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FEB 8 1954

THE

UNION PULPIT.

A COLLECTION OF SERMONS BY MINISTERS
OF DIFFERENT DENOMINATIONS.

" In e&30Eiials, unity ; in non-essentials, liberty ; in all things, cinxTity. "—Auffusiine.

FIRST EDITION.

WASHINGTON, D. C.

PUBLISHED BY WILLIAM T. SMITHSON, ^'^'^

FOR THE VOUXG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION OF WASHINGTOX, D. C.

I860,

Entered according to Act of Congress, June, 1860,

By William T. Smithson,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Columbia.

BUELL & BLANCHARD, PRINTERS.

C. W. MURKAY, STEREOTYPER.

STEKEOTYPED BY BLAXCHAKD'S ^EVf PROCESS.

I>IlEir'A.OE.

This volume, containing tlie productions of some
among the most gifted, pious, and distinguished cler-
gymen in the United States, and adorned with faith-
ful and elegantly engraved likenesses of the authors,
is published under the auspices of the Young Men's
Christian Association of "Washington city, in the full
confidence that its character and merits will insure
for it a favorable reception and a general circulation.
The names of those who have prepared the following
discourses are sufficient guaranty of their excellence.
They represent various evangelical denominations,
and every section of the country ; and this work, the
result of such a rare combination of talent and piety,
will not, only constitute a valuable addition to our
national literature, but also it is believed tend
materially to advance Christian Union, and prove,
through the blessing of God on the truths which it
contains, the means of great spiritual benefit.

But while we feel that the work, in itself, justly
claims approbation and patronage, we trust that the
object to which tlie proceeds of its sale are to be ap-
plied, will still more entitle it to the aid of Christians

IV PREFACE.

and philanthropists throughout our land, m pro-
moting its circulation.

This object, so generously advanced by the emi-
nent divines who have furnished these sermons, is to
enable the Young Men's Christian Association of
Washington to provide, at this centre of political and
social influence, a suitable hall, commodious, attract-
ive, and accessible, with a library, reading room, and
other appliances for social, intellectual, and spiritual
improvement, worthy of the city and of the Christian
and moral sentiment of the whole nation. Since the
organization of the Association, in 1852, these objects
have been steadily kept in view, and to a limited
extent accomplished. We have now a library of
3,000 volumes, of standard secular and rehgious
literature, with a good supply of periodicals and
newspapers in our reading room, which is the only
one in the city. Our funds, however, have mainly
been'required for more active benevolent efforts, and
we have not been able to secure an endowment, or
a suitable building for our purposes. Every year,
in adding to our opportunities for usefulness, has
extended our plans for the promotion of the cause
of Christ ; and while we deplore our past inefficiency
and failures, we still feel assured that the Association
has been a blessing to the community, and has had
continued indications of Divine favor as well as of
public approbation and confidence. '

W6 occupy a peculiar field, and the circumstances
in which we are placed entitle us to the considera-
tion of the citizens of 'all parts of our country. We
must labor and plan not only for our permanent

PREFACE.

population, but also for the multitudes that continu-
allyrepair to the Capital of the Union, from motives
of profit, pleasure, ambition, or in the service of the
Government. Of this large class, only a small pro-
portion identify themselves with our churches, or,
even if professors of religion, make themselves known
here as Christians ; while many become engrossed
by the absorbing interest of political excitement, the
fascinations of fashionable life, or the seductions of
worldly amusements and evil associations. The
young men who come from their homes in- the
various States, are especially in danger from these
allurements ; and to throw safeguards around them,
to introduce them to good companions, to churches
and Sunday schools, and to enlist them in active
Christian and benevolent labors, are special and
prominent objects of our organization.

Young Men's Christian Associations, though of
recent origin, have already become a powerful in-
strumentality, noble in design, simple jn method, and
efficient in operation. They have united Christians
of every name in fellowship of spirit and in concert
of action, without interfering with denominational
preferences or obligations, and in their operations
have aimed to avoid suspicion of any substitution
for the church, while they develop the talents and
activity of the laity, and endeavor to induce all to
render cheerful service in the promotion of the Re-
deemer's kingdom. They have provided for the
wants of the poor, for the education of the ignorant
and the neglected, the relief of the sick and dying,
the diffusion of the Gospel in jails, asylums, and sim-

VI PREFACE.

ilar institutions, the introduction of strangers to
suitable homes, the employment of the destitute, and
the advancement of all that can ennoble man's char-
acter.

The extensive sale which we confidently trust
this work may have, will materially aid us to ac-
complish these important purposes. Every effort
has been made to secure the highest literary and
artistic excellence in its publication, and we fully
commend it to public consideration.

Joseph H. Bradley, Jun.,

M. H. Miller,

E. T. Morsell,

Henry Beard,

J. Hall Moore,

T. J. Magruder,

William J. Rhees,
Committee on hehalf of the Association.

Rooms op the Young Men's Christian Association,

Washington, D. C, May, 1860.

INTEODUCTION.

ilad one stood by and listened to the prayer of the
Saviour for the unity of His people upon earth, as it first
fell from His lips, possibly the reflection might have im-
mediately arisen. How singular, if not unnecessary, is this
petition ! Can the followers of Christ ever be otherwise
than one people, bearing the same likeness, manifesting
the same spirit, cherishing the same views, maintaining
the same doctrines, actuated by the same motives, engaged
in the same work, and sharing the same reward? But
had He chosen for His stand-point centuries after, when
the Reformation had caused a breach in the colossal struc-
ture of the Romish ecclesiasticism, and men's thoughts
began to be free from the despotism of a thousand years, or
during the succeeding periods, when opinions newly quick-
ened were clashing, and the din of controversy, might be
heard on all sides, like the roar of waters long fast, but
now rushing into the channels which had suddenly been
thrown open — as the vision of all this passed before him,
then possibly the very opposite reflection might have been
suggested. How idle, if not impossible, is this petition !
Can these apparently sundered and fragmentary portions
be ever united, so that they may have an essential oneness
in the midst of much that seems so diverse, and even an-
tagonistic ? Yet neither of these reflections corresponds
with the design or the verification of the language of

VIII INTRODUCTION.

Christ, and the history of His cause among men shows
that both alike are erroneous.

The lesson which God has taught His people, through
all these changing aspects and fortunes of the church, is,
first of all, that Christ in God and God in Christ is, and
is to be acknowledged as the supreme Head of the
church, both in heaven and on earth ; and then, by a
series of inevitable consequences, that the "Word of God
is the only standard of ecclesiastical authority, and the sole
rule of faith and practice — that the truth of God is th^ in-
strument of the spiritual dispensation which now extends
over the world — ^that the power of the church, whether in
her offices or her ordinances, can be no greater and no
other than is sanctioned by the canons of the one divinely-
inspired volume, known and accepted as the Bible — ^that
the traditions of men and the decrees of councils are of no
validity to bind the conscience, beyond a clear warrant
obviously contained or properly deduced from the book of
Revelation — that there may be catholicity of spirit, with
diversity of creeds, in things subordinate — that unity may
exist without uniformity, and uniformity without unity —
that there may be " separation without schism, and schism
without separation " — that the metaphysics of philosophy
and the assumptions of hierarchal power are no part of the
essential oneness of the church — that the long dominion
and usurpation of the anti-Christian Governments rest
alone upon the assumptions of a permitted train of events
in providence, and not upon any jure dwino disclosed in
the Word of God — that the true test of what have been
opprobriously styled the heretical sects* is their submission
to or rejection of the doctrines of salvation contained in
the sacred Scriptures, and not their adherence to anj^ sup-
posajble lineal successions of men exclusively appropriated
to one body or another — that whatever company of be-
lievers sincerely and unqualifiedly accept the canon of in-
spiration, do in fact constitute a living and essential por-
tion of Christ's universal church on earth — and that, what-

INTRODUCTION. IX

ever agency or combination shall be devoted to tlie promo-
tion of the aims of a practical Christianity, founded purely
upon the instructions of the Old Testament and the New,
is within the scope of the divine covenant and favor, and
may lawfully expect to share in the divine blessing. These
lessons have been gradually unfolded, till now the princi-
ples they illustrate and impress have become, in a large
degree, familiar to the mind of the evangelical Christian
world. At the time of the Reformation, the main energies
of that great movement were called out to resist, and, as
far as possible, to overthrow, the hoary errors and super-
stitions which had been growing in their strength and mis-
chief for many centuries. It was not to be expected that
the influence of so vast a reign of bigotry and intolerance
could, at a single stride, be left totally behind. Accordingly,
as the different parties of the common uprising emerged
from the shadows of the past, they bore with them, into
their new positions and relations, something of that sever-
ity and bitterness which had been running in the veins of
thirty generations. It has taken the last three hundred
years of polemical strife to define the opinions of men
upon the important but yet not vital questions which enter
into the circle of religious truth and practice, and to estab-
lish and confirm the basis of mutual toleration and repose.
And though this work has not to this day been wholly
accomplished, yet a vast progress has been made. The
great line of Christian co-operation and heart-felt sympa-
thy, in all endeavors to promote the common good of
mankind upon evangelical principles, has been reached.
Men have found that, notwithstanding their theological
and ecclesiastical differences, and while they are paying a
cordial allegiance to the standards and polity of their own
denominational organization, they can, at the same time,
lay their hearts and their heads together upon the altar of
their common service and obedience to Christ for the
blessing of the whole world.

The more positive evidences of this advancement in the

S INTRODUCTION.

unity for whicli Christ prayed began to be exhibited in
modern forms more than half a century ago, in the found-
ation of the great parental Bible societies of British and
American Christians, and the numerous auxiliary or kin-
dred associations in various parts of the world. Attend-
ing or following these establishments, the missionary spirit
rose, with a fresh impulse, in almost every portion of the
evangelical church; and this again, both at home and
abroad, gave birth to new forms of Christian beneficence,
or served to quicken the energies of institutions already
in existence. Thus sprang up, in progress of time, the
wide and glorious circle of evangelical establishments
which adorn the civilization of the present century, and
shed their benignant light over the family of man.
Through the operation of these great foundations, a most
happy effect has been produced; and during the last
twenty years, much of the asperity which characterized
the former contests of the denominations has been abated ;
prejudices have been worn away; heated disputes con-
cerning the doctrines and polity of the church have, in a
great degree, been pretermitted. Men of all parties,
throughout the Protestant world, are beginning to discover
a more excellent way ; and while loyalty to the system of
their choice, and fidelity to the principles involved in it,
have neither been invaded nor impaired, they have been
coming gradually to a common conviction that they are
one in the great essentials of our glorious Christianity,
and that it is in this peculiar mode of the divine provi-
dence that the prayer of our Lord is to be wisely and gra-
ciously accomplished.

But during the period already indicated, perhaps noth-
ing has transpired in the Christian world whidi seems to
have more clearly proved at once the fruit and exemplifi-
cation of this spirit of Christian union than the rise of that
series of beneficent organizations which are now known as
the Confederations of the Young Men's Christian Associa-
tions throughout the length and breadth of Christendom.

INTRODUCTION. XI

"Whether they be regarded in the suddenness of their ad-
vent, the rapidity of their expansion, the simplicity of
their construction, the desideratum they satisfy, the work
they are accomplishing, and the almost unparalleled suc-
cess of their efforts, we may, in view of them, well ex-
claim, in delighted and grateful wonder, " What hath God
wrought!"

Twenty years ago, nothing like them existed, or had
ever existed, in the world. But, in the ripeness of time,
they seem to have appeared, as at the call of God, full-
grown, equipped, and instinct with the spirit of Christian
unity, as the very life-pulse of their existence. And though
but a few years have elapsed since their disclosure in this
country, the last Annual Report of the American Confed-
eration conveys the gratifying intelligence of the existence
of two hundred and five of these associations, scattered in
every section of the land, and embracing an aggregate
membership of twenty-fi.ve thousand young men. A sim-
ilar progress has been made in Europe, and in other re-
gions of the globe. If, then, we consider the local position
of these Christian institutions, in the very heart of the
great centres of population in the seaboard cities and inland
towns — or the refuge they provide and tbe attractions they
extend over the whole community of their own class, in
their spacious halls, furnished reading rooms, and growing
libraries — or the missionary work they are doing among the
poorer and more-neglected portions of the people, the des-
titute children and the unfortunate outcasts of our munici-
palities— or the employment they make of all the other
instrumentalities for elevating and evangelizing the society
in the midst of which they are planted — or the benignant
influence they throw around strangers and sojourners
coming among them under all the constraints and disabil-
ities of ignorance and want of acquaintance or associa-
tion— or the barriers which they interpose to guard the in-
experienced and tempted against dangers that might soon
destroy — or the mutual action and reaction of their prayers

XII INTRODUCTION.

and sympathies and experience, both in stimulating to re-
newed exertions, and in guiding to the methods of a riper
and a larger wisdom — or the total absence of everything
like sectarian principles, views, and feelings, which has
thus far marked their development — or the noble and
world-wide reciprocity and correspondence which the vari-
ous associations throughout the world sustain with one an-
other : what human thought can measure such a power as this
for doing good, wdiat Christian heart can fail to appreciate
it as an instance of one of the nearest approximations to the
perfection of Christian unity now existing in the world.

It is not, indeed, too much to say, that these associations^
from their very nature and composition, embrace the flower
of the Christian church at the present day, and that they
have hitherto been conducted, not only with the vigor and
vitality peculiar to the period of early manhood, but, as a
general rule, with a prudence and discretion that might do
credit to the very ripest age and wisdom of the church.
The fears of some have. been dispelled, and the objections
of 6thers have been refuted, by their steady, onward course,
pursuing the legitimate objects of their own sphere, and
careful not to trench on the functions and prerogatives
which belong to others. In this manner, they have already
attained a most hopeful and commanding position, and are
favored of God to look out upon a prospect of unexampled
future good and glory.

The Association of this .city was among the earliest
formed in America, and, with humble gratitude to God,
if is to be recorded, that though by no means so large in
numbers or external endowments as some of its sister asso-
ciations, it has from the first enjoyed the confidence and
Christian regards of the whole Confederation, and, by a
constant faith in the objects of its existence, and a patient
and persevering series of efibrts, it has been enabled to
bear no inconsiderable' part in accomplishing at home the
work it was designed to perform, maintaining its place in
the sympathies of the Christian public around it, and also

INTRODUCTION. XIII

in bringing to its present condition of prominence and use-
fulness the National Confederation. In the darkest days,
it has never faltered ; and when perplexity has stood full
upon it, God has raised up friends to succor it; and it has
risen above all discouragements, stronger and more resolute
than ever.

The field which this Association occupies, being in the
Federal Metropolis of the country, is found to be one of
singular importance and of peculiar trial. For though the
city of its operations cannot compare, either in wealth or
population, with many other leading towns throughout
the Republic, yet it is, and must of necessity be, the resort
of all classes of the people, from every quarter of our own^
land, and, in fact, from every nation on the globe. If,
then, it be considered what elements are brought together
here, what influences are continually at work, what inter-
ests are at stake, and what opportunities are thrown open
to the operation of such an agency as that which the Associ-
ation presents, it will be exceedingly difficult to compute
the importance of its position, or the necessity of sustain-
ing it. But the very fact that so many are sojourners,
having no local ties and no sense of .social responsi-
bility like those which belong to permanent residents —
that, with a population at the present time of some 65,000
souls, there are but comparatively few of what may be
termed the wealthy class, while the manifold and constant
drafts upon Christian charity, in every form of application,
absorb the resources to which it might otherwise look for
assistance, must make it obvious, at a single glance, that
the difficulties of the Association are by no means insignifi-
cant. And when to this it is added, that its labors must be
carried on in the midst of the most intense fashionable and
political excitements, and in the face of that peculiar fascina-
tion of worldliness which is to be found nowhere but in civil
Metropolitan life, it will be seen that all the inherent difficul-
ties of such a work must be greatly enhanced and aggravated.
Yet, notwithstanding these considerations, the gracious

XIV TNTKODUCTION.

hand of God has been upon this enterprise ; and an
amount of good has already been accomplished, which, it
may justly be said, no earthly line can measure, and
which may be regarded as the presage of still better and
greater things to come. Therefore, in fall confidence of
hope, and in prayerful reliance upon that providence
which has prospered them hitherto, the Association, in
casting about for new methods of exemplifying the spirit
of Christianity by which they have been animated from
the first, as well as for new channels of influence and use-
fulness, to be superadded to, but not to interfere with, those-
already employed, have undertaken to secure the material
from prominent and well-known clergymen of the diflerent
evangelical denominations throughout the country, and to
prepare and publish a volume from the same, as a kind of
first fruit in this department of united Christian labor. It
is believed that in this way the Association may contribute
something to the interest and elevation of the Union
Christian literature of the times, thereby dispensing also
a noble gratification and a substantial spiritual profit
to many hundreds, and they would fain hope thousands,
of their Christian brethren, in every portion of the land.
Should the circulation of this volume inure in any meas-
ure to the pecuniary profit of the Association, or tend
to produce a fund, it is their purpose sacredly to apply
it in a manner still further to increase their facilities for
doing good, and to plant themselves upon a higher plat-
form of Christian fidelity and efiiciency. Looking, there-
fore, to the great Head of the Church, in whose cause and
for whose sake this enterprise has been undertaken, and
commending to the acceptance of their Christian brethren,
of every name, both far and near, this, their first offering
to the sacred literature and the Christian Union of the age,
they send it forth, believing that it may be owned and
prospered of God, to the conferring of ceaseless blessings
upon many souls, in time and in eternity.

WILLIAM T. SMITHSOlN^.

CONTENTS.

EA£B.

The Tender Mercy op G-od 1

By Right Rev. 0. P. McIlvaine.
The Glory op Christ, the Christian's Life - - - 13

By Rev. D. R. Campbell, LL. D.

Christ and Him Crucified, the Exclusive Theme of
the Pulpit 25

By Rev. Linus Parkek, A. M.

The Believer's Privilege - - - " - - - 39

By Rev. E. Ykates Reese, D. D.
Vain Thoughts - - 51

By Rev. C. M. Butler, D. D.

Charity 61

By Rev. Edward N. Kirk, D. D.

The Breastplate op Righteousness and the Helmet

of Saj.vation 71

By Rev. G. W. Samson, D. D.

A Warning to Backsliders 85

By Rev. Bishop James 0. Andrew, D. D.
Christ the Way, the Truth, and the Life - - - 99

By Rev. P. D. Gurley, D. D.

Individual Moral Influence 109

By Right Rev. James H. Otey, D. D., LL. D.

A Question and its Answer, for Young Men - - 121
By Rev. Lyttleton F. Morgan, D. D.

The New Commandment 135.

By Rev. Richard Fuller, D. D.

Progress in Sin - - - 153

By Rev. John C. Granbery, A. M.

The Power of Faith 167

By Rev. Charles Minnigerode, D. D.

Repentance and Conversion 177

By Rev. Charles H. Read, D. D.^

XVI CONTENTS.

Page

The Prophet and the King ; or, a Message from God - 187

By Rev. J. H. Cuthbert.

Obedience Better than Sacrifice 199

By Rev. H. B. Ridgeaway, A. M.

The Strength and the Weakness of Youth - - 215

By Rev. Alexander H. Vinton, D. D.

Fellow-helpers op the Truth - - - - - 227

By Rev. George C. Baldwin, D. D.

The Evil Affecting the Universe - - - - 241

By Rev. Byron Sunderland, D. D.
The Important Choice ------- 259

By Right Rev. Thomas M. Clark, D. D.
The Knowledge op Acceptance vmra. Gob . - - 271

By Rev. William A. Smith, D. D.

Sowing Beside all Waters 303

By Rev. Robert Turnbull, D. D.

The Church the Pillar and Ground of the Truth - 315
By Rev. Nicholas Murray, D. D.

Fruits a Test of Systems - - - - - - 825

By Rev. R. S. Foster, D, D.
The Merely Moral Man - 341

By Rev. J. Lansing Burrows, D. D;

The Attractive Power of the Cross of Christ - - 353
By Rev. George D. Cummins, D. D.

Grieving the Spirit _ 365

By Rev. B. M. Palmer, D. D.

Christ and the Believer Inseparable - - -■ - 381
By Rev. J. George Butler.

Eternal Associations Connected with the Bible - 387
By Rev. William Adams, D. D.

The Christian's Confidence in Committing his Soul
into the Hands op the Kedeemer - . . . 401
By Rev. Thomas De Witt, D. D.

The Two Courses 419

By Rev. T. H. Stockton, D D.
The Christian Minister and his Work - - - - 433

By Rev. David S. Doggett, D. D.

Love the Sum op Christianity 447

By Rev. John McClintock, D. D.

SERMONS.

THE TENDEE MERCY OF GOD.

BY RIGHT REV. C. P. McILVAINE,

BISHOP OP THE DIOCESE OF OHIO.

Why will ye die? — EzeMel^ xxsiii, 11.

Such was the solemn appeal of the mercy and patience of God to
those whom the prophet Ezekiel was sent to turn, if possible, from
their evil ways. It was preceded by these remarkable words : '' Say
unto them, as I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the
death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live ;
turn ye, turn ye, from your evil ways." And then comes the ques-
tion, so difficult for a sinner to answer, after hearing such a declara-
tion from God, " Why xoillyc die?''

Now, there is no sense in this question, if the death alluded to be
only that death of which it is written, " It is ajipointed unto men once
to die." With that, our will has nothing to do, except to escape its
sting. The difference between the sinner saved and the sinner lost,
in regard to such death, is, that while it must come with equal cer-
tainty on both, it comes to the first deprived of its sting, because his
sin is pardoned ; while to the second it is all sting and terror, since
it seals the state of his soul under unpardoned sin and its condemna-
tion forever. To the first, death is as the passage of the Jordan to
the people, Israel — a flood that must be crossed, but a flood divided.
It is the passage out of the wilderness to Canaan ; the Christian, by
that path, goes home to God.

There is what the Scriptures call 'Uhe second death." " He that
overcometh (saith the Lord) shall not be hurt of the second death."
{Rev., ii, 11.) This, we may all escape. All the mercy of God ex-
1

2 THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD.

horts us to escape it. It was to open the way of escape, that " God
spared not his own Son, hut delivered him up for us all." What is
that second death ? We answer, by a'sking what is the first death
appointed to all ? You answer, it is dissolution. Yes, but dissolution
of what ? Of the body, in itself, among its own constituent parts ?
No. The heart ceases to beat, while there may as yet be no dissolution
of the bodily parts. The machine still holds together, but it is dead.
What, then, has been dissolved ? You easily answer, the connection
of the soul with that body. The body thus dead is a machine without
a power — a house without an inhabitant. You do not mean that the
soul departed is not still living, nor that the body forsaken is not still
a human body, but that the connection of that body and that spirit
is dissolved, whatever each, in its separate state, may now be. Hence
the people of God, who are now emphatically '' alive for evermore,"
having attained to the blessedness of ''the saints in light," are called
in Scripture ^^ tlie dead." They are "absent from the body." That
separation is the first death.

But what is the second? Separation again — dissolution, and that
forever and ever. The soul, being immaterial, admits of no dissolu-
tion within itself. It cannot lose its natural life. Its intellectual
existence is immortal. But it is not such existence that receives the
emphatic name of life in the Scriptures. There, life and bliss are
synonymous. " Eternal life " is the simple designation of the
heavenly state. "A Oliver of water of life" is the beautiful image of
abounding, satisfying, endless bliss. The Scriptures do not qualify
the word life, as applied to the future state, by calling it happy or
unhappy life; as if true life could be else than true happiness. To
say that a soul departed inherits life, is in the Bible to say that its
inheritance is incorruptible, undefiled, and full of glory. The ques-
tion then comes, what is the soul's happiness? and the answer is at
hand — GoD ! The favor, the peace, the love, the communion, of
God — nothing else, nothing less ! And what, then, is the soul's true
life ? The answer is at hand — God ! " In his favgr is life." God
is Light; God is Love; God is Life. That Infinite Spirit is to our
souls spiritual life, just as this finite spirit is to my body its natural
life. Separation from God is spiritual death. • Separation from God
forever, in the misery of hell, is eternal death — the second death ;
excommunication of the soul from God forever — that separation
which shall be consummated and sealed when those words shall be

THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD. 3

lieard. from the throne, '' Dqxirf, ye cursed, into everlasting fire" —
the sinner, with all his sinful passions and powers remaining, deserted
of God, left to himself, to his own emptiness and his own sinfulness,
a prey to his own passions and conscience and self-condemnation and
vigorous intellect — capacities so large, and nothing to fill them —
wants so incessant, so importunate, so raging, and not a hope of any-
thing ever to satisfy them ; and this, under the superadded infliction
of the positive wrath of God. Oh ! that will be death, indeed ; and
that is the death about which the question is asked in the text,
" Why will ye die?" And it is about that, brethren, that we desire
now, affectionately, to speak with you.

We are here amidst the privUeges of the Gospel. Our day of grace,
our time to save our souls, is fast hastening away. The first death is
near. I speak to a great many who are not prepared to meet it —
neglecters of the great salvation of Christ, their hearts far away from
God. Their present way of life is directly towards that second death.
To them, nearness to the grave is just so much nearness to the con-
dition of the lost. God's long-suffering is all that keeps them out of
that woe. They are not in the ark. Its door is wide open for their
entrance ; they heed it not. The Word of God comes to them, say-
ing, " Why will ye die?" Friends and brethren, will ye consider
that question? Will you follow me, while I endeavor to assist you
in its answer ?

I. First, then, I am sure that, if ye do thus perish, it will not be
in any degree chargeable on any deficiency in the mercy of God !
How solemnly is that declared in the words which precede our text !
" Say unto them, as I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in
the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and
live." God vindicates Himself from the possibility of the loss of a soul
being ever laid to His charge. He has no pleasure in such loss. In
the strongest possible mode. He seals that declaration. He swears by
ll\m?>Q\^—^^ As Hive, saith the Lord God." On the contrary. His
most earnest will is, that sinners should live. True, He desires not
they should live, except they '^ turn" — that is, except they forsake
sin and embrace His service. That would be to dishonor Himself
without blessing them. He desires their repentance, as not only
essential to life, but as a part of the life itself. Not to turn to Him,
is not to live. That they may turn and live, He does desire, with an
earnestness and compassion of which the whole Gospel, and all the

4 THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD.

history of Redemption, and all the experience of His people, and all
His wonderful patience with impenitent sinners, are the impressive
evidence. Think what God has done to make it consistent with His
holiness and justice, and the honor of His government, to save you
from your sins. Behold the Lamb of God ! Consider Him in His
Eternal Godhead ; consider Him in His deep humiliation when He
came in the nature of man ; consider Him in the sacrifice for which
He took that nature — in his sufi"erings and death when He was made
a curse for us ! Why such a sacrifice ? Why that agony, which
clouded the heavens at noonday, because the heavens had never
looked upon such agony before ? It was the awful payment of God
for your redemption. It was God's wonderful grace, toiling, in the
greatness of its strength and the wonder of its love, to open a way
by which you might turn unto Him and live. It was God writing,
in the blood of that great propitiation, the declaration of our text,
" As Hive, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked."

But we lead you to another view of the same emphatic truth. In
the second Epistle of Peter, there is a prediction that, in the latter
days, there would arise '.'scoffers/' scofiing at the promise of the
coming of the Lord to judge the world, and saying, " Where is the
promise of His coming, for all things continue as they were from the
beginning ? " Because they could see no signs indicating the changes
to accompany that awful day, they would infer that its promise would
fail. But the Apostle gives another reason. The promise of that
awful day is only delayed, not forgotten. And why delayed? The
Apostle answers : " The Lord is long-sufiering to iis-ward, not willing
that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance."
Thus the flood was determined' in the days of Noah. It was certainly
to come. TTie Pairiarch was sent to warn the world that they might
repent before it came and took them all away. But many long years
yet elapsed, and all things continued as they had been. No signs ap-
peared of such a judgment approaching. Doubtless there were scoffers
then, who set it down to the failure of the promise. But the Scriptures
tell us it was only " the long-suffering of God " which " waited in the
days of Noah." So does that same long-suffering of God wait in
these days, that sinners * " may come to repentance." And such is
God's own account of the present delay of that great and awful judg-
ment, when all that are unholy must be unholy still, and all that are
without the ark of peace must so remain excommunicate forever.

THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD. O

Each day, each hour, of the continuance of this ungodly world is
simply a gift of the forbearance of God. It is the impressive evidence
of His declaration, " I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked,
but that he turn unto Me and live."

But, my friends, if it be '' the mere long-sufiFering of God " towards
a sinful world that explains the delay of its destruction, what else
explains the fact that each of you, who are not God's servants, giving
no heed to his ways, and denying him your hearts, are not cut down?
Why do you yet live ? Why were you raised up from the borders
of the grave, when once you were there ? Why is your day of grace
lengthened out ? Is not the condemnation of a broken law already
upon you ? Why, then, is its execution delayed ? Have you not
sinned enough to merit the wrath of God ? Has not the barren fig-
tree been barren long enough in God's vineyard, in spite of all that
has been done for it, to make it worthy to be accounted a cumberer
of the ground, and to be cut down and cast into the fire ? Why,
then, is it allowed still to stand, and why is it still plied with efforts
to make it fruitful ? There is but one answer. My dear friend, yon
are not forever lost, you are spared as yet, simply because God is
long-suffering towards you. And could you see, as He sees, how you
have treated that long-suffering, you would intensely wonder that it
could have borne with you so long. Your whole continuance of life —
every hour of it, in your present impenitence and disobedience — is
just the strong attestation that God desires not your death, but does
desire your salvation. And thus we are sure that, if you do finally
perish, there will be no ground to charge it, in any degree, upon the
compassion of God, as if there were any failure there. The responsi-
bility will be all your own. You will have none to reproach but
yourself.

II. Let me add, that if you finally perish, it will not be because
you have not had presented to you every warning, every affectionate
invitation, every powerful and exalted motive, which ought to per-
suade a rational being to turn unto God and live. " The wages of
sin is death ; the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ."
There is a world of motive and persuasion and warning in those few
words. Can you conceive of anything that ought to weigh with man,
and govern his life, if the solemn truths therein uttered should not?
Sin's awful wages ; God's great gift ! And when it is considered
how you have had those wages of death and that gift of life placed

6 THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD.

before you in every form of awfulness and of preciousness, of solem-
nity and of tenderness, of God's entreating and persuading, of a
Saviour's love beseeching and exhorting, line upon line — persuading
you, waiting for you, wrestling with you — the heavens bowed, that
God may come near to you, to receive you when you turn ; His prov-
idence added to His written Word, for the stronger argument ; aflSic-
tions sent to show you the emptiness of the world and the desolation
of your state, that your eyes might be opened to your need of the
hope set before you in Christ ; oh, when we ask what more could
infinite wisdom, and goodness, and compassion, do for you, to turn
your minds and hearts to God, you mvist be ready to testify, that if
you die, it must be in spite of all that should have moved and per-
suaded a rational being.

III. Why will ye die? We have said it will not be for want of
inducement. We now add, it will not be for want of conviction.

No doubt, among those whom I am now particularly addressing, there
are many degrees of light, of impression, and of belief, from the man
who has scarcely any religious creed at all, to him whose belief of the
truth almost persuades him to yield himself to its government. But,
in all this variety, I doubt if there is the man who does not know,
and in his conscience acknowledge, that were he to follow the path,
not only of the highest obligation, but of the surest wisdom and hap-
piness, he would live a devoted follower of Christ. Ah! under
many an exterior of indifi"erence, and even of professed unbelief,
where it would seem as if a serious thought of God could never dwell,
how often is a voice heard, in the secret of the soul, saying, Alas,
how poor the man that is not at peace with God ! The true Chris-
tian ! what a precious hope is his ! A dear and venerable friend of
mine* once told me that he was walking with the celebrated mathe-
• matician, Button, who was an infidel, when they passed a dog, and
the unbeliever exclaimed, " Would I were that dog ! " Thoughts of a
judgment to come, however denied, haunted him. Much more do
careless men, who know that if the Gospel be truer they are without
hope, when they see a consistent Christian going on his way to death
and eternity in the enjoyment of his glorious hope, and enduring the
trials of the present lifq, uplifted by the expectation of. the heavenly
inheritance, often wish they were such as he. Oh ! no, my friends.

*The late Olinthus Gregory, LL. D., of England.

THE TENDER MERCY OP GOD. 7

should you die that second death, and the question be asked you,
amid your hopeless sorrows and woe, ichy ycni died? — why, wheu
there had been such salvation offered, and such a Saviour to flee to, and
such warnings and invitations from God to persuade you ? — you will
not answer that it was because you needed conviction of the incom-
parable wisdom of being a follower of Christ.

IV. Nor will it be, with some at least, that there was never a sea-
son in your present life when you were so far moved by the claims and
interests of religion as to suppose the time of your becoming the true
followers of Christ would some day arrive, and that all you wanted was
a little more time to advance in feelings and impressions which you
thought would finally ripen into the reality of godliness. I am not
delivering what I know by the private history of any of you. I am
speaking from a general knowledge and observation. Are there none
here who, although their present state affords no promise of any
growth in grace, can tell of times, under the solemn dealings of the
Word of God with their souls — when perhaps they had been brought
low in sickness, and seemed near to death — or when some other
afflicting providence had softened their hearts, and drawn a curtain of
darkness over all their earthly hopes, and had written vanity wherever
they looked — and when it seemed to them that a lesson had been
taught which they could never forget, and impressions received which
they could never -lose, so that they felt assured tl^ey would go on
from that time to get more weaned from the world, more drawn to
God, and before long would confess Christ before men ? Alas ! how
little they knew of their own hearts ! Who can trust to the perma-
nency of such impressions, unless they seek, in watchfulness and
prayer, their protection and renewal. Little did they suppose with
what power old habits of worldliness and indifference would struggle
to regain their old mastery, as soon as health should return, or the
wounds made by affliction should heal. Where now are those impres-
sions ? What improvement has been made of those precious influ-
ences of the Spirit of God upon their hearts ? Have they gone on
since, as they once expected, getting nearer and nearer the Kingdom ?
Is it not now more difficult than ever to arouse them to make effort
for their salvation ? What deafness, what blindness, what indiffer-
ence, is this that has now possession of them, after what they were
once made to see and realize ? Ah ! you may perish in this state ;
and by and by, voices will be heard in the home of the lost, saying

8 THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD.

with unutterable lamentation, " the harvest is past, the summer is
ended, and we are not saved ; " and those voices may be yours — your
" weeping and wailing." But when you shall say, in that bitterness
of despair, %chi/ did we die ? you will bear your testimony that it was
not because the Spirit of God did never strive with your hearts, to
lead you to the salvation of Christ, nor because He did not make on
your minds impressions which but for your neglect would have
ripened into life eternal. The mercy of God will not have to bear
the blame of your being tormented in that flame.

And now we ask again, '' Why will ye die ? " And we answer
by stating what is operating upon you directly towards that result.

1. A latent, insidious iinhelief- — I say unbelief, not infidelity ; for
the latter expresses a state of mind more positive and settled than
such as I am speaking of. We mean an unbelief so secret that it may
have hardly ever recognised itself, afraid to call itself by its proper
name, and ready indignantly to disown every approach to what you
call infidelity. Allow me to illustrate by putting a question. When
the Word of God is faithfully declared to you from the pulpit, and
you hear of the only way of salvation, and what must be your everlast^
ing heritage if you are not found therein, and when you know that what
you hear is just the plain testimony of the Bible, does there not arise
in -your minds such thoughts as these : " What if all should prove un-
true ? Perhaps, after all, there may be no such penalty, or no need
of such a method of escape. God desires not our death, and may He
not at last be willing to save us, whether we turn unto Him or not ? "
Such thoughts may be in your minds only as a timid, latent suggestion,
pretending to no evidence, and which dare not stand out and be ex-
amined ; but, nevertheless, do you not entertain them ? Have they not
their influence ? Is not their insidious whisper a magic spell, that turns
away in a great degree the force of the solemn appeals of the Word
of God, and keeps your mind at ease in your impenitence ? Do you
not allow and cherish such thoughts, because of their poor consolation,
while you never examine them, because you fear t© test their real
worth ?

We apprehend there is much of this state of mind in our congr<i-
gations — an underground, unformed, stealthy, whispering unbelief;
which does not positively deny, but insinuates a doubting question,
when it dare not venture an open denial ; which has no aim at the
discovery of truth, but simply to keep the mind at ease under tho

THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD. 9

troublesome dealings of the truth. A great deal of the inefficacy of
the preaching of the Gospel is to be accounted for by this paralyzing
influence.

2. Another cause that answers the question, tchy will ye die ? is
found in the grievous want of serious consideration.

When you have an important earthly interest at stake, you con-
sider, you examine, you would be afraid to risk a decision without
mature consideration. But how is it when the matter in question is
not earthly, but heavenly; not for a year, but for everlasting; your
souls at stake, and the decision lying between such issues as the
endless peace of God and His endless wrath ? Oh ! when do you
consider so little ; what interest are you so averse to considering at
all; what subject is dismissed from your thoughts so hastily; on
what question of welfare are you so easily persuaded to believe that
all will go well ? A. sermon listened to on Sunda"y ; a few scattered
recollections that there is a God, and a soul, and death, and eternity;
a few languid expectations of some time or other attending more ear-
nestly to these things — and that is all ! No earnest endeavor solemnly
to realize your state, your duty, your prospect, your danger, your
sin, what is coming, and how little you can count on what a day may
bring forth, with all the motives with which the mercy of God
should move your hearts ! Oh, how wonderful ! But is it won-
derful that the Word of God has so little power, when it is so little
considered ? Will it be at all wonderful if in this way you should
never come to repentance, but die just as you are, out of Christ — no
matter how open the door of that ark, all the while you were here,
or how loudly the warning and invitations of the grace of God may
have been always sounded in your ears ?

. 3. I might go on to give more reasons, such as the foregoing,
which, in case you die the second death, will help you to say why you
died. But there is one which lies at the bottom of all, and, when
told, tells all ; and with this we conclude. It is found in the words
preceding the text : " I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked,
but that he turn unto Me and live. Turn ye, turn ye, for why will ye
die." That " twn ye," so inseparably connected with escape from
that death ; that certainty that, however God desires not your death,
you cannot live, except you turn unto Him ; and then your so well
knowing that to turn unto God means no mere incidental outside
change, but a revolution of your whole inward life ; not the mere

10 THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD.

formal obedience or religious ceremonial, but a turning in heart, in
habitual affections, in renouncing inward sin, inward worldliness,
with all that keeps you from holiness of heart ; yes, the knowledge
that the whole basis of the Christian character is in such turning — ■
this it is which answers the question, tohy you will die. Take
away that essential union of turning unto God now, and living with
Grod hereafter "and forever; convince men that they could be saved
without it, by only conforming themselves to some mere ceremonial
service, added to a decent moral life, then how wide the way of
salvation, and how easy to persuade men to go in thereat, and not
die ! What makes the gate of life so straight, and the way so nar-
row, what accounts for it that so few there be that go in thereat, is
the simple necessity of such a conversion of heart, such an inward
religion of holiness, such an inward and spiritual reality of life, above
the world, and sustained by daily grace from Christ, obtained by
daily prayer of heart. All this explains the phenomenon that so
many will die. It is this that accounts for all that strange unwilling-
ness to consider, of which we spoke — and all that strong disposition
to put off the service of G-od, while its absolute necessity is fully ac-
knowledged ; this it is that- accounts for the various excuses which
men invent to keep themselves at ease in their sins, the earnestness
with which such excuses are held, and the infatuation which would
fain believe them to have some justifying importance. But what
shall toe do, who are sent with the messages of God ? Shall we apol-
ogize for this great necessity ? Shall we attempt a compromise be-
tween the sinner's heart and the requirements of God ? Shall we
hide or diminish what His Word declares you must do to be saved ?
Shall we conceal that between the will of the sinner and the holy
will of God there is such essential opposition, an opposition which
accounts for all this vast procession of immortal souls going ^down to
the second death, when God desires not their death, and when such
a Saviour and such salvation is provided for them ? Oh ! no ; that
opposition of the sinner's will to the will and ways of God is one of
the. great truths we have to publish. It shows how far that spiritual
death, of which the second death is but a consummation, has already
the dominion. It shows how great the spiritual- change which your
hearts need, and how earnestly you should seek the power of God to
make it. It is exactly what the Saviour declared to precisely such
hearts : " Ye will not come unto me, that ye might have life." Ye

THE TENDER MERCY OF GOD. 11

mill not ! Plan's will is the difficulty. There is a strong controversy
between the will of the unrenewed heart and the will of God. One
or the other must give way, if you are ever to be saved. And which
shall it be ? Shall God repent, or man ? Shall God surrender His
law, which pronounces that without holiness no man shall see His
face ; or will man give up his aversion to holiness, and seek it of the
Holy Spirit of God ? The whole responsibility is with yourselves.
Toxi must decide whether to be saved or lost. All things are ready
on God's part, only waiting the readiness on your part ; God's im-"
portunate calls and entreaties are sounding in your ears : " Turn ye,
turn ye." " Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not
bread, and your labor for that which satisfieth not? Incline your ear
and come unto Me ; hear, and your soul shall live, and I will make an
everlasting covenant with you." Nothing can be more earnest,
more compassionate,, more encouraging. It is a voice from the very
fountain of life and the very throne of grace. It is the tender
love of Jesus, now exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give
repentance and remission of sins, and saying to every poor sinner,
coTtie to Me — / loill give you rest. Oh ! my friend, how all the inter-
ests of an immortal soul, how all the solemnities of a judgment day,
how all that is terrible in the condition of a soul lost forever — how
the whole preeiousness of the peace and salvation that is in Christ
Jesus — how all are at this moment assembled about you, and plead-
ing that you will hear, and turn, and live !

God's mercy will meet you, as soon as your hearts shall seek Him.
The hand of His grace will be ready to help you, as soon as you in
your weakness shall be ready to take it. There was once a poor,
wandering, beggared sinner, who had been awakened to a sense of his
guilt and wretchedness and folly. He thought of the servants in his
father's house whence he had wandered, and compared his condition
with theirs. He came to a stand — he resolved to return. " I will go
to my father." It was a great way he had to go, for he had gone
"into a far country;" but, far as it was, he was resolved he looidd
turn and go to his father. No doubt he expected to encounter a
stern, offended father, who would bring up all his guilt against
him, and be exceeding cold and distant to him ; and the best he ex-
pected to get, by repentance and entreaty, was to be allowed to take
the place of a " hired servant." To be taken back as a son, he had
no idea even of asking. He set out on his journey. And "when

12 THE TENDEK MERCY OF GOD.

he was yet a great way off," (saith the Scripture,) his father saw
him. Yes ! For he was on the watch, patiently, unweariedly, looking
out for the return of his son. Now at last he saw him coming — as yet
a great way off— all miserable, degraded, beggared, and guilty. And
he ran to meet that repenting son — " he had compassion on him, and
fell on his neck and kissed him" — and the son, scarce able to speak,
says : " Father, I have sinned — I am not worthy to be called thy son."
The father looks not at his unworthiness, but his repentance — he has
turned unto me, he shall be my son. " Bring forth the best robe and
put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet ; "
and let there be joy in all my house — " for this my son was dead,
and is alive again — was lost, and is found." So is there joy in
heaven, with God and all the angels of God, when one sinner re-
penteth. Such is the Gospel! So does the compassion of God
come out to meet, to embrace, to take by the hand, to help, to com-
fort, to accept and save, any and every soul of man that will so turn
unto God, seeking His mercy by the one only way, the one only Me-
diator, Jesus Christ. What a wonderful declaration of grace is that —
" I WILL ABUNDANTLY PARDON." Mark its Connection — " Let the
wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and
let him turn unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him, and
unto our God, for He will ahundan% pardonJ' "Where sin hath
abounded, grace doth much, more abound," through Jesus Christ.
Do we wonder at a pardon that is so abounding and so free, that
though our sins be as scarlet, they are washed away as white as snow,
as soon as with a broken spirit we make the righteousness of Chirst
our refuge ? The answer is : " As the heavens are higher than the
earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than
your thoughts." Such is the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ; such
i-ts open door ; such its full and free salvation ; so does it wait to bless
you J so docs it entreat you to. come and live. Oh ! whi/ then 7viUi/e
die? All this grace rejected; all of it, because rejected, so fearfully
increasing your guilt, and the bitterness of your cup," and "the terror
of the Lord." It will be a fearful thing for them of Sodom to appear
before the judgment seat of God. But it will be more tolerable for
them, nevertheless, than for us, who have a Gospel which they had
not, if that Gospel be not obeyed, if its grace be not accepled.

^a^'T^'^c^^i^i-

^Lc/.X_^

MW\^\

THE GLORY OF CHRIST, THE CHRISTIAN'S LIFE.

By Rev. D. R. CAMPBELL, LL. D.,

OF THE BAPTIST CHURCH, AND PRESIDENT OF GEORGETOWN COLLEGE, KENTUCKY.

To me to live is Christ. — Philippians, i, 21.

Were Christians to live the life enjoined in the Scriptures, they
would doubtless still be " a wonder to many/' " a spectacle unto the
world, and to angels, and to men." Their relations, their duties, theii
aims, their plans, and their spirit, as there depicted, are so out of the
ordinary course of things, as to stand in striking contrast with those
of the rest of mankind. Subjects of a Kingdom, whose supreme
power is over the heart, whose first principle is self-renunciation,
whose reigning spirit is love, whose steady aim is conquest, whose
principal weapon is truth, and whose best hopes all centre in another
world, they present a strange anomaly to the unrenewed world around
them.

Just such an anomaly, however, Christians are designed to be.
They are to be in the world, but not of it. By their example and
exertions, they are to seek to enlighten, to reclaim, and to save it.
Under just conceptions of the new and heavenly life of which they
have themselves been made the subjects, acts of obedient gratitude
are to mark their career during the whole period of their earthly
existence. The glory of Christ in the conquest of the world, by its
subjection to the principles and spirit which so happily control and
bless themselves, becomes an object of such earnest and absorbing
desire, as to give sobriety and naturalness to the language of my text,
as the appropriate language of every true Christian.

The glory of Christ, the Christian's life, is the theme, to the con-
sideration of which we invite attention.

I. In the first place, we invite attention to the grounds on
which Christians make the glory of Christ their life. To make the

14 THE GLORY OP CHRIST,

glory of Christ one's life, in its widest scriptural sense, is the same
as to live supremely for His honor in advancing His cause in the
world. For thus living, Christians have the strongest reasons. Their
devotion to Christ is not blind ; their services are not superstitious ;
.their sacrifices proceed not from the mere lashings of conscience.
The whole of their religion proceeds on principles of reason and
gratitude, and is, in all its details, a most " reasonable service."

That their very being is derived and dependent, is a conception so
intuitive and distinct as to become an authoritative conviction of their
minds. Equally distinct and authoritative is the additional and in-
separable conviction, that such beings owe the perpetual honor and
services of the whole of the powers of their bodies and minds to their
Creator and Preserver. Christians distinctly and joyously recognise
the claims set up for Christ, in the Scriptures, on this score. They
apprehend, as no others can, such declarations as these : " All things
were created by Him;" "by Him all things consist;" all things
were created "for Him." The realization of the relations and obli-
gations involved in such inspired statements is peculiarly congenial
to their renewed inclinations, and, consequently, they delight to
dwell upon them, and to render the appropriate returns in lives of
becoming consecration.

•At this point, the delight of Christians becomes greatly enhanced
by the contemplation of the wonderful powers and adaptations with
which Christ, as their Creator, has endowed them. Man is " fear-
fully and wonderfully made." A glance at his mental capacities will
evince this. Conceive of his power of thought, by which the per-
fections and the ways of the Eternal become his daily study — his
power of perception, by which,, through the appointed portals of his
physical habitation, he contemplates nature, and attempts to trace
and delineate nature's Grod— his power of imagination, by which
there is not a point in space or duration, or an object in the universe,
which is absolutely beyond the range of his mighty sweep — his power
of memory, by which he can incorporate the recorded past with his
own living present — his power of reasoning, by which he takes the
material furnished by all the o.ther powers, and renders it practically
valuable amid life's necessities, present and future — his power of
conscience, by which there is a something ever within him that ever
speaks of God, of right and wrong, of accountability, and of retribu-
tion. Conceive, too, of his emotional nature — his power to feel, by

THE christian's LIFE. 15

which he can admire, wonder, and adore, by which he can love,
sympathize, or even sorrow. How much of life is made up of the
sensibilities ! Without such a nature, the intellect of an archangel
would be a dreary and desolate possession. Add to all these his
power of will, by which, under his perceptions and emotions, he goes
forth, amid life's struggles, to grapple with the stern resistances of
his lot, and to perform with success the diversified duties he owes to
God and man. When all these constitutional endowments are con-
templated, the conviction that they are from His creative hand, " by
whom are all things," and " for whom are all things," constrains the
Christian, from a feeling of conscious right and of profound gratitude,
to place them all, with all their capabilities, on the altar of Christian
duty. Christ's by creation and preservation, the feeling is impera-
tive that they should all be held for Him, and be expended for His
glory.

The disposition of Christians to consecrate all their powers to
Christ, and make Him their life, is greatly strengthened by the con-
templation of His own perfections. By the constitution of the human
mind, we are made to admire and honor grandeur of intellect and of
character. In Him, these exist in the most absolute perfection. All
that we behold of finite grandeur or excellency is but a feeble emana-
tion from Him, as its original and inexhaustible source. Is there
sublimity or grandeur in the awful storm or desolating tempest ? It
is but the breath of His omnipotence. Is there cause'for admiration
in the statesmanship that adjusts the causes, and reduces to order
the convulsions of nations ? It but faintly images the omniscient wis-
dom of Him who ruleth the universe. Is there occasion for awe in
the presence of that integrity that confronts unmoved the aggres-
sions of national corruption ? How feebly it represents the inflexible
purity of Him who confronts and controls the corruptions of men and
devils. Is there something really grand in the benevolence of How-
ard or Paul ? What is it, when compared with His, whose inspired
designation is " Love ? " If grandeur of mere human intellect or
character so attracts us, and involuntarily secures our homage, how
can the enlightened Christian fail to delight in Him who is the em-
bodiment and the source of every conceivable excellency and perfec-
tion !

But these perfections not only exist in Christ; they have all been
generously exerted to furnish man with every blessing that cheers

16 THE GLORY OF CHRIST,

liis existence. How rich the canopy spread over our heads ; how
vitalizing the atmosphere around lis ; how fruitful the earth we oc-
cupy ; how beautiful and cheerful is all nature ; how complete our
adaptation to our condition; how wise the laws imposed on us; how
much happiness they secure ; how much more they might secure ;
what checks they impose on vice ; what encouragements they hold
out to virtue ; and what is all this but the arrangement of sovereign
ffoodness, without our counsel or concurrence ? All this is the crea-
tion and arrangement of Christ ; by Him it all consists. How ptrong
the appeal in favor of living to Him, which comes to the Christian
from the consideration of what has been done for him in this point
of view ! Who can resist it ?

But great and controlling as these several grounds are for living
to Christ, there is another, which, with the Christian, far outweighs
them all. It is the realized conception of the relation of redeemed
and Redeemer, that truly fills the Christian soul with overwhelming
and unutterable emotion. The conception that, but for the gracious
interposition of Christ, his inevitable portion should be eternal death,
oppresses him with a sense of profoundest obligation and gratitude.
Sin had arrayed against him all the interests and all the power of the
moral government of God. The character of the Divine Governor,
the stability of the Divine throne, the majesty of the Divine law, the
interests of all upright beings, the infinite demerit of sin — all de-
manded his consignment to everlasting perdition. From this, all the
created resources of the universe could not dehver him. Facts show
that even the Almighty himself could not deliver him but by the
substitution unto death of an intelligent being of infinite dignity,
whose sufi"erings, as a measure of moral government, would be of in-
finite value, and a full equivalent for the merited suff'erings of the
guilty. This is clearly demonstrated by the result of the feeling
prayer of Him who was made the substitute. " 0, my Father," said
he, " if it be possible, let this cup pass from me." The cup could be
permitted to pass only on the condition that man sjaould be left to
bear his iniquity himself, and consequently to perish forever. If the
Divine Father would save a single sinner, the Divine Son " must, be
lifted up " to make satisfaction in his stead, and to open the way for
his salvation.

The emergency was awful. A world of immortal beings, through
its successive generations, must eternally perish, or Christ, the only

THE christian's LIFE. 17

begotten Son of Grod, must be the ransom. The price required was
immense. Only the Infinite in humanity could furnish it. Exac-
tion was made, and He became answerable. That He might save, the
Father spared His own Son, neither " from sulFering nor in suffer-
ing." " He laid on Him the iniquity of us all." Here, then, we
have the ground above every other upon which Christians feel that
they must make the glory of Christ their life. It is a ground which
involves and gives force to every other ; but above them all, it rises
in moral grandeur, and appeals to the Christian with a moral power
bordering on omnipotence. It points to hell, and says. See the pit
whence thou art delivered. It points to heaven, and says. See the
glory for which thou art designed. It points to his intellectual and
moral endowments, and says. See what powers and susceptibilities
have been preserved for thee. It points to the privileges and bless-
ings of the spiritual life, and says. See what treasures and glory
are secured for thee. It points to a perishing world, and says. See
to what semce thou art called. When the Christian thus contem-
plates the interposition and claims of Christ, the language of the
Apostle becomes but the sober and appropriate expression of his own
profound convictions. " We thus judge, that they who live should
not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him who died for
them and rose again." And under this conviction, he finds it morally
impossible to repress the truly Christian avowal, " To ^ me to live is
Christ."

II. We invite attention, in the second place, to the field in which
Christians are designed to make the glory of Christ their life. A
just apprehension of the relation of Christ to His people necessarily
issues, as we have seen, in a desire to devote the whole of life to His
honor. And the inquiry is natural. Where are Christians designed
to secure this honor for Christ ? The sphere is two-fold. Christians
are obviously to labor for Christ, both in the church and in the world;
and their duties are both personal and relative. These duties, more-
over, present themselves in both a negative and positive form. Every
man, even every Christian man, is the subject of evils, and liable to
others, which must be eradicated and avoided, while he has positive
wants which it must be the great business of his life to supply ;
and what every man may find to be true of himself, every Chris-
tian will find to be true, not only of himself, but of all others
to whom he is related, and who have claims on his sympathies
2

18 THE GLOBY OF CHRIST,

and efforts in their behalf. He possesses a physical organism of ex-
quisite Divine workmanship, through which he is appointed to carry
on all his active intercourse with the world around him. This organ-
ism it is his imperative duty to preserve intact for all the purposes of
its creation, during his stay in the present state. Unnecessary ex-
posure to any occasions of physical injury, as violence, climate, in-
temperance, pollution, true Christianity absolutely forbids. On the
contrary, it enjoins all due vigilance and exertion to cherish and pre-
serve, as far as may be, a sound body for the comfort and the use of
the spirit in its active efforts to serve Christ during this mortal life.
The human spirit itself is also liable to great evils, originating in its
depravity and the general depravity of the world. Envy, jealousy,
hatred, malice, revenge, together with vanity, avarice, ambition, and
discontent, are very serious evils in human nature, affecting the peace,
the dignity, and the worth of the soul, and which no real Christian
will neglect to eradicate and guard against. But the necessities' of
the spirit terminate not with the eradication of these evils ; they de-
mand positive culture. Its true interests require that it shall be
practically wise ; that it shall know how to mingle with others, with-
out suffering from stolid stupidity on the one hand, or from rashness
on the, other. This is a matter for observation, for reflection, for
watchfulness, and for prayer, which no Christian may overlook, and
which all who anxiously desire to honor Christ will assiduously attend
to. But the soul needs not practical sagacity only ; it needs also,
and must have, that higher culture called knowledge, or intelli-
gence— the enlightenment and discipline of the intellect ; the power
of thought must be developed and strengthened. In this direction,
there is no assignable limit to the exertions after knowledge due to
the spirit. A still-^higher want, however, is communion, intimate
and uninterrupted, with God. The evils inherent in the (Christian,
and the evils to which he is constantly exposed, affect more or less
his spiritual frame of mind and his spiritual enjoyment. He often
mourns an absent God. But even if the evils in question were re-
moved, a constant, earnest, spiritual culture is indispensable to attain
to a state of ultimate, habitual delight and happiness with God. What
is here indicated as due from the Christian to himself, that he may
reach the stature of "a perfect man," indicates, also, what every
Christian should seek to aid in accomplishing in every other Chris-
tian, that all may reach " the unity of the faith and of the knowledge

THE christian's LIFE. 19

of the Son of God." And here comes into view the importance, the
duty, and the power, of Christian association, as a means of personal
and relative religious culture, and of warding off the evils to which
Christians are exposed in this life.

But we learn, also, that '^ the field is the world," and that Christ
designs to subdue it to Himself through the instrumentality of Chris-
tians, whose agency, in their successive generations, is not to cease
until '' the Kingdom and the greatness of the Kingdom, under the
whole heaven, shall be given to the saints of the Most High." A
glance at the moral condition of the world will tend to awaken just
conceptions and sympathies, and to stimulate Christian exertions to
recover it te Christ.

Look at Europe, the boasted glory of the whole earth, and what
do you see ? Almost its entire extent, with the exception of one
small Kingdom, given up to the degradations of imposture, and to
the dead formalities of a corrupted Christianity. There is not, at
this moment, a city or town, there is not a village or hamlet or rural
district, but needs the missionary of the Cross to teach the people
the simple story of Jesus. Look at Asia, and what do you behold
there ? Here and there may be seen to flicker, in the midst of
the gloom, and at unmeasured distances, a small taper, lit by the
modern missionary, as if simply to intimate that the Gospel had
just touched the borders of the habitation of nearly half the popula-
tion of the globe. Look at Africa, and let Mofiat, Livingstone, and
others, say what is there. In one or two spots a feeble light, of recent
origin, may be seen to twinkle, as if oppressed by the gloom ; but
over the main portion of that vast country broods, in an unbroken
cloud, a blackness of darkness intenser far than that of the hue of its
sable sons. Turn your eyes on your own boasted continent, and what
meets you here ? A mere patch is favored with a partial supply of
the blessings of a pure Gospel. But, oh ! what irreligion, what infidel-
ity, what intemperance, what worldliness, what pollution, what moral
ruin, are everywhere to be seen, yea even in our own midst. Look
at the condition of many of our cities and towns, and at a very large
portion of our Western Territories ; and then look far away west and
south of our own vast domain, and behold the moral wilderness spread-
ing out beneath the tropical sun, and say, 0 say, how much land re-
mains yet to be possessed by the saints, and in the name of the Most
High ! Verily, the world lieth in wickedness. Full nine-tenths of

20 THE GLORY OF CHRIST,

its myriads of immortal inhabitants are at tliis moment " without God
and without hope/' " perishing for lack of knowledge."

Nor is the evil of their condition merely negative. Large num-
bers are positively arrayed against God and His revealed will, as
atheists, skeptics, and infidels ; other multitudes are the victims of
maddened appetites and passions ; and still other multitudes are de-
graded and fettered by the impostures of the false prophet and of the
man of sin ; while almost countless multitudes are brutalized under
the superstitions of idolatry and the cruelties of bai'barism. See how
even the maternal heart, that seat of purest human affection, becomes
petrified, so as to be able to bait the devouring crocodile with the
tender, unsuspecting, often smiling, infant of her bosom. See how
the filial heart, too, becomes so callous as to enable its possessor,
without emotion, to fire the funeral pile, and tearlessly gaze on the
last agonies of a burning widowed mother. And see, too, how the
terror-stricken victim of conscious guilt has, under the lashings of
conscience, offered " his first-born for his transgression, the fruit of
his body for the sin of his soul." In the conflicts of appetite and
reason, of passion and conscience, of conscious guilt and the terror
of' an angry but misinterpreted God, of infidelity and revelation, of
superstition and true piety, nine-tenths of the world's arena is a vast
scene of madness, with only reason and conscience enough to give
accountability to the whole, and to indicate with unerring certainty
the fearful doom to which life's drama is fast approaching, with the
vast majority of the successive generations of men.

Such is this world at a glance. What would it be, could we com-
prehend the length and breadth, the height and depth, of its actual
iniquity, its wretchedness, and' its doom ? It was under this vast
conception, to us impossible, that the Father of Spirits was so moved
as to give His only begotten Son to atone for its guilt, and to open a
way for the exercise of mercy consistently with the integrity of his
moral government. Under its influence. He made Him who knew
no sin to be sin, that sinners might be made righteous. The same
conception, also, moved the Son himself to lay down His life, that
redemption might be had through His blood, that sinners might l^e
brought unto God. The Holy Spirit acts under the same profound
sympathy and purpose of mercy. His great work on earth is to secure
for Jesus " the heathen for His inheritance and the uttermost parts
of the earth for His possession." Christ imparts the same noble

THE christian's LIFE. 21

spirit and purpose to all His true followers, and employs them iii the
same gracious services, which engage the Father, the Spirit, and
Himself. " Ye shall be witnesses unto me," said He, "both in Jeru-
salem, and in Judea, and in Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of
the earth." Their agency is to extend into " all the world," and,
through their instrumentality, the Gospel is to be preached "to every
creature." How divine, how glorious, their vocation ! They are
appointed to labor to redeem a world from sin and death. AVhat holy
enthusiasm kindles in their souls, as they go forth to subdue the na-
tions to Christ, and to " crown Him Lord of all." With what ap-
propriate and heartfelt pathos can they set forth His excellency and
His claims. Out of what depths of experience, and how true to lifp,
can they depict the evils of sin. With what tenderness and sweet-
ness of spirit can they dilate on the peace and the joy of faith, and
on the hope of heaven.; and if all be likely to fail," with what holy
tears can they weep over and pray for their race, as the enemies of
the Cross of Christ.

III. We invite attention, in the third and last place, to the spirit
in which Christians should make the glory of Christ their life.
There is always a liability to the undue manifestation of the wrongs
to which our depravity gives rise in the conduct of the affairs of
Christ's Kingdom. Christians may not forget that, while in this
world, they have not yet attained — are not " already perfect." It
is impossible for them but to find it too often true, tlxat, when they
" would do good, evil is present with them." The spirit or temper
which Christians should exhibit in living professedly for Christ, be-
comes, then, a matter of grave importance. The real worth and ef-
ficacy of the Christian life essentially depend upon it — so much so,
that it matters but little what else the Christian professor has, if he
have not the proper temper. Being of "another spirit," his life is
likely to be productive of more harm than good. Talent, position,
opportunity, only increase the power of such a man to do evil. The
spirit of a man is the most difficult part of his nature to conceal — it
always protrudes, is ever present, and sure to make its own impres-
sion. It is therefore not only important, but imperative, that every
Christian shall labor to possess " the spirit of Christ." No other is
allowed or suitable. This is his great model, and should ever be his
study.

Christians should especially cultivate and exhibit a spirit of dis-

22 THE GLORY OF CHRIST,

interestedness in tlie service of Christ. Paul represents it as the
great excellency of Timothy, that he supremely sought '' the things
which are Jesus Christ's." His injunction to the Christians at Cor-
inth was : " Let no man seek his own, but every man another's wel-
fare." To the Philippians he said : " Let each esteem other better
than themselves." He spoke of Epaphroditus with high commenda-
tion, " becaiise for the work of Christ he was nigh unto death, not
regarding his life to supply " a certain lack of service. Paul's own
spirit, no mean model, may be learned from such exj)ressions as these :
" None of these things move me ; neither count I my life dear unto
myself, so that I might finish my course with joy." " I will very
gladly spend and be spent for you, though the more abundantly I
love you., the less I be loved." " Yea, and if I be offered upon the
sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all."
In these examples, we have "the mind" that was in Him who "came
down from heaven, not to do" His own will, but the will of Him rhat
sent Him; and who, in obedience to that will, "laid down His life
for the sheep." How completely self is subordinated in that spirit,
which it is the duty of every Christian to cultivate and to practice.
Nothing else is compatible with his relations and obligations to Christ
and to the souls of men. However it may be with others, he is to glo-
rify Christ, not himself ; to seek the things that are Christ's, not his
own. In this lies the distinguishing excellency of his character,
and, in a great measure, the power of his life.

On this subject, let each interrogate himself with candor. Do I
possess this temper ? Am I concious of its governing influence in
my life ? Does it underlie my plans ? Does it regulate their execu-
tion ? Can I appeal to the omniscient eye, and say, the love of Christ
constraineth ? Do I covet intelligence, position, and influence, that
under this heavenly spirit I may the better advance the ^Kingdom
of Christ ? Oh, what excellence ! How noble, how divine, the at-
tainment ! How it facilitates living to Christ !

Christians should also cultivate a spirit of depenglence on Christ.
To live for His glory is impossible, without the support of His divine
arm. The Christian's strength is in the Most High, who has never
for a moment suspended His own immediate superintendence in the
progress of His cause. 'To His most holy and reliable servants He
has never wholly committed His honor. He watches it with His
own eye. He steadies and directs it with His own hand. Thus only

THE christian's LIFE. 23

can its triumph be successfully secured. In living to Christ, Chris-
tians " live and move and have their being " in Himself. Their suc-
cess is all owing to Him. True, He imparts to them no inspiration
to render their counsel infallible or their decisions authoritative ; but
He does not leave them to themselves, nor His cause to their finite
skill. In the economy of grace, Christ is made to the Christian wis-
dom, for every time of need — His presence is promised always. All
the Divine perfections, the fullness of the Godhead, are pledged. It
is, then, incumbent on the Christian to avail himself of all the Di-
vine aid profiered him. He should never go forth in any great un-
dertaking without the conviction that, with respect to it, he has " the
mind of the Lord," and that in its conduct he has "the power of
His might." Incousideration and rashness may be the result of
being unsent, and undue confidence in the arm of flesh is incom-
patible with that " wisdom which is profitable to direct," and which,
when properly invoked, insures being " strong in the Lord." Even
when the Christian has reason to believe that his plans are wise
and his efibrts in the right direction, he should go forth only in
the strength of Grod ; because it is only " through God " that the
weapons of his warfare are mighty to the pulling down of strong-
holds. No truth is more clearly taught in the Scriptures, than that
" the increase " must ever be of God. Under the distinct apprehen-
sion of this truth, the Apostle said, " When I am weak, then am I
strong." " I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth
me."

Again, Christians should ever manifest a spirit of self-consuming
ardor in the service of Christ. The complete sanctification of their
own hearts, and the conquest of the world to Christ, is an under-
taking of immense difficulty, as well as of immense importance.
The intense sufferings of Christ, endured for the purpose of laying
the foundation for it, sufiiciently show the greatness of the difficulty
as it lay in the mind of God. As co-workers with God, Christians
need to drink deep into suffering, that they may know something of
the fellowship of Christ's sufferings, and thus be prepared to endure
the privations, the toils, and the sacrifices, which a life of enlightened
zeal and ardor in the Divine life may be expected to encounter. The
Apostle uttered no extravagance when he said : " I count not my
life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy."
He simply gave utterance in another form to the ardent feelings

24 THE GLORY OF CHRIST, ETC.

wMcli burned in the bosom of Christ himself, when He said : '' I
have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened till
it is accomplished." The glory of Christ in the redemption of man
is the Christian's natural and legitimate passion. Who can limit its
just intensity and earnestness for the recovery of a lost world ? How
intensely it must have burned in the heart of Grod, when " He spared
not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all." In that sur-
render, all the perfections of His nature were " kindled together "
into the deepest compassion for the perishing. With what power
must it have operated in the heart of Jesus in the garden and on the
cross, where He gave full manifestation of "the travail of His soul."

The true Christian is in no danger of passing the bounds of pro-
priety in the excitement of his emotions on this subject. What
might be extravagance on any other, is here only sobriety. The
half that is due cannot be felt or manifested. The Apostle could
not mention the enemies of the cross without " even weeping." He
tells us that he "travailed in birth" for perishing sinners; that their
condition occasioned him " great heaviness and continual sorrow of
heart." David gave vent to his burdened feelings in "rivers of
water" from his eyes. Jeremiah exclaimed, in the deep anguish of
his soul, " My bowels, my bowels ! I am pained at my very heart, I
cannot hold my peace." Jehovah himself says of wayward Ephraim,
" I do earnestly remember him still, my bowels are troubled for him."
Of the blessed Jesus it is written : " When He beheld the city. He
wept over it."

Such ardor is not only becoming, it is highly beneficial ; and is so
no less to its subject than its object. It tends to consume the dross
and tin of the Christian's own heart. It raises him above the level
where vice usually tempts, and places him amid the sterner and higher
realities of life. The temptations of idleness and of luxury belong
not to the sphere in which it prompts him to move. It keeps him
viewing man as immortal, yet in danger of eternal death. It stamps
times and things with their proper estimate, and inflapaes with aspira-
tions and desires which this world cannot satisfy. Nothing short of
living to Christ supremely can gratify it while here, and nothing
short of having Christ as its eternal portion can gratify it hereafter.

L--/"

^<^-Z^riL^ /2'2^>

CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED,
THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OF THE PULPIT.

BY REV. LINUS PARKER, A. M.,

OF THE LOUISIANA CONFERKNCE, METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH SOUTH.

For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and
Him crucified. — 1 Corinthians, ii, 2.

Fidelity to the Cross stands out prominently in the words and life
of Paul. It is in relief upon every page of his writings and in every
act of his history. Under all circumstances, he ever presents the
same genuine Gospel front. No pressure from without, no prompt-
ings from within, warped him from this. Such pressure there was
from one or both of these sources.

With natural endowment enough to enrich a hundred minds, im-
proved by the most careful culture, and stored with the lettered at-
tainments of the most celebrated masters, he may have felt strong
temptation to depart from the simplicity of the truth as it is in Jesus.
He was " a Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee."
He was brought up at the feet of Gamaliel, and thoroughly imbued
with the spirit of Judaism. We know how hard it was for his fellow
Apostles, and for the early Jewish disciples, to divest themselves of
the errors and prejudices of education. In Paul, this was not ac-
complished without struggles of soul of which the world has never
heard.

And there were outward solicitations which appealed strongly to
these points of attack within. Christ crucified was a stumbling block
to the Jew, and foolishness to the Greek. There was abundant clamor
for compromise and adaptation. Many of the converts had given
way. How strong the temptation to seek some modification by which
the Jew might be disarmed and the Greek conciliated — some com-

26 CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED,

inon ground upon wMch the Cross, stripped of its offence, might be
planted ! The Jew and the Greek were in Corinth. The Gospel
would be sifted there. Whatever of offence it had would be felt to
the utmost. There would be a demand for the law, and not for the
Gospel ; and men with itching ears, earnest for the wisdom of words,
and not for the foolishness of preaching. There needed a determi-
nation against this multiform pressure. The text is it. For I de-
termined. There is heroism in the resolve, and in the performance
of it. No compromise with the Jew, none with the Greek, none with
the world.

It is a bold condensation of the preacher's mission. Christ is all
in all. The jBeld is narrowed to Him. It is not more, nor is it less.
But the condensation goes on, and greater compactness is given to
the subject matter of preaching. '' And Him crucified." This is
Christ defined ; not the historical Christ merely, as our example, and
a martyr to the truth, but the crucified Christ as a sacrifice, and as
" the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." The
atonement, as the great central and saving doctrine of the Gospel, is
announced as that to which Paul avows his adhesion, and his deter-
mination to make it the exclusive subject of his ministry.

I. The import of this determination.
. 1. It is the language of Christian devotedness and ministerial con-
secration.

Applied to the Christian man, it looks to a thorough and devoted
discipleship, in which the believer neither lives nor dies to himself.
In a most important sense, every Christian, however obscure his po-
sition, should know nothing save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
As expressive of faithfulness to the doctrines of the Gospel of Christ,
as the only ground of salvation especially, and as the symbol of that
crucified life which we are required to lead, it should be the heart-
felt language of all believers. The atonement reaches to every-
thing— to the air we breathe, to the ground we walk on, and to the
entire life. God's claim upon the creature, the redeemed creature
in particular, is an exhaustive one. No man is his own ; he is bought
with a price. Less is not required of the layman than the minister.
The extent and the spirit of the consecration isthe same in both, and
differs only in the direction it takes, or in the manner of its manifest-
ation. The same generous liberality, the same life of faith, and the
same all-pervading spirituality, should characterize every child of God.

THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OF THE PULPIT. 27

But whilst we insist upon an equal because an entire consecration
in all Christians, there is such a difference as grows out of a distinc-
tion between the Christian man and the Christian minister. The
minister is not a Christian man merely, nor can he put off the minis-
terial character at pleasure, and resolve himself back into the Chris-
tian man. If called of God to the ministry, and invested with the
sacred office, there is a peculiar consecration demanded of him, which
is not met in the Christian man. The extent may be the same, but
it runs in different channels, and assumes a distinct and specific
manifestation. Nor does the sole distinctive feature of ministerial
character and office lie in the functions of the pulpit. There is a
character and life which lie back of this, and which are as insepara-
ble from the ministry as the functions of the pulpit. Whether in
the pulpit or out of it, or if engaged in secular business, this charac-
ter still cleaves to him who is called to preach the Gospel. The
office, in its proper consecration, covers the entire life, embracing
talents, time, and substance. Secular pursuits, as a necessity, and as
a means to the fulfilment of the duties of the ministry, do not impair
this consecration ; but beyond this, and when followed from the usual
incentives of secular enterprise, they come in violent collision with
it. Paul did not compromise himself, nor fail in the resolve of the
text, when he worked at his trade with Aquila and Priscilla, at
Corinth, and when elsewhere, and on other occasions, his own hands
ministered to his necessities. The apostle and the 'preacher were
never lost in the tent-maker, but the last was made tributary to the
prosecution of his mission as an ambassador of Jesus Christ. Exclu-
sive devotion to the ministry is necessary to the performance of its
entire duties. Effectiveness in the pulpit, in general, requires much
premeditation and study ; and, besides, the duties of the pastorate are
not less binding, nor are they scarcely less important, than those of
the pulpit.

Insisting as we do that the determination of the text applies to the
ministry outside of the pulpit, we are prepared to admit that its
prominent application is to the subject matter of exposition in the
more immediate business of preaching. It looks to a consecrated
pulpit, the great mission of which is to unfold the doctrine of the
atonement, and to urge it upon the acceptance of a ruined world.
This is the distinctive burden of preaching, and it is here that the
determination of the Apostle bears with all its weight.

28 CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED,

2. Christ, and Him crucified, is to be the exclusive subject of
preaching in the sense of eminence. " A man of one book " was the
motto of Wesley, and it should be the motto of every evangelical
preacher. Paul's resolution amounts to this, when he declares, " For
I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and
Him crucified." But the Bible, as our text-book, is a mine of varied
riches. It is fruitful of the rarest historical knowledge. Almost
every science can gather treasures from its contents, and every art
can draw embellishment from its pages. The poet finds in it that
which quickens and elevates his muse, the orator's lips are -kindled
by its eloquence, and the philosopher is indebted to it for his noblest
conceptions. The incidental wealth of the Bible, in many of the
departments of knowledge and philosophy, is greater than all the
discoveries and productions of uninspired mind.

More nearly related to evangelical truth are numerous doctrines
and precepts of inspiration, of the highest importance to man, and
not to be overlooked by him who expounds the Word of God. "All
Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doc-
trine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness 3
that the man of God may -be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all
good works." All the words of God, all the thoughts of God, are
precious. Every jot and tittle is to be studied, and made to con-
tribute to the stores of the well-instructed scribe in the Kingdom of
Heaven.

But whilst the whole canon of revelation is laid open in the sacred
desk, the atonement, in peerless eminence, is to take precedence of
every other topic. Subordinate features in the scene there are; but
this, like the high mountains of the earth's altitudes, towers above
them all. This eminence the Cross has in the Word of God, and
the faithful minister will study to give it the same relative position
in his exhibitions of the truth. Christ is in no sense to constitute
the background of a sermon. Moses and Elias may be on either
hand, but Christ should ever be the central thought, which, like
a transfigured presence, permeates and subordinates everything
around it.

3. The atonement, in the sense of comprehensiveness, and as ex-
haustive of Divine revela'tion, is the exclusive theme of the pulpit.

This doctrine struggles for utterance in the earliest pages of in-
spiration. Through all dispensations of religion to man, it is the

THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OP THE PULPIT. 29

ever-growing subject of a progressive and gradual revelation. The
Christology of the Old Testament is that of the New, in its germ. It
is the Gospel in the blade and in the stalk, but not the full corn in
the ear. The history, biographies, manifestations, and ceremonies,
of the past, were the swaddling bands of an immature Christianity.
The entire sacrificial economy of Patriarchal and Levitical times pro-
claimed Christ crucified. " The law was our schoolmaster to bring
us to Christ," "and Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to
every one that believeth." The atonement is the Gospel. It is the
Gospel brought to a focus. Moses Stuart calls it "the point of
points." In it we have all that the Gospel is, and from this centre
an entire exposition of the Gospel is reached, so that a full explica-
tion of Christ crucified embraces the whole circle of revealed truth.
Paul did not fail to declare the whole counsel of God, but, he says,
" We preach Christ crucified." In the Gospels aiid Epistles, this
doctrine is the main current which runs through them — sometimes
profoundly hid from the careless reader, but ever and anon rising to
the surface, and sweeping on with resistless power and subduing
pathos.

Christ, and Him crucified, brings out the clear and harmonious
statement of the prominent doctrines of the Christian system. All
that is fundamental in the Gospel is exhibited in the Cross. In con-
nection with it, the doctrine of the Trinity is clearly and powerfully
vindicated. One God in a three-fold distinction of persons is un-
equivocally affirmed in the atonement, so that the high significance
of the one is lost without the admission of the other. The personal
distinction of the Father and Son is made in the sacrifice which the
latter ofi"ers and the former accepts; and the Holy Ghost is revealed,
as distinct from either, in the offices which he sustains to the work
of redemption. We think that a careful consideration of the subject
will result in the conclusion that the doctrine of the Trinity keeps
pace in clearness with that of the atonement, and that its completest
disclosure is made in fellowship with it. The Trinity is a positive
and everlasting truth, but the necessity of its announcement does not
appear, apart from the plan of salvation and the work of redemption.
But for the remedial intervention which the fall of man called for,
it might have remained among the secret things which belong to
God, rather than, as now, amongst the things which are revealed,
and which belong to us and our children. Consistency and reason

30 CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED,

demand tliat the atonement, in its high evangelical import as a
vicarious and expiatory sacrifice, be held in connection with the
doctrine of the Trinity. They stand or fall together. Where one
is denied, the other is rejected. All low and imperfect views of
Christ are necessarily Unitarian, because such views strip the Trinity
at once of its necessity and of its most comprehensive argument.

There is, indeed, an affinity of logical relation and consequence
which obtains between the atonement and the subordinate but funda-
mental doctrines of our theology, none of which can be held in har-
mony and security apart from that which is the centre of them all.
Where else do we read more clearly the lost condition of men, than
in the tragic exhibition of Calvary ? Where else are the issues of
human destiny more fearfully portrayed ? " If one died for all, then
were all dead." Thus the doctrine of Christ crucified implies the
original birth sin of our race. The remedy provided at such an incon-
ceivable cost is in fact the most overwhelming statement of the dis-
ease. Jesus exclaims, in the final hour, "Now is the judgment of
this world." If the Cross is a wonderful exhibition of Divine love,
so is it also a most unequivocal declaration of human depravity and
peril.

' The atonement is the only foundation upon which a scriptural or
reasonable theodicy can be built. In it the character of God is pre-
sented in the perfection of every attribute. Truth, wisdom, power,
justice, love, shine undimmed. The great problem, how Grod can be
just, and at the same time the justifier of the ungodly, is solved.
Here, mercy and truth embrace. The sinning creature is saved, and
the ofiended Creator is reconciled. The guilty and condemned are
restored to favor, and the majesty of the Divine government is up-
held. Were it necessary, and did time permit, we might at least
glance at those difficulties concerning the original creation , and the
subsequent fall of man, which are by some supposed to embarrass
our theology, and show that evangelical Arminianism is capable of
dissipating them, so far as they are properly theological. A right
conception of the atonement is the starting-point of doctrinal inquiry
and exegesis, and it will be found that most damaging heresies arise
just where this right conception is departed from. Those systems
which limit the atonement, and those which make it alike unlimited
and unconditional, prove and illustrate the position. The former,
by th<3 dark reserve of decree and pretention which is hid behind

THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OF THE PULPIT. 31

- the free tender of mercy in Christ, rob the Cross of its glory ; and
the hitter, by unwarranted license, impeach the justice and tarnish
the holiness of God.

If the atonement is exhaustive of Christian doctrines, it is also an
exhibition of the will of God. The Gospel is the perfect law of lib-
erty. As the rule of life, it is to us all that the law is to angels, and
all that it was to Adam. It is not the ground of salvation, but it is
the rule of Christian life. The severity and purity of the law is more
deeply unfolded in the Gospel than anywhere else, and its claims are
attested with thrilling emphasis in the death of Jesus. The compre-
hensive appeal of God to a perishing world is made in the Cross.
" For God so loved the world that he gave his on^y begotten Son.
that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have ever-
lasting life." Would we call men to repentance, and persuade them
to faith, this is the life-giving message. If you would feed the flock
of God, " this is the true bread which came down from Heaven." If
you would raise the Christian life to a loftier denial and spirituality,
" the love of Christ which constraineth us " is the sure basis of such
an appeal.

4. Christ crucified becomes the pulpit's only theme when it is
recognised as vitally related to the whole of Divine revelation, and
when the "Word of God is altogether apprehended and expounded as
the truth as it is in Jesus.

The mediatorial idea is broad and sublime, but it is 'without har-
mony or power when the kingly and prophetical offices of Christ are
considered apart from their relations to the priesthood. The centre
of the mediatorial idea is the priesthood, and the other offices are
subordinate and complementary to it. Any presentation of Christ
which does not set forth this vital relation which the priesthood sus-
tains to the regal and prophetical offices, must be regarded as capi-
tally defective. It would be a one-sided Gospel at best, and, although
dignified as the preaching of Christ, it could not claim to be the
preaching of Christ, and Him crucified.

The law as the subject of the pulpit should be held up in its
proper connection with the Gospel. A sermon upon this subject, in
which Christ is not presented as the end of the law for righteous-
ness, is little less than a monstrous pulpit barbarity. The law, pro-
claimed in its baldness, and as divorced from the Gospel, divests the
pulpit of its evangelical character. It may be the Christianity of

32 CHRIST, AND HIM CRrCIFIED,

Moses and of David's time, but it is not the Christianity of Christ and
His Apostles. The topic which cannot be brought into near con-
nection with the atonement, has no legitimate place in the sermon.
Whether we deal with man's depravity or with Heaven's mercy,
whether we speak of God as a consuming fire or as the Saviour of all
men, whether we portray the flames of perdition or expatiate upon that
life and immortality which are brought to light through the Gospel,
the atonement must be recognised in its vital relation to them all.
Whatever these are in themselves, they are not living .and felt truths
until seen in their relation to the Cross of Christ.

It is then as the eminent, comprehensive, and vital truth of Divine
revelation, that we are shut up to Christ, and Him crucified, as the
subject of preaching. We have aimed to show that in the Apostle's
determination there is no lack of breadth and fullness, and that it is
not the cramped and narrow view of the special pleader. Christ is
the text, of which the Gospel and all the pages of inspiration are
the splendid amplification. What this determination excludes, is
left to be implied or inferred from those general principles which
have been but partially and imperfectly stated.
II. Reasons of this determination.
' 1. Found in the Divine call and commission to preach the Gospel.
The minister is called of God. This call is effected by the agency
of the Holy Ghost, directly moving those whom God has selected for
His work, and is distinct from the work of regeneration, sanctifica-
tion, and adoption. The preacher's commission is given in the Gos-
pel, and in the words of Jesus to the Apostles. The call is to fulfil
the commission, and the commission is a limited and specific one:
" Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature."
Paul's commission to the Gentiles was, " to open their eyes, and to
turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto
God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance
among them which are sanctified by faith which is in me." As
ambassadors for Christ, God hath "committed to us the Word
of reconciliation." " Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as
though God did beseech you by us ; we pray you, in Christ's stead,
be ye reconciled to God." So distinctly was this commission limited,
that Paul unequivocally 'declares, "for Christ sent me not to baptize,
but to preach the Gospel ; not with the wisdom of words, lest the
Cross of Christ should be made of none effect." Now, the drift of

THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OF THE PULPIT. 83

these Scriptures, and many others of like import, is, tluit the com-
mission is limited to Christ, as the ground of reconciliation between
God and man, and that the minister has no warrant for nreaching
anything else.

To go beyond this special instruction is not only a violation of the
ordination vows, but it is directly opposed to the letter and spirit of
the Divine commission. Where the mission of the preacher is so
sharply deftned and so carefully guarded, we cannot suppose that he
is at liberty to diverge in the slightest degree from the line of duty
which he is so clearly instructed to follow. Whatever liberty may
be accorded to ministers in the discussion and advocacy of questions
and principles of secular, literary, political, and scientific interest,
their right to invest these subjects with the prestige of the pulpit,
and to make them the staple of pulpit discourse, is indefensible.
Their call to the ministry was not in reference to these things, and
the commission under which they profess to act lays a proscriptive
ban upon their introduction.

2. Fidelity to the Apostle's determination is the condition of
power. The Gospel in its purity is the power of God unto salvation
to every one that believeth. Christ is the wisdom of God, and the
power of God. " After that, in the wisdom of God, the world by
wisdom knew not God, it pleased God through the foolishness of
preaching to save them which believe."

The true power of the pulpit is not intellectual. It is not the
power of mind. Nor is it the power which genius and eloquence
display in exciting and wielding the lower passions and superficial
sympathies. This is often displayed without any corresponding-
results in the moral and spiritual man. The power of the lecture,
the rostrum, and the bar, is not pulpit power. The culture and
art which bi-ing success to them, may enhance the attractiveness and
promote the efficiency of the preacher, and should be studied to
these ends ; but these alone will never secure that desideratum in
preaching which we call power. They are neither barriers to it, nor
the essential conditions of it. The ministrations of the sanctuary
may be invested with a factitious interest, and spell-bound multitudes
may be held by attractions which are foreign to the real purpose of
preaching; and congregations gathered upon the spur of such incen-
tives, and entertained with such repasts, may starve for spiritual food,
and be dismissed without feeling those alarming convictions and

3

34 CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED,

pressing wants which God's message should awaken in the soul.
True power is displayed in affecting the conscience, in arousing and
stimulating the spiritual life, and in leaving the hearer either a new
creature in Christ, or without excuse in the rejection of the Gospel.

We believe that power like this is to be attained only by adhering
to the Apostle's resolve — by knowing nothing but Christ, and Him
crucified. Jesus exclaimed, " and I, if I be lifted up, will draw all
men unto Me." This was the announcement of a new power for the
regeneration of the world. The lifting up of Christr shall draw all
men. It is an attractive and subduing power. Nothing else can reach
the inmost depths of our spiritual nature, or meet the wants of a
perishing world. It is God's chosen instrument for effecting the
salvation of men, and this result will be accomplished through the
ministry, just in proportion as the ministry is faithful in present-
ing it.

And because it is in companionship with this doctrine that the
mightiest energies of the Holy Ghost are put forth. It is when the
atonement is thus singly presented, that the Gospel is preached
" with the Holy Ghost sent down from Heaven," and tho cries of
conviction, the groans of penitence, and the triumph and shouts of
faith, are heard. Our Lord says of the Spirit, that " He shall glorify
•Me ; for He shall receive of Mine, and show it unto you." In the '
agency of the Spirit, the promise of the Saviour is fulfilled to His
faithful ministers. " And lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end
of the world ! " Apart from the preaching of Christ crucified, the
minister has no right to expect the baptism of fire. The " unction
of the Holy One" is his, so long as he stands by the Cross; but when
Christ is hid behind self, or obscured by the trivial clap-trap of
pulpit popularizing, what wonder that the grieved Spirit takes His
flight? How often is the blessed Spirit grieved, and driven away
from our pulpits, by this cause ? The Word can never be with power
without the Holy Ghost, and we cannot have the Holy Ghost unless
the burden of our preaching be Christ, and Him ea-ucified.
. This doctrine, then, secures the condition of pulpit power. With-
out it, a Paul plants in vain, and an Apollos waters but to witness
the waste of his labor. With it, the feeblest instruments are strong,
and the weakest agents become the honored means of salvation.
" The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty, through
God, to the pulling down of strong-holds." Nothing which learning

THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OF THE PULPIT. 35

can bring to the task, nothing which eloquence can furnish, neither
the gems of a glowing fancy nor the embellishments of imagination,
can supply the place. If we would clothe our ministry with power,
with power to save, Christ must be lifted up, and evidently set forth
crucified. The Cross must stand alone in its sublime simplicity.
The wealth of intellect and the gifts of genius must bow to the una-
dorned grandeur of the theme, whilst the Lamb of God is presented
in bold relief, as the sole object to which the faith and hope of the
world shall be directed.

3. The preaching of Christ is more than anything else calculated
to develop ministerial zeal.

One of our greatest wants is an earnest ministry. The demands
which are made for a learned ministry may be just enough, and those
provisions which are being made to secure this desirable qualification
may be every way laudable, but we would place earnestness as more
needed, and without which no scholastic culture can be of eminent
use. Without earnestness, the ministry is a self-stultification. Christ
crucified leads to earnestness, by keeping the end of preaching ever
before us. This end is to save souls, and the preacher is wanting in
true zeal who does not always feel this burden weighing upon him.
The atonement is a call of mercy to them that perish, and the
preacher stands between the remedy and its application. An earnest,
absorbing purpose must that be which draws its inspiration from this
conception of the position occupied by the minister of the Gospel.
There is no ministerial zeal, where this vivid conception does not
obtain. Animation, stirring activity, noisy declamation, and display
of varied gifts, there may be, but there can be no Christian earnest-
ness. The earnestness of the Gospel is an earnestness of purpose,
which rebukes every worldly and sinister end, and pronounces its
withering anathemas against the ministerial demagogue and the
truckling sycophant of popular applause. The Cross develops a
character of large sacrifice and of heroic self-denial. It is a lesson
of self-renunciation — a crucifixion unto the world. A sufi'ering
ministry gets its inspiration from the doctrine which it proclaims,
and is at once the illustration and enforcement of its message.
Nothing but the love of Christ, as exhibited in His death, inspires
the ambassador of God with an ardor which cannot be quenched.
The zeal of the missionary is not too high a standard for the entire
ministry. To be a preacher and to be a missionary are one, and he

36 CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED,

is neither wlio is not both. Where shall the fire of such an evan-
gelism be kindled ? It is in the Cross alone. But let the Apostle
answer : "For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus
judge, that if One died for all, then were all dead; and that He died
for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto them-
selves, but unto Him which died for them, and rose again."

