71115
?/.
CNOX COLLEGE
TOfiONTO
CAYEN LIBRARY
KJiOX COLLEGE
TORONTO
at
AND IN OTHER PAETS OF SCOTLAND,
FROM 1846 TO 1853.
JOHN CHARLES CHAMBERS, M.A.,
LATE CIIANCELLOE OF THE CATHEDRAL OF S. NINIAN, PEETU.
V
TO SEKVE GOD IS NOTHING ELSE BUT TO DO GOOD AND SUFFER EVIL "
S. BERNARD.
LONDON:
JOSEPH MASTERS, ALDERSGATE STREET,
AND NEW BOND STREET.
EDINBURGH: GRANT & SON -, LENDRUM. ABERDEEN: BROWN & CO.
MDCCCLVII.
CAVEN LIBRARY
1NOX COLLEC1
TORONTO
71115
LONDON :
I RINTKl) BY JOSEPH MASTERS AND CO.
ALDEUSOATE STliEET.
ADVERTISEMENT,
THESE short Sermons, written under every disad
vantage, contain the teaching by which a congrega
tion was brought into existence in the Fair City.
Frequent Breakings of Bread and Prayers ; Baptisms
and Reconciliations ; Feeding CHRIST S lambs by
catechisings, and CHRIST S sheep by prophesyings ;
these in Perth brought and kept converts from
Presbyterianism to the Apostolic doctrine and fel
lowship. The Author wished to leave these Ser
mons as a testimony, that they who would attract
earnest Presbyterians to the Church must not ex
pect to do so by putting on surplices and reading
prayers out of a book, and delivering lectures on
Apostolic Succession : that they must offer the in
quirer for the Eternal Road something more real
than he already has, or can obtain, while separate
from the Church; that they must meet the deep
and constant wants of the soul by Absolution for
peace, and by the Most Holy Eucharist for nou-
IV ADVERTISEMENT.
rishment ; and never withhold through over-timidity,
or shallow policy, or blind tradition, aught which
may save a soul, or glorify GOD.
It is proper to add, that none of these Sermons
were preached after 1853, since which time the
Author wrote no more.
C N T E N T S.
SERMON I.
ALL SAINTS DAY.
" After this I beheld, and lo ! a great multitude." (Rev. vii. 9.) 1
SERMON II.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
"The night is far spent, the day is at hand." (Rom. xiii. 12.) 9
SERMON III.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
" The night is far spent, the day is at hand." (Rom. xiii. 12.) 19
SERMON IV.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
" The night is far spent, the day is at hand." (Rom. xiii. 12.) 28
SERMON V.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
" The night is far spent, the day is at hand." (Rom. xiii. 12.) 3S
SERMON VI.
THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DARKNESS.
"Till the LORD come, Who shall bring to light the hidden
things of darkness." (1 Cor. iv. 5.) . . 47
a 2
yi CONTENTS.
PAGE
SERMON VII.
DANGER OF GREAT PRIVILEGES.
" My heart is disquieted within me : and the fear of death is
fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me :
and an horrible dread hath overwhelmed me. And I said, Oh
that I had wings like a dove : for then would I flee away, and
be at rest. Lo, then would I get me away far off : and remain
in the wilderness." (Psalm Iv. 47.) . . 57
SERMON VIII.
THE MYSTERY OF BETHLEHEM. HOLY EUCHARIST.
" And there were shepherds in the same country abiding in
the field keeping watch over their flocks by night." (S. Luke
ii. 8.) -64
SERMON IX.
THE NEW YEAR A TYPE OF THE JUDGMENT DAY.
i! Behold, I make all things new." (Rev. xxi. 5.) .
SERMON X.
THE CHRISTIAN S CIRCUMCISION.
" And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising
of the Child." (S. Luke ii. 21.)
SERMON XI.
EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI.
" Now when JESUS was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the
days of Herod the King, Behold, there came Wise Men from the
East to Jerusalem." (S. Matt. ii. 1.) S>
SERMON XII.
EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI.
" And when they were come into the house, they saw the
young Child with Mary His Mother, and fell down, and wor
shipped Him : and when they had opened their treasures, they
presented unto Him gifts ; gold, frankincense, and myrrh." (S.
Matt. ii. 11.) 96
CONTENTS. vil
PAGE
SERMON XIII.
THE MYSTERY OF JORDAN HOLY BAPTISM.
" And lo, a voice from heaven, saying, This is My beloved SON,
in Whom I am well pleased." (S. Matt. iii. 17.) . . .106
SERMON XIV.
THE MYSTERY OF CANA TRANSELEMENTATION.
" This beginning of miracles did JESUS in Cana of Galilee, and
manifested forth His glory, and His disciples believed on Him."
(S. John ii. 11.) 114
SERMON XV.
THE CHRISTIAN S EPIPHANY.
To all who love His appearing," or " Epiphany." (2 Tim, iv. 8.) 123
SERMON XVI.
THE CHRISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM.
Behold, we go up to Jerusalem." (S. Luke xviii. 31.) . .133
SERMON XVII.
THE CHRISTIAN S BLINDNESS.
" And it came to pass, that as He was come nigh unto Jericho,
a certain blind -man sat by the way side begging." (S. Luke
xviii. 35.) 143
SERMON XVIII.
THE CHRISTIAN S PURIFICATION.
" And when the days of her purification according to the Law
of Moses were ended." (S. Luke ii. 22.) . .153
SERMON XIX.
EATING AND FASTING.
" Because thou hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded
thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: Cursed is the ground for
thy sake." (Gen. iii. 17.) .162
yiii CONTENTS.
PAGE
SERMON XX.
LENT : THE APOSTOLIC LIFE.
" In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger
and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness." (2 Cor.
xi. 27.) , . 17
SERMON XXI.
BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION.
" Then was JESUS led up of the Spirit into the wilderness, to
be tempted of the Devil." (S. Matt. iv. 1.)
SERMON XXII.
THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE.
" Then was JESUS led up of the Spirit into the wilderness."
(S. Matt. iv. 1.) 19
SERMON XXIII.
THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION.
"Then was JESUS led up of the Spirit into the wilderness, to
be tempted of the Devil." (S. Matt. iv. 1.)
199
SERMON XXIV.
RESULTS OF TEMPTATION.
" Then was JESUS led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be
tempted of the devil." (S. Matt. iv. 1.) . .208
SERMON XXV.
CHRIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE OF OURS.
" Then was JESUS led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be
tempted of the devil." (S. Matt. iv. 1.) . .217
SERMON XXVI.
THE TRIALS OF FASTING.
" And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He was
afterwards an hungred. And when the tempter came to Him,
he said, If Thou be the SON of GOD, command that these stones
be made Bread." (S. Matt. iv. 2, 3.) ..... 22-5
CONTENTS. ix
PAGE
SERMON XXVII.
OUR HEAL LIFE ETERNITY.
" LORD, make me to know mine end, and the measure of my
days, what it is; that I may know how frail I am." (Psalm
xxxix. 4. Bible Version.) ....... 234
SERMON XXVIII.
PRESENT FORETASTES OF ETERNITY.
" LORD, let me know mine end, and the number of my days :
that I may be certified how long I have to live." [What is yet
wanting to me. Vulg.] Psalm xxxix. 5. (Prayer-Book Version.) 242
SERMON XXIX.
TEMPTATIONS THROUGH THE KNOWLEDGE OF SIN.
" How then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against
GOD ?" Genesis xxxix. 9. .... 250
SERMON XXX.
CHRISTIAN SACRIFICE.
" Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had
offered Isaac his son upon the altar?" (S. James ii. 21.) . . 259
SERMON XXXI.
MOSES AT THE BUSH A TYPE OF CHRISTIANS.
" And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon GOD."
(Exodus iii. 6.) .... ..... 268
SERMON XXXII.
PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION.
" Behold, thy King cometh unto thee." (S. Matt. xxi. 5.) . 275
SERMON XXXIII.
THE LAST SCENE.
" And He said, It is finished. " (S. John xix. 30.) . . 285
x CONTENTS.
PAGE
, SERMON XXXIV.
THE DAILY BREAD.
" Give us this day our daily bread." (S. Matt. vi. 11.) . - 294
SERMON XXXV.
THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH.
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of
death, t will fear no evil : for Thou art Avith me, Thy rod and
Thy staff comfort me." (Psalm xxiii. 4.) .
SERMON XXXVI.
THE RESURRECTION OF THE FLESH.
" Always bearing about in the body the dying of the LORD
JESUS, that the life also of JESUS might be made manifest in our
body." (2 Cor. iv. 10.) . .310
SERMON XXXVII.
SPEAKING THE TRUTH IN LOVE.
" Speaking the truth in love." (Ephesians iv. 15.)
SERMON XXXVIII.
THE PRICE OF A SOUL.
" What shall a man give in exchange for his soul ?" (S. Mark
viii. 37.) ... .... 327
SERMON XXXIX.
ROGATION.
" Ye lust, and have not : ye kill, and desire to have, and can
not obtain ; ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask
not." (S. James iv. 2.) . ... 340
SERMON XL.
ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OF ADVENT.
" This same JESUS, Which is taken up from you into heaven,
shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into hea
ven." (Acts i. 11.) ... 350
CONTENTS. XI
PAGK
SERMON XLI.
SPIRIT AND MATTER.
" The Spirit of GOD moved upon the face of the waters." (Gen.
i. 2.) 358
SERMON XL1I.
SPIRIT AND MATTER.
" And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rush
ing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were
sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as
of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled
with the HOLY GHOST, and began to speak with other tongues,
as the Spirit gave them utterance." (Acts ii. 2 4.) . . . 368
SERMON XLIII.
THE MARKS OF JESUS.
"I bear in my body the marks of the LORD JESUS." (Gal.
vi. 17.) 376
SERMON XL1V.
WHAT IS LOVE ?
" Herein is love, not that we loved GOD, but that He loved us,
and sent His SON to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 S.
John iv. 10.) . 384
SERMON XLV.
EXAMPLE OF S. NINIAN.
" Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which
walk so as ye have us for an ensample." (Philip, iii. 17.) . . 392
SERMON XLVI.
RITUAL WORSHIP.
" And when He had taken the book, the four beasts and four
and twenty elders fell down before the LAMB, having every one
of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the
prayers of saints." (Rev. v. 8.) 401
Xll CONTENTS.
PAGE
SERMON XLVII.
OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION.
" Wherewith shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself
before the High GOD ? shall I come before Him with burnt-
offerings ? with calves of a year old ? Will the LORD be pleased
with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil ?
shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my
body for the sin of my soul ? He hath shewed thee, O man,
what is good ; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do
justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy GOD ?"
(Micah vi. 68.) .... .... 414
SERMON XL VIII.
THE TWOFOLD DEATH.
" The soul that sinneth, it shall die." (Ezekiel xviii. 4.) . 422
SERMON XLIX.
HOPE.
" Looking for that blessed hope." (Titus ii. 13.) . . . 432
SERMON L.
THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD.
" And hath made us kings and priests unto GOD and His FA
THER." (Rev. i. 6.) . 441
SERMON LI.
FAREWELL.
" Confirming the souls of the Disciples, and exhorting them to
continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation
enter into the kingdom of GOD." (Acts xiv. 22.) . . . 452
SERMON LII.
FAREWELL.
" Man goeth forth to his work and to his labour until the
evening." (Psalm civ. 23.) 459
SERMON I,
ALL SAINTS DAY,
ERRATUM.
Page 37, last line, for bled read humbled.
commemoration goes, would have been imperfect
without it. We have dealt with individual personi
fications of it on each festival, as it recurred in the
order of the Christian year ; but to-day it stands
before us in one Catholic reality. It is no longer
one or two saints, not S. Mary, or S. Peter, or S.
Andrew, not S. Philip and S. James, or S. Simon
and S. Jude, but " a great multitude." It is All
Saints Day we are met to sanctify to ourselves.
Nor again, only the saints of a particular Church,
not only British as S. Alban, and S. Etheldreda;
not only Scottish, as S. Ninian and S. Columba;
not only Frankish, as S. Martin and S. Hilary ; not
only Latin, as S. Ambrose and S. Gregory; not
xii CONTENTS.
PAGK
SERMON XLVII.
OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION.
" Wherewith shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself
before the High GOD ? shall I come before Him with burnt-
offerings ? with calves of a year old ? Will the LORD be pleased
with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil ?
shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my
body for the sin of my soul ? He hath shewed thee, O man,
what is good ; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do
justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy GOD ?"
(Micah vi. 68.) . -414
SERMON XLVIII.
THE TWOFOLD DEATH.
SERMON L.
THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD.
" And hath made us kings and priests unto GOD and His FA
THER." (Rev. i. 6.) 441
SERMON LI.
FAREWELL.
" Confirming the souls of the Disciples, and exhorting them to
continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation
enter into the kingdom of GOD." (Acts xiv. 22.) . . .452
SERMON LII.
FAREWELL.
" Man goeth forth to his work and to his labour until the
evening." (Psalm civ. 23.) 459
SERMON I.
ALL SAINTS DAY.
EEV. vii. 9.
"AFTER THIS I BEHELD, AND LO! A GREAT MULTITUDE."
TO-DAY we celebrate the complement and end of all
the festivals which we have been keeping since Ad
vent. Our communion of saints, so far as public
commemoration goes, would have been imperfect
without it. We have dealt with individual personi
fications of it on each festival, as it recurred in the
order of the Christian year ; but to-day it stands
before us in one Catholic reality. It is no longer
one or two saints, not S. Mary, or S. Peter, or S.
Andrew, not S. Philip and S. James, or S. Simon
and S. Jude, but " a great multitude." It is All
Saints Day we are met to sanctify to ourselves.
Nor again, only the saints of a particular Church,
not only British as S. Alban, and S. Etheldreda;
not only Scottish, as S. Ninian and S. Columba;
not only Frankish, as S. Martin and S. Hilary ; not
only Latin, as S. Ambrose and S. Gregory; not
2 ALL SAINTS DAY. [SEEM.
only African, as S. Cyprian and S. Augustine ; not
only Asiatic, as S. Nicolas and S. Catherine. All
the saints of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic
Church as it were meet us to-day and we them.
And not only these, and such as these, which the
Universal Church has singled out for recollection
according to the different patriarchates in which they
lived and died, but all upon whom the Everlasting
Eye gazes lovingly, and whom none but He can
comprehend. It is " a great multitude that no man
can number."
No wonder then that to-day we should be lost in
amazement as we try to bring before the eye of
faith this vision of what stands before the throne of
GOD. Like children taken for the first time to see-
any assemblage of natural and scientific wonders ;
or like the village swain come up to see the aston
ishing numbers which crowd the streets of one of
our vast cities of commerce, so it is with ourselves.
It is the immensity of the sight which makes it so
hard to realise it. And yet one day, strange to
think of, we shall, if we will, be amongst this great
multitude, and see with our bodily eye what we
have so often striven to penetrate by the medium of
faith. We have stood in a crowd of many thousands,
yet how more unutterably impressive a multitude of
many millions. That crowd was agitated by many
wills and many feelings, but this great multitude
has but one will and one feeling. It is all intent
upon one object the glory of Almighty GOD. All
earthly and carnal commixtures are purged out ;
i.] ALL SAINTS DAY. 3
the gold of the great Refiner has come forth from
His crucible without any adhesion of dross. The vast
company has but one heart and one soul, and that one
soul is GOD. O stupendous idea ! O inconceivable
conceit ! Not for two or three hours once a week
imperfectly, hurriedly, interruptedly, but for ever
and ever is the redeemed Body one with its ado
rable Head, ever seeing the beatific vision, ever
hymning the unceasing Hallelujah, ever following
the LAMB whithersoever He goeth, ever listening to
the voice of the Father of Spirits. And this oneness
will seem the more impossible, if ye only think how
hard it is to fix our affections or mind upon GOD
alone for a brief space of time : how many interrup
tions, how many wanderings, how many distractions,
how many surprises. What will it be to do so for
ever in so innumerable a multitude, where the ob
jects of sense must be continually new ? Lest then
we should fail in that day to come and stand amongst
the redeemed, let us begin now to bend an earnest
gaze upon them. To the Eye of the Eternal, to
Whom there is no such thing as time, hours, days,
or years, this sight is ever before Him. Let it be
so with us, let us scan the persons who are our fel
lows in this everlasting scene, that so we may cleave
to them for ever.
For it is not the character of one saint that we
have to-day to impress upon ourselves, but we are
to try and work into ourselves that sanctity which
envelopes them all. It is not as when we studied
the boldness of Peter, or the zeal of Simon, or the
B a
4 ALL SAINTS DAY. [SEEM.
lovingness of John, or the faith of Andrew, or the
justice of James, or the penitence of Magdalene, or
the lowly obedience of the Blessed Virgin. None
of these studies it may be exactly suited our
case. But in this great multitude there is a model
for every state or condition of life. We shall find
saintliness to be not merely an attribute of one age
of the Christian Church, but common to all. Here
is an answer to any who would excuse themselves
from its pursuit, as though the times are changed
and habits and manners different from those of the
first centuries of the Christian era. " I could have
done this or that," says one, " but I cannot endure
this trial." Here, however, is one who passed
through this very trial. It is the great mart of
holiness, at which is exposed every possible article
of use. You will see troops of children, who came
forth from the little furnaces of the afflictions of their
age ; some having shown wonderful patience during
painful disease or fretting sickness, or lowly meek
ness amidst harsh and cruel treatment from those
who should have stood in their parents place ; or
trust in GOD as some sudden accident carried them
to another and a better world. Some again, who
were not suffered to stay here below, after they had
been patterns of diligence in their daily tasks of
mental or bodily labour ; who only cared to please a
master or a parent by untiring, persevering toil.
Others again who grow up into this blessed com
pany amidst the most ungenial companions, the
most irreligious parents, or the most careless bre-
i.] ALL SAINTS DAY. 5
thren. Some flower here so fragrant, that the
foulest atmosphere could not retard its growth.
Some mirror here so pure and pellucid that no noi
some breath of corruption would tarry thereon.
Here they are at last come to the CnRiST-child,
Whom they so often visited at Christmas, cradled
in the manger, or bemoaned at Circumcision, shed
ding His infantine blood, or were gladdened to see
in good old Simeon s arms at Candlemas. Hands
that would not give blow for blow tongues that
would not render evil words for evil ; eyes that
flinched not from truth and uprightness ; feet that
would not go in forbidden ways. All these are here
with this chosen band of little ones. Or here may
be some young lamb that wandered and was well-
nigh lost, but the Good Shepherd brought it back
through penitence and tears amidst the joy of its
fellows. What a sight is this for you, my children,
as you think of these little white-robed saints stand
ing before the throne of GOD ! What encourage
ment to you in your little difficulties and trials, to
know that the like was felt and experienced by a
great multitude of little ones before you who have
entered into the joy of their LORD.
But we, your elders, see too our types and cha
racters amongst this great multitude. Amongst
them are some who came forth stamped with the
sign of saintliness from the vigour of manhood the
weakness of womanhood, and the infirmities of age.
Young men and maidens who forewent long-indulged
hopes of mutual help and society in order that they
G ALL SAINTS DAT. [SEEM.
might tend a sickly or enfeebled relative, and fainted
not under the burden of ministering to capricious
and passionate minds, and were thus fashioned by
the hand of the Almighty Artificer to be meeter for
higher places in His building than else they could
have been. Meek wives who at last sunk under
their patient endurance of ill usage and neglect at
the hands of their wretched partners. Parents left
to die alone and in poverty by their heartless and
ungrateful children, yet accepting their lot as a
punishment for their evil training of them. Some
to whom sickness and disease had become a second
nature, so that the men of this world marvelled to
see them dragging on a useless and painful exist
ence, but who were thereby perfected. Others who
though possessed of great riches, yet in the midst of
their luxury and splendour were poor in spirit, and
sanctified their estate by secret self-denial and mor
tification. Or poor beggars, living by daily alms,
fed as it were by Elijah s ravens, never knowing
where they could look for a second meal, yet
caught up to join Lazarus in Abraham s bosom.
Holy kings wearing the hermit s sackcloth beneath
their gorgeous robes of state. Dull and ignorant of
book lore peasants, yet by prayer and meditation
purified in their mind s eye to behold what escaped
the perception of the acute student and philosopher.
And wise scholars too are there, who learnt in the
vastness of their intellectual attainments only to
humble themselves before the Eternal, and confess
the weakness of human learning. Some who though
I.] ALL SAINTS DAT. 7
surrounded by the seductive attractions of a false
popular system of religion, yet held fast to the faith
of their childhood amidst taunts and reproaches and
unfounded imputations the only form which the
spirit of persecution dares in these days to assume.
There too are those gentle spirits whose peculiar
ministry on earth seemed to be to set men at one
who had been separated to speak words of peace
and unity to hush the loud voice of discord and
division. Those too who were ever content to bear
all things, believe all things, and hope all things
ever rendering good for evil ever giving back kind
and healing words ever suffering, but never re
turning evil. Here are they who became saints
amidst the everyday dull plodding work of this life,
to whom every act, however menial and low and
trivial, became hallowed by its dedication to Al
mighty GOD. Men wondered to see them as they
travelled on in the fellowship of their Master and
SAVIOUR, and they themselves knew not at times
who it was that made their hearts burn within them
as He held converse with them by the way. Yet
they are all here, safe housed in their everlasting
home. The billows and storms of this world can no
longer reach them as they stand on their watch-
tower, waiting for the last vessel that shall cross the
heavenly Jordan, freighted with the precious cargo
of redeemed souls. And we the while, brethren,
abide in the world, miserable and dark and joyless
as it is ; yet gaze at these victors, and listen to their
Hallelujahs of triumph, and behold their palm
8 ALL SAINTS DAY.
branches of victory. None of you but are treading
in the same footsteps of many in this vast multitude.
They were men like you of like passions of like
infirmities of like frailties, in the same conditions
and circumstances of life ; compassed about with
similar inclinations and dispositions of evil ; yet the
white robes now are theirs and they are in rest.
May this vision of All Saints quicken and stir and
rouse our wearied and jaded limbs, that we may run
the remainder of the race more steadily unto the
heavenly goaL
SERMON II.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
EOM. xiii. 12.
" THE NIGHT IS TAE SPENT, THE DAT IS AT HAND."
ADVENT-TIDE is once more here. It is to us the
trump of the archangel proclaiming CHRIST at
hand. What the bell is to the church-goer or the
mourner, that Advent is to the Christian year. It
is a solemn calling unto the creature from its CREA
TOR ; and the natural season when it occurs is suit
able to the lesson it conveys. Earth is robbed of
all its beauty, the flowers are faded and the leaves
are withered, the day is shortened and darkness
lengthened ; so that the night is indeed far spent
before He Who is the Day-Star of the soul can
appear. All around is, compared with what has
passed, a dreary wilderness. Earth has no more
joy nor brightness for awhile ; the cold northern
blast eats into our flesh, and the ice hangs about
our very faces congealing the life-blood in our veins.
All about us is a wilderness, the havens are teem
ing with the masts of weather-bound vessels. The
10 THE FIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
plough of the husbandman rests idle because of the
frozen soil, and the house that was building, and
the works that were in progress, are like a hive
deserted by its bees.
Fit place surely this for hearing a voice like that
of the Baptist moving us to repent because of the
nearness of GOD S kingdom. Men have time to
listen, if they will hear, to the awful sound, " The
night is far spent, and the day is at hand." The
night of the natural year is near its height, the day
is soon to dawn, the singing of birds and the bud
ding of flowers. It is a type and figure of the spi
ritual ; the night of the Church militant here on
earth, soon to be succeeded by the day of the
Church at rest and triumphant in heaven. Advent-
tide is again returned, let us fix our hearts on its
lessons. We are so much each one of us nearer
our end heaven or hell is so much the less distant
the world, and whatsoever we prize in this world,
so much the more unfolding our grasp. The last
scene is becoming more distinctly visible ; the mor
tal sickness, the giving up the ghost, the cerements
of the grave, the mourners going about the streets.
We are to speak after the manner of men so much
nearer CHRIST S coming, Who in truth is ever nigh,
Who hath neither beginning nor end of days, from
Whom in reality there can be no nearness or dis
tance of time. We have so much less time to live
here ; so many sands of the hour-glass of life have
run down. The future, whatever remains to us of
it, is all that is sure ; the past is no longer ours, but
II.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 11
registered in the everlasting book of GOD. And
each time that Advent has returned, we have had
this same warning voice sounding in our ears, "The
night is far spent, and the day is at hand."
It was that we might begin our Christian year
well, that we might call to mind for Whom it is we
have to prepare, for what Bridegroom we have to
trim our lamps during the year that is coming ; for
the day of the LORD is very great and very terrible,
which few if any shall abide. It is the voice of the
herald in the fight, bidding us remember the cause
of battle and the exceeding reward to the victor, to
inspire our arms with fresh vigour and renewed
ambition, " Soul, in all thou doest, look on to the
coming of thy Judge." And again, " Soul, in all
thou doest look to the indwelling of thy SAVIOUR.
Whether thou prayest or workest, whether thou
fastest or givest alms, do all as one in whom
CHRIST dwells, do all as one whom CHRIST will
judge. Resolve at this season to do all as be
comes one united to CHRIST, and as the account
you must one day give requires. You are weak
and feeble in yourself, and yet, as in CHRIST, you
are strong, and must be judged as having been
once partaker of Him. Your night is far spent,
your day is at hand. How you spend the re
mainder of this world s night, may determine the
lot which the dawning of the Great Day shall cast
up. And this the more,- if you can number your
sixty, fifty, forty, thirty, or even twenty summers.
The world s race, which, when you started from
12 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
childhood s goal, seemed so joyous and blithesome,
lags and drags as the tide of life carries you on.
Toil and cares, disappointments and vexations, un
requited loves and wounded affections, blighted
hopes and blasted prospects, sickness and infirmity,
stern dealing with ourselves because of our past
sins ; all these may have darkened the light of day,
and made the day of existence a long night. We
have no longer youth s buoyant floating upon the
ocean of life, but drift below the surface toward the
shore. Or again, those we loved with the un-
dimmed sincerity of early youth are gone ; the hand
that pressed ours is cold in the grave ; the eyes that
beamed and the voices that whispered have ceased
alike their lustre and their music. We cannot re
place the void in our hearts, nor repeople the silence
of our dwellings. We are alone in the world, the
last of our race, or kindred, or companions, we have
outlived all. How gloomy to sit thus lonely through
this long night, which gets gradually darker as we
advance in years. What we eat and drink now
affords no relish ; our former pleasures and amuse
ments pall on the mind. We have none to interest
themselves in us or in whom ourselves to be inte
rested. How terrible for one to have thought this
life all, and now to begin to cast it away as unsatis
fying to the immortal spirit ! The infirmities creep
on one by one, and filch from us piecemeal the only
things which make life endurable. The eye can no
more ponder its favourite studies ; the ear no more
its accustomed gossip. We can now no more rejoice
II.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 13
in the sweet smelling of flowers, nor in the singing of
birds. We can no longer trip over the glades or dells,
or climb the mountains. All our senses which made
this world too near, and the world to come too far
off are decaying and corrupting. Gradually the
light of our day has gone down, and the darkness
come on. And we feel that the night gets darker
and gloomier, so that we long more and more for
that day which is at hand, the day without night,
the light without darkness, the perfect day of GOD
in heaven. It is that darkness of which the Wise
Man preaches, " Remember now thy Creator in the
days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor
the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no
pleasure in them ; while the sun, or the light, or the
moon, or the stars be not darkened ; nor the clouds
return after the rain. In the day when the keepers
of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall
bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they
are few, and those that look out of the windows be
darkened ; and the doors shall be shut in the streets
when the sound of the grinding is low, and he
shall rise up at the voice of the bird ; and all the
daughters of music shall be brought low. Also
when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and
fears shall be in the way, and the almond-tree shall
flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and
desire shall fail."
Thus poetically, and yet minutely, does Scripture
speak of the weakness of age. That night is drawing
nearer and nearer, infirmities of body and mind alike
14 THE NIGHT OE LIFE. [SEEM.
grow upon us. Memory fails, so that the mind itself
is so dark that we cannot read its tablets. The
scholar pushes aside his books, for he can no more
pursue his studies as of old. The merchant can no
more trust himself to investigate the labyrinths of in
tricate accounts. The artisan s hand trembles so that
he can no more be trusted to perform the delicate
workmanship of his youth. The worn-out labourer
sits by the fire as though waiting for a call to de
part, for his task is done, and life is a burden, be
cause he can no more toil to support life and make
it tolerable. The hollo wness and shadowy semblance
of all things is daily manifesting itself; the gilding
and outward decoration is gradually removing and
displaying the counterfeit. Riches hardly and care
fully won satisfy not, now we have time to count
their value and what they have cost us to get
them. They cannot cast a light on the gloom of
ill-health, or the weakness of age. They cannot re
deem lost loved ones, or purchase new friends.
They cannot cheer the sadness of depressed spirits,
or comfort the misery of a mind diseased. They
cannot check the advance of death, most terrible ad
versary to them who have aught in this world
whereon to fix their hearts and affections. How
awful to feel that we are masters of all save our own
life whereon our possession depends ! How sad to
feel that we have gotten all that the soul yearned for
in this world, only to know that it hath nothing
substantial and real to rest on ! Or we have arrived
at the pinnacle of our ambition honour, fame,
IT.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 15
glory, triumph, all are ours, yet one breath may
sweep away all, like the scenes in a play. It is the
sharpest pang of all to be aware that all our earthly
pride and enjoyment hangs upon a thread. It takes
away the whole brilliancy of the jewel in the coronet,
when we learn that it may not last a moment. Let
us ponder well in this frame of mind, " I am rich,
but soon I must go out of this world as naked as I
came into it, I have great possessions but now a
few feet of earth will be all that I can call mine
I must exchange all my purple and fine linen for the
shroud and winding-sheet, my warm, comfortable,
and luxurious home for the cold grave." Or " I am
now above most of my fellows in rank, but I shall
soon be below all. I am treated with respect and
reverence, but I shall soon be trodden under foot
I have much in my power, many dependents and
courtiers, but soon I shall not even have power over
myself: others shall bind me and carry me whither
I would not. I shall be impotent, passive and
powerless in the tomb." Or again, " I am beautiful,
I have many admirers, artists have tried their skill
on me, to represent my form and beauty. Yet soon
corruption will do its work, and I shall be loathed
and avoided as the foulest of created things. I shall
say unto the worm, Thou art my sister, and to
the grave, Thou art my brother." Or again, "I
am learned, my wisdom is spoken of by all ; I can
speak almost every language of men. I understand
all sciences. Mankind regard me as an oracle ; yet
soon all will vanish away, for there is neither wis-
16 THE NIGHT OP LIFE. [SEEM.
dom, nor knowledge, nor device in the grave whither
I am going." Such are the thoughts which must
make the day of this life night, which cast a
shadow over the brightest light of this lower world,
which dim and dull the brilliancy of gold and
silver ; which wither the palm-branch of the con
queror, the chaplet of the poet, and plant cypresses
beside the myrtles.
Believe me then, brethren, when I say even in re
gard to the transitory nature of this world s pomp
and gladness, that the night is far spent and the day
is at hand. What you count day is not truly day,
but night. You may have fancied otherwise ; you
may not have penetrated beyond the surface. But
the sea may look calm and glassy, and yet beneath
those still waves many a brave ship lies, many a stout
seaman sleeps. The tranquil repose of its waters
and the gentle gales tempt you forth on its bosom,
and you spread the sails, and you stand out to sea.
How soon the storm gathers, and the waters rage,
and the illusion vanishes ! It is as though the sunny
beams in winter bid you go forth to bask in warmer
air, and soon you wrap your garments about you as
before. Must you have some severe lesson taught
you to discern the truth from deception, the reality
from the substance ? Must you have sickness and
disease, wasting consumption, ingratitude of friends,
poverty and distress, to show you how the fashion
of this world passeth away ? It is then night and
not day, and we know not how far spent to each one
of us it is. We know not what more of sorrow, of
II.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 17
anguish, of pain, of distress, of regret, of weariness,
of care is in reserve for us. To some of us it may
be only evening. The sun of this life may be only
just sinking below the horizon, and dipping his rays
in the ocean to many of us. Yet still the shades of
night are hastening on, we have left morn behind,
and it must grow darker and darker till the true
day dawns. It is night though it seems day, out
ward circumstances only lift the veil which hides the
truth from us, only fan into a flame the embers
falsely smouldering beneath our feet. Oh ! then be
lieve it to be night, and ye will then long for the day,
long for His coming Who shall lighten this dark
ness. Whether ye believe it or no, the true day is
at hand, and ye know not how soon to each of you.
There will be no more gloom, no more despair, no
more fever of body or mind, no more perplexity and
doubt ; no more groping our way as blind men ; no
more grief; no more tears ; no more darkness. He
Who is the Light of the world, the Sun of Righteous
ness, the bright and morning star is nigh. O gird
you then the vesture of light ; look carefully on
your baptismal robes, and seek to purify and cleanse
their spots and stains. Cast away from you all that
belongs to this world s night : its false joys, its de
lusive pleasures, its phantom lights, its anxieties and
its hopes. All will look dim and faded when the
day dawns. The best light of earth will seem poor
and miserable at His approach Who cometh. Bet
ter to sit on the ground without false light for a
while and at last be gladdened for ever by true light,
18 THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
than to mock ourselves with the semblances and
shadows of this world. " The day is at hand."
Soon our Beloved will speak and say unto us,
" Rise up, My love, My fair one, and come away, for
lo ! the winter is past, the rain is over and gone ;
the flowers appear on the earth ; the time of the
singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle
is heard in our land. The fig-tree putteth forth her
green figs, and the vines with the tender grapes give
a good smell. Arise, My love, My fair one, and
come away."
SEEM ON III.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
ROM. xin. 12.
"THE NIGHT IS FAB SPENT, THE DAY IS AT HAND."
WE have said of the baptized that they are children
of the light and of the day ; we have said that they
are not of the night nor of darkness except through
any habit of sin the light which was in them has
become darkness. In what sense is it true of the
good Christian that to him " the night is far spent,
and the day is at hand ?" I am not now going to
speak of the sorrows and distresses the cares and
the miseries the disappointments and dissatisfac
tions the pain and the sickness, which often to the
best of us turn this world s day into night. All these
things indeed make and are probably intended to
make the good long for the true day wherein shall
be no darkness of poverty or grief no trials and
hardships to cast even a shadow upon the brightness
of their blessedness. Nor again do I mean to speak
c2
20 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
of those signs of CHRIST S second Advent which
tend to make us fear the end is nigh. I purpose
rather to suggest to you other considerations which
make even the most holy men feel the light of this
life to be darkness, and urge them to long and wish
for the dawning of the everlasting day.
And first of all let me observe how great is the
error of those who imagine that even holiness and
righteousness, so long as their possessors are in a
world of sin and wickedness, have unalloyed light
and joy attached to them. Young Christians, those
who have but lately begun to think seriously about
their soul s estate and devote themselves to a more
regular religious life, oft fancy that the way of
eternal life will lose its straitness, and henceforth
blossom with perennial flowers. And so Scripture
seems to assure them when it says that the path of
the just is as a shining light increasing in brightness
until the perfect day. In one sense this is true ;
GOD is the light of His obedient people and a lantern
to their paths ; He ever directs and guides them,
and never forsakes them to grope and feel for their
way to heaven. The saints have a joy which no
man taketh from them a peace which the world
cannot give the hope of salvation an anchor of
the soul, sure and stedfast a faith which through
the veil of sacraments and ordinances feeds upon
GOD. Theirs is the love which feeds their hungry
brethren, clothes the naked, visits the sick, which,
in loving their brother whom they have seen, loves
Him Whom they have not seen ; love, which in that
III.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 21
GOD Himself is love, is a very earnest of future bliss
and pledge of immortality. Theirs is to cling to
the Cross and cast its wood into the bitter waters
of this world and so sweeten the toils and the diffi
culties, the vexations and humiliations, the agonies
and torments of earthly woes, that they only bring
them nearer to JESUS their hope and stay. Theirs
is no stammering voice of conscience no uncertain
sound of the trumpet ; but they hear a voice ever
calling to them when they turn either to the right
hand or to the left. Surely this is light and not
darkness, day and not night. Yet what is this com
pared with the bliss which is in store ? What are
one or more battles won to peace ? When we
think of the bright unclouded glories of heaven,
how dark is even the Christian s day. " Now we
see through a glass darkly all things, but then face
to face." "We walk by faith, not by sight."
Faith is but a help to the blind or distant spectator.
And so it needs must be that even the faithful have
but a dark and dim view of heavenly bliss. Thus
we gaze on till the eyes are weary, till they almost
refuse their office and a mist gather betwixt us and
the King in His beauty very far off.
Still more if we contemplate the terrors that
surround the Christian from the crafts and as
saults of the devil. Solemn indeed is that Scripture
which the Western Church reads in her office of
prayer at bed-time, " Brethren, be sober, be vigi
lant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring
lion goeth about, seeking whom he may devour,
22 THE NIGHT OF LIPE. [SEEM.
whom resist steadfast in the faith." How striking
the thought that, when this feeble body needs its
daily rest, then it is most exposed to the machina
tions of the enemy of souls. Then is it, as a hea
then philosopher has expressed it, that the higher
powers of the mind sleep and the inferior waken.
What a picture is this of our continual dangers.
When we might most reckon on ease and peace from
Satan, then he presses on us with fiercer rage and
greater violence ; and so the more closely we walk
with GOD, the more fierce are his temptations. It
was after CHRIST S baptism the devil tempted Him ;
yea, in that His wondrous fasting in the wilderness.
And when next did he visit Him? Was it not
when He girded up Himself to die for the sins of
the world that His soul was exceeding sorrowful, even
unto death ? Thus we experience the contrary of
what we once hoped. The nearer we approach our
home the hotter is the warfare and the more dreadful
is the conflict. Continual prayer brings with it
wandering and foolish thoughts. Self-denial of all
sorts whether a little abstinence or entire mortifi
cation whether a harder life chosen for CHRIST S
sake or voluntary poverty this leads in its train
murmuring and regret, a looking back unto the
cities of the plain. Frequent communions have
connected with them a deadness and coldness which
suits not with the excited fervour of young con
verts. Almsgiving ministers to pride and self-
righteousness, and indeed all living above the world
all separation from the follies and pleasures of
III.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE, 23
life tends to work this. Satan has a trap laid for
all devotion of ourselves to GOD ; no good work can
we do but he labours to mar it. He leaveth us for
a season only when we resist him ; never till he has
conquered or death has removed us out of his power.
What, my brethren, is this but night, wherein the
prince of darkness is so strong and terrible ? What
is this but night far spent when the more we press
to the light, the blacker is the darkness made to
surround us ?
Again, the more we know ourselves the more dark
does the night of our souls become. All the most
holy men have most deplored their own sinfulness.
The nearer they drew to the light of GOD S dwelling
the darker seemed their light. Self-knowledge is
the first step in holiness ; and it is the last, the
alpha and omega of our spiritual life. He who
would be holy must sit down first and review his
whole life, just as a physician must acquaint himself
with the whole constitution of his patients, ere he
can apply a cure to their diseases, so we must study
our whole selves as developed in our past lives.
We know not ourselves by selecting this or that
part of our life for review ; and this knowledge of
ourselves is but slow and progressive. At first we
can hardly remember anything ; afterwards it seems
as though the tongue could not utter or pen de
scribe the shortcomings and backslidings of the
past. It was only at the end of Job s heartsearch-
ing trials that he exclaimed, " I have heard of Thee
by the hearing of the ear ; but now mine eye seeth
24 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
Thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust
and ashes." We at last begin to see ourselves as GOD
sees us, and not as man flatters us. We by degrees
recall our excuses and palliations. As CHRIST
clothes us with Himself, the more foul seems our
natural nakedness. As He washes us in His own
blood, the more loathsome does our defilement ap
pear. The more He fills us with light, the darker
does the heart He chooses for His indwelling display
itself. As we approach the day, night shows her
darkness the most. And so it is, brethren, in that
Sacrament, wherein the LORD and Giver of light
knits us to JESUS most closely. Where do we feel
most abasement most prostration of soul most
utter unworthiness most perfect humility but when
we draw nigh to the awful Sacrifice ? Where else
do we confess in such hearty sorrow " the remem
brance of them is grievous unto us, the burden of
them is intolerable ?" Every time we receive the
Body and Blood of the LORD we feel more and more
humbled. " Let a man examine himself, and so let
him eat of that bread and drink of that chalice."
As frequent Communions suppose frequent exami
nations of ourselves, they tend to increase our know
ledge of ourselves, and our humiliation of ourselves
in the sight of GOD. And so the longer we live we
say the Penitential Psalms with greater reality and
fervour ; we feel that though we grow in holiness,
yet we also grow in a sense of our sinful ness. The
very victory we have accomplished over this or that
evil passion or lust makes it still more sad that so
many petty weaknesses remain so many infirmities
III.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 25
of temper or will so many evil inclinations and
desires. Our having checked outward sin renders
our proneness to inward sin more disgraceful and
intolerable. Such is the principle on which the
best of us may say, " The night is far spent and the
day is at hand."
Once more ; there is no period when the good
Christian can say of himself, " I am sure of heaven."
Even in the hour of death he may fall away ; so
that we need to join heartily in that prayer in the
Office of the Dead, " O holy and merciful SAVIOUR,
suffer us not, at our last hour, for any pains of
death, to fall from Thee." The holy child does
not always grow up to a sainted old age. Amidst
the temptations of Satan, the corruption of the
human heart, and the evil example of the world
about us, the best of us must always be working
out his salvation with fear and trembling. Thus in
the Office for Evensong we are taught to pray for
" that peace which the world cannot give," because
the best peace in this life is but imperfect and un
certain. Death only brings the full and perfect
rest stills the anxiety of warfare and the clangour
of arms. The child prays that he may pass through
the storms of youthful passions ; the youth that he
may be saved through the cares and seductive
pleasures of manhood ; the man that he may pre
serve the hope of eternal life amidst the breakers of
the murmuring and fretfulness of old age; the old
man that death may not at the last cause his faith
to fail. O ! terrible thought for the greyhaired
victor to lose his palm-branch now after so many
26 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
hardly-won battles ! What a night far spent is this,
wherein death only binds us fast to the Rock of
Ages ! wherein we ever fear lest through some
subtle bosom sin all our past watching and praying,
our confessions and communions, our fasting and
almsdeeds, our mortification and choice of hard
lives should be undermined and destroyed ! What
but night that in which we know not whether we
shall ever come to the day of eternal joy, but lose
our way only to be cast in the end into everlasting
darkness. Press on, my brethren, through the
darkness of this night unto the coming day. All
the fierceness of the devil s temptations, the more
terrible it rages, whether in craft or violence, only
proclaims the night far spent and the day at hand.
All the abhorrence and loathing of our own corrup
tions and infirmities, which the perfect knowledge
of ourselves produces, utters the same cry. All the
fear and trembling lest at the last our life-long obe
dience should be in vain, and one dreadful fall make
of no effect a long walking with GOD, calls to us to
wish the day nearer and the night at an end. Let
this Advent-cry, which all things in this weary life
lift up, stir you up to watch for the day, which
begins your only and eternal rest. It is night now
spiritually as well as literally even to the most ad
vanced Christian. Even the adorable Sacrament is
but night to that fulness of bread wherewith we
shall be fed, when our GOD shall feed us and the
LAMB shall lead us beside the fountains of living
waters, never more to hunger, never more to thirst.
III.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 27
" Blessed JESUS, let Thy light come and shine on
this our darkness. Even in the midst of this night,
let us see Thy rays if it be only for a season, lest we
faint and lose our way in this pathless world. Be
Thou our pillar of fire to guide us through this
wilderness in the gloom of doubts and difficulties,
distrusts, and fears. " Abide with us, LORD, for
it is towards evening, and the day is far spent."
Let us say with a good Bishop, " As day has its
evening, so also has life ; the even of life is age, age
has overtaken me, make it bright unto me. Cast
me not away in the time of age ; forsake me not
when my strength faileth me. Even to my old age
be Thou He, and even to hoar hairs carry me ; do
Thou make, do Thou bear, do Thou carry and de
liver me. Abide with me, LORD, for it is toward
evening, and the day is far spent of this fretful life.
Let Thy strength be made perfect in my weakness."
" Lighten mine eyes that I sleep not in death ;
deliver me from the terror by night, the pestilence
that walketh in darkness." " The LORD bless us,
and keep us, and show the light of His countenance
upon us, and be merciful unto us, the LORD lift up
the light of His countenance upon us." So let us
pray through this long night, and very soon the
morning star shall be seen again in the East, and
the sons of GOD shall shout for joy. " Now unto the
blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings and
LORD of lords, Who only hath immortality, dwelling
in the light which no man can approach unto, Whom
no man hath seen or can see, be ascribed, as is most
due, all glory for ever and ever. Amen."
SEEM ON IV.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
KOM. mi. 12.
"THE NIGHT IS TAB SPENT, THE DAY IS AT HAND."
IN Holy Scripture darkness is continually taken as
a figure or type of sin, and often put for sin itself.
Thus Ham, or Egypt, the house of bondage of the
Israelites, representing the captivity of the sinner,
means darkness. And the Apostle S. John says
of the man who hates his brother, that he "is in
darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth
not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath
blinded his eyes."
Again, S. Paul reminds the baptized Ephesians
that they " were sometimes darkness but now light
in the LORD." And still more appropriately to our
present subject, he addresses the Thessalonian
Christians, " Ye, brethren, are not in darkness that
that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all
the children of light and the children of the day ;
we are not of the night nor of darkness." In the
same spirit the devil is called the prince of darkness,
THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 29
and the wicked are said to be cast into outer dark
ness. Hence the ancient Church in her baptismal
forms, bade the baptized turn his back upon the
west as the place of darkness, and worship toward
the east as the place of light. And thus Advent
calls to us in these solemn words of the Epistle,
" The night is far spent, the day is at hand."
For what indeed is this life to the sinner but
night-darkness ? It is the nature of sin to darken
the soul to stand between it and the light of GOD
to intercept and cut off the Presence of the SA
VIOUR to cast out the influence of the illuminating
Spirit. Any one sin wilfully committed and per
severed in may have the effect of clouding that di
vine nature whereof we by baptism are partakers.
What must it be to live and die without the influ
ence of GOD S grace upon the soul ? What must it
be to become a dry and arid soil which no rain of
the ALMIGHTY can soften ? What must it be to sit
captive in a dark and gloomy cell, whither the light
of day never penetrates ? What must it be to travel
at night in a pathless forest, in which the road be
comes gradually more intricate and tangled, while
the wayfaring man looks in vain for a star or dim
cottage light to guide his wanderings ? What, if in
sad despair, the weary one cannot protract his search
till day dawn, but lays him down on the cold
ground to die ? All these images but faintly picture
to us the state of the sinner. For the state of the na
tural man is darkness as we see it fully developed
in nations among whom the Gospel is but partially
30 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
or in no way preached. We see wickedness prevail
ing in Christian countries indeed, but there is a
check, an unseen arm holding back the sinning
Christian or pursuing him with the lash of con
science. But in heathen lands vice goes on like the
spreading of fire, and assumes its most loathsome
and degrading aspect. There intellectual progress
but little stays the evil. Learning and philosophy
of themselves are no barriers against the immorality
of human nature. The soul may be dismal and
dreary in the midst of the light of human wisdom.
CHRIST alone is the True Light. All other lights are
false and miserable. Nor is it otherwise when the
baptized return to the state of unregenerate nature.
Once severed from the Head, the member has no
vitality.
As the night of ignorance of GOD and superstition
was far spent, when CHRIST came in great humility,
so is it with the sinner, who knows not how soon
He may come to him. What a long night must it
be to one who has lived hitherto without Him, Who
is the Light of the world ? Nothing is more dis
agreeable to the body than being in darkness. What
must it be for the soul to be unconscious of the
Presence of its Maker ? CHRIST by, but we not able
to see Him ? GOD nigh, but we far off? Light all
glorious and dazzling to all around us, but we shut
in from its rays ? We all know how readily the eye
becomes accustomed to the gradual diminution of
light, and how pained it is by any sudden withdrawal
of it. Let the shades of evening come on slowly
IV.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 31
and imperceptibly, and the eye pursues its labours
till the night comes. It would not be so if night all
at once drew on. So with the soul s darkness it
is not all at once. It has child s morning, youth s
midday eventide of manhood, and night of old age.
Sin would be too shocking to the soul, if the black
ness of its darkness all at once were to cloud its
light. Let us look back upon our baptismal gar
ments, when we first received them from the foun
tain of our SAVIOUR S blood. How long remained
they white and spotless ? A few years and I see a
dark spot upon them, which every year spreads and
grows more filthy. The child goes forth from the
Church into the world at morning dawn, to pant
and strive with his noontide passions as they scorch
and dry up the baptismal dew, and at eventide hangs
like a blasted and withered bough upon the Tree of
Life. What is that sin which stained youth s inno
cence and blighted the flowers of Christian vigour ?
Let us remember the hour when we first heard the
voice of the serpent in the garden, and first hid our
selves from the ALMIGHTY amongst the trees of the
garden. We stayed to parley, instead of turning
away. We stayed to ponder on the sinful object
Satan placed in our way, to look upon its pleasant
appearance, and anticipate its taste ; to antedate
its effects and slight the commandment. It may be
we went no further, nor have gone further since.
Yet we may have accustomed ourselves thus to
listen to the Evil One in his varied temptations. So
far our souls are darkened. Satan cannot whisper
32 THE NIGHT OE LIFE. [SEEM.
and be listened to without poisoning with his foul
breath. He cannot be an inmate for a few minutes
without leaving some mark of hell. Consider what
it is to go on in this habit of secret correspondence
with the enemy ? We do not, it is true, go over
openly to him and desert our post, but we are as
detestable in the sight of our General as if we were
convicted of desertion. Though he knew it not, yet
our own consciences would destroy all pleasure in
meeting him. How is it with us when we think of
meeting One Who trieth the reins and the hearts ?
How must our faces gather blackness when He
comes to bring to light the hidden things of dark
ness ? We are tied and bound with a habit of in
ward unfaithfulness which grows upon us till we
find an excuse for every sin against GOD. " The
night is far spent." The light of GOD has by de
grees become darkened, so that we can hardly dis
cern good from evil, sweet from bitter and bitter
from sweet. We are conscious of a change we feel
that some of our strength has departed from us, so
that we cannot rise and go about as at other times.
There is less light than formerly, we are forced to
stoop, and bend, and grope our way where we used
to walk on erect and confident. The moral sense
has received a blow, and its acuteness is stunned
and dulled. Even the sinner himself feels at times
that this his soul s night is far spent.
Still more if to the rebellion of the mind we add
that of the heart, if in addition to listening to the
devil s pleas for sin, we delight in contemplating the
IV.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 33
wicked objects, if we give up our imagination to
pleasurable imaginations of evil. It is said that old
sinners, when they have made a sort of reformation,
content themselves with repeating their sins by
speaking of or thinking over their sins with a secret
delight. It is even so with many who have never
sinned outwardly never committed overt acts of
wickedness. It is possible thus to delight in the
conception of revenge, murder, lewdness, dishonesty,
untruth, and the like. Nor only so, there is a dif
ference between indulging in a passing pleasure in
wicked thoughts, and in dwelling upon them with
delight. It is no good sign when we do not at once
loathe the evil desire, but when we go on to make
for it a temple in our hearts, that its contemplation
may continue to corrupt and defile, our state is so
much worse our night so much the further spent.
And when the Evil One would depart for a season,
but we make an effort to recall his presence avail
ourselves of books or places which tend to bring
back the temptation vividly to our memory, and so
repeat our sinful thoughts, we are then near mid
night, we are ready to break out into open warfare
with GOD at the first opportunity.
All these cases show that the night may be far
spent in our souls, before it clouds the conscience
with its deepest gloom. CHRIST may long have
ceased to be the bright and Morning Star of the
soul, before acts of unrighteousness proclaim our
condition to the brother or sister, the friend or the
enemy. The inward light is paled and faded, though
34 THE NIGHT OP LIFE. [SEEM.
outwardly we wear the garb of sanctity. And such
a state may be more dangerous, because less easily
convicted and condemned. Alas ! how many kneel
together even at the Blessed Sacrament, and how
few are inwardly what outwardly they seem ! In
how few has the light which was in them not be
come darkness ! In how few is the night not far
spent, the moon and the stars not darkened ! And
if such be the state of all who indulge in inward
sin, we need hardly speak of that thick darkness
which may be felt, when sin has broken forth into
external acts, when there is no light to show the
sinner the gloom of his abode, so that he becomes
unconscious of his condition. All around see that
his night is far spent ; but he himself has become so
used to want of light, that he is content to wander
amid the mists and fogs of his transgressions. It is
only when memory exerts her powers, and he thinks
for a moment of his childhood s innocence, that he
knows that a change has passed upon him, that he
is not what he was. But such thoughts are but as
the balmy breezes on the sandy deserts, and leave
the wanderer more miserable than before. They
tell him only that his frame is fevered, and that
death is nigh ; that he cannot exist long in such
unnatural atmosphere. How terrible to think that
the prayers of such a one cause no ray to descend
from the dazzling bright throne of GOD ; that the
Word of GOD kindles no fire within him ; that the
Sacraments are to him dead and lifeless rites ; nay,
that the Body and Blood of CHRIST, instead of cool-
IV. THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 35
ing and refreshing, only scorches and withers ; in
stead of enlightening and unveiling Him Who is the
Light of the world, only darkens and hides. It is
as when the Egyptians were visited with the plague
of darkness, but the Israelites had light in their
dwellings. Day after day the night of the sinner
draws to its height ; the power of the Prince of
Darkness becomes more despotic, and the day is at
hand, when, after so long having " walked in the
light of his fire, and of the sparks which he has
kindled, he must lie down in sorrow."
It is in the still gloomy chamber of death that
the sinner s night is farthest spent. There we see
most clearly how the light of GOD is departed from
His tabernacle ; how chill and cold is that body of
death which weighs him down. It is the first real
rending of the veil, which has so long severed him
from his GOD the first rending of the rocks, of the
hard and stony heart the first calling unto the
mountains and hills to fall on him, and save him
from the Face of Him That sitteth upon the throne,
and from the wrath of the LAMB. There may have
been some ground of excuse, some ignorance which
he could not overcome, some infirmity of mind,
some disadvantage of birth, or education, or circum
stances. For these it may be GOD may be merci
ful, may all at once for JESUS sake cause the Sun
to hide not his face from the suffering one on his
cross, and forsake him not in the last hour of agony.
But if not, how terrible ! It is the last hour his
friends look for his departing out of this life every
36 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
breath, and for his hereafter they dare not look.
As he has lived without GOD, in the foul caves
and holes of vice, so he must die. There is little
about his death different from that of the beasts
that perish ; the pains of sickness and death have
no alleviation. What to holy men sweetens death
and suffering is not there, the Cross of JESUS.
He is on his cross indeed, and that too beside
JESUS, but it is on the cross of the hardened thief,
hanging in mid-day without the light of the sun.
CHRIST smooths not his death-bed pillow the wood
of the Cross takes not away the bitterness of his
CU p angels hover not around him to guard him
from the darts of the Enemy, ever then most malig
nant, knowing that he hath but a short time. His
wandering thoughts and fitful words are not of
heaven and the blessed saints, but of worldly or it
may be wicked pursuits. No prayers for mercy or
patience, but murmurs of repining, and perchance
blasphemy. If memory fails not, it has no treasure
of good actions, but a dark, fearful mass of sin
oppressing the soul. What is this but a night far
spent ? And the day is at hand ; yet to him it will
be night and not day. He exchanges only one
night for another : the night of sin s guilt for the
night of sin s punishment the everlasting chains
under darkness the blackness of darkness for ever
the wailing and gnashing of teeth in the outer
darkness, lighted up only by the fire unquenchable,
the fierceness of the wrath of Almighty GOD. Who
shall not fear that everlasting night, that night with-
IV.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 37
out light, the dayless night, the rayless darkness?
Let us say to our souls, " Soul, thou hast sinned,
and the night is far spent. Let us sorrow and
mourn over that which has withdrawn light from us.
Let us not rest till we see again the day dawn, till
we behold Him by faith once more, Who hath
saved us, till we see the Star of Bethlehem once
more lighting us to the coming of the CHRIST-
child, and we humble ourselves with Him, Who
bled Himself for our iniquities."
SERMON V.
THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
EOM. xin. 12.
"THE NIGHT IS FAB SPENT, THE DAT IS AT HAND."
OUR LORD has bidden us watch and look for the
signs of the times, that He may not, when He
comes, find us sleeping. Christians indeed in every
age have thought they were right in concluding He
was near, and yet have been mistaken. They saw
one or two, or more, of the special signs of His
Advent, which He foretold ; a war a pestilence a
famine and meteors and other heavenly pheno
mena, and thence imagined that this world was
come to its close. Yet still we are waiting for
Him ; and perhaps He may not come in our times.
It will, however, be allowed that whenever a person
is expected to visit us whose coming may have a
serious consequence upon our whole life either for
joy or misery, it must be safer to watch many years
THE NIGHT OF LIEE. 39
in vain than to be surprised by his coming unex
pectedly. Better that many generations of Chris
tians should have been deceived by mistaking the
signs of their Master s coming, than that one should
not be aware of them when they did really come.
It is better to be often too soon than once too late.
Thus it is that for many centuries the Church has
gone on repeating at this season her Advent cry
" The night is far spent, the day is at hand/
And what are the signs of CHRIST S coming and
of the end of the world ? Are there no thrones
tottering, no crowns and sceptres falling, no king
doms against kingdoms ? Is not the state of society
in an alarming state as regards the relations of poor
and rich, so that in very fear and quaking Dives is
continually leaving his purple and fine linen and
sumptuous fare to minister to Lazarus full of sores ?
The foundations of the great deep are opened
knowledge is increased that earthly knowledge
which is power summoned from hell like another
Satan to war against heaven. Think of one of our
great cities either here or abroad, its vices and
wickedness, and ask if we can hope that GOD S
Spirit will strive with man much longer, if it be
possible that He can long withhold the flood of fire
which is to consume all things at the corning of the
LORD ? Statesmen openly avow that perilous times
are come, and the difficulty of finding any remedy.
We look around and we see self-love where self-
denial and mortification should exist ; fasting and
almsdeeds denounced as superstitious and useless ;
40 THE NIGHT OF LIFE. [SEEM.
all means, whereby the flesh is subdued to the spirit
ridiculed as unspiritual and carnal, so that they only
who indulge their appetites and desires escape the
charge of being formal and self-righteous. We
are warned not of the danger of having our good
things in this life and hereafter evil things, but of
the soul-destroying doctrines of such as bid us follow
CHRIST as our example from His birth to the sepul
chre. We are rather bidden as we would be saved,
live like those in the days of Noah, who did eat and
drink, did marry and give in marriage, till the flood
came and destroyed them all. "When the Son of
Man cometh, shall He find faith upon the earth ?"
Where shall He see His own life copied ? that faith
which counts all things here but dross that it may
be found in Him, despises things seen and palpable
for that which is invisible and immaterial? We
are not idolatrous we have much horror of the
slightest approach to graven images, even though
men worship them not nor fall down to them.
Even the very symbol of our redemption is ofttimes
looked upon as idolatrous. What is this but a veil
cast by the devil over the idolatry of our days
the idolatry of covetousness the golden and silver
images which men set up in the sanctuary of their
own hearts ? How are things measured not by their
value in relation to GOD and our own souls, but by
the pleasure, the honour, and the profit they bring
to this dying body. How ill is that generation
whose heart is set upon riches and fears poverty, as
the greatest of evils, prepared to meet JESUS in the
V.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 41
stable of Bethlehem. How ill that generation
which is full of the pride of life.
Christians are not for the most part dreading
greatness and outward pomp, fearful of all that
puffs up and makes men think themselves gods, as
inconsistent with the character of a follower of
JESUS CHRIST. They are not comfortable in a
lowly and humble station they would rather seem
more glorious than they are ; rather keep up a false
appearance of splendour in dress, equipage, or fur
niture, than seem to be like Him in any degree,
Who for them emptied Himself of all things and
descended to the meanest estate of life. They
rather boast them of what they have not, than hide
or diminish what they have. What marvel in such
an evil temper of mind if there is continual discon
tent and murmuring ? if men blaspheme GOD ? if
they curse Him in their hearts ? if they look upon
unequal ranks and conditions of men as evil instead
of good ? and set themselves up as judges of the
dispensations of the Almighty ?
Again, it is a very common complaint against
young people and children by their parents that
they do not follow the pattern of the CmusT-child
in His obedience. And if this be so with the green
tree, what shall it be with the dry ? If such be the
stiffneckedness of youth, what will it be in manhood
and age ? Insubordination to parents and teachers
is the root of schism in the Church and of rebellion
in the state. And as the disobedience to parents in
dicates a want of thankfulness to them for their edu-
42 THE NIGHT OP LIFE. [SEEM.
cation of us, so it is but a part of that ingratitude
to GOD and man which will be a sign of the end of
all things. And one great fault in education is the
cause of this and all. We do not for the most part
train up children on the principle that they are
members of CHRIST and children of GOD. They are
not ever reminded that they are holy to GOD, and
that every action of their lives must be in confor
mity with His will, and that their will must be lost
in His. Hence is that want of natural affection, the
strifes of brethren and sisters jars between hus
band and wife neglect of father or mother in their
sickness or old age forgetfulness of Him, Who
even on the dreadful Cross cared to see S. Mary
committed to the protection of His beloved Apostle.
And if men are unfaithful to their own, we cannot
be surprised if they are careless of the interests of
strangers. What can be a worse sign than the uni
versal distrust men have of each other the strict
ness with which even relatives guard against each
other, and provide against any opportunity of over
reaching and dishonesty ! Still more unnatural is
that readiness to slander and calumniate, to which
we all are exposed, the way in which even friends
gladly circulate evil things about each other. What
a hollow state of society is this ! how unreal ! how
unlike the days when it was said, See how these
Christians love each other ! Consider how sadly
men are destroying their souls and bodies with
strong drink, so that well-meaning persons often
combine themselves into societies for putting down
Y.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 43
even the very use of all fermented drinks. Consider
the unholiness of the mass how the rite of mar
riage is often neglected. How impurity either se
cret or open prevails even in small villages. Think
too of the bitter persecution which all who seek to
do good and be good must bear ; think of the mock
ing, or jesting, or rebuke, which even decent and
well-intentioned persons aim at those who are in
earnest about their souls, and striving to lead lives
nearer to GOD and His Blessed SON. " Marvel not,
my brethren, if the world hate you. Ye know
that it hated JESUS before it hated you."
Once more look into the world, and see how
afraid men are to trust their secrets whether of soul
or body to any other ; how rash they are in speak
ing or acting, unmindful of that day of account in
which all words and actions will be strictly weighed
in the balance of GOD. How each man despises
his brother either in regard to birth, or wealth, or
education. How men love to do what pleases
themselves rather than what GOD wills. And all
the while there is a form of godliness, whose power
they abjure, Prayers and Sacraments without self-
examination and confession. Formal sabbath-keep
ing religion, long prayers and longer faces once a
week, outward solemnities to make up for inward
sanctity ; passions and appetites unrestrained. In
what will all this end ? When religion has been
taken from the body and confined to the soul, when
feelings instead of actions are made the hope of
justification ; when sermons have taken the place
44 THE NIGHT OE LIFE. [SEKH.
of praying, and the pulpit of the altar of GOD.
When the eternal priesthood of JESUS CHRIST has
been blotted out from the earthly temples of men,
what is this but " a night far spent ?" 1 might add
to all this the miserable state of the Catholic Church.
Not now as when she " looked forth as the morn
ing, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible
as an army with banners." Composed as she is of
human members, in whom sinfulness is ever con
flicting with the Blessed Spirit Who dwells in them,
it were to be expected that as the world around her
grew worse and worse, she herself would suffer.
CHRIST Himself said, that in the days preceding His
Advent, " because iniquity shall abound, the love
of many shall wax cold." Eastern and Western
Churches divided and separated for nearly a thou
sand years ; ourselves too severed from our brethren
of the Roman Church, and both through the usur
pations of the bishops of Rome, their love of power
and pride, their covetousness and rapacity. Mem
bers of one family all at variance. Bishop setting
up his crozier against the crook of his brother,
priest setting up altar against altar, and offering
schismatic prayers and sacrifices. No desire or
prayer for unity. They who in either communion
desire or pray for it thrust forth as traitors. Surely
the Sun of the Church is withdrawing His light,
and the darkness is thicker, and the night is far
spent.
My brethren, when we contemplate the signs of
the times and the warnings of CHRIST S coming, let
V.] THE NIGHT OF LIFE. 45
us not be content with mourning over the state of
the Church and of the world. We see therein but
a panorama of ourselves. We doubtless partake of
the evils of our day and generation. We can hardly
help being influenced by the tone and language of
those around us. As we lament over these perilous
times, let us ask ourselves, how far am I helping
forward the evil ? What share have I in it ? Am
I selfish or self-denying ? Am I covetous or liberal ?
Am I boastful and proud, or lowly and humble ? Am
I a blasphemer or thankful ? Am I disobedient or
docile ? Am I holy ? Am I affectionate ? Am I
just and honest ? Do I speak well of all ? Am I
temperate and chaste ? Am I a lover of all saints ?
trustful ? not easily puffed up ? a pleaser of GOD in
all things ? In short, is my religion an inward as
well as an outward thing ? Do I control my pas
sions and feelings ? Do I pray for the unity of the
Church, for a blessing on all good and pious works
connected with it, and especially those in which
we are engaged and interested ? If so we may hope
that though the night be far spent, the day to us is
at hand. Come what may, we are as individuals
preparing to meet our GOD. We shall not be afraid
at His coming for which we have done and suffered
so much. We shall be as the good and faithful ser
vants looking for the LORD to say, " Well done,
good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of
thy LORD." We are doing our master s work; it
cannot be that His coming brings terror or amaze
ment. Each one of us, old or young, has a part in
46 THE NIGHT OF LIFE.
this night, or in the day which is nigh. Each of us
is in some circle, of which he is at least a radius.
It is in the power of everyone to hasten or delay
CHRIST S coming, to be by holy living a preacher
of righteousness, to be an example to some one who
has had less light given than ourselves. May we
in that day not be among the number of those, who
having slept in the dust of the earth shall awake to
shame and everlasting contempt, but amongst those
wise souls that shall shine as the brightness of the
firmament, and amongst those, that, having turned
many to righteousness, like the stars shall shine for
ever and ever. Even so. Amen.
SERMON VI.
THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DABKNESS.
1 COE. IY. 5.
" TILL THE LOUD COME, WHO SHALL BEING TO LIGHT THE
HIDDEN THINGS OF DAEKNESS."
IT is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the
Living GOD to meet Him Who is a consuming
fire to stand before an All-mighty, All-seeing, All-
knowing Being. It were terrible for us poor worms
of this world whose bodies and senses are so easily
affected with pain and terror to whom the sight
of the lightning s flash is so awful, and the sound of
the rolling thunder so alarming, to look for the coming
of the Eternal Deity. If the ordinary events of this
world, as manifested in the wonders of the Creation or
Providence, often cause the knees to tremble and
the limbs to shake, what must it be, when the
course of all things shall be changed, when nature
itself shall receive such a shock as it has never
48 THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DAEKNESS. [SEEM.
known since the foundation of the world ? It were
amazing to stand in the midst of a besieged city,
the houses tottering and the walls crushing, the fire
and the smoke, the dead and dying, the booming of
the cannon and the roll of musketry, the fear of
the enemy, the despair, the alarm which the be
sieged feel as their defences are weakened, and the
foes draw nearer. What will it be to stand in the
midst of a ruined world to behold the sun turned
into darkness, and the moon into blood, and the
stars falling to the earth the heavens fleeing away
with a great noise, and the earth and all things
therein burning ! What to hear that tremendous
trump sounding that mighty voice of the arch
angel pealing the death-knell of this world ! What
to see the rocks rent, and the sea and the waves
roaring, men s hearts failing them for fear and for
looking after those things which are coming upon
the earth the powers of heaven shaken ! What
to see death and hell and the sea giving up their
dead, the great white throne set up, and the Judge
sitting thereon ! What amazement, what awe, what
dread will the beholders experience !
And this is a real scene which we must all see
with our own eyes one day or other. As we say to
a child, " One day you will see this or do that,"
and it seems strange to him at the time, but he
finds it come true, nevertheless ; even so with our
selves, in regard to the coming of the Great Day.
We tell the child of what he must expect to do and
suffer, that he may not think it strange when it
VI> ] THE HIDDEN" THINGS OF DAEKNESS. 49
comes to pass ; and so Advent-tide conies round and
round, rehearsing year after year that great tragedy,
that we may be perfect in our parts, and not over
come with the wonders and dangers of the Last
Day.
In the midst of the melting of the elements, the
flames of a perishing world, and the rising of the
dead, one thing will arrest our attention, one object
rivet our gaze. The Son of Man has come, His
standard the holy Cross is, as it was in Calvary,
lifted up in mid-air. His clouds of angels and
saints are around Him, and the multitude of men,
women and children, are before Him. We, in the
midst of gloom and smoke, of fire and vapour, dis
cern that white and glorious throne, and Him Who
sits thereon, from Whose Face heaven and earth
have fled away, JESUS CHRIST, the Incarnate GOD.
The long-feared day is arrived. He Who we have
so often said, solemnly, " shall come to judge the
quick and the dead," He is come. The Future is
come. The coming One is come. Time is no
longer. We no more fear death and the grave, for
the end of all is come. But yet there is a fear and
terror, for it is the day of the LORD very great and
very terrible, and who shall abide it ?
My brethren, the thought of that day is awful to
all who have sinned. Who that reflects upon his
many sins can be sure that he has repented enough
or sorrowed enough ? Who can be sure that GOD
accepts his tears, and pardons his sins ? Let us
take any one of our crying sins, those which press
50 - THE JUDDER THINGS OF DAKKNESS. [SEEM.
on our conscience without our giving ourselves the
trouble of examining ourselves and probing our
hearts, and say, how will this sin stand the day of
final trial? What excuse can I offer? What
palliation ? Years may have passed by, and yet
still that one sin may be eating into our soul s
peace like fire, and consuming soul and body with
its undying worm. Marvel not, my brethren, when
I say, that there is far more hope of such sins be
ing forgiven than many and lesser transgressions.
Wherever there is sorrow and contrition, penitence
and shame, there is hope. If then we had only to
be judged for such sins as we feel and mourn over,
those which the world knows and rejoices over, the
coming day would be less terrible and dreadful.
We should be prepared to defend ourselves make
ready " the broken spirit and the contrite heart,
which GOD will not despise." We might put away the
evil habit, amend our lives, and so have hope in that
day ; but the LORD is not only to judge our open and
known and notorious sins, but to " bring to light the
hidden things of darkness/ CHRIST will not only
judge us for those sins which are commonly ac
counted such, but for those which are hidden and
unknown to our brethren. We are apt to think
little of those sins which the world knows not of, or
is gentle to. When the face of father or mother,
sister or brother, friend or enemy, is turned away,
and is not as at other times to us, because of this or
that sin, which is become scandalous and manifest
to all, we are naturally led to think of its baseness
VI> ] THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DARKNESS. 51
ourselves, and lead a better life. But it is not so
with those sins of which we alone are conscious. We
do not think of them, however gross, as we do of
those which are public. Their remembrance, while it
lasts, is a burden, but then there is nothing external
to bring it to our minds. We are ready enough to
accept the world s view of certain sins, and consider
them excusable, and so they pass from our memory
and are forgotten. Alas ! how many sins have thus
glided off from the surface of our memories, which
that day will disclose and reveal !
It may be our public sins have been suffered for
and atoned for by us, so that GOD remembers them
no more. The falsehood which in early childhood
was discovered and punished, may have been blotted
out of the great books of account. The theft de
tected and chastised, the bad word of anger, of
impurity, of slander and of envy, corrected and
disciplined, these may not be any burden to our
consciences. The pain of punishment and shame of
exposure may have been a means, through the blood
of JESUS, of pardon and peace, because it worked in
us repentance not to be repented of. But how
stands it with those faults which escaped detection
and correction ? Man has failed to discover us, to
drag us from the trees of the garden, and we know
not that we are naked. Alas ! if we know it not be
fore He shall speak on the judgment-seat, " Where
art thou ?" Parents and teachers respected us.
