+perfect solution of the problem. He is leading us through the great and
+terrible wilderness to a city of habitation; and as we look back from
+the hills of our goodly heritage upon the rough path of our pilgrimage,
+the whole journey may seem to us as a dream when one awaketh. Not all
+of the Christian's sufferings are the products of Christianity; many of
+his bitterest griefs are altogether of his own creation; and yet there
+is not an evil he endures, from which Christianity does not propose to
+evolve good for him--not a dark cloud which it does not glorify with
+its beams, nor a crown of thorns which it does not convert into a
+jewelled diadem.
+
+
+But while the burden is mercifully lightened, it is not at once
+removed. The aim of our heavenly Father is not so much to take it away,
+as to enable us so to bear it that it may become a blessing. Thus he
+would test our faith, develop its strength, prove its reality and
+efficiency. But why should faith be thus tested? why not rather the
+whole Christian character? Because faith is the root of character; and
+as is the root, so is the tree. The test of faith is practically the
+test of character, and in this fact lies the obvious value of the test.
+It is the law of the universe, and an essential factor in the process
+of our salvation. Look at this mass of gold just brought from the mine.
+How beautiful! how precious! But there are impurities in it. The true
+metal must be disengaged from all baser substances. Cast it into the
+crucible. "See! it is melted!" Yes, but not destroyed. "Is it not
+welded to the alloy?" No; it is separated from it--purified--glorified!
+So with our faith. Too precious to be purchased, even a single grain of
+it, with all the gold-fields of the world, it must be purged of its
+dross, and made easily distinguishable from the common counterfeits
+which deceive mankind. God gives it to the furnace. Does it perish in
+the process? Nay, it is as imperishable as Christ, and as enduring as
+the soul. The ordeal proves its genuineness and develops its latent
+lustre. The principle is universal, and everywhere manifest--evolved by
+Nature, illustrated by Providence--testing laws, customs, institutions,
+civilizations--awarding due honors to the wise, the pure, the brave,
+the true-hearted--consigning the false, the foolish, the indolent, the
+pusillanimous, to merited oblivion or infamy. Over the pearl-gates of
+the city of God is inscribed: "Blessed is the man that endureth
+temptation; for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life
+which the Lord hath promised to them that love him." Abraham's faith
+was tried by fire in the Plain of Mamre and on the Mount Moriah. St.
+Peter's faith was tried by fire in the garden, in the basilica, and at
+the Saviour's cross. In Eden, the first Adam's innocence was tested to
+our shame; in the wilderness of Judaea, the second Adam's obedience was
+tested to our glory. Before the birth of humanity, angelic loyalty
+passed through its ordeal in the heavenly places; and when the fulness
+of the prophetic times was come, God made proof of his love to a fallen
+race by a trial which shook the earth and rocked the thrones of hell.
+"If these things are done in the green tree, what shall not be done in
+the dry?" Every thing else tested, why not Christian character? For,
+what is Christian character? Is it not a man's protest against sin, his
+declaration of a new life in Christ, his assertion of a citizenship in
+heaven and joint heirship with the Son of God? Surely, this is a matter
+of sufficient moment to require a test, and no test can be too rigid
+that brings out the blessed reality. Think not strange, then, of the
+fiery ordeal. Providence is thus co-operating with grace for your
+sanctification. Bruised by tribulation, the flowers of Christian virtue
+give out more freely their fragrant odors; and the clusters of the vine
+of God must be trodden in the wine-press before they yield the precious
+juice which shall gladden the children of the kingdom. "When he hath
+tried me," saith Job, "I shall come forth as gold." By trial faith is
+transmuted into works, and by works faith shall be justified before the
+assembled worlds. "The Egyptians, whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall
+see no more forever." Courage, ye fearful saints! The clouds which are
+gathering over you shall rain righteousness upon you; the lightning
+that blinds you reveals the chariot of your King; the thunder that
+terrifies you assures you of his love. Courage! His glorious epiphany
+is at hand. Forth shall he come from the pavilions of the sky, with an
+escort of many angels, and anthems that wake the echoes of eternity.
+Then shall the tears of earth become the gems of heaven; and the
+tuneful sorrows of every psalmist shall rise, thrilling, into choral
+hallelujahs! And who will ever regret the "heaviness through manifold
+temptations" which hath wrought in him a meetness for the bliss
+immortal, or behold with aught but joy ineffable the precious gold of
+his faith which was tried with fire, now "found unto praise and honor
+and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at East Brent, Somersetshire, Eng., 1866.
+
+
+
+
+XIII.
+
+CONTEST AND CORONATION.[1]
+
+I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
+I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept the
+faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness,
+which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not
+to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.--2
+Tim. iv. 6-8.
+
+
+I go back eighteen centuries and a half into the past, and find myself
+in a grand old Syrian city. About midday I ride out at a western gate
+along a great highway looking toward a picturesque group of mountains.
+Straight before me towers the white head of Hermon, like that of a
+patriarch amidst his children. On my right and left are groves and
+gardens and smiling villas, a paradise of verdure and beauty, as far as
+the eye can reach. On this road marched Abraham two thousand years
+before me, and Jacob returning from Padan-Aram, and Jonah going to
+Nineveh, and all Israel in chains to Babylon. Enough, surely, in these
+objects, to stir the dullest brain and kindle the coldest heart. Thus
+occupied, my attention is suddenly arrested by a troop of horsemen
+riding briskly toward the city. Their leader is a young man, of rather
+low stature, with keen black eye, and stern and determined aspect. A
+single look is sufficient to assure me that he is no common man, and
+here on no common errand. It is the tiger of Tarsus, in fierce pursuit
+of some of the lambs of the Good Shepherd. A few Christians from
+Jerusalem, driven out by persecution, have come hither for refuge; and
+Saul, with full authority, self-solicited, is on their track,
+"breathing out threatening and slaughter." You know the rest. Blessed
+be the lightning-stroke that consecrated what it smote, and made the
+bold persecutor the bravest apostle of the Crucified!
+
+Thirty years later, in the world's metropolis, I visit the Mammertine
+Prison adjoining the Forum. Who is this, sitting on a block of
+travertine, with a tablet on his knee, a stylus in his hand, and a
+little ewer-shaped lamp at his side? As he looks up a moment from his
+writing, I see something in his face that reminds me of the young
+officer at the head of that vengeful expedition. He is indeed the same
+man--the same, and yet another. Toil, hardship, privation,
+imprisonment, and cruel treatment of all kinds, have wrought sad
+changes in his physical frame. Bent, bald, almost blind, though not
+more than sixty-five years old, I should hardly have recognized him
+without a word from his warder. One of Nero's victims, he waits here
+calmly for the hour of his release by the sword. Already doomed perhaps
+by sentence of the tyrant--it is not certain--neither he nor his keeper
+knows--he has undertaken another letter--most likely the last he will
+ever write--to Timothy, his "dearly beloved son." Abounding with godly
+counsel and encouragement to an intrepid and zealous young bishop, it
+is full also of the most inspiring utterances of Christian faith and
+hope. Among other incentives to diligence and fidelity, he adduces his
+own experience and expectation, and these are his words of cheer: "I am
+now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I
+have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept the
+faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness,
+which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not
+to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing."
+
+Not all called to be ministers and martyrs of Christ, we are all called
+to be his constant and uncompromising followers; and in the humblest
+sphere of Christian discipleship there is demand for the utmost
+activity and zeal, and in many cases for the heroic martyr-spirit
+commended to the bishop and exemplified in the apostle. Let us see,
+then, what instruction we can get from the text.
+
+
+The first thing here to be noted is the apostle's calm contemplation of
+his present position: "I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my
+departure is at hand."
+
+In a popular work of fiction two characters are taking final leave of
+each other. The one is full of heart and hope; the other, deeply
+dejected and despondent. "Farewell," is the last sad word of the
+latter--"Farewell! your way leads upward to happiness; mine
+downward--to happiness also." Such helpless resignation to the
+inevitable, in one form or another, we may all have witnessed. Few
+things are more common in human experience; and the dying, however much
+they have loved life or dreaded death, yield themselves at last to what
+cannot be averted or avoided. But in the apostle's language there is
+something more than this stolid and sullen submission. There is
+cheerful faith and buoyant hope--a conscious triumph over all the evils
+of life and all the terrors of death.
+
+I had a friend very ill. For three days his life hung in doubt with his
+physician. When he began to recover, he said to me: "Death came and
+looked me in the face; but, thank God! I could look him in the face
+without fear." Here stands a man face to face with the last enemy in a
+far more terrible form. To die as a public criminal at the hand of the
+executioner is very different from lying down to sleep one's self into
+another world--very different even from falling in the field fighting
+for all that is dearest to the patriotic heart. Yet the apostle speaks
+of his fate as calmly as if he were about only to set out on a journey
+or embark for a voyage. The manner of his death he already knows. A
+Roman citizen, he cannot be burned, strangled, or crucified, like some
+of his brethren; and Nero, devil as he is, can do no worse than take
+off his head and send him to his Saviour. He is ready to be offered as
+a sacrifice--poured out as a libation; and the time of his
+departure--the loosing of the hawser--the lifting of the anchor--is at
+hand, when he shall sail out upon the ocean of eternity.
+
+A good man, dying, said: "I am in the valley, and it is dark; I feel
+the waters, and they are cold." Not so the apostle. All with him is
+bright, hopeful, joyous. His last hours are the best of his life. It is
+not a stoical indifference to suffering, nor a disgust with the world
+that has misused him, nor a weariness of his holy work. Long since he
+learned in every state to be content. Some years ago he was in a strait
+betwixt two, having a desire to depart and be with Christ, but willing
+to remain a while in the flesh for the benefit of his brethren. For
+him, to live is Christ, to die is gain. Living or dying, he is the
+Lord's, and Christ is magnified in his flesh. At peace with heaven and
+earth, what has he to fear from either? Knowing whom he has believed,
+and confident that he is able to keep that which he has committed to
+his custody, he is ready at the beck of the executioner to go forth
+from his dungeon, and his last walk on the Ostian Way shall be the
+triumphal march of the conqueror.
+
+
+The second thing here to be noted is the apostle's pleasing review of
+his accomplished career: "I have fought a good fight; I have finished
+my course; I have kept the faith."
+
+The reference is to the old Grecian games--the Olympian, the Isthmian,
+the Nemean, and the Pythian. These festivals, we are informed,
+originated with Pelops, were brought to perfection by Hercules and
+Atreus, and restored by Iphitus when they had fallen into neglect. Very
+popular they were, celebrated with great pomp and ceremony, and made
+use of to mark memorable events and public eras--that of consuls at
+Rome, of archons at Athens, of priestesses at Argos. From Greece they
+passed to Italy; and were so much in vogue at the world's metropolis,
+that an ancient author speaks of them as not less important to the
+people than their bread. With these spectacles both St. Paul and his
+beloved Timothy must have been well acquainted, and in the writings of
+the former no metaphors are more frequent than those drawn from the
+Grecian games.
+
+"I have fought a good fight"--literally, striven a good strife, or
+agonized a good agony. The reference is to the athletic contests of the
+arena--wrestling, boxing, and fighting with swords. The apostle's life
+had been a perpetual struggle and conflict. He says he has "fought with
+beasts at Ephesus"--a metaphorical description doubtless of his fierce
+encounter there with the enemies of Christianity. Wherever he went, he
+met hosts of foes, marshalled under the banners of Jewish prejudice and
+pagan superstition. And the world assailed him with all its enginery of
+temptation and persecution; and the native corruption of his own heart
+caused him many a sore conflict, though in all these things he was more
+than conqueror through the victorious Captain of his salvation. As with
+St. Paul, so with all Christians; baptized into a warfare with the
+world, the flesh and the Devil; and signed with the sign of the cross
+in token of this consecration as Christ's servants and soldiers to
+their life's end. But this is "a good fight"--in a good cause, under a
+good captain, with good arms, good allies, good comrades, good
+supplies, good success, and good rewards--in all respects better than
+the patriot's battle for freedom, the crusader's conflict for the holy
+sepulchre, or any competition ever maintained in the arenas of Greece
+and Rome.
+
+"I have finished my course." The figure is changed. Seated with fifty
+or sixty thousand spectators in the Circus Maximus, we are looking down
+upon the _stadium_, where men stripped to the waist, with eyes
+fixed upon the goal, are rushing along for the prize. There goes St.
+Paul!
+
+  "Swiftest and foremost of the race,
+  He carries victory in his face,
+    He triumphs while he runs!"
+
+Forgetting the things which are behind, and reaching forward to those
+which are before, how eagerly he presses toward the mark for the prize
+of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus! With our apostle this is a
+favorite illustration of the Christian life--its steady aim, its
+strenuous action, its habitual self-denial, and patient endurance to
+the end. "Know ye not," he writes to the Corinthians, "that they who
+run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run that ye may
+obtain.... They do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an
+incorruptible." And in the Epistle to the Hebrews we read: "Seeing we
+are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay
+aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and run
+with patience the race that is set before us." So all Christians must
+run, never pausing in their progress, nor for a moment relaxing their
+energies, till from the goal they can look back and say--"I have
+finished my course."
+
+"I have kept the faith." Here seems to be a reference to the strict
+rules and rigid discipline to be observed in both these methods of
+competition. In the arena and on the _stadium_ every thing was
+duly ordered and prescribed, nothing left to chance or choice, and he
+that strove for the mastery was not crowned except he strove lawfully.
+In the race, there must be no deviation from the line marked out for
+the runner; in the combat, no unfairness nor violation of the rules. "I
+therefore so run, not as uncertainly," saith the apostle; "so fight I,
+not as one that beateth the air; but I keep under my body, and bring it
+into subjection, lest after having preached to others I myself should
+be rejected." "Would you obtain a prize in the Olympic games?" said a
+pagan philosopher. "A noble design! But consider the requirements and
+the consequences. You must live by rule; you must eat when you are not
+hungry; you must abstain from agreeable food; you must habituate
+yourself to suffer cold and heat; in one word, you must surrender
+yourself in all things to the guidance of a physician." "The just shall
+live by his faith." Without adherence to this rule, there is no reward.
+"The life which I live in the flesh," saith St. Paul, "I live by the
+faith of the Son of God." It is faith that strengthens the Christian
+_agonisti_ with might in the inner man. It is faith that unites
+the soul to Christ, and overcomes the world. The shipwreck of faith is
+the shipwreck also of a good conscience. Keep the faith, and it will
+keep you. St. Paul kept it, and triumphed in martyrdom.
+
+
+The third thing here to be noted is the apostle's joyful foresight of
+his glorious coronation: "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of
+righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at
+that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his
+appearing."
+
+The object of the apostle's hope is no garland of withering leaves or
+fading flowers, such as honored the victor in the Grecian games; nor a
+diadem of gems and gold, such as glorified imperial brows at Rome. He
+had sowed righteousness, and righteousness he hoped to reap. He had
+wrought righteousness, and righteousness was to be his reward. The
+principle of the competition was the chief jewel of the expected crown.
+The victor's award must show the character of the conflict. And what,
+to such a prize, are all the splendors of royalty, with all the
+magnificent pageantry and subsequent privileges of an Olympian triumph?
+Imperishable, it is called "a crown of life," and "a crown of glory
+that fadeth not away." In the Convent of Sant Onofrio, I have seen the
+wreath intended for the living Tasso, but delayed too long, and placed
+by the _fratti_ upon the brow of the dead; and, though very
+carefully preserved, it was all sear, and crisp, and falling to decay;
+but upon your heads, O ye righteous! shall your crowns flourish, when
+this earth and these heavens are no more.
+
+The judge who awarded the prize to the victor at the Grecian games
+might decide unjustly, either through culpable partiality, or from
+involuntary error; but "the Lord, the righteous judge," who is to
+decide the fate of the Christian _agonisti_, is no respecter of
+persons, and his perfect knowledge and infallible wisdom render
+mistakes with him impossible. St. Paul's imperial judge was the very
+incarnation of iniquity; but Christ "shall judge the world in
+righteousness," and "reward every man according to his works."
+
+The crown was not conferred as soon as the racer reached the goal or
+the gladiator gave the fatal thrust, but was reserved till the contests
+were all over and ended, and the claims of the several candidates were
+carefully canvassed and adjudicated. So the "crown of righteousness" is
+"laid up" to be given "at that day," when the Lord Jesus shall come to
+be glorified in his saints. One says, "we must die first;" St. Paul
+tells us we must rise first. Blessed, indeed, are the dead in Christ;
+but their blessedness cannot be consummated till their Lord return from
+heaven and they appear with him in glory.
+
+And to whom, or how many, is the crown to be given? "To all them that
+love his appearing." All the contestants shall then be collected, and
+every victor crowned. Christ hath crowns enough for the whole assembly
+of his saints, and the most illustrious of his apostles would not wish
+to wear them all. The humblest and obscurest Christian shall have his
+portion in the royal inheritance. There is only one condition--that we
+"love his appearing." This was the chief mark of his first followers.
+Through all their bitter conflicts, their hope clung to the Master's
+promise. Have we such hope? Rejoice then, and be exceeding glad! Fight
+on; stretch forward; hold fast your precious faith. In the crown that
+glitters in the hand of your Judge, is there not sufficient indemnity
+for all the agony of the conflict?