4. The last reason which we notice for preaching nothing save
Christ, and Him crucified, is, that in no other way can the Christian
minister meet the responsibility which devolves upon him.

Human accountability is a momentous fact. In every conceivable
condition, it is momentous. No man can consider it, and be unmoved.
Every individual life has its weight of accountability, but that of
the minister of Jesus Christ is most solemn — it is weightier than
any other. In it, all the elements of responsibility are intensified.
As stewards of the grace of God, the salvation of immortal souls rests
upon the faithful discharge of our duties. Our hearers pass from
our ministrations to the bar of God, and there we must meet them at
last. Other particulars enter into this responsibility, but to give
account of souls is the most fearful. In comparison, all else sinks
into insignificance. The serious question with every minister is,
how am I to meet the final account? We know not how it can "be
met, but by the faithful preaching of Christ, and Him crucified.
Then, and then only, can he affirm with any assurance,, " I am free
from the blood of all men." If he has failed in declaring the whole
counsel of God, of preaching the unsearchable riches of Christ, he
has failed in everything. No fallen archangel would exchange his
condemnation for that of the preacher who has been wanting in
fidelity to the Cross.

My brethren, the hour of reckoning is coming. With some of us
- it may not be far ofi"; and oh, what fearful, earnest work is burs, when
the power of the world to come is felt by us, and when eternity
throws around us its mighty shadows ! Sure we are, that so long as
we listen to the voice of eternity, and preach amid^ the solemn con-
victions of the coming judgment, we shall never find an hour which
can be diverted from Christ crucified to any other subject. The
dying Summerfield exclaimed : " Oh, if I might be raised again, how
I could preach ! I could preach as I never preached before; / have
had a hole into eternity ! " That look cannot be ours until our lips
ehall grow silent in death. God grant, when it does come, and our

THE EXCLUSIVE THEME OF THE PULPIT. 37

"eyes open upon its awful disclosures, we may leave bcliiud us the
savor of the Cross, and meet within the vail the fruitions of that
faith and hope which the atonement has inspired !

If a sense of our final account should keep us near to Christ, the
pix>mised rewards of a faithful ministry should not be lost upon us.
The whitening fields are before you ; the wages, eternal life ! " And
they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament ;
and they that turn many to righteousness, as the stars forever and
ever." " Cast thy bread upon the waters ; and after many days thou
shalt find it again." You need faith to venture, and patience to
wait. We then, as workers together with God, beseech you. Go
forth, men of God, go forth; sow beside all waters. Morning, even-^
ing, in season and out of season, preach Christ, for your reward is
sure.

In conclusion, Christ, and Him crucified, is the preaching for the
times; or, rather, it is the preaching for all time. '' Jesus Christ, the
same yesterday, to-day, and forever."

There is in certain quarters a growing demand for preaching
adapted to the times. This striving for adaptation is one of the
greatest evils which threaten the modern pulpit. It goes upon the
supposition that the Gospel can be made palatable to the carnal
mind, that the ofience of the Cross has ceased, and that it is no
longer to the Jews a stumbling block, and to the Greeks^ foolishness.
Human nature is the same. The carnal mind is enmity against God
now, as it was in the days of Paul. The heresies which the ministry
is called to combat are scattered over the entire field of ecclesiastical
history. They rise and set like the stars ; they come and go with
the periodicity of the comets, but they are essentially the same.
Respecting them it may be affirmed that " there is nothing new
under the sun." The preaching which was adapted to the apostolic
age is not unsuited to ours. The preaching on the day of Pente-
cost and of Mars Hill would need no modification for these times.
In reaching after a temporary adaptation, it is not impossible that
we shall ignore the Cross, and attain at last to the drivelling wisdom
of words.

If the pulpit is not adapted to the times, it is because we have
failed to carry out the determination of the text. The Gospel
preached with the Holy Ghost sent down from Heaven, is the Gospel
and the preaching for every age. A fresher utterance we may strive

38 CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIPIED, ETC.

after, but it will be in vain if we seek it elsewhere than in an
increased devotion to the atonement as the subject of our preaching.
With minds imbued with this great truth, we shall come to the task-
fresh as the morning, and from hearts gushing with tenderness, and
overflowing with love, we shall be able to speak as the oracles of God.
Let us then, my brethren, gather ai"Ound the Cross, and vow unfal-
tering fidelity in proclaiming Christ, and Him crucified, to a dying
world. Let us, in this sacred hour, lift our hearts to our crucified
and risen Lord, and pray for the pentecostal grace which shall send
us forth as burning and sliinina; lisihts.

S. /^i,uz^

^yl£ft:TES

THE BELIEVER'S PRIVILEaE.

BY E. YEATES REESE, D. D.,

EDITOR OP THE METHODIST PROTESTANT.

Now, the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye
may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost. — Romans, xv, 13.

It is a sad truth that we live in a world of sin. Speculations on
the assumed rectitude of human nature cannot change the realities
of life. The melancholy evidences of a common proneness to evil
are fearfully apparent everywhere. The slavery of sin is universal,
and its consequent misery so darkens the pathway of man, from
infancy to the tomb, that Inspiration has well recorded our present
life, as "of few days, and full of trouble."

The effort to solve the problem of the introduction of moral evil is
utterly fruitless. No man has ever been able successfully to grapple
with its subtle mysteries. Philosophy may stagger and grow blind,
in its ambitious endeavors to harmonize imagined inconsistencies
with the wisdom and justice of the Infinite Being who made usj a
shallow, haughty, and self-complacent skepticism may assume to set
aside, with dogmatic sneer, the plain teaching of the Word of God
upon this subject; but nothing can blot out the facts of our exist-
ence. Here they are, part and parcel of our consciousness ; and the
experience of to-day, in guilt and misery, in estrangement from God
and hostility to holiness, is but the reproduced experience of all the
past. When our first parents came forth, sin-smitten, from Eden,
they brought with them the bitterness of the curse. Antagonism to
God had become incarnate. Ever since, this has been the state of
man. " By one man, sin entered into the world, and death by sin,
and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned."

Our glorious Gospel, my brethren, is the only antidote to sin — the
only hope of the world. God is in Christ, reconciling the world unto

40 THE believer's PRIVILEGE.

Himself. The phraseology of the Gospel is distinct and significant.
It speaks of justification, regeneration, sanctifieation, thorough reform-
ation ; of holiness of heart and recovered happiness. It presents these
as the legitimate workings of the grace of God that bringeth salvation.
It proposes the mastery of the carnal, the re-creation of the spiritual.
It takes away enmity, and enthrones in its stead a love of God's law.
" A new heart will I give unto you ; " and " if any man be in Christ,
he is a new creature ; old things are passed away, and behold all
things are become new." In its earnest and afiFectionate exhortations,
its abundant and precious promises, it offers light to those in dark-
ness, liberty to those in bondage, joy to the sorrowful, peace to the
weary and heavy laden, hope to the despairing, and life and immor-
tality to those who are dead in trespasses and sins.

Christianity, then, is intended to aficct human experience. To
what extent, is a most momentous question. To determine truth in
this particular, is to determine the worth of the Christian relation in
its direct influence upon man's present state. Few subjects can be
more worthy the attention of a Christian congregation ; yet there is
reason to apprehend that, even among believers, few subjects are
more imperfectly understood. We are apt to measure the extent of
both Christian responsibility and Christian experience by the illus-
trations of it which may immediately surround us. The spiritual
life, however, in any congregation, may be very far below the scrip-
tural standard, just as the sense of Christian responsibility frequently
is ; so that, in determining a question of this sort, we should look
away from our immediate surroundings, beyond those living illustra-
tions of its power, with which we come in social and fraternal con-
tact, to higher, more certain, and infallible authority. It is not that
I may be able to ascertain what spiritual victories my brother may
-have achieved, or what is the measure of my own experience, past
or present ; the great question is, what docs our glorious Gosjjel pro-
pose to do for him who, in the use of all the means of grace afforded,
trusts implicitly to its teachings, and yields himself to its full con-
trol ? We all rejoice to believe that it is tlie poiver of God unto salva-
tion to every one that helievetli ; but is there not reason to fear that
we too often abridge th^ comprehensive significance of this and kin-
dred passages, and in the blindness of unbelief, staggering at the
promises, disregard its profiered blessings in the present, by setting
its glorious conquests too remotely in the future ; by recognising in

THE believer's PRIVILEGE. 41

its salvation too little mastery over present evil, too limited a con-
trol over the vicissitudes of every-day life, and tlieir tendency to fill
us with that distrust of Providence and sorrow of soul which so often
afflict the people of God ?

Christianity, my brethren, either proposes a high attainment of
spiritual comfort in this life, to which all discomfort shall be sub-
ordinate, or it does not. It proposes to temper the fierceness of every
assault of temptation, brighten the gloom of every cloud of sorrow,
and, dwelling richly in the soul, diffuse there a peace which " noth-
ing earthly gives or can destroy," or it does not. If it does not,
then to aspire after it is zeal without knowledge ; to preach it, is
fanaticism. But if the Gospel does come to man with such a bless-
ing; if its whispers of peace, and rest, and assurance, and confidence,
and hope, and joy, and walking by faith, and not by sight; if its re-
joicing in hope, its patience in tribulation, its thankfulness in all
things, its abounding righteousness, be not unmeaning rhetoric, but
absolute, significant, all-glorious truth — truth setting forth the com-
mon privilege of all partakers of a like precious faith, through the
sacrifice and mediation of a common Saviour and High Priest — then
is it evident that he is living immeasurably beneath his responsibility
and privilege, who, bearing the name of Christ, does not press to-
wards its attainment, seek after the glorious possession, until, placing
his feet upon this high vantage ground of scriptural, assurance, he
shall be able to take to him the whole armor of God, that he may be
able to withstand in the evil day, and, having done all, to stand.

Have you never been struck, my brethren, with the wonderful
zeal into which the Apostle Paul kindles, whenever this matter of
Christian experience becomes the theme of his discourse ? Next to
direct allusion to the Cross — in which he saw symbolized all the stu-
pendous achievements of the Son of God for us, both as it respects
this life and that which is to come — there is nothing which so tasks,
as it were, his marvellous power of exhaustive expression. The life
of Christ in the soul, and its consequent victories over sin, as real-
ized in the experience of him who goes forth to combat in the pos-
session of weapons, mighty through God to the pulling down of
strongholds, lifts him to a transport of utterance, in which words
seem all too feeble to represent the^astness of his conceptions of the
truth as it is in Jesus. The text is a specimen of that wonderful
verbal compass for which Paul is so remarkable, suggesting even

42 THE believer's privilege.

more than it expresses. Would it be fair to infer that, in these broad
and emphatic utterances, the enthusiasm of the teacher has led him
into exaggerated representations, and that, after all, they are to be
re"-arded as the impetuous exhibitions of his individual zeal, rather
than the landmarks of great and unchanging truth ? Hear him :
" Now, the God of hope Jill you with all joy and peace in he-
lleving, that ye may abound in liope, through the power of the Holy
Ghost." Whatever this may signify as an intelligent petition, surely
it is within reach of the believer to attain and to enjoy.

The words, "fill you with all joy and peace," are very emphatic.
They cannot be intended to express a limited and imperfect state of
confidence and enjoyment. That the Roman converts, in accepting
the truths of the Gospel, had known something of the joy and peace
it is its mission to bring, there can be no doubt. The history of the
early disciples is a record glowing with the victories of personal ex-
perience. Of doubt, distrust, moanings over temptation, murmur-
ings, dissatisfaction with the allotments of Providence, such as are
now frequently heard, very little is recorded ; but, in their stead, we
have triumphant prayer amid bonds and stripes, and even during
the agonies of martyrdom. We listen to jubilant songs from the
gloom of midnight imprisonment, bearing away the soul to so near
an approach to the Omnipotent, that prison-bolts are drawn and fet-
ters smitten by the mighty power of our God through faith. When,
therefore, the Apostle here prays that his brethren may \)Q filled \iiih.
a?? joy and peace in believing, I conclude that, whatever their joy
and peace may have been, it was not complete. There were heights
not yet scaled, depths not yet sounded, glorious trophies not yet won,
achievements to which they had not yet risen, but to which it was
their privilege to rise. In the spirit of a faithful preacher of right-
eousness, he would have them soar from inferior to superior joy;
have them know, not simply the dawn of that peace which, dispersing
the thicker darkness of the mind, fills the soul with a twilight of
hope and assurance, but be able to stand amid the clearer light of the
uprisen Sun of Righteousness ; that, " being rooted and grounded in
love, they might be able to comprehend, with all saints, what is the
breadth and length, and depth and height, and to know the love of
Christ which passeth knowledge, that they might be filled with the
fullness of God."

And surely, in claiming this high privilege for the believer, the

THE believer's PRIVILEGE. 43

Apostle did not go beyond the written testimony of the Word itself.
Joy and peace are not now for the first time associated with the Gos-
pel. " Behold, I bring you glad tidings oi great joy," said the herald
Angel to the shepherd sages. " And suddenly there was with the
Angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying,
" Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace." This was the
annunciation of Him who is "the Prince of Peace." What wonder
that joy and peace should ever after be the signal blessings of an
enlarged experience in Christ Jesus !

Moreover, in speaking of the fullness or completeness of these, as
the master principles of soul-emotion, the Apostle had found authority
for his utterance in the teaching of the Son of God Himself. In
that touching discourse delivered by the Saviour, just before the
agony of Gethsemane — the farewell address of the Son of man to His
beloved disciples — He thus addressed them : " Continue ye in my
love. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love, even
as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in His love.
These things have I spoken unto you, that ray joy might remain in
you, and that your joy might be full." And elsewhere, in the same
tender and soul-moving discourse, " Peace I leave with you. My
peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth, give I unto you."

Paul was not ignorant of these teachings. He had pondered their
import, and knew what a blessing to the world was involved in the
benediction thus spoken. Here may be found the key to his seem-
ing enthusiasm. All around him, men were laboring as they now
labor, for joy and peace, where joy and peace were not to be found.
In Christ, he saw a fullness for all mortal " need." His great heart
swelled with grateful and adoring love to God, and with sympathetic
love for his fellows, as he contemplated the exact adaptation of
the Gospel to the wretchedness of poor sinners. It was a mighty
achievement to lift the soul from its profound wretchedness of sin,
into the light of holiness, and crown it with "joy and peace in
believing," but the work was not of man, and therefore the Apostle's
faith faltered not. With what a glorious doxology does he celebrate
His glory who " worketh in us " this astonishing transformation :
" Now, unto Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, to
Him be all glory, in the church, by Christ Jesus, world without end.
Amen." Here his faith looks to limitless ability for the accomplish-

44 THE believer's privilege.

ment of all that his anticipations might promise ; and the very words
seem to tremble beneath the mightiness of the thought they suggest.
You will observe, my brethren, the importance which the Apostle
attaches to unfaltering belief " Now, the God of hope fill you with
all joy and peace in helieving." St. Peter, speaking of the ascended
Redeemer, says, ''whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though
now ye see Him iiot,7/et helieving, ye rejoice tvitlijoy unspeakable and
full of glory." All the triumphs of the Christian relation, in the
mastery of a love of the world, in the possession of that " peace of
God " which is " to rule our hearts," are suspended upon faith. In
the nature of man, this is necessarily so. The words of the Master,
" according to your faith, so be it unto ymi," reveal the philosophy,
not only of spiritual success, but of all moral, intellectual, and
physical triumphs. Take away faith, and you paralyze hope, and com-
pass the world in the foldings of despair. All great achievements
find here their stalling point, for in the power of man to believe, lies
his power to execute. Faith is the strength of the individual ; faith
is the sovereign power of the world. This principle is easily enough
understood in its application to the present and the secular. Had
there been no faith in the. ability of the electric current to transmit
human thought from one point to another, no such thing as a mag-
netic telegraph had ever challenged the admiration of men. Belief
is the antecedent to all energetic action. It is so in religion. Trans-
fer to the spiritual the principle thus illustrated in connection with
the physical, and how entirely in accordance with the law of mind,
under which we constantly act, is the idea that a man's spiritual
victories shall be in exact proportion to his faith in God.

The Gospel comes to us as Divine truth, gloriously attested.
Faith accepts it, not simply in the manner of a mental assent to
historical narration, or as a system of correct moral sentiment, but
as spiritual truth, in which are involved those living principles which
are to be wrought into the texture of the believer's life, by which
he is to be quickened into a full acceptance of its gracious privileges
and precious promises, and with a hearty recognition of its Divine
authority, " live henceforth not unto himself, but unto God."

By believing, then, we understand the soul's unshaken repose upon
the truths set forth in the Gospel. In the very nature of the pro-
visions of revelation, this is requisite to spiritual enjoyment. Where
confidence in assurances of God's holy Word is wavering and unsta-

THE believer's PRIVILEGE. 45

ble ; where the things of the present life crowd in upon the spirit,
claiming those moments which should be consecrated to heavenly
communing ; where undue importance is attached to the things that
are seen, and the realities of the invisible, as subjects of thought
and feeling, are put afar off; who can wonder that such joy and
peace as come only to the believing should be almost unknown to
us, and our religion degenerate, if not into a dead form, into an
almost powerless profession ? On the other hand, where the soul is
alive to God and the communications of His revealed Word ; where
the invitations of the Gospel are met by the full, constant, unreserved
responses of the heart; where the influences of the Spirit are ear-
nestly sought, and gratefully welcomed ; where Christ in all His holy
relations, as Prophet, Priest, and King, is enthroned in the affections,
and permitted to rule in the life; who shall wonder that joy and
peace in believing should be the legitimate and inevitable result ?
A glance at ourselves would, to be sure, be sufficient, at any moment,
to dampen our rejoicing, and plunge us into a vortex of hopelessness,
were we not permitted to catch a glimpse of Him who ever lives,
our ascended High Priest and Intercessor. That glimpse, however,
should dispel all gloom, and awaken joy unspeakable. The faith
with which we contemplate His sacrifice. His death and meritorious
offering, His glorious mediation, should be a confident, unfaltering,
and rejoicing faith. For here, and here alone, is God's special pledge
to the believer ; a pledge of present succor and of future and eternal
triumph. He lives; and because He lives, we shall live also. " For
if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death
of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His
life."

Allow me here, my brethren, to remark, that this state of joy and
peace in believing is not to be confounded with a stoical insensibility
to the sorrows and calamities which daily surround us. It consists
not in a constant exhilaration that regards with unconcern all sub-
lunary anxieties, and, crushing out the common sensibilities of our
nature, frees us from all sympathy with the bitterness and disappoint-
ment which fill up the measure of every man's experience on earth.
It must not be mistaken for an unsubstantial and purely emotional
state of mind, which feeds itself on visions, and indulges in rhapsodi-
cal dreams. We are yet in the flesh. The discipline of trial and
temptation is not completed. Satan is still our watchful foe. What

46 THE believer's privilege.

we do claim as the believer's privilege is, not an exemption from
earthly sorrow, not a deliverance from buffeting and fierce conflicts,
not an insensibility to those shocks of disaster to which he is every
moment just as liable as other men, but the possession of a living
principle in the soul, which rises above them, and holds them under a
resolute mastery, which imparts a calm acquiescence in the dispen-
sations of an all-wise Providence, a firm reliance on the out-working
of His gracious purposes, and a steadfast rejoicing in every time of
trouble. For, amid the fiercest conflicts, we have the assurance that
grace will be afforded according to our need. The way of escape
will be opened, and the natural result of strong, unfaltering confi-
dence in God, will be the creation of a hope, wrought in us by expe-
rience, which will bring to us an earnest of future and eternal good.
Hope, in the natural order of the emotions, stands related to despair
as its opposite. Wherever it lives, sorrow is not complete. Where
it abounds, joy and peace quicken into lively exercise. It is the
province of hope to turn sorrow into joy, and kindle smiles that
beautify the tears which affliction wrings from the heart of the suf-
ferer. Hope,, such as that which the text recognises, maketh not
ashamed, does not disappoint. It bears the signet of Divine creation,
because the love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the Holy
Ghost which is given unto us. Earthly hopes disappoint us. They
mock us by recreating themselves, only to end in final defeat. But
in Christ we have hope as " an anchor, sure and steadfast." The
abounding of this hope — that is, its realized influence in the soul of
the believer — will go far towards transforming earth into a paradise.
For '' faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of
things not seen." The future and the invisible become, as it were,
present and tangible ; and though eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
nor heart conceived, the things that God hath prepared for them that
love Him, yet are they revealed to us by the unutterable communi-
cations of the Holy Spirit. Hence, our Gospel speaks of '^ rejoicing
in hope," of "full assurance of hope," of "a lively hope," of '' the
hope of glory," of " that blessed hope," and of " strong consolation,"
as the possession of them who " have fled for refuge to lay hold on the
hope set before them." Depend upon it, brethren, there is a signifi-
cance in these phrases which we are slow to appreciate and improve.
And, surely, no loftier petition, no more comprehensive desire, could
have moved the lips and glowed in the heart of the Apostle, pleading

THE believer's PRIVILEGE. 47

for the spiritual triumph of his brethren, than this : " May the God
of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may
abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost."

The power of the Holy Ghost ! Here is the great instrumentality.
Nothing else can lift us into this state of abounding hope. All
spiritual life comes by this power. To the unregenerate, this lan-
guage is mysterious, if not unmeaning; for "the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him;
neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned." But
the experience of countless thousands has verified our Lord's declara-
tion, " ye hnow Him." When the Comforter should come. He was to
dwell with the disciples, and to be in them. This is true in regard
to every converted man. The change which the term itself implies,
all the processes of the gracious work, from the first dawn of con-
sideration, the first throb of penitential sorrow, the first gleam of
peace with God, through the exercise of justifying faith, to its
highest aboundings of hope, are the workings of this mighty power
within us. The New Testament is replete with distinct teaching
upon this point. Here alone, the soul of man, in its loftiest aspira-
tions, meets that which can assuage its thirst and satisfy its hunger,
for here alone is it brought into spiritual communication with its
Father and its God.

The phrase, " ahound in hope," is suggestive of degrees in the
enjoyment or consciousness of this blessing. Hope may exist, where
hope can hardly be said to abound. In like manner, there are de-
grees in which the Spirit of God is manifested in the heart. What-
ever of spiritual comfort any man here has ever known, it was wrought
in him by the power of the Holy Ghost. But to receive the Holy
Ghost, is one thing ; to be " filled with the Holy Ghost," is another.
To be partaker of the hope of the Gospel, is one thing ; to abound
in hope, is another. The Apostle sets the latter a.s a high mark
before those to whom he writes. He evidently regarded it as an
attainable grace. He ofi"ers petition after petition to this end, in
behalf of his brethren. He encourages them with the assurance that
God is "able to make all grace abound" towards them. He reminds
them that Jehovah hath said to His people, " I will dwell in them,
and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be My
people J " and from these promises. He exhorts them to " perfect
holiness in the fear of the Lord." Rich and deep as was his own

48 THE believer's privilege.

experience, the exhaustless provision he himself claims not to have
measured ; but as an example to his brethren, leading in the van,
and flushed with past victories, he exclaims, as he beckons them
onward : " Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but
this one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and
reaching to those things which are before, I press toward the mark
for the prize of my high calling of God, in Christ Jesus."

The recognition of the great truth suggested by the concluding
words of the text is of the last importance to us, not ojily as individ-
uals, but as a church. All our power to be what a church should be,
to do what a church should do, lies here. " Without Me, ye can do
nothing." The might of the Spirit is what Christians want, to ena-
ble them to go forward, conquering and to conquest. It must quicken
our prayers, kindle our songs, illuminate our understandings, pene-
trate our hearts, and vitalize all our religious efforts, or they will
avail nothing. Learning is powerless, eloquence is powerless, the
ministry is powerless, in the accomplishment of the great spiritual
results which the Gospel contemplates, if they be without the aid of
the Holy Spirit. All the machinery of modern Christendom, gigantic
and full of promise as it is, when allied to this spiritual agency, can
never give to the church its true moral power, can never accelerate
the final triumphs of the Redeemer's kingdom. Let us not lose
sight of this great truth — our help is in God ! In the possession of
enlarged facilities of a purely physical character, there is great dan-
ger that the source of true power may be overlooked, and a pride of
mere material and show, and a reliance upon them, take the place of
an earnest zeal for the spirituality of the Gospel.

Yonder gigantic steamer impresses the beholder with what he
calls the power of machinery. He looks at her massive proportions,
he examines her huge and. well-polished levers, he pauses with
amazement to witness the rapid revolutions of her mammoth wheels,
and goes away filled with wonder at the triumph of inventive power.
But the power of the machinery lies not in anything he has seen.
All that has no power, except as it is acted upon. All that wonderful
contrivance is secondary, not primary. The mechanism is valueless,
unless an element altogether distinct from itself shall be introduced.
This once superadded, and the huge structure moves majestically, in
accomplishment of the great purpose for which it was designed. An
artisan, who should devise and execute without constant reference to

THE believer's PRIVILEGE. 49

• this principle, would bring upon himself the scorn of the scientific,
and the sure mortification of defeat. He must never foro-et the
motive power. To its requirements, everything must be made sub-
ordinate. And if this is true in nature, how much more in grace.
Of what avail are all the externals of religion, the graces of rhetoric
the generous gifts of liberal hands in prompt responses to calls for
pecuniary aid — all organization, forms, ceremonies, church appli-
ances—of what avail are they all, if they be not subordinated and
controlled by the power of the Holy Ghost.

How, then, may this power of the Holy Ghost be secured ? To
you, to me, to every Christian, to all churches, what other question
rises above this ? Who shall solve it for us ? Let the Master speak; :
" If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children,
how much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to
them that ask Him." Oh, for faith to believe ! " Ask, and it sliaU
he given jon; seek, and ye s/taZ/ find ; knock, and it shall he opened
unto your Is not this enough ? Falters our faith still ? Hesitate
our anxious, seeking hearts ? Jesus would give us assurance. Listen
again : " For every one that as/cefh, receiveth, and he that secketh,
Jindeth, and to him that hnocketh, it shall he 02)e7ied! " There is the
promise of your Master, and mine ! Is it trustworthy ? Heaven
and earth may pass away, but the Word of the Lord abideth forever.
And, now, may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace
in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the
Holy Ghost.

,:-8Ew. (z:m, fBOJ-^i

VAIN THOUaHTS

BY REV. C. M. BUTLER, D. D.,

EECTOR OF TEINITT CHDECH, WASHINGTON, D. C.

0 Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved !
How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee? — Jeremiah, iv, 14.

The soul of man is here represented as a dwelling, and vain thoughts
as guests or lodgers.

In the hearts of the Jews, such thoughts lodged. Judgment was
about to overtake them. The Babylonians were soon to be upon
them. Yet the " vain thoughts '' of security, and of God's certain
protection, were fixed in their hearts. They arose from their " wick-
edness." Jeremiah could not dislodge them. He directed against
them in vain God's sure words. Argument, illustration, demonstra-
tion, and threatenings, failed. "Wickedness" kept them there.
Hence, seeing the futility of proof, while the wickedness remained,
he cried, " Oh Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness ! How
long shall thy vain thoughts lodge in thee ? "

The work of the Holy Spirit in the heart is symbolized by water
cleansing things defiled. Hence its use in baptism. " Arise and
wash away thy sins ! " " The washing of regeneration." These ex-
pressions refer to the purifying influences of the Holy Spirit in the
heart renewed. That Spirit expels defilements. They cannot remain
fixed where there has been the " washing of regeneration and the
renewing of the Holy Ghost." Vain thoughts, which proceed from
an evil heart of sin and unbelief, cannot " lodge " in such a heart.
If the Jews would have washed their hearts from wickedness, vain
thoughts would no longer have lodged in them.

An unrenewed heart is the home, the lodging-place, of vain
thoughts. In a fully-sanctified soul, they can only intrude them-
selves, as uninvited and unwelcome guests. Such a soul, if it cannot

52 VAIN THOUGHTS.

keep them from entering, will at least not permit them to lodge
within it. Vain thoughts may be said to lodge in the heart in which
they are often, habitually, and unresistingly, indulged.

The duty of controlling the thoughts is a very solemn one. It is
too little felt by most Christians. " Out of the heart are the issues
of life." " As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." His real
character determines his habitual thoughts. His habitual thoughts
indicate his real character. And yet, what Christian among us is
not more careful of his conduct than of his thoughts ? Who does
not do, in the thinking, that which he would not dare do in the deed ?
For, although it be a general law, that " as a man thinketh in his
heart," so '' is he " in his life — though the act of sin is always pre-
ceded by the thought of sin — yet it is true, also, that many thoughts
and desires of sin may not be matured into corresponding deeds.
The blossom of thought may not set into the germ of purpose, and
ripen into the fruit of deed. Hence, Christians are tempted to lose
sight of the sin and danger of yain and wicked thoughts. They
forget that such thoughts themselves, if indulged, are sins. They
forget that the chief, original, real, spiritual sinfulness of a deed is
found in the indulged thought of passion or desire from which it
sprang. There would be no fruit, if there were not first a blossom.
The evil life is in the blossom. The ripe apple of Sodom, the deed
of licentiousness, is but the full growth of the germ of lustful
thought. The rank, rough thistle, the open act of rebellion and,
defiance, was first a soft and downy seed — a mere murmuring and
discontent. Vain thoughts indulged are themselves sins. Observe
how closely Christ connects them with, and enumerates them among,
crimes, and refers them all alike to the heart. " For out of the
heart proceed evil thoughts, murder, adulteries, fornications, thefts,
false witness, blasphemies." "Evil thoughts" take the lead and
command of this frightful procession of crimes that proceed out of
the heart, as robbers and murderers from their den.

I, Vain thoughts ! Oh, how innumerable they aye ! Their name
is legion ! One day's history of the thoughts, desires, imaginations,
and conceptions, of all the inhabitants of the earth — what a black
book it would make ! One day's history of the inner life of thepro-
fesscd, nay, of the real. Christians of the world — what a melancholy,
shameful, confounding, htimiliating book that would be ! Because,
for the Christian, not those thoughts only are vain which are directly

VAIN THOUGHTS. 5S

sinful, but all unbelieving, discontented, idle, aimless thoughts, are
vain. Whatever thoughts are opposed to the truth of God, and the
providence and will of God, it is vain and sinful for the Christian to
indulge. And yet, how many such thoughts is he liable to admit,
and even to allow a lodging-place in his heart, if he be not exceed-
ingly watchful and self-restrained.

II. The liability to become the victim of unregulated thoughts is
fearfully great. In the minds of vast multitudes, they are as Plato
described them — like pigeons in a pigeon-house, flying in and out
and about, without aim or order. There are so many openings through
which they fly in — so many corners in which they can make their
nests and hatch their broods ! Living, as we do, in a most wicked
world, and moving amidst scenes of sin, they come in through the
eye to the mind, and become familiar conceptions. Having evil
hearts, out of them proceed evil thoughts. Being often given up to
idleness and reverie, these thoughts swarm and intercommunicate
their various evil influences. Memory brings in her motley train of
fantastic, disconnected conceptions; and imagination and desire
shape them into forms, which fire the passions and blunt the moral
sensibility, and benumb the will for good. Thus is the temple of
God defiled by the indwelling of vain and unholy thoughts. To keep
them from coming into the heart, is beyond man's power. To keep
them from lodging there, is his duty. It is a duty which can be
discharged only when the heart has been washed from wickedness
by the Holy Spirit.

III. Now, as the child of God has a lower or earthly as well as
a higher or spiritual life, he is open to the temptation of vain
thoughts. But such thoughts must not, and need not, be allowed to
lodge within his heart. There are two laws of our nature by which
thoughts become fixed as lodgers in the soul ; the law of habit and the
law of association. Trains of thought, often repeated, return again
by the force of these laws, independent of our will, and against our
effort and determination. Hence, sentiments and opinions become
fixed in very many minds by the mere fact of being repeatedly put
into them, independent of any ground of reason on which they
might have been intelligently accepted. Hence, the incalculable
power of education and of family influence. Children who have
certain sentiments, opinions, and maxims, put into them day by
day, and year by year, regard them as undoubted and self-evident

54 VAIN THOUGHTS.

truths. But whether accepted or rejected, approved or disapproved,
welcomed as visiters that bless and purify, or hated as those that
corrupt and defile the heart, it still remains true that thoughts which
have been often entertained cannot without great effort and disci-
pline be excluded, but will return and return, again and again, and
strive to get a lodgment in the soul. Each time the thought comes,
it will come as the bird to the tree in which it builds its nest, with
one more of those numerous slight and downy fragments of which
the cunning structure of its permanent abode is composed. If the
Christian be not vigilant over his thoughts, he will find that not
holy doves, but black ravens, have made their nests and lodged within
and defiled his heart.

IV. Take, for instance, selfish thonf/lits, purposes, and desires. A
Christian man is in business in the midst of a sinful and selfish
world. Hundreds around him view all business, and enter into all
transactions, for the single selfish purpose of getting all they caii for
themselves. Maxims and speeches to the effect that this is the
true work of life are flying about him every day, as thick as
hungry birds in a field of grain. These thoughts meet his ear,
and come into his mind. • Moreover, he is in business himself
for the purpose of accumulation. He lays his plans and con-
ducts his operations with a view to gains. This is his lawful
aim; nay, as this is his calling, it has become his urgent duty.
Now, how can he avoid having vain and selfish thoughts take
possession of his soul? His selfishness, stimulated and irritated by
constant counter-selfishness, and seemingly exalted into a duty; his
ear hearing, and his mind taking in, these selfish thoughts and
maxims every day and hour, how can it be but that such thoughts
shall master and absorb him? Oh, it cannot hut be, unless his
heart has been washed from wickedness by the Holy Spirit — unless
he is careful not to let these thoughts, which fly into his mind, alight
there, and build their nests. If a love of Christ has supplanted a
love of self and sin ; if there lodge in his heart generous self-sacri-
ficing thoughts, placed there by the Holy Spirit when the soul com-
muned with God in the early morning prayer, in the closet and in
the family ; if the habitual thought of God's "unspeakable gift has
made him aim at gains only with a view to honor God and bless others
with his substance, then such thoughts cannot stay in the heart. The
heart will be preoccupied. They may not even, except by stealth, enter.

VAIN THOUGHTS. 55

- They will, only flutter on the outside of the heart, the interior of which
they are not permitted to occupy. The windows will be closed to
them. The doves of holy thought and principle and desire, which
flew to their windows in the morning, will remain brooding and softly
murmuring within, while these birds of prey scream and wheel im-
potently without.

V. It is so, also, in the case of discontented thouglits. All around
us are the prosperous and successful. That which we have aimed
at, and failed to reach, we perceive that many have attained. At a
late period in life, we may, by reverses, be compelled to begin the
work of life anew. At a point where we had hoped for ease and
quiet, we may be in the midst of perplexities and cares. Even ouj-
moderate anticipations may have been disappointed. Our business,
our homes, our families, our social relations — all, or much that we rely
upon for satisfaction — refuse to become what we desite. Now, there
are constant temptations, from these sources, to fall into habits of dis-
contented thought. If this earthly life were our all, and if our
hearts were not transformed into a higher love, it would be impossi-
ble for us to avoid constant discontent. With selfishness ever clam-
oring for more, and life, even at its best, never furnishing its full
gratification, it were inevitable that we should be dissatisfied. Even
with the love of Christ and the hope of heaven in the heart, there is
a tendency to allow depressing and discontented reflections to recur
and become habitual. Nay, under the guise of religion, they may be
allowed an entrance. One may think of life's disappointments in a
strain like this : " This is a wretched world. God means, by con-
stantly baffling my hopes, to convince me of this truth. It is well
that I should be discontented with life. It is well that I should feel,
and express, and cherish, the thoughts connected with the disap-
pointments God has sent me." Now, this is true, but it is only half
the truth. God has, indeed, sent you disappointments, that you
should be discontented with earth, but not that you should allow
thoughts of earth's unsatisfactoriness to rest and throw a gloom within
your heart, but only to direct you to cherish those sweeter and higher
thoughts of Heaven, and of spiritual and holy satisfaction, which can
never fail you. This is a higher strain of thought, and is altogether
cheerful and pleasant : " Blessed be God for my disappointments !
Praised be His name that my desires in life have not been gratified.
Thus am I led to think upon my portion — to dwell on God's kind

56 VAIN THOUGHTS.

purposes — to revolve His promises — to be led away from being ab-
sorbed in tlie thoughts of vanity or of earthly good — and to medi-
tate more upon the greater blessings of the disappointments which
are discipline, than of the successes which would be temptation."
Such are the holy and contented meditations with which, preoccu-
pying the heart, we may keep out vain and repining thoughts. In
Switzerland, shepherds sometimes drive their flocks over the lower
glaciers in the glens, in order that they may reach the green pastur-
age which smiles above. So does the Good Shepherd drive our
reluctant feet over icy disappointments, to seek the green -pastures
which lie high up on the mountain of the Lord, where the airs are
purer, and where the sunlight glorifies all that lies below.

VI. Again, there are vain thoughts in reference to the past, which
build for themselves, like wild ravening eagles, high eyries in the
memory, thoughts which it is difficult to dislodge and destroy. Who
has not made awful mistakes in the past ? Who has not perpetrated
sins whose memory is now an open wound, or a red scowling scar
upon the soul ? Who cannot go back, in thought, to crises in his
life, which he would give all that he ever had of wealth or joy, if
he could renew, in order -that, he might make a diiFerent decision,
and pursue a different course ? Who has not had fearful sorrows,
which come back and scream around his soul in hours of weakness
and depression, as vultures wheel around the exhausted traveller in
the desert ? Now, the tendency to cherish and revolve and renew
these thoughts of past sin and sorrow, is very great in many minds.
It is greatest in minds that are most ingenuous and conscientious.
And it is well to call to mind the sins of our youth, and to confer
with the sorrows of the past ; to walk, with bowed head and humble
heart, up the avenues of departed time, and pause at the places
where our hopes lie buried, and read the monitory epitaphs that
surmount them ; this is well, if we do it to deepen our humiliation,
and quicken our obedience and diligence in duty. But these
thoughts are vain, and worse than vain, if they m?ike us feel that
because of this past we cannot have a bright, happy-hearted, earnest,
and useful life before us. If they persuade us that the sorrows and
sins of the beginning have inevitably necessitated gloom, inefficiency,
and blight, at the end of our probation, they are vain and lying
thoughts. It is not so ! Samson's riddle shall here be true. In the
carcass of the past, there shall be hived honey for the future. ''Out

VAIN THOUGHTS. 67

■ of the eater shall come forth meat, and out of the strong shall come
forth sweetness." From such a past, and from right, wise thoughts
upon it, shall come forth a strong, alert, and joyful Christian life.
Peter's sin and shame shall be the motive, and the prelude, to Peter's
burning zeal and glorious martyrdom for Christ. Paul's persecuting
hate, repented and remembered, shall deepen Paul's yearning love.
These remembered sins and sorrows of the past shall not be as stones
rolled upon the Christian, to push him down the mountain of holiness,
but rather as stepping stones laid before him, upon which he shall
ascend higher. Oh, it is a temptation of the Devil, when we are
led to coldness, depression, and inactivity, in the present, because of
the mistakes and sorrows of the past. Such a tried and tempted past
has made us well to know sin and sorrow ; and a deep knowledge of
these may and should lead us to aim and aspire after higher peace
and holiness. Over our remembered follies and self-made woes, we
will pass to glorious victory and success, even as in war, soldiers,
over dead bodies, mount the parapet, and scale the wall, and snatch
the victory. Then let us not allow the vain and disheartening
thoughts which memory brings from the past, to lodge in the heart,
and thus keep out of it thoughts of God's sure promises — cheerful
thoughts, which rest on duty, and give birth to praise. If these
wicked Philistines of the soul entrench themselves in the stronghold
of the Holy Land, which is the heritage of Emmanuel, send up these
thoughts and promises into the midst of them : " I can do all things
through Christ that strengtheneth me ; " " Christ's strength is suf-
ficient for me." Send these champions for Grod among them, and
they shall be as Jonathan and his armor-bearer at Michmish, and
the one shall chase a thousand ; and the vain thoughts shall be dis-
lodged, and holy thoughts — peaceful, happy, hopeful, thoughts — shall
take their place, and hang out their glad banners from the conquered
towers.

VII. Unbelieving, sheptical thovghts — such as charge God with
injustice, or hang around His glorious perfections as an obscuring
cloud — are prone to lodge within our hearts. There are two modes
of thinking upon God. Wo may think of Him as He is represented
in Scripture; as He is in Himself; as He is seen in the face of
Jesus Christ ; as our Sijiritual intuitions and our enlightened reason
tell us that He is, and everlastingly must have been. Then He is
the all perfect, all loving, all holy God, and our hearts are filled with

58 VAIN THOUGHTS.

love and praise. Then " our meditations of Him shall be sweet."
Or we may look into this evil world, a world which He created, and
dwell in thought upon its awful sins and uncounted sufferings; we
may look in upon ourselves, and study our weakness, inability, wretch-
edness, and fearful propeusion to evil ; we may dwell upon God, as
thus seen in an evil world, until our minds revolve and cherish
unbelieving, doubting, dishonoring thoughts of God. We may peer
into the mysteries and irreconcilabilities of His dispensations, in
providence and grace, until we cannot either see, or fully believe,
that He is only and wholly just and good aad loving. Now, all such
thoughts are vain. They are unworthy the privileged Christian,
who is permitted to see God in Christ, as He is in His essential
nature, and therefore as He miist he in all His dispensations. We
hear in modern phraseology of " the night-side of nature." There
are Christians who, in their speculations and sorrows, have come to
feel as if there were a night-side to God. " God is light, and in
Him is no darkness at all ! " To look at God, and judge of
Him by what we see in a world where a sinful free will has rebelled
and marred His works, is all one as if we turned our back upon the
sun, and stood in the shadow of a rock, and gazed down a deep abyss,
and then judged of the glorious orb of day by the few straggling
rays of light which only make the darkness visible below ! Our
thoughts of what God is should be only such as we find in His holy
Word, and have derived from our own sweet experience in Christ
Jesus, that the Lord is gracious. Thus shall all vain and dishonoring
and unbelieving thoughts of God be dislodged from our minds. We
will not then see God as the author or the careless permitter of the
awful sins and unimaginable woes of earth. We shall only see Him
in the midst of earth's imperfections, as the uncompromising and
triumphant foe of evil— the. beneficent Father, who educes all pos-
sible good from all inevitable evil. We shall see that all moral
darkness has come of getting away from His light, and not from
Him who is only light. Oh, the sweet thoughts pf such a God !
How inexpressibly blessed to look up from amidst the mysteries
which enwrap us here, to God Himself, " whose nature and whose
name is love," and to be sure that no evil i& from Him, that He
overrules it all for the. good of His children, and that its coming
has called out the fullness of His adorable perfections ! On such
thoughts we rise above the clouds of mysteries and doubt, and see

VAIN THOUGHTS. 69

them darkly rolling their glooms and flashing their fearful lightnings
on the children of sin and unbelief who abide below !

VIII. In the minds of men yet unreconciled to God, vain and
delusive thoughts lodge, which are intended to quiet their fear, and
keep them at peace in sin. They say to themselves, that they are
what God has made them, and are therefore not responsible for being
evil. They dwell upon the large mercy of God, and apply to the
impenitent the descriptions of the boundless compassion which is
ready to save the penitent. They strive to persuade themselves, that
however the Scriptures may sound, it cannot be that a God wholly
benevolent will punish forever and ever His weak creature, who
lives only according to the nature with which he came into the world.
Or they throw themselves on the excuse, that as they are declared
to be unable of themselves to turn to God, they must wait until the
ability is given to them from above. Now, to these thoughts they
give such constant welcome, they are so careful not to entertain or
allow an admission to their obvious answers, that they have effected
a strong lodgment in their hearts. Satan has prepared and decked
the chamber wherein they rest. He has administered the opiate
through which they sleep. He has forged the locks and bars by
which they are defended from the just and righteous truths which
would, as the ministers of holy authority, dislodge these rebel and
wicked thoughts. Qh, if they would but let their reason speak, they
would see how utterly vain such thoughts are ! You say you are
what God has made you, and therefore not responsible for being
evil. No — you are not what God made you ! You are far worse than
you were by your birth-nature. Even if we should admit that God
is responsible for the evil nature which you have inherited — which
of course we do not — still you have not acted according to tJiat nature.
You have made it worse. It, as it came to you, had a conscience,
whose place was supremacy. You have not assigned to it that place.
You have made it give way, times without number, to passion and
inclination, when you might have yielded to its suggestions. Again —
you dwell on the large mercy of God, as if, in its infinite reach, you
and all sinners must be included. It is indeed large, beyond your
possible comprehension. God is wholly, and, if I may so express
myself, inflezihli/ merciful. He is not so weakly merciful as through
mere pity to forgive the polluted, and thus defeat the very ends of
mercy. Justice is wrapped up in that mercy. Even your own

60 VAIN THOUGHTS.

imperfect human mercy is uot separated from justice; or, if it is, it
is a weak and contemptible quality, wliich results in direst cruelty
to its unhappy subjects. God, you say, will not punish His weak
and erring creatures, in another world, for sins to which an infirm
and damaged nature prompts them. But He does punish them here
for such sins. Then why not hereafter ? The drunkard, the adul-
terer, the murderer, are punished here by God's providential govern-
ment, for sins to which a weak and erring nature prompts them. Is
God one thing here on earth, and another there in heaven ? It were
all one to say that the sun has light and heat here, in his beams on
earth, but none of it there, in its source in heaven ; and to say that
God's holiness shines on earth, but that He has none of it in heaven.
Look you to it — that as God punishes sin now. He will punish it
more fearfully hereafter; and that as His holiness shines now
brightly from a distance, it will be a consuming fire when it draws
near.

You say, also, that you are unable to turn to God. This, indeed,
is true. But that inability, which you make the excuse for remain-
ing in sin, God uses as a reason for throwing yourself upon One who
is mighty. Because without ability, because helpless, throw yourself
upon Him who is mighty to save. " Work out your own salvation
with fear and trembling, for it is God that worketh in you to will
and to do."

How vain these thoughts are, is clear, from your own inner-
most consciousness. Notwithstanding all these cavils, you still have
fears and misgivings — "certain fearful lookings for of judgment."
These are the voice of your responsible immortal nature. They
cannot be reasoned out of existence. They are inseparable from an
immortal and spiritual nature. They will remain forever. They may
sleep, but they will never perish, and at length wake to sleep no
more. They did not ask leave of argument to come into your soul.
They will not go out of your soul at the bidding of argument. Prove,
conclude, affirm, what you will, your spiritual nature will testify that
it is an evil, a wrong, a thing of guilt, a real death and damnation,
here and hereafter, now and always, inevitably and necessarily, to be
evil and to be away from God ! Oh that the- Spirit of God would
cast these evil thoughts from your heart ! Why should vain thoughts
lodge in thee ?

f7/.^. A.A^/L:

CHAEITY.

BY REV. EDWARD N. KIRK, D. D.,

PASTOB OP MOUNT TEENON CHCRCH, BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS.

So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.
For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath shewed no mercy; and
mercy rejoiceth against judgment; — James, ii, 12, 13.

The two Apostles, James and Paul, have been regarded by many
as teaching two gospels. But there is no contradiction in their
thought; the appearance of it may be found in their varied use of
the word "justified." Paul means by it, our standing right before
God's law; James, our standing right before His Gospel. So far as
this difi"erence needs explanation, it will be met in the course of our
meditations on this passage.

There is in the uuregenerate heart an aversion, often unsuspected,
to the method of grace; justification by grace, through faith. That
aversion manifests itself as really in every unconverted professor of
religion, as in the rationalistic unbeliever.

James wrote his epistle mainly for that class ; persons who had
accepted and confessed the system of grace, with a secret antipathy
to its vital elements. And the passage now before us is one of the
touch-stones which he applied to their case. " Brethren, have not
the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect
of persons ; for if there come into your assembly a man with a gold
ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a poor man in vile
raiment ; and ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing,
and say unto him, ' Sit thou here in a good place,' and say unto the
poor, ' Stand thou there,' or, ' sit here under my footstool,' are ye
not then partial ? "

Here is the socialism of Christianity, in its antagonism to the ex-
clusiveness of pride. It is no attack on grades in social existence;

62 CHARITY.

no reduction of society to a monotonous level; no opposition to
reverence for station and rank, age, excellence, and office ; but, sim-
ply, love against pride. It is not an advocacy of the pewless cathe-
dral, against the pew in the church. It is simply charity toward
man, rich or poor, agreeable or disagreeable, friend or foe ; charity
expressed in the sanctuary or out of it, charity everywhere, and
always.

The argument of the Apostle is this : if we have really accepted
" the law of liberty," then we have become good and merciful like
God. But if we have not so accepted the. Gospel, and the grace it
proclaims, as to have been made condescending, kind, and impartial,
then we "shall have judgment without mercy."^

What, then, is the Gospel ? Regarded as a document, it is the
proclamation of a peculiar exercise of the Divine goodness toward
sinners. Considered as a method of Divine goodness, it is a law,
just as much as the Mosaic code ; having, equally with that, its com-
mands and prohibitions, its rewards and penalties ; nay, a higher
authority, more glorious rewards, and more terrible penalties. Christ
is both King and Redeemer; and, when He calls us to Himself, it is
that we may take upon us His yoke.

Yet the Gospel is entirely contrasted, in many points, "with both
the law of Pai-adise and the law of Sinai. This contrast is expressed •
in the phrase, " law of liberty," which designates it to be as peculiar
as is the person of Jesus Christ, its author; requiring personal
holiness, as much as the law of Moses ; but, unlike that, first setting
the soul at liberty from the bonds of guilt, and accepting sincerity
and faith instead of perfection.

To one who has always had the spirit of obedience, and against
whom the law has no charges, duty is itself freedom ; and the law
of Paradise re-enacted on Sinai would be to him the law of liberty.
But to the guilty and sinful, that law is only bondage, because it
requires holiness by mere authority, and with no relaxation of the
penalty incurred. Its spirit is, "the soul that sinn9th, it shall die."
" Then I may as well despair at once," is the natural, only reply a
sinner can make to mere law. " God hates me, and I cannot pro-
pitiate Him. I have a crushing load of guilt upon me, which I can
never remove. I am a wicked being, and can never renew the foun-
tain of spiritual life in my own spirit. I must then sink under the
load of my fetters, in absolute despair." Every child of Adam

CHARITY. 63

would use such language, if he knew himself without knowing the
Grospel. But the Gospel puts everything on a totally different found-
ation. It presents God in a new light. The law had revealed Him
as holy, just, and good, to the good. But the Gospel reveals Him
as good to the bad, merciful to the guilty, a Saviour to the lost.
Here, then, is emancipation. The guilty, depraved, lost spirit,
can return to its Creator, and Sovereign, and Judge. God is love.
Under this law of liberty, we can confess past transgressions, ac-
knowledge present evil tendencies, mourn over deep defects of char-
acter ; and all this, to a holy God, a kind Father, without despair,
without fear. The Gospel is a law of liberty also, because it reveals
a complete, ample foundation of reconciliation with God, which mo^t
abundantly satisfies every scruple of the conscience, every sentiment
of justice and honor, in the human soul. It moreover reveals a
new Divine power — the Holy Spirit, which Christ compares to living
water, to life itself. A free Spirit is to work in us all righteousness.
Hence David says, " uphold me with thy free Spirit." And God
says, by Jeremiah, " I will make a new covenant, I will put my law
in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts." Once it was put
without, by authority, on tablets of stone ; now it is put within, by
grace, on the living tablets of the heart. And another peculiarity
of the Gospel is, that faith constitutes obedience to it. The law
was to be obeyed ; the Gospel is to be believed. The whole power
of the law enters the soul, by the conscience approving it. But the
Gospel enters by the heart believing it.

Taith believes God testifying in the Gospel, His mercy ; as the
conscience recognises God commanding in the law. Faith sees the
law in the Gospel, and fully understands that Christ came not to
destroy the law. It accepts the law in the hands of a mediator.
The believer is a rebel acknowledging the purity and righteousness
of the law he has broken, but at the same time accepting the grace
that pardons and that renews. Unbelief, rejecting both authority
and grace, goes on carelessly to doom; or, accepting law, and despair-
ing of grace, it sinks beneath an insupportable load.

Many have misunderstood the act of faith, supposing it to be a
belief that we are saved ; while it is a belief that we are loved.

What, then, is the legitimate influence of this faith ? Its results
must be, humility, love, and gratitude. The trembling, despairing
Boul, expecting to meet only a God of immaculate holiness and in-

64 CHARITY.

flexible jastice, meets a God of love ! He sees only a self-sacrificing
friend, wiiere he liad looked for an avenger of blood. In that atmos-
phere of love, he learns to love ; to love God and man ; sinful, lost
man. Here is a death-blow at the root of his selfishness and isolating
pride. Here he learns sympathy. Being himself an object of Divine
compassion, of that mercy which rejoiceth against judgment, he
learns to show mercy to them whom his judgment must condemn.
Seeing how tenderly God regards man, without respect to his attain-
ments or position, he learns to respect humanity in. every instance.
Casting himself solely on the mercy of God, he knows the value of
mercy toward his fellow man.

This was beautifully illustrated by the Saviour in one of His
parables. The lord of a certain servant sent for him one day, to in-
quire how much the steward was indebted to his lord. It was ten
thousand talents; more than fifteen million dollars. " But forasmuch
as he had nothing to pay, his lord commanded him to be sold; and
his wife and children, and all that he had, (for that was the custom
of the times,) and payment to be made. The servant therefore fell
down and worshipped him, saying, ' Lord, have patience with me,
and I will pay thee all.'. Then the lord of that servant was moved
with compassion, and loosed him, and forgave him the debt. But
the same servant went out and found one of his fellow servants which '
owed him an hundred pence, or about fourteen dollai's; and he laid
hands on him, and took him by the throat, saying, ' Pay me that
thou owest.' And his fellow servant fell down at his feet, and
besought him, saying, ' Have patience with me, and I will pay thee
all.' And he would not, but went and cast him into prison, till he
should pay the debt." What a picture of man, refusing forgive-
ness, mercy, or love, to man, when he himself expects forgiveness,
mercy, and love, from God !,

James says, " So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged
by the law of liberty." In all your words and actions, it should be
manifest that you have believed in Christ, that you have believed
that God is love, have realized yourself to be the object of an infinite
compassion. Never manifest a want of respect for human beings ;
of compassion, sympathy, or mercy. So speak, and so do, as those
who expect to stand at God's dread tribunal; there to be dealt with,
not after the rigors of justice, but by the gentleness of mercy.

This is the Apostle's first appeal ; it is to our consistency, to our

CHARITY. 65

best judgment. It is manifestly reasonable, in tlie highest degree,
that they who meet so great mercy, should be merciful.

And to this he adds the consideration, that our pretensions to
faith will undergo a solemn scrutiny. Even they who profess to be
believers " shall be judged." " We must all appear before the judg-
ment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in
his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad."
" But does not faith save us from the judgment ? " No. While the
Scriptui-es say we are not to be saved by our works, yet they affirm
that we are to be judged by them. Let us get this cleai-ly before
our minds, by observing that the very question in the judgment will
be, Had you faith ?

Faith is to be tested in the general judgment; the Saviour has
taught us in His solemn description of the scene, in the twenty-fifth
chapter of Matthew. The whole process He makes to consist in — the
discriminating act of His omniscience, by which every human being
will be placed in one of two companies — the solemn sentence passed
on each company — the execution of that sentence. The sentences
pronounced describe their own reasons, and they are summed up
in this : the reception or rejection of Christ. We indeed never
saw Him, personally, a hungered or in prison, and therefore we have
never been tested by that. Yet there are a thousand other ways in
which the simple but momentous question. Have you faidi in Christ ?
has been answered by our words and acts.

Observe how James states it : " Was not Abraham justified by
works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar ? " Now,
observe what erpknation he gives of this. He does not say that
Abraham, by obedience to law, was saved. No; he declares, first, that
Abraham received justification, or righteousness, which is salvation,
by faith; and then that his works justified, or verified, his faith.
Hear his explanation : " Seest thou how faith wrought with his
works, and by works was faith made (or manifested to be) perfect ?
And the Scripture was fulfilled, which saith, Abraham believed Grod,
and it was counted to him for righteousness. Ye see, then, how that
by works a man is justified, and not by faith only." And the need
of this form of justification is obvious; for, as faith is an act of the
spirit, man cannot see it until it embodies itself in speech and deed.

Now, you will notice that there are many good deeds which in the
final judgment will be no better than bad deeds. Some are repre-
5

6Q CHAHITY.

sonted as saying, in tliat day: "Lord, have we not prophesied in thy
name, and in thy name cast out devils, and in thy name done many
•wonderful works ? " Now, while the Lord does not deny the perform-
ance of all these excellent deeds, yet He declai-es : " Then will I pro-
fess unto them, I never knew you; depart from me." And Paul shows
the possibility of speaking with the eloquence of angels, giving away
all our possessions to build hospitals and feed the poor — yea, our bodies
to the martyr's stake — and yet, of not being acknowledged of Christ.
Where, then, is the difference in the good works that will justify,
and those that will not ? It lies here : those that originated in a
living faith are deeds springing from a true, or loving, grateful, and
obedient heart. They therefore will be accepted ; and no others.
And it is manifest that a merely external obedience to God's law is
disobedience, and that no sinner begins to obey spiritually until he
has believed the Gospel. A self-righteous obedience must be an
insult to God, as it puts self above God, dishonors the law, and
despises the graee of God. It presents an outward, heartless act, as
both an obedience to the precept, and an atonement to the penalty of
the law. It does not obey God, for He requires repentance and faith.
Its motive is not gratitude for sins forgiven, but fear of punishment,
or some other reference to self. It fosters, not humility, but pride.
• It produces, not piety, but formality; not charity, but selfishness.
" Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteous-
ness." Why ? Because he cordially obeyed God's new command.
He came to God as a sinner, to be forgiven ; to receive all good, then
and forever, from the mere grace of God. Wonderful as it was, he
believed just what God said. He prostrated eveiy doubt, and fear,
and objection of reason, before the Divine testimony and promise.
He went fearlessly into the wilderness, unhesitatingly to the mount
of sacrifice ; never pausing to argue, to see whence help could arise,
or how God could make His own word good. You see in him that
faith and works, are fountaia and stream. The one is in the hearty
and invisible to man until it comes to the surface in deeds. And
.as James says : " Seest thou how faith wrought with his works? "
If Abraham had refused to obey Gcod, because the requirement was
too hard, then his faith would have proved itself a dead thing. So
we, if we pretend to faith, and then live in the want of charity to
man, will prove ourselves never to have believed, from the heart, in
Christ and the Gospel.

CHARITY. 67

Tlius our deeds and words are to be brought into the judgment
as a test of our faith or unbelief. Words alone will not answer. If
yre say to the hungry and naked, " be ye clothed and fed/' but do
no more, we have not charity. Then also, if we have philanthropy
that does not come from faith, we shall hear the Judge say, " I never
knew you."

We are all to be judged. And the judgment will be terrible to
unbelievers. They have not true charity to man. They have not
learned mercy, from the Teacher of mercy. They have not the pure
stream that comes from Christ the fountain; so that they really
show no mercy. They may be in the church, or out of it; skeptics,
non-professors, professors, preachers ; but they show no true Christ-
like mercy. And it is said, "He shall have judgment withoxit
mercy, that hath showed no mercy."

Kecall here the Saviour's parable. It continues thus : " So, when
his fellow servants saw what was done, they were very sorry, and
came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord, after that
he had called him, said unto him, ' 0 thou wicked servant, I forgave
thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me ; shouklest not theu
also have had compassion on thy fellow servant, even as I had pity
on thee ? ' And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the torment-
ors till he should pay all that was due unto him. So likewise shall
my Heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hfearts forgive
not every one his brother their trespasses." Here is an exhibition
of that "judgment without mercy," of which James speaks. Un-
mercifulness is peculiarly a sin against the graee of Grod. We are
taught to say, " foi"give us as we forgive others." When we go to
the mercy seat, we supplicate Ood both to give and forgive, most
devoutly. When we turn, then, from G-od to men, from prayer to
the intercourse of life, the Grospel requires that we be the children
of God, giving and forgiving liberally like Him. God exerciseth
mercy with great delight; His "mercy rejoice th over judgment."
He rejoiceth to give and forgive, A faith, therefore, that truly
accepts His grace, will manifest its existence by charity, by con-
descension, kindness, gentleness, sympathy, meekness. " Blessed are
the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy." Jesus " had compassion
on the multitudes." They were strangers to Him; they were a very
ungodly people. But He could not think of their sufferings and
spiritual necessities without compassion. His heart was drawn out

68 CHARITY.

toward them. He rejoiced to forgive them, to supply their wants;
nay, to die for them. " Now, if any man have not the Spirit of Christ,
he is none of His ; " he has never believed in His mercy, with an
intelligent apprehension and a cordial faith. And he shall be found
in the judgment on the left hand of Christ, and he shall have judg-
ment without mercy. For even Christ will say, " Depart, ye cursed,
into everlasting fire."

It is then obvious why faith is the condition of salvation. Mere
command, authority, or threatening, does not change a sinful heart.
It may awaken fear, anxiety, desire ; but it cannot produce " love,
which is the fulfilling of the law." "We require to become and to
see ourselves the objects of an infinite compassion and kindness, in
order to subdue the pride and remove the selfishness of our hearts.
It is by the discovery of our deep and dreadful guilt, our utter ruin
and helplessness, the infinite compassion and kindness of God, the
immensity of the sacrifice made for us, that our hearts are regenerated,
cast into a new mould, made like God. And hence the importance
of a clear view of the fundamental Gospel doctrines. Faith is the
condition of salvation. But that faith will undergo the most rigid
scrutiny at the judgment. It will be put to the test, to show whether
it was vital, operative, transforming.

We should then anticipate the final judgment, and try ourselves,
in view of its scrutiny. Have we faith, true faith ? That we are
to discover mainly by our actions, and the motives that actuate
them. Does our faith make us love God and our brother? We
love God if we love duty. To the unbeliever, duty is a bondage, and
sin, freedom. To the believer, sin is felt to be a bondage and a bur-
den, while duty is freedom. The unbeliever acts from the constraint
of fear ; the believer, from that of love. The unbeliever looks for
forgiveness on account of the smallness of his sins ; the believer, on
account of the greatness of Christ's sacrifice. The unbeliever loves
man for his excellence and friendship to himself; the believer
loves man for Christ's sake, even his personal enemy. There may
be found a philanthropy without faith, which will not stand the final
test. Yet without philanthropy, there is no faith. " So speak ye,
and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty."

But what must you do, who find yourself an unbeliever, and yet
anxious to be reconciled to God ? You must despair of salvation by
merely trying to do good. You must despair of working yourself

CHARITY. 69

into a state. of love to God and man. You must despair of help from
any being but Christ. You must get your tlioughts fully fised on
Him. The change you need is essentially this ; to see the entire
hatefulness of your character, as a selfish, ungodly creature ; to long
for holiness and reconciliation to God ; to see in Christ a Divine love
and loveliness; to see that God delighteth in mercy; that mercy
rejoiceth over judgment; to love that Divine goodness, to accept it,
to possess it, to imitate it. In an unawakened state, we are indiflPerent
to the mercy of God. The goodness of His general providence
satisfies us, or, rather. His gifts satisfy us, without any regard to the
love that bestows them. But when we are awakened to feel the
need of Divine mercy, then we are prone to look too exclusively at
ourselves, and at God out of Christ, ''a consuming fire." This brings
us neither hope, love, nor obedience. We are transformed into the
likeness of God, by looking at Him in the Gospel mirror. And the
eye that beholds Him there is faith — faith beholding and faith ac-
cepting His love. When we feel the need of an infinite mercy, when
we see an infinite mercy in God, when we cordially accept Christ as
the gift of God's mercy, then we believe, to the saving of our souls.
And this faith will show itself in the feelings we manifest daily and
hourly toward every human being with whom we have anything to
do. This probationary life will soon be terminated ; and then the
judgment day will bring our words and deeds before the universe,
to testify to either our faith or unbelief. If we shall tave had a
faith in God that produced a true philanthropy, we shall be acknowl-
edged as belonging to the family of God ; if not, we shall have,
whatever our pretensions or hopes, "judgment without mercy."

The momentous inquiry. Am I a Christian ? is brought to each of
us by the passage we are now considering. And the answer to it is
to be found in our daily conduct, taking in part the form of an answer
to another inquiry. How do I regard and treat my fellow man, par-
ticularly in reference to the classifications made in society ? For in-
stance, How am I afi'ected by the accident of wealth and poverty ?
Do I know the worth of manhood, the value of a soul made in God's
image, under whatever garb or complexion it may be found ? This
inquiry strikes deep. It searches for pride and selfishness, for envy
and injustice, for coldness and indifference. These may lurk in the
heart of a true believer. But the heart in which they reign has no
faith in Christ. The act of repentance for sin has subdued the pride

70 CHARITY.

of the heart. The reception of a free, full, cordial, and infinitely
generous forgiveness of all his transgressions, from Christ, has struck
a death-blow at that exclusiveness and indifference which characterize
an unbelieving spirit.

We are generally accustomed to regard with mere contempt the
aims and theories of Socialism. Perhaps a more just Christian estimate
of them would be, to regard them as a perversion, under the influ-
ence of selfishness, of an impulse which may be traced to a higher ■
and purer source than the spirits which feel its power. Their error
is manifold. The truth that is blended with their erroneous views
is one and simple, but of incalculable moment to mankind. The
truth they have embraced and perverted is this : we inust become
brothers. But they do not see that the brotherhood to be formed
must be a brotherhood " in Christ." It must originate in the subju-
gation of the selfishness of individual hearts by the power of " the
law of liberty." It must be admitted that the church is greatly de-
ficient in brotherly love and a pure philanthropy. But the remedy
for this evil is not in organizations erected on any other foundation
than that occupied by the church. Let philanthropists, then, come
into the church, imperfect as it is, and concentrate their labors on
making it perfect. But if they enter the church, it must be on the
terms Christ has prescribed. He will not change its foundation, its
principles, or its conditions of fellowship, to accommodate them. The
church of Christ must be godly as well as benevolent, Christian as
well as philanthroj)ic ; and whoever seeks to make her more philan-
thropic needs no new organization, no new principle. She only needs
to be made true to herself, her principles, her Lord, and her position,
to present the world a true specimen of what the race will be when
it becomes one family, every member of it so speaking and so doing
" as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty."

'h-

^-<^^

^

' f:

C^iic^

THE BREASTPLATE OF RiaHTEOUSNESS AND THE
HELMET OF SALVATION",

BY REV. G. W. SAMSON, D. D.,

PRESIDENT OP COLUMBIAN COLLEGE, WASHINGTON, D. C.

Putting on as a breastplate, the righteousness of faith and love ; and as an
helmet, the hope of salvation. — 1 Thessalonians, v, 8, and E^hesians, vi, 14.

Much more, then, being justified by His blood, we shall be saved from
■wrath through Him. For if, -when we were enemies, we were reconcOed to
.God by the death of His Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved
by His life. — Romans, v, 9, 10.

Christ called " His own/' on earth, both " disciples " and " follow-
ers;" implying, as He said, that they should first " learn" of Him,
and then live as He lived. Paul, Christ's great Apostle, was at once
a teacher and leader of his fellow Christians ; hence, writing for all
time, as a master ambitious for the progress of pupils, he seeks in
his letters to feed some as babes with milk, while he deals out for
others the strong meat adapted to men of mature age. At another
time, as a leader in action, he is seen drilling the young soldiers of
Christ for service, minutely describing their armor, and seeking to
accustom each hand to its several weapons of ofi"ence and defence.
Is it not a shame for a scholar to be told that he " knows not what
be the first principles of the Gospel of Christ ? " Must it not be a
disgrace, even to the youngest soldier of Christ, not to be able to
distinguish his '' breastplate " from his " helmet ? "

The first citations we have made from Paul's epistles are figurative,
and suggest the motto of discourse ; the second is didactic, and gives
us a text for discussion. The thought of the figure and of the plain
statement are one. The Christian soldier's breastplate is righteous-
ness, or justification, received through faith ; and his helmet is sal-
vation, or growing sanctification, derived through hope. The ele-
ments of the Christian's experience, described to the Romans, are

72 THE BREASTPLATE OP EIGHTEOUSNESS

these same two; their relations and dependence being more fully
developed. Here is reconciliation, justification, or righteousness,
with the blood, the death, or the propitiatory suflFering of Christ, as
its ground, and with faith as the condition of spirit in us which
secures it as ours ; and here is " salvation," or the renovation and
refoi-mation of our spirit and life, with the " life " of Christ, Hia
example when on earth, and His spiritual power sent from Heaven
as its source, and with hope as the animating impulse in us, which
makes its work progress to its accomplishment.

The three-fold distinction here indicated by Paul, often overlooked
and even regarded unimportant, and that by experienced Christians,
is seen to be most palpable and vital too, by a single quotation from
the Apostle, illustrating the three several points of contrast in his
words before us. To the Hebrews he writes, " Now is our salvation
nearer than when we believed." What Christian, however limited
his experience, would not instinctively perceive the difference 'and
the impropriety of the statement, should a Gospel teacher render it,
" Now is our justification nearer than when we believed ? " In its
nature, justification differs from salvation; justification is a "gift" of
God, complete at the moment it is bestowed, whereas salvation is a
'5 work" of God, pi-ogressive in its execution. To the Philippians,
again, Paul exclaims, " "Work out your own salvation." How mani-
fest the impropriety, should the Gospel preacher exhort his hearers,
" Work out your own justification ? " Every Christian instinctively
understands that the source of justification and salvation are not the
same; that the former is Christ's bestowal, directly, without any
instrumentality on our part; while salvation is wrought by His Spirit
through human agencies. To the Komans again Paul says that we
are "justified by faith," and "saved by hope." However little an
experienced Christian may have thought of the distinction between
"faith and hope, every one would feel that there was something wrong
in the statement, should it be said, "we are justified by hope." These
two exercises of the Christian, corresponding accompaniments of
the gift and the work of God, are distinct in theii- cliaracter and in-
fluence,

Here, then, is the theme of our discourse, and its divisions ; the

DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE GIFT OF JUSTIFICATION AND THE
WORK OF SALVATION : FIRST, IN THEIR NATURE; SECOND, IN THEIR
SOURCE ; AND, THIRD, IN THEIR RESULT.

AND THE HELMET OF SALVATION. 73

We are to consider, then —

I. The distinctive NATURE OF JUSTIFICATION, in its relation to
SALVATION. This distinction is readily perceived in our religious
experience; as well as in Scripture teax3liing, which is but the unerr-
ing record of human experience.

Dr. Duff, the able Scotch missionary at Calcutta, writes thus of a
Muhammedan convert recently baptized : " A few days before his
baptism, I asked him what was the vital point in which he found
Muhammedanism most deficient, and which he felt that Christianity
satisfactorily supplied. His prompt reply was, ' 3Iuhammedanism
is full of the mercy of God. While I had' no real consciousness of
inward guilt as a breaker of God's law, this satisfied me. But wher>
I felt myself guilty before God, and a transgressor of His law, I felt
also that it was not with God's mercy, but with God's justice, I had
to do. How to meet the claims of God's justice, Mlihammedanism
has made no provision; but this is the very thing which I have found
fully accomplished by the atoning sacrifice of Christ on the Cross ;
and therefore Christianity is now the only adequate religion for me^
a guilty sinner.' "

I have conversed with a man of most intelligent and cultivated
mind, who has declared and reiterated the declaration, that, so far as
human law is concerned, the man who has violated the law can never
be a justified man again ; as truly just as if he had never broken the
law, and freed from all consciousness of self-condemnation on that
account. And when I have endeavored to unfold to him the idea,
before little pondered, that through Christ's sacrifice the man who
has thus violated the Divine law is restored to this perfect integrity
again, he has exclaimed, " I won't believe it ! It is impossible ! It is
a contradiction ! " When, then, again I have urged — '' Then there is
no such thing as salvation possible, for I am sure I can have no
heaven anywhere, conscious as I am that I have been untnie to the
eternal law of right, unless I can among angels hold up my head
with a consciousness that God is Just, as well as merciful in forgiving
my transgressions, and admitting me to the companionship of those
that have been forever pure" — he was obliged to admit it; and
knew not which to allow, either that there is no salvation for sinful
man, or that justification as the New Testament describes it is pos-
sible.

Where, now, is the soul to be found that does not yearn after such

74 THE BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

a consummation of blessedness for his own spirit; to feel, not simply
that he is reconciled to God, subdued by His mercy, but, as the old
writers, with more of propriety than we now are ready to admit, used to
say, that " God is reconciled to us." The idea is, that the law of justice,
and God, as its author, can be reconciled to the fact of our being treated
as if we never had done wrong, and that, consistently with His own
character, as a just being before the pure in heaven, He can make it
true that we are Just ijied.

Certainly this has been the aspiration of the men whom the in-
spired Word of God presents as examples for us. What else was in
the minds of the patriarchs Job and Abraham, when one said, " How
shall a man be just with God?" and the other exclaimed, "Shall
not the Judge of all the earth do right?" Surely, the great ex-
pounder of New Testament truth did not mistake when he saw this
struggling, longing, in the soul of guilty David, as he plead, " Have
merer/ on me, 0 God ! According unto Thy loving kindness, ac-
cording unto the multitude of Thy tender mercies, blot out my trans-
gressions ; " and yet could not be satisfied with mercy, and asked for
the accomplishment of his heart's farther demand, "That Thou
mightest be justified when Thou speakest, and be clear when Thou
judgest;" making the sum of the favor he, as a sinful man, sought,
this, " Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity/' >
And, since this is the universal demand of the soul conscious of its
spiritual want, we should be prepared to appreciate Pa;ul's peculiar
statement to the intelligent Romans, that he was " not ashamed of,"
he " gloried in the Gospel," not because it was a special exhibition
of the " mercy," or even the " love of God," but " because therein is
the righteousness of God revealed," * * * " that God might be
just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus."

Justification, then, is that peculiar favor which makes it possible
that God should consistently remit, pass by, forgive, and blot out,
transgressions we have committed. When, however, this is secured,
our "salvation" is yet a work only begun. Indeed^ salvation, in the
sense of the word as employed by Paul, is, from beginning to end, a
work distinct from justification. When my sin past is remitted, I am
thereby possessed of a spirit averse to sin in- the future. It is an
added bestowal when the new spirit is wrought in me. This it is
which, in Paul's language, constitutes "salvation;" a new spirit,
begotten, indeed, at the hour the soul is justified by faith in Christ,

AND THE HELMET OF SALVATION. 75

but which is to increase in power and influence, according to the
declaration, " He which hath begun a good work in you, will perform
it until the day of Jesus Christ." It is this work which the old
divines called "regeneration and sanctification," which, in Paul's
comprehensive language, is "salvation."

And why should not the word " salvation," as applied to the soul,
take this comprehensive meaning ? We may indeed exclaim, using
the word in a limited sense, of a man on a burning wreck, " He is
safe ! " the moment the life-boat, manned by sturdy, resolute, and
humane oai-smen, pushes from the shore ; but, in the strict sensd*of
the word, the man is not saved till his feet touch the shore. We
may in hope exclaim of a wandering prodigal, " He is saved !" tl^e
hour when a pious parent, having wrestled with God long in prayer,
is able to say, " I know that my prayer is answered ; " and yet the
prodigal, strictly speaking, is not saved until the kst lingerings of
wrong desire have been eradicated from his nature. So the hosts of
Heaven may shout over a repenting sinner, " The lost is saved ! " at
the hour of his conversion ; while still they are to be " ministering
spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salva-
tion," and while these saved ones themselves may, at each stage of
that angel ministry, exclaim, "Now is our salvation nearer than
when we believed ! " From the very nature of our idea of salvation,
we can see and feel the force of those expressions which speak of it
in the Christian as a work only begun, and yet to be' wrought out,
while our idea of the nature of justification is entirely distinct.

Our minds are naturally drawn, after this point is settled, to pon-
der the second truth suggested in its order by the Apostle —

II. The distinctive SOURCE or GROUND of justification and of sal-
vation presented in the contrast of the DEATH and the life of Christ.

How manifest the distinction made between the death of Christ
and the life of Christ, as to their ef&cacy in securing spiritual bless-
ing for sinful men. Here it is said that we are " reconciled " to God j
we are "justified" "by the hhod," "by the death" of Christ; and
are " saved by His life."

This idea, that on account of what His Son sufiered in His death,
God is just in justifying us sinful creatures of His, is one that can
never be fully comprehended and appreciated by a finite mind ; and,
to the man unrenewed and untaught by the Holy Spirit, it seems an
absurdity. Both these suggestions the Scriptures make. It is through

76 THE BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

the church, men saved by Christ, that " to principalities and powers
in heavenly places " is "made known the manifold wisdom of God."
The effect of Christ's death, even upon angels, is such that " all
things in heaven " are reconciled to God through Him. And yet
they continually *' desire to look into " these things, comprehending
only enough to satisfy them that God is perfect in His dealings
with His creatures ; and thus they are so bound to Him in love, that
no more from their ranks will ever prove like those who " kept not
their first estate." Among men, boasting of their wisdom, but thor-
oi^hly depraved in their notions of heavenly excellence, " the preach-
ing of the Cross is foolishness." The idea that we can be justified on
account of what Christ suffered is absurd. To us, however, " that
believe," it is " the wisdom of God and the power of God; " even as
it seems to pure angels.

How to explain his own idea, the thoughtful Christian may be at
a loss. The clear-thinking Bible interpreters of the past age used to
take hold of the common expression, that Christ " purchased us with
His blood ; " and with an application, perhaps too much pertaining
to " earthly things," they represented the sufferings of Christ as an
equivalent outweighing, in the scales of justice, all that the race of
man united could forever suffer for their sins. Others, again, look-
ing at the idea of social exaltation in position, rather than of material
excellence, have dwelt on and developed the statement that he "ran-
somed" us in "dying for" man; and in the picture of a sovereign
condescending to receive in his person the penalty due to his rebel
subjects, an approximation to the idea that Christ the Creator <3ied
for man the creature's sin, has been attempted. Perhaps yet another
confirming illustration may shadow the great truth. When a friend
dear to me lies sick, to bring but a momentary comfort to him, I go
forth to the field, and with conscious integrity take the life of a
score of the little birds whose flesh may give him nourishment for a
day. In my esteem, millions of such inferior lives are less than an
equivalent for that of an intelligent being like man. I am right
in this instinctive feeling; and so all heaven and earth are right in
the instinctive impression that the life of Him who is King of kings
and Lord of lords, yea. Maker and Monarch, is - more than, immeas-
urably more than the life* of the whole race of man, from Adam to
the last born on earth. The one may be substituted for the other.

This indeed involves a truth, against which the mind of man may

AND THE HELMET OP SALVATION. 77

frame an objection ; one, however, wliich is the suggestion of a wrong
spirit, not of a really erring understanding. Thus, it is said, the inno-
cent is made to suffer for the guilty ! Yes, and this is the laio of
universal being where sin exists. Angels in heaven became tempters
to man, and our first parents suffered, innocence for guilt. A de-
praved son and brother inherited the nature of his depraved parents;
and the child suffered for the parent's guilt, and again, in their turn,
the parent for the child's bloody wickedness ; and this great law of
G-od's appointment (only partially true, indeed) became the universal
law for man. Where and when on earth have not the comparatively-
speaking innocent been involved with the guilty in flood and fire, in
cold and heat, in famine, pestilence, war, in social and domestic
wretchedness ? And if, where there may be a doubt, since "all have
sinned," and " death has come on all because all have sinned," why
should not the imperfect shadow in all human history have its perfect
substance in Jesus, who " knew no sin,'' and yet " was made sin for
us ! " And if, where the sufferer for another may be supposed
not to be a voluntary sacrifice, God has nevertheless ordained that
the innocent be involved with and for the guilty, why should it not be
that the imperfect copy of God's ordinance should be consummated in
the model of Him who "gave Himself" a free-will offering, saying,
with exulting voice, as he proffered the sacrifice, " Lo, I come ; I de-
light to do Thy will, 0 God ! " Ah, the death and suffering of Jesus,
my Saviour, in the view of perfect intelligence, love, and right, do
so appear in heaven, that God is just while He justifies the ungodly
who believe in Jesus.

The first moment's reflection, now, suggests the entire difference
of the statement that we are " saved by His life." Salvation is the
begetting of the new spirit in me, which, while I am justified for sin
committed, struggles in me for the mastery over my sinful nature,
until its triumph is complete. The ground, the source «f this, is- the
life of Christ.

There are two things here hinted ; there are two elements in the
power of Christ's life to renew me. If the need which I as a sinful
man have of justification convinces me that I am perfectly helpless,
and that, if justified at all, it must be a gift directly provided and
wholly furnished by another, this beginning and growth of a new
spirit in me I am equally satisfied is a worh, in which I have a re-
sponsibility, though for its commencement ,and progress in me all

78 THE BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

my moral power is utterly inadequate. Here, then, the life of Christ,
it is hinted, is the source to which I must look for this work. What
means the suggestion ? Jesus lived as a man, from childhood up to
maturity; and is it this earthly life in the body to which reference
is made ? Jesus lives now; being ascended from earth in a spiritual
body, " He ever liveth to intercede for us ; " and is it this heavenly
life to which Paul alludes? Or is it both ?

We arc now in the flesh, and in this state have spirits of our own,
clogged, indeed, by this clay. But these dead spirits are addressed,
and the commands of Grod's law are upon them. He commands us to
repent, believe, love, and follow Christ. Of course, the work of salva/-
tion is a work that we are to perform. At the same time, when these
commands come in all their purity, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy
Grod with all thy heart," where is the man that ever did or ever can
perform it? If the death of Christ has justified us, we need a new
Divine power to save us. And what mind now not wilfully per-
verse, what soul that prays to be saved, feels not that his whole case is
met when inspired Paul directs, "■ Work out your oion salvation with
fear and trembling, for it is God that worketh in you to will and to
do of His good pleasure."

Now, it is the "life " of Christ that does this work of God. Sinful
•as we all are, with no one example of perfect obedience to G-od's law
before us, we need a model. Christ's life in the flesh on earth is that
model. Were He to-day living in the body, near to and with us, we
might see with the eye His life. Since He is not, for wise reasons,
now in the flesh. His life, long since passed, must, in historic records,
be brought before us; and this is done in the Word of Christ. But as
a model placed before an experienced man does not give him the
artist's powers to copy after it, so the presence of the life of Jesus,
even when in person He was on earth, did not give men the power
to be like Him. As the life of a man is the life of his soul, so the
life of Christ was His spirit's life. And that spirit's life, Divine in
nature and power, must be communicated to us, or We are not saved ;
we have not the new spirit begotten within us, which, amid our fleshly
imperfection, is to grow into the same image with Christ, from glory
to glory. Need any mind that seeks salvation, then, stumble at
the statement that we are "begotten of the Word" of God, and that
Christ's prayer is, " Sanctify them through Thy truth ; Thy Word is
truth ;" or at the correspondent statements, we are "begotten of the

AND THE HELMET OF SALVATION. 79

Spirit of Gtod;" and "wlien He, tlie Spirit of Truth, is come, He shall
guide you into all truth." It is the life of Christ presented to the
mind by His Word, and made effectual in its influence by His Spirit,
through which we are saved.

How distinctly marked fo the experienced Christian, how precious
to him, these differing truths ! Transpose these statements ; say to
him, " We are justified by the Word and Spirit of Grod;" exhort
him, "Work out your own justification j " and the youngest disciple
of Christ instinctively perceives and feels the violence done to Gospel
truth. The youngest Christian knows the difference, in his own soul,
of the power of Christ's death and the power of Christ's life.

We are led on thus, after looking at the abstract principles that-
differ, justification and salvation, and then, looking at the person of
Him who bestowed them, in whom His life differs from His death —
we are led to look at ourselves, at the differing states of mind, the
differing emotions with which we are possessed when dwelling on
these two principles, and relying upon these two grounds of our own
redemption and salvation.

III. TJie distinctive RESULT in us of justification and saZvatioTif
seen in the contrast of Christian faith and Christian HOPE.

A common ornament for an armlet, in our day, consists of the
three emblems — the cross, anchor, and heart. Some think so little,
that though they perceive there are three forms, they, see not the
three ideas. Writing to the Corinthians, ambitious of miraculous
gifts, rather than to have a name written in heaven, by possessing the
spirit of that abode, Paul analyzes that spirit thus : " Now abideth
faith, hope, charity, these three ; but the greatest of these is charity."
Here is a form of words; but the idea may be as little thought of as
in the three emblems on the armlet. We readily distinguish the last,
the ultimate grace, love in action, or charity, from faith and hope ;
we must learn, also, to distinguish those two former, "faith and
hope," one from the other.

We have certainly the Apostle's own clue to the difference, in his
careful and distinct use of the two words. In the Epistle to the
Romans, we read that we are "justified by faith," and "saved by
hope." More than once, in figures addressed to other churches, we
read of the " breastplate of faith and love," of " the shield of faith,"
and of "the breastplate of righteousness," or "justification;" but we
read of " the helmet of salvation," and of " the helmet the hope of

y(J THE BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

salvation." As carefully as justification and salvation are distin-
guislied, so carefully are faith and hope, their accompanying emotions
in us. Let us follow up his hint, remarking first the distinction we
make in our worldly employ of these terms, and then observing how
this meaning of the words in themselves is made by the Apostle to
illustrate truths in Christian experience.

We are accustomed to say, " I helieve the sun will rise to-morrow,"
and " I liope it will be fair weather to-morrow." To reverse the
statement, and to say, "I hope the sun will rise to-morrow," would be
doing violence to something within us ; and what is that something ?
Trace it up, and we find this to be our instinctive conviction. When
any fact or event anticipated rests upon a regularly acting law of the
Creator, known to me to be sure in its operation, my conviction of the
certainty of the result is such that I say, unhesitatingly, '' I helieve
that." When, however, that fact or event depends on an irregularly
acting cause, or one supposed by me to be irregular, I have not the
assurance to say "I helieve;" I can only say " I Aojje." There is
therefore an intellectual difi'erence between the exercises of faith and
hope. Yet again. We say of the humane father of an abandoned
son, " I helieve the father would receive his son again ; " and of the
son, " I lioiie he will be reclaimed." Besides the intellectual diflFer-
. ence just mentioned, there is a moral difi'erence between the exercises
of faith and hope. Hope implies a wish, a desire, which faith does
not; for when I say I hope the son will be reclaimed, I express a wish
rather than an expectation; whereas no special desire, but a mere
conviction, is uttered when I say, " I believe the father will receive
his child." When, now, Paul wrote, as he was moved by the Holy
Spirit, a sure record of spiritual truth, it was in human language
he addressed men who knew the ideas expressed by the words of
language.

When Paul says that we are "justified by faith," then he means
to imply that the exercise of our mind is a conviction resting upon
testimony sure and certain ; hope would not be strong enough to
express the idea. The death of Christ, a fact that had just passed
before their eyes, meant something ; and what could it be that led
Christ to shed His blood in agony, but this, that through the rent
vail of His flesh a new way of near approach to God, of reconcilia-
tion, of justification with Him, was provided. Before Christ came,
to the children of Abraham before the Anointed One had died, to

AND THE HELMET OF SALVATION. 81

• most of Israel, the justification provided by Christ and all its conse-
quent blessings was a matter only of hope; so that Paul said to
Agrippa, " For the hope of the promise made of God unto our fathers,
I now stand and am judged." True, to a few spirits like iVbraham,
the death of Christ and its results was a matter of faith before He
came; but it was especially after His death, as Paul tells the Jews
of his day, thai the mystery of Christ, hid from the foundation of the
world, was revealed, as in other ages it was not made known unto
the sons of men. What a clear light, what a radiance of distinct-
ness, a little careful thought upon the inspired statements, exemplified
as they are in our experience, thus throws on the way of life by
Christ. Faith, a conviction founded upon a fact that has occurred,
faith in the propitiatory sacrifice of Christ, is the act of our mind
which accompanies and secures justification before Clod.

When Paul, again, declares that we are " saved by hope," he im-
plies that the work of salvation, which accompanies the gift of justi-
fication, is a matter relating to a fickle, uncertain, unreliable being;
God is unchangeable and reliable ; and if He has given His Son to
die, the object for which He gave Him we may be certain is secured.
But sinful man, even though renewed, is an uncertain, unreliable
creature. The very nature of sin is, that it is irrational; no
explanation can be given why man first sinned ; and no man can
foresee to what length a being who has once sinned will go. All I
can say about my salvation is, I hope that the work begun in me
will be carried on unto perfection. I am justified by faith; but I
am saved only by hope.

Youthful soldiers of Christ, you may be trained in diff'ereut schools;
but are we not all one community, one people of the living God !
You may wear a difi'ering uniform, and learn the drill of difi"ering
corps; but is not our banner one, and even our armor substantially
the same ? Certainly our order book, and our field duty read from it,
is the same. In the light of the truth, we have considered how near
to each other Christians seem to be, in thought and feeling, if not
in word and action.

Why should not the day dawn when Christians shall no longer
disagree in doctrinal views ? Human forms and features never will
be cast in the same mould; and no more will human conceptions
and expressions. And yet we are one distinct race among animate
beings in physical structure, after all our varieties : and so we may be

82 THE BREASTPLATE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

"one in mind," after all our differences. How manifestly one class
of thinkers, one branch of the Christian church, has been absorbed
with one of the two classes of truth we have pondered, while another
class have been energized by its opposite. But how plainly in our
youthful first-glance Christian impressions, and in our mature life-
long Christian experience, all truth comes more and more to assume
consistency, and to make up one perfect whole. Ponder the lesson ;
it is not truth in its letter, nor Christian experience in its spirit,
which is to change ; but our comprehensiveness in viewing our own
convictions, and in uttering our own experience, is to grow unto
perfection. Why, then, should not the Christian church be one, ac-
cording to Jesus' last intercession for His disciples, "I pray that they
may be one." Domestic relationships are not to be annihilated; my
family must be my own. But though, in perfecting society, families
may ever remain distinct, may not communities be more united, and
society more one ? Paul's practical commentary on the sentiment of
our Lord was given to the Philippian church, thus: ''If there be,
therefore, any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any
fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, fulfil ye my joy,
that ye be like minded, having the same love, being of one accord,
of one mind. * * * Brethren, I count not myself to have appre-
hended ; but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are
behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I
press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in
Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus
minded ; and if in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal
even this unto you. Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained,
let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing." Does
language like this need any comment to the young Christian of our
day, yearning for the time when the church shall be one !