We were accounted decent and well-conducted chil
dren; perhaps patterns to those who were really
E 2
52 THE HIDDEN THINGS OP DARKLESS.
better than ourselves. How terrible for such to
think of " His coming, Who shall bring to light the
hidden things of darkness !" And so with the sins
of more advanced age. The fear of public scandal
prevents many iniquities. Few are so far gone as to
have no feeling of shame or confusion on account of
their sins when made notorious.
But how lax is the tone of public morals ! How
much may men in particular do without incurring
much reproach or infamy. It must needs be
tempting for us to regard our sins as lightly as the
world about us. And so we palliate them to our
selves and judge ourselves not by the law of GOD
but by the traditions of men. But in that day the
Light shall shine upon the dark place in which we
have covered over our sins and unmask the excuses
wherewith we have glozed them over and so de
ceived ourselves. It will then be no satisfaction,
but rather a more crushing burden that we seemed
to others good sort of people because we managed
to avoid scandalous sins. To be condemned before
those, who had always thought us just and holy
people, must needs be a shameful end for us to
contemplate. If we shrink now from being exposed
to others on account of our faults, how much more
then when not one shall be hidden or concealed
but loudly proclaimed before men and angels. We
dislike those who will not suffer us to hide our
sins, even our dearest friends, who try to unveil the
flimsy covering we spread over our actions ; how
much more that day which will not only disclose
VI.] THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DARKNESS. 53
but also reward all. And if that day be terrible,
because it brings to light things hidden from men
though known to us, it is still more alarming be
cause it will make known and recall those which we
were never aware of. We all dread unknown arid
secret accusations. We have an undefined awe of
any reserve. We like to know the worst, and pre
pare for the worst, and make up our minds to the
worst. It is a relief to do so. Yet in respect to
the great day we never can know all the charges
that will be brought against us, till the day comes
and the books are opened. Many things we thought
would be in our favour, then will be against us,
because they proceeded from different principles to
what we imagined. GOD will then " bring to light
hidden things of darkness." He will then make us
read and know ourselves, if we have not already
done so. He will reveal to us points in our cha
racters before unknown to ourselves. He will open
our eyes that we may see ourselves and abhor our
selves in that wherein we had been confident. He
will show us the uselessness of good works done to
be seen of men the sad way in which we have
mixed up human motives and passions with His
service and worship. He will disclose some canker-
worm which has corrupted all our fruits of repent
ance ; some rust which has eaten into our brightest
virtues. He will reveal that slowly-working sin
which gradually crept into the blossoming virtues
and hindered their coming to perfection.
How marvellous, yet how tremendous, to have a
54 THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DAEKNES3. [SERM.
full retrospect of our whole lives without aught
extenuated, or aught set down in malice. We shall
then be able to account for our having gone wrong
at some period of our lives in a certain particular,
as it seemed to us suddenly. We shall see then it
was the natural result of a little sin which we forgot
as soon as committed, but which has gradually
strengthened with our strength till it became part
of ourselves. We shall understand how our con
science became dull and deadened in this or that
particular. And then it will all be too late. GOD
has brought to light the hidden things of darkness,
but it is in judgment, not now as a SAVIOUR show
ing us His hands and His side, the marks of our
sins wherewith we pierced Him, but as a Judge
pointing to them as the signs of the wrath of GOD
against sin. We shall know ourselves and see our
selves as we are, but all in vain. Satan has deceived
us and blinded our eyes. It was his object to make
us think well of ourselves, to keep back inquiry, to
prevent self-examination, and to check confession.
And now his work is done and we are lost. All
the while fancying ourselves safe, but in vain. The
wrath of GOD is poured out to the uttermost. " The
sinners in Zion are afraid; fearfulness hath sur
prised the hypocrites. Who among us shall dwell
with the devouring fire ? who among us shall dwell
with everlasting burnings ?"
Let it be then our object, my brethren, to bring
to light ourselves our hidden things of darkness,
before He cometh Who shall not only search and
VI.] THE HIDDEN THINGS OF DAEKNESS. 55
try but also punish and condemn. Let us seek to
know ourselves thoroughly ; let not our own hearts
be the only thing unfathomed and unlearnt in this
life; let us study ourselves in the fear of GOD. As
the darkness of night comes on, every day we live,
let us pray Him to lighten our darkness as our SA
VIOUR, to show us to ourselves and help us to weigh
ourselves in the balance of the sanctuary. Our first
thoughts ere we kneel down to say our evening
prayers and commend ourselves to GOD S holy keep
ing should be on the day that is passed ; how we
have spent it, and judge ourselves and condemn
ourselves in that which has been wanting. Day
after day at even let us say to our souls, The night
is far spent, and the day is at hand. I must look
into this darkness ere the day dawns when GOD
in wrath shall unveil all. Look into your souls
daily : treat them at least as being as valuable as
your estates and business ; make up your spiritual
accounts at least as carefully as you make up your
temporal. Let nothing slip. The smallest sin may
become a root of bitterness for ever. Think what
you have done to-day day by day where you
have been ? with whom ? on what business ? on
what pleasure? Consider what you said, did, or
thought. Hide nothing from yourself and GOD.
Thus act over that fearful play in which GOD and
you will be the only actors, as you are now, the
judgment.
I know of nothing more essential in religion than
that each one of you should know himself know
5G THE HIDDEN THINGS OE DARKNESS.
how he stands with GOD. May none of you die
with books unbalanced for eternity accounts un
settled for ever. May you have no hidden things
of darkness to be brought to light by GOD at the
great day of the LORD. Fathers and mothers, as
you would save your children s souls, teach them
early thus to try and examine their consciences, to
let nothing be hidden in darkness ; rather exhort
them to confess their faults to you and open their
childish griefs than let the wound skin over and
break out again in maturer age. " Confess your sins
one to another," says the holy Apostle. Ye that
are older, choose out some one to whom you like
to impart the secrets of your life, that so you may
realise the shame of that day when all shall be
brought to light, and escape it when it shall cause
blackness on all faces. Judge yourselves con
demn yourselves chasten yourselves. So shall the
Judge be your SAVIOUR ; justify your self-condem
nation, and be propitiated by your chastisement of
yourselves. May it be so with us when the Son of
Man shall come in His glory and all the holy angels
with Him, and He sits on the throne of His glory.
SERMON VII.
of BetJtcatton,
DANGIEB OF GEEAT PKIVILEGES.
PSALM LV. 4 7.
"MY HEART IS DISQUIETED WITHIN ME: AND THE FEAB OF
DEATH IS FALLEN UPON ME. FEARFULNESS AND TREM
BLING ARE COME UPON ME : AND AN HORRIBLE DREAD
HATH OVERWHELMED ME. AND I SAID, OH THAT I HAD
WINGS LIKE A DOTE : FOR THEN WOULD I FLEE AWAY,
AND BE AT REST. Lo, THEN WOULD I GET ME AWAY FAR
OFF: AND REMAIN IN THE WILDERNESS."
THESE words, I suppose, express the Advent
thoughts of most of us at this season, brethren. It
is of all others a time when men s hearts are dis
quieted within them, and the fear of death falls
upon them. As you dwell on the prospect of your
own death, which is the trump of the Archangel
proclaiming CHRIST S Advent nigh to you, your
fear of approaching dissolution, you know not how
soon, is heightened and increased by the end of
death, which is the judgment. Death in itself has
58 DANGER OF GREAT PRIVILEGES. [SERM.
no terror compared to its consequences ; that after
it cometh the great assize the bar of judgment
the thrones set the judge seated the books
opened. Here is the sting of death ; here is the
thought that makes us gasp and sigh for breath.
The bitterness of death is not passed to the Chris
tian man till he is ready for the judgment. And as
you picture to yourself the distress of nations with
perplexity ; the sea and the waves roaring ; the
world in its throes and pangs of fire expectant of
the Regeneration : as you wonder how all this will
affect you individually how you shall abide all this
what will be the issue of it all to you ; no wonder
that fearfulness and trembling comes upon you, and
that an horrible dread overwhelms you. And this
because you know you are not fit to abide what is
coming on the earth ; because you remember your
misdeeds ; because you feel your unworthiness.
Conscience makes cowards of us all. You are con
scious of something you have not confessed. Or
you are fearful that you do not know yourself
thoroughly. Or you dread to meet your Judge so
corrupt and sinful as you feel yourself to be. Old
habits will not be shaken off entirely. Day by day
you seem to be increasing your dangers and respon
sibilities. " Would that I could," you say to your
self, " get away from this place of trial and temp
tation. Would I could change my path of life
for one less exposed to my peculiar difficulties."
" O that I had wings like a dove : for then would I
flee away and be at rest. Lo ! then would I get
VII.] DANGER OF GEEAT PEIVILEGES. 59
me away far off and remain in the wilderness." All
things seem to bring to me the taint and touch of
sin. Society has its perils for me ; the mart and
business of life has its pitfalls ; all bring their own
special sad reflections. I will go into the wilder
ness, and be alone with GOD."
And I suppose this is what some of us pictured
to ourselves two years ago, dear brethren, when we
spent our first dedication-feast together. We
imagined what progress we should make in the
Divine life : how much nearer heaven we should be
by this time than we were then. We thought that
two Advents more would have found us more ready
for the last Advent. We meant to cast out the
world and the things belonging to the world more
thoroughly from our inmost hearts. We proposed
to go and remain in the wilderness, where the taber
nacle of our souls is being continually taken down
and set up again till we enter into Canaan, and the
Church be at rest from all her enemies. But has
it been so ? We have had numberless graces and
gifts poured out here upon us, but with what effect ?
All things which GOD bestows become to the re
ceivers too often sources of future penitence.
Bread He has given to the children of men to
strengthen their hearts, yet fulness of bread has oft
caused men to sin. Wine He has given to make
glad the heart of man, yet how many has it deceived.
Beauty has oft been cursed by its possessor; and
wisdom has led astray its students. All things GOD
gives may be misused or neglected. And if so,
GO BARGEE OF GREAT PRIVILEGES. [SERM.
what account must be given of them at the great
Doomsday? The barren woman has often seen
cause to rejoice that she has not had to keep house
and be a mother of children. The poor have some
times been thankful that GOD has withheld riches
from them. So awful is it to receive anything at
the hands of GOD, if not dealt with as a talent for
which He will one day come to reckon with His
servants. Much more is this the case with means
of grace and opportunities of converse with GOD,
which are offered you here. Just as it is with ordi
nary Christians, so with you who by extraordinary
privileges are raised above the mass of your bre
thren of the Church. As it is better to be heathen
or unbaptized than to be unworthy and reprobate
Christians : as a father visits with greater punish
ment a degenerate and apostate son than the sons
of strangers, so considering the larger measure of
gifts and graces which are dispensed here is your
responsibility. You ought to be better than others
you ought to have a higher standard you ought
to exhibit more perfect conformity to the image of
JESUS CHRIST. Others might say, " Ah ! if I had
but the fellowship of two or three assembled in the
Name of CHRIST; if I had the privilege of daily
services." Others might say, "Ah! if I had a
pastor to visit me, or to whom I could confide my
griefs and burdens." Others, "Ah! if I had but
more frequent sermons and instructions." Others,
"Ah ! if I had more opportunities of receiving or
attending the Blessed Sacrament." Others could
VII.] DANGER Or GREAT PRIVILEGES. 61
say all this ; others could complain of the dull life
less routine in which all their religious aids were
clothed. But, my brethren, great as my own defi
ciencies are as your pastor, I feel you cannot com
plain as some of your brethren might. For to say
no more : many of my defects have been more than
made up by the help of my brother clergy.
If then, my brethren, any of you are not what
you ought to be ; not living above the mass of third
or fourth-rate Christians around you ; what motives
for Advent penitence are here ? To think that the
rich liberality of those who built this house is in
vain for you that the self- denial of those who have
kept up the services here is in vain for you. To
think that all labours and prayers for you during the
past have been thrown away or wasted, is surely a
fearful thought, when you think of the account you
must render of every service you attend here, or
have neglected wilfully to attend here. I know of no
more sad and mournful thought than to imagine, as
the bell bids to prayer, its tones falling unheeded if
not despised upon the ears of some of us. CHRIST
bidding you to join the two or three, in the midst
of whom He has promised to be, He offering an
Advent of salvation to you, but you slighting or
scorning the gift. Or, still more, to come here,
yet not to realize His presence here with us ; to
touch Him, and yet not to be healed by Him ; to
have Him speaking to us, and yet not to recognize
His voice ; to behold the signs and sacraments of
His presence, but yet to be as blind men by the
62 DANGER OF GREAT PRIVILEGES. [SERM.
wayside, knowing not that the Incarnate One ever
passeth by.
O, my brethren, to think of the coldness, the
deadness, the lifelessness, with which many of us
have to reproach ourselves during the past two
years. How must we indeed dread these daily
Advents as are here vouchsafed to us, if we profit
so little by them, if they fit us so ill for the last
Advent of all. Well may our hearts be disquieted
within us, and the fear of death fall upon us ; well
may fearfulness and trembling come upon you, and
a horrible dread overwhelm you, as the thought
comes home to you, that CHRIST has so often come
to you, offered a gracious Advent, and you have
not embraced Him as the spouse of your soul.
When all the aids, which the Church of GOD can
supply, have been lavished upon you in vain, no
wonder you prefer the wilderness to the sanctuary ;
no wonder you flee from the responsibilities of
privileges. " And I said, O that I had wings like
a dove, for then would I flee away and be at rest.
Lo, then would I get me away far off, and remain
in the wilderness. "
Such indeed must be the solemn thoughts of each
one of us as we think of the time that has elapsed
since our first dedication, as a preparation for eter
nity. You indeed cannot shake off this tremendous
responsibility any more than unchristianize your
selves. You might wish that GOD would bring you
into the wilderness and speak to your hearts. But
He has not done so with all of vou He has been
VIT.] DANGER Or GREAT PRIVILEGES. 63
pleased to place you amidst every channel of grace
which our Church acknowledges ; with all the at
tractions which nature and art can furnish as hand
maids to religion. You cannot escape from your
responsibilities. You must answer to GOD for your
use of every means of grace here given you. " Why
are you not more ready for me ?" might the Son of
Man not say to you in that day which shall awake
the dead. " I have so often come to you to make
you ready. Why are you not ready now?" Bend
then the energies of your souls for the future, bre
thren, to make each service a preparation for the
judgment. Beware lest this disquietude as to the
past this fear of death be increased. Nothing, be
assured, is so terrible in the hour of death as the
remembrance of wasted or neglected privileges.
Nothing sounds so awful on the ear of the dying
man as the Church bell, to whose bidding he has
so often shut his ears, or which has led him to
mingle with brethren and sisters outwardly, but not
in his inmost soul. Dear brethren, let us pray that
the work here, if indeed GOD permits it to go on as
hitherto, may be a savour of life unto life to many,
and not a savour of death unto death. Else it will
not be wonderful if the LORD shall come down to
visit His Church here and drive us out as in the
days of His Incarnate suffering from this His temple.
Then, whether we will or no, we shall be driven far
off, and made to dwell in the wilderness, away from
this our holy and beautiful house.
SERMON VIII.
Cijrtstmas
AT THE MIDNIGHT EUCHARIST.
THE MYSTEET OF BETHLEHEM. HOLY EU
CHARIST.
S. LUKE ii. 8.
" AND THERE WEEE SHEPHEEDS IN THE SAME COUNTRY
ABIDING IN THE FIELD KEEPING WATCH OYEE THEIE FLOCKS
BY NIGHT."
IT is very striking how CHRIST has been ever pleased
to manifest Himself to His people in the darkness of
night. All the great deliverances in the Old Testa
ment figure this characteristic of those in the New.
It was when " the sun went down and it was dark"
that GOD appeared to Abraham, and promised him
and his seed the land of Canaan. It was at night
that the LORD delivered Lot out of the midst of the
overthrow, so that " the sun was risen upon the
earth, when Lot entered into Zoar." It was night
when Jacob beheld " the ladder set up upon the
earth, the top of which reached to heaven, and the
THE MYSTEEY OF BETHLEHEM. 65
angels of GOD ascending and descending on it," and
when he awaked out of sleep said, " Surely the
LORD is in this place and I knew it not."
It was at midnight that there was a great cry in
Egypt because of the smiting of the first-born, and
Pharaoh let the children of Israel go ; that Gideon
with three hundred men scattered the mighty host
of Midianites ; that the angel of the LORD went out
and smote in the camp of the Assyrians 185,000
and saved the kingdom of Judah. And so CHRIST
tells us His coming will be in the end of all things.
The day of the LORD so cometh as a thief in the
night." " At midnight a cry was heard, Go ye out
to meet him." And so it was night at His Cruci
fixion, when the sun withdrew his light at the sixth
hour, when His soul was exceeding sorrowful even
unto death in the garden of Gethsemane. What
marvel then if CHRIST S first coming was when there
were shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping their
flocks by night ? We may well connect with this
His first entry into the world as our Incarnate GOD
that institution of the Holy Sacrament wherein He
is continually born again in our hearts. The time
of the Last Supper is the more remarkable because
it was not the most usual time of keeping the Pass
over. Night indeed is a fitting time for us to re
ceive manifestations of CHRIST S presence. The
.toils and cares of the day are over. All our works
are for the day done. We have time to reflect on
the end which awaits us all to pray to examine
our own souls, and confess our faults. GOD often
66 THE MYSTERY OF BETHLEHEM : [SERM.
visits us in the night-time when He has ceased to
visit us by day. The solemn stillness the deep
gloom the hushed voices the windows untenanted
by light the silence of feet, the loneliness, all these
are so many proper vehicles to bring Him to us
back, Whom the busy marts and laborious toils, the
company of friends, the pleasures of the light, the
sweet tones of loved ones have through the day shut
out from the soul. When the senses have nought
to enchant them, when the eye has nought whereon
to wander, when the ear has nought to distract it,
then GOD enters in and takes up His abode almost
in spite of us. Often the careless and thoughtless
fear to be alone then. The mystery of their life
seems half revealed ; they almost see the world of
spirits, and all but lift the veil which covers eternity
and immortality. The ear seems then to have ac
quired a supernatural sensitiveness to sound, and
the eye to increase its powers of vision. All things
if rightly used may be made a means of realising His
presence Who is the Life of the soul. Therefore
did holy men of old pass sleepless or sleep-broken
nights, rise from their beds to watch for Him Whom
though they had not seen, they loved, and rejoiced
in with joy unspeakable and full of glory. Even so
we, as many as are now met together, are watching
for Him Who cometh to us year after year at this
season : looking out for the star which is to show us.
the way, or for the angel-voices proclaiming the carol
of the Nativity, " Glory be to GOD on high, and on
earth peace, good- will towards men." " There were
HOLT EUCHARIST. 67
shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over
their flocks by night." We are those shepherds, my
brethren, and ye are the flocks. We are not suffering
the night to be swallowed up in sleep or drowsiness, in
pleasure or vanity, but we are watching with all the
sheep and lambs we can gather together for the
coming SAVIOUR, the Shepherd and Bishop of our
souls. As the CmusT-child was first manifested to
them who led a harder life than others, abiding in
the field during the cold winter night, and in their
simplicity losing sleep and rest in order to watch
over their charge, even so now. He cometh most
to those, who toil to see Him most ; He was not
seen by the rich and luxurious inhabitants of Jeru
salem, though the place of His nativity was nigh to
them. A star guided the wayworn Easterns on
their pilgrimage, but no light in their darkness was
vouchsafed to the cold-hearted, sleepy Jews. We
must be looking out for Him in the shadows of the
night if we would hear the voice of our Beloved,
" Open unto Me, My love, My undefiled one." He
withdraws Himself often that we may redouble our
earnest seeking for Him. As with the disciples at
Ernmaus, He made as though He would have gone
further, that they might be moved to constrain Him
to abide with them, so He at times hideth Himself
to provoke our zeal and watchfulness. He is not to
be born in the holy city, in the chosen city of GOD,
not to be heralded in the ancient Temple, not to be
welcomed by the high priest, priests and Levites,
but in a lowlier city, and in a still lowlier habitation
r 2
68 THE MYSTERY OF BETHLEHEM : [SEEM.
in a manger of brute cattle, cradled in the straw.
Not in the pomp of surrounding courtiers, not as a
king in the midst of his servants, not amidst crowds
and assembly of worshippers, do we few in number
go to visit the Babe, the Infant Word, the GOD-
Man, the Victim Priest. And we go to Bethlehem to
seek the Child JESUS, Bethlehem the house of Bread :
to us is this figure fulfilled, who in the fulness of
the spirit, not in the barrenness of the letter seek
JESUS to be born to us this night under the form
of Bread in this most holy Sacrament.
We shepherds and flocks are come to the manger
to seek our food, the Bread which came down from
heaven. He lieth in the manger, to be eaten and
worshipped. Far more blessed than those shepherds
are we. They only worshipped Him, we wor
ship and eat Him. Nor is the miracle less to us.
They marvelled to see CHRIST the LORD lying in
a manger. How could GOD Who is a Spirit have
flesh and bones of a little child ? How could He, by
Whose word all things were, become a speechless
child? How could He Who is Eternal become
subject to time ? Undying become dying ? We too
marvel no less at Bread becoming the Body of the
LORD at Wine becoming His Blood. Those poor
shepherds had faith to believe the angelic message,
though they could not understand it. So we be
lieve the LORD Himself, though, to our senses, His
Sacrament is incomprehensible. Yet they saw only
we taste and see how gracious the LORD is. They
went in to tarry with the young Child for a little
VIII.] HOLY EUCHARIST. 69
while, we not only dwell with Him, but He also
vouchsafes to dwell with us. We visit Him, and
carry Him away with us. We say unto Him,
11 Abide with us, LORD," and He comes in to tarry
with us.
Not unto all is He thus born. It was said to the
shepherds, " Unto you is born this day a SA
VIOUR " unto them alone that day of all the Jews.
So unto us alone of many it may be He is born.
We alone out of many go to the Altar, our Bethle
hem, to have the Child JESUS born again in us
renewing our baptismal life saving us from the
power of Satan and of sin delivering us from the
iron bondage of evil habits and corrupt affections.
From that hour when the shepherds were called to
see the holy Child, with the exception of the Wise
Men from the East, up to the time of His Baptism
at thirty years of age, He was hid from the eyes
of all.
For thirty years the shepherds and eastern magi
alone knew of His birth, " of a SAVIOUR Who is
CHRIST the LORD." We do not know what op
portunities we may have of visiting Him, if we
do not visit Him in the House of Bread when bid
den. We may see Him no more till He comes as
Judge. He may come no more to us as a SAVIOUR.
To know where He is ever to be found, and to turn
away wilfully from His tabernacle, must doubtless
be an awful thing. He is born for us, yet not unto
us, except we look for Him. How can He be our
SAVIOUR, of Whom we think so little, as not to de-
70 THE MTSTEET OP BETHLEHEM : [SERM.
prive ourselves of sleep or aught else in this life ?
Even the love we should bear to Him, ought to
make us desire to hasten to Bethlehem, there to be
nourished and fed by Him with angel s food, the
heavenly manna Himself.
And where is He to be found this night ? The
LORD of earth and heaven has no place provided
for His reception, such as the poorest child amongst
us. The ox and the ass alone make way for Him.
He is rejected of men, but accepted by brutes. And
so the wise of this world have ever been tempted to
select some other place than Bethlehem for the
place of CHRIST S habitation, and invent some way
of their own by which CHRIST comes to dwell in
man. The ignorant, and those whose learning has
only made them feel their own ignorance, they have
prepared for the CnRiST-child a place in their
hearts. The Goo-Man refused the honour due to
Him, would not be born in the high places of
human glory, but in the lowest estate rather than
the highest which was His. He would teach us
thereby to humble ourselves rather than exalt our
selves, to make ourselves of no reputation ; rather
to lower ourselves beyond what is due, than seek
the height which belongs not to us.
" There were shepherds abiding in the fields,,
keeping watch over their flocks by night." Would
you, my brethren, have the bliss of the shepherds
vouchsafed you ? Ye must have a faith like theirs.
Doubt not, but earnestly believe that CHRIST is
born to you this night in this Bethlehem. Make
VIII.] HOLT EUCHARIST. 71
an act of faith, and say in your hearts, " I believe
firmly, O good JESU, and profess with lively faith
that Thou Thyself, Equal to the FATHER in glory
and power, Very GOD and Very Man, art truly and
really present in this holy Sacrament, under the
form of Bread and Wine." Say this, or words to
this effect, when you are tempted to doubt or say
with the unbelieving Jews, " How can this Man
give us His flesh to eat ?" The shepherds might
be better excused than you had they disbelieved
the Infant JESUS to be their SAVIOUR and LORD
and CHRIST, for you have the belief of all ages in
this holy mystery to raise and encourage yours.
Say then, with Bishop Ken, " I believe, O crucified
LORD, that the bread which we break in the
celebration of the holy mysteries, is the communi
cation of Thy Body ; and the cup of blessing which
we bless, is the communication of Thy Blood ; and
that Thou dost as effectually and really convey Thy
Body and Blood to our souls by the Bread and
Wine, as Thou didst Thy Holy Spirit by Thy
Breath to Thy disciples ; for which all love, all
glory be to Thee." LORD, at this holy season of
Thy Nativity, grant me a child-like faith, to believe
that as Thou didst truly take flesh of Thy blessed
Mother, wast truly born, didst truly lie in swaddling-
clothes in the manger, so Thou art truly present in
these holy mysteries, and Thyself united in them
tor us.
O ! what humility should be ours, as we draw
near the Child JESUS in the manger ! How can we
72 THE MYSTEEY OF BETHLEHEM.
be proud of wealth, as we see Him emptied of all
heavenly and eternal good things ! How can we be
proud of any gifts of wisdom or language, when we
look at Him Who is the Eternal Word, unable to
utter distinct sounds ! How can we be proud of the
praise or honour of our brethren, when we see Him
worshipped only by poor shepherds ! How can we
be proud of our birth or origin, when we see in how
low an estate He willed to be born ! How can we
be proud of any circumstances connected with our
condition in life, as we view all those relating to
Him ! How can we feel anger at any slights or
insults cast on us, as we see the holy Mary and
Joseph refused a lodging in the inn, and forced to
take refuge with brutes ! How can we wish to be
come known, to be renowned, to be above our
brethren in any way, when we contemplate CHRIST
thus hiding His birth from the world, and revealing
it only to a few peasants ! " LORD, I am not worthy,
I am not fit, that Thou shouldest come under the
roof of my soul, for it is all desolate and rained ; nor
hast Thou in me fitting place to lay Thy head. But
as Thou didst vouchsafe to lie in the cavern and
manger of brute cattle, so deign to receive me the
ruined, wretched and excessive sinner to the touch,
and partaking of the immaculate, supernatural, and
lifegiving and saving mysteries of Thy Body and
Blood." Even so. Amen.
SERMON IX.
Jleto Sear s be.
MIDNIGHT.
THE NEW YEAR A TYPE OP THE JUDGMENT
DAY.
REV. xxi. 5.
"BEHOLD, I MAKE ALL THINGS NEW."
ALL things in the natural world typify and repre
sent spiritual things, if we can only lift up the veil
which envelopes and shrouds them. As the taber
nacle was built by Moses according to the pattern
GOD showed him in the Mount, so this world is but
an image of the mystery of eternity to which we
shall soon become ministers. Thus it is with the
seasons ; spring, winter, summer, and autumn.
They all have their own spiritual lessons, their own
correspondences with the spiritual world. Who
fails to connect with his own life the course of the
year ; the spring of childhood, the warmth of man
hood, the autumn of old age, and the winter of
74 THE NEW YEAE A TYPE [SEEM.
death ? Or who is not touched by the evident con
formity of the decay of flowers to the wasting away
of human life ? And thus that wonderful book, in
which the beloved Apostle describes what he was
permitted to see of the world to come, sets before
us the things of the unseen and future, under pic
tures drawn from this life ; " The river of water
clear as crystal ;" " the tree of life bearing twelve
manner of fruits ;" "" the gates of precious stones ;"
" GOD and the LAMB are the light thereof in the
place of sun and moon." And so to them who have
faith, all that the eye rests upon is invested with deep
and secret marvels. The roaring of the sea bespeaks
the voice of many waters, the praises of the re
deemed in heaven. The peal of thunder thrills
through the soul, because it is a pledge of that
voice of the ALMIGHTY and of that trump of the
Archangel which shall awake the dead. Darkness
is but the shadowing forth of the power of Satan, as
light is the dwelling of the eternal GOD. Go through
the world in this spirit, and all things change as it
were their countenance. Measure them by what
they are fitted to set forth and imitate, and their
value will be the better appraised. Men who thus
view natural things around them as figures of the
true, as shadows of the substantial eternity, have
the twofold life. They have their conversation in
heaven, while they are at home in the body. Pil
grims here, they are the true citizens of the world
to come.
Why do I say this to-night ? Is it not because
IX.] OF THE JUDGMENT DAT. 75
I would not have you rest satisfied with the appre
ciation of the fact that one more natural year is past
as the clock has struck twelve, and that we have
entered upon another ? I want you at this thres
hold of 1853, to begin your year with GOD and
with meditations on your relations with Him. As
good men have bidden us think as the clock strikes
each hour that we are so much nearer the end of
our probation here ; as the end of each day is but a
warning of the end of life ; the night, of death ; the
morning, of resurrection : so with this end of many
days, this night of 1852, this morning of 1853. It
speaks to you in a twofold way ; of your own end,
and of the end of all things. As the last year is
just over, so must all your years come to their
close. As we now bid you a happy new year, so
too must you enter upon a new eternity. " Behold
I make all things new." First of all : ye yourselves
will be made new, for ye will receive new bodies ;
" CHRIST shall make your vile bodies like unto His
glorious body by His mighty energy." Next the
future habitation of your renewed selves will be
made new. " Behold I make new heavens and a
new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." As
Noah entered upon a wondrous new year s day,
when he set his foot upon the dry land ; so will it
be with you, as many as shall escape the fire of the
last days, the second deluge which shall consume
the wicked. What a marvellous new year will that
be, which shall be ushered in with so much pomp
and solemnity ! How unlike other days ! The sun
76 THE NEW TEAR A TYPE [SERM.
shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into
blood. The stars shall withdraw their shining.
There shall be no more sea after that day. There
shall be no more death, no more sorrow, no more
pain, no more crying, for the former things shall
be past away. There shall be no more night, for
the LORD GOD shall be your everlasting light.
These years often glide into each other so noiselessly
and unobservedly, but this new year will be ushered
in with the acclamations of all people and nations,
and languages ; " Salvation to our GOD Who sitteth
upon the throne, and to the LAMB." And on that
New Year s day we " shall see the Son of Man
coming in the clouds with power and great glory."
No longer we His ministers shall warn you thus
year by year ; for He is come in His own person to
make all things new.
Yet one thing there is He will not renew, if not
made new now. Your soul s life cannot be renewed
then, if it has not been kept alive now. How
fearful then will it be to be alone unchanged. Your
bodies must be changed, must assume the new re
surrection types. How unnatural will be the union
of the dead soul with an immortal body ! of old and
new things ! of the corrupt and the incorruptible !
of the natural and the spiritual ! what a shocking
and abhorred alliance would the chaining a living
prisoner to his dead fellow be ! And yet we con
template a far more hideous fellowship in the life
less soul and its regenerated and renewed tabernacle.
There is something repugnant to our feelings in the
IX.] OF THE JUDGMENT DAT. 77
union of the aged and grey-haired man with the
bloom of youth. Yet even this has its apologies.
The virtues and graces and charms and mental
vigour still manifest amidst the decay of bodily facul
ties reconcile often what were else repulsive to our
nature. But in the junction of an old and effete
soul with its new body vigorous of immortality,
there is nothing to abate our horror. Who can do
otherwise than recoil from the thought ! That soul
has wasted and defiled all its energies and powers.
Sin has deprived it of all loveliness. No blasted
tree standing in the midst of vernal foliage, no
hideous and mis-shapen creature amongst the fairest
group of human beings, can be so out of place as
that soul which has lost the savour wherewith it
was salted in its regeneration. Heaven and earth
made new ; your brethren made new ; your Judge
with that new Body He assumed after His Easter
burial and resurrection, yourself new, except
within, except in that which should have survived
the body s age and death. How utterly lost and
strange must you feel as that New Year s day dawns
upon you ! How must you shrink as the ALMIGHTY
clothes you afresh with a new and spiritual body !
As the filthy and diseased mendicant would shrink
from assuming clean and glorious raiment ; so must
you from that flesh which is to prison and shroud
for ever the ruins of your immortality.
More fearful still with that new restored body
returns sensation and feeling. It will tremble before
the Great White Throne. It will crouch from the
78 THE NEW TEAR A TYPE [SERM.
angel guards that shall drag it forth to view. It
will shudder and moan and cry, as the scorching of
the everlasting flames pains and agonises the incor
ruptible flesh. And worse than all. With that
sin-wasted, sin-aged soul, is bound up the eternal
memory of old iniquities. Other souls have passed
through the new and living way, and have been
washed from the stains of sin in the blood of the
LAMB. Old things have passed away, and all is
become new to them. But what shall renew you ?
Shall the Incarnate CHRIST ? The Man CHRIST
JESUS ? Ah ! no ! the Mediator of the New Cove
nant is become your Judge. He too is become new.
Even with Him the former things have passed away.
The fashion of His countenance is altered, for it is
the wrath of the LAMB from which ye will seek to
hide yourselves. The gentle and meek LAMB dis
plays His wrath against sin. Nothing here but is
new, still except you, who yet remain in the oldness
of your soul s mortality.
With this old year, then, that is gone let your old
and inveterate habits of evil depart. With the new
year that is come put on the new man CHRIST
JESUS. Array yourselves in new habits. Clothe
yourselves with humility instead of pride, with
meekness instead of anger, with diligence instead of
sloth, with purity instead of lusts and immodesty,
with almsgiving and charity instead of covetousness,
with temperance instead of drunkenness, with self-
denial instead of self-indulgence. Begin now, while
you may, by the help of Him Who dwells in you,
IX.] Or THE JUDGMENT DAT. 79
to make all things new within yourself. You have
allowed many old things to grow up and choke the
newness of your regenerate life. Make a solemn
vow before GOD this morning to make them all new.
Resolve to be indeed a new creature, to be a true
Christian, to fit yourself for that day, when whether
you will or no all things shall be made new. Here
the corruptible body weighs down the soul as it
energises for eternity. Let not your corruptible
soul weigh down and oppress your everlasting body
in the new world that is coming. As your body
wastes and perishes, let your inward man be re
newed day by day. So will the old year of this
your life gradually mix and adhere to the new year
of your eternal life. So at the last there will be no
sudden wrench, no unexpected change. As the
past year has evolved itself into this new year, so
will your present and future life mould into each
other. The gradual putting away of old things in
your own conscience, will be an antepast of the
restitution of all things around you. All external
changes will affect but little those who are inwardly
changed and spiritualised. Say to yourself; " 1
will make myself new in this or that, I will cease to
be my former old self in such particulars, men shall
see a change in me in such and such conduct and
behaviour."
Thus day by day you will be enacting in yourself
that renewal of all things which is so shocking to
the natural man. You will be ready for the pass
ing away of the old things around you. It will
80 THE NEW YEAR A TYPE OP THE JUDGMENT DAY.
seem no strange thing but only natural to witness
the regeneration of all things after the ruin of this
world. May GOD so make all things new in you
now, that when He comes to make new heavens
and a new earth He may find you fitted to inhabit
the New Jerusalem, and to receive the new name
which He shall write upon them that overcome.
SERMON X.
(Bircuntcfet on.
THE CHEISTIAN S CIECUMCISION.
S. LUKE ii. 21.
WHEN EIGHT DATS WERE ACCOMPLISHED EOB THE
CIRCUMCISING OF THE CHILD."
WHAT man can fail to be moved by an infant s
helpless sufferings ? They who have witnessed with
undimmed eye the tossings to and fro of the strong
man on his bed of disease and pain, who have heard
with almost cold indifference his fretful and im
patient murmurs or shrieks of anguish they have
been melted oft to tears as they stooped down
to gaze upon the agonised face and listened to the
moanings of a cradled Cross-bearer of an infant s
Passion. It is just as we feel after a mighty tempest
has swept with ravaging hand over the cultivated
haunts of mankind, when the ruin of the huge forest
tree affects us less than the destruction of some more
delicate and frail production of nature. So in the
contemplation of the Church s martyrs, we less pity
S. Stephen sinking beneath the stony shower, than
82 THE CHRISTIAN S CIRCUMCISION. [SERM.
those rosebuds by the whirlwind shorn the Holy
Innocents. Aged Polycarp and hoary Ignatius do
not interest our sympathies so deeply as Laurence
the deacon, and Agnes the virgin. Some of you
doubtless can recollect with inexpressible emotion
the last scenes of infantine life in one most dear to
you. You have had to watch by the dead and dying
often since then, in the case of others, no less closely
allied to you by the ties of love and affection, but your
feelings have never been so keenly excited as beside
that tender flower then ruthlessly cut down. Years
have since then fleeted by, but the picture of that
tiny body racked with pain, its feeble wailings, its
wasted limbs, and pointed features can never be
effaced from your mind s eye. Its very sinlessness
claims of you more commiseration. Not for its
own misdeeds is it thus afflicted, tormented, but it
bears in its own body the sins of others. It is, so
to speak, the very representation of the Crucified
One. Its natural powerlessness of speech to express
its necessities, recalls to our minds the willing silence
of our GOD Incarnate. All this meets in the manger
of Bethlehem. We are more touched by the picture
of that houseless Child amid the brute cattle shedding
His tender blood for us, than by the sublime scene
of the Crucified JESUS amid the rending of rocks and
the darkness of noonday. An infant and yet a
sufferer. A child, yet bidden to wear the martyr s
palm-leaves. Early thus must He go forth on His
saving way to redeem us with His blood, and excite
our love. CHRIST circumcised then is to us in a
x.] TIIE CHEISTIAN S CIECFMCISION. 83
sense more than CHRIST crucified, and more affect
ing. It is the beginning of our Christianity to cir
cumcise ourselves, to cut off the pollutions of our
spiritual life, to pare away the sinful habits, to prune
the dead and withered branches of our vine. It is
its end to deny ourselves in things lawful, to suffer
for well-doing, to endure all things, to cross our
selves in objects best and dearest to our hearts in a
word, to crucify ourselves. Circumcision first, then
crucifixion. First purifying the man, then nailing
him so atoned to the Cross of JESUS. It is the work
in babes in CHRIST, to depart from evil, to put away
the old Adam. It is the work in those of full age
to do good and put on the new Adam. That care
ful watching over the Christian child, that plucking
up of the noisome weeds as they spring up around
the flower of GOD, that checking its too premature
growth, that removal from too rich a soil or too soft
a climate, what is that but circumcision ? Such is
the Christian s life, circumcision in his cradle : in
his deathbed the Cross which all his life long he
carried. It is but a different form of trial. Both
bloody, both sharp and bitter, the one not less se
vere than the other if we consider the age of the
subjects of them. In one view the child s powers of
endurance are more put to the test, if we take into
account that he cannot see always the benefits of his
circumcision. He does not see why he should be
refused this or that ; why this playmate should be
forbidden ; why this pleasure or amusement is
proscribed ; why this task or duty is enjoined ;
84 THE CHRISTIAN S CIECTJMCISION. [SEEM.
why this act of dishonesty or untruth should be
so severely punished. He does not understand to
what a contrary mode of dealing with him would
bring him, to what sin, if permitted, it would tend.
He does not know why his looks and words are
analysed so accurately, why his manners are so
strictly measured ; why this gesture, this tone, this
look, this action must be laid aside. All these little
circumcisings seem to him often the effects of pa
rental caprice or tyranny. Hereafter he will crucify
himself in many of the things wherein he was unwill
ingly circumcised. The adult seizes the Cross as
his last hope. In self-denial and mortification is his
only chance for amendment. And he must do it of
his own free will. For good or for evil he is his own
master. It depends on himself whether he will walk
in the way of the holy Cross unto salvation. And
if his youth has been uncircumcised, all the more
must he crucify his untamed manhood. But ordi
narily circumcision goes before crucifixion. And
the difference lies in this, that the disciples of JESUS
CHRIST had been circumcised by others, but they
took up themselves the Cross. Carnal circumcision,
the outward Judaical rite, is we grant done away, but
its spiritual force and meaning is still binding. As
it preceded, in that it was part of a system, the
Christian dispensation, so must it now anticipate
Christianity in the souls of men. The austere Bap
tist declared this when he required of those who came
to the Jordan for the baptism unto repentance, that
they should cease from their evil ways. The pub-
x.] THE CHRISTIAN S CIRCUMCISION. 85
lican was to circumcise his overreaching and extor
tion ; the soldier to circumcise his violent rapacity ;
the rich to circumcise their clothing and food. This
is what S. Paul spoke of when he said of the Colos-
sian Christians that they had been " circumcised in
CHRIST with the circumcision made without hands,
in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the
circumcision of CHRIST ; buried with Him in Bap
tism."
Baptism is Christian circumcision, because it in
cludes amendment of life co-extensive with the
energy of GOD S grace, then given. Not that all
baptised persons do circumcise themselves. Yet
circumcision is not the less their calling and profes
sion. And it is because so many of the baptised
lead uncircumcised lives, that the connexion between
circumcision and baptism is so much overlooked.
What can give the lie so forcibly to this relation be
tween the sacraments of the old and new dispensa
tions as a self-willed, unchecked, ungoverned Chris
tian child ? What marvel if men deny that baptism
fulfils the Levitical rite, when they see our Christian
youth uncircumcised in heart and ears ? CHRIST to
day shedding His infant blood for us speaks to all on
whom the dew of baptism yet freshly rests, to endure
with patience their circumcision. Ye must be cir
cumcised in speech, in deeds, in food, in dress, in
sleep, in play, in things longed for and desired, if we
would be partakers of CHRIST S childhood. Here
after ye shall take up your cross willingly. " What
I do thou k no west not now, but thou shalt know
86 THE CHBISTIAN S CIRCUMCISION. [SERM.
hereafter." The discipline now may seem hard and
painful, but it is that it may be one day less hard
and less painful for you to carry your cross after
JESUS, All that children shrink from, the severe
reproof, the stern eye, the sharp chastisement, the
solitude, the hard diet, the strict keeping, the shed
ding of tears, and the taking away of your little idols
is but the eighth day circumcising, the perfecting of
the CmusT-child life.
And this is true not only of the natural child, but
of the child spiritual. All ye, who are but young
in religious experience, who have but just begun to
run the Christian race, who are at the eleventh hour
beginning the vine-dressing, know that this circum
cision awaits you too. As every part of your SA
VIOUR S Incarnate life has to be worked out in you,
so this too which meets us at the very threshold.
Don t say, I have to do with the Cross, but what
have I to do with circumcision ? Ye cannot bear the
Cross till ye have first circumcised yourselves. Ye
must undress your souls of the evil which has grown
and clung to them as ye lay in the cradles of sloth,
unconscious of CHRIST S presence within you the
very antitypes of the brute cattle, who could give no
signs of rejoicing at the birth of the Word Incarnate.
CHRIST is born in you, GOD dwelleth in man,
what a motive this to pluck out the eye that causeth
thee to stumble, to lop off the offending hand or
the offending foot 1 Ye cannot carry the Cross
through the strait gate ; till ye have circumcised the
swellings of pride, the dropsy of covetousness, the
x.] THE CHRISTIAN S CIRCUMCISION. 87
inflammations of lust, the madness of anger, the
grossness engendered by indolence and self-indulg
ence. Ye cannot learn to endure till ye have first
learnt to undo. Weeds must be cut down or rooted
up ere the flower can shoot forth a bud. Ye can
not run the race and be winners at the goal, unless
before starting from the barriers ye have cast off
the burden which would impede your progress.
Enough for you to have to run, bearing the Cross.
That is burden enough till you get used to its weight.
You need little to make crosses for yourself beside
that which every disciple of JESUS CHRIST must
carry. Circumcise then yourselves from all the pol
lutions of the old Adam ; your long and inveterate
habits of sin, your evil dispositions and tempers,
your lusts and desires, so at last your shoulders will
be fitted to take up the Cross, and your hands
hardened against its sharp edges, and though you
fall oft beneath its weight, the spirit of the CHRIST-
child within you shall raise you above the weakness
of flesh and blood, and you shall follow Him.
SERMON XL
EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI.
S. MATT. n. 1.
" NOW WHEN JESUS WAS BORN IN BETHLEHEM OF JuDEA, IN
THE DATS OF HEROD THE KlNG, BEHOLD, THERE CAME
WISE MEN FROM THE EAST TO JERUSALEM/
WHEN Almighty GOD vouchsafed to take upon Him
our feeble nature, and as at Christmas was born of
His Blessed Mother, a new relation was, as you
have lately heard very often, established between
GOD and man. Just as Adam s single transgression
disturbed and broke in upon the then close connec
tion between the LORD GOD and His creatures in
the first Paradise, so did this single fact of Goo-
made Man draw together what had been so severed
and kept apart. As by man came spiritual and
moral death, so by Man also came spiritual and
moral resurrection. Neither except CHRIST had
been born, could He have died and risen ; nor ex
cept we had been born in Him, could we have died
to sin and risen unto righteousness. But this new
relation was not instituted between GOD and man
EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. 89
without the co-operation of the latter. As without
the submission of the will of S. Mary GOD might
not have dwelt in her, as the true Tabernacle, so
the quickening power bestowed thereby on our hu
manity had to be acquiesced in and acknowledged
by mankind, in order to appropriate it to them
selves. Thus the Child-Goo was adored on His
manger-altar by unlearned peasants of the Jews,
as representatives of the people of GOD. Their
being summoned by angels to worship Him, and
their obedience to the call ratified the covenant,
written in fleshy tables, made betwixt the Infinite
and the finite in the stable of Bethlehem. But this
concerned only the chosen family of the ALMIGHTY ;
those who were the apple of His eye, who were ever
nigh to Him, whose were the promises, whose were
the fathers, to whom pertained the glory, the adop
tion, the covenants, and the giving of the law, and
the service of GOD. What marvel, that if it pleased
GOD to dwell in very deed at all among men and
in men, He should so dwell among His ancient
people the children of Abraham ? Nor seeing that
the Jewish people, as a nation of shepherds, were
bidden of old to sprinkle their houses with the
blood of lambs for their salvation from the Satanic
Pharaoh, marvel that shepherds should be chosen
to represent Israel in the adoration of the true Lamb
and Shepherd of His elect.
And as the shepherds were sponsors, or vicarious
worshippers in behalf of the Jewish people, so were
the Magi, as at this time, in the name of us Gen-
90 EXAMPLE OJ 1 THE MAGI. [SERM.
tiles. We in their loins, so to speak, ratified the
covenant between GOD and man then made. Ex
cept for the Wise Men s long journey from the
East, we had not been united to the Incarnate
GOD by any responding acts on our part. As we
have said of S. Mary, and of the shepherds, so we
say of the Wise Men and their important part in
the mystery of the Incarnation. If any of these
had refused to have followed the direction of angels
or heavenly bodies, supernaturally vouchsafed, what
a strange train of thought as to the consequences
necessarily suggests itself! And just picture to
your minds what a chance there was of the Wise
Men declining to present themselves before the
King of the Jews !
For assuming that a tradition had come down to
them from their ancestors concerning a star which
was to betoken wonderful results to the world ;
taking for granted all the feelings natural to men,
who, with their forefathers before them, had been
watching all their life long the appearances of the ce
lestial phenomena, and had at last beheld the expected
planet, yet with all this it is manifest that no com
mon feelings of this sort would have drawn men on
to follow the star, as a certain and infallible guide
through dangerous and difficult lands. It is not as if
they were moved by the prospect of riches, or by the
impulse of science. Even thus, as we know, it is not
an easy matter for men to leave their homes, and
relatives, and friends, and business, or duties, upon
doubtful objects. But they, as far as we can learn,
XI.] EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. 91
had nothing more to urge them than an honest desire
to follow their own convictions of what was right to
do. All that we can say for certain they under
stood, is expressed in their own address to the
Jewish doctors, " Where is He That is born King
of the Jews ? for we have seen His star in the East,
and are come to worship Him." What! under
take so long and dreary a travel for the sole pur
pose of paying worship and reverence to a King ?
And that King, remember, before unheard of by
conquest or warfare. It is not as if they had gone
to propitiate a Csesar. There was we know a gene
ral impression prevalent in the world, that a Uni
versal Monarch was to arise in Judea. Yet what
need for these Easterns to put themselves to pain
and trouble, to go to pay Him homage ere He had
built up His kingdom ? Some injunction so to do
from their fathers, coupled with the mysterious
vision of the star, might have been all that impelled
them on their journey. A very faint weak voice of
nature uttered its still cry within them, and they
obeyed its bidding, and went on their star-led way.
Now it is just in such a position as this that
many of you are tried and tested. You say, we want
more evidence, more light, more conviction. We
are for the cautious, the prudent, what-will-satisfy-
others line. There are many things you may feel
called on to do, concerning which it would be im
possible to convince your relatives or friends that you
were right in this or that proceeding. It might not
have been objected to the Magi that they watched so
92 EXAMPLE OE THE MAGI. [SEEM.
earnestly for a sight of the star ; but the journeying
after it, far from their own country, to worship Him
of Whom it was the herald was a very different
affair. And yet they, in obedience to such light
within and without them as they had, toiled on till
they came and knelt before the Bethlehem King.
Thus did the Gentiles come to confess a GOD Incar
nate. Thus did we, in the persons of these Magi,
sign the bond and covenant made betwixt GOD and
the whole world.
Well, now this is what I wish to bring your
thoughts to to-night. You have all of you a light
of some kind and degree leading you on to adore
CHRIST in the heavenly Bethlehem. Just put the
question fairly to yourself, " How honestly am I
following that light which is beckoning me onward ?"
Are you giving way to sloth or despair because of
the perils and trials which befal you under the guid
ance of the star ? Consider how hard it must have
been for the wise men to have persevered how
many discouragements and checks when once they
had started. Twelve days they had to travel, in the
cold winter, snow and ice perhaps as they crossed
the Arabian mountains and deserts, now over shift
ing sands, now over sharp rugged rocks. Many a
misgiving had they, many a doubt as they plodded
their weary way and asked fruitless questions on the
road, and at last the Star ceased to lighten them as
they stayed in Jerusalem, the royal city, where they
might well look for the end of their search. There
they find those whom most of all it concerned to
XI.] EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. 93
seek for their king, ignorant of His being, and care
less of inquiry. They are obliged to set out anew
on their journey, and when they regain the lost Star
it lights them not to a palace but to a manger.
At all these different points some might have
abandoned the search and the Star and returned
home. Not so they, but " when they came into
the house they saw the young Child with Mary His
Mother, and fell down and worshipped Him." Now
what are your difficulties to theirs ? You have cer
tainly more light than they. Can you say that it
is harder for you to come to CHRIST, than it was for
them ? Did you think as much of Him as these
heathens did of the king they looked for, we should
find no difficulty in urging you on to a like journey.
We do not deny that your journeying has its hard
ships and severities ; its grounds for scruples and
doubtfulness ; its coldness ; its roughness ; its slip-
periness ; its loneliness ; its contempt. You have
your disappointments ; your stumblings ; your falls ;
your lockings back. You cannot accomplish your
journey any more than the wise men without toil
and labour. But you have for your Star the Church
of GOD, the city set on a hill, whose light cannot
be hid ; its Sacraments ; its Scriptures ; its mi
nisters. You have too the graces and gifts of the
SPIRIT specially His illuminating influence. You
are travelling too on no new and untrodden lines
but in company with innumerable others. Are
you then faithfully walking in this light ? In
spite of all hindrances are you still struggling on
94< EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. [SEEM.
whither it calls you? Put the question home.
CHRIST is here presents Himself here to be wor
shipped day by day. Yet how many excuses do
many make for not coming with the Magi. Some
times it is too warm sometimes too cold. Or we
may be ridiculed for our devotion ; or the way is
too long and dreary ; or we have misgivings as to
the use and profit to our souls to be gained thereby.
GOD is here specially in the Blessed Sacrament
yet how many are too slothful to rise and worship
Him. It may seem unlikely that this Church
should be the special habitation of Almighty GOD,
or that the Altar should be in effect the throne of
the Crucified One, yet how equally unlikely that
the manger in Bethlehem should be the palace of a
great king.
Still more closely. Ye are the temple of the
Living GOD, JESUS CHRIST as truly tabernacles in
your frail bodies as He did in the stable of Beth
lehem. Yet what trouble do ye take to pay Him
reverence to realise His presence within you ?
Alas ! the Magi so far off, yet coming so nigh Him ;
ye so nigh, yet content often to be in effect so far
off! So little pains to recollect yourselves, to feel
after Him, to bow your hearts before Him, as He
sitteth in the midst and demands your worship and
service. Ah, Christian, thou hast often a long
weary road to travel ere thou comest to thy LORD
within thee. Thou hast gone back into heathendom
into the far country with the Prodigal. Thou
hast wasted thy more than father s gifts, and thou
XI.] EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. 95
must endure hardships ere thou canst come to thy
self, and arise and go back to Him and do Him
service. Think no more of the journeyings often
of the perils of robbers the wicked angels who
would intercept and spoil you ; of perils by your
own countrymen those who think you too earnest
and serious, of perils by the heathen those who
have no religion worth the name. Think no more
of perils in the wilderness the waste world around,
nor of perils in the city the Church of GOD, nor of
perils among false brethren, nor of painfulness and
weariness, nor of watchings often, hunger and thirst,
cold and nakedness, nor of fastings often. Be sted-
fast, and the Star shall lead you too to the CHRIST-
child on His manger throne.
SERMON XII.
EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI.
S. MATT. 11. 11.
WHEN THEY WERE COME INTO THE HOUSE, THEY SAW
THE YOUNG CHILD WITH MARY HlS MOTHER, AND PELL
DOWN, AND WORSHIPPED HlM : AND WHEN THEY HAD
OPENED THEIR TREASURES, THEY PRESENTED UNTO HlM
GIFTS ; GOLD, FRANKINCENSE, AND MYRRH."
WE brought our Magi to the manger and left them
there, that we might have somewhat remaining to
dwell upon when we next should meet. And now
the second obvious thought is, what they did when
they came into the Presence of the CmusT-child.
First just consider with yourselves what you are in
the habit of doing, when you come into the Presence
of Almighty GOD. For I presume that when we as
semble for our worship, we believe CHRIST to be as
effectually in the midst of us as He was in that
lowly manger. Well, I ask, what did the Magi do
when they came into that poor stable? What
EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. 97
would they have been likely to have done as they
found at the end of their long star-lighted journey,
the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes in such a
mock-palace as this ? Did they stand staring and
gazing with wonder ? Did they say, This is no king,
we must have been wrong in our calculations ; we
must have made a mistake ; this must be the wrong
place ? They had more faith than this. They left
the ox and the ass to stand staring and looking on,
while they no sooner saw the young Child with
Mary His Mother, than they " fell down and wor
shipped Him."
It is then of no avail to come to CHRIST, to take
ever so much trouble, ever so much pains and medi
tation, unless the end of the journey be, to fall down
and worship the Child JESUS. No journey, how
ever conducted with faith in the guide, will be suc
cessful except it be sanctified by this bowing down
of soul and body. And such worship as this was
natural to the Gentile mind. It had been abused
by it doubtless for idolatrous purposes, but the very
bowing down to stocks and stones being a corruption
of true worship, indicates what the universal tradi
tion was, before it was so diverted. And this is
implied in the second Commandment, "Thou shalt
not bow down to them nor worship them." For as
every commandment commands the contrary of
what it forbids, so we understand that the command
ment is not fulfilled by merely not bowing down to
idols, unless we also bow down and worship GOD.
And hence Gentile Christianity began with this idea
98 EXAMPLE OP THE MAGI. [SEEM.
of worship. They who were sponsors for us at our
birth into light and joy in the stable of Bethlehem,
engaged for us to do likewise. And this, observe,
was the first act of worship the Scriptures say was
paid to CHRIST. We are not told what the Blessed
Virgin did, nor yet what S. Joseph did, when their
GOD appeared to them in the form of a weak infant.
Marvellous thought to dwell upon how they tended
that Divine babe, and ministered to its necessities ;
how though so familiarized to the Incarnation, it
lost to them little of its awfulness. But we are not
told, I say, of their acts of reverence. Nor is it said
what the shepherds did, when they came in on the
holy night to visit the new-born CHRIST. But we
are told what the Wise Men did when they saw the
young Child. Had they been wrong in doing so, we
should have had a warning given us in the same
Scriptures against following their example. No
less could serve in the adoration of Him Who had
taken upon Him our body, than to be honoured by
our bodies. And who were they that paid this
bodily reverence to the Infant GOD ? Not ignorant
shepherds, as the world might say, poor supersti
tious Jews who had had no advantages of liberal
education, but were in the trammels of a priest-
ridden system of religion. Not such as these, I say,
but Wise Men, they were Chaldeans, astrologers,
scientific, philosophic, who passed their lives in ma
thematical calculations as to the movements of the
planets and heavenly bodies. We cannot object to
their doing it .that it was a piece of Judaism, and so
XII.] EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. QQ
foreign to Christianity. Nor can we plead that they
were influenced by any evil prejudices or traditions,
disposing them to material adorations. It is most
probable that they were fire-worshippers, and unac
customed to venerate human idols. It was doubt
less their custom to perform acts of humblest pros
tration before superiors, and so they followed their
custom here. And thus as they believed the CHRIST-
child to be a king, and (if we consider the unkingly
estate in which they found Him, and the mystery of
the gifts they offered,) to be a supernatural and ex
traordinary king, they staggered not at the stable
and the manger, the oxen and the straw, but " fell
down and worshipped Him."
The first of these two words expresses simply their
bodily posture, the second refers to the soul s act.
By " falling down" we have given us the outward
expression of homage ; by " worshipped" that in
ward reverence of the soul, which distinguishes re
ligious from mere civil bowings down. And these
two, the outward and the inward, the bodily and
the spiritual worship ought never to be separated.
It is a mistake of no small moment to make our
worship of GOD purely spiritual. GOD is a Spirit-
granted, but then He is also Man. And as He is
to be worshipped in spirit and in truth, in that He
is a Spirit, so is He to be venerated by material and
bodily gestures, in that He is Man. And as mere
outward worship denies GOD to be a Spirit, so does
mere spiritual worship deny Him to have become
Man. It is a revival by implication and inference
100 EXAMPLE OE TUE MAGI. [SEEM.
of the Docetian and Gnostic heresy, which taught
that JESUS CHRIST suffered only in appearance, and
not really. The Gospel did not destroy the idea of
worship familiar to Jewish and Gentile minds. It
purified and ennobled it, but did not annihilate. It
gave the body a soul, but did not take away the
body. And this is why the Scriptures of the New
Covenant insist so much on inward worship, because
to preach outward was unnecessary. As if a man
were to contend for merely outward acts of religion,
the obvious answer would be that we must not over
look the fact of our having souls wherewith to adore
GOD, so we would entreat those who would confine
religion to the heart to remember that He Who
made man for His own service and glory, gave him
in the Creation a body also. And recollect that this
union of soul and body is not merely to be for this
life. It is also to continue after the resurrection.
We shall then serve Almighty GOD and the LAMB,
not as now with frail and sinful bodies, but with
glorified bodies. S. John describes heavenly wor
ship as exhibited in outward acts in kneelings, and
bowings, and prostrations. This is no mere figure
of speech, no poetical exaggeration. We shall one
day in these very bodies kneel before the Crucified
One as truly and as unmistakeably as the Magi fell
down and worshipped the cradled Goo-child, or as
we now bow ourselves down lowlily in church at the
Invisible Presence of GOD.
This was the kind of worship the Devil sought of
us in the Person of CHRIST, when he came tempt-
XII.] EXAMPLE Or THE MAGI. 101
ing Him in the Wilderness, " All these things will
I give Thee, if Thou wilt fall down and worship
me/ This was the kind of worship S. Paul said
the heathen would offer to Almighty GOD, if they
entered Christian assemblies when conducted to edi
fication, " falling down on his knees he will worship
GOD, and confess that GOD is among you." This
was the worship which the SAVIOUR though in
mockery received from the Gentile soldiers, when,
after having crowned Him with thorns, and clothed
Him in purple, they, " bowing their knees, wor
shipped Him." This too was the worship S. Peter
suffered not Cornelius to pay to himself, when
he " fell down at his feet and worshipped him,"
and which the angel refused at the hands of S.
John. This is the honour offered to the Everlast
ing GOD by the " four-and-twenty elders, who fell
down and worshipped Him That liveth for ever and
ever."
True, indeed, worship may be confined to the
mind and heart, without being extended to postures
of the body. Jacob, when infirm and aged, " wor
shipped, leaning on the top of his staff," bowing
himself, that is, as well as he could. David, when
in like manner at the close of life, " worshipped,
leaning on his bed." Or where ignorance, or in
veterate prejudice exist, GOD may accept inward
reverence, though unaccompanied by external de
votion. But this cannot weaken, but rather con
firms what is set before us as the rule of worship in
the Scriptures. Exceptions prove, not disallow the
102 EXAMPLE OE THE MAGI. [SEEM.
rule. The exhortation of the Psalmist is, u O come
let us worship and fall down." And the prophet
Isaiah foretells, in the Name of the LORD, " I have
sworn by Myself, the word is gone out of My
mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, That
unto Me EVERY knee shall bow, EVERY tongue shall
swear."
It is as plain as words can make it, that whatever
homage we offer, whatever reverence we make to
earthly kings, we are bound to give no less to the
Goo-Man, the King of kings. Why do I insist so
strongly on this point ? Because I wish to make
this church a place of perfect worship, not of the
unreal, unnatural, half-worship of mere spiritualism.
I know that men s souls are only to be approached
through their bodies. I know that they by the aid
of their tongues impress certain characters of grati
tude to GOD, communion with Him, faith in Him,
and the like upon their souls. I know that at this
very moment, through the organs of hearing, I am
labouring to fix certain truths upon your inner
man. And so I know by experience, that bodily
worship is an aid to the soul in her efforts to grasp
the reality of GOD S presence. All that humbles
and crushes for the time our proud selves, helps to
bring us closer to the throne of GOD ; and bodily
reverence does stamp the idea of GOD S presence
upon the soul.
And this is not confined to us men : it is true of
the angelic host. Else why do they cover their
faces with their wings ? Why do they fall be-
XTI.] EXAMPLE OE THE MAGI. 103
. ,. :-. i? * , \ . _* ,* . l * i- f - , *
fore the throne on their faces and worship GOD ?
If outward, bodily worship be the rule in heaven,
what else mean we when we pray, " Thy will be
done on earth, as it is in heaven ?" But, indeed, the
denial of bodily worship is in effect a denial of
CHRIST having come in the flesh. If He refused
not bodily worship when on earth ; nay, if He
rather set us an example of bodily reverence in His
addresses to His FATHER, on what ground is that
bodily worship to be denied to Him, as the glorified
GOD -Man in heaven ? Or why should that which
was offered to Him after His Resurrection, cease on
His Ascension ? Where, and what is faith, if He
is to have such honour withheld from Him, be
cause He is now invisible ? Why is He to be less
honoured, because exalted to the right hand of the
FATHER ?
Be not then, O ye Christians, outdone by your
Gentile forefathers in worshipping the Incarnate
Deity. Let not your worship be less perfect than
theirs. Or granting that they comprehended less
than you the fulness of the mystery to which the
star had brought them, let not their recognition and
confession exceed your s. The more you think you
realise the fact of CHRIST the SON of GOD made
Man, the more ought this to be evidenced by your
behaviour. All the more lowly should your worship
be, as it were, to make up for the less informed, the
less spiritual, the less hearty adoration of our King,
offered by others. It was said by them of old time,
" we cannot see GOD and live." What must it be
104 EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. [SEEM.
to behold GOD as He manifests Himself in His
Word and Sacraments, and among the two or three
assembled in His Name? The Day-Star shining
and arising in your hearts has led you here, as to
Bethlehem, into the awful presence of GOD. If
Jacob could say of the place, where he had seen
angels ascending and descending, " How dreadful
is this place ; this is none other than the house of
GOD : this is the gate of heaven :" much more here,
where the ladder of the Incarnation has been set
up, whereby we have close union with the God
head. You soul and body are in the awful pre
sence of GOD, humble both before Him. As your
bodies are washed in baptism, your heads blessed
in confirmation, your mouths partake of the mys
teries of the Body and Blood, so bow them down
before Him, Who by His Sacraments visits you.
One day you soul and body too must fall down
and worship ; for in this flesh must you see
GOD. Anticipate that day. You must be reverent
then. You must prostrate yourself before the Ma
jesty of GOD then. Believe, then, that GOD is here
too, and act as if you believed it. As He was
pleased to receive the worship of the Magi, when in
the form of a little babe, even so is He ready to
accept yours, now that in His glorified Humanity
He sits as King in His Mediatorial kingdom.
So entering in with the Magi into the Bethlehem-
stable, we will look hereafter to join that company
which S. John saw. " After this I beheld, and lo
a great multitude which no man could number, of
XII.] EXAMPLE OF THE MAGI. 105
all nations, and kindreds, and people, and languages,
stood before the throne and before the LAMB,
clothed with white robes and palms in their hands ;
and cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our
GOD, Who sitteth upon the throne, and unto the
LAMB, and all the angels stood round about the
throne and about the elders and the four beasts,
and fell before the throne on their faces and wor
shipped GOD."
SERMON XIII.
THE MYSTEKY OF JOKDAN HOLY BAPTISM.
S. MATT. in. 17.
"AND LO, A VOICE FROM HEAVEN, SATING, THIS is MY
BELOVED SON, IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED."
I SUPPOSE that the difficulty felt by most persons in
answering objections to what is called the Sacra
mental system may be summed up in this, that it is
laid down as a first principle by those with whom
we differ, that material things cannot become chan
nels of grace to us. And the consequence is, that
we find persons or bodies still clinging to Sacra
ments or outward forms without any adequate con
ception of their relations to us, and using them as
if mere relics of Judaism. But why may not matter
convey spiritual as well as material powers ? Is it
impossible for the Author of all to impart super
natural as well as natural efficacy to the things
which He has created ? Is it so very absurd on the
face of it to imagine that there may be laws which
:THE MYSTERY OF JOEDAN. 107
regulate the relations of material things as duly and
fixedly to the new creation as to the old ? And in
that our new creation is described as the hidden
life, the being in CHRIST, and the like, we might
reasonably expect that a different exercise of intel
lectual powers would have to be called into action
in its discoveries and analysis. One thing is cer
tain. When GOD became man a new state of things
began. The relations of matter and spirit were
changed. To deny this is to deny the Incarnation.
CHRIST then, being GOD, by becoming man united
our collective manhood to the Deity. That was
GOD S Act irrespective of individual acceptance of
it. It was the proclamation of the new Creation,
11 Let there be light and there was light." But how
was man to accept the Incarnation ? how was he to
unite himself to the Goo-man ? I know that CHRIST
has become man, but how am I through Him to be
drawn into the Godhead ? That union of GOD and
Man in the Incarnation was not a mere effect of
emotions and feelings on the part of the Blessed
Virgin. Almighty GOD did really and truly dwell
in her. And therefore, in some way or other, we
must be as truly Deified as GOD truly became In
carnate. No act of faith or repentance or the like
will do this for me. How can I unite myself to the
Incarnate CHRIST ?
CHRIST not only became man and joined Himself
to our nature and so us to GOD, but He also made
a way for us to join ourselves to Him. He was
baptized not for Himself but for us. Not for Him
108 THE MYSTEEY OF JOEDAN : [SEEM.
was heaven opened Not for Him was the descent
of the holy dove Not for Him was the voice,
"Thou art My SON." First of all GOD hallowed
human flesh in the Virgin s womb. Next that hal
lowed flesh hallowed water. The fragrance of the
Godhead was in CHRIST S baptism imparted to all
waters. As we say of CHRIST, that by enduring
poverty, suffering, and the like, He has hallowed
those states to be special occasions of redemption,
so by being baptized He sanctified baptism. And
the flesh of CHRIST was not only legally or relatively
holy, but actually and in itself. So His Baptism
has become not a mere legal purification but a real
cleansing. Our manhood in CHRIST went down
into the Jordan. Water has no longer only a ma
terial but also a spiritual relation to us. We go
down with CHRIST to be baptized. To us the hea
vens are then opened To us the HOLY SPIRIT
comes down To us the voice is spoken, " Thou
art My well-beloved SON, in Whom I am well
pleased/ The Holy TRINITY met indeed at the
Jordan baptism. So too they do in effect and
virtue in all baptisms, for it is in the Name of the
TRINITY that we are washed. And thus the HOLY
SPIRIT does not supersede the fact of CHRIST S In
carnation. His office is to carry it into effect.
Just as in the first Creation the Spirit of GOD moved
upon the face of the waters, so now. It did not
pass by the void and formless earth and the dark
abyss of waters. Then spirit acted upon matter,
not without and apart from it. It brought matter
XIII.] HOLY BAPTISM. 109
into living and bright worlds. It changed it, so
that no one could have known that the heavens and
the earth which are now were once a rude and un
digested mass.
Well may this season then be called the Epi
phany, which besides other manifestations of our
Blessed LORD S Divinity, exhibits His baptismal
glory. He the sinless One is content to be bap
tized as though a sinner, that He might by His
Divine flesh sanctify water to the putting away of
sin. In the midst of His humiliation which even
the Baptist shrunk from allowing Him to undergo
we hear a voice from the excellent glory, and see
the mystic Spirit resting upon Him. Thenceforth
we hear the testimony of the Baptist that this is
indeed the CHRIST. " I saw the SPIRIT descending
as a dove from heaven, and It abode upon Him . . .
And I saw and testified that He is the SON of GOD."
He is set forth as the Author of the New Creation.
The HOLY GHOST personally descends upon the
manhood. Of our manhood thus baptized and thus
sanctified the voice of the FATHER declares that He
is well pleased therewith, and that we are His well
beloved Sons.
Such is the conclusion to which this Epiphany
brings us. Almighty GOD has been pleased to
manifest Himself to us in the waters. He the
second Noah sitteth on the deluge ; the windows of
heaven too are open, and the dove comes with the
branch of peace to declare that earthly nature has
been purified by water. Henceforth Baptism is set
110 TIIE MYSTERY OP JOED AN : [SERH.
forth in the true Ark as the bow in the cloud to
preach the immutable promises of GOD. As the
bed of sickness, death, and the valley of the shadow
of death have been divested of their terrors because
we only therein tread in the footsteps of our Al
mighty SAVIOUR, so is it with the Baptismal water.
We descend into the bath He has sanctified by His
touch ; He it is Who baptizes, for it is the virtue
of His baptism which gives regenerating force to
ours. And singular thought it is, that the very
nature of water is more than any other element
capable of carrying on a character once imparted to
it. On natural grounds we might argue that what
was done in Jordan has affected all rivers and brooks,
and streams and fountains. No thought can be
more overpowering if we really dwell on it than that
GOD, Who is a Spirit, has been dipped in the water
of His own creation. He indeed filleth all things.
In Him we live and move and have our being. How
is this reconcilable with the fact that He personally
was washed in Jordan? This is surely a difficulty
of no small weight. Can it be easier to believe this
than that we by the washing of water change our
natures by the invocation of the TRINITY ? GOD
must have, so to speak, changed His nature from
what It was, ere He was baptized in Jordan.
Again, in His baptism CHRIST showed Himself to
be the SON of GOD. Before that time, though S.
John, in the womb of his mother Elizabeth, acknow
ledged the presence of GOD, yet, till He baptized
him, he knew Him not to be the SON of GOD. Up
XIII.] HOLY BAPTISM. Ill
to that time our SAVIOUR was as though any com
mon man. None could see any difference betwixt
Him and any other of the sons of men. He had no
form nor comeliness nor any beauty that men should
desire Him. But He stepped forth out of Jordan
pre-eminently as the only begotten the SON of
GOD S love. Whatever CHRIST was before, we
know Him by this to be the Eternal SON. Spirit
and matter were for ever united in the waters of the
old creation. Much more is flesh and spirit for
ever joined and wedded in the waters of the new.
Thus the same Spirit who overshadowed the
Blessed Virgin, so that she conceived and bare holy
flesh, came down in the sight of S. John the Bap
tist and rested upon the work of the New Creation,
the second Adam. We cannot be born like our
Blessed LORD by the direct agency of the HOLY
GHOST but we must enter the sanctifying water,
as the womb of the Spirit. There are we conceived
by the HOLY GHOST anew there are we joined to
CHRIST S manhood there do we become sons of
GOD and joint heirs with CHRIST. Once our LORD
was supernaturally born of the Virgin Mary, and
was made man. In His baptism He was manifested
as GOD. Had He not been GOD always, He must,
if such a thing were possible, have become so then.