+
+To this prospect, alas! there is an appalling contrast. Some are
+fighting an evil fight, running a ruinous race, repudiating the only
+faith that can save the soul. Think you by unrighteousness to win the
+crown of righteousness? "Be not deceived; God is not mocked; whatsoever
+a man soweth, that shall he also reap." Even in the Grecian contests,
+the unsuccessful candidate found all his toil and struggle utterly
+unprofitable at the end. And you who never enter the lists, who take no
+part in the competition, who are mere spectators of the earnestness and
+the agony of others--will you dare, when the Judge cometh, to stand
+forth and claim the crown for which you have never striven? "Awake to
+righteousness!" Condemned already, dead in trespasses and sins, aliens
+from the Church and strangers to the covenant--what hope is there for
+you, but in God's regenerating grace, a thorough change of heart and
+life, a moral transformation of character which shall make you new
+creatures in Christ Jesus? Not yet is it all too late. Come and offer
+yourselves as candidates for the heavenly competition. Grace will
+accept your late repentance, and you will have nothing to regret but
+your long delay. We challenge you to the contest. All heaven awaits
+your decision. How long halt you? It is high time you were determined.
+Step forward, take your position, and struggle for the crown of
+righteousness which the righteous Judge shall give that day to all who
+love his appearing!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at Brighton, Eng., 1866.
+
+
+
+
+XIV.
+
+CALVARY TOKEN.[1]
+
+As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's
+death till he come.--1 Cor. xi. 26.
+
+
+Between Chattanooga and Atlanta occurred some of the severest conflicts
+of the American Civil War. For more than a hundred miles the fields are
+covered with battle-scars, and every hill-top bears traces of
+fortifications. Near one of the most memorable places may now be seen a
+cemetery, where Northern and Southern soldiers, side by side, await the
+resurrection. Visiting it a year after the struggle was over and ended,
+I found an East-Tennessee farmer sitting by a grave at the head of
+which he had just erected a handsome marble. To my question--"Was the
+soldier lying here your son?" he answered: "No, sir; he was my
+neighbor. I was drafted for the army; my family were all sick; I knew
+not how to leave them; I was sadly perplexed and troubled. A young man
+came to me, and said: 'You shall not go; I will go for you; I have no
+family to care for.' Glad to remain with those who needed me so much, I
+accepted his generous offer. He went, but never returned. I have
+brought this stone more than a hundred miles, to set it at the head of
+his grave. Look there, stranger!" I followed with my eyes the direction
+of his finger, and read under the name of the noble dead: "He died for
+me!" And we both bowed the head, and wept.
+
+My dear brethren, there is One far nobler who died for you and me. With
+a disinterestedness unparalleled in the annals of war, he took our
+place in a fiercer conflict than was ever waged for freedom or for
+empire. Fighting our battle, he fell; but falling, conquered all our
+foes. Triumphant he rose from the dead, and ascended on high, leading
+our captivity captive. At the right hand of the throne of God, in our
+nature redeemed and glorified, "he ever liveth to make intercession for
+us." All that we have or hope of good we owe to his dying love. But in
+an upper chamber at Jerusalem, with a few chosen witnesses present,
+just before he went forth to the final engagement, he instituted for us
+a perpetual memorial of his unexampled charity. Taking bread, he
+blessed, and brake, and gave to his disciples, saying: "Take, eat; this
+is my body, which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of me."
+Then, taking the cup, he gave to them, saying: "Drink ye all of this;
+for this is my blood of the new covenant, shed for you, and for many,
+for the remission of sins; do this in remembrance of me." This
+finished, he chanted part of the Great Hallel with the beloved twelve,
+as if the victory were already won; then gave them his valedictory
+address, and went out to die. And some twenty-four years later, the
+great Apostle Paul, in a letter to the Christians of Corinth, having
+narrated the facts just as they are recorded by the evangelists, adds
+these solemn words for the benefit of his brethren in all subsequent
+ages: "As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the
+Lord's death till he come."
+
+
+Here, then, is the precious Calvary token bequeathed by the dear
+Saviour to his redeemed Church. While we contemplate it, hear we not a
+voice from the excellent glory bidding us take off the shoes from our
+feet? Approaching the altar to gaze upon the great sacrificial
+memorial, the ground we tread is holier than that on which Moses stood
+before the bush that burned in Horeb. There is more of God seen here
+than in all the fires of Sinai. There he made known his law; here he
+reveals his love. There we read his will; here we behold his heart. No
+other ordinance, even of the new and everlasting covenant, contains so
+much of majesty, so much of mystery, so much of sanctity, and at the
+same time so much of mercy, as the eucharistic feast; in which the
+Messiah stands forth to our faith at once the sacrifice and the
+sacrificer, in the same sacred solemnity instituting an everlasting
+memorial and a perpetual priesthood.
+
+To us, more than eighteen centuries after the fact, if we have any
+right feeling and clear perception, the solemn transaction in the upper
+room,
+
+  "On that sad memorable night,"
+
+must wear an aspect far more interesting than it wore at the moment
+even to the apostles themselves. For we are able to view the matter
+more deliberately and more dispassionately than they could, and with
+many additional side-lights to aid our apprehension of the divine
+truths involved. Certainly no act of the Saviour has laid his Church
+under greater obligation, none has exhibited in more attractive colors
+the relations he sustains to his redeemed people. Taking the bread and
+the cup, does he not remind us of his having taken our flesh and blood?
+Presenting them with solemn benediction to the Father, does he not
+intimate to us the offering of his humanity to Heaven as a sacrifice
+for our sins? Giving them to his disciples with the command to eat and
+drink, does he not assure us that he is ours with all the infinite
+benefits of his incarnation and atonement forever? Ordering the
+apostles and their apostolical successors as his priests to do what
+they have just seen him do as their Lord, does he not furnish us a
+perpetual commemoration of his redeeming love, and a perpetual
+demonstration of his quickening power, till his return in glorious
+majesty from heaven to rule the world he ransomed with his blood?
+
+
+Under both the Hebrew and the heathen rituals, the meat-offering and
+the drink-offering were inseparable from every piacular sacrifice; and
+without the conjunctive offering of bread and wine, it is difficult to
+see how either Hebrew or heathen could have regarded the death of
+Christ as an expiation for sin. As the death of a martyr, indeed, they
+might well enough have taken it; but as a sacrifice for human
+transgression, how could they have received it, unaccompanied by the
+Holy Supper? Were the bread and wine the body and blood of Christ in
+the physical sense maintained by the Church of Rome, their perpetual
+presentation by personal intercession before the Father's throne would
+be superfluous and even impossible, while the voluntary death of our
+dear Lord upon the cross would be unnecessary and suicidal. Were they
+the body and blood of Christ in the merely emblematical sense
+maintained by the ultra-Protestant sects, they would constitute for us
+no sufficient assurance of his ever-living mediation in heaven, nor to
+God any effectual remembrancer of his suffering in the flesh for the
+expiation of our guilt. Therefore those denominations who deny the
+propitiatory character of his passion have little care or scruple about
+the due observance of this most sacred festival--
+
+  "Rich banquet of his flesh and blood."
+
+
+"This do," said the divine Author of the institution, "in remembrance
+of me"--strictly, "for my memorial;" not merely remembering
+me--reminding yourselves and others of me; but memorializing God the
+Father--reminding him of the self-presentation of his well-beloved Son
+as an offering and a sacrifice of a sweet-smelling savor for our
+salvation. In doing this, we do not repeat the once offered and forever
+accepted propitiation for our guilt--a thing which, indeed, we cannot
+do, and which no word of Holy Scripture warrants us in attempting; but
+we present a spiritual memorial of that propitiation, setting forth in
+the sight of God the perfect work and infinite merit of our personal
+Redeemer; we present the consecrated bread and wine, and with them we
+present ourselves and the whole catholic Church, to him who delivered
+up his own Son for us all, and accepted that Son's unknown sorrows and
+sufferings as a sufficient satisfaction for all human sin. This is the
+essence of the eucharistic oblation, the anti-typical peace-offering,
+the great sacrifice of the faithful. How unworthy are we of so sublime
+a service! and how should we cleanse ourselves to appear with such a
+gift at the portals of the heavenly sanctuary!
+
+
+In the presence of the chosen twelve presenting to the Father the
+meat-offering and drink-offering of the true Paschal Lamb, the
+appointed High-Priest of our profession solemnly attested to heaven and
+earth the sacrificial character of his ensuing sufferings, and pledged
+himself to the speedy accomplishment of the great sin-offering once for
+all. Enjoining upon his apostles the perpetual continuance of the same
+ministration by an unfailing succession of consecrated men, he provided
+the Church with a proof and the world with a token of the everlasting
+endurance and efficacy of that sacrifice, once offered, often
+commemorated, and eternally acceptable to God. Instituting a memorial
+for all subsequent ages of the completeness and perpetuity of his
+personal sacrifice, he instituted also the means of appropriating its
+benefits; and the Christian meat-offering and drink-offering being so
+intimately associated with the Christian sacrifice, the partaker in
+faith of the one is partaker in fact of the other, truly eating the
+flesh and drinking the blood of God's incarnate Son. Hear the Saviour's
+memorable words in the Capernaum synagogue: "Verily, verily, I say unto
+you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, ye
+have no life in you; whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath
+eternal life, and I will raise him up in the last day; for my flesh is
+meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed; he that eateth my flesh and
+drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him."
+
+Hard sayings were these to some who heard them, and hard they still are
+to all self-blinded unbelievers; but, as St. Augustine says, they are
+hard only to the hardened, and incredible only to the incredulous. To
+us who believe, though mysterious, they are very precious. We apprehend
+their spiritual meaning, and rejoice in the privilege which they open
+to our faith. Eating and drinking at the Lord's table, we become
+partakers of his life, his holiness, and his immortality. Here we
+participate with the Eternal Father in his joy over the accomplished
+work of his Beloved Son, and with that Beloved Son himself in his joy
+over the redeemed Church--his treasure and his bride; while heaven and
+earth unite in the glad festival of faith--the hidden manna and the new
+wine of the kingdom. And if the living Christ be thus in you, dear
+brethren! what outward enemy is too strong for you--what duty too
+arduous--what ordeal too severe? Away with your doubts and fears, O ye
+faint-hearted disciples! Can you not trust him who, in the power of an
+endless life, has established his throne in your hearts? With Christ,
+all things are yours, and no agency of earth or hell can rob you of
+your regal inheritance!
+
+
+Contingent upon the sacrifice of the cross, and from that sacrifice
+deriving all its meaning and its merit, the eucharistic sacrament
+itself becomes relatively sacrificial. As beforehand there was a
+continual sacrificial anticipation of Immanuel's atoning death, so
+after the event is there a continual sacramental commemoration of the
+accomplished purpose and prophecy. Both the Jewish passover which
+foreshadowed the future fact, and the Christian eucharist which to-day
+commemorates the fact historical, are sacrificial on the same principle
+and by the same rule--their relation to the cross of Calvary which
+gives them all their virtue and their value. The agony is over, and
+Christ dieth no more; the atonement once made without the walls of
+Jerusalem is still presented by our divine High-Priest before the
+mercy-seat within the vail. To all who believe, it is efficacious
+forever, needing no annual or even millennial repetition. But in the
+eucharistic sacrament, with prayers and thanksgivings, we lift up the
+reeking cross before the Eternal Father, and plead the sufferings of
+his Well-Beloved for our salvation. We say to God: "Behold this broken
+bread; it is the mangled flesh of thy Christ! Behold this purple cup;
+it is the blood which he shed for our sins! Behold at thy right hand
+our slaughtered Paschal Lamb, and for his sake have mercy upon us and
+save us!"
+
+Thus we say the holy eucharist is relatively sacrificial--sacrificial
+from its inseparable connection with the Redeemer's sacrifice. But even
+in this sense--the only one admissible to a true faith--the holy
+eucharist could not be sacrificial, were not its ministers in a
+corresponding sense sacerdotal. As the sacrament becomes relatively
+sacrificial by representing the Saviour's sacrifice, so its ministers
+become relatively sacerdotal by representing his person and functions.
+Commencing in the paschal chamber an ever-during sacrifice by
+ministering in person its accompanying meat-offering and
+drink-offering, he commenced there also the order of an ever-during
+priesthood by empowering his apostolic ministry to perpetuate that
+meat-offering and drink-offering forever. And, conferring sacerdotal
+functions upon the apostolic ministry, he conferred them upon that
+ministry alone. If he did not intend to limit to the twelve and their
+consecrated followers the power of consecrating and dispensing the
+sacramental bread and wine, why were not the whole five hundred
+brethren, or all the vast concourse of followers from Galilee, admitted
+to the original celebration? The selection of the few proves the
+exclusion of the many, and restricts the perpetual prerogative to the
+ministry of apostolical succession.
+
+The sacerdotal oblation being essential, the sacerdotal celebration is
+equally essential. The priest must consecrate; the priest must
+administer; or there is no divinely authorized memorial of the one
+everlasting sacrifice. No such memorial, where is the recognized bond,
+connecting the body on earth to its glorified Head in heaven? No such
+bond, what becomes of the Church, and what assurance has she of an
+eternal inheritance? That bond secure, the Church is invincible and
+immortal; the city of God stands upon a rock which no shock of
+colliding worlds can shake; all her happy people, instinct with the
+life of their Lord, walking in white robes her streets of gold. And the
+apostolic series of sacerdotal ministers continuing to the end of time,
+the conjoined memorial of consecrated bread and wine shall still bind
+the successive generations of the faithful to the sacrificial cross,
+till he who for our great and endless comfort instituted the holy
+mystery nearly two thousand years ago shall return with all his flaming
+cohorts from the skies to take us to himself forever. "As often as ye
+eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till he
+come."
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at Porto Bello, Edinburgh, Scot., 1866. For much
+of the thought contained in this discourse the author is indebted to
+the <sc>Christology of the Old Testament</sc>, by the honored rector of
+his childhood, the Rev. Joseph Stephenson, A.M., late of Lympsham,
+Somersetshire, Eng.
+
+
+
+
+XV.
+
+HEROISM TRIUMPHANT.[1]
+
+Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ,
+and maketh manifest the savor of his knowledge by us in every
+place.--2 Cor. ii. 14.
+
+
+The grandest of all human pageants was a Roman triumph. This honor was
+conferred only upon the emperor or the general who had conquered a
+province, or achieved some signal victory. The conqueror was arrayed in
+rich purple robes, embroidered with flowers and figures of gold. His
+buskins were adorned with pearls and costly gems, and a wreath of
+laurel or a crown of gold was set upon his head. In one hand he held a
+laurel branch, the emblem of victory; and in the other his truncheon,
+the symbol of authority and power. He was borne in a magnificent
+chariot, drawn generally by white horses, but sometimes by other
+animals. Pompey had elephants; Mark Antony, lions; Heliogabalus,
+tigers; Marcus Aurelius, reindeer. Musicians led the procession,
+playing triumphal marches; and heralds, proclaiming the achievements of
+the victorious hero. These were followed by young men, leading the
+victims, with gilded horns and garlanded heads, intended for
+sacrifice. Next came the wagons, loaded with the spoils and trophies of
+the conquered foe; succeeded by the captured horses, camels, elephants,
+and gayly decorated carriages; and after these, the captive kings,
+queens, princes, and generals, loaded with chains. Then was seen the
+triumphal chariot, outdoing all other magnificence; before which boys
+swung censers and maidens strewed flowers; while the people, as it
+passed, prostrated themselves and shouted, "_Io triumphe!_"
+Immediately behind marched the sentries; and the procession was closed
+by the priests and their attendants, with the various sacrificial
+utensils, and a white ox destined for the chief victim. Entering the
+city by the Porta Capaena, passing through the triumphal arch, and
+proceeding along the Via Sacra, the splendid _cortege_ moved on
+toward the Capitol; at the foot of which the captives divided, some led
+to the Mammertine and Tullian dungeons on the right, while the others
+went straight forward to the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus; the former
+doomed to death, the latter made tributaries if not even allies of
+imperial Rome. Meanwhile, the temples all being open, every altar
+smoked with sacrificial fires, and clouds of incense filled the city
+and sweetened all the air.
+
+
+With such spectacles the Corinthians were not unacquainted. About two
+hundred years before St. Paul wrote this epistle, Lucius Mummius, the
+Roman consul, had conquered all Achaia; had destroyed Corinth, Chalcus
+and Thebes; and, by order of the senate, had been honored with a
+splendid triumph and the surname of Achaicus. Over the same people the
+apostle now has a triumph, but it is a triumph of very different
+character--a triumph in Christ by the power of the gospel, the glory of
+which he ascribes to God alone. As in a Roman triumph the smoke of
+altars and the odor of incense filled the city with a pleasant perfume,
+so the name and the doctrine of Christ preached by him and his
+colleagues pervaded Corinth and all the surrounding country--wherever
+those holy men had labored--with odors as of Eden; and the apostles
+appeared as triumphing in Christ over idols, demons, devils--over
+ignorance, prejudice, scepticism, superstition, false philosophy, and
+all the powers of darkness; yet appropriating no praise to themselves,
+but attributing all to the wisdom and the mercy of God. Indeed, it is
+God's triumph, not theirs. He has first triumphed over them, and is now
+making them the partners of his triumph. Better expressing the sense of
+the Greek original, Trench and Alford read, "leadeth us in triumph;"
+and other eminent critics give us substantially the same rendering;
+while Conybeare and Howson, in their admirable work on the "Life and
+Epistles of St. Paul," thus translate the language of the text: "But
+thanks be to God, who leads me on from place to place in the train of
+his triumph, to celebrate his victory over the enemies of Christ; and
+by me sends forth the knowledge of himself, a stream of fragrant
+incense, throughout the world." A pretty free translation, it is true;
+but embodying, no doubt, the precise meaning of the writer. "St. Paul
+regarded himself," says Fausett, "as a signal trophy of God's
+victorious power in Christ; his Almighty Conqueror leading him about
+through all the cities of the Greek and Roman world, as an illustrious
+example of his power at once to subdue and to save." The foe of Christ
+was now the servant of Christ. Grace divine had subdued and disarmed
+him. The rebel, the persecutor, the conspirator with hell, was brought
+into subjection, and rejoiced in his burden as a blessing. As to be led
+in triumph by man is miserable degradation, so to be led in triumph by
+the Lord of hosts is highest honor and blessedness. Our only true
+triumphs are God's triumphs over us. His defeats of us are our only
+true victories. Near the gate of Damascus the lion is smitten into a
+lamb by the hand of the Crucified; and in a short time the lamb has
+become his bravest champion. Brought into willing obedience, he falls
+into Christ's triumphal train, ascends into Christ's triumphal chariot;
+and, in full sympathy with Christ, becomes the partner of his triumph.