Why then, again, should not the individual membership of the
church of Christ reach a higher stage of development ? Mingling
together with the spirit Paul has described, as the early converted
and most devoted of the youth of our churches do, why should they
not come to appreciate the truth each holds, and the grace which
each displays, and learn to combine them in their individual charac-
ters and lives ? The spij-it of the world is downward ; and the more
men of the world mingle, the more they take on each others' errors
and faults, and the more society tends to corruption. But the

AND THE HELMET OF SALVATION. 83

Spirit of Christ leads upward ; and the more often Christians speak
with each other, the more each must " grow in grace and in the
knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ."

Why then, finally, should not a new " power from on high " be
brought to bear, leading unrenewed men to embrace Christ's religion ?
Jesus made the appeal of His plea, " I pray that they may be one"
Ms: "That the world may know that Thou hast sent Me." That
power has been felt within the last five years, as never before in the
Christian church. The lips of objectors have been sealed; and the
tono'ue of sincere men of the world has been unlocked to confess
their convictions. The class of men whom apathy in one class of
Christians'and fervor in another has failed to reach, has been moved
by the gentle pervading spirit, bringing out universal Christian faith,
hope, and love. The hopeful are made disciples, and the hopeless
are reached as never before.

Spirit of truth and grace, out of the perfect word of Christ's truth,
thoroughly furnish the minds, and out of the infinite fullness of Jesus'
grace endue with His Spirit the young men of our land and age.
May they be thoroughly instructed in Thy will, and so thoroughly
furnished unto every good work. May they stand, having girt on
the whole armor of the Gospel ; and having done all, may they not
only stand, but withstand, in the evil day !

^^v.^.

"H..

'-^t^-lt^^^ejJ (^ ■

1? JAMIXS (ID.ARjroDREWg.

86 A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS.

parting from the living God. The nations around them were idol-
aters; their altars were in all directions, on hill tops and under green
trees ; the gods to whom they bowed were tangible — they could be
looked upon and handled ; their sacred festivals and mysteries were
not only occasions of grand and pompous display, but in many in-
stances were seasons of wild indulgence — passion, appetite, and un-
bridled lust, held uUcontrolled sway ; and not only did their religion
fail to rebuke these riotous indulgences, but a voice from the shrines
of their deities, and the examples of their gods then»selves, invited
to unrestrained lust and debauchery. Not only were their gods
worshipped by fornicators, but fornication itself was a part of the
sacred services, in many instances. But He who called Himself the
God of Israel was invisible. A dense cloud shrouded His dwell-
ing-place. No sounds of bacchanalian revelry, no note of lewdness,
dishonored the worship performed at His shrine; but about His
tabernacle, or His wide, glorious temple, the thousands of Israel
gathered to pour forth the song and the shout of holy and devout
gratitude to the all-mighty but invisible Being, whose pillar of cloud
and fire announced to the hosts of Zion, that God, the Eternal, the
Omnipotent, the Lord of all worlds, and emphatically their God, was
among them.

But the sons of Jacob were a sensual and stupid generation, gov-
erned largely by the objects of sense, and hence they were constantly
backsliding from the worship of Jehovah. To prevent this state of
things, God hedged them in by numerous and peculiar institutions,
the design of which was to keep them separate from the idolaters
around them ; but these usages and laws became irksome to a peo-
ple whose hearts were alien from the spirituality of God's worship.
God forbade them the use of cavalry, that they might not be tempted
to enter into the schemes ©f conquest with the nations around them.
The rite of circumcision, and the institution of the Passover solem-
nity, were well calculated to keep them in memory of the deliverances
God had wrought for them in days of yore, as well as of the peculiar
covenant which bound them to the one true and living God ; yet
they rebelled under the most aggravating circumstances imaginable.
The altars of Jehovah were deserted, and idolaters arose over all the
holy land. In looking o^er the history of the Jewish and Israelitish
kings, one is perfectly surprised at the constant proneness to abandon
Jehovah for Baal. If there arises now and then one or two good

A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS. 87

kings, of whom it is written, " and he did that which was right in the
sight of the Lord," as a general thing their successors are very apt
to be recorded as doing " that which was evil in the sight of the
Lord." Why is all this ? Is there something in royalty and kings
and courts utterly antagonistic to the spiritual worship of God ? One
would be tempted to think so; and yet Hezekiah and Josiah would
seem to stand out as glorious exceptions to the rule. Be this as it
may, one thing is sure : the Israelitish kings were generally the lead-
ers of idolatrous worship. Baal was too often the god of the court,
and the obsequious people were too obedient to repudiate the religion
of their rulers. Often, when their rebellions became perfectly out-
rageous, God scourged them by His judgments. The sword of the
uncircumcised, and the chains of a bitter captivity, taught them that
Jehovah rules in heaven, and among the kingdoms of the earth; and
they were brought to their prayers and confessions. • Then they were
ready to say, " What have we to do any more with idols ? " They
humbled themselves, and God heard them, and had mercy on them.
They sought again the forsaken altars of Jehovah, and rendered Him
the calves of their lips. But too often this amendment was but tem-
porary, and they wandered again in forbidden paths. We often
wonder at this tendency to backsliding, which the history of God's
ancient people records ; but is not human nature the same in Jew
and Gentile ? And does not the history of the Christian church, both
past and present, present just the same sort of pictur6 with the his-
tory of God's ancient people ? Is it not true of the Christian church
in most places, that her members — at least many of them — are bent
to backsliding ?

Man is an alien from God. His nature is earthly, and sensual,
and devilish — prone to evil, and utterly disinclined to good. The
Gospel of the grace of God proclaims to him peace and pardon,
through the atonement and mediation of the Son of God. The
repentant sinner, by a living, active faith, appropriates Christ in all
his offices — as God manifest in the flesh : Immanuel, God with us;
as being here among us, enduring pain, hunger, thirst, temptation ;
enduring insult, slander, and contempt ; and at length laying down
His life for us ; as descending into the grave ; as rising from the
tomb — thus triumphing over death and the grave, to make sure our
salvation ; as taking the mediatorial throne, and occupying it as our
ever-living and interceding High Priest, who remembers us, knows

88 A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS.

us and our circumstances, thoroughly sympathizes with us, and prays
for us. This faith brings us to the mercy seat — enables us to cast
all upon the power, love, and faithfulness of God ; and the Holy
Ghost comes down from the Father and the Son into our hearts, to
enlighten us when we are dark, to encourage and strenghen us when
we are like to faint and when we are discouraged, and to whisper to
our trembling hearts the words of peace and pardon : " Thy faith
hath saved thee ; go in peace, and sin no more." " Old things are
now passed away ; behold, all things are become new." New hopes,
new fears, new objects, and new ends, now govern his life; he has
now daily communion with God, and looks to God and heaven aa
the ultimate end and home of his redeemed and forgiven spirit.
Now, this man's principles of action — the objects of his faith and
hope — all belong to eternity. He endures as seeing Him who ia
invisible. He walks by faith, not by sight. He looks from tempo-
ral things which are seen, to those eternal things which are. not
seen — ^which are rendered visible, tangible, and as it were substan-
tial, by the glorious revealments of faith in God's character and his
promises. The Christian must have daily communion with God; his
soul must thus be fed with this heavenly manna ; it must be kept
daily and hourly in spiritual contact with those glorious verities, or
else the flame of piety will die out of the heart; confidence in Gbd
^ill be lost; that affectionate, simple, childlike faith and trust in
God, and that earnest and devoted love for Him, will . expire, and
the man will backslide. Now, no matter how soundly men may be
converted to God, yet while they are here, and in a state of proba-
tion, they will be assailed by temptation, and may yield to the tempt-
ation, and backslide. This their great adversary knows, and conse-
quently uses all his arts to induce them to relax in their zeal and in
their watchfulness. He assails their confidence in God, for this is
the vital point. He knows that this humble, grateful, affectionate
trust in God is the only strong link which binds the soul to God. It
is because of this confidence in Him as our friend and father, that we
love God. We love Him because we have the witness that He first
loved us — yea, that He laves us still ; and therefore our hearts re-
spond with stroDc; and ardent expressions of love and heart devotion
to Him.

It is not strange, therefore, that Satan should attempt, by every
possible assault and all possible sophistry, to weaken and destroy

A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS. 89

, this coufidencc, for he knows that if he ti'iumphs here, the day is
gained. Now, we are not to suppose that the tempter approaches
every cue in the same manner. By no means. He has lived and
tempted men for so many thousand years to but little purpose^ if he
has not learned that all are not approached successfully in the same
way. He well understands the temperament and the peculiar weak-
nesses of all whom he approaches, and is pretty sure to adapt his
temptation so as to meet these prevailing tendencies. In the infancy
of our experience, perhaps we are assailed with questionings as to
the genuineness of our conversions; and this may be more especially
the case if our experience or conversion was attended with no
remarkable or overwhelming manifestations of the power and glory
of God, such as others around us have experienced. We measure
ourselves by others, and that very unwisely too ; for it is always un-
safe to lay much stress on the mere accidents of conversion, as it is
indeed unsafe to make the professions of others the standard of our
Chl-istian experience at any time, and especially at the commence-
ment of our course. Or it may be that the young convert was in
the beginning happy almost to ecstasy — perhaps for several days all
was transport — but those hours have passed away; they no longer
seem to walk on Pisgah's top, and they are assailed with doubts as
to whether all was not a mistake; and if so, the question often arises,
May not this whole matter of Christian experience be a mistake — a
mere dream of enthusiasm ? And about this time the young Christian
unfortunately falls into the company of some who have only the form
of religion, and know nothing of its power — who are what is called
decent, respectable members of the church ; whose great dread is lest
they should be righteous overmuch, and thereby offend the gay and
thoughtless world around them, but who have no change of heart, no
spiritual Christianity. The pardon of sin, and the witness of the
Holy Ghost, they have never experienced — perhaps have never even
sought — and of course they know nothing of its power and precious-
ness, its peace and its joy. But, making their own experience the
sole standared of all possible Christian experience, they repudiate as
impossible any higher degree or more spiritual experience than their
own. They insensibly yet surely lead the troubled heart to feed in
pastures that are not of God's appointing. They are so charmed
with the outside of the stones of the Christian temple, that they can
scarcely think or talk of anything else than its beautiful exterior, its

90 A WAP.NING TO BACKSLIDERS.

merely temporary scaffolding, wliicli is soon to fall or be removed.
This class of persons talk largely of the chiwch, its forms, and all
that; but tbe Kingdom of God is not within them. They have been
so taken up with the outside of the temple, that they have had neither
heart nor eye for the sublime revelations of its pure and glorious
interior ; and now they have nothing to say except to deny the ex-
istence of any such glory.

The consequence of such association will soon be manifest in the
altered tone of the young Christian's conversation.. It will, become
vapid and dull, not savoring of the things which are Christ's, but
those that be of the world. Instead of the happy and simple
childlike and loving confidence of their early espousals to God, we
have the language of chilling doubt, if not of absolute unbelief.
Private prayer is neglected, or is performed without interest. No
sweet visitations of peace and joy gladden the heart. At those sea-
sons of communion with God, once so hallowed and joyous, now God
meets them not as aforetimes. For a while it may be that the knees
bend and the lips move almost mechanically in prayer, and a sort of
dread of God and eternal things may for a while in some sort whip
them up to the discharge of outward duty, but this state of things
will not likely continue long. It will be apt soon to pass away, or
only become spasmodic in its influence; and the soul, finding no joy
and peace, no comfort, no spiritual food, in the mere routine dis-
charge of duty, is very apt to turn again to those sensual pleasures
so lately abandoned. And now these same counsellors, whose influ-
ence has begun their ruin, talk to them of innocent amuse:ments :
"Dancing is really healthful ; the theatre is a fine school for morals;
much is to be gained by attending both. Many respectable members
of the church go there with their children ; would they be found
there if it were wrong ? .The enlightened and liberal attend such
places, and only bigots condemn them." And thus the poor God-
forsaking soul is enticed to take another downward step. And now
fashionable parties, balls, theatres, and operas, appropriate the hours
which were once consecrated to sacred meditation, godly reading,
■ and private communion with God. These last are now given up,
because there is neither time nor heart for any such service.

But it is not only is the earlier stages of experience that Chris-
tians are exposed to great danger from the influence of wrong associ-
ations. This danger besets us through all our journey. Many a

A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS. 91

' gray-headed Christian backslides through the influence of his associ-
ates ; and in reference to this danger, as well as to every other, we
shall do well to take heed and watch and pray, and that in a very
emphatic sense. Your only safety in this matter is to take heed of
your associates. You can control the choice of your companions ;
but having once chosen them, you have no power to say how far
your head or heart may be affected by their conversation. That is
beyond your control. It grows necessarily out of the relations
which, for the time, you voluntarily sustain to each other. The
very laws of your nature settle it. Nor let it be supposed that you
are only in danger from the avowedly profane and ungodly. Asso-
ciation with those who are only negatively good will do you much
injury. It is enough if they exclude God from their conversation.
If they are simply living without God, and of course without hope in
God, all such associations must certainly harm you. If your chosen
companions are the men whose talk is mainly of lands and crops and
wealth, take heed how you step — you are on slippery ground ; for
that which constitutes the burden of your talk will soon occupy the
chief place in your heart.

But there is yet another class of companionships which are fre-
quently the cause of backsliding. I mean improper marriages, where
a young man of piety marries an irreligious woman, or, what is prob-
ably as much to be regretted, a pious woman marries an ungodly
man. These ill-assorted marriages have been the fruitful source of
backslidings in every age of the church, from the time when, in the
early days, the sous of God took them wives of the daughters of men,
till this day. It has always been a dangerous experiment, whether
in the Patriarchal, Prophetic, or Christian dispensation, and must
continue to be so. Indeed, how can it be otherwise ? How can two
walk comfortably together, unless they be agreed in reference to that
which is the chief interest of life ? I think it will be found that one
of two things will be pretty sure to take place ; the influence of one
or the other of the parties will predominate, and the scale will turn
for hell or heaven, according to the preponderating influence. True,
the Christian may carry the day ; but when we consider how much
of fallen humanity with satanic influence is engaged on the side of
evil, the contest must be regarded as a very unequal one. There-
fore, let me just deliver one word of caution : take heed, 0 Christian
man or woman, with whom you link your destiny for life. Marry

92 A WARUING TO BACKSLIDERS.

only in the Lord; for be assured that, in going to heaven, yon will
need all the help you can get. Therefore, seek a wife or husband
who will be a helper to you in your Christian course.

There is danger, too, in the doctrines which may sometimes greet
your ears. Whatever doctrine obscures the glory and holiness and
love of the Divine character, hear it not. Avoid all Laodicean doc-
trines. Every one which does not tend to keep constantly alive in
your heart an earnest desire for holiness of spirit and life, and an -
undying effort to obtain it and live for it, reject at- once, no matter
how specious and eloquent the plea which is made in its behalf Let
your motto always be, " The truth which is according to godliness," .
and " the faith which works by love, and purifies the heart." With
these truths always before you, you will be apt to go right. Yet one
more caution, and on this point I cease. Kemember that books are
often the most influential companions; therefore, take prayerful heed '
to your dumb library companions. Wrapped up in the pages around
you, there maybe much truth to save, or much error to destroy;
therefore, be careful. Remember, many a man has been corrupted
by a single book.

Some men grow rich; their business prospers, and wealth pours in
upon them from almost every quarter. The man's head and heart
are busy; cares multiply in proportion as wealth increases, and, iii
the same ratio, prayers decrease both in frequency and earnestness.
One would think, that as his means increased, so in proportion would
his liberality ; but it is not so. He gives now more grudgingly, and
on a more niggardly scale than formerly, when his means were limited.
Then he gave according to his ability, and gave cheerfully, and the
giving did him good. His benefactions now are small. He gives
with an ill grace, and regards all he thus gives as a shameful waste,
the bestowment of which causes him many a heart groan. , Of course,
this man is a backslider already. He is even now a worshipper at the
shrine of Mammon.

Most men who backslide do so gradually. Pergonal ease and self-
indulgence lead them to neglect the private or the social or domestic
' duties of religion. The pleasures of sense steal over all the powers
of the spirit, and enervate and paralyze all its energies. Hence, the
works of faith and th6 labor of love become onerous, and are aban-
doned. The world's opiates are swallowed freely, and the man sinks
into a sleep, profound and deadly, from which he too frequently

A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS. 93

never wakes till the hour when his waking will do him no good. It
may indeed sometimes be the case that one is suddenly and furiously
assailed by some powerful temptation, to which, unfortunately, he
yields. Now he has sinned, openly and notoriously sinned, and his
arch enemy whispers, "It is all over with you; God has cast you oflF;
return to your former pleasures." The Good Spirit whispers, " Re-
turn to thy God ; repent of thy backsliding, and the Lord will heal
thee." But the voice of the tempter is most apt to prevail, especially
if the delinquent be improperly neglected or managed by the pastor,
or the church, or by surrounding friends. The backslider, at this
stage of his history, requires to be managed with a great deal of pru-
dence, firmness, and love. Many of this class of persons go finally
back into the world, because of deficiency at this point. Alas for the
poor sinner, if his pastor forgets the work of a pastor — if he knows
not his people, or has shown them so little attention as that they feel
that he is a stranger to them, so that they cannot make free to ap-
proach him ! Sometimes it may be that the wanderer is lost because
of the want of tenderness, sympathy, and faithfulness, on the part of
the church. One in such circumstances requires to be treated with
a great deal of faithfulness. He must be told of his wrong in all its
turpitude. It will do no good to make him think lightly of his sin.
Let him see that he has sinned against God grievously, and that
there is no apology or excuse for his sin. But while all this plain-
ness is shown him, remember he is a brother ; and if indeed he be a
brother fallen into the ditch, you must lay hold of him, and never
rest till he is redeemed from his fall, and brought back to the favor
of God. Woe, woe to the backslider ! for he is treading a thorny
road. The contrast of the past with the present will make him
wretched : " Oh ! that it were with me as in days past, when the
candle of the Lord shone upon me ! Then I was peaceful, and all
was cheerfulness and joy within. The Sabbath and the sanctuai'y of
God were hallowed by the blessings and presence of my father, God.
Then my closet and my family altar invited me to a cheerful and
joyful off'ering of myself and my all to God, who deigned to meet me
there, and assure me of His acceptance of my sacrifice. Then He led
me in green pastures, and caused me to rest beside the sweet streams
that flow through the garden of God. Then I enjoyed, daily, sweet
peace and communion with God. Wherever I went, I knew that the
great Shepherd of Israel, who neither slumbers nor sleeps, was my

94 A WARNINa TO BACKSLIDERS.

cuide and protector. But, alas ! those days are past; and now God
frowns on me. I cannot approach Him. When I would think of Him
as my father and friend, I feel that guilt repels me. I cannot pray with
my wife and children ; I feel that they have no confidence in me. If
I go to the house of God, and hear His Word preached— that Word
on which my soul used once to feed— all is dark, and brings to me
nothing but messages of wrath and despair. My old Christian
friends shun me ; and the ungodly, with whom I am now wont to as- '
sociate, I feel that, vile as they may be, they do no^ respect me. All
around me is dark, whenever I reflect. A hell within- me, and a
still worse and fearfully dreaded hell before me ! Methinks I would
fain return to my father's house ; but how can I ? My heart is hard.
No broken heart, no contrite spirit, can I present to God. No sigh
of penitence stirs my soul ; no tear of godly sorrow dims my eye.
And then I feel that I have hindered others from entering on the
paths of piety, or my example has caused them to turn away from
the ways of God. Perhaps my wife has been caused to stumble, or
my children have been hindered, and it may be I shall be the means
of their damnation. Oh ! Jehovah — the pure, the terrible God —
could I only hope for mercy from thee ! But wilt thou, canst
thou, pity and forgive a poor miserable ofi"cast from God, whose
backslidings have been manifold and great ? If a fellow creature
had wronged me greatly and oft as I haVe wronged thee, sure I am
I should not forgive him."

And yet, 0 backslider, hear the word of the Lord. He says He
will heal your backsliding, and love you freely. He says, " Take
with you words, and return unto the Lord 5 " and He hath promised
to heal you. Hear, ye backsliding wanderers from God ! See how
unwilling God is to give you up to utter ruin. Hark how He ex-
postulates with you : <' How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? * * *
How shall I make thee as Admah ? How shall I set thee as Zeboim ?
Mine heart is turned within me ; My repentings are kindled together.
I will not execute the fierceness of Mine anger ; I will not return to
destroy Ephraim." And why is all this pity and long-sufi'ering pa-
tience in the midst of such unprovoked and daring rebellions, such
black and damning ingratitude ? Hear it, O sinner ! It is because
He is God, and not nlan. So the very argument which perhaps at
first led thee to despair, God presents as an incentive to repent and
return to God, with a strong persuasion — yea, with an abiding and

A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS. 95

unfaltering, confidence — that God will meet you in mercy, and forgive
you, and heal your backslidings, and bring you again into His family,
and make you again His happy sons and daughters. Then, 0 back-
slider ! deky no longer. Come home at once to the Shepherd and
Bishop of your souls ; come, while God calls ; come, while Jesus
pleads with you, and entreats you to return to His fold ; come, while
the Holy Ghost warns, and, with untiring and unceasing patience,
invites you to come home to the bosom of a forgiving Father ! What
joy would your return enkindle among the angels of God in heaven;
and oh ! what pleasure to parents, husband, wife, or children, on
earth ! Wait not, then, till a more convenient season. Now is the
accepted time, and now is the day of salvation. Now — to-day — re-
solve to arise and go to your Father. Postponement but increases
the difficulty. Every moment that you remain in your backslidden
state but increases the power of evil over you, and binds you more
strongly with the chains of habit. Awake, and act at once ! There
is no safety in your purpose of gradual improvement.

Let me warn you, my Christian friend, to watch vigilantly against
the entrance of prejudice into your heart. A very small matter may
sometimes give it entrance, and, once entered, it poisons the whole
fountain of thought and feeling within you. It disorders the soul's
vision, and gives a wrong aspect to everything on which we gaze.
If you expect to obtain forgiveness, you must exercise it towards
others ; otherwise, the petition in the Lord's prayer, " Forgive me
as I forgive," invokes a fearful curse upon thee. Oh ! beware of
prejudice ! If it hath found a lodgment in thy heart, never rest till
it is driven from thy bosom. Do not dare to sleep with it rankling
in thy heart, lest there be an awakening in a world where mercy and
pardon are unknown. Many — oh, how many ! — begin their back-
slidings there. Cultivate kindly feelings for all ; pray for all ; do
good to all ; so shalt thou prosper.

One more warning, and that closes these warnings. Thousands
perish from the home and family of God, because they are at ease in
Zion. They wish to steal softly and quietly to heaven, with as few
crosses as possible, and as little work. They are unwilling to work
for God ; hence they are always full of excuses or apologies for neg-
lecting their duties. Sometimes they plead want of talent, want of
influence, their great diffidence; but He who searches the heart
knows that all these are hollow and insincere — mere subterfuges for

96 A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS.

neglecting duty to God or our fellows. But let no man deceive him-
self. God is not mocked. You must be willing to do all your duty,
or you will backslide, as sure as you live. No ; your only safety is
in a prompt and earnest and thorough casting all at the feet of your
Redeemer. Jesus looks upon you, backslider, as He did on back-
slidden Peter. Oh, go out, like Peter, and weep bitterly. But do
you say, '' I have no feeling on the subject of salvation; how can I
attempt a return to the Good and Merciful ? " For that reason, thou
shouldst without delay begin thy return to God. Thy hardness will
increase, the longer thy return is delayed. The continuance of thy
heart and lip and life rebellions has no tendency to soften the heart, or
cause the outgushing of deep and honest and hearty repentance. Come,
then, at once. If you feel, come ; and if your heart is as hard as the
nether millstone, come, under the convictions of judgment and un-
derstanding. The command, the invitation of God to you, is, " Re-
turn; take with you words of confession, and words of pleading inter-
cession. Break off from thy sins, and from thy ungodly associations."
Give them up, though pleasant and dear to you as a right hand or a
right eye. Your associates must to a great extent be changed, or all
is lost. Return at once to .the church of God. Take the precious
Bible as your daily companion ; restore again your long-neglected
family altar, and let prayer — ardent, earnest, and importunate — agairf
ascend to God ; resume the discharge of every duty ; and, as it may
be that you have lost many of the best years of your life, now that
your eyes are once more open, try as far as possible to make up lost
time. Make the effort honestly and perseveringly, and you will
surely succeed ; God's word of promise insures you success.

The history of returning backsliders in every age of the church is
full of instruction. Witness the case of poor apostate Peter. How
grievously did he apostatize ! And yet Jesus gave him, not up to
perish. Think of that heart-breaking look his Lord gave him — and
he has given thee njany such ; and now, poor alien from peace and
joy and holiness and God, follow Peter's weeping example. Go out,
weep, repent, turn away from thy sins, and Jesus will cast another
look — even one of pity, of tenderness — and His words to thee will
be words of forgiveness. He will say to thee; " Be whole of this thy
leprosy. Go in peace,' but sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon
thee." Consecrate thyself anew to God. Go, work with all thy
might to undo the mischief which thy backslidings have inflicted

A WARNING TO BACKSLIDERS. 97

upon society. Go, weep over tliose whom thou didst lead astray,
aud never rest till thou hast brought them back into the good ways
of the Lord. And do thou watch and pray more vigilantly and
earnestly than ever, lest thou again be led astray. Let thy past ex-
perience be a warning to thee ; and may God so preserve and keep
theC; that thou fall not into sin any more !

V

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CHEIST THE WAi, iiiii. TRUTH, Alp) THE LIFE.

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100 CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE.

He has shown us in His teachings, and shown us clearly, as no other
teacher ever did, what principles we must embrace, what feelings we
must cultivate, what objects we must pursue, and what kind of a life
we must lead, if we would reach the house of His Father and the
home of the blessed. Professions without piety, forms of religion
without the substance, adhering to externals and neglecting the
heart, cleaving to our own merits instead of trusting in Him, tithing
mint, anise, and cummin, and omitting judgment, mercy, and faith —
this He has told us is the way to perdition, but not to salvation; the
way to hell, but not to heaven. While, on the other hand, the
washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, repentance
towards God and faith in Himself as the Saviour, purity of heart and
a life bearing the impress of love to God and our neighbor — these. He
has told us, are the preparation we must seek, if we would sit down
with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of glory. This
is plain and faithful instruction. No one need misunderstand it. It
is level to the capacity of a child. And because He has so spoken,
we say He is the way to heaven by His doctrine. He teaches men
the true way, as opposed to the false and misleading paths that would
conduct them down to ruin.

2. Secondly — Jesus is the way to heaven by His death. There
were legal obstacles in the way of our return to our Father's face and
favor. We had offended His infinite majesty; we had incurred His
infinite displeasure. We had broken that law which is holy, and
just, and good. We were exposed to its awful penalty; and that
penalty inflicted in its fullness would have sunk us to the world of
despair, and held us there forever. What, then, was done for our
rescue ? Jesus interposed for us. He said, Deliver them from going
down to the pit, for I have found a ransom. And how did He ran-
.som us? He gave Himself for us. Taking our nature into personal
union with His Divinity, He became our substitute and surety. He
stood in our place. He assumed our legal liabilities. He obeyed
the precepts of the law in our stead. He endured the penalty of
the law in our stead. Yes, He obeyed, and He suffered— obeyed
and suffered as the accepted substitute of sinners, till the violated
law was honored, the claims of justice were met, and God, for His
Bake, without tarnishing' any perfection of His character or compro-
mising any principle of His government, could offer us terms of par-
don and make us the heirs of glory. It was thus, my hearers, that

CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE. 101

the mighty barriers were removed which prevented our return to
happiness and God. That removal was the price of blood. It cost
the humiliation, the obedience, the agony, and the ignominious death
of Him, who, though He was God's equal, consented to become our
brother; nay, more — consented to become "a man of sorrows and
acquainted with grief." It is with reference to all this that He says
to us to-day, " I am the way." He means, not only that He has
shown us the way to heaven by His teachings, but that He has o_pencd
it hy His death.

3. Again — Jesus is the way to heaven by His example. It is true,
we need preceptive instruction to give us light, and we need the effi-
cacy of a sin-atoning sacrifice to give us access to God ; but we need
more than these : we need to have before us the life of One, who, in
our nature, without defilement or deviation, has trod the rugged
pathway to heaven, and in so doing has gone before us, and shown
our feet the way. This priceless boon we have. The life of the
incarnate Son of God is a model life, beautiful, stainless, perfect,
which every candidate for bliss within the vail is required to study
and to imitate. By sojourning in this vale of sin and sorrow for
more than thirty years, finishing His work, and then returning
to His Father, He has taught us how; to live, and taught us what
sort of a life is our best and truest preparation for going to the
Father.

And what is the force of that teaching, its method and its drift ?
I answer. It shows us One who was " holy, harmless, undefiled, and
separate from sinners ; " One who, from the beginning to the end
of His earthly pilgrimage, devoted Himself to the glory of God and
the highest welfare of humanity ; One who "went about doing good,
and healing all that were oppressed of the devil ; " One who was
ever diligent in His work, devotional in His habits, humble in spirit
and deportment, patient in tribulation, forbearing towards His ene-
mies, a stranger to revenge, a pattern of self-denial, the helper of
the needy, the instructor of the ignorant, the comforter of the
afflicted, the loving, sufi"ering, dying friend of sinners — I say, it
shows us such an One, holds Him up before us in a most clear and
impressive light, bids us commune with His history till we imbibe
His very spirit, and assures us that the more closely we conform to
Him in feeling and deportment, the more sure and reliable is our
moral preparation for the blessedness of heaven. In reading the

102 CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE.

narratives of the Evangelists, we see more than the teachings of
Jesus, more than the death of Jesus ; we see His life, and
" In that life the law appears,
Drawn out in living characters."

" Follow me," He says, pointing to His own clear and radiant path-
way— radiant with the light of meekness, purity, and love — " I am
the way." Ah, now we understand Him ; He is not only the way
to heaven by His teachings, and by His death, but He is also the
way by His bright and perfect example. Oh, that 'there were an
heart in every one of us to say,

" His track I see, and Til pursue .
The narrow way, till Him I view."

But we must pass on to our second inquiry: What does Jesus
mean when He says, " I am the truth ? " I answer — He is the truth
because He is the substance of all the typical shadows, and the ac-
complishment of all the prophecies and promises of a Saviour, which
we find in the Old Testament. No matter what these types, and
prophecies, and promises, may be, or what the extent and value of the
" good things " they prefigured and predicted, all, all are realized
in Him. He is the true medium of intercourse between earth and
heaven, of which Jacob's ladder was the type. He is the true lamb
of Grod that taketh away the sin of the world, of which the Pkschal
lamb was the type. He is the true propitiatory sacrifice, of which
the Mosaic sacrifices were the type. He is the tnie High Priest and
Intercessor, of which the Levitical high priests were the type. And
He is the true object of faith, the true source of spiritual healthful-
ness and healing,, of which the brazen serpent was the type. He is
the "Shiloh," whom Jacob predicted; the "Prophet," whom Moses
predicted; the "Prince of Peace," whom Isaiah predicted; the
"Lord our Eighteousness," whom Jeremiah predicted; the royal
"David," whom Ezekiel predicted; the "Messiah," whom Daniel
predicted ; the " Branch," whom Zachariah predicted ; and the
" Desire of all nations," whom Haggai and Malachi --predicted. He
is the fulfilment of all that the ancient Prophets announced respect-
ing Him that should come to be " the glory of Israel," and "a light
to lighten the Gentiles." Did they say He sho\ild be born in Beth-
lehem ? There Jesus was born. Did they say He should be de-
scended from the family of David according to the flesh ? Such was
His descent. Did they say He should be despised and rejected of

CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE. 103

men ? So He was despised and rejected. Did they say He should
be led as a lamb to the slaughter ? So He, a meek and patient suf-
ferer, was led to the death of the Cross. Did they say He should
not be left under the power of death — should not be permitted to see
corruption? This was fulfilled in the case of Jesus. The third
day He rose. Did they say He should see of the travail of His soul,
and be satisfied ; that a seed should serve Him ; and that the Lord
would send the rod of His strength out of Zion ? It is so done, even
to this very day. His sufi'erings are rewarded in many lands ; His
converts are multiplying as the drops of the morning ; and the rod
of His strength, the Word of His grace and salvation, is converting
and redeeming the world. We repeat it, then — Christ is the truth
in this most interesting and important sense : He is the substance
of all the typical shadows, and the fulfilment of all the inspired pre-
dictions and promises of a Saviour.

But He is the truth in another sense. He is the source of truth —
the great Prophet of the church, whose revelations are that testi-
mony, full and infallible, by believing and obeying which, sinners
come through Him "the way" to the Father and to heaven. We
need something to guide us every day — something to show us our
enemies, that we may avoid and resist them — something to warn us
of our dangers, that we may flee and escape them — something to set
before us the objects of legitimate pursuit, that we may seek and
secure them — the objects of legitimate affection and trust, that we
may love and embrace them — something to tell us what spirit we
must exhibit, what aims we must cherish, what excellences we must
cultivate, what hopes we must entertain, and what duties we must
perform, that we may attain to glory, honor, and immortality. In
other words, we need an infallible rule of faith and practice ; and
Christ, in His Word, is that rule. He is the Amen, the true and
faithful Witness. The Bible is His testimony. As our great Teacher,
He has given it to us for our guidance and our good. It tells us
truly and unmistakably " what we are to believe concerning God,
and what duty God requires of us." It comes to us through his
hands as Mediator, as one of the fruits of His gracious interposition ;
and its every utterance bears the impress of His mediatorial faith-
fulness and love. Christ speaks in these Oracles, from the beginning
to the end of the volume — speaks as our Monitor and Guide — speaks
with an accuracy that never errs, and with a fidelity that never fal-

104 CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE.

ters — speaks for our benefit, for our direction, that we may find and
pursue the way to heaven. And hence it is that, in exhibiting to
us His own character. His transcendent claims upon our confidence,
He says, " I am the truth ; " I am the great centre and source of that
true light, the light of Kevelation, which alone can guide earth's
guilty and benighted wanderers home.

But Christ is more than the way to heaven — more than the light
of truth to show us the way ; He is the life. He has life in Himself,
and He is the author of spiritual and eternal life to all- who put their
trust in Him. Those whom He saves are by nature the children of
wrath, dead in trespasses and sins. In this condition, the Gospel finds
them. They have ears, but they hear not; eyes have they, but they
see not. They are told the way to heaven, but they are listless and
stupid. The great and precious truths of the Gospel are urged upon
them with afiectionate fidelity, but they feel no interest, they exhibit
no concern. The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness cbm-
prehendeth it not. What, then, is the first great want of the per-
ishing sinner? Life, life, spiritual life. Life must be imparted
before the eye can see, or the ear can hear, or the heart can feel.
And who gives life but the Prince of Life ? He intercedes for His
chosen, even when they are dead in sin. He prays that they may
be regenerated. That prayer is heard; and lo! the Holy Spirit
descends upon them with almighty quickening energy, and, in an
instant, they spring into life. Old things pass away, and all things
become new. Then they see the way, and they begin to walk in it.
Then they hear the truth, they understand it, and they begin to
make it their rejoicing and their guide. Then they are alive unto
God; but how? Through the intercession of Him who has said
to them, " Because I live, ye shall live also." Regeneration, the
beginning of spiritual life in the soul, is, in every instance, a fruit of
the Lord Jesus' mediation — an answer to His prayer. And, then,
how is that life perpetuated and advanced ? Still in answer to the
prayer of Jesus, and through the efficacy of His blood. Because He
lives, and pleads, and spreads His wounded hands, in heaven, the
regenerated believer holds on his way. He grows in grace ; he tri-
umphs over the world; he presses onward and upward; he runs; he
rises ; he ripens for glory within the vail. Why ? There is a hidden
bond uniting him to One who has said, " I am the life." His life is
hid with Christ in God. There is a hidden Intercessor who prays

CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE. 105

for him daily, and prevails — prays, not that he may be taken out of
the world, but that he may be kept from the evil. There is a hidden
source of grace, and strength, and comfort, and blessing, with which
he is connected, as the branch with the vinej that source is " the
fullness " that dwells in Jesus. By faith and prayer he draws upon
that fullness continually; and there lies the secret of his growth in
grace, and perseverance therein to the end. Because Jesus lives, he
lives. True, the body dies, and sees corruption ; but in the grave it
is still united to Him who is " the resurrection and the life," and,
for this reason, it can only remain there for a season. The blood and
advocacy of Jesus avail even to the opening of the graves of His
people. In Him " shall all be made alive," and with soul and body
reunited, purged from the last stain of sin, and adorned with " the
beauty of holiness," they shall go up together to the employments
and the rest of the redeemed. And how shall it be with them there ?
Through the endless ages, their vital union with Jesus will continue.
Through the endless ages. His sin-atoning merits and His ever-pre-
vailing intercession will be their security. And with reference to
all that bright, and glorious, and immortal future which is before
them, it will ever be said by all who know their history, their rela-
tions, and their indebtedness to the Son of God, Because He lives,
they shall live also. Surely not less than all this, my hearers, does
the Saviour intend to teach us, when He says to us in the Scriptures,
and says to us by His servants, and says to us by our own experience
and hope of His mercy, and says to us by the Cross, and through
deeply and touchingly significant sacramental symbols of His own
appointment, " I am the life."

You perceive, therefore, that the passage before us is radiant
with light and mercy. It gives us just the instruction, and just
the encouragement, and just the word of warning and guidance,
which we need. Sin has darkened our minds. In our natural
estate, we are wanderers from holiness and heaven. Jesus meets
us in our wanderings, assures us of His interest in our welfare,
shows us what we must do and where we must go if we would
find our true destination, pours the radiance of His own ineffable
character and doctrine upon our souls, and says to us. Give up the
false views and principles that have been hitherto misleading you ;
sit at my feet ; confide in my instructions ; " I am the way." But
tJien we see that sin is more than darkness ; it is guilt, impurity, cor-

106 CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE.

ruption a barrier to communion with God — a high and fearful wall

of separation between His favoi- and our souls. Who shall remove
the barrier ? Who shall demolish the separating wall ? Jesus does
it by His death. He becomes our sin-atoning sacrifice. Trust in my
merits, He exclaims, and your iniquities shall be remembered against
you no more. " I am the way." I not only show you the way to
the Father, but I remove the obstacles, that you may walk therein
and be saved. But when we have seen the right road, and the ob-
stacles to our entering upon it have been removed, and our feet are
inclining towards it, we are ready to say. Oh, what a help it would be
to us, if we had some bright and perfect pattern of a holy life to be
ever before us as a stimulus and a guide. Such a pattern do I give
you, says the Saviour. " Follow Me ; " I am the way by My exam-
ple. But then we find that we need more than the light and help of
such an example. We need verbal instruction, line upon line, and
precept upon precept. Even this want is met, says the Saviour, for
"I am the truth;" I am the substance of the Old Testament
shadows; I am the fulfilment of its predictions; the whole of
Divine Revelation relates to Me, points to Me, comes from Me;
and I offer it to you, that.it may be a lamp to your feet and a light
to your path. But then another difficulty meets us, more serious
and formidable than all the rest. While we listen to the Saviour's
doctrine, distinguishing the true way to heaven from every other j
while we contemplate His atonement, levelling and removing every
barrier ; while we see His holy example beckoning us onward and
upward; and while we hold in our hands the sacred Scriptures,
which are able to make us wise unto salvation through faith which
is in Him : behold ! what is our real condition ? We are spiritually
dead — dead to the beauty of holiness, the evil of sin, the claims of
God, and the realities of eternity. How, then, can we move ? How
can we arise and go to the Father ? We need some new principle in
our very hearts — some living, vital force, that shall quicken our facul-
ties, break our fatal slumbers, raise us from the deep long death of sin,
and urge and impel us onward to duty and to God. And even this,
says the Saviour, I am able to bestow, for " I am the life." I proffer
you the renewing of the Holy Ghost. I promise- you perpetual access
to My own infinite fullness. I give unto you eternal life, and you
shall never perish. I will redeem you from the corruption of sin,
and through everlasting ages the promise shall be gloriously verified,

CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE. 107

that, " Because I live, ye shall live also." Oh, my hearers, these are
great and precious revelations. The eternal Son of God, " He of
whom Moses in the law and the Prophets did write," has verily come
to us, perishing, guilty sinners, on an errand of mercy — come with the
clearest credentials — and what has He said ? " I am the way " to the
Father and to heaven. I shoio you the way; I open to you the way.
"I am the truth;" I give you just the light you need, and all the
light you need, to direct you in that way. " I am the life ; " I offer
you spiritual quickening, the redemption of the body, and then
eternal preservation, security, and blessedness, beyond the reach of
sin and sorrow. What a message is this to be received from such a
source, by such sinful, erring, dying creatures as we are ! A message
of great joy, indeed ! If we improve it, it will save us; but if we
undervalue and neglect it, it will but aggravate our ruin.

The great question of questions for us all is this : Are we going
to the Father — going to His glorious and blissful presence, as our
everlasting home ? Not by our own wisdom, our own righteousness,
our own efforts, can we reach that blessed destination. He who came
from that presence, and returned to it again, has said — and they are
words that should sink down into our hearts — "No man cometh unto
the Father but by Me." You can go elsewhere, my hearers, without
Christ. You can go to the servitude of sin, and to the vanities of the
world, without Christ. You can go far, far away from a\\ your truest
interests and all your most urgent and momentous duties, without
Christ. You can go down, down to lower depths of darkness, and
impenitence, and unbelief, and sin, without Christ. You can go to
a cheerless sick bed, and a hopeless death, and a terrifying judgment
seat, and a wretched eternity, without Christ. But if you would turn
your face in the other direction ; if you would aspire to a brighter
destiny ; if you would rise to the soul's true rest, the bosom of your
Father and your God ; then you must hear and heed the declaration
of the Son of God, "No man cometh unto the Father but by Me."
Rely upon it, this Jesus whom we preach is the ladder by which you
must climb to heaven ; He is the truth that must direct you in your
upward progress ; and He is the life that must quicken, and animate,
and sustain, and preserve you, to the end of your journey and for-
ever. Shall He be ^ow way, T/oia- light, your life — or will you turn
away from Him, and reject Him, and wander on and perish ? My
brethren, is Christ mir way, our light, our life ? and are we actually

108 CHRIST THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE.

going to heaven, by the guidance of His Word, the efficacy of His
atonement, and the vitalizing power of His Spirit. Oh, then, let us
be thankful unto Him, and bless His name forever. Let us cleave
to Him with a fonder affection, and rely upon Him with a firmer
confidence, and serve Him with a warmer and a more unreserved
devotion to His person and His cause. Nor let it seem to be among
the least of our precious privileges, that from time to time we are
permitted to sit together at His table, and to do this in remembrance
of Him whom we do delight to remember and to henor as the Way,
the Truth, and the Life — by whom, as we. humbly hope and believe,
we are going to the rest of the ransomed — going to the very foun-
tain of blessedness — -going to the Father.

/U

^TvTH^ TTV

.V•fT•>J<^

id of restlessness
rized wi:'

. ft ot im;

of vieissi;
! ■Hns b-

u its

tic similitude. Uut in this t6xt there is a gc ';'yofidea. It

;birng-fai':

iri!»TV Ibn

to fall in his'
«

-ntry, nur

110 INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE.

it appeared to the mind of the inspired writer, and, so conceiving it,
we shall find it invested with new beauty and additional propriety.
Among the nations of the East, the principal routes of travel and
trade are, as you are aware, over land. Extended between the points
of chief resort, there are commonly vast deserts, arid and inhospitable
climes, infested by predatory communities, which ever since the dawn
of history have subsisted by rapine — " their hands being against
every man, and every man's hand against them." For these reasons,
the usual method of travelling in those lands has always been in large
companies, for the sake of mutual protection and assistance". Conse-
quently, we are to conceive of human life, in the idea of the Apostle,
as a pilgrimage which many pursue together; a vast and innumerable
caravan, moving on in one long-extended and never-pausing column
to the silent realms of shade. But we must remember that, unlike
other pilgrimages, the destination in this case is constantly in view,
the arrival uncertain as to time, but sure in the event. Death, like
a narrow stream, divides us from the unknown and untravelled regions
to which we pass. The way tends along the shore of a vast and lim-
itless ocean, while before and behind us are many who are summoned
ever and anon to embark. Often we see the wretched survive the
fortunate, the feeble as often wrap the athletic in his shroud j de-
crepid age still totters along its way, while the young and vigorous
form that sustained it is dragged down from its support. And we
must also remember, that though the progress is in a crowd, the
arrival of each pilgrim is nevertheless solitary and alone. The last
downward leap into the gloom is the way of all the earth ; but it is a
way which each one must adventure unsupported and unattended by
any earthly companion. It is but to do what at the very moment,
among the myriads of the peopled earth, a thousand and a thousand
more among the pilgrim multitudes must do also. The little compa-
nies which have been gathered along the journey by the ties of con-
sanguinity or of friendship, or clustered into family groups, must be
broken up, must separate, called one by one in succession to that
long and dreary voyage that must be made in loneliness. The last
look is caught, the last tender farewell spoken, which cheers the
summoned spirit ere it puts forth into that viewless world from which
no voyager ever comes back, and a void is visible in the surviving
band, which in the turmoil of the crowding multitudes is soon filled
up and forgotten ! In such a pilgrimage^ to which the text has evi-

INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE. Ill

dent allusion, the mind of every wayfarer should be awake to the
momentous warning: "Let no man put a stumbling-block or an occa-
sion to fall in his brother's way;" for in that common journey, that
vast and reckless caravan of souls, the progress of each must be aided
or impeded by his fellows.

From every heart there proceed influences, more or less powerful,
which radiate and entwine with other hearts. Soul acts and reacts
upon soul, and the spark which fires a single breast is conveyed like
electricity to surrounding bosoms. The present happiness and future
destiny of every individual depend in a very great measure on the
character and force of the external influences acting on his mind
from the minds of others. Man is a social animal ; often he debases
his nature to a character rather gregarious than social, by yielding
his own better thoughts to the evil impulses of the mass; or by
blindly following the lead of some fellow worm, whom his foolish
idolatry has elevated into the place of a divinity. In this latter
aspect, the features of man's moral constitution, which we are now
considering, assume a humiliating and even a degrading prominence.
All the great revolutions in human society have been brought about
mainly through the influence and activity of a few individuals. The
annals of the world exhibit the actions of only a small number ; and
all the important events of its history, which are strewn along a track
of about six thousand years, would be necessarily recounted in giving
the biography of some six hundred persons. The three greatest
empires of the earth began with the manhood of Cyrus, Alexander,
and Tamerlane, and crumbled into pieces with the dust of their
founders.

On the confines of civilized Europe, a little more than a century
ago, the now mighty empire of Russia was regarded and spoken of as
a country unexplored and barbarous. It had scarcely a name in his-
tory, and was hardly numbered among the nations. It was a sort of
loose aggregation of savage tribes, held under some restraint by the
fiercest and most powerful of them, called Muscovites, but politically
and commercially almost as remote from the world's ken, from the
observation of the keen-sighted spirit of trade, as the ice-bound
coasts of Wilkes's land, or the interior and sun-scorched plains of
Africa. A native prince of the Romauofi" family, reared in the midst
of feuds and scenes of contention and blood, Peter Alexio-
WITZKI by name, with little to sustain him besides his own trusty

112 INDIVIDUAL MURAL INFLUENCE.

sword and indomitable spirit, conceived the noble but apparently
hopeless design of elevating his country in the scale of nations. He
travelled abroad to acquire knowledge in the prosecution of his pur-
pose. He went to London, to learn the complex operations of gov-
ernment, finance, and commerce. He wrought at the trade of a ship
carpenter, in the naval yards of Saardam, in Holland. In short, he
left no efforts untried and no opportunities unemployed to perfect
himself in all the arts of government, that he might meliorate the
condition of his rude subjects, improve their social character, and
raise their political state. He invited men of learning and of skill
in all the arts of life to settle in Kussia, and by their well-rewarded
labors to aid his own endeavors. Now, contemplate for a moment the
results following upon the persevering exertions of an individual.
The silent rivers and widespread lakes of Muscovy were suddenly
made white with the sails of trade — her vast plains were covered with
waving crops of golden grain — the magnificent city of St. Peters-
burg, with its marble palaces, arose magic-like out of the icy swamps
of the Neva — a powerful navy issued from the unfrequented ports of
the frozen • Baltic — in the thick darkness of ignorance, institutions
of learning were lighted up, like beacon flames, to dispel the gloom
and shadows that had brooded over a land of barbarism and cruelty,
and Europe was astonished by the sudden apparition of a gigantic
sovereignty, with its powerful and disciplined armies, its numerous
and well-appointed fleets, entering into a fierce conflict with the
veteran troops of Sweden, headed by Charles XII, and, after a strug-
gle of twenty-one years, finally crushing him upon the bloody field
of Pultowa. More than this : Peter laid the foundations of an em-
pire, and by his wise policy so consolidated its resources and strength
as to enable it single-handed to meet and drive back the great captain
of modern times, at the head of victorious legions that had gathered
laurels in nearly every country of Europe. And in our own times
we have seen Russia braving the banded nations of the Old World,
which, having felt the power of her arms, now look upon her grasp-
ing ambition with trouble, and regard her expanding proportions
with unconcealed dread.

Take another more recent but no less illustrative and striking ex-
ample.

About eighty years ago, an obscure and untitled boy was studying
mathematics at the military school of Brienne, in France. In a little

INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE. 113

while, that youth, having ripened into manhood, was raised by the
frantic devotion of his fellow beings almost to the pinnacle of uni-
versal rule. Alike on the burning sands of Syria and in the moun-
tain defiles of Spain, beneath the shadows of the Pyramids of Egypt
and amid the drifting snows of Kussia, the altar of his ambition
reeked with holocausts of human sacrifice, until made captive, as it
were, by an assembled world, he was conveyed to a sterile rock island
in mid ocean, and there watched by trained sentinels and guarded
by armed fleets ! And why ? Because his personal influence over the
minds of his fellow men was a spell so potent and tremendous, that
the stamp of his foot on the soil of Europe would have raised legions
of armed men to do his bidding of slaughter and death, and from
the yet warm ashes of past conflagrations the fires of desolation
would have again been kindled and swept over a war-wasted world.
These may be, perhaps, regarded as extreme instances to illustrate
the power and force of individual moral influence. But in all other
departments of human thought and action, the same characteristic
prevails. Persons are the springs, and names are the watchwords, of
all human efibrts. A name is often, with men, the prestige of success
in the most difficult and desperate enterprises. It will rouse men to
the most determined exertions, it will support them under the most
cruel sufi"erings, it will cheer them in the hour of death. What's
in a name ? does any one ask ? Let the bleeding and dying corporal
of the old guard on the field of Waterloo, in his reply to the British
surgeon, who, in removing a shattered rib from near his heart, asked.
Where is the Emperor? answer the question. "Cut an inch deeper,
sir, and you will find him" — meaning, of course, in his heart. What's
in a name ? There is that in it which challenges the reverence and
the homage of heaven and earth. For " at the name of Jesus every
knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things
under the earth, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord, to the glory of God the Father ! " In polities, in letters, even
in religion, the authority of a name is often more influential and
convincing than an argument; and the individual to whom Provi-
dence has accorded such intellectual sway. Providence will hold ac-
countable, not only for his own faults and errors, but, so far as these
have affected the interests of others, for the faults and errors of
peoples, sects, and generations of mankind. It is not the heathen
mythology only that affords examples of the apotheosis of human

114 INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE.

nature. The altar smokes with sacrifice long after the idol has be-
come dust ; and the dicta of the oracle are law to its votaries, long
after the lips that uttered them are silent in death. Statues are
erected in their honor, institutions are decorated with their names,
orations are pronounced in their eulogy, and pilgrimages are made
to their tombs. As years roll on, their fame, instead of fading,
gathers a more reverend lustre, and on each anniversary of their
birth the air rings with the shouts of rejoicing thousands, and the
welkin is rent with the thunders of artillery.

The bearing of such extensive and powerful influences on the
moral and religious welfare of human society is too conspicuous to
require development or to call for argument. But in the aspect
which most demands our attention, which falls legitimately within
the scope of remark proper from the pulpit — for what are all other
interests, compared with the interests of eternity ? — the principle in
question displays not its most important operation in those celebrated
and notorious examples of individual influence to which reference
was just now made. The man whose authority and example have
degraded the moral sentiment and impeded the religious melioration
of his age and country, has committed acts of turpitude and inflicted
injury enough to weigh down more than all the political and literary
merit that can be claimed for him by his veriest idolaters. Mental '
impressions are often enfeebled by the distance of the agent that
produces them ; but moral impressions are more forcible in propor-
tion to the familiarity and contiguity of the productive cause.

Thus, in literature, men render the homage of their admiration to
genius, but they are most attracted by characters which come into
close and sympathetic intercourse with the heart of the reader. We
admire Byron. We love Wordsworth. Than the former, a more
brilliant star has not shed -its light upon the horizon of, letters in
modern times. But it was a wandering star, dazzling by its splen-
dor, throwing off coruscations in its wayward course, that led men to
gaze, and, while gazing and admiring, to tremble, 9s at the appear-
ance of something strange, unearthly, and to fear that, like the flash
from the dark bosom of the thunder-cloud, it might blast and destroy
them. With Wordsworth, we feel that it would have been a blessed
privilege to sit down with him on the margin of his own Winde-
mere, which he loved, with its smooth and glassy waters, and in the
silence of the evening, when the stars began to look down from their

INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE. 115

watch-towers, or in the bright and glorious morning, amid the hum
of insects and the carols of birds, and under bright clouds floating
on the deep blue seas above, hear him discourse of God's goodness,
God's mercy, and God's love — of man's dependence, man's duties,
and man's destiny ! Byron's was unsanctified genius; his splendid
endowments unconsecrated but to selfish ends and the diabolical pur-
pose of corrupting his kind. And of all devices put in operation by
the cunning of the devil for the demoralization and ruin of men,
there is not, perhaps, one so subtle, so disguised, and so efiectual, as
that which seeks first to debauch the mind in order to deprave the
conduct — to pollute the heart in order to degrade the person. This
is fearfully and shockingly exemplified in the character of our ephem-
eral literature — in those light productions which the press throws off
yearly by hundreds of thousands of pages, and which are to be found
at all the thoroughfares of the country, at the railroad depots of our
large cities, at the principal steamboat landings, and in the hands of
all the news-mongers and vendors of novels and novelettes through-
out the land. Whatever the taste may be, or whatever the fancy to
be gratified, appropriate food is provided for its indulgence, from the
marvellous and the beautiful, to the terrible, the atrocious, and the
horrible, presented in pictures for the eye, songs for the ear, and
narratives for the mind. And thus, with the vast majority of the
young who travel — who seek amusement at places of fashionable
concourse, and whose unoccupied hours are given up to this kind of
reading — life is divested of all reality; sober, serious reflection is
banished; the lessons of experience are lost upon them; the voice
of conscience is stifled; they live on present enjoyment, and revel in
anticipation in scenes of coming bliss, and thus become trained in
mind and heart to adopt any sentiments, and fall easy and almost un-
resisting victims to the arts of the profligate and the designing.

A few months since, I met with a young man on bis way to join
General Walker in Nicaragua, who said that that daring adventurer
and fomenter of revolutions for freedom's sake n^ould never again
visit the United States, unless he came at the head of a victorious
army through the conquered domains of the IMontezumas ; that it
was his purpose thus to return to overthrow this Republic, erect on
its ruins the most glorious throne on wliich men had ever gazed, and
establish here a Government to rule the world. What though this
be, in our estimation, the veriest rodomontade? It shows in what

116 INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE.

vagaries of imaginatiou the youthful mind of the country indulges,
and in what fancies '^t disports. Certainly they are not more extrav-
agant than were the day-dreams of Napoleon's boyhood, which con-
templated Constantinople as the capital of an empire whose glories
should eclipse the splendors of all preceding dynasties, and more
than realize the magnificent creations of Eastern romance. There
are doubtless thousands, now in this land, burning with the ambition
which fired the breast of Napoleon Bonaparte, and who, if opportunity
favored, would, like him, wade through seas of blodd, and tl-ample
thousands into the dust of death, if they might thus grasp the scep-
tre of power, and place a diadem on their brows. Happily for the
peace of the world, there are few Napoleons among the many actu-
ated by the like or an equal ambition. But if, in the common road
of life, there be truth in the beautiful fancy of the poet, that " full
many a flower is born to blush unseen, and waste its sweetness on
the desert air," never attaining the notoriety necessary to gain intel-
lectual influence and eminence, it is also true, on the other hand,
and the observation of almost every man verifies the fact, that full
many a weed of society, low, nauseous, pestiferous, unsung by the
satirist, unnoted on the records of published villainy, flourishing un-
regarded and rotting unmissed and forgotten, has infused poison and
.poured ruin into hearts within the natural circle of its baleful influ-
ence, to an extent and degree that efi"ectually counteracted the opposite
efi"orts of men who have toiled and wrought diligently in the tasks
of philanthropy, and thus striven, by doing good, to gain an honored
and enduring remembrance. Yes, it is indeed a humiliating and
disheartening thought, that the honest and faithful herald of the
Cross, whose days of labor and weariness, and nights of study and
prayer, are devoted to the extension of his Master's kingdom, and
before whom are congregatexi every Sunday, for the very purpose on
which he is sent, those same hearts which he seeks to impress and
influence— maj strive faithfully in his labor of love, and yet strive in
vain — may persevere through long years of patient self-denial, and
live on through despondency and the sickening process of hope de-
ferred, and feel the spirit dying in his heart, and the marrow drying
up in his bones, and yet effect less for the promotion of holiness among
men— by his stated public and professional exertions— by his admoni-
tions, expostulations, and reproofs— by the purity of his life— by his
exemplary deportment and godly conversation— <Aa?i is witnessed in

INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE. 117

the magnitude and extent of the harm wrought in the same commu-
nity by one emissary of Satan, seeking the gratification of his own
gross and depraved appetites — pandering to the corrupt inclinations
and low propensities of the vulgar crew of which he is the leader, and
thus plunging souls into perdition by the fatal influence of his
wretched principles, and by the death-doing mischief of his ruinous
example. The influence of this moral contagion, which is so easily com-
municated in the circumstances in which we find human society, can
scarcely be over-estimated. In our country, especially, almost every
man can gain some measure of influence ; and no matter what may
be his opinions upon any subject — morals, religion, politics — through
the tremendous power of the press he can speedily scatter them>
broadcast through the land, from Maine to Georgia, from Virginia
to California. It is something which demands the most serious at-
tention of every man who loves his country, his family, and his kind.
It is the mighty agent in transmitting and circulating through a
thousand channels, swelling into resistless torrents the great stream
of human depravity. It is, to every soul among us, the just occasion
of deep anxiety and painful care. It is the parent of solemn duties,
the stimulus to constant and wakeful vigilance, the source of burden-
some responsibilities. It ought to be the provocative of earnest efibrt,
the theme of fervent prayer for light, guidance, and help, from on
high. Moral impulses^ we repeat, arc infectious. Philosophy tells us
that a stone cast into the ocean communicates an impulse to its waters
which is felt on the most distant shore washed by its waves, and that
a word spoken makes an impression on our atmosphere coextensive
with its limits. The idea is a grand one for contemplation. It is a
more fearful thought to consider, that in the contact of men, through-
out the multiform and complicated interlacings of human association,
an impression for good or for evil is necessarily and inevitably made
upon each other. "Wherever there is intercourse between man and
man, there is incurred a reciprocal moral responsibility, correspond-
ing in degree to the intimacy of that intercourse, and proportioned to
the force of the circumstances which create the influence. Thus the
principles and practice of parents tell most powerfully upon the char-
acter and conduct of their children. The care and influence of
teachers generally give shape to the future destiny of their pupils.
The intimacies of friendship impart complexion to the deportment,
as exhibited on the theatre of life; and those elevated, by wealth, tal-

118 INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE.

cuts, aucl power, to higli social positions, become the guides and ex-
amples of others in humbler conditions and less conspicuous stations.
Throu"-h all these ramifications of the social state, this moral respon-
sibility exists; and there is no possible escape from it, unless men
flee from the converse of their fellows, and seek refuge, like an-
chorites, in the caverns of the mountains or the deserts of the earth.

Men, therefore, who are morally diseased, are as justly accountable
for the moral corruption with which they taint the social atmos-
pliere — ^l^y their language, their conduct, or their writings — as re-
sponsible for the contagion which they communicate to other hearts,
scattering around them, with thoughtless levity, " arrows, firebrands,
and death," as the physically diseased, who, with fiendish, malignity,
seek to spread their own loathsomeness through the community.

The practical bearing of these remarks will not be misunderstood,
I am persuaded, by those for whose benefit their delivery is chiefly
intended. Some one has written, that " if there be a period in mjin's
brief but eventful pilgrimage, more than another, at which perils
surround him, when the passions are strong for evil or for good,
when the mind is powerfully susceptible to virtuous or to vicious
impressions and impulses, that is the brief period which connects
youth with manhood, that bridges the narrow gulf between the docile
disciple and the man who is, or conceives himself to be, now his own
master. Just as in summer, it is said, there are a few days which
determine the condition of the coming harvest. If the sun then
shines bright and warm, the juices are matured and consolidated, and
made ready for the autumn. But if cold and withering mildews de-
scend, a few hours destroy the fair progress of months, and the lovely '
prospect of spring is at once and forever blasted; and the havoc is all
the more apparent in proportion to the amount of herbage and verd-
ure over which the ungenial winds have swept their deadly course.
So, too, a few years — it may be mouths, nay days, with maiiy — have
accomplished the fatal work, when the instructions of youthful days
were uprooted. Whilst men were asleep, the ever-wakeful enemy
of God and man has sowed tares broadcast, where ^heat had been
often strewed. We have seen many a youthful mind, opening with
the fair prospect of blossoms ripening into the perfect fruits of right-
eousness, nursed under the prayerful anxieties of godly parents, and
enjoying, too, the advantage of a Christian ministry and an enlight-
ened course of religious instruction, but passing too soon under the

INDIVIDUAL MORAL INFLUENCE. 119

tempest of the world's temptations, become a barren and blasted
branch of the social tree

What a disastrous termination is thus seen to mark often the
fondest parental hopes, the diligent labors of faithful teachers, the
reasonable expectations of loving friends ! Can any effort of asso-
ciated benevolence, or any word of friendly counsel, be misplaced,
which seeks to guard the rising generation against results so fatal to
themselves, so painful to their friends, so ruinous to the best interests
of their country !

Hear the words of the wisest among men :

" Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth
understanding. For the merchandise of it is better than the mer-;
chandise of silver, and the gain thereof than fine gold. She is more
precious than rubies, and all the things that thou canst desire are
not to be compared unto her. Length of days is in her right hand,
and in her left hand riches and honor. Her ways are ways of pleas-
antness, and all her paths are peace ! "

" Now to God the Father," &c.

^31-a.Tred "by- J- C. B-a»re. -•

7^ ^T^-'t^

Ot,,-<i^,

X QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER, FOR YOUNG MEN.

II. The Answc]
Word."

Of the importance of vu:. (|ue
that I .shall Icnve to >)c i^feivYl ^
1. Tb.

:uua cleau:it' his

■•ordinp: to Thy
T s].i(.';ik p;irtiCii'aiiv )

ah. 4

-.... ,. ..>„ „.. i .^-. . . :iijch evci)

feature gives utterance. His sanguine spirit feasts upon the prom-
ises of hope, and his glowing fancy invests every prospect of the
future with Eden-like enchantment. He hi the subject of interest
to all ; childhood and maturity are in synipaiby with him, and evin
' im an object of attraetior '-■ fails to charm.

n make an old man wi x again, it i.s the

c everywhere fiml- the young marl; if

'' him to fli vhich he h;is re-

■'■ .sthesoli^:" ■■.mself, feels for

the >

122 A QUESTION AND ITS ANSWEK,

The past belonged to our fathers ; they are gone. The present
is ours, on whom is devolved the responsibility of the living ao-e.
The future is to be the young man's. True, many will die without
possessing the inheritance ; but of those who gain it, their purity of
character in time, and their happiness of existence in eternity, depend
upon accepting the counsel of my text.

The past died with our fathers, bequeathing its estate to the
present; and of the possessions of the present the future is the pros-
pective heir. If this age shall do as much for the future as the
past has done for the present, who shall estimate the value of the
inheritance awaiting the young man ? True, it is only in a limited
sense that it can be said that the succeeding age begins where the
preceding has left off, and this, in a measure, may account for the
tardy progress of humanity toward the intellectual and moral perfec-
tion which it is destined to attain. Each proceeds from the same
starting point of first principles, and growth depends upon the facili-
ties with which the past has furnished the present, and upon the
facilities with which the present shall furnish the future. Progress
is indefinite, and capacity for its development is that property in
man's nature most resembling the Infinite. Our fathers toiled alono-

> - ^

in travel by horseback, or in lumbering stage coaches, at the rate of
four or five miles an hour ; without weariness, by steamboat or rail'-
road, we travel twenty. The sixty days required to cross the ocean
have been reduced to ten. We all remember when post or express
was our swiftest means of communication with distant places. Now,
intelligence we wish to convey, can be sent with lightning speed
along the telegraphic wires. But, far as were our fathers, behind us
in these respects, where would we have been, had they not prepared
the way for our progress ? Do we owe nothing to their science and
enterprise ? I need not say, if I could estimate it, how much we are
indebted to such minds as Fulton and Franklin.

If the present shall furnish to the future, facilities to progress
equal to those furnished by the past to the present, what may be
expected of the age to come, in which the young man is to be the
responsible actor ? The future is his sphere ; the wealth of the
present, his capital. As the future shall become to him the living
present, he shall make th^ investments which shall subsist society,
the church, and the nation. These are destined to be what he shall
make them.

FOR YOUNG MEN. 123

Cau it be a wonder to any, that the young man is an object of in-
terest to all, and especially that the intensest concern should be felt
by those to whom belongs the responsibility of the present, whose
duty it Is to prepare him, as far as education and example can do it,
for the progress of society, of the church, and of the nation ? The
question, "Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way?" is
therefore for them, as well as for him.

2. The import of the question :

It implies the impurity of his way, otherwise there could be no
propriety in the language employed ; for why ask how that shall be
cleansed, which is already pure ?

True, if we go back over all his way, from its beginning, we find
him with Innocence for his companion, shedding her smile of com-
placence upon him, blessing him with her favor, in his every step
through infancy. On to the end of this period, all is well, both as
it respects character hei'e and destiny hereafter. Innocence takes
care of both, and they are safe in her keeping. But grown to youth,
he quits the flowery domain over which she presides. He may not
tarry if he would — he would not if he could. He seeks in Education
a wiser guide. He tastes in her school of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. His eyes are opened, and he discerns that in the
journey before him there are two ways, the right and the wrong.
Unhesitatingly he approves the former, but, from the moral state of
his nature, and the action of Temptation upon it, he pursues the latter.
No sooner is the line between childhood and youth past, than the
way of impurity is entered upon. That the steps of youth may be
so guided, by mere moral training, as always to keep the sinless path
along which Innocence guided infancy, is to be regarded as a very
great heresy, since its direct efi'ect would be to prevent that convic-
tion of depravity which is the preparation to the work of cleansing
the young man's way.

I would not, on any account, disparage Education. I look upon
her as an angel from heaven, as from her seat of learning she dis-
penses the treasures of wisdom, and seeks, by her many appeals to
reason, to guide the youthful step in the way of purity. I admit,
and do it gladly, to her praise, that she has done much to restrain
the evil of youthful nature ; but ask me not to consent that she cau
eradicate it. I might agree with those who say she can, if Tempta-
tion were not more potent than Education in its sway over human

124 A QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER,

nature. There is a power for evil in Temptation, wliich no moral
training has ever yet overcome. But if we were to suppose these
two great powers rivals in the contest for mastery over the young
man — the one always for good, the other always for evil, but the one
often betrays her trust, the other never — such is the advantage
which Temptation has over Education, in the moral state of our na-
ture, as to insure invariably her success.

A mere glance at the proof of the inhei-ent impurity of humanity,
which is the barrier to the success of Education, is all that the limited
discussion to which I am restricted will allow. And since God's
Word is the rule by which the young man is to cleanse his way,
that Word is sufficient authority for the existence of that impu-
rity. " Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother
conceive me." Such is the style of teaching in the Old Testament.
Turn over to the New, and its corroboration is furnished by Christ,
when He said to Nicodemus, " That which is born of the flesh' is
flesh. Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of
God." Here is the same impurity of nature with which, according
to the Psalmist, we are born, and the nature of the change that must
be effected in cleansing us from it. I imagine that all who take the
pains to read these pages are sufficiently acquainted with their Bibles
to know that' such proofs as the foregoing might be multiplied
almost indefinitely.

The impurity of our nature is not only established by the authority
of the Word of God, but also by the facts in the history of the human
race, and by the experience of every human being. In this state
of the case, it is easy to see, as I have held, the advantage of Tempta-
tion over Education, and why, despite of all the efforts the latter may
make, the former succeeds in sending the young man along the ways
of impurity.

■ If the case were reversed, and our nature were pure, then Educa-
tion might carry on the contest on equal grounds with Temptation.
Then it might be admitted that from infancy forward ^hrough youth,
and on to the end of the journey, our way might possibly never stand
in need of cleansing. But the opposite being the fact, nature harmo-
nizing with Temptation, " all have gone out of the way " — " there is
none righteous ; no, not oae."

The young man's way, then, is corrupt. First, because of the
depraved state of his nature. Secondly, because, in this condition

FOR YOUNG MEN. 125

of his nature, Temptation to evil is more powerful than the best in-
centives to good which Education can urge. The latter may furnish
theories which claim the approval of his mind ; the former can offer
indulgences which gratify the feelings of the heart. The restraints
of the one are despised for the gratifications of the other.

But the argument by which I have maintained the corruption of
the young man's way applies alike to all who, heeding not the coun-
sel of the text, have failed to cleanse their way, according to God's
Word. For the nature of all is depraved, and over this nature, un-
renewed, Temptation holds despotic sway. I now proceed to remark,
that to insure the corruption of the young man's way, there are
temptations ^ecw?jar to youth, luring him into the ways of impurity.

Never were there two friends of closer intimacy than Temptation
and Vice. They are business associates, and partners that never
quaiTcl. They have more places of commerce than any other firm
in the world, and offer more inducements to customers than all
others put together. Especial pains are taken to please the fancy
and suit the taste of the young. If once they have gained the cus-
tom of the old, habit makes them sure of their patronage. Of these
partners, Temptation's office is to lure the victim to the place of trade,
where Vice presides.

1. Pleasure may be set down as among the most successful agencies
by which Temptation corrupts the young man's way. The love of it
is strong in his nature, and its indulgence, under proper restraints,
is allowable. But it is the policy of Temptation to take advantage
of what may be right in itself, to lead astray the victim it has marked
for crime. Note how through the young man's natural love of
pleasure she lures him in the ways of vice.

Where is pleasure to be found ? Temptation has as many answers
as there are questioners. She suggests place after place of vice,
which promises the gratification of every variety of taste. The ele-
gantly decorated hall, where assemble the giddy throng of fashion's
worshippers, she calls the temple of innocent amusement. Through
his card of invitation, she exacts his promise for the evening. He
joins in his first dance ; or he is entertained, for the first time, with
the comic or the tragic of the Theatre ; and he feels, blinded by the
one and gratified by the other, that Temptation did not promise more
than Vice has fulfilled ; and now. Temptation, if her delusive spell be
not broken, leads him on from one place of innocent amusement,

126 A QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER,

falsely so called, to anotlier, till you find him the companion of the
worst in crime.

The appetite which he acquired for strong drink in the circles
where he sought pleasure in amusement, now claims his unrestrained
indulgence, and he is a drunkard. The excitement which he found
in the game of chance for social pastime, has relieved gaming of the
enormity with which he had been accustomed to invest it, and he is
a gambler. Continuing his negotiations with Temptation, thus ou
he goes, till he becomes, not only the inmate of all the haunts of Vice,
but the accomplice in, and perpetrator of, all its deeds ; as "corrupt
in his way as any convict who has ever paid the penalty of his crimes
in a penitentiary or upon a gallows.

2. Vanity is another of the successful agencies through which
Temptation corrupts the young man's way.

Unless he is a youth of understanding beyond his years, vanity is
excited often by the interest he sees felt for him, while he is pre-
paring for the part he is to perform in the drama of life. Here
lies the danger, in the case of the young man whose native talent
gives early promise of usefulness and distinction in the world. He
is made conscious of superior -capacity by his teacher at school or
by his parents at home. This consciousness is renewed from time to
time, and in various ways, by his contact with society. Temptation,
seeking to entrap and ruin him, kindles out of it the vanity which
consumes all his splendid promise; and so far from meeting exi^ecta-
tion, he is -flattered into a self-assumed consequence which makes
him an object of disgust to the society over which he is ambitious
to obtain sway.

• But vanity, like pleasure, has many tracks, over which by the aid
of Temptation she guides the erring footsteps of the young man.
One makes his boast of family — another of position — another of ap-
pearance. Vanity in all its forms, by the help of Temptation, has a
miserable end for its victim.

3. Honor, higher in grade than pleasure or vanity, is another
agent by which Temptation corrupts the young man's way.

His honor is more than his life— is more than the life of his fellow.
To him it is the " higher law "—in a more criminal sense than any
"higher law" known to * politics— higher than his county s law,
higher than God's law. Obeying the behest of this law, how terrible
are the deeds written in humanity's history!

FOR YOUNG MEN. 127

The young man of accomplished education and well-furnished
4iind, who cannot stoop so low as to reach down to a mean action, is
ivell deserving the admiration of all. But just here the nobleness
of his character, and the estimate in which he is held on this ac-
count, is the point at which Temptation directs her battery. As he
would not do a mean action, she would compromise his honor if he
did not resent insult. Sadly misguided, he gives or accepts the
challenge to mortal combat, in which, at the crack of the rifle, is ex-
tinguished a light which, had it gained its zenith, might have shone
in the galaxy of great men, with a lustre scarce inferior to that of
Calhoun, or Clay, or Webster. Hamilton and Decatur both fell by
the bloody hands of duellist murderers while yet comparatively young
men.

It is impossible to estimate the power which, through these and
oilier agencies, Temptation sways over the young man. Appeal is
made to every impulse of his ardent nature, and with such success
that in many sad instances the youth of even pious education and
early virtue has become desperate in vice, reckless of the laws of Grod
and man, a fit subject for the penalty of both.

But the question, " Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his
way ? " as it implies the fact that his way is corrupt, applies also to
the young man whom neither pleasure, vanity, nor honor, has led
astray, and who may have avoided the temptations most common and
most fatal to the morality of youth. He may never have polluted his
lips with profanity. He may never have inflamed his spirit with wine.
He may never have kindled the fire of passion with the fuel of im-
pure or revengeful thoughts. Yet since, as we have seen, his nature
is corrupt, that nature develops only by corrupt ways of thought, or
feeling, or action. For him, as well as the young man of riot and
crime, the question is submitted, " Wherewithal shall a young man
cleanse his way ? "

II. The second part of the text shall now claim attention, namely,
the Answer to the Question — " By taking heed thereto according to
Thy Word."

Here is a general and specific direction.

1. "By taking heed thereto." To heed is to think. That think-
ing which implies earnest inquiry into what is right or wrong, and
which awakens desire of the one, with the purpose to pursue it —
apprehension of the other, with the purpose to avoid it.

128 A QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER,

Inconsideration is one of the greatest faults of youth. It is the
door by which Temptation is admitted, in gaining the ear of youthful
desire for sinful indulgence. In his haste, the young man does not
stop to think.

How much would be different in every man's life, if he had only
thought before he spoke, and reflected before he acted ! And could
youth know without experience the consequences of heedlessness: —
consequences which embitter maturity and age — the indiscretions
and crimes which so often mar and stain this period in life's journey
would be avoided. But, alas ! the experience which teaches the
father the follies of his youth conveys not its lessons to his son.

There is a vast difference between the seeming and the real of
things. The former beguiles; the latter punishes. "There is a
way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the
ways of death." Experience teaches the old man to distrust the
seeming, and to fear the real. Had he taken heed, he might have
detected what was only seeming, and avoided the real, with which
he is punished, in painful remembrance of the sins of his youth. Too
late he learns from the pangs of sorrow and remorse — lessons taught
in the school of experience — to distrust the seeming of things. The
old man, remembering, can but exclaim. Oh, that the young man
would think !

• Heeding, the young man would at once realize a consciousness of
his evil way — the evil of his nature inherited, and the evil of his prac-
tice commenced in his very first step after crossing the line of account-
ability. But however much he might take heed to his way by thought
and investigation of the principles of right and wrong, and by action
corresponding in as full a measure as possible to his convictions and
conclusions, how earnestly soever he might endeavor to pursue the
right and avoid the wrong, as the means of cleansing and keeping
pure his way, he must fail utterly, if he overlook the second part of
the answer to the question. And now we come to the specific direc-
tion contained in the text.

2. " According to Thy Word."

.This is the standard that must rule his thinking and acting, if in-
deed he would cleanse his way. God's Word is the only guide to
the path of purity— the t^ue rule of faith and practice.

First of all, then, acquaintance with God's Word is of the highest
moment, and young men cannot be too thoroughly impressed with

FOR YOUNG MEN. 129

the importance of its study. Wisdom xinto salvation is the lesson it
teaches. I am iu want of terms strong enough to express the com-
mendation due to Education, through the agencies she employs to
impart to the youthful mind a knowledge of the Holy Scriptures.
Not that Education, through the instruction she furnishes by her
best agencies, including the Sabbath-school and Christian associations
of young men, and even the preaching of the Gospel, can cleanse a
man's way, but the instruction she thus imparts is the very best
preparation of the soul for the action of the only cleansing power.
She is the voice of one crying in the wilderness, " Prepare ye the
way of the Lord."

A servant must know his master's will before understandingly he
can do it; and as knowledge is not intuitive, but acquired, he must
gain it by instruction or study ; and the more direct the source of
his information, the clearer will be his conviction of duty, and the
more confident will he be of approbation in its performance. I do
not, however, say that knowledge of God's Word is absolutely de-
pendent upon direct access to its pages. This would be to say that
a large part of our Roman Catholic and slave population are shut up in
total ignorance — the former not being permitted to read it, except
within such limits as proscribe it to the masses ; the latter, making
but few exceptions, not being able to read it. No one doubts the
statement in regard to the latter. If that in reference to the former
be denied by the Catholic, or questioned by the Protestant, I refer
for its proof, in the first place, to the action of the Council of Trent.
In the second place, to the fact, that everywhere throughout our
country, where Pioman Catholic influence is felt, there is outspoken
opposition to the Bible in the public schools. And thirdly, to the
very significant fact that it is excluded from the Sabbath schools of
said church, and from all the schools of literature under its patron-
age.

As the means of instruction to our youth, that our young men may
take it as the guide of their way, let the Bible, God's blessed Word,
go into all the schools, public and private, in the land ; let it go into
every family, that its morning and evening lessons may form a part
of the devotions of the domestic altar ; let it thus lodge its purifying
truths in the hearts of our children, " that our sous may be as plants
grown up in their youth, that our daughters may be corner-stones,
polished after the similitude of a palace."

a

130 A QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER,

" What would be the condition of any one of us," said Daniel "VTeb-
ster on his dying bed, "without the hope of immortality, and what is
there to rest that hope upon but the Gospel ? " Take the Gospel of
Jesus away from us — deny us all access to the Word of God — and
the light that cheered the soul of the great statesman on the eve of
its exit to eternity would be extinguished, and a darkness more
dense than covered Egypt, when plagued by the judgments of
Heaven, would veil the face of the moral firmament now lit up with
the glorious sun of Gospel truth. Whatever else may be learned
from other sources — and science, philosophy, and history, are almost
exhaustless fountains — the Bible alone can furnish the certain knowl-
edge of immortality, and point the way to its untold joys. It alone
contains the lesson of wisdom unto salvation, teaching, as it does, the
process of cleansing by which the young man's way is made pure.

« According to Thy Word."

Two questions naturally arise. What does God's Word teach?
What does it require in cleansing the young man's way ?

1. What does it teach ?

The primary is the most important lesson in every branch of knowl-
edge. A teacher would never make a scholar of his pupil, if he did
not begin with the alphabet. First principles are interwoven through
every part of subsequent attainment. The great problem for the
Study of the young man, who would cleanse his way, is himself; the
first lesson in its solution is the impurity of his moral state. Him-
self the subject, his sinful nature the alphabet, God's Word the
teacher. "Know thyself" was the wisest maxim of the old philos-
ophers ; but the teacher was wanting to explain the alphabet, and
instruct them in the first principles of self-knowledge ; they had not
God's Word.

I will add nothing to the proof of the depraved moral state of hu-
manity submitted, in maintaining the corruption of the young man's
way. Starting with this primary principle, to the truth of which
his consciousness responds, resist it as he may, he realizes the fact
that his way is impure, and needs cleansing — in short, that he is a
sinner, guilty before God, and deserving hell.

The second lesson which God's Word teaches, is, that though a
sinner, he has a Savioux, great and glorious, even Jesus, who, to
save him, invested Divinity in flesh ; and in that flesh, in due time,
when -we were without strength, died for the ungodly— a Saviour

FOR YOUNG MEN. 131

" who, by the shedding of His blood, opened the fountain for the
cleansing of his depraved nature, and who by His precepts marked
out for him the way of purity, and by His example showed him how
to walk in it.

Such are the preparatory lessons the young man must learn, if he
would cleanse his way, according to God's Word. First, that he is
a sinner ; secondly, that he has a Saviour. They are not merely les-
sons for his mental, but his moral nature — not only to be assented to
as facts furnished by the revelation of Divine truth, but as facts
that are to penetrate the soul with conviction and hope.

2. And now, finally, what does God's Word require ?

Plainly, that he at once turn from the way of impurity, by " re-
pentance toward God, and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ."
Repentance and faith succeed the conviction that he is a sinner, and
the knowledge of the fact that he has a Saviour. Repentance is the
heart's sorrow that he is a sinner ; faith is the heart's trust in the
Redeemer. But repentance cannot cleanse his way. Faith cannot
do it. These are but means to which he must resort in having it
done, and it cannot be done without them. He must be converted —
by which I mean there must be efiected such a change in his nature
as shall prepare him for the succeeding steps of obedience, in the
way of purity. Repentance succeeds conviction ; faith succeeds re-
pentance ; conversion succeeds faith. The converting power of the
Holy Ghost reaches the heart, and renews the nature, only through
faith in Christ. God's Word requires, in cleansing the young man's
way, his repentance, fb,ith, conversion — not one or the other, but all.
There is no other process for those who, having God's Word, are
made conscious that they are sinners, and know that they have a
Saviour; and of those who have not God's Word, this is not the place
to speak. Repentance is the preparation for faith ; faith is the prep-
aration for conversion. And nothing can be more clear, if we have
not exaggerated the depraved condition of humanity, than that, in
order to moral purity, there must be the action upon the heart of
the regenerating power of the Divine Spirit.

There are many powerful motives which enforce the counsel of the
text, a due reflection upon which would make the young man wise
unto salvation. I select only two, on which, in conclusion, I make
my appeal to him in favor of the period of youth as the most pro-
pitious for cleansing his way — namely, Jiabit ^and happiness.

132 A QUESTION AND ITS ANSWER,

Try it wlieu he may, it will be found no easy work ; but it is easier
now than it will be if delayed to maturity or age. He may master
habit now, but presently habit will master him. No doubt of it, at
all. It is to prove the great auxiliary to him in the way he goes,
whether it be virtue or vice, purity or impurity. Youth is the period
when habit is planted in our nature. It grows, cultured by thought,
feeling, and action, till it becomes the tree that casts its shade, re-
freshing or deadly, over the whole area of character.

The formation of habits of piety in youth has an importance which
age only can fully appreciate. If the young man would know the
advantage of habits of early piety, let him go and talk with the man —
and it is only here and there he will find one — who, in his riper years
or advanced age, has become religious. The daily struggles he has
with bad habits teach liim, too late, how much he would have gained
in surmounting the difficulties in the way of a pious life, had he in
youth " cleansed his way " according to Grod's "Word.

But I rest not my appeal to the young man alone on the argument
from the force of habit, which I have barely touched. Besides the
help he may gain hereafter, in treading the way of purity, from the
habit of piety formed while young, I urge the liappiness which piety
begun in youth will furnish all along life's pilgrimage, and at its
end.

Happiness is the good after which our restless nature pants.
Everywhere and always, and in all things, it is the object we pursue.
There is, after all, but one road to it. That is the way cleansed ac-
cording to God's Word, and known by the name of purity. This is
the path of the just, that shineth more and more to the perfect day.
In this way, we cannot go without Happiness for a companion. Here
we find duty j we perform it, and are happy. Here we find priv-
ilege; we improve it, and are happy. Here we find opportuni-
ties of usefulness ; and we do good, and are happy. Let the young
man know, his ardent nature panting after happiness, that in the way
of purity he will always find duty, privilege, and usefulness, the
springs from which he may quench his thirst. In short, purity is
the essential of happiness ; and more, purity is always happy.

And then the end ; as he shall look back over the way he has come,
then, when those wh(i have gone by the way of impurity shall be
most unhappy, he will be most happy. The memories of the past
will be as the dew of youth upon his old age, and at four-score the

FOR YOUNG MEN. 133

future will furnish him a more glorious prospect than he looked upon
from the Mount of Anticipation at twenty. If the young man would
make his old age happy, his end triumphant, and his future glorious,
he has only to hearken to the counsel of the text, " By taking heed
to his way, and cleansing it according to God's Word."

THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

'"' ■'^^' ''^" '' D.,

JBB, MABTtAXD,

•unded

• 11 euuiuejuitiuu oj ti
oJ, though dry gel" V;
rror.atid heresy, it
f-'uro tokii'

- It
■ritli-

kke loVe at once the motive and esscace Gt ail piety.

]{' jQ lovc ;iii;. keep my commandments."
Our text is a remarkable illustration of this ♦'•nth.
' e earth. Upon that earth, his <
' ■ "'^v-nly ti-iumph. And, •-^'
-urch? How are
>n of the world 'i 1

Je«n!? is ahovit

.,? t^

•y could 4>ay, • ~

■ t vanquish al!
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to equi];;
first dis'
■ K guid haT© we norn. ; "

136 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

they were destitute of learning; they were humble and despised; nor
did they ever kill or wound a single human being, though constantly
wronged, insulted, murdered. The power with which the Re-
deemer arms his church — but which that church still so little com-
prehends— is the power of love. All wealth and honor and might
were his, and he could have conferred them upon his subjects;
but he bequeaths to them a richer legacy, a more resistless potency.
He infuses love into their souls. ''Love one another," he says. "A
new commandment I give unto you. That ye love one jyaother.", This
is the sacrament by which a new era is inaugurated in the. history
of the world ; this is the sign by which the cause of Jesus shall tri-
umph, and his empire be established.

" That ye love one another." Let us meditate upon this great
truth, and then inquire why this commandment is called " new." " A
new commandment I give unto you. That ye love one another." 0
Jesus, uncreated, eternal, essential Love ! incarnate, bleeding, dying
Love ! risen, ascended, glorified Love ! let thy voice be heard this
day in our hearts, repeating this new commandment; let thy Spirit
kindle this love in our souls, to dwell there and burn there with
sacred, inextinguishable ardors.

I. This valedictory address of the Redeemer, these farewell in-
structions to his disciples, are full of significancy, and deserve our
most careful study. What oceans of ink, what rivers of blood, have
been shed about the True Cliurch. Now, surely, if salvation depends
on our being within the pale of some hallowed enclosure, on the ob-
servance of certain forms and rites, Jesus would, in these final in-
junctions, have accurately defined this consecrated area; he would
have described this indispensable machinery. But we hear from
his lips not a syllable on these subjects. He has taught us all things
pertaining to eternal life, and he has given us a programme of the
last judgment; but neither in his discourses, nor in his admonitions
as to the great Assizes, nor in the inspired teachings of his apostles,
do we find one word about the mystical virtues of churches and sacra-
ments. I do not undervalue creeds and forms and ordinances, but,
after all, love is the soul of all creeds, the heart of all forms, the life
of all ordinances. Without love, all sacraments and rites and minis-
tries are ''sounding brass apd tinkling cymbals." Where two or three
are gathered together in Christ's name, and with love breathed into
their souls, there Christ is in the midst of them, there is a true church.

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 137

My brethren, love is the only badge by which the church of Christ
is known. " By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if
ye have love one to another." Nations have their escutcheons, their
crests, and ensigns; armies have their shields and banners; and
ftimilies their heraldry, with its arms and quarters and bearings. In
the da3's of Christ, Jews and Gentiles had their emblems, different
sects and schools and academies being distinguished by symbols, de-
vices, and mottoes. At this day, churches called Christian glory in
names and titles, in pomp and parade. But there is only one badge
of the true church which wi41 be recognised and honored by " all
men." That badge is love. " The banner over us is love." A so-
ciety may have a ministry and ordinances, may build temples, and
observe the Sabbath, and do many virtuous acts ; but, without love,
it is not a church of which Christ is the head, and its members his
members. " He that loveth is born of God." '^ By this shall all
men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another."

Love is the only law by which a church of Christ is to be governed.
Church government — how much pride, prejudice, ambition, selfish-
ness, arrogance, injustice, cruelty — the very tempers most emphati-
cally reprobated by the Gospel — have been sanctified by this phrase,
staining the history of the church, so miscalled, with the darkest
and foulest crimes which have blackened the annals of our race. A
king, dabbling with astronomy, once said, " Had I been present when
God arranged the solar system, I could have made some important
suggestions." So vain men have thought as to the Saviour's regu-
lation of his church, and they have sought to improve his system.
But he knew what was in man. Under his own eye, and on more
than one occasion, his apostles betrayed spiritual ambition, in-
quiring, " Who should be greatest ? " and you remember his answer.
Had he indoctrinated them in the arts of exercising dominion — of
elevating themselves into an ecclesiastical aristocracy — they would
have been apt scholars. All men are geniuses in that department of
learning which teaches self-aggrandizement. But he rebukes their
ambition, setting a little child before them, and pronouncing him
greatest who has the most childlike and loving spirit : " Ye know
that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and
they that are great exercise authority upon them ; but it shall not be
so among you ; but whosoever will be great among you, let him be
your minister ; and whosoever will be chief among you, let him be

138 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

your servant." As in the natural world, the Creator secures order
without monotony, by forming each particle of matter with its own
peculiar properties, and throwing around all substances the law of
gravitation, so in the church there are many members and diversities
of o-ifts and tastes and characters, but the law of love binds all into
one harmonious whole.