All who descend after Him into the water become
what He is, as He by descending after us into the
fleshly tabernacle became what we are.
It is then your Epiphany, who have been bap
tized, that is celebrated in the Baptism of JESUS
112 THE MYSTERY OF JORDAN : [SERM.
CHRIST. As He was then manifested to be the SON
of GOD, so ye are then proclaimed likewise Sons of
Him. It is no human voice, but the voice of GOD
that has spoken to you ever since, " Because ye are
sons, GOD hath sent forth the Spirit of His SON
into your hearts, crying, Abba, FATHER." It is not
as if GOD had become man, and there stopped. We
too, in baptism, have been made partakers of the
Godhead. And as we celebrate not merely one
manifestation of the Godhead in CHRIST ; not merely
His Epiphany to the Magi, or His Epiphany in His
Baptism, or His Epiphany at His first miracle in
Cana, or that Epiphany of feeding the thousands in
the wilderness ; so your lives ought to be too un
ceasing Epiphanies, never-ending showings forth of
the glory of CHRIST, Who abides in you. Men
ought to be able to see at times a difference betwixt
you and others. Ye may seem common every-day,
Christians I say not, but even common men. People
may come into contact with you without being
struck with the light that is shed around you. But
ye must have your manifestations of sonship with
GOD. If ye have real union with CHRIST if ye
have kept fast hold of that bond which in baptism
knits men to Him men must see your light shin
ing before them. Ye have in Him a hidden life.
But the evidences of it must, every now and then,
flash forth upon lookers on. As CHRIST S Godhead
was not so hidden but that It had Its Epiphany, so
must be your Divine life.
Evil spirits evil habits and tempers must be seen
XIII.] HOLT BAPTISM. 113
openly departing blindness removed deafness un
sealed deadness quickened sin s leprosy healed.
At times even the disciples knew not that it was
JESUS. " It is so with the CmusT-life. People say
of its possessors at one time, that they are nothing
so very wonderful; at another, that they never
thought to see such exhibitions of wisdom, patience,
forgiveness, liberality, self-sacrifice, and so on, in
them. These are your Epiphanies. Your very
temptations should all the more manifest your
supernatural vigour. Even on your very last Cross
it should be said of you, " Truly this was a Son of
GOD." This is what the world naturally requires
of us. You cling to your birthright ; you have not
yet despised it ; you speak of your sonship, your
adoption, your regeneration. Let it be seen then
by all. Let men see the CmusT-like character com
ing out from the veil of the flesh the spirit of
peace and love dwelling on your tongues. So in
the Great Epiphany you shall be confessed by
CHRIST as His, when He shall come in great glory
and manifest Himself as He is.
SERMON XIV.
THE MYSTERY OP CANA TEANSELEMENTATION.
S. JOHN ii. 11.
" TlIIS BEGINNING OF MIRACLES DID JESUS IN CANA OF GALI
LEE, AND MANIFESTED FOKTH HlS GLORY, AND HlS DISCI
PLES BELIEVED ON HlM."
IN these words is described the third event com
prehended in the festival of the Epiphany CHRIST S
first miracle of changing water into wine at the
marriage-feast in Cana of Galilee. At this time
then JESUS if manifested forth His glory." The
other Epiphanies but exhibited His humiliation in
the manger of Bethlehem to the Eastern Magi,
and in the waters of Jordan to John the Baptist,
but this His divine power in working miracles.
Now He begins that wondrous ministry on earth
which is to last three years, and be crowned with
His Resurrection and Ascension. Consider that for
THE MYSTERY OE CANA. 115
thirty years He had lived hidden and unknown.
With what joy should we behold this exercise of
CHRIST S Godhead after He has so long delayed the
exhibition of His power. Let us at least now join
His disciples in their believing on Him. Hitherto
it might have been hard to believe that He was
GOD, as we saw only a poor, humble child at His
mother s breasts, and lodged in a cradle of straw,
none to receive Him but the brute creation. It was
perchance difficult to think of His Divine Essence,
as we beheld Him increasing in the powers of mind
and body like any other youth. Faith might have
been oppressed by the contradictions of sight, as we
looked upon JESUS emptied of His Deity, and un
clothed with His unchangeable attributes.
We have, doubtless, been led to lament over the
humiliation of CHRIST for us, and to mourn that
our pride and vanity caused Him so much abase
ment ; but now we rejoice over His first miracle,
the first proof He was pleased to give of His Divi
nity. The true Light has burst forth from the veil
of the flesh. " Our GOD appears in perfect beauty."
He Who created all things at the first, is pleased to
change what He created. It is His will that the
water poured into the water-pots, by some secret
energy is converted into wine. Water obeys its
Creator s voice, and becomes what it was not, that
He might be seen Who He was.
This is the Epiphany of glory, as the others were
the Epiphanies of shame. In those the shepherds
and wise men beheld our LORD S humiliation, and
i 2
116 THE MYSTERY OF CANA : [SERM.
John the Baptist shrunk from being an agent in it ;
but here He " manifested forth His glory, and His
disciples believed on Him." In those, manifesta
tions apparently external to Him, drew worshippers
to Him. Here the Epiphany proceeded from His
own act : He, by the exhibition of His innate power,
attracted believers. The company of angels and
the strange star led their disciples but to a poor,
meanly clad, and hardly-housed Infant, falling far
short of their expectations. But the marriage-feast
of Cana disclosed Him, Who seemed to be but a
laborious carpenter s son, to be the CHRIST.
As Christmas exhibits the beginning of the man
hood of CHRIST, whereby He became partaker of
all the sufferings of our mortal state ; so Epiphany
begins that series of miracles, whereby He was con
tinually drawing the attention of the Jews to His
Divinity. For our LORD Himself declares, that the
sin of the Jews mainly consisted in rejecting Him
after having worked so many miracles. " If I had
not done among them the works which none other
man did, they had not had sin, but now have they
no cloke for their sin." " The works that I do bear
witness to Me." Nothing short of working so many
wonders and signs, could have kept the interest
alive in such a One as our Blessed LORD, homeless,
beggar, and friendless, the Man of sorrows, and
acquainted with grief, the despised and rejected of
men, a worm and no man, a very scorn of men, and
the outcast of the people. And thus this manifes
tation of His glory took place on the third day.
XIV.] TEAKSELEMEIfTATION. 117
The Patriarchal and Prophetic day had passed away,
and now it was the Evangelical day, when the
Brightness of the FATHER S glory began to shine
forth. As in the giving of the Law the LORD came
down in the sight of all the people in a thick cloud
on the third day, so on the third day the SON of
GOD manifested His power, though shrouded in the
cloud of His humanity. And fitting, too, that but
a short time should elapse after S. John the Bap
tist had pointed our SAVIOUR to be the LAMB of
GOD, That taketh away the sins of the world. Meet
that He should soon bear witness Himself by some
outward demonstration of His Divine energy, that
He was the CHRIST. And He was pleased to do
this at the time of a marriage. This because mar
riage is the public confession and ratifying of be
trothal and engagement, the sign and seal of love.
He who had loved us so much as to condescend to
pass through all the stages from conception to
birth, and to choose for His first earthly habitation
the stable of brute cattle ; He, Who had secretly
betrothed Himself to our nature in the Virginal
chamber of S. Mary, now openly declares His mys
tic union with man.
From this time there can be no doubt but that He
is the SON of GOD, made man. Now we believe not
because of S. Mary s word, nor because of S. Jo
seph s, nor because of the shepherds word, nor be
cause of the Wise Men s, for we have seen Him
ourselves, and know that this is indeed the CHRIST
the SAVIOUR of the world. As the love of GOD was
118 THE MYSTERY OF CANA : [SEEM.
manifested toward us, in that He sent His only be
gotten SON into the world, that we might live
through Him, so at this His first miracle have we
known and believed this love that GOD hath to us.
To-day we ratify the espousals of CHRIST and His
Church. His Church comes to Him in faith, ty
pified by the Virgin Mother, the second Eve, the
mother of all living, " they have no wine." The
Church alone has faith to call forth the efficacy of
the Incarnation. Jewish shepherds and Gentile
Magi alike fail to make the Goo-man show Himself
to the world. And in that our LORD seems to re
pel the Church, " Woman, what have I to do with
thee, Mine hour is not yet come," what have we
here but another proof of the virtue of faith, which
caused the LORD to anticipate His hour the hour
when the Church should ask and her joy should be
full ? the hour, when, as was represented by His
committing His Mother to the care of S. John, the
Church should have sons which should obey her
suggestions and rules, and treat her with the obe
dience due to a natural parent. And the union of
CHRIST and His Church is anticipated by a singular
miracle. It is not healing the sick ; it is not rais
ing the dead ; it is not casting out devils ; it is not
preaching to the poor ; it is not cleansing lepers ; it
is not giving sight to the blind ; hearing to the deaf;
strengthening the infirm ; making the lame and halt
whole. None of these or of like to these. It is
transformation ; transmutation ; changing water into
wine, "not a mixture but a creation :" as says S.
XIY.] TRANSELEMENTATION. 119
Chrysostom, " the simple nature of water vanished,
and the flavour of wine was produced ; not that a
weak dilution was obtained by means of some strong
infusion, but that which was was annihilated, and that
which was not, came to be." Or as S. Augustine,
" The Same, Who makes every year wine in the
vine, made that day wine in the water-pots."
This then is the miracle whereby He manifested
His glory, transmutation, change of nature. Where-
ever He meets His Church in hallowed union, there
does He work a change of the character of her chil
dren. It is then this destruction of what was, and
production of what was not in you, which manifests
His glory more than the preaching of the shepherds,
who had seen Him in the manger. It is the effect
and issue of His birth and thirty years privacy and
seclusion from the world, that He should work this
miracle of conversion to higher from lower, to
stronger from weaker. And this is accomplished by
His Church and ministers. He does it in answer to
the prayers of His Church, at our baptism. He
makes to exist in us what was not there before. He
annihilates one principle in us and introduces an
other. Yet He does this not directly and imme
diately, but by the hands of others. He bids the
water-pots to be filled with water. And the Church
has said to the servants, " Whatsoever He saith unto
you, do it." And when the servants draw from the
water-pots they find conversion has taken place.
What was there, poor, and weak, and insipid, is no
longer there. It is now strong, powerful, and ac-
120 THE MTSTEET OF CAXA : [SEEM.
ceptable. It is the change typified by Moses, whose
name retained the history of his salvation ; he who
was exposed to death and Pharaoh, after being
drawn out of the waters became a king s son by
adoption. It is so with all sacraments and outward
means of grace. They all tend to change man s na
ture from what it is. They all accompany every
mystic marriage, every union of men with the Hea
venly Bridegroom. And because CHRIST is present
and works His miracle in us, as He did in the
earthen vessels, our natures are transformed into His
image. It is not that we by any feeling or emotion
act upon our natures, but that He from without
produces a change by His own will, carried out by
human agents. Thus the miracle in Cana fore
shadows the great object of CHRIST S Incarnation
the new creation. Every one so transformed and
created anew displays the glory of the Incarnate
Word. The new life which is poured forth from the
water-pots, ruddy like the Bridegroom in the Can
ticles, is a continual Epiphany. The changed nature,
the reformed sinner, the purified penitent, all tell
upon the world around far more than the Angel
voices of the Nativity or the Adoration of the Magi.
The world is awed and silenced by the revolution
which takes place in the transformed Christian. It
is a startling miracle, when the grace of the Incarna
tion bursts forth from the veil of fleshly lusts and
passions, and the guests rejoice that the Bridegroom
has kept the good wine even until now, nor suffered
it to be exhausted. No longer can the Church say
XIV.] TEANSELEMENTATION. 121
to CHRIST of you, " they have no wine." Then the
HOLY GHOST was not given. But now the <{ new
wine maketh the maids cheerful," for it is the " feast
of fat things, of wine on the lees, of fat things full
of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined."
All things then around you in the Church speak
of change and new relations by virtue of the Incar
nation. Its energy has transmuted law and rites,
and sacraments, and sacrifices. The buildings
wherein we worship, though built of material things,
are hallowed and changed by the will of CHRIST.
Water receives a secret purifying ability, and becomes
the laver of regeneration. Hands lifted up in prayer
bless with invisible power the heads of the baptised.
Bread and wine are transelemented by a like mys
terious energy into the Body and Blood of CHRIST.
Ye too yourselves have been changed and transformed.
Ye are not what ye were at your first entrance into
this world, for ye are temples of the HOLY GHOST.
How is the work progressing in you ? Has the
miracle been once for all performed in Cana, and
become only a dead historical fact ? Or is it a living
spectacle, a never ceasing manifesting of CHRIST S
glory in you, a calling unto the world to become His
disciples, to believe in Him ? When all around you
preaches renovation, will you alone shrink from con
version into the likeness of CHRIST ?
Are ye then transformed by the renewing of your
mind ? Is that transformation, once begun in you,
being ever increased ? Consider with yourself, Am 1
less like my old self, and more a new self than in
122 THE MTSTEEY OF CANA.
years past than this time last year ? What effect
has the transforming power of the Incarnation had
upon me ? In what respect is CHRIST manifesting
forth His glory in me ? Has such a change been evi
denced in me, that the world can be forced to con
fess that JESUS CHRIST is come in the flesh ? Upon
you depends very much the success of the preaching
of the truth. Ye are the true preachers of CHRIST S
Incarnation, whose lives testify that He is yours and
that you are His. So may " we all with open face
beholding as in a glass the glory of the LORD, be
changed into the same image from glory to glory,
even as by the Spirit of the LORD."
SERMON XV.
THE CHBISTIAN S EPIPHANY.
2 TIM. iv. 8.
"To ALL WHO LOVE HlS APPEARING" OB " EPIPHANY."
WE have said that CHRIST S Epiphanies or manifes
tations of His glory from beneath the veil of His
Manhood have their counterparts in His people.
Natural enough that there should he this assimila
tion of the Head of the Body and His members.
As He seemed for the most part a mere man, so
that even we ourselves, when carried away by the
narrative of the Gospels, lose sight of His Godhead,
even so is it with Christians. It is often hard to
believe that they are sons of GOD. They seem for
the most part common men, as did our Blessed
LORD. As He was subject to human bodily infir
mities, so are they to spiritual. They have their
foibles, their weaknesses, their venial sins. Of
course I am speaking of Christians living as such,
who are indeed leading CnRisx-like lives, who are
124 THE CHRISTIAN S EPIPHANY. [SERM.
in a true sense followers of JESUS CHRIST. And of
these, as men said of our SAVIOUR, Is this the
CHRIST? so the like is said, Are these Christians?
Are these the light of the world ? the salt of the
earth ? Are these the peculiar children of the Most
High ? What is allowed to the heroes of the world,
is denied to earnest Christians. Great men of the
world are universally permitted to have their little
nesses, their failings. And yet the defects and im
perfections of real Christianity are taken as proofs
of its non-existence. No thorn in the flesh would
have been by such conceded to S. Paul. And so
the world goes on and deals with Christians as it
did with CHRIST. It ascribes to them gluttony or
winebibbing, or some devil or other. It treats the
religion they profess with scorn and contempt and
as unworthy of following. This would be serious
if it lasted for ever. What would have happened
if CHRIST had lived and died without any Epiphany ?
But Christians have their Epiphanies too. You
may not have been at their new birth ; you have
only heard from the witness of some Baptist of this.
But you see every now and then wonderful break
ings forth of light from that seemingly opaque body.
You see manifestations of self-denial, forgivingness,
patience, liberality, meekness, humility, sobriety,
chastity, and such like, that surprise you. A Chris
tian is placed on his trial like our SAVIOUR in the
wilderness. He is tempted to some great sin under
very trying circumstances, and you see him triumph
and the devil as it were openly departing. You see
xv.] TIIE CHRISTIAN S EPIPHANY. 125
a Christian content to suffer wrongfully, shame,
reproach, and slander. You see him silent under
very great provocation. You see him giving away
his money to others, when he needed it perhaps
more himself. You see him showing strength of
purpose in fulfilling duties, though you know him
to be naturally of feehle resolve. What surprises
you is that his natural tendency to evil is strongly
contradicted by supernatural goodness. Innate
slothfulness is, as it were, denied by positive acts of
diligence and toil. It is in short CHRIST showing
Himself to the world from time to time in His
Church. You see continually spiritual miracles
going on. The lame walk, the deaf hear, the blind
see, the lepers are cleansed, the dead are raised.
Kings and mighty men of this world come as it
were to the poor CmusT-child in the manger and
acknowledge Him to be GOD. In the midst of the
waves of this troublesome world the dove-like
Spirit is seen oft resting on the heads of the bap
tized. The world acknowledges a change a con
version a renovation of nature to have come
from those poor water-pots. So the Epiphany fes
tival is never stopping. Our victories in Lent over
the evil that is in us our crucifixion of ourselves
our risings at Easter our ascendings our sanc-
tification at Pentecost ; what are these but a con
tinual Epiphany going on in this life ?
But CHRIST S Epiphany was not merely during
His Incarnate life on earth. It did not end with
His Ascension ; nor did it come to an end with the
126 THE CHRISTIAN S EPIPHANY. [SEEM.
last soul, reborn in Him, that has reflected His glory
in the Church on earth. His Epiphany through
His visible Church ; His manifestations of glory
through His Body militant here on earth, which
have for 1800 years and more been going on, must
reach their furthest bound at last ; but still there
remains another Epiphany. All this while, except
through His Saints, He has hid His Godhead. All
this while the heavens have been darkened during
the night of His bodily absence from His people,
and but for little stars twinkling in the gloom every
now and then, we should have said that all light
was gone. All this while CHRIST S manifestations
of Himself to His people have been transferred from
the regions of sight to the dominions of faith.
And so we wait for another Epiphany, " looking
for/ S. Paul has it, " the blessed hope and glorious
Epiphany of our great GOD and SAVIOUR JESUS
CHRIST," " which in His own time He shall show,
Who is the blessed and only Potentate, King of
kings and LORD of lords, Who only hath immor
tality, dwelling in unapproachable light, Whom no
man hath seen or can see, to Whom be glory for
ever and ever. Amen." And what that Epiphany
will be S. John saw in the Apocalypse. Nothing
then will be real but the glorified manhood of JESUS
CHRIST. " I saw a great white throne and Him
that sat on it, from Whose face the earth and the
heaven fled away, and there was found no place for
them." " I saw no temple therein, for the LORD
GOD Almighty and the LAMB are the temple of it.
xv.] THE CHEISTIAN S EPIPHANY. 127
And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the
moon to shine in it, for the glory of GOD did lighten
it, and the LAMB is the light thereof/ This is
" the Regeneration when the Son of Man shall sit
on the throne of His glory." The heavens shall
pass away with a great noise and the elements shall
melt with fervent heat, the earth also, and the works
that are therein shall be burned up." " And then
shall they see the Son of Man coming in the clouds
with power and great glory." That Epiphany of
the Son of Man will be perfect and complete. Not
as in the days of His first coming by transitory and
brief unveilings of Himself.
But all veils will then be removed, " We shall
see Him as He is." It will not be as during the
season of His glorified Presence after His Resurrec
tion, when He came and went, and went and came :
when their eyes were holden that they should not
know Him. But He will be ever personally and
visibly with His chosen. As truly as He was on
earth in His humiliation so will He really be in His
glory. There will be new heavens and a new earth,
purified, like the old antediluvian world, by fire,
meet for His holy habitation. Fitting as it should
seem that this world, which was the scene of CHRIST S
abasement, should be cleansed to become the scene
of His exaltation. All will be then, not as now,
shadowy and unsubstantial, but lasting and real.
The same eternal power which created all things at
the first, which purged them in the flood, which re
novated our manhood, will make all things new, will
128 THE CHEISTIAN S EPIPHANY. [SEEM.
finish and consummate the new Creation begun in
the Incarnation of JESUS CHRIST.
And as He will then manifest the reality of His
Divine Manhood, so we too shall be unclothed of
our infirm humanity and arrayed in Him. " We
shall be like Him." Now indeed it is difficult to
see any likeness at times to Him in ourselves. Men
scoff at our failings and weaknesses ; we ourselves
mourn and pine over them. But then a new and
glorified flesh will be given to us, incapable of sin,
full of the glory of CHRIST. We shall stand before
the throne and be judged. Our Deification will be
completed. His Epiphany will be ours too. The
same day on which He shall exhibit His Manhood
will manifest our participation of His Divinity. The
Son of Man comes, and the sons of GOD go forth to
meet Him. That change in us which has been
gradually working in us since the seed was sown in
our Baptism will then be perfected. Our bodies
will not be annihilated but finally regenerated. We
shall pass again through the hand of the Potter, and
be re-made as vessels of honour. The spiritual life
which for so long was hidden in the tabernacle of
the flesh, will radiate, and warm, and lighten our
whole frame. The fire of the last days, which will
for ever consume the undying flesh of the reprobate,
will burn out and refine every portion of the old
Adam in us. The thorn in the flesh will then be
for ever plucked out. The evil that we mourned
over and struggled with so much will then be for
ever crushed and trodden under foot. We shall be
XT.] THE CHRISTIAN S EPIPHANY. 129
in CHRIST for evermore. We shall be gathered and
collected in the pierced side of His glorified Man
hood from which the blood and water flowed to hal
low us. Thus His last Epiphany will be reflected
by us. As He will then manifest all His glory, so
shall we be transfigured with Him. If He will sit
on His throne, so too shall we sit there with Him.
For " to him that overcometh will I give to sit with
Me on My throne, even as I also overcame and am
set down with My FATHER on His throne.
Thought fails to grasp the reality of this mani
festation of the sons of GOD. We have such a long
standing prejudice against any bodily notions of the
Resurrection state ; we have theoretically so spiri
tualized the whole truth, that it prevents our grasp
ing the solemn reality. The difference of our state
now from what it will be will only be in degree. A
vast degree, I grant, but one of which we have now
the germ and outline. As the elements themselves
are unchanged when the calm noon is succeeded by
the stormy and tempestuous night ; when the blue
sky becomes suddenly overcast with dark clouds ;
or when the sunshine is hid by the lightning s flash,
and the murmur of the brook deafened by the roll
ing thunder, so with the last great Epiphany. The
contrast, the change, will be tremendously affecting.
The realization, and embodiment, and substantiation
of what before was conceived, believed, desired,
must ever be overpowering when, as in this case, all
imagination must come short of the truth. To see
all we now comprehend by faith must indeed be be-
130 THE CHRISTIAN S EPIPHANY. [SEEM.
yond measure astonishing. We believe, for instance,
that GOD is everywhere present, and we try to force
the recollection of this truth upon ourselves. What
will it be to find it impossible to forget or to ignore
His Presence : to be ever conscious that He is in
and around us to be dazzled by the unvarying
brightness of His Epiphany ? The eyes of the Son
of Man S. John beheld " like a flame of fire, and His
feet like fine brass, burning as in a furnace, and His
voice like the voice of many waters : and having in
His right hand seven stars, and out of His mouth
proceeded a sharp two-edged sword, and His coun
tenance was as the sun shining in his strength.
And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead."
" Behold He cometh with clouds, and every eye shall
see Him." It will not be a dream -like, visionary
meeting. We shall not be bodiless spirits traversing
the expanse of air. We shall have eyes to be dazzled
with the light of His glory ears to tingle with the
thunder of His voice feet to tremble at the circum
stances attending His advent. " I know that my
Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter
day upon the earth. And though after my skin,
worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see
GOD, Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eye
shall behold and not another."
If then CHRIST S Epiphany and ours be at hand,
let us see to it that ours be indeed begun. We may
have been bom anew and begotten of GOD, but
there may be no Epiphany. We may not have
manifested forth the glory that dwells in us. That
xv.] TIIE CHEISTIAN S EPIPHANY. 131
holiness of CHRIST in which we hope to shroud our
poor sinful nature, must be now striking its roots
deep into our souls. As CHRIST S will be no ideal
Epiphany, but the Son of Man s coming in great
glory, so our manifestation must not be shadowy or
visionary. It must be real, essential, incorporated
righteousness, of which we are now laying the foun
dations. The memory of Christian truths will not
suffice, nor yet the acute understanding of them ;
but there must be the will to do them and put
them into practice. This is why our bodies
are washed in Baptism, our heads blessed, our
mouths partake of the Eucharist, because holiness
must be not merely an internal affection of the soul,
but also an external manifestation of the body.
What help will clear views, abstract science, strong
faith bring to this ? How can I make myself ac
tually and positively holy by thinking or talking
or feeling about it ? Is a mere Epiphany of know
ledge or intellect at all fitting us for the hour when
the King shall separate the sheep from the goats ?
So then, love His Epiphany and ye shall receive
the crown. Perform works such as the Bride who
waits for the Bridegroom performs that she may
please Him at His coming. This is to love CHRIST S
Epiphany, when ye make manifest to all that He
dwells in you. As your worship consists of external
bodily as well as inward spiritual piety, so let your
love show itself by outward acts as well as by in
ward feeling. Take S. Paul for an example, " I
have fought the good fight," "I have finished rny
K 2
132 THE CHBISTIAN S EPIPHANY.
course." Amid bonds, imprisonments, scourgings,
stonings, and sufferings of all kinds ; after travers
ing the whole world preaching the Gospel, he bare
on his body the marks of the LORD JESUS. As the
LORD S body exhibited the scars of the crucifixion,
so S. Paul reflected them on his own body. This
was his Epiphany. This was the pledge of his lov
ing CHRIST S Epiphany. You too, brethren, have a
fight to contend in and a course to finish. If no
thing else, ye have to fight and wrestle with your
own selves, till CHRIST is stamped on your very
bodies. If ye love His Epiphany, ye will let nothing
lie in the way of your being counted worthy to share
in it : ye will count not your lives dear unto you ;
ye will throw away all that the world deems most
precious : so that ye come not short of the glory
that shall be revealed. If nothing else seems open
to you endure your trials. This at least all can do,
be conformed to the image of CHRIST S sufferings.
Endure sickness, endure poverty, endure shame, en
dure contempt, endure persecution. All the more
dark and dreary that this world seems, the more will
you long for the True Light dawning. It will be as
it is now with us, we have a long sad time of trial
and mourning before us, but at its end there is
Easter. So through this world s Lent, let us look
on to the great Easter Epiphany. It will be the
path of the just, shining more and more unto the
perfect day.
SEKMON XVI.
THE CHEISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM.
S. LUKE XYIII. 31.
" BEHOLD, WE GO UP TO JERUSALEM."
JESUS saith of Himself, " Behold, we go up to Jeru
salem." And how does the King s Son travel ?
How does He, to Whom so many thousand angels
minister, vouchsafe to go up to Jerusalem ? No
gorgeous array of attendants, no retinue, no richly
caparisoned camels wait upon the SON of GOD, as
we see Him perform His humble pilgrimage to Jeru
salem. Therefore have often holy kings and great
men of the earth disguised themselves in mean
garb, and begged their way to the holy city. JESUS,
their LORD and King, hid Himself in the form of
man, and so journeyed to Zion. They too imitated
His humiliation, and so hoped to share in His glory.
Weary and fainting, hungry and thirsty, exposed to
all the vicissitudes of weather, the SAVIOUR of man
kind goeth up to His own city, the place wherein
134 THE CHRISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM. [SERM.
He as GOD had placed His Name. He depends on
the charity of His own creatures for food and lodg
ing, as the shades of night draw on every day of His
journey.
My brethren, I am not sure you realise this.
Imagine a poor,, ill-clad, sorrowful, emaciated man
toiling up the steep road, a few companions as mise
rably off as Himself with Him. It is no, it
cannot be yet, it is GOD Who thus without form
or comeliness, no beauty, no majesty, treadeth on
this earth. Difficult as it is to grasp, it is true, it
is as true, as that we are men ourselves and have
souls, that this Man, so poor and wretched, so dis
tressed and outcast, is Very GOD, and will one day
come to judge the mighty ones and rich ones of
ages past, present, and to come. This truth does
indeed demand all our faith, and yet there is another
truth connected with it which we are even slower
to comprehend. The miserable and squalid beggar
that asks your alms, or that asketh not, but pines
in silent want and sorrow, is no less to you CHRIST,
than JESUS going up to Jerusalem is to you GOD.
One day we and they who have sought our charity
will meet again, and the Son of Man will sit on
His great white throne, and say, " Inasmuch as ye
have done it unto these My brethren, ye did it unto
Me."
, The Man of sorrows goeth on His sad journey.
Who of us would not assuage His sufferings, as we
see Him amongst us ? Who would not shelter him
from the storm, or the inclement season ? Who
XVI.] THE CHRISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM. 135
would not minister to His hunger, or to His thirst ?
Who would not pity Him, foot-sore, heart-sick, and
overcome with fatigue ? Who would not have com
passion, as He speaks of His decease which He
must accomplish at Jerusalem ? Yet such is the
mysterious power of His Incarnation, that He is
ever thus travelling among us. He cometh to us
for relief and sympathy continually, in the form of
a poor brother or sister in poverty or affliction, in
sickness or sorrow. Day by day thus we go up to
Jerusalem with Him. Each kind act we do, each
kind word we say to our fellows, carries us a step
further to the heavenly Jerusalem, where we shall
see GOD Who is Everlasting charity.
JESUS had gone up twice before with His disciples
to Jerusalem ; yet now only He speaketh of it in
such solemn warning. It is His last journey, His
last toilsome pilgrimage. He has been a pitiful
wanderer on earth for more than thirty years, and
now the end is come. The sweet angel voices of
the Nativity sound fainter and fainter on the Divine
Ear, and the hoarse murmur of the mad multitude
rushes on fiercer and louder. What a change from
that calm and still manger, where the ox knew his
owner, and the ass his master s crib, is that Cross
high upreared in air, and He stretching out His
hands all the day to His gainsaying and disobedient
people. A few days now, and the last great scene
of man s wickedness and GOD S love will close.
That tearful eye, that chastened look, that bowed
head, that blanched cheek, that furrowed brow
136 THE CHRISTIAN GOING TIP TO JERUSALEM, [SERM.
alike gather a deeper gloom as the pinnacles of the
Temple glitter in the air. The SON of GOD goeth
up to Jerusalem, and for what ? To die. He pic
tures to Himself the whole tragedy, with his All-
knowing mind. Not one act of indignity escapes
His foresight. The kiss of Judas, the ill-usage of
the multitude, the dragging away to the high-priest,
to Pilate and Herod, and again to Pilate, the smiting
with the hands, the plucking of the hair, the shame
and the spitting, the scourging, the thorny crown,
the scarlet robe, the reedy sceptre, the mockery, the
nailing to the Cross, the pain and agony of dying.
All these fill the mind of JESUS with horror and
misery. Therefore He saith, " Behold, we go up
to Jerusalem."
It is surely no ordinary journey of which He
speaks thus significantly. He would prepare the
souls of His people for that awful spectacle of Good
Friday. Yet wonderful to say, His disciples under
stood not that saying so hard is it to realise the
thing which CHRIST S words portend. They go up
with Him, yet He alone realises that event for
which He took His journey. Yet, as it seems to
us, He speaks plain, and without possibility of being
mistaken. It was not till after the fearful events
had succeeded, and they saw Him again with scarred
hands and feet in their barred upper room, that they
at all understood the Passion and Death of the God-
Man JESUS CHRIST.
My brethren, it is to us these words are spoken
by JESUS CHRIST. Lent is at hand, and Passion-
XVI.] THE CHRISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM. 137
tide hurries on, when in thought and mind the
Church of GOD will have reached Jerusalem and
perform the stations of the Cross and kneel at
Calvary. The Church saith to each one here pre
sent to-day, " Behold, we go up to Jerusalem/
Year after year we thus ascend with JESUS, and
company with Him on His fatiguing travels. We
visit the manger at Christmas and Epiphany, and
on the Holy Sabbath His grave. Let us then once
more go up to Jerusalem with JESUS. Let our
hearts go with Him in His doing good, in His pray
ing, in His fasting. Who of us would enjoy him
self as at other times, when his SAVIOUR is fasting
and suffering ? Who would be careless, when
CHRIST is praying ? Who would be unmerciful,
when CHRIST pities all men s sorrows but His own ?
Who would go to the fair, or the feast, or the dance,
while CHRIST breathes out His crucified soul in
agony ? It is but for a short time that we bid the
young cut short their play, and the old their cares
of this life, to go up with JESUS along the way of
sorrows. A short time and the great tragedy will
be finished, and we shall or shall not have borne
our part in the humiliation and sufferings of the
Messiah. And these thing are too terrible and
tremendous for ear to hear, or eye to see repeated,
without some preparation.
Death ordinarily as it meets us in the case of a
brother or sister is too shocking in the sudden snap
ping asunder of the thread of life, or in the calm
decay of nature. Much more awful is that spectacle
138 THE CHEISTIAN GOING IIP TO JERUSALEM. [SEEM.
of death on Calvary, the air darkened, the sea of
heads moving, a black mass in the withdrawal of
light, the pale body of JESUS gleaming amidst the
gloom, the curses of the people, the sobbings of the
women, the rocks rending, the earthquake, the
rising of the saints, and the wondrous loud voice of
JESUS crying "It is finished." We cannot realise
that scene with unchastened eye, with untamed
appetites, with selfish inclinations. We may see it,
but it may be without any good result to our own
souls. We may be among the multitude that stood
by gazing, and not with S. Mary and S. John ador
ing, she her Son, and both their GOD. We must
set out on the road with JESUS now and be partners
of His pilgrimage to His kingdom. We must follow
Him step by step, as He wrestles with the tempter
in the wilderness, and with the destroyer in Geth-
semane. We could not burst in suddenly upon the
scene of the Passion. We must attune our souls to
join in the wail of the daughters of Jerusalem. As
it is in the soul s bitterness and in the body s suf
fering that CHRIST and His Cross usually find a
place, so there must be a turning aside from the
delights of the senses and of the mind, if CHRIST
and His sufferings are to have any tabernacle in our
souls. We must do something we dislike naturally
now, if we would go up with JESUS to Jerusalem
and follow Him to His sepulchre. Choose some
thing to do this Lent you shrink from, endure cold,
or hunger, or thirst. Or lay yourself out to do a
good turn to some one who needs your help. Or
XVI.] THE CHRISTIAN GOING UP TO JEETJSALEM. 139
add to your prayers at home ; the time of each
prayer, and the number of times of prayer. Or come
more frequently to church than you are accustomed.
Or practise silence with Him Who before the High
Priest and Pilate answered His false accusers not a
word. Or it may be CHRIST has already laid His
Cross upon you in such manifold ways that you
could not bear to add to its weight or increase its
pain. If it be so, then now resolve to be patient
and contented. Unite your trials to this journey to
Jerusalem and pray that your mind may be con
formed to the mind of CHRIST JESUS. There is no
act of self-denial no voluntary suffering no patient
endurance, but will make us true companions of
JESUS in His sorrows and tribulation. In propor
tion as we suffer with Him in Lent shall we rejoice
with Him at Easter. It is a type of our whole pro
bation, narrowed into a few days. Most of us
would shrink from a whole life of earthly suffering
and affliction. And our mother the Church is mer
ciful. She requires us to suffer with JESUS CHRIST
only during the time He fasted in the wilderness.
The whole Passion is brought before us in that short
space. It is now or never. We shall either suffer
with CHRIST now, or we shall not at all. And if
we do not suffer with Him at all, how can we hope
to reign with Him hereafter ?
Dear brethren, we have many of us gone up to
Jerusalem before with JESUS, and yet how few of us
have really felt the awfulness of the mystery which
overshadowed us. How many were like the disci-
140 THE CHRISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM. [SEEM.
pies which forsook Him on that Good Friday 1800
years ago ; or like Peter that had the heart to go
into the Judgment Hall to see the end and yet shrunk
from bearing his part in the end. How few like S.
John that endured unto the end at the foot of the
Cross. We cannot pass this penitential season in a
middle, half and half sort of way. Fearful indeed it
is to think of any one refusing when called upon to
go and share in the sorrows of his REDEEMER,
turning aside from the Cross, when bidden to carry
it for his SAVIOUR, yet no less fearful is it to think
of any going year after year up to Jerusalem and
returning from the scene of the Crucifixion as cold
and hard and dead as ever. O sad condition of
that creature which shall behold its Creator s suf
ferings for sin and go back to sin. O wretched
hardhearted ness, which shall see the blood of GOD
poured out in journeyings and ill usage in the
agony of His soul in the garden in the scourging
in the buffeting in the wounds of the thorns
in the marks of the nails in the gash of the spear
if the soul be not softened into grief for its own
unworthiness to have such a price paid for its vile-
ness and misery. Let us pray earnestly that we
may so look off from all things in this world unto
JESUS, that He may look upon us in mercy, when
He shall come with clouds and every eye shall see
Him, and they also which pierced Him. It is
CHRIST S last journey to Jerusalem. It may too
be ours. We may never again accompany Him to
His Crucifixion and Death. What if His last Pas-
XVI.] THE C1IEISTIAN GOING UP TO JERUSALEM. 141
sion and ours be united. How would we deter
mine to spend these few weeks, if we knew that
never more on earth we should witness His Death
and Burial ? There would perchance be no coldness
then no deadness. The value of the price paid
on Calvary would then be rightly reckoned, as we
set forth in earnest to take our last journey and
sleep beneath the shadow of the Cross. Could they
have repeated this journey with their Master, how
differently would the disciples have acted how
many prayers would they have uttered that they
might be found clinging to their Master s Cross with
S. John and S. Mary. How many poor souls, gone
now to meet their GOD, would be glad of this op
portunity to take their portion of the Cross of
CHRIST with us. Alas ! they know the value of
the Cross now. They despised or neglected it in
life ; but the valley of the shadow of death clears
away the mist of prejudice or the veil of unbelief.
Let us set before our eyes the Cross of JESUS, as the
end of this our journey. He, Who is thereon lifted
up, draweth us after Him, if we will be drawn. Let
nothing now obscure this vision of a dying SAVIOUR.
What we have hitherto done to save our souls must
now be done more earnestly and more frequently.
Say to yourselves now every day, and every hour
of the day that you can recall your minds to JESUS,
By Thy fasting and temptation,
Good LORD, deliver me.
By Thine agony and bloody sweat,
Good LORD, deliver me.
142 THE CHRISTIAN GOING TIP TO JERUSALEM.
By Thy Cross and Passion,
Good LORD, deliver me.
So brethren, suffering together with JESUS CHRIST,
may we pass through the grave and gate of death
unto a glorious Resurrection through Him, Who
redeemed us and washed us in His own Blood.
SERMON XVII.
THE CHRISTIAN S BLINDNESS.
S. LTJKE xvni. 35.
IT CAME TO PASS, THAT AS HE WAS COME NIGH
UNTO JEEICHO, A CERTAIN BLIND MAN SAT BY THE WAY
SIDE BEGGING."
THE LORD, brethren, in the Gospel by His fore
knowledge being aware that the minds of His dis
ciples would be perplexed by His Passion long before
it took place, prophesied to them both the details
of the Passion itself, and the glory of His Resurrec
tion ; with the view of removing any doubts in their
minds that He would rise again, after they should
have beheld Him dead upon the Cross. But seeing
that His disciples were so carnally blind " that they
understood none of these things," and that " this
saying was hid from them, neither knew they the
things which were spoken/ He performs a miracle.
In their presence a blind man is made by Him to
receive sight, that they who could not comprehend
144 THE CHBISTIAN S BLINDNESS. [SEEM.
the words of the heavenly mystery of His Redemp
tion, should be confirmed in the faith by heavenly
miracles. But the miracles of our LORD and SA
VIOUR are to be so received by us, that both their
performance be indeed believed, and their significa
tion convey a lesson to us. " For His actions show
as well as His power speaks mysteriously to us. For
who that blind man may have been, the history is
silent \ but what he in a mystery represents, we
understand. For that blind man is the human race,
which in Adam having been driven out from the
joys of Paradise, and unconscious of the heavenly
light s clearness, does suffer the darkness of condem
nation. But nevertheless, by the presence of its
REDEEMER it is illuminated, so as already by de
sire and longing to behold the joys of light within,
and to direct the steps of good works in the way of
life." This is the observation of S. Gregory, and
may serve as a preface to our present considerations.
Now as the LORD worked in the days of His hu
miliation miracles, that by means of things which
are seen He might build up faith in things not seen,
even so still. For of whom spake He but of us,
brethren, when He said to S. Thomas, who believed
not till He had handled the scars of the Cross,
" Because thou hast seen, thou hast believed ;
blessed are they who have not seen and yet have
believed." He then being present in His Word
and Sacraments worketh even greater things now
that He sitteth at the right hand of GOD, than when
He was on earth. For as the soul is better than
THE CHRISTIAN S BLINDNESS. 145
the body, so is that a more signal miracle whereby
the blinded heart openeth its eyes to the Word of
the LORD than that which maketh the eyes of the
blind body to see. Not all those who are present
at the Word and Sacraments see JESUS. He is in
them, and they who believe see Him in them, yet
not all see Him. He was with His disciples, yet
they saw Him not. " Have I been so long time
with you," said the LORD to one of them, " and yet
hast thou not known Me, Philip ?"
Again, two of them were with Him for a few
hours after His Resurrection, and though "their
heart burnt within them while He talked with them
by the way, and while He opened to them the Scrip
tures," yet " were their eyes not opened" to know
Him, till He gave them the Eucharist. We must
believe what we see not, ere we can see what we do
not see. For this end do.es the Church minister the
Word and Sacraments that the eyes of the hearts of
her children may be opened. This is the great
business of every Christian, to seek to have that
hindrance taken away through which we cannot see
JESUS. For with our natural eyes, when anything
falls into them, they close against the light; and
not only do they not see the light, which surrounds
them, and turn away from it, but even this very
light, which it was created to see, is painful to it.
So in like manner the eyes of our hearts, when dis
ordered and wounded by any defilement, not only
turn from the light of righteousness, but cannot
endure, till healed, to look upon it. And what is it
146 THE CHRISTIAN S BLINDNESS. [SEEM,
which disorders the eyes of our heart ? What but
one or other of those deadly sins pride, anger,
covetousness, gluttony, envy, lust, sloth ? Nor only
so ; not only habitual indulgence, but even a tem
porary entering in of these disorder the eyes of the
soul. Surely a very small particle falling into our
bodily eyes hurts and closes them to the light.
Moreover, what a hurry are we in to open and
cleanse them. Much more should we seek to have
the eyes of our soul cleansed and opened from even
the slightest particles of sin, that we may see GOD,
Who made that sun, whose light our bodily eyes
are so eager to recover. Hence did the LORD say,
"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see
GOD," and His holy Apostle, "Without holiness no
man shall see the LORD."
We then, brethren, that are in anyways blind
through sin, may not rest till we find a cure. Like
the blind man we must " sit by the way side," wait
for His passing by, " Who is the Way." We must
walk with JESUS in the way of the holy Cross, if we
would be healed of our spiritual blindness. For,
tell me, was it not to heal our natural blindness that
CHRIST became man ? Wherefore His holy Incar
nation ? Wherefore His holy Nativity and Circum
cision? Wherefore His Baptism, Fasting, and
Temptation? Wherefore His Agony and Bloody
Sweat ? Wherefore His Cross and Passion ? Where
fore His precious Death and Burial ? Wherefore,
but that the blindness of our eyes might be opened ?
He drank the bitter cup Who is the Physician. We
xvii.] THE CHEISTIAN S BLINDNESS. 147
the patient may surely not hesitate to drink it after
Him. What sorrow or affliction should we shrink
from on account of our blindness, when He vouch
safed to endure such manifold distresses to cure us ?
How poverty, if He became poor ? How unde
served reproach, if He was called a devil ? How
bodily pain, if He was scourged and crucified ? If
He counted no suffering too severe, so that He
might heal thee, what suffering shouldest thou count
too severe that thou mayest heal through His suffer
ing thyself? Others may seek easier ways of being
enlightened ; may trust He will heal them without
themselves. Others may decry seclusion from the
world for prayer and meditation, and ridicule self-
denial and abstinence, yea, that fasting of Lent,
whereby we are knit more closely to our SAVIOUR S
earthly sufferings in the flesh ; yet we shall be wise,
who knowing the blindness wherewith our sins the
sins of childhood and of youth, of manhood, and of
age, have encompassed us seek for healing and for
sight by walking in His footsteps, Who bore and
endured the Cross for us and before us.
Who would not humble his pride, or purify his
lust, or moderate his anger, or relax his covetous-
ness, or temper his gluttony, or check his envy, or
rouse his sloth, at any cost, at any risks, so that the
eye of his soul might be purged from all that stood
betwixt him and the presence of GOD, which is the
foretaste of bliss unending and joy eternal ? And
as these evil things owe their habitation in the soul
to a complication of distinct and separate acts, so
L 2
148 THE CHEISTIAN S BLINDNESS. [SEEM.
we must cast them out also by distinct and separate
acts of prayer, fasting, mortification, meditation,
almsgiving, and self-denial. We must do acts of
humility to cast out pride. If the HOLY SPIRIT has
been in any degree driven out from our souls by
deeds of ours, surely by deeds of ours must we seek
for His return, however repugnant to our feelings.
But the blind man sat by the way side, and they
told him that JESUS of Nazareth passeth by.
CHRIST, brethren, is ever passing by us, who wait
for Him in His way. In the days of His humilia
tion He was ever passing by. He passed by from
the Virgin s womb to Man s full estate. His mira
cles were ever passing by. He passed by in His
sufferings, in His crucifixion, His burial, His resur
rection, and ascension. But now He no more
passeth by, for He sitteth at the right hand of GOD
the FATHER. Yet even now He passeth by us,
when He is preached to us in the Scriptures, when
all those transitory acts are rehearsed in our ears.
And as the blind man cried, as JESUS passed by, so
let us cry unto Him, as He passeth by us in His
Word and Sacraments. For therefore is it that He
willed to take upon Him a passing and transitory
form, subject to time, that we may cry unto Him to
heal us. Hence did the blind man address Him
twice as " Thou Son of David," while He passed
by. For only in His humanity does He pass by.
He suffered as Man, that we might be as Gods.
And how shall we cry out to CHRIST? Surely little
profit will it be to cry out with our voices, if our
xvii.] THE CHRISTIAN S BLINDNESS. 149
lives do not correspond. By good deeds then we*
cry out to Him, as He passeth by in the Word and
Sacraments, that our inward blindness may be
cleansed. Ye cry out to CHRIST, who sell that ye
have, or deny yourselves of what ye have, that ye
may give to the poor. Ye cry out to CHRIST, who
despise the world, its lusts, and pleasures ; who dis
regard wrongs and injuries. For when ye hear
CHRIST bidding you do these and other good things,
" the sound as it were of His footsteps passing
by," ye cry out in your blindness when ye do
them.
But as the multitude rebuked the blind man crying
to CHRIST, "that he should hold his peace ;" so when
a man convinced of spiritual blindness so cries to
JESUS for healing, all his friends and relatives rebuke
him. Why so much crying ? they say. Why such
abstinence from worldly pleasures and amusements ?
Why such self-denial in dress, food, and comforts ?
Why such excessive praying and meditation ? We
follow JESUS as well as thou why criest thou as
though some superior Christian ? Wherefore such
fasting and mourning? such charity to the poor ? such
churchgoing, such frequent confession, and receiv
ing of the Blessed Sacrament ? Ah ! brethren, was it
not the multitude that then followed JESUS, and re
buked the poor blind man for his singular and earnest
cry for mercy, that afterwards cried, " Crucify Him,
crucify Him ?" So then let us not listen to the crowd
of careless Christians, who merely follow the fashion,
but cry unto JESUS till He heal us. In the meantime
150 THE CHRISTIAN S BLINDNESS. [SERM.
be assured, that, it is the multitude of lukewarm
Christians following JESUS, who hinder others from
crying out for the cure of their blinded sight. And
yet it is an encouragement to us that in the midst
of so vast a multitude rebuking him, one blind soul
dared to cry for healing and was heard. For at his
second cry, " JESUS stood still, and commanded
him to be called. " At CHRIST S standing still,
he no more calleth Him, " Thou Son of David,"
but " LORD." Cry we unto Him, as He passeth
by in His Manhood, that He may stand still in the
power of His Godhead to heal us, for His Godhead
abideth ever, nor ever passeth by. Wherefore doth
JESUS pass by us in our blind and lost condition,
but that we may so cry unto Him, and He stand
and heal us ? One thing yet I have forgotten,
though the multitude rebuked the blind man for
crying to JESUS passing by as for some strange
and unheard-of act yet it was so no longer when
He commanded the blind man to be brought unto
Him. Then, doubtless, they who had so rebuked
his cries, changed their note into one of exhortation
and encouragement and applause at the result of
his perseverance. So we, if we persevere, and men
see by our enlightened lives, or our purified and
mortified conversation, that JESUS has taken away
our blindness and heard our cries, they will give
over their rebukes, and praise and commend us.
Though they rebuke our crying, our fasting and
almsdeeds, our prayers and meditations, our strict
or severe life, they will laud and bepraise our heal-
XYII.] THE CHEISTIAN S BLINDNESS. 151
ing. They who mislike the means, will yet acknow
ledge the end.
Wherefore, brethren, let us who are in anywise
blind redouble our cries, as JESUS passeth by, that
He may stand and give us sight. At all times we
should cry to Him for this, yet now more especially,
when the Church sets apart a special time for us to sit
thus by the wayside, as poor beggars of the LORD.
He will in a few weeks pass by us in His Fasting
and Temptation, His Agony and Bloody Sweat,
His Cross and Passion, His precious Death and
Burial. As He thus passeth by, may we from the
depths of our ignorance and blindness cry to Him.
We may be only a few amongst many. In that
great multitude to one only was it said, " Thy faith
hath saved thee." One only cried one only knew
his blindness one only was healed. The multitude
cried, " Crucify Him," soon afterwards. How few
stayed to see the end as He, the Prince of Life,
passed by to die on the Cross ! How few sympa
thised in His bitter pain, as he cried with the loud
voice, and gave up the ghost. May it not be so
with us. May we join ourselves to Him in His
fasting and temptation, His sufferings and death,
that our sight being purged and healed we may rise
with Him at Easter, and be able to look upon His
glory. Every cry unto Him of our self-denying
charity, whether in word, or thought, or work, will
obtain an answer from our great High Priest, as He
standeth before His altar in heaven, ever minister
ing the benefits of His own Sacrifice for us.
152 , THE CIIHISTIAN S BLINDNESS.
Finally, remember we that the time is short,
which GOD giveth each one of us to purify our
sight from this evil world s corruptions. For if we
would know hereafter even as we are known, we
must begin now to know in part ; if we would see
hereafter face to face, we must begin now to see,
though it be through a glass darkly. Otherwise
could we even reach heaven blind and unseeing, we
should never be able to behold His adorable beauty,
from which the guards at His resurrection trem
bled and became as dead men, and which Moses
could not see and live. But now crying unto Him,
we may hope to see Him hereafter, when He shall
stand in Judgment, and be of the number of those
His servants, who shall see the face of GOD and of
the LAMB, for evermore.
SERMON XVIII.
of tfje i^lewtf Firgtn Jflavg.
THE CHRISTIAN S PURIFICATION.
S. LTJKE n. 22.
WHEN THE DATS OF HER PURIFICATION ACCORDING
TO THE LAW or MOSES WERE ENDED."
THE very name of this feast in our Prayer Books in
dicates a variety of thoughts ; whether we con
template the All-holy SON of GOD contented to be
hallowed to His FATHER, as though He had ceased
to be GOD, and had become not only man, but
sinful and fallen man ; or whether we think of the
Redeemer redeemed by the blood of His own crea
tures the great Sacrifice Himself having sacrifice
offered for Him the Law- giver obedient to His
own law the Sanctifier of the Temple sanctified
Himself therein, the Creator embraced in the arms
of His creatures. In all these circumstances of our
LORD S presentation in the Temple we cannot fail to
find much whereon to dwell and marvel. " They
154 THE CHRISTIAN S PTJKIFICATION. [SEEM.
brought Him to Jerusalem to present Him to the
LORD."
The SON of GOD is emptied of His Divinity, when
carried thus helpless and infantine He is dedicated
like any other child to His FATHER. Or again,
when we think of the unspeakable value of His Re
deeming love, how strange to think that He willed
Himself to be redeemed by the poorest offering the
Law offered. On the other hand, we gaze upon the
Blessed Mary, Ever- Virgin undefiled, willing to ap
proach, as though subject to human defilements,
the Temple of GOD. She, who is the Spouse of
the HOLY SPIRIT and the Mother of GOD, disdains
not to appear like any common Jewish mother.
This is, so to speak, to-day s Sacrament, before
which we bow our minds and understandings in re
verence. And yet we must do so remembering that
all these things happened for our sakes. Mary
and JESUS of their own will submitted to the Law,
that we might be loosed from the bonds of the Law.
S. Mary, who needed not to be purified, consented
to fulfil the requirements of the Law, as though un
clean, that we who are unclean, might purify our
selves through Him Who is the end of the Law for
righteousness. JESUS, Who was never hidden from
His FATHER S eye, or separate from Him, yet is
presented to the LORD, that we might also learn to
present ourselves to the LORD. Let us then, as the
mind vainly strives to grasp so unspeakable a mys
tery, join ourselves to that holy company who are
to-day assembled in the Temple, and make their
XTIII.] THE CHEISTIAN S PURIFICATION. 155
reverence and joy our own. Not long ago we united
ourselves to the adoration of the ignorant shepherds
and wise kings. Now we meet saints and worship
JESUS with them. Old Simeon just and devout,
aged Anna, that departing not from the Temple,
served GOD with fastings and prayers night and day,
righteous Joseph and his Virgin spouse. Join we
them as they handle reverently the sacred Body of
the Child JESUS, and embrace with gladness the In
fant SAVIOUR. Let us lift up our voices no more in
a formal, careless way, as we behold the congrega
tion now assembled in the Temple, " LORD, now
lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, according
to Thy word ; for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation,
which Thou hast prepared before the face of all
people, to be a Light to lighten the Gentiles, and to
be the glory of Thy people Israel/
One thing is specially worthy of observation in
regard to the wondrous Incarnation of JESUS CHRIST,
I mean that penetration of Its mystery vouchsafed
to holy people only. To the Jewish shepherds on
the night of the Nativity it was said, " In the city
of David is born to you a SAVIOUR, Who is CHRIST
the LORD." The Eastern kings said, " Where is He
That is born King of the Jews ?" But to Mary it
was said, " Hail thou that art highly favoured, the
LORD is with thee." Unto Joseph it was said,
"That Which is conceived in Mary thy wife, is of
the HOLY GHOST." And when Simeon came by the
Spirit into the Temple at the very time of the Pre
sentation of CHRIST, he embraced Him as His Sal-
156 THE CHEISTIAN S PUEincATioisr. [SEEM.
vation, as the Light of the Gentiles, and the glory
of Israel. Anna likewise spake of Him with thanks
giving to all them that looked for redemption in
Israel. So marvellous is the power of holiness. It
lifts the veil from off the mystery of the Incarnation,
and we behold JESUS the SON of GOD tabernacling
in our flesh. What a little company is here realizing
in their degree this mystery of godliness ! Many
doubtless saw the venerable Joseph and his Virgin
wife hastening with the Child JESUS to the Temple,
and but two and they by an extraordinary call
witness His first coming to His Temple in the like
ness of sinful flesh. Others, as the shepherds and
wise men, saw Him as it were afar off, but these
embraced Him. Unlearned Christians, living harm
less and innocent lives like the shepherds, and
learned philosophers of heathendom may catch a
glimpse of CHRIST amidst their toils and studies, but
the Christian saints alone receive and hold Him
fast. We must go with S. Mary to be purified,
from our natural uncleanness, which ever seeketh to
rise above the surface of the baptismal washing, ere
we can embrace the Jfisus-Child. And hence it is
that we find the ancient Fathers of the Church con
tinually attaching accusations of loose living to those
who denied the Catholic doctrines of the Incarnation.
It must be no gross or carnal mind that would dwell
with firm faith on so holy a mystery. And so we
find that no subject of Christian doctrine is so open
to mockery or scorn from the Deist or unbeliever.
Thus in the last century, when morals were pro-
xviii.] THE CHRISTIAN S PUUIFICATIOST. 157
bably most degraded in all classes, the Athanasian
Creed was a dead letter in the services of the Church.
There was no purification except here and there
where GOD had reserved to Him a remnant in the
midst of the land, and so there was no embracing of
JESUS. Eucharists few and far between, daily prayer
gradually decaying, the temples closed, and the in
cense of prayer extinguished, schismatics pointing to
the Cross and to Him Who hung thereon more than
they who outwardly were joined to His mystic Body.
All these things tell us that without holiness no
Church can see her GOD ; creeds and confessions of
faith are unreal where we enter not into their fulness.
If we shrink, as some do, from morbid delicacy, and
pass over the sacred Incarnation of CHRIST, it is be
cause we have not purified ourselves, and may not
enter into the joy of Joseph and Mary, of Simeon
and Anna.
First, then, let us purify ourselves, " He that hath
this hope, purifieth himself, even as GOD is pure."
S. Mary went to the temple to be purified, to
offer there her poor alms, and her rich prayers, and
to wait upon the sacrifice slain for her supposed un-
cleanness. We, brethren, who are in manifold ways
unclean, who being Christians have so little realised
our union with CHRIST by thought, word, and deed,
to whom even the most innocent period of our lives,
childhood, is not altogether free from remorse of
conscience ; can we pretend that we need no puri
fication ? We have conceived sin and brought forth
iniquity. Angry thoughts cherished have given
158 TIIE CHRISTIAN S PURIFICATION. [SEEM.
birth to acts of revenge passionate and malicious
words. Pride of heart has made us disagreeable to
our neighbours, and kept us back from the humilia
tions of self which CHRIST requires in His people.
We have loved and desired the dying things of this
world, and for them have at last bartered away our
souls. The love of creatures the desire of human
sympathy and affections ; these have caused us oft
to wander from the good Shepherd and seek pas
tures of our own choosing. Can we think of the
Blessed Virgin, hallowed by the miraculous energy
of the HOLY SPIRIT, purifying herself as though un
clean, and yet think ourselves sufficiently removed
from all taint of sin ? And if we really feel our
selves to be unclean if with S. Paul we confess
ourselves to be the chief of sinners, shall we disdain
the temple and the temple service ?
Mary and Joseph had far to travel many obsta
cles ere they could present their child in the temple
many difficulties ere they could provide the offer
ings the law required. What difficulties do we
encounter and surmount in order to present our off
spring our sins and follies before the LORD, that
He may cleanse us in His ordinances ? What can
be more terrible than to think of Christians passing
a whole day without never thinking of GOD or their
own souls ? having no intention to please GOD ? no
recollection ? And yet such a condition is too com
mon amongst even intelligent Christians. Day suc
ceeds day, and yet with the exception of hurried
prayer night and morning, GOD may be said to have
xviii.] THE CHRISTIAN S PURIFICATION. 159
no place in their hearts. The holy Anna served
GOD with fastings and prayer and departed not from
the temple, and therefore found CHRIST there. What
do we not lose by neglecting the priest s bidding to
prayers, when we would not, if we could, join him ?
What loss for eternity is ours when, without the
excuse of infirmity or real positive engagements, we
refuse to purify ourselves in the temple and enter
into the presence of CHRIST ? It may be we have
gone long to the temple without much apparent
profit ; we have scarce found Him for Whom our
soul longeth ; but how long had holy Anna waited
to see the redemption of Israel ? Had she been
absent from the temple then she had never beheld
the promised CHRIST.
And this call to purification is increased when we
remember Whom we have to meet in the temple.
Simeon and Anna embraced CHRIST in their arms.
They folded the Infinite, Incomprehensible GOD in
their arms. Mortality compassed the Immortal.
Corruption the Incorruptible. Weakness the Al
mighty. He Whom they received was really GOD
though filling a small child s body. Yet mar
vellous as this is, in these latter temples we have a
greater marvel. We do not embrace in our arms
the Infant SAVIOUR, but we receive Him into our
mouths and souls. He is therefore and to this end
so often presented in our temples so often lying
on the altar. The bread and wine is hallowed to be
His Body and Blood that we thereby may be made
holy. It were easy for the holy Virgin to be cleansed
100 THE CHEISTIAN S PUEIFICATION. [SEEM.
from legal impurity, but it is not by the blood of
slain birds that we shall be purified. The blood of
JESUS CHRIST alone cleanseth His Body alone pu-
rifieth. We cannot purify ourselves. His Sacrifice
alone, applied to us in the blessed Sacrament, mak-
eth us clean. Yet not without ourselves; Mary s
purification was not without sore travel and without
some cost. Whatever we do whether self-denying
charity, or fasting, or prayer, must all look on to the
blessed Sacrament. As without shedding of blood
is no remission, so without faith in the Blood of
CHRIST all acts of religion are vain. And without
that Sacrament wherein we commemorate CHRIST S
Bloody Death and Passion, all attempts to purify
ourselves are in vain.
Let us then in our own case unite purification of
ourselves to CHRIST S presentation in the Temple.
Disdain we nothing which through the virtue of His
Atonement may become effectual to the purging
away of sin. Let us multiply our acts of self-denial,
and our holy communions. It were foolish to mul
tiply one to the neglect of the other. Frequent
Sacraments should quicken our desire for purifica
tion. Our longings to become purer in the sight of
GOD urge us to seek for that Bread by which alone
we attain unto everlasting life hereafter, and are
strengthened and refreshed now. We must look on
to that time when in the Providence of GOD the
Church shall have restored to her daily communions
and a stricter life. We, as individuals, must hasten
that consummation by increased communions and
XVTII.] THE CHRISTIAN S PURIFICATION. 161
increased watchfulness over ourselves. GOD calls
us to Him by a louder voice than He spake to our
fathers, and we must hear it, if we would be saved.
We cannot be saved at so easy a rate as they who
went before us in a season of darkness and deadness.
Light and life is among us and around us. We may
not stay amid the sparks that we have kindled or
in the graves of sloth. If we do not purify our
selves to receive CHRIST now as our SAVIOUR, how
shall we purify ourselves to meet Him as our
Judge ? If JESUS is not our constant food now, how
strange will it be there where " the LAMB feedeth
them ?" If it joyeth us not now to be in His pre
sence, how can we look forward to the fulness of
joy on His right hand for ever ?
SERMON XIX.
Eent,
EATING AND FASTING.
GEN. in. 17.
" BECAUSE THOU HAST EATEN or THE TEEE OF WHICH I
COMMANDED THEE, SATING, THOU SHALT NOT EAT OF IT :
CUESED IS THE GEOUND FOE THT SAKE."
NOTHING is more common in religion than the con
founding truth with error. And as all copies, how
ever ill-done, or imperfectly executed, suppose a
good original, so the very erroneous statement of a
doctrine becomes an argument for the existence of
the truth. This is singularly illustrated in Scrip
ture by the errors into which some of its students
have fallen in their denial of fasting to be a Christian
duty. Thus the very cautions given in the Bible
to take heed to fast in a manner pleasing to GOD,
and the very condemnation pronounced upon hypo
critical or imperfect fasting, have been perverted
to mean that fasting itself was displeasing to GOD,
and condemned by our SAVIOUR. These perver-
EATING AND FASTING. 163
sions are so obvious, that we need not dwell on
them. Far less intelligible to many are those pas
sages in the Epistles which speak of the dangerous
doctrines of those who " forbade to marry, and
commanded to abstain from meats. 7 Some persons
conclude from this, that abstaining from flesh meat
for a time, or entirely, is unscriptural, and that such
passages in the Scriptures are directed against the
uniform practice of the Church in all ages. Such
persons are generally not aware that the Apostle
was warning against the doctrines of the Mani-
cheans and others, who held that marriage and par
taking of food were in themselves sinful, and sub
jected those who indulged in them to the power of
the Evil principle, which they imagined to reside in
all matter. Now this is a totally different reason
from that on which the Apostles and their succes
sors enjoined on the faithful, abstinence and self-
denial. And this will be more clear if we consider
S. Paul s comment upon such false grounds of
mortification. "Every creature of GOD is good,
and nothing to be refused, if it be received with
thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the Word of
GOD and prayer."
These words may remind us of the change which
the Fall of Man has wrought in respect of our
natural food. It has to be sanctified by prayer
before we eat of it. Our very daily bread reminds
us of the disobedience of our first parents and their
punishment. Before the Fall of Adam GOD said,
Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely
M2
164 EATING AND FASTING. [SEEM.
eat.* After his fall came forth the sentence, " Be
cause thou hast eaten of the tree of which I com
manded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it:
Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shalt
thou eat of it all the days of thy life."
What a very solemn thing, if we duly consider it,
is the benediction of food before it is received into
our bodies ! Or again, how awful must be any
abuse of it, when so hallowed by prayer, by the
glutton or drunkard ! It is a repeating of Adam s
sin by the children of the second Adam a falling
back into original sin in its most literal and mani
fest development. And thus abuse of food, by the
very laws of our nature, brings on the offender
sickness and death. Physicians tell us that most
of the diseases of our body are owing to excess in
eating or drinking, even in the case of persons who
cannot be charged with any flagrant abuse of meats
and drinks. Still more striking do our relations to
food become, when we remember that not only does
pain and disease follow on the abuse of it, but that
it costs the greater part of mankind sorrow and toil
in getting it. " In sorrow shalt thou eat of it all
the days of thy life."
Looking then at the question in this light, it
does seem strange that any should deny that the act
of eating and drinking is of itself intimately con
nected with our past and future welfare. Eating
brought death into the world, toil and sorrow. This
cannot be gainsaid. Every time we pronounce a
blessing on food and partake of it, we commemorate
XIX.] EATING AND FASTING. 165
the abuse of food and its punishment. Eating is
the type of all sin, since Adam by eating brought
sin into the world, which before existed not in it.
In the same view we may regard our SAVIOUR S
acts. He fasted in the wilderness, because Adam
sinned by eating in the garden. He made bread to
be His Body, and so hallowed it by His own Incar
nation. He shed His sweat of blood in the garden
on the ground, which had been cursed for Adam s
sake, that they who of old had gone their way
weeping and bearing forth good seed, might come
again with joy, and bring their sheaves with them.
The Cross again the holy wood is the tree, whose
fruit the regenerate eat, to cleanse them from the
taint of sin wherewith Adam s eating of the tree in
the garden had infected their nature. All Scripture
points to the Eucharist as the great feast of the
Gospel, of which a man may eat and not die. All
other food is but a calling to mind Adam and Eve s
fall this proclaims and sets forth our redemption
and salvation. By eating in Adam we died by
eating in CHRIST we live. Wherein we sinned,
therein we return to GOD and obtain pardon.
It is not wonderful then that we find in the
Scriptures, that whenever men were conscious of
having offended GOD, they attempted to appease
His anger by abstinence from food. " My heart is
smitten down," says the Psalmist, " so that I for
get to eat my bread." Natural sorrow and heavi
ness of heart, it may be replied, tend to produce
this. David fasted and wept for the child of his
166 EATING AND TASTINGK [SEEM.
adulterous marriage with Bathsheba, that its life
might be spared. How strongly does this recoil
upon the objector, that if earthly sorrow causes the
appetite to fail, much more ought repentance and
mourning for our sins. It was not the natural effect
of their sorrow or fear that caused the Ninevites to
withhold food from even children and their cattle ;
but the hope of propitiating the mercy of GOD.
Again, weakness of body caused by bodily morti
fications of any sort or degree predispose the mind
to sorrow and penitence. It is essential then in
fasting, that we bear in mind that in union with our
SAVIOUR S fasting, its exercise has the effect of
turning away GOD S displeasure. It represents to
GOD in a special way that special fasting of CHRIST,
whereby He atoned for the gluttony of Adam, which
let in the flood of all sin upon the Eden of man s
heart. In Adam by self-indulgence we sinned in
CHRIST by self-denial we turn away the wrath of
GOD. Had not Adam s disobedience taken this di
rection, it would not have been necessary for our
penitence to be directed into the opposite channel.
We might have chastised ourselves in a different
way, had Adam s temptation and fall assumed a
different phase. We follow now the law of our na
ture in correcting the grand evil propensity of
fallen humanity by following after the contrary vir
tue.
One way in which persons deceive themselves
into the idea that abstinence from usual food cannot
benefit the soul is to say, " what good can it possibly
XIX.] EATING AND FASTING. 167
do me to restrict myself to this or that kind of food,
or to such a number of meals," and the like? I
would suggest by way of reply, Surely you must
admit that it had been well for Adam and for us in
him to have restricted himself to the other trees of the
garden. If his refusal to do so caused his loss of
GOD S favour, may not ours have an equal effect ? If
his want of self-denial cost him and many thousands
of souls so much sorrow and pain, can we regard our
own conduct in regard to his example lightly or
carelessly ? It was a small act of self-indulgence
which at so great a distance of time yet works
death and misery. Trifling as we may deem this or
that act of mortification of ourselves in food, it can
not be so, if we only see what has been the effect of
a seemingly equal act of self-pleasing. And are we
so very indifferent really to our little comforts of
any kind ? Is it not really the petty, small, trifling
indulgence which tries and worries us most, when
we miss it? Nothing certainly causes more dis
comfort and uneasiness in families than the stress laid
by this or that member of them upon little bodily
indulgences. And nothing has usually a more
perceptible effect upon the temper of most than
the want of food. Trifling as such things are to
speak of, they are anything but trifles in practice.
It has been observed that all great men, according
to the world s appreciation of greatness, have their
littlenesses. On the contrary, the saints of the Church
have ever been ridiculed by the world for their strict
attention to trifles. Where the soul s welfare is
168 EATING AND FASTING. [SEIIM.
concerned, nothing can ever be trifling or unworthy
our notice. Heaven was lost for want of attention
to a trifle. Hell may be escaped by attending to an
equal trifle. Let no man who reads the fall of
Adam count abstinence or indulgence a trifle.
I have made remarks sufficient to show that no
one should neglect to perform some act of abstinence
from food this Lent. However small our imitation
of CHRIST S fasting be, let us not forbear to imitate
Him, because we follow at so great a distance. It
may be we have only lately had this duty set before
us ; or we are infirm in our health, or have much
bodily exertion to endure. Still there is no one who
cannot do something to copy our SAVIOUR. We
may imitate Him by changing the quality or quan
tity of food, or by diminishing the number of meals.
We can put away pleasant diet and choose a less
agreeable. Or we can take less at each meal, or we
can have fewer meals. Any person who chooses
can do one of these. Prayer, no doubt, is not al
ways suited to our humour, nor is almsgiving kept
up by most. The very difficulty of performing our
duties has a tendency to make men neglectful of
their duties. Fasting is the only duty which we can
always perform. Almsgiving can be practised only
by him who has more than enough to supply the
necessities of the body. Prayer is not always suited
to the mind and temper of man. But fasting de
pends not on the purse or on the inward feeling,
and can be done by all, and by many of the poorest
is done at this season.
XIX.] EATING AND FASTING. 169
It is not true to say that abstinence can only be
performed by the strong and healthy. Fasting in
deed must be fulfilled with a due regard to the state
of our health, but not so with abstinence. Many can
abstain who cannot fast. Nor let us imagine that
our little acts of abstinence avail nothing for our
soul s health : GOD requires us to do nothing above
our power. The least self-denial united to CHRIST S
fasting shall not lose its reward, but shall help to
wipe away the stains of selfishness long marring the
soul s purity. As Adam s eating was a type of all
sin, so is fasting of all atonement for sin. Hence
we are not to confine ourselves to fasting and absti
nence from food, but to combine other acts of mor
tification of ourselves. And these should be directed
against our besetting sin. All of us have some one
monster sin which we ought to have discovered by
self-examination, and against which we bend all our
prayers and good works. Let us, as against a be
sieging enemy, move all our forces against that sin.
Whether it be pride, or covetousness, or misuse of
the tongue, or foolishness of imaginations, let our
penitential acts now be aimed against it. So may it
be said to us in the great day, " Because thou hast
denied thyself, I will not deny thee, because thou
hast humbled thyself, I will not humble thee ; be
cause thou hast sown in tears, thou shalt reap in
joy. Well done, good and faithful servant, enter
thou into the joy of thy LORD."
S E R M N X X.
before 2Lent
LENT: THE APOSTOLIC LIFE.
2 COR. xi. 27.
" IN" WEARINESS AND PAINFULNESS, IN WATCHINGS OFTEN,
IN HUNGER AND THIRST, IN FASTINGS OFTEN, IN COLD
AND NAKEDNESS."