+Bengal writes--"who shows us in triumph"--that is, not only as
+conquered by Christ, but as conquering with him. Our victory is the
+fruit of his victory over us; and the open showing of that, so far from
+being our shame, is our greatest glory. Therefore saith the
+apostle--and it is the most heroic utterance of the prince of heroes:
+"God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus
+Christ; by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."
+And from this evangel of the crucifixion, which he lives to preach and
+will die to defend, arises the fragrant odor with which he and his
+companions are filling the world. As the approach of the triumphal
+procession is made manifest by the sweet perfume scattered far and wide
+by incense-bearers in the conqueror's train, so the heavenly Victor
+makes use of his vanquished to herald the victories of his grace and
+diffuse like fragrant odors the saving knowledge of his name. It is the
+triumph of grace over sin, the triumph of truth over error, the triumph
+of faith over unbelief, the triumph of divine love over human
+selfishness. It is the right triumphing over the wrong, the pure
+triumphing over the impure, the heavenly triumphing over the earthly,
+the spiritual triumphing over the sensual, the eternal triumphing over
+the temporal, the true religion triumphing over all superstition. It is
+God by Christ triumphing in man, and man through Christ triumphing with
+God; who leads us in triumph as his captives, shows us in triumph as
+his trophies, and "maketh manifest by us the savor of his knowledge in
+every place."
+
+
+You see, my brethren, that the apostolic work was missionary work--that
+the Church, as constituted by these heroic and holy men under the
+leadership of their divine Lord, was a missionary society--the
+primitive propaganda of the Christian faith. They were sent forth by
+the Captain of their salvation to conquer the nations for Christ, and
+gather captives from all countries into his triumphal procession. For
+this work St. Paul was added to the original number, and from his
+peculiar fitness by education and spiritual endowment became the most
+successful of them all. And the constitution of the Church is still
+unchanged; and our high calling in Christ Jesus has never been revoked;
+and your bishops and clergy to-day are but heralds and incense-bearers
+in the train of Immanuel's triumph; and every faithful communicant, and
+every baptized believer, and every humble neophyte, are triumphing with
+the heavenly Conqueror. Surely here is a demand for all our faith, for
+all our zeal, for all our moral heroism; and for an embassy like ours,
+"more than twelve legions of angels" might have been commissioned from
+the skies. Alas! where sleep our energies? where slumber the holy fires
+within our hearts? Calm and secure, here we sit in our Christian
+assemblies. With something of the Spirit we pray, with something of the
+Spirit we sing, and with much of the understanding we do both. With
+reverent delight we hear the word of grace, and with unspeakable
+gladness welcome its revelations of the unseen and the eternal. With
+our best faculties we inquire into its meaning, seek elucidations of it
+in ancient literature and modern criticism, and rejoice in its
+accumulating confirmations from history and from science. We worship
+with a comely ritual derived from the fathers, and celebrate the
+sacramental mysteries of our redemption in words that have warmed the
+hearts of martyrs. But while thus occupied, how little think we of the
+millions around us who for the same mercies are constantly invoking
+Heaven with the voice of all their sins and sorrows! For us, Christ
+"hath abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light by his
+gospel;" they follow their friends to the burial, and mourn for them
+without hope, no star gleaming over the grave, nor seraph beckoning out
+of the darkness beyond; they lie down to die, but above the pallid day
+no halo gathers, no seraph wings are hovering, no sweet familiar voices
+inviting to an eternal fellowship of joy. Have we no loving compassions
+for them, no desire to rescue and save their souls alive? Oh! look at
+the heathen world, where Satan holds undisputed empire, and man has
+never felt the power of Christian civilization. Look at the dark places
+of the earth, full of the habitations of cruelty; where Belial reigns
+supreme, and Moloch revels in fire and blood. Look at the countries
+that languish under the curse of the Crescent, where sense misnamed
+faith triumphs over reason, and strong delusion has quenched the last
+beam of divine knowledge, and obscured every ray of intellectual truth.
+Look at Jacob's heritage of milk, and honey, "destroyed by the
+wickedness of them that dwell therein"--the most beautiful of lands,
+the very garden of God, by ignorance and barbarism turned into a
+sterile waste and delivered up to the tenantry of noisome and noxious
+creatures. Look at the exiled children of Abraham, a vagabond race,
+roaming everywhere, and nowhere finding rest; the curse of their
+rejection branded on every brow, and reprobation written in every
+feature of an unmistakable physiognomy; their synagogues little better
+than Mohammedan mosques and pagan temples, their worship an empty and
+abrogated ceremonial, and Mammon substituted for the Messiah. Look at
+the villanous impostures of the Vatican, and the notorious corruptions
+of faith and worship wherever the Roman mystagogue holds sway; the
+habitual invocation of saints and martyrs; the adoration of images,
+pictures, and relics; the monstrous abuses and manifold abominations of
+the confessional; the doctrines of indulgence, purgatory, and human
+merit; the blasphemous dogmas of papal supremacy and infallibility, and
+the immaculate conception of the Blessed Virgin; with the legitimate
+and lamentable fruits--an abject and atheistic priesthood, and a
+thriftless and degraded people. Look at your own country, Christian
+though it is called--your own city, highly as it is favored of heaven;
+and see how far the masses lie from the living God; how his name is
+profaned, his altars abandoned, while every place of amusement is
+thronged with merry votaries of pleasure, and drunken men reel athwart
+the path of church-going people, and the house of her whose steps take
+hold on hell stands in the very shadow of the sanctuary, and libidinous
+songs and blasphemous oaths form the horrible counterpart to your
+sacred psalmody; on all sides temples of Bacchus and Beelzebub, with
+scenes of revelry and riot, debauchery and blood, where dissipation
+discards all disguise, impurity all shame, and impiety all fear. Look
+at your Western States and Territories--fields demanding a hundred
+missionaries where you have one; a numerous and constantly increasing
+population scattered over a vast extent of country, with only here and
+there a church and a school, like solitary torches a thousand miles
+apart struggling to dispel the deeper than Egyptian darkness of half a
+world; while Rome is rearing her temples and convents everywhere,
+everywhere establishing her brotherhoods and sisterhoods, founding
+orphan-asylums and educational institutes, exercising a powerful
+influence over the development of the youthful mind, and poisoning the
+wells whence the people are to draw the water of their salvation; and
+heresy and schism are setting up their tabernacles, and agnostic
+infidelity is travelling _pari passu_ with population, and myriads
+of redeemed immortals are perishing for lack of knowledge. Look at your
+fair and sunny South-land, lately devastated by contending armies;
+churches in ashes, cities in ruins, fenceless plantations growing up to
+forests; bishops and clergymen wofully impoverished, and forced to
+resort to secular occupations for subsistence; earnest and anxious
+spirits, shipwrecked in the collision of sectarian crafts, struggling
+desperately in the dark waters of doubt, and longing to see the
+life-boats of the Church upon the billows; four million slaves in a
+state of semi-barbarism suddenly set at liberty like so many unfledged
+cagelings turned out to the wintry tempest, amidst hawks, and owls, and
+eagles, and every beast of prey; many of them already relapsing into
+their ancestral superstitions, suspecting one another as wizards and
+witches, practising hideous rites and abominable incantations,
+worshipping some exceptionally ugly old hag as a new incarnation of the
+Divinity, and dancing with demoniac noises over the graves of their
+dead. No fancy pictures are these which I present, nor overwrought
+descriptions of realities. Impossible were it to find language or
+figures to exaggerate the wretchedness of humanity unrelieved by the
+gracious revelations of God. In comparison of the moral ruin around us,
+what was the late catastrophe of a hundred South-American cities,
+whelming in a common destruction men, women and children to the number
+of forty or fifty thousand? Should some pilgrim from a distant sphere,
+traversing the ethereal space with wings of light, chance to cross the
+orbit of our fallen planet, and cast a momentary glance down at our
+condition, might he not hurry past with a shudder, suspecting that hell
+had emptied itself upon earth, and the unhappy race had been given over
+unredeemed to the dominion of the Devil?
+
+
+But why dwell on this dismal theme? Oh! I could tell you of victories
+demanding another David to sing them or another Isaiah to record them,
+till every loving heart should leap for joy and exult in hope of
+millennial triumph. But I would fain stir your compassion. I am feeling
+for your purse-strings among your heart-strings. I want to play a tune
+upon your spirits which shall echo in Colorado, and make music in New
+Mexico, and reverberate from the heights of the Himalaya, and gladden
+the hills round about Jerusalem. Can we survey the valley of vision,
+and not prophesy to all the winds of God? Can we see millions of
+immortal beings crushed by the dominion of Satan, and not cry amain to
+the Prince of peace to come and unseat the great usurper, and establish
+his own universal and everlasting empire? And how shall we pray
+successfully, if we answer not our own prayers by pouring our offerings
+into the Lord's treasury? How shall we arrest the long carnival of
+crime, and error, and delusion, and infidelity, if we bestir not all
+our Christian energies, occupying every available position, evoking
+every beneficent agency of the Church, barricading with Bibles and
+Prayer-Books the teeming way to ruin, and bridging with the blessed
+cross the mouth of the flaming pit? Thus, my brethren! may we save
+souls from death, and give new joy to benevolence in other worlds, and
+gladden the heart that eighteen hundred years ago quivered for us upon
+the point of the Roman spear, and fill the reverberant universe with
+the shout of the apostle--"Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth
+us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savor of his knowledge
+by us in every place!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at a missionary meeting in New York, 1868.
+
+
+
+
+XVI.
+
+FRATERNAL FORGIVENESS.[1]
+
+So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your
+hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses.--Matt.
+xviii. 35.
+
+
+When John Wesley was in Georgia, he was dining one day with Gov.
+Oglethorpe. A negro waiter at the table committing a careless blunder,
+the governor said to his guest: "See this good-for-nothing servant; he
+is always doing wrong, though he knows that I never forgive." "Does
+your Excellency never forgive?" replied Mr. Wesley; "then it is to be
+hoped that your Excellency never does wrong." A beautiful reproof; and
+the more effectual, no doubt, from its gentleness. Those who need
+forgiveness for their own faults, certainly ought to forgive the faults
+of others. "Forgive, and ye shall be forgiven;" but "he shall have
+judgment without mercy, who hath showed no mercy." This is the lesson
+taught us in the gospel for the day,[2] which I shall endeavor to
+unfold and apply. For moral elevation, the passage is very remarkable.
+Found in some old Greek or Roman volume--in some parchment dug up from
+Herculaneum or Pompeii--on some tablet or cylinder discovered amidst
+the _debris_ of Nineveh or Babylon--it would have awakened the
+wonder of the world, and men would never have been weary of praising
+its transcendent charity.
+
+
+The Jewish rabbis taught that a man might forgive an injury a second or
+even a third time, but never a fourth. When St. Peter asked--"How oft
+shall my brother trespass against me, and I forgive him? until seven
+times?" he doubled the rabbinical measure of mercy, doubtless imagining
+that he had reached the ultimate limit, and that his Divine Master even
+could require no more. How must he and his brethren have been
+astonished when Jesus answered: "I say not unto thee, Until seven
+times; but, until seventy times seven!" What! four hundred and ninety
+times? But Jesus puts a definite number for an indefinite. "Count not
+your acts of clemency," he seems to say; "be your forgiveness of a
+brother as free as the air you breathe or the light you enjoy--your
+love as unlimited as the illimitable heaven above you." Then he puts
+the matter strongly before them in a parable:
+
+A certain king calls his servants--the collectors of his taxes and
+revenues--to account. One of them is found frightfully in
+arrears--owing his lord ten thousand talents--a debt which he can never
+pay. The king orders the sale of the delinquent, with his family and
+all his effects. Falling at the royal feet, he implores patience, and
+promises the impossible. Touched with pity, the king forgives the debt.
+But the forgiven goes to a fellow-servant who owes him the small sum of
+a hundred pence, seizes him by the throat, and demands immediate
+payment. The helpless debtor falls before him, and pleads with him as
+he himself had lately pleaded with the king. The creditor, however, is
+inexorable; and into prison the poor man must go till the debt is paid.
+The sad matter is reported to the king, who recalls the subject of his
+clemency, rebukes his cruelty, revokes his own act of forgiveness, and
+delivers the unmerciful over to the tormentors till the last farthing
+shall be paid. Finally, in application of the parable, the Divine
+Teacher adds: "So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you,
+if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their
+trespasses."
+
+God's mercy to man, and man's unmercifulness to his fellow, are the two
+principal things set forth in the parable. Let us look at them both,
+and see how the former enhances the latter, and enforces the duty of
+fraternal forgiveness.
+
+
+To have any right appreciation of the master's mercy, we must know
+something of the amount of the servant's debt. Ten thousand talents was
+an enormous sum. The delinquent was a viceroy, and the amount he owed
+was the revenue of a province. In those days large debts were not
+uncommon. Julius Caesar owed, beyond his assets, $1,425,000; Mark
+Antony, $2,250,000; Curio, $3,375,000; Milo, $4,125,000. An Attic
+talent was about $1,080; which, multiplied by 10,000, would make the
+debt $10,800,000. But if the Jewish talent of silver is meant, it would
+amount to $16,600,000; if the Jewish talent of gold, to $569,000,000.
+Now let each talent stand for a sin--10,000 sins! Reduce the talents to
+dollars, and take every dollar for a sin--569,000,000 sins! Reduce the
+dollars to dimes, and let every dime represent a sin--5,690,000,000
+sins! Reduce the dimes to cents, and let every cent be considered a
+sin--56,900,000,000 sins! Perhaps, however, our dear Lord never
+intended by the number of talents to intimate the number of our sins,
+any more than by the seventy times seven he meant to say how often we
+should forgive an offending brother. In each case the idea is that of
+indefinite number, unlimited extent. But if the seventy times seven
+means mercy without measure, what can the ten thousand talents denote
+but guilt beyond all human calculation or imagination? Think you any
+estimate of the number and enormity of our sins can be an exaggeration?
+"Who can tell how oft he offendeth?" "My sins are more than the hairs
+of my head, therefore my heart faileth me." "My sins are increased over
+my head so that I am not able to look up." Far better and holier than
+the best of us, my brethren, was the man who wrote these statements,
+and left them for an everlasting testimony against those who are pure
+in their own eyes. If David had such consciousness of sin, what must
+our consciousness be if we knew ourselves as well? They are the
+self-blinded, self-hardened, self-deceived, who fancy themselves
+innocent and glory in their virtue. Even the great apostle called
+himself "the chief of sinners," and declared that in himself dwelt "no
+good thing." There is no danger, then, of extravagance in any estimate
+of our sins of which our arithmetic is capable. So let us proceed a
+little farther. Take our Lord's summary of the first table of the law:
+"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
+soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength." Here is
+required the surrender of the whole man as a living sacrifice to his
+Divine Creator and Sovereign Proprietor. This is his unquestionable
+claim upon every moment of our existence throughout its immortal
+duration. A duty this which we cannot omit for a single second without
+robbing God; and every minute that we neglect it, comprising sixty
+seconds, we may be said to repeat the sacrilege sixty times; every
+hour, 3,600 times; every day, 86,400 times; every year, 31,536,000
+times; in twenty years, 630,720,000 times; and in forty years,
+1,261,440,000 times. But these are sins of omission only, and that in
+relation to a single phase of duty; add all the other instances, and we
+must multiply the sum by multiplied millions. Then we must take our
+positive sins--our violations of the divine law by thought, word and
+deed--open sins and secret, public and private, personal and
+social--sins defying all enumeration, and difficult even of
+classification; and, adding all together, we must multiply the sum by
+all our faculties, facilities and gracious incentives for doing God's
+blessed will, and aggravate all by the innumerable mercies and
+inestimable blessings which he has diffused over our lives as his
+sunbeams over the earth. And its any thing short of infinite mercy
+adequate to the forgiveness of such a debt?
+
+For all this, however unwilling, we must give account to God; and how
+terrible the array, when conscience shall summon forth from the secret
+chambers of memory every sin of which we have been guilty, and every
+evil act and every neglect of duty shall stand out distinct and clear
+in the light of eternal judgment! How shall we meet the reckoning? In
+all the eternity to come, what satisfaction can we offer for our
+faults? Can we alter the facts, undo the deeds, repair the wrongs,
+recall the time, or efface the record? Nay, the account remains
+uncancelled, and the debt can never be paid. Soul and body, with all
+the capabilities of both, the creature belongs to the Creator; and by
+an original and perpetual obligation, perfect love and blameless
+obedience are his constant duty. Beyond this he can never go. Even
+though he commit no sin, neglect no duty, he can offer to the Creator
+no service whatever that is not justly required of him as a creature.