I know it would be unutterable folly to dispense with the vigorous
and rigorous administration of laws in such a world as this ; human
society would soon be disorganized and plunged in wild anarchy and
confusion, were its members left to be controlled by love. .If any
events could unite men together as brothers, they were the trials and
triumphs of the American Revolution. Yet scarcely had independ-
ence been achieved, when an enemy more formidable than any for-
eign army at once appeared, and intestine strife threatened to rend
into hostile fragments that noble Confederation. It was at this crit-
ical moment that General Washington made a remarlc, showing his
calm and profound wisdom. Mr. Lee wrote, urging him to use his
great influence to quell a tumult in Massachusetts. " You talk of
influence" — this is the reply — "but influence is not government,
and nothing can save the country but a government. For this, we
have no common Constitution."

" Influence is not government ; " but in the church, influence is the
best government — the influence of love. While Jesus was upon
earth, what regulated his yoUng church ? It was his influence. In-
carnate love was the incarnate conscience of his church. And now,
love is the only arbiter needed ; love will settle everything. If love
reign in a church, it will almost supersede discipline.

When, from the internal administration of the church, we turn to
its outward work, its enterprise upon the earth, we find a mission
entirely of love. It is this which makes the Gospel the religion
suited to all climes and all ages. It is the code of love ; it deals not
with cases, but with principles ; it appeals not to casuistry, but to
the heart. Human enactments, executed by human tribunals, really
have in them no moral sanction whatever ; they appeal never to eon-
science, but only to detected facts ; they leave the depraved passions
to grow and fester, and scowl and pounce only upon their outbreaks.
The Gospel reaches the springs and sources of character, and seeks
to purify them ; it nourishes principles of love, and these will destroy
selfishness, and thus secure universal and eternal equity in all things.

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 139

"And. one of the company said unto him, Master, speak to my
brother, that he divide the inheritance with me. And he said
unto him, Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you ? And
he said unto them. Take heed and beware of covetousness." Which
of the brothers was wrong, he does not decide ; but he exhibits the
principle which settles this and all similar cases. The baneful love of
money was the cause of that family quarrel, as it is of almost all family
quarrels now. Let this vice be corrected, and the disgrace and un-
happiness will at once cease. And it is thus the Gospel redresses
all the evils and disorders of society. It assails no form of civil gov-
ernment, prescribing a better ; but it enforces principles which will
transform any government into a government of love. It does not
seek to break up social and domestic relations, but it infuses a spirit
which will make these relations ties of affection and happiness.

I will only add one. other remark here. It is love, my brethren,
which is to secure the perpetuity, and final and universal triumph,
of the church of Christ. Force, stratagem, hereditary prescriptive
authority — these are the foundations on which earthly kingdoms
rest. Had Jesus been a competitor with worldly monarchs — had he
accepted the crown offered him, and employed his miraculous power
to establish a temporal empire, his throne, like that of the Caesars,
would have been an unsubstantial, perishable fabric. But he founded
his empire on love; and as God alone is omnipotent, because he
only is pure, essential Love, so it is certain that '' the gates of hell
can never prevail " against a church which embodies the love of God.
Against it error and superstition and tyranny will set themselves,
and for a time its progress may be arrested ; it may even seem to be
defeated ; but it will possess the earth, " as the waters cover the face
of the deep." You stand upon the sea-shore when the tide is in its
flood. Wave after wave rolls up, is broken, and driven back; but
the ocean is thundering in, and will sweep all before it.

Crowded as was the life of Napoleon with the manifestations of
genius, nothing ever done or uttered by him discloses more strikingly
the greatness of his mind than those profound words recorded by
Count Montholon : '' I know men, and I tell you that Jesus is not
a man. The religion of Christ is a mystery which subsists by its
own force, and proceeds from a mind which is not a human mind.
We find in it a marked individuality, which originated a train of
words and actions unknown before. Jesus borrowed nothing from

140 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

our knowledge. He was not a philosopher, for his proofs were mira-
cles and from the first his followers worshipped him. Alexander,
Csesar, Charlemagne, and myself, founded empires ; but upon what
foundation did we rear the creations of our genius ? Upon force.
Jesus Christ alone founded an empire upon love ; and, at this hour,
multitudes of men would die for him. I die before my time, and
my body will be given back to the earth, to become food for worms.
Such is the fate of him who has been called the Great Napoleon !
What an abyss between my end and the eternal kingdom of Jesus
Christ which is proclaimed, and loved, and adored, which is extend-
ing over the whole earth."

It is a significant fact, that Jesus left behind him no prescribed
artificial organization ; yet his teachings established a society com-
pacted by ties firmer, more indissoluble, than those which consolidate
states and kingdoms. Unlike earthly kings, he did not concern
himself about a successor; nor, like human teachers and philoso-
phers, did he compose volumes containing a full and systematic ex-
hibition of his doctrines. He simply taught men to love. This was
the lesson our common humanity was waiting to receive, and it at
once penetrated to the depths of our nature. Uttered by an humble
Hebrew youth, that imperial word, " Love," began directly and irre-
sistibly to work out the most wonderful changes. Pride, prejudice,
lo'dged and rooted superstitions, were soon vanquished by it. Thrones
have crumbled and dynasties have expired, but the power of that
word hath not been exhausted ; it is inexhaustible ; it will yet sub-
due and renovate this fallen world, making all things new, creating
a new earth, and a new heaven bending over it.

There are other thoughts which I ought to present here, but I
must sacrifice them. I ought to remind you that love is the glory,
the happiness, the perfection, of the church of Christ. Love is
greater than faith and hope, not only because it is more enduring, but
because it comprehends them both ; for it " Jiopeth all things, hellcv-
eth all things." It hath more hope than hope itself, more faith than
faith itself We every day see loving hearts hoping against hope,
an-d trusting in spite of the basest perfidiousness. Love indeed is
the crowning flower in which all the Christian graces shall expand
and bloom in eternity. It is the glory, the happiness, the perfection,
of the church triumphant. The highest heaven knows nothing more
exalted and blessed than love. It is folly to speak of knowledge.

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 141

IVe mistake familiarity for knowledge, or we would confess our ig-
norance of everything. We think, and understand, and speak, as
children ; and when " that which is perfect is come," these pueril-
ities shall all " be done away "—that is, what we call knowledge
will not be perfected, but entirely superseded, as so much imbecility
and nescience. But love will be perfected in heaven. " Whether
there be prophecies, they shall foil ; whether there be tongues, they
shall cease ; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away." But
" Love never faileth." The perfection of love is the beatific glory
of heaven ; and to be " made perfect in love " is to anticipate heaven
while we are upon earth.

While, however, I must omit many thoughts upon which I would
delight to dwell — for this is a subject very dear to me — there is one
question which I must put before leaving this topic. I must ask
each of you, Do you belong to the true church of Christ ? Have you
this love for his people ? " We know that we have passed from
death unto life, because we love the brethren; " ^' He that loveth not
his brother, abideth in death." Ponder these solemn, searching,
stripping words. Do not speak of your love for God. '' If a man
say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar." You love
God; you are zealous and liberal; you delight in prayer, in the
bible, the sanctuary, and all the exercises of devotion. Very well.
But do you love your brother ? do you bear with his infirmities ? do
you admire his excellences ? is his reputation dear 'to you ? are you
concerned for his salvation ? — " But he has so many imperfections
and faults." What, are you faultless, then ? do you not love your-
self, in spite of conscious imperfection ? do you not expect Jesus to
love you and bear with you, though loaded with defects ? What if
God should condemn you, as you well know you are compelled con-
stantly to condemn yourself !

Lord, many a time, I am a-weary quite

Of my own self, my sin, my vanity ;
Yet be not Thou — or I am lost outright —
Weary of me.

And hate against myself I often bear,

And enter with myself in fierce debate.
Take Thou no part against myself, nor share
In that just hate.

142 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

Best friends might loathe us, if what things perverse

We know of our own selves, they also knew.
Lord, Holy One, if Thou, who knowest worse,
Should'st loathe us too.

This humbling confession of the poet, is it not yours ? And, after
this, will you be eagle-sighted to detect blemishes in your brother —
motes in your brother's eye — and plead his imperfections as a reason
for not loving him ? Ah, my dear hearer, how little have you been
in the school of Christ ; what a stranger are you to th^rt love which
he taught, and which his whole life exemplified.

II. " That ye love one another." I have thus spoken of this part-
ing injunction of the Redeemer. Of this heavenly grace we know,
alas ! little but the name. The models of greatness which we dream
of in youth, and which we admire in mature age, are they not men
of the world, leaders in the world, who utterly despise this precept?
And even in the church, our eulogiums of this love are, I had almost
said, epitaphs upon a dead virtue. If a man complies with some
natural impulses of humanity, if he expends some small sums in
alms, he is regarded as a charitable man, though he indulges in
calumny, vindictiveness, every form of selfishness. But without
love, nothing is charity. " Though I bestow all my goods to feed -
the poor, and have not love, it profiteth me nothing." If a man con-
tributes to build churches, and is zealous about ceremonies and rites
and dogmas, he is a model of devotion, though he be ever so intol-
erant and bigoted. But without love, nothing is devotion. " Though
I give my body to be burned, and have not love, it profiteth me
nothing." In our remaining article, I am going to examine what
there is of novelty in this injunction. For Jesus designates this pre-
cept as a new enactment. " A new commandment I give unto you,
That ye love one another."

Now, at first, this seems strange; for to love others was an old com-
mandment ; it pervades the Old Testament, and Jesus himself gives
it as an epitome of the second table of the decalogue./ How, then,
can it be called new ? This is a question which has excited much
discussion ; in fact, however, John, who records the text, has fur-
nished its explanation. In his First Epistle he says : " Brethren, 1
write no new commandmetit unto you, but an old commandment
which ye had from the beginning; again a new commandment I
write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you ; because the

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 143

darkness is past, and the true light now shinefh." And he then en-
forces the new command of love to our brother. To love, then, is an
old commandment ; but now, since Christ has come to save us, it is
new, because a light is thrown upon this duty which presents it in
aspects and with motives never known before.

This is the general exposition given by the Holy Spirit. And if
you require me to go into detail, and to specify in what respects this
precept is new, the answer is easy. For it is manifest, in the first
place, that, under the Grospel, this commandment appeals to a new
principle. The affection here required is not what the world calls
friendship, for it is to be recognised by " all men " as the distinctive
trait of a disciple. It is an affection springing from faith ; hen^ce,
" Add to your faith — brotherly kindness." It is, in fact, a reverbe-
ration of our love to God.

I will explain myself; and, for this purpose, le't me ask you to
consider carefully the language of the apostle : " He that loveth not
his brother, whom he hath seen, how can he love God, whom he hath
not seen ? " Does not this reasoning seem to you very illogical ? Is
it easier, then, to love a man, with all his defects before me, than to
love the blessed God ? The solution of this difficulty is found in the
nature of the love inculcated. It is not attachment to a human being
for his natural excellences, but complacency in the image of God
reflected by him. If this likeness, thus brought near and vividly in
contact with our senses, has no charm for us, how can we pretend to
love God, whose character we can only dimly apprehend by faith ?
" Every one that loveth him that begat, loveth him also that is be-
gotten of him." Now, Jesus has made a new revelation of the
Father. When we say that God is a king, we speak metaphorically;
but his fatherhood is not a figure. That we are not the inhabitants
of a forlorn, forsaken, fatherless world — that God sustains to us rela-
tions infinitely more tender and enduring than those between us and
the parents from whom have sprung only our bodies — this is a glo-
rious, strengthening, rejoicing truth. It is, however, a truth which
patriarch and prophet never reached. Among the proofs of deprav-
ity which everywhere met his eye, none seems to have affected the
Saviour more than this ignorance. He saw the world living as if
the fatherhood of God were a falsehood. Hence that melancholy
exclamation, " 0 righteous Father! the world hath not known thee;"
and hence his constant anxiety to elevate the minds and hearts of

144 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

his disciples to this great truth. Jesus revealed the Father; and
what a revelation ! " Grod so loved the world that he gave his only
begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish,
but have everlasting life." Such a manifestation not only sheds
amazing glory on our race, but binds us together by the dearest
brotherhood. The old commandment was written on stone ; but it
becomes new, because it is now engraved upon the heart by rays
which come directly from the love of God as it shines in the face of
Jesus.

This first remark suggests a second. If this love to our brethren
be an emanation and reflection of our love to God, it will, of course,
embrace all who are the children of God ; and the commandment is
therefore new, not only in its principle, but in its extent.

It is a fearful observation of Hezel, but too true, that " To nothing
is man more inclined than to the hatred of man." What an appal-
ling lesson in those words of the apostle, " This is the message
which ye had from the beginning, that ye should love one another.
Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother."
That is to say, the want of love is secret hatred, and this hatred only
waits for provocation to commit murder. Indeed, " He that hatcth
his brother is a murderer." Even in the Old Testament, love was
limited, partial, selfish. There, it is " My God J' Jesus first taught
us to say " Our Father," thus abolishing all exclusiveness, and estab-
lishing a new and heavenly union among all the children of God-

My brethren, this is a sublime truth. I know not how it affects
you, but the more I revolve it, the more intensely am I conscious
that Jesus was more than man. Consider who he was, if he pos-
sessed not the divinity he claimed ; he was, then, only a poor, ob-
scure, unlearned youth, and that youth a Hebrew. How impossible
for him not to imbibe the prejudices of his nation, which caused
them to shrink from all contact with other people as defiling. When
I recollect the age in which Jesus appeared, and the nation from
which he sprang, and then hear him revealing this doctrine — a
doctrine which, even at this day, after eighteen hundred years, is
still new and unintelligible to most Christians — I confess I feel a
conviction, which I cannot express, of his immeasurable elevation
above humanity. And I feel, too, that the bonds in which the Gos-
pel unites liis followers are new bonds, comprehending all in one
new body; that in him there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 145

neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female," there is
neither rich nor poor, honored nor obscure, alien nor kindred,
stranger nor friend ; but " all are one in Christ Jesus." All other
ties and relations are subordinated to this I'e-ligion — this new spir-
itual affinity, which re-hinds us to Christ and to each other.

"The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost."
Separated from God, men are walled off from each other by selfish
and hostile distinctions. To repair these unnatural breaches, the
" Son of God " became " Son of Man " — not of any particular man,
but of humanity. He thus put himself in communication with our
common nature, that he might attract us all to God, and unite us all
to one another by new and heavenly ties. Those who have learned
of Jesus will rejoice in the spiritual equality of all who are in him.
As applied to any of them, the term " lower orders," too often heard
in the church and pulpit, is a direct insult to the Redeemer. When,
where, did the carpenter's son ever use or teach such an epithet ?

And this brings us to a third novelty in this command of the
Saviour. I mean its spirituality. The love mentioned in our text is
affection, not only for the bodies, but for the souls of our brethren.

If it be a grand truth that Jesus came to reveal the Father to man,
it is another grand truth, that he came to reveal man to himself.
You all know the effect of familiarity in dulling our sensibilities, so
that the orb of day, in his noontide glory, attracts less attention than
the blaze of a meteor or the glare of a rocket. But for this deaden-
ing influence of familiarity, we would at once be struck with the
startling originality of Christ's teachings as to the soul of man. That
our nature is spiritual, I believe, indeed, to be one of the radical
truths received from God at the creation; but humanity had lost it;
scarcely a dim echo of it had been transmitted.

Like the royal child of whom we read, man had degenerated from
the pristine consciousness of his dignity. Why, even now, and in
lands called Christian — nay, in churches called Christian — how few
really and practically recognise the soul. Jesus proclaimed this
truth — a truth which our nature longed to hear. In his teachings,
the soul is everything. Little cared ho for what was external. He
heeded neither the trappings of the prince nor the rags of the beg-
gar. Beneath all, through all, he saw a soul whose dignity and worth
transcend finite thought ; and with what solemn warnings, with what
intense earnestness, with what weeping entreaties and expostulations,
10

146 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

did lie not seek to awaken in man a sense of the existence and glory
and danger of that immortal spirit. This was the source of the bitter
tears he shed — not poverty, nor sickness, nor sorrow, nor the death
of man's body — but the soul, which was everywhere overlooked and
wronged, and about to perish forever.

This caused him to cling to every human being with an interest
which no guilt could destroy, a compassion which no injuries nor
insults could exhaust. The only charge which his enemies could
ever prove against him was conveyed in that sneer, 'j This man re-
ceiveth sinners, and eateth with them." And, catching his spirit,
breathing an atmosphere yet warm, vibrating with the benedictions
of their ascended Lord, see what a new passion inflames the souls of
his disciples. Observe, first, their love among themselves. Selfish-
ness is expelled by a new and absorbing devotion to each other.
They are initiated into a new brotherhood which astonishes the men
of the world, who — unable to comprehend this mystery — exclaim,
" See how these Christians love one another." Nor did they only
identify themselves with each other. The spirit which Jesus be-
queathed to them could not find adequate vent in the church ; it
overleaped all restraints, and inaugurated an enterprise which was,
and still is, the most glorious spectacle to angels. Men traversing
the earth, and enduring toil and suff"ering, not for gain, but for love
to their enemies ; men renouncing home, wealth, ease, honor, and
welcoming poverty, reproach, shipwreck, dungeons, cruel deaths,
not to win. honor or fame, but to save the souls of others — here was
a phenomenon — here was a wonderful epoch in the archives of our
race. This new revelation of the transcendent glory of the soul,
flooded the hearts of that little band of apostles, and sent them
through the world, burning with a zeal and love which were inde-
fatigable and inextinguishable.

- A fourth novelty in the Saviour's command is its comprehensive-
ness ; for it embraces and renders superfluous all other commands.
A testator, about to die, executes a new will, which, while it ratifies,
supersedes all former wills.

• Manifold are the duties which the word and spirit of Christ re-
quire us to perform towards each other, but " Love is the fulfilling
of the whole law." The life, health, property, purity, reputation,
happiness, salvation of a brother— these should be sacred to us. To
injure a Christian in either of these respects is such a sin, that Jesus

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 147

declares, " It were better for a man that a millstone were liaugcd
about his neck, and he drowned in the depth of the sea," than to
wrong the humblest of his people. But if love reign in our hearts,
no enactments will be needed as to these obligations ; our conduct
will be regulated by a higher and holier motive than the dread of
penalty. Every former commandment is merged in this command-
ment, every duty is comprised in this duty.

It is, however, above all, in the type and example and measure of
love prescribed, that this precept is unique and singular ; for we are
to love each other as Christ hath loved us. " A new commandment
I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that
ye also love one another."

I wish you, my friends, to feel this closing remark. And to im-
press it upon your hearts, let me remind you that, in speaking of a
new commandment, Jesus plainly refers to the moral code published
on Sinai. This was sealed and ratified with blood. *' Neither was
the first testament dedicated without blood. For when Moses had
spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took
the blood of calves and of goats, with water and with scarlet wool
and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book and all the people, saying,
This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto
you." Now, when the Saviour uttered the commandment in our
text, he was seated at the table upon which the supper had just
been received; he had just instituted that solemn and touching
ordinance, saying, '' This is my body which is broken for you, this
is my blood which is shed for you " — thus dedicating this new testa-
ment with his own blood. And, thus consecrated and enforced,
well may this commandment be called new. "As I have loved
you " — this is his own interpretation of the newness of this com-
mand ; but who can comprehend all the import of these words ?
How many admonitions, and reproofs, and exhortations, are con-
densed into that single sentence .

A love how attentive — as considerate and assiduous as the tender-
ness of a woman. Are others hungry ? he works miracles to feed
them, but will not employ his power for himself, even when famish-
ing in the wilderness. Are his disciples weary? he bids them
" Come apart and rest awhile," but gives no repose to his exhausted
frame Even in his agony, he is concerned to provide a home and
tender sympathy for John, whose heart would be most bitterly wrung

148 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

by his bereavement, avS well as for his mother. ''When Jesus there-
fore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by whom he loved,
he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy Son ! Then saith he
to the disciple. Behold thy mother ! " And we are to love as he
loved, with the same considerate assiduous solicitude.

A love how confiding. " Having loved his own which were in the
world, he loved them unto the end." Often had they been faith-
less ; and now, while addressing them, he knows that they will all
in a few hours forsake him. Yet he trusts them; -he opens his
whole heart to them; he commits his cause to their keeping. And
we must love as he loved. Nothing so alienates human hearts as
suspicion; nothing cements others to us more strongly, and more
certainly secures fidelity and devotion, than confidence.

A love so condescending, that it stoops to the most menial oflice
of kindness and hospitality. It was just before uttering the text,
that he performed an act which I can never recall without tears,
when I remember his consciousness of ineffable majesty. "And
Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands,
and that he was come from God, and went to God ; he riseth from
supper and laid aside hia garment, and took a towel and girded
himself After that, he poureth water into a basin, and began to
wash the disciples feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith
he was girded." And we are to love as he loved. " Ye call me
Lord and Master, and ye say well; for so I am. If I, then, your
Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one
another's feet."

Love so compassionate, that he not only pronounces every sin,
however aggravated, pardonable, if only against himself; but he is
ingenious in finding apologies for all the weaknesses, even for the
baseness and treachery, of those he had trusted. Could a.nything
be more unfeeling than the want of sympathy in his three chosen
friends in the garden ? They could not, for one hour, watch with
him in his sore anguish. But he pities them, and^excuses them,
saying, " The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." Was
ever such vileness as that of Thomas, who stubbornly rejects all
proofs, and dictates the most unreasonable, not -to say impious, con-
ditions? But Jesus not' only forgives him, he complies with the
demands of this perverse disciple. All forsook him, and Peter
denied him. Does he resent this perfidiousness? Scarcely has he

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 149

risen, before he sends a special message of love to Peter, '' Go tell
my disciples and Peter ; " and he appears to the apostles without
a word of reproof, with assurances of a devotion which no ingratitude,
no turpitude, could alter.

Love so disinterested, that he entirely forgets himself when his
friends are in sorrow or danger. The fearful hour of his crucifixion
is at hand, but he is solely occupied in encoui'aging and comforting
those whom he is about to leave as orphans in the world. The armed
band approach in the night, he at once throws himself between
them and the apostles, hastening to immolate himself that he may
cover his disciples. " If ye seek me," he says, " let these go their
way." And when toiling up the hill, bearing his cross, he is un-
willing that the women should be afflicted for him. "■ Daughters
of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and for
your children."

But I will never have done upon this subject. " Having loved his
own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end." Having
devoted his whole life to his disciples, so that he could appeal to
them, " if they had lacked anything," he now welcomes death, and
pours out his blood for them. " Christ loved the church, and gave
himself for it." " Greater love hath no man than this, that a man
lay down his life for his friends." On the cross he bears our bur-
den, that we might learn to " bear one another's burden." Risen,
he remains forty days upon earth, teaching us that no prospect of
happiness should cause us to forget our brethren. Ascending, his
eyes turn not to the radiant gates which are lifted up to usher him
into glory; they are bent upon objects dearer to his heart — upon his
little flock, whom he "is blessing" as he rises from the earth, and
continues blessing until " a cloud " of angels " receives him out of
their sight." Nor has his love known, nor will it ever know, any
abatement. " The Forerunner is /o?- us entered " into heaven. In
the midst of the throne he still loves to wear our humanity ; he is
still " a merciful High Priest, touched with the feeling of our infirm-
ities." No elevation can weaken his sympathy for the humblest
Christian. Surrounded by glorified worshippers, his delight is still
in his church upon earth. The salvation of sinners was "the joy
set before him " in the days of his suffering pilgrimage here ; and
it is when beholding the peace and happiness and safety of his peo-
ple, that he " sees of the ti-avail of his soul and is satisfied," " A

150 THE NEW COMMANDMENT.

friend of publicans and sinners!" tliis was tlie contemptuous derision
flung against him by the superb Pharisees. He does not repel the
impeachment ; he glories in it. He prefers that title above all his
titles. All over this guilty earth he would have it proclaimed ; he
would have it inscribed on every pulpit, and recorded in every human
heart ; and yonder, where he sits with cherubim and seraphim fall-
ing at his feet, it is written upon his blazing diadem, " The friend
of publicans and sinners."

]My brethren, my beloved brethren, what a type, what a pattern
of love is this. And thus to love is the normal condition of human-
ity to which Jesus has come to restore us. Behold how he loved
us! "He saved others," said his enemies, ''himself lie could not
save ] " how could he, since it was by the sacrifice of himself that
others were to be saved ? Let us cultivate a love like this. It is to
be cultivated ; it is not an impulse, but a principle ; it is not natural
to us in our fallen state, but is a fruit of the spirit, and is to 'be
habitually nourished and strengthened. Recollect we have no evi-
dence of piety, if we are destitute of this love. " We know that we
have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren."
" He that loveth not his brother, abideth in death." Without this
love we can never enter heaven ; nor, if admitted there, would it be
heaven to us. .

• But I will not, I cannot, urge any argument of fear ; let me press
other and tenderer pleas. My brethren, if the blood of Christ be
precious to us, let us love one another ; it is by that blood this pre-
cept is consecrated and charged upon us. If the truth, the cause of
Christ, be dear to us, let us love one another ; the triumph of that
truth, the success of that cause, depend upon our harmony, '-That
they all may be one, that the world may know that thou hast sent
me." Lastly, the farewell, dying words of one dear to us always sink
deep in our hearts ; then, let, oh, let this last parting entreaty of the
Redeemer be engraven on our souls, let it be incorporated into our
very being — rebuking our selfishness — correcting our prejudices —
calming our passions — expanding our afi'ections — binding us, not in
denominational, but in Christian union. He that loves his party
more than the image of G-od in his brother — though that image be
stamped on inferior metal,, and very imperfect — really loves his party
more than Christ, and himself more than everything.

"A new commandment I give unto you. That ye love one another;

THE NEW COMMANDMENT. 151

as I haye loved you, that ye also love one another" — a love not only
in spite of cliflFerences, but in spite of ingratitude and injm-ies — a
love linking us all to Christ, and each to the other, by ties which
shall outlive every earthly connection, which shall become stronger
and closer and dearer with each revolving cycle of eternity. God
grant that this love may flow from his own heart, and circulate
through all our hearts ! May it evermore dwell in us all richly !
" For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that
he would grant you according to the riches of his glory, to be
strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man ; that Christ
may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye, being rooted and grounded
in love, may be able to comprehend, with all saints, what is the
breadth and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ which
passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of
God. Now, unto Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly above
all that we can ask or think, according to the power that worketh in
us, unto Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all
ages, world without end. Amen."

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154 PROaRESS IN SIN.

method. It is not a systematic creed or code. It was not given to
us by a single writer, or in a single age. It consists of a large num-
ber of books. They were written at diflferent periods, extending
through a long course of centuries. The earliest portion dates back
beyond doubt to the very beginning of history and literature as they
have descended to us ; the last appeared soon after the glories of
the Augustan age. The authors were widely diverse in intellectual
culture. We have histories and biographies which record facts full
of moral interest and instruction with great beauty, and yet with the
utmost simplicity and with slight comment ; collections of proverbs
which come down with condescending grace to the rules of temporal
prudence, and rise up with lofty dignity to the principles of Divine
wisdom ; psalms so noble that they would become the golden harps
of angels, and yet such an outpouring of contrition and supplication
and acknowledgment of mercy as suit only man in his depths of
shame and woe, a wail as from a broken heart now trembling from
those chords, and anon a strain swept thence so joyous and exultant
and adoring that we are borne up to the company of the blessed and
close by the throne of God ; prophecies which are a history of the
world in advance, sometimes foreshowing events a few days remote,
and again sweeping in all-comprehending vision through ages and
centuries to the very end of time, minute in details about individuals
and dates and places, and yet embracing the destinies of nations, the
deep counsels of Jehovah, the conflicts of principalities and powers
belonging tq heaven, earth, and hell, and the vastest interests of hu-
manity; letters written to individuals and churches for their instruc-
tion and confirmation. We have a gradual disclosure of. truth and
grace from the time of the fall to the time of the Apostles, a period
containing distinctly-marked eras of religious light and observances,
the Antediluvian, Patriarchal, Mosaic, and Christian, new prophecies
coming out like stars in the firmament and, at last losing themselves
in the efi"ulgence of the rising sun, new symbols and rites being
given to prefigure the truth until the very substance was revealed in
Christ. And yet amid all these diversities we find unity, consist-
ency, one great plan developing, one holy spirit pervading the whole^
one design towards whose accomplishment every part tends in its
own force, and all harmoniously combine. The only explanation is
found in the fact that God at divers times and in sundry manners has
spoken unto us by the mouths and pens of His servants.

PROGRESS IN SIN. 155

I have chosen for consideration an incident in the life of Hazael,
briefly recorded iu the inspired history of Israel, and containing a
lesson and warning for the profit of all ages and all nations. I have
thought it proper to preface the discussion of the subject by some
general remarks concerning the Scriptures, with the design of recom-
mending the careful perusal of all their parts, because they display
the manifold wisdom of God, and are profitable for doctrine, reproof,
correction, and instruction in righteousness. Even in the historical
books you will discover the richest lessons of a wisdom unto salvation.
Let us now notice the few facts connected with the text, and try to
deduce thence an important truth.

Benhadad, king of Syria, was sick, and hearing that Elisha had
come to Damascus, he sends Hazael to inquire of the prophet
whether he would recover. Elisha replied, "Go, say unto him.
Thou mayest certainly recover ; howbeit, the Lord hath showed me
that he shall surely die." That is, his disease was not incurable,
but his death would be brought to pass by other means. He then
gazed fixedly on the king's servant until he was ashamed ; and the
prophet burst into tears. Hazael inquired into the meaning of that
weeping ; and the prophet replied, " Because I know the evil that
thou wilt do unto the children of Israel ; their strongholds wilt thou
set on fire, and their young men wilt thou slay with the sword, and
wilt dash their children, and rip up their women with child." Ha-
zael said, " But what, is thy servant a dog, that he should do this
great thing ? " and Elisha answered, " The Lord hath showed me
that thou shalt be king over Syria." He returned to the king, told
him that Elisha had predicted with certainty his recovery, on the
morrow sufi'ocated his master with a thick wet cloth spread over his
face, and reigned in his stead. Soon followed the oppression,
slaughter, and cruelty towards Israel, which, as foreseen, had brought
tears to the prophet's eyes. Truly, "the heart is deceitful above
all things, and desperately wicked j who can know it ? "

Hazael appeared to be filled with astonishment and mortification,
at the atrocities predicted by the prophet. Were these feelings
feigned or real ? Did he only pay to virtue the tribute, and pro-
nounce against himself the judgment, which have been extorted
from hypocrisy in all ages ? Did he have it in his heart to do all
these abominations at the very moment he afi"ected to be horror-
stricken at the idea that he could ever be brought to such baseness

156 PROGRESS IN SIN.

as to consent to them, and complained that the servant of the Lord
had made such grave charges against him ? Or have we not a right
to suppose, is it not in accordance both with the intimations of this
brief account and with the workings of human nature as shown in
the world's history to conclude, that he revolted with sincere disgust
and recoiled with sincere terror from the prospect of crimes so black
and base, and wondered in his heart why Elisha should suspect him
to be capable of committing them ? He had never had a motive for
such vast and foul cruelty, and do we not all know how little apt
men are to suspect that they would ever violate principles of right
and humanity, especially in a gross and infamous way, before they
have been placed in a position which furnished inducements and
temptations to do so ? We must remember that every man has in
his own conscience a testimony against sin, and in the better feelings
of his own heart a repugnance towards it, especially in the earlier
stages of life, ere that conscience has been blinded, and that heart
debased by familiarity with vice and crime. He must revere good-
ness though he may not possess sufficient strength of principle to
practice it, and must condemn wickedness though his lusts and pas-
sions may lead him to its perpetration. How ready men are to cen-
sure and denounce, in the most unmeasured terms, those sins from
which they themselves have been preserved either by a peculiar
temperament or by lack of motive and opportunity. Hazael, while
a servant, who executed his master's decrees without the responsi-
bility of fixing them, had not the power of oppression and massacre
on a large scale, nor was he urged by ambition to attempt such
schemes. No doubt he gave himself credit, as we do oui-selves, for
his freedom from crimes against which his circumstances alone had
shielded him. But when he saw the chance of ascending the throne,
he had not virtue to prevent him from seizing it by the assassination
of his king; and once grasping the sceptre, he indulged the royal
propensity of invading and subduing neighboring kingdoms, and
soon suppressed all qualms of conscience and sickness of heart at the
most relentless cruelty. Israel, deserted by God for their idolatries,
suffered as had been foretold. Hazael became by his own verdict a
dog, mean and cruel. He was not the first, or the last, to pronounce
beforehand the harshest eqndemnation of his own guilt. '

Does it still seem strange to you that he should have expressed so
great abhorrence towards a course which he soon pursued, unless it

PROGRESS IN SIN. 157

were sheer hypocrisy? Then I ask you, How would David have felt,
with regard to his conduct in the matter of Uriah, before the charms
of Bathsheba were displayed to him ? Do you not remember with
what hot wrath he pronounced sentence against himself unwittingly,
when Nathan the prophet related his act under the disguise of a
parable, and the king was not brought to a sense of his sin until the
prophet added, " Thou art the man ? " Do you not remember also
how Peter with sincere ardor afifirmed that he would follow Jesus to
the death, though all others should forsake Him, and yet that very
night denied Him with oaths and bitter cursing? These were far
better men than Hazael, but their lives teach a similar lesson, viz :
that under temptation we are often led to crimes which we had
loathed and hated, and which we would never have suspected our-
selves to be capable of committing, had not the temptation occurred.

I announce this proposition : Exposure to strong temptation and
a long course of evil often lead men to a depth of vice and an ex-
tremity of crime from the bare contemplation of which they would
once have shrunk with disgust and terror; they would have resented
with burning indignation as an unwarranted insult a warning from
the best friend to avoid such infamy, and would have sincerely ex-
pressed a preference for the poorest and obscurest condition to wealth
and rank acquired by such means.

You will notice that in this proposition I mention two influences,
the one arising from a man's situation, and the other from his own
previous course; for both forces co-operate to form his character
and determine his conduct. I do not intend to apologize for crime,
or exempt the criminal from responsibility, by attributing it to the
force of the circumstances amid which he is placed. Joseph fled
when strongly enticed to sin, and Daniel proved faithful to Je-
hovah, amid the profligacy of a court, and against the decree of his
king. We are not the mere slaves of our circumstances, but are
endowed with the power of will to bend them to our own purposes,
and by the aid of Divine grace may purify and strengthen our virtues
in the fires which were kindled to consume them, and the conflicts
which were waged to conquer them. But, beyond all dispute, cir-
cumstances do have great influence over us, and we may learn from
fliis fact two lessons : one of charity, not too stringently to judge
our fellows, without knowing the violence of the temptation to which
they yielded.

158 PROGRESS IN SIN.

Then at the balance let's be mute,

We never can adjust it;
What's done, we partly may compute,

But never what's resisted.

The other of caution, to avoid occasions of temptation, or, if we are
necessarily placed among them, to watch and pray with peculiar
earnestness that we be not overcome. But in a man's own heart and
habits you will find either a readiness to embrace the occasion of
sin when it shall occur, or else a virtue to resist it. When the spark
of temptation, struck out amid the collisions of life as fire from a
flint smitten by steel, falls upon a vast magazine of lust and passion,
inflammable and explosive materials in the heart, wide-spread devasta-
tion ensues. Those tempers might have slumbered there without
the knowledge of the person in whom they exist or of others, had
not the event occurred to excite the temptation, and the event may
have been without his choice or expectation. On the other hand,
the event might have transpired without these terrible results, had
not those passions previously existed, though dormant. Do we not
all know that the tiger in a man's heart, his ferocity of temper, his
dire revenge, has slept for years, and been quiet and harmless as a
lamb, until, aroused by some provocation, it has sprung upon its vic-
tim with merciless cruelty? Oi", to illustrate the gradual concurrence
of these internal and external forces as we most usually witness it,
hidden within the heart of the infant is a germ of depravity. It
soon develops and shoots forth. Drawing nourishment from the soil
in which it is placed, having the fatal power of growing alike amid
the sunshine of prosperity and the rains of adversity, and surrounded
by a favorable athiosphere of worldly influence, it increases and
strengthens until it has waxed' to the size of a great tree, its roots
deeply imbedded and firmly intertwined in the earth, its rugged
trunk towering aloft, and its wide-spread boughs laden with deadly
fruit.

To be impressed with this truth, cast your eye over ^ociety; review
the history of our race. What a variety of character is presented
to our view — what different shades and grades of sin. Here is a
luxuriant, there a stunted growth of iniquity. Or, to adopt the old
comparison of the soul to a sheet of paper, here is one with a few
pale stains, there another much defiled and blurred, and yonder a
third which is one foul blot. Whence this diversity? I do not

PROGRESS IN SIN. 159

deny a difference in the original moral texture of men, in the abso-
lute and comparative strength of the various appetites, propensities,
and tempers, from birth. But this is by no means adequate to ac-
count for the vast dissimilarity of character which prevails through-
out our globe.

Sprung from the man whose guilty fall

Corrupts our race and taints us all,

every one is born with an unholy nature, in which are enclosed the
elements of all sin. Those least liable to one sin may be most prone
to another ; and instances are not rare of the grievous disappointment
of early promise — virtuous and amiable youths becoming men of the
most depraved and atrocious lives. Nero, Rome's young Emperor,
weeps that he has ever learned to write, because he must sign a
decree for the execution of a criminal, and gives fair promise of the
restoration of morality and refinement to a city where abounded the
most inhuman and scandalous sins ; yet soon that tender-hearted,
blushing boy is converted into the most execrable monster and
tyrant, murdering his own mother, and surpassing all others in im-
purity and barbarity. But leaving out of question, just now, the
direct operations of Divine grace on the heart, the difference must
be chiefly attributed to two causes : 1. The influence of different
circumstances, both those over which they had no control — as the
land of their birth, the character of their parents, and the society in
which they were raised ; and those for which they afe responsible —
as the occupations they select, the associates they voluntarily seek or
allow, &c. 2. The influence of their own habits of thought, feeling,
and action. Here is a monster of iniquity, an outcast from all decent
society, who drinks down sin with greediness, and is restrained from
no abomination, either by fear of God or regard for man — a beast in
lust and a fiend in temper. There is another not so far gone, and yet
travelling the same road j the difference lies only in the length of
time during which they have pursued the common path ; this one
will soon be as far advanced as that. Here is a third who has lived
more years than either of those, but either has had fewer tempta-
tions and greater restraints, or else has resisted vigorously his evil
inclinations and cultivated virtuous sentiments; hence he is com-
paratively an unstained man.

Enter with me the court-house. See that man in the prisoner's
bos. He is charged with the malicious murder of a fellow man. His

160 PROGRESS IN SIN.

face may now wear upon its featiires legible impressions of guilt and
wretcliedness, from which you look away in disgust, or he may have
the aspect of fm honorable gentleman. But listen, as witness after
witness relates the horrid details of his crime, perhaps contrived with
deliberate malignity, perhaps executed as quickly as conceived upon
sudden temptation. And thus, for revenge or money, he hurries an
immortal spirit into the presence of the great God, and wrings the
hearts of parents, wife, and children, now childless, widowed, or-
phaned. The jury must find him guilty; the judge must pronounce
the sentence of death ; the story of his crime and condemnation must
pass from mouth to mouth of horror-stricken people, and be published
in the papers of the land ; the gallows must be erected, and in the
presence of a shuddering, sickened crowd, he must hang by the neck
until he is dead, dead, dead. And yet that man, wretch though you
justly call him now, was once an infant, pressed fondly to a mother's
bosom, and receiving the admiring kiss of a mother's love ; over .his
countenance played the smile of innocence and aflfeetion, and his
amusing prattle was the merriment of the house. Did the mother
imagine the time would ever come when that child, whose face was
overshadowed with grief by her slightest frown of displeasure, and
whose eyes filled with tears at her gentlest word of reproof — that
child with spirit so confiding, whose anger, if excited, would soon.
pass away and be forgotten — could ever become the obdurate, un-
principled perpetrator of a crime sufficient to freeze the blood of the
ordinarily humane, and demanding from outraged justice the taking
of his own life as the penalty ? Many happy days did that boy spend
at school, or in wandering over the fields, or playing upon the streets,
his laugh as loud and free, his heart as gleeful and generous, as warm
and hopeful, as those of his merry companions. Then he wept at
scenes and tales of suffering; then he quaked at deeds of blood. By
what spell of infernal magic has this strange transformation been
wrought ? How has this innocent babe, this lovely boy, this noble-
hearted youth, been changed into the degraded, blood-thirsty
wretch? Ah! by no magic-spell, by no mysterious witchery, has
this been done, but by a regular law of the moral nature or of
Divine appointment ; not in a moment, not in a day, but through a
process which progressed , steadily during years; slowly it may have
been, imperceptibly to others, unconsciously to himself, his heart
has been hardening, blackening, coming under the dominion of

PROGRESS IN SIN. 161

selfish and diabolical tempers ; and now you have the accursed re-
sult.

By a fixed law of God, I say, this moral transformation has been
wrought. " God is not mocked ; whatsoever a man soweth, that
shall he also reap." Life is the great seed-time ; through eternity,
the harvesting will last. We now scatter the seed; we will then
reap the abundant fruits. But each period of life is a seed-time, and
each following period a harvest. Youth is reaping what had been
sowed in childhood; manhood is an autumn, during which are ripened
and gathered the fruit of life's spring-time. You reap what you sow
in kind, but a more or less prolific increase in quantity. '' For he
that soweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption ; but he
that soweth to the spirit, shall of the spirit reap life everlasting."
The fact is as plain now as in the days of Eliphaz, who testifies :
" Even as I have seen, they that plough iniquity, and sow wicked-
ness, reap the same." And mark this diff'erence : that good seed
may mature its fruit, the heart must be prepared for its reception,
and the crop must be carefully tended, and the grass and weeds must
be kept out. But fling broadcast the seeds of evil ; do not watch, do
not assist them ; go and sleep, if you please ; you may be sure that
they will come up and thrive rankly.

Life is a warfare between the principles of good and evil. It begins
with the dawn of thought, and progresses to the hour of death. Sin,
though an usurper, is the reigning power from birOi, and occupies a
well-fortified citadel. But the tyrant has not undisputed sway. Vir-
tue, though not reigning, asserts her just claims to the throne, and
struggles to gain it. Every day, slight skirmishes occur; and occa-
sionally there are fought pitched battles, in which the contending
forces are all brought into the field, and the gravest interests are at
stake. ■ Do you not remember many of these spiritual conflicts be-
tween desire and conscience, the love of sin and the sense of duty ?
When sin gains a decided victory, the nobler sentiments are like a
defeated army, with thin and dispirited ranks. They do not surren-
der easily, however. But triumph follows triumph; the virtuous
feelings give battle less readily, and quickly retreat; at length, they
are thoroughly subdued, and sin rules without opposition or fear.

Many specific instances of this truth might be cited ; it applies to
every form which sin assumes, and to every individual by whom it is
practiced. The boy stammers forth a falsehood to his questioning
11

162 PROGKESS IN SIN.

parent, that he may conceal some fault and escape punishment; but
shame trips the tongue and burns the cheek, clearly disclosing
his guilt. The man will lie without a falter in his voice or a change
in his countenance. Have you ever seen a youth, in a fit of passion,
utter his first oath, and then stand still and silent, as though his
tongue had been paralyzed and his frame petrified, his conscience
convicting him of a great crime ? In a few years, he will pour out
oaths the most blasphemous, and curses the most fearful, without
compunction. A man lives in idleness or extravagance^ wilfully, ex-
ceeding his means, and plunging into debt ; pressed by creditors, too
lazy to work, ashamed to beg, unwilling to deny himself the luxuries
to which he is used, or to reduce the splendor in Which he has lived,
he at length tries to extricate himself from difficulty by forging his
neighbor's hand or plundering his drawer, or by some other means
not less swindling though more safe. A young man plays a game
of cards with some little stake, not to make money, but to increase
the interest of the sport, with a few companions, who wish to beguile
the hour cf its weariness or the heart of its care. He contracts a
fondness for the amusement, and spends hours at it every night; he
is led on to bet larger and larger sums, stimulated by success, or ren-
dered desperate by losses ; he acquires a disrelish for securer and
slower methods of getting riches, and a passion for gambling ; he
visits the hells which abound in our cities, hardens his heart to ada-
mant against every generous feeling, and plays himself into utter pov-
erty, or, what is more galling to an honorable man, into wealth
gotten unjustly from families thereby impoverished and ruined. You
have noticed the blush of offended modesty, as it spread over the face
of an ingenuous youth at some indelicate allusion. But he accustoms
himself to listen to the lewdest conversations, learns to laugh at the
coarsest jests, indulges his kindling passions by reading obscene
books, and enters on a course of unrestrained licentiousness. Need I
repeat the oft-told tale of the drunkard's career ? It commences with
a sparkling glass of wine on a festive occasion, when the coiled adder
is not seen or suspected to be near. It is continued in the private room
of a friend, to brighten intellect and enliven the soul. Then, in a
stealthy way, the bar-room is entered, and strong drink is demanded.
Intoxication at night; headache, shame, repentance, in the morning.
The system becomes used to the stimulant, demands it as a necessity,
is burning up by slow fires every day, is often inflamed by extraor-

PROGRESS IN SIN. 163

dinary potions. The generous, hopeful, intelligent youth has be-
come a slave in fetters, a doomed victim, tormented before death — a
dog — worse than a dog — more grossly indulging his appetites, and
falling into gutters where the dog is too cleanly to lie.

Learn, 0 man, he that tries to lead a holy life is like one who rolls
a heavy stone up the steep side of a lofty hill ; the tendency of na-
ture is to resist his effort, and bring the stone to the vale again.
Steadily, with patience and perseverance, must he struggle on, glad
even of small progress. If for a moment he relax his effort, it will
roll back to the foot of the hill, and he must begin the task anew.
But the servant of sin is like one who starts the rock from the top of
the hill ; the force of nature co-operates with him. On, on, with
ease and speed, it rolls ; he need not push it now ; its velocity rap-
idly increases ; such momentum has it gathered, that all his strength
would not suflSce to stop it, but, with fearful swiftness and force, it
rushes downward. Alas ! how we gravitate by our own nature to-
wards earth and hell !

A virtuous heart is like a most delicate musical instrument.
There is nothing half so beautiful on earth, and it gives forth the
richest melody that is heard this side of the gates of heaven. But
the breath of sin will tarnish its exquisite polish ; the least rudeness
will snap some string, and make its notes discordant. There are a
thousand avenues to the heart which must be carefully guarded, if
we would keep sin out. Some enticing form presetits itself to your
eye, some charmer sings in your ear. You gaze, you listen. Thought
dwells on the forbidden fruit ; desire is excited ; sense, imagination,
lust, are indulged ; the will yields, and the deed is done.

In conclusion, let us trace the downward progress. Its outward
steps are evident. The keeping of bad company, forsaking home and
church, visiting places unfavorable to virtue, jesting at sacred things
and the restraints of morality, plunging headlong into depths of in-
iquity, selling one's self to the devil.

But let us attempt an analysis of the internal process of degene-
racy.

1. There is the force of habit. It inclines us to repeat our acts,
and enables us to do so with greater ease. Its power augments with
each repetition, induced by itself in part. Every one knows that
habit renders things which were offensive agreeable, things which
were difficult easy, things which were indifferent necessary, and

164 PROGRESS IN SIN.

things which were pleasing beloved to idolatry. Each indulgence
in sin helps to form a habit of sin ; it drags on other indulgences,
which are an effect of the previous conduct, and a cause of sins to
come ; thus, as you this year reap the harvest of last year's sowing,
you sow a larger field, and prepare for a vaster harvest ; every turn
of the windlass wraps about you another coil of a chain, each of
whose links is hard enough to be broken. To give a single illustra-
tion, how quickly a man forms the custom of swearing, so that oaths
and curses drop unconsciously from his lips.

2. In addition to the strength of mere habit, we give greater
activity and vehemence to evil desire and passion by indulging them.
A man cherishes the love of money, and seeks with undue anxiety to
accumulate, until gold becomes his god, and his whole life an idola-
trous worship of it, and avarice eats up every good feeling. Or he
fosters ambition after place and power, applause and fame, until it
becomes a grasping, insatiate, absorbing craving, which leaves no
room for less selfish and more sacred principles. Anger and resent-
ment are nourished, until the spirit is thoroughly soured, or filled
with revenge. So with all the appetites, propensities, and passions.
They are fed with fuel, and flame with a violence which cannot be
quenched.

3. While the bad tempers are gaining strength, the better senti-
ments are dying for want of culture, and ma.i is losing his self-con-
trol. The stream is swollen, and rushes with torrent speed, and man,
like a log without power of resistance, is swept down.

4. Conscience once spoke loud in warning against sin, and in re-
proach when it was committed. Often it restrained the man; and
even when overcome, he felt uneasy and alarmed. But now that
voice has been so long disregarded, it is silenced, or speaks so indis-
tinctly that you hear it not amid the shouts of revelry, and the
clumor of desire, and the cry of passion. You sin without rebuke.

5. The mind is blinded. He loses his sense of right and wrong,
good and evil. He cannot see the truth. What vision he has is
perverted. Once there was a deformity in sin, a beauty in holiness,
but he walks in darkness now. The Gospel is hid unto him.

6. The heart hardens. Its feelings were once tender, but now
they are callous. Nothing can move him. Not even the mercy of
God, not the hope of heaven, not the fear of hell, not the triumphant
death of a Christian, not the unhappy death of a sinner, not all these

PROGRESS IN SIN. 165

combined, can stir his dead, can warm his icy, can soften his stony
heart.

7. The Holy Spirit, long grieved, many times repulsed, leaves
him — leaves him to himself. He is given up to his own lusts. He
is abandoned to his own folly. He is undisturbed in his ease and
pleasures. His companions wonder at the quiet and security which
he exhibits. The explanation is, that a benumbing chilliness has
overpowered him, and all sense of danger is lost, as he closes his
eyes, and sinks into a frozen slumber scarcely less profound than that
in which it soon ends, the sleep of an eternal death.

" Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way ? By taking
heed thereto according to Thy Word."

e^.

-•'^y.cmA? raoR3Kia(KEffl(Q)[n)Ei,

168 THE POWER OF FAITH.

creative, but deductive. It cannot project premises upon nothino-. If
it were possible, that would isolate man in the universe, and change
its steady faithful light, which is to irradiate every dark cavern and
lay open every mystery, into an ignis fatuus ; its fabric would be a
castle in the air, its teachings useless, hopeless hypotheses, fleeting
fancies, which in chaotic confusion would tumble one over the other,
and pass away like dreams before every succeeding wave of imagina-
tion. No! Science consists only in connection with Grod and Grod's
world ! It is not self-taught, but " taught of God." To,her wonder-
ing gaze nature lies open, and on expanded wings she passes through
the universe, and "sweeps suns and stars and galaxies in her range,"
then kneels reverently at the throne of God, to behold the truth of
every vision, and hear the interpretation of all things, and meekly
she closes her pinions on her breast, and returns to earth — in the
sweat of the brow, in the laboratory, in the study, with deep thought
and unwearied labor, to spell out the unutterable things heard in the
height, and read the name of God written in every law, and find His
truth in the appearances of His world.

It is this intuition, these assumptions of science, this basis of faith,
which lays her foundation upon grounds everlasting. No wonder
the first sages were the priests of the earth, her priests the teachers
of her children. And to this day, the true scholar, the earnest man
of science, is a priest, ministering at the altar of nature and nature's
God. Resting on the fundamental truths which are revealed to faith,
and called self-evident because incapable of demonstration, he carries
them through the created universe, its matter and its mind ; and by
their light examines every process, and by their rule measures every
depth ; and step by step deduces one truth after another, and links
them together in a chain with which he threads his way throuo'h the
labyrinth of the phenomenal world; and calls forth its hidden powers,
and combines them to new forces, and applies them for new pur-
poses, at every step verifying his processes by exhibiting the " im-
primatur" of its germinal truth — till he has made the circuit; and
from the sanctuary of the student's cell he steps forth', like Newton
carrying the tables on which are engraved the everlasting laws of
God's creation, or with the prophet-eye of a Leverrier descrying un-
known worlds, and bidding, stars to rise on the distant firmament in
obedience to those laws.

Our daily life furnis"hes a more accessible witness to the same

TEE POWER OF FAITH. 1^9

truth. Human society is so constituted, that it rests on the mutual
exercise oi faith on the part of its members. I cannot trust my
neighbor without believing in his truthfulness. I cannot esteem
him without assuming the dignity of his character. I cannot love
him unless the eye of faith has found the way to his heart. I cannot
labor without relying upon the coming reward. I cannot undertake
anything without looking for issues appreciated only by faith. My
every calculation, my daily work, the merchant's busy agency, the
statesman's plans and schemes, the legislator's care and circumspec-
tion— all become impossibilities without the substratum of faith, which
is " the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen." Yes, and that hope, which is our constant companion, which
visits with its smiles the darkest mind, and lays her balm on every
wounded spirit : what is it but " the soul reposing on the breast
of faith," the soul enjoying already the vision which faith has con-
jured up, and laying her hand on possessions the existence of which
is revealed only to the believing mind ? And is it strange or unrea-
sonable, is it not — humanly speaking — by necessity, and in perfect
harmony with that constitution which God gave to man, when He
made him receptive of impressions from without and from above,
that His revelation appeals to this faculty, and makes it the onlf/
medium through which He can be found and possessed, and His
truth incorporated in our life?

" Faith," saith the apostle, " is the substance of things hoped for,
the evidence of things not seen." It is "that feeling or faculty
within us, by which what is future and what is invisible is assumed
as real, and becomes the ruling element for our action in the present;
the faculty by which the future becomes to our minds greater than
the present, and what we do not see more powerful to influence us
than that we do see." Our Saviour expressed the same idea when
He upbraided the Pharisees : " How can ye believe which receive
honor one of another, and seek not the honor which cometh from
God only," who prefer the present to the future, the visible to the
invisible, the earthly to the heavenly? He lays His finger on the
true point at issue ; and what is true here in the special case of
" honor," is true of everything else — possessions, pleasures, gains,
gratifications, &c. Buried in the present, or looking up to what is
before and yet to come, looking aloft to what is higher and more val-
uable, and worth the surrender of the moment — that is the question !

170 THE POWER OF FAITH.

It has often been illustrated by plain cases in an ascending scale.
The child which forbears to eat the forbidden fruit, because of the
threatened punishment, the certainty of which overcomes with its
anticipated terrors the temptation before him ; the boy who submits
to the drudgery of the school-room and his daily task, because he has
regard to the promised reward of knowledge and distinction ; the
victim of vice, who forswears the intoxicating cup or the gambler's
hell, because to the eye of his mind are revealed, with a power that
claims obedience, the issues of the diverging roads of indulgence or
reformation ; the man who in his business, transactions overlooks
many a slight loss or sacrifice, counting on the increased popularity
he gains, and the sure reward that is to pour into his lap ; the spec-
ulator who risks his all on one cast, in the mad persuasion that his
scheme cannot fail, but must bring him in the coveted treasure : all —
in however subordinate a sphere, however unwarranted the premises
of some, however low the aim — all actu-pon the principle of faith.
The life of most men is just a fluctuation between these two domi-
nant influences — the strength of the present, or the power of faith.
The warfare is going on ; now the one, now the other master bears
the rule. The secret of .every failure is the want of persevering
faith. Victory is only theirs (whatever goal they may have placed
before them) who acknowledge the power of the invisible, who obey
the influence of faith !

The power of faith lies in this: It brings the object ever nearer,
and its eager gaze makes it clearer and more to be desired ; and yet,
it keeps up the stimulus and the fascination of suspense and excite-
ment ; it brings it so near, that hope aliKjady has a foretaste, and it
seems almost within the grasp of the eager soul. Yet it is still to he
obtained, and not yet in full possession, not yet exhausted, not yet
ours to satisfaction or satiety.^ it still has its coming reward ! Can
we not see, then, how deeply harmonized this principle is with the
very constitution of our mind and heart ? And, again, how rational
is the position of Scripture in proclaiming faith as th^ means of suc-
cess : " All things are possible to him that believeth ? "

This statement, it is true, finds its perfect fulfilment only in the
Christian; for he alone pursues, not only the highest, but what is
alone the true, the real object of faith. But it is approximately true
in everything. Where a man hai faith, his object — whatever it may
be, good or bad — becomes the one ruling thought and aim of his life.

THE POWER OF FAITH. 171

We know what a power is possessed by one idea. The man who
scatters his strength, and engages in a multiplicity of pursuits, rarely
excels in any, rarely meets with marked success. The Polyhistor,
the man who dabbles in every branch of science or literature, is great
in none. But when an earnest mind selects a "specialty," and
makes all the rivers of science and art tributaries to this one stream
on which he is embarked, he leaves his mark upon his age. Just so
in every department of life. Let a man be possessed with one great
thought and problem, to which he is ready to sacrifice all, for which
he counts all else but loss ; and the very difl&culties in his way will
but nerve his soul, and make the goal he runs for more desired. His
every thought and power and interest are absorbed in it, his soul
hungers for it more and more, and thirsts and craves for it with ever
keener zest; it becomes to him life, and wealth, and health, and hap-
piness, and all ; it is Ms religion, for which he gives up all else, to
which he consecrates his labor and his strength : that man cannot
fail ! If he does not actually gain the victory, and seize the crown,
and plant his trophy, he will fall on the battle-field of life, still un-
subdued, his wounds in his breast — that breast which was faithful to
the last to the idol of his soul !

From his earliest days, the Roman believed he was destined to
rule. Seven hundred years could not wear out his faith nor abate
his ardor ; but after seven hundred years of struggle and combat, the
world lay at his feet.

It was faith which nerved the heart of France to the horrors of
her revolution, and lashed it into mad rebellion against the rights of
God and man. The sj)ell was on her, and she quaked not in her march
through blood and terrorism ; and she quailed not before the coali-
tion of all Europe, and carried her eagles to every clime and land.
Nor did she falter in her course, and admit the allied armies on her
soil, till she was disenchanted with the object of her faith, and woke
aflPrighted, as from a fearful dream !

The gentle shepherdess of Dom-Remy, clad in steel, and carrying
the oriflamme, rallying the faltering followers of the Dauphin, it was
her faith — the fanatical faith, perhaps, which she placed in her own
divine visions and holy calling — that nerved her for the deadly con-
test, and gave her power over the armies of France, and struck terror
into the victory-crowned chivalry of England ! Only after she had
conducted the Dauphin to Rheims, and Charles VII had been

172 THE POWER OF FAITH.

crowned — only when her mission was completed — her star began to
set ; and Joan of Arc exhaled her pure, romantic life on the fagots
of Rouen ; but her faith had triumphed !

Like a second Noah, who for one hundred and twenty years was the
laughing-stock of his generation for building the ark, Columbus
braved the sneers and coldness of his contemporaries. The belief in
his heart that he should find a new world, he ventured on the broad
Atlantic ; his faith sustained him through all the long, long days and
nights, and all the storms of sea, and the more threatening dangers of
mutiny. On he steered, westward, ever westward. What though per-
secution afterwards assailed him, and ingratitude put him in chains !
That cry of " Land ! " " Land ! " ever rang in his ears. That reward
of his faith, when he planted the cross on St. Salvador — it was worth
the sufferings of an age.

All these are victories of faith. History and our daily life are full
of them. And we record these here to show the analogy, and how
the same principle prevails everywhere. But the issues must depend
on the nature of its object. And here is the difference between the
Christian and all others. As it is with the Christian's hope, " their
rock is not as our rock," so it is with his faith. Many others, like
him, may walk by faith, rather than sight; but if the object be
earthly, its reward must be so too. He may gain the gold for which
be hungered, and for the sake of which he stifled every generous
feeling. He may seize the honor for which he sacrificed his peace.
He may revel in excesses which but sink him lower than, the brute.
Ah! but he can look for naught beyond; he has had his reivard
here; he cannot complain if his sowing does not bring. up the fruit
of eternal life ; he cannot complain even if here in this life he suffers
shipwreck, and dies a martyr to his hopeless faith, without ever at-
taining fruition ; he cannot complain, if, in the world to come, he
rises to " the resurrection of damnation."

Nor is it every religious faith which gains the final victory. There
be many a deluded soul, which, in utter selfishness, just makes a
bargain of " profit and loss," and foregoes the sweets and sins of life,
not in the heart and disposition, but in open practice, to gain a
heaven of more lasting gratification, (oh ! what a heaven for a soul
of such tastes !) or which slaves it along in the bondage of penance
and self-torture, to merit the rewards of eternal life ! Between world-
liness, even as turned upon eternity, on one side, and superstition, as

THE POWER OF FAITH. 173

darkening the portals of free grace, on the other, behold the soul
passes free and victorious that believes in Christ ! Ah ! brethren,
Christ, the object of our faith ! Christ, our religion ! Christ, our
life ! Christ, the hope of glory ! Rere is a radical difference ! Here
the alone object that can last, for it alone is true; and here the power
which must insure the victory ! Believe in Christ, and there can he
no failure !

In Christ there is certain escape from ruin, for " there is no con-
demnation to them that are in Christ Jesus," and " His blood
cleanseth from all sin." In Him, there is certain possession of all
the glories and treasures of heaven. " When He shall appear, those
' whose life is hid in Him' shall appear with him in glory." " Where
I am, ye shall be also I "

But this is only the lower strata of the Christian faith. There is
a heaiity, a loveliness, and attraction, in Christ, as the object of faith,
before which every lower object fades into insignificance. It creates
a new affection, which casts out the world and its charms, and fills
the soul with the highest, most enduring passion. For the greater
the drafts of the believing soul, the richer the reward ; and Christ
becomes the more precious, the more the soul goes out to seek and
find Him !

Aye, there is a compulsion of love in Christ; there is a constrain-
ing power in the contemplation of His person and His love, which
captivates the soul, and carries it along to overcome every difficulty,
to triumph over every obstacle, to endure to the end, and find its life
only in the entire and eternal consecration of every thought, feeling,
faculty, power, means of soul, body, spirit, life, and death : " For
me to live is CHRIST ! "

And there is in Christ a promise of strength and help, the con-
sciousness of which becomes an impenetrable coat of mail, from
which every arrow of terror or fear falls off, and a source of power
which no human trust could give : " My grace is sufficient for thee ! "
sufficient in the day of prosperity, when ease and riches may betray
our faith; sufficient in the hour of temptation and the season of
trial, when the remnant of sin may start anew into life, and fear may
shake the heart; sufficient to break every fetter; sufficient to bear
meekly the thorn in the flesh; sufficient to carry us triumphantly
through the battle of life !

If Christ be our object of faith, if Christ our life; if we are in

174 THE POWER OF FAITH.

Christ, and have our being, our hopes and aims, our strength and
righteousness, our will and heaven in Him, it becomes the centre
from which radiate new light and life and strength, new thoughts
and feelings and hopes, upon our whole existence and all the objects
around us. "All things become new;" the truth is revealed "as it
is in Jesus." Sin is crimson with the blood of Christ. Mercy sure
and precious in the gift of the Only-begotten ; self abased in the
righteousness of faith ; strength unconquerable in the abiding pres-
ence and love of Him " to whom all power is given, in heaven and in
earth ; " holiness, the very craving of the soul, because it changes us
into the image of Christ ! This is the faith which nursed the heroes
of the Bible and the church — a St. Paul, a Luther, Henry Martyn !

Ah ! brethren, this faith — this faith in the atoning power of Christ's
death, in the prevailing efficacy of His intercession, in the fault-
less plea of His righteousness, the certain presence of His spirit, in
the unalterable faithfulness of His love — it can do all things, and it
can hear all things. Christ always xoith me, sharing my cross and
bearing my burden. Christ always xoith me, giving me His grace,
and working in me " to will and to do." Christ always with me, in
the hour of temptation, to cry to Him, " Lord, save, or I perish,"
and feel His helping hand; in the hour of weakness, to cry, "Lord,
increase my faith " — " Lord, I believe; help Thou my unbelief; " arid
to learn that, " when I am weak, then I am strong." Christ always
with me, with me, in the trials of this life, " as thy days, so shall
thy strength be ! " with me in the hour of death, "because I live, ye
shall live also." Aye, loho is he that overcometh the world, but he
who hclieveth that Jesus is the Son of God ? Yes, " all things are
possible to him that believeth ! "

He looks upon his sins buried in the sea of blood that flows from
Golgotha, and cries victory ! He raises his eye trustfully to Jesus,
the author and finisher of his faith, assured that there is no' condem-
nation for him in Christ, and cries victory ! He passes the allure-
ments of sin, and they fade before the glory of heaven, which is shed
on his path, and cries victory ! He meets the enemy, who like a de-
vouring lion obstructs his path, and with the Spirit's sword he slays
the fiend, and cries victory ! Death comes and lays his icy hand
upon the heart ; but heaxen is open, and the Kedeemer, standing on
the right hand of power, beckons the travelling soul to seize the
crown of glory, and, with his last breath, he cries victory ! The por-

THE POWER OF FAITH. 175

tals of heaven open, and the hosts of angels and archangels, wel-
coming the soul of the faithful, shout victory, victory ! And, wel-
comed by the Lamb of God into the Kingdom of Heaven, raised out
of the life of faith to the life of sight, out of hope to fruition, his
prayers are changed to praises ; and the armies of souls, redeemed
like him by faith in Christ, join in the song of jubilee, "Thanks,
thanks be unto god, "who giveth us the victory through
Jesus Christ our Lord 1 "

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178 REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION.

warranted terms of salvation are yet to he complied loitli by some of
you, if you are to escape the death that never dies, lij jJreaching,
God saves them that truly repent and turn to Him. Our business,
in preaching, is to bring the truths, whereby God convicts and con-
verts sinners and edifies believers in the ways of holiness and peace,
home to their consciousness and hearts. I come, then, to urge this
message, in the name of God, upon all whom it concerns — " Repent

YE THEREFORE, AND BE CONVERTED."

Plain, straightforward language is consistent with true kindness,
and best becomes this theme ; with such language would I speak to
my fellow men — my fellow sinners.

In addressing you as sinners, let it be understood that you are 7iot
arraigned, nor called upon to " repent and be converted," upon the
ground that you are exceptions in the scale of general morality, or
that you are more ungodly than your impenitent and unconverted
neighbors and acquaintance around you. Our Saviour. made no such
discriminations in His preaching; but among sinners of every grade,
and of all social positions, and in every path of wrong-doing, He and
His true disciples went everywhere, urging the same immediate duty,
and enforcing the appeal upon all with the same solemn and tre-
mendous alternative of the s'oul'g eternal ruin.

A sinner — be it then observed — is one who is out of the right loay ; ■
it matters not by what particular path he departs from God, or by
what particular forms of sin his alienation of heart and life is distin-
guished ; he is one of that great multitude of whom the world is so
full, of whom God has declared, •' They are ALL gone out of the
way."

Among a thousand, yea, ten thousand sinners, there may not be
found any two alihe in the outwa,rd manifestation of the alienation
of their hearts from God, their true and proper sovereign; and yet, as
a?Mack the predominant principle of genuine allegiance to God, tlds
is the just ground of His complaint against them, and of their con-
demnation in His sight ; and upon this basis the text is applicable to
each one of their entire number — to one as logically alid as impera-
tively as to another. This statement and view of the case must, I
think, be readily comprehended and assented to by all intelligent
and candid minds. Let it be supposed, by way of illustration, that,
as a father or master, you discover a predominant disposition in your
household, among your children and servants, to neglect your proper

RErENTANCE AND CONVERSION. 179

claims upon their regards and dutiful services ; your righteous au-
thor-ty is not submitted to in the true spirit of reverence and love by
any of them. No two of them, it may be, act out their disloyalty in
/Ac some way. This one uses your name disrespectfully; that one
appropriates to his own selfish use and ends the supplies of the family,
or the individual gifts conferred, without any proper appreciation of
your cr>,reful and kind provision and bestowments; another heedlessly
tramples upon the orderly regulations of the household, producing
confusion and waste. Your approbation is not prized; your honor'
is not consulted; your interests are not contemplated; and in respect
of each and all of them you find occasion, in the sorrow of grieved
love and despised authority, to exclaim, " If I be a father, where is
mine honor? If I be a master, where is my fear?" In such a case,
the recital of the different wrongs done by each — the profanity of
this, the selfishness of that, the heedlessness of another, the various
vices and debasing associations, habits, and resorts — all of these will
painfully affect you, each perhaps in a different way and degree; but
the root of the difficulty, and the common cavise of complaint with
them all, is, that they are alike alienated in heart from you; they
are all " gone out of the way." To sit down and discriminate as to
the precise and distinguishing forms and paths of their rebellion —
to cast up the exact amount and degree of their several offences —
this will not lead to the peace of your mind, nor will it procure the
approbation of your judgment or heart for any one 6f them. More-
over, should this individual offender seek to justify himself, because,
forsooth, he had not committed the offence peculiar to another ; or
that one claim your favor because his course had been less public,
or possibly less injurious or shameful than that of some others —
these several pleadings at self-justification would be, in themselves,
offensive, while as yet genuine love and loyalty were wanting in them
all.

The self-justification of one, at the expense of another, where all
were " out of the icay," would virtually be the setting up of sin, in
some form and degree, as the law of your household ; it could be
regarded only by you as a subtle plea/o>- sin, and for each individual's
preferred mode of transgression ; thus there would be added to the
injury first done to your authority and feelings, an insult to your
purity and good sense. What you would most earnestly desire, and
most righteously demand, would be — that each and every one of

180 REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION.

them should immediately and truly " repent and be converted "
from his way; and in every case of genuine repentance and conver-
sion that might occur, there would be this feeling common to them
all — " Against thee have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight,
and am not worthy to be owned as thy child, or servant." Each one
would see and feel his own sin most clearly and most deeply.

It is alienation of the heart from God that opens the door and
leads the way to all the outward forms of sin. This it is that gives
the sinner up to the various forms of temptation which may assail
him. In //its he diverges from the right way; and tliis alienation
of the heart from God is the corrupt stream and force which sets in
motion all the wheels of transgression.

The poison of the intoxicating cup may make one man taciturn,
another noisy, another mirthful, another profane, another pugna-
cious— all alike drunken and debased, deranged and demoralized ;
so the poison of apostacy in heart from God may put on innumerable
forms of debasement, and work out ever-varying kinds of mischief,
and there shall possibly be found as many kinds of sinners as there
are individual men, still one thing is true of them all — each one has
departed from God, each is devoid of holiness, each is obnoxious to
the Divine displeasure, and iii the way to hell. Therefore, to each
one does the appeal of the text apply with equal fureo, "Repeat

AND BE converted."

The disposition, so common in the world among sinners of different
classes, or of the same general class, to compare themselves one with
another, and to justify themselves, each in his own course of aliena-
tion from God, in his impenitent and unconverted state and way,
indicates most clearly an " evil heart," opposed to the holy claims
and righteous rule of Jehovah. This disposition is utterly at vari-
ance with right apprehensions of the attributes and honor of God,
and cannot coexist with true reverence for His law, or penitence for
sin. Indeed, where true penitence is felt, whilst each sinner will
deplore the sins of othersy be they the same or different from his own,
he will be apt to think worse of himself \\\?iX\ of othfers, inasmuch as
iti.s the proper office of the individual conscience in the bosom of a
man to press upon him the searching authority of his Maker and
Judge, to bring up into, absorbing view and to produce an abasing
sense of his own depravity and guilt.

Conscience, as a witness for God and an accuser of the individual

REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION. 181

man for his own sins against God, to his own shame and peril, drives
the truly convicted and penitent man away from all refuges such as
the unhumbled and impenitent seek to find in the greater or less
sins of other men.

The average impiety of other men around him is no shield or
ground of justification to one who is disposed to he honest with
himself and with his Maker. A petty defaulter, who should plead
exemption from the duty of repentance and convei'siou, or from the
enforcement of the sanctions of law, upon the ground that there were
many other instances of defalcation as bad or even worse than his
own, virtually repudiates the law of honesty, and pleads for a license
to commit repeated petty frauds. Such a plea is subversive of the
primary and fundamental principles of virtue and integrity, and a
defence of the principle and practice of sin. Such an advocacy of rt
little defakaiion, or wrong of any kind or degree, done toward God
or man, is, in itself, one of the most high-handed insults to God, and
one of the most injurious sentiments among men that can be com-
mitted or proclaimed. It goes to subvert the first ideas of moral
virtue. It saps the foundations of private integrity and public jus-
tice. Give it play and room, let it work out its legitimate results
unrestrained, and it would dethrone God himself.

What should we say of a worshipper of graven images, arraigned
before his Maker for that offence, who should exci^se himself, and
decline immediate repentance and conversion, upon the plea that his
neighbors worshipped a greater number of idols, or idols of a greater
size than his own? He pleads for his own idolatry ! Be it but one
image, and that a little one, a cheap one, he pleads for it ; and in
pleading for that one idol, however small, he pleads against the only
living and true God, and for idolatry in the principle of the thing.
That little idol, harbored and defended, shows a heart quite '' gone
out of the way." Thus the habitual cherishing and advocacy of the
least of all sins, (as men are accustomed to speak of " little sins,"")
and a refusal to '' repent and be converted," proves a heart stoutly
opposed to God and holiness, in league with the devil, and an abetter
of moral anarchy.

We may compassionate infirm humanity, when, under the force
of strong and sudden temptation, it falls into sin; and we may re-
joice over it with holy joy when, in self-condemning abasement, it
prostrates itself before God in the true spirit of repentance and con-

182 REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION.

version ; for such self-abasement, in view of its offence against the
Divine rule of truth and purity, is true dignity and honor. But when
apostate humanity habituates itself to known sin, in any form or
degree, and pleads for it under any pretext, refusing to " repent and
be converted," then, as we are true to God and moral virtue, we
must approve of the solemn expostulation and warning of the Bible,
wherein the God of Mercy and of Justice exclaims, "I will judge
you, 0 house of Israel, every one according to his vxiy, saith the Lord
God. Repent, and turn yourselves from all your traegressions ; so
iniquity shall not prove your ruin."

It is doubtless true that there are different degrees of guilt among
impenitent and unconverted men, of which God himself is the only
infallible judge; but as the spirit of sin is a spirit of delusion, and
as every sinner is one to whom the language of inspiration may be
applied, " a deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he cannot de-
liver his sold, nor say is there not a lie in my right hand?" hence it
follows that the sinner, great or small, is not a competent witness in
his own case. Each deceived and deceitful heart, in love with its
own sins, and prone to evade the spirituality and extent of the law
of God — prone, like Adam and Eve in the first transgression, to ex-
culpate itself at the expense of others — prone to magnify the mote
in a brother's eye, and to be unconscious of the beam in its own —
such a heart will fail to make a proper estimate of its own inward
depravity, or the evil of its outward conduct.

God only knows, and can reveal, the evil nature of sin. He has
expressed His estimate of it in the expulsion from paradise, and the
blight sent upon the entire earth as its theatre. He has expressed it
in one general deluge by water, and in one partial destruction by fire.
He has expressed it in the agonies of His Son Jesus Christ on the
Cross, endured in behalf of those who are guilty of sin ; aqd in the
fore-threatened and fore-shadowed doom of the impenitent and un-
converted, in the pains of hell forever. " The soul that sinneth, it
shall die."

In view, then, of the immeasurable and inexpressible baseness and
deinerit of all sin, considered as opjyosition to infinite holiness, good-
ness, truth, love, and majesty ; and in view of the deceiving power of
sin in the heart where it dwells, it would seem safe for each man to
act upon the apprehension, at least, that his heart and his sins may be
as blind and as base as the heart and sins of any other man possess-

REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION. 183

ing equal light and privileges. It is certain that no man, especially
no impenitent and uncouvcrtcd man, will ever over-estimate the cor-
ruption of his own heart or the guilt of his own transgressions against
the infinitely holy God. And we have already seen that the dispo-
sition to plead even for a supposed " little sin " is the very height of
oflFending.

Thus are we all, as sinners, g7'eat or small — and of this God is the
only proper judge — all shut up to the solemn and immediate obliga-
tion of repentance and conversion. To this solemn and immediate
duty, interest, and privilege, it is the design of this discourse to per-
suade the impenitent and unconverted, llepentance or perdition are
the alternatives in your case. '' Except ye repent," said the faithful,
loving Jesus, to a promiscuous assembly of sinners, " ye shall all like-
wise perish."

Casting aside all idle speculations, it is not difficult for candid
minds to understand the nature of true repentance and conversion.
The Holy Scriptures reveal the character and will of God — the one
every way worthy of supreme reverence, adoration, and love; the
otlier a sublimely and supremely excellent and authoritative rule of
feeling and action, in every relation and path of life. They repre-
sent this world, with all its objects and interests, as the moral domain
of Jehovah, where all the faculties of the souls and bodies of men
may and ought to be employed in the grateful and obedient recog-
nition and improvement of every gift of His bounty, and ordering of
His AVord and providence, to His honor and glory. THIS IS THE
RIGHT WAY — the way of truth, integrity, and honor ; of real hap-
piness and peace for mankind. This way it was in which the race
started its career in Eden. God smiled, and the human soul was
glad. Love, gratitude, and cheerful duty, were the sweetest per-
fumes of paradise; and the unclouded morning of creation witnessed
the offering of this holy incense from the hearts of creatures to their
approving Creator. This way has been departed from by all the
descendants of apostate Adam, begotten in his apostate likeness, and
following in his apostate steps. The call to repentance and conver-
sion is a call from GOD to His creatures, to come hack to Him, to
change their minds, their affections, and aims. It is a most righteous
call for God to make. It is a most righteous and noble obligation
for man, the sinner, to meet and respond to at once, without evasion
or reserve.

184 REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION.

In genuine repentance, the seed principle of opposition toward
God, and indifference to his will and honor, is abjured, with virtuous
shame and sorrow. There is baseness, disgrace, and peril, in sin, and
the repentant heart realizes and confesses it. God's order of things
in his moral government is right, useful, and tends to His glory and
the good of His creatures, and the repentant heart assents to and
rejoices in it. The way of apostacy from God is the way of the arch
tempter, and of all bad men ; the way of vice and all crime ; the way
of delusion and folly now, and of hopeless ruin and remorse beyond
the unknown limits of divine forbearance.

The repenting and converting soul — moved thereto by just views
of spiritual and eternal things, as urged upon it by the Word and
Spirit of God — trusting in the graciously-proffered remission of sins
through the blood of Christ, and the promised aids of Divine grace
to persevere in the right way, comes hack to God, saying, Forgive
me ! Uphold me ! Guide me ! Save me ! -

Blessed change ! Blessed is the soul that experiences it ! It is a
change from darkness to light — from the power of sin and Satan
unto God. Moral order takes the place of impious disorder in the
heart. Satan is dethroned, and God is enthroned in His proper place.

All who love God and truth, and who take pleasure in man's
highest interests — his only true happiness — rejoice over this change;
the good on earth and the good in heaven are glad; 'Hhere is joy in
the presence of the angels of God, over one sinner that repenteth."

The philanthropy of heaven and earth is in deep and holy sympa-
thy with this triumph of truth and grace in the penitent's soul, and
the echoing refrain swells upward, and downward, and onward —

" 0 how divine, how sweot the joy, •

When but one sinner turns,
And with an humble, broken heart, ,

His sins and errors mourns !

" Pleased with the news, the saints beloTT
In songs their tongues employ ; /

Beyond the skies the tidings go,
And heaven is filled with joy.

"Well pleased, the Father sees and hears

The consci'ous sinner's moan ;
Jesus receives him in His arms,

And claims him for His own.

REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION. 185

" Nor angels can their joys contain,

But kindle with new fire :
'The sinner lost is found,' they sing,

And strike the sounding lyre."

Repentance and conversion is no abstract, cold, difficult dogma
of religion, but a thing of plain and practical sense, and of vital
interest and experience. Some sinners — yea, a great multitude —
have experienced this change, and are examples and witnesses for
it, in heaven, and also now upon the earth. This experience is"
the line of demarcation between all that is pure and ennobling and
all that is impure and corrupting among mankind.

Why, 0 sinner, with these motives and calls from the revelations
of God, itrged upon you by the blessed Spirit, why should not you
REPENT AND TURN TO GOD ? The delusion of sin has led
you, it may be, far, far away from the way of purity and peace. That
delusion, strong as it is now, grows stronger by delay. If ever saved,
j-'ou must repent. Continued impenitency is itself a growing vice in
the heart, and crime in the life. It is iMerly indefendhle ; if per-
sisted in, it must grieve and tend to quench the Spirit of God from
your heart. It keeps you on the side of sin and guilt in this world,
thus giving all the force of your example to public irreligion. It may
quite possibly be said of some of you, in view of your respective po-
sitions in the family and in society, as the Saviour said to some in
IIIk day, " Yc shut up the Kingdom of Heaven against men; for ye
neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to
go in." Turn, then. Oh, turn now to God in Christ, from the
world's delusive snares, renouncing all for God, and submitting all
to God, as your soul's proper sovereign and choice.

If it were a matter of uncertain propriety to which you are urged,
you might hesitate ; but this change is divinely appropriate.

If it were a question of abstract speculation, you might content
yourself with neutrality ; but, so far from this, it is your personal,
immediate, chief concern.

Declining or deferring immediate repentance and conversion, is it
not obvious that you give moral preference to that which is evil, over
that which is good? and do you not virtually .say to God your Maker
and Christ your Saviour, " Depart from me, and follow me no more
with Divine counsels and merciful propo.sals?" Do you not virtually
say to the Holy Spirit, " Depart from me, and leave my conscience to

186 REPENTANCE AND CONVERSION.

slumber in sin, my heart to harden in impiety, and my soul under
the present displeasure and the suspended, avenging wrath of a holy
God?"

Will you not, now, be won to repentance and conversion — NOW ?

"Behold the SAVIOUR at thy door!
He gently knocks — has knocked before;
Has waited long — is waiting still ;
You treat no other Friend so ill.

" Oh, lovely attitude ! He stands

With melting heart and outstretched hands !

0 matchless kindness ! And He shows
This matchless kindness to His foes.

"Admit Him ; for the human breast
Ne'er entertained so kind a guest ;
Admit Him, or the hour's at hand
When at His bar denied you'll stand."

Let it be your grateful and glad response —

" Open my heart, Lord ; enter in ;
Slay every foe, and conquer sin.

1 now to Thee my all resign ;

My body, soul, and all, are Thine."

'IE PROPHET AND TEE KINa? OK, A MESSAO

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188 THE PROPHET AND THE KING ;

snatched away in the first dawn of life ; others are struck down in
the prime of manhood, or in the hlush of womanhood ; others, again,
are summoned away, stooping under the weight and infirmity of
years. Some pine away under the slow approaches of disease; some
are hurried ofi" by the sudden casualties with which the annals of
every-day life are crowded; while multitudes, like the leaves of
autumn scattered before the wind, are swept away by the blast of the
pestilence, or, like the blades of grass under the reaper's hand, are
mowed down in the red carnage of the battle-field. But for each and
all, it is the inevitable doom — the universal appointment.

Besides this universal and inevitable character of death, that
which invests it with still more seriousness and importance is the
true meaning of the event itself. Looking at death simply in the
light of nature, as the point of departure from time— the passage in
man's historj- where he pauses to look, for the last time, on the
scenes and associations of this world — it is a critical period. But
when we view this change in the light of Revelation, it becomes an
event a thousand times more critical and eventful. It is no longer
the shadowy and uncertain region where the great thinkers before
Christ, Socrates and Plato, tried in vain to penetrate, as the naviga-
tors before Columbus could see across the Atlantic nothing but an
abyss of waters. Nor is it the land of oblivion and eternal sleep into
which the French infidels thought they could convert it by a decree
of the Convention.

Jesus Christ has crossed the waters, and discovered the new world
on the other side. Jesus Christ has descended into those silent and
shadowy regions, and brought life and immortality to light. With
the chart of the Bible before us, death is discovered as a landmark
which points to the future, as w6ll as to the past — the act and mode
of entrance into the eternal world. The essential difi'erence Ijetween
the soul and the body is shown, so that the loss and disappearance of
the one in the grave does not afi'ect the continued life and conscious-
ness of the other. For the body to '' return to the dust " js for the spirit
to "return to God who gave it;" while according to its moral and
spiritual fitness or unfitness for that Holy Presence, will be its place
and destiny in the invisible world. These are the clear and unmis-
takable revelations of that <Word which all the principles of sound
criticism and historic faith compel us to receive as the Word of the
true and living God. To die, according to this testimony, is to

OR, A MESSAGE FROM GOD. 189

nass at once into the presence of our Maker and Judge. It is to
have all those trmendous revelations of the Bible, which now seem
so distant i-nd so shadowy, converted into objects of intense and im-
mediate consciousness. For the believer in the one Saviour, the one
great salvation, it is to enter into rest — it is to be " present with his
Lord." For the despiser of that Saviour, the neglecter of that great
salvation, it is to pass away to no intermediate place, no purgatorial
fires, but to go with Judas to " his own place" — to be cast, with the
unprofitable servant, into " outer darkness," where " the worm dieth
not, and the fire is not quenched." To all intents and purposes,
then, the hour of death is the day of judgment for every man. What-
ever additional solemnity the more public transactions of the last day
may give to the decisions of that judgment, if the Bible teaches any-
thing, it teaches that those decisions are virtually made and enforced
in the hour of death. Then for each and all, as death ushers them
separately and yet unceasingly into that interview with God, the
trumpet sounds, the great white throne is erected, and the sentence
goes forth which meets the spirit to bless and save, or to overwhelm
and destroy it forever.

Now. while to most, if not all, of those who may glance over these
lines, these reflections are among the admitted articles of their belief,
the singular fact here meets us, that of all events and occurrences in
this world, not one is so little regarded or anticipated as this great
hour of crisis anxl doom, which strikes for every man in death.
Everywhere else, in all that relates to this world, men will act with
forethought and sagacity. Every step of the way will be accurately
surveyed — all their plans and speculations arranged with the utmost
system and punctuality — not a domestic comfort, not a pecuniary
interest, not a dollar, not a cent, overlooked. But as soon as death
rises up and claims their consideration — this most momentous of all
events in their history — at once, and for the first time, a strange
lethargy seizes upon the soul, all its energies are paralyzed, and the
whole subject is entertained with impatience, if not speedily and
entirely dismissed. Every man's conscience will testify to the fact.
Under all the circumstances, it is an indifi"erence so strange, so con-
trary to those laws and principles which usually govern the human
mind, that there is but one explanation of it. The Word of God
supplies that explanation. Man, awake everywhere else, is asleep
here ; seeing everywhere else, is blind here ; living with all the en-

190 THE PROPHET AND THE KING;

ergies and sensibilities of his nature for this world, is dead, in all the
best feelings and powers of his soul, to the world to come.

What Foster says of conscience, rising up and rebuking the pas-
sions of the heart, may be said of this thought of death, as it flashes
across the chambers of the soul; it comes and stands, as some stern
and unwelcome intruder among a company of gay revellers. Men
who are lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God cannot be com-
fortable with either the rebuke of conscience or the thought of death.
Accordingly, they turn away from both. They are ingenious and
uni"emitting in their efforts to devise methods to silence the re-
proaches of the one, and to drown the very thought of the other.
As the cuttle-fish hides itself from its pursuer in the dark fluid with
which it discolors the surrounding water, so the soul, under the
cloud and cover of its vain speculations, seeks to evade the pursuit
of conscience, and the very thought of that calamity which impends
over it in death. Turning to the cares of life, the anxieties and
engrossments of business, men imagine that they find in these tem-
poral things which God commands, a plea for indifference in those
eternal things where God equally commands ; and while the prophet
warns, or the apostle reasons, they deem it a sufficient answer to each
and every monitor, '^Go thy way for this time; when we have a con-
venient season, we will call for thee." Or else, plunging into the'
whirl of fashionable life, and drinking deep at the fountains of for-
bidden pleasure, they are soothed by the songs of the enchantress,
and lulled into the oblivious slumbers of spiritual death,, until the
voice of conscience is drowned, the alarms of death are silenced, the
very power of reflection is paralyzed, while their language, incoherent
and murmuring under the delirium of sin, is that of the dying Mira-
beau — the language of a heart, where the profligacy and chilling
materialism of his age had crushed out every higher thought and
holier aspiration — " Crown me with flowers, sprinkle me with per-
fumes, that I may enter upon eternal sleep."

The prophet 'warns the king to set hi's house in order.

In these warnings of the Old Testament, the truth 6f a future life
is strikingly exhibited. The immortality of the soul, the future and
endless destiny of man, has been "brought to light" — clearly re-
vealed in the New Testament. All must live, whatever be-the mean-
ing of that life ; all must rise again, whatever be the character of
that resurrection. But underlying all these passages in the Old

GE, A 3IESSAGE FROM GOD. 191

Testament — passages where the notes of warning and preparation are
so distinctly sounded — the same truth may he discovered. The argu-
ment is indirect, but, on that very account, more striking. For why,
it may be asked, warn us to " set our house in order," or prepare at
all for death, if there is to be no judgment after it — no existence
beyond the grave, where that judgment is to be realized. If death
is an eternal sleep, where our being and the responsibility attached
to it is to be buried forever, then let our house be in disorder,
let us sleep on in worldliuess, unbelief, and sin. We can smile at all
the warnings of all the prophets in the world ; we can despise the
threatenings of the Almighty himself. Instead of setting our house
in order, and stirring ourselves to prepare for death, we can afford to
banish the whole subject from our minds, while we say, each to him-
self and to his neighbor, ''Take thine ease; eat, drink, and be
merry ; " " to-morrow we die.''

We may discover, then, from these very warnings, so constantly
sounded in the Old Testament, as well as from the clearer revela-
tions of the New, the great truth of life and immortality as the ap-
pointed destiny of man.

Side by side, however, with this truth of a future life, stands
another, which gives it additional seriousness and importance. Man
is immortal ; but man, as he is, has no assurance that that immor-
tality will be for him a state of happiness, or even of safety. The
truth is, the kingV house is iu disorder, and in no state to meet the
scrutiny of Him who comes to search Jerusalem with caudles. Men
talk of their innocence, and boast of their deportment before the
world. But, after all, this is but an evasion of the question, which
is not as to any appearance before men, but as to the true state of
the heart before God. This vague statement of the case is a style
of pleasing rhetoric and accommodating logic, which may do very
well in hours of frivolity ; but let that illusion, in which we love to
wrap ourselves, be dispelled by the touch of some serious calamity,
and these complacent thoughts and proud imaginations are broken
up as the mists of morning are scattered under the touch of the
solar rays.