WE are fast approaching that solemn season of
Lent, when the Church puts on her sackcloth and
garb of mourning. We stand between the Nativity
and the Passion of CHRIST. It is a space allotted
for hushing the songs of joy and for pushing aside
the signs and relics of festivity. We could not pass
from the one to the other, from gladness to sorrow,
all at once without a pause. It is contrary to our
nature to realize both sensations at once. It would
be too shocking to go from Bethlehem to Calvary
from the manger to the Cross from the Glory to
GOD in the highest, to, Crucify Him, Crucify Him,
unless a space were given to recollection. Thus it
is that the Christian s joy or grief is guided alway
LENT: THE APOSTOLIC LIFE. 171
to his SAVIOUR as the only end of all human affec
tions. He sanctifies our joys and sorrows thus
directs us when to laugh and when to weep. Even
in the most mirthful season of Christmas, how hal
lowing is the thought that it is the birth of the SA
VIOUR, which bids men rejoice and be glad one with
another, and causes the fountains of benevolence to
break forth. But Christmas and the Epiphany are
over, and we sit now in the vestibule of the temple
waiting to hear the trumpet of the season of expia
tion sound, and to go forth and weep between the
porch and the altar. Let us therefore turn our
eyes from the glare and glitter of all earthly joys and
look toward the Cross of JESUS, as we week by week
are drawn nearer and nearer to it. As we gaze on
the pale emaciated body of the SON of GOD hanging
on the Cross, we shall see more and more the vanity
and nothingness of all things that enchant and fas
cinate us here ; we shall sorrow more and more that
for any worthless object of human love and desire
we have turned away from bearing that same Cross,
hallowed by our SAVIOUR S sufferings ; we shall
long to become partakers of His sorrows and griefs ;
we shall be thankful that the Church has bidden her
children fast and afflict their souls because the
Bridegroom is taken away, and the tokens of re
joicing put from them. The thorns which in the
parable are said to choke the seed sown in our hearts
are the cares of this life and deceitfulness of riches.
Now the contemplation of our SAVIOUR S Pas
sion is a medicine for this disease. The poor may
172 LENT : THE APOSTOLIC LIFE. [SEUM.
refresh their weary souls with the thought of
CHRIST S sad life and death. The rich may learn
hy the example of Him Who emptied Himself of all
things to disburden themselves of that wealth which
is ever leading them into temptations and hurtful
lusts. The Christian cannot consider all the cir
cumstances of his master s poverty, afflictions, and
pain, without compunction of heart, if he is in no
wise conformed to the image of CHRIST S sufferings.
It is the hour of sickness or distress for the most
part when men are most inclined to listen to their
SAVIOUR S calls to follow Him. They have been
unwilling to take up their Cross, and He in pity for
their weakness lays His Cross on their shoulders
and bids them follow Him. No one who reads the
Scriptures can feel satisfied with himself that he is
a disciple of JESUS CHRIST, if he never at any time
takes up His Cross if he lives as he likes, un
checked, indulged, and tasting every enjoyment
which comes in his way. All earthly pleasures and
human joys fade, we know, and decay as the au
tumnal leaves ; what then must become the temper
of mind of them who fix their affections on such
unreal things, who continually walk in vain shadows
and disquiet themselves in vain, or who heap up
riches without knowing who shall gather them.
Religion mainly consists in giving a preference to
invisible joys hereafter above visible pleasures here.
How can such a religion be safely preserved by any
who enjoy themselves as much as they can without
actually committing gross sins ? who choose to
XX.] LENT : THE APOSTOLIC LIFE. 173
drink to the very dregs every cup of this world s
happiness ? Surely they will be ill-prepared for the
season of trial when CHRIST lays upon them the
Cross they ever refused to take up. Surely they
will hardly abide the refiner s fire. Sickness
sorrow poverty pain death, all these will come
with a crushing weight on all who have never set
apart some seasons of self-denial some days of
mortification of the flesh some hours of crossing
their wills and desires. It might be sufficient to
say, "Members of CHRIST, how can ye have com
munion with a suffering Head and LORD, if ye never
suffer yourselves ? How can He dwell in you, who
studiously turn away from His calls to partake of
His sufferings ?" It might be replied to this that
He suffered for us, endured the Cross and despised
the shame, and that therefore no Cross or shame
remains for us. Yet the lives of His first followers
contradict this way of arguing, even were there not,
which there are abundantly, our LORD S own decla
rations.
What a lesson is set before us by the Apostle in
the Epistle of to-day. How strange it is that in
the midst of so much Scriptural discussion and
interpretation so little stress is laid in general on
what the Bible describes to be the Apostolic life ;
that while men are disputing about abstruse points
of religion, such as predestination and free will, they
should hardly ever touch on what is so plain and
clear. " In stripes above measure ; in prison more
frequent ; in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times
174 LENT: THE APOSTOLIC LIFE. [SERM.
received I forty stripes save one ; thrice was I
beaten with rods ; once was 1 stoned ; thrice I suf
fered shipwreck ; a night and a day I have been in
the deep ; in journeying often ; in perils of waters ;
in perils of robbers ; in perils by mine own country
men ; in perils by the heathen ; in perils in the city ;
in perils in the wilderness ; in perils in the sea ;
in perils among false brethren ; in weariness and
painfulness ; in watchings often ; in hunger and
thirst; in fastings often; in cold and nakedness."
Such, my brethren, is the Scriptural life of Chris
tians. Contrast it with the life of most professors
of our religion. Or rather contrast it with your
own way of life your own habits your own feel
ings your own language. Can that religion be
fitly termed Christianity, whose professors in no
degree copy the Life of CHRIST and of His Apostles ?
Ought it not rather to be condemned as a degraded
and corrupt form of it with no less severity than we
comment on superstitious and heathenish forms ?
We are acute and sharp discerners of corruptions in
doctrines and ritual, but we are as blind as moles or
bats in respect to the degeneracy of Christian prac
tice. If most men were to speak truly they would
say that the Cross was to them a sturnbling-block.
They will listen to eloquent sermons, painting in
awful colours the Passion of CHRIST, but they will
not listen to the teaching which bids them deny
themselves and take up their cross and follow
CHRIST. We might rather expect that they who
affect to adopt a Bible religion exclusively would be
XX.] LENT : THE APOSTOLIC LIPE. 175
pained and distressed at being well clothed, well
housed, well fed, and well attended. It would be
expected at least that they whose station or position
seems to require attention to appearances should
make up for external indulgences and comforts by
secret acts of mortification and self-denial. The
Christianity of the New Testament is ever looking
out for occasions of thus warring a good warfare
ever denying itself food, raiment, and lodging ever
proposing to the disciples the pattern of a Master,
Who had not where to lay His head Who spent
all night in prayer on the Mount of Olives Whose
first resting place on earth was with brute cattle,
and His last given by the charity of the Arimathean.
We shrink from hard lives, we cannot bear a
scarcity of meats and drinks ; we will not even come
to worship GOD except we are as well clothed as
our neighbours, and we often profane the worship
of GOD by making His house a place of displaying
our dress and ornaments. All things which cause
pain or discomfort are studiously avoided. It is too
cold or too wet to go to church ; we cannot kneel
except on easy cushions. How must the soul that
has ever turned out of the way of the Cross tremble
at the pangs and restlessness of dying ! How lift
itself to GOD amidst the hard and bitter struggle for
life ! How can they who are ever making them
selves at home upon earth, have a desire to depart
and be with CHRIST ? Were there no other reason,
we ought to fear to be too comfortable, too much at
ease in this life, lest our very comfort and ease
17G LENT J THE APOSTOLIC LIFE. [SEEM.
should weigh us down to earth, and hinder the soul s
aspirations after heaven. It is the very nature of
all earthly bliss to cloud the vision of heavenly.
Carnal meats and drinks usurp the place of the
spiritual sustenance in the Eucharist. Purple and
fine linen supplant the righteousness of saints. The
time they take up in preparing or arranging might
save many souls. And then our way of life affects
our language gives a tone to our characters sinks
deep into our thoughts, and occupies our inmost
selves. " The corruptible body weigheth down the
soul." Even when chastened and subjected to the
soul, it oft rebels and brings down its master.
Much more so when it is full and pampered, in
dulged and satisfied, unchecked and uncrossed.
How could the Apostles have converted the world
if they had been men of soft and luxurious habits ?
Nay more, how could Christians in those days have
preserved their faith, if they had not inured them
selves to hardships in life, and schooled themselves
by daily mortifications against the fiery persecutions
which ever awaited them ? It is very strange that
any should be found to decry fastings and mortifi
cations of the flesh as worse than useless, when we
think how much we are enslaved to the necessities
and infirmities of our bodies. Heat and cold, hun
ger and thirst, toil and pain, do not these aifect the
soul ? Is the mind entirely passive and easy by its
very nature amidst all external bodily distractions ?
See here the history of many a young man or young
woman s falling from baptismal grace. They never
XX.] LENT : THE APOSTOLIC LIFE, 177
learnt to deny themselves in little things, and so
they denied themselves not in great. They yielded
to small temptations and so they gave way at last to
the greatest. Our spiritual life is won only and
maintained by slow steps up the hill of Calvary. It
is not only No Cross no Crown, in the things of
GOD S sending, but also in the things of our own
choosing. All this is true of the mass of Christians
that if they would live above this world and rise to
heaven, they must find out ways of crossing their
pleasures and desires. And if it be true of those who
have ever lived blameless lives as the world counts
blamelessness much more is it true of all who have
sinned. Evil habits of any kind are created by a
succession of evil acts, and can only be undermined
by continual watchfulness, and self- mortification.
Acts of self-denial strengthen the failing will, and
renew the weakened conscience to a quicker pulse.
Every time the sinner chastens himself by refusing
meats or drinks, he gains power to resist the lusts
of the flesh. Every time the outward adorning of
plaiting the hair, or of wearing of gold, or of putting
on of apparel is curtailed and checked, the sinner
gains a victory over the pride of life. Words which
should not be spoken, kept back by the barrier of
the lips, make the tongue a less deadly evil a less
venomous poison. All punishment of ourselves
deepens penitence. We cannot feel our sins till we
suffer for them. We who have sinned must volun
tarily suffer if we would repent as GOD would have
us. If the Apostolic life was good for the saints of
178
LENT : THE APOSTOLIC LIFE. [SEEM,
the Primitive Church, it must be necessary for the
sinners of our day. " In weariness and painfulness,
in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in cold and
nakedness, in fastings often" must the sinner seek
again the grace and favour of GOD, which he lost in
ease and enjoyment, in much sleep, in eating and
drinking, in warmth and apparel, and in much glut
tony.
All this seems hard and difficult, yet compared
with the precious Blood of CHRIST, the price of our
redemption, or with the everlasting reward, what is
the self-denial of a few years ? S. Paul suffered it
all for the love of the souls of others. Shall we not
suffer in our measure and degree for the sake of our
own souls? They then who are richer than the
poorest among us should be glad when the Church
appoints a season of special abstinence. It is not
long she bids us take up the Apostolic life, forty
days only instead of three hundred and sixty-five.
We may compound now for the whole year. They
who would follow CHRIST most closely, must do so
always. But we who live in the world must do so
at least for the time during which the Church would
associate us with the forty days fast of CHRIST in the
wilderness. For forty days at least let us be like
CHRIST and His first disciples. It may give a tone to
our life through the whole year. It may be with us as
it was with Moses on Mount Sinai, when by his al
tered countenance the Israelites knew he had been
with GOD. We say we could not endure to live so
always, and in truth GOD may not have called us
XX.] LENT: THE APOSTOLIC LIFE, 170
so to live always. Let us accept the mild discipline
of a gentle mother, and hear GOD speaking to us by
her. If we be young, obedience to that call now may
prevent the penitence of years, and lay up a treasure of
moral strength against the perilsof spiritual adversity.
And to the poorest among us I would say, GOD has
made you, whether you will or no, imitate in the
poverty of your condition CHRIST and His Apostles.
Do not, I beseech you, be ashamed of that poverty,
except so far as your own wickedness may have
brought it upon you. If you are only poor in spirit
as well as in body, if you are content with your con
dition, you are the truest antitypes to CHRIST and
His x\postles. Why should you be ever backward
in coming to church because of the bad state of
your clothes, if you are placed by GOD in the blessed
state of poverty which CHRIST and His Apostles by
their own lives dignified and ennobled ? It may be
disgraceful to any of us who are able to help you to
appear better and do not, but that does not affect
you. If you are proud or discontented you lose all
the blessings and rewards promised to the poor in
spirit. Earth indeed has few joys for you. So
much the better, if this makes you long and pray to
be fit for the eternity of bliss in heaven. The sweat
of toil and the rain of tears make the seed of eternal
life spring up the faster, and hastens the harvest.
Soon it shall be said of you, "These are they
which have come out of great tribulation, and
have washed their robes white in the blood of the
LAMB."
N 2
180 LENT: THE APOSTOLIC LIFE.
Lastly, remember as ye give your alms to-day,
that the mite of the widow was precious in the
sight of CHRIST, because it was her all. Cast ye in
like manner your mites into the treasury of the
temple, and small though your offerings be, they
shall overpass the gifts of mighty princes in the
great Day of Visitation.
SERMON XXI.
Eent
BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION,
S, MATT. iv. 1.
WAS JESUS LED trp OF THE SPIRIT INTO THE WILDER
NESS, TO BE TEMPTED OF THE DEVIL."
OUR LORD S life up to the time of His Baptism,
represents to us the state of the natural man, in
that we read not of His being tempted, till He was
baptized. Baptism introduced Him to the Evil
One for the first time. Hitherto He had been con
cealed from his influence and power. Therefore had
He been born in a miraculous manner, hidden even
in His birth of the Blessed Virgin when espoused
to Joseph. So too for thirty years He passed for
the son of the carpenter, and was unknown, save to
His Mother and S. Joseph. Satan knew not Who
that Man of Sorrows was, and could not hinder
thus far the work He came to do. But when the
SAVIOUR was baptized, the world of evil spirits was
confounded.
.182 J3APTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. [SEEM,
When the SAVIOUR was baptized, water was
sanctified to the washing away of sin. Satan could
not be expelled from that element without its caus
ing wonderful uproar amidst the spirits of the air.
And we might nevertheless believe that they did
not know Him to be GOD, Who was thus washed in
the waters of Jordan. The Dove s descent concealed
the HOLY GHOST, just as the Manhood veiled the
SON, and the Voice the FATHER. They knew some
what had occurred to stay their course and repel
their power, but understood not the mystery of the
Incarnation ; and hence the Tempter puts the ques
tion doubtfully, " If Thou be the SON of GOD ?"
He would know if He were the SON of GOD, at
Whose advent his kingdom was to totter, and the
voice of GOD to be heard. He suspected that some
mighty antagonist was disguised under that poor
despised form of most wretched humanity, Which
the Eternal SON was pleased to assume. And the
Evil One was left in doubt by the mystery of the
Incarnation when CHRIST fasted. For when the
LORD endured fasting for forty days, the devil
thought the Deity was manifested ; but when He
became hungry, the Tempter was again perplexed,
and so he adapts the first temptation for the pur
pose of inquiry. If the Being he addressed were
human, He would betray Himself by the delight of
food ; if Divine, by the transformation of stones into
bread. Our SAVIOUR throughout kept His purpose
of concealment by condescending to argue the mat
ter, as with the doctors in the Temple, on Scriptural
XXI.] BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. 183
grounds. He could have destroyed the Tempter,
had He so willed ; but He chose rather to be as one
of the sons of the Prophets, than as the Second
Person of the Blessed TRINITY.
So too He was content to be taken up by the
devil into the holy city, and set upon a pinnacle of
the Temple, as if still mere man. The devil said to
himself, This man, not sensible of the delights of
food, is at least a holy man, if not the SON of GOD,
I will now tempt Him by desire of vain glory. If
He be man, He will fall should He attempt to
descend ; if GOD, I shall discover it by His safe
descent.
And, lastly, when so baffled, the devil becoming-
more sure that It was only a holy man whom he ad
dressed, tries Him with the deceits of covetousness.
We may observe throughout, how carefully
CHRIST avoids applying the Scriptures to Himself.
He might have said, had He not had regard to the
mystery of the Incarnation, " I live not by bread
alone," instead of saying, " Man doth not." He
might have said, "Thou shalt not tempt Me the
LORD thy GOD;" but simply, "The LORD thy
GOD," which any holy man might have done. Nor
did He reply on the last occasion, " Thou shalt
worship Me ;" and yet we who look on at this great
conflict, see clearly the force of the implied reason
ing. What Satan knew not, we know. We see
the edge of the weapon, which fell upon him with
its duller and blunter side. Nor is this all. As it
were more fully to deceive the Evil One, " Angels
184 BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION.
came and ministered unto Him." We may contrast
with the cool effrontery of the Evil One on this
occasion, the terror and dismay exhibited by the
devils when JESUS was casting them forth, " What
have we to do with Thee ? Art Thou come hither to
torment us before the time ? We know Thee Who
Thou art, the Holy One of GOD." This contrast
shows distinctly the difference that would have
been made in the behaviour of Satan towards our
LORD, had he been certain that the Word had
become flesh, and that He was JESUS of Nazareth.
Marvellously awful as is the scene of Satan thus
tampering with GOD of the Author of Evil thus
working upon Him Who is Good in His own
essence, it is but what goes on every day. Satan
daily tempts us who have been regenerated, and so
tempts CHRIST in us to Whom we belong. Each
one of our members which he allures to sin is part
of CHRIST, and so CHRIST in us is continually so
licited to sin. We are ever acting over the scene
of CHRIST tempted by the devil, though too often
with a different result. The hour of our baptism
led us into the battle-field with Satan, to whose
kingdom our natural birth subjected us. And the
contest goes on not in Eden as of old, but in the
wilderness, this bleak dreary world which sin has
desolated and wasted. As surely as Satan would
have longed for the fall of the Second Adam, so
surely does he desire ours. He saith to each one of
us as it suits his purpose and our condition, " If
Ihou be a son of GOD, make bread of stones, dis-
XXI.] BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. 185
trust, despair ; thy GOD and FATHER has deserted
thee " or "If thou be a son, do all thou listest,
live as thou wilt, cast thyself down, neglect all usual
precautions and care for temporal or spiritual neces
sities, and GOD will not forsake His child, nor
suffer him to be lost " or if he thinks us not to
have the spirit of sons, but to have become mere
servants, he saith, " Look at the rewards I give my
servants. If you only think of service, I am the
best master you can have. My wages are at hand
and palpable. Why should you choose the hardest
service, with at best distant and future recompence ?
And, as with our SAVIOUR, he knows not fully with
whom he has to deal. Outwardly we present to
him only the poor outcast fallen manhood, over
which he has so often in the case of others tri
umphed. He cannot penetrate the extent of our
communion with GOD, or of our union with CHRIST.
He comprehends by the success or failure of his
temptation our sonship ; but by nought else. He
fathomed not Job till after he had tried all his skill
against him. Even so the Prince of darkness beholds
not our hidden strength, our latent energy, whereby
we may hold him at bay. He sees not the Divine
nature, whereof we have been made partakers, the
life which has been hid with CHRIST in GOD.
If we be true to ourselves the inward divinity will
sustain our outward manhood. Satan can have no
power over the regenerate except by their own act
and deed. As well might we think of CHRIST
yielding to the tempter as of His faithful people.
186 EAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. [SEEM.
Only hold fast and endure, and at last shall the
angels come and minister to thee and hide thee from
the wrath of the foiled and baffled Satan. One way
then to be true to ourselves or rather to that which
is not of ourselves, the grace of GOD, is to watch
against temptation. And this we may do now by
studying the peculiar temptations to which we are
liable to the present season. Our LORD S tempta
tion in the wilderness is an image of our own.
When in His quadragesimal fast He was hungered,
He was tempted to despair. So in our fasts when
the faintness of hunger comes on we are moved to
discontent, peevishness, and fretfulness. Fasting
has its special trials as well as gluttony or self-
indulgence. And such are the trials of those who
are weary and exhausted for want of food. Their
necessary occupations become a sore toil and heavy
burden. They murmur at the Church their mother,
who imposes so severe a tax upon their selfishness.
Or they are moved to make an escape from this so
great bondage, forge excuses for their neglect of
fasting, and pretend their health allows not of it.
The spirit of a servant takes the place of that of
a son. And then the man is ready to meet the next
temptation halfway. Spiritual pride enters in, and
past abstinence is made a cloke for present reck
lessness. I have been so long mortifying myself
that I cannot fall away now. GOD will not think
so little of my self-denial as to cast me off for a little
fault. I will just go here or there and see whether
or no GOD will preserve His child. My neighbours
XXI.] BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. 187
fast not as much as I ; why should I fast more than
they ? Why should I, belonging to a true Apos
tolic Church, take so much pains to save my soul ?
Or again, the very spirit of the Pharisee enters in,
which being adopted by hollow Christians has
brought fasting into disrepute. " GOD, I thank
Thee, that I am not as other men are : I fast twice
in the week." When we are fasting Satan tempts
us to rebel against the yoke of the Cross. When
we have fasted he tempts us to be puffed up with
pride on account of that very abstinence he urged
us to give up. All acts of devotion of ourselves
apart from CHRIST are wearisome while they last.
When they are at an end, they serve only to feed
pride and self-esteem. O Christian ! beware how
thou losest sight of the Cross of JESUS in thy mor
tifications and good works. Whether thou prayest,
fastest, or givest alms, think of thy SAVIOUR, and
unite thyself to Him. " JESU, good JESU, I offer
this my abstinence as a sacrifice to Thee. JESU,
good JESU, I offer these my prayers as a sacrifice to
Thee. JESU, good JESU, I offer these my alms as a
sacrifice to Thee. Do Thou offer them on Thine
eternal altar in heaven."
Again, when Satan has tried all these seductions,
he throws off the mask boldly and offers us the
world and the things that are in the world. It is
his last chance, and he stakes all on one throw. He
spreads all the deceits of the world and of the flesh
before us, as though we were no longer the children
of a better inheritance. He says no more, " If
188 BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. [SEEM.
Thou be the SON of GOD," but " All these will I
give Thee." He would draw our minds off from
our birthright that he may exchange his pottage.
He would dazzle our faith with the sight of his too
visible and palpable pleasures, and reduce us to cap
tivity at once. By one bold stroke he would anni
hilate the advantage our fasting had given us. We
might marvel indeed that he should choose to tempt
by the proffer of the world our SAVIOUR, who re
fused even to sate His appetite with bread. But
experience tells us that many who have fasted in
Lent have fallen at Easter. S. Chrysostom had to
warn the Antioch Christians against this danger in
a homily bearing the significant title, " On the Re
surrection and against drunkards." And this is the
danger of all who do not fast aright who conform
outwardly to the rules of the Church, but inwardly
chafe and vex themselves. It may not be perhaps
that we love our Lenten discipline while it lasts, but
we must pray and strive against fretting against it
as a burden, " My yoke is easy and My burden is
light." Or there will be the danger of falling when
Easter comes. It will be as with the Israelites in
the wilderness, who longed for the flesh-pots in
Egypt, and despised and loathed the heavenly food
of manna.
We must in all oar self-denial live under the
shadow of the Cross, to protect ourselves from the
fierce heat of the temptations of the evil one. So
shall the seed sown in abstinence and mortification
grow up in us and not fade and wither away. And
XXI.] BAPTISM CONDUCTS TO TEMPTATION. 189
hence we may see the peril of fasting beyond our
strength of changing our manner of life too sud
denly and unpreparedly. Many have taken up too
heavy a cross, and fallen under its weight. All our
self-denial must be gradual, and so to speak natural
to ourselves. We cannot force Christian habits.
They must grow and increase. CHRIST passed
thirty years increasing in wisdom and stature and
in favour with GOD and man before He entered
on His wondrous fasting. Even so with us. Our
armour must be that which suits our stature in
CHRIST. The stone and sling served the stripling
David better than the armour of Saul against the
giant. Only let us not be always striplings. One
day David must put on more soldier-like armour.
So too must we, for we are soldiers of the Cross,
and our Philistine is the devil. Which armour may
He give unto us, Who for us wrestled and overcame
in the wilderness. Amen.
SERMON XXII.
THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE.
S. MATT. iv. 1.
" THEN WAS JESUS LED UP OE THE SPIKIT INTO THE WIL-
DEKKESS."
EVER since Adam was tempted and fell in the gar
den of Eden, GOD has been pleased to permit His
chosen ones to be tempted in the wilderness. Thus
it was in a most marked manner with the children
of Israel. GOD led them into the wilderness " that
He might prove them," it is written, " Thou shalt
remember all the way which the LORD thy GOD led
thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble
thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine
heart, whether thouwouldst keep His commandments
or no." And so again, GOD speaks of their being led
into captivity, as a sojourning in the wilderness, " I
will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and
there will I plead with you face to face." And as
with nations so with individuals : Noah was driven
THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE. 191
into the wilderness, when he alone with his family
was preserved alive of all flesh ; Abraham, when
he was called out from his country and from his
kindred to dwell in a strange land ; Jacob when he
was forced to flee from his loving mother and his
home to Padan Aram ; Joseph when he was sold into
Egypt far from his too affectionate father ; David,
when he wandered an outcast for fear of Saul ; Eli
jah literally and truly, when he fled from Jezebel
and was fed by an angel before his forty days fast.
All these were sorely tried and sifted by GOD, as He
stripped them of all external consolations and sym
pathies. They typified the solitude and temptation
of CHRIST, Who " was led up of the Spirit into the
wilderness, to be tempted of the devil."
For they all were tempted by one or other of
the three temptations of CHRIST, and some of them
failed in their one trial. CHRIST alone withstood all
three. The Israelites fell most signally in requiring
meat for their lust, and so making bread of stones,
as well as in murmuring against GOD. They yielded
themselves to the temptation to cast themselves
down, when they presumed to ascend the hill against
their enemies and enter the Promised Land without
GOD S permission. They worshipped the golden
calf, and so were tempted to serve Satan, saying
unto Aaron, C Make us gods to go before us."
Noah yielded to the temptation of appetite, when he
became drunken. Abraham was tempted to distrust,
but he believed GOD, and it was counted to him for
righteousness. Joseph to adultery, but he withstood
192 THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE. [SEEM.
the evil one. Elijah distrusted GOD when he cried,
" The children of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant,
thrown down Thy altars, and slain Thy prophets
with the sword, and I only am left, and they seek
my life to take it away."
CHRIST went into the wilderness to be tempted of
the devil. Such would not be naturally thought to
be our battle-field our greatest place of trial. Yet
in many ways solitude opens the door to the tempter
even more than life in the world. This is obvious
if we consider the influence which the natural love
of winning golden opinions from our neighbours has
with us. One question which the masters of ca
suistry bid us put to ourselves is, " Do I act differ
ently in one kind of society to what I do in another ?"
And if the mere change of society has an influence
upon our actions, what may withdrawal from all so
ciety have ? Even the worst of men are checked
and awed at times by the company of the good.
How much more those whose character is at least
outwardly correct, and who have something more at
stake ! We ourselves are influenced more than we
are aware by our equals or superiors in leading a
spiritual life. It is a common remark that it takes
some time to know persons thoroughly. What
does this mean but that it is some time before they
throw off the mask they have assumed without
knowing it ? The idea, what will such a one think
of my doing thus and thus ? continually creeps in as
a motive for action. Sad to say, persons are under
the control of so low a principle in their attendance
XXII.] THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE. 193
at church or at the Blessed Sacrament. Certain
times and seasons are fashionable others not so.
Alas ! that the soul and its wants should be sub
jected to the customs and practices of others that
men should think less of the Presence of their SA
VIOUR, than they do of the company of their fellows !
The drunkenness of Noah is but a sample of the
temptations of solitude. All the world had been
swept away for their sins. There were no saints to
rebuke the Patriarch no sinners to mock at his
downfall. " Noah began to be a husbandman, and he
planted a vineyard ; and he drank of the wine, and
was drunken, and he was uncovered within his tent."
GOD, knowing how little we naturally realize His
omnipresence, has put the presence of our brethren
to meet this our deficiency. Remove this barrier
and how many, if tempted, would fall ? Many com
mit secret sins of drunkenness and impurity, which
the society of others would utterly proscribe and
render difficult if not impossible. We shrink from
exposing our little faults and passions to the gaze of
our family or friends. We exhibit them more to in
feriors than to equals less to superiors than equals.
With most they are rather pent up and hidden, than
cast forth and forsaken, and only wait a convenient
occasion for breaking forth. How much sin might
some of us have been spared if we had always had a
brother or sister, whose goodness kept us in check,
at our side as diligently watching every thought
and word, and work, as those heavenly watchers,
our guardian angels, do invisibly ! What is it that
194 THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE.
prevents most persons treating their minister as the
physician of their souls, and consulting him as freely
respecting their eternal health, as they do their
bodily physicians ? Is it not the consciousness that
they have not acted in secret, as they have in the
eyes of all men ? Solitude has then secrets, which
almost all fear to reveal. For what we have sinned
when none could see or know our actions, is indeed
our temptation and our fall in the wilderness. We
wish as we think to stand well with all men to
heal ourselves of our wounds, and let them skin
over, and preserve an appearance of health, while all
is festering and rankling within. We would have
our sins laid on the scape-goat and send him away
into the wilderness without any sacrifice or atone
ment. What would have been our state before
GOD, had we never been in any way under the in
fluence of good and religious acquaintance ! had we
thus ever been tempted in the wilderness ?
Once more. We are much dependent on each
other for sympathy. The mere listening to the
narrative of distressed and afflicted persons con
soles them. It often quiets murmurs, fretfulness,
repinings. Even our Blessed SAVIOUR had some
one to bear His Cross part of the Way of Sorrows ;
S. John, and S. Mary, and S. Mary Magdalene, to
share in His last sufferings and death. He said to
His Apostles, " Ye are they which have continued
with Me in My temptations, and I appoint unto you
a kingdom." Yet in Gethsemane He complained,
" What, could ye not watch with Me one hour ?"
XXII.] THE TEMPTATIONS OE SOLITUDE. 195
and then He cried, " Abba, FATHER, remove this
cup from Me ;" and then on the Cross we hear His
sad lamentation, "My GOD, My GOD, why hast
Thou forsaken Me?" He fulfilled thus the con
ditions of humanity, and felt the horror of loneli
ness in afflictions. Even there He might have made
bread of stones, and escaped by a miracle from the
shame and pain of the Cross. It is hard to bear
long-wasting disease, hard crushing poverty, or
heart-broken anguish without one kind word of
comfort, one pitying eye, one helping hand, one
listening and attentive ear. Then is the Tempter
busied in suggesting distrust and despair, bitter
thoughts of GOD, unjust suspicions of men, and
even unfair and morbid dejection of ourselves. Man
has forsaken us and GOD also, let us curse GOD and
die, is the awful bidding of Satan, which solitude
impels. We have, perhaps, suffered much, and
borne our trials on the whole tolerably well. How
would it have been with us, had we had to go
through them alone, and unsympathised with ?
Again, we are greatly dependent on external aids
to religion. Many who have been deprived of
means of grace, by necessary change of residence,
or of state in life, are tempted to become less strict
and religious. They have unwillingly left the Church
for the wilderness, and gorgeous temples and beau
tiful music for miserable neglected churches, or for
no outward tabernacle whatever. They are proved
and tried as to their interior religion, and it is
found wanting. They have never learned to be
o 2
196 THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE. [SEEM.
alone with GOD, never realised the freeness of His
grace; that it is not tied to His sacraments and
ordinances so unchangeably, that He cannot save
without them, if He pleases to deprive us of them.
What but this kind of solitude has tried and brought
loss upon many souls ! fostered discontent and rest
lessness, and distrust of their own religion, and of
the faith of their forefathers? They have used
churches and church-rites as rests and ends, and
regarded eloquent sermons as the very pith and
marrow of their individual Christianity. They have
lived in the shadow of the Body of CHRIST, but
never dwelt in the fulness of His Substance. They
cannot become a spiritual temple to themselves,
when the Spirit driveth them into the wilderness to
be tempted of the devil.
My brethren, in any one of these ways we may
have to go into the wilderness with CHRIST against
our will one day or other. Alone we may have to
bear poverty, alone we may have to endure disease,
alone we may have to suffer bodily or mental pain,
alone we may have to die. The accustomed hand
may no more be able then to smooth our pillow ;
the wonted voice, with its soft prayers and pitiful
tones, may be silent then. The eye that soothed us
by its gentleness, and the ear that shrunk not from
our cries and frettings, may alike be incapable of
lightening our sorrows by their constancy. What
a trial to pass away alone to GOD ! to follow all our
loved ones at last and after all ! None to pray with,
or for us ; to enter the dark valley of the shadow of
death without one tender farewell behind ! Let us
XXII.] THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE. 197
prepare for such a case. It may be ours Who can
tell ? Let us go into the wilderness now, and pre
pare for the last trial. Who knoweth but all the
watching and praying of a life may be lost in the
solitude of a death- bed ? Let us accustom ourselves
to the absence of human sympathy, to the loss of
sensible alleviations, to independence of creatures.
Let us not rest too much on earthly loves and
affections, lest we be not able to bear their loss,
when we seem most to need them ; lest murmurings
and regrets take up the time that should be spent
in arraying ourselves for our last voyage. For
every reason then we should habituate ourselves to
live in retirement from the world, at least in such
seasons as the present. We can then sift and try
ourselves how far we feel the presence of GOD, how
independent we are in our conduct of human regards
and opinions. Exercise yourself in acts of faith
upon GOD S Omnipresence, and meditate with men
tal prayer upon it. Say to yourself, as you begin
your employments and duties, your reading or
speaking, " O GOD, I am in Thy presence. I be
lieve that Thou art about my path, and spiest out
all my ways."
And in order to gain a closer walk with GOD, we
should avail ourselves continually of the practice of
spiritual communion. Every day of ourselves, by an
act of faith, we can communicate, however unfortu
nate we may be in the supply of outward means
of grace, or unfit as we deem ourselves for actual
communion. We can go through the Communion-
Service by ourselves, imagine JESUS CHRIST to be
198 THE TEMPTATIONS OF SOLITUDE.
ministering His Body and Blood to His disciples,
and by faith receive Him. This is the wonderful
property of His presence, that He giveth Himself
to all who believe in Him. He is ever present to
them who have faith. He goeth into the wilder
ness with them, and is there in the pillar of fire and
of the cloud, as well as in His Church and Sacra
ments. He was as truly present in that poor upper
room in Jerusalem, as He has been since in the
most splendid churches His priests have ever blessed
and consecrated. CHRIST may be found by us in
the wilderness, when He calleth us to go after Him
thither, as well as in the city and in the Temple
wherein He caused His Name to dwell. Carry an
abiding sense of CHRIST S presence in you and with
you into the wilderness, and the Tempter must
leave you, though it be like your LORD, only for a
season. CHRIST S presence will take the place of all
earthly influences, and make you live as though every
eye was ever upon you, where human eye could not
watch you. CHRIST S presence will make up for the
absence of all human sympathies. In Him we shall
have strong consolation, Who is the only anchor
that never fails the ship of the soul, and Who alone
can say " Peace, be still," to the storms of passion.
He will be father, sister, mother, son, brother, and
daughter to all, who for Him lose all. CHRIST S
presence will make up for diminished privileges, for
closed churches, for sleeping pastors. Only go into
the wilderness with Him, and thou shalt never be
alone. " I will make the wilderness a pool of water,
and the dry land springs of water."
SERMON XXIII.
Eent
THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION.
S. MATT. IT. 1.
WAS JESUS LED TJP OF THE SPIRIT INTO THE WIL
DERNESS, TO BE TEMPTED OF THE DEYIL."
THE great defect in most religious teachings is in
sufficient regard to habits. Those systems of re
ligion, which suppose a man to become justified in
the sight of GOD by mere emotions of the mind at
a particular moment, of course cannot pay any re
gard to habits. On the contrary the Church teaches
that our faith is strengthened by habits, by con
tinued acts of righteousness and goodness. Thus
all the sacrifice we make for religion, confirms our
faith, and perfects it. And it will make all the
difference in the world whether we have a due appre
ciation of habits in the education of children or
otherwise. To give a child faith, you must make
it act. Your constraining him to obey your com
mands, will give him faith in your claims upon his
200 THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. [SEEM.
love. Your training him to self-denial and over
coming selfishness, will give him faith in that life
which is invisible. And so with yourself. Your
state is probably not an education, that is, a drawing
out and completing of an outline, but a reduction,
a return to GOD. But whatever it be, still your
ultimate success will rest upon your having culti
vated moral and religious habits. If you resist one
temptation to do evil, you will be better able to
resist the next. If you fall before the first, you will
more likely fall before the second.
Now this is imaged to us in CHRIST S Temptation.
Baptism introduced Him as us to trial. And each
of the temptations became fiercer. The devil goes
from carnal grounds to spiritual, leaves his stones
for a Bible, and at last dazzles with the whole pros
pect of his power and riches. As our LORD refused
to submit to his seductions in the beginning, so He
endured. And so we follow JESUS to His Cross,
tracing from this point the progress of His human
perfection. He Who thus resisted in the wilder
ness, will hereafter demand our adoration in Geth-
semane, and on Calvary, for His refusal to despair
of His FATHER S love, or to presume upon His
Eternal Sonship. The wilderness was but a school
for Calvary, fasting but a discipline for the Cross,
solitude for desertion by friends. And this is why
CHRIST is said to have been led up of the SPIRIT to
be tempted.
It is necessary for our moral probation that we
should be tempted. All our life is but one going
XXIII.] .THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. 201
up into the wilderness to be tempted for this end.
The very putting our tempers and passions to the
proof tends, if we endure the trial, to improve them
and correct them. Were there no temptation, the
moral powers would lie dormant, dull, and stagnant.
Use alone strengthens the soul s powers, even as it
does the body s. And thus the very care, which is
sometimes carried to an excess, in keeping young
persons out of temptation, prevents their acquiring
that moral strength which is necessary to their
individual Christianity. There must be a time when
such restraints as you put on them must have an
end, and then how unutterably helpless do they go
forth to do battle with Satan. Hence we may con
clude, that it is needful for our present condition
that there should be temptations and a tempter.
" It needs must be," says our LORD, " that offences
exist." GOD permits them so to be for the build
ing up of His people in His love and fear. The
existence of schisms strengthens our view of unity ;
the rising up of heresy confirms our reception of
truth. The company of dissolute and licentious
persons fills us with a loathing for drunkenness
and impurity. Virtue is even strengthened in the
neighbourhood of vice, if it grows at all there. And
thus it is that we find at times a holy son and
daughter succeed to the name and property of a
vicious parent. What was the Gentile Church in
the days of early Christianity, but the Body of
CHRIST tempted by the Devil ? Whether we regard
the vices of Greece and Rome, or the intolerance
02 THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. [SERM.
of idolatry, we see that evil has ever been the cru
cible out of which the gold of our religion has been
fined. And we are conscious of this ourselves.
Which of us has not felt, after being exposed to a
temptation and resisting it, that he was raised so
much above what he was before. All triumphs are
nothing to his who has successfully withstood the
Tempter. It is to temptations and difficulties that
all men owe their strength of principle in the va
rious callings of life. Where shall we look for such
strong untiring faith as in the poor cottager, who
lives by his own hands, whose employment is un
certain, whose health is necessary for existence ?
We shall hardly find it among those who live amidst
riches and pleasures. Who so likely to despair,
and make bread of stones, as they who are suddenly
reduced from affluence to misery ? Were his faith
not nourished by his tribulations, the poor man
must despair. And doubtless many do succumb to
the weight of their temptations. Hence the Apostles
said, when CHRIST spoke of the difficulty of a rich
man being saved, " LORD, who then can be saved ?"
And so most persons imagine that exemption from
temptation is a sure sign of GOD S favour. It is
not so, or all GOD S saints from the beginning
would not have been so sorely tried. GOD tempted
Abraham. It was for good, not for evil. It was
good for Abram to be called out of the idolatrous
Chaldees. His faith and obedience then proved and
tried fitted him for the still greater temptation, the
command to sacrifice his only son. And this is
XXIII.] THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. 203
true not only of those temptations which we ascribe
directly to GOD, but also of those which we speak
of as being permitted by Him. Job s temptations
were permitted by GOD. Satan was suffered to afflict
him most awfully, yet all was for good. " The
LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before."
" The LORD blessed the latter end of Job more than
his beginning." Joseph s trials, well supported, set
him on a throne beside Pharaoh. And so with our
blessed LORD, "when the devil had ended all the
temptation, he departed from Him, and, behold !
angels came and ministered unto Him."
Again, humility is not found in the lowest classes
of life in its perfection. We must go to sainted
kings and princes who have been tempted to pride
by the very circumstances of their condition, in or
der to meet with patterns of humility. It is a
common saying that no one can be pronounced to
have this or that quality till he has been tried. And
so where there is no trial undergone, we cannot be
sure of the existence of the virtue. We observe in
all who are suddenly elevated to power or influence
more pride usually than in those who have always
possessed rank or station in society. Every one
knows how difficult it is to treat inferiors with such
chanty that they shall nevertheless not presume on
our kindness. And again, how ready all persons
are to suppose themselves slighted or passed over
in proportion to the lowness of their condition. All
this shows that nothing evolves or passes off the la
tent inclination of human nature to pride so much
201 THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. [SERM.
as exposure to constant temptation to that feeling.
Or again, they who have no higher place to gain in
this world cannot be affected with a perpetual crav
ing to rise in society to know great people to
talk of connexions and distant relatives. Tempta
tion alone expels or renders formal such tendencies,
according as it is resisted or yielded to. The law of
our nature seems to be, that temptations to pride
increase upon our conditions in life being raised, for
the very purpose of keeping down the tendencies
which elevation creates. They call forth the better
part of our moral nature into conflict with the Evil
one, as he manifests his bitterness more openly. It
is as if the besieged sought to fortify the salient
points of a city, which they saw the enemy were
preparing to attack. We may similarly observe of
spiritual pride that it exists less among saints than
sinners. Self-examination, which is the accompani
ment of all saintliness, is of itself a check to pride.
None can so little presume on the grace of GOD, as
those who have received most of it ; none feel so
deeply their continual need of it none pray so de
voutly for perseverance as the gift of GOD. On the
other hand, what is such a picture of presumption
as the man who believes he is in favour with GOD,
a special favourite, who has little or no likeness to
CHRIST whose religion costs him nothing? who
but he may be said to cast himself down, and rest
on the mercy and love of GOD to His elect, and ex
pect the angels to bear him up ? This is the case
of all who trust to excited feelings, and hope to be
XXIII.] THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. 205
saved through them. They presume who expect
GOD S grace ever to wait patiently upon them, not
they who ever wait and watch for the grace of GOD.
And yet it might be expected that great attainment
in holiness would produce pride. Here again the
very temptation is met and prepared against, because
it is naturally an accident of that condition. Less
advanced Christians are not so tempted, because
there is little ground for the enemy to occupy. And
yet we find often indications of half developed pride
or presumption neglect of little pardonable sins
want of love to penitents oversight of small duties
in those who are as yet half formed Christians. If
we are to look for humility in its truest develope-
ment, we must go to the saints of the Church.
They only fear to cast themselves down, they only
fear to act presumptuously, they only fear to take
their own wilful way in opposition to the guidance
of others, and rush blindfold into danger. None are
so reckless as they who speak of their priest as a
pastor, and yet do not treat him with half the re
spect that they do their physician in regard to the
advice he gives. What is acting without the
guidance of those under whose care we are placed,
but casting ourselves down ? What should we say
of a person who called in a physician, and yet did
not follow his prescriptions ? or who employed a
lawyer, and yet ended with making his will himself?
If this be presumptuous, is it not much more so in
the case of GOD S ministers, who claim to be listened
to, not merely because they are learned or pious
206 THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. [SEEM.
men, but because they have a right to be heard in
the Name of CHRIST ? Certainly it is at least
worthy of remark that the most holy people of the
Church have ever been most afraid, I say not of
acting contrary to the advice of their clergy, but
even without their advice in any grave matter, or
questionable practice. And yet they of all men
might have acted otherwise. Yet the very height
of piety to which they had risen seems to have
warned them of the danger of presumption. They
could not stand on their pinnacle without fear.
They could not listen to the devil quoting Scripture
without fear, nor be content to do what was right in
their own eyes, because they had a text suggested to
them, which seemed to justify their proceedings.
Nor is it otherwise with the third temptation.
More often the poorer are more covetous than the
richer. More often they who are making their for
tune than they who have made it. They who be
come suddenly rich from poverty are often more en
slaved by the idolatry of gold and silver than any
who have all along possessed wealth. Ambition
predominates more in the middle ranks of life than
in the highest. What sins indeed what bowing
down before Satan have not been the issue of a
gradual ascent to riches or power ! Poverty of
spirit is oftener found among the rich or moderately
wealthy, than with men of yesterday.
Such then is the relation which the temptations
have to our spiritual state. When we say, Lead us
not into temptation, our prayer is not that we may
XXIII.] THE BENEFITS OF TEMPTATION. 207
escape all trial, but that we may not be led into
trials beyond our strength, and into temptations
of Satan. We rather pray that GOD would lead us
only into such trials as shall be for our good, and
suffer not the wrath of the devil to come upon us to
the uttermost : that He would make for us a way
that we may be able to bear them. May our temp
tations be ever proportioned to our strength, and
be for the confirmation of our habits of good.
SERMON XXIV.
Hent,
EESULTS OP TEMPTATION.
S. MATT. iv. 1.
WAS JESTJS LED TIP OF THE SPIEIT INTO THE WIL-
DEBKESS TO BE TEMPTED OP THE DEYIL."
BAPTISM, we said, has made us liable to the temp
tations of the devil. The natural man is not so
tempted, because he is more immediately under the
devil s power. The devil tempts not those who are
his subjects, as those who have been baptized. He
has no need to do so, for he need not battle with
those who lie at his feet vanquished. All men
doubtless, even in their unregenerate state, are not
alike in this respect. Even among the heathen
there are some who in their measure and degree
resist the devil. Fallen as man by nature is, he
may or may not sink into a still lower state by his
own acts and deeds. I may be prostrated by the
superior strength of an adversary, but I need not
add to my degradation by any dishonourable acts,
RESULTS OF TEMPTATION. 209
nor imitate the vices of my conqueror. He will, no
doubt, seek to enslave me thoroughly, and put me
to the vilest uses, but he cannot vitiate my integrity
and virtue unless I yield my soul and body entirely
to him. Still no doubt Satan counts all unbaptized
as his sure prey, and is not concerned to try them
as he does us by his subtle seductions. We may
represent the baptized by reversing the picture.
Satan lies at our feet ready to spring on us when
we are off our guard to take advantage of every
opportunity against us and to regain the power
over us he lost at our baptism. When we lay pros
trate there was no battle or scarcely any ; but since
GOD prostrated him, the conflict has begun. A
mighty ally has conquered our ancient enemy for
us, and left us a garrison to defend our citadel
against him as long as we choose to maintain it.
Every temptation is an assault from the enemy
below, or a bribe and subsidy against our old ally.
From the day of our baptism we have been so
tempted. We have been put on our trial. It is
what is usually called our probation. Some of us
are now half way on our time of trial others nearly
at the close of it. And soon the great temptation
or trial will come ; the last great struggle with the
powers of evil in the dying and passing away of every
one. All our life-long trials and temptations look
on to that day when the adversary shall put forth
all his wrath as knowing that he hath but a short
time. The time of tribulation and the time of
wealth all have their fruit in the hour of death.
210 RESULTS OE TEMPTATION. [SEEM.
All our discomforts, and pains, and troubles, here
tofore but fit us to pass through the bitterness of
death. Past watchings and self-denial in sleep make
us bear better the sleepless agony of our death-bed.
Past fasting and abstinence cause the discipline of
the physician to be more endurable. Past self-
examinations and confessions render the last un
rolling of the books of conscience more easy amid
the distractions of bodily pain and the anxieties of
bidding worldly cares a long farewell. All carrying
the Cross along the way of sorrows after JESUS,
helps us to hang with Him at the last on Calvary.
And once again, we and the tempter shall meet.
Amid the voice of the Archangel and the trump of
GOD, the din and stir of myriad souls, the vast host
of the Resurrection, the companies of angels, the
LAMB upon the throne, we and he shall meet again.
He who so often tempted us to sin will be our chief
accuser. He will testify to our despair or our pre
sumption our fasting or our drunkenness our
worldliness, to which he led us on. How unspeak
ably awful that trial ! How much it concerns us
to know the effect and issue of all our past and pre
sent temptations ! How we have hitherto endured
our trials may serve as a sample of our endurance
in that solemn day, when the Son of Man shall all
things sift and try.
Hence it is obvious that we consider what has
been the effect of past temptations upon us. As
we have yielded or not in health, so will it most
likely be in our old age and death. We have either
XXIV.] RESULTS OF TEMPTATION". 211
encouraged a habit of peace or war. We have been
fighting in mortal combat, or we have been sleeping
at our posts, and the enemy has surprised our cit
adel. And our souls are disciplined and trained to
match the foe, or they are as raw recruits. We
have acquired a habit of resistance to temptation or
a habit of yielding. Which is your case ? What
has been in the main the distinguishing feature of
your life ? Have we stood the test of Satan s at
tacks, or have we fallen ? Put aside all other books
and studies and fix your minds on the volumes of
your conscience. They are the charts and maps of
your journey homewards. All other study for the
most part leads away from the great books which
shall be opened in the day of man s final trial.
Once, I would say to some one, you were a child,
pure and spotless compared to what you are now.
Can you remember it ? Yes ; you can : you can
recollect the first whisper of the tempter ; you can
recall how he first suggested to you disobedience to
your parent. It was a mere trifle a thing easily
done or forborne. The very easiness of the thing
deceived you to neglect the command. Then fol
lowed falsehood to conceal your misdoing ; or even
casting the blame on another. You acted over
again not the temptation of CHRIST, but that of
Adam and his fall. All our present, cold, dead,
lifeless, irreligious state may be owing to that first
temptation and that first fall. It would have made
all the difference to us now. It affects us indi
vidually as seriously as Adam s fall affects the hu-
p2
212 RESULTS OP TEMPTATION. [SEHM.
man race generally. Adam indeed, we may believe,
repented, and in the mystery of the Incarnation was
saved ; but how many souls through him have been
lost for ever. Our first fall may have been forgiven,
but still we may carry its scars to our graves. How
many persons have an unreality about them a sort
of insincerity a want of childlike freedom. We
do not know how far they mean what they say. We
must filter their assurances of friendship and love
from the dross of unmeaning conventionalism, ere
we can venture to put a value on their words. We
cannot say that they are devoid of truthfulness, but
we feel that all is not as it should be. It is the
king s coin indeed, but it is sadly dimmed and rusted
ere it comes to our hand. And this is more or less
the case according to the way in which they met
their childish temptations to falsehood. One fall
prepares for another. The feeble knee is more
likely to fall again, and cannot stand as though it
had never fallen. Gradually the tongue assumes
its disguised form and wraps around itself uncon
sciously the habits of deceit. Men get to speak
untruly without any definite purpose of doing so.
Truth has ceased to be natural to them. And this
is little compared to times when we felt more dis
tinctly put on our trial. We cannot forget that
some foolish conduct of our own has once placed
us in a dilemma, to speak truly or not to expose
our folly or to hide it. How terrible it is when the
first childlike sorrow for falsehood has dried up for
ever.
XXIV.] EESULTS OF TEMPTATION. 213
And the same may be said of temptations to
anger. We can vividly recall our first great burst
of passion displayed towards brethren or depen
dents. We can recall the blow or the word inju
rious, which then made so deep an impression on
our consciences. Since then how many friendships
have we broken up ! how many attachments have
we marred and blighted ! Nay, how withered and
seared is the foliage of our spring-tide home ! A
quick and hasty word has severed us for ever from
the sisters of our youth, the playmates of our boy
hood, and the brethren of our manhood. The
weeds have sprung up and taken up their abode,
where the dew of baptism had watered the soil. We
are now 7 mastered by the very habit of anger, which
parents perhaps thought little of while it was in the
bud.
Or again, our temptation has been to positive un-
holiness. We can remember our first acquaintance
with or use of words the Christian ought not even to
dwell upon. Alas ! unto what does this often grow ?
If not to acts of unrighteousness, how many consent
to impure thoughts and desires ! Few men there
are, at any rate, who have not a painful remem
brance of their first knowledge of wickedness ; still
fewer who do not recall with shame how they were
tempted, and how they fell. Others can say, " I re
member my first desire for worldly honours and
distinction, how it grew till I sacrificed all to them,
my time, my prayers, my thoughts, and actions.
All were directed to that end, and not to the glory
214 RESULTS OF TEMPTATION. [SEEM.
of GOD. I can recall the first time that it and my
duty to GOD or man were at variance, and how I
yielded to the temptation." Another comes and
accuses himself. " I think with shame on that day
when I first was tempted to covetousness, and fell
into sin through desire of money." Another recalls
his first sense of pride, to which he gave way in the
ill-treatment of an inferior, or in irreverence to a
superior. And be our past temptations what they
may, our falls what they may, we are, except we
then formally repented of them, now under the in
fluence of them, and shall be so in the hour of death,
and in the day of judgment.
Yet it is not too late even now for those who
hear with their ears and understand with their
hearts to regain the stronghold from which the
Tempter forced them. It, perhaps, was not in our
power at the time to repent, and do acts of satis
faction for our falls. We were not so advised by
those over us then ; or we were not so solemnly
warned as we might be now in similar cases, to turn
at once to Him Who is the SAVIOUR and strength
of penitents. Even now by the efficacy of the Temp
tation we may be upholden. CHRIST was tempted
and overcame, that through Him we might triumph
over the wiles and assaults of Satan. All our pre
sent trials in our religious life are due to past falls.
We may be sure that the virtue of CHRIST S victory
extends to the verge of the grave. Why have we
not long ago been crushed and slain by the fierce
ness of the rage of Satan ? We have sinned far
XXIV.] RESULTS OF TEMPTATION. 215
more and worse than Adam, yet still we abide in
the earthly paradise, the Church of GOD, watered
by rivers of grace around her, and having the tree
of life in the midst of the garden. Adam was
tempted, and fell, and was exiled from GOD. He
but once and for ever, from Paradise. We have
been oft tempted and have often fallen, yet through
Him, Who dwelleth in us, except we be reprobates,
we may be restored to the love of GOD. Herein is
the marvellous power of CHRIST S life on earth.
His Temptation and victory is ever working in us,
by virtue of His having become man. Satan cometh
and layeth us low in the dust, but through peni
tence we are lifted up by his mighty Enemy once
again to do battle, and repair our loss.
It seems strange to us, when we think of our past
falls, that we could ever rise again ; or if risen again
stand another temptation. Yet acts of penitence
strengthen the will. The muscles of the body are
strengthened by exercise. So too the weak parts of
the soul by their use become more able to resist
Satan. Are you prone to disobedience ? Exercise
yourself in obedience ; obey in things not only ne
cessary, but indifferent. Are you prone to anger ?
check even, what in others might be pardonable,
but in yourself dangerous, indignation. Are you
fond of food, clothing, exterior appearance ? check
and restrain all these. Or you have yielded your
tongue to the Evil One ? now then practise silence,
and so resist him. Such are the ways in which
CHRIST S Temptation may yet lighten the burden of
216 EESULTS OF TEMPTATION.
our trials. And though the effect of your old falls
may be felt in the inclination you have to do as of
old, yet so long as your will consents not, or your
heart delights not in the blandishments of Satan,
despair not of final victory. And thus to us who
have sinned each trial, wherewith Satan has leave
to sift us, is a means of penitence. Not only our
pain and sorrow, sickness and disease,, poverty and
loss, are trials whereby we are purified, but also our
temptations to sin. Each time we are tempted,
arid we overcome, we gain fresh strength for the
future. As each fall weakens our moral powers,
so each resistance invigorates and refreshes them.
Wherein we know ourselves to have fallen, therein
let us prepare to resist unto death. CHRIST within,
and angels without us, who would be a coward or a
traitor in the battle for eternity ? " Remember,
then, from whence thou art fallen, and do the first
works," the works becoming the new creation in
CHRIST JESUS.
SERMON XXV.
Hettt
CHEIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE OE OUES.
S. MATT. TV. 1.
" THEN WAS JESUS LED TIP or THE SPIEIT INTO THE WIL-
DEBKESS TO BE TEMPTED OF THE DEVIL."
IT is a very awful picture that we present to our
minds at this season the SON of GOD personally
contending with the devil the Creator with one of
His own fallen creatures. We see the spectacle of
the mightiest of GOD S creation striving to tempt
GOD to sin. It is an Angel, one who should have
been a faithful messenger, that has become Satan or
an adversary. We gaze on the conflict as being
ourselves of a lower order of beings, and stand
amazed that even the highest rank of GOD S ser
vants should so act against his Master, as to tempt
perfect self-denial to covetousness, perfect humility
to pride, perfect patience to murmuring and dis-
218 CHRIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE or OTJKS. [SEBM.
content. It is the warfare of Goodness in its own
essence with Evil in its uncontrolled, unmitigated
form. It is what we never see in this world so
openly developed. Evil is never brought so nigh
us ; Satan attacks us by his instruments, sinful
men and women. Yet they are not simple and essen
tial Evil. Sin in its foulest shape will never be seen
in man except in hell. But in Satan it is ever full
and clear : Evil in its very sum and substance. We
shudder as we draw near those whom Satan has
possessed through drunkenness or impurity of the
foulest sort, but this is nothing to the Tempter s per
sonal approach to CHRIST. It is as different as the
scene before Pilate and Caiaphas. These wicked men
ill-use CHRIST. Here the devil himself abuses Him.
There His sacred body is wounded, here His soul is
pierced. Indignities offered to the body are little
compared to calumnies and degradations of the
mind. It is a less evil to have the body maltreated
than the soul polluted. And we do not feel the
same loathing for one who persecutes our bodies
that we do for one who labours to prostrate our
souls. Thus this is called distinctively the Temp
tation of CHRIST.
All His life here CHRIST was tempted, but in the
wilderness only did He stand face to face with Sa
tan, and hold parley with him. Only in the wilder
ness was His soul assailed, and Its purity attempted
by the whole might of the fallen Angel. Again,
ever since the fall of Adam the devil had met with
triumphs over humanity. In all the saints he found
xxv.] CUEIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE OF OUES. 219
something. He stood with CHRIST in the full pride
of conscious victory, counting Him as a sure prey.
None of us are in such a position. Ever since
CHRIST overcame in the wilderness Satan s power of
temptation has been checked and restrained. In
a certain sense even now he is bound. This is
peculiarly illustrated by the absence, at least in
all Christian countries, of demoniacal possessions.
There is a charm, a fascination about Christians
that keeps off the roaring lion from utterly destroy
ing, except they cast it from them. In every
faithful Christian there is a mark and a seal set,
which cows and awes the adversary with the me
morial of that signal defeat in the wilderness. Yet
though in general Satan tempts us indirectly through
others, there are times when we seem to realize
something like a personal conflict with him. And
that is, as it was with CHRIST in the wilderness, in
the hour of solitude. It is very awful to be atone
with Satan. It is not a man then who persuades us
to sin, but a superior being, of naturally greater in
telligence, invisible and therefore more formidable,
experienced in human weaknesses and follies for
near six thousand years, a perfect master of the
art of deception and falsehood. We sometimes
see wicked men, whose cleverness in wickedness
even excites our admiration. Much more acute
and wondrous is the versatile wickedness of him
who is emphatically the Wicked One. Satan s
skill is most shown in the readiness with which he
shifts his temptations. His generalship demands
220 CHEIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE or OUES. [SEEM.
our wonder in the way his regiments perform rapid
evolutions. We never know where he is, till he is
on us. No sooner is he baffled in one point of at
tack than we hear a sound of alarm in another. All
things become arrows in his quiver. Fasting, we
have said, is a door opened to his onset. And thus
it is a type of all religious acts. The devil takes
our repentance, and urges us to despair of mercy
suggests that GOD will never forgive, and that we
may as well live on in sin. He makes our con
fessions of past sins occasions of dwelling upon
them with pleasure and acting them over again in
our minds. Our forgiveness of each other in his
hands often becomes only a raking up again of dead
embers of wrath. Our prayers are turned into
mockery of GOD and a profanation of His presence,
as he leads us off from saying them with intention
and recollection. If we do any good and kind ac
tion, he it is who would filch away the merit of it,
by puffing us up with pride on account of it. Sick
ness he turns to his account weakness of body or
mind by suggesting hard thoughts of GOD, fretful-
ness and repinings. Health, he tells us, is to be
enjoyed, while it lasts, there is plenty of time yet for
sober and religious thoughts before we die. When
flying from despair we dwell in the midst of our
penitence upon our sonship to GOD, as a ground
that He will not forsake us, the devil urges us to
trust to our sonship as a sure title to forgiveness,
whatever we do. GOD, says he, will never cast
away His children utterly. When we humble our-
xxv.] CHRIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE OF OURS. 221
selves, he tempts to despondency ; when we turn
away despair by thoughts of GOD S mercy, he tempts
to self-complacency. We are never safe. At one
time he says, If thou art a child of GOD, if He loves
thee, how is it thou art so sorely distressed ? At
another time, if thou art a child of GOD, why
needest thou walk so warily ? why such caution ?
why dost thou fear to do thy lust ? Even at the
Holy Sacrament he says to us, " GOD loveth thee
not, why comest thou so often hither ? Thou
wouldest have more sensible pleasure in this com
munion, if thou wert His. Thou art but a stranger
and hast no part in the children s feast, or thou
wouldest feel thyself more at home here." What
is so common an argument against frequent receiv
ing of the Eucharist, or indeed against all commu
nicating, as the plea of unworthiness ? What then
is this but a determination to make bread of stones
for ourselves ? We will despair of GOD S grace, and
then devise some other way of supplying the necessi
ties of the soul than the Sacrament CHRIST appointed
to nourish it. Eloquent sermons, excited feelings,
these are the stones which the devil offers instead
of that Bread which cometh down from heaven, of
which if any man eat, he shall not die, but live for
ever. Nor only so, men on the other hand are
tempted to the Altar simply because they were once
children. " Why so much careful preparation, so
much self-examination, so much confession ?" asks
the tempter. You are the child of GOD, go and
take your portion of goods that falleth to thee.
222 CHRIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE OF OUKS. [SEEM.
What with despair and presumption the Altar is
often forsaken. For some say, " I dare not come
often to the Holy Communion, because of my sins,
my daily falls and oversights ;" others, " I do not
think there is any use in going so often to the
Altar." They have a way of their own the way
that seemeth right in their own eyes, the downward
path from heaven the Tempter long since himself
has trod. Satan sometimes produces a morbid
state of conscience in men, tries to make that ap
pear a deadly sin, which is only the natural effect of
that remains of fallen humanity which even in the
baptized is felt and pains. Persons in such state
refrain unduly from enjoying their Christian privi
leges. In others, Satan inspires a reckless feeling,
a wilful indulgence in small trifling sins, either in
things done or left undone. But it is very awful to
treat anything from which the conscience warns us
lightly or carelessly. Are there not many, who say
to themselves of little causes of temptation, " I may
yield, and yet it will go no worse with me for all
that. In this I will cast myself down and the an
gels will bear me up. I may without danger give
free licence to my tongue. I may without danger
slight the advice of parents or pastors in so trifling
a thing, as it seems to me."
Alas ! to think that all CHRIST S Temptation
should for many of us have been endured in vain,
that we should yield the battle He so nobly won for
us and in us !
Lastly, Satan gains his way over those who
xxv.] CHRIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE OF OTJRS. 223
are neither desponding nor presumptuous by offer
ing gifts, "All these things will I give thee."
How few are there, that cannot be won by some
thing in this world ! One cannot be tempted by
riches, but he is by power. One cannot be seduced
by power, but he is by ease and luxury. Another
cannot be persuaded by ease, but he falls before the
shrine of beauty. And so men who are very self-
denying in some things are extravagantly selfish in
others. And our very self-denial in one great mat
ter is set before us by the Evil One as a reason why
we need not deny ourselves in another. There is in
our minds a continual appraising and valuing the
devil s wares, for he comes to us now in his mer
chant dress, as he came as a grave divine with his
texts of Scripture before. It is now a question
whether we will have these things which we see, or
those things which we see not. All things in life in
the devil s hands become temptations to us. How
watchful should we be as we enjoy the good gifts of
GOD, lest the devil lead us to pervert the use of any.
Wine maketh by GOD S appointment the heart of
man glad, yet in the devil s hands, it stingeth at the
last as an adder. Bread strengthens man s heart,
and yet many have fallen through fulness thereof.
One only way there is to baffle Satan, and that is to
daily take up our Cross and despise all else, daily
to look to the invisible rewards of heavenly bliss,
daily to look on to the inheritance of the saints.
We must learn to set the true value on the mer
chandize of Satan, as he parades them skilfully be-
224 CUEIST S TEMPTATION AN IMAGE or OTJKS.
fore us ; we must say of all earthly joys that they are
shadows, ere we can fear to part with the substance
for them.
Terrible as is the thought that Satan is ever
tempting us, it is more terrible to think that one
day, except we resist him as a tempter, we shall meet
him as an accuser. In the great day of wrath, he
will number up all his successful attacks and our
falls. As we would stand against him with open
brow and unflinching eye, so let us stand now. All
trial, all conflict now, is better than that bar of
judgment, wherein Satan turns king s evidence and
approver, and our Judge was our SAVIOUR. A little
longer and this scene must shift the dry and bar
ren ground wherein no water is for the paradise of
GOD. A little longer and the angels shall come and
tread down Satan under our feet, and bear us up in
their arms unto Abraham s bosom, there to rest
until the morning of the Resurrection.
SERMON XXVI.
Eent
THE TEIALS OF FASTING.
S. MATT. iv. 2, 3.
" AND WHEN HE HAD FASTED FOETT DATS AND FORTY
NIGHTS, HE WAS AFTEEWAEDS AN HUNGEED. AND WHEN
THE TEMPTEE CAME TO HlM, HE SAID, IF THOU BE THE
SON OF GrOD, COMMAND THAT THESE STONES BE MADE
BEEAD."
THESE words describe the natural effect of fasting
upon the human mind. As it was with the GOD-
Man, JESUS CHRIST, even so is it with us. The
other Gospels represent our SAVIOUR as being
tempted of the devil during the whole forty days of
Lent. What was the nature of the former tempta
tions we know not. We can only judge by what is
revealed what may have been the fierceness of the
assaults of Satan before. It was at the end of the
forty days fast that CHRIST was an hungred and the
devil tempted Him to satisfy His hunger by work-
226 THE TRIALS OF TASTING. [SERM.
ing a miracle. Only when He began to be hungry
did the devil s attempts become so perilous as to be
counted worthy of being delivered to us. And thus
we are assured of the reality of His Manhood. As
GOD, He fasted forty days ; as Man He was hungry,
and through hunger tempted. This puts before us
plainly what is required of us. For it is His true
Manhood that calls upon us to fast with Him. If
we regard our LORD as simply GOD, we may indeed
content ourselves with sitting down, as before a
beautiful picture, admiring the wondrous powers of
abstinence of GOD. If we regard our SAVIOUR truly
as Man we shall not be satisfied, except we in our
measure and degree imitate Him. Each time that
we abstain and are hungry we shall but represent in
ourselves Him, in Whom we fight and hope to
triumph. Every one of us now fasting in any de
gree is in effect JESUS CHRIST in the wilderness.
This is the deep mystery of the Incarnation, whereby
CHRIST is ever tabernacling in the flesh. He dwells
in us according as we conform ourselves to His like
ness ; to the likeness of His humiliation ; to the
likeness of His sufferings ; to the likeness of His
death. And all who deny this and take refuge in
the soul-destroying doctrine that we need not take
CHRIST as our pattern, or that we shall not be judged
according to the degree in which we have copied
that pattern, recal to our minds that denunciation
of S. John, " Every spirit that confesseth not that
JESUS CHRIST is come in the flesh is not of GOD ;
and this is that spirit of anti-Christ, whereof ye have
XXVI.] THE TEIALS OF PASTING. 227
heard that it should come, and even now already is
it in the world."
For to what end do we believe that JESUS CHRIST
is come in the flesh ? Not simply that He might
die for us. This could have no effect on our moral
nature. CHRIST S death indeed is an atonement for
the sins of the world, but not for the wicked, who
refuse to repent and become holy. CHRIST then
has come in the flesh that we might through Him
become holy. Again, why is so much stress laid
upon the coming of the Son of Man to judgment ?
More naturally on other accounts we should have
dwelt on His divinity than on His humanity in look
ing on to the day of wrath. Yet fitly does He come
in His manhood, if He is the model Man the
standard by which all human virtue is to be weighed
and measured. And as He truly hungered, and in
His hunger was truly tempted, so, we may be sure,
our abstinence will be the season of our trial.
When Adam was commanded to fast from the fruit
of the forbidden tree, the devil came to him. When
we propose a rule of abstinence to ourselves for a
day or term of days, the devil in like manner comes
to us. The very law we lay upon ourselves excites
the natural disobedience. It matters not often how
trifling our acts of self-denial may be ; if practised
by a fixed rule, it will be the object of the evil one
to put us off from them. If our fasting be of a
slight kind, he will suggest, " what good will such a
trivial act do you ?" Or if our fasting be rigorous
and severe, he will propose the bodily danger in-
228 THE TRIALS OF TASTING. [SERM.
curred thereby, as well as the folly of hoping to
become spiritual by mortifying the body. If our
tempers become more irritable, we shall be tempted
to give up abstinence for fear of its leading us into
sins of anger. It is a common complaint with all
who observe the rules of the Church on this head,
that they find themselves tempted to impatience,
fretfulness, and discontent. Yet this is the case
with all duties in life ; they cannot be fulfilled with
out some sacrifice of self, some mortification of ease,
some foregoing of self-indulgence. The same temp
tation to unchristian feelings in the discharge of
duties domestic or social in proportion to their irk-
someness or inconvenience awaits us.
Fasting with its attendant temptations is only a
type of all self-denying duties. He who declines
the one will in time decline the others whenever he
can. "Fasting from food," says the objector, "is
such a trifle for a spiritual Christian to attend to."
Be it so ; then be thankful that you are only called
on to attend to such a trifle in order to discipline
yourself for greater points of obedience. Adam was
tried by a trifling test of obedience, and yet he
failed. Can you be sure that you will stand a trial
in trifles ? Of what is the habitual sin of most per
sons made up ? Is it not of little acts of disobe
dience ? Little grains of sand have been driven by
the breeze and accumulated against the fortress of
the soul, till it falls a ruin beneath the weight of
earth. We may fairly presume that little acts of
obedience are equally necessary to preserve the per-
XXVI.] THE TRIALS OF PASTING. 229
severance of saints, and aid the return of the sinner
to GOD. Fasting is the first place in the school of
the Cross. The delights of appetite are the first
which fallen humanity displays in the helplessness
of infancy the last it retains in the second childish
ness of age. Deny yourself meats and drinks, and
you will receive strength to deny yourself in greater
matters. Refuse to deny yourself the pleasant
ness of food, and you will refuse to deny yourself
greater things. Resist the tempter when in hun
ger for CHRIST, and with CHRIST he bids you make
bread of stones, escape from your self-denial by
unauthorized ways, by shallow pretences and by
hypocritical excuses, and you shall overcome at
the last.
They who have been with CHRIST in His Temp
tation and Fasting in the Wilderness, will not shrink
from His Agony and Bloody Sweat, His Cross and
Passion. If we cannot stand the trials incident
upon taking less nourishment, how little fit are we
for harder trials in other duties. It is so with alms
giving and deeds of charity. It is a great trial for
a charitably-disposed person, to find that the object
of his benevolence has made an ill use of his gifts.
Nothing is scarcely more provoking, than to find
out the unworthiness of some favourite pensioner ;
nothing so likely to disgust us with any charitable
habit. So again, when we are drawn off to wan
dering thoughts in prayer, or are cold and dead, and
experience no sensible delight in devotion. So true
it is that we can do nothing high or holy without
230 THE TRIALS OF TASTING. [SEEM.
subjecting ourselves to temptations, which we should
otherwise have been spared.
Temptations await us here on all sides. We
change only their nature and form by changing our
post in the Christian army. Each step in self-
denial only varies the trial. As in the lowest degree
of fasting, so in the higher efforts of Christian life.
Our LORD S temptation was more fearful, amounting
to a real personal encounter with Satan, because
His fasting was of the highest order. And so the
saints have ever experienced that the greater their
following after JESUS, the greater was their perse
cution by the Devil. Hence it is most necessary
to proportion our self-denial to our strength, and
not to go beyond it in any spirit of enthusiasm.