+By his utmost efforts forever, he simply renders to God what is his
+indisputable due. How, then, can the transgressor hope to pay the new
+and additional debt which he has incurred by innumerable crimes? Before
+he can do a single meritorious act, even his original obligation to God
+as his creature must be cancelled; but to cancel that is more than the
+Creator himself can do, the obligation being inseparable from the
+relation. As to human merit, therefore, the case is hopeless. What,
+then, is to be done? Sell the debtor, with his wife and children? Such
+procedure on the part of the creditor was allowed by ancient law. But
+in what slave-mart of the universe shall God sell the sinner? Who will
+want him but Satan? and Satan has him already, self-sold, and bound by
+indefeasible indenture. Nay, by this part of the parable our Lord
+presents justice as ministering to mercy. The menace of punishment
+opens the way for pardon, and the hopeless condition of the debtor
+enhances the clemency of the king. See the poor wretch, prostrate at
+the royal feet, imploring a little indulgence, and promising what is
+utterly beyond his power. So, on a bed of sickness, stung by conscience
+and confronted by doom, often has the most incorrigible transgressor
+vowed reparation for a vicious life, only to augment his guilt by
+disregarding the vow on the return of health and strength. But if the
+sinner cannot pay, God can forgive. If neither saints nor angels can
+wrest the culprit from the grasp of justice, yet Heaven has found a
+ransom to save his soul from the pit. Jesus interposes with "a price
+all price beyond;" the debt is overpaid in the blood of the cross;
+through the compassion of the King the debtor is released from his
+bonds; and the angels tune their harps to sing "the blessedness of the
+man whose unrighteousness is forgiven and whose sin is covered!"
+
+
+So far the parable illustrates God's mercy to man; what remains is a
+sad picture of man's too frequent unmercifulness to his brother, and
+the just punishment of his cruelty visited upon the delinquent. Here
+are five points worthy of our attention; which, duly considered, may
+serve to impress upon our minds the duty of fraternal forgiveness.
+
+First, we have the two creditors, with their respective claims. The
+king represents God in his relation to man; the first servant
+represents man in his relation to mankind. God has his supreme claims,
+as creator and sovereign lord, upon the love, worship and obedience of
+the whole human race; while man has his subordinate claims, as an equal
+and a brother, upon the justice, the kindness, the sympathy and the
+charity of all other men--sometimes, as patron and official superior,
+upon the reverence, submission and loyal service of a particular part
+of them.
+
+Then, we have the two debtors, with the different amounts of debt. Both
+are servants, holding a like relation to the king. Both are in arrears,
+the one to the king, the other to his fellow-servant. Ought not a
+common bond and a common condition to produce in them mutual kindness
+and sympathy? But how great the disparity of their debts! ten thousand
+talents, and a hundred pence--the latter less than a millionth part of
+the former--if the gold talent is intended, less than a hundred
+millionth. Surely if the king could forgive the greater, it were a
+small matter with his servant to forgive the less. In comparison of our
+sins against God, what are our brother's sins against us? "As the small
+dust of the balance, lighter than vanity itself."
+
+Next, we have the two arrests, with the opposite methods of their
+making. Calmly and kindly, in his accustomed way, worthy of his royal
+dignity, and just as he treated others, the king calls his servant to
+account. This proceeding was to be expected, and involves neither
+harshness nor severity. But when the man is found so culpably in
+arrears with nothing to pay--a case which could not happen without
+great dishonesty and wickedness--the king orders, as he has legal right
+to do, the sale of the culprit, with his family and effects, to satisfy
+some small part of the royal claim against him. Now mark the very
+different conduct of the criminal. No sooner is he released than he
+goes out--not staying a moment to express his gratitude or admire the
+mercy shown him--finds the man who owes him fifteen dollars: and, with
+a violence unprovoked and inexcusable, lays hands on him, takes him by
+the throat, and exclaims, "Pay me that thou owest!" Could there be a
+more unlovely contrast to the conduct of the king? Such is the
+difference between God's dealing with guilty men and man's dealing with
+his delinquent brother; the former all mildness and forbearance, the
+latter all harshness and severity.
+
+Again, we have the two pleas, with their contrary receptions by the
+creditors. The two pleas are identical; the two receptions, quite
+opposite. The first servant falls down before the king, saying, "Have
+patience with me, and I will pay thee all;" so falls down the second
+servant before the first, with the very same words upon his lips. Not
+forgiveness, but merciful indulgence, is what each debtor craves of his
+creditor; and full payment is what each promises. The payment of a
+hundred _denarii_ seems quite practicable, and not at all
+improbable; but the payment of ten thousand talents is beyond all power
+except that of royalty itself. Yet the wretched impossibility moves the
+royal heart to compassion; while the feasible and probable meets with
+stern and cruel refusal from the servile defaulter--all mercy on the
+one side, all implacability on the other. If, when overwhelmed with
+conscious guilt, you smote upon your breast and implored the divine
+mercy, your penitential tears moved the compassion of Heaven, how can
+you now harden your heart against the like plea of an offending
+brother? Even if he offer no plea, can you be utterly indifferent to
+his grief? Is this the spirit of Him who prayed for those who were
+nailing him to the cross? Perhaps your brother's heart is almost
+breaking, while he is too proud to apologize. A kind word, a look of
+love, might melt him into tears at your feet. Oh! give him that word,
+that look! It will restore to your arms a brother--to your heart a
+peace like that of heaven.
+
+Finally, we have the two issues, with their consequences in impressive
+contrast. Great as his debt is, the king's debtor is released and
+forgiven; but the servant's debtor, owing so small a sum, is cast into
+prison till he shall pay the debt. But how shall he pay it in prison?
+Nay, it is not to secure payment that he is incarcerated, so much as to
+gratify the malignity of a wicked and revengeful heart. After so great
+a mercy shown to himself, the creditor cannot show the smallest mercy
+to his fellow-servant. And there the poor man must lie, in a private
+dungeon, amidst filth and darkness, his creditor his jailor, no
+comforts nor supplies but what are furnished him by friends without, no
+hope of deliverance till death comes to his release. Such is the
+contrast between God's dealing with man, and man's dealing with his
+brother. He compassionately forgives; we cruelly proceed to punish. Or
+if we pretend to forgive, how different is our forgiveness from his!
+God forgives gladly; we reluctantly. God forgives promptly; we after
+long delay. God forgives completely; we but partially and imperfectly.
+God forgives from the heart; we only with outward formalities. God
+forgives very tenderly; we with indifference or contempt. God forgives
+and forgets the crime; we cherish the bitter memory for many years. God
+forgives and takes the pardoned sinner to his heart; we thrust him away
+from our presence and our fellowship forever. God forgives so lovingly
+that he is said to delight in mercy and rejoice over the pardoned; we
+with such coldness, such hatred, such haughty disdain, that to meet the
+object of our clemency in heaven would spoil our joy!
+
+That the cruel severity of the servile creditor should touch the hearts
+of his fellow-servants with sorrow is no matter of wonder. Stern and
+inexorable as were the laws of the age, no man without grief or anger
+could witness such inhumanity. In our day the case would have convoked
+an indignation meeting, if not a mob; with denunciatory resolutions, if
+not the prompt application of the code of Judge Lynch. The better
+method, however, is chosen; and the sad matter is prudently reported to
+the king. The king recalls the late object of his amazing clemency, in
+a dignified but very pointed speech remonstrates with him, and then
+delivers him to the tormentors till he shall pay the last farthing of
+the debt once forgiven. A righteous but terrible punishment! A state
+criminal, he goes to the public prison, the royal dungeons--perhaps,
+like the Mammertine and Tullian at Rome, three stories under ground.
+The debtor's prison, however, was ordinarily in the house of the
+creditor--often in his cellar; where the prisoner was kept in chains,
+subject to the creditor's will, to be tortured or slain as he chose.
+Slaves were there on purpose to torment him, and make his life as
+wretched as possible. They scourged him, beat him with rods, racked him
+with engines, pulled out his teeth, plucked out his nails, burned out
+his eyes, cut off his nose and ears, tore and mangled his flesh with
+hooks and pincers--to make him disclose his hidden treasures, to induce
+his friends to pay his debt for him, or simply to gratify a diabolical
+spirit of revenge. That all this has its counterpart in God's
+retribution upon the implacable, though almost too terrible for our
+faith, is the plain teaching of the parable. Men and angels rise up in
+remonstrance with Heaven against the unforgiving. And when the divine
+Heart-searcher calls him to judgment, what answer can he make to the
+dread animadversions of the angry king? Dare he now pray, as he often
+did on earth, "Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors!" Will he
+lift up his voice and sing, as he used to do in the church,
+
+  "That mercy I to others show,
+  That mercy show to me!"
+
+It was a mockery then; he will not repeat it now. Speechless as the
+unrobed intruder at the marriage feast, he stands trembling before his
+Judge. Angels of justice, take him away! Let us not see his anguish,
+nor hear his lamentation! Showing no mercy, he has lost all claim upon
+mercy. Conscience his eternal tormentor, any spot in the universe may
+be his dungeon of despair. Ask him now the question he has often asked
+with a sneer--"Is there a hell, and where is it?" He lays his hand upon
+his heart and answers--"There is, and it is here!" Angels of justice,
+take him away!
+
+"So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your
+hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses."
+
+
+
+[1] Preached in St. John's, Buffalo, N.Y., 1869.
+
+[2] Twenty-second Sunday after Trinity.
+
+
+
+
+XVII.
+
+CHRIST WITH HIS MINISTERS.[1]
+
+Lo! I am with you alway, even unto the end of the
+world.--Matt. xxviii. 20.
+
+
+The agony of redemption is accomplished. The lately crucified and
+buried is alive forevermore. Forty days he has walked the earth in his
+resurrection body, instructing and comforting his disciples. The time
+is come for his return to the Father. He must enter into heaven itself,
+now to appear in the presence of God for us. If he go not away, the
+Comforter will not come--the baptism of fire and power will not descend
+upon the Church. But before his departure, he renews the commission of
+his apostles: "All power is given unto me, in heaven and in earth; go
+ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the
+Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; 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."
+
+Ye publicans and fishermen, what an embassy! How vast the field! How
+grand the work! How glorious the promise! Heaven never gave a sublimer
+commission; man never went forth under a mightier sanction, or on a
+nobler errand. To utter the words which were syllabled in thunder from
+out the flames of Sinai, to publish the love that was written in blood
+upon the cleft rocks of Calvary, to administer the sacramental
+mysteries of the new and everlasting covenant, to negotiate a perpetual
+amnesty with this revolted and ruined province of Jehovah's empire, to
+convert perishing souls from sin to righteousness and build them up in
+the blessed faith that saves,--this is to do what for ages has occupied
+the purest spirits and loftiest intellects of our race, and enlisted
+the interest and the energies of seraphim and cherubim, and furnished
+constant employment for all the agencies of the infinite goodness and
+wisdom and power. How poor in the comparison are all earthly
+diplomacies and royal ministries! Thrones, triumphs, the homage of the
+living world, and the praise of a thousand generations to come,--what
+were these to the office and dignity of Heaven's ambassador! How should
+the Christian minister tremble beneath the burden that weighs down the
+angel's wing, or rejoice to bear the tidings sung by celestial voices
+over the hills of Bethlehem! And who were sufficient for these things,
+but for the Master's promise appended to the command--"Lo, I am with
+you alway, even unto the end of the world!"
+
+"Lord, it is enough. With such assurance, we will go. With such
+assistance, we will preach. With such encouragement, we will baptize.
+With so mighty a patronage, we will summon the nations to thy feet. If
+thou be with us, we shall fear nothing, we can do all things. If thou
+aid and defend us, no enemy is invincible, no achievement is
+impracticable. In court or camp, in palace or prison, in temple or
+forum, in city or desert, to Jews or Gentiles, princes or peasants,
+scholars or rustics, sages or savages, we will gladly set forth thy
+claims and offer thy salvation." So might the apostles have answered
+their ascending Lord; and so, in effect, they did answer him. They went
+forth everywhere, and preached the kingdom of the Crucified. Mighty in
+spirit, they conferred not with flesh and blood. Strong in faith and
+hope, they consulted neither present appearances nor future
+probabilities. Constrained by the love of Christ, they hastened, with
+his message of grace, from city to city, from province to province,
+from nation to nation. Nothing retards them; nothing intimidates them.
+The word of the Lord is as fire shut up in their bones, and they are
+weary with forbearing. They must speak, or they will die; and though
+they die, they will speak. They cry aloud, and spare not. In the
+dungeons they lift up their voices, and in the tempests of the sea they
+are not silent. Before awful councils and sceptred rulers they bear
+witness to the precious truth. Under the crimson scourge and on the
+cruel rack they steadfastly maintain their testimony. Death only can
+effectually interdict their prophesying: and even in the agonies of
+death, ere yet the organs of speech are paralyzed, they offer Christ's
+salvation to their murderers, tenderly beseech those who are mocking
+their tortures, and bless with loving words the lips that are cursing
+them out of the world. And with what effect, let the early triumphs of
+the gospel testify; idols abolished; temples abandoned; cities
+converted; churches planted everywhere; whole provinces embracing the
+faith of Jesus; monarchs upon their thrones trembling before manacled
+preachers; Christianity spreading, even during the lifetime of the
+apostles, as far northward as Scythia, southward as Ethiopia, eastward
+as Parthia and India, westward as Gaul, Spain, and the British Isles;
+and a little later, assuming the imperial purple, and lifting the
+Labarum, glorified with the cross, as the signal of salvation to the
+nations; and all this, because Christ hath said, and so far hath
+fulfilled the saying,--"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of
+the world."
+
+
+But the promise is ours. It extends through all time. It can never be
+obsolete, while Christ hath an ordained servant upon earth. Who talks
+of change? Who says the apostolic office, with its high prerogatives
+and awful responsibilities, was intended only for a season, and has
+long since passed away? Who sneers and scoffs at the claim of the Holy
+Catholic Church to this sublime descent on the part of her chief
+pastors, and the consequent connection of the whole body of her clergy,
+through a regular series of ordinations, with the blessed men first
+commissioned by our divine Lord to go forth and disciple all nations?
+And hath the Master abandoned those who are obeying the mandate and
+perpetuating the sacred succession? Hath the Word forever settled in
+heaven come utterly to naught, and the Rock dissolved on which the
+Church was founded, and the gates of hell prevailed against her? True,
+the direct inspiration is withdrawn, and the miraculous endowments are
+no more; but these are not essential to the apostolate, and were not
+intended to be permanent; being only the needful authentication of a
+new revelation from heaven, and therefore discontinued as soon as the
+Christian faith was once well established among men. The work of the
+ministry, however, is the same, and its divine sanctions are the same,
+and its three orders are the perpetual ordinance of Jesus Christ. Ay,
+and its conflicts are the same, and its succors and consolations in all
+its sorrows and sufferings are the same, and the faithful servant is
+still as much as ever the object of his Master's loving care. Whoever
+else may abandon him, the glorified Man of sorrows saith, "I will never
+leave thee nor forsake thee." Wherever he goes, Christ attends him.
+Wherever he labors, Christ sustains him. Wherever he preaches the
+gospel or administers the sacraments, he has the express authority and
+assured blessing of their heavenly Author. As the Lord stood by St.
+Paul, and strengthened him, when all men forsook him; so will he stand
+by his ministers in every time of trial, and strengthen them for every
+duty and every danger. Trusting in his might, they will never be left
+to their own weakness. Depending upon his counsel, they will never be
+abandoned to their own poor expedients. Weary and faint, his arm will
+support them. Doubtful and perplexed, his wisdom will direct them.
+Destitute and afflicted, his bounty will relieve them. Persecuted and
+calumniated, his providence will vindicate them. Faithful to their
+sacred functions, all their teachings will be clothed with a divine
+power, and every priestly act will be hallowed with a heavenly unction.
+O my brethren! beside all your baptismal fonts to-day, at all your
+altars, and in all your pulpits, stands he of the wounded hands, the
+mangled feet, the thorn-pierced brow, and the ever-open side,
+saying,--"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world!"
+
+
+And do we not need such assurance? What is the end and aim of the
+gospel ministry? To undo the work of the Devil; to turn men from
+darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God; to reconcile
+them to the law of holiness, and bring their rebellious thoughts into
+captivity to the obedience of Christ; to draw them against the stream
+of their carnal inclinations and worldly ambitions and interests; to
+make them love what they naturally hate, and hate what they naturally
+love; to graft the degenerate plant of a strange vine into a new and
+heavenly stock, that, nourished by its life, it may bring forth the
+wholesome fruits of righteousness; to assure the penitent of the divine
+pardon, and feed the faithful with the bread that cometh down from
+heaven; to perfect the saints in that precious knowledge, and edify the
+Church in that holy faith, which are the sources of all spiritual
+excellence and the earnests of eternal life; in short, to subvert the
+seat of the great usurper, and build upon its wreck the imperishable
+throne of the Prince of peace, and give back into the hand of him whose
+right it is the sceptre of a ruined world restored. Are these
+achievements to be wrought without the Master's presence? Are these
+victories to be won without the Captain of our salvation? What saith
+the holy apostle? "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any
+thing, as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God, who also hath
+made us able ministers of the New Testament, even of the Spirit that
+giveth life." Christ with us is at once the guaranty and the glory of
+our success. If the word proves powerful to save the hearer, it is
+because Christ is with the preacher. If the water conveys regenerating
+grace to the infant, it is because Christ is with the baptizer. If the
+consecrated bread and wine impart spiritual comfort and nourishment to
+the faithful, it is because Christ is with the celebrant. If the
+appointed absolution and benediction give peaceful assurance of pardon
+and heavenly succor to the penitent believer, it is because Christ is
+with the officiating priest. If Christ were not with him, all his
+learning, his logic and eloquence, were but a sounding brass or a
+tinkling cymbal. If Christ were not with him, all his sublime
+sacerdotal functions, though instituted and ordained by Christ himself,
+were as powerless upon the spirits of men as the moonbeams upon the
+frozen sea. If Christ were not with him, the blind eye would not be
+opened, the dead conscience would not be quickened, the rebel against
+God would not be subdued, the lost wanderer from the fold would not be
+restored, the moral leper would still remain festering in his fatal
+impurity. Oh! who could undertake the work of the ministry, with the
+least hope of winning souls, awakening sinners, edifying the body of
+Christ, or accomplishing effectually any of the objects of his divine
+commission, without the infallible promise--"Lo, I am with you alway,
+even unto the end of the world!"