The very thought of death, though the event itself may be at a
distance, is full of terror to the human heart. This, in one sense,
may be regarded as a wise safeguard which has been implanted by
God for the preservation of life. But where life has lost all its

192 THE PROPHET AND THE KING ;

charm and attractiveness, that terror and misgiving is still associated
with death. Another element, then, must enter into that fear of
death, which seems to lie at the very foundation of our nature. And
what is this but that deep and ineradicable conviction of sin which
every human being carries in his bosom — the consciousness of guilt,
and consequent unfitness for the presence of the holy and omniscient
Judge.

. And if the simple thought of death, and the misgiving that
thought occasions, reveals this fact, we are not surprised that actual
contact with the event itself invariably confirms thes'fe impressions.
As death approaches, how complete the change which begins to take
place in all our views and feelings ! Those sins which we had passed
over so lightly are at once invested with alarming magnitude. That
view of the Supreme Being which could overlook His holiness
and justice, and, by the imputation of a blind and indiscriminate
mercy, reduce Him to the level of human weakness, and make Him
"altogether such an one as ourselves," gives place to some just con-
ception of His character as the moral Governor of the Universe.
That oversight of Christ, the most wonderful being that ever
challenged the attention of the world — an oversight in which we
could persist with such singular deliberation and complacency — rises
up, and is seen, perhaps, for the first time, in the light in which -it
is discovered in the Gospel, as the neglect of the one Saviour, and
the one great salvation. Those excuses we could once urge with so
much confidence and composure, while we attempted to justify our
indifference to religion, and our devotion to the world — excuses
drawn from a thousand sources — from the difiiculties of Providence,
as if these difficulties did not constitute the great trial of life for
all — from the inconsistencies of professed Christians, as if these
sins of others could possibly afi'ect the question of personal duty —
from the mysteries connected with the Divine Being and government,
as if, with our limited vision, we could scan and measure those mighty
and complicated wheels that sweep through the universe in the vast-
ness of their dimensions, and embrace eternity in the grandeur of their
movements — as if the challenge of Jehovah to Job were not a sufficient
answer to all objections which our ignorance and littleness may sug-
gest— " Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth ?
Declare, if thou hast understanding " — -these sophistries with which
we could once beguile ourselves, while we declined the consideration

OR, A MESSAGE FROM GOD. 193

of religion and its claims — extenuations of our guilt, which, in the
blindness of self-love, we invested with such importance — all begin to
fade and vanish in the light of eternity, as the dreams which amused
or troubled the sleeper are broken up and scattered when the morn-
ing dawns upon his slumbers. The experiences of some may seem
to be at variance with this account j but unless the poison of infidelity
and a long familiarity with sin have eaten away every moral sense
and instinct of the soul, the approach of death will invariably sug-
gest these views and awaken these apprehensions.

Our house " in order ! " We, with the evil of sin unremedied in
our nature, ready to go forth and meet the scrutiny of the omnis-
cient Judge ! ready to confront that God whose law we have broken,
that Saviour whose love we have despised ! ready to have the record
of our whole life unfolded, and to challange the sentence of the
righteous and impartial Judge ! No ! with all the illusions of which
the human heart is capable, it can scarcely be betrayed into one so
monstrous as this. Our house is all in disorder and confusion. The
chambers of imagery within are crowded with tumultuous passions,
which cannot bear the inspection of the Omniscient Eye. The hard-
ness of the heart, the frivolity of the life, the eagerness and zest with
which multitudes are rushing into scenes so fatal to every principle
of piety, all testify to the moral and spiritual ruin into which sin has
plunged our nature, the total unfitness of man for the inevitable and
tremendous ordeal of the coming judgment. Sin'has involved the
whole race in a controversy with God — sin, so fearful in its curse,
and so far-reaching in its results, that Isaac Taylor has well said of
it, " If there were no other argument for a future life, sin would
furnish one never to be refuted ; for it tells of a cause standing over
between the Judge and ourselves, for the hearing and decision of
which^ a time must certainly come."

The king's house is in disorder. But as the warning of the prophet
rings through his chamber, he turns his pale face to the wall, and in
prayer and penitence begins to set his house in order. With the
mention and exposure of the evil, let us then suggest the remedy for
this disorder, which we believe God has mercifully provided.

Side by side with the great ''mystery of iniquity " stands the great
mystery of redemption — these two equally incompi^ehensible mysteries
in the history of this world.

When the judgments of God were upon the land of Egypt, the
13

194 THE PROPHET AND THE KING;

destroying angel, on that memorable night, entered every house and
slew the first-born of every family in the land. More dreadful than
that destroying angel, sin has entered the inmost life and home of
every soul, and left the mark and the curse of his presence on every
individual of the great family of man. According to the Divine
appointment, there was but one refuge from the sword of the destroy-
ing angel — it was the blood which God commanded Moses to sprinkle
oh the door posts of the Israelites. By the same appointment, there
is but one refuge from the curse and condemnation of sin, the sprin-
kling upon the guilty soul of that blood which was typified- by the
blood on the door posts of the Israelites — " the blood of Jesus Christ,
which cleanseth from all sin." Christ and the mystery of His Cross,
as revealed in the Gospel, is the only object in this world at the
presence of which the dark and disordered house of the human heart
can be restored to order and peace. The plan may be thus explained.
Among all the crowded habitations of men. His was the only house
which the judgment of God ever pronounced as perfectly in order;
among all the millions of the human family, He was the only Being
who, at the close of a pure and sinless life, could say, '' Father, I
have glorified Thee on the earth." In the glory of this work and
the completeness of this sacrifice. He is set forth in the Gospel as
the one great object of hope. By the merciful appointment of God,
He is proposed and accepted as the substitute of all who will accept
Him in this relation. In the act of looking to that Cross, and
believing on that Saviour, the guilty and the lost are identified with
Him in all the transactions of the Divine justice. He becomes the
Lord, their righteousness.

The warning of the prophet, then, to the king, " Set thine house
in order," is equivalent to the call of the apostle to every lost and
guilty creature upon earth, " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and
thou shalt be saved." The house of every soul that looks to Him
in faith, He will set in such order by the glory of His presence, that
the scrutiny of the last judgment itself will find nothing to condemn.
" It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment ;
so Christ was once ofi"ered to bear the sins of many, and to them that
look for Him, shall He appear the second time., without sin, unto
salvation." The sentence juay still go forth, " Thou shalt die, and
not live." But for the believer. He has divested that sentence of
all its gloom and terror. He, the Lord of life Himself, was " once

OR, A MESSAGE FROM GOD. 195

dead, and is now alive for evermore ; " and side by side witli tlie
sentence of death against us, is the sentence of life in Him. " Thou
shalt die, and not live," is written against us ; but the assurance is
equally clear and unmistakable, " He that believeth in I\Ie, though
he were dead, yet shall he live ; and he that liveth and believeth in
Me shall never die." During a season of severe illness, Mr. Cecil
once wrote these words: "When He said to me, by my physicians,
' Thou shalt die, and not live,' and especially when one of them told
me this with tears, my soul, like a man suddenly overwhelmed by aii
inundation, looked around to examine the ground on which it stood
to meet the unexpected trial. The ground was found to be such as
could secure me from any flood, and I was enabled to reply, My
friend, you do not alarm me. ' I know whom I have believed, and
am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed
unto Him, against that day.' " This fragment wa's written in the year
1799. The passage it quotes as the ground of consolation was
written about the middle of the first century. But in all ages, and
among all generations of men, the faith embodied in that great sen-
tence has constituted the one immovable foundation on which innu-
merable souls, swept away in wreck and ruin by the floods of sin that
have inundated the whole world, have been built up again in perfect
order and imperishable strength.

Nor is this all — this initiatory act and exercise of faith. Besides
that first movement which unites the soul to Christ, there is a subse-
quent movement, a constant, habitual preparation, which we cannot
overlook — a work necessarily growing out of and connected with all
true faith. It is the setting of the house in order, not once, but day
by day, to the end of life. Hezekiah, when the prophet came to
him, had been a man of faith and prayer for many years — one of the
most pious of all the kings of Judah. But his work is not done. God
stretches out His hand against him, and smites him with a malady
which, in its nature, is mortal. The king turns his face to the wall,
and pours out his soul in an agony of tears. He prays as men pray
when they feel the hand of God upon them. And lo ! the sentence,
always, it would seem, suspended on the exercise of penitence and
prayer, is arrested, and fifteen years more of hope and promise are
added to the king's life. As a sign from heaven that the promise
shall not fail, one of the greatest miracles recorded in the Bible is
wrought, and He who made the stars to " fight against Siscra," com-

196 THE PROPHET AND THE KING;

mands the sun to smile upon Hezekiah, and the shadow turns back
again ten degrees on the dial of Ahaz. He is saved. But alas for
the vanity and weakness of human nature in its best state. Even
after that stern lesson of illness and miraculous deliverance, we find
the record, "But Hezekiah rendered not again according to the
benefit done unto him ; for his heart was lifted up — lifted up with
pride." Again the Almighty touches him — " there was wrath upon
him, and upon Jerusalem." Once more he turns his face to the
wall ; the child is subdued at the reproof of his father^s^" Hezekiah
humbled himself for the pride of his heart." .

What child of God, or believer in Jesus, does not recognise him-
self in this portrait hung up in the picture gallery of the Old Testa-
ment. A complication of events in the providence of God, merciful
and mysterious, hedge up his path, and drive him to the Cross. He
beholds, and lives. A new life fills his soul ; a new hope brightens
on his path. But it is the life of faith in its germ ; the first breath-
ings of hope in its chrysalis form, fair and promising, but still fettered
by a " body of sin and death." How many struggles are still neces-
sary, before that body of sin and death is thrown aside, before the
thick and interlacing branches pf worldliness are broken off, and the
new creature in Christ Jesus, like the joyous insect soaring away
from the withered branch or twig where it was bound, moves and
exults in all its free and unrestrained energies, in the light and
splendor of the heavenly world. Alternate light and darkness, joy
and sorrow, health and sickness — these are the shifting scenes of that
path where the Father in heaven leads His child upon earth — that
path so bright, at times, that it seems to touch the very borders of
Immauuel's land; and then so dark and cheerless, that the trembling-
child can only grasp his Father's hand, and whisper, " He knoweth
the way that I take." But through all these alternations and vicissi-
tudes, it is a gradual though irregular progress, a setting of the house
more and more in order, "the path of the just like the shining light,
shining more and more to the perfect day." If it ^is first of all,
" through belief of the truth," that our house is set in order, it is
always afterwards " through sanctification of the spirit " that that
house is prepared for the coming of the Master, furnished and
adorned as the dwelling place of the Spirit of holiness.

A German writer has remarked that God accounts nothing right-
e9us which is not so in reality. If he means that whenever God ac-

OR, A MESSAGE FROM GOD. 197

counts the sinner righteous by the imputation of the righteousness
of Chi-ist, He makes him truly and personally righteous by the in-
fluences of the Spirit, this is a great and invariable truth — the law
of the progress and perfection of the Divine life in the human soul.
The work of yesterday will not answer for to-day, nor the work of
to-day for to-morrow. Each successive day and year, as they bring,
in their onward march, new trials and sterner experiences, demand,
as the condition of our safety, constant effort and increasing vigilance
to the end. " This one thing I do, forgetting the things that are
behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I
press toward the mark, for the prize of the high calling of God in
Christ Jesus." The Christian is a soldier, and, with his armor on,
he may be ready for the battle ; but if he foils asleep at his post, or
on the field, a child may disarm him. The believer is a pilgrim,
and with his face turned to the shining city, "that'city whose builder
and whose maker is God," he is in the way of life; but if ho turns
aside to the enchanted grounds of forbidden pleasure, he may touch
the very borders of Immanuel's land, and still not enter. The child
of God is a sentinel placed on duty upon the plains of life, and watch-
ing in the darkness and silence of the night for the coming of the
Master ; but if he suffers himself to be overtaken by the dalliance
of sin, or lulled asleep on the open plain by the songs of the enchant-
ress, that cry may at last burst upon him in a dreadful and unex-
pected hour, '■'■ Behold, the Bridegroom cometh ; go ye out to meet
Him." There is peace, it is true, for the believer, even here, in an-
ticipation of heaven. But as the albatross rests on the bosom of the
wave, or was supposed, in the superstitions of the mariner, to sleep
even on the wing, so with the child of God, in the region of the
new life, the congenial element where the principles of faith and
hope expand their wings and take their delightful excursions, he
reposes amid all the storms that surround him, and finds in the very
act of putting forth his energies in the service of his God, that peace
which passeth all understanding.

Let me then whisper one parting word of warning, as we take
leave of the prophet and the king. '' Awake, 0 sleeper I " '' Set
thine house in order ! "

To him whose eye, in the providence of God, may be directed to
these pages, I would say. This is a message from God to you. '' It
is not a vain thing for you, because it is your life." Let the trav-

198 THE PROPHET AND THE KING, ETC.

eller, lost in some trackless wilderness, smile at his peril. Let the
shipwrecked mariner, drifting far out on a stormy sea, laugh at the
winds and the waves. Let the criminal on his way to the scaffold
indulge, if he will, in levity. But, 0 impenitent man, unregenerate
woman, lover of pleasure more than lover of God, make not light of
that evil of sin which possesses thy soul — that " wrath of God re-
vealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of
jiien " — that wrath already darkening the horizon with the storm of
the coming judgment. Are you turning away from the.warning. of
the prophet because the bloom of youth is mantling your cheek, and
the life-blood of youth is bounding in your veins ? the arrow which
is to wither that bloom, and smite all that strength and beauty to
the grave, is already cleaving the air. Are you closing these pages,
as you have closed ten thousand before, because you have not yet
been brought, like Hezekiah, to the chamber of sickness and death —
because the future seems full of opportunity and radiant with prom-
ise ? The hope is as false as hell, as cruel as the grave. When that
chamber shall be once entered, your spirit, in crossing that threshold,
may have crossed the last boundary and terminus of hope. Amid
the wild distractions and crowding anxieties of that tremendous hour,
with a heart trembling in suspense, and a body shivering in the
pangs of dissolution, you may discover that in the dealing of a
dreadful though righteous retribution, the sweet visions of hope and
heaven have faded forever, and that " hell is truth seen too late."

'' Set thine house in order." King, prophet, minister, member
of the church, man of the world — the sentence has gone forth
against thee, '' Thou shalt die, and not live."

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200 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

now sends, at the hands of Samuel, the command, to execute the
long-impending sentence against the " sinners, the Amalekites."
" Now, go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have,
and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suck-
ling, ox and sheep, camel and ass." " And Saul smote the Amalek-
ites." His obedience, however, was not perfect ; he did not wholly
fulfil the Divine direction. For this Grod was wroth, and sent Sam-
uel to rebuke him, ''And Samuel came to Saul; and Saul said unto
him " — for hypocrisy is ever bold in its professions — " Blessed be
thou of the Lord; I have performed the commandment of the Lord."
But sin will have a tongue, though it be the braying of an ass or
the bleating of a sheep. " And Samuel said. What meaneth, then,
this bleating of the sheep in my ears, and the lowing of the oxen
which I hear ? " There are two ways in which sinners commonly
try to excuse their guilt. They either endeavor to shift its responsi-
bility upon others, or plead for it a religious motive, or they do both.
Saul had spared Agag the king, also the best of the sheep and the
oxen; but he avowed it was at the clamor of the people, and to ofier
in sacrifice to Grod. Samuel retorts upon him, ''Hath the Lord as
great delight in burnt-oiferings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice
of the Lord ? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken
than the fat of .rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and
stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry."

The text in its historical connections suggests the following theme :
That obedience to God's law is superior to disobedience,
even when attended by sacrifices to his cause.

The Jlrst leading thought offered in support of this proposition is.
If God should sanction or allow disobedience to His law for any
cause whatever, it would finally subvert His Kingdom altogether in
the earth.

It is an axiom in physics, that no two bodies can occupy the same
place at the same time. Every spiritual existence fills some sphei*e.
And it may be equally said that no two spirits precisely alike can
occupy the same position at one instant. Herein may be seen an
argument for the unity of God. There can be but one infinity — all
true and pure ideas of Godhead demand that He be infinite. It is
impossible to conceive of t\yo unlimited beings filling one unlimited
space, and hence there can be but one Infinite Being. The author-
ity of this one God must be equally prevalent with Himself, uni-

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE. 201

versal. The assertion and maintenance of another rule, which must
ensue if God allow disobedience to His own government — because
disobedience to it is only obedience to another — would be to set up
two universal and supreme dominions, which would be impossible.
One must destroy the other. This is a fundamental principle in
civil government, as is illustrated in our own country. The laws of
the United States are supreme in all the States and Territories.
Hence any municipal law of a State or Territory which conflicts with
them is not binding, and falls to the ground from its very illegality.
Should the States of this Union pass laws to regulate the currency,
to declare war, and enforce them, it would be insurrection, and cause
finally an utter subversion of the G-eneral Government. '' A house
divided or a nation divided against itself cannot stand." " Ye
cannot serve God and mammon." Consequently, if God be not obeyed
by His creatures, some other power will be enthroned in the uni-
verse, and His rule practically destroyed.

Moreover, a law is a law only so far as it is sustained. The enact-
ment of a statute by the law-makers gives the form, not the force of
law. If the statute passed and published do not flow from the heart
of the people, and be not sustained by public sentiment, it soon be-
comes a dead letter in the archives of the courts. You will find in
the records of every State laws entirely obsolete, because long disre-
garded, and to attempt now to enforce them would madden to rebel-
lion. Therefore we see the folly of legislating in adVance of public
opinion. This should be first created and educated, and then the
laws passed would have a sufficient guaranty for their support. Then
I submit, What is to become of the laws of God, those pure emana-
tions of Divine wisdom and goodness, enacted and promulgated to
preserve the order of the universe, if they are to be habitually
trampled upon with impunity? Surely violation, unreproved, would
superinduce contempt, and contempt, in its turn, recklessness, and
the ordinances of Heaven would virtually cease to be laws.

Let it be also remembered, that if the Almighty should allow dis-
obedience for any object whatever, it would defeat the end of His
moral government, the promotion of virtue and religion, upon the
existence of which its stability depends. Let it be once authorita-
tively understood among men that sin can be freely indulged, and
yet the Divine favor secured by sacrifice, and there will be an end to
virtue. Human nature will never endure the rigid habits of un-

202 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

swerving integrity in the relations of life, if all the rewards of such
a life can be as certainly obtained by a loose disregard and contempt
of those relations. The ungodly can well afford to bring to God's
altar their occasional offerings of money, talents, or services, if they
can receive from the Divine hand sanction for their illegal gains and
unholy lusts. Let me pursue my desire for wealth, have license to
get gold — by right if I can ; if not, by wrong ; by steeling my heart
to the calls of mercy, the claims of humanity, trampling under foot
every attribute of justice and truth, and chiselling betw.een the flesh
and bones of unfortunate men, helpless women and children, for
gain — and surely I would prove myself destitute of the first qualifi-
cations for success, if I could not afford occasionally to replenish the
poor fund, or even the missionary treasury. Burning with worldly
ambition, let me understand from Heaven that I may seek honor by
the legitimate influences of reason and truth if I can succeed ; if not,
by force and fraud, by blood and double-dealing — then I would show
myself poorly versed in modern state-craft, if I could not readily
consent on great anniversaries to allude in vague terms to the Su-
preme Ruler of the universe, or even go so far as to make a polite
bow to Jesus of Nazareth, or order a Te Deum, or celebrate a public
fast. A devotee of pleasure, my heart a nest of all uncleanness, I
might well be' bold to draw the sword against the church's foes, and
peril limb and life, fame and fortune, for her safety and honor, if for
all other times and seasons I could have her permission and pardon
for my libidinous intrigues, my habitual unblushing violations of in-
nocence and virtue ; or in hoary age be ready, with feeble tottering
steps, when the fires of the soul have spent themselves in whirling
consuming lusts, and the man once so proud and beautiful in his
fleshly glory, has naught left but the dry, blackened crust of a former
self, to creep to the stately altar, and vainly strive to appease an in-
sulted God by the parade of a penitence which grieves not that it
has sinned, but that it can no longer sin.

" In every street, ^

The brave streams of the proud and gaudy world

Flow to the house of God,"
may be a satire too severe, but it has its fearful pointing. Multitudes
delude themselves that they can live irregularly, divorce business
and religion, throw the reins upon the neck of passion and spur on
to the freest indulgence, and on the Sabbath go to the house of God,

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE. 203

and wipe away the sins of the week by repeating a prayer, singing a
psalm, or praising the preacher.

Vain man, foolish and blind ! What is your gold to God ? " Will
He esteem thy riches ? No, not gold nor all the forces of strength."
What your learning and services to Him who has angels for His
ministers ? He by a single word could people the earth with myriad
forms of strength and beauty, and, breathing into them the living
spark of intelligence and sensibility, could employ them all to fulfil
His Word. Think not " to walk in the ways of thy heart and in the
sight of thine eyes," and afterward to corrupt judgment by the plea
of heroic suiferings ! To use your mental and social powers solely
to gain the praise of men, and then to escape that most crushing pf
all curses — the penalty which awaits abused talents — by recognising
with patronizing air the precepts of the Bible in a fugitive essay, or
deferentially referring, to the worth of religion to the poor and the
criminal in the court room or the Senate chamber ! To amass money,
to add house to house, acre to acre, ship to ship, to crowd your safes
with bonds and mortgages, to get all you can and keep all you get
through a long life, despite the appeals of poverty and ignorance, and
then, when death comes and strikes all from your avaricious grasp,
to buy off the accusing witnesses, Mercy and Justice, and purchase a
valid title to heaven by founding a hospital or endowing a college !
To encourage such a hope would be a libel on the Gospel, a mockery
to you. It is your heart, your love, that God asks ; your obedience,
and not your sacrifices. He made the stars, and said, shine, and they
shone — the birds, and said, sing, and they sung. Your will He can-
not compel. The submission of this will is the only service He can
accept. " Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with
ten thousands of rivers of oil ? Shall I give my first-born for my
transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He hath
showed thee, 0 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?" (Mi'c, vi, 7, 8.) And yet are there not teachers,
claiming a Divine commission, who boldly proclaim, Give us your
money and your conscience, and we will square your sins with
Heaven ? Indeed, is there not a deeply-seated popular belief, not
defended to be sure, but covertly felt and cherished, that God will
be bribed at last by some act of devotion or beneficence which man
himself can perform ?

204 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

Furtliermore, such is the infectious nature of disobedience, that if
countenanced at all, it must spread with fearful rapidity. Obedience
is difficult, and reluctantly imitated. Disobedience is easy, and
readily imitated. In the natural heart there is a strong bias to sin,
a restiveness under restraint, an inherent proclivity to mischief,
which like a train of powder needs only the spark of vicious example,
to cause the explosion of corrupt passions into open, defiant rebellion
against all authority. If there be such positive and rapid commu-
nication between material substances, such as light, electricity, and
heat, notwithstanding the grossaess of matter, what may we not ex-
pect between spirit and spirit, where the nature is so ethereal, the
organism so exquisite and subtle ! Swifter than the beams of morn-
ing, and passing the speed of angel's wing, is the transmission of
thought, thought impelled by fiery passion. Incalculable is the
force of embodied conception and feeling over the hearts of men.
Truly, the mind is a chamber hung with pictures painted by the
brush of sympathy from the scenes of associated life. But alas ! for
the pictures, the originals are too often the habitations of cruelty, the
region and shadow of death, where the light and love which gleam
and flash above and below serve only to disclose the darkness and
death. Not more quickly does fire run through stubble, mutiny
spread • on shipboard, or insurrection in an army, where the spirit
of faction and disorder is not decisively met and crushed, than would
universal anarchy ensue in the moral world, were Grod to tolerate for
a moment, and for any object whatever, disloyalty to His supremacy.
" Forever, 0 Lord, Thy Word is settled in heaven." " Thou hast
magnified it above all Thy name." " It is easier for heaven and
earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail."

The second general argument for the superiority of obedience is
found in the excellent fruits or graces which it instrumentally origi-
nates and nourishes.

Need it be said that faith without works is dead ? There can be
no real confidence in the Divine mercy, where there is not sincere
obedience to the Divine law. " Repentance towards Grod and faith
in'our Lord Jesus Christ" has a profound psychological as well as
theological order. He who knew what is in nian, understood per-
fectly that man neither would nor could trust another to save him
from a condition with which he felt fully satisfied ; and that trust
in another and higher power for salvation was not possible, until, in

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE. 205

adclition, to a thorough dissatisfaction ■with self, an all-pervading con-
viction fills the heart, " I have done all I could to save myself."
God never does for us what we can do for ourselves. Divine inter-
position begins where human strength ceases. Not to destroy man
by ignoring his personality, but to save him by reaching forth a help-
ing hand to fiillcu though glorious powers, is the cardinal idea of the
Gospel. And it is not until the penitent feels that he has done all
in his power to deliver himself from sin, that he will trust God to do
for him what experience has taught he cannot do for himself.

This truth obtains equally in the experience of every Christian.
If he have not pure love to God and to his neighbor, there can be no
abiding faith. Unless he be conscious of integrity, of a sincere, ear-
nest, and habitual eifort to do God's holy will, he cannot come to
Him with confidence either for his own personal sanctification and
comfort, or for the salvation of others. " For if our heart condemn
us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. Beloved,
if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God.
And whatever we ask we receive of Him, because we keep His com-
mandments, and do those things which are pleasing in His sight."
(1 John, iii, 19, &c.) The cords of iniquity efFectually bind the
wings of faith. And the reason that the church is so cold in her
devotions, and so little comparative success attends her evangelizing
efforts, is, that her confidence in God's promises and methods is par-
alyzed by a self-accusing consciousness of delinquency. There can-
not be an overcoming faith in the people of God, except the Spirit
of Him who fulfilled all righteousness breathes and works in their
hearts and lives.

With equal justness I may add, that humility can be successfully
cultivated only by habitual obedience. There may be the appear-
ance of true self-abasement in the man who, while his life is marred
by gusts of anger, vindictiveness, and plottings for place, comes ever
and anon, when glimpses of his folly flash suddenly upon him, before
the people with tearful confession. But this does not imply that the
heart is really humble. For no sooner is the pride stung or the
imaginary rights invaded, than the same resentment shows itself.
Ah, spasmodic grief and intensest haughtiness may coexist ! Paral-
lelism is often found in one point, between the straightest and the
most crooked line; but run them out, and the disparity is soon seen.
The proudest heart may in single instances harmonize with the rule,

206 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

"Let each esteem others better than himself;" but trace the two into
all the possible contingencies of morals and religion, and you will
discover the disagreement. Action tries the temper of a grace. It
is not by periodic fits of sorrow that the heart is made lowly, but
keeping it in daily contact with the bright, keen edge of the com-
mandment.

Some think to grow humble by contemplating God's wisdom,
goodness, and power, as displayed in creation. They " consider
the heavens the work of his fingers, the moon and stars which he
hath ordained, and ask, what is man that Thou art mindful, of him,
or the son of man that Thou visitest him ? " They dwell upon the
magnitude and permanence of the universe, and, in contrast, the
smallness and instability of man, write disparaging words of human
life, and regard themselves humble. In poetic frenzy, they group
the worst and saddest scenes of the world into pictures, brood over
the most unamiable tendencies of human nature, and think, by such
a process, to become humble. The value of meditation upon the
Divine works and human follies cannot be doubted ; but that humility
can be wholly or chiefly cultivated by it, I totally deny. Philoso-
phers and poets have written rapturously of the Divine Majesty, and
painted in blackest shades and tenderest pathos the vileness and
vanity of mankind, but have remained the veriest self-idolaters. He
is not the humblest man who constantly berates himself, but who,
from a just estimate of his own character, a thorough consciousness
of his own power as changed and strengthened by grace, pursues a
quiet, orderly, and useful life. No one so deeply feels the need of
Divine help as he who is trying habitually to fulfil God's law. None
so fully estimates and extols the Divine power and glory as he who
can say, " Wherefore I take you to record this day, I am pure
from the blood of all men.". He indeed is the only man who can
"truly say, "I am the least of the apostles, that am not meet to be
called an apostle " — " less than the least of all saints." Behold !
Jesus takes a little child up in His arms, and, in the presence of
His disputing disciples, declares him to be the type of His King-
dom. And why? Because of his humility. He meant by this
example to warn them against ambition, to .teach them that the
great practical lesson tbey would learn in following Him was lowli-
ness. And so the sequel proved. I have sometimes thought, man
begins the world a child in simplicity and guilelessness, and soon,

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE. 207

alas ! exalts himself against God ; but if he ever return to God by
way of the Cross, and fulfil in his life the whole circle of the com-
mandments, compress in his experience and practice their divinest,
sweetest harmony, he ends where he began — a child, a very child
for meekness.

Spiritual knowledge comes originally and is chiefly promoted by
obedience. To acquire a certain and satisfactory insight to any sys-
tem, we must follow in our inquiries such a method as its nature
allows. It would be the height of folly to attempt to trace and
measure the paths of the planets, by manipulating according to the
rules of chemical afiinities and repulsions; or to determine the deli-
cate flow of thought, imagination, and wit, by disquisitions on the
square and circle. Equally absurd is the efibrt — which many, in
their presumption, have sought to make — to ascertain the things of
the Spirit of God, the sublime mysteries of religion, by processes
strictly human, appeals to facts belonging wholly to the sensible
world. Would a man master the natural sciences, metaphysics, pol-
itics, or any one of the sciences subordinate to these, then he must
pause at the threshold of each, and, acknowledging his ignorance,
must first receive from each the key which unlocks the recesses
within — otherwise, all attempts at entrance are vain — must meekly
learn how each is to be interrogated, else all questionings will but
return in the echoes of their own folly, and no progress whatever in
sound knowledge will be made. And when any one of these has
deigned to speak, he must receive thankfully any revelation of law
or fact which is uttered, and, instead of complaining of either its
scantiness or absurdity, must be content to proceed cautiously and
slowly to perfection, and be satisfied if, after the lapse of long years
of study and trial, he can say, " I am master."

As in the earthly sciences the Creator has indicated, in half-surface,
half-buried features, the line of investigation by which they are to be
successfully explored, so also in the heavenly He has revealed to us,
by the conjoint teachings of his secret Spirit and open Word, the
unerring way to Himself, to the knowledge of His spiritual king-
dom. " How knoweth this man letters, having never learned ? " said
the marvelling Jews. Jesus answered them and said, " My doctrine
is not mine, but His that sent Me. If any man will do His will,
he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I
speak of myself." {John, vii, 16, 17.) Christ claimed to be of God.

208 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

Nay, said the Jews, we are of God ; we have the commandments ;
we received the law by Moses. Allow that ye have the law and the
prophets ; ye know them not, neither do them, else ye would discern
My origin, person, character, works, doctrine, as foretold in them —
in learning and doing the will of God as revealed in them, ye would
assuredly come to know My doctrine to be divine, and that I am
the Christ of God, whom now ye so ignorantly and culpably deny.
Here, then, is the clue to spiritual knowledge. The heart and will
must be submitted to God's law. - .

" But, above all, the victory is most' sure
For him who, seeking faith by virtue, strives
To yield entire submission to the law
Of conscience,"

illustrates the point— indeed, is simply another expression of the
same truth. For, even should the divinity and spiritual import of
the Bible be doubted— if its excellent moral precepts be allowed,
and there be a willingness to conform to them, such willingness, if
actual, will ultimately insure a perfect belief of the highest claims
of the 33ible. " No man is so ignorant in religion as to know noth-
ing of the truth. * * * Now, Christ says, if any man will do His
will, as far as he already discovers it, he shall know," &c. If there .be
a simple willingness to do what is already received, further and fuller
knowledge shall follow. And just here— in the obstinate aversion
of the will to doing what pierces and crucifies selfishness— lies the
great barrier to spiritual insight. '' Behold, the fear of the Lord,
that is wisdom ; and to depart from evil is understanding." {Job
xxviii, 28.) Take an example. A worldling who questions the
spiritual doctrines of Christ, but admires His practical precepts, re-
solves upon reformation, and takes these precepts for his guidance.
.At the end of the first day, what is the result? In th^ whirl of
business, the old leaven of avarice begins to work, and equity is vio-
lated. When the shades of evening gather around him, and the rush
and strife of trade give place to the quiet thoughts of home, he is
obliged, on reviewing his actions, to write— failure. The next day,
he is more guarded, and succeeds better; the third, and no special
occurrence brings him into condemnation. The fourth comes ; the
usual scenes and excitements are met with composure and self-com-
placency. Suddenly he is assaulted by a temptation, from a source
of which he never dreamed. His honor, the honor of his family, is

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE, 209

impugned. The calm man is on fire. I'll be avenged ! he cries.
Alas ! he has forgotten One hath said, '' Vengeance is Mine ; I will
repay ! " Satisfaction is sought and obtained. Ah ! Samson could
be held with new ropes while asleep; but let him hear the cry,
'* The Philistines be upon thee ! " and go out and shake himself, and
the cords are snapped like tow before the flame.

Human nature can be kept decent and orderly, if nothing occurs
to arouse its slumbering corruption ; but let this demon be maddened,
and where then are all the bonds of reason ? Look now at the guilty
man. The night has closed upon him ; and in its solemn, hushed
stillness, conscience awakes, and, with self-accusiug voice, compels
him to write again, as the great tears drop upon the page — failure,
failure. But what is going on in his mind ? He is coming to knowl-
edge— making the discovery that he is a sinner, depraved and help-
less; that ''the carnal mind is enmity against God, is not subject
to the law of God, neither indeed can be ; " " that they that are in
the flesh cannot please God." " He had not known sin but by the
law; the commandment came, sin revived, and he died." His
aching heart looks around for help, but refuge fails him. He
groans and roars with grief, and cannot be comforted. He is bound
by a power he cannot break. He is on the verge of despair, and he
cries as one who feels its horrid, chilling shadows are stealing over
him, " Oh, wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me from the
body of this death ? " Hark ! a voice sounds throtigh the awful
silence! Lo, a form bright and glorious shines through the mid-
night darkness ! It is the voice, the face of Jesus ! " Come unto
Me ! " Eapturously he shouts, " I thank God through Jesus Christ
our Lord ! " What, then, is " the law but our schoolmaster to bring
us to Christ ? " Does this man doubt any longer the divinity and
spirituality of the Gospel ? " He that believeth on the Son of God
hath the witness in himself" that its glorious doctrines are true. 0
ye proud and foolish ones, pufi"ed up with fleshly wisdom, with the
vain conceits of worldly philosophy, how can ye discern the Son of
God, and perceive the mysteries revealed unto babes, when ye refuse
to submit to the only infallible test of spiritual religion ? Ye prefer
sacrifice to obedience. Ye would fill God's nostrils at once with the
incense of your boasted culture, and the stench of your folly and im-
morality! " Bring no more vain oblations ; incense is an abomina-
tion unto Me; the new-moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assem-
14

210 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

blies, I cannot away with ; it is iniquity." {Isaiah, i, 13.) Only he
who is penetrated with the spirit of the Word can understand its
teaching. " The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit
of God. for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know
them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual
judgeth all things." "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh
and blood hath not revealed it (the messiahship and divinity of
Christ) unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." And as in
originally coming to knowledge, so afterwards, he who follows most
closely the footsteps of Jesus, lives most rigidly in the observance of
the law, will have the deepest insight to spiritual truth, the clearest
discernment of Divine providence, and the most positive and reliable
^dews of practical duty. While, on the contrary, he who follows
Christ afar off, and presumes to atone for his delinquencies by sacri-
fices, will be confounded. " The secret of the Lord is with them
that fear Him," ''but the way of the wicked is as darkness; in the
greatness of his folly, he shall go astray."

The same course of development and illustration might be pursued
in the treatment of all the Christian graces. It could be shown that
life, vigor, beauty, can be imparted to them only by uniform devoted-
ness to duty. The richest tracery-work may be exquisitely deline-
ated on. the porcelain, but, until burnt in the furnace, it cannot stanJ. .
The most thoroughly orthodox theories of practical religion may be
gathered from books; the virtues all may be accurately learned from
the teachers — their force acknowledged and beauty a.dmired; and
they may acquire a sort of sentimental existence in the mind ; but
they never inhere in a man's very being, subsisting in all his thoughts
and feelings, and inseparable in all their robustness and beauty from
his own individuality, until, in- addition to being learned by rote,
they are burnt and fixed into his heart in the intensest fires of actual
obedience and submission. Thus instinct with a man's own con-
sciousness, they shall last while he himself endures.

The third and last general argument offered to show the superi-
ority of obedience to disobedience, even though attended with sacri-
fices, is the stronger proof it affords the world of the reality and
divinity of the Christian religion.

This is no small consideration, when we reflect that it is mainly
through the practical exhibition of the advantages of Christianity
that men are to be brought to accredit and espouse it. "Let your

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE. 211

light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and
glorify your Father which is in heaven." The salvation of the world
is made to depend upon the shining of true religion in the lives of
believers. It is not difficult to determine which of two characters
makes the best impression upon the mind of an observer — one dis-
tinguished for uniform observance of duty, that moves on steadily in
the path of uprightness, or one marred by irregularities of conduct
and temper, and yet expects the favor of God and the church by
occasional or frequent sacrifices. Men will try Christianity by its
practical fruits, as seen in its professors. What does it accomplish
for mankind ? To this test, every theory of every science which
claims public confidence is brought. Does it belong to the natural
sciences ? Then, is it supported by facts ? Is it a new measure in
politics ? Then, does it work well ? Of what advantage is it to the
nation ? If none, time and common sense soon work its destruction,
and it is only remembered as the vagary of some dreamer. Those
who want the time or the disposition to investigate the original
sources of scriptural evidence will judge of the title of Christianity
to belief by its effects in the church. Does it make its possessor a
better parent, child, neighbor, citizen ? Is he more faithful to en-
gagements— happier, sweeter, holier, in temper and word ? Does it
efi'ect more for him than worldliness does for the worldling ? If the
Christian can show the power of Divine grace to transform the
nature, to restrain lu prosperity, and to transmute th'e sorrows of life
into joys, then will his influence for good be positive and efi'ective.
But the world will hoot the man from its presence, and with him the
religion he professes, who has the hardihood to attempt to hoodwink
it with his large behests to charity, when it knows, and he knows,
that he is daily breaking the plainest laws of love.

But let Christianity be brought to this inflexible standard. Go to
the career of Jesus of Nazareth ! Behold Him as He traverses the
hills and valleys of Palestine, as He threads the streets of Jerusalem
and Capernaum ! His whole life teems with mercy; His lips are ever
breathing words of wisdom and consolation ; His hands are ever open
with acts of love and healing ; His feet are ever swift on errands of
kindness and relief; and when He pauses in His way, it is to impart
strength to the faint and sinking heart, deeming this a greater proof
of His messiahship than to pronounce an eloquent discourse upon
His divinity ! " He went about doing good." Jesus Christ came

212 OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE.

from heaven, not simply to teach, and to atone, but to clothe in flesh
and blood the sublime doctrines and precepts which he came to estab-
ligli — to embody in living form those immortal principles which orig-
inated in the infinite benevolence and justice of God. This He ac-
complished, and now forever remains an example unto us, that as He
was, even so we should be, in this world. And from these principles,
as so many seed-powers in the hearts of His disciples, have grown
the great philanthropic institutions of the day, which constitute the
crowning glory of modern civilization.

I am glad that Jesus lived among the people, met and answered
the great questions and difficulties of ordinary life. I am not less
happy in the conviction that His religion is designed not alone for the
scholar, the poet, the recluse, if at all for them as such, but for every-
day people — people who have to do with the things which occupy

" The talk

Man holds with week-day man in the hourly walk

Of the world's business."
In the great arena of the world, in the thickest of the battle of life,
amid its din and dust, its smoke and carnage, the Christian is to
enter, " stand in his lot as a good soldier, devour the many chagrins
of it,'" fight and conquer, and thus show to the thronging multitudes,
the brain and muscle men of the land, that Christianity is divine be-
cause human, from God because fit for man — that it can make a
Christian successful on Christian principles, can transform business
into means of grace, transmute gold into godliness, conyert the hum
of industry into the hymn of praise, the counting-room, the workshop,
the field, into a temple of worship, to the glory of God and the honor
of the Redeemer ; and so realize the glorious symbol of the prophetic
vision, " In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses,
Holiness unto the Lord." {Zach., xiv, 20.) Infidelity has
striven hard to drive Christianity from practical life. Its last and
convulsive effort was to out-do it in works of humanity ; and wildly,
though plausibly, theorizing about equality, fraternity, and liberty, it
has boastfully said, the religion of sufi"ering can now be politely
bowed out of society, as no longer needed. But the effort has proved
a failure, and this day the credit must be awarded to Christian men,
that there is not a great public movement, which looks to the ameli-
oration of the race, that had not its origin in their hearts, and the
prosecution of which is not in their hands. And this shall be till

OBEDIENCE BETTER THAN SACRIFICE. 213

" Change wide and deep, and silently performed,
This land shall -witness ; and as days roll on,
Earth's universal frame shall feel the effect,
Even till the smallest habitable rock.
Beaten by lonely billows, hear the songs
Of humanized society, and bloom
"With civil arts, that send their fragrance forth,
A grateful tribute to all-ruling Heaven."

Christians ! your weapon for the conquest of the world is obedi-
ence. Your sacrifices, if they spring from it, will have power over
the hearts of men, and be acceptable to God ; but as atonements for
sin, substitutes for integrity, never ! One sacrifice alone can be re-
ceived as vicarious for sin, and it solely because obedience without
it was impossible. " There remaineth now, therefore, no more sac-
rifice for sin." And what is remarkable, that great sacrifice, made
once for all to put away sin, was itself an act of obedience. " Lo, I
come to do Thy will, 0 God." It is your constant exemplification
of the Gospel, in its rich experience and practice, which will do more
to win souls to Jesus than all the professions of the mighty, the ben-
efactions of the wealthy ; nay, more than all the sermons and writings
of the wise and good. Plerein lies the real need of the times — holi-
ness to the Lord. Regular living, regular praying, working, and
giving, patient continuance in well-doing, in all that is pure, lovely,
and of good report, will impart to the church's forces and appliances
a grand and mighty momentum, which will bear down all opposition.
Her progress, like the awful and sublime sweep of the spheres,
though silent, will be certain and glorious. So shall the Gospel be
vindicated from the foul aspersion that salvation by faith in an atone-
ment is only an invention of orthodoxy, to rid men of the responsi-
bility of obedience by devising an easy and wholesale remedy for
their abominations. "Do we, then, make void the law of God
through faith ? God forbid ; yea, we establish the law." This con-
stitutes the perpetually recurring miracle of Christianity — " the sign
which shall never be cut ofi"" — the works which Christ's disciples
shall do in all ages greater than His own works, because performed
on a more wide-spread scale, and more comprehensive in their results.
From all which let us learn, that " To obey is better than sacrifice j "
and " To love God with all the heart, and with all the understanding,
and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love one's
neighbor as himself, is more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."

216 THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH.

We see how an Apostle, wise both from age and from grace, ad-
dressed a band of Christian young men, whose strength was of the
most unquestionable quality — moral strength — tested already by holy
enterprise — a godly energy exhibiting the highest type of young
manhood.

And then, how should we address the young men of this congre-
gation ?

That too should depend upon who and what they are. As this is
beyond my power to determine, it is safe and therefore proper not to
assume too much. I cannot say, in the full latitude of the Apostle's
expression, " Ye have overcome the wicked one, and the Word of
God abideth in you." This thought may better come in by-and-by
for an exhortation, rather than now as a congratulation.

I assume, therefore, only one thing — that being young, you are
strong — strong, in some sense of that word.

Let it be my object to indicate how a young man's strength may
be made perfect,, in all senses of the word. And may He, without
whom nothing is strong or holy, be with me to speak, and with you
to hear.

<' I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong."

If we should cast about for a living type of strength, I apprehend
it would come to our minds in the shape of young manhood.

• Other attributes might embody themselves before us in different
forms.

For gentleness and sensibility, the image would be a woman ; for
docility and dependence, a child clinging to his father's hand as he
walked ; for rugged, persistent fortitude, a full-aged man of forty-
five, inured to trial, care-hardened beyond the melting of tears;
while for caution and slowness of judgment, the picture should be
that of an old man at the fireside, dealing out parcels of experience.
■ But for living, effective power, the human type is a young man.
His step is a stride. The lighting down of his arm is a blow. His
very standing still is strong ; and if he could then b^e transformed
into marble, that statuary quiet would still betray the strength
creeping unconsciously through every limb and muscle, and bespeak
the bounding of a heart against its stony ribs.

Mere resisting weight might seem to be wanting, but the constant
self-restoring energy compensates that lack, and makes up that sum
total of momentum which is strength.

THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH. 217

Physically, therefore, young manhood, in its normal shape, is the
truest impersonation of power.

And this outward man is a not untrue index of that which is
within. If the muscles swell, it is because the spirit within is a
galvanic battery, simmering and seething with the ceaseless produc-
tion of power. If the red blood mantles the cheek, it is from the
soul working at the heart. If the step is strong, it is because the
will is determined. If the eye flashes, it is because there is hope
and daring and ambition looking through the eye to the mind's great
ideal. So that a young man's real strength is begotten of his spir-
itual nature. Let us dissect his spiritual frame, then, and discover
the elements of this inworking power.

I. First, then, young manhood is the period of strong passions
and appetites. They come out then into their first license, and some
of them into their first consciousness, and, like everything else in
nature, they work strongest when first developed. By-and-by they
will be exhausted with over-action, or wearied out with defeat, and
will live only in the insensible form of habits. But now they are
rampant, self-conscious, importunate. They make large demands on
the life, and use up a large share of its vigor. They Avork them-
selves in among the motives of the soul. They color the sentiments,
dictate the tastes, engross the time, and sometimes shape the whole
path, of a young man's daily life. They develop the full power of
his animal nature as it never has been before, nor -tvill be at all if
not now. The capacity for wickedness is measured by the strength
and indulgence of the passions. The highest reach of virtue will
consist in the power to bridle and subdue them. Which of the two
is the great problem for a young man to determine for himself? This
is the crisis in the life of the passions and in his life. As they are
sovereign, he is a poor slave. As they are controlled, he is a man —
free, lord of creation, because master of himself.

Again, in the second place, the period of young manhood is apt to
be the period of pride — a strong power for good or evil — a grand or
a mean quality — the prompter of a noble ambition if well directed,
or else degenerating into self-conceit and forcible feebleness — making
a man a hero or a dandy, a Webster or only a Brummcll.

When a youth is just let loose from the restraints of boyhood, and
sent out to take a man's part in the world, feeling the freedom in his
very veins, what can be more natural than that all other importance

218 THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH.

should dwindle by the side of his own ? The world is all before him,
and seems to be all for him. He longs to try his new-fledged pin-
ions— to realize his ambition to show how he can do the world's
work in less time than other men, and succeed where they have
failed. Full of self-reliance, he cannot but be sanguine. He scouts
advice, calls caution cowardice, and, as his life has been without ex-
perience, he has no such word in his vocabulary. He knows enough
already, and pronounces on all subjects like a master.

I need not stop to delineate all the workings in and out of this
youthful pride. Its features, color, and expression, are familiar to us
all. It is enough for our purpose to recognise it as one of the forces
which go far to determine the character of young men, and so as a
part of their strength.

Next to this, in the third place, is another co-ordinate force, viz :
self-will.

This is an offshoot of the sense of freedom which I have men-
tioned, and grows naturally out of the first consciousness of power.

As the will is itself only an executive faculty, receiving its im-
pulse from other forces of the character, its quality will be deter-
mined by theirs.

Give up a young man's will to his passions and his pride, and it
will seem as if there were a master demon driving him, with his eyes
open, to destruction. If he is thwarted, he rebels. If he is defeated,
he commits suicide.

When I thus name passion, pride, and self-will, as the great con-
stitutional forces in the character of youth, do I not draw a picture
in which the shadows predominate over the lights ?

Is it not evident that such a character needs some compensating
force on the other side — some' element of strength to overmatch
these, and forefend their mischief? — specially when you look, abroad,
aiid think of the age and the land we live in, and of all the peculiar
influences that mould the character here.

In our country, everything is precocious. Under o;ir institutions,
all are free. By our system, the child is not ftither of the man; the
child is the man. The spirit of independence is breathed in with
the atmosphere, and nurtured by education. The theory of inde-
pendence is lisped from the school-book, and trumpeted from the
platform and the stump. The effects of it flash and coruscate through
the whole illuminated path of our history. Our admirable achieve-

THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH. 219

meats, in war and peace, are its legitimate fruits. Our national
energy, a proverb now throughout the world, is the exponent of it —
full of emphasis, full of meaning.

But the national energy is only the energy of individuals aggre-
gated into a mass. And energy itself is only another name for strong
power of will.

When, then, our young men are sent out at an earlier age than
those of any other nation to wield the responsibilities of life, in the
mart and in the forum, with their faculties thus grown under the
influences of independence, does not the thought gather emphasis —
a solemn emphasis, too — that there needs to be a compensating
power to overrule the strength of our young men, and to guide it 9-II
to good ? Is there, then, in the character of youth, no such force,
latent or active ?

There is, thank God for it, a place for such a power — a central
place dug deeply by the finger of God into the nature of every man,
in his very heart of hearts ; I mean the conscience. Every man has
the sense of it, for every man knows the difi'erence between ought and
ought not. But it is not, alas ! a faculty so commonly developed in
young men as to be pronounced characteristic. It forms no essential
part of his strength, but it is indispensable in order to make his strength
safe. It is the only power to control effectually his passions, his pride,
and his self-will. It will do this, for conscience is of royal pedigree.
Its nature is divine. Its authority is telegraphed down from heaven.

When God shaped the human soul, and assigned to each faculty
its place, He reserved one high and central seat, which He canopied
with His own peculiar glory ; and there He enthroned the conscience
to be ruler over the soul, as the viceroy of the soul's creating God.
From its presence and power springs the whole sense of moral obli-
gation. Its presence is like a felt omniscience. Its power is like
the thought, '' Thou, God, seest me." We may profess to ignore it,
may violate it, even dethrone it. But it is kingly, even in the dust.
We cannot meet its eye, though it be prostrate, and not feel that it
is a prostrate majesty, whose rebuke and threat remind us of a terri-
ble judgment. If we could suppose a person to be deprived of it,
he would have lost the glory of his faculties — would be a moral
idiot. No man can be the man God meant him to be, unless the
conscience occupies its rightful place of authority. Let this wanting
element be supplied to the strength of young men, and their strength

220 THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH.

is perfect. The passions, instead of consuming tlie very material of
feeling, will lend their fire to other faculties, and become cooled into
lawful and genial desires. The sentiment of pride will expand itself
into the holy ambition of achieving a Christ-like character. The
overmastering will, no longer a perverse and profane self-will, will
be turned in consecration to the will of God. So will the young
man have " overcome the wicked one " — the devil without, or that
other devil within him, viz : his own selfish self.

But though I thus speak of conscience as the chief faculty of
the human soul, let us remember it is still of the soul, and, though
divine in its authority, is still in its infirmities human. The lower
faculties may become higher than it. Passion may blind it, pride
pervert it, self-will supplant it. Hence conscience needs a foreign
aid to establish its power and use in the great experiment of life.
It needs the tutelage of a better life than this. It needs a revela-
tion. The guaranty of our moral strength is conscience taught by
the Word of God. "Ye are strong," says the Apostle, "and the
Word of God abideth in you." See what omnipresent sufficiency
there is in the Word of God to be the director of a young man's
conscience, by meeting his nature in all the forms of its trial. See
how comprehensive its instruction, which the Apostle sums up in a
phrase, " Love not the world."

■ He does not mean the natural world, with its green beauty, its
glorious garniture of sky and sea and rock, of field and forest, of
sunlight and shadow, feeding the taste and stirring the imagination ;
nor the natural world, with its secrets of science, its mechanism and
laws, its geologies and botanies and astronomies — the world of gran-
ite, of flowers, or of stars — a boundless field of mental activities. He
does not mean, " Love not the world " of human life, its social organ-
izations, its friendships and home scenes — ^yea, its commerce, its
enterprise, its collisions of thought, its strife and battle of improve-
ment. He does not mean, turn hermit, as if you could scourge
your loves by hunger, or scarify your soul with a hair shirt. God's
Word is genial, not ascetic.

But " love not the world " in its antagonism to conscience and the
soul and immortality. Love it not in its three potential forms of sin —
" the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride' of life " —
"for these are not of the Father, but of the world," and pass away
with it, and are therefore not enough for your immortality.

THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH. 221

" As the "Word of Grod abideth in you, you will be exempt from
profane loves, and will overcome the world ; bring thus your moral
streogth to bear against this triple alliance of the wicked one." This
is what he wrote to the young men then.

The skies are changed, but are we changed ? Is there nothing in
the passions, pride, and self-will, of early manhood, that finds its nat-
ural expression in " the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the
pride of life," now, as much as ever ? Look around you. Look
within. You cannot leave this house of God, to find your homes
to-night, but you will meet with some meretricious tempter — the lust
of the flesh incarnated and adorned — the " wicked one " dressed in
human witchery, to beguile you to the chambers of pollution. You
cannot join your associates to-morrow, but some gross tongue will
suggest gross thoughts of that indulgence which " hardens all within,
and petrifies the feeling."

To keep down this prurient lust, to make it wait on conscience
and the soul, you need to counteract its young strength with the in-
dwelling "Word of God. You need to reinforce the claims of your
moral nature by the truths of another life. You need to recall the
solemn testimony of the Bible, that you have a soul to save, an eter-
nity to win, a God to serve whose smile or frown is to you as life or
death. Conscience needs this flaming sword, turning every way to
guard the entrance of your soul, and keep it pure — a reclaimed Para-
dise, where God will'dwell with your spirit aff'ectionately. Your heart
needs to be regenerated by this indwelling "Word, so that love divine
shall supplant and overshadow the lusts of the flesh, and that all
" carnal afiections may die, and all things belonging to the Spirit
may live and grow."

This will save a young man from being consumed, body and soul,
by his passions. The fire of his nature, instead of burning like a
hell within him, will be transformed into the glow of godliness, and
he will be "strong" in the victory over his lusts.

Another of the enemies of the young man is "the lust of the eye,"
a part of " the world " which he must not love. I understand this
expression to denote the desire for those objects which are not neces-
sary for life or comfort, but only to be hoarded like riches, or to be
displayed, like fashionable dress, a showy equipage, a gorgeous man-
sion. If ever young men were in danger of this sin of the world,
it is our young men. How many of them, when entering on a clerk-

222 THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH.

ship, propose to themselves this distinct aim, viz : to he rich, not for
usefulness, nor even for enjoyment, but simply for the sake of dying
rich ; not to feed the hungry with their surplusage, to clothe the
naked, support the Gospel, endow a hospital, but to build splendidly,
and outdo their peers in pomp and sumptuousness.

The desire for gain is not necessarily mischievous. Every man
who undertakes a business has a right to urge it on to its most bril-
liant result.

Few things are so interesting in our survey of life as successful
enterprise. It tells well for mankind, helps the community, advances
civilization. But when the impulse springs from the mere love of
money, the moral of the story is changed. When a man . has con-
centrated all his hopes and aspirations to simple gain ; when he has
narrowed and pointed his whole spiritual consciousness towards the
next piece of coin, and compressed his soul within the periphery of
a dollar — I speak not of the pitiful exhibition he makes of human-
ity, but looking at him through the glass of God's immortal truth —
I ask you to note and tremble while you note the profane prostitution
of the moral sense, the scorn of his conscience, the gross idolatry of
this man of Christendom, idolatry as gross as a heathen's, and far worse
in its moral complexion, because the Christian-born man knows better.
Whether \\\q lust of the eye take this or the other form of display
and fashion, let the young man fortify himself against it. It will
make dishonest clerks and mean men. Whatever else might restrain
him from crime, his conscience will not. He may be afraid of the
" lock-up," he may even have sensibility enough to stand in whole-
some awe of State street and the brokers' board. ]^ut beware of him.
He gets his morality from mammon. To this god of his idolatry he
has given himself a holocaust, body and soul, and very soon, it may
be, no fraud will be too stupendous for his gloating avarice. It will
seize the treasury of a railroad, or gorge a Mexican mine;' and if
detection stares his felony in the face, he has, as his grand offset,
flight, exile and death in a foreign land, or a dose of strychnine in
his own chamber. Would a young man bo saved f/om this moral
ruin, at which angels might weep and demons laugh, let him have
the Word of God abiding in him. Let him learn the godlike use of
riches. Let him understand that wealth is a divine power, with
which he may imitate his Maker, dispense benefits to the world,
bring sinners to the Saviour, and make the unrighteous mammon

THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH. 223

purchase habitations in heaven. With this for his grand ultimate,
he may hiy forth his whole energies to the strife of gain. His strong
will shall no longer be a moral weakness, but a power co-ordinate
with conscience itself, and the lust of the eye looking eagerly for
useless gains will be reformed into the sacred passion of doing good.

Now, once more let us contemplate another temptation of a young
man, levelled point blank at one of his strongest propensities. " The
pride of life," St. John calls it, which I understand to mean the in-
centives to youthful ambition. It may take many shapes, but its
common American forms are the pride of intellect, the ambition of
political distinction, and the love of office, sometimes all combined
in one.

Every American is a politician ; a zealous politician is naturally ia
partisan, and the reward of partisan devotion is office.

There is hardly any bane of morality so deadly as strict devotion
to party interests and the strife for place. A mere politician must
have two consciences — one for himself and another for his party; and
these, being mutually destructive of each other, are equivalent to no
conscience at all. He must connive at practices that he would not
dare to own, and resort to shifts that would compromise any private
reputation, and <?an only excuse himself to his better self by the
shameful plea of the necessity of the party, an excuse that shows him
not humble, but degraded; not modest, but mean; not bending before
a true majesty for that divine approval which will make him a truer
and a nobler man, but prostrate and flat before a tyranny so base
that it can receive no devotion which is not debasement.

Such a politician, with a conscience drugged and drunken with
ambition, will scruple at no indirection, w'ill huckster away his coun-
try's honor for his own advancement, and perhaps for the Presidency
of a nation of freemen will lend himself to a conspiracy against the
very life of fi-ccdom itself.

In what melancholy contrast stands this type of political partisan-
ship to him who was the grand living archetype of what an American
politician should be — him w'hom we lovingly name " the Father of
his Country," who by subordinating all claims to the sovereignty of
conscience, turned politics into patriotism, and made devotion to the
interests of his country identical with the loftiest virtue of man.
What our politics need, even to starvation, is a great national con-
science. Our young men need it most of all, for they are the nation

\

224 THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH.

that is to be. They need the felt power of the Word of God, teach-
ing them that the Lord reigneth, let the people tremble : teaching
them that nations have a judgment day; that, therefore, parties are
amenable to the tribunal of morality; that a vote is a moral act, and
that political drill without conscience is a sin.

I have not time to dwell on other forms of pride tempting to a
young man's nature, and abhorrent to the Word and Spirit of God.
But remember, '* by that sin fell the angels," and many a man has so
made shipwreck of his salvation. The Bible would have brought
him to his knees — kept him low at " the footstool," and opened up
to his open eye of faith a better path of glory, honor, and immortality.
This is the ambition that is both warrantable and • saving— the eagle
pride of a child of God, soaring high, seeing far, and not afraid to
plunge up into the very brightness of the firmament, coveting a place
in the eternal glory.

Happy the young man who has learned from the Word of God. so
to exalt his pride. He need not eradicate it from his nature, need
not crucify it, but only surrender it to his conscience, and then this
strong point of his character will be his salvation.

And now, my friends, will you pardon me for yet one closing word.

" I have written unto you, young men, because ye ai'e strong."

I have attempted to disclose the naturally strong traits in the char-
acter of a young man, and to show that unless they are trained by
conscience, this natural strength is moral weakness; but that when so
approved and sanctified, the fire of passion, the loftiness of pride, and
the energy of self-will, may become the forces of a great and holy
character. Conscience being the ruler, and the Word of. God the
rule, the young man may battle successfully with the world's lusts,
and be crowned in heaven.

As I speak of such an one, I almost seem to see him. I see him
in the first noblest act of loyalty to God and truth, in his closet on
his knees, acknowledging his dependence upon sovereign grace and
power; there surrendering his whole being to Him who died to save
him.

I see him next in the street, in the parlor, in the gatherings of
young men. He turns a deaf ear to the charmer; he refuses the in-
toxicating cup ; he conquers al) the lusts of the flesh.

I see him in the counting room, the shop, the workshop. He is a
faithful clerk, an honest cashier, a diligent workman.

THE STRENGTH AND THE WEAKNESS OF YOUTH. 225

I sec him in the strife of politics, on the platform, in the street
canvass, at the polls, aiming at right ends, and only by lawful means.

I see him afterwards as a man with his earlier virtues grown stout
and stiff about him — true, honorable, faithful to conscience. His
word is his bond; his name is a capital.

I follow his life of energy, beneficence, and moral worth, as it is
reinforced by conscientiousness and daily prayer and the Word of
God. I see him, in a word, a Christian man.

xVnd then I see him die. He lifts his failing voice, and murmurs,
" I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept
the faith — henceforth there is a crown laid up for me." " Not unto
me, 0 Lord, not unto me, but unto Thy name be the praise." " By
the grace of God, I am what I am." " Thanks be to God who giveth
me the victory through Jesus Christ my Lord." Yes! Victor^/
through Jesus Christ.

His chest heaves to its last gasp with that utterance, and he
breathes out his spirit with the words "victory " and " Christ " still
clinging to his lips.

And then I see him no more ; but we know where the victory in
Christ is crowned, and we know that as he meets his ascended Lord,
he feels a hand of blessing on his head, and hears a thrilling voice
of welcome, " Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into
the joy of thy Lord."

Young men, among you all, whose portrait have I sketched ?

15

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228 FELLOW-HELPERS OP THE TRUTH.

I. Christian Truth has a great icork to accomplish in this world.
Thus saitli the Lord, in Isaiah, Iv, 11 : "As the rain and the snow
Cometh down from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth
the earth that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth ; it shall not
return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please ; it
shall prosper in the thing whereunto I send it." Here, you per-
ceive, this truth, sent forth by the Eternal, on a definite errand — to
accomplish a distinct purpose — to effect some positive "Ihing;" and
you observe the pledge of the resources of the Godhead to secure its
prosperity in that mission ; for He saith, " It shall prosper in the
thing whereunto I send it."

What is that mission ? It is a work for God and for man. Look
at it, first, in its more direct relations to God. Having fitted up this
world to be the residence of man, and then having created him in
His own image, and so constituted him that his highest good should
be connected with knowing, loving, and serving his Creator, both a
regard for His own glory, as well as for His creatures, would lead
Him to desire that they should have correct views of His char-
acter— know and love Him. But one of the first effects of sin
on man was to lead him away from his God, and a characteristic
feature of his depravity ever since has been false notions in all his
conceptions of Divinity. The evidence is overwhelming, that the
masses of men have no true ideas of the nature, character, and gov-
ernment of God. On this account, our Lord exclaimed, " Kighteous
Father, the world hath not known Thee." And yet the decree, old
as eternity, was, '' The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the
Lord." The promulgation of that decree was followed by the inten-
sified edict, " As I live, saith the Lord, the earth shall be full of my
glory." And the mission of truth is, like an opening day, to dissi-
pate this blinding darkness, and present God with the clearness of a
noontide sun in a cloudless sky, as the Creator and lawful Sovereign
of this world ; to proclaim, with a voice rotund and distinct as a
trumpet-tone, majestic and authoritative as the thundering of Sinai,
" Jehovah, He is God, and beside Him there is none other ; " and
to enforce upon each and every human being the. practical exhorta-
tion, "Acquaint now thyself with Him, and be at peace; thereby
shall good come unto thee."

Consider next this work in its more direct relations to man.

FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH. 229

Through its instrumentality, men are not only to receive correct
views of God, but of themselves. False notions of our own real
character, higher duties, and destiny, inevitably result from false
notions of God ; they have sprung up spontaneously from the soil of
human depravity, and systems of error have contributed to support
and nourish them. And God hath foreordained that His truth shall
consume all these noxious developments of depravity, and be " quick
and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, piercing even to the
dividing asunder of soul and spirit, the joints and the marrow, and
be a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." In the pros-
ecution of this work, divine truth reveals to us, that with all our
supposed goodness, we are wicked sinners; with all our apparent
innocence, we are guilty sinners; with all our wealth, we are poor
sinners; with all our freedom, we are enslaved sinners; with all our
light, we are blind sinners; with all our knowledge, we are ignorant
sinners; with all our power, we are helpless sinners; with all our
life, we are spiritually dead sinners — who, left to ourselves, will, must
be inevitably lost.

Another object of truth, in this relation, is tcf exhibit the Lord
Jesus Christ as a Saviour exactly adapted to the necessities of such
sinners — to exhibit, not the ethereal Christ of a transcendental im-
agination— not the dead Christ of a christianized paganism — not the
cold, creature Christ of a baptized infidelity, but the living, loving
Christ of the Bible, in the essential divinity of His nature, the virtue
of His vicarious atonement, the infinitude of His love, the perfection
of His salvation, the universality of His ofi'ers of mercy, and His
complete adaptation to the necessities of guilty, condemned, helpless,
blind, poor, dead sinners. And while, as we shall presently see, an
almighty agent gives the essential efficiency, still it is affirmed that
" The Word of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; " that " We
are begotten by the Word of truth ; " that " Wc are to be sanctified
through the truth ; " that we are to " purify our souls," by '' obeying
the truth."

Now, the direct and resultant influence of Christianity, while ful-
filling these purposes, is so great as to permeate everything around
us in this land, and be observable in every direction. You may see
it in our school-houses as well as our sanctuaries, at our weddings as
well as our funerals, brooding with maternal tenderness over our
family circles, guiding and giving wholesome vitality to our business

230 FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH.

enterprises, generating and fostering noble charities and public
reforms, moulding and sustaining our political institutions, directing
and guarding our national destiny. Yea, we have seen thousands
coming to it out of darkness, and being illumined — for " it is a sun ; "
we have seen diseased and crippled ones come to it and be healed —
for it is a " Bethesda pool ; " we have seen throngs come from life's
dusty chase, thirsty and faint, and drink — for it is a " well of living
waters j " we have seen hungry souls come to it, eat, and be satis-
fied— for it is the "bread of life;" we have seen penitent sinners
come to it, bowed with guilt, and go away rejoicing — for '^jt is a
mercy-seat;" we have seen afflicted ones, tossed on the stormy
waves, come to it and become settled — for it is an " anchor sure and
steadfast;" we have seen dying ones press it to their expiring
bosoms, and heard them exclaim, " 0 Death, where is thy
sting?" — for it insures resurrection and eternal life!" Thus,
my brethren, is divine truth wondrously adapted to the wor-k
assigned it! Have we not found it so in our personal experience?
Hath it not been unto us the " Word of our salvation ? " Hath it
not made us free then in Christ Jesus ? Hath it not been to us a
firm basis of hope in hours of despair, strength in hours of weakness,
joy. in hours of sorrow, encouragement in hours of despondency,
light in hours of darkness ? And how inexhaustible the system of
divine truth is ! Who has ever imagined himself to have fathomed
its vast depths, or trodden upon the topmost elevations of its golden
mountains of thought, or felt the full force of its grand motives, or
dreamed of having taken into his mental comprehension all of its
ineffable and divine revealings !

II. Ill the accomplishment of this work, " the Truth " needs help.

This is the second branch of our doctrinal statement. In our
text, the early Christians were urged to take a course, indicated by
the context, in order that they might be "fellow-helpers to the
truth." This exhortation is obviously based upon the idea that it
needs help, and a brief glance at its nature will reveal the correctness
of that idea. What is truth ? It is not a personal existence, as an
angel or man is. It is not of itself endowed with powers of locomo-
tion. It is spiritual reality, which in itself considered has no power
to bring itself in contact with the human mind. Nay, it may justly
be compared to gold, deeply imbedded in the earth, which, however
valuable, has no power to force its way through the superincumbent

FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH. 231

mass, and go, self-coined, self-stamped, into circulation. It needs a
foreign power brought to bear upon it to bring it forth ; it needs the
smelting process, the furnace blaze, and the mint stamp, to place it
in conditions to be useful ; and then it needs helpers to circulate it,
in order that it may accomplish the purpose to which it is so admira-
bly adapted. So is it in regard to divine truth. It may indeed be
said that God might have emblazoned that truth on the sky, or
stamped it upon the leaves of the forest, or by miraculous act have
revealed it to human minds as soon as they reached the. point of
development where it could be received. But He has not done so.
He has devised and perfected a divine system of truth, and then, in
infinite wisdom, placed it in a position where it is subject to the
same laws that govern the development and dissemination of other
truths. This is the basis of Paul's grand argument in his epistle to
the Romans, in which he says: ''Faith cometh.by hearing, and
hearing by the Word of God. How, then, shall they believe on
Him of whom they have not heard ? How can they hear without a
preacher ? And how can they preach except they be sent ? " Here
it is distinctly taught that Gospel truth cannot float on the wind, or
sail on the waves, or travel on the land, in order to reach those
within whom it has its mighty work to accomplish, and that there-
fore, because of its own nature, it needs help. So also the fact, that
God has foreordained multitudinous agencies and instrumentalities
to this end, proves the reality of this necessity. And the further
fact, that on almost every page of the Bible we are exhorted to this
work, and by the conscious influences of the Holy Spirit we are im-
pelled to it, completes the demonstration of that necessity.

III. We man ^^^P ^^•

This is the third point of our doctrine. Before entering upon its
discussion, I feel that I should be recreant to my duty if I did not
here pause, and ask you to pause with me, in order that we may do
reverence to a fundamental article of our faith. I refer to tlie rela-
tions, of the Holy Spirit to this truth. He is its great efiicient helper.
He giveth it " the increase." His hand grasps it as His own two-
edged sword. He is the " Spirit of Truth," the infallible guide " into
all truth." Ah, if every angel in heaven and every man on earth
were " helpers to the truth," should the Holy Spirit withhold His
omnific aid, it couM never accomplish its work, for God or man.
Nay, it would utterly and hopelessly fail. We would ever have

232 FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH.

sounding in our ears, and influencing all our efforts, the sublime
declaration, " Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith
the Lord."

But while this doctrine is firmly believed, while it is depended
upon as the basis of success, while we reverently bow our souls before
it and glory in it, assuredly it becomes us to listen obediently to the
exhortation of that adorable Spirit, as given in this inspired text,
wherein we are urged to be " fellow-helpers to the truth." Assuredly
it becomes us to listen obediently to the command of our Lord, who
saith, " Go ye into all the world, and preach the Grospel to every
creature." " Freely ye have received, freely give." As if He had
said, " I have not given My Gospel feet to walk or wings to fly ; I
have not bidden careering winds ' bear it from Greenland's icy moun-
tains to India's coral strand ; ' I have not commissioned angels to
help it through the earth on its sublime mission, but I have com-
mitted it to you, my chosen, redeemed, beloved people, co-heirs, co-
laborers with Me ; upon you I have conferred this honor and duty.
Go ye therefore into all the world ; lo, I am with you always."
Is it asked, how may we discharge this duty ? I answer —
1. We heiji the truth when, having received it ourselves, loe obey it
and exemplifi/ it in our lives. Constituted and depraved as men are,
my brethren, they will not believe in the great spiritualities of oui*
religion, unless they can palpably see practical exemplifications of
them. Hence it is that, however eloquently we may talk or preach
of the glory or blessedness of " the truth as it is in Jesus," the world
demands practical demonstrations of it. Therefore it is, that although
we profess the truth, if we do not live it, if there be not practical ap-
plications of it in our lives, we hinder instead of helping it. We
prejudice minds against it, instead of influencing them favorably
towards it. We block up its way, instead of removing obstacles.
In fact, we are really against it, while professing to be for it. We
thus " hold the truth in unrighteousness." Hence, it is far better
to take a Papist by the hand, speak kindly to him, and give him a
Bible, than to ridicule the Pope or any of his bishops. It is far
better to lift a drunkard out of the gutter, take him home, and help
him to become a man again, than merely to deliver eloquent addresses
upon temperance platforms. It is far better for the cause of benev-
olent truth to actually feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and admin-
ister to the pressing necessities of the destitute, than to be forever

FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH. 233

prating about charity, and never giving anything. It is far better
to develop the beauty and loveliness of our religion, the blessedness
resulting from obedience to its precepts, in our personal characters
and daily lives, than to argue and debate about them. Oh, brethren,
when our spirit, our words, and lives, are in anjcordance with the
holy Gospel we profess, then are we personally living, powerful,
influential exemplifications of it. Then are we, emphatically,
" helpers to the truth." And this is in harmony with other facts.
Let a farmer who would help agricultural truth neglect to apply its
principles to his own farm, and all he may say will avail nothing ;
but let him industriously apply those principles to his own land, and
realize their results in the superior beauty of his place, in greatly-
enlarged harvests, and in the increased value of* his estate, then his
neighbors will begin to seek after that which has thus benefited him.
Fulton helped mechanical truth, not so much by propounding a
theory, as by actually building a steamboat. Thus it is that he who
lives God's truth eflEiciently helps it. Be he whosoever he may, be
his circumstances whatsoever they may, be he wheresoever he may,
he is an " epistle known and read of all men ; " he is a living dem-
onstration of the divinity of Christianity. And, oh, if all of us who
profess it thus helped it, then would it rapidly accomplish its glorious
work in this world ; then would no combination of its foes be able to
resist its progress, any more effectually than, could a party of Swiss
boys arrest, by holding out their little hands, the overwhelming ava-
lanche, as it comes crashing, thundering down from the regions of
eternal snow.

2. We help the truth 7ohen toe do what toe can for its establishment
at home and dissemination abroad.

This is done, first of all, by those who organi2e and sustain Chris-
tian churches, each of which is "a pillar and ground of the truth;"
who in some destitute portion of the country, or a village, or a city,
organize divine models of republicanism on the old Jerusalem plat-
form, and, unfurling the banner of truth as it is in Jesus, keep it
up through storm and sunshine, keep it up through discouragements
and encouragements, keep it up in adversity and prosperity, and
never relax their hold upon the standard until it is loosened by
death.

This is done by those who sustain a ministry, called of God to
preach " the truth." Such is the definite mission of every minister

234 FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH.

of the Gospel. He has authority for preaching nothing else. His
business is to " rightly divide the word of truth/' and give to each
a portion in due season. He is by profession a herald of the truth,
who has sworn before the altar to believe it, to love it, to live it, to
proclaim it, to help it, so help him God !

This is done by those who erect sanctuaries, where these organized
churches may worship, and this ministry may statedly and publicly
''hold forth the Word of life." Every such sanctuary is of itself
monumental evidence for " the truth " — evidence that where it is
located there are believers, who have loved it so well as to give time,
money, and toil, to erect a house, from whose pulpit elevation it may
throw its pure light upon humanity around — a house to stand for
God when they shall have fallen in death — a house where their
children may come and remember the God of their fathers — a house
where the poor may come and hear the riches of grace treasured up
in Christ Jesus, the afflicted may come and find consolation, the
tempted and tried may come and gather up strength for the conflict,
the despairing may come and receive comfort and hope, the ignorant
may come and receive instruction, the aged may come and have their
spiritual youth renewed — a house to be made glorious evermore as
the earthly tabernacle of Jehovah in Covenant.

This is done by efficiently aiding those organizations, whose prime
object is to disseminate the truth. Such, for instance, as Sabbath
Schools, Bible Societies, Tract Societies, Home and Foreign Mission
Societies — for all these are but different methods of performing the
same work — disseminating a knowledge of saving truth through the
world. And such, emphatically, is the last and one of the most
beautiful and blessed developments of active Christianity — that which
bears the name of " the Young Men's Christian Association." Oh, it
is a precious helper to the truth ! It gloriously exemplifies the es-
sential unity of the Spirit of the Gospel, in the bonds of peace. It
makes applications of the truth in directions which had previously
been neglected ; and because of its increasing potentiality for good,
its benign influence upon both the church and the w6rld, the palpa-
ble approbation of Heaven rests upon it, and the sympathies of
Christendom are gathering around it. Oh, it is a sublime thought,
that all these multiplex instrumentalities, under the divine guidance,
are working out one grand purpose, one sublime consummation, and
that is the universal and permanent triumph of light over darkness.

PELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH, 235

of love over hatred, of holiness over sin, of eternal truth over every
form and development of error. Therefore it is that every one who
aids these according to his ability is in fact, and is recognised, both
on earth and in heaven, as an efficient helper to the truth.

IV. We ought to he fclloic-hclpcrs to the Truth.

Having seen the work which the truth has to accomplish ; that it
needs help ; and having seen how we may help it, the last point in
our doctrinal proposition is, that we ought to be its helpers. And
this will appear if we consider —

1. The ncdure of the icorh. In it are wrapped up the interests of
the world. We hear much in our day about the progression of our
race, as if that fact alone insured its well-being. But we mu^t
remember that there is a progress downward as well as upward, a
progress of vice as well as of virtue, of darkness as well as of light,
of error as well as of truth; and we should never' forget that all
progress is positively hurtful, which has not its basis in Bible truth.

.All else "leads but to bewilder, and dazzles to blind;" all else is a
mere " ignis fatuus," beguiling the unwary, leading them from right
paths to wander hither and thither, and finally leave them exhausted
and ruined. All else is temporary and transient, but truth is stable;
truth is firm and abiding; truth is enlightening and sanctifying;
truth is strengthening and elevating. It therefore promotes perma-
nent well-being. It elevates, equalizes, and blesses all. It honors
God. It places on the glorious brow of Jesus the crown of all the
earth. Do you desire such results realized in this world ? Then you
ought to help the truth.

2. Consider the debt of graiitude ice oive it. What has it done for
us ? Nay, I change the form of that question, and ask. What has
it not done for us ? Ah ! all that we are personally, as intellectual
and moral beings ; all that we are socially, politically, and ecclesiasti-
cally ; all of our hopes that radiate the future ; all that has made us
different from the lowest, meanest, and most degraded of earth — for
all this we are indebted to the truth, as it is developed in the divine
system of Christianity. Therefore I affirm, that mere gratitude dic-
tates that each of us ought to be its active, liberal, zealous helpers.

3. Consider the present posit iori of Bible truth. Perhaps at no
former period have its enemies been more numerous or malignant
than at present. Formalism on the one hand, and infidelity on
the other, are the extremes of a long line of opposition to its simple,

236 FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH.

unadulterated, sinner-humbling, and Grod-exalting doctrines. Our
holy Bible — hoary with an antiquity of which no other book can
boast, environed and impregnated with divinity, radiant with the
constellated glory of the entire system of moral and religious truth —
is made the grand point of attack. Now it is assailed under one
form, and then in another; now the opposition is led on by what
seems to be an angel of light, professing great sympathy for its moral
teachings, adopting its venerated modes of expression, and yet en-
deavoring to undermine its claims to inspiration, and thus destroy it;
and anon the attack is made by open, avowed, impersonated unbe-
lief. The powers of darkness do congregate, and the hosts of hell
do agree, that this blessed volume, which has withstood the storms of
eighteen centuries, shall be shoru of its glory, and regarded as an
effete thing — a relic of the past, unneeded by the prodigious wisdom
of the nineteenth century. Yea, in these days, the Herods and
Pilates of error easily become friends. Romanism and Pusey'ism
speak cooingly to each other ; German Atheism, imported to Boston,
and thence distributed over the land, is croaking, '' No God ! no God ! "
while transcendental Pantheism, its first-born child, is screeching,
"Everything is God, and God is everything;" Rationalism is offering
to inspire us, as truly as prophets and apostles were inspired, while
Spiritism is proposing to dispense with inspiration entirely, and sub-
stitute in its place what it calls fresh communications from the spirit
world.

These exigencies, my brethren, demand from us, if indeed we are
its friends, that we stand firmly by, and courageously defend Bible
truth. They call upon us, with new zeal, to love it, to profess it, to
live it, to preach it, to help it in every possible way; and swear by our
God, that let the opposition come from what quarter soever it may —
let it come in what form soever it may — let it come as the loifd-voiced
tempest or thundering hurricane — we will never give it up — nay, we
will brace ourselves against the tomb-stones of our fathers, and with
one arm around the rugged Cross, and the other grasping the sword
of the Spirit, we will do battle for it until our warfare is accomplished.
And rest assured that while thus helping the truth, we shall hear
voices of cheer sounding in our ears above the din of conflict saying,
" Go on, pursue, assert the sacred cause,
Stand forth je proxies of all-ruling Providence,
Saints shall assist you with prevailing prayers,
And warring angels combat at your side."

FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH. 237

4. Consider the idea involved in our being urged to be fdlow-
hdpers to the tnitli. From this you perceive that wc arc not called
upon to work alone, make sacrifices alone, aid the truth alone, but
merely to be /e^foiu-helpers. Ah, what a mighty array have already
been engaged in this service ! Lofty angels and hoary patriarchs ;
holy apostles, flaming martyrs, and eloquent preachers; Epaphroditus
the messenger, and Gains the host; Paul the aged, and Timothy the
youth; Eunice his mother, and Lois his grandmother — all these, and
unnumbered hosts of others, have been helpers. And time would
fail me to tell you of the witnesses God has raised up in every age,
who have gloried in spending and being spent in this work. And
to-day God hath a glorious host of truth-helpers in this world, de-
praved as it is. He has pious fathers and mothers, who belong to
past generations, encouraging and blessing us with their examples,
counsels, and prayers. He has hundreds of thousands of children
and teachers in Sabbath schools, some of whom are yet to shake the
world. He has numerous bands of Christian young men, gathered
in consecrated associations, who have laid their all upon His altar.
He has devoted ministers, pious deacons, and a " peculiar people,"
zealous of good works, scattered through all denominations. He has
Christian merchants behind their counters, and Christian mechanics
in their shops, and Christian farmers on their fields, and Christian
physicians and lawyers — all of whom in their several spheres are
fellow-laborers. And besides these, there are dying saints, sending
back their testimony from the gates of death ; and saints in heaven
whose works are following them, and ministering spirits on viewless
wings, and clouds of prayer arising from millions of heart-altars ; and
then there is the vast providential government of God, and the en-
tire material universe, both of which are subordinated to His purposes
of grace — and all these are helpers. And grander than all this, each
of the persons of the adorable Trinity, God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Spirit, is an eflEicient helper. Oh, what a host !
what a transcendently magnificent array ! What heart does not cry
out, in view of them, '' Let me, poor, weak, unworthy though I am,
let me have the high privilege of being a fellow-helper with such
associates, in such a cause ! "

5. Consider, lastly, that the ultimate tnumph of this truth is cer
tain, and that all who help it shall share in that triumph. It may
be, it will be long delayed. God takes time to consummate His

238 FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH.

work. " The ages to come " are His, as truly as the ages past. With
Him, one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
Error may conquer in a single battle ; it often does ; but it shall be
conquered in the war. John Milton never uttered a nobler senti-
ment than when he said, " Though all the winds of doctrine were let
loose upon the earth, so truth be in the field, we do injuriously to
misdoubt her strength. Let her grapple with falsehood. Whoever
knew truth put to the worse in a free and open encounter ? "

" Truth crushed to earth shall rise again, '
The eternal years of God are hers ; ■

While error, wounded, writhes in pain,
And dies amid her worshippers."

But this triumph is guarantied by an omnipotent Jehovah ; it is
promised in the covenant of redemption ; it is recorded on the
page of prophecy ; it was beheld from mounts of vision by ancient
prophets — and so glorious was the view, that they fell down like
dead men before its overwhelming magnificence. It is presaged to
the believing heart by the Holy Spirit, so clearly that oftentimes,
when clouds and darkness are around Zion, when her enemies shout
the p83an of victory, and the ranks of the faithful seem to falter,
even then Faith lifts up her voice like a trumpet, and sings —

" Thy saints, in all this glorious war,
Shall conquer, though they die."

Brethren, we shall die ; the places that know us now shall know
us no more. But though God buries His workmen. He will carry
on His work. The thorn-scarred brow of our Redeemer shall wear
earth's many crowns. His nail-scarred hands shall sway the sceptre
of this world. This earth, which was the scene of His humiliation
and ignominious death, shall be the theatre of His glory. Yea, this
sin-cursed world, wet with human tears, dripping with human blood,
shall again be clad in more than primeval beauty during millennial
years, and, as it rolls in its orbit, like a golden censer, shall send up
to the God of truth the incense of universal praise, He said that
the gates of hell should not prevail against His church ; and when
Zion, triumphant — decked like a bride waiting for her beloved— is
about to ascend to her eternal home, as she looks back upon the
theatre of her conflicts, shall shout, with exultant joy, '' The gates of
hell have not prevailed."

Brethren, when a harvest is gathered after much toil, who sings

FELLOW-HELPERS OF THE TRUTH. 239

most sweetly " the harvest home ? " Those who helped in preparing
the soil and in sowing the seed. When the independence of our
country was achieved, when the fires of Freedom blazed on our iiill-
tops, when the eagle of victory perched upon our banner of stars,
who rejoiced the most, who shared the largest in that triumph ? See
those aged veterans, a few of whom still linger among us ; tell one
of them to look over our vast Republic; tell him of its amazing
progress and resplendent prospects — and then tell him that, under
God, all this is traceable to the independence achieved by our fore-
fathers, and you shall see that bent form straighten up, that dull eye
flash, that feeble voice grow strong, as he exclaims, " I helped in
that struggle; I gave time, toil, and blood, for my country." And
you shall feel that he has a right to exult as no other may. He
shared the trials — he has a right to share the triumph. So, beloved
brethren, it is graciously given unto us, not only to believe, but to
suffer for Christ's sake — to have fellowship in suffering, fellowship
in sacrifice, fellowship in toil, and then final fellowship in the mag-
nificent glories of the ultimate triumph of truth — personal participa-
tion in the splendors of the coronation-day of our Lord.

THE EVIL AFFECTTN-a THE UNIVERSE.

Tb«* iirst of these. passages liaa another reading to thin effect:
Shall there be evil ^" ^ ' ' ^ ^ and the Lord not do «■ .rn r,,,rT, .,t, v " This
onstnietion. taken yotntl'vn fraxn <1.-: -y implies

8t!r

bie with the responsibility of His rational creatures ?

These questions bring us to consider one of thp profoundest sub-
jects that has ever engaged human attention — that of the existence,
c and authorship of evil — the '.rJations of mni, to it— and the
' '-d to it.

little to say that, how. ; ny have originated.

)Oth the diviiu' . an agencies are m-

..;i it. Of thii- 'omn troth, the

i 18 fall of the Ji^ id admonitory

cxiii • deluge and i crucifixion of

242 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

Jesus Christ have each, in their way, proclaimed the mighty hut
melancholy fact. The great centres of human population in every
age have become the monuments of its reality. And everywhere and
at all times the conflicts and disasters of the human race have only
served to illustrate and impress the fearful fact of existing evil, and
to confirm and manifest the equal truth, that man errs and suffers,
while at the same time God is also displaying, in this identical series
of events, the dispositions of His infinite mind.

In entering therefore, upon a somewhat closer examination of
this subject, we shall dwell at present on the three following topics
of discussion :

I. The nature of evil.

II. How creatures are connected with it.

III. How God is connected with it.

I. First then, as to the nature of evil, we observe that, so far as
we can know anything concerning it, the idea of evil is presented to.
our apprehension in these three aspects :

1. Moral evil, or sin.

2. Physical evil, or suffering.

3. Alternative evil, or that evil which might have resulted from
the choice of any other than the present system of the universe.

The conceptions of damage, hurt, injury, loss, mischief, pain, vio-
lence, and wrong, some or all of them underlie and form the basis or
real groundwork of each of these three aspects of evil. We are
somewhat at a loss how further or more clearly to express even our
own sense of what this evil truly is. But if possible to make it plain
in our meaning, we may remark, there is a divine will, there is a
constituted order of nature, and there is an eternal and immutable
distinction between right and ' wrong. Now to a sentient, spontane-
ous, intelligent, moral, spiritual, and accountable being constituted,
conditioned, and developed, in just accordance with this divine will,
this order of nature, and this immutable distinction between right
and wrong — to such a being, that which is absolutely not to be de-
sired is evil, that which is to be desired is ffood. We know of no
bfetter way of defining evil in the abstract, or of distinguishing it
from good. And consequently, still more certainly, that must be
evil at which God, in the divine sympathies and sensibiilities of His
infinite nature, reluctates.

Then, as to the aspect of moral evil or sin, we see at once that it is

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 243

and can be nothing more nor less tlian the want of conformity to, or
the positive transgression of a moral law ; and of course that it is
and can be produced only by the proper agent or subject of such a
law ) and of course only by a being who must be, in his own nature,
a free, intelligent, moral, and responsible creature. This being so,
it is indispensable to a comprehension of the subject that we should
have a clear conception of the possibilities and beginnings of moral
evil, and of the only conditions of its origin and rise. You see
plainly what it is — a violation of moral law — a departure from that
spiritual order and consistency of things, which God has established
in the constitution and administration of the existing universe. You
see as plainly that it can only arise in the nature and out of the st^ite
or action of a free moral being, subject to moral law. And it is
equally conclusive, that it must arise in the nature or from the mode
of such a being, only upon those occasions which aYe of the essence
of temptation, because the principles of creature mind and the proofs
of our experience are such, that this moral evil cannot exist except
as it is accompanied by a consciousness of the proximate causes which
produced it. These proximate causes are the occasions of tempta-
tion, which temptation, as witnessed by the consciousness of the
creature, may be present to the mind either from within or from
without, and must therefore be, in agreement with the circumstances,
either clothed with or divested of the quality of voluntariness. And
thus again, temptation itself must be distinguished as of two kinds,
when considered in reference to the subjects which hold it forth, or
the objects out of which it springs. Temptation is voluntary or in-
voluntary, according to the method of its presentation ; but tempta-
tion is not in itself properly an evil, when separated from the ele-
ment of voluntariness. It may be well to illustrate this distinction.
When Satan came to tempt the Redeemer, it was on the part of the
fallen angel a temptation voluntarily put forth. Hence we call it a
voluntary temptation, not with reference to Christ, but only with
reference to his adversary. But when Achan was tempted at the
sight of the wedge of gold, that temptation, arising from an involun-
tary object, may be termed an mvoluntary temptation. It was con-
tingent on the circumstances, and in itself had no moral quality.
Thus we see the difference between the.se two classes of temptations,
which together embrace all the forms of temptation of which it is
possible for us to conceive.