"Nature, indeed," it has been well said, "does
with few comforts grace with less." But then
grace must have time to grow and increase. The
grace of perfection is not infused all at once ; nor are
all called to the same amount of self-sacrifice. It is
a great thing to see that we are duly called to any
great act of self-denial. JESUS CHRIST was led up
of the SPIRIT to His. We too must follow the
same blessed Guide. Manifold things in life be
come the channels of that voice. Blighted hopes,
withered affections, and above all past misdeeds im
pel us gradually into the wilderness with CHRIST.
The sun of this world, as it sets, calls us to cling
to the True Sun That never declines nor disappears.
And then when we have gone forth with CHRIST
into the wilderness, can we expect fewer or lighter
XXYI.] THE TRIALS OF TASTING. 231
temptations ? or must we not expect that our very
nearness to Him brings us still nearer to Satan?
So true is it that we cannot come nigh to GOD, but
His enemy and ours draws nearer to us. It was so
with Peter and Judas ; it must be so with us. Only
let us draw near with CHRIST. Let us not lose
sight of Him amidst all our weariness and painful-
ness. Let us not be alone with the Devil when he
comes unto us. Discontent and murmuring must
vanish as we gaze upon the meek suffering LAMB
of GOD, driven into the wilderness to be tempted of
the Devil.
Further, supposing that we do not intend to de
vote ourselves to any very strict religious life, yet
who, that thinks of the many reverses of fortune
which betide all mortal men, would not provide
against the trial of poverty by leading a life of self-
denial now ? Or who would not be prepared for
the trials of ill-health, by disciplining himself to
despise those luxuries which may be forbidden him ?
We cannot tell how much service self-denying
habits will render us some day or other, or how
much lighter they may make that Cross which we
shall have one day laid upon us, the rod of GOD,
whereby He chastens His people. We have only
to visit some poor distressed family, to comprehend
this. How sorely tempted are such often to make
stones into bread to steal, to cheat, to get into
debt ! How much to murmur and repine, to utter
hard words against GOD, or against rich neighbours !
Satan then finds them fasting, and moves them to
232 THE TEIALS OF FASTING. [SEBM.
despair ; while he suggests every unlawful means he
can, by which they may escape from the state of
life in which GOD has placed them. We may be in
such a case, or near it, we know not how soon.
How shall we stand such a temptation, if we do not
of our own will try to make ourselves more indepen
dent of creatures or external goods ?
This is still more true of sinners. They are often
tempted to make bread of stones. GOD has afflicted
them as He did the Israelites for their good. He
has called to them by His SON to go into the wil
derness through the Red Sea of the baptism of tears.
He has humbled them, and suffered them to hun
ger. But they oft refuse His manna, the food of
the Holy Sacrament ; and prefer quails, the good
things of this life ; or they choose rather the quails
of human tradition to the manna of the Word of
Life. They turn from the quadragesimal fast to the
flesh-pots of Egypt, to the cucumbers, and the
melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the gar-
lick ; their soul loatheth the light bread, wherewith
GOD appoints them to be fed.
It is hard to return to GOD in that very thing
wherein we have sinned. Yet if it be necessary for
the righteous, far more is it so for the sinner. If
self-denial be requisite to avoid sin, it is still more
so to put it away. And as the righteous are tempted
to seek easier and smoother ways of walking in the
narrow way of life, so sinners are tempted to try for
smoother roads whereby to return to the way of
life they had forsaken. Let us despise nothing
XXVI.] THE TEIALS OP FASTING.
whereby we may retrace our steps heavenward.
Let us rather choose hard ways and stern dealing
with ourselves. Satan may meet us there ; yet it
matters not, for CHRIST is there also Who en
dured the Cross, despising the shame, and is set
down at the right hand of the throne of GOD.
SERMON XXVII.
iUttt
OTJE EEAL LIFE ETEKNITY.
PSALM xxxix. 4. (BIBLE VERSION.)
"LORD, MAKE ME TO KNOW MINE END, AND THE MEASTJBE
OF MT DATS, WHAT IT IS ; THAT I MAT KNOW HOW FRAIL
I AM."
IT is when the day becomes dark and gloomy with
impending storms, or when the feet grow sore after
long and painful travel, or when the shades of even
ing close around, that the weary traveller bethinks
him of the rest in store for him and compares with
it his present toil. We are such travellers at all
times, and specially now towards eternity. The very
penitence to which Lent calls us with dull heavy
sound, makes this voyage of ours more grievous and
wearisome. We have been strangers and sojourners
all our life long ; absent from home, without settled
place of abiding. For long we keep our mouths
with bridles ; we speak nothing, and at the last the
fire kindles and we utter our voice, " LORD, let me
CUE EEAL LIFE ETEENITY. 235
know mine end, and the number of my days, what
it is, that I may know how frail I am."
Eternity is our end known indeed and appre
hended by few. As time departs, eternity advances,
terrible eternity. All that interests our thoughts
and affects our feelings seems but a speck upon that
pathless sea. And human nature is conscious of
this. What in the past we coveted and loved is
trodden under foot by the busy crowd pressing on,
ever onward to the future. It is the eternal future
that ever racks the brains of the merchant and the
politician, the young and the old, the virgin and the
parent, the scholar and the philosopher. Death is
but a check to one view of the future. It lifts the
veil of the whole mighty ocean, upon a small part
of which we have launched our barks. We do not
dwell upon death, because we are immortal. It begins
only a change of life, a new life. It does not extin
guish all energies. We seem by our very careless
ness in regard to death to have assumed that it is but
an accident, not the essential element of our being.
That very forgetfulness of our mortality whereby
proverbially mankind live as though they were to
live for ever in this world is an anticipation of
eternity. We may mistake or misapply this instinct
of our nature by limiting it to this day of our ex
istence, but we cannot deny its influence upon our
minds. We have within us seeds of immortality
and eternity ; though the thorns spring up arid choke
them continually, yet even from their very decay is
breathed undying fragrance. We rest not on yes-
236 OTJE EEAL LIFE ETEKNITY. [SERM.
terday and to-day, it is the everlasting to-morrow
that absorbs the cares and energies of humanity.
And as within, so without us too are the pro
phecies of eternity. This very Time, which with
hourglass and scythe seems to measure out life, is
but a fiction and a dream. Hours, and days, and
minutes have no existence, except for certain events
connected with them in the minds of living men.
Try to recollect each hour of to-day since you awoke
to consciousness, and where are they ? What is
past becomes present by an act of the mind. Even
in this state of being we know that day and night
are relative, because what we call day other fellow-
inhabitants of this globe count night. We measure
time as it passes by perceiving it, but when it is
past, we cannot, because it exists not. We know
too that any anxiety of the mind makes minutes
seem hours and hours days. What to one man
seems to drag so heavily and drearily, to another
flies with inexpressible rapidity. Time then is but
an invention of the mind, impressed upon it by cer
tain external occurrences. It has no real and sub
stantial measure. Therefore we say, " LORD, let me
know mine end, and the number of my days, what
it is." These days which follow on so quickly and
escape from us so that we retain scarce any mental
hold on them, are not. We cannot say at the pre
sent moment which continues not, that it is, nor of
the past which is gone. And the future, which we
regard as no less transitory, that too is not. Eter
nity alone is. One only is there Whose days are
XXVII.] OTJR REAL LIFE ETERNITY.
I AM THAT I AM. With Him the thousand years
are hut as one day. Therefore said He to the Co-
eternal SON, "This day have I begotten Thee."
And so they who without any respect for revela
tion have fathomed the depths of this our earth,
tell us that they see proofs of its having been long
before Time was that is, before man was. We
ourselves, generation after generation, do fade as a
leaf, and mingle with the dust, but the changes of
seasons are what they were of old. Seed time and
harvest, summer and winter, are still the same.
The planets wander in their courses as our fore
fathers observed them. The sun is still as he was
when he obeyed the bidding of Joshua, and the
moon still shines on the valley of Ajalon. Our
fathers are resting side by side in the green and still
church-yard, but the spire, that has stood so many
centuries pointing up to heaven, ceases not to preach
to us a lesson of eternity. The everlasting hills
with their cloud-capt summits, the foaming river
rushing onward to the sea, the ruined castle with
its massive impregnable walls, the sea flowing on to
embrace its many tributaries ; all these seem proof
against what we call Time. Many eyes have gazed
on them from century to century, that now have
lost their lustre, but these are unchanged. The old
man comes back to his native village ; the houses
are where he remembered them in his boyhood, but
they have other tenants. And so it is with our
selves ; this world will go on, as it does now em
blematizing eternity, when we are away, the solemn
238 OTJE EEAL LIFE ETERNITY. [SEEM.
chant and the response will still ascend to heaven.
The flowers indeed wither and die and image our
mortality, but the evergreens watch beside them to
tell of eternity. As we stand upon the shores of
lona, or on the plains of Marathon or Cannee, the
scene becomes peopled with the actors in those
events which we connect with them. Silent as the
grave is Pompeii, or Thebes, or Nineveh, but they
exist as though of yesterday, links of the great
chain of eternity. I too, myself, by a mere effort
of the mind make the days of childhood as though
present and passing before my eyes. Time indeed
is a deceit and an illusion. My life is the beginning
of my eternity.
Eternity indeed has no beginning, yet to us it be
gins at our birth. We were born not for Time, but
for eternity. Eternity is the end of our being.
This is the number of our days, which is and pos
sesses real existence. All other life is but a shadow
and day-dream. This is the life we pray to know
to have the veil drawn aside which hides it from
the men of this world. Death only shifts the scene
from the days which are not to the day which is,
the never-ending day of GOD. Its length and the
number of its hours passeth knowledge. We can
approximate to the number of our days which is not.
We can at least limit it to a hundred, ninety, eighty,
seventy, or sixty years. Or the fast failing sick
man has been known to have forecasted the hour of
his departure. This is not then the number we
would know. We would mount our Pisgah and
XXVII. j OUR REAL LIFE ETERNITY. 239
calculate the length of that day, which knows no
sunrising, nor sunsetting. LORD, let us know it
or if not what it is, what it is not. Begin to count
a million of years. Consider that mankind s his
tory in the Scriptures scarcely carries us back six
thousand years ; yet ten hundred thousand years
shall pass away, but still eternity will have only be
gun. Another ten hundred thousand pass away,
yet eternity still only commences. Or again, im
agine yourself removing one of our lofty mountains
with hand-labour to any distance, yet though you
should live to complete your task, it would be but
as the beginning of everlasting toil. Accustom your
mind to such comparisons as these. By reckoning
what is not eternity, you will better conceive what
it is. But I have said your birth began eternity to
you. I should rather have said your new birth.
By it ye are for ye are in CHRIST, the Eternal I
AM. By your new birth the days which are not
vanish, and the days which are are given you. Ye
are parts of Eternity for weal or woe for joy or
misery. Ye belong to Him, Who, though to man s
eye not yet fifty years old, yet said of Himself,
" before Abraham was, I am." Ye have commu
nion with all saints and angels, with Enoch and
Abraham, with Moses and Elijah, with S. John and
S. Mary. The seed of Eternity has been implanted
in that dying, wasting, perishing body of thine, that
thou mayest no longer be content to live days that
are not, but mayest live the days that are. Thou
hast begun Eternity. All thy prayers, praises, con-
240 OUR SEAL LIFE ETERNITY. [SEEM.
fessions, aspirations heavenwards are the instinctive
pressings onward to a day that is, a turning away
from these days that are not. " LORD, let me know
mine end and the number of my days, which is."
Let me turn from the span-long days to the endless
day. When I was born I began life, when I was
re-born, I came to the endless end, eternity. LORD,
make me to know it. Take away the veil that hides
me from myself, that hinders my view of my real
estate, that confines my thoughts and desires to the
days that are not. And that too, " that I may
know how frail I am." I, who am eternal, who
have been united to the eternal CHRIST, am so frail
that I have mistaken my true home, have forgotten
my family, have lost sight of my brethren amidst
my sad pilgrimage. Mine eyes are so weak that the
bright sun of the eternal city has dazzled them, so
that I have been groping along the ground. My
limbs are so feeble that they shrink from ascending
the steep path that leads to the everlasting Jerusa
lem, the Jerusalem, which is. My ears so dull and
heavy that they hear not the sounds of Angel voices
calling us away from cares and sorrows, pleasures and
sins to the work of eternity, adoration to the King
of Saints. Surely I have been frail, I am frail, who
thus continually need to be reminded of Eternity.
Ye are frail surely who catch at the shadows of this
life, forgetting the substance. Ye are frail surely
who reckon days, and months, and years as passing
between CHRIST S Advent to you, when He has
come already to you, and is upbearing you with His
XXVII.] OUR REAL LIFE ETERNITY. 241
everlasting arms. Ye are frail surely, who live as
though children of days which are not, when ye
possess within yourselves the elements of everlasting
day. Pray ye then earnestly that ye may know and
grasp this truth, that ye are already launched forth
on the sea of eternity. Those headlands at which
ye oft long to touch, are but phantoms in the mists
of this visionary existence. As your bark presses
sail, a mere speck on the sea, and your eye gazes
from side to side without one glimpse of land, and
it seems as though the voyage would never end, so
is the vision before us now. It is a wide expanse
on which to gaze. The painter has drawn a vast
outline, which each day will more fill up. Scarce
six thousand years have been depicted there, and
they seem to occupy no space. The world s end
will be described there, and the outline looks as void
as ever. The day of wrath and judgment is on that
canvass, but yet there is room. The bliss of
heaven and the woe of hell is there too, but the out
line is not filled up still. What a mere point in
that scene is our life, yet it is part of eternity. Our
song has begun here for eternity, our vision of GOD
too for eternity, afar off and in the outer court.
Let us remember to do, and think, and speak as im
mortal and eternal.
S E R M N X X V I I I.
Eent.
PRESENT FORETASTES OF ETERNITY.
PSALM xxxix. 5. (PRAYER-BOOK VERSION.)
" LORD, LET ME KNOW MINE END, AND THE NUMBER OF MY
DAYS: THAT I MAY RE CERTIFIED HOW LONG I HAVE TO
LIVE." [WHAT is YET WANTING TO ME. VTTLG.]
WE have said, that our real life is Eternity. We are
now for ever. It is not that we shall he eternal.
We have entered upon our eternity. Death only
makes our immortality more manifest. Even now
as we carry a brother or sister to their cemetery, or
as the word signifies, their sleeping-place, we mock
death to his face in those triumphant hymns, " O
grave, where is thy victory ? O death, where is
thy sting?" And so meet it is to carry the Chris
tian, who sleeps in JESUS, to his last earthly resting-
place, with signs of victory and immortality. Fitly
there should we banish outward tokens of mortality,
to show that though to us he is dead, he still liveth
unto GOD. The dav that is, the true day, the un-
PRESENT FORETASTES OF ETERNITY. 243
approachable light, the nightless day, has dawned
more closely on the souls at rest. This day and its
measure we would know. We would penetrate the
veil that this state of being is encompassed with,
that we might be certified what is yet wanting to us.
The seed of our eternity we said too was our re
generation. And this is why each stage becomes
more invisible to us, who see as through a glass
darkly. Even here those days of ours which are
are days of a hidden life. Our actions, indeed, are
often palpable enough, and our words likewise ; we
see what men do, and we hear what they say, but
we do not know what passes between them and
their GOD. Men are not always with GOD what
they seem to be with us. The springs of their out
ward developments may be corrupt. Their life may
be dead and withered, while they go through forms
of godliness. There is no positive active union be
twixt them and the Incarnate GOD. For all that
we can conceive, CHRIST needed not to have become
Man for them, for they realise not any upliftings
of their manhood to His Godhead.
These days of ours, which we spend in mere for
mal services, without any effort to unite ourselves
to the Invisible GOD, are but as grass. The wind
bloweth over it, and it is gone. They have no
substantiality, no endurance. But all that inward
struggle to hang upon GOD, to fix our thoughts
upon Him, to join our cares and sorrows with the
sufferings of the Incarnate CHRIST, our works with
His works, our prayers with His prayers, our
244 PRESENT FORETASTES OF ETERNITY. [SERM.
praises with His praises, makes these fitful and pass
ing days eternal. All days passed with CHRIST are ;
others are not. Yet of those whose days are thus
immortal it is said, that the world knows them not
even as it knew CHRIST not. None of us know
what amount of union with CHRIST another has.
We are mostly seeming to be better than we are.
Yet sometimes, as we stand by the Christian s
death-bed, we learn that all their life long we have
undervalued the Christianity of this or that brother
and sister. The hidden life escaped our ken. The
discerner of spirits found himself baffled. In that
wasted emaciated dying one he found a CHRIST be
yond his largest conception. As the flesh faded
away, the spirit manifested its energy more and
more. This was the Apostle s comfort. " Though
our outward man," says he, " perish, yet our in
ward man is renewed day by day." Thus, as the
days that are not decay and vanish away, the day
that is shines more brilliantly. " Man that is born
of a woman, is of few days ;" but the man that is
born of GOD is for ever. The inward man is day by
day growing and increasing, while the outward man
is hasting to decay. As what is seen vanishes, the
unseen becomes more visible. The ship loses sight
of land only to be filled with the prospect of the
everlasting sea.
What marvel then that each stage after death
becomes more and more cloudy and difficult to
penetrate. They who depart this life in possession
of the hidden manna, taste more clearly the sweet-
XXVIII.] PRESENT FORETASTES OF ETERNITY. 245
ness of its grace. But they who have watched them
without discerning their nearness to GOD, cannot of
course discern their increased closeness to Him.
The life that was before hidden from them, has now
become far more invisible. Men that have only
gazed upon the outer tabernacle, and been at fault,
are still more so now that the glory of it has de
parted. When the spirit has left the body, our link
with the world of spirits is dissevered, if we have
only had a corporeal union with its possessor.
Prayer is a distinct emanation of the hidden life.
Yet how many seem to pray without grasping hold
of the Invisible. To go out of ourselves, to lose
consciousness of our bodily existence, to forget all
that is passing, to be insensible to pain or weariness,
this is a foretaste of that stage which succeeds
death. And so also in sleep we are often brought
near the throne of GOD. Holy men and women
have heard the angelic hallelujahs while they were
bodily senseless. The very destruction of bodily
sensations in sleep, often quickens the functions
of the spiritual. Thus it has been ever in dreams,
that GOD visits more closely His saints. Jacob
dreamed of heaven opening, and angels ascending
and descending. GOD made the eternal covenant
with Abraham, when a deep sleep had fallen upon
him. Solomon conversed with GOD, and prayed
Him to grant him an understanding heart, as He
appeared to him in a dream by night. And in like
manner Daniel tells us, "I was left alone and saw
this great vision, and there remained no strength in
246 FliESENT E011ETASTES OE ETEENITY.
me, for rny vigour was turned in me into corruption,
and I retained no strength. Yet heard I the voice
of His words ; and when I heard the voice of His
words, then was I in a deep sleep on my face, and
my face toward the ground." Nor is it unlike this
when we find S. Peter delivered by an angel, as he
was sleeping betwixt two soldiers ; and S. Paul
warned by night of the coming shipwreck. It is
worth while also, in connection with all this, to re
member that GOD S great interferences with ordinary
laws have mostly taken place by night. Adam must
first lie in a deep sleep ere Eve was formed from him.
CHRIST, the Second Adam, lays too Himself down
to sleep in the sepulchre of Joseph of Arimathea,
ere the Church could rise from His side. By night
the angel of the LORD slew the firstborn of the Egyp
tians, and the armies of the Assyrians. And thus
the departed are said to sleep. They have come to
their night. Their true day is not dawned. They
are enjoying nearer communion with GOD, for
their corruptible body no longer weighs down their
soul. They sleep, but their heart and spirit wakes.
The hidden life they hardly grasped while material
things pressed upon them, now expands and de-
velopes itself freely. What sleep is to the living,
death is to the departed. Our spiritual faculties are
quickened by the very cessation of our material.
As it is said of blind persons that the withdrawal
of sight is counterbalanced by the increased powers
of their other senses, so with the withdrawal of all
bodilv senses. The soul no longer dispersed over
XXVIII.] PRESENT FOIIETASTES OF ETERNITY. 247
the organs of our bodies gathers its rays into one
focus and lights itself up with greater intensity.
The bustle and noise of the multitude at the foot of
the mountain enter not into the ears of Moses as he
talks with GOD face to face. The three children
feel not the scorching flames as they walk with the
SON of GOD. It is in sleep that we feel most our
eternity. We are often then carried back to child
hood and youth ; see faces once again we thought
we had looked our last look upon ; mingle in scenes
that we imagined were shifted, not to re -appear on
the stage of life again. Past, present, and future
are set forth often in sleep as one and the same
event of time. We, the old and the greyhaired,
seem often to be sporting in all the innocence of
childhood. And there is no infancy or age in
eternity.
And we may more analyse this if we take into
consideration that the subjects of our dreams differ.
Our hearts do not all wake alike while we sleep.
Ordinarily our dreams have some connexion with
our daily life and conversation. Men s sins have
sometimes then betrayed themselves, though at all
other times concealed. They have made involun
tary confessions then, who studied through the day
to keep an unmoved countenance and unfaltering
speech. The wakeful spirit goes wandering to the
scenes where the body has been occupied in the
daytime. And so when the last sleep has been
creeping upon men, their lifelong occupations seem
to be the only things in which they show conscious-
248 PEESENT FOHETASTES OF ETEENITY. [SEEM.
ness. Such as they have been in life, such their
half conscious wanderings of mind exhibit them to
be. The devout soul sings then its favourite psalms
and goes over its favourite prayers. And the miser
clutches his gold ; and the drunkard seizes his cup ;
and the profane utters his curse or his ribaldry.
What a foretasting is this of the sleep of the de
parted ? What will it be when all bodily sensation
is at an end ? Will it be better or worse ? May
we not see here the traces of our eternity what
our sleep will be beyond the grave ?
And all this shows the reasonableness of that
theological opinion that holy people now at rest,
who have loved us, continue to pray for us as they
did in this state of being. Death is not an abrupt
termination of anything but animal life. It renders
our communion with GOD fuller places us a stage
nearer His presence brings us so many steps higher
in that state which our souls on this side the grave
have won. It removes all obstacles to the perfec
tion of our devotions and prayers. And those our
earnest aspirations and breathings will be in the
main a carrying on of the work we have had to do on
this side our Jordan. The rich man in the parable,
who interceded for his brethren, gives us the result
of all natural affection in the case of one who was
no saint. Much more may we conclude that they
who have loved CHRIST in their brethren, most
truly will still occupy themselves in that greatest of
all charity the helping us with their prayers to flee
from the wrath to come.
XXVIII.] PRESENT FORETASTES OF ETERNITY. 219
But above all, how awful is this subject, when we
think what our thoughts and desires are usually in
tent upon ; what our affeetions centre in ; what are
our dreams and speculations. All these betoken your
sleep in the invisible \vorld. You are now providing
yourself with visions and dreams for eternity. This
life is your day this lifeless life. Thereafter cometh
the night the end of this day the night before
the morning which discloses the cloudless eternity
in which you have been navigating the ship of your
soul. Now material objects shut out the solemn
anticipations- the breathless suspense the agoniz
ing doubts \vhich will haunt you in that long sleep.
But then it will not be so. Nothing then will fill
your mind but dreams of the past and pictures of
the future joy or sorrow which awaits you. Who
would go to sleep there in that dark valley with
seared or unprobed conscience with confessions
not made with acts of restitution omitted with
neglect of duty with remembrances of evil things
with ghosts of injured persons haunting us ? And
all this while we see the preparations making for
the world s assize, the thrones set, and unbarring of
the prison house of souls, every minute expecting
to hear the knell of the everlasting convicts, the
voice of the Archangel and the trump of GOD.
What a wakeful sleep what a disturbed night
what feverish dreams ! Yet all this is wanting to
us ere the Christian shall be perfected, shall have
assigned to him perfect bliss or perfect woe.
SERMON XXIX.
Eent.
TEMPTATIONS THROUGH THE KNOWLEDGE OF
SIN.
GEN. xxxix. 9.
"HOW TIIEN CAN I DO THIS GREAT WICKEDNESS, AND SIN
AGAINST GOD?"
NOTHING I suppose is more common than for many
persons who are outwardly decent and correct in
their behaviour, and even religious, as the world
reckons them, to indulge in loose thoughts in
thoughts such as they would be ashamed to confess
to another, or to have imputed to them. There is
an immense deal of surface piety of a holiness
that goes no deeper than an abstinence from im
moral acts. You will observe that I am not speak
ing of the having unholy or improper or indecent
thoughts suggested to your minds, but to your in
dulging in them. You may be tempted by the
devil, by some bad thoughts, but this is no sin in
itself. The sin is only incurred by your embracing
the thought instead of expelling it. You cannot
TEMPTATIONS THROUGH TILE KNOWLEDGE OE SIN. 251
help having a bad thought, but you can help its
fixing itself on your mind and feeling. This is one
part of our probation in this life. Day by day to
stand with the mirrors of our souls for the evil one
to cast his foul breath of sin upon them, and yet to
no purpose if we keep them clean and bright and
pure. Angels we may imagine gaze on this pol
luted world of ours without any loss of purity or
stain of sin. Saintly men and women listen no less
with undimmed eye or unblushing cheek to tales of
sin that make us perhaps conscious of our weakness
and readiness to sin. One there has been Who
walked on earth amidst its loathsome and disgusting
scenes of guilt and shame, yet without spot of sin.
One Who shrunk not from the kisses of the Mag
dalene nor from converse with the adulteress JESUS
GOD Incarnate it was, Who could gaze on all
the loathsome and corrupt mass of evil presented
to Him by Satan without a shadow of guilt being
thrown upon the eternal purity of His being. We
know how fearful the contact with evil must have
been to Him, Who in His agony shed great drops
of bloody sweat upon this earth, laden with Adam s
curse. We know that to meet Satan s temptations
must have been a sore trial to Him, Who vouchsafed
to be comforted by the ministry of angels in the
end. But all this horror and amazement at the
temptation to any sin is in saintly people perfectly
distinct and separate from any secret enjoyment or
encouragement of the thought of sin.
Our horror at sinful thoughts is too often after,
252 TEMPTATIONS TII11OUG1I [SEllM.
not during their coming in upon the soul. We
tremble to think how near we were falling into acts
of sin to what next step we might have gone
what might have been tbe fatal result of welcoming
or at least admitting as a guest of our souls this or
that unholy imagination. Ours is too often the
horror of penitence not the loathing of sin in its
essence. And this explains why people who have
no great depth of religion judge saints so harshly
and unjustly. They know that if they were in such
and such conditions, places, company, and so on
themselves, that they could not escape enjoying as
far as they dared their nearness to evil. Such and
such relations would give them a secret pleasure.
such and such language such and such persons
such and such situations would amuse at least, if
not excite their bad passions. They know and feel
this ; and so they go on to bring all men down to
their own levels, and say in effect that no such
thing as absolute saintliness exists in the world ;
that no man really hates sin and loves GOD ; that
no one has a position and spiritual innate repug
nance to wickedness and vice. For there are mul
titudes of persons who, if I may be allowed the
expression, look over the brink of the precipice
without having the courage to throw themselves
down. They are too timid to sin themselves, but
they have no great objection to contemplate sinful
deeds. They smile and laugh at the relation of
this or that wickedness, or it may be at the very
recollection of its rehearsal. And as I have said.
XXIX.] THE KNOWLEDGE OF SIN. 253
they do not understand how any one else can feel
differently from themselves. They may he even too
discreet or modest to utter language of a doubtful
description, which tends to the withering of Chris
tian purity or to indulge in scandalous stories of
others, whether true or invented ; but they do not
shut their ears to anything of this kind, when brought
before them by others. Such a temper of mind as
this shows itself in its way of regarding the sacred
Scriptures. For there are many things recorded in
the Bible bearing on the natural depravity of man
kind which cannot be recited in your ears without
testing your religious condition your inward life
your tendencies. You either dislike to have them
read before you because you know your own weak
ness and danger of secretly enjoying their recital ;
or because you think all present as bad as yourself,
and in a sort of authoritative way you decide against
such chapters of the Bible or passages being made
part of the public service.
Now we know that it is said by an inspired Apos
tle, " Unto the pure all things are pure." And
there can be no danger of our forcing or constrain
ing this text beyond its obvious meaning of our
applying it further than the Apostle would, in such
a case as the hearing passages of Holy Scripture.
I say then to all who have a morbid sentimental
dislike of attending to those sad tales of sin in the
Scriptures, at a time when they must outwardly
receive them in a religious way, Are you sure the
fault is not your own ? Are you fit judges of what
2f>4 TEMPTATIONS THROUGH [SEEM.
GOD has appointed for your instruction ? Is not
the feeling most suitable to you, a feeling of humi
liation and penitence, that the recital of sins should
wake up in you sinful passions and desires ? Still
more that you are not pure enough to listen to the
voice of the Spirit of purity ? You are ashamed of
giving way to unholy thoughts here, or of being
thought likely to do so, because you are at times,
when alone, conscious of a secret pleasure in ideas
unworthy of the Christian s hope and end. All this
makes it clear that a repugnance to listen to the
narratives of guilt in the Divine Scriptures is not
founded upon a right view of things, much less upon
a devout and holy frame of mind. In proportion
as their recurrence is accompanied with sensations
of sin or not, so is our advancement and growth in
real holiness. As we become more and more posi
tively and substantively holy, things which to other
minds or to our own minds in by-gone years sug
gested miserable feelings of sin, will, like blunted
arrows from the quiver of Satan, wound in no wise
the moral sense in us. As our LORD says of Him
self, "The prince of this world cometh, and findeth
nothing in Me," so is it in degree true of real Chris
tians. The more complete your union with CHRIST
is, the more is your soul in this respect CnRisT-like.
And thus too is the state of childlike innocence
restored to us, which by sinful habits was lost.
I conceive that if you could have anything given
you for the mere wishing for it, nothing would
satisfy you more than to have that simplicity of
XXIX.] THE KNOWLEDGE OP STN- 255
children, to whom unholy thoughts are strangers ;
who do not know what vice is, nor comprehend the
meaning of sinful words and feelings. Yet the
purity of saints, whether of those who have by
watchfulness kept their garments, or by penitence
cleansed them, is of a higher sort than even that of
childhood. Purity is the natural mark of childhood.
An unholy child would be a monster in nature.
Ignorance is the main cause of childhood s sinless-
ness. To be ignorant of sin is one thing to be
influenced by sin another. Most of you know of
necessity what sin is ; most of you are acquainted
with the details of such sins as form the group of
iniquity of which the seventh Commandment con
tains a type and sample. You cannot help know
ing what is meant by words and expressions and
actions. All this while it is in your power to remain
pure yourself. Your conscience is not affected by
the mere knowledge of sin. It is only when you
suffer sin to become part of yourself by dwelling
upon it giving your heart to it allowing your
affections to centre round it that you sin that
you defile yourself and grieve the Spirit of GOD.
For example, if you hear a sad story about this or
that person s disgraceful conduct, you need not let
your mind rest upon it, nor repeat what you have
heard, nor suffer yourself to be amused with the
details.
Again, if you read anything in print sugges
tive of bad thoughts, it is in your power to check
them, or to let them in like a flood upon your soul.
250 TEMPTATIONS THEOUGII [SERM.
It is the suffering the mind to rest upon evil, I re
peat, not its mere coming in contact with evil that
ruins and destroys the soul. As all temptations
either make or mar the Christian so is it with
temptations to evil imaginations. You cannot
yield without loss and you will not resist without
gain. Every time evil is set before your mind by
the tempter in vain, you become a mightier warrior
against the crafts and assaults of Satan.
Ah ! dear brethren, what a wondrous battlefield
is the Christian s heart so secret and yet so severe
so unseen and yet so bustling and careworn. He
seems so peaceful and so joyous so composed and
so staid. We might fancy he was lifted up above
the strife below above the noise and strivings of
the people at the foot of the mount. His face is
not as the face of other men. There is a chastened
look and a disciplined voice such as other men have
not. The Church seems his home and haven, his
only chosen resting-place. He is happiest on his
knees, in his fasting and self-denial. Prayer seems
his very food, and above all, the Blessed Sacrament
his daily meat. We might have seen such a one
now and then in our lives, coming across us as an
angel vision in this dull weary world of ours, and
we shrunk as before some superior being, some
being of another life, some habitant of another
world. Yet so calm and so loving and so removed
from all sin and woe that sin begets as he seems,
he has an inward conflict more bitter and more
fierce than those who gaze at him. The scene of
XXIX.] THE KNOWLEDGE OF SIN. 257
warfare is only shifted, not taken away. While
other men are fighting against their temptations to
sinful words or sinful deeds, his battle is against
thoughts of ill, which the devil is ever presenting to
his view. The strife of other men is all outward, a
contention against habits of loose talk and foolish
conversation, or, worse it may be, against a tempta
tion to some act of positive unholiness. Or at best
they are fighting against giving themselves up to or
privately indulging in a train of sinful conceptions.
He on the other hand has a terrible assault to sus
tain, but it is against assenting for a moment to that
idea of evil which Satan perpetually pushes before
him. Satan knows where to attack ; and his last
struggle is within us. And while the din of arms
may be still and hushed to all outward sight, it may
be most tumultuous in the soul. They then who
are only occupied with checking themselves in words
and deeds have only begun a warfare which is to
conclude only with a more deadly one of thoughts.
They are but novices in the Christian soldiery, and
have a far heavier assault to stand, before the vic
tory is theirs for ever. It is thus that souls fall and
perish, and amaze the spectators by their fall. Hu
man eye fathomed not the state of that sober, reli
gious, well-conducted person, as it seemed, till all
at once tongue cannot tell the sadness of her decay.
Her trial was secret, but it was not the less severe.
In youth she first listened to the voice of the tempter.
A little further on and we might have seen her take
pleasure in hearkening to that seducing yet destruc-
258 TEMPTATIONS TTIEOUOU TUT KNOWLEDGE OF STN.
live voice. A little more and she gives up the reins
to her imagination and passions, until, if she be not
outwardly lost, she is but a whited sepulchre, full of
dead men s bones and all uncleanness. Such is the
end to which all come who do not manfully gird up
the loins of their souls and withstand the enemy, as
he commences his warfare in the soul.
My brethren, these are unpleasant truths to hear,
and they whose consciences are not seared but still
sensitive, may be pained to hear. To think that I,
whom men account so moral and well-conducted,
so regular in my performance of religious duties,
may be yet but deceiving others and myself, is a
terrible blow to the pride of man. GOD grant that
if any of you are conscious of yielding to evil
thoughts, of inward corruptions tacitly encouraged,
you may have grace to confess your sin to GOD and
make an earnest effort to amend. Avoid all that
lias hitherto led you into such errors, all books, all
occasions of sin, all conversations and companions.
Say short prayers to yourself for the help of GOD,
when such temptations arise. So will the stedfast
ten our of your soul be the language of Joseph,
" How can I do this great wickedness and sin
against GOD ?"
S E R M ON XX X,
passion >untuu>.
CHRISTIAN SACRIFICE.
S. JAMES n. 21.
: WAS NOT ABRAHAM OUR FAT HER JUSTIFIED BY WORKS,
WHEN HE HAD OFFERED ISAAC HIS SON UPON THE
ALTAR?"
MOST persons know that the sacrifice of Isaac, the
only son of Abraham, is a type of the Sacrifice of
JESUS CHRIST upon the Cross by the will of His
Heavenly FATHER. Most too know that it was for
his readiness to offer up his son at the command of
GOD, that Abraham became the father of the faith
ful and the Friend of GOD. Now many persons in
sist on the great faith of Abraham as a pattern for
us, and but very few on his works. Had he not had
great faith he never could have pleased GOD by such
a willing obedience, but it was his act of obedience
which moved the ALMIGHTY to declare, " By My
self have I sworn, saith the LORD ; for because thou
hast done this thing." He said not, " because thou
hast believed" but " because thou hast done this."
260 CHRISTIAN SACRIFICE. [SEEM.
It was the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice, his
intention of sacrificing which pleased GOD : the
effect of his faith, not merely his faith itself. And
thus the two statements of S. Paul and S. James
are true, both that Abraham was "justified by
faith," and that Abraham was "justified by works."
All controversies on the doctrine of justification
turn rather upon the meaning of the word " faith"
as used in Scripture. Faith in Holy Scripture is
only another word for Christian obedience, or obe
dience on Christian principles. It is opposed to the
deeds of the Law, because all works done apart
from faith in CHRIST either under the Law of con
science or the Law of Moses could not make us
righteous in the sight of GOD. But works done by
faith in CHRIST do justify. Of such works S. John
tells us, " Little children, let no man deceive you,
he that doeth righteousness is righteous even as
CHRIST is righteous." Such was the work of
Abraham whereby he pleased GOD, and it was
counted unto him for righteousness.
And this was not the first work of faith whereby
Abraham was accepted of GOD ; long before, he
left his home and kindred at the command of GOD,
and went into a strange land. For this obedience
GOD promised to give his seed the land of Canaan.
It was the spirit of sacrifice which thus early ani
mated the patriarch. And so again when he suffered
Lot to choose the most fertile plains and pleasant
habitation, he still showed the same self-denial.
Nor after the battle with the four kings would
XXX.] CHRISTIAN SACRIFICE. 2G1
Abraham take any part of the spoil. This is the
very life of faith which few Christians realize, evi
denced by acts of self-sacrifice. The faith of many
is cold, and dead, and lifeless, because it is not
warmed, and quickened, and nourished by self-
denial and mortification. All enjoyment of visible
things hides invisible. All the endearments of
friends and relatives, wife and husband, parents and
children, cast a veil over the love of GOD. We
love GOD most when we have severed ourselves
from all that engages our affections and feelings on
earth. And they who have not like Abraham been
called to forsake home and friends, are in danger,
unless they keep alive in themselves the spirit of
sacrifice. This is most especially true of Christians
whom a dying LORD and Master draws unto Him
in the school of the Cross. And thus penitence is
called in scripture a sacrifice. " The sacrifices of
GOD are a broken spirit." It is a sacrifice because
we choose to be sorry for our sins, force our thoughts
and feelings into the channel of repentance, and turn
from the joys of earth to self-imposed sorrow. We
bruise, break, rend, and tear the hard sin-worn
heart as an offering to GOD. We slay ourselves
upon the Altar of the Cross. It costs a man some
thing when he ceases to compare himself to his
neighbours, and humbles himself before GOD. It is
an effort, a violent exertion by which we turn to
GOD after we have sinned. We sacrifice our will
by conforming it to the will of GOD. Repentance
cuts off and extinguishes a man s former self, so
262 CHRISTIAN SACRIFICE.
that he ceases to be what he was : he dies to sin and
rises to holiness.
Again, almsgiving is a sacrifice, " To do good and
to communicate forget not, for with such sacrifices
GOD is well pleased. " This is more clearly so than
the rest : for we can do nothing of this without self-
denial of some sort. Moreover, fasting is a sacrifice,
for by it we humble the flesh and subdue it to the
Spirit, and so " present our bodies a living sacrifice,
holy and acceptable to GOD." In like manner all
worship of GOD is a sacrifice, for we therein "offer
the fruit of our lips/ or as the prophet expresses it,
" the calves of our lips." In all these ways faith is
exercised and confirmed. We turn from the visible
world, which ever tends to engage our hearts, and
look to the unseen and intangible. We are thus
continually drawn off from ourselves unto GOD, and
so sacrifice ourselves to Him. And like Abram
our sacrifices must be extended to the petty details
of social or domestic life. Whether we decline even
to take advantage of our superiority over our neigh
bours, as Abram refused the spoil of the king of
Sodom he had assisted in recovering; or whether
we allow inferiors the preference of any earthly
good, as he permitted Lot to take the best of the
land for his inheritance : we are but carrying the
spirit of sacrifice into our intercourse with each
other, setting up the Cross on each family altar,
and making every household the school of Him,
Who pleased not Himself, but gave up not only a
little or much for us, but His whole and entire self
XXX.] C1I1USTIAN SACRIFICE. 263
for us all, whether friends or foes, saints or sinners.
And in order to do this habitually and naturally,
(for all religion which is not habitual and natural to
as is but as the grass of the field, which to-day is,
and to-morrow is cast into the oven) we must try
day by day to sacrifice ourselves to GOD. Begin
the day by offering yourself and all your actions to
JESUS CHRIST upon the Cross, connect all your
daily crosses with His Cross, unite all your kind
and good actions to others with His love for you.
All that hinders your oblation of yourself to GOD
must be resisted in the spirit of sacrifice. Whether
it be self-denial in food, or dress, or speech, or plea
sure, make each act a formal act of sacrifice. Lay
it, so to speak, as solemnly on the altar of your
heart, and let its incense ascend as gratefully to
GOD, as ever Jewish priest laid slain beast on the
temple altar of burnt-offering, and its sweet odour
was pleasing to the ALMIGHTY. Every action so
done increases faith. All that we do with sole re
spect to the unseen now will make our acts of obe
dience easier hereafter. It will be more natural to
us at last to do what we dislike, than what we like,
as measured by fleshly and mortal standards : more
natural to do good to others than to ourselves, more
natural to make others happy than ourselves. Our
favourite resting-place will be the altar of burnt-
offering, our hearts will ever send up from it sweet-
smelling savours to GOD.
What a different world would this be, if we all
lived in the spirit of sacrifice ! How much more
264 CIIKISTIAN SACRIFICE. [SEBM.
rapid would be the progress of Christianity ! How
much more truly could a heathen say of us, "These
people wish to persuade me to adopt their religion ;
but I cannot see that they are any better than we.
They have wonderful doctrines, and they are clever
in explaining them ; but their practice and doctrine
goes not together. They are as anxious about this
life as any of us, though if what they say is true,
they ought to think only of another and a better.
They are as quarrelsome as we among themselves,
though they are not quite so violent in their way of
showing it."
Ask yourselves then, brethren, seriously, what
does your religion cost you ? I do not mean merely
the maintenance and support of your ministers, and
the keeping up of the solemn services of the Church
with due solemnity, though that is worthy the con
sideration of some ; but what does your religion
cost you in your employments, your duties, and
your intercourse with each other ? What irksome
and unpleasant duty do we fulfil at all risks ? What
employment do we steadily continue, notwithstand
ing its trial of our patience ? What kindness do we
show to our kindred or neighbours, in spite of their
vexation of our tempers and annoying ways to
wards us ? In all this consists the reality of Chris
tianity. Without this life of sacrifice, Christianity
is a solemn sham, and a monstrous delusion : the
Church is the Body of CHRIST without a substance.
What is national religion without a priest and a
sacrifice ? And so what is individual religion, which
XXX.] CHRISTIAN SACKIFICE. 265
never has an act of sacrifice to offer through the
High-Priest of our profession CHRIST JESUS ? All
of us, even the poorest, can and must as we would
be saved by the sacrifice of CHRIST offer some
sacrifice, whether it be the widow s mite cast into
the treasury of the temple, or the prayers shortened
because of the necessity of daily toil, or the poor
man s sorrows and afflictions, or the labourer s hard
toil and care, all must be presented to CHRIST, that
He may sprinkle them with the Blood of Atone
ment, and offer them to GOD.
How much more does all this apply to those who
have any habit of sin to forsake ! If the righteous
cannot be saved without sacrifice, much less the
sinner. If we must offer holiness and purity as a
sacrifice to GOD, much more must sinners cut off
and burn up their sins. Search and examine your
selves, brethren, as to your besetting sins, that you
may sacrifice them to GOD. If you are proud,
sacrifice this your loved offspring by humility. If
you are passionate, sacrifice anger by meekness and
gentleness. If you are too much inclined to love
money and desire wealth, sacrifice covetousness by
almsgiving and self-denying charity. If you are re
luctant to submit to parents or pastors, superiors or
masters, sacrifice a disobedient spirit by obedience.
If you are too fond of eating or drinking, abstain
wholly or in part from whatever tempts you to sin.
If you are tempted to unholy thoughts, sacrifice
them by at least refusing to consent or delight in
them. Now, by the grace of GOD, you can sacri-
266 CHRISTIAN SACIIIFICE. [SEltM.
fice your sins ; hereafter you will not be able, when
the earthly temple shall be dissolved, and the LORD
shall suddenly come to it in wrath and indignation.
Now you can burn, consume, and destroy your
sins ; hereafter the impenitent will burn for ever as
a sacrifice, and a never-ending atonement for their
sins. Choose, therefore, now one or other of these.
Sacrifice a part of self now, that which is corrupt
and impure ; or else, hereafter, be thy whole self
sacrificed to the anger of GOD and of the LAMB.
What are all sacrifices of ourselves, compared to
that smoke which goeth up for ever and ever from
the torments of the damned ? There we must be
sacrificed in wrath then, if here we sacrifice not our
selves now. " If thy foot, or thine eye, or thy hand
offend thee, cut them off, and cast them from thee ;
it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, or
one-eyed, or halt, than having two feet, or two eyes,
or two hands, to be cast into fire, where their worm
dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. For every
one shall be salted with fire, and every sacrifice
shall be salted with salt."
Now is the special time of sacrifice the season
we are looking on to the Cross of Calvary, Let us
choose one of our members, that we may unite the
sacrifice of it to the wounds of CHRIST, our sinful
hands to His stabbed hands, our wandering feet to
His nailed feet, our deceitful and desperately wicked
hearts to His pierced side, our proud, irreverent
heads to His thorn-printed brow.
" O LORD, bruise, rend, break, cut, burn me as
XXX.] CHRISTIAN SACEIFICE. 267
Thou wilt here, so Thou unite me to Thyself. Spare
me not here, so Thou save me for ever." What is
a little pain now here, if we be spared an endless
pain in eternity ? Deny yourselves somewhat in this
world, or you will be denied all in the world to
corne. Bear the marks of the LORD JESUS now, or
He will say to you who have pierced Him, " De
part from Me, I never knew you, all ye workers of
iniquity."
SEEM ON XXXI.
MOSES AT THE BUSH A TYPE OF CHRISTIANS.
EXODTJS in. 6.
MOSES HID nis FACE, FOR HE WAS AFRAID TO LOOK
GOD."
SOLITUDE is, as you have often been told during
Lent, the place where GOD meets us. It is not only
a place where we may look for Satan, but also for
GOD. Not only do we look for trial in this wilder
ness of our probation, but also for strength. It is a
school for GOD S work into which we must all, more
or less, enter that we may be disciplined and trained.
And this is because we in solitude, in severing our
selves from ordinary pleasures and enjoyments have
thereby more time to look into ourselves, and apply
the pruning knife to whatever there is seared and
withered. We fly from the world that we may draw
nearer to GOD. We turn from the visible that we
may penetrate the invisible. And this is what is set
before us in the history of Moses up to the time of
MOSES AT TITE BUSII A TYPE OF CHRISTIANS. 2G9
liis being sent by GOD to lead tbe Israelites out of
Egypt. He needed training for his work, and so
he had to go into the wilderness. He had already
set his heart upon the work GOD now appoints him,
but he had had need of discipline. You see this in
his violent way of going about his work at first,
when he slew the Egyptian, compared to that
patience which was called forth by the caprice of
Pharaoh and the murmurings of the Israelites. He
had had training of some sort, but not the right sort
of training. He had been educated by Pharaoh s
daughter as her own child. Scripture tells us he was
learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians the
then philosophers of the world. He had been ac
customed to the manners of a court : had mixed
with the best society ; and to this was added a
finished education. We should have said he was
just the man, as he was then, for having to face
Pharaoh and his courtiers, and to manage and direct
a nation. But as we have said, it was not so.
Something else was needed. Another school was
required. He had something to unlearn as well as
to learn. And this his first failure taught him.
For in that court, wherein his childhood was passed,
Scripture hints that there was much of evil. Moses
is commended for his faith in that he " refused to
be called the son of Pharaoh s daughter, choosing
rather to suffer affliction with the people of GOD,
than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season."
For a mere worldly sovereignty he was doubtless
as well fitted as any of the princes of the time. But
270 MOSKR AT THE BUSH [SERM.
to do GOD S work a man must commune with GOD.
And in order to commune with GOD he must sepa
rate himself from all that stands between him and
GOD. Just as kings and queens under the Chris
tian dispensation have laid often aside their sceptres
and purple robes that they might take instead the
rod of discipline and the sackcloth of penitence, so
was it with Moses. See the young courtier now
far from the haunts of men embracing that shepherd
life, which was an abomination to the Egyptians.
What strange thoughts must have crossed his brain,
as he tended those sheep in the wilderness. All his
ardent youthful projects of delivering his brethren
crushed. Rejected by them, and fearing the anger
of Pharaoh on account of his impetuous haste in
slaying the Egyptian. We all know how, in soli
tude, our past lives assume a different form to what
they did when we had others to encourage and urge
us on. What then was excused and palliated seems
when we sit lone and desolate to wear a more sinful
aspect. We see then how frail, how infirm, how
weak we are. We weigh things differently and we
acknowledge much of error that mixed itself up
with our best intentions. And it is often just then,
just when we have confessed our incapacity, our
unfitness for our work, just when we are lamenting
false steps and misadventures, just when we sick at
heart are giving up the idea of being ever useful to
Almighty GOD, just then that GOD says to us,
"Come now, I will send thee." It was so with
Moses. Not in the days of his pride and exaltation,
XXXT.] A TYPE OP CHRISTIANS. 271
not in the days of his zealous indignation for his
brethren, not in the days when he thought himself
fitted for the work, but when a fugitive and a wan
derer, with the wilderness instead of the kingly palace
for his home, GOD met him and bade him become
a deliverer and a judge for Israel. And in like
manner when GOD sent him, he seemed then to
doubt his own fitness for the work. Strange indeed
that he who had once been willing to take up the
defence of his brethren of his own free impulse,
should now, when GOD sends him, draw back as if
unsuited for His purpose. All this shrinking and
self-doubting as we feel GOD calls us to His work, to
any nearness to Him, to His presence, is represented
by the fear of Moses. "And Moses hid his face,
for he was afraid to look upon GOD."
And this applies to ourselves now very solemnly.
What the burning bush was to Moses, the crucifixion
of a Man GOD is to us. We have been disciplining
ourselves up till now, hoping to be brought at least a
step nearer to GOD. We have gone of our own free
will into the desert, severing ourselves from our
usual enjoyments and relaxations, because we feel
that we have made great mistakes in our religious
course, that we are not yet perfect in the school of
obedience, and that we are not yet masters of our
selves. So we have been trying to fit ourselves for
this great sight of CHRIST on the Cross ; trying to
attune our souls to that sad scene of our Maker s
agony ; trying to cast out that evil in ourselves
which caused CHRIST to suffer. And all this pre-
272 MOSES AT THE BTJSII [SERM.
paring of ourselves to sympathize with the suffering
SAVIOUR must tend to make us hide our faces, as
though afraid to look upon GOD.
The fire that burned in the bush did not consume
it. The Divinity of CHRIST did not extinguish the
Manhood. Upon the Cross of Calvary we see a
sight no less strange than what Moses saw in the
desert. Fire and fuel co-existing without the de
struction of the latter. GOD and Man united in the
suffering JESUS without the severance of the former.
How awful is that sight : that of the Incarnate
GOD crucified. The sun beheld and hid his face in
the clouds of night. That sun which had witnessed
so many years of sin s effects, shuddered to gaze
on the atonement. How much more we who are
sinners, who have sins of our own to bewail, ought
to be covered with shame and confusion at this most
fearful of all mysteries. All our self-examination,
all our conviction of our own sinfulness, all our
realisation of the punishment our sins deserve only
make the Crucifixion of our GOD more tremendous.
That terrible Pharaoh from whom we have fled,
that death which we have sought to avoid, by re
tirement and communing with GOD and ourselves,
all add to the majesty of that scene in which GOD
vouchsafes to humble Himself by veiling His glory
in the form of a crucified man. As was the bush
burning with fire yet not consumed, so is this no
common scene. This the darkened sun this the
rent rocks this the earthquake this the loud voice
this the risen saints that slept in their graves all
XXXI.] A TYPE OF CHRISTIANS. 273
testify. It is indeed GOD Who looketh upon us
from the Cross, and bids us turn aside and see why
He remaineth in the essence of His Deity incarnate
while His Manhood bleeds. The LORD S Head is
bowed in shame and grief. The Virgin Mother
waileth and covereth her face, and the women
lament, shuddering from the contemplation of the
Dying GOD, that mystery of nature. Alas ! how
many are shooting out the lip and shaking the head
in scorn ; how many pass by without a tear or pity.
It is so now, we only act over again every year
what was done long ago. CHRIST is still mocked,
still abused, still crucified by sinners. That day
which is more important to us even than the anni
versary of the Creation, whereon we commemorate
CHRIST crucified, how little is it observed ! And
where observed, how little is it realized ! How is it
that we feel not the effect upon our own natures
more ? Why do we not feel the stabbing of the
nails, the gash of the spear, the punctures of the
thorny crown? Almighty GOD S sufferings shook
and convulsed the world on that day. How is it
we are so little affected ? We gaze on it as if look
ing on a picture outside of us, when all the while
the Crucifixion ought to be felt within us. We
look on the Cross, when we ought to be drawn
to H.
Let it then be your care now to fit yourselves for
gazing on the mystery of the Cross. Let it be with
you just as people who have received a message to
attend a loved friend s or relative s death- bed.
274 MOSES AT THE BUSH A TYPE OF CHRISTIANS.
You have had a letter describing their sufferings,
and you try to imagine how they look. You have
seen them in health and strength, and you picture
to yourself what ravages disease has made on their
well-known forms. You fear and shrink from seeing
them as they are now, so awful is the contrast. All
death is the presence-chamber of GOD, much more
where GOD Himself groans and dies. And you have
other thoughts too beside the imagining what their
sufferings are. You recall your offences against
them. You remember that you have perhaps caused,
increased, or at best, not diminished their trials.
And though the insensible face of the sufferer re
proach you not vehemently for this, yet there stands
beside him a mother or a beloved friend to point to
him and say to you, Behold your work. How full
of dread must the hour of meeting be. Still more
will this be the case as you stand beside the dying
agonies of your LORD. Beside Him too is a Mother
with tearful eye reproaching you, and a meek sor
rowing friend, the beloved Apostle. All your be
trayals and desertions come to mind as you hide
your face in dismay at your work. And above all,
how terrible the thought, this your work is for ever.
He Whom you have crucified will come to be your
Judge, unless you obtain His pardon now. Even
now He is willing to pardon. His last breath is for
His murderers. Gather up your whole self into
penitence, and as you hide your face from a dying
GOD, say unto Him, " LORD, remember me when
Thou comest into Thy kingdom."
SERMON XXXII.
PEEPABATION FOB COMMUNION.
S. MATT. xxi. 5.
" BEHOLD, THY KING COMETH UNTO THEE."
THIS Sunday, next before Easter, is usually called
Palm Sunday, as being tbe day on which the words
of the Prophet were fulfilled, " Behold, thy King
cometh, meek, and sitting on an ass, and on a colt
the foal of an ass." The Church intends us on this
day, as we think of His triumphal entry into Jeru
salem, to prepare for His entry into our souls at
Easter. As we dwell in thought upon the manner
of CHRIST S reception, the palm branches hailing
Him as the mighty Conqueror of Death and Hell,
and the garments cast in the way before Him Who
did invest man first with clothing after his fall ; as
we picture to ourselves how the Jews thus greet
their King, let us ask ourselves how we purpose to
receive Him ? Let us carry the palms of victory over
ourselves, over our passions and infirmities ; let us
276 PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION. [SERM.
despoil ourselves of the old Adam, of all our old
and inveterate bad habits, and so go forth to join
the cry of the rejoicing Church throughout the
world, " Behold, thy King cometh." At Easter
CHRIST purposes to enter into thy soul in the Holy
Sacrament of the Altar. Prepare for His entry,
prepare worthily as for thy King. And in order to
be a worthy receiver of JESUS, see to it, in the first
place, that you meet Him without sin.
David, when GOD suffered him not to build the
Temple, prepared for its future erection by his son
Solomon. Long before the time of his death he
laid up the most precious things he could find for
the use of his son in building it. But this Temple
was only to receive the tables of the law and the
pot of manna. How much more should we pre
pare the temples of our souls for the reception of
CHRIST, as the Giver of the Law and the True
Manna of His spiritual Israel? When the Jews
celebrated their passover, what a number of rites
and ceremonies had they to go through ? Surely
Christians must have to use greater diligence in
making ready for the true Paschal Lamb in the
Eucharist. Consider what you would in the way of
preparation, if you expected a prince or a noble to
come and pay you a visit. What putting of things
in order, what cleanings, what provisions, what
adornments would exercise your skill arid taste, ere
you would deem your house worthy of such a guest !
Yet JESUS CHRIST is coming to you, He is coming
to unite Himself to you, He is coming to dwell with
XXXII.] PREPAllATION FOR COMMUNION. 277
you. Must there not be great preparation for so
great a guest ? Sin will else place a barrier betwixt
Him and your soul. You wdll derive no benefit from
His indwelling presence, but rather loss. Sin does
not indeed alter the fact of His spiritual presence
in the Sacrament. CHRIST is present in the Sacra
ment, whether we prepare for Him or no. We re
ceive the Sacrament of His Body and Blood, come
how and as we may ; but then it is of no avail to
us. He was present in the days of His earthly
tabernacling to all; but He did not heal all. " Ac
cording to your faith be it unto you." " Accord
ing to our belief and obedience," is still the measure
of our benefiting by CHRIST S presence among us in
the Blessed Sacrament. What outrages does He
suffer still at the hands of Christians in this season
of His spiritual presence ! A Judas, a Pilate, a
Herod, a Caiaphas, a multitude, are still found to
treat Him ill, to profane Him, to use all manner of
indignities towards His Sacred Person. For the
unworthy communicant resembles all those mon
sters in nature who came about Him like fat bulls
of Basan.
Let not then the vindictive, the revengeful, those
who harbour feelings of anger against their brethren,
come to their meek and patient King. Let not
those who restore not what they have gained by
fraud or cheating. Let not the drunkard and the
unclean draw nigh to their SAVIOUR. Keep aloof,
stand without, all ye who sorrow not and mourn
not over past sins and errors, who know not your
278 PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION. [sERM.
besetting sins, who never examine yourselves, who
never confess your sins, nor pray for pardon. Draw
riot nigh hither all ye who, though ye have forsaken
your sins, yet preserve an attachment to them, nor
have learned to loathe and detest them. For we
must not only give over sin, not only cease from
evil for awhile, but also hate that wherein soever
we have fallen from GOD. Else our hearts still re
main enslaved to Satan, while outwardly we are
GOD S else we have but skinned over the wound,
and it is ever ready to break out anew else our
communion is sacrilegious we are guilty of the
Body and Blood of the LORD we profane His pre
sence. " Ye cannot eat of the table of the LORD,
and of the table of devils." We shall be only in
the condition of sick people, to whom the best and
most nourishing food becomes poison. " But let
a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that
bread, and drink of that cup." Let him repent
from the bottom of his heart. Let there be no
superficial review of his faults, but let him scan him
self thoroughly. Let him be like a debtor expect
ing his creditors to meet him, and inquire into his
accounts. Let him not be content with bare decla
rations of his faults. It is easy to make general
and even particular confessions of sin, to recite a
few prayers. But this suffices not. The extir
pation of sin must be thorough. We must look
diligently to see if we be enslaved to any sin, any
evil habits, any bad passion. Does any secret sin
hold us in subjection ? Is the heart as well as the
XXXII.] PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION. 270
hand fit to receive its King ? Do we take heed not
to offend with our tongues ? Our tongues are to
he tinged red in the Blood of the LORD. Oh ! hor
rible, if we have polluted them with lying and de
ceit, anger and hatred, drunkenness and impurity.
Your tongue is to taste and your heart to receive
the King. O that this thought might restrain your
speech, and prevent your heart from becoming the
throne of His enemy ! See what are your faults,
your irregular passions, your secret pollutions. In
quire whether you are living as becomes one who is
to be joined in the closest intimacy with your LORD.
What are your occupations, your duties ? How do
you fulfil them ? Do you do your duty in your
station, be it high or low ? If not, reform your
habits, begin a change. Be really sorry for having
lived a life so unworthy of Him Who bought you
with His own Blood, for having defiled yourself the
tabernacle of the HOLY GHOST. Else fear to ap
proach the Altar. Come not to your King without
sorrow, real and lasting, for your past rebellions.
For the holy bread and the sacred chalice is death
to the wicked, life to the good. " Whoso eateth
and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh dam
nation to himself."
Every wicked and impenitent communicant re
ceives into his body condemnation, and not sal
vation. What an awful example for unworthy
communicants is Judas! "After the sop, Satan
entered into him." Satan too will enter into thee
and not thy king, if thou doest not thy best to root
2SO PKEl A RATION FOR COMMUNION.
out every thing of evil, unworthy of the Divine
Visitor. " It were good for that man if he had not
been born." Depart then, unforgiving, vindictive,
perjured persons, all whose passions are unrestrained
and have not cast off the slough of their sins.
Better that ye should delay to communicate till ye
have purified yourselves, than receive unworthily
even at Easter ; GOD grant that you may by His
grace be cleansed and purged, GOD grant you better
than this. May He make you worthy, and assist
your hearty endeavours at preparation for your
Easter Communion. Nor only ye who have sinned
grievously, but ye also who have little failings and
infirmities, purify yourselves also. CHRIST washed
His disciples feet before His institution of the
Eucharist, to set before us the necessity of receiving
Him with the utmost purity. Little sins hinder
grace, the lightest breath of sin may dim and dull the
image of CHRIST reflected in yourselves. The smallest
transgression may be a root of bitterness hereafter to
spring up a curse and a blight on your existence as a
Christian. Let there be nothing in you unrepented of
and unwept for, nothing not hated, not loathed as it
ought to be. O rny younger brethren, let there be
nothing in you to deaden the freshness of your SA
VIOUR S love, let Him find in your hearts a throne
without a rival, a temple without profanations. Be
seech Him to consume by the fire of His love, the least
fault of which you are conscious.
II. The Jewish ceremonies in the celebration of their
Passover, point out the manner in which we ought
XXXII.] PEEPARATION TOR COMMUNION. 281
to prepare to eat of the true Paschal Lamh. They
were ordered to eat it with bitter herbs. What do
we understand by this, but that we must mortify
our appetites and desires, that the Christian must
deny himself, must not live as he wills, must cross
his affections and pleasures ? We must prepare for
the Eucharist by a course of painful obedience, and
no less painful penitence if in anything we have not
obeyed.
Again, the Jew was to eat of his Passover, stand
ing, with shoes on his feet and staff in his hand, as
one on a journey. Even so must the Christian
realize to himself the character of a pilgrim and a
sojourner, not thinking of himself as having a con
tinuing city, not loving the things of time and sense
so much as the things of eternity. Let him eat as
of the true manna in this wilderness, let him kneel
down as at the table which GOD has provided in a
desert, " O GOD, Thou art my GOD, early will I seek
Thee. Thus have I looked for Thee in the sanc
tuary that I might behold Thy power and glory.
My soul thirsteth for Thee, my flesh also longeth
after Thee, in a barren and thirsty land where no
water is." Behold, thy King cometh." Have a
lively faith in Him, in His greatness, majesty, and
holiness. Contrast with this your misery, lowli
ness, and need. Who is this King you are going to
receive ? It is the LORD of Heaven and earth, the
King of kings, my GOD, my Creator, my SAVIOUR,
the same JESUS CHRIST Who worked so many
miracles on the earth, Who healed the sick, Who
282 PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION.
raised the dead, Who died on the Cross for me,
Who rose again, ascended into heaven, sitteth on
the right hand of His FATHER, and Who shall come
one day with all His glory and majesty to judge the
quick and the dead. Yes, I believe that It is the same
JESUS CHRIST That I go to receive Who is the bliss
and joy of the saints in glory. Ah ! what happiness
for me. But for me who am a poor and miserable
sinner, dust and ashes, a worm of earth to approach
thus the Holy of Holies, the GOD of all majesty and
greatness ! Oh if I had but at least preserved my
innocence ! Oh that I had never offended a GOD
so good and gracious ! But after so many sins how
can I have the boldness to approach the holy table ?
Such, brethren, are the feelings faith should produce
in us, such is the humility, which should make you
recognize, more than did the Centurion in the Gos
pel, your unworthiness to receive your King. LORD,
I am not worthy that Thou shouldest enter under
the roof of my soul ; I am unworthy to receive
Thee. One word only from Thee would be far above
my deservings. Or say with S. Peter, far from ap
proaching Thee, 1 should rather pray, " Depart
from me, for I am a sinful man, O LORD." It
would be too much for me to be allowed to occupy
the lowest seat at the feast, even with the Publican
to be allowed to stand afar off and say, " GOD, be
merciful to me a sinner." It suffices that Thou
shouldest pardon my sins. But to approach Thee
after having so often offended Thee, to lodge Thee in
my heart, which has been so often soiled by sin. Oh
XXXII.] PREPARATION FOR COMMUNION. 283
I fear that fire will come forth out of the tabernacle
and consume me for my boldness. Had I the purity
of Angels, all the virtues of Saints, I should fear to
approach Thee. How must it be after all the sins
I have committed ?
But this fear, brethren, need not discourage us if
we do our best to prepare to receive our King.
You may temper this salutary fear with that con
fidence which JESUS CHRIST would inspire in all
whom He invites. " Come unto Me all that tra
vail and are heavy laden, and I will refresh you."
" Come, eat of My bread, and drink of the wine
which I have mingled." But that this delicious
food may do you good, you must hunger and
thirst for it. You must excite in yourself that
ardour which JESUS CHRIST has testified to unite
Himself to you. Pray that a coal from off the
Altar of His sacred Heart may kindle your coldness
of love and desire. " Behold, your King cometh,
meek." He comes in all the mildness of a SAVIOUR,
to make a conquest of your heart, to reign in your
soul, to subject all your passions to His law, to
teach you your duties, to scatter your darkness, and
lead you into all truth. As a physician to heal
your diseases, as a shepherd to guide you into the
fold or as a tender husband to form a holy union
with your soul. Is not all this capable of producing
in you the most ardent love for GOD, Who loves
you thus wonderfully ?
To prepare then for a fervent communion, pass
this holy week in greater retirement, in more prayer-
28-1 PREPARATION EOIl COMMUNION.
fulness. Be more faithful to your duties, more
constant in your attendance at church. Go with
joy to the foot of Calvary to contemplate the love of
GOD, Who was made obedient unto death, even
the death of the cross, for you. Mortify your
flesh, try to feel yourselves some of the pains
JESUS CHRIST suffered for you. u Let this mind
be in you which was also in Him." Self-denial
joined with prayer is a good preparation for the
communion. Excite in yourselves acts of faith,
adoration, humility, fear, hope, and love. If you
can spare but little time, insist especially upon acts
of humility, as most suitable to a sinner. Say as
you go to communion like the mother of S. John
the Baptist, " Whence cometh it to me that not the
mother of my LORD, but my LORD Himself should
visit me?" "Blessed is He that cometh in the
Name of the LORD." May you so prepare for the
great King, that He may abide with you for ever,
and admit you hereafter to His heavenly palace,
where He will give unto you to sit upon His throne.
SERMON XXXIII.
THE LAST SCENE.
S. JOHN xix. 30.
HE SAID, !T is FINISHED. "
THERE is a strange feeling which enters the mind
when w r e come to the end of anything we have to do
or suffer in this life. Whether it be joy or sorrow
we still feel a something which we cannot express,
different and varying according to circumstances,
hut still under all coming very near to what we call
regret. Joy may have seemed cut too soon short, or
to have led us into some error. Sorrow may have
had its tender alleviations, which we now miss. It
is a very solemn thing to be told of anything in this
life, "It is done it is all over." If of an action,
it cannot be done over again ; if of a suffering, it
cannot be suffered over again. Come what may of
either, our probation in them is finished. Our par
ticular trial in this or that particular is at an end
here, and awaits the last end of all, the judgment.
2SG THE LAST SCENE. [SEUM".
The end of a journey, the end of a day, the end of
the year, all have their peculiar sensations, their
peculiar regrets. And so it will be when we our
selves come to the end of life. Then too shall we
have our mixed feelings of joy and sorrow. Joy
that heaven is so near and sorrow that we have so
ill deserved it. Joy that our trials are over, sorrow
that we have so ill acquitted ourselves in them.
Some such undefined and confused idea is upper
most in our minds to-day when we hear our Blessed
LORD on the Cross say, " It is finished."
Even this might be present to our LORD Himself,
if it be, as some say, that His agony in the garden
was caused by the thought of those millions who
would reject the Atonement He made for sin. It
could not escape His all-knowing mind that when
He uttered those words, they were a savour of life
to some and of death to others. His having finished
the work of salvation the FATHER gave Him to do
could not but be an aggravation of the guilt of sin
ners. But whatever feelings were His, ours at
least must have a somewhat mixed character as we
stand by the Cross for the last time in this way for
this year, and hear His last words of humiliation,
" It is finished." For the warrior sleeps soundly
when the battle is done, but his countrymen mourn
a lost brother, and mingle tears for the slain as
well as cheers for the victors. The labourer or
mechanic completes his work and receives his wages,
but others are pained that his work is so heavy and
his wages so scanty, or that he knows not how long
XXXIII.] THE LAST SCENE. 287
he may be able to get work and maintain his family.
The infant coming into this world of sin and sorrow
casts even a gloom over the joy of a mother s heart,
as she forecasts much of the evil that awaits her
child. And the grief that succeeds to its being
taken away from her is mingled with the comforting
thought that it is at rest from pain in the place
where tears at least are wiped away from the faces
of the Holy Innocents. Or a man has been in
poverty up to a certain time when he suddenly
comes into a large fortune. It is wonderful in such
a case how often he has his misgivings as to his
having come to the end of his hard trials. Some
how or other men cling to their sorrows and trials
as if by an instinctive feeling that they were good
for them. They seem to be conscious that the end
of tribulation is more pregnant with danger to them
than the end of joy. Men who have severe afflic
tions laid upon them seem raised above their fellows.
They seem as if they had a prize which they would
not part with. And when it is snatched from their
hands and they are brought down from the height
of the Cross to the level of the world around, they
seem no longer what they were. There is about
sorrows a sort of Sacramental power. We feel to
wards those on whose heads they rest, as towards
the Crucified One. Who can doubt but that in all
these cases there is almost a wish to delay the utter
ance of those words, " It is finished."
I am trying to help you to conceive just now what
were the feelings of the dolorous mother and the
288 THE LAST SCEXE. [SERM.
sorrowing Apostle at the foot of the Cross. For
their feelings ought to be yours, if you have at all
tried to enter into the events of the Passion. One
knows how it is when one has been watching by a
sick and dying person for a long while. It seems so
distressing and painful that if we were told how long
we should have to tend that sufferer, we should sink
at once at the very idea. Day succeeds to day, and
night to night. Hours grow into days, and days
into weeks, and weeks into months, or more than
all this. This and that circumstance adds to our
distress, that wound, this unkindness towards the
patient, that neglect, harsh and unfeeling words
which then above all times go to the quick and pain
most. We look upon that wasting and worn body
as it hangs beside our SAVIOUR S Cross with prayers
that the pangs of the sufferer may be shortened.
And as the clammy sweat gathers on the brow, and
we wipe it away from the convulsed limbs, we say,
" Eli, Eli," " Heavenly FATHER, hast Thou forsaken
Thy son or daughter?" Kind women look in upon
us, often our poorest neighbours, and lament the
sorrows of their crucified brother or sister. And
the same voice, we have heard it often, comes from
the sufferer s lips, " Weep not for me, but for your
selves." Then too comes the settling of worldly
concerns, the care for an aged mother or a loved
child. And the sufferer is bidden withal to do that
sometimes the hardest of all things, forgive those
who have wronged him or her. Mental and bodily
struggles hasten the departure of the lingering spirit,
XXXIII.] THE LAST SCENE. 289
but the body s wants are yet alive, and the cry, " I
thirst," is heard. Then comes the commending of
the soul into the hands of the FATHER and " It is
finished." The head is bowed in death and all is
over. And that release makes us thankful, and yet
we are not satisfied. We could have wished to
have detained the fast ebbing life a little longer,
Something more we would have done ; something
more the sufferer should have done ; something
more we should have said ; something more the
sufferer should have said. The "It is finished, 5
seems to grate on our ears unpleasantly. It has
come too soon, and unexpectedly at last. We can
hardly believe it. It* has ended so quietly and
calmly at last. " Pilate wondered if he were already
dead." The soldiers, who brake the legs of the
two thieves to hasten their end, marvel to find
JESUS dead already. And then the thoughts come
how we shall manage to inter our crucified one,
how to get money for the myrrh and the spices,
how the grave clothes, where we shall be able
to find a sepulchre; how to get our JESUS down
from the Cross decently and reverently. And then
how to quietly carry the remains of the loved one
through that multitude that stand by the Cross.