+
+
+Moreover, it is important, in the work of human salvation, that the
+excellency of the power should be of God, and not of us, that no flesh
+may glory in his presence. When Joab had captured the city of Rabbah,
+he sent for King David to come and claim the honor of the achievement.
+When Garibaldi had conquered the Two Sicilies, he sent for Victor
+Emmanuel to come and take possession of the united kingdom. And Christ
+must have the credit of his servants' success in the good fight of
+faith. The warfare is ours; the crown belongs to him who giveth us the
+victory. "Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give the
+praise, for thy loving mercy and for thy truth's sake." But if we could
+accomplish aught without his aid, the honor would be ours, and not the
+Master's; and there would be no justice nor reason in the command, "He
+that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." Therefore the Divine Wisdom
+hath ordered that all our success shall depend upon the divine
+blessing; and to this end, Christ is ever present with those whom he
+hath commissioned, helping them mightily with his Holy Spirit. All the
+power of the gospel to convert the soul, all the power of the
+sacraments to purify the heart, all the efficiency of Christ's
+ambassadors in establishing and fortifying the Church, is attributable
+to this unction of the Holy One. Was it not the angel in the waters of
+Bethesda, that gave them their healing virtue? Was it not Jehovah in
+the waters of the Jordan, that cured the leprosy of Naaman the Syrian?
+And what is it but the gracious presence of Christ in the preached word
+and the administered ordinance, that renders them effectual to the
+salvation of those who believe? Is it not as true to-day, as it was
+when he said it, nearly nineteen centuries ago, "Without me ye can do
+nothing"? Without Christ, what were our knowledge but ignorance, our
+wisdom but folly, our eloquence but noise? what our profession but an
+imposture, our ritual but a solemn farce, and all our zeal but painted
+fire? It is God that "always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and
+maketh manifest by us the savor of his knowledge in every place." He
+who girds us with the sword must nerve the arm that wields it. Now and
+forever, "We see the Lamb in his own light," and shine only by the
+reflection of his glory. The ministry, in its three orders, with all
+their spiritual endowments, is the gift of Christ to the Church; and
+through these his chosen representatives, though he is ascended on
+high, he still hath his tabernacle with men, and dwelleth manifestly
+among them; and millions of saints, throughout the earth and throughout
+the ages, united in one body, inspired by one Spirit, saved through one
+calling, sealed with one baptism, professing one faith, cherishing one
+hope, obeying one Lord, and adoring one God and Father of all, are
+built up in him, a spiritual house, a temple of living stones, whose
+foundations are deeper than the earth, and whose towers are lost in the
+empyrean. This great truth, so humiliating to the pride of man, and so
+glorifying to the grace of God--this great truth, that all depends upon
+Christ, let us keep constantly in view; listening for the Master's feet
+behind his messengers, and looking for the Master's blessing in all
+their ministrations; ever inviting his presence, and never forgetting
+his promise--"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world."
+
+
+And to you, my dear brother, who are now to be set apart to the
+functions of the Christian priesthood, the Redeemer's assurance hath a
+special significance. Here we are, seeking the lost sheep in the
+wilderness, rescuing the shipwrecked from the devouring waves, plucking
+with fear the perishing out of the fire. To this blessed end we have
+devoted all our studies and directed all our labors. This is the
+glorious aim to which we have consecrated the flower of youth and the
+ripe fruit of manhood. How consoling and encouraging the Master's
+promise of his constant presence! Here is the answer to every anxious
+question. Here is the solution of every painful doubt. Christ is with
+us; therefore our priesthood involves the gift of a heavenly power.
+Christ is with us; therefore our gospel is vital truth, instinct with a
+quickening spirit. Christ is with us; therefore our sacraments are not
+mere naked signs, but divine mysteries, infolding the grace of life.
+Christ is with us; therefore the Holy Catholic Church is not a ghastly
+corpse, but a living body, composed of living members, united to a
+living Head. Christ is with us; therefore let us not weary in our
+blessed work, nor faint under the burden and heat of the day; but look
+cheerfully forward to the result, and lighten the toil of tillage with
+the hope of harvest. Trials are inevitable. The work of the ministry is
+no holiday amusement. He that follows Christ must know the fellowship
+of his suffering. He that preaches the glad tidings must be partaker of
+the afflictions of the gospel. He that cultivates Immanuel's land must
+expect often to plough the rock and gather his sheaves from the naked
+granite. You have embarked in a voyage which is to be contested with
+pirates as well as tornadoes; and if you would save the treasure, you
+must be ready to scuttle the ship, though you go down with it. You have
+set out in a campaign which requires that you should burn the bridges
+behind you, and brave the iron storm of battle, and march through the
+bristling forest of bayonets, and wrestle unto the death with the
+powers and principalities of other worlds. But gird up your loins like
+a man, in the strength of the Lord of hosts. Stand firmly for the truth
+as it is in Jesus. Contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to
+the saints. Hold no parley with expediency. Be independent as a
+prophet, and intrepid as an angel, though gentle as Jesus Christ. Let
+all men see that you fear nothing but God, hate nothing but sin, and
+seek nothing but souls. Call things honestly by their right names, and
+never show yourself ashamed of the Church and her teaching. Let every
+sermon be an echo of the ancient catholic symbols, a melodious voice in
+the mighty anthem that comes ringing down the ages. Be faithful to your
+flock in parochial visitation, with godly counsel and timely prayer.
+Let the sound of your footsteps on the stairs be music to the widow and
+orphans in the garret, the light of your countenance sunshine in the
+dismal basement, and your presence a benediction at the bed of death.
+Take heed to yourself, and suffer not your spirit to be chafed and
+soured by adverse criticism or unfriendly speech. Allow nothing to
+hinder the regularity of your private devotions, or rob you of your
+daily communion with Christ. Come always from your closet to the
+chancel and the pulpit, filled with your Master's charity, and fired
+with your Master's zeal. Then shall you come to your people "in the
+fulness of the blessing of the gospel of peace," verifying by every
+message and every ministration the Master's precious words--"Lo! I am
+with you alway, even unto the end of the world."
+
+
+O my brethren! what a glorious investiture is the gospel ministry!
+Whereunto shall I liken it, or with what comparison shall it be
+compared? Is there a glory in science? Ours is the knowledge of the
+unknown God. Is there a glory in letters? Ours is the living lore of
+the immortals. Is there a glory in poetry? Ours is the burden of the
+angelic antiphons. Is there a glory in eloquence? Ours is the sweet
+persuasiveness of a heavenly inspiration. Is there a glory in heroism?
+We bear the banners of the Lord in the good fight of faith. Is there a
+glory in royalty? We share the sceptre and the diadem with the Prince
+of the kings of the earth. Is there a glory in philanthropy? We preach
+the incarnate love of heaven, born in a cave, cradled in a manger,
+baptized with blood in Olivet, and enthroned over a ransomed universe
+upon the cross. Is there a glory in the aesthetic arts? But where are
+the forms and colors to rival those with which we are adorning the new
+Jerusalem? and what are the finest bronzes and marbles to the living
+statuary with which we are peopling her palaces? and who shall ever
+speak of purple robes and jewelled crowns, that has once beheld the
+immortal beauty of the humblest saint in heaven? "The glory of the
+terrestrial is one, and the glory of the celestial is another;" and the
+Platos and Homers, the Tullys and Virgils, the Shakspeares and Goethes,
+the Bacons and Humboldts, the Raphaels and Angelos, the Caesars and
+Napoleons, the Washingtons and Wellingtons, with whose fame the earth
+is ringing, drawn into comparison with the men of the pulpit and the
+altar, have no glory by reason of the glory which excelleth; and I
+would rather be a priest of Christ, with the apostolic seal and
+signature to my commission, than wear all the laurels ever won by
+genius, and enjoy all the triumphs that ever rewarded valor, and sit
+secure in peerless enthronement over a vassal world! Faithful unto
+death, nobler functions await us, and loftier ministrations in a temple
+not made with hands. Who shall tell the privileges of a celestial
+priesthood? Who shall sing the raptures of an eternal eucharist?
+Already we enjoy the earnest. We have learned something of the ritual,
+and are practising the prelude of the anthem. We stand at the gate, and
+catch bright glimpses of the inner glory, and hear the ravishing
+minstrelsy of the host, and inhale the perfume from the golden altar.
+Soon the portal shall open, and we shall be summoned to enter; and the
+white-vested elders shall advance to meet us, with greetings of
+gladdest welcome; and visions of beauty, such as mortal eyes were never
+blessed withal, shall smite the sense with sweet bewilderment; and
+voices of wondrous melody, with the accompaniment of many harps, shall
+be heard chanting through the corridors--"Come in, ye blessed of the
+Lord! come in!" and of all our blissful fellowships in the everlasting
+home of the faithful, our happy intercourse with the best and purest
+that ever lived and died, and our long-desired re-union, realized at
+length, with those we have loved and lost, this shall be the crown--to
+be with Him in his glory world without end, who made good his promise
+to be with us in our ministry "unto the end of the world!"
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at the ordination to the priesthood of the Rev. Robert A.
+Holland, in St. George's Church, St. Louis, 1872.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII.
+
+KEPT FROM EVIL.[1]
+
+I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that
+thou shouldest keep them from the evil.--John xvii. 15.
+
+
+So pleaded the departing Shepherd for the little flock he was leaving.
+Though the petition primarily respected the apostles and first
+believers, there is no impropriety in extending its application to
+their successors down to the end of time. We, too, are in the world and
+exposed to evil; we, too, are incapable of self-protection, and
+dependent upon the merciful guardianship of Heaven; and Christ invokes
+the Father's love for our preservation as for theirs: "I pray not that
+thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep
+them from the evil."
+
+
+How often does it happen that the Christian pilgrim, weary of the way
+and worn out with sorrow, or longing for a higher sphere and a holier
+companionship, exclaims with Job, "I loathe it, I would not live
+alway;" or cries out with David, "O that I had wings like a dove! for
+then would I fly away and be at rest;" or responds in the depths of his
+heart to the sentiment of St. Paul, "We that are in this tabernacle do
+groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed
+upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life." And who shall
+blame this longing for rest, this sighing for home, this desire of a
+better country? Who would not quit the scene of toil and strife and
+danger for the regions of eternal blessedness and peace? Who that has
+any perception of spiritual good, any appreciation of moral excellence,
+any sympathy with the pure and the true, does not prefer heaven to
+earth? The desire, however, should be tempered with submission, and the
+Christian should await with patience his heavenly Father's will. God
+has much for his saints to do here below. They are lights in the
+darkness, living springs in the desert, Bethesda fountains for the
+perishing. They are the Noahs, the Josephs, the Daniels of the world:
+yea the Abrahams, in whom all the families of the earth are to be
+blessed. They are witnesses of Christ, proofs of his redeeming love,
+specimens of his renewing power, and pledges of his final victory. They
+must remain a while to win sinners from the error of their way and save
+souls from death. They must remain a while to adorn and strengthen the
+Church, to comfort their fellow-Christians, and relieve surrounding
+misery. They must remain a while to glorify the Author and Finisher of
+their faith, to weaken the kingdom of Satan, thwart his malicious
+design, mortify his pride, and hasten his fall. They must remain a
+while to exercise and improve their own virtues and graces by works of
+piety and charity, that so they may perfect their moral likeness to
+their Lord, and secure for themselves a loftier station and a brighter
+portion among the saints in light. The world itself, indeed, exists for
+their sake, and through their influence with God on its behalf: and if
+all the saints had been taken away with their ascending Saviour, "we
+should have been as Sodom, and like unto Gomorrah." All which if we
+duly consider, we cannot fail to perceive the wisdom and goodness of
+the Master's request for his disciples, "I pray not that thou shouldest
+take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the
+evil."
+
+
+Now, what is "the evil" from which Christ would have his people
+kept?--Sorrow? No: "blessed are they that mourn." Poverty? No: "blessed
+are ye poor." Persecution? No: "blessed are the persecuted."
+Temptation? No: "blessed is the man that endureth temptation." All
+these and all other "afflictions of the righteous" are turned into
+benefits and beatitudes by the wondrous alchemy of redeeming love.
+Over-ruled by divine providence and sanctified by divine Grace, they
+are the occasions and instruments of a salutary discipline, working
+together for good to those who love God, calling into exercise the
+holiest feelings and highest faculties of the regenerate soul, and
+perfecting the believer for his "far more exceeding and eternal weight
+of glory." None of these, therefore, is the evil from which Christ
+would have his disciples kept. What is it then? for he manifestly has
+some specific evil in view. It is sin, the great moral evil; or Satan,
+the dread personal evil; or both, for sin and Satan are inseparable.
+These only can rob you of your peace, comfort, confidence, purity,
+spiritual strength, communion with God, and joyful hope of immortality;
+and from these effectually preserved, no earthly affliction or
+misfortune, no malice or might of wicked men, can work you any possible
+harm, or dim by a single ray one star of your celestial diadem. From
+these, therefore,--from the power of sin and the delusions of
+Satan--Christ would have his followers kept; and from these to guard
+them, he prayed so fervently to his Father in heaven. Two of the chief
+forms of the evil he deprecates in their behalf are heresy and schism,
+with the uncharitableness which they always engender, and in which they
+often originate. He prays that they may be one in him, as he is one
+with the Father--united by one faith, cemented by one love,
+incorporated in one body--that thus all mankind may be effectually
+convinced of the truth and excellence of his gospel. And oh! how
+important must that be, for which the Redeemer prays! There is nothing
+else important in the comparison. It is not important that we should be
+rich: the poor are to possess the kingdom. It is not important that we
+should be mighty: God hath chosen the feeble for his agents. It is not
+important that we should be distinguished: he hath promised to crown
+the lowly with everlasting honors. It is not important that we should
+be comfortable: "weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the
+morning." But oh! it is important, beyond the power of tongue to tell
+or heart to conceive, that we should be preserved pure and holy amidst
+surrounding depravity and pollution, that we should ever maintain "the
+unity of the spirit in the bond of peace." Let us, then, join our
+petition to that of the great Redeemer, and watch against the
+deceitfulness of sin, and guard against the wiles and works of Satan,
+and co-operate with the grace of God to effect our own salvation, and
+never forget that preservation from evil is better than translation to
+paradise! He who hath redeemed us would not have us again captured. He
+who hath purified us would not have us again polluted. He who hath
+restored our title to the kingdom would not have us again disinherited.
+He who hath wrought in us an incipient preparation for his glory would
+not have us again disqualified for our destiny. He who hath given his
+life for our ransom, his flesh and blood for our nourishment, and all
+his eternal fulness for the endowment of our immortality, can never be
+indifferent to the spiritual wants and welfare of those who have been
+baptized into his death; and the request which he breathed so sweetly
+for his disciples while he was yet with them on earth, he has been
+repeating for all his people ever since he returned to heaven, "I pray
+not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou
+shouldest keep them from the evil."
+
+
+Trusting in him who thus pleads for his disciples, and seconding his
+gracious intercession with our own supplications, what have we to fear?
+Shall Jesus pray in vain for his redeemed? Shall he fail those who have
+committed their all to his advocacy? Will not the Father hear the
+petitions offered in the name of the Son with whom he is ever well
+pleased? Coming boldly through his merit and mediation to the throne of
+grace, shall we not certainly obtain mercy and find grace to help in
+time of need? Will God leave to the lion and the wolf the sheep for
+whom the divine Shepherd cares so lovingly and pleads so earnestly?
+"Fear not, little flock! it is your Father's good pleasure to give you
+the kingdom." And "if God be for us, who can be against us?" What evil
+agency or influence shall harm those who "dwell in the secret place of
+the Most High and abide under the shadow of the Almighty?" Are not the
+redeemed of his dear Son his jewels, his _segulla_, his peculiar
+treasure? Will he not hide them in the hollow of his hand, and guard
+them as the apple of his eye? "Who shall lay any thing to the charge of
+God's elect? It is God that justifieth; who is he that condemneth? It
+is Christ that died; yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at
+the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. Who shall
+separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or
+persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is
+written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long, we are counted as
+sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than
+conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither
+death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things
+present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other
+creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is
+in Christ Jesus, our Lord." Such is St. Paul's confidence, and such
+should be ours. But such confidence requires our hearty co-operation
+with Him who is always praying for our preservation from evil. We must
+steadfastly resist all temptations to sin. We must stand firmly and
+fight bravely against the world, the flesh, and the Devil. We must
+avail ourselves constantly of all the helps which the Church offers us
+in her services and her sacraments. God's grace is for those who ask it
+earnestly and use it faithfully. It is not in the power of Omnipotence
+to save from sin and Satan those who endeavor not to save themselves.
+You must be workers together with God, my dear brethren; and then all
+his attributes and resources are pledged to your success, and neither
+earth nor hell can do you any harm. Suffer, then, the word of
+exhortation, and forget not that the kingdom is taken by force and held
+by continual struggle. Especially important are these counsels and
+cautions to you who have just ratified your covenant with God in
+confirmation. Your rector assures me he never knew a more pleasant task
+than that which he enjoyed in preparing you for the hands of the
+bishop. As you sat before him in the lecture-room, he felt it a sweet
+privilege to talk to you so freely of Christian duty and
+responsibility. And when a new name was added to the list of
+candidates, he said in his heart--"Here is another gem for my Master's
+crown, another guest for his table, another chorister for his choir!"