244 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

Yet, whether the temptation be voluntary or involuntary, as now
explained, the sin or act of demerit does not lie in the fact of being
tempted, but only in essentially yielding to such temptation. Moral
evil has not properly begun prior to the actual submission of the
creature to the dominion of the temptation. Temptation, as we have
seen in the instance of our Saviour, may arise upon a being purely
innocent, and if repelled, makes the innocence of the person tempted
even more conspicuous by virtue of the resistance.

These then are the conditions of moral evil — a juoral law — a
moral being subject to that law — temptations to a violation of the law,
such temptations being either voluntary or involuntary, and arising
either from within or without the moral being— and finally, an es-
sential submission of the moral being, upon the occasion of the
temptation, to that violation of the law in which the sin or moral evil
essentially consists. This is all it seems possible for us at present to
know of the rise and nature of this kind of evil. It remains only to
add, on this point of our examination, that philosophically consid-
ered, the first temptation must have been involuntary^ since any other
supposition would necessitate an act of sin prior to that which must
have been the first act, which of course is a self-contradiction.

, The occurrence of moral evil lays the foundation for the further
and consequent existence of physical evil or sufi'ering, embraced in
the distinct forms of natural sequence, positive curse and the strict
penalty of violated law. Thus we have, in this view, all that consti-
tutes the pain and disorder of the universe, as exhibited under the
Creator's administration, or attested in the history of His creatures.
So the natural sequence of the violation of moral law, operates mental
alienation from the law and from its Author, and that corruption of
nature which constitutes the spiritual death of the sinner. This oc-
casions a liability to the infraction of natural laws, and to its corres-
ponding damage or suflFering. The positive curse is a superadded
expression of the divine displeasure against sin. In the case of
human beings, it comprises natural weakness, toil, weariness, decay
and death, and may be regarded as a manifestation of the divine will,
giving direction providentially to the certain results of moral evil, as
those results are wrought out in the subordinate, departments of the
material creation. The sirict penalty of violated moral law is that
which may be termed the remediless and everlasting evil of the
divine wrath, as inflicted on the incorrigible sinner in a future pun-

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 245

ishment and an endless hell. No part of this physical evil could
have found introduction into the existing universe, had there been
no sin.

The third kind of evil — which we have designated alternative evil,
from the simple circumstance, that in the possibility of our concep-
tions, we may suppose it to have existed, had any other system of the
universe been adopted essentially different from the present — embraces
solely our ideas of what would or might have been either a defect or
a redundancy in any such supposable economy. Imagine for a mo-
ment, that any other system had been chosen ; we can easily con-
ceive that there might have been left out of it the element of the
creature's free agency. This must have been a defect, and as such,
an evil. Or there might have been engrafted into it severities even
more than those which now actually exist, and this we ma}^ conceive
to have been an excess such as would prove itself an 'evil. And so
we might conceive numerous modifications of this alternative evil,
which God has happily separated forever from the actually existing
universe. But as this alternative evil, though immeasurably trans-
cending in its possibilities all the realized evil ever existing or to
exist in connection with the established universe, has been at the
same time absolutely avoided, we may, in the present discussion, dis-
miss it from our further computation.

Such being the nature of evil in its three exhaustive aspects, it is
impossible to conceive of any evil other than that which must be in-
cluded under the one or the other of these primary forms. What-
ever divisions may be made or terms employed to designate our
notions of evil, it is evident that an ultimate analysis must trace each
specific instance of evil back to one of the three conceptions which
have now been specified. Having seen therefore, from the exposi-
tion already made, that the actual existence of the evil which afilicts
the universe must of necessity in some manner complicate the
agency of moral or spiritual beings in its origination and perpetuity,
it remains to consider, as proposed, the method of this complication,
both in respect of creatures, and especially of man, and also of the
infinitely perfect Jehovah. This leads us to the second branch of
the general discussion, which is —

II. The relation of creature agency to the actual evil of the uni-
verse, or a consideration of the manner in which angels and men are
connected with it.

246 THE EVIL AFFECTIXG THE UNIVERSE.

On this topic, our chief inquiry must be in reference to the blame-
worthiness or demerit of the relation in question, because it is evi-
dent, that on the proper determination of this point stands the
whole weight of the responsibility of the introduction of evil into the
universe. And though, as we shall hereafter see, we may not obtain
a full solution of the difficulties of this subject, or discover a theodicy
which is competent, in every imaginable aspect, to " vindicate the
ways of God to man," we may at least show upon whom, in the exist-
ing system of the universe, the entire burden of the introduction of the
evil which affects it, ought of right to rest, and does in fact repose.

Our proposition consequently is, that from the very nature of
evil, and from the only possible ways in which it can be conceived
to have arisen, the responsibility of its introduction into the universe
lies alone upon the moral creatures of God. The blameworthiness
of its existence rests solely with them. Accordingly it is clear, as
a historic truth, that previous to the first sin of the first sinner, no
trace of evil of any kind, was to be found in all the universe. But
on the other hand, all that subsisted was good, and admirable, and to
be desired. And if, in hypothesis, we take up our stand-point at
any period antecedent to the first act of sin in the creature, and
thence look over the stupendous fabric of the creation, we shall
behold on every side, and without exception, displays of God's good-
ness, wisdom, and po-\Yer. We shall see the countless monuments
of beauty and grandeur, of peace and happiness, of perfection and
glory, scattered throughout immensity, with nothing as yet existing
to obscure the splendors or mar the mighty substance of this illim-
itable empire. We shall observe how, in this unperverted order of
the vast economy, the tide of being rolls on majestically, and over all
the realm of the unbounded monarchy, a sound of hai'monies breaks
forth so musical, so full of life and light and immortality, that not
even the suspicion of evil shall enter upon this august panorama of
unfallen things, as it sweeps around the throne of the eternal Father,
from whose complaisent looks there ever flows a smile of approbation
on all the creatures of His authorship.

• Wherefore then, came evil ? Whereat could it thrust itself into
the goodly universe ? We mark the free nature of angels and men,
and we say at once, " there it crept in ; there it got entrance, and
there alone." Creature ageney produced it, and the responsibility
of its existence lies only on the sinner. The first appearance of evil

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 247

was an intrusion into the creation, in the form of sin — the disobedi-
ence and transgression of those " angels who kept not their first
estate." Had this motion of moral evil never risen out of the free
nature of moral beings, all actual evil must have been unknown to
the universe. And here let us observe more particularly, in tracing
the inception of that evil which has really accrued under the divine
government, that in the first angel that sinned, both the temptation
and the act of submission to it must have arisen purely with himself,
as he found himself conditioned when he sinned. There could have
been no antecedent evil ; there was no external or surrounding evil.
It is therefore evident that no form of evil could have assailed him
from without. The source of it was in himself, and there it burst
up. If it be suggested here that he must have been the subject of
temptation presented by the objects around him, we have already
shown that such temptation would be divested of the attribute of
voluntariness, and therefore not properly an evil in itself. That
angel was a moral or spiritual being — the subject of a law that was
"■ holy, just and good." He was created perfect after his kind. His
innocence was unexcepted, and his happiness complete. God had
laid no necessity upon him that he should sin. He had placed him
in no circumstances which ought of right to have coerced his act of
sin. There he stood, in his original innocence, amid the most suit,
able corresponding external conditions, when lo ! suddenly his heart
changes, and the fearful lapse begins. Hard feelings and murmuring
thoughts come swelling up, and black and damning purposes of rebel-
lion go coursing in the soul. That was the inception of moral evil,
and, so far as we are able to conceive of it at all, that was the manner of
its introduction into the existing universe. That was the first trans-
gression of the moral law, by a moral being voluntarily yielding him-
self upon the occasion of an involuntary temptation; and that was the
first act of sin. It is plain, from the nature of the case, that no vol-
untary temptation at that time existed; for this would imply the
presence of one who had sinned prior to the first sin, which is ab-
surd. So that the first temptation must have involuntarily arisen
with the first sinner, in view of the surrounding objects, and of his
own condition as afiected by them. But suppose that under the pres-
ence of the temptation so arising, it had gone no farther with liim,
moral evil would still have been shut out, because the being tempted
in such a manner was not itself the carrying away of his innocence,

248 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

nor the subversion of his integrity, but rather became instead a
conspicuous occasion for the additional display of virtue. But this
temptation was, as a matter of fact, strangely followed by submission
to an act of sin. The creature fully yielded. It was a motion of
his free nature, and through that movement evil got a foothold into
the great empire of God.

Now there was no need of opening this door ; there was no neces-
sity for such an occurrence — absolutely none. Nothing hitherto
derived from God constrained it, but on the contrary, everything so
derived put discountenance upon it. Nor was the finite reas.on less
positively opposed to it, while firmness of resolution might forever
have barred it out. Temptation might have pried with all its keys
for the ingress of moral evil, but temptation would have been bafiled
at every turn, had only the creature set the watch, and with an un-
wavering will, looked stern and defiant on every beckoning attitude
of solicitation. But creature agency betrayed its trust, and ever
since the evil, which first then found a lodgment in the empire of
Jehovah, has been perpetuated and extended in the free action of
rebellious creatures. The conclusion is inevitable. The blamewor-
thiness of evil lies wholly with God's sinful subjects. Their relation
to it is one of responsibility and guilt. They have become thus fear-
fully complicated with it, and must bear the whole demerit of its
introduction, as to the past — while, as to the future, they must be
either wholly separated from it, or overwhelmed and ruined by it.
Such being the connection of angels and men with existing evil, we
proceed to consider the third general topic, which is —

III. The relation of the divine agency to the evil of the universe,
or the sense in which God may be regarded as connected with it,
and His designs respecting it.

From what has already been shown, it appears that the blame-
worthiness of evil belongs exclusively to those creatures who have
sinned ; and therefore we may assume, once for all, that the Deity
holds no relationship to evil, in any sense derogatory to the infinite
perfections of His character. He cannot be censured on account of
its existence, because it is evident that He is not properly responsible
for its introduction. But it may be said, if God had not chosen and
actualized the present vsystem, the existing evil might have been un-
known. Of course, we answer; but then in that case, what we have
termed the alternative evil must necessarily have existed, and that

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 249

may have been vastly greater than all actual evil. And moreover, if
the principle be admitted, that a superior being should do absolutely
nothing-, because some inferior being, erring from the law of right,
may take occasion to pervert the innocent works of that superior,
and so to let in evil where before no evil existed, then there is a
necessity which, according to the logical requisitions of the principle
avowed, must compel the instant blotting out of the universal struc-
ture, and the subsidence of all its products into the primeval noth-
ingness. ''The King eternal, immortal and invisible," must sit
alone upon a senseless throne, wielding a barren sceptre over the
solitudes of a depopulated immensity. But from such a conclusion
the understanding itself recoils, because the principle is false, and
its fruition vicious.

If then, the connection of the divine agency with actual evil be
wholly separated from the character of blameworthiness, it is essen-
tial to consider in what method this relation of Jehovah to the pres-
ent evil actually subsists, and with what jDurposes He proceeds to
administer His government in view of it. In the statement of our
hypothesis upon this subject, we shall submit the question upon the
following series of propositions :

1. God chose and actualized the present existing universe, fore-
knowing that the present evil would exist.

2. He jDurposed, in connection with all the other constituent phe-
nomena of the universe, to permit it to exist — that is 'to say, foresee-
ing the liability to evil, as resulting from the constitution and devel-
opment of the chosen system, He designed to tolerate its actual ex-
istence, in view of the manner in which it must arise, and of the
possibilities that would result, in the order of nature, subsequent to
the event of its actual occurrence.

3. He purposed, upon the factivity of its introduction under His
government, either to overrule or to meet it with such positive con-
straints and penalties as to manifest forever to the universe its self-
destructive nature. In this way, the evil of which He becomes the
direct and positive Author is not moral evil, but that natural or
constitutional evil which, in a compensatory system like that of th
present universe, is seen to be necessary for the proper treatment of
such moral evil as may spring from the free nature of moral subjects,
and which therefore God does originate, in the two-fold aspect of
His disciplinary and punitive governance.

250 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

4. In creating the present universe, God did not desire the actual
evil with it, as in itself considered. Nor did He necessitate the evil
which was first to mar the beautiful order of the creation, nor was
it any part of the proper and essential motive which may be sup-
posed to have led Him to the choice of the existing system.

5. God may be said to have ordained the present universe in spite
of the actual evil which attends it, and because, for a final motive,
of the vastly greater and more glorious objects which are apposite to
the system itself, and can only be attained through its .existence and
operation.

6. In all this, it is not possible to perceive that there is anything
traceable to the divine agency as its sole and proper moral cause,
which is not manifestly "holy, just and good." Neither in the de-
signs of God, nor in His overt action, can there be found anything
which looks like the transcript of a vicious nature. The evil which
He purposely permits, originates in the action of responsible creatures.
The evil which He positively creates is, in the order of nature, but
a consequence of that moral evil which began with the first sinner,
and is therefore, so far from derogating from the divine character,
only another though fearful element of the perfect vindication of
Jehovah.

In further illustration of these positions, we are not to overlook
the great primordial features of the divine manifestation exhibited
in the present constitution of the universe. God has made bright
and blessed worlds. He has made innocent and happy creatures.
He has given them righteous laws. He has supplied all necessary
provisions, and maintained all suitable vigilance for the realization
of one unbroken order of beneficence and perfection, throughout the
entire extent of His immense dominions. How or when therefore,
did He desire the coming in of evil ? How or when did He favor
or foster it ? How or when did He put forth one single manifesta-
tion of His character which offers the least shadow of evidence that
He could authorize or sanction it ? But it is alleged that God per-
mitted sin in others. And what was this but permitting them to
us'e their freedom as they would, even though He had built around
them a wall of warning, and established every moral security against
the contingency of their evil choice ? To have done more than this
for the prevention of evil, He must have arrested the moral action
of His creatures, and totally obliterated their moral nature. The

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 251

question here becomes fundamental to the perpetuity of the moral
universe. Shall the creatures of God retain their spiritual being
and their free agency ? Then must they, on the strictest principles
of philosophy, be permitted to sin, if they will sin against light and
law and eternal penalty. But it is alleged that Crcd foreknew that
these creatures would sin, when He made them. And what was this
but the necessity of His omniscience ? Can He be blamed for know-
ing all things ? Or could He of right be estopped from the work of
creation, by the knowledge of the coming evil ? But God actually
inflicts pain upon the sinner. He has prepared a place of everlast-
ing torment for the finally incorrigible ofi"ender. And can He be
blamed for this when, by reason of His character as Ruler and Judge,
and of the executive office of supreme administration, He is bound
to uphold and protect those interests and laws of the universe which
sin assails ? Under the divine government, hell is the philosophical
result of sin, no less than the positive appointment of God as the
retribution for violated law. The question of the divine relation to
moral evil is reduced to this — that God's purpose is not to prevent
its inception and specific progress within the limits which the moral
freedom of His creatures furnishes — and that beyond this, He pur-
poses to overrule or to punish.

But inasmuch as the punishment of the sinner is itself an evil, in
the sense of suffering, it belongs to this discussion to show that^^so
far from impeaching God's infinite perfections, the pain inflicted
upon moral delinquents could not be withheld or averted upon any
theory consistent with those perfections. It must be remembered
that the divine agency is continually presented in a two-fold aspect —
first in His work as the Author and Maker of the universe, and
again in his office as the Upholder and Governor of the universe. In
the character of Creator, God elected and ordained a system liable to
evil, foreknowing that the evil would accrue. But the evil which
He thus foreknew was moral evil — the sin of moral beings. In this
remote sense only can the divine agency be said to be related to the
origin of evil, since, if God had not created anythinrj^ moral evil
could not have existed. But in that case, the alternative evil could
not have been evaded ; and this might have been a result far worse
than that which has actually transpired. It is true this statement
of the case at once brings forward, to the perplexity of our under-
standing, a formidable series of ulterior difficulties, which no theodicy

252 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

ever yet devised by the human intellect has proved capable of solv-
ing. Of these difficulties, the following may be taken as examples :

1. The question of the modification of the present universe from
what it now is, to the extent of rendering the liability to evil impossi-
ble. Why could this not have been done ? Is not the assumption
gratuitous, that there is no middle ground between the existing uni-
verse with its contingent or actual evil, and no universe at all ?

2. A suggestion from the revealed fact in the history of the moral
universe, that some of God's moral creatures have neve? lost '* their
first estate," but have continued in the perpetual goodness of their
spiritual life. The question is, why could not God have secured,
upon the same or upon similar principles, an immunity froni evil to
all His moral subjects? Upon what basis of right reason can this
difference in the condition of moral beings be explained ? And still
further, considering the doctrine of cause and effect in the strict
method of philosophy, how could evil come to exist as an effect at ali,
while there was no prior evil cause to produce it? If like causes
produce like effects, how is the enigma of this evident solecism to be
resolved ?

3. A derogation from the perfections of the Deity, apparently
arising from the fact that somethivg seems to exist in the present
universe which was not desired by Him, which did not emanate
froin Him, which came to be in the face of all His wisdom, good-
ness and power, and which He must in some form or other eon-
tend with throughout the endless ages of eternity. This something
is moral evil. It is the direct result of the action of moral beings,
who are themselves the creatures and therefore the effects of God.
This moral evil is consequently the effect of an effect, imme-
diately traceable to the great First Cause ; or if it have no first
cause, it then must either spring from the second cause in inde-
pendence of the first, in which case an antagonism is erected
against God which He cannot remove — or it must exist without any
cause whatever, that is be self-existent and therefore eternal and
unchangeable. It would thus become an incident of immensity,
like' time and space, and hence be divested of its moral quality
altogether. So that viewed in whatsoever light, the fact that it ex-
ists at all, when carried to. its ultimate analysis, presents a problem
which, in all the attempts of man to solve it, still remains as totally
mysterious as ever.

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 253

4. A fourth difficulty is disclosed in the fact that every hypothesis
yet constructed by human thought respecting this subject, turns out
to be upon close inspection, that purest of all metaphysical inani-
ties— a petitio principii — a "begging of the premises," and ''reason-
ing in the circle." The divine perfection is what is sought to be
proved, starting from the stand-point of existing evil. If God couJd
prevent it, and loould not, how is He infinitely good ? If He would
prevent it, but coidd not, how is He infinitely powerful ? The final
result of our rationality upon these questions is, that we take for
granted what we propose to prove, and we prove our proposition by
what we take for granted. A single formula contains it all — God is
infinitely good, notwithstanding the existence of evil j and though
evil exists, still God is infinitely good. This is the substance of all
that the human intellect has yet contributed towards the final dis-
position of the subject in question. And indeed rt seems incompe-
tent to do more than this ; for whatever hypothesis may be assumed,
or whatever philosophy adopted, it appears to result from the rela-
tions of the finite to the infinite, that every step in the advance of
human knowledge discloses further points of equal mystery, and gives
rise to new questions which, though couched in other forms, still
embody the same unsolved problem.

It is not therefore, our object in this discourse to attempt any ex-
planation of the difficulties thus suggested It would be at best
but a futile task. Many have tried it, and all have signally failed
in the efi'ort. The theories of Origen and of Swedenborg may stand
as specimens of the whole. All therefore we are seeking to do, is
to show how, or in what manner, the divine agency stands related to
the present actual evil of the universe, and not to furnish the slight-
est satisfaction as to the ultimate reasons of such a complication.
The will/ and the wherrforc of the actual phenomena, and their philo-
sophical reconciliation, are subjects lying wholly beyond the scope
of our present rationality, and so we are unable to incorporate their
elements into any authoritative demonstration.

But when once it is admitted that moral evil began with God's
moral creatures in the way we have supposed, then it is compara-
tively easy to comprehend the fact that the divine agency is and
should be connected with such evil, either for overrulement or pun-
ishment— and the further fact that in His office of Upholder and
Governor of the universe, God does so treat it. And in so dealing

254 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

with it, He does often directly and positively create or cause to exist
tlie corresponding physical evil. God does directly and positively
decree and purpose to bring evil upon the oifender. He does actually
give to the earth its barrenness, to the winds and waves their fury, to
war its havoc, to famine and pestilence their fangs, and to death its
fearful sting. He does undoubtedly arm the elements with destruc-
tive energy, either as the superadded expression of His anger against
sin, or as the required discipline of those whom He would reclaim,
or finally to pay off in just and judicial retribution the score of the
offender. In this clear and administrative sense, the Lord does create
evil. So far as we can see, He would be blameworthy if He did not
create it, for as the Supreme Ruler of the universe He is bound by
every high consideration to the piinisliment <^^ wrong-doing so soon
as it is clearly demonstrated that its overrulement is impossible. In
all this we discover at last the relation of Jehovah to the actual evil
of the universe. It is a relation purely permissive, reformatori/,. or
punitive — not one which as to Himself is condemnable or blame-
worthy.

Thus from the nature of evil as it actually exists, and the relations
which God and His creatures hold to it, we must conclude that the
beginning of actual evil is sin in the free nature of moral beings.
We know nothing of actual evil prior to this, either in God or the.
uiiiverse. The existence of evil demands such a course on the part
of the Deity as shall consist with the designs of His infinite perfec-
tions. This last necessity God fulfils, first with a view to the final
extirpation of evil, and secondly to concentrate and confirm what
may not be thus extirpated, within the limits of that place and con-
dition which He lias prepared for it, to remain forever.

If, then, there be any consistency or correctness in the view now
presented, we see that the whole matter of evil in its origin is the
intrusion into the universe of an unwelcome visitant. It came in by
no positive purpose or personal act of Jehovah. On the contrary,
His whole endeavor seems to be to eject it. The sinner would keep
it in the system, corroding, convulsing, destroying. It becomes
therefore, in the order of nature, a question for practical treatment.
If it cannot be cured, it must be separated from so much of the moral
universe as may be possible in the premises. The great Physician
must either purge or cut it out. He must therefore countervail sin
by sufi'ering. And yet the physical evil so inflicted shall be none

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 255

the less bitter, because God is just in dispensing it. "It is a fearful
thing to fall into the hands of the living God/' For He it is who
can kindle the penal fire and awalic the awful ministers of aveng-
ing justice — He it is who is roused and indignant upon every
movement of sin, whose forbearance will not always last, and whose
terrors once inflamed shall burn to the lowest hell — He it is who de-
clares by the utter inviolability of His own emphatic oath, " the soul
that sinncth it shall die." If sin then cannot be overruled, it must
be met with punishment awful and remediless.

From the exposition now made in reference to the evil of the uni-
verse, we may derive some lessons of the gravest import to our pres-
ent and everlasting well-being.

1. In the first place, we have the spectacle of a universe invaded
by evil with which the Supreme Power of the government proceeds
to grapple for its overthrow. In this great conflict; all the elements
of the divine empire are intensified, and all its features brought out
into bold relief. At every changing scene of the august exhibition,
there is a further confirmation of the great fundamental truths of
divine Revelation, and of those awful verities of our existence which
every individual of the human race must meet. It is the movement
of an empire whose Ruler is so sovereign, and whose issues so estab-
lished, that there can be to the sinner nowhere either evasion or im-
punity. ''Be sure your siu will find you out," is the fearful sentence
which burns along the pathway of every flying ofi'ender. In one of two
ultimate objects this inquest shall be laid. The every sin of every sin-
ner shall hunt after him till he is discovered, either first, that he may
repent and be restored ; or if this shall fail, then secondly, that he
may be consigned to the punishment that is everlasting and condign.
This is the solemn ordinance of Heaven. The conditions of God's
dealing with His sinful creatures are plainly stated. " When a
righteous man turneth away from his righteousness and committeth
iniquities, for his iniquity that he hath done shall he die." Again :
" When the wicked man turneth away from his wickedness which
he hath committed, and doeth that which is lawful and right, he
shall save his soul alive. Because he considereth and turneth away
from all his transgressions that he hath committed, he shall surely
live, he shall not die. Therefore, will I judge you, every man ac-
cording to his ways, saith the Lord God. Repent and turn your-
selves from all your transgressions, so iniquity shall not be your ruin.

256 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE.

Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have trans-
gressed, and make you a new heart and a new spirit ; for why will
ye die ? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth,
saith the Lord God. Wherefore turn yourselves and live ye."
These are the principles of the divine administration, and to give
them an everlasting power in a world of rebellious subjects, God has
further made the crowning display of all His works in the Gospel of
His Son Christ Jesus.

2, We have therefore a second impressive lesson in the plan of
Redemption brought to light in the Scriptures. Upon this gracious
economy God has gone forth actually to accomplish in our world all
that can be done for the cessation of evil, up to the point beyond
which the absolute destruction of the free nature of His moral crea-
tures is all that would be left to be enacted. Up to this point, God
has in the Gospel done everything possible in the premises to reform
and deliver men from evil. He has established another covenant.
He has initiated another dispensation. He has given to sinful men
the written revelation of His will. He has provided an all-sufficient
atonement for their sins. He has reprieved them throughout the
entire period of this probationary life. He has upheld them by His
providence, admonished them by His Word, instructed them by His
Spirit, and in every way conditioned them upon terms most favorable
to their recovery from the dominion of evil. He has afforded to
them every facility, and bestowed upon them every blessing, of the
glorious economy of salvation. He has given them His Son, " to
die, the just for the unjust; " and with IL'm, also, God has provided
the ordinances of the church and the means of grace. In manifold
ways He conducts the ministration of mercy, while everywhere is
uttered the solemn expostulation, " Turn ye, turn ye, for why will
ye die ? " And if, when tlie period of respite has expired, when
at last it is discovered that the sinner has rejected all the overtures
of the Gospel, and has resolutely persisted in the way and in the
prosecution of evil, shall '' it be thought a thing incredible " that
God should abandon him to his own chosen ways, and " fill him with
the fruit of his own doings ? " It is this result to which the guilty
must indeed be brought at last. And what a visitation of evil must
that be which bears in 'its execution the fearful weiglit of a re-
jected Gospel, a despised Saviour, abused privileges, and squan-
dered opportunities, and which shall roll the awful curse of " in-

THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVERSE. 257

dignation and wratli, tribulation and anguish," over tlie human spirit
forever !

3. There is one further serious lesson to be derived from this view
of existing evil. We have already seen that evil was first originated
by the action of God's moral subjects, and that by the same action
it is now maintained. Since, then, it exists by creature agency, it
is emphatically by the same agency that it must be made to cease.
There is a way in which our world might be entirely separated from
every vestige of the evil which afflicts it. Were everything now to
cease from sin, and henceforth take a steady stand for God and holi-
ness, this would finish the disorder, and finally efi"ace from human
conditions all that now makes up the curse and the catastrophe of
the creation. What we have to do is just to retrace our steps, drag
back the evil we have caused, and thrust it out again. If it is to go
out at all, it must disappear by the same door through which it was
brought in. If it is to go out at all, it must be made to vanish
during the period of man's probation. It must go while yet repent-
ance is possible, and pardon and peace may be had at the seat of that
Sovereign Mercy over which there seems to shine a sentence of living
comfort — " The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." It
must go now, " in this accepted time, in this day of salvation." It
must go when as yet God is putting forth His power to allay the ter-
rors it has spread around, and to break its deadly spell, and to delivei
its unhappy subjects from the captivity of their guilt.

Then, my fellow-men, there is in all this a pressure of obligation
and of duty which lies on every one of us, so great as scarcely to be
borne. If we have heard the voice of God calling us to our great
work of " ceasing to do evil and learning to do well," how shall we
contrive to postpone for a single hour the action that must be taken
in our deliverance and salvation ? How shall we still dwell upon
our earthly projects, in ruinous indifference to all these mightier
verities of the government of God ? How shall we, in utter mad-
ness, still cleave to the great iniquity, and still swing the red scimitars
of sin, reeking in the fresh-drawn blood of the Messiah, in the face
of the omnipotent Jehovah ? The day shall come when we must be
hurried through the iron gateway, to behold, on the other side, the
august phase of irreversible destiny. No present quietude, no earthly
stays, shall hold us back. But as we ride insensible upon the eternal
wave, the bitter truth may then first break upon us, that " sin, when
17

-58 THE EVIL AFFECTING THE UNIVEKSE.

it is finished, bringetli forth death." And then shall the furies of
an undone existence make each man to know the height and depth
and the length and breadth of that evil which he has authorized and
perpetuated, in spite of all the reclamations that flow from the Re-
deemer's Cross. Oh ! then, while yet the catastrophe delays, and all
the wretchedness of our estate may be disposed of in another way,
let the summons of Jehovah be instantly obeyed. " Let the wicked
forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him
return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him ; and to our
God, for He will abundantly pardon." Amen.

.»;:J >J

260 THE IMPORTANT CHOICE.

of Christ. It should never be done, without careful counting of the
cost. To come up to the altar, and there, with the hand laid upon
the great sin-offering, to renounce the devil and all his works, con-
secrating ourselves soul and body to the Saviour, involves tremendous
consequences. To do this, merely in compliance with a hereditary
custom, thoughtlessly and carelessly — to do it, with no intelligent
perception of the self-denials of a religious profession ; or to do it,
under a temporary, spasmodic feeling, and from sympathy with the
general interest about us — is a grievous and damning- sin. If the
ceremony have any meaning, it is awfully significant. It is the most
solemn act which a creature can perform. It professedly separates
us, thoroughly and eternally, from the world. Thenceforth, its
" vain pomp and glory " are abjured, its sinful lusts renounced, its
covetous desires disowned. We, and all that we have, belong to
God.

I. The first question that we shall consider is this : What is essen-
tial in order to the actual exercise of the will in choosing the service
of the Lord ; or, in other words, what is the nature and process of a
genuine conversion ? In its every stage, it is the result of an opera-
tion of the Holy Ghost upon the heart. If we are convinced of our
guilt, it is because '' He is come, who will reprove the world of sin."
If our minds are enlightened as to the things of heaven, it is because
" God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit." If we die unto
sin, it is because we experience the new birth of the Spirit. If we
are sanctified, it is by the same Spirit. Every Christian grace im-
planted in us is a fruit of the Spirit; and by Him are we ''sealed
unto the day of redemption." There is not one independent move-
ment of the soul, from the beginning to the end of the process of
renewal. It is not capable of such a movement, and yet its every
motion is voluntary and free. . No other being chooses for us. The
appeal is made to you personally — ■" choose ye this day whom ye will
serve."

The Holy Ghost deals with us in the fullest recQgnition of our
freedom. So far as our consciousness can reach, it is by the power
of motives addressed to the understanding and the heart, that He
effects the mighty change. There is heard the voice of argument :
'' Come now and let us reason together," saith the Lord. There is
heard the voice of threatening: "I will laugh at your calamity, and
mock when your fear cometh," There is heard the voice of en-

THE IMPORTANT CHOICE. 2G1

treaty : " Return unto me, and I will return unto you." There is
heard the voice of encouragement: "Come unto me, and I will give
you rest." There is indeed some mysterious action of the divine
upon the human mind, analogous to the exercise of creative power,
which lies far back of our consciousness, and therefore cannot be
subjected to analysis. How it is wrought, passes our comprehension.
It is among the deep things of God. It need not, however, obscure
our view of the formal process of renewal. It is impossible for us to
define the essential nature of physical or vegetable life ; how God
creates, we cannot tell ; but all the processes of life are open to our
observation. We know all the conditions of its existence. We know
where the seed must be planted, and how it must be sheltered ; and
we can foresee precisely the character of the plant, from our knowl-
edge of the nature of the seed ; but what it is which causes the seed
to germinate at all, we cannot define. All life, in its inception, is an
unfathomable mystery. "So is every one that is born of the Spirit."
The efi'ectual grace of God must move upon the soul, in order to our
choosing to be His servants; to every one that will make this choice,
the grace is given. There stand the two facts, alike certain and
alike inexplicable. But there is no necessity for us to perplex our-
selves with these mysteries, for all with which we are practically
concerned is easily understood. The process of spiritual life we will
now endeavor to exhibit.

The truth of the Gospel is first presented to th(^ understanding.
Grace and truth are always found in company, and both " come by
Jesus Christ." We are called upon to "obey the truth." "Ye shall
know the truth," says the Saviour, " and the truth shall make you
free." Truth is the key which unlocks our dungeon door. Christ
says of Himself, "I am the truth." The Holy Ghost is called "the
Spirit of truth." Jesus prays that His people may be " sanctified
through the truth." St. Paul describes his ministry as a "manifesta-
tion of the truth." Repentance is termed the "acknowledging
of the truth." There is then, in every step of our renewal, a distinct
recognition of man's intdlectual nature. He is supposed to be capa-
ble of discerning the true from the false, and of being impressed by
the truth. And in all this is involved the fact that he must exercise
the power of choice, and be led to this choice by the influence of
motive. His sin consists in this — that he has hitherto chosen wrong;
he must now be brought to choose right.

262 THE IMPORTANT CHOICE.

And what is the truth with which the Holy Spirit plies the soul ?
Comprehensively, " the truth as it is in Jesus."

The minci is always busy upon something. Science may tax its
energies, and so the man become well skilled in the wisdom of the
world. Schemes of profit may exhaust its powers, and secure to the
laborer abundant wealth. Dreams of vanity may weave themselves
there, filling the vacuum with spider's webs. But there is one sub-
ject to which by nature we are always averse. That is the law of
God. We dislike it, because it condemns us. It tells_us that of our-
selves, which we hate to hear. By it, is 'Hhe knowledge of sin."
This is something of which we prefer to remain in ignorance. But
the Spirit forces this subject upon our notice. He tells us the truth
concerning ourselves. He forces us to acknowledge that it is the
truth. And then there comes up from the depths of the soul the
earnest cry, '' Woe is me, for I am undone! "

This result efi"ected, there appears upon the canvas another .pic-
ture. Sinai vanishes, with its smoke and its thunderings ; and Cal-
vary shines forth, with its Cross and its redemption. The stern voice
of vengeance sinks into a whisper of mercy. The clouds break, and
the sun gleams upon the earth. The eye is anointed by the hand
of faith, and we see Jesus interceding for us with an offended God.
" Father, forgive them ! " The words fall like music upon the ear.
The law still condemns, but there is salvation by grace. This is in
brief the truth which the Spirit reveals. Thus does '' He take of the
things of Christ, and show them to us." Until this is done, we remain
utterly blind to our own condition, and hopelessly indifi'erent as to
our salvation. From prudential motives, we may abstain from the
grosser forms of sin — from the force of education, we may manifest
an outward respect for religious observances; but not one step do we
advance towards heaven. We are "without God and without hope."
Our " feet stand in slippery places," and we hang upon the very
brink of hell. "The truth is not in us." Conscience slumbers.
The will is inert. Holy affections are dead. Selfishness rules the
members and the mind. The heart is swollen witK pride, cankered
by avarice, corrupted through lust. I know that the sinner will
deny this, for deceitfulness is one element of the heart's desperate
wickedness. He does n.ot understand his own errors. ' And, when-
ever the spirit flashes the light of heaven into the dark chambers of
his soul, he stands aghast at the disclosures which are made. And

THE IMPORTANT CHOICE. 263

very often lie is unwilling to take a second glance; but, with a sud-
den and convulsive effort, shuts the door of his heart against the
light, preferring to be ignorant of what lies within.

And this leads us to our second observation — that, in a process
of renewal, not only must truth be presented to the mind, but
we must be induced to dioell upon truth, and give it time to do its
work.

All important and permanent changes for the better in our moral
condition must be the result of reflection. It is not generally on the
instant that we perceive i\\e full bearings of spiritual truth. Most
men will carelessly acknowledge that they are sinners ; but they do
not consider what it is to be a sinner, in what a position it places
them before God. His law must be comprehended in order to this,
and the final judgment must be distinctly brought before their
minds. They must think seriously and patiently. ■ " When I con-
sider, I am afraid." It requires a steady gaze to measure the long
distance which separates the transgressor from his Maker. The cat-
alogue of our sins is not to be read at a glance. Many of them we
have forgotten, and they cannot be recalled without an effort. If
they were all written in a book, and it were put into our hands, we
should be shocked at its magnitude. Days and weeks would be needed
for its perusal. And oh ! how we should tremble as we turned it
over, leaf by leaf, and found each page growing darker and
darker. That will he the melancholy occupation of feternity, unless
the record be blotted out in the blood of the Lamb. Neither can
the depths of grace be penetrated in a moment. We can perhaps
tell you nothing of the work of Christ which you did not know
before; it is not information which you need; but, if you would
take the simplest truth of the Gospel, and meditate upon it till it
stands out in all its distinctness, it would come home to you with a
power, and be invested with a meaning, which never before entered
into your conception. " The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from
all sin." Those words are not new; the ftict which they state is
perfectly familiar to you, and it has perhaps never stirred a single
pulsation in your breast ; but if you would only give your thoughts
to this truth ; if you would consider that you have been redeemed
by blood, the blood of Jesus Christ, and that this is cleansing blood;
that, even though your soul be as red as crimson, crimson blood will
wash it white as snow; if you would fix your attention upon these

264 THE IMPORTANT CHOICE.

things until you really apprehend them^ you would rise up "a wiser
and a better man."

The necessity of patient dwelling upon the truth is seen in this,
that truth must shape itself into motive, before it can act upon the
will. Now, a moral motive is the combined result of the action of
conscience and affection, conscience showing what is right, and the
affections urging us on to obedience. Truth enlightens the con-
science and excites the affections. It does this just in proportion to
the intensity with which it is apprehended. It is with the fire of
burning thoughts that the Holy Ghost melts the iron obstinacy of
the rebellious will. The sinner begins to think ; it may be some
domestic affliction that sends him to his closet — the revered and be-
loved parent, the sweet child, or the affectionate partner, dearer than
all, has been laid away in the grave, and he flies from the world's
uproar to weep in secret. The Spirit of God goes with him to his
lonely chamber, and there holds solemn colloquy with his soul. His
thoughts are led forward into eternity. He seems to see the spirit
of the departed beckoning to him from the land of shadows.
He remembers how soon he must follow. The question now
begins to press achingly upon his heart, "Am I prepared for
the change of worlds ? " The attending angel unrolls before him
the record of the past. He reads, and trembles as he reads. The
World has had all his time and all his thoughts. God has been
forgotten. The Saviour has been denied. " He has sown to the
flesh, and must reap corruption," "What shall I do?" he cries
in agony. "Pray!" answers the Holy Ghost. There comes a
struggle. Those knees have not been wont to bend, before man or
God. The words of prayer would sound strangely from those lips.
Pride remonstrates; despair whispers, "It is too latel" Satan
pleads for a respite : " It is time enough yet ; tarry awhile ! " He
knows, wise and artful as he is, that the crisis has now come, and
that the prey is slipping from his hands. Oh ! it is a crisis, and
heaven is poised upon the uncertain balance of the human will.
" What shall I say to God ? " asks the timid and convicted sinner.
" Say whatever is in your heart ! " replies the Holy Ghost. " Shall
I be heard ? " he asks again. There come crowding upon his mind
the multiplied and earnesi promises of God ; and Jesus draws near,
pointing to His wounds, and the shadow of the atoning cross
seems to fall upon his chamber floor, and he sinks upon his knees,

THE IMPORTANT CHOICE. 265

and tliere is prayer in his heart — real, accepted prayer — even before
the words are formed upon his lips. '' God be merciful to me a
sinner ! " at length breaks from his burdened soul. He lays him-
self in faith at the Saviour's feet, giving all he has to Jesus, choos-
ing Him as his everlasting portion, and the offering is accepted.
Angels touch their harps to a loftier note over one more sinner who
has repented.

And what has wrought this change ? Instrumentally, and in the
hands of the Holy Spirit, it has been the simple fact that the sinner
was brought to earnest and intense reflection. " While he was
musing, the fire burned." Truth was applied to his soul; circum-
stances led him to give special attention to the truth ; gradually it
found its way to his conscience and his affections ; he turned his face
in penitence to God, and on the instant the hand of reconciliation
was stretched forth, and he was adopted as a son. His final act was
one of choice — a free and cheerful acceptance of the Saviour ; and
.had he stopped short of this, all the emotion which he experienced
would have gradually subsided, and after a while he would have
returned to the world, ten-fold more hardened than ever before.

II. The question to which I shall now direct your attention is
this : What are the most prominent hindrances in the way of a final
decision to consecrate the life to God ?

And here I may remark, that, whatever they may be, they have a
common origin and a common character. Their origin' is in the nat-
ural depravity of the heart, and they are in themselves only its sin-
ful issues. We may throw around the matter whatever appearance
of palliation we can devise ; we may say that we cannot come to a
decision, because we wait for further light, or because the present
conjuncture of circumstances does not favor it, or because we are so
shocked at the inconsistencies of professed Christians, or because we
do not feel the necessity of an immediate decision ; these are only
different forms in which the rebellion of the heart manifests itself
And yet it may be well to enter into certain particulars, and see how
they operate to hinder a decision. One prominent difficulty grows out
of the popular estimate of religion. The Gospel, in certain of its more
general features, in our day, may be considered as having received
the favorable verdict of the community. A degree of respect is paid
to its outward forms by all who would maintain a reputable standing
in society. Christianity is generally noticed with respect in our liter-

266 THE IMPORTANT CHOICE.

ature. It is not fashionable to profane the name of the Eternal God,
or openly to trifle with the awful secrets of the dark prison-house of
the damned. It is easy to distinguish, by the aspect of the city, the
Lord's day from secular time. All the grosser vices, which our re-
ligion condemns, are also condemned by the civil law and by public
opinion. Christianity, with its wonderful system of ethics, its
sublime truths and glorious revelations, its disclosures of a judg-
ment and an eternity — with its eventful history of persecutions and
martyrdoms and heroes — with its long array of learned and powerful
supporters — with its trophies of refinement and civilization, gathered
wherever the world has been trodden in its triumphant march — with
its noble temples, its impressive services, and its' growing dominion —
would certainly afford a strange subject for contemptuous ridicule.
Even if I were an infidel, I would as soon think of sneering at the
science of astronomy. If I believed that the Grospel were but an idle
fable, I should find in it but little food for laughter. If I thought it
all a delusion, when I saw the Gospel making the drunkard temperate,
the thief honest, the lascivious pure, the passionate sober, the riotous
calm, the avaricious liberal, the ambitious humble, the selfish open-
handed, I should hesitate before I ridiculed such a faith. When I saw
this religion lifting its genuine professors above the infected atmos-
phere of the world, tempering their minds in prosperity, and cheering,
them in adversity — when I saw the spirit of Christian faith and hope
hovering like an angel of consolation around the dying bed of the
believer, and lighting up with joy the dreary passage :tothe tomb — it
would not be in my heart to interpose a single obstacle to hinder a
fellow- creature from attaining its comforts and its blessings.

And yet it is the fact, that, in certain aspects, popular usages and
opinions are directly opposed to the spirit and requirements of the
Gospel. It must necessarijy be so, in respect of what may be called
the great central doctrines of Christianity, so long as Christ's King-
dom is not of this world. It cannot be expected that an individual
will regard with favor and complacency any higher standard of god-
liness than he practices himself A worldly community will not
■patronize a system which declares that, ''if any man love the world,
the love of the Father is not in him." And therefore it is, that even
in circles where Christianity in its general features is treated with
respect, there will be manifested the most bitter and resolute opposi-
tion to that doctrine which declares the vital and absolute necessity

THE IMPORTANT CHOICE. 267

of a radical eliange of heart and life. It is opposed and ridiculed,
not so much theoretically as practically. There is no proper distinc-
tion made between the earnest and genuine convictions of the contrite
heart and the wild outbreaks of the maddened enthusiast. The
awakened emotion is ascribed to melancholy, or caprice, or some
idiosyncrasy, which is to be removed by secular employment and re-
laxation ; and various influences, direct and indirect, are brought to
bear upon the convicted sinner, to divert his thoughts, and enkindle
his pride, and lead away his mind from the things of eternity. These
efforts too often prove successful, and, after a few faint struggles, the
voice of conscience is silenced, and the world resumes its sway.

Another class of hindrances grows out of peculiar habits and tempt-
ations connected with our secular occupation. Whatever that may
be, it is liable to interpose special obstructions in the way of a final
and decisive consecration of the heart to God.

It is hard for the man who is absorbed in any secular pursuit,
tasking his energies in the pursuit of wealth, excited to-day by a
favorable turn of fortune, and depressed to-morrow by the prospect
of reverses, to give his mind long enough and intently enough to the
subject of religion to reach a fixed decision. In the silent hour of
the night-watches, when sleep forsakes his eyelids, solemn medita-
tions may possess his soul, and the question sorely agitate him,
'^ What shall it profit me if I gain the whole world ? " but, with the
excitement of the morning, and amid the bustle of returning day, all
these things are forgotten. He does not actually resolve, finally and
forever, to banish the subject from consideration; he acknowledges
its importance; he hopes to make his peace with God before he
leaves the world ; he is not satisfied with his condition, but earthly
cares have preoccupied his mind ; and so year after year slips by,
and the will lies dormant. He comes to no decision, and at last he
givcth up the ghost, and where is he ?

So it is with the ambitious man, whose hopes are suspended upon
the people's favor, who is busily studying how to win the public ear,
and secure for himself the place of power. He must scheme and coun-
ter-scheme, watch lynx-eyed and incessantly his opponent's move-
ments ; he breathes a tainted atmosphere ; the lines of truth and false-
hood become strangely blended ;, he learns to check the honest expres-
sion of his mind, and trains himself to utter whatever policy may dic-
tate. In some hour of disappointment, when he is disgusted with the

268 THE IMPORTANT CHOICE.

honors of the world, and loathing its empty promises, the Spirit of
God may stand before the door of his soul, and hold up to his view
an incorruptible crown, reserved in heaven for those who love the
Saviour. He is prompted to secure that crown, and to seek the
honor which cometh from Grod. Angels gather around him, to second
these holy desires. Great truths, which he had long forgotten,
crowd upon his mind. The frozen surface of his heart begins to
melt. The will, which had seemed so rigid and immovable, vibrates
faintly and tremulously. But at this critical moment, there is a
change in the aspect of earthly fortune. The long-coveted prize,
which had been given up in despair, is suddenly laid at his feet. A
thousand voices shout the name of the successful statesman with
vociferous and hearty acclamation. His hand insensibly closes upon
the wand of power. With a spontaneous joy, he bows his head to
receive the laurel, and God is thenceforth forgottep.

And there is the scholar, shut out from the busy excitements of
life, careless of wealth, and not over-anxious for honor, " whose mind
to him a kingdom is." Are there any peculiar hindrances in the way
of choosing God's service, likely to grow out of his condition ? He
has a cultivated understanding, ability to comprehend, and leisure
to digest the truth ; " His labor is in wisdom, and in knowledge, and
in equity." He has learned to fortify himself by the power of philo'so- ,
phy — is not this a good stepping-stone to religion ? Alas ! it is made
a substitute for the Gospel; and when the Spirit of • God pleads
with his soul, he falls back behind the stony entrenchments of this
philosophy, and so cuts off all communion between his soul and
heaven.

Another difficulty in our way arises out of the existence of some
secret and cherished idol, which must be sacrificed when the soul
devotes itself to God. There is comparatively little difficulty in
making the surrender which Christ requires, until this favorite pos-
session is touched. Then the nerves quiver, and the heart draws
back from Jesus. The sinner shrinks from the threatened lacera-
tion. He cannot bear the torture of the knife. He trembles at the
thought of his alienation from God ; he feels his sinfulness ; he longs
for peace of conscience and joy in the Holy Ghost; he is impelled
by a power that is almost irresistible to go and lay his head upon the
Saviour's breast, and plead with Him to be pardoned and to be loved ;
and yet he is held back — for if he goes, he must leave the object of

THE IMPORTANT CHOICE. 269

his idolatry behind, and bid farewell to it forever. He reaches the
very threshold of the kingdom ; another step, and the dividing line
would be passed ; but there lies in his way one rock of oifence over
which he stumbles, and the gate of heaven is not attained.

Now, it is this fond idol, which has been to him in the place of
God, for his best affections have centred there ; his will bus pros-
trated itself before this shrine. And the whole question of his sal-
vation turns upon his readiness to sacrifice this particular object of
his love. It may be considered as the concrete of his inward depravity.
It may have its root in the passion of avarice or ambition or sensu-
ality, or it may be grounded upon some nobler affection ; it docs not
matter what it is, so long as it sunders the creature from God. Thev
devotion rendered to it is a robbery of God, giving to another what
belongs to Him.

There is still another impediment which often stands in the
sinner's way ; and that is, the fact that he is called to mark the be-
ginning of his Christian life by a public and formal dedication of
himself to God. After all other difficulties are supposed to be sur-
mounted, here the individual hesitates. It seems a formidable thing
to come out before the world, and renounce the principles by which
life has thus far been guided. It is an open confession of past un-
faithfulness. It may sunder long-established ties of friendship. It
may expose you to ridicule and reproach. It will bring you into
connection with those whose sympathies and associations are very
diverse from your own. It is an assumption of new responsibilities.
It lays you under peculiar restrictions. It exposes you to a scrutiny
which otherwise would be avoided. The mark of Christ will now be
upon you, and you will be expected to walk answerably to your Chris-
tian calling. You must hereafter be seen no more in the place of
vain amusement and noisy revelry. Your speech must be seasoned
with salt, and no profane or careless words must proceed out of your
mouth. Your unruly temper must be brought into subjection, and
railing must no more be answered with railing. Your fellow-crea-
tures, in whatever relations they may stand to you, inust be treated
according to the Christian rule of love. You must no longer be over
eager after earthly gain, but hold all your possessions as subject to
the will of the Lord. To take the final step which involves all these
consequences, and pledges you to such a life, is indeed a serious
thing. Your word, once passed, can never be retracted. There is

270 THE IMPORTANT CHOICE.

but one door by whicli you can leave the churcb of Christ, after you
once enter the enclosure, and over that is written, ''anathema —
maranatha ! "

Various and serious, then, are the difficulties which tend to hold
you back from a decision. We are not disposed to evade or under-
value them. We would prefer that you should distinctly see all that
must be encountered in choosing the service of God. At the same
time, we would remind you that none of these difficulties are insur-
mountable. Others have fought their way through all the' obstruc-
tions of Satan to eternal life, and you may do the same. " And just
remember what is to be determined by your decision. Consider,
seriously and patiently the dreadful alternative, if you allow anything
to keep you at a distance from the Saviour.

What is the interest here at stake ? Your salvation. Salvation —
from what? From sin, with all its debasing corruptions, its grind-
ing tyranny, its remorseful pains, its debilitating influences, and its
destructive results. Your present well-being is here involved. Un-
checked by grace, that incipient lust may ripen into riotous and
ruinous excess, and the drunkard's living shame or the suicide's in-
glorious grave may be your.miserable heritage. The youth who finds
salvation in Christ, and is early sanctified of the Spirit, is safe. Who
else can be safe in such a world as this, and with such hearts as these
lodged within us ?

But is this all ? Is there no other salvation than this ?
" There is a death whose pang
Outlasts the fleeting breath."

There is a doom which reaches both soul and body, whose hopeless-
ness and dreariness no word of ours can picture ; and salvation is
deliverance from this doom, rescue from this eternal death. When,
therefore, you are repelled from what you feel to be your duty by
thinking of the hindrances which obstruct you, and the sacrifices
which must be made, remember also what lies beyond. And let the
thought of a heaven to be gained nerve your arm/with strength, and
inspirit you for the contest.

>

■JF I'iANDOLPE MACON C,

272 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE "WITH GOD.

Gospel being to quiet tlie fears wticli the threatenings of the law
do actually awaken, this operation and effect may be called the spirit
of adoption. But this interpretation, I think, may be safely ignored,
as far short of the high import of the spiritual teaching of the Apos-
tle, for no man deferred to the law more than he. He relied im-
plicitly upon his obedience to both the moral and ceremonial law, as
affording him the only ground of salvation. " As touching the law,"
says he, " / loas blameless." Whatever, then, may be the natural
operation of the law upon a mind which looks not ta it merely as a
rule of life, but to his obedience to it as the procuring cause of sal-
vation, we may expect to see exemplified in the early history of Paul.
What, then, was the effect upon him? Was he a subject of servile
fear ? Far from it. For, speaking (Romans, vii, 9) of that period in
his history when he was " without the law" in that spiritual import
which gives it a direct awakening effect, he says of himself, " / xcas
alive" in that state ; I had no idea of my sin and danger. With the
straight edge of the law lying to my crooked path, I was neverthe-
less ignorant of the obliquities of my course ! I really thought I
was doing God service, while I was actually shedding innocent blood,
in utter contempt of His authority ! " But lohen the commandment
came, I died " — that is, " when my pure reason was so enlightened
by the Holy Spirit, whose office it is '■ to convince the world of sin, of
righteonsness, and of a judgment to come,' that I had a clear percep-
tion and just discrimination of the nature and relations of moral law
to my heart and conduct, I at once saw and felt that I was a ruined
sinner, hastening on to judgment without a single ray of hope. 'I
died,' to all the former quiet of my mind. I saw that I was really
dead, in the eye of the law, and only awaited the act of the execu-
tioner to complete my ruin." ' Hence the bitter lament : " 0 wretched
man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"
Here was slavish fear, indeed — the bondage of a chain, which, his
own unhappy and fruitless experience taught him, no human power
could break.

Now, we know that the law is not defective in its own nature. It
is ^'through the flesh" only that it is ^^ loeah." In itself, it is holy,
just, and good. Here, then, is an effect, in the case of Paul, not
resulting from the nature of the law, for that remained the same that
it was before his awakening — ^holy the^^, and holy noio ; nor yet re-
sulting from the essential nature of mind, for Paul's mind remained

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 273

the same also ; but, as tlie context shows, an effect resulting from the
direct operation of the Holy Spirit — so enlightening, and thereby
quickening hispi<ye reason — the faculty by which he perceives real
abstract truth, and discovers its relations to himself — that he per-
ceives and acknowledges his lost and ruined condition, and /eels all
the force of this new belief.

Let it be observed, that there remains to man, since his fall, in
common with his fellow animals, the capacity to take in all ideas
which come through his physical senses. Besides this, there is that
measure of understanding, or capacity to perceive and assent to the
nature and relations of these ideas to himself and the business of life,
which is inseparable from the existence of the pure reason, and which
makes him, though a, fallen, still a rational, heing. But because his
pure reason is no longer in immediate contact with the Holy Spirit,
as it was before his fall, he has, by nature, no clear perception of
moral good, moral heauti/, and moral truth, (our classification of all
pure abstract moral ideas,) and, at best, only a dim, shadowy outline
of these ideas. Hence he does not discriminate their relations to
himself, and their claims upon him. Hence he does not believe the
teachings of the law, that he is a transgressor, and liable to death.
And as he does not believe this, he does not (nor can he) feel the
obligations of this belief. The feeling of the onght or the ought not is
not present — that is, he has no conscience about it. Hence his will
is powerless, touching these matters, though capacitated for freedom,
because it is not supplied with the antecedent feeling of obligation,
which is the necessary condition of volition, or condition of choosing
by election — a condition inherent in an act of moral freedom. For,
as the presence of two individuals, one with the other, is a necessai'y
condition of their holding a personal conversation, while at the same
time, this condition, being supplied, does not compel the conversation
they hold with each other ; so the feeling of obligation to the truth
believed (conscience) is a necessary condition of an act of volition,
or an act electing to be governed by this obligation ; whilst at the
game time, this condition, being supplied, (conscience being present,)
does no more compel the volition than, in the former case, the pres-
ence of the parties compels the conversation. If this were not so,
it could not be said with truth, in any sense, that man was a free and
accountable being. But, although it is true that he is constituted a
free being in his essential mental nature, it is still true that, in his
18

274 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

entirely fallen state, he is as powerless in eflfecting his recovery as if
he were not constituted for mental freedom ; because, in his fallen
state, he is so far deprived of the presence and influence of the Holy
Spirit, that he cannot so clearly perceive the nature and claims of the
moral law, as to be able to believe them. Hence, he cannot feel his
obligations to obey them, and therefore cannot elect (choose, loith
])pioer not to choose) to be governed by them. If he does not so elect,
(and he cannot,) he performs no act in regard to them, and cannot
be saved as a rational being.

No marvel, then, that (legal) Paul, who was but partially raised
from the ruins of the fall, should stumble, with the lamp of truth
before him. With a Jewish Bible in his hand, he was yet a most
flagrant transgressor, and wholly ignorant of the fact — evidently be-
cause he did not see and admit the claims of the moral law — ''■ he-
cause they, seeing, see not; and hearing, thcij hear not, neither do
theij understand." (See Matthew, siii, 13, and Romans, vii, 7 — 11.)
Paul did not see that obedience to the ceremonial was not obedience
to the moral law ; nor was it an atonement for the failure !

But God has not left man in this entirely helpless state. Christ
has certainly redeemed him from this dreadful curse of the law of
Paradise, and placed him in a salvable state ! For " He is the Light
of the world— the Light that enlighteneth every man that cometh into
the world." We need not stay to inquire into the philosophy of
atonement. We rely on the great Bible truth, that the vicarious
sufi"erings and death of Christ were accepted in the jurisprudence of
Heaven, on behalf of rebellious man. Grod can now show mercy to
man, with due regard to the claims of all on earth and in heaven,
which before He could not do. (Romans, iii, 26.) The great Medi-
ator becomes the Light of the world ; for He not only is the author
of those great facts which embody the truths of revelation, but also
enlightens us by the gift of the Holy Spirit. The great' abstract
ideas of revelation will avail nothing to man, unless he shall see and
understand them. The ideas he gets through the senses of seeing,
hearing, feeling, tasting, and smelling, form in him, as a mere fallen
being, the chief basis of his mental operations. These ideas, (ex-
ternal knowledge,) and the use which his mind makes of them, con-
stitute the carnal ox fleshly mind — (Romans, viii, 6, l)— carnal, be-
cause the source of these ideas is the senses, and the end of all the
uses to which the mind puts these ideas is the gratification of these

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 275

bodily senses. These things being so, in his fallen state, this carnal
mind is in the ascendant, and the pure reason or spiritual mind — the
power by which it was designed he should appreciate pure abstract
ideas, such as do not in any wise come through his senses — is sub-
ordinate. Hence, he is strictly a selfish being, a being seeking the
gratification of his sensual nature. The claims of God as a holy and
just being, the claims of his own spiritual nature, and similar
claims of his fellow men, are not perceived, and hence cannot be
appreciated by him. The result we see in the case of (legal) Paul.

But the remedy of atonement is direct. The Spirit — that Holy
Spirit which abandoned him in the moment of his great transgres-
sion— is restored to him in redemption ; and, in a measure, in the
moment of that redemption. For the same atonement which an-
nounced the truth, "the seed of the looman shall bruise the serpent's
head," conferred the gift of the Spirit upou the first pair. Their
reason was enlightened. They then perceived the broad spiritual
truths contained in the promise, and, we may charitably hope, were
saved by faith in Christ, who was the essence of that promise. But
this promise, together with this gift of the Holy Spirit, was not to
Adam alone, but to all his posterity. And all the thousands, in every
age, savage as well as civilized, who have gone to heaven, were saved
by some of the forms of abstract truth furnished by the atonement,
such as were appropriate to the dispensation under which the provi-
dence of God placed them, and by such influence of the Holy Spirit
as was necessary to enable them to perceive and appreciate the claims
of these truths. Hence they were saved by the atonement of Christ,
the only name given under heaven whereby sinners can be saved.

This atonement is unconditional, up to a certain limit; but beyond
that limit, in the case of every accountable being, it is wholly condi-
tional. The benefits of atonement, in the form of such truths as are
appropriate to his dispensation, and that measure of the Holy Spirit
necessary to enable him to appreciate the claims of these truths, and
thereby awaken in him a conscience in regard to them, or feeling of
obligation to choose them and be governed by them, arc uncondi-
tionally given. All the benefits of atonement beyond these limits
are conditionally given.

The great condition which runs through the whole scheme of
human redemption is, not belief or rep>entancc, in the common ac-
ceptation of it, but/atV/i, and such/aiVA jis implies belief; and that

276 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

faith, in Christ directly in the case of all those to whom He is
preached, and faith in Christ indirectly, because constructively, in
the case of all those to whom He is not preached. Faith, then, is
the great Gospel condition. I say, not mere helicf, or mere repent-
ance, however sincere, hut faith in Christ.

Belief im^ faith are sometimes used interchangeably in the Scrip-
tures. Belief is, also sometimes used to express both faith and belief,
^aut faith is rarely ever used for mere helief They are terms, how-
ever, which differ widely from each other in meaning;. One js an
act of the jndff77ie7it ; the other is an act of the zoill. No two mental
states are more distinctly marked than these. Belief is the assent of
the judgment that the truths presented are truths, and the assent of
the judgment to the claims of these truths. Such belief in the case
of any truth whatever, claiming to control our action, is always fol-
lowed by conscience, or the feeling of obligation to obey. This is its
uniform consequent.

The case in which the judgment assents fully to the claims of
truth, and yet the man feels no obligation to obey, would argue an
abnormal state of mind, the result of either derangement, or the
wasting effects of that form of grace abused, in which a man ulti-
mately " believes a lie, that he may he damned.'' But I speak of the
operations of the mind in its normal state. The man who stops in
this mere belief and its effects, whether he be savage or civilized,
stops short of salvation.

Now faith, indeed, implies all this. It could not arise without
these antecedent mental states. But, in itself, it is very different
from each of these states. It is an act of the loill. It is volition —
volition in the form of choice, trust, or reliance. Any truth whatever,
assented to by the understanding, is a truth believed. If it be a moral
truth, it is uniformly followed by the feeling of obligation to obey.
This feeling-^ furnishes an occasion for faith. When the will puts
forth a volition, choosing or electing to obey this feeling, instead of
some antagonistic feeling, it exercises an act of faith or trust in the
truth believed.

Therefore Socrates, and all like him, to wliom Christ was never
preached, if saved, (ais I suppose them to be,) were saved by a faith
implying this antecedent belief in truths peculiar to the dispensation
under which God placed them, and constructively, as already re-
marked, by faith in Christ, And so of Paul ; he was saved by faith —

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 277

faith directly in Christ. That Christ is the Saviour of sinners was,
as it still is, the great truth of the dispensation under which he lived.
He not only believed this great truth, but trusted in it, by electing
to obey all the obligations its belief imposed, and hence was saved
directly by faith in Christ.

Again I say, hy faith in Christ, and not mcrchj by rc^ycntance. I
confess to much painful misgiving of mind as to the teaching of the
present day on the subject of salvation by repentance and faitli ! Ac-
cording to much that is heard from the pulpit, a man has but little
use for hflief, and certainly none for faith, and especially /a <V/i in
Christ, until, by some means, he becomes a true penitent, earnestly
seeking salvation ! I dissent from all this. The teachers in ques-
tion are sentimentally right, no doubt; but they strangely err in
much they say, whether we test them by the standards of Method-
ism, the teachings of the Bible, or the facts of mental nature.

The only true ground seems to me to be this : We are saved by
faith, andycfiV/i aJone in Christ, from first to last. We have to do
only with saving faith. No faith is saving but faith in Christ. Noth-
ing less than this can bring a carnal sinner into the state of true re-
pentance, and this same saving faith — not another faith, or another
degree of it, or anything of the kind, but this same saving faith in
Christ — is necessary to bring him from that state of bondage indi-
cated by repentance^ into a state of acceptance with ,God. Let us
analyze the mental process in this work.

Here is a carnal man, not so apparently a disbeliever as that he is
no believer. This great truth, the sum of all Bible truth, is brought,
no matter by what agency, before his mind, namely : " God so loved
the tcorld that He gave His only-hegotten Son, that lohosoever helieveth
in Ilini should not perish, hut have everlasting life."

Now, observe : He is carnal, living for the gratification of his
senses only; and therefore, living regardless of the will of God, his
rightful sovereign, he is a lost sinner, hastening to eternal death.
Upon these facts turns the manifestation of the great love here pro-
claimed. Of course, his mind, in the nature of things, must cognize
these facts, before he can be prepared to appreciate, in the least
defp'ee, the benefits of this gracious ofi'er. Now, we know that re-
pentance is a necessity in salvation; that is, he vavi^t fixedJij — sin-
cerehj, if you like the term better — in the purposes of his mind, turn
away from his sins, and turn to God ; for to do the one is to do the

278 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

other. Unless lie thvis repent, lie will surely perish, because, in that
ease,, he can never participate in the benefits of this gift. But
wedded to sin, as he is, by affinity and by habit, is it even conceiva-
ble that he ever can (not to say wlU) put forth a fixed volition or
determination to sin no more, unless his judgment fully assent to or
believe the great truths which define his present state, and his con-
science be fully awakened, deeply to feel his obligations to obey all
the duties to which the belief of these truths commits him ? Im-
possible, in the very nature of things !

He then must believe, _/??'s^, that he is a sinner against an infi-
nitely just and holy God; secondly, that sin, in itself, is. exceedingly
evil, most justly exposing him to the present displeasure and the
final judgment of Almighty God; and third Ji/, he must so believe
these truths, personal to himself, that his conscience deeply feels the
obligation under which the belief of these truths personally lays
him. This last, we know, will always be in the ratio in which' the
former two are believed. If the first and second are fully believed —
believed without doubting — the obligations of conscience touching
these points will be fully felt. If they are not so felt, I say it is not
possible that a selfish being, wedded to sin, can put forth a volition
to forsake it ; but when they are so felt, the great condition is sup-
plied to the will, by which it may put forth the volition to be gov-
erned by these ohligations — that is, forsake his sins; and yet, so as
not to comjjcl the will to this act of volition, as the philosophy of
Edwards vainly teaches.

Here the question arises, How is he so to believe these personal
facts as to produce the conscience necessary to such a mental act of
elective choice, or trust, in the truths belie\*d, as constitutes a fixed
purpose to forsake sin ? This' question is raised to meet one point
only. That this man's mind could never rise, unaided, to those
■purely abstract ideas — that the agency of the Holy Spirit is indis-
pensable to illuminate his reason, and thereby crane up his judgment,
by bringing these high abstractions within the compass of his fallen
capacity — are cardinal points in our theology, and, as between myself
and the reader, are assumed to be understood and admitted. But
when we undertake to induce this belief, which it is the design of
all preaching to do, by aad with the aid of the Holy Spirit, which
we suppose to be supplied, how shall either tve or the Holy Sjm-it, or
both together, efi'ect the proposed design, in harmony with the laws

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 279

of mind ? Why, certainly, by presenting these facts as they really
are. But what are these facts ? They are, that sin in itself is so
exceedingly evil, that in the mind of the all-wise God^ who could not
fail to know the truth in this case, nothing but the incarnation of
His only-begotten Son, and that life of extreme suffering, and that
vicarious death, recorded of Him in the Bible, could make it possible
for Him to forgive and save a guilty sinner, without the grossest in-
justice to all His unsinuiug family, whether on earth or in heaven !
Yet still, great as were the difficulties to be overcome — perilous as was
the sacrifice — so great was His love to a world of sinners, that He
did not hesitate — He passed at once all those bounds, and in the
fullness of His love lie gave His only -begotten >Son ! Now, I say,
these are \he facts, and that no man eve?' did, and that no man ever
can, assent, in his judgment, to the real evil of sin, until he j^erceives
and assents to these truths ; or, in other words, until he believes in
the atonement of Christ ! It matters little who is the agent, able to
produce in a man the belief that he is a sinner, so as to bring about trtie
repentance — he can never succeed, if he leave out the Cross of Christ !
His own heart may glow as he describes the astonishing goodness
of Grod in the wise ai'rangements of nature, the singular adjustments
of providence, the amazing provisions of grace. Poets may sing of
these themes, as they have done, and the heart may wail under the
sweet tones of their lyre, but all this is short of our mark ! "We
would cause the mind to assent to the fact, that sin is not the mere
imj)rudenf, itnioise thing, these ideas show it to be, but that, ?'?i itself,
it is the reed damning evil the Scriptures represent it to be ! But the
mind icill not, the mind cannot, yield its assent to this flxct, until it
sees the f\ict; and this fact is nowhere to be seen, in the whole com-
pass of human thinking, hut in the infinite love of God, as disj^lai/ed
■in the atonement hy Christ ! The preacher who delays — as many, I
fear, actually do — to offer Christ until he has need to comfort a des-
ponding penitent, has misinterpreted an important part of his mes-
sage ! He needs the atonement, the Cross — as much to make men
penitents, as to comfort them when they are penitent.

Another question arises here : Is this full assent or belief in the
true evil of sin producing, as it cannot fail to do, that deep feeling
of obligation we call conscience, whose voice in this case is, '■'■ I ought
to hate sin — / ought to turn from it and unto God " — accompanied
by more or less of regret, sorrow, remorse, and the like — is this re-

280 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

pentance, or does it necessarily result in rejyenfance ? I answer, No I
There is no faith in it. As yet, it is raere belief — correct belief, it is
true, because it embodies the atonement; and both in itself, and in
the effects it produces — an enlightened conscience — it supplies an
indispensable condition of repentance. But because there is yet no
faith, the true saving clement, so far as the voluntary agency of man
is concerned, is still wanting. 'Now, faith is the act of the ^oill — not
the mere act of the judgment, as is belief but the act of the 7cill, a
volition, choosing, consenting to or trusting in, (take which you
please,) by an act of election, (that is, choosing with liberty not to
choose — the only true idea of freedom,) the truths assented to, with
all the obligations of conscience. Until this is done, it is clear, there
is no turning from sin — no fixed purpose (for this only is the pur-
pose) to turn from sin, and hence no repentance — for nothing else
but this fixed purpose to turn from sin and unto God is repentance.
But can a man go so far as to believe and feel all the obligations
of conscience, and still stop short of repentance ? Undoubtedly he
can, unless he be a mere machine, as well as a fallen being. Having
yielded the assent of his judgment to truths, which another displayed
to his mind — an assent which, in given circumstances, he could not
prevent — and having felt the obligations of that conscience, which
these admitted truths awakened by a law of his mind equally beyond
his control : now, if he must necessarily go forward and give the
consent of his will — that is, exercise faith — then is he a mere ma-
chine, and. no more an accountable being than is the clock which
strikes the hour it was set to strike ! But who dare affirm this ? None !
Then I offend none in asserting its contradictory.

Very little observation of mental states will exemplify these views.
Numerous examples teach us that men perceive the whole truth re-
lating to them as sinners, displayed in the atonement; that they feel
the monitions of conscience touching these truths — aye ! hear its
thunder tones, as the roar of the cataract of death, and feel their
souls within to be rocking as a ship in a tempest; and yet it is dis-
tinctly traceable, that there underlies all these necessary beliefs, and
their consequent emotions, a stubborn, unyielding u-ill, which (secret-
ly) refuses to submit, and chooses the present gratification of sense,
with only the vague and indefinite purpose, that ''at a eonvcnicnf
season" they will yield the obedience now so urgently demanded. The
Holy Spirit is grieved. He withdraws from the mind. The active

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 281

assent of the judgment is abated. The feelings of obligation subside,
and the thoughts soon take the smooth current of business or of
pleasure, as before. lie onaj/ return again and again, but if with the
same fruitless effect, He leaves to return no more; and the necessity
which the man's own folly has brought upon him, to believe a lie,
and be damned, is all that awaits him !

But if, on the other hand, he does what he is abundantly able to
do, by all these supplied conditions of volitive action — that is, if he
exercise faith in the truths he has been made to believe and feel in
the form of conscience — he puts forth an act of volition, he chooses
to adopt those truths, to rely on them, and to be governed by the
obligations of conscience in regard to them. That is, he resolves to
forsake his sins, and to consecrate himself to God, and he is there-
fore, on the ground of this fact alone, a true penitent.

Now, it is precisely at this point that the state of bondage, brought
to view in our text, begins. That is, when he has both belief and
faith in the broad doctrine of atonement by Christ, so far as it ap-
plies to him as an unrepentant sinner, a consciousness of Ids bondage
to sin commences. He has been all his life in this bondage, but he
was never conscious of the fact until now. Experience makes him
conscious. " ^o wiU" (to purpose) ^^ is present with Mm." (Acts,
vii, 18.) His resolution is decided to put away his sins, and to live
a life of pure devotion to God. He enters upon his new career with
confidence of success. When stung by remorse of conscience, that
he had lived regardless of those truths he now so clearly believes,
he naturally thought it only remained for him to determine to obey
the obligations of these truths, and he would at once place himself
right before God ! But alas, how disappointed ! He has deliberately
elected (an act of faith) to obey all these obligations. He is honest.
He does riot for a moment doubt this. Still his mind cleaves, of
course, to existing beliefs: ''God is just. I deserve no mercy!"
For a time he wonders that no change has followed his decision.
But so it is ; he feels himself to be the same ungrateful sinner as
before ! He thinks — he reasons ! He trembles and prays ! Still
no change comes. " God is just. God is angry with me. I deserve
it all." As before, conscience stung him with these thoughts ; so
still these ideas prevail in his mind, no less than before his resolu-
tion was taken. He casts about for reasons why there is no change.
He falls naturally upon the fallacy that he does not feel enough !

282 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

He tries to feel more. But as no effect follows his oft-repeated ef-
forts, lie falls at once into the error — " I do not feel at all ! " He
doubts his belief — doubts, it may be, all hellcf — doubts his sincerity !
Fear entered largely as an element in that remorse of conscience
which first sprung from his belief of the great fact of atonement.
The natural demands made by this belief, that he obey the obliga-
tions of conscience, afforded him hope that obedience would be fol-
lowed by immediate relief. But he has tried it, and utterly failed I
His fears revive. They rise upon him like an awned man ! His
mind verges on despair! " 0 icrctclicd man tliat I am! -what shall
I do ! " This is hondage to sin, homlage to sin and to fear, indeed !

This mental state is subject to great modifications. All true pen-
itents do not by any means realize the same type of emotion. In
some, the feeling resulting from the same beliefs is far more intense
than in others. One, highly excitable in temperament, will suffer
much more acutely from the same mental causes, than another who
is less so. And then, again, education and general habits, of thought
and belief will go f:ir to modify these results. One, educated from
early life in correct views of the atonement, and whose habits of
thought make him speculatively familiar with its distinctive features,
.will not be so liable to despair (whatever his temperament may be)
as another,- whose views are necessarily limited by those features'
■ only of atonement which define his condition as a sinner — which, to a
great extent, is necessarily the case with a mind without antecedent
instruction. In the first case, however, other features of atonement
would frequently occur to his mind, and better sustain his hope — he
would fear, but not without hope. But however this may be, the
mental state of every tnic but unpardoned penitent is one of bondage
to sin and hondage to fear ! •

Now, if we trace this state back to its souree, we shall find that it
does not result from any change either in the lavj, which is a source
of so much terror to him; nor yet in his own mind, which is so per-
plexed and tortured. Each of these is, in its essential nature, just
what it was before. The immediate cause to him is consciousness. lie
is now conscious of a state of facts, of which befoi'e he was unconscious.
But there is a mediate cause, which lies back of this consciousness —
the immediate or producing cause of this consciousness that he is a
lost and ruined sinner. It is the gift of atonement — the Hohj Sjn'rit,
sent from God to convince the world of sin.

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 283

la no otlier way can we possibly account for the mental state of
true repentance. For if he who comj^eh me to do a thing is the
cause of my doing it, the Holy Spirit, who so brings revealed truth
to the mind of a sinner that from the very nature of his mind he
cannot avoid (if he yield his attention) helieving what he thus clearly
sees, is the cause of Ids Jjelieving. And as he who enables me to do a
thing, but does not compel me to do it, (leaving me free not to do
it,) is in a ^ood sense also the cause of my doing it, the Holy Spirit,
who, by thus awakening heUef and conscience in a sinner, supplies
the condition necessary to enable him to put forth that act of volition
which we call faith or trust, is the cause of his faith, and hence is
the active cause of his repentance.

The penitent may not cognize this state as the fruit, in any proper
sense, of the Holy Spirit. Men educated in religious sentiments
only, and accustomed to speculate on the subject morfe as a system of
morals than a scheme of spiritual life, are apt to attribute repent-
.ance to the unaided operation of their own minds. Nevertheless,
it is the fruit of the Holy Spirit, and none admit it more readily and
maintain it more confidently than they do after reading the Bible
with the advantage of their own experience. But the uncultivated,
who think but little on the subject, and to whom an awakening is a
startling novelty, will readily assign it to a supernatural cause, or to
some secondary cause, such as hair-breadth escapes, occurrence of
death, a book or sermon, or something of the kind— just according to
the idea that prevails at the time. But all true penitents alike soon
learn that it is the Holi/ Spirit alone that convinces of sin.

The Spirit brings such truths before his mind as are appropriate
to his case, and in such way as enables him to perceive and thereby
believe and feel the truth ; and this He does, in regard to truths re-
vealed in the Bible, and nothing beyond. Now, if a man go into
court, and so bring certain truths before the minds of an attentive
jury that they see the harmony of facts and principles so clearly
that they cannot avoid yielding the assent of their judgments to his
statements, toe call him a witness, and his statements testimony/. Why
need we scruple, then, to call the Holy Spirit, in this case, a u-itness,
and His v:ork testimony !

The truth is, the sinner in bondage to fear has the direct witness
of the Holy Spirit, that he is an enslaved sinner ; and this testimony
is confirmed to him by the witness of his oion spirit; that is, he has

284 THE KNOWLEDGE OP ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

his otcn conscioKsness that he believes and experiences the fact that
he is a helpless sinner.

Now, Paul reminds the Roman Christians that this was once their
state, and that they are not now in that state again, but " have re-
ceived the spirit of adopt ion, loherehy we cry, Abba, Father.'^

The import of these words in their connection is very obvious.
" As the Holy Spirit was once a witness to you that you were un-
pardoned sinners, so, in the very same way, He is now a witness to you
that you are adopted into His family; and, in virtse of your confi-
dence ox faith in the fact, you rejoice in the relation of sons, sajnng,
' My Father, My Father ! ' " But how so ? Plainly thus : The
man already brought to see his ruined and helpless state is in a con-
dition to see and appreciate another truth, (not to exercise a higher
faith, as some suppose; for this it is impossible for him to do, in the
nature of things,) but to exercise the same belief 'va kind, and the same
faith in kind, in another truth, as appropriate to him now, as the
truths before believed were appropriate to him then. Thus, this
great truth — " God icas in Christ, reconciling the icorld unto Him-
self"— "through His name is preached the forgiveness of sin" — "he
that believeth in Hinn shall not perish, hit have everlasting life " — the
.great truth which runs through these and all similar sayings of .the
Scriptures, is presented to his mind by the Holy Spirit. Before his'
'penitence, he could no more appreciate this truth, than a child who
was never sick could value the skill of a physician in' a sick room !
And now. that he is penitent, (that is, sick,) he is too much engrossed
with his sorrows, too much alive to the justice of the sentence which
has gone forth against him, to listen to any terms of pardon. Hear
him, as he looks up to the Cross, and reads its lessons of the deep de-
merit of his sins : " Pardon — pardon such a sinner as I ? Absurdity —
absurdity ! How can God forgive me, when I never can fprgive my-
self for having sinned so long and so much, against infinite love and
mercy ? Impossible — impossible ! " Yet in such a state his mind
is called to deal with the highest of all abstract truths, the profound-
est of all metaphysics, the deepest of all mysteries — angels only de-
sire to look into it ! and still from the point which this man occu-
pies it is the most simple and the most appreciable of all truths, if
he can only be induced >to turn his desponding mind upon it! But
who is equal to the great task of breaking the spell by which selfish
fear enchants him ? You and I may as soon think to stanch the

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 285

flood of grief that wells up from the wailing heart of the young
mother, as she catches the last imploring look of her babe, snatched
by the hand of death from her warm bosom ! But, thank God, there
is One who is equal to this great work — the Holy Spirit, the Spirit
of God ! He takes the " deep things of God, and shows them to the
mind of this man." He presents this great truth to his mind, just
as it is, exactly suited to his lost and ruined state. He sees its con-
sistency, harmony, and perfect adaptedness to his case — its truth. Is
belief the assent of the judgment? Then he believes. He could
no more withold his assent from this, than he could from the plain-
est truth in the world. He believes — there is nothing voluntary in
his believing in these circumstances — he knows that to him, as though
there was not another sinner on earth, a free and full pardon is
offered through the merits of Jesus Christ. This belief, like any
other act of belief in moral truth, is followed by its appropriate feel-
mg of obligation, or conscience. There springs up at once a profound
emotion of duty to obey all the obligations of this belief, accept all
its terrns. Every condition is now supplied to his voluntary power,
his will, for its free act of volition, its act of election (call it choice,
trust, acceptance, or the like, it comes to the same thing) of Christ,
on the terms of the offer believed to be made. Is faith such an act
of the will? Then the Komans exercised faith. But in the moment
they made this election of Christ instead of the demands of the car-
nal mind, asking release from His yoke, they were justified, for "he
that hclieveth (has faith) is Justified from all things from lohieh lie
could not he justified hy the ivorks of the law."

But what is justification? It is pardon. What is pardon? A
remission of the penalty of our sins. What is the penalty thus re-
mitted ? Jehovah's displeasure, in the various forms in which He
manifests it in this life, and will display it through all eternity! But
" God only can forgive sin." Such remission, then, is a special act
of the divine mind. But, "the things of God, Icnoiccth no man, (1
Corinthians, ii, 11,) no, not even the Son of man ! " No man, then,
can be cognizant of this act of the divine mind. And yet the per-
sons in question must trustingly believe that this act has passed in
their favor ; or, from the very nature of mind itself, they can never
realize personal comfort from the fact. They would be in the con-
dition of one who accepts the offer he believes to be made him, and
still does not realize the gift ! Such hope deferred would make the

286 THE KNOWLEDGE OP ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

heart sick. True indeed, it is written in the Scriptures, '' he that
helicveth in Me shall be saved" — pardoned; and is not this enough
for his comfort? Quite enough for the belief of a great general
truth ; but it is nowhere written that / have actually reached that
true penitent belief which has certainly secured the act of pardon
in my favor ! The mind, left to itself at this point, would recoil
from such a belief as a bold presumption. All its antecedent train-
ing has been to inspire it with profound distrust of self — even to
the loathing of self in sackcloth and ashes ! In this mental state, to
venture unaided upon such a belief would indeed be a bold pre-
sumption ! And yet, to pause at this point is fatal to peace — it is to
sink into the slough of Despond ! only the more fatal, because of the
great height of the fall ! Thank God ! this is not a case in which
" the children have come to the hirtli, and there is not strenr/tJi to hring
forth ! " There is one that does know the acts of the divine mind !
The Holy Spirit knoivs the mind of God; and it is His office- (as
seen throughout this whole process) to take of the things of God, and
shoio them to the mind of man, (John, xvi, 14,) ''tliat we might know
the things that are freely given to us of God." (1 Corinthians, ii, 12.)
This great fact, contained in the general truth revealed — ''your sins
are jjci'i'doned " — He brings before the mind; and, at the same time,
enables the man so cleai-ly to discern and so justly to discriminate >
his own mental states as a penitent believer, that he clearly sees the
harmony of this truth with his existing mental states, and thus spirit-
ually discerning, he believes thi» Scripture truth, that he is pardoned !
And this belief, thus reached, is not at the expense of his humility,
any more than any preceding act of belief, which, being reached in
this way, did actually beget and increase it. Now, this belief, as in
each preceding instance of belief, is immediately followed by its own
appropriate emotion — a feeling of duty to take upon him the yoke
"of pviblic profession, and openly confess Christ before man ! The
act of faith (consent) as immediately follows, and he breaks forth in
strains of humble joy — " Tes, I, even so great a sinner as I, am jyar-
daned ! I wees lost, but am found! I%cas dead, but am alive! Glory
to God in the highest!" His heart overflows with grateful love and
triumphant joy !

In all this, no miracle* is performed, as some suppose. The result,
according to the established laws of mind, could not be otherwise
than it is. A system of new truths is initiated in the mind. Not

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 287

.by any one act, but by all together, au entire change is effected.
The j5??re reason, whose vast powers of discerning abstract truth had
been for the most part limited in its exercise to the demands of ex-
ternal knowledge, (which were only to gratify the physical senses,
through which it came, and which state of facts subordinated it to
the carnal mind,) is now raised to its own proper sphere and dignity.
It is raised to deal with those high abstract ideas, the truatful belief
of which has operated to enthrone love in the heart. Before this,
the ideas which come through the physical senses (the use which
the reason made of this knowledge constitutes the carnal mind) fur-
nished the Kill with natural desires, in the form of appetite, propen-
sity, and affection, as the only motive of action. Of course, the man
was carnally minded, or lived to gratify natural desire. This gratifi-
cation was only restrained by the limits of the will's power, and the
fear of public opinion, and those cheeks of spiritual conscience
awakened by the ideas of pure moral truth brought before the reason
by the Holy Spirit. But as no act of faith, or consent to obey this
conscience, followed the emotion, both the belief and the emotion
passed away, and left the reason, as before, the mere agent of natural
desire! But now \h.Q pure reason, the true spiritual nature, believing
and trusting in the ideas of moral truth, has, in the place of natural
desire, enthroned in the heart, tlie love of God as the great motive of
the will's future action. The xoill is now in circumstances of power
never before realized. It can limit the gratification of' the natural
desires by the will of God; and to do this is to keep the command-
ments of God.

Thus we see that the law, (as a schoolmaster,) having brought
him to Christ, has effected that which, because it " icas xccak" through
the dominion of the carnal mind, it could not of itself do — that is,
effected obedience to the commandments of God. The man is
changed altogether, in beliefs, feelings, and practice. He is born
again. He is a new creature in Christ Jesus ! And from first to
last, the Holy Spirit is the direct agent, employed in the office of
a witness, or one testifying to the truth ; and faith in Christ (an act
of man's will) is the condition on which he realizes the benefits of
this testimony.

Now, to realize a thing is to be conscious of it. Hence this man
is conscious he lelieves, and is conscious he feels that which he be-
lieves. He is conscious he trusts, and conscious that he feels the

288 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

ultimate results of this trust — that is, he feels the love of God shed
abroad in his heart. He has then the evidence of his own con-
sciousness, that he is a new man. And as a man's spirit is the
power by which he is conscious or knows his own mental states, he
has, in the fact of his consciousness, the evidence of his own spirit,
corroborating the testimony of the Divine Spirit, that he is a child
of God.

Such was the experience of Eoman Christians. But what they
experienced, it is the privilege of all to experience who live under
the Gospel dispensation. Hence the Apostle asserts the general
truth, " The Spirit itself ^careth loitness " (along) " icith our spirits,
that tee are the children of God." And, surely, if a man may aflGirm
that he knows any particular thing, when that thing is so presented
to his mind that he clearly sees its harmony with all his ideas of
truth, and at the same time has a distinct consciousness that he does
so perceive it, and (still more) that he personally enjoys the benefits
resulting from that truth, then may the Christian say, " I know that
I am a child of God." Aye, and not to say it is, to his mind, the
most unnatural thing in the world. This is so obvious, that unless
his judgment of duty is betrayed, by a false philosophy, into an un-
grateful silence, he will naturally exclaim, with David, " Come and
hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what He hath done for
my sold) as far as the East is from the West, so far hath He sepa-
rated my transgressions from me."

It is therefore the privilege of all to whom Christ is preached, to
Jcnoio their sins forgiven ; and unless I have greatly mistaken the
facts of Christian experience, and those mental states which that
experience nece&sarily implies, this doctrine is in perfect harmony
with them.

II. Several inferences of grave import are deducible from this
discussion. I notice two only.

1. The things to which the Divine Spirit together with our own
spirit testifies, and the conscious perception of which constitutes our
knowledge of them, are matters of morcd truth, and" not of physical
or absolute truth. Therefore our knowledge of these truths, though
to us certain, and in themselves certain, is moral knowledge, and not
absolute knowledge.

This distinction is of grave import, in estimating the practical
bearings of the apostle's doctrine. A failure to note this distinction

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 289

has led .many, of sound experience in the things of God, to reject
the doctrine altogether; and from the same cause, many who adopt
it have employed such terms to express their views, or have urged
such conclusions from their views, as justly lay them open to the
charge of fanatical error. Let us examine these terms.

All spiritual truth is moral truth, and all primary or intuitive
truth is absolute truth. The diflFerence is this : Absolute truth is
not only certain in itself, and certain to our minds, (if we know it
at all,) but it is certain in this sense, that the opposite is in itself an
■impossihilifi/, and therefore such an absurdity that we are not capable
of believing it under any circumstances. Two and two are equal to
/our, is an absolute truth ; if I know it at all, I am incapable of
doubting it, or in any degree of believing its contradictory. Not
so with moral truth. This, though certain in itself, and certain
to our minds, (if we know it at all,) is yet of such a nature, or
our relations to it are such, that, to our minds, its opposite or
contradictory is not in itself an impossibility, and therefore not
such an absurdity that, in given circumstances, we cannot doubt
or disbelieve the moral truth, and in that ratio believe its contra-
dictory. That a man is so entirely/ penitent and trustful as to
place him among those to whom the divine assurance of pardon is
given, and that this promised act of pardon has really passed the
divine mind in his favor, are high and consoling moral truths. He
may be entirely certain of their truth, and say, and truly say, '' 1
hnoio it;" and yet, that these propositions are not true, is not in itself
an impossibility, and therefore not such an absurdity but that he
may {in given circxvnxstances) believe the one proposition, when he
ought to believe the other. In a word, such is the nature of this
truth, in its relations to him, that he is liable to be betrayed to doubt
that which he ought not to doubt, and lose the comfortable assurance
of his acceptance. There is a wide dijBFerence, then, in these kinds of
knowledge. The one is absolute certainty ; the other is moral cer-
tainty. The one admits of no doubt, under any circumstances; the
other, though certainly true, may yet be doubted, under given cir-
cumstances. The Christian may, very improperly, allow himself to
doubt. These doubts may ripen into the greatest disaster — even the
rejection of Christ.

These things being so, he who asserts that he knows he is a child
of God, in the sense of absolute knowledge, (as many do,) commits
19

290 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

himself to a belief that admits of no doubt at any time. For such
a one to doubt, as it is quite possible he may do, and very certain
he will do, if not well instructed in the things of God, is to be thrown
upon the conviction that his whole experience is a delusion of some
kind ! It is well if he escape unhurt from this snare of Satan. It
is to be feared that many a young and uninstructed convert has
been wrecked upon this coast of unbelief, and set adrift again upon
the wide ocean of sin. On the other hand, many who thus confound
moral with absolute certainty, because this certainty implies the im-
possibility of doubting under any circumstances, reject the, doctrine
of the direct witness of the Spirit altogether, and involve themselves
in errors no less disastrous. Instead of saying, with Paul, "the Spirit
itself hcaretli witness with my spirit, that I am a child of God" or
"/ hnoio luhom I have lelieved," they would have us say, "I hope I
am a child of God." But it is quite certain this is no improvement
on Paul's language, and may prove as fatal to them as it is certainly
contradictory of his theology ! One thing may be relied on— genuine
Christian experience is essentially the same in the case of every man
who realizes it. Temperament and education, or habits of thought,
will to an extent modify its manifestation, both to ourselves and to
others. One is neither the less or more a Christian, because his
views and feelings are marked by particular accidents of birth or
education. The general class, to which all varieties belong, is dis-
tinctly marked as to essential experience. Each individual of this
class takes upon him the yoke of Christ, openly avowing himself a
child of God, and, as such, asserting his hope of getting to heaven
at last. Now, this is his profession before all the world, and he is so
understood in the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's supper.