How much too soon that " It is finished" has come
upon us.
Is it not so, dear brethren, with us just now ?
We have been the while trying to work into our
selves the Crucified One, as the type and symbol of
all suffering. All His sufferings have been dwelt
200 THE LAST SCENE. [SERM.
upon by us, in the hope that through thus dwelling
upon them we might become crucified with Him ;
that we might be accustomed to the endurance of
pain and sorrow, affliction and death. The lesson
seems hardly learned when the school of the dis
ciples of the Cross is dismissed, and we are told to
go home. A little longer, a few days more, and the
lesson would have been well worked into us. Some
part of it we fear is unlearned. We have not learned
how to bear the desertion of loved ones, as they
shrunk from staying to see the end ; or how to take
their betrayal of our confidence, and seizing advan
tage of our infirmities. We can forgive enemies,
perhaps, but not the familiar friend, whom we
trusted, and who has lifted up his heel against
us. We have learned how to bear pain, but not
shame. We can forbear speaking in the midst of
bodily pain, but not in the midst of spiritual. False
accusations torture us more than bodily indignities.
We are prepared for death, but not that mode of
death which is perhaps to be ours. Trifles may
affect us more than we think. The spitting moves
us more than the scourging, the smiting on the
cheek more than the mocking of Herod. We can
bear hunger and fasting ; but parched lips extract
the cry, " I thirst." Or we are ready to endure
withdrawal of human sympathy, but not of the light
of the countenance of our Heavenly FATHER. We
are not yet perfect in our lesson. We do not know
what may come upon us during the rest of the year,
for which we have now been associating ourselves
XXXIIT.] THE LAST SCENE. 291
with the crucifixion of JESUS CHRIST. Just that
may come upon us, for which we are most un
schooled, least disciplined. And so we feel it good
for us to be here, close beside the suffering GOD.
But the words seem to be said too suddenly, " It is
finished."
And there are other thoughts too beside these
that come rushing into our mind ; for it is not only
to obtain grace, but also pardon that we have visited
Calvary. Not only does the Virgin Mother come
here, not only the loved Apostle, but repenting
Peter, and the saved Magdalene. We have forgot
ten, or we have been too late for speaking on such
a subject. We wanted to have told the sufferer
how much it grieved us that we had done so and
so ; that we had been thus and thus unkind ; that
we had neglected him in this or that way ; that we
had been impatient and wayward ; that we had in
jured him in such and such and such ways. There
he lies speechless, eloquent in his silence ; or he
bears even bodily marks of our conduct. The blow
we gave in childhood may have become more visi
ble and distinct, as the fulness of his features is
wasted ; or his very disease may be owing to our
neglect or unkiridness. It is so now with JESUS
CHRIST. Our hands and feet are not our own, but
His, for He has taken them into His sacred Huma
nity. So with our mouths, and the whole of our
body. It is His mouth we have defiled, not our
own. His hands we have profaned. His feet we
have made to stray. His eyes we have caused shame
r 2
292 THE LAST SCENE. [SEEM.
unto. And we see how we have wounded them.
As He hangs on the Cross we see them bleeding.
And last we see the tide of pain gushing from His
heart, because we have filled our hearts with guilt
and sin. We wanted to tell Him all this. Part we
may have told Him, but not all. We did not begin
to think about it soon enough, to prepare our con
fessions, to shed our tears. Something we would
have said, we cannot now, for "It is finished."
But we hope to meet again one day, we and that
suffering one. How will it be with us? What
sort of meeting shall we have ? We have parted
without being forgiven all. That fixed look seems
to haunt us, which said in expressive silence, " Yet
one thing is betwixt us." Ah ! dear brethren, the
saints do not feel anger, or indignation, or resent
ment. They pray for us, and help us, in that wherein
we have been lacking by their prayer. All involun
tary failings they can assist us in blotting out of
the books of remembrance. Much more He, the
King of saints, Who knows best our infirmities and
shortcomings. He will intercede for our failings
this Passion-Tide, and entreat the face of His
FATHER not to turn away. Let us pray Him to
make up to us what is wanting in our prayers for
pardon. Let us, as He now mystically hangs in
the midst of us, beseech Him to let us have a
portion in His prayers, " FATHER, forgive them,
for they know not what they do." So when He
shall come again in glory, and say of this world
and its works, "It is done" " It is finished"
XXXIII.] THE LAST SCENE. 293
we may be of the number of those that having hung
on the right hand beside Him in His Crucifixion,
may be set on the right hand beside Him on His
throne, and hear Him say unto us, " This day shalt
thou be with Me in My kingdom."
S E K M ON XXXI V.
THE DAILY BKEAD.
S. MATT. vi. 11.
" GIVE US THIS DAY OTJK DAILY BEEAD."
WHEN the husbandman gathers in his wheat after
a good harvest with what satisfaction does he think
of all the toils and labours he had to endure in pre
paring the soil and tilling the ground ? It will be
so with the great Husbandman, JESUS CHRIST, when
the end of the world shall come and His angel -
reapers shall put forth their sickles and bear the
wheat into the eternal garner. And to-day was the
end of all His severe pains and troubles in culti
vating that soil which sin had cursed and choked
with the briars and thorns of unfruitfulness. As
He came to renew that soil by imparting to it His
own salutary influence, so He was pleased to submit
to be brought into cultivation as though the most
barren and waste wilderness. Therefore did He
give His back to be furrowed by the scourge, and
THE DAILY BREAD. 295
suffered as it were the plough-share of the Cross to
pass over Him. He irrigated this soil with His own
Blood, that so might spring forth that corn of wheat,
from which we receive the hallowed Bread of the
Eucharist. All that we have heard this week and
to-day has had its share in providing us with this
Bread. Therefore do we call to-day Good Friday,
since it has furnished us with so healthful a food.
Glorious harvest whereby we eat and drink at the
table of GOD, and are satisfied with the pleasures of
His house. Other bread is but the bread of tears,
hardly won with the sweat of our brows. But this
fills our heart with joy and gladness, and in its
strength we go even unto the mount of GOD through
this waste howling wilderness of life. Truly we see
in this the travail of His soul, and are satisfied, as
we eat of that bread and drink of that cup. For
CHRIST on the Cross is not only a Sacrifice for sin,
but also strength against sin. As with the Jewish
sacrifices so with this our sacrifice. The victim is
not only slain, but also eaten. He is our food and
sustenance as well as our propitiation. He not only
appeases the Divine wrath by being offered up on
the altar of the Cross, but He hallows us by commu
nicating to our fallen natures His own sinless One.
The Cross is that tree of life, to which we, who
were lost through Adam s eating of the forbidden
tree, may put forth our hands and eat of its fruit
and live for ever. CHRIST on the Cross is the
Eternal High Priest, Who not only slays Himself as
the most perfect and spotless Lamb for an atone-
296 THE DAILY BREAD, [SE11M.
rnent, but also gives us Himself for the nourishment
of His people. Thus He is too the Good Shepherd
Who not only gives His life instead of the sheep,
but also feeds them with Himself. Not only does
He prevent their perishing by offering Himself to
the wrath of their enemies, and receiving in His
own body the wounds intended to have been in
flicted on them, but He also preserves them alive
by allowing them to pasture upon Himself in the
desert of the world. And this is why He cried so
earnestly on the Cross, " I thirst." He thirsted to
supply the hungry souls of men with His own
Blood. He knew how long the prodigal sons of
Gou had been trying in vain to satisfy their want
with the husks of swine. Adam had sinned through
eating of food forbidden him, and CHRIST, the second
Adam, thereby is content to suffer the pangs of
thirst even as He hangs a dying, that He might
cool our feverish desires for material things. He
thirsted to feed us. He was willing to thirst that
so He might thereby supply us with a refreshing
cup. " With desire have I desired to eat this pass-
over with you before I suffer/
He longed not only to accomplish His bloody
baptism for our forgiveness, but to nourish our souls.
Other pains moved Him not to utter any complaint.
But this did because of the intensity of His desire
for our salvation. It was no mere bodily thirst, but
a burning love for the souls of men, which extracted
this sharp cry. We know what mental emotion
will do. We have most of us felt that gasping for
XXXIV.] THE DAILY BKEAD. 297
breath that sudden parching of the mouth which
great inward struggles will cause. As it was some
inward and secret pang of soul which brought the
SAVIOUR into an agony and forced the drops of
blood as it were sweat from His body, so too it was
on the Cross when He cried aloud, " I thirst." And
therefore it was that the soldier pierced His side with
the spear that this His thirst should be satisfied.
For that water and blood which therefrom issued is
given us in the Blessed Sacrament to cool our
parched lips. Thus all that happened to-day all
the sad circumstances of CHRIST S Crucifixion and
Passion have their fruit in the Blessed Sacrament.
He who sows in tears to-day, will on Easter morn
ing, reap in joy, as He beholds us drawing near to
eat and drink of Him. And hence we are bidden
in this way to " show the LORD S death till He come."
Every celebration of the Holy Eucharist is another
Good Friday, wherein the priest commemorates the
sacrifice of the death of CHRIST. We do not com
memorate It to-day, because It sacramentally takes
place to-day. All the rest of the year we are like
artists copying from recollection of some master
piece of painting or sculpture, but who, once a year,
are allowed to gaze upon the original.
To-day, as it were, the whole scene comes before
us. We do not, as at other times, take this or that
detail and work it up into our picture : but w r e are
occupied with the varying and shifting circumstances
which surround the Crucifixion of JESUS CHRIST.
When the High Priest Himself thus comes once a
298 THE DAILY BKEAlh [SEBM.
year to enter in by His own blood into the Holy
Place, His subordinates must needs give way. And
this leads me to say, that to dwell on the Crucifixion
in your own minds, is to feed on CHRIST crucified.
This is what should be your daily bread CHRIST
on the Cross. As even the Blessed Sacrament can
have no higher office than to show the LORD S death
till He come: so by continually representing to
your mind s eye the pangs and agonies of your dy
ing SAVIOUR, you do hourly what in the Sacrament
can at most be scarcely done more than daily. And
this continual lifting up of our LORD on the Cross
feeds and sustains the soul more than one can ex
press. Fixing the thoughts on His thorn-crowned
Head dispels pride. Dwelling in spirit on His
nailed Hands checks covetousness and lust. His
Mouth abused and buffeted bids us refrain from
profane or defiling words. His pierced Heart can
not but recall wandering thoughts from sin. His
thirst and fasting must make us resolve not to of
fend or exceed in meats or drinks. His nailed feet,
obedient to the will of the FATHER in suffering,
should stir us up to put away sloth in doing.
All the more that we gaze on the Crucified One
shall we be fed with such virtues and graces as these
which flow from His Passion. And without this all
Sacraments and ordinances are useless. We only
really show the LORD S death, when it feeds and
quickens us. We do not show It when we remain
dead ourselves ; when our life is dormant or de
cayed, when in fact, It is not part of ourselves.
XXXIV. j THE DAILY BHEAD. 209
To-day, as we stand by the dying agonies of our
LORD and Master is a fit day for making good reso
lutions. Let then this day be a beginning to some
of you of making CHRIST on the Cross your daily
bread, your ceaseless meditation. Lovers dwell on
the form and fashion of those they love till we see
they have acquired a resemblance to the loved one.
So it will be with you if you cherish love to CHRIST
crucified. All sins will seem to work themselves
out of the characters of those who are impressed
with the image of their dying LORD. All virtues
grow and mix themselves up with their regenerate
life. This day will be useless to you if some such
effect as this does not result from what 1 now say to
you. Anciently Christians were ridiculed because
they said they carried about with them the Crucified
One. Would it not be a satire upon many Chris
tians if they were called Xpia-ropopoi or CnRiST-bearers ?
Can anything be further from the thoughts of many
as they go on from childhood to the grave, than this
scene which to-day engrosses our thoughts and affec
tions ? What marvel when trials, and afflictions, and
disappointments, and reverses come, we are often so
ill-prepared, so ill- fed, so weak to meet our struggle !
And as nothing can be done in religion without
habits, so let the Crucifixion thoughts work them
selves into your daily habits. Many of you leave
your work at nine, you can think then of JESUS
setting out on His painful journey bearing His
Cross. Many of you return to your work at three,
you can fix your minds on JESUS breathing out His
300 THE DAILY 33IIEAI>,
soul in death on the Cross. Just to take any hour
that you find mentioned in Holy Scripture con
nected with the Crucifixion, and force a habit of
dwelling on its peculiar share in the sorrows of our
LORD will in time have an impression on your cha
racters. It will become natural to you to go in
thought to Calvary, just as now it may be natural
to turn away from it. All this is a lesson you must
learn some day, and you had better try to learn
it now, before some stern master comes and lays
his rod upon you. Sickness, poverty, sorrow 7 , or
death may come to you sooner than you imagine,
and then what a miserable starved troop do you lead
against the enemy ! You have turned aside and
gazed on the Cross, but It has not been stamped on
your characters. Its fruit has not sustained and
nourished you ; you have not lived by the death of
CHRIST : and when Satan comes to sift you as
wheat, you are feeble and cowardly. Pray then that
this Bread of Life may be given you daily. Pray that
the Crucified one may ever be the food of your soul.
So will it not seem strange to you to come often to
show forth the LORD S death till He come, either by
partaking of the Body and Blood of CHRIST, or by
being present at every celebration of that Sacrament,
wherein the Son of Man is lifted up like the Brazen
Serpent, in order that even they who gaze with
faith, though they eat not, may in their measure and
degree be fed by Him.
SERMON XXXV.
THE VALLEY OP THE SHADOW OF DEATH.
PSALM xxm. 4.
" YEA, THOUGH I WALK THEOUGH THE VALLEY OP THE
SHADOW OF DEATH, I WILL FEAE NO EVIL : FOR TlIOU AKT
WITH ME, THY BOD AND TllY STAFF COMFOET ME."
THE valley of the shadow of death ! What a dark
and dreary prospect for those who climb the heights
of this world, that they must come down from their
transitory greatness and toil through this valley of
humiliation. Nothing can accompany us as our
feet tremble and totter there. No loved ones join
their hands to ours, and assist our stumbling paces.
The endearments of parents, the caresses of chil
dren, the sympathies of friends, the loves of part
ners, the embraces of brethren and sisters, vanish
from our eyes as we descend to the region of sha
dows. Heaps of gold and silver lie piled up to
gether at the gate thereof; for they who would not
part with their riches before, here are forced to leave
302 THE YALLEY OF TTT.E SHADOW OF DEATH. [SEftM.
them. As we pass beneath its gloomy portal we
are stripped of all. Fame, titles, renown, good re
port, of what use are they ? Will they guide us to
the goal of this dismal vale ? The splendour of
this world is at once hid and overwhelmed by the
pall of death. Nor will their wisdom aid, who have
scanned the path of the heavenly bodies, or probed
the strata of the earth, or mastered the tongues of
all nations.
O mortal man, here gaze,, where soon thou must
be bereaved and spoiled of all things. Gaze upon
that yawning blackness. Surely it will convince
thee that
" The glories of our birth and state,
Are shadows, not substantial thiDgs."
Rather does that valley begin the dread reality of
life. It is the valley of the shadow of death, not
of death itself. This world is the valley of shadows ;
but this valley, through which thou passest, leads
to that life, whereof the present is but a faint shadow
and a poor semblance. Here thou art stripped of
earthly things, that thou mayest return to thy home
disencumbered of thy soldierly baggage. Naked
didst thou come hither, naked must thou return.
Well mayest thou fear, if thou hast hitherto lived
as amongst realities, and not by faith amidst sha
dows, when the seeming realities dwindle into
shadows, and shadows grow and wax into realities.
What were the good things of this life but shadows
to that rich man, who cried in the bitterness of his
XXXV.] THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. 303
soul, " Father Abraham, I pray thee send Lazarus,
that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and
cool my tongue?" All the purple, fine linen, and
sumptuous fare, these were but shadows ; the In
finite Reality stared him in the face. What greater
evil can there be to the worldling than to look for
ward to this valley, whither nothing he has valued
and prized can follow him ? Well may he tremble
as he stands poor and naked at its very door ?
Nor only so, brethren, but we ourselves, who
know the vanity and worthlessness of earthly ob
jects of desire, who desire not to make our home
in this world of shadows and day-dreams, we also
are beset with fears as we approach the valley of
the shadow of death. We fear, because of its dark
ness. It is an evil that we cannot measure. We
feel as though setting out on a journey to an undis
covered country, from which no traveller has re
turned to give us his experience. It is the last
stronghold of the Prince of Evil. Once pass this
and we are safe for evermore. The warrior pauses
as he sees before him the last battle-field, on which
all depends. Here the foe will employ his wiliest
stratagems, and exert his utmost strength. It may
be that an inglorious defeat may rob him of all the
advantage he has hitherto gained by continual vic
tories. So in our Christian warfare we dread the
last conflict with evil, because on it all depends.
Our whole life crowds into that narrow vale where
we must struggle for life and victory. On the one
side is the Evil One and his angels, and our sinful
304; THE VALLEY OP THE SHADOW OF DEATH. [SEEM.
habits, threatening our utmost peril. One secret
sin here may come forth to light at last, and become
our sad undoing for ever. Every act of ours that
has been evil then seems to set itself against us, and
become a vantage ground for the malicious enemy.
If the Evil One lose his victim now, it is for ever,
so he is on the alert. And the conflict is not as in
past times. We have often met the foe before, but
it was in health and strength ; but now it is to be in
sickness and weakness. We fight now on unequal
terms, and that for the last time. Dreadful as is
the thought of the parting asunder of soul and body,
our dread increases with the knowledge that Satan
will take occasion then to work our eternal ruin.
If our body shrinks from the sudden separation of
the soul, much more the soul as evil spirits wait its
departure from its tabernacle of clay. Who can tell
whether that same faith which has stood him so
well hitherto, will not fail when the dews of the last
agony are on his brow, or when the soul sets out on
its flight to the world of spirits ? " Woe unto us,"
we shall say then, " for the Devil is come down
unto us with great wrath, knowing that he hath but
a short time." At no time is our salvation sure and
indubitable ; still less when our enemy is labouring
for the last time to work our destruction. And if all
have cause to fear then even those who have lived
closest to GOD, and obeyed His commandments-
much more they, who have not watched and kept
their baptismal garments, but led careless not to
say sinful lives. Good were it to fear the evil which
XXXV.] THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. 305
awaits us in the valley of the shadow of death now,
so that when it shall come to us, fear may turn into
confidence and trust in GOD. Pray we and strive we
always to endure unto the end, that when the end
cometh our perseverance and patient continuance in
well-doing may bring us to the eternal salvation of
our souls.
But the true Christian shall, when he passes
through the valley of the shadow of death, fear no
evil. He may dread ere the evil come ; and good
it is for him to dread ; for it is that which keeps
him watchful and prayerful, but when the evil comes,
it causes in him no terrors. " Though I walk
through the valley of the shadow of death, I will
fear no evil, for Thou art with me." Here is his
ground of confidence CHRIST S presence. "Thou
art with me." He Who in baptism vouchsafed to
make His creature a member of His mystic body,
Who has continued with him and ever and anon
revived his decaying strength by Confirmation, Ab
solution, and the Holy Eucharist. He is with him in
that last struggle also. All his life long has been a
perpetual endeavour to keep close to his SAVIOUR, by
holy deeds, and words, and thoughts, and by assem
bling with the two or three in His Name and spe
cially by receiving the Sacrament of His Body and
Blood ; and now CHRIST will not fail him. While
health and wealth permitted he sought for and con
strained JESUS to abide with him, and in his hour of
tribulation and danger the presence of his LORD
cheers and encourages him. Every good thing said
306 THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. [SEEM.
or done in past days now gives assurance of His
presence, without Whom we can do nothing, and
Who forsaketh not us except we forsake Him.
With Him on our side, Whom can we fear, " GOD
is our hope and strength, a very present help in
trouble. Therefore will we not fear, though the
earth be moved; and though the hills be carried
into the midst of the sea. Though the waters thereof
rage and swell : and though the mountains shake
at the tempest of the same." As He was with the
three children in the burning fiery furnace, so with
His faithful in the valley of the shadow of death.
His voice speaking to their inmost souls calms their
terrors and assuages their excited and disturbed
feelings. His hand strengthens their weakness-
abates their sufferings expels the legions of evil
spirits, thirsting for their destruction. He it is Who
smooths the pillow of the dying Christian and brings
him safely at last by the hands of angels to the
mansions of the blessed. The waters of Jordan
foam and rush fiercely along as though to keep us
from crossing into our Canaan, but our Elijah
JESUS the everlasting SON makes a way for His
ransomed to pass over. "Fear not; for I have
redeemed thee, I have called thee by My Name ;
thou art Mine. When thou passest through the
waters, I am with thee; and through the rivers
they shall not overflow thee ; when thou walkest
through the fire thou shalt not be burned, neither
shall the flame kindle upon thee."
" Thou art with me, I will fear no evil, Thy rod
XXXV.] THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. ,307
and Thy staff comfort me." It is the rod and staff
of the Good Shepherd the Cross of our JESUS
which comforts us. To this end were we signed
with that Cross on our entry into the Church, that
by It we might be comforted and strengthened all
the days of our life. It is the Cross of JESUS which
extracts the bitter from the cup which we must
drink from that font of baptism to the last Sacra
ment. It is the knowledge that we are treading in
His blood-stained steps which comforts us in every
trial, every sorrow, and every pain. Nothing is
dreaded by those who keep in mind and heart the
Cross of CHRIST save sin within and sin without.
And by the power of the Cross even this is alleviated
and softened. It is the last hour that we must live.
We lie in a darkened room, friends and relatives
watching the progress of death, pain and distress
of body are racking our whole frames ; yet here the
Cross comforts ; JESUS the GoD-Man nailed to the
Cross bids us rejoice in being admitted to a fellow
ship with His Incarnate sufferings. Or the Evil one
presses upon our souls with all his malice troubling
our peace with fearful visions. JESUS on the Cross
comforts us as overwhelmed with sorrow He utters
those words of despair, " My GOD, My GOD, why
hast Thou forsaken Me ?" Or reproaches and false
accusations pursue us to our very last breath. JESUS
reviled by the thieves crucified with Him comforts
us. Or the Evil one tempts us by exciting our
minds against those who have injured us. JESUS
on the Cross comforts us, as His voice cries, " FA-
x 2
308 THE VALLEY OP THE SHADOW OF DEATH. [SEttM.
THER, forgive them, for they know not what they
do." No sorrow, no pain, no affliction, no perse
cution, no bitterness of life, or death, but is thus
assuaged and mitigated by the power of the Cross.
Tt is the rod of Moses, which being cast into the
waters of this world, takes away their salt and bitter
savour. How can we live better than by taking
up this holy Cross of our SAVIOUR? How die, but
by crucifying ourselves together with Him ?
Brethren, does the Cross of JESUS thus comfort
you? Does He, Who was lifted up for you, so
draw you unto Himself, that ye are comforted by
Him ? Is JESUS on the Cross your daily meditation,
and specially on that day, which commemorates His
blessed Passion ? Be assured of this, that except
you accustom yourselves daily to meditate upon His
Cross and Passion, it will be a hard matter to rea
lize His dying love in your greatest need, in your
passage through the valley of the shadow of death.
Does the summons to join His disciples in that
upper room at Jerusalem, where He instituted the
memorial of His death and sufferings upon the Cross,
meet in your hearts with a ready welcome ? Let
me urge you to come more frequently to that Sa
crament, wherein we do show forth the LORD S death
till He come, that that life which you received in
baptism and renewed in confirmation may be re
freshed and strengthened by the Communion of
CHRIST S most blessed Body and Blood. Be it your
greatest care and study how you may keep Him
continually before you, as He with outstretched
XXXV.] THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. 309
arms embraccth the whole world upon His Cross,
lest by lukewarmness or actual unholiness you lose
the sense of His presence which taketh away the
fear of evil. " Ignorance," Alvarez says, " of the
treasures which we possess in CHRIST crucified is
the ruin of Christians." Wherefore meditation on
the sufferings of JESUS was his greatest delight, par
ticularly as they regarded His poverty, ignominy,
and torments. Hence he earnestly exhorted his
penitents to meditate frequently on the passion of
our REDEEMER, saying, that they should never think
they had done anything until they had acquired the
habit of constantly keeping the remembrance of
CHRIST crucified alive in their hearts. Let no false
pride, no unhappy prejudice hinder you from using
any means whereby you may realize to yourself
CHRIST on the Cross. Day by day let your prayers
be sanctified by a remembrance of Him. As you say
" through JESUS CHRIST our LORD," pause to look
upon that proof of His love for you. Thus living
close to the Cross of the LORD, thus having Him
ever present to us, when this short and fitful life
shall end, He may remain with us in our passage to
eternity, and bring us to the everlasting comfort of
Paradise.
SERMON XXXVI. 1
THE EESUEEECTION OF THE FLESH.
2 Con. iv. 10.
" ALWAYS BEARING ABOUT IN THE BODY THE DYING OF THE
LORD JESTJS, THAT THE LIFE ALSO OF JESUS MIGHT BE
MADE MANIFEST IN OUR BODY."
A GREAT deal of modern religious controversy might
have been spared if the doctrine of the Resurrec
tion of the Flesh had been surely believed and
universally received. For as the Jews had their
Sadducees, who denied that there was any resurrec
tion, so have we our semi- Sadducees who hold only
a half resurrection. And as the ancient Church had
her Docetse, who impugned the reality of our LORD S
Body, so have we our Docetse, who would make our
rising again from the grave to be a mere phantom
or spectral resurrection. So common is a practical
disbelief in the doctrine of the Resurrection of the
1 Preached also before the University at S. Mary s, Cam
bridge, 1852.
THE RESURRECTION OF T1IE FLESH. 311
Flesh that an Inspector of Schools has asserted that
he found it to he an exception to the rule where
the lambs of CHRIST S flock had had it impressed
upon them. The tacit or open denial of a carnal
resurrection is the origin of so many mere spiritual
abstractions in modern Christianity. It is this
which prevents persons from realizing the doctrine
of the Incarnation fully, or embracing the true doc
trine of the Sacraments. Once give that this body
is not to rise again as really and substantially as
that corn of wheat which after being buried in the
earth sends forth new and fresh life, and the whole
solemnity of the Judgment by the Son of Man sit
ting on His great white throne ceases to impress
the mind with a sense of its reality. All becomes
shadowy and dreamy, where matter ceases to have
being. The graves opening, the dead rising, the
voice of the archangel, the trump of GOD, the small
and great standing before the Judge, the books
opened, the angels carrying the sentence of eternal
weal or woe into effect, the rayless darkness, the im
passable gulf, the gnashing of teeth, the wailing, the
unquenchable fire, all these bereft of the substance
of a true and proper resurrection of the body become
mere poetic fictions of the imagination, rather than
the facts of our stern and terrible future realities.
And so many persons seem to think that the tor
ments of lost souls will be merely spiritual or
ghostly, the rackings and discruciations of the soul
rather than bodily and incarnate sufferings. Of
course I know that the language of Holy Scripture
312 THE RESURRECTION OF THE FLESH. [SERM.
has been accommodated to the comprehension of
our finite capacities ; but I know also that it was
never intended to mislead us altogether by its con
descensions. And the whole description of the
future dispensation supposes mankind to be re
invested after the resurrection with some kind of
fleshly tabernacle though different from the present.
11 All flesh is not the same flesh : but there is one
kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, an
other of fishes, and another of birds."
The notion of a spiritual body does not exclude
the material flesh. Our blessed LORD to-day as it
were, bids us handle Him and see, for a spirit hath
not flesh and bones as we see Him have. The
apostolic comparison of the difference of the mortal
and immortal body to that which exists between the
various constellations affects only their difference in
glory, not their difference in substance. And were
it otherwise, what are we to make of those descrip
tions of the state of the blessed hereafter, which
picture them sitting down at an everlasting feast
sitting on the throne of CHRIST, standing at the
right hand of GOD, and eating of the tree of life ?
Still more though " the heaven shall pass away
with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with
fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are
therein shall be burnt up," yet " we according to
His promise look for new heavens and a new earth
wherein dwelleth righteousness." All these indicate
no fantastic or bodiless existence in the life to come,
but with every allowance for the mode in which the
XXXVI.] THE EESTJftKECTION OF THE FLESH. 813
Scriptures are adapted to our understanding convey
the idea of our being something not wholly distinct
and unlike what we are now. This is illustrated
very strikingly by our LORD, in His teaching us one
difference that will ensue. It had been needless for
Him to have told His hearers that " in heaven they
neither marry nor are given in marriage," unless
the flesh of the resurrection- state had some affinity
to our present state of being. And even in that
middle state, where the soul rests until the great
Easter, may be some embryo of that body which
shall be, some Platonic o^r^c*, of the living prin
ciple. For " what we call spiritual may in fact be
an infinitely fine modification of matter, far too
subtle to be appreciated by our present powers/ 1
" And when we say the soul is immaterial, we mean
that it wants those properties of matter with which
we are acquainted." 2 This is that doubtless whereby
at our LORD S Crucifixion " many bodies of saints
which slept arose and entered into the holy city,
and appeared unto many ;" whereby Dives prayed
for a drop of water to cool his tongue, and whereby
S. John saw under the altar the souls of them which
were slain, and cried, " How long, O LORD ?" As
the body by itself is not the entire man, so no more
is the soul by itself. Nay, there was a time when
man existed soul-less, but never bodiless. Unless
indeed the ordinary acceptation of the term " living
soul," as applied to Adam be incorrect, and con
veys no higher notion of life than that communicated
1 Newnham s Eeciprocal Influence. 3 Ibid.
314 THE RESURRECTION OF THE FLESH. [SERM.
before to the brute creation. All things were made
for man, as he was first created out of the dust, be
fore GOD breathed into his nostrils the breath of
life, whereby Adam became a living soul. And
while thus soul-less, it is said of Adam that he was
created in the image of GOD. Still less hereafter
will the soul by itself be able to represent fully our
humanity. This is why our Blessed LORD did not
at His Ascension leave behind Him that Body which
He had assumed. For then He would no longer
be the Man CHRIST JESUS, but have simply and
purely the nature of GOD. But now is His Man
hood in heaven in pledge and pawn that He will
make this our body of humiliation like His own
Body of glory. And yet in that glorified Body, as
the heathens pictured their warriors in the Elysian
shades, are the marks and scars of earthly suffering,
so that when He comes with clouds every eye shall
see Him, and they also which pierced Him.
Yet there are parts of Holy Scripture which would
seem to disparage the body as opposed to the soul.
But this is only at first sight. For though it is said
by Isaiah, that " all flesh is grass," yet the prophet
also says, that " all flesh shall see the salvation of
GOD." And though GOD declares that His " Spirit
shall not always strive with man, because he is
flesh" yet He also says that He " will pour out of His
Spirit upon all flesh." And though the Apostle
Paul speaks of there being no good thing in his
flesh, of the impossibility of those who are in the
flesh pleasing GOD, of the flesh lusting against the
XXXVI.] THE HESUllEECTION OF THE FLESH. 315
Spirit, yet it is not the substance of the flesh but its
actions which he disparages. For else why does he
boast of bearing in his body the marks of the LORD
JESUS ? why does he forbid the pollution of the
body, as being the temple of GOD ? why does he
speak of our bodies as the members of CHRIST?
why does he bid us glorify GOD in our bodies ?
And when it is said that flesh and blood cannot in
herit the Kingdom of GOD, we must remember that
JESUS CHRIST has ascended into heaven with flesh,
bones, and all things pertaining to the perfection of
man s nature : and that this mortal must put on
immortality, and this corruptible must put on incor-
ruption. Flesh and blood must undergo a change,
but being so changed will find admittance into the
kingdom of GOD. The mortal and corruptible will
not be annihilated or destroyed, but absorbed and
included in the higher principle, which will here
after be superadded to our humanity. Whence S.
Paul says that we desire not to be unclothed, but to
be clothed upon, that mortality may be swallowed
up by life. In like manner our LORD says that " it
is the Spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth no
thing," that is to say, the flesh without the Spirit.
For had the flesh indeed profited nothing, as S.
Augustine remarks, " the LORD would not have be
come flesh and dwelt among us." So little does
Holy Scripture warrant the notion, that our bodies
any more than our souls are the main sources of
evil : or that our present bodies are to have no
part in the resurrection life.
316 THE BKSUEHECTION OF THE FLESH. [SEEM.
And thus because our flesh is to partake with
our souls of the joy or sorrow everlasting, because
it is to undergo a change and not a destruction ;
because the entire man, and not merely a part as is
the soul or body, is to be punished or rewarded,
therefore is it that even in this life the body must
have its place in the work of redemption. No won
der, if in this flesh I am hereafter to see GOD, that
I labour so earnestly to keep it undefiled. No won
der, if in this body, changed but not destroyed, I
am hereafter to prostrate myself before the throne
of the LAMB, that I now exercise it in genuflexions
and bowings of adoration. No wonder that all
Christian Sacraments and Sacramental acts termi
nate upon the body, seeing that it is the seed of our
future regeneration. No wonder that the body is
to be washed in baptism with purifying water, as
well as the heart sprinkled from an evil conscience.
No wonder that in Confirmation and other Sacra
mental rites the hands of the Bishop or Priest over
shadow the Christian disciple. No wonder that in
the Holy Eucharist we eat and drink supernatural
food, not the less real because spiritual and super
natural than that spiritual and glorified body here
after to be assumed by the co-risen with CHRIST.
This was why S. Paul kept under his body with
fastings often ; this is why the crowning point of
Christianity is the bodily sufferings of its Founder ;
and this is why bodily acts of self-humiliation or
mortification serve to the putting away of past sin.
It is a bearing about in the body the dying of the
XXXVI.] THE RESURRECTION OF THE FLESH. 317
LORD JESUS that the life also of JESUS may be made
manifest in our body. As we hope one day to be
taken down from those little crosses on which we
hung our life-long day beside our LORD, and to be
buried with Him, it is because we hope that as we
have shared His death, we shall also share His
Resurrection and Easter glory. And as we have
impressed on our bodies the Sacraments of His Cru
cifixion, He will make manifest in them also His
own glorified life in heaven. And why make mani
fest? Because that your life is hid with CHRIST in
GOD. So when CHRIST your life shall appear, ye
also shall be made manifest with Him in glory.
Wherefore then do we call the bodies of Chris
tians mortal, seeing that death is to them only the
development of life ? And how could we present
our bodies a living sacrifice, if they could be anni
hilated ? We can hardly fail to see in all these
expressions a very different appreciation of the
body s place in the scheme of atonement from that
which is evidenced by the tone of the age in which
we live. And as we enter into this, it will seem
more natural not only that virtue should proceed
out of our LORD S body and heal, but that even the
shadow of S. Peter, as the Holy Scripture tells us,
passing by might possess a medicinal power ; and
that the garments of S. Paul might cure diseases.
All this indeed is the SPIRIT S work. And as He
has been pleased to make our bodies His temples, it
is not likely that He will take even from the dust
and ashes of the Christian His sanctifying influence.
318 THE RESURRECTION OP THE FLESH. [SEEM.
Well indeed has it been said, that " none are so
carnal as those who deny or think little of a carnal
resurrection." It is to the depreciation of our
bodies, and of the part they have to play in our
salvation that we owe the undervaluing of the Church
as the Body of CHRIST, and the Sacraments as the
channels of His grace.
And what is this dying of the LORD JESUS ? Ye
who mortify yourselves by daily dying, by which a
resurrection is being continually accomplished in
you. Men need not study Christian evidences, or
attempt to reconcile contradictions while they have
you among them. You are witnesses to the truth
of the dying and resurrection of JESUS CHRIST. Go
where you will, there you carry about with you
the Gospel of our LORD, known and read of all men.
I see a young man chastising and restraining with
much penitence his lusts and passions, abandoning
scenes and occasions of sin ; punishing the member
that has offended ; weakening his knees by fasting ;
submitting his body to discipline and rule. What a
glorious testimony to the doctrines of the Cruci
fixion and Resurrection. Who will refuse to believe,
when he sees it no longer in a book only, but
wrought out in the daily life of one like himself?
If any one believes not that JESUS died and rose
again, let him believe as he beholds us always carry
ing about in the body the dying of the LORD JESUS,
and manifesting in the body the life of the first
Resurrection. And if Christian men cease thus to
be bearers of the Crucified One, no wonder that the
XXXVT.] THE EESTTRRECTION OF THE FLESH. 319
world believes not in CHRIST. It is only when the
corn of wheat is buried in the earth and dies that it
brings forth fruit. So too they only to whom this
life has been more or less of a Lenten cast, can
hope for its fruits in an Easter resurrection. Daily
deaths manifest the power of the resurrection.
First dying unto pride, to obtain the resurrection of
humility. First dying unto the love of the world
and of worldly things, to gain the resurrection of
the love of GOD. First dying unto our own wills,
to rise again unto obedience. First dying unto
fleshly appetites, that we may hunger and thirst
after a more heavenly food, the Holy Eucharist in
this life, and the hidden manna in the life to come.
First dying to our anger and turbulent passions that
we may manifest the meekness and gentleness of
JESUS CHRIST. First dying to all pollution of flesh
and spirit, that the strength of CHRIST S holy Incar
nation may be exhibited in our weakness and infir
mity. First dying to all jealousy at the goods or
gifts of others that the demon of selfishness may be
thoroughly cast out and trampled under foot. Here
is indeed the carrying about in the body the dying
of the LORD JESUS that so His life may be mani
fested in the body also. As our bodies at the last
must decay and perish, ere they can be swallowed
up of life, so too do they daily die that day by day
they may endue fresh life. It is the law of our
humanity that death must precede life, and out of
the ashes of penitence comes forth the phoenix of
our risen life in CHRIST. May we keep up and
320 THE KESTJKRECTION OF THE FLESH.
continue that carrying about of the dying of the
LORD JESUS, which has been our Lenten work, at
least on each weekly remembrance of the Cruci
fixion, that so when this dying shall have an end,
this lifeless life may be succeeded not by a deathless
death, but by the life everlasting. Unto which
may He of His great mercy bring us all. Amen.
S E ]{ M N X X X V f I.
Iftarfc s I3aj>.
SPEAKING THE TEUTH IN LOVE.
EPIIESIANS iv. 15.
"SPEAKING TIIE TRUTH IN LOVE."
THE Apostle is here insisting on that most impor
tant subject which the Church gives us for medi
tation to-day, union and growth in CHRIST. He
speaks of the hindrances to that union, " the wind
of doctrine the sleight of men and cunning crafti
ness," by which all who are but babes in CHRIST
are liable to be tossed and carried about, as well as
the wonderful assistances provided for us by the
grace of GOD Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pas
tors, and Teachers, by whose ministry the saints
are perfected and the Body of CHRIST edified. Thus
the ministry which GOD the SON gave for the bring
ing mankind into unity with Himself is ever opposed
to the deceitful inventions of men. Once slight
and neglect these ministerial gifts, and the conse-
322 SPEAKING THE TEUTll IX LOVE. [SEEM.
quence is a tossing to and fro upon the waves of
this troublesome world at the mercy of every gale.
But one virtue the Apostle insists on as necessary
to be preserved in the use of these abundant means
supplied by an Apostolic ministry, and that is cha
rity or love. He introduces it in a sort of forced
way, and by way of addition, to show that without
it growth in CHRIST is impossible. Thus the Body
of CHRIST increaseth unto the edifying of itself in
love, and so here " speaking the truth in love may
grow up unto Him in all things."
Without love no societies of men, collected for
whatever purpose, however high and exalted, can
effect the end in view. Our SAVIOUR set this before
the seventy disciples, of whom S. Mark was one,
when He sent them forth two and two. For charity
or love is twofold, since it has two objects, GOD and
our neighbour. And in solitude love can hardly
exist, since there can be no love without an object,
and self-love is not love. And because no one can
be a true Gospel messenger without love, therefore
the LORD sent forth His disciples two and two, that
they might learn to cultivate the principle of love
by mutual exercise of that virtue. And thus all
human associations, in any work, have their trials
as well as comforts. It depends very much whether
the individuals composing them do or do not resist
the natural tendency to selfishness, waywardness,
and wilfulness. We cannot have help from others
except we are prepared to endure something unlike
ourselves something repugnant to our peculiar
XXXVII.] SPEAKING THE TRUTH IN LOVE. 323
habits and views. We cannot have our own way
altogether, and receive help from others. Even
servants of the lowest degree often require of their
masters to put up with their strange modes of set
ting about their work. And the very disciplining
ourselves, which such association in work demands,
has a beneficial effect. Many never knew what
selfishness in themselves or others was till they
came to belong to a body. Hence we observe in
the disputes of such bodies manifestations of selfish
ness or of its opposites, according to the degree in
which their component parts school themselves in
the practice of love. As any rough substances be
come smooth by constant collision, so it is with the
hard earthly nature of men. This is particularly
true of what is a common result of associations of
men. I mean the necessity there often is of ex
pressing our own opinions in contradiction to those
of other members of the same society. It is evi
dently one thing " to speak the truth/ and another
" to speak the truth in love." The truth has been
often disregarded and trodden under foot, because
they who felt called upon to speak it, did it not in
love. And perhaps there is no greater trial than,
when we consider it a solemn duty to tell others of
their faults, to observe the strict measure of Chris
tian charity. We see continually how one man
influences so wonderfully others beyond what men
of his own age, condition, or powers does, simply
because he does not forget love while he openly
rebukes and corrects. A man thinks himself called
Y2
324 . SPEAKING THE TRTJT1I IN LOYE. [SERM.
upon to take others to task and become a sort of
fault-finder general among his brethren. In most
cases his attempts at reformation are utterly in vain,
and that merely because he does it not in love.
We can endure a great deal of correction if ad
ministered in a loving way. Love is, after all, the
greatest part of the punishment. So long as we
are sure that our chastisement is done in love we
can bear much. It is the tone and the manner in
which truth is spoken which makes lovingncss or
unlovingness apparent, and sets the world against
it. It does not then follow simply because what we
have said is true that therefore we have done right.
People sometimes fall back upon this wrongfully.
They remonstrate that their assertion is true, and
attempt to satisfy themselves on this ground that
their conduct is quite irreproachable. We may
speak the truth in sheer malice we may rejoice in
iniquity. It may seem that we were glad of an
opportunity to correct another. The very edge of
the weapon is blunted by its unskilful handler. And
it is a curious fact that, while any reproach stings
the sharpest which is founded on truth, any truth
said of us loses its effect, if said reproachfully.
All this sounds very commonplace, and yet how
difficult it is to practise. All our life long we may
have been wondering why it was that when we saw
the truth so clearly and distinctly we could not
bring others to see it with us ; why it was that
though we showed others so very plainly what the
error .of their creed was, we could make no converts ;
XXXVII. J SJPEAKINO THE TRUTH IN LOVE. 325
and why it was that while making it evident to
others what their faults were, we could never per
suade to amendment. And yet here is the root of
the matter. Want of love. Men saw the truth
and would have accepted it but for our rude and
uncourteous way of exhibiting it. What an account
must we have to render for so miserably squander
ing the treasure committed to us. GOD made us,
His evangelists of truth, and our word returned to
us void and accomplished not His will. It gratified
our pride, our envy, our anger, at the expense of
others, and that was all. We used the fine gold of
heaven to lacquer over the iron with which we
pierced the soul of our fellows. You doubtless
know what this sort of thing is you have suffered
it from others you know what it is to have a per
son affecting great friendship coming in to us and
evidently taking a delight in picking out our defects,
looking at the worn and threadbare garments, re
minding us of omissions, taking the harshest view
of our misconduct. We are sensible such a person
has truth in what he says we cannot contradict
any of his remarks we are galled and wince we
do not the more dislike ourselves, so much as feel
irritated and vexed. And we feel rather inclined
to require an apology from the critic, than to set
earnestly about amending ourselves. Now it is
clear that this person, so far as he was concerned,
lost a soul. I mean, that whatever GOD destined
him to do for good to me, he has marred and
spoiled. And the worst of it is, that even should I
326 SPEAKING THE TRUTH IN LOVE. [SEEM.
be told the truth again, I may refuse to attend to it
because of its having been once mismanaged before.
But the not speaking the truth in love does not
merely prevent Christian growth in the person
spoken to, but also in the speakers. He who
habitually disregards the feelings of others in his
way of setting the truth before them, cannot culti
vate a loving, CmusT-like spirit. There can be no
weeping over the desolations of Jerusalem in such a
prophet. It will be the sword of Mahomet by which
he converts, and not the patience of JESUS CHRIST.
Let no man set himself up to put others right, if
he cannot do it in love. He is only cultivating his
own evil tempers and passions, instead of the souls
of others. Be careful then not to speak the truth
when by doing so you are tempted to encourage
unloving habits. It is quite possible nothing may
do you as much harm. It is only by loving
one another you can grow up into your Head.
And so it may become your special duty to abstain
from placing the truth before others, lest you should
get into unloving ways, and so decay in Christian
graces. Of course you ought to try to speak the
truth in love : learn to acquire that spirit of love
which would make it safe for you to tell others of
their faults, or convert them from error. But what
ever you do, sin not against yourself by indulging
your own bitterness in speaking the truth. This
applies to all societies, still more to that great so
ciety of which we are members, the Catholic Church.
And since that society is deprived of entire oneness,
XXXVII.] SPEAKING TUE TRUTH IN LOVE. 327
first of all by the schism between the East and
West, and since by the schism between ourselves
and the rest of Western Christendom, we owe this
duty to that part of it to which by Baptism and
Confirmation we belong. There is and may be
much of evil which we can say in truth of that so
ciety to which we belong, but let us take heed to
say it in love. For there are two kinds of material
schism into which the members of the Church fall,
unlovingness to their spiritual Mother, and immo
rality. By either of these we cut ourselves off in
fact from the Church. We may profess external
obedience to the Church of our baptism, but we are
schismatics in effect when we cease to love her,
when we speak the truth indeed of her but not in
love. Most important then it is that we be very
slow to speak of the defects under which we labour
in this Church : that we may not speak of them at
all, except in love. Any other way of expressing
our feelings deadens our growth in CHRIST, and
must of necessity hinder our reception of those
blessings GOD has reserved for us of the British
Churches. As we could not indulge in bitter sar
casms against any one we loved, however open to
ridicule, nor endure others to utter them, so with
the Church to which we specially owe filial affec
tion. We may depend upon it, that if our mission
is in any degree to supply those things that are
wanting, or to strengthen those things that re
main, it will not be fulfilled by any acts or language
which breathe not a spirit of love.
328 SPEAKING THE TKUTII IN LOVE. [SEIIM.
Men of this world are very quick in detecting in
spiritual men disloyalty, disaffection or insubordina
tion to the authorities of their religion. They see
at once what is truth according to the principles of
this or that belief, but most distinctly of all do they
recognize the temper of mind in which it is main
tained or defended. When a man gives way to
harsh undisciplined speeches in regard to the wants
and imperfections of his own communion, it is a ne
cessary consequence that he neither succeeds in
benefiting others nor himself. It is one thing to
mourn as an affectionate son over the failings of a
parent, and another to expose them to the world in
rude language. All that is said may be true and
incontrovertible, as was the nakedness of Noah in his
drunkenness, but it is a Ham only who will talk of it
to them who are without, and upon whom the curse
of schism is entailed. My brethren, if ever there
was a time to take heed to our ways that we offend
not with our tongues against our spiritual Mother,
it is now. All the difficulties with which she is be
girt demand of us increased energy in the work we
have to do : more laborious instructions, more fre
quency of prayers and attendance at the Blessed
Sacrament, more schooling of ourselves, but above
all, greater love in speaking of Her. Any other
course must make us material schismatics now, and
prepare us for becoming formal schismatics hereafter.
It is a most evident thing that to accustom ourselves
to say cutting and bitter things about the body of
Christians to which we belong, is the most certain
XXXA r II.] SPEAKING THE TRUTH IN LOVE. 329
preparation for severing ourselves from it eventually.
And if you are now sure that you are in the Fold of
the Good Shepherd, which has received His gifts
of Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and
Teachers, do not tamper with your own convictions
by undisciplined words, unloving truths, unchari
table assertions. Or if you have doubts, such as
are the natural results of the trials which the British
Churches are now enduring, do not give weight ad
ditionally to them by disaffected language. Act as
you would in any other relation in life, and not as
though you were a monster in nature, void of the
feelings of our common humanity. If Moses durst
not bring a railing accusation against the devil,
much less should you against the Body of CHRIST.
So speaking the truth in love, shall you grow up
into Him in all things Who is the Head, neither-
tossed to and fro by every breath of doctrine, every
rumour, every slanderous imputation, nor " carried
away by the sleight of men and cunning craftiness
whereby they lie in wait to deceive."
SERMON XXXVIII.
THE PEICE OE A SOUL. 1
S. MARK vin. 37.
"WlIAT SHALL A MAN GIVE IX EXCHANGE FOR HIS SOUL?"
IF we look into the busy world about us and visit
the marts and halls of commerce we shall see all
most diligently employed in bartering and exchang
ing. There at least is no want of sagacity no want
of earnestness in endeavouring to make the best
bargain. Each for himself, the buyer and the
seller hope at any rate to be no losers, but rather
gainers by the exchange they make. From the
wealthiest merchant prince down to the most ped-
ling huckster, all are seeking to have the balance of
trade in their favour. What dismay and conster
nation at any loss ! however small, it may be the
forerunner of some more serious. A slight miscal
culation a small depreciation in the value of the
goods to be exchanged may be ruinous. What
eyes have become dim, what hairs silvered and
1 Preached at Peterhead, on the Feast of the Invention of
the Cross, us Examining Chaplain to the Bishop of S. Andrew s.
THE PRICE OF A SOUL. 331
cheeks paled in the various speculations of an ex
change !
See that vast group of heads gathered together.
See how the brows are knit and the lips compressed
in the closing of bargains. Foreign news is an
nounced the sea of heads undulates to the centre
of information, and all are busy in adjusting their
prices accordingly. Can you conceive any more
vivid picture of ardour and intentness upon any
thing than this ? Yet it is but an earthly exchange
a bartering of things of time. It is indeed " what
shall a man give in exchange." Man that is but a
worm is exchanging a little dust, as though it were
precious beyond computation. There he is, labour
ing to profit by every exchange. Another house
another acre other luxuries and comforts is to be
the fruit of all his merchandise. He is going on in
his mind as though to live for ever as though there
were to be no end to his exchanges. Will it satisfy
him when he dies ? When the last agony shall be
nigh, what will it profit him to have the balance of
this world on his side ? to die with the advantages
of exchange in earthly things in his favour ? Ask
yourselves the question as if you were going to die,
Will any good thing I enjoy here give me satisfac
tion when all is over the cup of this world drained,
and the dregs only remain to me ? Is there any
promise in Scripture that happiness in this world,
and riches, and honour, will render us more likely
to die happier? In short, is a prosperous life,
generally speaking, such as smooths a death-bed
THE PllICE or A .SOUL, [SEIIM.
pillow ? Or is it not rather poverty, distress, dis
ease, and sorrow, that brings an exchange of joy to
the dying Christian ? " What shall a man give in
exchange for his soul ?" or " for his life ?" " What
is your life ? is it not a vapour ?" a shadow that
confinueth not as grass and the flower of the
field ? Yet for this vapour this shadow this
fading grass this withering flower what will not
mortal man give in exchange ? The thread of life
may he snapped in twain any time, yet who will not
give all he possesses to save that life, which the
next minute may be equally endangered ? " Skin
for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for
his life." Hast thou ever been in danger of losing
thy life ? Hast thou ever been on the wide and path
less ocean, far off from land ? When the wild storm
shivered the sails, and the strong mast bent before
the gale, and the sea broke over the ship side .
when the straining timbers mingled their murmurs
with the cry of the stout-hearted man and the moan
of the frail woman, and thine heart beat in agony,
what wouldest thou have given in exchange for thy
life? Thou, O man, hadst gold perchance. All
that thou hadst seemed as dust in the barter for thy
life. Was it not so? Or again in the darkened
and still sick room, as the anxious whispers and sad
faces of relations and friends warn thee that thy life
is upon a razor s edge, and the dews of the grave
seem to gather on thy brow, what wouldst thou have
given in exchange for thy life ? Thou must die
some time. Thou knowest it, but thou wouldst not
XXXVIII.] THE PHICE OF A SOUL. 333
die now. Yet a little more life. To die in the
fresh buoyancy of youth to hide flowing hair and
glowing cheeks in the last home of mortality de
mands of thee any price of redemption thou canst
raise. Has it been never thine thus to set a price
on thy life ? If the numerous ills to which flesh is
heir have never thus urged thee to consider what
thou must give in exchange for thy life ; at least
thou canst imagine what value thou wouldst set on
thy life were it now in instant peril. Wert thou
now summoned to die, what wouldst thou be will
ing to pay for the redemption of life ? If the bare
thought is so terrible, what must the reality be?
Seest thou an angel conducting a man and wife and
two daughters from a rich and fertile country.
Wherefore have they left yon cities of the plain,
their goods and substance, and all that they possess ?
What but the words, " Escape for thy life," " escape
to the mountain, lest thou be consumed." Why
did Jacob leave his mother dear and home-comforts
to be an exile at Haran, but because of the words,
" Esau will kill thee ? Or again, lo, a whole city
is fasting, neither man nor beast, herd nor flock
tasting anything, neither feeding nor drinking water,
and wherefore ? Because of the preaching of Jonah,
" Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown/
Ah ! dear brethren, if man will thus struggle
earnestly for this life, what would ho not do, did he
know its value, for the life to come? Shall he
watch over " the vapour," and care not for the
flame ? contend for the shadow and neglect the
334 THE PBICE OF A SOTJL. [SEEM.
substance ? seek to stay the fast-dropping sands of
time in the hour-glass of this existence, and consider
not the infinite, eternal, everlasting ? " What shall
a man give in exchange for his life ?" that life be
yond the grave ? What shall a man give in ex
change for his soul ? If thou canst not set a price
on this life, when the accidents of this world bring
it into jeopardy, on this life which is but for a mo
ment, thou canst not on that which is for ever and
ever. " What shall it profit a man if he gain the
whole world and lose his own soul ?" What is it
to the dying man, that he has " much goods laid up
for many years ?" And what, if with this life ends
also the hope of everlasting life ? Wouldst thou
exchange aught in this world for thy soul ? Seek
for its price in the mines of the Indies, amongst sil
ver and golden ingots, thou wilt not find it there.
Seek for its price in the rich freighted vessels and
their bales of merchandize, and thou wilt not find it
there. Ask the pale student if by wisdom he
hath discovered its price amidst the calculations of
philosophers, he will not help thee. Where is its
price ? There on the rock of Calvary, I see a Cross
and a pale body fixed to it. From the thorn-
crowned head to the nail-pierced feet, blood streams
in every part. Wonderful mystery ! our CHRIST-GOD
redeems His " Church with His own blood." The
blood of GOD is the price of the soul of man. Thou
canst not value any thing of GOD. His wisdom in
finite, His power ineffable, His mercy unceasing.
Thou canst not set a price on the blood of GOD.
XXXVIII.] THE PRICE OF A SOUL. 335
Yet It is the price of thy soul and mine. What can
we give in exchange for it ? Yet more, GOD became
man, and suffered all the miseries of humanity for
thy soul. GOD endured poverty that thy soul might
he nerved to bear up under its galling yoke. GOD
submitted to obey human parents, and human
princes and priesthoods, to strengthen thy soul in
fulfilling filial and social relations. GOD shrunk
not from false accusations, ill-usage, and reproaches,
to discipline thy soul. GOD, Who made man a
living soul, redeemed thee. He is at once the
Maker, Redeemer, and Sanctifier of thy soul,
what canst thou give in exchange for it ?
Dear brethren, man can give nothing in exchange
for that soul which GOD made and bought with His
most precious blood, but what does he give in ex
change for it ? Answer the question faithfully,
what hast thou given in exchange for it ? All thy
life long thou hast had a soul, and hast thou not
bartered it often for miserable vanities ? Hast thou
not made poor bargains ? Judas valued his Master
at thirty pieces of silver, and thou scornest his
paltry barter. Hast not thou oft made a far worse
exchange ? Judas exchanged his GOD, thou the
soul for which that GOD was content to be exchanged
by Judas. Thou hast exchanged thy soul for a lit
tle pleasure and self-indulgence. Or for a little
gain, or for a passionate word, or a filthy thought,
or envious desires, or proud looks. Hast thou not
been all thy life a silly merchant, with the balance
of eternity against thee ? With whom hast thou
336 THE PRICE OP A SOUL. [SERM.
been trading ? with whom carrying on thy exchange V
Is it not with that Evil One, who said to JESUS,
" All these things will I give Thee, if Thou wilt fall
down and worship me ?" He tried to begin a trade
with the Head, and failed, JESUS said, " Get thee
behind Me, Satan." Alas ! is it so with thee, the
member ? Satan has promised thee fair, and thou
hopest to make a good exchange with him. Did he
not promise to Eve that by eating the forbidden
fruit, they should be as gods. They learnt the
value of the devil s exchanges, when they were
driven out of Eden, and fled from the sight of the
cherubim with his flaming sword. What said the
Rich Man, when his " fine linen and sumptuous
fare" ceased with the end of this life ? O pitiful
exchange " Father Abraham, have mercy on me,
and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his
finger in water, and cool my tongue ; for I am tor
mented in this flame." Here it is in Abraham s
words, " Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime
receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus
evil things : but now he is comforted, and thou art
tormented." "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thy
self, but in Me is thy help." O Christian, thou
hast suffered things of time and sense to be given
in exchange for thy eternal soul, but in CHRIST
is thy help; thou canst not redeem thy soul,
but He has redeemed it. But for Him thou
hadst lost it over and over again, but He has re
stored it thee. Thou art the sheep which the good
Pastor, JESUS CHRIST, has so often sought upon the
XXXVIIT.] THE PRICE OF A SOUL. 337
mountains of pride, and brought back in His bosom
amidst the praises of the angelic multitude. Wilt
thou not do what thou canst to save that soul,
which has cost so much ? Wilt thou labour for the
meat that perisheth, and not for that Bread, Which
endureth unto everlasting life ? Wilt thou not la
bour to cleanse thyself from this world s pollutions,
to gain joy which cannot be pictured, and to avoid
misery which cannot be imagined ? Now it is only
in hope and fear that we can calculate the value of
a won or lost soul. The hour is coming when the
price shall be known, the real value of the ex
change each is contracting, plainly manifested,
" When the books shall be opened" then will men
and angels know our folly, or our wisdom, whether
we have laboured for time or for eternity whether
for this life or for the next, whether we value our
souls so little as to barter them like Esau for a mess
of pottage ; or so much as CHRIST did when He
came to seek and to save that which was lost. Now
we know not all the consequences of the exchange
men make for their souls. But when the SAVIOUR
cometh as a Judge, we shall know and feel in that
day what each man has given in exchange for his
soul.
Dear brethren, fellow servants of the Church of
GOD, JESUS CHRIST knew the value of a soul, He
alone knew the infinity of joy or misery which shall
be to a soul. Before His eyes only was the full
view of heaven s bliss, and hell s curse. Who of us
hath not yet laboured with all his might for the
338 THE PRICE OP A SOUL. [SERM.
health of priceless souls ? Who of us hath been a
slothful servant, in exercising those gifts bestowed
on us by the laying on of hands ? We are " workers
together with GOD." Woe unto us if we relax our
efforts in this co-working ! What shall be our an
swer when the souls that cannot be valued shall be
required at our hands ? See we in this ordination
a memorial of that day when we devoted ourselves
with young and untried hopes to the work of the
priesthood. How have we kept our vows? Be
think we of the souls lost, for which we have neg
lected to intercede which we have not warned-
which we have not visited which we have not fed.
" They watch for your souls, as they that must give
account." Ah ! what is it for which we must give
account? the incomparable, priceless, inestimable
soul. To give account for anything of the past will
be fearful, still more fearful to give account for our
watching over that which nothing in this world can
purchase, nothing earthly can redeem. Miserable
Pastor, what will be thy feelings when thou seest
the souls entrusted to thee driven from that good
which " eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither
hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive,"
and cast into that fire " where their worm dieth not
and the fire is not quenched ?" Let us all, looking to
the Great Day, resolve to be more faithful to our trust,
to preach the word of life more instantly, to feed
with the bread of life those who are fainting in the
weary strife and din of this fitful life, to strengthen
the things that remain. So when the chief Shep-
XXXVin.] THE PETCE OF A SOUL. 339
herd and Bishop shall come, He may find the work
of us His bishops, priests, and deacons less imper
fect, and accept it and offer it to the FATHER at that
Eternal Altar before which He ever standeth making
intercession for us."
z 2
SERMON XXXIX.
Mogatton
ROGATION.
S. JAMES iv. 2.
u YE LUST, AND HAVE NOT : YE KILL, AND DESIKE TO HAVE,
AND CANNOT OBTAIN: YE TIGHT AND WAR, YET YE HAVE
NOT, BECAUSE YE ASK NOT."
I SUPPOSE that there is nothing in which we are
most of us so little faithful as in the matter of
prayer. And yet in this congregation there are two
sides of the question. First of all here is a very
costly house, which even in these cold-hearted days
has been reared for the main purpose that here
prayers and intercessions should be offered up con
tinually to GOD in behalf of His people. We stand
here, as did the Jewish priests of old, daily litur-
gizing and ministering, and offering remembrance
of that one Sacrifice of CHRIST on the Cross. On
the other hand, there are but few who come to join
us in this oblation of prayers the Christian incense
from the altar of every man s heart to the eternal.
IfeOGATlON.
Of course 1 know that age, infirmity, and necessary
occupations and business prevent many who are,
though absent in body, yet present with us in the
spirit, and so receive the full benefit of our prayers
for the whole Church. Yet still, if these were to
be numbered, as GOD numbers them in His books
of remembrance, I fear that there would be many
names found wanting. Not all join us in body that
might. And why is this ? I think one answer
will be true, which naturally will suggest itself to
you who remember what I lately have tried to im
press on you. It is this, that people now-a-days
think so much about worshipping GOD in spirit,
that it seems hardly necessary to them to come to
worship Him in body. Of course, if bodily wor
ship, if bowings and genuflexions, if so much imi
tation of angelic and saintly services as are con
tinually going on in heaven, be out of place ; or if
GOD requires only an inward veneration, the wor
ship of the inner man, then naturally enough I see
that this spiritual worship must override and ex
clude all frequent attendance on public worship.
No wonder that in a country where the material
has been quite lost in the spiritual, and where man
attempts to live above himself and forget that he is
flesh and blood, and not simply and entirely spirit,
that the houses of GOD are closed from week s end
to week s end. For if I can worship GOD as accep
tably in my closet, why need I ever come to Church ?
Why, if the spirit s homage is needed, should I
take the trouble to walk any distance to another
342 IIOGAT10N. [SEIIM.
building than my own dwelling ? If this exclusive
spirit-worship be indeed true, then I know not what
arguments I could justly use to inculcate coming to
church on any day in the week. It holds as good
for Sunday as for Saturday or Monday. If GOD
loves not that service which costs us least trouble,
this is true for all days. And we are commanded
indeed by the law of GOD to do no work on the
seventh day, but we are not commanded to go to
church. The Israelites, to whom the fourth Com
mandment was first delivered, had a daily temple
service. In Jerusalem, at this very day, they have
a meeting for prayers daily. And I suppose no
one will contend that Christian worship should be
less frequent or stinted than Jewish ; or that our
religion presents us with less grounds for thankful
ness. Unless indeed public worship is to be classed,
as it is to be feared it is by many, with those many
intolerable burdens of the Mosaic dispensation which
have been done away in CHRIST. I know of no
valid reason for going to church on the seventh day
which is not equally binding for every day, except
this, that the law of the land enforces a cessation of
labour and business. This, however, only makes
the neglect of public worship on that day more
sinful and inexcusable. On other days our em
ployments may supply us with excuses for non-
attendance on public worship, but on that day there
is no such apology. On all days then, if possible,
our bodies as well as our spirits are to be presented
as living sacrifices in the temple of the LORD. And
XXXIX.] HOGATTON. 343
in truth so far from Christianity demanding of us
less material worship, I think it would be more true
to say that it requires more of us. If in the Jewish
dispensation men flocked to the place where GOD
set His incommunicable Name much more since
in the mystery of the Incarnation GOD has become
Man. As it is a GOD -Man we worship in the Person
of JESUS CHRIST, so do we give Him by virtue of
His Manhood, a local habitation as in this cathe
dral. Granted that as GOD He hears the prayers
which are offered to Him from every spirit of men
in every place and under every possible circum
stances, yet that concession does not interfere with
the truth that as Man He sets up here His throne,
and receives the homage of His redeemed, who
come to offer their personal services to Him.
I could understand how utterly we seem to miss
of the truth of the nature of Almighty GOD, if 1
only contemplated GOD as a Spirit, but when I con
sider the Manhood of the SON of GOD, I am at a
loss to conceive how any one can be satisfied with a
simple spirit-worship. If Solomon built the AL
MIGHTY a house to dwell in, though he knew that
heaven was His throne and earth His footstool, and
that the Most High dwelleth not in houses made
with hands, he must have expected that in some
lesser way or other GOD would vouchsafe His pre
sence there. Still more must we, who in the Gos
pels have seen our Blessed LORD come and go with
all the reality of a material and carnal presence
among His people, believe that in some way or other
344 ROGATIOK. [SERM.
He is truly in this place. And that this mode of
His presence is not of that unreal sort, which per
sons ordinarily imagine, appears if we consider that
CHRIST S presence to the regenerate is of no shadowy
or incorporeal nature. " We are members," says
the Apostle, " of His body, of His flesh, and of His
bones. " Every Christian is part of the Incarnate
CHRIST. It is in his power to desecrate and to pro
fane himself. But still the fact remains that whether
a fruitful branch or not of the True Vine, he will be
dealt with in the last day as having been once grafted
into the body of JESUS CHRIST. It does not make
me the less a Christian, a consecrated part of JESUS
CHRIST, that I do not choose to live as such, that I
will defile myself with sin, that I will do all I can to
deaden my senses to the fact of my having once
passed through the throes and pangs of the new birth.
Just as if having been born the son of a nobleman I
choose to disgrace my high birth and connexions,
that does not alter the fact that I am by birth en
titled to respect, honour, and character, and such
like, all of which I have forfeited by my misconduct.
And so, though men come to a consecrated Chris
tian church, and choose to treat it as any ordinary
building, their behaviour does not alter existing
facts. JESUS CHRIST has set up His throne here
for you to pay Him honour. Ridicule this forget
this shut your eyes from this as you may* the
fact that He is here remains the same. Take an
other truth; "Wheresoever two or three are ga
thered together in My Name, there am I in the
XXXIX.] ROGATION. 345
midst of them. He has promised to hear the
prayers of all, however secretly offered up, but He
has nowhere as here promised His being present to
individuals. " In the midst of two or three gathered
together," there is He present, in some way, in
which He is not present to each one severally.
There is a special promise to the bodily assembling
of ourselves together, which is not given to separate
outpourings of the Spirit.
There is then a twofold promise attached to
prayers offered up in this place, which you have
not as individual souls in your own houses. First,
that here the Man-Goo, JESUS CHRIST, is pleased
to dwell. He, Who when on earth had not where
to lay His head, now sits enthroned in the noble
Christian temples, which have been dedicated and
set apart to His honour. This is the presence-
chamber of the King of kings, the LORD JESUS
CHRIST, where He receives His suitors and claim
ants. Secondly, here are our fellow-worshippers,
whose company secures you the promised presence.
Well may I ask, with such privileges, such certain
responses to your prayers, are you faithful to per
form this duty ? If things go wrong with you in
your families, in the Church of GOD, in your own
private health of soul, who is to blame but your
selves ? If the sick man lacks comfort ; if no angel
with messages of consolation visits the widow and
the fatherless ; if the weak are not upholden, and
the oppressed relieved ; if the sinner is not awakened,
nor the wanderer brought back to the fold ; if priests
346 ROGATION. [SEEM.
are neglectful, and bishops are worldly, who but
yourselves are to be condemned ? If the earth ren
ders not her fruit in due season, if the harvest fail,
and the grass wither, to whose account shall it be
put, except to theirs who, when the angels held the
golden vials to receive therein the prayers of the
saints, contributed not their quota of intercession.
Not that the Eternal alters His will because of your
praying, or not praying. But just as He wills that
the land which is not tilled and cultivated, shall not
bear golden harvests ; just as He wills that the
child, whose mind is suffered to lie fallow, shall not
astonish mankind by his intelligence ; so with the
effect of prayer, GOD has so ordered and disposed
all things, that they run in certain channels or not,
according as prayer is exercised toward them or
not. It may depend on your prayers whether some
great evil, public or private, be averted ; or whether
some great good come to you or others.
It is a law in GOD S kingdom, that your prayers
shall draw down blessings, else lying treasured up
in heaven. Just as in the natural kingdom you see
divers things counteracting each other by certain
laws, so in GOD S spiritual kingdom. As a gentle
breeze springing up disperses the threatening storm,
so the child s breathings in prayer have oft turned
the mad course of its sinful parent. Prayer is one
of the things which must be taken into account,
if we attempt to calculate the action of the Church
upon mankind. Another point in the efficacy of
prayer, is that it has been tested and tried. The
XXXIX.] ROGATION. 347
Old Testament history is full of it. " Elijah, a
man of like passions as ourselves," says the Apostle,
11 prayed earnestly that it might not rain : and it
rained not on the earth by the space of three years
and six months. And he prayed again and the
heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her
fruit." This was the effect of a saint s prayer.
But a like result follows the united prayers of sin
ners. When the Ninevites cried mightily to the
LORD for forty days, GOD turned His wrath from
their devoted city, and spared it. And when Israel
turned their backs before their enemies, Joshua and
the elders of Israel interceded until eventide for the
people, and their supplication was heard.
It is not, then, matter for speculation, how far it
is profitable for bodies of men to assemble together
at certain times for prayer. We have promises for
ourselves, and the success of others to encourage
us. It is a problem long ago solved by the faith
ful in all ages. Your sloth, your indolence, your
lukewarmness, your love of ease, your desire to get
to heaven with as little trouble as possible, is really
the only lion in the path, that hinders the unbarring
of the gates of heaven, and the pouring out of fresh
gifts and mercies continually. And why say I so
much to-day on this head? Is it not Rogation-
Sunday ? Shall we not begin our annual litanies
to-morrow, and beseech Almighty GOD to give us
a prosperous year? These Rogation or Asking-
days, call upon you to supplicate GOD with more
than common earnestness, to give us the fruits of the
348 liOGATION. [SERM.
earth in their season ; to remove afar off blight and
mildew and blasting ; the caterpillar and the palmer-
worm, that great army He oft-times sends in His
displeasure to turn the fruitful field into a desert.
Let us meet together to pray Him to grant to the
fleets and fishers fair weather ; to all wholesome
weather and health of body ; " peaceful times, mild
government, and good laws ; that our sons may
grow up as the young plants, our daughters as the
polished corners of the temple ; that our garners
may be full and plenteous with all manner of store ;
that our sheep may bring forth thousands and tens
of thousands in our streets, that there be no decay,
no leading into captivity, no complaining in our
streets."
Let us pray, that this country may be free from
plague or famine during the year that is coming,
from flood and fire, from hostile invasion or civil
war. Let us pray for the whole Church, that a
supply of things wanting, and a strengthening of
remnants may be vouchsafed. Let us pray for
widows and orphans, for all spirits and flesh that
need our prayers, or that have implored them, or
that have desired our prayers. It is the time of
asking. It is, again I say, Rogation-time. " Ask,
and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full."
Do not take for granted that all things will go on
well with you without your praying that they may
do so, because they did so last year. Do not pre
sume upon your past thoughtlessness and neglect
of intercessions, and so recklessly refuse the present
XXXIX.] ROGATION. 349
call upon you. And then come what will be it
scarcity of food, want of money, sickness, distress,
or whatever ill may be in store you will not have
this bitter reflection, " once I might have escaped
all this by praying earnestly at Rogation-time, but
now it comes to me as the rod of GOD S anger."
SEEM ON XL.
ascension Uaj>.
ASCENSION A FOKEBUNNER OF ADVENT.
ACTS i. 11.
" THIS SAME JESUS, WHICH is TAKEN UP FKOM YOU INTO
HEAVEN, SHALL SO COME IN LIKE MANNER AS YE HAYE
SEEN IIlM GO INTO HEAVEN."