+and he passed the new-comer over into the hands which were spiked for
+him to the cross, and his faith heard the angels rejoicing over one
+more sinner that repented. And many a time, no doubt, returning from
+the lecture to the privacy of his chamber, he knelt and commended you
+all, with tears of love and joy, to him who gathereth the lambs with
+his arms and carrieth them in his bosom. And often, during that sweet
+Lenten season, I know, he wrestled for you with the angel of the
+covenant through the livelong night, and ceased not till the blessing
+came upon the wings of the morning. Shall all his labor be lost upon
+you? Shall the fruit be blasted in the bud? Shall Satan and his
+servants triumph over the grace of God? Shall souls over which seraphs
+have sung hallelujahs excite the mirth and mockery of fiends by their
+fall? "Watch and pray that ye enter not into temptation." Observe daily
+your closet devotions. Never deny your Saviour by forsaking the holy
+eucharist. Cleave to your Church whatever may be her fortunes. Let no
+uncharitableness in the family drive you from your Mother's bosom. Let
+no wound that bleeds in your own breast imbitter you against any of her
+children. Oh! how painful it is, to see people who are angry at others
+wreaking their revenge upon themselves! out of malice to their brethren
+murdering their own immortal souls! spurning the bread of life and the
+wine of the kingdom because they have a quarrel with the hand that
+offers them! refusing to take another step toward heaven, and plunging
+incontinently back toward the gulf of hell, because they have conceived
+a dislike to some person who was travelling in their company! "If
+angels weep, it is at such a sight!" Oh! do ye not so, beloved! Hold
+fast whereunto ye have attained. Let no man take your crown. Most
+heartily "I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is
+able to build you up, and to save your souls, and to give you
+inheritance with them that are sanctified through faith in Christ
+Jesus." And in all my petitions for you at "the throne of the heavenly
+Grace," I repeat the loving words of "the chief Shepherd" for his
+little flock--"I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the
+world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil."
+
+
+
+[1] Preached, immediately after a confirmation, at a parochial mission,
+Illinois, 1873.
+
+
+
+
+XIX.
+
+CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH.[1]
+
+Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common
+salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that
+ye should earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the
+saints.--Jude 3.
+
+
+And if such exhortation were needful then, when prophecy and miracles
+and the gift of tongues were still in the Church, authenticating the
+mission of the apostles, confirming the doctrines which they taught,
+and commending the common salvation to all who heard them; much more
+now, when all these signs and wonders have long since disappeared, and
+those holy men of God have been for eighteen centuries enjoying their
+repose in Paradise--now, when the predicted perilous times of the last
+days are come, and heresies and schisms everywhere abound, and human
+reason is exalted above divine revelation, and religion is denuded of
+all that is supernatural, and Omnipotence is subjected to the laws of
+science, and answers to prayer are pronounced impossible, and Christ is
+robbed of his essential glory, and man is become his own redeemer, and
+every article of the ancient creeds is called in question, and the
+authority of the Church in matters of faith is scoffed at as an
+exploded absurdity, and the old dogmatic formulas of Christian theology
+are consigned to oblivion and the bats, and every one's private
+judgment is worth more to him than the decisions of all the
+[oe]cumenical councils, and there are not wanting those in every
+community who deem it wiser to make a religion for themselves than to
+accept that which has been given to them from heaven. Surely, now, if
+ever, might some faithful and uncompromising servant of Jesus Christ,
+inditing an epistle to his Christian brethren, assert the necessity of
+exhorting them to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the
+saints.
+
+
+What, then, is this faith? and why and how must we contend for it?
+These questions allow me to answer.
+
+
+As you all probably know, the word faith is used in different senses.
+Suffice it at present to say, there is a subjective faith, and there is
+an objective faith. The former is the act and habit of believing, which
+characterizes the Christian life; the latter is the divine truth
+believed, comprehending the whole body of Christian doctrine. When it
+is said we are justified by faith, we are saved by faith, we walk by
+faith, we live by faith, it is manifestly the habitual act of Christian
+believing that is intended--of relying upon Christ and trusting in him,
+as our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; when St.
+Paul speaks of holding the mystery of the faith, exhorts the
+Corinthians to stand fast in the faith, encourages Timothy to fight the
+good fight of faith, testifies of himself that he has kept the faith,
+it is evidently the system of Christian truth that he refers to--the
+doctrine that Christ came to reveal, sent his servants to proclaim, and
+established his Church on earth to maintain. This objective faith,
+being at once for all time and for all people authoritatively delivered
+to the saints--in the primitive creeds by apostolic tradition, in the
+Christian Scriptures by inspiration of God--admits of no alteration or
+addition, and needs none to adapt it to the ever-changing circumstances
+of men. What it was eighteen hundred years ago it is to-day; and what
+it is to-day it will be eighteen hundred years to come. Mutation is the
+law of all things earthly; but heavenly truth is immutable and eternal.
+Science is progressive, developing gradually by the slow process of
+induction; but the faith was delivered all at once, during the lifetime
+of our Lord on earth and the ministry of his inspired apostles, and can
+never be made more perfect than it was in the beginning. There are no
+new revelations in religion, no new discoveries of Christian truth. We
+must take the gospel as it comes to us, without attempting to improve
+or presuming to mutilate the system. The Church, in her militant
+probation, may pass through many successive phases; but the faith, like
+its divine Author, is "the same yesterday and to-day and forever." And
+for this Christians are called to contend--not for progress, not for
+science, not for freedom, not for glory, not for life itself; but for
+what is more precious than any or all of these--"the faith once
+delivered to the saints."
+
+
+"Earnestly contend?" Whence this necessity? What more at variance with
+the prevalent ideas of the day? Who dreams now of warfare in the cause
+of Christian truth? Is not Christianity pre-eminently the religion of
+peace and love? Must we reject and oppose, as unsound or heretical,
+every thing that does not happen to fall within the limits of our own
+particular belief? May not every man hold his own opinion without
+assailing that of another man? Is not the gospel platform broad enough
+to afford room for all? Earnestly contend? "This is a hard saying; who
+can hear it?" I answer: there is one faith delivered, not many faiths;
+there is one system of divine truth revealed, not many systems. That
+one faith, that one system, whatever it is, we are required to adopt
+and maintain, to keep as we would keep a treasure, to guard as we would
+guard the crown-jewels of our King, to fight for as we would fight for
+what is dearer to us than life, and devote ourselves with the zeal of
+martyrs to its propagation among those who are ignorant of the
+blessing. The apostles knew nothing of compromise in matters of faith,
+and they bequeathed an unfinished warfare to their followers; who
+maintained the cause heroically, among sages and savages, in temples
+and dungeons, before thrones and tribunals, on the rack and amid the
+flames. All this, we know, is the very opposite of the popular
+sentiment of the age. Few among us seem to have any conception of a
+Christian's duty to defend the truth as it is in Jesus "to the last of
+their blood and their breath," battling and dying for a creed. The
+spear and the shield of the warrior are laid aside, and the trumpet no
+longer sounds for the battle, because peace is deemed more precious
+than purity, and controversy is more deprecated than false doctrine,
+and a man's belief is regarded as having nothing to do with his conduct
+and his character. But the apostles knew that the Church held a trust
+which involved inevitable warfare, and would turn the world into a
+battle-ground. This trust they transmitted, through their successors,
+from generation to generation, to us; and we are signed with the sign
+of the cross in baptism, as a token of our consecration to "the good
+fight of faith." The struggle may be strenuous as that of the wrestler
+in the arena, or fierce as that of the hero in the marshalled host; but
+this is every man's duty, to maintain the faith against all assailants,
+and strive to win for it a home in every human heart. Do men light a
+candle to put it under a bushel or a bed? Does the sun refuse to shine
+lest he should offend the bat or blind the owl? And shall the Christian
+conceal his faith or suppress his convictions to please those who hate
+the light because their deeds are evil? Nay, let him proclaim it boldly
+and defend it bravely, like a knight-banneret in the army of the Lord
+of hosts; and, whatever the cost, let him urge its claims with becoming
+zeal upon all whom his voice can reach. To neglect this is not charity,
+but apathy; not humility, but lukewarmness; not liberality of opinion,
+but infidelity to Christ. "The Lord hath spoken; who can but prophesy?"
+Christ hath commanded us to proselyte all nations; shall we be recreant
+to our responsibility? What value do we set upon the faith which we are
+not willing to defend--which we attempt not to teach to the world?
+Where is his love for man, or his loyalty to Christ, who says nothing,
+does nothing, gives nothing, for the diffusion of this heavenly light?
+His creed may be right, but his life is wrong. He may have a Christian
+head, but he has no Christian heart. He entertains the faith as a
+guest, but he does not fight for it as a prize.
+
+
+Here, then, is the lesson of the text: our duty, the duty of all
+Christians, to contend earnestly for the dogmatic faith of the Church.
+Amid the deluge of ignorance and error and sin, this is the only ark of
+safety. Amid the mighty conflict of human speculations and
+philosophies, this is the only evangel of hope. From the beginning the
+faith has ever had its enemies and assailants. Wherever angels lodge,
+the Sodomites will batter at the door. All along through the ages, the
+saints have had to fight for the one faith, and they must fight for it
+to the end. Oh! not of peaceful homes, and tranquil communities, and
+brethren dwelling together in unity, do the words of the apostle
+breathe; but of divided tongues, and imbittered spirits, and the
+tenderest relations of life bristling around us like the iron front of
+battle; and as one who rides along the line of his marshalled host, he
+shouts to us across the centuries, and bids us earnestly contend for
+the faith. All those sublime verities for which "the noble army of
+martyrs" bled, are committed to the vigilance and championship not only
+of the clergy, but of each baptized believer. Some are to vindicate
+them by argument; all by practical exhibitions of their regenerating
+power. Who does not kindle at the thought of being associated in such a
+struggle with St. Paul and St. John, with Ignatius and Polycarp, with
+Athanasius and Augustine--men whose names yet thrill the hearts of
+millions? Now let us have done with concessions. Away with truce and
+armistice. The faith is worth the conflict. None can afford to be
+neutral. We must all fight or perish. Look practically, then, at the
+solemn necessity before you. "Multitudes, multitudes, in the valley of
+decision; for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision."
+Arise, my brethren, armed with the whole armor of God, and go forth to
+battle! Remember that the saints of all ages are with you; that the
+victor Lamb is the captain of your host; that the weapons of your
+warfare are mighty through God; that your guerdon is an unfading crown
+of glory, and your destined home a house eternal in the heavens! Go and
+contend for the faith, as those contended who now sleep in Jesus! Go
+and battle valiantly under his banner, who hath promised you a seat in
+his throne!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at a convocation, Illinois, 1874.
+
+
+
+
+XX.
+
+THE FRUITLESS FIG-TREE.[1]
+
+How soon is the fig-tree withered away!--Matt. xxi. 20.
+
+
+Next Friday we follow our Saviour to the cross. The last few days
+before his death are crowded with some of the most significant acts of
+his ministry. One of these we are now called to contemplate--the
+withering of the fruitless fig-tree by his word. To-day being the
+anniversary of that event, it is appropriately chosen as the theme of
+our discourse. Like all the other miracles of our Lord, this is a
+parable in action. The fruitless tree represents the Jewish people, and
+its fate foreshadows their terrible doom. In this interpretation we are
+warranted by a parable of the divine Teacher uttered a few days
+earlier--that of the barren fig-tree in the vineyard, for which the
+vine-dresser intercedes with the proprietor and obtains a further
+probation. The apostles, who had heard the parable and now saw the
+miracle, could scarcely fail to connect the one with the other, and to
+refer both to the infidelity and fearful punishment of the chosen
+people, as they exclaimed--"How soon is the fig-tree withered away!"
+
+Fifteen hundred years before, God had brought a goodly shoot out of
+Egypt, and planted it in a very fruitful hill, and hedged it about with
+wondrous providences, and watered it with constant dews and seasonable
+rains, and enriched the soil around it with a thousand gracious
+appliances, and waited on it patiently with a careful and diligent
+husbandry. And it sent down its roots deep into the earth, and threw up
+its leafy branches high toward heaven, and gave good promise of
+abundant fruit. Then he sent his prophets to prune it, and stir the
+soil around it, and watch over it night and day. And the wild beast
+that gnawed its bark was pierced by the arrow of the Almighty, and the
+hand that raised an axe against it fell smitten by the lightning of
+heaven. But, instead of producing figs, it wasted its luxuriant life in
+leaves. Then came the Proprietor in person, hungering for the fruit of
+his labor; and, finding none, he tarried and toiled with it three
+years, and watered with frequent tears its deceitful foliage. But all
+was in vain, and he was forced at last to pronounce its doom, and leave
+it blasted and decaying upon its fruitful hill.
+
+Let us drop the figure. Never before the incarnation was there another
+people so highly favored as the Hebrews. God chose them for his own,
+and established his covenant with them, and talked with them from
+heaven, and dwelt in their midst upon the mercy-seat, and led them
+forty years with a pillar of cloud and fire in the wilderness, and
+smote every enemy that rose up against them, and exterminated mighty
+nations to make room for them in Canaan, and brought them into the
+goodly land which he had promised to their fathers--a land flowing with
+milk and honey, which he gave them for a perpetual inheritance. But how
+often they forgot his covenant, and forsook his ordinances, and turned
+aside after other gods, and provoked him to anger with their
+inventions! Then he hewed them by the prophets and chastised them by
+the heathen, but they would not return from their evil ways. He
+permitted their cities to be sacked, their young men to be slain in
+battle, their virgins to be carried away captive, and their kings to
+serve in chains at the tables of the uncircumcised. When they returned
+to him with weeping and supplication, he returned to them with
+loving-kindness and tender mercies. "Is Ephraim my dear son? Is he a
+pleasant child? For since I spake against him, I do earnestly remember
+him still. Therefore my heart is troubled for him. I will surely have
+mercy upon him, saith the Lord."
+
+But after all, when Christ came, he found only fruitless foliage upon
+his long-cherished fig-tree. Mint, anise, and cummin were scrupulously
+tithed; but the weightier matters of the law--judgment, mercy and
+faith--were altogether neglected and forgotten. The phylacteries were
+large, the prayers were loud and long, the chief seats in the synagogue
+were always occupied, and no poor man in vain stretched forth his hand
+for alms; but the religion of the Jew ran all to superstitious
+observances and ostentatious formalities, divine precepts were
+sacrificed to human traditions, a nation of hypocrites could not
+produce the fruits of righteousness; and, given up at last to the
+grossest self-delusion, they rejected their King and crucified the Lord
+of glory. How graciously he had labored! how anxiously he had watched
+and waited! and yet there was no grateful return for all his arduous
+toil and loving care. But is he willing to cut down the worthless tree,
+or blast it with his curse? See! he is crossing the ridge of Olivet on
+his way to Jerusalem, riding in triumph amidst the acclamations of the
+multitude who have witnessed his miracles and confessed his
+Messiahship, his path carpeted with their garments and covered with
+branches of the palm. Reaching the brow of the hill, he looks down upon
+the beautiful city, lying like a jewelled crown before him. He thinks
+of all his labor for her children, and all their base ingratitude and
+suicidal unbelief. He knows that those who are now shouting him on his
+way with hosannahs will soon be clamoring for his crucifixion and
+mocking around his cross. Full well he knows that the chosen race will
+shortly have filled up the measure of their guilt, and wrath will come
+upon them to the uttermost. And as the vision of their ruin rises upon
+the eye of his spirit, with the long ages of unparalleled tribulation
+and despair which must succeed the catastrophe of the beloved city, he
+weeps as only Infinite Compassion can weep, and laments as only an
+incarnate God can lament:--"Oh that thou hadst known, even thou, at
+least in this thy day, the things which belong to thy peace! but now
+they are hid from thine eyes; for the days shall come upon thee, when
+thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and shall keep thee in on
+every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children
+within thee, and shall not leave in thee one stone upon another,
+because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation." In about sixty
+years all is fulfilled--the temple burned, the streets heaped with the
+dead, the plough driven over the ruins, and the hopeless remnant of a
+reprobate race scattered in isolated exile over the face of the earth.
+The curse has fallen, and "how soon is the fig-tree withered away!"
+
+
+And we, my brethren--shall we not take warning from the fate of the
+unfaithful people? "Dried up from the roots," the old Jewish tree has
+been torn from the soil and cast into the fire; and we--alien shoots
+from without the enclosure--have been transplanted into the vineyard of
+the Lord. Disinherited and undone, the murderers of God's Messiah are
+strangers and fugitives to-day over the face of the planet; but we have
+succeeded to their inheritance, glorified with new revelations of grace
+and truth. Baptized into a better covenant, with a better Mediator than
+Moses, we rejoice in the mercies and immunities of a better theocracy
+than Israel ever knew. In the midst of our camp Jehovah has pitched his
+tabernacle; and by the more glorious ministration of the Spirit,
+through the word and sacraments of an everlasting testament, he is
+seeking to make us fruitful in righteousness and true holiness. Brought
+nigh to God by adoption and regeneration, we become heirs of his
+kingdom and joint-heirs with his first-born--partakers of his life and
+expectants of his immortality. And now we have enjoyed another season
+of merciful visitation, and the daily services of Lent have been like
+vernal sun and shower to the fig-tree. Have we borne fruit, or only
+leaves? Has our penitential humiliation been real and effectual, or
+only feigned and perfunctory? Have these thirty-six days in the holy
+mount deepened our communion with God and intensified our love of
+holiness? Are we purer and wiser than we were on
+Ash-Wednesday--stronger to resist evil and do good--more like Christ in
+meekness and charity and self-denial? Be assured, my dear brethren,
+that your privileges bring with them a fearful responsibility. If you
+have received the grace of God in vain, your Lent has been a curse, and
+not a blessing; and the mercies by which you have failed to profit have
+enhanced unspeakably your condemnation. "He that knoweth his master's
+will, and doeth it not, shall be beaten with many stripes;" and "he
+that, being often reproved, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be
+destroyed, and that without remedy." Ah! how many of us have no heart
+for the service of God--no pleasure in that which enraptures the
+seraphim! Conscience impels them one way, but inclination draws them
+more powerfully the other; and duty is constantly sacrificed to carnal
+gratifications, worldly interests, and vain ambitions. They fear God,
+but love him not; and though they cannot sin without a tremor, the
+tremor is not strong enough to repress the sin. Generally at church,
+they do all they can to support the public worship and encourage the
+heart of the clergy; but here ends their all of duty, their all of
+practical religion, their all of gratitude for the unspeakable love of
+Christ--mere foliage without any satisfying fruit.