But upon what ground is this profession made ? He makes it,
because he is satisfied in his own mind that he is a child of God;
" and nothing short of this open declaration of what God has done for
him will fill the measure of his gratitude for the great love where-
with He has loved him. All true disciples agree in this experience.
They are conscious these things are so. Now, if they also allow
themselves to think, that because they are certain these things are
so, they cannot, under any circumstances, doubt about them; they
fall into gross error. They assume that the subject matter of their
knowledge is in itself absolute truth, which is not the case. The
dominion of this error (as already stated) may prove their ruin.

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 291

If, no.w, to avoid this error, that a true Christian cannot at any
time doubt his conversion, we adopt the doctrine, that the neio hu-th
does not imply the knowledge of sins forgiven, and by consequence
reject the doctrine of the direct witness of the Spirit; we shall not
mend the matter. For, if this be true, we make douhtiiKj a necessary
element of Christian experience. We shall not usually rise higher
than our aim. But we do not aim to rise higher than a hope of pres-
ent acceptance, which necessarily implies a doubt as to our conver-
sion. But this, in the nature of things, is a very uncomfortable state
to an awakened mind. It will inevitably keep it in constant con-
flict with this assurance of the Saviour : " Come unto me all ye that
labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." For it is very
certain, that when He fulfils this promise. He brings our minds into
that state of quiet repose which is utterly inconsistent with the idea
that a painful doubt (and all doubt is painful) should hang over the
question of our present safety. Should one at any time feel this
quiet repose of mind, in the belief that he is a child of God j as he
does not allow himself to think that he can be thus conscious or
know that this is so, he is bound to ignore the consciousness as mere
fanatical excitement, and to fall back into painful fears of the future.
This error, in many instances, effectually shuts the door against the
peace which can only flow from the trust/id belief that we are the
children of God. I am not surprised, therefore, that the peace and
joy of the true spiritual life should not more generally characterize
the experience of this class of persons; but that, wearied and harassed
with doubts, they should so generally tend to the coldness and inanity
of formalism ! I know not which is the greater evil of the two —
the holding the truth in error, or the rejection of the truth in order
to avoid the error !

The true ground, it seems to me, is this : "It is my privilege to
know my sins forgiven ; but this knowledge constitutes moral cer-
tainty, not absolute certainty." This ground is safe. No man need
fear to take the fortunes of truth. If I can know that anything is
true, I surely know that to be true which the Holy Spirit, together
with my own consciousness, testifies to me is true. Still this cer-
tainty is not absolute. If it was, I could in no case doubt the fact.
But I am capable of doubting, and of believing it is not, when it
really is so. Because that it is not so, is to my mind, at least, possi-
ble. And if I allow myself to be betrayed (as Satan has bcti-aycd

292 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE "WITH GOD.

many) into those unscriptural views which lead me to conclude,
contrary to all truth, that my deep repentance and conscious belief
that I am a child of Grod might be, and probably is, the work of
Satan, or of my own deceitful heart; I shall certainly doubt of my
acceptance, and believe myself deceived in that of which I was be-
fore satisfied that Ihnewl And so, if I allow myself to take these
unscriptural views of the love of which I am now so happily con-
scious, that lead to the belief that, because it is not as ardent as I
think it ought to be, in the case of so great a sinner as I have been,
and that therefore it does not result from the fact that I am par-
doned, but from the fact that I only imagine that I am ; in this cage,
also, I shall doubt. And these perplexing doubts will not only
greatly abridge my comforts, but lay me open to the most disastrous
assaults of my spiritual foes. Now, we know that it is possible, and
especially for such as are not deeply experienced in the teachings
of the Bible, to be betrayed into these erroneous methods of think-
ing. Therefore our certainty that we are the children of God is
not absolute certainty. For, if so, the proposition that %oe were not,
would be to our intuitive perceptions an impossibility in itself, and
we should be incapable of believing it in the slightest degree, or
even of maintaining any such course of thinking as might lead t,o
the belief of it. For these reasons, it would be impossible for Satan
even to tempt us to such belief. For, since the world began, it was
never known that a sane mind was either induced to believe, or even
tempted to believe, that two and two are not equal to four. But he
does tempt the children of God to believe that they are not pardoned.
The fact that this proposition is not to their intuitive perceptions an
impossibility, is the ground on which he is able to do it. And (I
repeat) if we allow ourselves to be decoyed to those stand-points from
which his proposition looks reasonable, (and there are maijy such,)
we shall find ourselves believing it, and of course doubting whether
we are the children of God. Doubt is the first step towai'ds the
highway of unbelief and ruin. Let us beware of th^ first step !

Aye then, says one, this doctrine of the direct witness of the Spirit
is' not the comfortable doctrine I have been taught to think it is!
My objection is, that your view robs it of half its comfort. I sup-
posed that the witness of the Spirit left no room to doubt, and it
troubles me to think that with this witness it is even possible for me
to doubt !

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 293

As an experimental Christian, you are sentimentally correct; but
allow me to say, that you need to be instructed as to the language
you use, and the extent to which that language, no doubt, misrepre-
sents your own views. Your objection implies that the comfort iu
question arises from the intensity or degree of the certainty, and
that there is more certainty (so to speak) in absolute certainty than
in moral certainty. But this is not the case, as you suppose. In ab-
solute certainty you are entirely certain, and in moral certainty you
may be entlreJy certain. In each case the certainty is complete.
There is no room for increase, in the case in which it is complete.
And yet the difference in the comfort arising from these certainties
is very great ; and, contrary to your hypothesis, it is all on the side
of moral certainty. You are certain that one and one are equal to two.
You are also entirely certain that your dying wife was sincere when
^he extorted the promise to meet her in heaven. Which affords you
most comfort ? The first has its pleasure as a question of science ;
the second affords immeasurable comfort as a question of moral cer-
tainty. Whence ^oes this great difference arise ? Not from the
degree of certainty — for that is the same iu each case, but from the
nature of the truth of which you are certain. Physical truths (mat-
ters of absolute certainty) are sources of pleasure, and especially
when connected, as they frequently are, with moral truths. But
moral truths, because they involve the questions of right and wrong,
(good and evil,) deal directly with men's feelings, and are therefore
the great sources of human comfort. Are you morally certain that
you are a child of God ? What if it he pos&ihle for you to believe it
to be otherwise ? That is not a reason why you sJiould believe it to
be otherwise. You are now on a lofty eminence, which relieves the
oppressive heat by refreshing breezes, and affords you the most com-
manding views your eyes ever beheld ! You are certain your situa-
tion is one of entire safety, but you are equally certain that it may
prove to be a very unsafe one; but surely this is no reason why you
should walk to the edge of the precipice, and precipitate yourself
headlong to ruin ! And how did you reach the present spiritual ele-
vation, on which you are so conscious that you are safe ? It was by
assenting (an act of judgment) to the successive Scripture truths
brought by the Holy Spirit before your mind, and by consenting (an
act of the will, or faith) to all the obligations you felt that this belief
imposed upon you. The last iu the series of these truths was, that

294 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

you were pardoned. To the obligations of this truth, to wit : that
you take upon you the yoke of Christ, or a Christian profession,
bearing the Cross before all men, and thus glorify God in your body
and in your spirit, which are His, you also consented. Thus you
received the Lord Jesus ! Now, " as ye received Him, so walk ye in
Him." In Him abide. Keep your mind upon these points, and
employ yourself in efforts to fulfil all the obligations of your com-
mitment, and you will not be annoyed with doubts. You will daily
advance to manhood in the Christian life. In a word^ trust and worJc
in doing good, and you will be a stranger to doubts. But allow
yourself so far to yield your faith or consent to the obligations of
duty as to feel culpably negligent, because duty is so great a weari-
ness that oftentimes you cannot encounter it, and, you may rely on
it, doubts will rise upon you like an armed man. You have in a
measure yielded (though secretly) your faith. You have cast away
your shield 1 The enemy is at hand. If you do not quickly recover
your shield, he will be upon you with all his forces. But, again, even
though you go not so far as to withdraw your consent to the obliga-
tions of duty, but allow yourself to cherish those "vain tJioui/hts"
which Satan has power to excite, and which, with David, you have
so much cause to deplore; you will find that your mind is led away
from the only safe stand-point, which is this : " Jesus Christ is my
atonement — in Him I am safe." Instead of these ideas, it is led to
deal with " vain thoughts." But it is not able to distiiiguish those
which Satan suggests (and which, therefore, you cannot help) from
those which spring up from your own mind, and which therefore
you ought to help, and would help, if you were at the- right stand-
point. Such persons are soon perplexed and confounded by these
harassing mental states. What they know to be at least possible,
they will soon begin to look on as quite probable ; that is,, they will
begin to doubt whether they were converted ! But the voice of the
Good Shepherd is crying after these lambs of the fold. It is well
if the fears which now distract them, cause them tp turn their eyes
to Him. They will soon again be at His feet; and, though wounded
and bleeding, they will be looking up to Him, and resolving togo
not again for fruit into the wilderness of vain thoughts ! Frequent
excursions, however, of *this kind, will beget self-confidence. Self-
confidence makes us deaf to the voice of the Good Shepherd. The
danger is not the less, nor may we be the less sensible of it; but we

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 295

are learning to trust ourselves for safety — our reason — our philoso-
phy— our moral firmness to maintain our faith against all odds ! But
the contest is an unequal one. The case is one in which this David
is gone to meet Goliath, without his sling, or even so much as a peb-
ble from the brook of truth ! Wearied with so unequal a contest,
the yoke of Christ's profession will become a sore burden. Consent
to its obligations may be withdrawn ; and, if so, the man emerges
from this wilderness of mental conflict, into the broad desert of sin
and ruin, where the voice of the Good Shepherd is seldom heard !

Let us, then, stand near the Cross ! Let us ivoric, as well as watch
and pray! Let the desponding, melancholy man, whose mind is torn
by distracting thoughts, break away to the field of duty — his farm-r-
his merchandise — or to his study. Here he may find the Cross !
Only let him ask, as he adds dollar to dollar, or wins golden opinions
from the good, with persecutions from the evil, how shall I turn
this growing capital to the account of my Lord's goods? What pious
foundations can I lay? Where, how, can I do good with my Lord's
money ? So, also, let the woman do, whose feeble nerves are daily
yielding under mental frictions, which make life a burden, and
precipitate her into the " slough of Despond ! " In duf^ she will
find the Cross, and be comforted by the voice of the Good Shepherd.
Let her, therefore, break away from her sentimental books ! Let
her away to her kitchen, her chambers, and to every part of the
field of domestic duty ; or away to the houses of sorrow and death !
Let her own sweet voice console the afflicted ! Let her own soft
hands minister to the wants of the sick, and smooth the pillow of the
dying ! In all these things, the Cross shall be seen without a vail
between, and the voice of the Good Shepherd be so heard within as
to make you certain of your acceptance — so certain as to shut out all
occasion to doubt. You shall grow in grace, and rejoice as you look
forward to your home in heaven !

2. Another inference from this discussion is, that it is the joint
testimony of the Divine Spirit and of our own spirits that is the
ground of our knowledge.

Neither of these, separately considered, will meet the necessities
of our case. They are Joint witnesses, and must be so considered.
The divine testimony is the cause, and our consciousness is the effect.
The cause is imminent in the effect, and cannot in truth be sepa-
rated from it. The Christian, who, in his modes of thinking, shall

296 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

divorce tliat wliicli God has joined together, will do so at great haz-
ard, however sincere he may be.

Suppose a man, for example, ignores his consciousness of love, joy,
Ijcace, and the like, (the testimony of his own spirit,) and relies alone,
for proofs of his Christian character, upon what he considers the
witness of the Divine Spirit; he will soon grow to be a pure fanatic.
Guided by impulses alone, he will adopt the wildest and most extrav-
agant doctrines — the fruit of an overwrought imagination — and pre-
sent, from time to time, the most ridiculous caricatures of the plain-
est truths of the Bible. Such a one will grow rapidly in spiritual
pride. Inflated beyond measure with self-importance, it will be well
if he stop this side of actual lunacy !

On the other hand, suppose a, man ignores (as I incline to think
but few do, in point of fact, although many do it in the terms of their
theory) the witness of the Divine Spirit altogether; he will gain, it
is true, by avoiding many of the errors of fanaticism, but, in another
direction, he will lose the full equivalent of the gains.

This man relies upon his consciousness of love, joy, peace, long-mf-
fering, gentleness, meekness, temperance, and Jiclelify,as the proofs and
tests of his claim to the hope of heaven. But the question will often
arise — he cannot help it ; the interests involved suggest it — what is
love, and the rest? and why should they establish my claim to
heaven ? Why love ? It is the pleasurable feeling, the delight, I
have in thinking of God as my reconciled Father ! But, surely, I
must first be persuaded in my own mind that He is my reconciled
Father, before I can possibly delight in Him as such. But how
now ? You show to your own satisfaction that you hve God, by the
fact that you are before persuaded that He is your reconciled Father;
and you then prove that He is your reconciled Father, by the fact
that you love Him ! Mahomet is a prophet. How do you know he
is ? Because the Koran says so. But how do you know that what
the Koran says is true ? Because Mahomet is a prophet, and he says
it is true. Very smart, to be sure ! So, in this case,^the man postu-
lates the fact that God has pardoned him, and thus accounts for his
love; and then proves his postulate by the fact that he does love
Him ! Equally smart, no doubt ! Now, the truth is, that Satan
makes short work of all such logic as this. In the case of every
man (speaking of truly converted men) who does not, most fortu-
nately, deceive himself, when he asserts that he discards the doctrine

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 297

' of the direct witness of the Holy Spirit, the matter will stand before
his unclouded reason somewhat in this way, namely : " It is idle for me
to think of knowing that an act of pardon has passed the divine mind
in my favor, unless the Holy Spirit (the admitted medium of com-
munication, if there be any at all) has by some means so displayed
the Scripture statement before the mind, that the hdi>;ver is pardoned,
that I so clearly discern the agreement of my mental states with this
assurance as to be fully persuaded that I am pardoned. He only is
cognizant of the fact, and, if I be not informed by Him, I am not in-
formed at all; and to allow myself to think that it is so, is the mere
fancy of a heated imagination — the wild dream of an excited brain !
But I utterly discard the belief that there is any such testimony of,
the Divine Spirit. Therefore, any impression that I may cherish
that I am pardoned is mere imagination ; and the idea that I delight
in God, as reconciled to me (which could not be without the antece-
dent belief that He was reconciled) is the mere chimera of an ex-
cited brain, which, like the ' stars and garters ' that dance before the
minds of the ambitious, plays in the foreground of my thought ! "
The whole thing, he says, is unworthy of a man of sense ! This man
does not fall into mere doubts. He rushes headlong into disbelief;
and it is well, if he stop in a decent morality.

But there are those who, although they reject the doctrine in ques-
tion, still greatly magnify the office of the Holy Spirit in the conver-
sion of sinners. If there is a revival, an awakening, a conversion —
in each case, they say truly, the Spirit does it. Now, all this involves
a belief in the doctrine for which we contend. And hence, I must
think these persons deceive themselves, and fortunately so, because
it is on the side of truth. But still " the fly is in the ointment." No
error is safe, and especially when it enters into a matter of Christian
experience, as this does ; for these men, no less than the others, will
certainly find themselves entoiled in the meshes of their own false
theory. They will recoil with horror, it is true, from the infidelity
to which the other is driven ; and falling back upon their settled
belief, that all religion is somehow the work of the Spirit, they
will conclude, despite their theory as to His office as witness, thai
He has in some way, without a direct antecedent persuasion of
pardon — an impossibility, by the way, unless He work by miracle,
violating the laws of mind, which no Bible reader pretends to be-
lieve— wrought love, peace, and joy, in the heart, and the like graces

298 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

in the life ; and that these, and these alone, are the proofs to the man
that he is pardoned. But then they are not freed from serious diffi-
culties, nevertheless. Their theory must have its effect. The belief
that the Holy Spirit so brings the direct truth before the mind that
the merit of Christ's atonement has really and actually availed to
procure a direct pardon for him, is a belief which brings the mind
and keeps the mind in direct contact with the atonement, both as
the cause and the proof of his pardon. But to reject the belief that
the Holy Spirit does testify to this fact, by so displaying it to the
mind, is to throw us upon this necessity; the current of thought is
turned away from this immediate contact with the atonement of
Christ, as both the cause and proof of pardon, and turned to the
graces of love, and peace, and the like, as the direct proofs. Now I
say, that of course, (of course, because he can no more help it than
he can help the harmony of truth,) to our minds, these graces can
only be proofs in the ratio in which we estimate them to exist. Take
love, for example. If our delight in thinking of God as our recon-
ciled Father is very great, the proof that we are pardoned is very
strong. If it exists in a slight degree, the proof is weak. Now, when
will it appear to a man's mind that his love, thus considered in itself, is
very great ? It can only so appear, when to his mind it corresponds,
in some good' degree, with what it ought to be, in the case of so great
a sinner as he knows himself to have been ! But this correspond-
ence can never exist, in the case of a sinner saved by grace. '' She
loved much, because much was forgiven." This is the principle laid
down by the Saviour, and it is the one that ought to govern us y and
it is the only one that can control this man's thoughts, from the
stand-point which he at present occupies. Upon this principle, then,
he is to determine the essential value of his love. Of what value
can he decide it to be ? I lay it down as an unquestionable truth,
that the sinner, saved hy grace, can give but one answer to the ques-
tion, " Is the grateful pleasure which I feel towards God, sucli as so
great and unworthy a sinner as I am ought to feel J" and that is,
" No I no ! It is not, by any means, such as it ought to be ! " Nay,
we need not be surprised if this subject of grace, having a clear
view of the exceeding evil of sin, should be reluctant to admit that
he has any love, any peace, or anything else but a deep sense of sin
and its fearful results. But, still, the emotion which he is estimating
remains to be accounted for. It is a strange something. What is it ?

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 299

and echo, answers, What is it ? The door is thus thrown wide open
to the tempter. He enters, and the conflict begins. There are fearful
odds in Satan's favor, because the conflict is from within ! " Your
love is nothing," says he ; " you yourself admit it." And how can
he help admitting it ? For in the comparative view which he takes
of it, really it is nothing worth the mention, and it must always re-
main so; because, the higher he rises in grace, the more love he
has, in point of fact ; the more clearly does he discriminate the wide
diff'erence there is between the love that he has and the love that he
ought to have, as a sinner saved hrj grace ! So, then, from this point
of observation, the more he actually has, the less he really estimates
it to be ! What chance, then, has he, in so unequal a contest as this,?
Who need wonder, when he considers the fluctuations to which emotion
is liable, from many causes, and the specific abatement which it suff'ers
under this severe mental conflict, that this man yields to the belief
that his love is only imaginary, animal feeling, or sympathy, and
thus falls before his enemy ? And if he escape at all from this snare
of Satan, it is by falling back upon his general belief, (for it is only
general.) " All religion is the work of the Spirit, and the Christians
tell me I have religion ; somehow, this is grace, and I won't give it
up ! " The highest attainment we can suppose it possible for a mind
in these circumstances to reach, is one of alternate hope and fear,
until the mind settles down into a mere '* liojpe to go to heaven,"
often interrupted by serious and painful doubts whether the hope is
well founded.

Hence the origin of this doubting " hope-so " religion ! The evi-
dence of our own spirit — our consciousness of love, peace, and obedi-
ence— is divorced from the direct testimony of the Holy Spirit, which
testimony is imminent in that of our oicn spirits, and without which
that of our spirits is in truth worth nothing as proof, but with which
it is most conclusive and consoling evidence.

Restore this union. The facts will appear very dlff'erently from
this union as the point of observation. The mental states which
follow will also be very difi"erent, and the odds will be greatly in our
favor, in the battle to which we go ! Let us see : I take the case of
a genuine subject of grace, who holds the doctrine of Paul in regard
to the union of these witnesses, who says the testimony of the Holy
Spirit is, not to our spirits, but along " with our spirits." He too. as
every other man, is drawn into this great battle. What are his mental

300 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE "WITH GOD.

states in this severe struggle, and, it may be, on the banks of the
Jordan of death ? " What evidence have you," says Satan, '' to sus-
tain your claim of right to retire from the place in my ranks which
once you so nobly filled ? " "I am pardoned." " What ! do t/ou
love God too ? " " Yes, I trust I do delight in him greatly, but not
as much as I ought to do, and hope I soon shall do. My love is very
little, compared with what it ought to be, so great were my sins."
" But how do you know that you love him ? " " Because I was alle
to believe, and did believe, that Jesus died for me." J' Suppose He
did ; it does not follow that you are pardoned, unless you admit the
doctrine of universal salvation ; and if so, we are agreed, and will
walk together." " Aye, but I was persuaded that His atonement
did really avail to procure an act of pardon for me ; and, moreover, I
saw so clearly the harmony of my own mental states with this fact,
and with the teachings of God's Word, I not only believed it, but I
had faith in it; I trusted in it, and therein committed myself to- all
the ohligations of an open profession that Jesus died for me I And you
know that no such poor carnal sinner, as I was, could trust in so
high and holy a truth as that, unless the Holy Spirit had broken my
chains, dispelled my darkness, and lifted me up to see and admire its
beauty, and its harmony with essential truth ! Now, these things
being so, I think it very reasonable that I should love Him ! It
would be the most unreasonable thing in the world, if I did not ; and
I reproach myself that I do not love Him more ! My belief and my
faith, the Scriptures teach me, are the work of the Holy Spirit. I
am sure they cannot be the work of anything else." ''But do you
not allow that it is at least possible you may be deceived ? " " Yes,
and none know it better than you, or you would not try to induce
me to believe that I am deceived ! It does not follow, however, that
I am deceived, because it is possible that I may be. Moreover, lest I be
led away by your delusions, that some other spirit, satanic or fanatic,
has persuaded me to this belief. He has given me another evidence ;
it is the testimony of my own spirit. He tells me Jhat love, peace,
joy, and a holy life, are ike fruits of this divine testimony; that no
other spirit, on earth or in hell, can bear these fruits in my heart
and life, but the Divine Spirit. The insight He gives me into the
atonement leads me to see that I am a sinner. His further insight
gives me to see that I am a pardoned sinner — a light so clear to my
mind that I not only believe, but I trust, and thus commit myself to

THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD. 301

all the obligations of this belief; and the fruit of it all is, / love
God ; and my consciousness that I do love Him, however little com-
pared with what it ought to be, is proof to me that I am not de-
ceived. The two witnesses united leave me without a shadow of
doubt that I am on ray way to heaven ; I therefore boldly assert my
independence of you, Satan, and joyfully 'commit myself to glorify
Jesus in my body and in my spirit, which are His, and not yours ! "

Thus we perceive that this saving truth keeps the whole current
of thought in direct contact with the atonement. It weds and welds
the soul to the Cross, the Christian's only hope. It is equally removed
from fanaticism and from formalism. Little as his love and imper-
fect as his obedience may be, compared with what they ought to b^,
still these graces are the fruits, little or much, of this witnessing
spirit; and thus the mind is led to the Cross, and kept at the Cross —
the only point from which he can view himself, as "he is, a sinner
saved hy grace.

This man, we say, is born again. Though but a babe in Christ, it
may be, he has every element of the spiritual life, and enters with
cheerful confidence upon its hopes and its toils. He is in this mo-
ment an " heir of God and joint heir with Jesus Christ." For the
babe is not the less a human being, because it is a babe ; nor is this
man the less a child of God, because he is newly born. If he die in
the moment he first believes, the atonement avails for him ; he goes
directly to Paradise. If he lives, he must ^^ grow in grace and in the
hnowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." The muscles
and limbs of the babe must grow to maturity. So must this man's
spiritual muscles and limbs — all his mental states — take their in-
tended position of height, depth, and j^ei'mancnc)/. And as the being,
who was once a babe, is now conscious that he is a man, so he, who
was once a babe in Christ, may also be conscious of his maturity —
his fixedness in grace and in holy pursuits : " iliy heart is fixed; 0
God, my heart is fixed."

Reader, are you trying to go to heaven ? Do not live without this
joint testimony. The Cross! the Cross! This is your only plea.
Nothing but these united, witnessing spirits, can bind you to the
Cross. Even when you shall have reached the maturity of spiritual
manhood — the sanctified state, in which you rejoice in the unwaver-
ing fixedness of your purpose to glorify God in all things — your
great elevation will but serve to enable you to stretch your spiritual

302 THE KNOWLEDGE OF ACCEPTANCE WITH GOD.

vision so far away into the immeasurable abyss between you and the
infinite holiness of God, that the contrast, reflecting its light into the
depths of your own heart, will discover so vast a disparity between
what is and what ought to be, that you will still feel abased before
God ', and nothing but the Cross, the blessed Cross, will enable you
to maintain your confidence; and nothing, I repeat, but these wit-
nessing spirits will bind you to this Cross !

" Every moment, Lord, I need

The merit of Thy blood."

^

/^./'C^

■li'lUllHMIBIUil

sowijfa BEsn>E all waters.

redeem 0

304 SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS.

happy bands, to sow beside all waters. " Blessed," says be, witb
exultant emotion, " Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters ! "

Brethren, the kingdom of Christ is come ! His reign on earth
has commenced. The wilderness and the solitary places are visited.
Waters break out in the wilderness, and streams in the desert.
Spring is breathing over land and sea. A motion and a stir are
felt in the depths of forests. The sowers are abroad, on the hillside
and in the valley. Is it not the sight, in its first stage of advance-
ment, which greeted the eyes of the prophet ? Did-he not see the
sowers, in the wilderness of this new land, on the banks of -the Hud-
son and the Mississippi, by the far Oregon and the golden shores of
the Pacific ? Did he not see them on the banks of the Nile, by the
waters of the Ganges, the Brahmapootra, and the Irrawaddy ? Did
not his heart go out towards them ? Did he not mingle, so to speak,
in their toils and triumphs? Above all, did he not behold the
glorious harvest waving in the light of heaven, ripe for the sickle
of the Lord — and so, hailing them through the ages, cry out,
" Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters ? "

This is the great work to which, in all times, the church is called.
This is the work to which we are called. Let us inquire, then, with
■a view to a practical application of the subject, ^cliat and ichere and
liow we are to sow; and, finally, as to the blessedness of sowing beside-
all waters.

I. In answer to the question, W?iat are toe to soil) ? we reply,
briefly and at once, in the words of Christ, " the good seed of the
kingdom" — that is, as we understand it, the seed of eternal truth,
which, taking root in the soil of the human heart, shall '' grow up,
in some thirty, in others sixty, and in others a hundred fold, unto
everlasting life." Hence, it is not every seed bearing the semblance
of the divine which ripens for immortality. Nothing earth-born or
artificial is capable of producing a result so stupendous and beautiful.
'' That which is born of the flesh is flesh; " and no *' broad" or formal
church can divest it of this character; "and that^which is born of
the Spirit is spirit." It is emphatically the seed of Grod, the siqyer-
natural, and thence " incorruptible seed, which liveth and abideth for-
ever." In plainer and less figurative words, it is the simple but om-
nipotent truth of God, 'given us in Christ, and made vital — " quick
and powerful," as St. Paul expresses it — by the Holy Spirit. De-
scending from heaven as a power, it ascends thither as a growth.

SOWIXG BESIDE ALL WATERS. 305

. "For as the ruin comctli down from heaven, and rcturncth not
thither again, but watereth the earth, that there may be seed for the
sower and bread for the eater, so shall My word be that goeth forth
out of My mouth. It shall not return unto Me void, but it shall
prosper in the thing whereunto I sent it." The eternal harvest on
the hills of God is thus assured. "For ye shall go out with joy,
and be led forth with peace. The mountains and the hills shall break
before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their
hands."

What we want is not the husks of old speculations and arid dog-
mas ; not the chaff of human philosophy, fluttering its brief hour
amid the changing winds of opinion; not the debris of outward
forms and vain superstitions, gathered from the dust of the dark
ages ; but the simple Gospel of Christ, quickened by the breath of
the Almighty, and lodged as a living power in throbbing human
hearts.

This is what each man, " dead in trespasses and sins," needs. This
is what the world, hoary with guilt, needs for its renovation. And
thus, with all the prophets and apostles of the olden time, we cry,
'' 0 J]arth ! Earth ! Earth ! hear the Word of the Lord I" '

Christianity, then, as a miracle of grace, as a life-giving seed, must
be preached, in its integrity, among all nations, " for a witness." It
is only thus that it will prove " glad tidings of great joy unto all
people," and that the angels of God will accompany its proclamation
with their jubilant song, "Glory to God in the highest; on earth
peace, and good will to men ! "

II. Our next inquiry is, Where shaU we soio? In its more gen-
eral application, the answer has been anticipated; for, obviously, "the
field is the world." Unlike all other religions, Christianity is adapted
to universality. Everywhere, in all soils, in all climates, the seed of the
kingdom germinates and grows. It thrives equally in India and Ice-
land. Other religions, Pagan and Mohammedan, are local and tempo-
rary. Expatriated, they wither and die. They are stationary, also, in
the very lands which gave them birth. Intertvined with the social
and political prejudices of the people whose spirit has formed them,
they are incapable of the slightest improvement and expansion. They
recognise " lords many and gods many "— " gods of the valleys," and
"gods of hills." Thus we have the nature-worship of the ancient
Magi— the adoration of the sun, moon, and stars; then the aesthetic
20 '

306 SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS.

symbolic worsliip of the Greeks, in which all the forces of nature and
the passions of the human soul are deified and adored ; after that, the
political hero-worship of the Romans, in which, by a transference
of human qualities to the gods, men are transformed into gods, and
gods into men. Similar systems are reproduced in modern times, so
that pantheism, or nature-worship, and polytheism — which is man-
worship, or, in more degraded form, beast worship — constitute the
religions of the entire heathen world — adapted, of course, with end-
less variations, to differ ens countries, and expressing, with marvellous
precision, the moral condition of each. Narrow, local, defective,
superstitious, often licentious and demoralizing, and in some in-
stances absolutely demoniac, the earth groans under the despotism
of religions; so that what was originally meant for a blessing is
turned into a curse.

The religion of Mohammed, founded partially upon the Bible, and
recognising one true and eternal God, is a great advance ; but that,
too, is narrow and local in its origin and aspirations. It has no power
of transformation, in the case either of the individual soul or of the
race. It is meagre, despotic, and selfish ; so that it is impossible for
the nation in which it- prevails to rise into anything like moral
strength and grandeur. The religion of the Jews, in its primitive
purity, true and divine, after all, was local and temporary, beings
adapted to the peculiar condition of the Hebrew race, and prepara-
tory to something better aiid more enduring.

There was needed, then, for man, as man, a system of religion,
simple, spiritual, plastic, universal — a religion adapted to human
■ nature in all its phases, and thus fitted for constant and unlimited
expansion.

Such is Christianity, so generous and comprehensive in its whole
character and aims, bringing God to man in all the fullness of His
love and power, as the Universal Father, and bringing man to God,
as the child of eternity ; knowing, therefore, none high, none low,
none rich or poor, bond or free, but treating all as souls, partakers
of the same guilt, heirs of the same immortality.

Hence, it has found a response wherever it has found men, whether
on the banks of the Jordan, or in the depths jof Scythian forests, be-
neath the shadow of the Parthenon, or on the rock-bound coast of
New England. Those who proclaimed it at first went everywhere
preaching the Word. They addressed men as guilty sinners, yet with

SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS. 307

a poweror capacity of endless life. Multitudes, of every name and
nation, heard this and believed. The heart of man everywhere met
the heart of God. The inhabitants of Palestine, Greeks and Romans,
Cretes and Arabians, Elamites and the dwellers in ]^Iesopotamia, Par-
thians and Cyrenians, dusky Ethiops and the dwellers on the Nile,
were made " new creatures in Christ Jesus." Far off in the depths
of India, and amid the wilds of Scandinavia, men and women felt the
life-giving grace. " There is not a nation," says Justin jMartyr, in
the first half of the second century, " either of Greek or barbarian, or
any other name, even of those who wander in tribes or live in t-ents,
among whom prayers and thanksgivings are not ofi'ered to the Father
and Creator of the Universe, in the name of the crucified Jesus." So,
also, Clement of Alexandria, a little later, contrasting the doctrine
of the Cross with the speculations of the philosophers, narrow in
their range and limited in their influence, says : " The philosophers
were confined to Greece and to their particular retainers, but the
doctrine of Christianity did not remain in Judea, but is spread
through the whole world, in every nation and village and city, con-
verting both whole families and separate individuals, having already
brought over to the truth not a few of the philosophers themselves."

The same thing has occurred in modern times. So that, could we
pass round the world, we should hear hymns to Christ, whether we
lingered under the walls of the Burman pagoda, threaded the Karen
jungles, sat under the banyan of India, or climbed the heights of the
Syrian hills. At one time, you might hear them floating from the
burning sands of Africa ; at another, from the coral reefs of Polyne-
sian isles.

Such, then, is the general reply to the question. Where shall we
soic ?

But the words of our text suggest a yet more specific answer, and
one involving considerations of the highest practical moment.
" Blessed are ye that sow beside all toaters." The field, indeed, is
the world, but it must be approached and occupied in a certain
order, and in specific directions. So that in these words is hid-
den a profound practical philosophy, suggesting the necessity of
working outwardly, in all directions, from some great centre or cen-
tres, along the chief lines of social^and commercial influence.

And it is curious to observe how, corresponding to this, the phys-
ical world has been prepared for the abode of man ; for everywhere

308 SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS.

we fiud the most admirable adaptation of its physical aspects and
resources to the natural and even spiritual wants of the race. Over
all the face of the earth, for example, we find a stupendous prep-
aration for a complete system of water-works, in high mountain
ranges and table lands, with corresponding depressions and declivi-
ties, not simply to supply the requisite moisture and fertility, but to
bring the whole world into intimate social and spiritral relations.
Apparently dividing mankind into hostile communiticv, the great
oceans and seas actually bring them together, and forfii the highway
of nations.

Within a narrower sphere, see how wonderfully, linked the diiferent
parts of a country, and sometimes of different contiguous countries,
by a network of beautiful inland seas, lakes, and rivers ; so that the
face of the earth is checkered by the great water-courses over which
speed the commerce and population, the life and intelligence of man-
kind. Railroads, themselves, are mere appendages of rivers and
oceans, to bring them into closer and more pei-fect connection.
Around and through all lands, God has poured His tides, " where
go the swift ships," freighted with merchandise, and not unfre-
quently, in these latter days, with the seed of truth to be sown broad-
cast on all heathen shores.

. The Gospel, then, must be preached and its institutions planted
beside all waters, amid crowded and busy populations, in all the
great centres and avenues of life.

The mdthod is to start from some chief points of influence, and
advance along the streams and seas where men do most congregate,
to proceed from land to land, systematically and orderly, as God shall
direct, to take possession of the world. It is of little use to main-
tain a sort of guerilla warfare, with a few scattered tribes on the out-
skirts of society, while the great nations are left behind. Not from
the circumference to the centre, but from the centre to the circum-
ference, is the method of nature and of providence.

In this view, the procedure of Christ and His apostles is most in-
structive. He came from heaven freighted with immortal seed,
which, in tears and blood and agony. He sowed in one of the chief
centres of the world. Lying on the eastern shores of .the " middle
sea," between Europe on the one hand and Asia on the other, having
Egypt and Africa on the south, and Rome on the west, Judea, insig-
nificant in itself; formed a centre from which the seed of divine

SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS. 309

truth spread on all the wings of the Avind, on all the streams of time.
Yonder you behold the Divine Redeemer on the banks of the sacred
Jordan, anon in the city of Jerusalem ; then by the shores of the
lake of Galilee ; then in the land of Zebulon and Naphtali, by the
shores of the Mediterranean, about the coasts of Tyre and Sidon.
From the temple, according to the symbolic language of the prophet,
flow the deepening and expanding waters of life, to diverse and dis-
tant seas.

The disciples of our Lord follow in His steps. After preaching
and baptizing by all the streams of Palestine, we trace them around
all the shores of the Mediterranean, the seat of ancient empires.
Then we see them on the banks of the Ilissus and the Tiber, and
afterwards on those of the Rhine, the Rhone, and the Elbe, where
churches of Christ were planted about the close of the second cen-
tury. On the other side of the world, we find them preaching and
baptizing by Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, coasting around
the whole of Asia the Less, from Jerusalem round about unto Illyri-
cum, and especially in those seats of ancient commerce, where Greeks,
Jews, and barbarians, were gathered for business or pleasure, Antioeh,
Ephesus, and Smyrna. Soon after, we find them sowing the seed
of the Kingdom by the water-courses of the Nile, in the cities of
Carthage and Alexandria. They travelled far eastward to the banks
of the Euphrates, by the shores of the Caspian sea, and some say,
towards the close of the third or the fourth century, as far east as
the Ganges. Monuments of their labors, in later times, have been
found in Assyria, in the region of the Nestorians, in India, and even
in China.

Thus the truth was spread '^ from the rivers to the ends of the
earth " — from Palestine to Rome; from Rome to Gaul, Germany, and
Spain; and thence to the Ultima Thule of the British Isles. From
England and Holland, it has come to this new world of the West,
over which it has spread from the shores of the Atlantic, by the
banks of the Merrimac and the Connecticut, to the Bay of New
York and the lordly Hudson, whence it has gone, mainly by mis-
sionary labor, along the valley of the Mohawk, to the shores of Erie
and Ontario, and thence far west to the Father of Waters. But not
there alone, but farther and farther still, along all the lines of travel
and business, until now the song of salvation mingles with the dash
of the Pacific Ocean.

310 SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS.

III. Our tliird question, When are we to soio ? is easily answered.
For, in the domain of religion, all times are seasons of sowing — at
early morn and dewy eve, in spring-time and summer, in autumn and
winter, alike.

True, indeed, there are certain grand transitional eras in the history
both of individuals and of communities, which may be regarded, in
a special sense, as their spring or seed-time.

Such was the era in which Christ and His apostles '' filled the
world with their doctrine.'' Such was the period of the Reformation
in the sixteenth century. And is not the present, in nearly all lands,
pre-eminently such a time ?

Look around you and see ! Is there a nation anywhere wholly
closed against the truth ? Is not the long winter of despotism even
in heathen lands giving way? Is not the whole world somewhat
awake, impressible, expectant? For the first time we can penetrate,
with the seed of God, to the very depths of Africa. There is riot a
portion of India to which we cannot convey the Word of life. All
Europe is in a transition state. Spring is stirring, amid the snows
of winter, on the banks of the Danube, through the Alps of Switzer-
land and Italy, and among the vinefields of Etruria and France.
The cold winds of tyranny and priestcraft may check the progress
of spring, aiid throw it back apparently into the bosom of winter;
but waters are gathering in the hills, soft winds are stealing through
the valleys; once more the frosts will dissolve, the torrents will
sweep fram the mountains and roll over the plains. France, Ger-
many, and even Italy, will yet rejoice in the summer of freedom and
hope.

And what shall I say of this " free land " of ours, with its teeming
myriads and throbbing life ?

0 ! never in the history man was there a season of such wondrous
movement and promise as the present. The nations, aroused and
agitated by the new forces of discovery and revolution, of scientific
and commercial development, of free thought and daring enterprise,
everywhere invite the labors and prayers of the church. The enemy
too is up and busy at the rising and the setting sun, sowing tares
over all the open fields. Even in India, as well as in Europe and in
this country, infidelity and superstition are at their work of death,
and, if the hosts of God are not watchful and diligent, will darken
the face of the earth. Let none then draw back, let none slacken

SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS. 311

in the glorious work of sowing the seed of God beside all waters.
" In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not
thou thy hand; for thou canst not tell which shall prosper, this or
that, or whether both shall be alike good."

TV. This naturally brings us to our next but not least important
question, How are ice to sow? Patiently and perseveringly, of course
every one will say; for in what great enterprise are these qualities
more imperatively needed ? Years, ages, may roll by before the glo-
rious harvest; but it will come at last. "Ye have need of patience;"
for the spring is often cold and backward, and even tempestuous.
" Little by little " was the motto of a great scholar, and little by
little will the season advance, and little by little must the seed be
sown beside all waters.

But not only patiently and perseveringly, but generously and
bountifully, with some due proportion to the zeal that animates our
heart, and the sublime results to be achieved. The " Expect great
things from God," in Carey's immortal sermon, was followed by its
counterpart — " Attempt great things for God." It would be absurd
to go forth to the conquest of a great country with one or two strag-
gling battalions and a few rusty cannon ! What folly to sow a bushel
of corn in a thousand-acre field ! But, alas ! are we not sometimes,
in this grand enterprise of occupying the world with the religion of
Christ, about as foolish as this ? How slender and inadequate our
means; how meagre and thinly scattered our seed ! A few handfuls
here and there, most precious I grant, and occasionally ripening
abundantly in the far wilderness ; but this is not the sowing beside
all waters, which is to fill the world with the glory of the Lord.

The Lord loveth a cheerful giver; He loveth also a cheeiful, free-
hearted worker, who, with noble generosity, scatiers broadcast the
seed of life beside all waters. " Freely ye have received, freely give."
He that hoards corn when it is needed for sowing, deserves a double
curse; for he inflicts a double injury. Open then the granaries
stored with the sacred treasure, and let the Word of life be scattered
freely in all lands, and in due time the harvest will "shake like
Lebanon."

Hence, in conclusion, we linger a moment upon the blessedness of
such a course. " Blessed are ye that sow beside all waters." Twice
blessed ! nay, thrice and four times blessed ! Blessed in the heart ;
for that, in its generous quality, is a perrennial fountain of joy ; blessed

312 SOWING BESIDE ALL WATEKS.

in the sympathy and gratitude of others; blessed in the work itself,
a work in which angels might share; and blessed in the hope of the
harvest to come.

Though it is the springtime, oft bleak and cheerless, work for God
is ever a joy. The life, energy, movement, of such a season, are
themselves a compensation. The idler and pleasure seeker is the
unhappy man. The laborer, " a-field at early morn," ploughing on
the mountain's side, " in glory and in joy," or scattering the golden
seed in the fruitful meadows, has no time to be wretched. He sows
in hope also; and in the sphere of religion, it often happens that the
sower overtakes the reaper — nay, becomes the reaper — iwhile sowers
and reapers rejoice together. Ah ! what glorious sheaves are gathered
even now in the fields of toil ! " He that goeth forth and weepeth,
bearing precious seed, shall come again, bringing his sheaves with
him." Even at tlie close of life's weary day, the sower has wept
tears of joy as he gazed upon the fair harvest waving before his eyes.
" The wilderness and the solitary place are made glad, the desert
rejoices and blossoms as the rose." Who can describe the thrill of
sacred delight which passed through the frame of the dying Board-
man, when, borne upon a litter, he gazed upon the Karen converts
going down to the river to be baptized in the name of Jesus ? The
death of Gordon Hall, far from kindred and home, was like the coro- '
nation of a king. His last words were a sort of triumphal shout:
" Glory be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost ! "

And what shall I say of the last harvest, the final coming and
kingdom of the Lord ? " The harvest is the end of the world; the
reapers are the angels;" and the result, unnumbered myriads of
glorified spirits. ''For the ransomed of the Lord shall return and
come to Zion, with songs, and' everlasting joy upon their heads; they
shall obtain joy and gladness, sorrow and sighing shall flee away."

Then the sea shall give up the dead that are in it — the silent wil-
derness and solitary graveyard among the mountains, or by the lone
heathen river, the once populous city, and the opeij field, shall give
up the dead that are in them. They shall come, myriads upon
myriads from all lands, and from all seas, beautiful as angels and
expectant of glory. For the seed of God has ripened, and the last
field is reaped. Earth's weary sowers are there ; but oh ! how
changed, how glorified, as they mingle with the happy throng as-
cending " the shining way," chanting with angels the song of the

SOWING BESIDE ALL WATERS. 313

harvest ! • In many mingling tones as of a great multitude from all
lauds, singing the one song — '' Worthy is the Lamb to receive honor
and glory and blessing."

Ah ! well may we say, as by faith we descry them from afar, " Who
are these, and whence come they ? " Lo, these are they — the Lord's
sowers, blessed reapers now — who, in toil and tears, scattered seed
by all waters; and having washed their robes and made them white
in the blood of the Lamb, are now before the throne of God, and
praise Him night and day in His temple. Yonder is Luther with
his Germans singing, Gloria in Excelsis ! Yonder is Carey with
his Hindoos, and among them Krishnu Paul, singing as of old,

"Oh thou, my soul, forget no more
The friend Avho all thy sorrows bore ! "

Yonder too is Judson with his Burmans, glorious now as angels
of God, and around theni, and stretching far away among '' the shining
ones," many dear forms long missed on earth, now glorified in the
heavens. Tears, anguish, death, all forgotten, swallowed up and lost
in the joy of the harvest. Happy sowers ! Happy reapers ! Blessed
are ye that have sown beside all waters 1

Bouse thee then, oh my brother ! to the sublime work ! Onward!
right onward ! thou man of God, sowing immortal seed beside all
waters —

" And thou an angel's happiness shalt know ; ,
The good begun by thee shall onward flow,
In many a branching stream, and wider grow.

The seed, that in these few and fleeting years,
Thy hands unsparing and unwearied sow,
Shall spring to life in amaranthine flowers.
And yield thee fruits divine in heaven's immortal bowers."

-u.

'^y'l^i^-t

TRUTH.

utli, by i

he

for whJ

.1 IvLTJifM. lU

flirf"'!-'. :iTl

his liut:'

■. nt. disco t.

GROUND OF THE TRUTH. 317

' "who, in heart and life, are conformed to the will of God. It is not
the badge we wear, nor the name by which we arc called, nor the
way in which we administer or submit to ordinances, nor the church
authority to which we yield obedience, but the image of Christ en-
stamped upon the soul, that gives us a name and a place among those
who are the people of God upon earth, and who will sit down with
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven. So that the
church visible is composed of all who profess the true religion, and
their children ; and the church invisible, of all who truly possess it.
Let any individual, rejecting these views, go out in search of the
church, and, like the visionary in pursuit of the philosopher's stone,
he is in search of an object he will never find, and will in all proba^
bility take up with something which has the least possible claim to
it. It is the way of God, with those who reject the simple truth, to
give them up to strong delusion to believe a lie. When men reject
the truth, they soon become fiery zealots for a fiction.

II. This church is the house of God.

" That thou mayestknow how to behave thyself in the house of God."
The tabernacle in the wilderness, and, after it was taken down, the tem-
ple, was called the house or the habitation of God, because there the
symbol of the divine presence resided. And whilst under our dispen-
sation no material building is called the house of God, yet the language
is applied in figure to the church of God, as we have just explained it:
believers in Christ, joined together for His worship according to the
forms of the Gospel. Of this the following passage is the proof and
illustration, in which Paul thus addresses himself to the converts
from the Gentiles : '•' Ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but
fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God ; and
are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus
Christ Himself being the chief corner-stone, in whom all the build-
ing fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord,
in whom ye are also builded together for an habitation of God through
the Spirit." (Ephesians, ii, 20, 21.) The material temple at Jeru-
salem was a type of the spiritual church ; and as that rose from its
elevated foundations laid on the rock, stone after stone, and plank
after plank, to its completeness and magnificent perfection, so the
spiritual church rises, by the continued conversion of sinners, and
the progressive sanctification of believers, and is growing up unto an
holy temple in the Lord. And every believer, like the stones and

318 THE CHURCH THE PILLAR AND

timbers of a building, conduces to the growth, the stability, and the
proportions, of the house. The wall must not say to the roof, nor
the roof to the wall, I have no need of thee. The polished corner-
stone must not say to the lesser stones that are hidden in the founda-
tions, or in the centre of walls, " I have no need of thee." Each is
needful to the stability and the perfection of the whole. All are
fitly framed together ; and the building is rising to its glorious com-
pletion by the additions making to it of every believer. This house
of Grod is rising from age to age, and will only b'^ completed in
glory.

III. This house is the church or the living God.

"Which is the church of the living God." Here, it may be, the
church of the living God is placed in significant contrast with the dead
idols of the heathen. Timothy was in Ephesus, where was the magnifi-
cent temple of Diana, and where was the miraculous image which all
the world worshipped. There stood the image in its magnificent abode,
without life, sense, or motion ; dead as the wood, or the stone, from
which it was made ; and without any power of imparting any benefit
to its world of worshippers. It saw not their sins — it heard not the
cries of their pagan revelry — the fermenting corruption of their
hearts, it knew not; and whatever chastisement they deserved,' it
had no hand to inflict them. The image was polished, and beautiful,
but it was dead. And the idols and gods of the heathen are all
dead. And the living God, whose centre is everywhere, and His
circumference nowhere, stands out in the broadest contrast with
these. Having life in Himself, He is uncreated, but He is the
fountain of life, to all beings. He gives life, and breath, and all
things, to His creatures. It is in Him we live, and move, and have
our being. As the living God, He is everywhere present, and sends
out the p\ilsations of life to the most remote fibres of His own infi-
nite creation. And especially, as the God of grace, is He the author
of eternal life to all who believe. The temple of Solomon was con-
structed of dead stones and timbers; and so was the temple of Di-
ana, and all the temples of heathenism. But '* the house of God,"
" the church of the living God," is built up of living stones, and
living timbers. God's spiritual house is constructed of those whom
He has made spiritually alive. He is the living God — and the ma-
terials of His house are all alive unto Him. He enters His house,
not like a pagan or papal priest parading his embroideries and vest-

GROUND OF THE TRUTH. 319

• ments amid lifeless walls, and beams, and pillars, and paintings, and
statuary ; but like a fatlier coming among his own living children,
loving and embracing all, and loved and embraced of all. He comes,
the living God, into a living temple, to impart new life to all who
compose it, that they may be co-workers with Him to extend spiritual
life throughout our world, which is dead in trespasses and sins.

The heathen serve dumb idols, but ours is the living God. He
sees our faults — He marks our sins — He hears our complaints — He
knows our hearts. But He is our Father — He has for us a father's
heart. And His church, from its foundations, up, up, to the top-
most stone, should be alive unto Him. Thus may His church be
alive unto Him !

IV. The church of the living God is the pillar and

GROUND OF THE TRUTH.

The words which we render " pillar and ground " are nearly iden-
tical in meaning; or they may be interpreted so as simply to give
intensity to the word pillar — as a very strong pillar, an unfailing
pillar— a pillar that cannot be moved, so strong are its foundations,
and so strongly is it built.

We will not weary you with detail as to the interpretations given
to the word " pillar," and as to the variety of opinions as to what it
refers. Because Timothy was left in Ephesus to preach, defend, and
support the truth, some would make him the pillar. Whilst, in a
high sense, he was a pillar, as is every true minister of the Word,
yet, were Timothy now living, he would promptly decline the honor
which these interpreters would confer upon him. Others would
make God the pillar ; but whilst He is the pillar and ground of the
universe, a true interpretation forbids this. Others would make 'Hhe
mystery of Godliness," in the subsequent verse, the pillar ; but this
would require a new arrangement of the entire passage. We believe
the true meaning to be, that which lies on the very face of the text,
that the church, not the church of Home, not the church of Eng-
land, not the church of Scotland, not any particular church, but the
church of the living God, made up of all the true churches of Christ
throughout our world, is the pillar and ground of the truth ; and
that glorious church is here brought out in contrast with the temple
of the lifeless image of Diana, which was the pillar and the support
of falsehood, idolatry, and vice.

In the porch of the temple of Solomon were two magnificent pil-

320 THE CHURCH THE PILLAR AND

lars, between wliicli the worshippers entered into the splendid inte-
rior. The one was called Jachin, the other, Boaz ; and it is said
that upon these pillars the prophets hung up all their prophecies,
written upon parchment, that they might be read by all who entered
the temple to worship. May it not be to this the apostle alludes in
our text ? And if so, how beautifully it illustrates the way and man-
ner in which the church is the pillar and ground of the truth ! It
is to hold up the truth of God, to be known and read of all men !

The temples of the heathen were splendid structures, as is proved
by those of them which yet remain, and by the ruins of others. Who
can even now wander amid their ruins without being awe-struck with
their magnitude and beauty, ere they were crushed by the ruthless
hand of barbarism ! These temples were crowded with pillars sup-
porting their ample roof, some of which are models in architecture
to the present day ! Upon these pillars the laws and edicts of kings,
and emperors, and governments, were hung, to be read by the people!
And when the people desired to know the laws and edicts to which
their attention and obedience were required, they resorted to the
pillars in the temples which held them up for their perusal. May
it not be to this the apostle alludes in our text? And if so, how beau-
tifully it illustrates the way and manner in which the church is the
pillar and ground of the truth ! It is to hold forth the truth of God, '
to be read and known of all men ! And we are confident, as to the
essential truth, that here we have the mind of the Spirit in our text.
The church, not the church papal, not the church protestant, nor
any branch or segment of either, but the church catholic, composed
of all who profess the true religion, is the pillar and ground of the
truth.

Let this be accepted, and' then, in view of the illustrations just
given, there are some weighty truths that follow.

1. The jjiiiar neither viaJccs nor modijles the laios. These are en-
acted by supreme authorit}'-, and were hung on the pillars to be read
by the people. So the church has no right to m;ike new laws, or
to modify those already given by God. The law of the Lord is
perfect, and it must be preserved from all additions or subtractions;
and the one simple duty of the church is to hold forth the laws of
the King of Zion, in their purity, to be known and read of all men !
If this principle is surrendered, our religious liberty is gone — for
religious liberty consists in refusing to submit to any authority but

GROUND OF THE TRUTH. 321

that of God — in refusing to receive, as of divine authority, anything
not plainly taught in the Bible. "Would that all contrivers and
lovers of novelties, who are acting on the supposition that tlie law
of the Lord is not perfect, might remember this !

2. The 'pUlar gives no efficacy to the laws. It cannot make men
read them, nor believe them, nor obey them. It holds them up, and
then men disobey them at their peril. So the church gives no effi-
cacy to the truth ; that is the work of the Spirit ; and all pretension
to such power must go into the category of old wives' fables. We
regard it not merely as pretentious and deceptive, but as blasphe-
mous. The simple mission of the church is — and it is a glorious
mission — to hold up the truth, and the whole truth. The power
which gives it efficacy is from God. The church has to prophecy to
the dry bones, and then to pray, " Come from the four winds, 0
breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live."

3. Nor can the pillar suppress the laws of the King, and pnt up
others in their place, as more conducive to the good of the suhject.
This would be virtually calling into question the authority of the
King, and dethroning Him; as the power which repeals, modifies, or
enacts the laws, is the supreme power. And this is the crying, hor-
rible sin of Rome, and which subjects it to the curse of anathema,
maranatha. It hides the truth from the people, and teaches them,
for doctrines, the commandments of men. It puts up a pillar of its
own, and, putting aside the revelation of God, it covers that pillar
with its own teachings ; many of which it is as difficult to compre-
hend as the hieroglyphics of Egypt, and when understood they arc
contemptibly frivolous, and only deserving a place with the bones
of St. Quietus.

4. The truth lohich the pillar is to hold up for tiniversal jpcrusal is
not any fomiularu of doctrine of human contrivance. These are very
well in their place; and we favor creeds and confessions because
they embody the great truths which the diifercnt branches of the
church receive as the teachings of the Scripture. Nor have we ever
known any violently opposed to them, but the propagators of error,
to whose success they opposed strong barriers. Yet it is not these
symbols, but the revelations of the Spirit by prophets and apostles,
as contained in the Bible, which the church is to hold forth. Sym-
bols are nothing, but as they are based upon the revelations of God ;
they arc worse than nothing, when they either oppose, pervert, or

21

322 THE CHURCH THE PILLAR AND

obscure them. And by preserving the Scriptures in their integrity —
by preserving their doctrines and institutions from corruption — by
transmitting them from age to age in their original purity — by truth-
ful translations of them into the tongues of all people — by her eflPorts
to send the Bible, and the ministers of God to preach it, to all the
tribes and kindreds of the earth — the church of the living God has
shown and is now showing itself to be the pillar and ground of the
truth.

These are all weighty truths, and of the highest importance to the
being of the church, and to the well being of the race. The high-
est temporal and spiritual interests of man are intserwoven with the
perfect purity, and the entire fi'cedom, and the universal circulation,
of the truth of God.

Now, the application of all this is important and obvious.

1. /;; settles the questions as to lohat is the church, and where is the
church. In its visible form, it is composed of those who profess the
true faith — in its invisible, of all those truly collected unto Christ.
Nor is it confined to the domains of popery, prelacy, or presbytery ;
it is composed of all who receive and practice the truth. The most
obscure believer on earth is a part of it — and wherever a family, or
a body of faithful men, are assembled for the worship of God, therp
it is in form, and in spirit, and in reality. The individual in whom
the Spirit dwells is a temple of God ; and there may be a church in
the family, as well as in the city, or i<i the state. These are the true
answers as to, What is the church ? And where is the church ? In
no other way have the questions been ever answered, worthy the re-
gard of an intelligent mind.

2. It defines the simple duty of the church. That duty is to hold
forth and to hold up the simple truth as it is in Jesus, to be known
and read of all men. Behold those pillars in the temple a,t Jerusa-
lem, covered with parchments containing the Will of God, as revealed
to the prophets, and daily surrounded by multitudes of anxious
readers ! There is symbolized the duty of the entir;? church. It is
to hold forth and to hold up the Word of life ! Oh that the heart
of the church, and of its entire ministry, might be impressed with
this great truth, so that we may cease from sectarian strife, and from
questions that tend to no profit, and from modes of reform which
only aggravate the evils they mean to remedy, and cause the con-
flicting passions of men to swell and foam like the waves of the sea

GROUND OF THE TRUTH. 323

ia a storm; and that we may turn our entire energies to the spread-
ins: of the knowlcdire of the truth to the ends of the earth. Let the
dead bury the dead, but the one duty of the ministry is to preach
the Gospel. God's truth is the great rectifier of all error and of all
evils. This alone purifies the heart. All other reformations are but
partial and apparent, like the skin drawn over the cancerous sore,
whilst its fiery roots are spreading within. Ephraim must cease vex-
ing Judah, and Judah Ephraim, about qviestions as to the mint,
anise, and cummin; and both must give themselves to the holding
forth the Word of life to all people.

And what is the duty of the church in the aggregate, is the duty
of every member of it. If the church may be compared to a tem-
ple, then may its every member be compared to a pillar in that tem-
ple. Some of these stand in the porch, some arounij the altars, some
in very obscure corners; but the duty of them all is to hold up and
to hold forth the "Word of truth. Think not that this noblest work
is confined to the pulpit. It is the device of hell to divide the
church into castes, and to authorize only the few to preach Christ
crucified, and to forbid others to tell those perishing around them
of the way of life. The Sabbath-school teacher — the obscure mother,
with her children grouped around her, and with her Bible on her
knee — the friend who deals faithfully with the soul of his friend —
the young men banded together for works of benevolence and mercy —
these, no less than the minister, are co-workers with God, are hold-
ing forth the Word of life. You may be poor and obscure, and hold
no rank in the church; but may not a private in the army fight as
valiantly for his country as the officer that commands ? May he not
die fighting for the colors which he may not carry? If it is not his
business to train recruits, he may enlist them. And to this work
of enlisting recruits for the Cross, the Gospel calls all who are look-
ing to the Cross for salvation. "The Spirit and the bride say come;
and let him that hearcth say come, and let him that is athirst come,
and whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely." The
Master hath need of the active service of all His people. Multi-
tudes, even in our most highly-favored places, are dying in their
sins; and though every minister were as a flaming fire, and every
preacher a Whitcfield, they could not overtake the great work before
them. And no person should be considered as converted, unless so
converted as to take a living, loving interest in the conversion of

324 THE CHURCH THE PILLAR, ETC.

others. The g-reat, grand, glorious duty of the church, and of its
every member, from the minister to the most obscure member, is to
hold forth the "Word of life. When the church and its entire mem-
bership shall be thus the pillar and ground of the truth, the moru
of the millennial day has already risen upon our world; and the shout
will be soon heard rising from earth to heaven, and echoed back
again from the heavens to earth, hallelujah, salvation, for the Lord
God omnipotent reigaeth.

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FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS, 327

is truth.? One says, lo ! here; another, lo ! there. Whom shall
we follow ?

Distracted inquirer, are you honest? Would you find the truth?
Are you perplexed whom to follow, and anxious lest you go astray ?
Hear the words of Jesus; he suggests a test to you; one which the
most unskillful may apply, and which is infallible.

The method is short and practical : '^ By their fruits ye shall
know them."

There are other tests — this is the most available and simple. Phi-
losophy is useful — there are ultimate criteria of truth; but this is the
sum of all. '' A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can
a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits ye
shall know them." The labyrinths of evidence may be too intricate;
the import of doctrines too obscure, too profound ; truth too inac-
cessible for the comman mind. This rule lies level with the feeblest
capacity. The scheme may not be understood — the theory may be
incomprehensible ; the fruit is patent.

Wisely did the great blaster supply His disciples with this easy
and infallible test. It is our wisdom, amid all the confusion and
uncertainty of debate and polemical strife, to remember it. Under
the blinding influence of passion, and beset Avith the weaknesses of
finite and limited powers, our logic often limps, and our reason
turns to unreason; but "grapes do never grow upon thorns, nor figs
upon thistles."

We do not ignore reason, nor deny it its appropriate place in the
investigation of truth; we would not prejudice its full and free play;
but we insist that reason is never more reason, never more like
itself, than when, whatever other rule it employs on moral questions,
it falls back upon that which is furnished here as primary and ulti-
mate.

No evidence can show that to be trutli whose legitimate working
is evil, nor the opposite. Honoring, and holding in the highest es-
timation, then, all the kinds and variety of evidence by which mind
is led to moral truth, and especially joying in the fullness and
abundance of that proof which God has been pleased to array in sup-
port of His own revelation ; proof comprising a long line of most
illustrious prophecies, with innumerable miracles the most brilliant
and indubitable, alike the utterances of a supernatural and divine
agent; proof interwoven with the entire chain of human history, and

328 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

overspreading the whole scope of the race ; proof internal and ex-
ternal, beaming on its pages and inscribed on monuments, speaking
ft-om the earth and the heaven ; proof which for variety and fullness
has never been equalled in any other case; rejoicing, as we do in the
wisdom and goodness of God, which in this has left all men without
excuse to whom His revelation comes, we yet turn away from all
others, to this one proof for the present — the proof arising from the
fruits of the system.

Let us proceed, then, to apply this test principle to the various
systems propounded by men, and inviting the acceptance of their
fellows.

By fruits, is meant effects ; effects produced by the system in the
minds and in the external lives of those who come within its influ-
ence ; effects extending from the individual to society ; all the ef-
fects resulting from the system, upon the inward and outward life
of individuals and communities.

It is postulated that truth is good; that it is good working and
benign; that, so far as it characterizes a system, the system will have
a tendency to make men wiser and purer and happier, to diminish
the evils and multiply the blessings of society, to improve individ-
ual character^ to elevate the masses, to ameliorate the asperities of
life, to invigorate mind with high and noble aims, and in every pos-
sible way to sweeten and sanctify all relations, and render the earth,
what it was designed to be, the sanctuary of virtue, the abode of
happiness, and the ante-chamber of heaven. Any system producing
such effects is shown to be good, and of God ; it is the good tree at-
tested by its precious fruits. Any system or separate idea tending
in the opposite direction must be condemned as evil, and as emana-
ting from the fiither of lies, whose impress it bears.

But obvious as the principle is, and easy of application, some pre-
caution may be needed in its use.

No series of ideas, related as a system of doctrines, that has ever
yet been conceived by man, is either wholly true, /or wholly false.
In the best, there are some traces of human imperfection ; in the
most vicious, there is some truth. The same is true of their effects.
Even the divine system, which is perfect in itself, is never so in the
finite conception. Hence, the extent to which the principle can
apply is to show the general character of the system, condemning
or approving it as a whole, and not in every minute part. Minute

FRUITS A TEST OP SYSTEMS. 329

differences may exist between systems of the same general complex-
ion, and harmony on inferior grounds between those fundamentally
adverse. It results that the elements of truth are not so directly
attested separately, if indeed they are attested at all, by the effects
flowing from systems, as the general system itself.

A further precaution required is, that as each minute element of
doctrine is not verified by the effects of several related doctrines,
so a system is not to be adjudged by some single effect which seems
to flow from it, or by several unusual effects. A good and whole-
some law, impinging on a vicious state of society, or, simply, the
publication of a most humane and beautiful sentiment, may become
the occasion of alarming riots and bloodshed ; the proclamation of
liberty may instigate rebellion against oppressive thrones; the coming
of Christ, and His benign ministries, may evoke the instruments of
cruel and inhuman persecutions ; these incidental results may not,
therefore, be attributed to their several antecedents, as their legiti-
mate effects, but must rather be traced to the malignant resistance
of deep-seated evils.

Again, as a system of doctrine is not to be judged by some acci-
dental effect, so neither is it responsible for its abuse or misapplica-
tion or perversion. If zeal without knowledge lead to persecution,
it will not prove that it is bad to be zealously affected for a good
thing; if much learning sometimes puffeth up and euge.ndereth vain
disputings, it will not invalidate the truth that knowledge is to be
desired, or that for the soul to be without knowledge is an evil; if
charity at times extenuates wrong, and withholds the punishment
that is due, thereby endangering the well-being of the innocent, it
will not show that it is not better than all burnt sacrifices; if, because
of the long-suffering of God, the hearts of the sons of men are often
set in them "to do evil, it will not show that mercy can have no place
in the bosom of Divinity.

Finally, a system must not be supposed always to be represented
by the character of its expounders and defenders, or its effects be
judged of by either their follies or virtues. A good cause may have
the misfortune to have bad advocates, and most ruinous falsehood
receive, through ignorance, the support of good and virtuous ad-
herents. The doctrines of Jesus will suffer no tarnish by the avarice
and treachery of Iscariot; though the devil, as an angel of light,
should preach remission of sins through the crucified, it would be

330 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

none the less trutli from heaven. No doctrine or scheme can be
justly iuiplexecl with the virtues or villianies of its supporters, fur-
ther than, by uniformity of the association, it can be shown to be
identical with and the cause of the peculiar character of its defenders.
The rule is, that men have a moral likeness to the doctrines they em-
brace and advocate, espousing them because of sympathy, or trans-
formed by them; but the doctrine must be tested by a fair and can-
did view of its legitimate effects, as they are seen invariably and by
natural sequence flowing from it, when it is carried out.

Bearing in our memories these and similar precautions, let us now
proceed to apply our test to a few of the leading systems which have,
from time immemorial, put forth their claims among men ; schemes
which are yet found lying out broadly upon the mind of the world.

Let the examination hegin loitli Atheism.

Atheism is the scheme which denies God, and by consequence all
religious ideas. Basing itself on the assumption that there is no
kind of being but matter, and that all changes, which are but varie-
ties of shifting forms, are produced by inhering forces guided by no
intelligence, it ignores all ideas of accountability except to the self-
imposed laws of the majority or the most powerful; discards as a
mere fiction the distinction between right and wrong; finds all good
to consist in the gratification of the animal nature, since there is no'
other; and, orphaning the universe, abandons it to merciless and
meaningless fate.

Having dethroned God, and imbruted man in its creed, it would
in its practice abolish forever all the symbols of religious thought
and all the sanctuaries of religious worship. In the world, where it
should prevail, there would be no temple — no prayer— no Sabbath,
with its hallowed rites — no morning song of praise — no evening
hymn of thanksgiving. In its spring-time, when flowers bloom; and
its summer, when fruits mellow; and in its amber-tinted autumn,
when the falling leaves fill the mind with saddened thoughts of de-
parting life; and in the winter drear, when outwai-d cold enkindles
inward warmth of glowing sympathy; over its slaving and toiling
and hopeless millions, a dark death pall would eternally brood.
Death ! how unmitigated must be its horrors, in such a world, with no
lights kindling on the 'further shore ! no gleam of hope to illume the
darkness of the grave ! What a sorrowful world it would be ! Orphan-
ed, bereaved, and uncomforted ! No Father above ! no hope within !

FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS. 331

To my own mind it suggests an awful midnight, amid whose dark-
ness, storms wail, and lightnings bicker, and thunders roll, and men
stand shivering with fright — a midnigiit, stretching on through ages,
without a star, without a morning ! In such a world, every look
should be a tear, every breath a sob ; a funereal sorrow should fill
every bosom, and insupportable anguish break every heart.

This is the system. On whatever philosophy it reposes, these are
its dismal contents. It has been circulating in the world for ages,
seeking to gain credence among men ; and is yety limitedly it is
true, but assiduously, putting forth its claims the earth over. It is
entrenched among us, and has its juntos in all the considerable cen-
tres of the land, who are secretly, but industriously and fatally, prop-
agating its detestable dogmas.

What are its fruits ? It requires but little insight of the springs
of human action to perceive what they must necessarily be. "What
they are, is to be seen in the sentiments and lives of those who have
come under its influence, and in the state of society where it has
prevailed. Once or twice, in the sad history of the world, they have
appeared on a gigantic scale. Wherever it has obtained, the utmost
demoralization has prevailed. Its votaries have uniformly become
the most debased of mankind. In its polluted soil has grown up,
with rank luxuriance, every abominable crime. Fidelity, chastity,
domestic love, honor, friendship, patriotism, philanthropy, and every
virtue which ornaments our nature, blight and die under its leprous
breath. Lechery and prostitution, and robbery and murder, spring-
up like poisonous fungi amid its death-engendering shades. Once
in the life of man it enthroned itself in a single nation. France
accepted it as her dismal creed. Immediately the realm became a
seething sea of blood. Society rushed into disorganization. Millions
perished in a few months by assassination and violence. Men, mad-
dened and intoxicated by the hellish potation, rioted in carnage.
Had the reign of terror continued for twenty years, the nation, the
most enlightened on earth, would have been not reduced to barbar-
ism merely, but absolutely exterminated, or reduced to a miserable
remnant of demonizcd men, devouring and destroying each other.
What was the result in this atrocious instance, would be the result
universally, were the scheme accepted by mankind. The race could
not exist under its dreadful sway, or only exist in fragments, har-
rowed and harrowing each other with eternal war. The fixmily, the

332 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

church, the state, arts, sciences, commerce, and civilization, would
alike be an impossibility. An organized government of Atheists
cannot exist. All institutions and common interests sink before it
as the rush before the tempest. Even the sexes, held together by
the strongest natural bond, could subsist only in a commerce of lust;
and paternity, robbed of all the natural instincts, becoming an insuf-
ferable burden, would be associated with general infanticide, as was
the case in the appalling instance referred to — the offspring of re-
volting lust would but furnish the victims of unnatural murder.

Such are the fruits of Atheism — by them let it be tried. Let it
stand forth surrounded with its hideous growth — its profusion of
desolation — its dethroned and decapitated Grod — its imbruted and
materialized humanity — its dismantled temples and altars and fanes —
its demolished governments and shattered and roofless homes — its
bleared and bloody and lecherous men — its dishonored, prostituted,
and defiled women — its beggared and starving and abandoned chil-
dren ; let it stand forth amid its abominations and horrors of sin and
shame, full to the brim of all manner of loathsomeness ; and let
men judge of it by its fruits. "Who shall plead its cause? Surely
the world wants not Atheism. There are woes enough without it.
He is an enemy who abets it. Everything prized and lovely resents
it as inimical. 0 Atheism ! thou remorseless monster, thou direst
child of perdition, who can think of thee without a shudder ? Self-
condemned, get thee back to the dark abyss out of which thou didst
emanate with cursings and blasphemies ! The world Wants thee not.

Let the test next he applied to Deism.

Deism is that system of religous faith, or rather unfaith, which
recognises God, but discards the Christian revelation. It makes a
great account of natural, but wholly ignores revealed, religion. Its
Bible is nature — its interpreter, unaided human reason. , Its God is
afar off, and inaccessible to mortals; who, having created the world,
has abandoned it to the operation of fixed laws, and no more inter-
meddles with its affairs. To these laws men, irv common with all
other creatures, are accountable. From their penalties there is no
escape. There is no compassion or mercy in the divine nature.
Prayer is unprofitable, worship meaningless and vain. Man may be
immortal or not. The future may be happy or miserable.

This is the system. It is not so dreadful as Atheism, for it con-
tains some truth; but it is only less frightful. It makes no provis-

FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS. 333

ion for humnn sin — lias no alleviation for liuman soitow. Amid the
darkness of time, it leaves man without a guide, without a Saviom-,
without a hope — the victim of doubt and guilt and despair. It tells
him, indeed, that God is, and that nature is, and that sin is ; and
then abandons him with these awful convictions to work out his
dubious destiny. It reads him beautiful lessons from the stars and
the earth and the flowers, but it brings him no tidings of Jesus or
Calvary. It philosophizes of laws and forces, and stands in awe be-
fore the dread and august tokens of eternal power, but it brings no
messages from His throne. It gives the universe a Creator, but
leaves it without a Father. Like Atheism, it has no temple ; for its
God will not hear prayer ; no Saviour, no atonement, no sabbath, no
sacraments, no promises ; no renewing Comforter. Upon the great
problem of destiny it has no light.

"What are its fruits ? What can they be but a harvest of despair ?
For sin it has no cure, for sorrow no solace, for the yearnings and
cravings of our nature no relief It is a boastful system, calling
itself by ambitious names, and bearing itself loftily before men, and
the young especially arc wooed to embrace it, as a substitute for the
abused and discarded Bible. A long list of brilliant minds are enu-
merated among its admirers, and some of the finest literature in the
realm of poetry celebrates its praise ; it fascinates by its boldness,
and contempt of authority, and freedom from restraints aad the tur-
moils of conscience; it is a short method to silence all troublesome
ideas of duty and all corroding reproaches ; it disposes in a very
summary way of many sayings hard to be received ; it says, eat and
drink, for to-morrow you die. Honeyed words — but, after all, what
are its fruits ? Are they not dreadful to contemplate ? This boast-
ful system, is it not a land barren and bloomless as the shades of
death ? What does it give in the place of what it takes from us ?
It robs us of our Father in Heaven, of our Saviour, of our Sanctifier,
of our Bible, of our sabbath, of our altars, of hope concerning our
dead. It gives us, in the place, a cold, distant, unsympathizing
God, a dreary world, a dark grave, a hopeless future — nothing to live
for but sin, nothing to look to but annihilation. It smothers every
generous sentiment, stifles every noble aspiration, and spreads the
blight of death over every divine and heavenly sympathy of our
nature. Less appalling than sheer Atheism, it is but another ward
in the same great pest-house ; less loathsome, it is scarcely less deadly.

334 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

Let its friends point out a single beneficent influence it exerts, a sol-
itary good it has ever done ! Where are its trophies ? Whom has
it made better ? What family has it redeemed ? Show us the nation
or people who have been blessed by its sway ! There are no such
trophies. Its fruits are fruits of death. The world wants it not.

Let tlie test he ajipUcd to Pantheism.

Pantheism is the scheme which resolves all things into God. God
is the universe, and the universe is God. God is the substance alike
of matter and of spirit ; and all phenomena are but the unfolding of
Himself, and in no way distinct from Himself Observe, the theory
is, not that things exist in God, by means of His power, as exponents
of His thought, but that they are nothing different from Himself.
There never has been, and never can be, anything other than God.
Extension is extension of God; all forms in objectivity are forms of
God ; all material qualities are qualities of God ; the substance of
which these qualities and modes are predicated is the substance of
God; all thought is God thinking; all consciousness is God conscious;
I am God, body and soul, and nothing but God ; the same is true of
all other men and things ; we are all God, and God is all of us ; we are
not many, but one ; as the waves are not different from the ocean, but
only, perishing and fleeting forms thereof, so we — all things, objective
and subjective — are but modes of the Infinite. It will be found that, in
the last analysis, this scheme, though the most extreme opposite of
Atheism, that wholly ignoring God, this wholly ignoring any being
other than God, is essentially the same. Its god is impersonal nature.
It denies creation, since there is nothing existing, and never can be,
but God ; it denies all moral distinctions, since there is but one in-
disceptible actor; it converts the me and the not me into a delusion,
since there is no not me in being, and no me as distinct from the
whole. Allow it to be true, and consciousness is a cheat; moral dis-
tinctions fictions, all ideas and experiences and hopes and fears vaga-
ries and dreams, resting upon no reality; God is the sum of all in-
consistencies and contradictions — a kaleidoscoi^e, whose shifting
. combinations mean nothing — an ever-becoming unintelligible mas-
querade of fleeting forms and vanishing thoughts.

Its effects must be essentially the same as those -of the systems
already noticed. It has no hope. Its gairish rarefied atmosphere
supports only shadows. For the guilt and sorrows and aspirations
of the human soul it has nothing, except the dreary thought that

FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS. 335

these are mere delusions, the shadows of a shade, since there are no
human souls. The system prostitutes God and abnegates man, and
sweeps away the possibility of both virtue and happiness from the
universe, since it abolishes the conditions of both. It may amuse
the intellect as a speculation, but it can never find place in the heart
as a creed until the heart itself has become the sepulchre of blasted
loves and perished hopes.

Appli/ the jjrinciple to the various si/stems of idolatry and heathen-
ism.

The most absurd and meaningless of all the idolatries is better than
no religion. Utterly false and bad as it is, it comes nearer the truth
than the universal negation. Some of the systems of mythology
have possessed much truth, but as scattered rays amid immensity of
darkness. Their worship has been the absurd worship of things
that are not God.

The fruits of one system are the fruits of all. What it is at one
time and in one place, it is for all time and the earth over. Its re-
volting portrait is fully drawn in Romans, second chapter. Such
was heathenism two thousand years ago, within the limits of the
proudest and greatest empire the world ever beheld ; such it is to-
day, wherever it is found. " By their fruits ye shall know them."
The world wants not heathenism ! Its fruits are all bitter, even in
the mouth; in the belly, they are wormwood — hemlock.^ From its
proud temple resounding with the worship of the Olympian god, to
its miserable fetich and loathsome greegree, it is full of abomination.
It has nothing for mankind but death. Look and see ! Is it not so ?
Look at India, with its blood-impurpled Ganges, and the senseless
tortures of Brahminical worship ; look at China, with its million pa-
godas, and its cheerless and stupid ancestralism ; look at central and
further Asia, with its mosques and pseudo-revelations; look at Af-
rica, with its besotted fetichism, and obscene and devilish orgies ;
look everywhere over the wide regions of heathenism, and one sight
greets the vision at every turning — one wide, dreary, dreadful deso-
lation; a scene of barbarian stupidity, and foul and disgusting de-
pravity, at which the heart sickens, and every sensibility revolts.
Death, death, death, everywhere. Cheerless, hopeless, rayless night.
Such is heathenism. The world wants it not. Its fruits condemn it.

Let the Bible he noio ti'ied hy this test : " By their fruits ye shall
know them."

336 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

The Bible comes to the Tvorld as a divine system — a revelation
from the great j^aternal Spirit of the Universe. It prescribes duty,
and assumes the direction and guidance both of the faith and prac-
tice of mankind. It demands that all men should abandon every
other authority, and implicitly embrace and obey it. To reject or
neglect it is the highest guilt, while to receive and honor it is the
sure passport to the favor of Grod and supreme felicities of heaven.

What are the fruits of this scheme ? How does it answer its high
professions ? Look over the world, and behold t -

Let any one take a map of the world, and, carefully drawing a line
around those portions where the Bible and Christianity prevail, in-
stitute a comparison between such portions and those under the sway
of other systems, and what will he discover? A contrast the most
striking, in every point of view, as of midnight and mid-day. And
why this ? It is not to be explained upon any natural difference of
soil, or climate, or mineral resources, or population. Britain is the
same island, and its people the same people, they were two thousand
years ago. The valleys of the Indus or Niger are not inferior to-day
to those of the Thames or Mississippi. The territories embraced by
the North American Stateg arc precisely what they were only three
hundred years ago, when pagan tribes held undisputed sway. The
contrast is to be found in the tendencies of systems.

Again, let a contrast be instituted between Christian nations, and
what do we find ? That just in proportion as they are Christian, they
rise in the scale of excellence; just in the ratio in which the Bible
is made known, and its precepts practiced, the nation rises up in all
the elements of worth and prosperity. Why is Scotland superior to
Ireland ? The former is a vast stone-henge, the latter the most fer-
tile island on the globe — the emerald gem of the sea ! Nature has
done all for the latter, nothing for the former ! Yet, while Ireland
is cursed with almost pagan night, every rocky crag of Scotland
blazes with meridian day ! Why ? Scotland has an open Bible,
read in her families and taught her children, and^Scotland has faith
and a Sabbath ; Ireland has the confessional and priestly absolutions !
Take Italy and Switzerland ; take England and Spain ; take the
United States of North America and the States of South America;
the same contrasts, and for the same causes, are seen in every case.
Throughout the length and breadth of Christendom, one can tell, by
the very aspect of the country — the thrift, and industry, and intcl-

FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS. 337

liircncc, ami morality, and happiness, and social elevation, of the peo-
ple— where there is a Bible received and I'evered, and where there
is not! Its fruits are as obvious as the mountain ranj^es and great
rivers. What docs it mean ? " By their fruits ye shall know them."
The Bible makes the difference I Where it goes, and is read and
believed, the rock turns into gold, and the wilderness blossoms and
blooms like a garden. Flowers spring up in its path, and the conti-
nents and islands become radiant beneath its beams ! It takes Druid
Britain, and transforms it into Christian England — pagan America,
and ■ makes Christian Massachusetts, and her constellation of sister
Christian States ! Any land, and elevates it into honor and glory,
and makes it great and distinguished in the earth, though it be a
barren heath, or a cold and rocky desert.

Let it be viewed in its influence upon individuals, and let the con-
trast be between those in the same place and condition who accept
and those who reject it; and here the contrast will be no less stri-
king than in the former case. It will be found that, in proportion
as the individual man or family or state comes under the influence
of the Bible, he and they are elevated and ennobled; it carries into
the individual heart and family and neighborhood the seeds of
a new life — a power which makes all things new ! Every man knows
this. Commencing with the best forms of humanity, the purest and
noblest portions of thd race, you find that they are those who are
most imbued with the Bible ! Going downward, you observe, just
as you sink in the scale of excellence, that you are finding less and
less of the Bible, until, in the abysses of depravity and shame, you
are among those who discard it entirely ! Or, beginning at the low-
est extreme, it is seen that, just as you ascend, you come into the
atmosphere of that holy and divine book !

You find, again, that when the elevated and good gradually let go
the Bible, and just in the ratio in which they do so, they infallibly
sink down, and lose their pre-eminence ; and again, when the Bible
is introduced amid the lowest and basest conditions, just in the de-
gree in which they embrace it, it lifts them up, until, from the deep-
est abysses of degradation, they pass up to the very summits of pre-
eminence. These are facts well known — witnessed bj'^all. And why
is it? There can be no difficulty in answering the question. The
case is plain. The Bible contains truths which elevate and improve
mankind. These results flow from it, as the stream from the fouu-
22

338 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

tain. What it does for one, it would do for all. What it does for
one nation, it would do, it will yet do, for all nations. Let its prin-
ciples but prevail universally, let it be received fully into all hearts,
let its life-giving currents flow through all families, let it gain a
place in all countries, and such will be its fruit universally; it will
make a new world, as it makes new men tind new nations. Does any
man doubt it ? Has not the fact become established in every con-
viction ?

Let the test be applied : " By their fruits ye shall know them."
Bring forth the blessed book ; behold what it hath wrought ! Let
its divine fruits cluster upon it — its hallowed influences, its re-
splendent trophies, all that it hath done for the world ! And what
is the judgment? Do not all men rise up to hail it? Is there one
in all the world so blind, so lost, so devilish, that will not in his
lieart exclaim. Hail, thou blessed of the Lord — thou harbinger of
good to man !

Without remaining longer on this part of the subject, we shall
proceed, in conclusion, to some reflections which grow out of
the preceding line of discussion.

1. A system so replete with blessings to mankind deserves to be
cherished by all men. Nay, more: it becomes a most sacred duty. to
'humanity to love and promote it; and he must be accounted inimical'
to his species who hinders or impedes it.

Aside from considerations of duty to God as the author of revela-
tion, and aside from the personal interest we all have involved, there
arises an obligation to humanity, to the world, of a most urgent and
commanding character, which, without most inhuman and cruel
recreancy, we cannot refuse. . The highest interests of our children,
and kinsmen, and race, for all generations, is concerned. The Bible
is their only hope. Every other scheme fails them. Deprive them
of this, and the race is doomed. There can be no mistake about this.
The experiment of ages proves it. All history is full of the demon-
stration. Strike it down, and man's last refuge is' swept away. An
■awful midnight of guilt, and despair, and ruin, must ensue. Strike
it down, and the sky is swept of every star, and the earth of every
blossom! There remains nothing, nothing 'but death — no hiding
but the grave ! Palsied be the hand that would inflict so dire a
calamity — palsied the arm that interposes not to prevent it. The
hand lifted against the Bible is lifted against humanity — against me,

FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS. 339

against yoa, agaiast our cliildrea ! The wrong it would inflict is a
million-fold worse than murder ! It is the moral and social murder
of mankind. We hold it as a sacred trust for the ages. Anything
else we have to transmit to them is husks and vanity ! The Bible is
their life ! Faithless ? A thousand hells were a penalty too small
for treason such as this ! No ! no ! I no ! I ! We cannot be indifferent
spectators when such an issue is made.

It follows from the discussion, that the abettors of infidel theories
and perverted forms of Christianity must be condemned, as inflicting
the grossest wrong upon society. Their attitude is not one of indif-
ference or innocence. It matters nothing what may be their social
position; it matters nothing what may be their professed aim. They
may regard themselves as only exercising their natural rights in prop-
agating their dreadful dogmas, and they may consider .that no immi-
nent evil is implied. The fact is, they have commenced a most
deadly war against the best interests of mankind; and every man
owes to himself, and to his assailed brotherhood, and to God, to
assume explicit ground, and stand forth in the breach as the friend
and defender of his own and his species' interests !

We must take the Bible closer than ever to our hearts; wo must
no longer view it as simply an interesting antiquity — a monument of
the genius and learning of former times — a powerful and wonderful
book, which has done good service in its time, but in whose fate we
have no vital concern ; we must no longer regard it as merely the
property of Christians, from which they arc to derive strange but
unimportant doctrines, and by which their organisms are to be pre-
served. If history teaches us anything, it teaches us that all hap-
piness and progress for the race centres here; that therefore it is a
common cause, and the most urgent and momentous in the universe !

2. It results, from the tenor of discourse, that the most earnest
eS"orts should continue to be made to give the Bible to the nations
that have it not.

3. It is obvious that, as there is hope nowhere else for the race,
there is hope in the Bible ; it is the pledge and promise of a better
future. What it has done, it can do, it will do. It will yet make
all heathendom to bloom. Infidelity cannot triumph against it. The
Bible belongs to God, and He will take care of it.

4. It follows that the friends of the Vnhh are the truest and best
friends of humanity, and are engaged in the noblest cause in the

340 FRUITS A TEST OF SYSTEMS.

universe ! While tliey dig for the ore which makes themselves rich,
they are enriching their children and all posterity.

Finally : Would we become good, and would we have our families
become good ; would we be lifted up to the very summits of excel-
lence and prosperity, our way is through the Bible. It furnishes us
the infallible helps. It is not enough that it is in the world — that
we have it in our houses — that we hug it to our hearts, as a most
precious treasure — that we account him an enemy to ourselves who
is an enemy to it — that we print it by millions, and give it to the
nations ! It is not enough that it is preached from our pulpits, in-
corporated in our literature, and enthroned in our government. We
must read and believe and practice it. We must eat it as our daily
bread, and derive our life from it. It must enter into our souls, and
become, in soiue sort, a part of ourselves; its ideas, and principles,
and hopes, and aims, must become our own ; it must rule our rulers
and permeate our commerce ; it must enter our families, and markets,
and schools, and courts; it must reproduce itself in us; we must
become living Bibles; our minds must think by it, and our hearts
beat by it, and our acts square by it; we must be true to it, and
teach our children to be true to it; we must make it our guide for
time, and our light for eternity; we must build on it, and hide init;
. it must be our first, and last, and only law !

Let us do this, brothers, and it will be our palladium, our high
tower, our salvation ! It will keep us from evil amid the temptations
of time; it will furnish us for eternity; and amid the swellings of
Jordan, and in the bitterness of the last conflict, it will sustain and
comfort us, and bear us in triumph and glory to the heaven of its
promise :

Which may God grant, for His name sake Amen.

Hfiiitevun^;

P A S T <■'

THE MERELi >iuiuii. 3i.UY.
BY REV. ./ !5DRR0 •

igainst Sle. — Matthew, xii, -u.
m most commodities, some persons who* clain

ness of men, and to rn
lence. They :
thithpi -v.wl .
kin i

:il ro.fincrt^r.nt, pnrifr.

re oui
ers or
■ as an

1.

i)-

iiimilies
i;-. lacv Boem
■lurcl),
witt in

itable; reudv with their contribu-
aullcrijig, t.) benefit mankind, and to aid the eu.

^ .'irch. H;-.riM,.iT ',, 1.1-.-. ■,. err,,*; ! . :.. ,1,. .... .

ter and couduct may sr

But they aro not, pnia^.^U^, at heart, Chribtiaus. Their souls
have never been inspired by the love of Christ. If-to be ^'with
Jesus " imply union by faith to Him, spiritual affinity with Him,

■ 'ove for Him, siueere d ' ^ o be in life

!Vt (^onforniod to His c--_. , .,,,, .,,. .,,,

that is U'

," ackuowl-
th;it tli-y

. : IV- .'1 ill c ;: iiivij bj ittcji pertoii::. •' il •
.1 Mk." '

'^^k

101

PisT.i .1 ■

TlereiR,iiMi

friends to O'^'^'"
pncticilirj .
Mmndtkitfi
dmiktti admn
mdm:.ai\ipm
bee. IltjndAik
tlitk ^' ■ -^

11

7>- t^^c/^-d"

\

Cl (J

terfiri; .
terst,'
h-
tave:
Jea- '

sipreut Ivi; ;
aniinW..-
"witl i;

siigeiluti..
yetmaji^

Aati,

THE MERELY MORAL MAN. 343

that answers to his own wishes, and he may adopt the counsel wliile
he curses the counsellor. If he obey only those laws that please
himself, he obeys only himself Ninety and nine of the laws of the
land, one may faithfully observe, because they suit his interests, or
because he has no strong motive to violate them; yet a wilful and
perverse breach of the hundredth, stamps him a criminal.