ASCENSION tide is a forerunner of Advent. We
part in this world often with hopes of meeting once
again before we die. And still more does death it
self give a faint whisper of the resurrection. When
a man goes away from us, we dwell on his return
to us. And so Ascension preaches a like lesson to
that of Advent. CHRIST S Humiliation is over.
Even the last traces of it in His glorified life on
earth, which we have been accompanying for forty
days, are lost. He is gone in the full blaze of His
risen glory. And as He is gone away in glory, so
too will He come again in glory. His glorious de
parture is a pledge of His coming again in glory.
ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OF ADVENT. 351
" This same JESUS, Whom ye have seen taken up
from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner
as ye have seen Him go into heaven."
Yet the thoughts are not the same entirely. We
are so taken up with CHRIST S going away that we
have hardly time to think of His Advent. We are
like people standing on the sea-shore watching the
sails of a vessel disappear below the horizon, who
have just gone through the pain of parting, whose
hearts are full with the excitement that attends such
scenes. When they have gone to their lone homes
and see the empty places, they will then go on to
contemplate the pleasure of meeting again, but not
now. Or again, as people stand by a sick bed, and
watch every signal of the parting spirit, till it has
passed away ; you cannot then break in upon them
with the truth that their long-tended care will meet
them on another shore, and in another state of be
ing. We are not capable of entering thoroughly
into two ideas at once. W r e must gradually let the
one go as we grasp the other. We bridge them
over, and in thought go continually from the one to
the other, till we feel we can dismiss that which first
claimed our allegiance. And thus we have so long
a time set between Ascension and Advent. It
images the period which intervenes between our se
paration from each other and our meeting again.
What fills our hearts now is that He, Who has
sacramentally been present with us so long in our
commemoration of His Incarnate Life on earth,
His Nativity, His Baptism, His Epiphany, His
352 ASCENSION A FOEEEUNNEE OF ADVENT. [SEEM.
Temptation, His Passion, His Death, His Resurrec
tion, and the like, is now no more so to be with us
till Advent comes again. There are other thoughts
that come to supply the void caused by this, but we
are slow to enter into them. And this because we
must exert ourselves to do so. It is the perfecting
of the inward life that groweth without observation.
Hitherto we have had everything outward to assist
us. High festivals music and nature lending their
best gifts to inaugurate them, sermons bidding us to
fathom the depth of their meaning, hymns re-echo
ing the mysteries of the GOD manifest in the flesh.
And now these are consummated. " It is expedient
for you that I go away." All these accessories
which the Church pours out upon you during the
period of CHRIST S Sacramental presence in the ce
lebrations of His Incarnate acts are gathered up and
put by for another year. You have had them vouch
safed to you for an end, and that end is your
abiding in Him. It is as necessary for you as it was
for the Apostles that this mode of His presence
should for a while terminate. CHRIST is indeed
with us alway, but not in the same way. It is a
great fact which we have been all along celebrating
that Almighty GOD has been pleased to unite our
nature to His, and to redeem our souls and bodies
from sin and death. But that has not been a work
done once and for all, and so to be left to itself.
We have to take it up and complete that which has
been so begun in us. This is what we have been
setting before your eyes, and crying into your ears,
XL.] ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OE ADVENT. 353
that in spite of the contradiction of our senses in
spite of that corruptible and frail part of our nature
which is so continually weighing us down and crush
ing our upward tendencies, you are parts of Almighty
GOD that He came down from heaven to do and
suffer in our nature, that He might remake and re
generate it like unto His own. Advent will bring
its own considerations, as to how you have carried
on this work in yourselves. That terrible thought
that He Who began it in you will come to visit His
own handiwork, which so many of you have defaced
and marred, is for Advent. And it looms in the
distance, ever sounding nearer and nearer, but it is
not so forcibly set before you now. Only one idea
is present strongly to you now CHRIST Ascended
your LORD and Master gone. The thick cloud
has shut Him out of your sight. And still " He is
gone," suggests too " He will return." It is ever
recurring, " This same JESUS, Whom ye have seen
taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in
like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven."
And so the facts of His Ascension set us about con
ceptions of His Advent. Almighty GOD went up to
heaven in our nature. The marks of the cross and
of the spear were in His glorified body. He stood
on a material mountain, and the air parted to receive
its Creator, and He was seen no more by His dis
ciples. So it will be at His second coming. Angels
will be with Him then not two or three as at His
Ascension but myriads of angels. The cloud that
became His chariot at His Ascension will be the
A A
354 ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OF ADVENT. [SERM.
cloud of witnesses His saints, when He descends
to judgment. All that He did before His Ascension
He will do at His Descent. He may eat and drink
with us. This earth will be changed, not destroyed
He will set His feet again on the Mount of Olives.
And the pierced hands, and feet, and side, shall con
found His enemies. And witnesses too, as at His
Ascension, will be there the world that then shall
be those that are alive and remain, not merely a
few as now, but millions of human beings shall
quail and tremble as they hear that blast of the
everlasting trumpet; that voice of the archangel,
pealing from pole to pole. As it was a real and
palpable Ascent, so will the Descent be. As really
as we see the flash of the lightning, or hear the roll
of the thunder, so shall we really see and hear then
the signs of His coming.
We speak of His ordinary visitations, though we
see Him not bodily in the whirlwind and in the
storm ; but this will disclose Him visibly present,
for every eye shall see Him then, as certainly as the
disciples saw Him now. All things for the most
part after the LORD S Ascension went on to human
eye as they did before. The disciples had their
secret joy and broke bread in their different habi
tations with sincerity of heart. They had their
gifts poured upon them of healing and of tongues,
but the world said, "these men are drunken, they
are beside themselves. And so says the world
still ; as we call to their remembrance the great
facts of Bethlehem, of Calvary and the Mount of
XL.] ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OF ADVENT. 355
Olives. The notes of His presence among us are
often too weak and faint, not to miss of being re
cognized by the world. But it will not be so when
the Head returns to His members. They shall call
to the rocks to fall upon them, and on the hills to
cover them from the face of Him that will then sit
upon the throne. " This same JESUS Whom ye have
seen taken up from you into heaven, shall so come
in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven."
One thought I have said we naturally harp upon
now, CHRIST is gone away, the SAVIOUR is departed.
And when He returns it will not be only as a SA
VIOUR, but also as a Judge. He is gone that He
may intercede for us at the very footstool of the
FATHER. He has done all for us that eternal love
could do. The SAVIOUR is indeed gone, but with
Him salvation is not gone. As a man, who leaves
mother, or children, or wife, and travels to a far
country, leaves some pledge behind of return, so
CHRIST too goes not away without bequeathing
some earnest of His Advent. "If I go not away
the Comforter will not come unto you, but if I de
part, I will send Him unto you." As we gather
together and treasure the relics of loved ones gone,
or embrace with still tenderer aifectionateness those
whom they have bidden us cherish in their stead
and in their place, so it is now with us. What we
would do to CHRIST were He still with us, let us do
to the Comforter. All that intenser hanging upon
the words of the SAVIOUR ; all that carnester long
ing to become like Him ; all that resolve to lessen
A A 2
356 ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OF ADYENT. [SERM.
His pain and suffering, or sorrow that we have in
times past increased the bitterness of the cup which
the LORD had to drink for us, let this be fulfilled
now towards the Comforter. CHRIST indeed can
no more be the present and visible object of your
love He was, but you have the abiding presence of
the Spirit of grace to regard with all the intensity
of human affection. CHRIST can no longer speak
to you. He spake to His disciples only now and
then as He was pleased to visit them after His Re
surrection. But the HOLY GHOST dwells as a con
tinual guest in your soul, ever addressing Himself
to your conscience : ever kindling your coldness :
ever upholding your feebleness : ever guiding you
into truth. GOD does not leave you alone in this
dull weary world. Ye are not orphans. If He
leaves you for a while it is only that He may fit you
thereby the better for meeting Him again. And
this is too the mystery wherein we see all earthly
objects of love removed from us. Teachers and
pastors ; all whom we have respected and loved
often are called away from our side that we may be
stirred up to become more fit for their company in
the regeneration of all things. And thus as the
mind girds up all its energies to attune itself to that
state of being which shall be, as it struggles to
attain to that mind which was in CHRIST JESUS,
and in all who have become CnRiST-like, it cannot
but look on to eternal re-union with those, whom
having not seen we love, with the innumerable com
pany of angels, with the spirits of the just perfected,
XL.] ASCENSION A FORERUNNER OF ADVENT. 357
with GOD the Judge of all, and with JESUS the Me
diator of the new covenant. " This same JESUS
shall so come in like manner." Let us yearn after
that coming. So shall we be daily trying to he-
come ready for it. Advent indeed comes but once
a year as we celebrate it in the Church s cycle-
but CHRIST S Advent may be to us any hour and
any day. Any moment you may be called away.
Angels may be even now waiting on your depar
ture, and the distant voice of the archangel s call
may be on its road to your ears. As noiselessly
and secretly as He left His disciples, so to you alone
may be His Advent. One or two friends may see
that His Advent to you. Or you may depart in
solitude, none to witness that His summons. " Be
ye therefore ready, for in such an hour as ye think
not, the Son of Man corneth." Welcome all things
that tend to hasten that Advent welcome the loss
of friends and relations welcome the perishing of
the outward man welcome suffering welcome in
short the Cross of JESUS. All these perfect the
inner life, make men ready for their LORD. So
when He does come in like manner, He shall see of
the travail of His soul and be satisfied. He shall
behold in you His own dear workmanship.
SERMON XL I.
SPIEIT AND MATTEE.
GEN. i. 2.
" THE SPIEIT or GOD MOYED UPON THE FACE or THE
WATERS."
IF we rightly apprehend the objectors to the Catho
lic or Sacramental system, that is to say, that sys
tem which holds out to us gifts and graces, pro
ceeding from GOD to the soul of man through the
channels of sacraments, rather than without the in
tervention of any such means, we are told by them
that our system is unspiritual and unworthy of
rational beings. What an answer to them is given
by the Church in this annual commemoration of
the descent of the HOLY SPIRIT on the Apostles at
the day of Pentecost ! We at least can hardly be
charged with being indifferent to the holy influ
ences of the SPIRIT, who to-day with so much joy-
1 Preached also at the opening of the church of the HOLY
SPIRIT, at Cumbrae.
SPIRIT AND MATTER.
359
fulness keep the feast of His coming down to dwell
amongst men. Idle mockery and self-deceit, in
deed, it were for a Church to celebrate the first
bestowal of the gifts of the SPIRIT, if her re
ligion were, as it often is misrepresented, material,
formal, and carnal. And if that be the answer
of the Church to her adversaries, if she can point
to this festival and ask, Is this a proof of my
neglect of spirituality? is this an exhibition of
gross heathenism, in that I keep with so much joy
the Church s birthday through the SPIRIT ? much
more is this the case in this place where we cele
brate at once the Dedication of the Apostles, and
the Dedication of this Collegiate Church to the
HOLY SPIRIT. Here at least is a standing memorial,
that we yield to none in paying honour to the
HOLY GHOST, the LORD and Giver of life. Here,
at least, we may challenge on this day here we
may point to the double solemnity which has
called us together, as a token of our acknowledg
ment that it is through the Spirit of GOD S assist
ance we hope to pass through the waves of a trou
blesome world unto the haven of everlasting life.
Now the SPIRIT S work at the Creation of the
world was typical of Its work in the New Creation.
It did not address Itself in the first instance to the
spiritual, but to the material. When the earth was
formless and void, there were no souls whereon to
operate. Till man was created a living soul, what
was the work of the SPIRIT? Did He disdain the
material work before Him ? Surely to acknowledge
360 SPIE1T AND MATTEll. [SEEM.
His share in the Creation of the world, is at once to
confess that there may be relations between GOD
and matter not inconsistent with His spiritual per
fections, as well as akin to those which we represent
by the Sacraments of the Church. If, for example,
He moved energetically upon the waters of the
Creation, so that the earth was begotten thereby in
all her first-born loveliness, why is it so strange to
be told that He does the same upon the waters of
the New Creation, whereby the baptized come forth
new creatures in all the grace and beauty of the
adoption ? And if we take the full meaning of the
original language of the Old Testament, we shall
have this brought before us more strongly. For
the word is the same as that used in Moses song in
the book of Deuteronomy, where it is said of GOD S
care for the Israelites, that He was to them as an
eagle " fluttering over her young." The word
seems, in its original meaning, to give the idea of
a bird hatching a shell, as it warms, and conforms,
and brings into life and light its young. This gives
us an idea of the SPIRIT S work in the generations
of the earth, and the regeneration of man. It
brooded upon matter with quickening power.
According to men s notions now-a-days, the
world ought to have had a soul ere the SPIRIT
could have any relations to it. And It would have
to operate upon that world s soul by some means
independent of that huge and disordered mass by
which it was surrounded. But the SPIRIT brooded
upon the world, that then was dark and gloomy as
XL1.] SPIRIT AND HATTER. 3(31
it lay embryo in the mighty waters, just as a bird
over its young as it fashions and moulds them into
life. Deny spiritual influences to matter as you
may in other cases, you cannot here. We are not
told how or in what form the SPIRIT thus operated
on matter. We know that He descended in the
likeness of a dove on our Blessed LORD S Man
hood, and in the likeness of fiery tongues upon the
Apostles. But here we are not told anything more
than that He did brood upon this our world. " The
Spirit of GOD brooded upon the waters." Abso
lutely and immediately Spirit acted on matter. All
that we read of in the Scripture history of the
Creation, begins with the world s birth through the
SPIRIT. Not only do we commemorate the first-
fruits of the Second Creation, but also the first-fruits
of the material Creation, when GOD saw every
thing that He had made, and lo ! it was very good.
What a marvellous birthday of the world was
that, my brethren, when all things started into life
on this our earth ! Air, water, earth, all made to
teem with animal and vegetable life ! Man too
himself, springing out of the dust of the earth, as
though no way distinguishable in his origin from
the beasts that perish ! Angels hymned the birth
day of the Second Adam with their Gloria in Ex-
celsis ; but this was ushered in by the concerts of
the morning stars, and the shouting for joy of the
sons of GOD. To this end was the SPIRIT S brood
ing upon the waters, that It might initiate the life
of the creation. And so we are told by physiolo-
362 SPIRIT AND MATTEE. [SEEM.
gists that there are degrees in animal and vegetable
life, from the human species down to the lowest
herb. The natural world is continually passing
through the throes and shocks of life and death, no
less than mankind. Of the world we may say then,
that at the Creation it was severed and set apart
and sanctified in the waters by the agency of the
SPIRIT. And therefore is so much stress laid upon
the fact so often repeated, that GOD saw it, and it
was good. Therefore must the earth, as well as its
wicked inhabitants, be regenerated in the Noachic
deluge. Therefore do we look for a purgatorial
fire, which in the last days shall again regenerate
the world, so that there shall be, according to GOD S
promise, a new heaven and a new earth wherein
dwelleth righteousness. " For the whole creation
groaneth and travaileth under sin together even
until now," as well as ourselves who have the first-
fruits of the SPIRIT. Not only is man in his natu
ral state all ruined and desolate and broken down,
needing to be rebuilt by the SPIRIT, but the very
earth itself partakes of the corruptions of its inha
bitants, and needs also the SPIRIT once more to
brood upon it, and reduce it from its chaotic state,
that GOD may once more behold it, and say of it
that it is very good. And thus, my brethren, as
through the sins of mankind the earth is said to
have been corrupt, when it was purged by a de
luge, so too is it consecrated by the saintliness of men
through the SPIRIT. What the Evil One has branded
and marked for himself, staining with bloodshed,
XLI.] SPIRIT ANJ) MATTER. 3G3
and violence, and fraud, that Christianity is ever
reconquering to the kingdom of the Cross, ever
regaining to sacred and holy influences. And, there
fore, we are continually taking possession, in the
Name of GOD, of material things, hallowing and de
dicating them to Him.
The particular dedication of churches and colleges
does but image the universal sanctification of ma
terial things by the devotions of Christian men and
women. Even our houses partake of this hallowing
influence when we set up in them our family altars
and consecrate them by prayer. So too the very
food we take is as the Apostle speaks sanctified by
the Word of GOD and by prayer. And if this be
the case with the things of ordinary and every-day
life, much more is there a special sanctification at
tached to the things which relate to the direct in
tercourse of man with his GOD. That affectation
of superiority to all outward and material sensations,
that separation of the spiritual from the material is
a forgetfulness that at the creation of matter the
Spirit brooded over its generation. And this too
is why to many persons it seems an unreal thing to
do as we are called on in the Psalms ; to bid, that
is to say, material things to unite with us in spiritual
worship. Yet if they come from the womb of the
Spirit, and in some sort are His offspring, what
marvel that we should invoke sun, moon, and stars,
beasts, and all cattle, worms, and feathered fowls,
fruitful trees, and green things upon the earth, to
join in the Catholic Allelujah with the children of
364 SPIEIT AND MATTEE. [SEEM.
men ? Still more striking is it that we ourselves
cannot render our worship of GOD entirely inde
pendent of matter. For are our tongues and lips,
without which language is impossible, agents of pure
and unmixed spiritualism ? No system is so un
natural and so fatal to religion as that which gives
up matter to the kingdom of Satan, instead of win
ning it back from his power. And this is more
striking if we consider the false and absurd views
held by many as to the post-resurrection state, that
the spiritual bodies then assigned will in fact be not
bodies, but mere phantoms or ghosts, incapable of
any such religious acts as are now represented in
the Church on earth.
Far, however, my brethren, be it from us to go
to the other extreme, and be satisfied with material
and formal worship of Almighty GOD. To do so
would be to forget that as man is on the highest
step of the Creation, so of him is it more strictly
required that he breathes into his dedications of
anything to GOD more life and vigour. In man
alone is there spirit as well as life. And the de
velopments of his spiritual existence must be analo
gous to the gradual generations of the heavens and
earth. There you have light, fruitfulness, life. All
these are the effects of the Spirit s descent. If
these were wrought upon the material world, much
more are they to be looked for in the spiritual man.
What a strange thing it is that ofttimes man alone
of the whole of GOD S creation should be lifeless,
barren, dark, and void ? Flowers and trees shed
XLI.] SPIRIT AND MA.TTEE. 365
forth their fragrance, beauty, and freshness to the
praise of their Creator ; the birds with their voices
and plumage utter the same voice ; the rolling
thunderpeals its Amen to them all amidst the splen
dour of the constellations or glory of the heavens.
"Their sound is gone out into all lands, and their
words unto the ends of the world." All the while
man alone utters no response ofttimes. He is
dumb that should be praising and glorifying, while
the mute creation bespeaks the majesty of GOD.
All the more that we acknowledge the part that
animated nature has to play in the worship of the
ALMIGHTY, all the more must we require from man
his more perfect service the union of spiritual and
material adoration. What so miserable a spectacle
is there as a magnificent structure raised to the
honour of the Eternal, but peopled only by wor
shippers whose spirits concord not with the elo
quence of material things around them. Not a
stone employed in its building but has had expended
on it much toil and labour for the glory of GOD,
but these worshippers have spent no pains on them
selves to fit them for their part in His service. Not
the most secret or out-of-the-way portion of the
material building, as often ancient architects left
their works, even where no eye of man could ever
reach, but bore its testimony to the honour of the
CREATOR, yet living men oft care not for the wor
ship of their GOD, except when human eyes can
watch and scan their diligence in His service.
Oh, my brethren, what a thought is this that
3GG SPIRIT AND MATTER. [SERM.
spiritual man should thus offer, in spite of the wit
ness of all things around him, a worship inferior to
that which material things pay. You, if you realise
your destiny, must neither content yourselves with
mere spiritual or mere material worship. As you are
composed of matter and spirit, your worship must par
take of hoth, in order to offer a whole burnt-offering
of yourselves to GOD. The material is not to he
crushed and annihilated, but quickened and spiritual
ised. Bowings and genuflexions are not to be ana
thematized, but to be accompanied by the inward
reverences of the spirits of men. Crosses and cruci
fixes are not to be trampled under foot, but their sight
is to inspire the beholders with the desire of crucify
ing themselves. Else you deny the Spirit s work in
the creation of the world. What He generated may
not unsuitably be taken into partnership by the
spiritual man. Let us dare neither to misuse nor
neglect as beneath us what His touch or breath once
hallowed. How much does all this apply to you
who are accustomed to worship in this place ?
These very walls dedicated to the HOLY SPIRIT call
to you day by day to offer the most perfect worship
man can give the union of the material with the
spiritual. The very stones cry out to you to spare
no trouble or labour that you may present yourselves
in the sight of GOD such as He would have you.
And as spiritual worship is to material what the
spirit is to the body, so ye are to be the soul of this
building. Just as Christianity became the soul of
Judaism, so we by inward acts Christianize what to
XLI.] SPIRIT AND MATTER. 367
the world about us is Judaical and carnal. Do this,
consecrate yourselves to the inward homage of the
Eternal ; let it be seen that you are full of light,
and life, and growth, and men will cease to confound
your Christianity with Judaism. Let us pray, above
all things, that the HOLY SPIRIT may brood over
this place so solemnly dedicated to Him, that here
ever souls may be enlightened, and quickened, and
purified, and nourished. May He take it under His
special care, that so by its means in this valley of
the dry bones of the Church there may be a noise
and a shaking, that the breath may come into them
and they may live and stand up upon their feet, an
exceeding great army.
SERMON XLII.
MJfjiteun
SPIRIT AND MATTER.
ACTS ii. 2 4.
SUDDENLY THERE CAME A SOUND FROM HEAVEN AS
OF A RUSHING MIGHTY WIND, AND IT FILLED ALL THE
HOUSE WHERE THEY WERE SITTING. AND THERE AP
PEARED UNTO THEM CLOVEN TONGUES LIKE AS OF FIRE,
AND IT SAT UPON EACH OF THEM. AND THEY WERE ALL
FILLED WITH THE HOLY GHOST, AND BEGAN TO SPEAK
WITH OTHER TONGUES, AS THE SPIRIT GAVE THEM UT
TERANCE."
ALL GOD S manifestations of Himself to man have
been of a material nature. And this chiefly because
man being material GOD acts upon him by means
of material media. Constituted as man is, it would
not be natural to expect that GOD would commu
nicate directly and immediately with that portion of
him, which we call his soul, independently of his
body. For first of all, that body of man cannot be so
unworthy of being admitted to intercourse with GOD,
which was created, in His image and likeness. What
SPIRIT AND MATTER. 369
man is to GOD may be not unfitly compared by the
relation a likeness of any man in painting or sta
tuary bears to tbe man himself. And thus the Old
Testament is full of passages which represent GOD
as a Being indeed superior to man, but still as not
disdaining to be at times assimilated to him in ap
pearance and functions. This too is quite com
patible with saying that Holy Scripture uses a phra
seology adapted to our understanding, when it speaks
of GOD relatively to us. For though the form in
which the finite expresses his conceptions of the In
finite, must needs be imperfect, yet this does not
prove his conceptions to be entirely mistaken. Not
only did the Second Person of the Blessed TRINITY
become Incarnate nearly two thousand years ago,
and so, if I may say so, stereotyped the principle of
relationship between the material and immaterial ;
but even before that time each Person of the Blessed
TRINITY seems from time to time to have assumed
material shapes, in order to hold converse with man.
No man hath seen GOD at any time ; neither FATHER,
SON, nor HOLY GHOST have been seen of men in
Their Own Substance Which remained invisible and
immutable. When therefore They have been seen,
it was simply through some material media which
They chose to adopt, while They continued in them
selves and in Their Own Substance thus incapable of
sight or change. Thus it was, that when GOD talked
with the first man He created out of the dust of the
earth, it would seem He conversed with man in the
form of man. For Adam heard the voice of the
B B
370 SPIRIT AND MATTER. [SEEM.
LORD GOD walking in the garden in the cool of the
day and hid himself among the trees of the garden ;
and when GOD said, "Adam, where art thou?"
answered, " I have heard Thy voice and hid my
self, because I was naked."
For how can such walking and speaking of GOD
be literally understood, except a human form was
assumed? For it cannot be said that there was
only a voice, where GOD is said to have walked ; or
that such walking was invisible, since Adam hid
himself from GOD S presence. And so Cain, after
hearing GOD speaking and taxing him with his crime,
said to Him, " I will hide myself from Thy face."
Which Person It was that is here signified is not
clear. And in like manner when it is said that the
LORD spake and appeared to Abraham ; it is doubtful
whether any One of the Three, or the whole Three
in One is to be understood. And though these
instances of the Godhead assuming a human form
may be doubtful, yet there are others which can
scarcely admit of any hesitation. For when the
Scripture begins with saying that the LORD appeared
to Abraham, and proceeds to describe the visitation
of three men, whom Abraham addresses in the sin
gular number, and who, as one man, promise Sarah
a son, we see the unity of the TRINITY manifested.
Abraham invites them, washes their feet, and brings
them on their way as men, but speaks to them as
to the LORD GOD both in receiving the promise of a
son, and the news of the destruction of Sodom.
Not more difficult is it to conceive of the entire
XLI1 -] SPIRIT AND MATTER. 371
Godhead thus manifesting Itself than of the Person
of the SON before His Incarnation. And so when
two angels appear to Lot in Sodom, after it is said
that the LORD departed from Abraham ; Lot ad-
dresses them in the singular number as LORD. As
they say of themselves that they were sent, we un
derstand that the SON and the HOLY GHOST are
here signified. Again, it is said that the angel of
the LORD appeared to Moses in a flame of fire out
of the midst of a bush ; and then we are told, the
LORD called to him out of the bush, saying, " I am
the GOD of thy father, the GOD of Abraham, the
GOD of Isaac, and the GOD of Jacob." In this place
it would seem to be evident that either this was one
of the angels, in whose person the LORD appeared,
or that something created was assumed, to interpose
a visible manifestation for this particular purpose,
and to utter sensible sounds in order that the LORD S
presence might be exhibited by means of a creature
to the bodily senses of man. And so we are told
that the LORD went before the children of Israel in
a pillar of fire and in a cloud. In like manner the
glory of the LORD is said to appear in the cloud, and
the LORD spake to Moses. On mount Sinai the
LORD descended in the fire, and answered Moses
with His voice. And after the giving of the Law
Moses entered into the cloud where GOD was, and
the LORD spake unto Moses. No one imagines that
smoke, fire, and cloud, and such like, are the sub
stance of the Word or of the HOLY SPIRIT. Hence
all this took place through the creature being made
B B 2
372 SPIRIT AND MATTER. [iSERM.
subject to the CREATOR. And thus, when it is said
that the elders of Israel saw the place where GOD
had stood, that under His feet was a paved work of
sapphire, and as it were the appearance of the fir
mament in his brightness, we must not suppose
that the Word and Wisdom of GOD stood on earthly
space in His own substance, thus limiting His In
finity and changing His Immutability, but all these
visible and sensible representations took place by the
subjection of the creature, as we are insisting, for
the sacramental, if I may so speak, exhibition of the
invisible GOD, not only FATHER, but also SON and
HOLY SPIRIT, of Whom, and through Whom, and in
Whom, are all things. As the Apostle speaks,
" The invisible things of GOD from the creation of
the world are clearly seen by the things that are
made even His eternal power and Godhead."
But what more immediately relates to the present
subject let us inquire Which of the Three Persons
It was Who was shown to the Jews by all those
terrible signs on Mount Sinai. If we are to under
stand that One Person alone was then manifested,
we may justly conceive that It was the HOLY SPIRIT.
For the Law then given is said to have been written
on tables of stone by the finger of GOD, under which
title we know that the HOLY SPIRIT is signified in
the Gospel. And fifty days are reckoned from the
killing of the lamb and celebration of the Passover
to the day on which these things happened on Mount
Sinai, just as fifty days after our LORD S Resurrection
the promised Spirit came. And in His very Ad-
XLII.] SPIRIT AND MATTER. 373
vent as we read in the text, there appeared cloven
tongues as of fire, which sat upon each of them.
So in like manner Mount Sinai smoked because
GOD came down on it in the fire : and the appear
ance of the glory of the LORD was as a burning fire
on the top of the Mount before the children of
Israel. It was then no new thing for the HOLY
SPIRIT to present Himself in some material shape
unto mankind. Thus at the Creation of the world
He is said to have brooded like a bird over the
waters of the formless void, fashioning the world ac
cording to the Word of the FATHER.
And similarly He descended it is the very lan
guage of Holy Scripture in a bodily shape like a
dove on the Incarnate Deity of JESUS CHRIST. And
so He, the Blessed SPIRIT hath filled all things. As
at the Creation of the world He brooded on the
waters ; as at the Creation of man He breathed
into His nostrils the breath of life ; as at the In
carnation He overshadowed the Blessed Virgin ; as
at the Baptism He descended on CHRIST ; so here
He filled the house with a mighty rushing wind, and
sat on the heads of the Apostles in fiery forms.
Not less condescendingly than the Eternal SON
(Who abhorred not the Virgin s womb, that He
might deliver man,) does the Blessed SPIRIT ally
Himself to material things for our salvation. And
therefore is it that there is so much which is ma
terial in our religion. It is but a carrying on of
such dispensations as these, when we say that in
Baptism the HOLY GHOST sanctifies water to the
374 SPI1UT AND MATTER. [SEEM.
mystic washing away of sins : or that by the anoint
ing of the Bishop s hands He falls on those who
have been baptized. Naturally enough then, do we
pray Him in the Eucharistic Liturgy to sanctify and
bless His creatures of bread and wine, that they
may become the Body and Blood of CHRIST. There
is nothing more strange in all this than the Divine
appearances in the bush of Horeb the pillar of fire
and cloud in the wilderness, the thunderings and
fire of Sinai the dove the rushing wind and
tongues of fire of Pentecost. If it be a condemna
tion of our religious system to say it is too material
and carnal the same sentence must be pronounced
not only of the natural and Jewish systems, but
also of Christianity itself, as unfolded in the pages of
the New Testament. What indeed after all is so
material a thing as a printed Bible ? Yet no one
doubts that the Spirit energizes in it for the salva
tion of man. Why is a book a more innocent ma
terialism than water, or bread and wine ? The
Spirit alone gives life and energy to the Divine
Word. Without His inspiration how dead and flat
Holy Scripture sounds to the unconverted. And it
is so with the Sacraments. Their power and
efficacy come from the Spirit. They are material
things, but wielded and fashioned by the Spirit they
become powerful in the work of grace. Ye too, my
brethren, though of flesh and blood, are temples of
the HOLY SPIRIT. He dwells not in your immate
rial and incorporeal part, but in your corruptible and
mortal bodies. He would make your senses and
members instruments of His holiness and righteous-
XLII.] SPIRIT AND MATTER. 375
ness. It is not that He produces an effect on your
inward feelings and thoughts alone, setting up the
throne of CHRIST in your hearts ; but He acts, if
you be His in power and virtue, upon your bodily
functions. And when the tabernacle of your body
shall be taken down, He will restore it after the
image of your Risen and Ascended CHRIST. It is
not merely the impurity of soul which is so offen
sive to the Spirit of Grace, it is not because outward
acts are significative of inward corruption, that the
Spirit departs from the individual Christian He has
descended upon, but your bodies are the shrines of
His indwelling. This is what makes religion not a
matter of opinions or sentiments, but of active
charity. It is what we do, that testifies that we
have been filled with the Spirit. You cannot shut
out and exclude any part of your hallowed self from
a share in holy things. This is why in the Holy
Eucharist we are not fed merely with the Word of
GOD and with prayer, but with material, though su
pernatural food. Had the HOLY SPIRIT never sat
upon our Humanity in bodily forms or created sub
stances, assumed as channels of His advent to the
souls of men, it had been free for us to abjure the
principle of our being bodily receptacles of the
HOLY SPIRIT. But since His indwelling affects the
body no less than the more subtile and divine part of
man, we cannot live and act, either as men or Chris
tians, in the world or in the Church, but as walking
in the Spirit as those who are not their own guides
and masters, but as moulded and directed by Him
Who has filled them with Himself.
SE1U1 ON X L I I 1
after 3Trmit|>*
THE MAEKS OF JESUS.
GAL. vi. 17.
"I BEAlt IN MY BODY THE MAEKS OF THE LOUD JESUS."
1 OFTEN think one reason why the sign of the Cross
is so much objected to, is not merely that people
think it has been abused superstitiously,, but also
because the great mass of the baptized abhor the
idea of suffering, as part and parcel of Christianity.
One cannot wonder at this when we think how we
most of us live ; what a low standard of religious
practice we hold, and how little the next world is
thought of compared with that which is coming.
Just recall to your minds some of those daily scenes
which are continually being acted over and over
again in this changing world. The merchant with
his princely mansion and furniture, gloating over
the present speculation ; the rich man indulging in
every luxury and comfort ; the man of moderate
competency devoting himself to an affectionate wife
THE MAiiKti or JESUS, 377
and children. Suddenly the speculation fails, the
riches vanish, the wife or child is snatched away,
the Cross appears, like the handwriting on the wall
in the midst of Belshazzar s revelry, how ungrateful
and unpleasant is that image of GOD S Incarnate
misery ! Yet did S. Paul glory in this Cross, which
men now shut out of sight, and would not see if
they could avoid its to them hateful sign. It is the
difference between S. Paul s religion and that of
world-wise men that they cannot hear to be re
minded that Christian men and women must carry
the Cross after their crucified SAVIOUR. And this
is no marvel. It is our nature to shrink from pain
and distress. Still more so the more we seem by
our position or condition to be less obnoxious to it.
It was the young man who had great riches that
turned back from the Cross, when our LORD bid
him abandon them for Himself, not the poor Gali
lean fishers. Who can wonder that men who are
going on as if this world was to have no end, as if
wealth and health was given them only for the
greater enjoyment of this life Who can wonder, I
say, at these, or such as these, who make faith a
barren lifeless thing, robbing it of love to GOD and
man, who can wonder if they fight to the very death
to remove the sight of that standard, which calls on
all to suffer and die with their LORD and His Saints.
People then, do not like crosses in churches, in
houses, and the like, because they are made by them
to recollect a plain practical truth. The Cross says
to each who gazes on it, This is your vocation more
378 THE MARKS OF JESUS. [SERM.
or less, this is your lot in this life ; as you hope to
be saved you must be crucified in some way or
other ; you must kill, mortify, destroy something in
yourself. I do not marvel that mankind should be
so bitter against crosses and crucifixes. 1 I think it
is just what might be expected. A cross brings to
you all your duties, trials, and conflicts. And if
you are shrinking from these, you may well shrink
from what is the emblem of all these. If you ima
gine that your only business in this life is to get on
as easy as you can, suffer as little as possible in any
way, avoid pain and sorrow as a curse and not a
blessing, it is quite consistent in you to tear down
every cross everything which can recall what you
are, and what is required of you.
For it is not only the duty of Christians to bear
suffering, but to go forth to meet it. Our blessed
LORD bids us not only endure the Cross and carry
it, but also to take it up. As He Himself vouch
safed to take up His Cross, so His followers in some
sort must, if it has pleased GOD to leave them
without any necessity of bearing it. So that the
Cross is set before all men from their very baptism ;
before some necessarily, before others voluntarily.
But all who would be saved must be able to ex
claim with S. Paul, " I bear in my body the marks
of the LORD JESUS."
S. Paul doubtless could say this without any
1 British Protestants ought always to be reminded that no
Lutheran place of worship is without its crucifix, and that Dr.
Arnold recommended the use of the crucifix not of the cross.
XL1II.] THE MAKKS OF JESUS. 379
figure of speech. He would point to scars of
wounds he had received in the good warfare he had
warred as a soldier of JESUS CHRIST. This is the
mark of a stone at Lystra ; this of stripes at Philippi ;
this of rods ; this of fastings often ; of hunger and
thirst ; this of cold and nakedness. He had but to
show himself as the proof of His militancy in
the service of his Master. Well might he say,
" I am crucified with CHRIST." He was a living
crucifix an example of suffering in the Name of
CHRIST. " There are," he would say, " false
teachers come in among you, leading you astray
from the truth of the Gospel. They would deceive
you into the belief that I am a hypocrite and false
Apostle. But look at me, see what I have suffered
for CHRIST S sake. Here are the tests of my sin
cerity. I challenge those who are leading you astray
to say that I am not in earnest. Can they show as
good proofs of their sincerity ? What amount of
suffering for CHRIST have they experienced ? They
would have you adopt Jewish rites, and follow the
fashion of an old and more tolerated religion ; keep
up the outward formalities of Judaism and all will
be well. You will thus escape the odium attached
to innovators in religion, in short, you will avoid
persecution for the Cross of CHRIST. This is their
language. On the contrary, " I glory in the Cross
of our LORD JESUS CHRIST;" 7 delight in all pain,
trouble, distress, reproaches which come to me as a
Christian. But they quail and faint before it them
selves, and would shake your faith and zeal."
380 THE MA11KS OF JESUS. [SEEM.
This is the offence of the Cross a dying GOD-
Man proposed for the imitation of a proud, covetous,
luxurious world. How tempting for us to have
professedly religious people to come and tell us to
put aside the Cross, to shut our eyes to it, and live
as if we had not to learn of a crucified Master. We
all know how often we ourselves have misgivings,
that we are needlessly wearying ourselves in the
way of the holy Cross, that CHRIST does not call
His disciples to follow Him so very closely, and
tread in such very rough and rugged paths. Yet
here is our warning. They do not glory in the
Cross. They would go easily and smoothly to
heaven. They do not bear the marks of the LORD
JESUS. They would entangle you in the bondage
of the world. So then, brethren, we are in some
way to be marked with the Cross, to bear the marks
of the LORD JESUS. Tn some way or other our cru
cifixion is to take place, or we are not really His.
Let us go into the sad abodes of mortality, we shall
see there some pallid sufferer enduring patiently,
like her LORD, the pangs of lingering consumption.
JESUS has laid the marks of His Cross on her
wasted limbs, her sunken eye, her agonised body,
her thin hands. All the more desolate, uncared-for
by human aid, all the more unkind neighbours and
relatives are, all the very CHRiST-like thirst of her
last hour, that then hems her in with accumulated
hardship, so much the deeper is the note of her
SAVIOUR S presence drawn. It is the very scene of
the Crucifixion rehearsed on earth. Or again, in
XLIII.] THE MARKS OF JESUS. 381
the full possession of health and strength, we are
disappointed of some object we had hoped to gain :
some earthly prize has slipped from our grasp.
The toil of years has proved useless and vain. We
have to begin the world again with duller and darker
prospects ; more depending on our exertions than
before, and less strength of rnind or body to bring
to bear on our aims. Riches suddenly make to
themselves wings and flee away, and the old man sits
down in faith to look on that Cross, and believe in
Him who hangs thereon, emptied of every Divine
treasure. Power and influence miss our grasp, and
we gaze on the Crucified One forsaken by all. Re
proaches, and scorn and ridicule await us, and it is
but the multitude round our cross shooting out the
lip, and shaking the head. Or it may be none of
these, but rather the cross laid on our inner man,
the crucifixion of our old Adam. Are you natu
rally proud and full of self, but yet trying to hum
ble yourself? Or you may be endeavouring to put
away sloth by fighting against your natural ten
dency to do nothing more than you can possibly
help ; or you may be labouring against your covet-
ousness by liberal almsgiving and kindness to rela
tives less opulent or well off than yourself; or you
may be contending against your love of meats and
drinks by abstinence ; or you may be cultivating
gentleness and meekness, and gradually overcoming
your proneness to passion and anger. All this is
hard to do. It costs us many a bitter thought,
many sorrowful misgivings, many painful struggles ;
382 TILE MAKKS OF JESUS. [SEEM.
but who can look upon the chastened look, or hear
the calm voice of such as have been with CHRIST
on the Cross, and not confess that they bear in their
bodies the marks of the LORD JESUS ?
Dear brethren, do you bear in your bodies the
marks of the LORD JESUS ? Are you really engaged
in battle for your SAVIOUR ? Is there any differ
ence, think you, in your state now from what it
would be if you were not a Christian ? Wherein
do you differ, I say not from the better sort of
heathen, but from those Christians who enjoy fewer
means of grace than yourselves ? In what respect
are you crucified ? Against what are you warring ?
What evil habit are you striving to overcome?
Does any one do you think that you are sincere
and earnest in your own way of religion ? Either
CHRIST, or Satan, (it is a very solemn thought,)
have set their mark upon you as theirs. You are
struggling against one or the other. You are either
striving to exert or deaden your conscience. You
are either going against your natural evil inclina
tions, following the bent of your passions and pre
judices, or you are crossing your will and mind,
and bringing them to the obedience of CHRIST.
All bearing of the Cross must bring forth fruit
some day. You cannot do anything difficult or un
pleasant, because it is a duty and a call, without
receiving the impress of the King s coinage, under
whom you serve. All this marks and forms your
character. It is evidenced by your readiness to
perform disagreeable offices of kindness to others
XLIII.] THE MARKS OF JESUS. 383
which naturally you would shrink from and the
great mass of people around do shrink from, ex
cept some worldly advantage is likely to result to
themselves therefrom. Great acts of self-denial,
done at GOD S bidding, mould and fashion the rough
materials of the world s Christianity of our day,
into something which staggers and even alarms
those who have settled once for all, that we are not
called upon to do anything, but only believe in the
Name of CHRIST. Or again, little deeds of love,
which cost us something, and are as it were but the
dints and scratches of the Cross upon us, do by
continual repetitions change the countenance of our
inner self, and affect the whole personal presence of
Christians. It is then the very test of your being
truly CHRIST S that you thus bear His marks.
May He vouchsafe ever thus to impress them upon
us, that when He comes to judgment, He may ac
knowledge us as His, and see in us the reflection of
His Five most Blessed Wounds.
S E II M N X L I V.
aftcv CvtnttjD.
WHAT IS LOVE?
1 S. JOHN IY. 10.
" HEREIN is LOVE, NOT THAT WE LOVED GOD, BUT THAT
HE LOVED US, AND SENT HlS SON TO BE THE PROPITI
ATION FOE OUR SINS."
WHAT is love ? I said to myself as I looked into the
world, and there sought for some type or character
of it which would express it to my mind. I saw a
happy mother bending over the face of her fair babe,
and I asked, Is this love ? But I spoke to her, and
she talked of the fame and honour her child was
one day to bring her, of the stay and comfort he
was to afford her in her age and weakness, of the be
guiling of long days by his childish sports and prat
tle, and I said to myself, This is not love. I looked
forth again into the world and I saw the father s
body bent with toil and his face furrowed with care,
and he spake of the riches he was to leave to his
child, and the great name and family he should
WHAT IS LOYE ? 385
found, and I said to myself, This is not love. So I
turned and looked forth again, and I saw a young
child striving with pleasant countenance to do its
parent s bidding ; but when I addressed it, it spake
of some gift it was to win thereby, and I said to
myself, This is not love. I saw again two foes that
were shaking the hand of friendship and brother
hood, but one whispered to me that now henceforth
he feared not the power of the other to do him
harm, and I said to myself, This is not love. I saw
two beings professing before the altar their marriage
vows of love, and I stayed awhile to see what their
love was. But I found that they lived more or less
miserably because they wanted to have their own
way and do each their own pleasure, and I said to
myself, This is not the Sacrament of unity this is
not love. And thus I walked up and down through
the world amidst brethren and sisters, pastors and
people, parents and children, husbands and wives,
friends and relatives I said to myself, What is
love?
At last I came into the temple of GOD as it were-
to-night, and I heard a voice, saying, " GOD is love."
Then I girded up the loins of my soul to under
stand this great mystery of love, and then came
gushing from the fountain these most marvellous
words, cc Herein is love, not that we loved GOD, but
that He loved us, and sent His SON to be the pro
pitiation for our sins."
There is then no love but GOD. Out of Him
there is no love to be found. All else is mere self-
386 WHAT IS LOYE? [SEBM.
ishness. Doubtless there have been emanations
from Him whereby even the heathen man has mani
fested a fragment of unselfish love. But it was but
a ray and passing sunbeam in the clouds overhang
ing this dark world of ours. GOD loves us, and yet
desires nothing from us but our love. He gains
nothing by loving us, and yet by His love are we
saved from endless pain. Yea, rather does He suffer
all shame, contempt, and sorrow, to use human
language, because of His love to us. " He loved
us and sent His SON." Alas ! O my GOD. Thou
didst love me and didst come to seek my love, and
what did I give Thee ? Who gave Thee the punc
tured brow, the marred face, and defiled cheeks, the
stabbed hands and feet, the pierced side? Who
filled Thine ears with scoffs, and jeers, and mockery ?
Alas ! I, most unworthy ; I, the sinner ; I, the lost
one whom Thou didst come to seek and to save. I
loved Thee not in my childhood ; I loved to lie and
to steal ; I loved to speak all hurtful words ; I ac
customed myself to blasphemies, to defiling and las
civious talk, to loose and filthy jesting ; I hated to
be subject to parents and pastors ; I murmured
against the sickness wherewith Thou didst visit me
for my good. Day after day I lived thus far from
Thee Who art love, cold, dead, lifeless, seeking
mine own ease, comfort, pleasure, and joy, seeking
myself in all things, obeying Thee only because of
the present profit I derived ; following after my own
glory, honour, and advancement. Truly I loved
Thee not ; and yet didst Thou love me. Yea, even
XLTV.] WHAT IS LOVE ? 387
to Thy sanctuary did I most unworthy come, even
to Thine altar, with uncleansed hands and polluted
heart. I desired not the absolutions of Thy priests,
but month after month came in the fulness of my
impiety into Thy presence. I came with no totter
ing limbs, no bowed head, no adoring eye. I valued
not the pricelessness of Thy love wherewith Thou
hadst washed me in baptism and sealed me in Con
firmation ; mine eyes failed not for looking after
Thee ; my soul gasped not unto Thee ; my tongue
was not athirst to be embrued in Thy most precious
blood. I knew not how Thou hadst loved me ; and
I knew not how to love Thee ; and yet I knew how
to love the world and the things that are in the
world. I have given Thee hatred, aversion, forget-
fulness, neglect, rebellion. Truly this is love, to
love such a one as me.
Is not this, my brethren, more or less your feeling
as you contemplate GOD S love to you, and your
return ? Is not this a mystery of love that GOD
loves such as you, most of you, have been His
children, yet having the spirit of bastards His
friends, yet having the mind of enemies. Not only
does He love those who by nature and callings were
His enemies; but us has He also loved, who by
baptism were made His people, and yet have fallen
and lost our places in His kingdom. O marvellous
love, thus boundless and endless, loving not only
enemies but rebellious and wayward children.
"Herein is love." And this love of GOD is pre
sented to us after the manner of men, and set before
c c 2
388 WHAT IS LOVE ? [SEEM.
as suitably to our human comprehensions. What
parent amongst you would not shrink to contemplate
the bare chance of his son being degraded to the
lowest and poorest estate, a beggar and a wanderer,
an outcast and houseless, despised and rejected by
all men? Would not this shock you still more if
all this were for and through some who had always
behaved ill in every way to you, and acted towards
you with signal ingratitude. But if you further saw
your son in behalf of these wretches loaded with
reproaches and false accusations, beaten, insulted,
mocked, and cruelly murdered ; with what feelings
would you regard those who were the cause of all
this suffering ? Yet such is the aspect under which
we behold the love of GOD. "Not that we loved
GOD, but that He loved us, and sent His SON to be
the propitiation for our sins." Can our idea of love
surpass this ? What matters it to GOD if I and you
burn for ever in hell fire ? Why did He not let us
die in our misery and guilt useless, ungrateful, pro
fitless creatures ? He loved. And see how He has
sent His SON to be the propitiation for our sins.
See our pride and self-exaltation propitiated by His
humiliation and coming into the world ; see our un
clean hands propitiated by His nailed hands ; our
haughty heads propitiated by His bowed and thorn-
crowned head ; our immodest looks and counte
nances propitiated by His dejected and blushing
visage ; our purple and fine linen propitiated by His
nakedness ; our sumptuous fare propitiated by His
fasting, and hunger, and thirst ; our wandering feet
XLIV.] WHAT is LOVE ? ;j89
propitiated by His fixed to the Cross. See here all
our self-indulgence, love of ease and enjoyment,
softness, propitiated. Every part in this Sacrifice
has its virtue and grace. The seat of all our vile-
ness and sin is propitiated by the spear that pierced
the sacred heart of JESUS. All our actions of evil
here are propitiated and atoned. How must that
FATHER have loved you ? He suffered His only
begotten SON thus to be tormented for the sake of
your love ; you thus unhallowed and sinful.
And where on earth shall we gaze upon this love ?
Where shall we see the SON propitiating for our
sins ? Where but in the Blessed Sacrament ? There
is the Altar there is the Cross there is the Victim
there is the Sacrifice there is the propitiation.
Even to them who by faith spiritually communicate
of His Body and Blood His Sacrifice and Death is a
propitiation for sin. Much more so to them who
really communicate of His Body and Blood by eat
ing and drinking of Him is there a propitiation for
sin. For in that He imparts Himself to them and
dwells in them, He hallows them again and again
and makes them meet to face their GOD in heaven.
GOD is on the altar, and therefore there is love,
thither do we come in love, and there are we filled
with love. There do we in measure fathom the
mystery as we feel His love and perceive ourselves
to be loving. Then do we make an act of love and
say, " O, my GOD, I love Thee not only that Thou
didst deign to die for me, arid give Thyself for me,
but more especially because Thou dost give Thyself
390 WHAT IS LOVE? [SEEM.
to be my food and sustenance, my manna in this
wilderness." Then do we love GOD the more that
we hate and abhor ourselves, and know what we are
for whom He has provided such treasures of love.
My brethren, do ye always avail yourselves of the
Sacrifice of the altar, whereby CHRIST is sealed to
you as the propitiation for your sins ? Is your love
fixed thither ? Is your heart ever turned thither,
where He makes the Bread to be His Body and the
Cup His Blood ? Do ye bring hither all your sins,
and here learn to hate yourselves and love GOD ?
Ye must corne out of yourselves and lay aside your
selves if ye would be filled with the love of GOD.
By yourselves and in yourselves ye hate GOD and
love yourselves. Here, at the foot of the altar, ye
are beside yourselves and unconscious of all, save
GOD. Here the world clingeth not, for the Cross
trainpleth it down. Here the delights of the senses
satisfy not, for the Body and the Blood feed the
hungry and thirsty. Here Satan cometh not, ex
cept we bring him with us, for the awful mys
teries make him afraid. Here the weak are made
strong. Here the sick are restored to health.
Here the penitent is sanctified. Here the saint
is perfected. So goes on the efficacy of the pro
pitiatory Sacrifice; There we intercede for our
selves and the departed. Oh ! what might of love
is there which worketh thus wondrously and chang-
eth the face of this world by means of a few short
words of the priest. If ye love not as ye desire to
love, then come to the Sacrifice of propitiation
XLIV.] WHAT IS LOVE? 391
Offer it again and again till your love is kindled and
glows with heat. Offer it again and again till ye
loathe yourselves with burning hatred. It is thus
the angels learn to tune their harps to songs of love.
Heaven is then presented on earth as ye with loving
hearts adore Him Who is love on the holy altar.
" The four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down
before the LAMB, having every one of them harps, and
golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of
the saints, and they sung a new song, saying, Thou
art worthy to take the book and to open the seals
thereof ; for Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us
to GOD by Thy blood out of every kindred, and
tongue, and people, and nation, and hast made us
unto our GOD kings and priests, and we shall reign
upon the earth." " Worthy is the LAMB that was
slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and
strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing."
11 Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be
unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the
LAMB for ever." Amen.
SERMON XLV.
dfeast of jUtniatu
EXAMPLE OE S. NINIAN.
PHILIP, in. 17.
"BRETHREN, BE FOLLOWERS TOGETHER OF ME, AND MARK
THEM WHICH WALK SO AS YE HAVE US FOR AN EN-
SAMPLE."
IT is a common thought with many persons when
they hear others speak about the Saints of the
Church, when they see that a great deal is made of
them, when churches are placed as it is technically
called under their invocation and called by their
names, that all this is derogatory to the honour of
our LORD and Master JESUS CHRIST. People seem
to imagine that if we remember the Saints, we must
forget CHRIST. Doubtless like all good and proper
things, this thinking about and dwelling upon the
Saints, may be carried to excess, but this fault of
running to excess in thinking too much about them,
ought not to prevent you from thinking at all about
them. But my brethren, there is another view,
which may not have struck you, on the other side,
EXAMPLE OF S. MNIAN. 393
that forgetting CHRIST S holy ones is very near to
forgetting CHRIST Himself. To forget those, in
whom CHRIST has infused the fulness of Himself,
must indeed be in a sense forgetting Him. For they
are His marvellous workmanship, created anew by
Him, quickened by Him, and hereafter to appear in
the likeness of His adorable and glorious Humanity.
And it were as true to say that contemplation of
GOD in His material creation, and the fixing our
eyes on His handiworks of heaven and earth must,
because it has so operated on some philosophers,
lead to a banishment of Him from the temple of
hearts. It were as true to say all this, I repeat, as
to assert that the meditation on the Saints of GOD,
must turn away the heart from Him, Who made
them what they were. But this is not necessarily
the effect in the one case or in the other. Religious
philosophers will abhor the supposed evil tendency
of beholding the works of creation ; and so will the
enlightened Christian abhor the alleged mischief of
beholding the works of the new creation in CHRIST
JESUS. And strange to say, men who thus dread
the making so much of the Saints as standards of
goodness or holiness, in the ordinary concerns of
life go on this very principle which they profess to
abjure in religion. For in a school if a master would
spur on an idle, or a bad-behaved, or a passionate,
or a deceitful boy, he does not always appeal to the
Child JESUS ever about His FATHER S business, or
to the goodness, or meekness, or truth of JESUS
CHRIST. He takes another boy in the same school
394 EXAMPLE OF S. NINIAN. [SEHM.
and sets him before the other as a pattern for
amendment. There is a living example, he might
say, of what you read in the Gospels. You cannot
excuse yourself because it is so different reading
a story in a book, and acting out what you read,
for here is a boy like yourself, perhaps with fewer
opportunities, setting forth in his daily walk
what a Christian child should be. And so it
is in the world around us. If you want to convince
a drunkard of the possibility of becoming temperate,
you do not speak to him of the self-denial of JESUS
CHRIST, but you point to some man who has
abandoned the vice of intoxication, and ceased from
strong drink. And so you do of all virtues, whe
ther it be of chastity, or patience, or forgiveness, or
humility, you find you can come more home to a
man by being able to show the incarnation of them
in some Christian man like himself than by preach
ing directly to him JESUS. Do you then, in all this
turn away from CHRIST ? Of course not. You
suppose Him present all the time. Just as when
you inculcate obedience to a master or teacher, you
do not necessarily forget that they are only set to
children in the place of Almighty GOD, to Whom
all power and authority belongs. Parents, pastors,
and teachers are to mankind in the place of GOD.
He has delegated a portion of His honour and au
thority to them. And in like manner the Saints
are to us in the place of CHRIST. Him we no longer
see personally on earth, exemplifying all the virtues
and graces of His Incarnate life, but we do see His
XLV.] EXAMPLE OF S. NINIAN. 395
holy ones those in whom He specially dwells
those who are most closely united to Him those in
whom He works most vividly His miracles of re
deeming love. And we need such CmusT-like
visions to present themselves ever and anon before
us, lest we should be tempted to imagine the Gospel
standard too high or impossible for us common
place Christians. You must have felt this, my bre
thren, at times, when you have come across a brother
or a sister perfect in that virtue in which you are
deficient strong in your weak point accomplished
in that you have well nigh deemed impossible. As
it is often said and acknowledged that Christian
practice is worth more than many Christian lessons,
so the carrying out of the Gospel life in any Chris
tian affects you more strongly than the story of the
Bible. But it seems to me that one cause of the
opposition to taking much thought about the Saints
of CHRIST rests upon a forgetfulness from whom
their saintliness proceeds. If it were borne in mind
sufficiently that what we are in holiness, or love, or
meekness, or humility, or patience, we are by virtue
of our union with CHRIST S Incarnate Body, there
would be no misgivings on this head. We should
see in the glory that sits upon the heads of the
Saints only the glory which CHRIST has given them.
We should see in their righteousness only the LORD
our Righteousness, Who clothed them in their fine
raiment white and clean, meet for the Marriage Sup
per of the Lamb for evermore. We should not
think them detracting from the honour of CHRIST,
39G EXAMPLE OF S. NINIAN.
as we heard them as it were like S. Paul, beckoning
us onward in the narrow way of life eternal, crying
in that Apostle s own words, " Brethren, be fol
lowers together of rne, or imitators of me, and mark
them which walk so as ye have us for an ensample,"
or "type."
All these thoughts, my brethren, come into my
mind, as I think of to-day s solemnity. For it was
not without some idea of fitness that S, Ninian was
chosen to be the continual representative of saint-
liness to the body to which I belong. S. Ninian
was a stranger and a pilgrim in Whitehorn He
had left loved relatives, to toil amongst the Picts
and Northern Britons. Many a place he might
have chosen for himself more grateful to his own
feelings ; many a place where he would have been
more loved and valued ; many a place where there
would have been less of his LORD S Cross to carry ;
but some voice of GOD S Providence drew him to
his work there, and he could not shrink from obey
ing. He could say to CHRIST, as the Apostle said,
11 Lo ! we have left all, and followed Thee." It was
not for honour, it was not for position, it was not
for riches that he came to labour in North Britain.
For what honour could there be in being Bishop of
a half-savage race ? There could have been nothing
but the love of souls, and the increase of the Body
of CHRIST, His Catholic and Apostolic Church. It
was not as if he went to minister to those who
already knew the truth, and valued it. He came to
lead wandering sheep to the pastures, whose fatness
XLV.] EXAMPLE OF S. NINIATST. 397
as yet they knew not of. And this is, indeed, the
weariness of all missionary exertions, whether as
imparting the whole truth, or only portions of it
which have become obsolete.
Again, S. Ninian came from a city of churches
to the rude temples that existed in the North.
As the Jews of old wept when they contrasted
the lesser glories of the second Temple ; so, doubt
less, S. Ninian grieved to look upon the mean
houses of GOD he found here. He had to im
prove the tastes of his converts, or of those al
ready Christian ; to elevate their conceptions of
the beautiful, and apply them to the making their
churches more magnifical. It was no small inno
vation to suggest stone instead of wood in the build
ing of churches. One can imagine how some
might stand out for what they had been accustomed
to ; or dispute the points of beauty and taste with
one who had seen all that was worth beholding in
Christendom. One can fancy his gentle bearing,
his mild persuasion, or his determined firmness.
And he brought new music with him too, such as
those valleys and hills never heard before, whereby
the Psalms of the sweet Singer of Israel won their
way all the more to men s hearts. Whether it was
music or whether it was architecture, our saint had
to be always exercising his innovating functions,
and introducing his novelties. No one who thinks
for a moment what human nature is, can fail to
conceive numberless difficulties and trials which
came in the way of one like S. Ninian. All at-
398 EXAMPLE OF S. NTNTAtf. [SEEM.
tempts to erect a higher standard in anything must
have their peculiar vexations and troubles. Hu
man nature revolts from any idea of service to GOD,
which costs them much of what they would keep
for their own pleasure or enrichment. Sometimes
it is money, sometimes it is time, sometimes it is
labour, sometimes it is danger, sometimes it is trou
ble which must be given and risked in GOD S ser
vice ; and it is just then that the pastor, who aims
at higher things for his flock, often suffers the keen
est disappointment and resistance.
Further, I think that S. Ninian is set before us
here as a special example of trust in Almighty GOD.
In his life, as it has come down to us, there is
mention of something which indicates that he was
often put to great straits, and pinched by poverty.
Whether the miracle he is said to have wrought be
as is handed down, matters not. It is at least a
proof that his faith in the Providence of GOD was
unshaken by the trials of poverty. We do not
know much how his mission was supported. There
were no Church Societies then, guaranteeing the
missionary at least a livelihood. Some near him,
able to help him, or friends at a distance might
look coldly on him, because they thought them
selves not called upon to trouble themselves about
the barbarous Picts, or to interfere with their re
ligious views, at the risk of irritating them and
rousing their warlike animosities to return the battle-
cry for the Gospel message of S. Ninian. We
know what various excuses people make in such a
XLV.] EXAMPLE OF 8. SIMIAN. 399
case, for refusing assistance in these days. Perhaps
men are not so very different now from what they
were then, or S. Ninian s faith would not have been
so severely put to the test. Be that as it may, we
may learn a lesson of patience and endurance from
him. We may have many obstacles to surmount,
many difficulties to meet before we succeed in our
imitation of his labours ; but we may be sure that as
our day so shall our strength be, and that the LORD
never fails them that trust in Him.
Still more striking is S. Ninian our pattern, in
his foundation of a college for choristers and others,
in connection with his Cathedral of Candida Casa.
All of us know the trials incident on the care of
youth and boyhood, how difficult to give each case
its proper attention, how to mingle fitly kindness
with strictness, how often the man fails to enter
into the mind of the child, how seldom a child
meets with exactly that treatment it most needs.
And we picture to ourselves S. Ninian doing all
this, and more than this. We imagine one who en
tered heartily into his work, and enjoyed the deal
ing with the simplicity of childhood. We see him
sitting, as the old chronicler describes him in the
midst of his boys, and counting upon each one as
another Ninian to multiply his labours and work.
And this illustrates the vast importance that chil
dren occupy in any missionary work. What you do
with children, far more than with adults, is lasting.
The seed sown in them springs up, perhaps not just
when you expect or desire, but not the less surely
400 EXAMPLE OF S. NINIAN.
and certainly. It may be in mature age, or it may
be in old age, or it may be in death, that your child
becomes a missionary for you, and hands down the
good deposit to others.
There is, indeed, much that remains here to be
done, in this imitation of S. Ninian. But to those
who remember the day of small things, and see thus
far an answer to prayers, there must be much
ground for hope. We at least can look as far on
ward as we can look back. What has been done
hitherto is but a pledge and earnest that Almighty
GOD will perfect what He has begun. Trial and
suffering and distress there may be, as there has
been to some of us ; but it is but the lot of all such
as follow S. Ninian and S. Paul as they followed
CHRIST as " deceivers and yet true, as having
nothing, and yet possessing all things." May we
so follow CHRIST S blessed ones, that we at last
may follow the LAMB for evermore. Amen.
SERMON XLVI.
Season after
EITTJAL WOKSHIP.
EEV. v. 8.
WHEN HE HAD TAKEN THE BOOK, THE FOUR BEASTS
AND FOUR AND TWENTY ELDEES FELL DOWN BEFORE THE
LAMB, HAVING EVERT ONE OF THEM HARPS, AND GOLDEN
VIALS FULL OF ODOURS, WHICH ARE THE PRAYERS OF
SAINTS."
I HAVE said that a more perfect reception of the
doctrine of the Resurrection of the Flesh would tend
perhaps more than anything else to heal the schisms
among professing Christians. And amongst other
points which its right understanding would clear up,
I think Ritual Worship would stand forth as pre
eminently claiming the attention of man. For if it
were intended that the service of the Blessed to
Almighty GOD hereafter should be purely and sim
ply spiritual and immaterial, why is man hereafter
to resume his body and flesh ? To what end is flesh
and blood to be admitted into the kingdom of GOD,
D D
402 RITUAL WORSHIP. [SERM.
if GOD was to be satisfied with a mere inward, an
intellectual, or a highly imaginative religion ? Nay,
why did GOD Himself will to take on Him our
nature, but to show us that our religion was not to
be merely spiritual ? He, the Eternal High Priest,
sacrificed Himself on the altar of His Cross no spi
ritual and immaterial Host and Victim, no phantastic
or shadowy immolation, as the Docetse vainly taught,
but He offered a corporal Sacrifice, a real blood-
shedding for the sins of the whole world. " Sacri
fice" indeed " and meat offering Thou wouldest not,"
yet " a body Thou hast prepared me." And by the
offering of the body of JESUS CHRIST once for all,
is sealed and ratified the principle of material wor
ship. For as He ever standeth before the FATHER,
interceding and exercising His Priesthood in behalf
of His Church, so does He there plead the merits of
a material service and ritual He once solemnized on
Calvary. And as there is no such thing as time
with GOD, that one offering of JESUS CHRIST once
for all is everlastingly going on. As before the
foundation of the world He was the LAMB that
was slain : so is He ever being slain and crucified
amongst us. We describe this when we say that
He is ever representing to GOD the sacrifice He
offered of Himself. The FATHER looketh on the
scars of His Victorious SON, and turneth away
from the wrath due to us sinners. The FATHER
is then pleased with this material ritual. It is
a Body which satisfies His requirements. This
material ritual began only on Calvary, but still
XLVI.] RITUAL WORSHIP. 403
goes on in heaven. To make religion spiritual and
disembodied, you must exorcise and empty heaven,
not I say only of saints and angels, but also of the
material High Priest Himself, the Man CHRIST JE
SUS. Where a man is to be worshipped, there of
necessity must worship take a material form ; and
also where a man is a worshipper, there except he
mutilates or abjures his human and bodily nature,
must there too be material and corporal worship.
To worship the Man CHRIST JESUS with the spirit
only denies the truth of His Humanity. For man
to worship Almighty GOD with the spirit only, is in
effect to claim the attributes of a being above him
self, to affect a simple Divinity.
Pure spiritualism in religion not only is Scriptur-
ally and theologically false, but also ignores existing
facts the manhood of the Glorified JESUS and of
the regenerate man. In that our LORD is man, He
accepts all the worship of the entire humanity, of
the body and soul, as well as of the spirit. Because
He is Spirit, we offer Him the homage of our spirits.
Because He has a human soul, we worship Him with
that particle too of the divine breath. Because He
has a body, we adore Him with the honour of our
limbs and bodies. Strange to say, the old heresies
of Apollinarius and of the other Gnostics have re
appeared under new shapes, whereby the substantial
reality of our LORD S Manhood is undermined and
suppressed. If persons did but consider how the
refusal of a ritual, and, if you like, sensuous and
material religion, does in effect deny the truth of the
D D 2
404 RITUAL WORSHIP. [SERM.
Incarnation, " JESUS CHRIST having come in the
flesh, they would be rather horrified to find that
genuflexions and prostrations, and reverent attention
to all that concerns the worship of the Man CHRIST
JESUS, were the exception rather than the rule in
that communion to which they belonged. And ob
serve to what scanty reverence to CHRIST as our
King would legitimately lead us if men followed out
their opposition to ceremonial religion, as they con
temptuously phrase it. I suppose that no religious
man offers homage and respect to his superiors or
equals out of or apart from CHRIST. We honour Him
in the person of His princes, or rulers, or bishops,
or magistrates. What would be thought in a king
dom, if the petty and inferior officers about a court
were treated with greater outward respect than the
monarch himself? And yet in the kingdom of
CHRIST it is true to say that the King Himself ordi
narily receives less honour than His subordinates.
It is clear that there i* here somewhere a mistake.
Either the subordinates ought to be honoured less,
or the Sovereign more. And herein is the wonderful
property of our Blessed LORD S Presence, that while
by His Divinity He claims adoration everywhere and
ubiquitously, at the same time by His Manhood He
demands a material worship. Thus though it is
true that because of His being omnipresent as Deity
in this place as well as in every one of the myriads
of Christian temples throughout the world you
may come and worship Him here yet your wor
ship is but of a debased and imperfect caste, if you
XLVI.] RITUAL WORSHIP. 405
deny to Him that kind of adoration which befits
Him, Who is bone of your bone and flesh of your
flesh by having been born of Mary. As truly as
though we saw Him with our very eyes, therefore
do we bring to Him all our choicest material gifts,
because He has vouchsafed to mingle His pure Di
vinity with our material flesh. Truly GOD He is in
this temple and every place where He has been
pleased to set His holy and ineffable Name. Truly
Man He receives our carnal and material worship
over and above the spiritual service of Christians.
For Christianity has but deepened and expanded
and developed the ritual worship it found in the
Jewish temple and in the temples of heathen my
thology. Nowhere does Christianity except when
dwarfed and stunted, ignore, or resist, or annihilate
prior dispensations and revelations of the Will of
GOD. It would not be true if it did. It must ap
prove itself to the consciences and instincts of men,
or it must fail of its mission. And I cannot but
feel that one cause of its failure in many cases has
been a reckless disregard if not abnegation of the
inward voice of those to whom it addressed itself.
Indeed those who oppose ritual and ceremonial wor
ship can only get over the fact that by so doing they
are doing violence to the very moral being of men,
by asserting boldly that a craving for bodily and
material worship is a sign and symptom of our cor
rupt nature which needs to be repressed. That is
an assumption I am all along attacking. Almighty
GOD has recognized this craving as fit to be en-
400 RITUAL WORSHIP. [SEllM.
couraged by giving us the "Man CHRIST JESUS" to
be our King on His Mediatorial throne.
All the ritual of the Jewish temple was, we are
distinctly told, a pattern of heavenly things. " See
that thou make all things according to the pattern
showed thee in the Mount. " All Jewish ritual was
but a figure of the true. Much more so is real
Christian ritual a representation of heavenly. The
only difference is that whereas Jewish ritual antici
pated the Incarnation and Atonement, Christian does
represent and commemorate it. All the changes
which have been made in Jewish worship to convert
it into Christian are due to that sole difference.
Jewish worship has not been stripped of all its acci
dents or abolished. It has simply been Christian
ized. In that the spirit or new principle of life has
been bestowed on Christians, it has to play its part
in glorifying GOD. But the gift of spiritual life did
not blot out and destroy the animal or material.
Still, no less than before, must the wealth of nature
and art be ransacked to do honour to CHRIST. Still,
must the children of David praise GOD on the in
struments of music. Still, must the voices of sweet-
toned choirs send forth glad Allelujahs. Still must
the first-fruits of verdant foliage the oblations of
the mighty forest, and of the fragrant flowers the
oblations of the meads and gardens be presented to
the LORD of all. Those glorious colours with which
the painter gratifies the eye must not be withheld.
All things which are so grateful to the senses in the
regions of architecture and its kindred sciences are
XLVI.] BITUAL WORSHIP. 407
but offerings from the redeemed unto the Manhood
o
of JESUS CHRIST. And as He had them withheld
from Him in the days of His humiliation on earth,
all the more do we strive to make up by our offer
ings the honour which His brethren denied Him,
when " He came unto His own and His own re
ceived Him not." And why speak we as it were
apologetically for our material ritual-worship ? Has
not prophecy long ago told us that such is the will
of GOD ? Or what means the prophet when he
says, "The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee,
the fir-tree, the pine-tree, and the box together, to
beautify the place of My sanctuary ; and I will make
the place of My feet glorious." What is this but
material worship ? Who can say in connection
with such a passage as this that Almighty GOD in
tended that Christian Churches should ignore, much
less prohibit, all appeals to the senses, because being
a Spirit, He willed to be worshipped spiritually?
And since the temple of Solomon was but a copy of
that Tabernacle which Moses ordered and set up
after the image of heavenly things showed him in
the Mount by GOD Himself, on what destructive
principle is it assumed, that we are wrong in build
ing our churches and decorating after that ex
emplar ?
All GOD S dispensations have been progressive
and not destructive. The Prophetical did not abolish
the Levitical, nor the Levitical the Patriarchal. In
each successively there was a fresh element of truth,
without denying what existed in the former dispen-
408 KITUAL WORSHIP. [SEBM.
sation. At least it was so in matters concerning
the worship of Almighty GOD. You see Noah, and
Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, building their altar
and offering the sacrifices a confessedly material
worship with no solemn order of ritual, but where
they listed, and how they chose. You read again
and you see Moses arranging still the ruder forms
of material worship, and decking them with vest
ments and carved work, appointing the place and
manner the persons to offer and things to be
offered and all by the command of GOD, not only
for a temporary and transitory purpose, but as
being the representation on earth of what was ever
going on in heaven. A little further on and
you find the prophets not disparaging the material
worship of their day, except as compared with that
higher form of it, which they foresaw in Christianity,
but calling on the people to offer this worship sin
cerely and from the heart. Our Blessed LORD did
but take up this language of the prophets when
He said to the woman of Samaria, " Woman, be
lieve Me, the hour cometh when ye shall neither in
this mountain nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the
FATHER. Ye worship ye know not what : we know
what we worship : for salvation is of the Jews. But
the hour cometh and now is, when the true wor
shippers shall worship the FATHER in spirit and in
truth ; for the FATHER seeketh such to worship
Him. GOD is a Spirit, and they that worship Him
must worship Him in spirit and in truth." Our
LORD did not say that when the Jewish Temple
XLVI.] RITUAL WORSHIP. 409
should be destroyed, that its ritual should die with
it. Rather did He predict that that worship should
go on elsewhere that spirit, and life, and reality
should be given to it. And thus, as S. Paul de
scribes the Jewish priest as standing daily minister
ing, 1 and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices,
which can never take away sins, so is he himself
with S. Barnabas described by S. Luke as in a like
though higher sense ministering 2 in the Church of
Antioch. Still more boldly does S. Paul say, " We
have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat who
serve the tabernacle." All that we read in the
New Testament of things pertaining to the worship
of GOD speak of no such violent change from sensu
ous and material worship, to what people are pleased
to call Protestant and Presbyterian simplicity. Such
a change would be utterly irreconcileable with the
sanction given by the Apostles to the older ritual
by their attendance upon it, but quite accords with
the notion of a gradual progress of growth from
youth to manhood in CHRIST. So connected and
entwined together do we find the two rituals of
Christianity and Judaism, that it is difficult to say
where in the New Testament the one begins or the
other ends. As after the Ascension the disciples
were continually in the Temple : as inso me room
within its precincts the HOLY GHOST descended
upon them : as Peter and John went up to the
Temple to pray at the accustomed hour : as Paul
circumcised Timothy, and to-day we read of his
410 EITUAL WORSHIP. [SEEM.
going out of his way to prove that he wished not to
violate the Mosaic ritual, so it is throughout the
Word of GOD.