+
+And what can the end be but a blasting malediction from the Master?
+Long, indeed, may he continue his merciful efforts to make such
+Christians fruitful; but when his grace is habitually rejected or
+perverted--when his Holy Spirit is forced to strive in vain with an
+obdurate heart and a will obstinately set on evil--he will withhold his
+favors, or grant them less frequently and in inferior measure.
+Meanwhile sins multiply, bad habits grow stronger, the roots of vice
+strike deeper, and its branches grow broader and higher; till at length
+comes the hot wind from the desert, beneath which every green thing
+becomes crisp and sear. Christ rejected, there remaineth no more
+sacrifice for sin, and he who has lived in impenitence dies in despair.
+Oh! when conscience presents the long catalogue of uncancelled crimes,
+and only a few moments of wasted life remain, what can the dying sinner
+do? When his broken vows, abused mercies, and neglected opportunities,
+through all the corridors of memory come trooping up like the vengeful
+ghosts of the murdered, whither will he fly for refuge? Or the advent
+of the last enemy may be a sudden surprise, unexpected as the crash of
+a ship under full sail upon some sunken rock; launching the poor soul,
+all unprovided, with a shudder and a shriek into an unsounded sea. Or
+if a little space be given the delinquent, yet through the violence of
+his disorder the mind may be quite incapable of a rational repentance,
+drifting like the wrecked mariner upon a spar at the mercy of wind and
+wave. But in whatever form and with whatever circumstances Death may
+come, he comes ever to the impenitent as an avenger--avenger of God's
+neglected mercy--avenger of Christ's insulted love; and a fearful thing
+it is--fearful beyond all power of language to express--to die without
+hope in Christ and unreconciled to God. Oh! to be forced out at
+midnight, amidst howling tempests and roaring billows--no compass to
+guide nor star to cheer--on the eternal voyage! Beware, then, beloved,
+lest that come upon you which our blessed Lord foretold of those who
+rejected his mission: "Ye shall die in your sins, and where I am ye
+cannot come."
+
+With only two exceptions, Christ's recorded miracles are all works of
+mercy, wrought for the relief of suffering and the consolation of
+sorrow; and even these exceptions, which may be called miracles of
+judgment--performed, the one upon irrational animals, and the other on
+an insensible tree--show the aversion of his tender heart to severity
+and vengeance. He is long-suffering, unwilling that any should perish,
+desiring that all should be saved and come to the knowledge of the
+truth. He smites only where he cannot cure. As long as there is any
+hope of reformation, he spares the unthankful and the evil; and never,
+till all possibility of salvation is past, does he visit the
+incorrigible with punishment. Justice must have its claim as well as
+mercy; and, mercy rejected, justice must avenge. The terribleness of
+the retribution makes nothing against its righteousness; and though it
+send a tremor through all the worlds of God, the obstinate transgressor
+shall not go unpunished. Very terrible indeed it is, and imagination
+staggers beneath the apprehension of the wrath of the Lamb; but
+terrible also was the deluge, and the fate of Sodom, and the slaughter
+of the Egyptian first-born, and the overthrow of Pharaoh and his host,
+and the end of Korah and his mutinous company, and the destruction of
+seventy thousand Israelites at a stroke, and the death of a hundred and
+eighty-five thousand Assyrians in a single night, and the sudden
+catastrophe of Nineveh and Babylon with all their pomp and their power,
+and the wrath which fell in its manifold final infliction upon the
+chosen people when the day of their merciful visitation was over and
+ended; but the terribleness of the vengeance did not stay the avenging
+hand of Justice, when Mercy, with broken heart, retired and left the
+guilty to their fate. And the dawn of the last day will be terrible,
+and the coming of the Son of man will be terrible, and the destruction
+of the Antichrist will be terrible, and the conflagration of the
+universe will be terrible, and terrible beyond all precedent the
+punishment of reprobate impenitence when the Lord Jesus with his holy
+angels shall be revealed from heaven in flaming fire! The tree may long
+lift its green boughs to the sun and toss its gay blossoms to the
+breeze; but when the Master comes for fruit and finds nothing but a
+deceitful promise, smitten with his curse it shall quickly wither away.
+
+Let us make haste to avert the vengeance. In this our gracious
+day--this clement mediatorial hour--let us invoke the Holy Spirit to
+aid us in bringing forth fruit meet for repentance. Think not that the
+work will be easier in coming years, when passion is weakened, and
+temptation is lessened, and coercive grace comes to conquer the rebel
+will and reclaim the alien heart. Alas! by every hour's delay you are
+riveting the fetters of evil habit, and multiplying and consolidating
+the barriers to your salvation; and the special grace for which you
+wait will never come till God shall revise his evangel and Christ
+change the whole economy of his kingdom. Now is your time for
+conversion, and a better moment will never occur between this and
+eternity. Hark! it is the voice of the Master: "Cut it down! why
+cumbereth it the ground?" Hark! it is the voice of the Vine-dresser:
+"Lord! let it alone till another Lent! I will renew my efforts; I will
+redouble my endeavors; I will try some new expedients; peradventure
+next year will reward thy forbearance with the long-expected fruit!"
+Oh! prayer of crucified compassion! shall it not be answered? Oh!
+prophecy of ill-requited mercy! shall it not be fulfilled? Beloved, it
+is for you to say. God hath spoken, and uttered all his heart.
+Henceforth all depends upon yourselves. Answer your Saviour's prayer,
+fulfil your Saviour's prophecy, and so avert the judgment of
+unfruitfulness; or else prepare for the unutterable alternative--your
+Saviour's blighting curse!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at a parochial mission in Memphis, Tenn., 1876.
+
+
+
+
+XXI.
+
+CHRISTIAN CONTENTMENT.[1]
+
+I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be
+content.--Phil. iv. 11.
+
+
+An instance of the moral sublime, which none can fail to admire, and
+all should endeavor to emulate. What an ornament of the gospel is such
+a spirit! What a commendation of Christianity is such a testimony! No
+human philosophy, no stoical indifference, no diligence of
+self-discipline, ever elevated the soul of man to so serene and pure an
+atmosphere--nothing but that religion which the Son of God brought with
+him from heaven to earth, the tendency and design of which is to raise
+its human subjects from earth to heaven. "I have learned, in whatsoever
+state I am, therewith to be content."
+
+
+Contentment is satisfaction with one's lot or condition. The word
+conveys the idea of fulness and sufficiency. It is opposed to envy,
+which is displeased with the prosperity of others. It is opposed to
+ambition, which is not satisfied with equality, but aspires to
+superiority. It is opposed to avarice, which grasps all it can reach,
+keeps all it obtains, and "sayeth not it is enough." It is opposed to
+anxiety, which is always taking needless thought for the morrow,
+saying, "What shall we eat? what shall we drink? and wherewithal shall
+we be clothed?" It is opposed to murmuring and repining, which is an
+ungrateful distrust of God, an unjust arraignment of his providence, an
+impious impeachment of his wisdom and goodness, a presumptuous spirit
+of rebellion against his righteous government.
+
+St. Paul's statement seems to express complete and perfect
+satisfaction. In the highest sense this is applicable only to Jehovah,
+who is El Shaddai, God All-sufficient. But in a lower sense it is true,
+to a greater or less degree, of all good men. They have no sufficiency
+in themselves, but their sufficiency is of God. Of his fulness they
+have all received--the unsearchable riches of Christ. With the fatness
+of his house they are abundantly satisfied, and he makes them drink
+from the river of his pleasures. This is the only satisfying portion of
+the soul. Without this, men may be indifferent--may be jovial and
+reckless; but these are not contentment--are perhaps the very opposites
+of contentment; indifference, the sullen obstinacy of a perverse and
+rebellious will, as far from contentment as it is from submission;
+jovial recklessness, the effort of a restless heart to throw off its
+burden of care and trouble--the revolt of the whole man against
+Providence and against conscience. But when Divine Love brings us to
+its banqueting-house, and God becomes our shield and exceeding great
+reward, then the fluctuating soul returns to its native rest, like
+Naphthali satisfied with favor and full with the blessing of the Lord.
+
+
+When the apostle says--"I have learned, in whatsoever state I am,
+therewith to be content," no one can imagine that he refers to his
+former state of sin; for of that he constantly speaks in terms of
+strong regret, and as long as he lived he never ceased to sorrow for
+the evil he had done. Nor are we to suppose that he means to express
+his full satisfaction with his present state of grace; for he is always
+hungering and thirsting after the fulness of God; and no Christian can
+be fully satisfied with his spiritual attainments till he awakes in the
+likeness of his Lord.
+
+If there can be any doubt of the apostle's meaning, the verses
+immediately following may solve it: "I know both how to be abased and
+how to abound; everywhere, and in all things, I am instructed both to
+be full and to be hungry, to abound and to suffer need; I can do all
+things through Christ which strengtheneth me." These several conditions
+he had tested by experience; and found himself able, by the grace of
+God, to maintain a calm and unperturbed spirit amidst all their trying
+vicissitudes: thoroughly assured that all were ordered or overruled by
+Infinite Wisdom and Love, and must therefore work together for his good.
+
+In another place he says: "Most gladly will I glory in mine
+infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me; therefore I
+take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in
+persecutions, in distresses, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak,
+then am I strong." To be content in success and prosperity, were easy
+enough; but to be content in trials such as these, immeasurably
+surpasses the power of the unsanctified human heart. The apostle,
+however, bore his tribulations, not merely with patient submission and
+quiet fortitude, but even with exultation; rejoicing evermore; in every
+thing giving thanks; counting the heaviest cross his greatest blessing;
+with all his heart glorying in the fellowship of his Saviour's
+suffering; willing to live or die, because in life or death God would
+be magnified in his body; and when the alternative presents itself in
+imminent prospect, perplexed only as to which he ought to prefer: "I am
+in a strait betwixt two; having a desire to depart and be with Christ,
+which is far better; nevertheless, to abide in the flesh is more
+needful for you; and having this confidence, I know that I shall abide
+and continue with you all for your furtherance and joy of faith, that
+your rejoicing may be more abundant by my coming to you again." What
+heroic resignation is here! what disinterested charity! what
+transcendent sublimity of hope!
+
+
+And how had the apostle attained to such experience? In what school,
+from what teacher, had he learned so great a lesson? Certainly not from
+nature, nor from any human system of morality. Ever since man went
+forth from the blessed garden, he has been a restless and unhappy
+creature, always seeking repose for his spirit in some inferior good,
+and ever disappointed in the end. Contentment is a lesson to be
+learned, and to be learned only, in the school of Christ. There St.
+Paul learned it, not at the feet of Gamaliel. There he learned it,
+under the tuition of Providence, aided by the Holy Spirit of grace, by
+a long and painful course of discipline--by hunger and thirst, cold and
+nakedness, desertion and persecution, shipwreck and dungeon, scourging
+and stoning, a life of perpetual conflict, and the frequent menace of
+death.
+
+So others have learned it. And what a blessed lesson it is, well
+learned! Aaron, when his sons were smitten, "held his peace." And Eli,
+when informed of coming judgments, said: "It is the Lord; let him do
+what seemeth him good." And Job, bereft of every earthly comfort,
+exclaimed: "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the
+name of the Lord." And David, trained in every school of affliction, is
+ever singing of the loving-kindness of the Lord, and extolling the
+excellence of his mercy which endureth forever. Such contentment as
+these instances exemplify, nothing can produce but the grace of God in
+co-operation with his providence, the one purifying and the other
+disciplining the heart. But when we learn to draw water from the wells
+of salvation, we shall imbibe contentment with the draught. Believing
+in Christ as our Saviour, we shall confide in God as our Father. All
+made right within, all will be right without. An Almighty Friend in
+heaven--"a very present help in trouble," we have no real cause for
+anxious thought or disquieting fear. Faith overcomes all apprehension
+of evil, and enables every saint to sing with the psalmist--"The Lord
+is my portion, Faith my soul, therefore will I hope in him;" and to say
+with the apostle--"I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith
+to be content."
+
+
+Brethren, let us aspire to this apostolic experience. In this grace,
+why should we not equal St. Paul? Is it not the high calling of every
+Christian? And what reason for discontent have we, that this noble hero
+had not? Our present state, like his, is God's appointment, and only
+for a season; and the discipline of sorrow and conflict may be no less
+needful for us than it was for him, and the result no less a blessing.
+
+How much worldly good is necessary for any of us? how much wealth,
+honor, happiness? Most of our wants are artificial and unreal. We
+create them, or imagine them, and then complain that they are not
+supplied. Our first needs--our only absolute needs--are food and
+raiment; and having these, we are divinely counselled to be content.
+And many have been content with much less of them than we possess, and
+no health for their enjoyment--have been content without either
+sufficient food or comfortable raiment, and for years scarcely an hour
+of exemption from pain--content in great poverty and utter destitution,
+on the bed of sickness, in the gloom of the dungeon, under the
+foreshadow of martyrdom--consoling themselves with the assurance that
+God hath chosen the poor of this world, the afflicted, the persecuted,
+rich in faith, and heirs, of his heavenly kingdom.
+
+And to be content--is it not, after all, the best way to be well
+supplied? "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all
+these things shall be added unto you." Will not the Good Shepherd
+provide for his confiding sheep? Will not he who clothes the lilies and
+feeds the sparrows regard your necessities, O ye of little faith? Can
+you not trust the bounty of your King, the affection of your Father?
+"Cast all your care upon him, for he careth for you." Jacob asked food
+and raiment, and God gave him also abundant flocks and herds. Solomon
+prayed for a wise and understanding heart, and received in addition
+great riches and honor. With the divine love you are rich, whatever
+else you lack; without it poor, whatever else you possess.
+
+And what avails your discontent? What can it bring you but present
+trouble and future regret? Why disquiet yourselves in vain? Can all
+your anxiety change the color of a hair, or add a moment to your little
+all of life? Does not God know what is best for you, and will he alter
+his wise and gracious economy to gratify your foolish and capricious
+desires? What claim have you on him? What service have you ever done
+him? What benefit has he ever received from your virtue? Nay, you are
+sharers of a thousand blessings, not one of which have you merited.
+Rightly estimating yourselves, instead of murmuring against God, you
+would be ready to say with the pilgrim patriarch: "I am not worthy of
+the least of all the mercy and truth which thou hast shown unto thy
+servant."
+
+But discontent is ingratitude. Recently redeemed from the iron furnace,
+shall the children of Israel complain of their hard fare in the
+wilderness, spurn the manna, clamor for flesh, and talk of the fish
+they freely ate in Egypt, of the cucumbers and the melons, the leeks,
+the onions, and the garlics? Let them remember the toils of the
+brick-kiln, the voice of the oppressor, the scourge of the task-master,
+and all the burdens which there imbittered their lives. And you, have
+you not infinitely more ground for gratitude than for grumbling? God's
+mercies, fresh every morning and new every evening, crowd the day and
+crown the night. One single gift hath he bestowed--one unspeakable
+gift--the channel through which all others flow--worth more than a
+solar system to every child of Adam. Redeemed by the blood of Christ,
+every moment becomes an inestimable mercy; nay, every breath becomes a
+thousand mercies; nay, every pulse metes out incalculable mercies by
+the million; and while we receive them, what deserve we but reprobation
+and ruin infinite? Add to these the many great and exceeding precious
+promises with which the Bible overflows, all pointing to an
+incorruptible inheritance reserved for you in heaven; and tell me, have
+you no cause to be content?
+
+All things ours--God with all his communicable fulness--Christ with all
+his riches of grace and glory--heaven with all its clustering honors
+and immunities--who will not say: "Return unto thy rest, O my soul! for
+the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee"? Ye who now like Lazarus
+have your evil things on earth, will you not hereafter with Lazarus be
+comforted in Abraham's bosom? Oh! what is poverty to you who are to
+inherit all things--heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus Christ?
+What are toil and pain, reproach and persecution, the utter prostration
+of health, the loss of every living friend, and the burial of all you
+ever loved below, to you who look for your Lord's return from heaven,
+the renovation of the world, the redemption of the body, the immortal
+fellowship of the just, and the termination of all the sad vicissitudes
+of time in the blissful calm of eternal content?
+
+And those of you who are trying to content yourselves with these
+fleeting vanities! know ye not that your treasures will decay, your
+glories wither, and all the delights of sense perish with the world?
+What will you do when the ground dissolves beneath you, and the
+atmosphere around you becomes flame? A surer trust we proffer you, and
+a nobler felicity. Come and feed your famishing souls with the hidden
+manna of God, and slake your spirit's thirst from the fountain of
+living waters. Here, in the love of God--here, in the blood of
+Christ--here, in the assurance of pardon--here, resting upon the Rock
+of ages--here, anchored in a sure and steadfast hope--you shall learn
+at last the tranquil blessedness of true content!
+
+
+
+[1] Preached at Seneca Falls, N.Y., Aug. 12, 1883--the last actual
+pulpit-utterance of the author.
+
+
+
+
+XXII.
+
+"YE KNOW THE GRACE."[1]
+
+Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich,
+yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be
+rich.--2 Cor. viii. 9.
+
+
+To the rich, commonly, what is more terrible than poverty? So great,
+sometimes, their dread of it, that they seek to avoid or avert it by
+measures the most dishonorable and even the most desperate. Rather than
+be poor, many will practise the worst hypocrisies or commit the
+greatest crimes. For thirty pieces of silver, more than one Judas has
+sold his Saviour to the murderers and his own soul to Satan; and to
+escape the possible condition of Lazarus at his gate, many a Dives has
+slain himself in his palace. Horrified at such insanity, we scarcely
+wonder at the fear from which it springs. The noblest spirits quake at
+the thought of want, and a prospective reverse of fortune is enough to
+make the bravest quail.
+
+Yet are there cases on record in which men and women, for some worthy
+principle, have cheerfully welcomed absolute privation, or patiently
+endured the destitution of all things. The fear of God, the love of
+truth, devotion to duty, domestic affection, patriotic sentiment,
+disinterested philanthropy--have not some of these again and again led
+the dwellers in palaces to the hovel and the hermitage, substituting
+for the downy couch a pallet of straw, for the purple and fine linen a
+suit of sack-cloth, and for the daily sumptuous banquet a crust of
+bread and a cup of water? While we recognize in such cases only a
+conscientious service rendered to God or a life of superior charity to
+his rational and immortal creatures, we can but admire and honor the
+noble principle that thus renounces the conveniences and advantages of
+high birth and ample fortune for the lowest conditions of civilized
+humanity. The impulse is divine; the spirit is that of Christ. Some
+become poor through misfortune, some through improvidence, some through
+criminal indulgence, these through stanch adherence to duty. If they
+had not relinquished their riches, they must have repudiated the
+authority of conscience and let go their hold on virtue. Poverty has
+saved its thousands, where wealth has ruined its tens of thousands.
+
+Here we are reminded of One who was originally rich beyond all human
+conception, but became poorer than the poorest that ever trod the
+earth--not because he desired the change, nor because he could not help
+it, nor because it was his bounden duty, nor because a superior bade
+him, nor because the perishing implored him, but because he loved us
+with an infinite love--beyond all imagination of men or angels.
+
+  "'Twas mercy moved his heavenly mind,
+        And pity brought him down."
+
+
+First, then, we must think of the poverty of Christ as the
+manifestation of his grace. What was it but purest goodness, gratuitous
+favor, unmerited compassion, that moved him to forsake his glory and
+become the brother of worms and the Man of sorrows? What saw he in this
+revolted province of his boundless empire, that he should come to seek
+and save the self-destroyed? Among all the myriads of Adam's children,
+what one quality was there worthy of his love? Who solicited his aid,
+or repented of his own sin? What obligation pressed or necessity
+impelled the Saviour? Had he remained indifferent to our helpless woes
+in the heavenly mansions, who could have impeached one of his
+perfections? Had he smitten this guilty planet from its orbit, and sent
+it staggering among the stars--a reprobate world--a warning to the
+universe of the ruin wrought by sin--might not the minstrelsy of heaven
+have chanted over its catastrophe--"Just and true are thy ways, thou
+King of saints!" Perfectly he foreknew all that awaited him in his
+mission of mercy; yet with what divine alacrity did he vacate his
+throne, leave the bosom of his Father, and retire from the adoring host
+of heaven--as if a loftier throne, a more loving bosom, and a worthier
+concourse of worshippers, were ready to greet him in the world to which
+he came!
+
+  "O love that passeth knowledge! words are vain!
+  Language is lost in wonder so divine!"
+
+
+Secondly, we must consider the poverty of Christ in contrast with his
+previous riches. How much we commiserate the poor who have seen better
+days! His better days what human art shall depict or finite mind
+conceive? Lift up your thoughts to the glorious state of the Eternal
+Son in the bosom of God the Father. As yet the worlds are not; no star
+reflects his smile, nor seraph chants his praise; but, possessed of
+every divine excellence in the most transcendent degree, he has within
+himself an infinite source of happiness. Now he arises to the work of
+creation, and myriads of self-luminous suns, each with his retinue of
+rejoicing planets, begin their eternal march around his throne. All are
+his, created by him and for him; and all their countless billions of
+rational and immortal beings own him as their supreme Lord, and adore
+him as the sole giver of every good and perfect gift. Down from all
+this glory he descended into one of the poorest provinces of his
+illimitable realm, assuming the frail and suffering nature of its
+fallen people,
+
+  "And God with God was man with men."
+
+Having a body and a soul like ours, he was liable to all our
+temptations and infirmities; and suffering--the just for the
+unjust--that he might bring us to God, he became poorer than the
+poorest of those whom by his poverty he sought to redeem. Surely, had
+he so chosen, with all the pomp and splendor of royal state he might
+have made his advent; but see! he comes as the first-born of an obscure
+family--a stable his birthplace--a manger his cradle; through all the
+years of his youth, subject to his parents, and toiling at Joseph's
+side with the carpenter's saw and plane; and when at the age of thirty
+he enters upon his Messianic mission, having no home but such as a poor
+fisherman can offer him at Capernaum; often hungering and thirsting
+over the fields and fountains of his own creation, everywhere hated for
+his love and persecuted for his purity; and at last basely betrayed
+into the hands of his enemies, abandoned and denied by his disciples,
+falsely accused of blasphemy, and cruelly condemned to the cross; while
+the powers of hell, in all their might and their malice, co-operate
+with the murderers of the Lord's Anointed; and the loving Father,
+laying on him the iniquities of us all, withdraws from the scene of
+infamous horrors, and leaves the immaculate victim to die alone in the
+darkness.
+
+  "O Lamb of God! was ever pain--
+    Was ever love--like thine?"
+
+
+Thirdly, we must contemplate the poverty of Christ in relation to the
+enrichment of his people. For our sake it was--for our benefit--as our
+substitute--he became poor, that we through his poverty might be rich.
+"What are a million of human lives," said the great Napoleon, "to the
+scheme of a man like me?" Infinitely more sublime was the scheme of
+Jesus Christ, sacrificing no human interest to his own ambition, but
+enriching all his followers with the durable riches of righteousness.
+Benevolence, not ambition, was the grand impulse of his action. To save
+mankind from sin and Satan--to quicken dead souls with the power of an
+endless life--he came forth from the Father, sojourned in voluntary
+exile among rebels, and joyfully laid down his life for their
+redemption. How much the apostles write of "the riches of his grace"!
+How sweetly they assure us that he "hath chosen the poor of this world,
+rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them
+that love him"! He became poorer than we, to make us as rich as
+himself--joint-heirs with him to an inheritance incorruptible,
+undefiled, that fadeth not away, reserved for us in heaven. Already,
+indeed, the believer is rich in faith, rich in love, rich in peace,
+rich in joy, and rich in hope; but when the dear Lord shall return to
+consummate in glory the salvation thus begun by grace, the saints shall
+enter with him the everlasting kingdom, satisfied with his likeness and
+radiant with his joy. Rejoice then, O my brother! in the unsearchable
+riches of Christ. Is the culprit enriched by pardon on the scaffold? So
+Christ hath pardoned thee. Is the exile enriched by the edict that
+calls him home? So Christ hath recalled the banished. Is the leper
+enriched by the cure of his foul disease? So Christ cleanses the soul
+that comes to him. Is the disinherited enriched by the restoration of
+his lost estate? Jesus has bought back for us our forfeited
+possessions, and made them ours by an everlasting covenant. Is the
+prisoner enriched by the power that gives him freedom? If the Son makes
+us free, we are free indeed, and hell cannot enslave the ransomed soul.
+Is the alien child enriched by adoption into the royal household,
+making him heir to the crown? Brought nigh by redeeming blood, I become
+interested in all that belongs to my Lord, and whatever he receives
+from the Father I am to share with him in the kingdom of his glory. His
+voluntary poverty in my behalf makes him my Brother and associates me
+with him upon the throne. Taking my earthly station, he raises me to
+his heavenly honors. Bearing my manifold infirmities, he assures me of
+a share in his infinite blessedness. Emptying himself of his glory for
+me, he fills me with all the fulness of God! Thus we know the grace of
+our Lord Jesus Christ--not, indeed, in all the amplitude of its
+extension, nor in all the plenitude of its comprehension; but
+adequately to our necessity as sinners, and adequately to our duty and
+privilege as Christians--we know it, and rejoice in it with unspeakable
+joy. What returns shall we make, or how express our gratitude? Shall we
+be like him who, having promised Mercury part of his nuts, ate the
+kernels himself, and gave the god the shells? Shall we not imitate the
+Macedonian churches, that first gave their own selves to the Lord, and
+then sent their liberal collections to the poor saints at Jerusalem?
+When we have given ourselves, what else can we withhold from him who
+gave all his wealth to enrich us, and has enriched us most by giving us
+himself?
+
+  "The mite my willing hand can give,
+    At Jesus' feet I lay;
+  His grace the tribute will receive,
+    And Heaven at large repay."
+
+
+
+[1] Written in the last days of September, 1883, but never preached.
+
+
+
+
+THE REV. DR. JOSEPH CROSS'S WORKS.
+
+
++_KNIGHT BANNERET._+ Sermons. By the Rev. Joseph
+Cross, D.D., LL.D. 1 vol. 303 pp. 12mo, cloth. $1.50.
+
+
+"Its literary qualities will charm still another class of readers, for
+imagination has filled its pages with pictures from near and from far;
+fancy has lavished its every color upon them; they gleam with an
+unstinted splendor of rhetoric, or glow with an eager, consuming
+intensity of conviction."--_Am. Church Review._
+
+"The sermons are serious and conservative in theological position,
+practical and assisted toward their end by an unusual amount of
+illustration and metaphor."--_The Independent._
+
+"They [the sermons] are pervaded by an intensely earnest spirit, full
+of Christ and his salvation, and suited to be useful. The author's
+style and method of treatment are oratorical, and we find many vigorous
+and eloquent passages."--_Lutheran Quarterly._
+
+"The diction is always magnificent, always elegant, and the thought
+never fails of clearness."--_The Living Church._
+
+"They are true and brave and zealous presentations of questions of
+practical moment; and their perusal will give new strength and a new
+inspiration to every honest reader."--_Syracuse Daily Journal._
+
+"They are distinguished by remarkable intellectual force, point and
+brilliancy of statement, short, vigorous sentences, and a desire to
+benefit his fellows by teaching them the truth."--_The Keystone._
+
+
+
++_EVANGEL._+ Sermons for Parochial Missions. By the Rev.
+Joseph Cross, D.D., LL.D. 1 vol. 303 pp. 12mo, cloth. $1.50.
+
+
+"Not for a long time have we pored over pages glowing with so much
+gospel power and spiritual radiance."--_Michigan Christian
+Advocate._
+
+"This volume of sermons is one of the very best we have recently met
+with for the lay reader or for family reading."--_Church Guardian._
+
+"They appeal more to the feelings than do the ordinary sermons of
+church pastors; but preaching of this kind is needed. The idea that all
+sermons must follow a fixed model, either in style and arrangement or
+in length, tends to a lifeless formalism. Dr. Cross has an original
+way, and is very strong in his presentation of truth."--_The
+Churchman._
+
+"Many books of sermons which are regarded as models have in them much
+less of thought and gospel truth."--_American Literary Churchman._
+
+"They unfold and enforce wisely and winningly the fundamental truths of
+the gospel, and are direct and impressive in style."--_The
+Congregationalist._
+
+"There is in them just what is indispensable to success on such
+occasions,--the flowing earnestness of a spirit that burns with the
+love and glory of the message it has to deliver."--_The Living
+Church._
+
+
+
+_+EDENS OF ITALY.+_ By the Rev. Joseph Cross, D.D.,
+LL.D. With more than one hundred illustrations, map, and index. 1 vol.
+Royal 8vo, cloth extra, gilt edges. $5.00.
+
+
+"He writes without exaggeration, and with a strong sense of enjoyment
+in a land that constantly surprises him by its varied beauty.... The
+work takes the reader along by its clearness, and there is no better
+test of a descriptive book."--_Cincinnati Commercial._
+
+"The book is one of the most attractive among those intended for
+holiday gifts."--_New-York Tribune._
+
+"This is one of the handsomest and most substantial of the higher-class
+gift-books of the season.... The external appearance of the work is
+exceedingly attractive, the stamped design of the cover being in the
+most perfect taste. The literary execution of Dr. Cross's book is of a
+very high order. The author is a master of descriptive style; and his
+learning and information, though unobtrusive, are both extensive and
+accurate. The study of his subject occupied many months of intelligent
+and careful observation."--_Good Literature._
+
+"Either because the subjects themselves are wondrously rich and varied
+in interest, or because the writer is most happily gifted in the
+treatment of these subjects, or for both reasons combined, this book
+abounds with very choice and delightful entertainment. It may be
+compared to a string of gems, all of the richest kinds, sparkling and
+flashing with radiant and ever-varying beauty, or to a garden filled
+with a great variety of the rarest flowers and fruits: while the
+descriptions and pen-pictures are transparently faithful to truth, they
+also seem to be the very essence of poetry. The reader is fascinated;
+he seems to be travelling upon enchanted ground....
+
+"The work in its mechanical execution throughout, in paper, type, and
+binding, is a splendid specimen of book-making."--_Northern Christian
+Advocate._
+
+"There are very few cities and spots that are omitted in this excellent
+work, which has been written and prepared with experience and care. We
+know of no work at a reasonable price that answers in its
+stead."--_Boston Sunday Globe._
+
+"One of the elegant books of the season is 'Edens of Italy,' by Rev.
+Dr. Joseph Cross."--_Springfield Republican._
+
+"The author has written from a full mind and richly-laden memory, aided
+by careful notes taken on the spot. The readable quality of the book is
+aided by the clearest typographic expression, and the numerous
+illustrations make the volume a feast to the eye. Even in this day of
+attractive bindings, this one is noticeable for its extreme beauty. The
+coloring is refined and tasteful; and the decorative design, which is
+beautiful and appropriate in conception, has been artistically carried
+out. As a whole, the cover is charming in effect, and reflects great
+credit on the taste of the house which issues the volume. On the
+principle of honor to whom honor is due, it seems hardly just that it
+is not customary to permit artists who furnish designs for book-covers,
+to reap what measure of glory and profit there is to be had from being
+publicly credited with the work they do."--_Art Interchange._
+
+
+
+_+COALS FROM THE ALTAR.+_ Sermons for the Christian Year. By
+the Rev. Joseph Cross, D.D., LL.D. 2 vols. 12mo, cloth. $1.50
+each.
+
+  Vol. I., Advent to Ascension.
+  Vol. II., Ascension to Advent.
+
+
+"They are aptly named 'Coals from the Altar,' for they are admirably
+adapted to kindle a flame of fire in the Christian heart. The author's
+wealth of imagery, his warm sympathy and personal appeals, his fine
+descriptive powers and flow of language, his deep pathos and
+tenderness, do not need the fervor and emphasis of the living voice to
+send home the arrow of truth; but his sermons touch the feelings
+equally when addressed to the eye, by means of type, and become an
+efficient ministry of good."--_The Churchman._
+
+"Evangelic truth and apostolic order have no better definition and
+defence in the whole range of sermonic literature, than in these
+glowing 'Coals from the Altar'"--_The Standard of the Cross._
+
+"They are written in a most moderate tone, with much force and beauty
+of language, and with great earnestness and tenderness appeal to the
+hearts and consciences of readers. For family reading and for lay
+reading we can warmly recommend these sermons."--_The Church
+Guardian_, Halifax.
+
+"The sermons are eminently scriptural, terse and accurate in style, and
+are excellent illustrations of good principles in
+homiletics."--_Lutheran Observer._
+
+"Dr. Cross shows himself an eloquent and able thinker, and his sermons
+are full of spiritual fervor."--_The American Bookseller._
+
+
+
++_PAULINE CHARITY._+ Discourses on the Thirteenth Chapter of
+St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians. By the Rev. Joseph
+Cross, D.D., LL.D. 1 vol. 12mo, cloth. $1.50.
+
+
+"These sermons are eminently instructive and stimulating; the great
+central truth of practical religion is forcibly presented and well
+illustrated, and the discourse is often marked with special vigor and
+eloquence."--_Zion's Herald._
+
+"These are clear, instructive, thoroughly evangelical, and highly
+edifying. They will serve as good models for young ministers, in style,
+spirit, and directness of address."--_Lutheran Observer._
+
+"The sermons included in the volume before us are vigorous and fluent;
+and, though the author calls them 'old-fashioned homilies,' they are
+neither dry nor antiquated in style or thought."--_Good
+Literature._
+
+"These are of sermons which leave an influence that the hearer carries
+into his daily thought and conduct."--_Boston Globe._
+
+
+
++_OLD WINE AND NEW_+. Occasional discourses. By the Rev.
+Joseph Cross, D.D., LL.D. 1 vol. 12mo, cloth.
+
+_Just Issued._
+
+Copies mailed postpaid on receipt of price.
+
+
+THOMAS WHITTAKER, Publisher,
+  2 and 3 Bible House, New York.
+
+
+
+
+
+By JOSEPH CROSS, D.D., LL.D.
+
+
+KNIGHT-BANNERET: Sermons. 12mo, cloth,                $1.50
+
+EVANGEL: Sermons for Parochial Missions.
+  12mo, cloth                                          1.50
+
+EDENS OF ITALY. Profusely illustrated. 4to,
+  cloth, extra, gilt edges                             5.00
+
+Tree calf                                             12.00
+Morocco antique                                       12.00
+
+COALS FROM THE ALTAR: Sermons For
+  the Christian Year. Volume I., from Advent
+  to Ascension. Volume II., from Ascension to Advent.
+  12mo, cloth, each                                    1.50
+
+PAULINE CHARITY: Discourses on the
+  Thirteenth Chapter of Saint Paul's First
+  Epistle to the Corinthians. 12mo, cloth              1.50
+
+OLD WINE AND NEW: Occasional Discourses.
+  12mo, cloth                                          1.50
+
+
+THOMAS WHITTAKER,
+
+_PUBLISHER_,
+
+2 AND 3 BIBLE HOUSE......NEW YORK.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's note: Italicized text is indicated with _underscores_,
+bold text with +plus+ signs.  The oe-ligature character is shown as
+"[oe]".
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Old Wine and New, by Joseph Cross
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