And lest there should be any doubt in our minds
as to the perpetuity of this material worship any
idea that it was to be supplanted and terminated by
a fantastic spiritualism, and unsubstantial aspirations,
the beloved Apostle had vouchsafed to him a vision
of heavenly worship, which if any, must be spiritual
and true, and acceptable to the LORD of all. There
we see an answer to the question, " Why am I to
rise again with a material body like That of the In
carnate CHRIST ?" Why but because this material
worship this bowing the head and bending of the
knee is to go on for ever? The Resurrection of
the Flesh were unnecessary, were worship in the
New Jerusalem to be conformed and pared down to
the conceptions of those who would spiritualise
away the Manhood of CHRIST and the glories of the
Regeneration of all things. Heaven and earth are
to pass away, but to be purified and reproduced.
There are to be "new heavens and a new earth."
And a great city is to descend out of heaven from
QOD the holy Jerusalem with her twelve gates of
pearl, and her streets of gold, and her foundations
of precious stones. And therein is the throne of
GOD and of the Lamb. Thus is the object of ma
terial worship to be continued by adoring evermore
the Lamb that was slain. And if we would know
how the Lamb is to be reverenced with heavenly
manners, we are told by the Apostle how he saw
XLVI.] ftlTUAL WORSHIP. 411
four and twenty elders falling down before the
Lamb, having every one of them harps and golden
vials full of odours, which are the prayers of the
Saints." And so too he saw all the angels falling
down before the throne on their faces and worship
ping GOD. Now I ask if this is or is not as mate
rial and sensuous a worship as that we offer, so far
as outward forms go. The only difference is that
we worship with bodies of humiliation now, whereas
hereafter they will be glorified, and that we worship
Him Who is invisible to us, whereas then we shall
see His face, and His servants shall serve Him. If
you cannot realise this, it is because you do not
realise a real and palpable resurrection. And when
persons object to our worship as histrionic or
theatrical, I would ask, if our worship is to be a pat
tern of heavenly, how it could be otherwise ? We
are acting a rehearsal of our parts for eternity. We
are representing on earth what goes on in heaven.
No wonder then that we have here what people call
a theatrical performance. It needs must that we
be actors, but that does not necessarily imply that
we are hypocrites, or deceiving ourselves with mere
outward gestures. If we are not to make heavenly
worship, as is revealed to us our worship, then I
grant all our material reverences are mistaken and
dangerous to spiritual religion. Then I allow it is
right not to practise ourselves for that place to which
one day we hope to come, by humbling our bodies
before the Unseen. But if it was for any purpose
that the Revelation was made to us of the manner
412 BITUAL WORSHIP. [SEBM.
in which the Crucified One is adored in heaven,
then I must maintain that true Christianity demands
of us bodily venerations. Else the GoD-Man does
not now sit on the throne nor reign. Else He did
not truly ascend nor rise. Else He only suffered
on the Cross in appearance and not in reality. Else
we shall not rise again with our bodies to do Him
homage. Nor shall we ever hope to hear His
Voice, nor see Him with our eyes, nor handle Him
with our hands. If material worship exists in
heaven, why should it cease on earth, merely because
we cannot see with our very eyes the Lamb sitting
on the throne ? So far then from our ritual being-
opposed to " the truth of the Gospel, or to the sim
plicity that is in CHRIST," it is no more so than the
ritual of heaven, as revealed to us in Holy Scripture.
And remember that that doctrine is not said to be
Antichristian, which recognizes to the full the
Manhood of CHRIST as well as His Godhead, but
that which denies that " JESUS CHRIST has come in
the flesh/ which repudiates all corporeal and ma
terial homage as inconsistent with the purity of
Christianity.
One word more by way of caution : if I have said
nothing about the necessity of giving our LORD in
ward as well as outward worship of setting up for
Him a throne in our hearts, and bowing our souls
and spirits before His Indwelling it is not because
I do not feel the importance of that part of true
worship. But my subject now requires me to vin
dicate bodily worship from the charge of being un-
XLVI.] RITUAL WORSHIP. 413
scriptural, and therefore I have wished to keep its
importance distinct. In the meanwhile, I may re
mind you that the neglect of either outward or
inward worship is equally repugnant to the consti
tution of our being, as well as to the twofold nature
of JESUS CHRIST. And while we thus " fall down
and kneel before the LORD our Maker," let us not
forget too that He has also made us partakers of
the Divine Nature, that not only must we present
our bodies a living sacrifice to Him, not only must
we glorify GOD with our bodies, but also with our
spirits, because both are His, and for His service.
SEEM ON XL VI I.
after Cttnitg,
OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION.
MICAH vi. 68.
: WHEREWITH SHALL I COME BEFORE THE LORD, AND
BOW MYSELF BEFORE THE HlGH GOD ? SHALL I COME
BEFORE HlM WITH BURNT-OFFERINGS ? WITH CALVES
OF A TEAR OLD ? WlLL THE LORD BE PLEASED WITH
THOUSANDS OF RAMS, OR WITH TEN THOUSANDS OF RIVERS
OF OIL ? SHALL I GIVE MY FIRSTBORN FOR MY TRANSGRES
SION, THE FRUIT OF MY BODY FOR THE SIN OF MY SOUL ?
HE HATH SHEWED THEE, O MAN, WHAT IS GOOD ; AND
WHAT DOTH THE LORD REQUIRE OF THEE, BUT TO DO
JUSTLY, AND TO LOVE MERCY, AND TO WALK HUMBLY WITH
THY GOD?"
" THAT is what I call religion," I think many ex
claim when they hear or read these words. " This
comprehends my idea of Christianity." They con
ceive that all outward acts, much praying in Church,
many services, much almsgiving, much fasting and
self-denial, much costly decorating of GOD S houses,
all these are quite foreign and opposed to true re-
OUTWARD AND INWAED RELIGION. 415
ligion. " Can these things/ they ask triumphantly,
benefit a man s soul ? Can they cleanse him from
sin ? Will they make a man acceptable to his
GOD ? Can such things as these please the AL
MIGHTY? Is it not much better to do justly, and
love mercy, and walk humbly with our GOD, than
to be always ringing of bells, and going to Church,
and joining in solemn services, or building hand
some temples to GOD S glory? There is no such
thing as sacrifice in our religion ; that belonged to
Judaism. The only sacrifice we know of, is CHRIST S
upon the Cross. He has done all for us, we have
no sacrifice to offer ourselves, except that of broken
and contrite spirits. And you see how the Prophet
treats the question. He sweeps away at once the
burnt-offerings and calves of the Law, the rams and
the oil, the meat-offering and the drink-offering,
the redemption of the first-born. Justice, mercy,
and humility, these are all GOD wants and seeks in
us. All rites and ceremonies are rather hateful to
Him. This beautiful Church, and its solemn music,
and its ornaments, and its elaborate ritual is a great
mistaking of the genius of Christianity. And the
people who worship in it no doubt make all their
religion to consist in it, and are woefully deficient
in justice, mercy, and humility. I want a pure
Bible Christianity, but theirs is Judaism brought
back again."
This is all very fine, and sounds very well. But
is it GOD ALMIGHTY S truth, or is it your concep
tion of His truth ? First of all, does the Prophet
416 OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION. [SEIIM.
in these words really condemn all outward rites and
sacrifices as such ? Were burnt-offerings wrong ?
Was it a mistake of the Jews that they offered so
many calves, so many rams, and so much oil ?
Were they in grievous error when they redeemed
their first-born at a great cost and expense ? No
thing of the kind. All that the Prophet seems to
you to inveigh against, was enjoined by the express
commands of Almighty GOD. This was no inven
tion of man, no vain and empty tradition of their
fathers, but the positive injunction of the Mosaic
Law. Neither Micah, nor Isaiah , nor any other
Prophet, had authority to dispense with the require
ments of that Law. Of that Law even our Blessed
LORD said, that not " one jot or tittle should pass
until all was fulfilled." No Jew could without
grievous disobedience to that Law content himself
with justice, mercy, and humility, and neglect the
Sabbaths, new moons, and solemn assemblies. If
our Blessed LORD came not to destroy the Law,
much less did the Prophets. If He, in His own
person, was particular in observing the rites and
ceremonies of the Jewish Church, can we imagine
that the Prophet Micah intended to advocate an
opposite course ? If things were not ripe in our
LORD S time, could they have been so, so long be
fore, for a sweeping change ? Or had Micah more
authority, or more knowledge of the truth than our
LORD ? Or did CHRIST, by not following out the
prophetical teaching, give a check to its spiritual
improvements? In fact, was CHRIST very much
XLVII.] OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION. 417
more in the dark as to vital religion than the Pro
phet Micah, that is to say, the Maker and Author
of all law than one of His messengers and inter
preters ? You see then that you cannot take the
Prophet s words as such a triumphant condemna
tion of the benighted creatures you take others
to be.
Wei), then, some one will say, I see my view will
not exactly hold ; but the Prophet s words mean
something surely. What explanation can you give
of them ? Why something of this sort. The office
of the Prophets was clearly to prepare the way for
a more spiritual religion than the Law had given
the Israelites. They saw CHRIST, the body and sub
stance of true religion, looming in the distance, and
they could not endure to see the Jews resting in the
shadows of good things, as if no better thing was
provided. Their mission was to perfect, or rather
to prepare the way for perfection. And so they
disparaged and ran down legal ordinances, not as
useless or wrong, but because they were imperfect.
As the Jews were ever inclined to rest in the Law as
a perfect and final dispensation, all the more strongly
did the Prophets dwell upon its defects. There is
a world-wide difference between showing the points
in which a system is inferior to another, and doing
away with it altogether. The Law was given for a
particular use, to be a schoolmaster to bring men to
CHRIST. But if men made it the end, instead of
the way to an end, no wonder that the Prophets
lifted up their voices in warning against it. You
E E
418 OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION. [SERM.
do not deny a man to be your friend, because when
his goodness is exaggerated, you feel it your duty
from any reason to show that you are less indebted
to him than others imagine. You are not necessarily
arguing for the total disuse of a thing, because you
maintain its proper use against its abuse.
Our LORD Himself indicates the proper light in
which we are to regard the prophetical denuncia
tions. When He rebuked the great zealots for the
Law in His day for tithing mint, anise, and cummin,
while they neglected the weightier matters of the
Law, justice, mercy, and faith, He added, "These
ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other
undone." The genius of the Law was not, I have
said, perfect. It regarded the bodies of men rather
than their souls it dealt with externals rather than
with the interior of religion it had outward wash
ings rather than the purification of the conscience-
it had respect to this state of being rather than the
future and immortal. Christianity took account of
a ]l bodies and souls externals and internals out
ward and inward cleansings this and the next life.
It grafted a higher state of things upon what was
already in existence. And the prophets seem to
feel that their vocation lay in preparing the Jews for
superadding a spiritual to a more material system
of religion. "Your sacrifices of calves and rams,
your offerings of oil," they said, "are nothing in
themselves, but connected with the truth they typify
and shadow forth they have a value and dignity.
But while you practise injustice, cruelty, and pride..
XLVII.J OUTWABD AND INWARD RELIGION.
419
they are utterly valueless in the sight of GOD. You
cannot please GOD with these alone, unless you are
pleasing Him by the discharge of your social and
moral duties." In all this they simply pressed on
the Jews the defects of their system as opposed to
the perfection of the coming dispensation. But to
represent the prophets, as intending to destroy the
Law of GOD delivered to the Jews, because they
wished to spiritualize and extend its enactments, is
quite contrary to the whole tenour of Scripture.
However much they protested against the way in
which the Jews rested in the mere letter of the Law,
they neither dared nor wished to abolish it alto
gether.
And thus, I think, we have arrived at the view
which, as Christians, we are to take of the prophet s
words. They call you to the important truth, which
Christianity has brought forth so prominently, that
no attention to the externals of religion can satisfy
the demands of our Creator and Redeemer if it be
not accompanied with a holy and virtuous life.
Sabbaths and Sacraments, preachings and prayings,
are well enough in their way, but they are but the
shell and shadow of true piety. Only do not sup
pose that the body has no shadow that the kernel
has no shell. You cannot have one without the
other. As you are men with living souls and dying
bodies, your religion must be fitted to the con
stitution of your being, and must take both souls
and bodies into account. Or you deny the truth of
natural religion, for you make it antagonistic to
E E 2
420 OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION. [SERM.
revelation. Nay more, you make the old revelation
to Moses directly contrary to the new, or as some
ancient heretics affirmed, the GOD of the Old Testa
ment a different Being from the GOD of the New.
Whether you make your religion a merely spiritual
or a merely material one, it is, I say not equally im
perfect, but at least not so perfect as that which
deals with mankind as it finds them, and requires a
spiritual as well as a literal fulfilment of the Divine
Law. No doubt if the choice lay between attending
Church and Sacrament and the requirements of
justice and mercy, we should take the latter as most
binding on us. But both are laid upon you ; and
it is incumbent on you not to neglect the lesser
while you are diligent in discharging the greater
duties ; not to take for granted that the fulfilment
of the less spiritual or intellectual duties implies an
abandonment of the higher not to assume that
costly sacrifices indicate the blindness and ignorance
of those who offer them. Meanwhile, my Christian
brethren, do you see to it that no neglect of social
or domestic duties bring discredit upon the perform
ance of those which concern religion. Every reli
gion has its Sacraments and forms, and every Sa
crament and form may be abused and corrupted.
To all who make their religious profession an empty
piece of formalism, the prophet speaks now as of
old, in warning. No calves, no rains, no rivers of
oil can compensate for breaches of the moral Law.
No ceremonies and rites can absolve from continu
ing in any violation of the Divine commands.
XLVII.] OUTWARD AND INWARD RELIGION. 421
" LORD, who shall dwell in Thy tabernacle : or who
shall rest upon Thy holy hill ? Even he that leacl-
eth an uncorrupt life, and doeth the thing which is
right, and speaketh the truth from his heart. He
that hath used no deceit in his tongue, nor done evil
to his neighbour : and hath not slandered his neigh
bour. He that setteth not by himself, but is lowly
in his own eyes : and maketh much of them that
fear the LORD. He that sweareth unto his neigh
bour, and disappointeth him not : though it were
to his own hindrance. He that hath not given his
money upon usury : nor taken reward against the
innocent. Whoso doeth these things : shall never
fall.
" Glory be to the FATHER, and to the SON: and
to the HOLY GHOST ;
: As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever
shall be: world without end. Amen."
S E It M ON X L V I I I.
after gfrmttg.
THE TWOFOLD DEATH.
EZEKTEL xvin. 4.
"TlIE SOUL THAT SINNETH, IT SHALL DIE."
WE cannot too often be reminded that GOD S deal
ings with the soul of man are analogous to those
wherewith He affects the body. We are to look for
the shadows of the truth in those visible and palpa
ble things which come every day under our notice.
And thus we cannot fail to notice that every viola
tion of GOD S laws in regard to the well-being of
His people brings with it its own punishment.
Eating or drinking to excess does of necessity injure
the bodily functions and beget disease. And there
are other sins of deeper dye which have a still worse
effect on the human frame. Sin does not in these
cases merely deprave or ruin the moral sense, but
impairs and enfeebles the bodies of men. Not only
are the mental powers debilitated and impaired by
sins of impurity, drunkenness, and the like, but also
THE TWOFOLD DEATH. 123
the physical. If you go amongst the lowest class of
the idle, or unfortunate, or dissolute of any of our
large towns, you will see human nature exhibited in
her most repulsive externals. Crime of various
kinds stamps on the countenance its disgusting
peculiarities. Moral and religious degradation is
succeeded by bodily. The soul that sins the per
son who indulges in wickedness is daily dying to
the very sight of his acquaintance. He is daily
losing that image in which he was re-created that
of the Incarnate CHRIST. Decay and corruption
are pictured on his very brow. And this, though
often hidden from like-minded associates, is manifest
to the true children of GOD. They can often trace
the replacing of the image of the Crucified One by
the seal of the Evil Spirit. As the wicked sec only
in their companions a mirror of themselves, so the
good see in them all the incarnation of evil. And
this connexion of bodily with spiritual death is evi
denced by the fact that GOD often does visit the
bodies of men with affliction for their sins. And
this is reasonable, because when sin comes to its full
height, it is carried out in the members of the body.
And it is meet that those members of our bodies
which have been the agents of sin should receive
their peculiar chastisement. This was specially the
case under the Jewish dispensation, which held out
rewards and punishments of a temporal nature. As
once it was the entering or not entering Canaan, so
afterwards it was the living long or not in the land
which the LORD their GOD had given them. Fire
424 THE TWOFOLD DEATH. [SEEM.
from heaven consumed Sodom and Gomorrah with
their inhabitants. The flood drowned all, save Noah
the righteous and seven others. Death is the judg
ment that awaits all sin before the coming of CHRIST.
The sword and the pestilence are rods of correction
in the hands of GOD towards His chosen people in
the wilderness and in Canaan under judges and
under kings upon judges themselves and kings too.
Nor is this law confined to the Jews. Witness the
extermination of the idolatrous Canaanites witness
GOD S destruction of the enemies of His people con
tinually. And lastly, what a wonderful connexion
does all this supply between the sentence on Adam
and the death of our Blessed LORD on the Cross.
Not even is the stern law " the soul that sinneth
it shall die," repealed in favour of the Incarnate GOD.
Out of the numberless myriads that have lived on
this world of ours two only, Enoch and Elijah, are
excepted from this law.
What is very striking in all this is, that these
temporal deaths were the sole punishments of which
the Jewish dispensation spake. Fearful as are the
plagues denounced on the backsliding Israelites by
Moses in the book of Deuteronomy fearfully as
their fulfilment is represented by the historian Jo-
sephus they are but temporal. Death comes with
all the horrors of a besieged city, the famine of the
shut up inhabitants the rage of the invaders and
the despair of the beleaguered it comes and does
its worst, and then all is over. That tremendous
agony and conflict of a few days or hours comes to
XLVIII.] THE TWOFOLD DEATH. 425
an end at last. And this is all that the Scriptures
held out as inducements to godliness under the old
dispensation. GOD visited and chastened man with
death for sin, and there it would seem to have ended.
Even those who sometime were rebellious, when
Noah preached repentance to the antediluvian world,
had the Gospel message delivered to them by our
Blessed LORD in Hades. It was the death of the
body wherewith they were chastened, nothing more.
And so our LORD says that it shall be more tolerable
for Sodom and Gomorrha and for Tyre and Zidon
in the day of judgment than for those cities, as Beth-
saida and Chorazin, which rejected Him. GOD has
yet a reckoning in store for them in His great day.
They have had their temporal punishment adapted
to the dispensation under which they lived, but their
degree of happiness or of misery has yet to be as
signed. And we may infer that their sentence will
not be proportionably so severe as their temporal
visitation. Just as we look with satisfaction on the
sufferings which we undergo in consequence of past
sins, as a sort of pledge of GOD S future mercy be
cause He judges now so we may with greater cer
tainty infer what will be the judgment passed on all
sinners under the old dispensation. They have
received the punishment threatened by the Old
Covenant Law " the soul that sinneth it shall die."
The bitterest thing that mankind knew of was
brought upon them the going down to the grave
the bidding farewell to kindred and friends, to wife,
and husband, to children and loved ones the loos-
426 THE TWOFOLD DEAT1I. [SEEM.
ing hold of vineyards, and money, and flocks, and
herds, and changes of raiment. Good king Heze-
kiah lamented sore when the Word of the LORD
came unto him, saying, " Set thine house in order,
for thou shalt die and not live." I said, In the
cutting off of my days I shall go to the gates of the
grave : I am deprived of the residue of my years.
I said, I shall not see the LORD, even the LORD in
the land of the living . . . The grave cannot praise
Thee ; death cannot celebrate Thee ; they that go
down into the pit cannot hope for Thy truth." Job
lamented likewise. " Man that is horn of a woman
is of few days and full of trouble ; he cometh forth
like a flower, and is cut down ; he fleeth also as a
shadow and continueth not .... There is hope of
a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and
that the tender branch thereof will not cease ....
But man dieth, and wasteth away : yea, man giveth
up the ghost, and where is he ?" Compare the
alacrity and readiness with which the Christian mar
tyrs went to their sword, or fire, or wild beasts, or
barbed arrows, with the reluctance and sorrow where
with the Old Testament saints wept sore for their
own death or for that of others, and you will see
how 7 to them the sentence was full of anguish and
pain, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die."
Death of the body is not to Christian men a sor
rowful thing. In proportion as they bear the Cross
of their LORD after Him, they go forth with Him to
their Calvary, to be crucified there together with
Him. They who are ever bearing about in the body
XLVIII.] THE TWOFOLD DEATH. 427
the dying of the LORD JESUS, what matters it to
them when the end of all their dying comes ? They
who die with the Apostle Paul daily, rejoice when
they have come thither where shall be no more
death. All foretaste of death in them, the sins of
their youth taking hold of them so that they are
unable to look up ; their bones filled with the
transgressions of the past, disease, sickness, weak
ness of mind or body ; all these are not grievous,
but joyous, because in the wasting and perishing of
their outward man they see the marks of the cruci
fied One. Gladly does the soul that has sinned
die to outward things while yet in life, and content
edly does it quit all at the last. It embraces the
law of death for sin as its chiefest comfort and con
solation. It says with the Apostle, "It is better
to depart and be with CHRIST." The soul that has
sinned must die to self, to self-indulgence, to self-
exaltation, and to self-love. While it dies thus,
it has hope of life. Whereinsoever the soul hath
sinned, therein it must die. The law has not been
abrogated, it has been changed, but not destroyed.
The sickening at the world, and the things that are
in the world, must come ; the loathing and distaste
for what has caused disease, must come ; the trem
bling and terror at the wrath of GOD, must come ;
the agony of penitence and tearful cries for help,
must come ; the last burial of sin, must-come. He
may be alone, or with friends ; but be that as it
may, the soul that has sinned must die if he would
be saved from eternal death.
428 THE TWOFOLD DEATH. [SEEM.
And what is it that makes this wonderful differ
ence between the Christian and the Jew ? Why
must the Christian suffer not only an external, but
also an internal death for his sin ? Because his sin
is not only bodily and outward, but also spiritual
and inward. Because he has a spirit as well as a
soul. Because he has marred not only that out
ward image of GOD, wherein he was made, but also
that inw r ard likeness to Him wherein he was remade
and regenerated. If Ahab walked humbly and went
in sackcloth because he feared a temporal death,
what ought Christians to do lest a spiritual death
come upon them ? Sin has a more fatal effect on
the Christian man, than it had on Jew and Gentile.
Therefore had the Jew only outward washings and
cleansings ; therefore was the whole Levitical system
a tissue of mere ceremonial ; therefore did it do so
little to affect the interior man, because the wicked
Jew was not spiritually corrupted, so much as
bodily depraved. Murder, for example, is less a
spiritual sin than habitual passionateness, or thirst
for revenge. Adultery is less a spiritual sin, than
the continual dwelling upon loose and unclean
thoughts. Theft is less a spiritual sin, than the set
and intentional habitude of defrauding and over
reaching others. Acts of disobedience to parents is
less a spiritual sin, than the stedfast and systema-
tised resistance to all authority. Or, again, in re
gard to Almighty GOD, the mere act of bodily
worship to an idol, is nothing to that spiritual idola
try whereby men cherish objects of adoration and
XLYIII.] THE TWOFOLD DEATH. 429
service in their own hearts. When a Christian
man sins, he dies not merely bodily, but that life
he has received, supernaturally and mysteriously
linked with the glorified CHRIST, is sapped and
withered. This is what makes his death so terri
ble. He dies a twofold death. The seed of im
mortality is corrupted, and he is twice dead ; dead
in body, soul and spirit. It is the temple of the
HOLY GHOST, not the mere habitation of a human
soul that is ruined and waste. It is the member of
CHRIST, and not part of the human family only, that
is defiled and degraded. It is a son of GOD and
not of man, that has been counted unworthy of a
FATHER S adoption and love. It is an heir of
heaven and not of earth, that has lost his inherit
ance. It is not the human nature, capable of so
many noble deeds and virtues, which is fallen and
grovelling in the dust, but it is the garment of
Deity wherewith man s original nakedness is clothed,
that is now tarnished and polluted. All the more
noble that any creature of GOD is, all the more sen
sibly are we affected by his death and decay. All
the more good and holy and just a man has been,
all the more sadly do we mourn over his back
sliding. What must it be to see a Christian man
or woman dying the twofold death, the natural and
spiritual ? If angels break out into glad Alleluias
when fallen man is brought back to GOD, how must
they mourn at his wandering and straying. If
Christian life is so joyous and gladsome, making
even the fulness of heaven s joy more full, how
430 THE TWOFOLD DEATH. [sEllM.
fearful must be Christian death ! " The soul that
sinneth it shall die." Awful words to Christian
men and women. It were nothing to die the death
of the beasts that perish, compared with that death
they die, who have been born anew of Water and
of the SPIRIT. The fires of passions and lusts be
come foretastes of that fire which is not quenched
for ever. The thirst for gold, or pleasure, or rai
ment, or rich dainties, that never is satisfied, does
but anticipate that thirst of dead souls in hell, cry
ing for a drop of water to cool the tongue. That
restlessness of the wicked, which knows no peace in
this world, is but a step to the tormenting day and
night that is to come. That dislike of Church
Services, that neglect of Sundays, that refusal to
join in the public worship of Almighty GOD, is but
forecasting that shutting out from the holy city, of
which the LORD GOD Almighty and the LAMB are
the Temple. That shrinking from confessions of
sin, and meeting GOD now, does but represent what
it will be, when they shall call to the mountains
and hills to hide them from the face of Him That
sitteth upon the throne. That distaste to the spiri
tual meat and drink in the blessed Sacrament does
but image the hour when they shall be separated
from them whom the LAMB, Which is in the midst
of the throne shall feed. Brethren, are there any
tokens of this death in you? Is CHRIST still in
you the hope of glory ? Is He still sustaining you
with His living waters and true manna ? or have
you a name that you live and yet are dead ? "Be
XLVIII.] THE TWOFOLD DEATH. 431
watchful and strengthen the things that remain,
that are ready to die. Remember how thou hast
received and heard, and hold fast and repent. But
if thou shalt not watch, I will come on thce as
a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will
come upon thee."
SERMON XLIX.
?iast ^untiaj) after 3Trimtji>.
HOPE.
TlTTJS II. 13.
"LOOKING TOR THAT BLESSED HOPE."
MAN is a creature of hope he is ever looking on,
expectant, waiting. The present all absorbing as
it is with its hard and unbending realities, does not
satisfy his cravings. It is the future only that
which is to be the ever hereafter which from the
creation of our race has occupied his thoughts and
aspirations ; as with the present so with the past ;
man closes his eyes to both that he may gaze beyond
to that which follows after. The child would be
a man and the man is not content. The man looks
on to fame, fortune, power, happiness, and is not
satisfied ; and at last he sits down in old age to
gather together the fragments that remain of his
manifold hopes, and amidst them lays him down to
die. And this character of our moral nature is
stamped upon us through various channels ; one
cause of it is our tendencv to think much of our
HOPE. 433
pains and sorrows, and but little of our joys and
pleasures. What was looked for as the source of
our greatest joy always falls short of our expectations
and fades from the memory, but trials and difficul
ties of years gone by leave a mark which cannot be
effaced. Human joys are never of that unmixed
nature, which might lead their possessors to intoxi
cate themselves with the enjoyment of them ; and
thus continued disappointments drive us on to the
future as poor prisoners of hope waiting one day to
be free.
This is specially true of the natural man. He
tries all ways to make himself at home in this life,
but he does not succeed. He has not yet attained,
or else why does he still hope ? All objects of desire
would be given up if he were quite content with the
present. It is in hope of this life that he lives. He
would have more riches, more power, more renown,
more influence, more pleasure, more laughter. The
present always has its want, its deficiency in his eyes ;
and this belongs to every degree and condition of life.
It is this same forecasting this same looking on
ward which sustains the widow and her fatherless
children, the beggared merchant or tradesman, the
shipwrecked mariner, the convicted criminal and
the pain-worn, disease-ridden sufferer. Hope, like
a faint ray, gleaming in upon the darkness of this
world, cheers the foot -sore wanderer, the falsely ac
cused, the victim of slander and misrepresentation,
the ill-assorted couple, the hardly-used child, the
poverty-stricken household. Despite the past, des-
F F
434 HOPE. [SEEM.
pite the present, they yet think to bring their vessel
through the storm into the haven of futurity. It is
indeed an overwhelming misery that can quench the
last spark of hope in lingering humanity. Reason
itself first departs from the mind of man ere he can
let hope go forth. What but this animates the
bosoms of those who stand around the dying man
and watch his every look and motion ? While there
is life, they say, there is hope. Only with our last
breath does hope die out. Not till then is all lost,
and the conflict between the senses and hope over.
" Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and
full of trouble. He cometh forth like a flower and
is cut down ; he fleeth as a shadow and continueth
not .... For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut
down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender
branch thereof will not cease. Though the root
thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof
die in the ground ; yet through the scent of water
it will bud and bring forth boughs like a plant.
But man dieth and wasteth away ; yea, man giveth
up the ghost, and where is he?" Such is the lan
guage of the natural man. All his actions and
sufferings have this motto engraved upon them
" In hope of this life." While this life lasts he is
always in mind and heart hastening onwards till the
great change comes. And then even then some
glimpse of hope perchance shines through the veil
of those things which he has placed betwixt himself
and the life to come.
For it is, as we have said, a principle bound up
XLIX.] HOPE. 435
with the soul of man, thus ever to be reaching for
ward unto the things that are before. GOD has so
constituted man that he is not satisfied except with
the prospect of a future. It is the earnest and pledge
of immortality an argument for an eternal life
beyond the grave which every one of you possesses
by the mere instinct of nature ; and yet what is it
but to degrade and profane such a principle of eter
nity as this, when we only use it for this life and
not for the life to come ? GOD has given you this
evidence of heaven and hell in your very natures, and
yet how are you dealing with it ? You may be no
scholar you may be distracted by the din of con
troversy and the jar of sects -you may be perplexed
by strange and diverse doctrines. But here is no
mistake : it is GOD S everlasting voice in the soul of
man, say ing in unutterable words, " Prepare to meet
thy GOD, O Israel."
Act then for eternity as you do for time. I might
ask more in the same degree that eternity is of more
moment than time. But I ask only of you to wait
upon the life to come as you do upon that which is
now. Do not stop short in your expectations, but
carry out your principle of hoping and resting on
the future to eternity. Your life hitherto has been
a life of hopes. It might have been cut short at
any time. Nothing was so uncertain as its dura
tion. But this did not change your natural pro
vision for the future, though you knew that that
future might never come. You went on toiling and
labouring as though you were to live many years,
436 HOPE. [SEBM.
when in truth you could not say of yourself that
you could ensure an hour s breathing time. You
laid your deep plans for securing that post, that
situation, that profit, though nothing was so doubtful
as your living to enjoy it. You sent forth that
vessel on the ocean laden with your bales of mer
chandize, though you knew that many predicted
its loss and damage. You brought up and edu
cated your children, though death had seemed
to have graven his lines in their fair countenances.
Or you projected some great work of Christian
charity, while it was humanly impossible that you
could ever live to see it finished. With the same
predicaments you have builded and planted, eaten
and drunk, bought and sold, married and given in
marriage. Surely, if such has been the result of
your hope in regard to this life, so changeable and
fleeting, what may we expect of you in regard to
that which is firm and immovable ? Surely to find
you more earnest in your forethought, more wise and
sagacious for life eternal. But alas! what is the case ?
We might reasonably have looked for things to
be just on the contrary footing to what they are.
We should have expected to see the results of your
hopes much more strongly evidenced in regard to
eternal than to temporal things. We should have
imagined that eternal life would be so interesting, so
intensely exciting that all temporal concerns would
in comparison of it cease to have their attraction.
But it is not so. And it is not so in opposition to
reason and the plainest induction.
XLIX.] iron:. 437
You provide for the necessities of manhood and
age, why do you neglect those of that period of ex
istence which is heyond them ? Why are you so in
consistent with yourself? Why do you act in con
formity with your expectations of the future state
of existence up to a certain point, and then slacken
your hands and relinquish your spirit of prudent
anticipation ?
You must then by the very constitution of your
self look onward. And it depends on yourself
whether you will use this principle of your nature
for good or evil. You may waste and squander it
on the unsatisfying world about you. You may be
ever hoping to amass gold ever hoping to gratify
lust ever hoping to satisfy wrath ever hoping
to enjoy yourself according to the fashion of this
life. You are but walking in the light of your own
fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled, and
the end of this must be that ye shall lie down in
sorrow. It were miserable to find out at the last
that your long cherished expectations were vain
yet far worse to find yourselves on a deathbed
" without hope," for such is the end of all who live
here without hope of eternal life.
I. am not supposing that any of you here are en
tirely in such a case. But at the close of another
Christian year, (for we begin our year at a different
time from the world s year,) I would at least ask
you, is your hope of eternal life stronger and
brighter than this time twelvemonth ? As faith and
love gain power and might by being exercised, so
438 HOPE, [SEEM.
too does hope. As a man who hopes to be rich
daily increases that hope, so is it with him who
travels in the way of eternal life. Has then your
hope increased by exercise ? You are at least one
year nearer to the realisation of it and to the evan
escence of all earthly ones. As you cultivate faith
by saying the Creed, so do you ever profess your
hope ? Do you ever say such words as these, O
LORD JESU, I hope in Thee, Who hast redeemed me
with Thy precious Blood, that Thou wilt intercede
for me a sinner. O HOLY GHOST, I hope in Thee
that Thou wilt hallow me unto the end. O my
FATHER, I hope in Thee, that Thou wilt not cast off
Thy penitent child.
It is a wonderful help, so they tell us who have
been accustomed to it from childhood, thus to con
firm our hopes of eternal life. Just to add such
acts of hope as these to our daily prayers will assist
us very much in bringing home to our minds that
future upon which our hearts ought most to dwell.
It is just the way children realise to themselves the
possession of some new thing which has been pro
mised them. They start up every now and then in
the day and say, " I hope I shall have it to-morrow,
next week, or next year." Or as older ones go and
look at lands or houses which are some day or other
to be theirs, and exclaim, " I hope to be master of
this in a few years/ It is no effort to them to say
this ; it comes natural to them. And the reason
why we do not use their language in regard to our
eternal future is that we don t half believe in it.
XLIX.] HOPE. 489
They believe the promises of men that are liars and
deceivers. We believe not the strength of Israel
that cannot lie. If we did, it would come natural
to us to express our hope. And as it is, we must
force ourselves to believe and hope for eternal life,
and make our hope a means of stirring us up and
rousing us to live as inheritors of such a glorious
futurity.
Depend upon it, my brethren, that a great deal
hangs upon your bringing home to yourselves what
your hopes are. You are heirs, you have been told
so to-night by S. Paul, according to the hope of
eternal life. Heaven is as much yours, and you
have as much right to hope for it as your inheritance,
as the son of any wealthy man can reckon on his
father s property becoming his. You have been
"saved by the washing of regeneration." You
have been " born of water and of the Spirit." I
deny not but that you may forfeit your title to this
by disobedience. Nay, I warn you that you are
every day of your lives in danger of losing your
right to the heavenly treasure. But I want you to
dwell upon this your hope. I want you to make it
more and more your own. I wish you to set it be
fore yourselves in so strong a light as to shut out
every other hope. I want to dazzle your eyes with
the prospect of the eternal future, so as to make
them unwilling to gaze upon the brief future of
this life. And then the thought will come deep into
your inmost souls, "Am I living worthy of this
hope ?" " Am I indeed living as one whose future
440 HOPE,
is so glorious, so blissful?" "Is this hope really
mine?" Can I, whose hopes are eternal, dare to
neglect this duty or commit this sin?" <f Can an
heir of heaven like me lament such losses, such
sufferings, or desire such earthly dross, such tem
poral wealth ?" And so our Christianity will become
more real and true. Visions of heaven will wrap
round us as we sleep. Angels will carry us as we
dream to the pearly gates of the heavenly city,
whose streets are paved with pure gold, and whose
walls are garnished with all manner of precious
stones. Our hope when we lie down to rest will
be to wake in the glorious appearing of our great
GOD JESUS ; and when we awake our hope will be
to rest in the bosom of Abraham. Begin then this
week to look for that blessed hope. Begin to put
aside other hopes, other longings, other aspirations,
beside that of the eternal hereafter. So when the
last Advent comes, and the last trumpet sounds, it
shall be no strange thing, and your eyes shall be
hold with joy, what your hearts have long hoped for.
SERMON L.
THE CHEISTIAN PEIESTHOOD. 1
KEYELATION i. G.
"AND 1IATII MADE US KINGS AND PRIESTS (/e/H-ts) UNTO GoD
AND His EATHEK."
PERSONS who have either separated themselves from
the communion of the Church, or while continuing
in outward union have forsaken ancient traditions,
argue from these words that there is no special or
der of men designated above their fellows by the
name and office of Priest. All Christians are priests
they say, and hence it is not scriptural to speak of
the ministers of GOD as priests in any sense in which
the whole people of GOD are not equally so. Both
the minister and his people have to offer up spiritual
sacrifices, and so are alike priests. GOD has made
all men priests under the Christian covenant the
Levitical and ceremonial priesthood has passed away,
which was tied up to a particular tribe and its fa
milies. Now if all this were to be inferred from the
1 Preached jilso before the University at IS. Mary s, Cain-
bridge, 1850.
442 THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. [SERM.
words before us, we might equally argue against the
unscriptural system of kings. For as before argued
concerning priests if all Christians are said to be
kings, then there ought to be no one person invested
above the rest with regal authority and office. The
first Anabaptists used this argument. But those
with whom we have to do in Scotland reject this ar
gument by their assertion of a right to exercise disci
pline, and by their distinguishing some ministers by
the title of ruling elders. Thus, on the very thres
hold of our inquiry we find a want of consistency in
the inferences drawn from our text by those who have
invented traditions for themselves. No argument
can be here fairly deduced against priesthood which
may not with equal reason be brought to bear against
kingship whether civil or ecclesiastical. And this
appears further by the consideration that even in re
gard to the Jews, who are confessed to have had a
priesthood, the same mode of argument applies.
For the Jews were called a kingdom of priests, just
as Christians are but for all this they had a special
priesthood, not disannulled by the fact of each Jew
being in a certain sense a priest. It is in conformity
with this truth of a special priesthood that we find
even our opponents urging the necessity of greater
holiness and strictness in their ministers than that
exhibited by ordinary Christians. The voice of na
ture often speaks out in spite of the efforts made to
check its utterance and the testimony of the truth
of GOD.
And just as we find our opponents making exactly
L.] THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. 443
the reverse inference from the limited priesthood
of all Christians to the denial of any superior
functions in their ministers, so we are met by a
similar deduction from the supreme priesthood of
CHRIST to the exclusion of any inferior priesthood of
ministers. Because CHRIST is a High Priest for
ever because He has fulfilled the types of the
Mosaic Priesthood, therefore all priesthood ends and
vanishes away in Him. We argue on the contrary,
that CHRIST was ever a High Priest and that as
He was anticipated by the Levitical priesthood, so
He is represented and commemorated by the Chris
tian. As in other respects so here, He came not to
destroy but to fulfil the Law. Why, we might ask,
should the function of kings and prophets be still
discharged on earth, if the office of priest is extinct ?
CHRIST is no less the King of kings and Prophet of
prophets than He is the great High Priest. All
kings are but types and shadows of the Eternal
King. All prophets but figures of the Great Pro
phet that should and has come into the world. If
with CHRIST priesthood ends, surely kingdoms and
prophesyings do also. You have no authority for
saying that one of our LORD S offices is not repre
sented on earth while the other two are. Or is
there more need of kings and prophets than of
priests? The world has gone on well enough at
times without either kings or prophets. But it
never has been without a priesthood. Long before
the institution of the Aaronic priesthood Melchi-
sedek was Abraham s priest. But we may go fur-
444 THE CUillSTlAN PlilESTlIOOl). [SEIIM.
ther : CHRIST is said indeed to be the great High
Priest figured by Aaron and his sons. Be it so,
still there remains the inferior priesthood. CHRIST
indeed is ever offering His sacrifice to the FATHER
in the inner sanctuary of heaven, but that truth does
not interfere with the priests who continue to mi
nister at the altar of incense in the outer court of
this world. True indeed it has been said that the
three orders of the Levitical ministry typified the
three orders of the Christian. But that is not true so
far as priesthood is concerned. The Christian priest
is no less a sacerdos or sacrificer than the Christian
Bishop. So that were we to allow that with the
Ascension of our LORD the functions of the High
Priest were ended, that still leaves us in possession
of the daily priesthood and sacrifice. And here I
may observe how clearly this is brought out by a
due appreciation of the doctrine of the Incarnation,
CHRIST became man, and so sanctified our manhood.
Our manhood has not ceased by the Ascension of
the Second Adam. It has been raised and exalted,
but not taken away. Every saint is a type of
CHRIST the Pattern Man. All goodness represents
His graces and virtues. Holiness is not shut in
with Him in the Holy of Holies; but is still con
tinued and carried on here through His Incarnate
Deity. And in like manner the Christian priest
hood is elevated above the Levitical by CHRIST S
taking on Him the office of High Priest. All
denial of this goes to deny that He is truly man as
well as GOD. His being the model priest, king,
L.] THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. 445
and prophet, noway excludes, but rather supposes
other priests, kings, and prophets. They who
stumble at the idea of mortal men being invested
with the priesthood of CHRIST, may with equal rea
son stumble at His investing our humanity with His
Divine nature. By His Incarnation He has deified
manhood. Away with all such spiritualizing of our
Catholic Creeds, as that which in effect denies
that JESUS CHRIST has come in the flesh, and treats
all Christian Sacraments as carnal and lifeless forms
incapable of operating on the soul. All teaching
which overlooks the fact that CHRIST S priesthood is
carried on on earth by human representatives, neg
lects also the fact that the whole economy of the
world is one active dispensation of GOD by the hands
of earthly ministers. As we minister unto CHRIST
in the person of our brethren, so He works good for
us by the benevolence of Christian men and women.
There is nothing more strange in the one case than
the other. He communicates His attributes of
wisdom, justice, and truth to us, by which we
minister the same to our fellow men. Why should
He refuse to withhold one, and that His choicest
blessing, from being ministered by the agency of
man? And thus as Hooker has expressed it, " the
power of the ministry of GOD translateth out of
darkness into glory ; it raiseth men from the earth,
and bringeth GOD Himself down from heaven ;
by blessing visible elements, it maketh them invisible
grace ; it giveth daily the HOLY GHOST ; it hath to
dispose of that Flesh which was given for the life of
446 THE CHRISTIAN PEIESTHOOD. [SEEM.
the world, and that Blood which was poured out to
redeem souls ; when it poureth malediction upon
the heads of the wicked, they perish, when it re
voke th the same they live/
As all our SAVIOUR S priestly acts were wrought
on earth in substance of our flesh as He still
stands before the FATHER pleading and interceding
for us, clothed in the same Manhood wherewith He
suffered, even so doth He communicate the virtue
of His sacerdotal character to men through the
human priesthood which He ordained, when He
said to His Apostles, " As My FATHER hath sent
Me, even so send I you " " Whosesoever sins ye
remit, they are remitted unto them ; whosesoever
sins ye retain, they are retained."
But the fact of the continuance of the priesthood
becomes more evident by considering the text itself
of the Holy Scriptures. And this not in the mode
popular in these days, which permits every man to
interpret them as he pleases, but according to an
cient traditions. For it is plain that our exposition
of the Greek text of the New Testament must be
regulated by the meaning which has been attached to
certain words and phrases by ecclesiastical scholiasts
and grammarians. That system which would make
common-law and lay judges to sit upon the trial of
theological questions, is only the result of a contrary
feeling, long growing up amongst us, till it has
fallen by its own absurdity. For example, the mode
in which the English word priest is derived from
Presbyter and divested of any sacrificial idea because
L.] THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. 447
the derivation has none such etymologically inherent
in it, needs only to be stated in order to be exploded.
Unless indeed the word pontiff for a like reason
ought to be the title of no religious officer because
derived from pontifex. Whether the Apostles pre
ferred the title of presbyter as a protest against the
notion of an altar and sacrifice, or out of deference
to the ancient Hierarchy must, I imagine, be decided
by the voice of antiquity, which recognized and
endorsed the Christian priesthood. Again, when it
is said, " When thou bringest thy gift to the altar,
and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught
against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar
and go thy way ; first be reconciled to thy brother,
and then come and offer thy gift." We must un
derstand this, not merely as a precept to Jews, but
as an ordinance of the New Testament, according to
the practice of our SAVIOUR, who thus often antici
pated the rites of the Christian Church. Still more
plainly, when S. Paul says, " We have an altar,"
and that " they who wait at the altar are partakers
with the altar." We cannot conclude that an im
proper metaphorical altar is meant, except we dis
regard all ancient writers. Again, our LORD by the
very word, "Do this," in His institution of the
Blessed Sacrament, was ever understood to have
thereby declared His pleasure that the priesthood
should be continued by those who were then pre
sent, because the verb TroieTv, signifies, according to
the use of the Greek writers of the Church, " to
offer sacrificially." Once more, S. Paul tells the
148 THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. [SEEM.
Corinthians, " Ye cannot be partakers of the LORD S
Table and the table of devils." By which we learn,
that as the sacrifices were eaten at the place where
they were offered to idols, so the Christians ate of
their Eucharistic feast after the celebration of their
sacrifice by their priests. S. Paul, in another place,
speaks of the " offering up of the Gentiles ;" and of
himself, as \siTovpyw lepovpyovvra. TO evdyysXuv, " minis
tering the Gospel in his priestly character." All
these passages must be understood to sanction the
doctrine of a priesthood and a sacrifice in the -Chris
tian Church, unless we are prepared to invent a new
Bible for ourselves by putting constructions of our
own upon its meaning, and deserting the old ety
mology of Christian writers. All rules of language
at this rate must be abandoned at will, and gram
mars and lexicons concocted to suit the religious
principles of various sects and parties.
Lastly, we may consider how it was prophesied
by Isaiah and Jeremiah, that the priesthood should
be continued in the Christian Church, as well as
the fact that such continuance of priesthood has
been claimed and professed. Isaiah prophesies of
the Gentiles becoming a holy Church, and that
GOD would also " take of them for Priests and for
Levites;" Jeremiah, "that the Priests and Levites
should never want a man before Him to offer burnt
offerings and to kindle meat-offerings, and to do sa
crifice continually." How is this prophecy fulfilled,
but by the Christian priesthood ? And, indeed, were
it otherwise the Christian minister s office would be
I*.] THE C1IEISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. 449
less noble and excellent than that of the Jewish,
which in effect is to derogate from the honour of
the Christian religion. And if it be said that the
Christian priesthood is not brought forward pro
minently in the Scriptures, the same argument would
tell against the priesthood of CHRIST. Both, how
ever, are scarcely mentioned out of respect to the
Jewish religion. They only exemplify the usual
forbearance of the SAVIOUR and His Apostles, on
account of the prejudices of the Jews. But if the
Church on earth is in any way a figure of the
Church in heaven, the vision of S. John in the
Apocalypse is convincing enough, that both altars
and intercessions are part of Christianity.
Now if the Church of England rightly denominates
her bishops and presbyters, sacerdotes, or sacrificers,
it is incumbent on all who are invested with that
dignity to see that they walk worthy of it. If they
minister the Holy Eucharist seldom ; if they never
stand offering the daily intercessions of the people
according to the prescribed order of Morning and
Evening Prayer ; if they are content to be mere
preachers, how is this consistent with the idea of
that priesthood which was anticipated by the Levi-
tical, and which represents the eternal Priesthood
of CHRIST ? What marvel in the midst of all this
want of realisation of their office, the Clergy should
become secular, mere professional men, covetous,
ambitious ! How can he who at all believes that
he is what his ordination made him, feel at all ade
quately the importance of his office better than by
G O
450 THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. [SERM.
giving those under his charge as well as himself the
benefit of daily prayers and at least weekly commu
nions ? This is surely the office of a priest, to be con
tinually offering intercessions and prayers, ever com
memorating the Sacrifice of CHRIST at the altar, ever
advising and warning sinners, and encouraging them
to come and open their griefs that they may receive
absolution ; this is to do on earth what the Redeemer
does in heaven. And except this is done, a man
may have the name of priest indeed, but he cannot
fulfil his duty to his people and children. He will
fall into idolatry with his people, or cultivate a
mixed worship like the Israelites after their cap
tivity. There will be the idolatry of covetousness
and will-worship blended together. He will not be
a Christ an Anointed one to his people. As
his labours profit them little, so will his example
less. If the priest values, or seems to value little
daily prayers, or weekly Eucharists, much less will
his people. Their tone will be taken from his,
even though they may not practically follow his
teaching. What a solemn responsibility for good
or evil !
Lastly, ye who are of the laity, remember that ye
too are kings and priests unto GOD. Not, indeed,
in so high a sense as the clergy ; but still in a sense
ye bear rule or exercise priesthood according to
your stations or states in life. No less are ye bound
to attend the daily service where ye have that pri
vilege, or the weekly Eucharist. Ye have spiri
tual sacrifices to offer up, prayers, and praises, and
!- THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD. 451
alms. If ye are disposed to contend against what
seems to be to you an overstatement of clerical
supremacy over the laity, vie with us in offering up
these sacrifices. Let not the Temple Service lack
your priesthood, when ye are bidden to assist in
offering up prayers and praises to GOD. Let not
your priesthood be wanting when we call upon you
to minister of that ye have for the glory of GOD, or
the good of souls. Let not your priesthood be
wanting when ye are bidden to offer the Great Sacri
fice, to draw near to the altar of GOD, and feed on
the spiritual food of the Body and Blood of the
LORD. Then, if ye are faithful in this ministry, if
everywhere and at all times ye lift up your hearts to
GOD in intercession for others, as well as for your
selves ; if by holy lives ye consecrate yourselves to
the ALMIGHTY, ye may rejoice that ye have in Bap
tism been called to the kingdom of priests, that ye
have been made " kings and priests " unto the
praise and glory of GOD.
o o -1
SERMON LI.
EAEEWELL. 1
ACTS xiv. 22.
" CONFIEMING THE SOULS OF THE DlSCIPLES, AND EXHOET-
ING THEM TO CONTINUE IN THE FAITH, AND THAT WE
MUST THEOUGH MUCH TEIBULATION ENTEE INTO THE
KINGDOM OF GOD."
IN very few words we have the substance of what
Paul and Barnabas said to their converts at Lystra,
Iconium, and Antioch. Few words, yet with how
much consolation are they pregnant to many souls !
And greatly are they needed too, for in these places
the Apostles, and therefore their Disciples also, had
passed through much tribulation. Here no sooner
did they succeed in publishing the word of the
LORD throughout all the region, than they were
expelled out of its boundaries ; here they were
threatened with ill usage and stoning, and fled
away ; and at the very city of their refuge Paul was
stoned, dragged out of the city, and left for dead.
Observe in all this that tribulation was the very
consequence of success. It was because signs and
wonders were done by the Apostles at Iconium ; it
i July, 1853.
FAREWELL. 453
was because the multitudes came together at An-
tioch, " almost the whole city together ;" it was
because at Lystra the Apostles scarce restrained the
people from doing sacrifice unto them as Gods,
that persecution and suffering befel them ; and on
account of the tribulation the Apostles were eager
to return to their converts, as if for the last time to
confirm their souls and exhort them to stand fast
in the faith. It is the type of all Church history.
Christianity ill-used and persecuted, and smitten to
the ground, and its adversaries deceived into the
idea that it was utterly ruined. The storm is over,
and fair weather returns, and the sun restores his
light and warmth to the prostrate vine-branches. A
few words of holy consolation from their returning
Bishop or Priest, and the Christians stand to their
arms as manfully as ever to fight the good fight.
Individual suffering and loss, but general good and
triumph. Christianity was at the first a religion of
suffering. The four quarters of the Cross depict
its height, its length, its breadth, and depth. Its
foundations are set in Calvary and watered with the
Blood of the Eternal SON, and at the end of all
things, it will be borne as a banner before the Judge,
" the sign of the Son of Man in heaven." You
could not have been a Christian then without hav
ing to endure some ill, because you were so. Chris
tianity was then only another name for death, in
every shape and form, reproaches, misrepresenta
tions, false accusations, bodily pain, and mental
anguish ; and one element of bitterness in all this
454 FAEEWELL. [SEEM.
was that its chiefest enemies were those, who were
most called to embrace it, by kindred ties of flesh
and blood to its first preachers, and by their nearer
approximation and resemblance to its ecclesiastical
system and ritual. Not heathens but Jews stirred
up opposition to the preaching of the MESSIAH and
His Apostles. The plaint of the Psalmist is ever
being fulfilled. "Thou hast put away mine ac
quaintance far from me, and made me to be abhorred
of them." Suffering then is the universal law of
Christianity ; and where its most earnest and painful
work has to be done there the operation of this law
is most severe and hardest to bear.
And tt|is we may gather from the words before us.
Even the entrance of their converts, said the Apos
tles, into the kingdom or Church of GOD must be
through much tribulation. If suffering waits even
at the threshold, what must it be to dwell there?
If entrance into the privileges of CHRIST brings with
it trials and difficulties, no doubt continuance in
them and building up will not be without their
afflictions. And this because else it would not be
GOD S work. This is why it is said, "we must
through much tribulation" we must. It is certain
that if we become earnest Christians we shall have
to suffer accordingly. It is a necessary consequence
of doing any great work in the Church, or of setting
ourselves stedfastly to save our own souls that tribu
lation comes. This is because the devil rages most
where GOD is most served ; and in GOD S Providence
he only acts as a winnower of chaff from wheat, the
LT.] FAREWELL. 455
very idea of tribulation. If it were not GOD S work
he would let it alone and undisturbed. This is true,
whether afflictions come upon us through external
agency or our own failures. In the one case he is as
the roaring lion, in the other, as the angel of light ;
and it answers his end as well whether he mars our
work by leading us into mistakes and sins, or whe
ther he lays us waste and desolate by raising up
enemies to us. Thus tribulation is to the Church
at large, and particular Churches and congregations,
what it is to individuals. It rather evidences GOD S
love and favour all the more that they bear the
marks of the devil s wrath and cunning. It would
be far more ground for doubting the work in which
we are engaged to be GOD S, and well-pleasing to
Him if afflictions were absent, than if they are pre
sent ; any work connected with GOD S kingdom must
in proportion to its importance bring upon its agents
much tribulation ; and therefore, my brethren, now
that like Paul and Barnabas, I would confirm your
souls and exhort you to continue in the faith, be
none of you moved by these afflictions which have
befallen us during my seven years ministry among
you. If they had not been, the work would not
have been what it is ; they are the very earnest and
pledge that GOD has been in the midst of us, and
that we are indeed a vine of His planting. If you
look back to our first meeting in that upper room,
so consecrated in the hearts of many of you, and
think how much faith I must have had in the living
powers of the Church to undertake a mission labour-
456 FAREWELL. [SEEM.
ing under so many discouragements and difficulties,
you will see how wonderfully GOD S hand has been
in the work even on looking back myself, it seems
to me wondrous strange that out of a poor despised
mission should have come forth a noble cathedral.
The words of our late venerated father and bishop
come home to me often, as I think how in those
days he said to us in quite prophetic language,
" Fear not, little flock, it is your FATHER S good
pleasure to give you the kingdom." There has
been fulfilled in us the Apostolic type, "Troubled
on every side, yet not distressed ; perplexed, but not
in despair ; persecuted, but not forsaken ; cast down,
but not destroyed ; always bearing about in the body
the dying of the LORD JESUS." Howsoever all this
may finally terminate, of this I am certain that it
has from first to last been GOD S work and not
man s. It has gone on without man, and in spite
of man. Amidst all storms CHRIST has been in the
ship with us, arid in some unlooked-for way com
manded the waves and the sea, and suddenly there
has been a great calm. Unknown friends have
aided us by intercessions in times of great per
plexity, or by alms in the hour of necessity. New
friends have been raised up when others forsook
us. And the bitterness of unexpected opposition
and unkindness, has been often soothed and alle
viated by the sweetness of unlooked-for help and
sympathy. It has been a gradual and progressive
work. The Spirit of GOD has brooded upon the
formless void, and moulded it, often contrary to
!<!] FAREWELL. 457
our wishes, but still evidently by Divine Power,
because it crossed our wills and desires. And this,
perhaps, is more true as regards myself than any
one. I admitted long ago to one who was dissuad
ing me from proceeding in that direction in which
GOD has led me, that I knew well what the conse
quences to myself would be. I have had before
me from the first, not indeed the exact details, but
the general result to myself. For you I have no
fear, because, as far as you can look back, so far
at least may you look on in confidence and hope.
Had I not felt sure that you would not lose by my
departure, I could not have left you. Long ago I
would have gone, but for your sakes, lest you
should be as sheep without a shepherd. And now
I leave you " in a peaceable habitation, and in
sure dwellings, and in quiet resting-places. 37
But for myself I would say to you all, that " I
desire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you,
which is your glory." What I personally have had
to endure since my first coming amongst you, few,
if any, beside myself know. But let that pass now.
Ye are our hope and joy, and crown of rejoicing
in the presence of our LORD JESUS CHRIST at His
coming. Be strong and of a good courage, stand
fast in the faith, quit you like men. Ye have come
through tribulation ; therefore strengthen ye your
souls, and continue in the faith. All the more that
ye have had to endure evil for the sake of your
principles, in the dark days of adversity, do ye en
dure to the end, now that a brighter hour is come.
45 S FAREWELL.
Let the assurance that GOD has made you sharers
in a great and good work, quicken your resolution
to adhere to those principles which have brought
you thus far. " Yea, brethren, let me have joy of
you in the LORD." Let me hear that I have not
toiled and suffered in vain that ye continue " sted-
fast in the Apostles doctrine and fellowship, and in
breaking of bread and in prayers." Let us not
have gone through much tribulation in vain. When
you are tempted to think that either you or your
pastor have had hard usage, say to yourselves,
" No wonder this, if this be the end of all, if
through us has come the revival of any dead and
withered branch, the restoration of any forgotten
truth, or the rebuilding of any tabernacle that was
fallen down." It could not be otherwise, consider
ing the work that had to be done. If you love me,
prove your love by cleaving to the Church in which
it has been my privilege to feed you with the Bread
of Life. If you do not stand fast to your principles,
sorry indeed shall I be to have sacrificed myself so
long for your sakes wasted and mis-spent shall I
reckon all my labours and anxieties for your sakes.
Every one of you who forsakes the assembling of
yourselves together here, will bring on me disgrace,
shame, and reproach. And though absent, in spirit
I shall ever be with you. My prayers will be still
ever for you all. Let me have yours it is not
much to ask of you for me and mine, that " in this
life we may have knowledge of GOD S truth, and in
the world to come life everlasting."
SERMON LI I.
EAEEWELL. 1
PSALM CIY. 23.
GOETH TOETII TO HIS WORK AND TO HIS LABOUR
UNTIL THE EVENING."
WORK and labour are intimately bound up with the
life of all mankind. There is no man of whom the
saying is not true, that he must one day give ac
count of all his works. All have something in this
world to do, all have a work to accomplish. It
may be as various as the individuals themselves. It
may not be alike to all in the place where it must
be done, or the way and methods or in the objects
to be served by it or in the time and occasion ;
but still it has to be gone through by all. It has
been so since the fall of our first parents, and it will
be so to the end. What was inflicted on the first
Adam as a curse and heritage of sin, has been con
secrated by the Second Adam to be the benediction of
Christianity. For suffering is no less a work than
action. To be passive too is often an exertion of
i July, 1853.
460 FAREWELL. [SEEM.
higher Christian life than to be active. This is why
we often see so much saintliness wrought out in the
sufferings of a long sick-hed. To sit still may be a
greater effort than going forth.
As the Psalmist found it so hard to hold his
tongue and speak nothing, so with all outward de-
velopements of action. Thus work and labour are
of two kinds positive toil, and endurance of suffer
ing. They are sometimes separate, sometimes con
joined but day by day in both senses " man goeth
forth to his work and to his labour until the even
ing."
And that man s work and labour is most blest
where the Cross is most to be borne. Or in other
words, his work and labour is of the most perfect
kind, who represents most closely the Incarnate
Life of Almighty GOD on this earth. For the GOD-
man JESUS CHRIST is the Pattern Man, Who most
truly goeth forth in the persons of His elect to His
work and to His labour until the evening. As in
His own Passion-life of active love He went forth on
the Annunciation morning to tabernacle in man s
nature, so is He still energising in man, and will
continue to do so till the sun of this world shall
haste to its close. His thirty years or more cruci
fixion life was but a sample in His own individuality
of the life of Christianity while the world lasts. He
is ever thus going forth up the hill of Calvary bear
ing the Cross of toil, of self-discipline, of suffering,
or of penitence. And as it was in the cool of the
day that the First Adam must needs leave the work
I ll.] FABEWELL. 401
which was assigned him in the garden, so long as he
was sinless, so too it was when the evening was
come that the Second Adam sat down with the
twelve to begin that work, which was to go on in
His Church for ever the communication of His
Saving Body and precious Blood, " With desire
have I desired to eat this passover with you before
I suffer." It was the end of all their passovers to
gether. It was the crown and fulfilment of them.
A Last Supper, but the First Eucharist. Here was
the object of the Goo-Man s going forth to His work
and labour accomplished "the giving His Flesh
for the life of the world :" His Body to cleanse our
sinful bodies His Blood to wash our polluted souls.
Just perchance at the very hour when the gates of
paradise were barred against our first parents, did
the LORD of life make afresh a new and living way
for us through the veil of His Flesh into the
heavenly Sanctuary. And yet, brethren, even in
this wondrous evening the banner of the Cross was
suspended over the heads of all. Even that short
respite from conflict and sorrow was ushered in by
the prediction of His sufferings, and of the falling
away of His disciples. " Behold, he is at hand that
doth betray Me." " The cock shall not crow before
thou hast denied Me thrice." " All ye shall be
offended because of Me this night." Crucifixion,
betrayal, denial, abandonment, all these thoughts
of sorrow circle round the first Eucharistic evening.
The Cross borne through the lifelong day waits still
upon the rest of the weary Christian, and leaves its
402 FAREWELL. [SEEM.
mark upon his shoulder as he lies down at the even
tide of this fitful existence.
To die upon the Cross we have carried in life is
but the closest fellowship we can have with our
LORD S Manhood. When our last eventide comes
and our labour is over, there will be nothing so
comfortable to our inmost souls as to behold our
work dented and bruised with the marks of the
LORD JESUS. How different all this is from the
course of the men of this world. They go forth to
their work until the evening, but their first thought
is not how to endure, but how to escape suffering of
all sorts. When eventide comes there is no scar of
warfare with the world upon them. They cannot
rejoice, when all visible things are vanishing away,
that they counted them but dross that they might
be found in CHRIST. They cannot tell of poverty,
of shame, of persecution, of reproaches, of distresses,
brought upon them through steadfast adherence to
any given religious principle. Of what value to
them now that the world is passing away from them
is its applause, its honours, its wealth? As the
gloom of evening shuts all these out from their
gaze, how gladly would they then trace upon them
selves the lines of CHRIST S Passion wrought out in
themselves ! And if these are absent, how terrible
that midnight which cometh after eventide that
cry, "The Bridegroom cometh," that sign of the
Son of Man in heaven from which in life they so
oft recoiled ! How shall the Crucified One acknow
ledge them and their works and labours, which His
MI.] FAEEWELL. 463
Cross has never signed and sealed ! How shall He
see in them the faintest image or reflexion of Him
self ! How ill assorts the praise of men with the Cross
of Calvary ! " Marvel not, my brethren, if the world
hate you." " If they have called the master of the
house Beelzebub, how much more they of the
household." So says our LORD of His own elect,
yet worldly Christians meet with no hatred or abuse
even in signal departure from the principles they
profess. The world knows its interests too well to
find fault with Christians that descend to its level.
How terrible to go to meet one s GOD if the world
speaks well of us !
Much need is there then to examine and try
your work and labour before evening comes. For
it will come sooner or later to each of you. It
may be death. It may be the bidding and wish of
superiors. It may be a train of circumstances, but
in all these GOD speaks to His Cross-bearers. He
alone Who gave each man his individual work to
do, can call him away from it. As with our
Blessed LORD Himself, Who waited till His hour
was come, so for every Christian man is there a
time and an hour, when he must leave the work
which has been given him to do. That hour and
time is man s evening. He can no more go forth
to his work and labour as aforetime. S. Paul must
one day be separated by the HOLY GHOST for this
work, another day be forbidden that labour: one
day see a man of Macedonia, in a vision, saying,
" Come over and help us :" another day see an an-
FAKEWELL. [SEEM.
gel of GOD bidding him abide in this city or this
ship. Amidst all this pilgrimage, one thing alone
the Apostle found fixed and certain, " bonds and
afflictions." " And now, behold, I go bound in the
Spirit unto Jerusalem without knowing the things
which shall befal me there ; save that the HOLY
GHOST witnesseth in every city that bonds and af
flictions await me." All this is more or less a de
scription of every man s work who aims at doing
much for the service of Almighty GOD. No evan
gelist or preacher can look to lead an easy comfort
able life, if he would accomplish such a work as
shall bear the test of a survey and review when the
evening comes. This is why it is a safe proof of
GOD S being pleased with our work, even when af
flictions followed into it. Where the Cross is,
there is CHRIST. Nothing so surely convinces us of
our union with Him, as being partakers of His
sufferings. So long as trials and difficulties press
and weigh us down, we must not cease our work
and labour. When they vanish we are more free.
Evening has come and brings the labourer rest.
And this in various ways. Sometimes because the
portion of the LORD S work He gave us to do is ac
complished or can no longer be done as before : or
because the individual agent requires for his own
culture and growth to be transplanted to another
soil : or that other work has to be done which he is
less adequate to execute. GOD then speaks to the
soul and says, " It is done. I am Alpha and Omega,
the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End."
LTI ] FAREWELL. 465
Evening has come to him in that place, and no
more work can be done there.
It is an awful thing to come to the end of any
thing. Man then sits down to review the past, for
that is all which remains to be done. In the midst
of toil and labour much is forgotten and shut out of
view. We then anticipate the end of all things,
and prejudge ourselves. Just as each day brings
matter for self-examination and self-discipline,
still more when the evening of our work day corncs.
Adam thought of his disobedience as he heard the
LORD GOD walking in the garden in the cool of the
day. Far otherwise than most of us poor sinners
did the LORD JESUS review His labours, when the
supernatural eventide had veiled in darkness His
Divine Passion, and He said, " It is finished." At
evening the man, who went forth in the morning so
confidently and hopefully to his work and labour,
sits down anxiously to scan and try it, of what sort
it has been. Much there will be then to lament
and sorrow over failures, mistakes, negligences,
ignorances, if not actual transgressions.
It is not only what has been done, but how it has
been done, and with what mind and intention it has
been done. It is whether all has been done with a
single eye to the glory of Almighty GOD, or under
the influences of the private and selfish aims of
man, veiled under the garb of religion. How few
can deny all mixture of mere human motives in
their best actions? And how sad must be that
evening, when man sits down to review any work
H H
4GG FAEEWELL. [SEEM.
which has been assigned him, and finds self-love to
be the spring from which all his energies were
drawn ! Try and analyse the motives of your la
bours, my brethren, day by day ; it is easier to do
so while the work is going on than when eventide
is come. Evening comes, and the work has been
done somehow or other. How terrible, if you lose
your wages when the Householder rewards His ser
vants, because your motives have displeased Him.
All these thoughts belong to the completion of
every work much more to ministerial labours. As
a bishop or priest is more immediately a worker
together with GOD, so it is more solemn for them
to sit down to recollection and review, when any
portion of their work is done, than for others. For
it is GOD S own special work which has been done,
done amiss, or left undone. As the honour and
reward is greater, so is the responsibility and peril
more tremendous. This was why S. Paul feared,
after all his wonderful labours in behalf of the Gos
pel, lest he should yet become a castaway. In pro
portion as the authority and commission of a Chris
tian minister is magnified and heightened, must his
perils and fears be increased. All the more that a
man talks of his family honours and titles, is he
expected to do something worthy of them all the
more disgraceful is his falling short of his ancestral
dignity. So is it with the Christian priesthood.
Words cannot express the fearful mockery of claim
ing to be successors of the Apostles, when the
Apostolic spirit has ceased to breathe in any body of
LII.J FA11EWELL. 467
Christian ministers. For others to outstrip and go
beyond, in works of labour and love, those who
trace their orders and jurisdiction to the Apostles-
others, who either are denied, or do not lay a claim
to Apostolic Succession this is, indeed, a foul
blot on the Apostolic escutcheon ; and therefore it
is that a Christian bishop or priest may not be satis
fied with his work, if it only equals, still less, if it
comes short of the toils of ordinary ministers.
And these last thoughts come home to me as
I remember that the work, to which seven years
ago I went forth, is come to a close. My even
ing here is come. " LORD, now lettest Thou
Thy servant depart in peace." I have seen all
the work completed for which I was invited hither
or begged to remain here by the bishop, whose
bones ^y the mercy of GOD rest amongst you. His .
evening came, and mine follows. His the end of * *
a whole life s work, mine of seven years. Bright,
sunny days there may be for others in this place,
but such could never, and will now never be for
me. It is evening to me and the day is far spent,
and I would seek some Emmaus, where I might
rest during that portion of day which remains, and
have undisturbed communion with my crucified
LORD. It is no new feeling and conviction in my
own mind that the hour is come. I have been long
watching and expecting it. It has been only a ques
tion of time and circumstances ; but that time and
those circumstances, in my judgment, are fairly
arrived. Nothing would have so long bidden me
468 FAREWELL.
linger here, but ties of love and affection, which knit
the hearts of a pastor and people together, all the
more that they are isolated from the sympathies of
the Church at large. And those are now, as I feel,
outweighed by other considerations, which I forbear
to enter upon. Enough for me and you to know
that I would not have resigned my charge, so long
as former trials and difficulties oppressed me, or any
object remained for which I deemed myself called
upon to endure, what I have endured until now.
And so evening is come, and I am preaching to you
all for the last time. As I look back upon the
work I have had to do, one pervading idea meets
me at every step, your salvation and perfection.
For this above all, have I your pastor been willing
to suffer thus far. For this above all have I worked
and laboured. Amidst the simplicity of our hum
ble upper room, or the more elaborate magnificence
of this cathedral one prayer has ever gone up
more earnestly than another, " That it may please
Thee to strengthen such as do stand, to comfort
and help the weak-hearted, and to raise up them
that are falling."
Dear brethren, if such has been the earnest long
ing of your pastor if for this he has been content
to bear his cross so long in this place if he has
counted poverty, distress, anxiety, reproach, and
persecution, as nothing for the sake of ministering
to your souls salvation, what will ye do yourselves ?
Will ye not yourselves be at least as much in ear
nest, in prayer, and in good works ? Will ye not
L1I.] FAREWELL. 409
value your own souls at as high a value as I have
valued them ? Will you not suffer the spoiling of
your favourite sins, and cherished failings ? Put
away your besetting trespasses, that you may save
those souls for which your pastor has worked, and
laboured, and suffered. Let not tribulation, nor
distress, persecution, nor famine, nakedness, nor
peril ; neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor prin
cipalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things
to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other
creature, be able to separate you from the love of
GOD in CHRIST JESUS our LORD.
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