So is it, in relation to the law of God. He whose actions are
prompted by a supreme regard to Jehovah's authority will willingly
disobey in no point, because that authority, and not his own will, is
law to him. He who wilfully and perseveringly violates but one
law, cannot be governed by the principle of obedience in conform-
ing to any. Hence, God has said: "Whosoever shall keep the
whole law, and yet offend in one point, is guilty of all," (or wholly
guilty.) That is, he who is not obedient from principle, is not obe-
dient at all.

Are you honest, hrcausc God commands honesty ? Then you will
pray daily and fervently, because that too is God's commandment.
If the reason for the duty is in the authority of the Lawgiver, and
not in your own choice or desire, then you cannot indulge in prefer-
ences or make exceptions among His laws.

The regenerate child of God may indeed be betrayed or tempted
into sin, but he cannot love it nor continue in it. The supreme de-
sire of his heart is, to be entirely controlled by the will of the Lord.

Themerely moral man, then, is not controlled simply by a regard
to God's authority, because he habitually lives in known disobedience
to all His spiritual requirements. The Lord commands him to pray,
and he does not pray — to repent of sin, and he does not repent— to
confide his soul in faith to the keeping of Jesus Christ, and the con-
trol of the Holy Spirit, and he does it not. The Lord commands
him to love his enemies, and he does not love nor strive to love them.
He does not even aim to fulfil those personal spiritual duties that
involve the daily communion of the soul with God.

And yet these are all commandments of Jehovah, as important, and
based upon the same authority, as those which are designed to gov-
ern his more obvious relations to his fellow men.

Whatever right actions, then, he may perform, whatever good
emotions or dispositions he may exhibit, they are not rendered he-
cause God requires them. There is some other reason than the
authority of the Lord for their cultivation.

344 THE MERELY MORAL MAN.

Suppose, for the sake of illustration, that from such a man as we
are describing, charity is solicited by a hungry child ; he promptly
gives alms for its relief. This is a good deed, and he would have
been blamable to have refused. Now, what are the real motives that
prompt this beneficence. Perhaps his heart is oppressed by the
thought of the want and wretchedness of that sufferer, and to relieve
himself, he gives. Perhaps he desires to impress upon the mind
of that beggar child — or through it, upon some other minds — a sense
of his own generosity. Some desire there may be,-too, to relieve
the suffering. He feels that there is a kind of obligation resting on
the prosperous, to aid the needy.

Now, do we not give to that action all the credit it deserves ?
But is there any reference to God in it ? Does the thought that it
is done in obedience to a commandment of the Lord once occur to
his mind ? If not, then the motives that prompt and the emotions
that accompany such charity terminate mainly upon self

You have perhaps given liberal contributions to some benevolent
purposes. This was, in itself, praiseworthy. But what was the na-
ture of your reflections previous or subsequent to such gifts ? Was
thei-e any thought of Christ's .requirements in connection with them?
"Was there not a fear that you might be considered mean or avaricious
if you refused, or a desire to be regarded as generous or liberal by
your compliance with the request ? Might not one have manifested
a similar liberality, from precisely similar motives, who doubted or
denied the existence of a God ?

You do not mingle, with the openly vicious, in scenes of debauch-
ery, riot, and crime. Why do you abstain ? Is it from a regard to God's
law ? Or is it from a dread of disgrace, or a desire to maintain a
good reputation ? Or is it because a higher social refinement has
created a distaste for such scenes and associations? Does ai^y thought
of God's disapproval interpose to check you ?

Do you not more frequently ask what is reputable than what is
right ? Do you not strive rather to conceal than^to conquer your
faults ?

Thus, when we scrutinize rigidly the deeds and developments of a
mere worldly morality — of which so much boast is made — we find
that they do not originate in any desire to please God, or to render
obedience to His law, hecaxise it is His laiv.

If we could strip away all the motives to morality by which unre-

THE MERELY MORAL MAN. 345

newed men are goverucd — the desire of praise, the fear of reproach,
the dread of siugulurity, the eifort to gain or preserve a reputation,
the iuflucnce of custom and fashion, the workings of natural sympa-
thy— there woukl be no inducement left to many, to manifest any
benevolent emotion, or perform any charitable deed. They would
live and act about as they do, were it possible, if they were con-
vinced that no God existed, or claimed obedience from them.

Thus we percieve that many actions and emotions, right in them-
selves, may be exhibited without any regard whatever to God's au-
thority or even existence.

The character of the merely moral man may, then, be thus deline-
ated. He performs many useful and praiseworthy actions, but none
from a principle of obedience to God. He is rigidly honest in his
dealings with his fellow men, but is dishonest toward God. He
would not defraud man of a farthing, but he robs God of those af-
fections to which He has the highest and teuderest claim. He dreads
the censure and courts the approbation of the world, more solicit-
ously than he fears the displeasure or seeks the favor of God. All
his thoughts and affections terminate upon earthly objects, just as if
piety had no claims, and God demanded no obedience. The graphic
metaphor of Jesus is fairly descriptive of this class of persons. In
the eyes of men, they are as " whited sepulchres," which indeed ap-
pear beautiful outwardly, but to the eye of God, which scrutinizes
the heart, they are " full of dead men's bones and all uncleanncss."

We proceed to notice —

II. The nature of the influence exerted by the merely

MORAL MAN.

His reputation and respectability in society give him an influence
that cannot be secured by the openly vicious. His deportment and
habits command respect, and l)y children, kindred, and friends, he is
regarded, it may be, as a pattern for imitation. In proportion to his
honesty, sobriety, good judgment, and experience, is his influence
extended.

Look, then, upon this sage, pure moralist, surrounded by a circle
of trusting and affectionate hearts, upon all which, as their lucid
centre, he radiates the light of his example and teaching, and say,
will that light guide them to Calvary and to Zion '{ Is it not rather
like that of a flickering taper, gloomily illumining the vestibule to
" utter darkness ? " Though that influence may temporarily restrain

346 THE MERELY MORAL MAN.

and regulate the worldly conduct — though it may tend to train worthy
and amiable members of society for the present life — yet is it at all
adapted to teach the depravity and guilt of our fallen nature; the es-
sential necessity of regeneration and of a Mediator and Saviour; or any
of those momentous truths upon which the salvation of the soul depends ?
One lesson conveyed by the entire influence of the merely moral
man is, that the restraints of piety are unnecessary. When the
question is anxiously asked, " Wherewithal shall a young man
cleanse his way?" the Bible replies, "By taking heed thereto ac-
cording to Thy word." There is no need for that, is the" response,
not perhaps of the lips, but emphatically of the life, of the irreligious
moralist. His influence and example say, " I take no heed to the
Word of God; I am not restrained by its precepts, nor controlled by
its spirit; yet my way is clean in the esteem of the world. You may,
my child, my neighbor, be like me, respected and beloved, amiable
and benevolent, without heeding the restraints of piety." Is'not a
life like this " against Christ ? "

The carnal heart, hostile to holiness, greedily imbibes such teach-
ings, and children and kindred are lured, by the deceitful sophisms
of such a life, along the broad road to perdition.

Ye worldly-minded fathers ! will ye thus draw, as in the net of
an irreligious influence, your own sons away from the narrow path to
life everlasting, and encourage them in fatal "neglect of the great
salvation ? "

Another lesson instilled by the influence of the worldly moralist
is, that there may be true enjoyment, a satisfied heart, without obe-
dience to God.

The Word" of God dcclai'cs, "There is no peace to the wicked;"
"Wretchedness and misery arc in their paths, and the way of peace
they have not known."

The thoughtless daughter may cry, when such assertions are made,
"Does my dear mother experience no peace nor happiness? She is
not religious, yet surely she enjoys much. There -must, therefore, be
.peace and felicity without piety."

Alas ! short-sighted maiden ; you know not that mother's painful
anxieties — perhaps remorse — in her hours of-solitude and reflection;
nor do you know the infinite superiority of those "joys unspeakable,"
which true piety procures, and in comparison of which, the peace
which " the world giveth " is " no peace."

THE MERELY MORAL MAN. 347

Cau you uot see that that daughter is led, by the cords of a god-
less yet moral mother's influence, away from the " straight gate "
that opens towards heaven, and into the ''broad road" that termi-
nates in the " burning lake ? "

Ye worldly mothers ! will ye continue to exert that strong, sweet
influence, which filial love so confidingly owns, in teaching your
children that piety is needless for them, and that they may be happy
enough and safe enough without regard to the comforts and sanc-
tions of religion ?

The influence of the mere worldly moralist, draws the soul away
from dependence upon the atonement and niediation of Jesus Christ.
In the Cross, centre all the sinner's rational hopes for heaven. There
may be a dreamy and misty expectation of gaining eternal life, " by
deeds of righteousness which we have done," but it is " baseless as
the fabric of a vision."

It dispenses with the atonement of Christ Jesus, and " there is
none other name under heaven given among men whereby we can
be saved." No " other foundation " for acceptance with God can
any man lay, " than is laid." There is no possibility of salvation to
a sinner, but through Christ.

The merely moral man gives all his influence to bring this me-
dium of salvation into doubt and disrepute, by encouraging men to
depend upon their own righteoiisncss. They shun ^nd spurn '' the
foundation stone which God has laid in Zion," and point to the quiv-
ering quicksands of external merit, as a substitute. They tear away
the Cross, and plant in its place the ragged banner of self-righteous-
ness. Thus they array their influence — often perhaps in dumb un-
consciousness— in hostility to the purposes and teachings of Jesus,
and, as far as others are controlled by that influence, are they led
along the way that ends in everlasting destruction.

In one very important respect, the influence of worldly moralism
is more baneful than that of open and odious vice. We are not
speaking of the inherent character of these diff*erent classes of men,
but of the influence exerted by their examples and lives upon others,
and we repeat that, in one view of the subject, the lessons of the
mere moralist's life are more hurtful than those of the utterly vile
and profane.

" Vice is a monster of such hideous mien,
As, to be hated, needs but to be seen."

348 THE MERELY MORAL MAN.

The drunkard, the robber, the assassin, the riotous and profligate, all
stand out as so many truthful witnesses of the deceitfulness and
deformity of sin, and frown the tempted youth from the entrance
into its paths. Who would transgress God's laws, if the dread-
ful results to which sin leads were continually forced upon his
gaze ? Who would slight God's mercy, with the howls of the damned
always ringing in his ears ? When we see one debased, brutalized,
and wretched, from sinful indulgences, we are repelled from the
remote beginnings of a career that forebodes such n termination.
Thus, depravity, embodied in its ugliest shapes, furnishes niost ter-
rific warnings against persistence in sin. The thoughtful youth will
not follow such leading, if his eyes are once fairly open upon the goal.

But when the hand of the respected and moral father is affection-
ately laid in the hand of his son, how easily may he be led away from
God, and toward destruction ! When the hideous deformities of an
impenitent and rebellious heart are concealed, by the robe of external
virtue, the thoughtless and the giddy may be easily drawn astray.

According to the Mosaic law, the man who was but partially lep-
rous— whose appearance did not plainly reveal the loathsome dis-
ease— was required, under- hea^vier penalties than the palpably-ulcer-
ed victim, to separate himself from all intercourse with the health-
ful. The reason for this is obvious. Men needed no special warn-
ing to prompt them to avoid the marked leper. But the concealed
contagion might be borne unobserved among the dwellings of the
well. So, those who do not develop in its loathsomeness the Icp-
'rosy of sin — who hide, beneath a healthful exterior, the direful
plague — may carry and spread it, where the openly, udisomely dis-
eased dare not come.

Again : No man has a moral right to pm*sue any course of con-
duct— to exert any kind of influence — which, if exerted by all, would
result in universal wretchedness. What would be wrong for all men,
can be right for none. Suppose that, from this day, all men were to
resolve to be governed only by the principles of a m^re worldly mo-
rality, how terrible and ruinous would be the results ! Our Bibles
and churches might at once be given to the flames. The voice of
prayer and thanksgiving would be forever hushed. All. the tender
sympathies and loving charities, that are peculiar to Gospel piety,
would be exiled from the world. The reins of government would be
torn from the hands of Jehovah, for man would submit to no control

THE MERELY MORAL MAN. 349

but ttat of his own selfish principles and will. HoiTible beyond
imagining Avould be the result of the universal adoption of the moral-
ist's rule of life !

Thus we see that the influence of the whole spirit and life of the
merely moral man is arrayed against God and the Gospel. He is not
with Christ ; he is against Him.

III. Let us consider, thirdly, what must be the destiny

OF THE MERELY MORAL MAN.

He cannot be admitted to association with the ransomed in heaven,
for several reasons :

He has no plea of justification to enter at the bar of God for the
sins he has committed. That he. has transgressed the law of God,
in some points, he dare not deny; and although he may think that
his guilt is but trifling, yet the least taint or spot is sufiicient to ex-
clude him from heaven, for " there entereth nothing that defileth."
" He that ofi'endeth in one point"— ^and this is true of all law, human
and divine — is gviilty, wholly guilty. How, then, shall he be justi-
fied or purified for heaven ? He has slighted that which alone can
''cleanse from sin" — "the blood of Christ." ''He trusted in him-
self that he was righteous." And no despiser of Christ can ever enter
heaven. There, worship of Him is the peculiar employment and
enjoyment. The ransomed hosts love to swell and prolong the
chorus, " Worthy is. the Lamb that was slain ; " " Thou hast re-
deemed us to God by Thy blood." In such doxology, he could take
no part. And can the redeemed of the blood of Jesus regard with
complacency those who have slighted their Redeemer — who have
lived and died unaffected by His love — who have preferred depend-
ence upon themselves to faith in Him ? How could he associate in
loving communion with them ?

Heaven would furnish no joy for such. They could find there no
pleasures suited to their taste. They have never loved the service
and worship of the Saviour upon earth, and that service and worship
form the occupation and delight of the redeemed. There is nothing
in death to change the tastes and habitudes of the soul. The pur-
suits and emotions that are hateful to him on earth, without regen-
eration, would be equally so in heaven. The society and conversa-
tion distasteful to him here, without a renewal of his nature, would
be even more distasteful there, for it will be more holy. There
would be no music in all the harps of heaven for his ear.

350 THE MERELY MORAL MAN.

You perceive, then, that the worldly moralist is not excludecl from
heaven for flagrant, debasing crimes — for sins which he never com-
mitted. Some speak as though it would be cruel and vindictive in
God to condemn and banish from His presence those whose lives
have been so moral and praiseworthy. But it is not for their vir-
tues— not because they have been moral and upright — that God bars
heaven against their entrance. He is just, and He rewards them,
as He rewards all, " according to the deeds done in the body." They
are banished from God and heaven, because they have no affinities
for them — because there is no adaptation in the joys of heaven to the
gratification of their unchanged natures — because they have neg-
lected and hated Jesus Christ, arrayed all their influence against
His benevolent designs for the regeneration of the world — and be-
cause they have passed, without profiting, the only period during
which means and facilities are furnished for renewing the spirit, and
fitting it for the blessedness of heaven. He is excluded by the ne-
cessities of his own nature.

As the mere worldly moralist cannot associate, either in fact or in
heart, with those who are " washed and sanctified " by the blood of
Jesus, the only alternative is, that he must find companions among
devils and the lost. Oh ! thought appalling, and burdened with
horror ! The moral and upright man of the world — the volatile and
fastidious daughter of fashion — those who have shunned companion-
ship with the degraded and debased upon earth — who have withheld
even the ordinary tokens of recognition from a former friend, dis-
graced by unfashionable vice — those who have been welcome guests
in " good society," as it is termed in fashion's technicalities; for such
to be driven to mingle eternally with robbers and assassins, with liars
and blasphemers, with drunkards and harlots, with the most debased
and vicious of earth — this will be indeed an overwhelmingly terrific
doom. There, ears accustomed here to the sweetest music, to the
softest intonations of friendly voices, must listen to the grating
curses of blasphemy and the wailiugs of despair, ^here, eyes that
have scarcely looked upon aught save flowers and cheerful faces, must
gaze upon contortions of agony and writhings of woe. They must
themselves, too, become objects of loathing, and-subjects of hopeless
despair. Guilty man, living without Christ in the world ! this is as
certainly true as the AVord of God is true.

Almighty God ! avert this fearful doom from him who reads this

THE MERELY MORAL MAN. 351

page. Convince and renew liis soul by Thy grace, that, repenting

of sin and believing in Jesus, he may be saved through His atoning

blood.

REFLECTIONS.

1. It is right, though it is not sufficient, to practice the most rigid
rules of moraliti/.

It was not for tything " mint and anise and cummin " that the
Pharisees were condemned, but for omitting "judgment and mercy
and faith, the Aveightier matters of the law." " These things ought
ye to have done," said Jesus, "and not to leave the others undone."
It is not for conforming to the rules of a strict morality that God
denounces punishments against men, but for the neglect of the prin-
ciples and spirit of piety. The mere moralist may enumerate and
boast of his good deeds and benevolent sympathies ; he may tell of
his alms to the needy and his charity to the church ; of his desire for
the prosperity of Zion; of the piety of his kindred; of his joys for the
gladness and his tears for the sorrows of others; and we will believe
him and honor and love him for all.

But while his spirit refuses submission to Christ Jesus, while he
withholds his heart's affections and fellowship from His sufferings,
while he proudly lives regardless of His sacrifice and mediation, Jesus
ranks him among His enemies. " He that is not with Me, is against Me."

2. The Lord will not accept any compounding of one class of
duties for another. Men are much disposed to plead their good
deeds as an offset to their irreligion. But a scrupulous performance
of one series of duties can never excuse negligence of uthers of equal
or superior moment. God will make no such compromise. He will
not — He cannot, consistently with His attributes and the interests
of His moral administration — approve or accept a partial obedience.
You must be saved, either by keeping the whole law, or through
faith in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. But you have not kept — you
have not even tried to keep — the whole law. You have perhaps
never even attempted to obey those commandments which require
the affections of the heart for God and holiness. You have sinned,
and yet have never repented, prayed for pardon, believed in Jesus,
nor exercised any spiritual emotions, nor performed any spiritual
duties, which are peculiar to the Christian spirit and life. You
cannot be saved by your good works, for these, at best, have been
sadly deficient; nor by faith in Christ, for that you have not exercised.

352 THE MERELY MORAL MAN.

" Talk they of morals ! Oh, Thou bleeding Lamb !
The great morality is love of Thee!"

Finally : Ponder the foUj and guilt of trusting to a mere God-
less morality for salvation. Ye who are depending upon your moral
deeds and amiable dispositions, and hoping that they will take you
to heaven, hear and heed the voice of warning and exhortation.

Briefly review the sentiments that have been advanced, and, in
view of their truth and weight, build upon a sure foundation.

You have contemplated the character of the man who is called by
the world moral, and have seen that he is not controlled by any
regard to God's law in what he does — that he mjikes himself his own
lawgiver — and that all his deeds of charity and kindness may be con-
sistent with entire selfishness.

You have also examined the inflxicnce which his teaching and ex-
ample exert upon the world, and seen that it induces men to break
away from the restraints of godliness, to undervalue the blessedness
of piety, to slight the warnings and invitations of the Gospel — that
it tends to the overthrow of God's government, to the introduction
of universal skepticism and misinile, and encourages scorn and neg-
lect of the great salvation provided by the sacrifice and intercession
of Christ.

. You have been forewarned of the just and terrible doom that must
befiill those who have nothing better than their own imperfect right-
eousness to commend them to God's grace.

A wretched maniac, who had escaped from his cell, once fancied
that he would be beyond the reach of the pursuing keepers, if he
could only gain the summit of the glass dome upon the roof of the
hospital. He ran up to the top of the building, rushed along its
roof, and sprang upon the brittle structure. It crushed under him,
.and he fell upon the paved hall beneath, a mangled corpse.

So may you, who are so unwisely, guiltily, depending upon your
own defective virtues — so may you, in your moral madness, trust the
weight of your soul upon the smooth and glittering 'platform of self-
merit, but it will not sustain the burden. It is built over the gulf
of perdition, and the crash will precipitate you into the burning
waves. Already it may be breaking. Oh ! I'eap from, it, into the
outstretched arms of Jesus. Upon Him, as upon the rock of ages,
you may depend. There, and nowhere else, you will be forever
safe.

!EVo(SEC5)ISffiE [fficCQJSfflRflQRJScIDoLOo

THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OE THE CROSS OF CHRIST

BY REV.

TOK OF KT

. D.,

4. i< T I .wo [

be lifted Qti fruu. tb'

U UbU> hi

Ted," was the

lilt; bitter
mind

aa iiiuf-

■msummataon of His rc-de^minj.

i' coming trimnpli

: iK i ■ nest expression, "I have a baptism to be

b;ij'tizod with, and ni.nv am I straitened till it be accomplis': ''"
Ilulice, cveu in the midst of the-tninHcendeut glory of the Tr
1 nation, and in communion witli the glorified spirits of Moses av/d
''^''~ convci-se was only of ''His decease which lie f' ■ '
■f)t -Tf'r'i<'alom.'' .^r,-^ '•■»w. as the hour drawe nijjl
il '• .OSS fal).^ m Hira, it is; almost wi:

•■ ■'^.■■< I i.uais, "Now is the jiidgm

r this world be ca.st out; an^
; i iiiied up Irom the earth, will draw all men unto Me.'
2.^

^Y.'<^'^t.'/^^U-^^>^

THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST. 355

vate it, by testing the worth and power of other means to effect this
great design.

I. And, first, see how powerless our highest natural conceptions of
Grod arc to awaken love to Hiui. The instinctive and universal feel-
ing towards God, where he is unknown as '' God in Christ," as " the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," is a feeling of dread.
Where, in any heathen nation, is there to be found the conception
of God as a being to be loved ? Where does love mingle with their
worship? Is it not all fear, dread, terror? What is the meaning
of the almost-universal prevalence of human sacrifices ? AVhat mean
the offerings to IMoloch, the drownings in the sacred Ganges, the
immolations under Juggernaut's car ? What do all the cruel a^d
bloody rites of heathenism mean but this — that the Deity is to be
/eared, to be dreaded, to he propitiated, and that there is nothing in
His character to awaken love ?

And this feeling has its basis in man's moral nature, in the sense
of guilt and ill-desert, in the law written by the finger of the great
Creator upon every human soul. Tell me alone of the omnipotence
of God in its sublimest aspects, and the intelligence is only fitted to
fill me with alarm, as the array of the forces of Him whose power I
have cause to fear. Tell me of His unsullied justice alone, and I am
prompted to flee from the face of Him whose laws I have broken,
and whose just anger I have incurred. Tell me of the dazzling holi-
ness of the Being " in whose sight the heavens are not clean," and
rather than be drawn to His presence, would my strongest impulse
be to call upon the rocks and mountains to hide me, the unholy and
unclean, from His gaze.

II. Nor is nature, or tlie visible universe, better able to accomplish,
this great work of drawing the heart of man to God, where the uni-
verse is beheld without the light of Ilevelation.

Such an announcement may sound strange to many who all their
lives have been accustomed to "■ look through nature up to nature's
God." There are certain minds, gifted with a love of the beautiful,
and elevated by a high degree of culture, who, as they behold the
radiant glories of the morning, or the milder beauty of the setting
sun, the splendor of night when the firmament is all glowing with
living lights, the beauty of spring-time, the golden harvest-fields of
summer and the gorgeous hues of autumn, the grandeur of mountain
and cataract and ocean, can only see incentives to love towards Him

356 THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST.

who traces the lines on every leaf, and colors every flower with
beauty. They forget how much of the beauteous light from the
face of nature is reflected light from the glory of God in the face of
Jesus Christ. How different its aspect to those who are without a
knowledge of salvation through the Redeemer ! Has nature ever
taught the heathen world to love God ? Nay, where the light of the
Gospel has never penetrated, all the beauty and grandeur and sublim-
ity of this goodly universe have been powerless to enkindle in the
darkened and degraded soul one throb of genuine love to the Cre-
ator.

Men forget also that nature has two voices, and that her testimony
is far from being harmonious and invariable. If tokens of goodness
abound on every side, they are commingled with signs of severity.
The surface of the earth, so fair and smiling with the fruits of plenty,
might speak of the hand of a loving and bounteous Father; but
within and beneath the soil are to be found traces of convulsion,
disaster, and ruin, which might indicate the judgments of an angry
Deity. The gentle refreshing rain of summer might bear one testi-
mony to God, and the fearful tempest or desolating tornado another.
The air of heaven, now bringing health to the invalid's wasted frame,
bears witness to the goodness of God; while the same element,
ladened with' the deadly pestilence, would seem to testify of the
harsh severity of a wrathful Deity. Cast the human soul out amidst
these conflicting testimonies of nature, with no light from on high
to reconcile them, and to blend all discordant voices into one harmo-
nious utterance, and, so far from the heart being drawn to God, it
might despair to find whether the God of nature were indeed a God
of love.

III. Is the providence of God, then, able to do what nature cannot?
Alas ! we are met here by a Ijke impotency. Conflicting testimonies
abound here, also. Is there, on the one band, much peace and com-
fort ? There is, on the other, more strife and want. Here is a land
over which peace smiles, there a country desolated bv the ravages of
war. Here are happy homes, with unbroken family circles; there
are darkened apartments and silent halls and cheerless fii'esides. On
the one side, I hear blithe voices, making music in their joy; but
again, " the air is filled with sighings and wailings for the dead; the
heart of Rachel, for her children mourning, will not be comforted."
Thousands bask in wealth; tens of thousands struggle from the era-

THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST. 857

die to the grave with stern, relentless poverty. The best of men arc
often the most severely afflicted and sorely persecuted — the basest,
oftentimes, most highly exalted. Amidst scenes like these, what is
there, apart from this lamp of God, to assure the human mind that
the God of providence is a God of love — what to win the love of the
heart already dead to Him ?

IV. Now, then, the great question returns to us, yet unsolved,
how can the heart of man be won to God ? For love must be won,
alone. No other influence can for a moment be allowed to have sway
here. " Authority cannot command love. Force cannot implant it.
Terror cannot charm it into existence. The threateniugs of ven-
geance may stifle or may repel, but never can call forth love into
being."

Love must be won, but hovj won? There was but one power
mighty enough to do it, and that power was love itself. All the
hoarded love of the heart of God towards His erring child must be
manifested, to enkindle a return of love. Oh ! it seemed as thouErh
God, who knew what was in man, knew that in his dark and guilty
bosom there was but one solitary hold that he had over him, and
that, to reach this. He must put forth all the might of the Godhead
in His display of love, and show to man all the yearnings of a Father's
heart over a wayward and yet beloved child. And this was done. It
was by a love which left nothing more that God could do — a love in
which He gave His highest, richest gift. It was a love in which
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, embarked all their infinite treasures.
It was a love at which angels wondered, in silent adoration and awe.
It was a love that could go no higher, for it came from the bosom of
the Infinite — God spared not His Son ; it was a love that could reach
no lower, for it reached to the Cross of ignominy and shame.

This was God's expedient to draw to Him the love of a disaffected
and alienated world. This is the meaning of the Cross — love stoop-
ing to win the human heart — love triumphing over all difiiculties —
love making its last and most powerful appeal. And this was the
meaning of Jesus when He uttered the wondrous prediction, " I, if
I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me ! " He
looked beyond " the offence of the Cross," beyond the " stumbling-
block" which His death of ignominy might prove to the benighted
Jew or contemptuous Greek, and beheld it, " the power of God and
the wisdom of God." He knew that even as the hope of the

358 THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST.

world's redemptiou hung upon that last crowning act upon the
Cross, His own willing sacrifice as the Lamb of God, " bearing
our sins in His own body on the tree," " wounded for our trans-
gressions and bruised for our iniquities ; " so that lowest depth
of humiliation, that most terrible endurance of suffering, that
mightiest evidence of the love of God, 7mist forever draw the
hearts of men to Him. He saw streaming from that Cross mighty
and irresistible influences, reaching into far-distant ages, unchanging
and unwasting, ever, while time lasted, melting human enmity and
obduracy into tenderness and love. He saw unborn generations look-
ing to the spectacle on that Cross, even as the dying Israelites looked
to the serpent of brass, and in that look of faith finding life unto
their souls. He saw men out of every kindred and people and tribe
and tongue " looking upon Him whom they had pierced, and mourn-
ing for Him as one mourning for a first-born son." All this, and
more than this, passed before the vision of the blessed Saviour,' as
He uttered these prophetic words. And the vision of this made
Him long for the hour of His " vpli/tiiiff." Even then, " for the joy
set before Him " — the joy of drawing all hearts to Him — He longed
to "endure the Cross, despising. the shame." Already He saw of " the
travail of his soul, and was satisfied." Already, it may be, ^' His eav
caught the far-distant shout of His redeemed and glorified church,
singing, ' Worthy is the Lamb that was slain I' "

V. Now, let us pass to mark ih.c. fulfilment of the Ptedeemer's pre-
diction. How has that strange prophetic utterance been verified?
Has the blessed Saviour's vision been realized ? Has the Cross,
with its scenes of agony and shame, proved a mighty magnet every-
where and in all ages, drawing men to Christ?

To ask the question, is to answer it. Scarcely had He been lifted
up upon the tree, ere that vplifting began to draw human hearts to
the bleeding, sufi"ering Lamb of God. It won the centurion at the
foot of the Cross, whose admiring exclamation was, " trul>j this was
the Son of God!" It Avon the crucified malefactor q,t His side, who
believed in Him when all other faith was dead, who hailed Him as
King, even while wearing the crown of thorns, and whose spirit, ere
the sun had set, ascended with Jesus to Paradise. It won the heart
of Joseph of Arimathea', and Nicodemus, his brother counsellor,
who came and begged His body, wrapped it in costly spices and
linen, and bore it to an honored grave. It won three thousand

THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST. 359

hearts, between the rising and the setting of a single sun, on that day
of Pentecost, when they who were guilty of His blood, found in that
blood pardon and peace and cleansing for the soul.

And from that day, the mighty process has gone forward, gather-
ing strength with the lapse of time. " Beginning at Jerusalem," and
extending through all the coasts of Israel, thousands of the tribe of
Judah were gathered to this their Shiloh, their long-expected Mes-
siah. And as the apostles and evangelists Avent throughout the civ-
ilized world, this was the secret of their wondrous success. They
preached the doctrine of the Cross, salvation thi-ough the crucified
Redeemer; and it was this which drew the nations to His feet, found
a response in unnumbered breasts, and soon filled the Roman Empire
with the followers of the Lamb. And in every age and period since,
among all tribes and nations of the globe, wherever the Cross has
been uplifted, wherever Chi-ist crucified has been simply and faith-
fully proclaimed, innumerable multitudes have been drawn to Him,
who " have counted all things but loss," that they might win Christ.
What countless millions now on earth, and what rejoicing hosts of
the redeemed in heaven, ''whom no man can number," now stand
forth as " a cloud of witnesses " to the fulfilment of the Redeemer's
prophecy as He looked forward to His Cross !

That prediction has been fulfilled in us. There was a time in our
history when our hearts were cold and dead to His love, and there
was no beauty in Him that our souls desired. Now He' is to us " the
fairest among ten thousand," '' the pearl of great price," the rock
of our salvation. "What has wrought this wondrous change ? What
has melted our iudifierence to adoring gratitude and love? One
mighty spectacle, the dying Lamb of God, the Lord of glory crucified
for us, the matchless love of Jesus, " God in Christ," bearing our
sins in His own body on the tree," dying, "the just for the unjust,
that He might bring us to God."

"His love alone
Has broken every barrier down."

VI. It is a study of deepest interest to look along the line of the
church's history, and mark how powerfully this great magnet has
attracted to Him all that is loftiest and noblest in human character.
All along the stream of time, for eighteen centuries, there has
sounded, from hymns of praise and wrestlings of prayer, this great
response of Christian hearts, " Unto Him ivJio loved us and qave

860 THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OP THE CROSS OF CHRIST.

Himself for us and redeemed us hy His hlood, he ejlovij forever I " Go,
searcli among the dim recesses of the catacombs of ancient Rome,
where the early Christians of that city sought refuge from the fury
of their pei'secutors, where they found a sanctuary and a grave ; and
what name, above all others, everywhere meets your eye, rudely cut
into the rock ? It is the name of Jesus. " He sleeps in Jesus ; "
''she rests in Christ" — such is the burden of all. "None hut Christ!"
is the silent testimony from the martyr's resting-place. Take the
hymns of the church, from its earliest to its latest period, the truest
expression of the heart of Christendom ; and what strain pervades
them all, from the songs of Ephraem the Syrian, through the grand
old hymns of the middle ages, like the Dies Irae of Thomas De Ce-
lano, down to Watts and Wesley, Cowper and Montgomery, but one,
the sublime key-note of love to Jesus ?

" Jesus ! the name that charms our fears,
That bids our sorrows cease ; ' -

'Tis music in the sinner's ears,
'Tis life and health and peace."

And so take the great names of the church, her elect and kingly
spirits, and one common feature stamps them all — the heart drawn
to Christ, by the power of His love — His love unto death. Hear
" that disciple whom Jesus loved," and who leaned upon His bosom,
give utterance to the great truth which was the foundation of all
his Christian life — "tve love Him hecause He first loved lis!" Then
turn to his very opposite in temperament, the intellectual, logical
St. Paul, and ask the secret of his unsurpassed activity and endu-
rance for the Gospel, and this is his reply — " the love of Christ con-
straineth me ! " " To me to live is Christ ! " Then listen to the fer-
vent and impulsive St. Peter,' as from a bursting heart he exclaims,
" Lord, Thou knoivest all things, Thou hnoivest that Hove Thee." See
the love of Mary of Bethany, as she breaks upon His head the costly
box of ointment, not too costly for an expression of her devoted love.
Kecall the memories of Augustine and the saintly Mopica, his mother;
or Jerome the monk of Bethlehem ; or Thomas a Kenipis and Fene-
lon ; or Leighton and Herbert and Ken -, or Wesley and Doddridge
and Fletcher; or Marty n and Brainerd and Pay-son; and what makes
them all one, kindred by one holy tie ? It is love to Christ. It is
each heart draion to and fixed on Christ, won by the attractive power
of His Cross.

THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST. 361

But fulfilled as this prediction has been, in every age and among
every generation, there is yet a fulfilment on a far grander scale
awaiting the words of Jesus. We cannot believe that all the sub-
lime vision which then passed before the mind of the Redeemer has
yet been realized. He is " to see of the travail of His soul, and to be
satisjicd." And what will satisfy His great heart of love, less than
the draicing of the xchole world to Ill's Cross P

And this is what the sacred writers everywhere teach us will yet
take place. " The ichole tporld shall he filled icith His glori/," is the
testimony of them all. The Psalmist tells of the day when '' the
heathen shall be given to Him for His inheritance, and the utter-
most part of the earth for His possession ; " and as the glory of that
day breaks upon His vision, He pictures the redeemed as the count-
less dewdrops from the womb of the morning, covering the face of
the whole earth with dazzling beauty. And the prophet, as he sees
the coming of the day when ''every knee shall bow and every ton^^ue
confess that Christ is Lord," can only portray its majestic grandeur
by the image of the ocean's fulness in its unfathomed depths — ''/or
the earth shall he full of the hnoidedge of the Lord, as the vxiters cover
the sea." The Cross is yet to draw all nations; Christ crucified is
yet to win the whole world to a willing obedience. Who can doubt
that Jesus, in that hour when He said, " now is my soul troubled "
looked beyond the Cross, and "despised" its bitterness and ignominy
in " the joy set before Him " of the whole world filled with converts
to His name, every human heart a shrine of love to the Redeemer,
every voice joining in the mighty anthem, "Worthy is the Lamb
that was slain ! "

Then " the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of
our God and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever."
" Arabia's desert ranger

To Him shall bow the knee ;
The Ethiopian stranger
His glory come to see.

" With offerings of devotion,

Ships from the isles shall meet,
To pour the wealth of ocean

In tribute at His feet.

"Kings shall fall down before Him,
And gold and incense bring ;

362 THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST.

All nations shall adore Him,
His praise all people sing.

" For He shall have dominion

O'er river, sea, and shore ;
Far as the eagle's pinion

Or dove's light wing can soar.

"For Him shall prayer unceasing

And daily vows ascend;
His kingdom still increasing,

A kingdom without end.

" The mountain dews shall flourish,

A seed in weakness sown ;
Whose fruit shall spread and flourish,

And shake like Lebanon.

" O'er every foe victorious.

He on His throne shall rest;
From age to age more glorious,

All blessing and all blessed.

" The tide of time shall never

His covenant remove ;
His name shall stand forever,

That name to us is Love ! " ■

Glorious as will be tliis fulfilment of the words of Jesus, may we
not believe that they will receive a still sublimer fulfilment? When
this world shall have passed away, and the " new heavens and the
new earth " shall arise ; when all the redeemed, of every age and
every land, shall be gathered into the heavenly Jerusalem ; when
patriarchs and prophets, apostles and evangelists, martyrs and con-
fessors, shall be brought into one eternal home; who but He will
be the centre of the mighty multitude, to whom every l;ieart shall
turn with rapture and ever-increasing joy? It is the Lamb, whom
they will ''follow whithersoever He goeth." "We may believe," says
a glowing writer, " that throughout eternity Chris^ will continue to
draw all men to Him; still will He be the point towards which
sTiall converge whatsoever hath been delivered from the consequences
of man's apostacy; still will He be the source- of gladness, the well-
spring of happiness, to the myriads who have entered heaven through
the virtue of His blood; to Him shall the ransomed flock, and around
Him shall they congregate, and from Him shall they derive acces-

THE ATTBACTIVE POWER OP THE CROSS OF CHRIST. 363

Bions of kuowledge and fresh materials of triumph; and this Avill be
the final drawing of the nations. AVhen the men of every age and
of every land, linked in indissoluble brotherhood, shall crowd totvards
the Mediator as their common deliverer, their all in all, and cast
their crowns at His feet, and sweep their harps to His praise ; oh !
then will the prophecy receive its full and splendid accomplishment,
and all orders of intelligence, connecting the crucifixion as a cause
with this ingathering, will bear its enraptured witness to the thorough
verification of the words, ' And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all
men unto Me.' "

A word of explanation, and also of warning, is needed in closing.
No passage of the Bible sets forth more fully the universality of the ,
atonement, and of the love of Christ. '' I loill draw all men," said
the Divine Redeemer; why, then, are not all hearts won to Him?
Why is there a single soul without the fold of Christ'? Alas ! He
can onl>/ draw, He cannot compel ; He can only attract , He cannot
constrain by force the love of the human heart. Christ died for all;
He draws all; He yearns for all; onh/ those loho resist this attraction
arc excluded from salvation.

Oh, then ! if this fail to win the heart, there is nothing else left.
Even God Himself can do no more than has been done. The sacri-
fice of Jesus on the Cross is His mightiest effort; it is love's cost-
liest gift. In that crowning effort to win the love of man to God,
Infinite wisdom and power and love, have exhausted all their re-
sources. And the Divine Father's great and everlasting challenge
to every soul, unsaved at last, will be, " what more coidd I have
done!"

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GRIEVING THE SPIRIT

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GRIEVING THE SPIRIT. 367

tion is enforced, the sealing of the Spirit, refers not to His first in-
fluence upon the hearts of the impenitent, but presupposes union
with Christ and the existence of true faith; as this apostle elsewhere
testifies, "■ in whom also, after that ye believed, yc were sealed with
that Holy Spirit of promise." If it were prudent to offer an explana-
tion of this striking fact, it might be suggested, that as the later and
more full operations of the Spirit within the Christian presuppose
and involve His earlier influences upon the sinner, both classes are
compendiously embraced in the references which seem to be addressed
only to one. By a natural and even necessary deduction, we carry
over these expostulations from the church to the world, from the
Christian to the unconverted sinner, as being by necessary implica-
tion embraced. Since none come to Christ save those who are effect-
ually called, at every step of the sinner's return to God he is under
the influence of the Holy Spirit, by whom this call is niediated; who
may therefore as well be resisted and grieved in the first stage, when
He convinces of sin, as at the last stage of our sanctification, when
we are made meet for the saints' inheritance in light. But whatever
explanation may be offered, there is no diflSeulty in the widest ex-
tension of the language of the text. Since, from first to last, we must
feel the power of the Holy Ghost, at any stage from first to last of
our career, we are in danger of grieving Him; and the exhortation
is quite as pointed to the sinner as to the saint.

In this large application, then, of the text to all classes of men
with whom this Spirit may be dealing, I propose to consider the rea-
sons Vjliy none should permit themsclvps to grieve Him.

I. Because of the solemnity of so personal and recognised a contact
loith God.

We are at all times in contact with God, and surrounded with His
presence. There is no hiding place within the universe, whicli is
not penetrated by the eye of His omniscience, and covered by the
hand of His protection. " Whither shall we go from His Spirit, or
whither shall we flee from His presence ? If we ascend into heaven,
lie is there ; if we make our bed in hell, behold. He is there. If
we take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts
of the sea; even there shall His hand lead us, and His right hand
shall uphold us ; even the night shall be light about us ; the dark-
ness and the light are both alike to Him." Yet is this dreadful
truth not always so discovered to us as to enlist the devotional senti-

368 GRIEVING THE SPIRIT.

ment of the soul. But if our sensibilities be not utterly blunted,
and conscience entirely seared, there are seasons when we must feel
solemnly impressed as God draws more nearly and personally in con-
tact with us. In times of sickness, when our couch is watered with
tears, and the strong man is bowed down with pain and " brought
into the dust of death ; " in seasons of bereavement, when God
" darkens the earth in the clear day," and death comes in at the
window, and we are shut up to solitary communion with our own sad
and bitter thoughts ; in the pestilence, when the angel of death flaps
his black wing over the city, and the mourners go about the streets,
and there is not a house which does not weep for its dead ; in the
famine, when " the seven ears are withered, thin, and blasted " on
the stalk, and want, like a grim and ghastly spectre, strides over the
land, snatching the black crust from the mouths of crying babes ;
when war, with his bloody heel, treads upon the whitening bones of
his slaughtered victims, and the widow's wail mingles with the or-
phan's cry in a concert of anguish ; in the storm and tempest, when
hoarse thunders roll down the pavement of the sky, or startling peals
discharge in one volley the whole artillery of heaven, and the sharp
lightnings cleave the clouds like the flashing swords of angry cheru-
bim : who, then, does not stand in silent awe, and tremble before
these symbols of the divine majesty and presence? We speak not
" here of that slavish terror which quails before the mere tlxought of
Aliuighty force ; but of that holy dread, which may fill the bosom
even of a seraph, as he looks uncovered upon the fa<3e of Jehovah's
throne. Yet not in one nor all of these does God come so nigh or
make such disclosures of tfis presence, as when by His Holy Spirit
He enters within the sanctuary of the human breast. In all these
acts of providence, however near God may be, and with whatsoever
closeness of pressure. He is still iclthout us ; but through His Spirit
the shadow of His awful presence is cast within the veil, and meets us
alone in the sacred chambers of the soul. He lays His holy hand upon
our very thoughts, turns the eurrentof our affections into new channels,
and makes the heart beat with the pulse of a new and strange life.

Shall we not exclaim, with the prophet, when he saw the skirts of
the divine glory filling the temple, '' woe is me ! for I am undone ;
for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts ! " We may
therefore endorse this, '' the argument of reverence ; " and store it in
the heart, that we may " not grieve the Holy Spirit of God."

GRIEVING THE SPIRIT. 369

II. Because He draws noar to ^ls onhj to hring home to ovr hearts
the overtures of God's infinite love.

Have you ever considered the fact that the Holy Ghost is the only
person of the Godhead whose name is not associated with offices of
terror and of wrath ? The Father, as first in the order of thought,
is the original fountain of all authority. By Him the Son is sent
into the world, and the seal of His commission gives validity to all
the Mediator's acts. To Him the glory of all Christ's miracles, and
the wisdom of all His doctrines, are continually referred. The whole
work which He finished upon earth was the work which the Father
gave Him to do. As the sacred three, in the language of Erskine,
"sat together around the council board of redemption," in the dis->
tribution of offices there made, the Father assumed to be the repre-
sentative of the Godhead, to hold in His hands the divine law, and
the reins of universal empire. It belongs officially to Him to "reveal
from heaven the wrath of God against all ungodliness and unrio-ht-
cousness of men ; " to execute the penalty upon the sinner, or else
upon his substitute; and to pass the judicial decree, by which the
one and the other are justified and declared righteous together. Of
course, it is impossible to think of Him but as clothed with "terrible
majesty." "Clouds and darkness are round about Him; justice
and judgment are the habitation of His throne." "When He is
wroth, the earth trembles," and "the perpetual hills do bow."
"When He thundereth in the heavens, and the Highest giveth His
voice, hailstones and coals of fire pass before Him." "At the blast
of the breath of His nostrils, the channels of waters are seen, the
foundations of the earth are discovered." Under this goroeous im-
agery, in which the whole frame of nature is seen dissolving at His
presence, do the Scriptures represent the awful majesty of God, and
the supremacy of His jurisdiction as a lawgiver and a judge.

In like manner, the Son, though He is the author of grace, has
another revelation of Himself as full of terror as that is of mercy.
He is not only the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, but
also the Lion of the tribe of Judah, who shall rend the wicked in
His fury. Over His Cross may indeed be read the inscription,
"God so loved the world;" yet beyond and against that Cross may
be seen the throne of His power, beneath which all principality and
power and might and dominion and every name that is named, not
only in this world, but also in that which is to come, are seen to be
24

370 GRIEVING THE SPIRIT.

put. ^' Tlie Father judgetli no man, but hath committed all judg-
ment unto the Son ; " " for He hath appointed a day in which He
will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He hath
ordained ; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that
He hath raised Him from the dead." In the last great assize, all
nations shall be gathered before Him ; He shall come in the clouds
of heaven, with His own glory and with the glory of His Father,
and " all the tribes of the earth shall mourn," as He shall sit upon
the great white throne, and pronounce the sentences of destiny.
Amidst the terrors of a burning world, when the heavens are rolled
together as a scroll, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat,
the wicked are represented with awful significance as calling upon
the rocks and mountains to fall upon them, and hide them from "the
wrath of the Lamb." Paradoxical as the expression may seem,
there is no phrase in all the Scriptures more full of woe or pregnant
with despair than this, "the wrath of the Lamb.'* Certainly,- no .
one can go around the circle of Christ's ofiices without solemn dread
of the commission He is hereafter to execute as the Judge of quick
and dead.

If, however, we turn from these to the person of the Holy Ghost,
He sustains, in the economy of grace, no office but that of tenderness
and love. Though equal with the Father and the Son, He descends
upon no " mount that may be touched," surrounds Himself with no
"blackness and darkness and tempest," speaks not to us' "with the
sound of trumpet " nor with " the voice of words." No symbols of
dreadful majesty strike through the soul with terror when He makes
His advent. With quiet yet resistless power. He gently slides into
the breast, and speaks the words of love by which the stubborn sin-
ner is so sweetly persuaded. May the pulpit ever be restrained from
uttering a sentence which shall abate our conceptions of the Saviour's
infinite compassion and grace ! It was surely a "love which passeth
knowledge" that brought Him from the bosom of the Father, to
" endure the contradiction of sinners against Himsejf." The extent
of His condescension cannot be measured, unless we could penetrate
the fellowship of the Godhead, and know the wealth of the Father's
love eternally lavished upon Him. Nor, unless we could estimate
the recoil of His holy nature from all sin, can we appreciate the com-
passion which led Him to bear the dishonor and shame of our sin,
and to cry out, in His anguish, "Reproach hath broken My heart."

GRTEVIXG THE SPIRIT. 371

But let us not, on the other hand, disparage the equal condescension
of the Eternal Spirit, when He descends into the heart, which is as
"a cage of unclean birds," and brings His purity into contact with
all the taint and defilement of our nature. This is the love of the
Son, that He " became sin for us, that we might be made the right-
eousness of God in Him ; " and this is the love of the Spirit, that no
unclcanness ever shuts Him out from the soul He would purge and
render fit for communion with God. The very name by which His
official work is defined describes His compassion ; He is the Com-
forter. Though He " reproves the world of sin " "and of judgment
to come," it is by the exhibition between the two of that righteous-
ness by which the one is covered and the other is stripped of its
terrors; and through Him the promise is fulfilled to the mourner,
that he shall be comforted. He is therefore pre-eminently the ex-
pounder of God's love, bringing it home to us in the hour of despair,
and making it the hope and joy of the soul forever. We may there-
fore endorse this, "the argument of gratitude;" and lay it up in the
memory, that we may " not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom
we are sealed unto the day of redemption." Our aiFections yield to
the voice of human kindness, as the strings of the ^olian harp give
responsive music to the soft breath of summer. Shall not this argu-
ment, appealing to " the memory of the heart," touch every senti-
ment that is noble and generous within us ? And w^iat damning
proof of the sinner's enmity against God is given, when he is not
subdued by this argument of love !

III. Because, if ever saved, it must he through this very influence
of the Sjnrit which ice are here exhorted to recognise.

Nothing is more common than to parry the warnings and expostu-
lations of the Bible by the flippant excuse, " I do not know that I
am chosen to salvation." Does the sinner know with any more cer-
tainty, on the other hand, that he is appointed to destruction ? Can
he ascertain either except by the result ? Does anything remain to
him but to " make his own calling and election sure " — " working
out his own salvation with fear and trembling," knowing that " it is
God which workcth in him to Avill and to do of His good pleasure?"
And will he permit us to say, with all possible affection, yet with as
much frankness, that this language is on his lips as foolish as it is
wicked, as absurd as it is profane ? The secret purposes of God can
never be to him a rule of action, simply because they are secret;

372 GRIEVING THE SPIRIT.

and for the same reason, they can never be the motive by which he
is constrained on the one hand to receive Christ, nor upon the other
to reject Him. By the very constitution of our nature, that cannot
be to us a controlling law nor an operative motive, which is to us
totally unknown. It is therefore in accordance not only with the
modesty of true piety, but also with the maxims of sound philosophy,
when the Scriptures say that " secret things belong to God, but the
things which are revealed belong to us and to our children." Not
only ought the sinner to act only under the influeuce-of the latter,
but it is simply impossible that he ca7i act under the influence of the
former. He who supposes his decision to be afiected in the one di-
rection or in the other by the undiscovered purposes of God, passes
upon his understanding a most singular delusion. Undoubtedly, the
sinner may resent the fact that God has purposes which He chooses
not to disclose, and, with a peevishness that would be ludicrous if it
were not fraught with consequences so terrible, may continue 'to
resist the divine supremacy, to his own everlasting discomfiture.
But these purposes themselves, so long as they are closely veiled
from his view, can never constitute the reasons of his choice. It is
one thing to be angry with -God. because He has purposes, and another
thing to be determined, in this direction or in that, by the discovery
of what these purposes are. If they be wholly unknown, they afibrd
no reason by which the judgment can be influenced ; and to suppose
a decision resting upon them, is to suppose an effect without a cause.
If it be said the sinner's embarrassment proceeds from this very sus-
pense arising out of his ignorance of God's will in regard to him,
this assumes that God's will, if ascertained, would be a controlling
motive to obedience. But God's will is known in what lie actually
reveals. He " now commaudeth all men everywhere to repent."
Jesus Christ is sincerely ofiei-ed, with the assurance that whosoever
believeth shall be saved ; and, with this promise, the Holy Spirit is
freely given, that the sinner may both believe and repent. Why
should not this suflSce, if the discovery of God's wili be only want-
ing as the sufficient motive to determine the choice ? We submit
that the sinner's reasoning should be precisely the reverse of what is
implied in the flippant language which we now rebuke. Let him
argue thus : I read in thfe record that none are saved but those who
come to Christ; that none come to Christ but those whom the Father
draws; that none are drawn but by the power of the Holy Ghost.

GRIEVING THE SPIRIT. 873

That blessed agency, which is so indispensable, is now experienced
by me. Instead, therefore, of pausing to pry into the deep things of
God, which are reserved for the disclosures of the great day, I am
encouraged, by this collation of facts, to yield myself freely to that
mysterious power which can alone conduct me to the feet of Jesus.
Let the sinner take, further, the testimony of all the redeemed. Let
him summon the thousand witnesses for Christ now upon the earth,
and then the ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thou-
sands, whom John saw before the throne, and, without dissent, they
will all testify, that by just such power as he now begins to feel, were
they brought into a state of salvation. They, just as he, were roused
from apathy, and were made to feel the powers of the world to come >
they, just as he must, were led to " loathe and abhor themselves,'' and
to " cast themselves upon the mercy of God in Christ Jesus." Then, by
all that he now feels, may he hope that a good work is begun within
him, which will be carried on till the day of Christ. The true de-
duction leads not to despondency and cavil, but to hope and joyful
trust; for he can be saved only through those influences which are
now consciously experienced, and which he is exhorted to cherish.
We may, then, endorse this, " the argument of interest ; " and let it
restrain the sinner from foolishly perilling his salvation by grieving
now away the Holy Spirit of God.

IV. Because the Scriptures hedge about the office and work of the
IIolij Ghost icith very solemn aiid pecidiar sanctions.

It has been already said that He is the only person of the God-
head who sustains no ofl&ce of wrath, and is attended by no symbols
of terrible majesty. This, however, is one of those partial truths
which might mislead, unless qualified by the statements now to be
made. Perhaps, for this reason, His person and office are guarded
by the most fearful warning found within the Bible. " Wherefore
I say unto you, all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven
unto men, but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be
forgiven unto men ; and whosoever speaketh a word against the Son
of Man, it shall be forgiven him ; but whosoever speaketh against
the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world,
neither in the world to come." It thus appears, " there is a sin unto
death " — one form of transgres.sion which is excepted from all hope
of pardon, which the infinite goodness of God refuses to cover, and
for which the prayer of intercession may not be offered ] and that sin

374 GRIEVING THE SPIRIT.

can only he committed against the person of the Holy Ghost. It may-
be irreverent to inquire into the reasons of this remarkable limita-
tion. Perhaps it is because the Holy Spirit is the third and last
person of the adorable Trinity, so that he who sins finally and fatally
against Him has sinned past the entire Godhead. He that trans-
gresseth against the person and law of the Father may yet be for-
given through the infinite merits and prevalent intercessions of the
Son 3 and he that sins against the person and office of the Son, may
yet be overtaken by the resistless might and grace of the Spirit;
but when the Spirit is grieved away, there remains behind no
other person who may gather up the resources of the Godhead, and
bring them to the sinner's rescue. Or, perhaps it is because to the
Holy Ghost is assigned the office of applying the scheme of redemp-
tion ; so that he who sins against Him finally has sinned against the
Gospel in its last stage, just where it is intended to bear upon human
destiny ; and having sinned past the scheme of grace, " there remains
no more sacrifice for sin, but a certain fearful looking for of judg-
ment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries." Or,
it may be in compensation for the lowliness of the Spirit's con-
descension ; because, in discharging the office of Comforter, He must
come with a gentleness that shall not alarm the timid soul, and
descend into contact with the lowest impurity of the sinner's heart; ,
'because he must stand thus seemingly defenceless before the sinner,
and submit to all the outrage of the sinner's resistance and scorn,
therefore He must bear this solemn seal of the Father and the Son,
who throw around his person the sanctions of their own official great-
ness and severity. But without pausing, with prurient curiosity, to
pry into the reasons of this awful warning, the fact itself, in its fear-
ful solemnity, is sufficient for- us. Trifle not with this person of the
Trinity, since the one sin which God will never forgive is, and can
be, perpetrated only against Him. Nor is it essential to the import
of this warning, that we should define precisely the nature of this
sin. That it is special, and does not involve every act of resistance,
is evident ; since, otherwise, the whole human race would be cut off
from the hope of salvation. Which one of all the redeemed, on
earth or in heaven, but consciously has, at some stage in his career,
resisted and grieved thfi Holy Spirit? This dreadful offence, there-
fore, described under the strong term of blasphemy, must import
something more than the ordinary resistance of the unrenewed will.

GRIEVING THE SPIRIT. 375

It must imply a confirmed and malignant opposition of the soul to
holiness and God, such as can alone admit the wilful and habitual
traducing of the Holy Ghost in the fulfilment of His glorious
and benign mission. But, even in this view, the warning is not
the less significant. It may be presented thus : He that con-
sciously sins against the Spirit, in the face of such a woe here de-
nounced, has no guaranty that he may not be judicially abandoned
of God to sin that sin which shall never be remitted. This side of
the judgment bar, there are awful sanctions by which Jehovah
guards both His law and the Gospel of His grace; and the most
fearful of these is the withholding of His restraints, and punish-
ing sin by allowing the commission of other sins which are deeper.
Your present resistance of the Holy Ghost may not be " the sin which
is uuto death," but it may be the first step in the path of declension
which terminates in that fearful abyss. Grieved by ordinary and per-
sistent rejection, this blessed agent, whose commission is sealed by the
Father and the Son, may depart; and He that sitteth upon the throne
may lift His right hand in the dreadful oath, " My Spirit shall no more
strive ! " The withering sentence may be pronounced, " Let him
alone ! " Thus judicially abandoned, with all the restraints of prov-
idence and grace withdrawn, the sinner may go on from sin to sin,
until the last dreadful act of treason is consummated in the blas-
phemy against God's Eternal Spirit. We may therefore endorse
this, "the argument of warning;" and, by the terrors of the Lord,
persuade the sinner not to trifle with the thunders of Jehovah's
Word. Rise not up now, in the stubbornness of your pride, and
say, " We will not be frightened into submission by the echoes of a
penalty like this." Eemember that the language of bravado is always
the language of cowardice and of falsehood. It is right to be afraid
of God, when He speaks to us in the majesty of His law. And when
these warnings come as the foreshadowing of His stern retributive
justice, and are addressed to our judgment and conscience, rather
than to our sense of fear, they can only be disregarded by the reck-
lessness that is blind, or by the folly that is mad. The flaming-
sword which turneth every way guards the person of that Divine
Spirit, who comes to the sinner the last exponent of God's infinite love.
He who rushes upon that sword dies by the hand of God; while mercy
and love, outraged and despised by the sinner, vindicate themselves by
echoing the decree which inflexible justice both issues and executes.

876 GRIEVING THE SPIRIT.

But some one may arise here and say, Of all this, we are deeply
persuaded; there is no fault more grave, and no calamity more fatal,
than to grieve away the Holy Spirit; if we know ourselves, there is
no crime from which we shrink with greater dread ; tell us how we
may be saved from an offence of such awful magnitude. The de-
mand is reasonable, for doubtless there are many who would not de-
signedly do despite to the Spirit of Grace, who nevertheless, in their
blindness, pursue a course which leads to this dreadful issue. It is
of immense concern to such, to know the principal jvays in which
this may inadvertently be done.

I. Many grieve the Sjyirit hy their unwiUingness to oicn that they
are under His influence and feel Ills i^wer.

Those who are called to deal with awakened souls are aware
how studiously these religious exercises are screened from the view
of others. Nor have we the right to complain of this, so far as it
springs from that natural reserve which God has cast, as a veii of.
concealment, over all the sacred and tender affections of the soul.
It is never easy to speak out the sentiments even of natural affection
into the ears of a stranger; and we speedily lose respect for those who
can babble forth all their inner feelings in the shambles and in the
market place, which should be reserved for self-communion, or at least
for the confidential disclosures of intimate friendship. That veil of
secrecy should not be rudely drawn aside or rent, which a true and
instinctive delicacy draws around the heart; and which,- as a princi--
ple of our nature, God has implanted, that we may be protected from
the profane and intrusive gaze of our fellow men. It is not of. this
we complain, that anxious sinners are reluctant to make us the de-
positaries of their religious secret. However we may regret that
want of confidence which renders unavailing our wisdom and expe-
rience, an unquestioned right alone is exercised, which no one may
lawfully challenge. But the indisposition to acknowledge, even to
themselves, the source and nature of their distress, is what we cen-
sure. How many are peevish and fretful when no adequate cause
exists without them for this disquietude, who would discover, if they
w6uld institute an inquiry, that it is God Himself by whom they are
troubled. He has " stirred up their nest," and .therefore they are ill
at ease ! To live day by«day in this discomposure of soul, and never
ask wherefore they droop; not to cease the din and clatter of life
long enough to ask who it is that knockcth at the door of the heart,

GRIEVING THE SPIRIT. 377

and seeks admission — this is to grieve the Spirit of God, by sad in-
attention to the signs of His presence, and by slothful disregard to
the calls of His love. An earthly friend, however dear, would turn
away from our door at such rebuffs, nor could he be pacified without
acknowledgment and sorrow for the wrong. Is it strange that the
Holy Ghost should suspend His importunate solicitations, and leave
the sinner that is deaf to all his entreaties to reap the fruit of his
folly in bitter disappointment and sorrow ?

II. Others grieve the Holy GhoU hij laboring to extinguish their con-
victions, and escape j^rcscnt distress, without repentance and confession.

Transparent candor is due to all earnest searchers after truth — the
same candor exhibited by our blessed Lord, when He said, " Who;
soever will not take up his cross and follow Me, cannot be 3Iy disci-
ple." So we are bound to say to all who would press into His King-
dom, it is through sorrow and pain this entrance must be gained;
for the gate is strait, and none enter but through striving. The
agonies of the second birth, like the pains of the first, must be felt
by all who would see the light. It is impossible, in the nature of
things, that a man should wake up to the fact that he is vile before
God, and that in him dwelleth no good thing, without torture of soul.
The misfortune and guilt of multitudes is, that they will not undergo
that distress which is antecedent to all relief. They desire to be
comforted, without the mourning to which the promise of comfort is
annexed. Hence the eff"ort, at every hazard, to throw off the sense
of pain. Hence the lamentation of God, '' 3Iy people hav.e com-
mitted two evils : they have forsaken Me, the fountain of living
waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold
no water." In the very crisis of their fate, instead of " repenting
in dust and ashes " — instead of ** being in bitterness as one that is
in bitterness for his first born " — they plunge with frantic haste into
anything that will for the time hush the upbraidings of conscience,
or extract the sting of remorse. They addict themselves to business,
and steep themselves in care; they mingle in society, and drown the
voice of the monitor within amid scenes of pleasure; they lock up the
heart in a cold and stony stoicism; anything but listen to the Spirit's
reproof, when He "convinces of sin, of righteousness, and of judg-
ment to come." "What is this but mad resistance of the Holy
Ghost, by which all His blessed influences are quenched, perhaps
forever ?

378 GRIEVINa THE SPIRIT.

III. Others still grieve the Spirit hij too sedulous cultivation of ihe
emotions, till they evaporate in mere sentiment and feeling.

The universal complaint of men, when pressed with the duty of
faith in Christ, is, that they do not feel enough. Even where the sad
blunder is not committed of supposing this mental anguish to be in
some sort expiatory and atoning for the past, the fatal delusion ex-
ists, that from this agony, as a preparatory discipline, it will be easier
to pass into the peace which the Saviour gives. Instead, therefore,
of turning at once to Him under the guidance and blessing of the
Holy Spirit, they turn back upon themselves, and press the law
with all its sharp points in upon the conscience, that they may bleed
at every pore. To their utter dismay, they come by this process at
last not to feci at all. Yet, no one acquainted with the laws of our
nature, but could predict the result. By the very constitution of
the human soul, these emotions are not to be produced by efforts ex-
pended directly upon the emotions themselves. They are in- their
nature so subtle as to escape in the very act of handling;, like those
volatile essences which preserve their life only when confined, these
emotions evaporate as soon as they are drawn forth to be discussed
and strengthened. What living man ever succeeded in producing
the sentiment of the beautiful, or of the sublime, by putting himself
through a logical process to show that he ought thus to feel? The
argument shall be convincing; but the heart will remain as insensible
as the iceberg under a polar moon. The Scriptures, with a far more
accur9.te knowledge of man's nature, recognise the triple powers with
which he is endowed, and address him as a being capable of thought,
feeling, and action. They reveal God glorious in holiness, and man
sunk in sin, that his thoughts may be stirred within him. Inasmuch
as, by the relation subsisting between these faculties, thought tends
to elicit feeling, the Holy. Grhost deepens these reflections into con-
viction and mourning. But He does not now draw a charmed circle
around the man, or throw the heart back upon itself, that it may be
lashed into frenzy. The Bible nowhere presents a graduated scale
of feeling, that the sinner may watch and wait until the mercury
rises in the tube to the boiling point. It recognises, on the contrary,
the great principle that feeling should at once take concrete form,
and embody itself in corresponding action — and that emotion, which
is not allowed thus to shape itself outwardly in the appropriate act,
dies within itself. It comes therefore at once with its great com-

GRIEVING THE SPIRIT. 379

Kiand to hellevc in that Saviour whom it reveals. He who wishes to
feel more intensely the vileness of sin, must look out upon that holi-
ness of God with which it is in dreadful contrast. He who wishes to
feel greater contrition, and more tender sorrow, must look forth with
a trustful faith upon that Saviour through whom alone he can be
brought to genuine penitence. All these acts of the soul reflect back
upon each other. If thought engenders feeling, it is in turn quick-
ened by that very feeling which it produces. If feeling tends to
shape itself in the outward act, it is reciprocally intensified by the
very energy of its own development. It is precisely here the sinner's
great error is committed. Contradicting all the known laws of our
spiritual economy, he strives to deepen his emotions by a direct effort
upon them, instead of yielding prompt obedience to the great prac-
tical command of the Gospel, which rouses him to immediate faith
in Christ, and which the Holy Ghost now enforces upon the con-
science. "What though, within the magic circle in which he has
bound his heart with a spell, he should, contrary to known expe-
rience, burn and blaze before God with all the ardor of a seraph !
It is only that the heart may be consumed in the intensity of its
emotions, to fall back at last into its own ashes, a charred and black-
ened ruin ! And what is this but a mad attempt to find salvation
within ourselves, to create a Saviour in our own emotions! What is
it but to reject and grieve that Holy Spirit of God, who, in accord-
ance with the very laws of our being, would lead us forth from our
misery and guilt, to rest upon the bosom of our God in Christ !

IV. Finally, thousands grieve the Sjnrii hy the postponement of
present duty to a future day.

After a few fitful efforts, the sinner sinks down in sheer ex-
haustion, and hopes that what seems impossible to-day will be prac-
ticable and easy to-morrow. Is it necessary to show how this offends
God and grieves the Holy Ghost? Is it nothing to trench upon
God's prerogative, who alone has to-morrow in His gift? Put
your finger upon your pulse, and remember that life is measured out
to us in each single beat, that wc may feel our dependence upon the
supreme will of Him in whom we live and move. Is it nothing to
trifle with God's command, which covers every inch of our time with
its own immediate duty ? Is it nothing to mock that august person
who knocks at the sinner's heart, and make Him bend to our indo-
lence or caprice ?

380 . GRIEVING THE SPIRIT.

" There's no ^jrerogative in human hours.

In human hearts what bolder thought can rise,

Than man's presumption on to-morrow's dawn?

Where is to-morrow ? In another world !

And yet on this, perhaps,

This peradventure, infamous for lies.

As on a rock of adamant, we build

Our mountain hopes, and spin eternal schemes,

As we the fatal sisters would outspin,

And, big with life's futurities, expire."

Every command of God's law binds the present moment, and every
offer of the Gospel is made equally in the present. "Behold, now
is the accepted time ; behold, now is the day of salvation ! " He
who uses up his morrow in fruitless resolutions of amendment, then,
is like the spendthrift who anticipates his income, and overwhelms
his fortune with the debts of the past.

"A man's life is a tower, with a staircase of many steps.

That, as he toileth upwai'd, crumble successively behind him ;

No going back, the past is an abyss ; no stopping, for the present perisheth ;

But ever hasting on, precarious on the foothold of to-day.

Our cares are all to-da^ ; our joj^s are all to-day ;

And in one little word, our life, what is it but — to-day ? "

Sinner ! now be wise. Reflect, that as you cannot, without fraud, '
anticipate the future which is yet with God, so neither can you recall
the past, that has gone beforehand to the judgment bar. On this
isthmus of the present alone you stand, with the momentous interests
of eternity crowded with you upon its narrow space. This now,
which is " ticking from the clock of time," is past, even as you have
counted it, speeding along with its truthful testimony against your
neglect and sin, if now you grieve the Holy Spirit of God.

.il'j&'LnlL ;J-

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CHRIST ANT

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comforts, and cheers, the
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CHRIST AND THE BELIEVER INSEPARABLE. 383

The Spirit and tlie bride say come; all heaven invites; they only
shall be lost who -will not come to Christ. Ye who disbelieve His
Word, and harden yourselves against His providence, and resist His
Spirit, ye are that barren fig-tree. But for the pleadings of this
loving and ever-living Intercessor, you would have been cut down as
cumberers of the ground. His loving arm stays the avenging blow
of justice. And, in deciding for or against Christ, it is not, whether
you choose annihilation or heaven, but whether you prefer heaven
or hell. This wonderful love work of the Redeemer has secured
life to all who died in Adam. All that are in their graves shall
come forth, some to the resurrection of glory, some to the resurrec-
tion of damnation. In considering the love of Christ, it is for you
to decide whether you will be

" with the damned cast out, or

Numbered with the blest."

This Christ's love to me as a sinner — that is the ground of my
hope, and source of my peace, and love, and joy. Bowed down be-
neath a load of sin, I rejoice in the assurance that Christ is my advo-
catCj and that His blood cleanseth from all sin.

" This precious blood
Shall never lose its power.

Till all the ransomed church of God
Be saved to sin no more."

To illustrate more fully the depth and tenderness of this insepara-
ble love of Jesus, let us look at some of the relations in which He
presents Himself to us in these Scriptures, which we should search
daily, because they testify of Him.

He is our friend — calls us His friends. He is the friend that
sticketh closer than a brother — the friend in need — the one above
all others — the friend of sinners —

" Which of all our friends, to save us,
Could or would have shed his blood."

He is thy tried friend. His is an unchanging love — faithful, strong
as death. He is thy son, thy brother. He that doeth the will of my
Father, the same is my mother and sister and brother. His is a
filial heart — a fraternal love. When on earth, subject to His parents,
mark how He cared for His mother, even when on the Cross — and
His love is still as great. He is the brother born for adversity.
And what more beautifully sets forth the tender love of Jesus to

384 CHRIST AND THE BELIEVER INSEPARABLE.

His followers, than that oft allusion to the conjugal relation. In the
Old Testament and in the New, how frequently does Jehovah-Jesus
present Himself as the Bridegroom — the Husband of the church, the
Lamb's wife; the husband her Redeemer, that she might be presented
without spot or wrinkle, as a chaste virgin, when the marriage supper
shall be celebrated, amid the hallelujahs that fill the Fathers house.
What relation so full of tenderness and confidence and permanence
as this ? True, sin in ten thousand instances makes it a curse ; but
sanctified in Christ, as fellow heirs of the grace of life, the Christian
home, even in this sin-stricken world, presents the brightest type of
heaven that earth affords. Jesus thy Redeemer is thine, thy hus-
band. And would He impress yet more the tender faithfulness of
His love — " as one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort
you." A mother's love ! Poets, with all their rich imagery, have
not fathomed it. What pictures for the artist! The mother watch-
ing, praying, by the bed of a dying, it may be of a disobedient, -un-
grateful child. Poverty and peril, by flood or fire, only, test the
strength of a mother's love. How tender your yearning heart,
mother, whether aroused by the sweet prattle of innocency, the sighs
of pain, or shrieks of danger. Even a mother may forget her infant,
helpless child, but Jehovah-Jesus will never forget thee.

This is the love of Christ for thee, the love, as the apostle calls it,
infinite as the unsearchable, boundless nature of its divine author.

It is, as the mind of the inspired Paul reverts to the- councils of
eternity, when earth was to be redeemed by blood, and no sacrifice
was found but the Lamb — as he contemplates, amid the shouts of
angels, the incarnation of Deity— with His life of poverty and toil,
terminated by the scenes of the garden' and Calvary — as he looks at
the risen and interceding Redeemer, exalted as a Prince and Saviour,
to give repentance and remission of sins — Avith love, love, love, as
its beginning and end, that he asks in triumph — Who shall separate
7(S from the love of Christ? I see the apostle — as, in the infancy
of the church, he followed the Redeemer at the cost of tribula-
tion, and distress, and persecution, and nakedness, and famine, and
pferil, and sword, and death, daily — looking away from these things
to Christ, as his wisdom, and righteousness, and strength, and
refuge; and am prepared for the triumph of faith, as he challenges
the universe. Christ's love is his anchor. In all these things he
is more than conqueror, through Him that loved him. Neither

CHRIST AND THE BELIEVER INSEPARABLE. 385

death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things
present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other
creature, shall be able to separate the believer from the love of God
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Many of these things were then, and are now, incident to a life
of devotion in the service of the Master. By reason of abounding
iniquity, the love of many a professed disciple waxes cold. Abound-
ing worldliness, enticements to sin, poverty, bereavement, disappoint-
ment, affliction — these are the means which God uses, at once, to root
up the plants which He has not planted, and to root and ground the
believer in the love of Jesus. The faith and love of the believer are
to be tried. It is to be a furnace trial, too, and woe to him whos.e
faith stands in the wisdom of men, and not in the power of God —
the enmity of whose heart has not been eradicated — who has not the
filial spirit of obedience, and submission, and love.' Only he that
endures to the end, shall be saved. The precious metal is put into
. the crucible, not to destroy, but to purify it. I fear not for the true
child of God in the furnace, for the Son of man, the blessed Re-
deemer, is with him and will not suflfer him to be destroyed. He
shall only be purified and refined, made meet for the Master's ser-
vice here, and fitted for the incorruptible, and undefiled, and un-
fading inheritance there.

These things may pluck up the tares, may change your earthly
friends. They, like the friends of Job, may come only to censure
and condemn, but they cannot separate you from the love of Christ.
Ah ! is it not in need, and trial, and affliction, and bereavement,
that the aff"ection of all these relations — friend, son, brother, husband,
mother — is intensified ? In all the sufferings of those we love, do
not we suffer ? Yea, quietness and peace may fortify the heart of our
suffering, dying friend, but are not our hearts lacerated and bleed-
ing ? That would not be a true friend, a filial child, a faithful
brother, loyal husband, a loving mother, whose affection any trial
could diminish. I am persuaded that we have an High Priest who
is touched with the feeling of our infirmities — who bears our sick-
nesses and sorrows, as well as our sins — who was tried in all points as
we are — who, for love of us, died, and nothing shall separate us from
His love.

In view of this love, is not his condemnation just, who will not
love the Lord Jesus Christ — the one altogether lovely ?
25

336 CHRIST AND THE BELIEVER INSEPARABLE.

Here is encouragement for God's afflicted, tempted people. Noth-
ing shall separate them from the love of Christ — the Saviour whom
they love though unseen. Be thou faithful unto death, and He will
give thee the crown of life.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ he with you all. Amen.

^^^^.^^

5

iCi' lH.

^- J

fVf

CONNECTED WITH THE BIBLE. 389

Avith prayor. A whole houscliold collected together, children ranged
along on either side in lessening size, and your father reading out of
that volume which you had always regarded with such veneration.
You recall the day when some strange affliction befell your household.
You could not comprehend it. You knew not yet what was meant
by death; but those who were older than you were in tears, and the
family were gathered together, and the book of God was brought
forth, and your father read from it, as well as he might, through
falling tears. Soon )^our own mind began to catch the sounds which
were uttered, and forthwith to weave in your own thoughts with
the mystic words which were read. You remember a certain sabbath
night, when the reading was going on, the damp wood upon the
hearth was sighing and sizzling, as if something of life was there,
and your mind was started off to unwind the meaning of those awful
words — ilie " worm which dieth not, and the fire that is not
quenched " — or again, when you looked out into the cold, dark
night, and you thought of a soul shut out from the kingdom of God,
with all its brightness and warmth, and you could not refrain from
tears; for you felt that this sacred book was in some way connected
with your eternal destiny. Years elapsed, and strange changes oc-
curred— your vcnenible father died — you remember that during hia
last illness there was notliiug which he so much desired as to have his
children read to him^ out of the Bible; and among his latest counsels
was this, that you should read it and love it. He sleeps in some grave
yard, but upon the stone which marks the spot, there is graven some
verse, out of that volume, which was his solace and delight when living.
You liave seen your mother, in widowhood, resorting to the same
book for the best comfort she knew — and when her eyes were too
dim to read anything beside, reading this, to the last, as something
from which she could not be separated. Follow the several members
of your household — one dies here, and another there ; but the last
words which ever they uttered may have been of such a character
as to cast new importance on the Bible. It may be that, dying in its
hopes, they made use of some of its joyful promises; or, alas! up-
braided themselves for their neglect of the Word of God. Look
now upon it. Is it the same to you as any other book ? I do not
ask you whether you have full foith, after personal investigation, in
all its contents, but are there no associations with its very exterior,
which have an amazing power over you ? Are not these designed,

390 EXTERNAL ASSOCIATIONS

like tlie tendrils of the vine, to attach you to a personal belief and
living understanding of the inspired contents of this volume ? See
what a power there was, in such associations, in the case of Bums,
the author of the Cotter's Saturday Night, in the midst of all liis
dissipation ; and you may as well untie your heartstrings, and un-
weave your whole intellectual and social life, as disregard all the
memories which are associated with the book of God.

Or the associations of which I speak may be of a more personal
and private character, even with the individuals wha once owned
and read the copy which is now in your possession. Perhaps it
was given to you by a parent, on your birthday, or at New Yearj
or on the day when you were leaving home, for school, or for the
city. It contains your name, and it may be some expression of love,
as kind as an angel could breathe, in the handwriting of the father
or the mother whose love for you was next in strength to the love
of your God and Saviour. You remember the request which was
made, that you would read it — the promise that you should never be
forgotten in affection and in prayer; and your regard to or neglect of
that request you have felt was the turning point of your destiny.

Years ago, a boy entered the counting room of an eminent mer-
cliaut in this city, and asked for employment. He was told that no
va^cancy existed at the time, and was about to withdraw, greatly dis-
appointed. Happening to mention that he had a letter of commenda-
tion from Mr. , the merchant requested to see it, remarking that

he had the greatest regard for that person. The boy fell upon
Ids knees, to unstrap the little valise which he carried in his hand,
to find the letter. . Taking out, in search of it, one and another of the
little articles which maternal love had neatly provided for his use and,
comfort, a small volume fell out, which caught the eye of the mer-
chant, who was looking on. *' What is this ? " said he. Oh, '' that
is my Bible," replied the boy. " And do you read it ? " " Always/'
said he, in artless simplicity — "and when I left home, I promised my
mother that I would read two chapters in it every day." The men-
tion of his mother, the thought of his separation from her, and his
own disappointment, brought a glistening tear to the boy's eye, which
as quickly, by untold sympathy, infected the stern nature of the
man who was bending over him. "Well," said the merchant, "I will
take you into my employ." And never from that time did he have
occasion to distrust the integrity of the boy whom he then received,

CONNECTED WITH THE BIBLE. 391

and who himself then began a career which ended in affluence and
honor. Do you think it strange, that when he became a man, he
should cherish with peculiar regard the identical volume with which
was associated all his success in the world ?

Or the copy now in your possession was once the property of some
esteemed friend, who has now gone from the earth. It may be a
memorial, sent to you from his sick chamber, with some kind message,
intended to turn your thoughts to its more frequent perusal; or, ac-
cidentally, as we say, it has fallen into your hand, when laid aside
by him who needs it no more. Casting your eye along its pages,
you perceive that many of its verses have been marked by its former
owner. Forthwith you begin to imagine what must have been the
reflections which these verses excited, at the time they were thus
designated as matters of special interest. The eye which now is
closed in death once glanced along these very characters. Here is
a place where it rested with a special attention ; perhaps a tear of
penitence fell upon this very page, and here a ray of joy was kin-
dled in the eye which is now rayless forever. Here are promises
which were of great comfort during a long illness and the weariness
of a sick room. It is not necessary for me to ask whether they are
illusion or truth; the fact is, they were regarded as substantial truth
by the individual who read them, and were an actual support to him
in life and in death. In the faith of these he died. Do they not
address me, therefore, with a special force ? Whither has the spirit
departed? With what emotions does he now look back to those
very thoughts and dispositions which were nurtured by the Bible ?
What is eternity ? What is death ? How near may the departed
spirit be to me, the moment that I now read ? I look upon a blind
person, and perceive that by the loss of a single sense he is shut out
from all perception of surrounding objects ; or a deaf person, who by
the loss of one faculty is ever after insensible to the sounds so dis-
tinct to all others. And I am startled to think how near the reali-
ties of the spiritual world may be to me; just as near as the sights
and sounds of this world are to the blind and deaf, and yet I do not
now perceive them, for want of the proper faculty. But shall I infer
that those objects do not exist, and that other beings are incapable
of perceiving them, and holding intercourse with them ? Is there
not in fact an intercourse, through memory, and through love, of our
souls, with the departed ? We know that it would have given them

392 EXTERNAL ASSOCIATIONS

pleasure, could they have anticipated, that wheu we look into the vol-
ume which was once theirs, and upon the passages which once con-
veyed special instruction to them, our remembrance of them would
''■ infuse a more touching significance " into these very words — thus
''retaining them, though invisibly, and without their actual presence,
in the exorcise of a beneficent influence." * Is it nothing to us, when
our eye rests on the copy of the Bible, in aid of its eff"ectual impression,
that memory recalls the friend with whom it is associated, and imagi-
nation apprehends him, when now, under a mightier manifestation of
truth, as still animated with a spirit which would, if that'were consist-
ent with the laws of the higher economy, convey to me yet again the
same testimony and injunctions? Is all influential relation dissolved
by the withdrawment from mutual intercourse; so that let my friends
die, and I am as loose of their hold upon me as if they had ceased
to exist, or never had existed ? The supposition is inadmissible.
The voice of many a departed friend seems to address us, from the
very exterior of the Bible, not to slight the truths which are so
sacredly associated with their memory.

And from these personal recollections, the mind glances to asso-
ciations yet more general. The Imtory of the Bible is associated
with every mention of its divine claims. It has not been monopolized
by a few individuals or families. It has had a long and eventful'
history. No book has been so often translated, into so many lan-
guages, and of none have so many impressions been made. . Its home
has been the world. It has been domesticated in the distant East,
and travelled on the wave of life to the West. What untold mill-
ions of the human race have seen it, and handled it, and been more
or less aff'ected by it. We cannot divest ourselves of the remem-
brance of the multitudes who have believed it. What we have seen
it accomplish in our domestic observation, that we know it has ac-
complished in the case of millions beside. We have heard, we have
read of thousands, who valued it beyond gold, who lived in its light,
and died in its hope. It bears with it the testimony of ten thousand
times ten thousand. Whenever we think of it, we think of the
great muster roll of the saints, in all ages, and in all lands. It is
pei'fumed by the fragrance of their piety. It is illuminated by the
glory of their ascension. I,t is borne down into our hands along with

* John Foster.

CONNECTED WITH THE BIBLE. 393

the accumulated memories of the world, and associated ■with the ex-
perience of the multitudes, -whom no man can number in heaven,
whose testimony in its advocacy is as the sound of many waters.

The very sight of it recalls the forms of those who were reputed
to be its authors. Never before did such a conclave of worthies
people the halls of our imagination. Never did such sanctity and
awe surround the legislators and heroes of the world, as invest the
names of those vrho are associated with the authorship of the Bible.
Moses is before us, the shepherd amid the sublime solitudes of
Horeb, and the deliverer of a nation out of bondage; admitted to an
audience with God on the curtained top of Sinai, the leader of a host
in march, in battle, in worship, and in peace; and at length, dis-
appearing from human view, after the vision from the summit of
Ncbo — uniting in his person the qualities of legislator, soldier, his-
torian, poet, beyond any other the world has seen. And Samuel
passes along in the train, in whose ear at midnight, when yet a child,
the voice of God was heard, startling the silence of the night, the
stern old judge, the anointer of kings, the awe-struck seer. David
follows on, now a stripling, working deliverance for his country's
armies, from the host of the Philistines, challenging a mighty giant
to mortal combat, and bringing back, he a ruddy boy, the huge head
of the fallen foe; now a king in Zion, the leader of the worshippers
in those jubilant songs which filled the courts of the temple, and
now waking the echoes of the night, in the compos-ition of those
odes which were designed to be universal and immortal. And his
3'outhful son is not forgotten. With wisdom when a youth surpass-
ing the oldest sage, enthroned amid wealth and glory such as im-
agination never had conceived, recording in sententious form that
knowledge which his own experience had discovered. And Isaiah,
and Jeremy, and Daniel, and all the choir of the prophets — robed in
mystery, yet luminous with awful sanctity — uttering the deep things
of God, and from the high places, to which they were led, announcing
to the world beneath the events of future and distant ages. Theu
there breaks upon our view the company of the apostles, the reputed
authors of the later poi'tions of the book. We stop not to decide, or
even to inquire, whether indeed they were moved by the Holy Ghost
to write what was ascribed to their authorship, for our minds are
filled with the remembrance of their tragic deaths, as gathered from
history, which imparts a sort of fascination to the words which are said

394 EXTERNAL ASSOCIATIONS

to have proceeded from their pens. Matthew suifering martyrdom
in Ethiopia — Mark iu Egypt — John exiled by Domitian — James
precipitated fi*om the temple at Jerusalem — Peter requesting to be
crucified with his head downwards — and Paul beheaded in Nero's
reign at Rome, flinching not from danger, doing all things, daring
all things, and giving the best and mightiest confirmation of what
they wrote, by a cheerful martyrdom. All these associations are in
advance of any scrutiny of their several arguments, and surround the
Scriptures themselves with a power of impression from which it is
difficult, if not impossible, to divest ourselves.

Then there sweeps before our vision the great army of the mar-
tyrs, whose attachment to this book was stronger than the love cf life.
It was with them in the cells where they were imprisoned. They
carried it in their bosoms, and next to their hearts, when on their
way to the scaffold. It kindled up that strange gladness which out-
shone the flames which consumed them, and inspired them with that
heroism which incites and captivates us without our choice. Nor can
we forget the efforts which have been made to exterminate this book
from the earth. Kings have leagued together to destroy it. They
have ransacked the dwellings of those who had been suspected of
possessing it. The world has been convulsed with wars and battles
over and around this single volume. But, lo ! it has emerged from
them all, like a veteran unscarred from a thousand fields, and laden
with the spoils of its bloodless victories. What conquests has it won,
over those who have ridiculed, and argued, and despised, and hated,
and attacked it. Men of all climes have been proud to do it hom-
age. The Littletons and the Rochcstcrs, who once made it the
theme of profane wit, came at length to receive it with faith and
eladness. What testimonies, to its truth were extorted from the
Rousseaus and Yoltaires, whose life-long opposition had left it un-
harmed. Calm and uninjured, it emerges from the floods which
have swept over it, the fires which have been kindled upon it, and
the blood which has flowed around it, and passes into our hands,
with all these glorious recollections of its history, '

" The milk-white hind, immortal and unchanged."

Then, again, we remember that it is associated with the best minds
and with the best men c>f whom our species can boast. The golden-
mouthed Chrysostom preached from it at Antioch and Constantino-
ple ; so did Ambrose at Milan ; Gregory Nazianzen ; and Jerome, at

CONNECTED WlXn THE BIBLE. 395

• Rome. The eloquence of Massillon was inspired by it, and the sub-
lime genius of Pascal fed upon it. It is the very book out of which
the daughters of Milton read to the blind old prophet, and by whose
inspiration he was borne up,

"Above the Aonian Slount,"

" to the height of his great argument."

It was with Euuyan in jail at Bedford, and suggested and informed
that wonderful allegory which for its inventive genius will ever be
held the second uninspired book in our language. It was the very
book which Newton studied more than he studied those other Scrip-
tures, the stars of heaven ; which Bacon and Boyle and Locke be-
lieved with unfaltering faith. Raphael and Guido and Rubens drew
from it the inspiration of their art. The ripest scholars of the world
have passed their lives in unfolding its import. It was eulogized by
Sir William Jones, Sir Matthew Hale, and Sir Samuel Romilly.
The gravest judges, the wisest legislators, have honored it, and it
spreads itself out, and rolls down, like another Pactolus, with its
sands of gold, through all forms and departments of literature, in-
forming our language, tinging our books, and leaving its impression
on everything which it touches.

Nor can we forget that this very volume, whatever are its contents
and its claims, is historically related to all the great movements and
reforms of the world, especially with all the advances of civil and
religious liberty. It is the good old book which WicklifFe studied
in the cloisters of Morton College ; out of which John Huss
preached so eloquently in Bethlehem chapel, at Prague. It is the
book which was the sole armory of Luther, and with which, like
a lever, he pried up fifty millions of people to liberty of thought
and life. The very same which Calvin and Beza and Melancthon,
and their accomplished coadjutors in France and SAvitzerland,
employed in the revival of letters and the reformation of religion.
It was this from which John Knox thundered out his denunciations
of despotism, from the windows of the Canongate. This is asso-
ciated with the martyrdom of Cranmer and Ridley, at Oxford. It
is this very book, a part of which Alfred the Groat translated
into the English tongue, and in which he found the seeds of all
good and wise culture — the book from which patriotism and lib-
erty have drawn all their inspiration. Here was it that Algernon
Sidney found his best arguments in defence of what he called on the

i3y(3 EXTERNAL ASSOCIATIONS

scaffold, " the good old cause." It lay beneath the head of Argyle,
when sleeping in his cell the sweet sleep of infancy, within an hour
of his execution. It was quilted into the doublet of John Hampden,
and saturated with his blood, when, throwing his arms around the
neck of his faithful horse, he was borne from the battle-field to die.
" Sire," said Lady Kachel Russell to Charles II, '' I shall never for-
give myself for having knelt to your Majesty. My noble husband is
too good a man to live in your Majesty's domains. I will hasten to
the tower and prepare him for the kingdom of God;" and this was
the book out of which that heroic woman read to her husband, the
night before he was beheaded. It was out of this that Cromwell
read aloud, at the head of his troops, before the battle of Naseby.
It came over in the Mayflower. The first compact of constitutional
liberty in that ship was written upon its cover. It had a place in
every cabin which our fathers reared in the wilderness. The soldiers
of the revolution carried it in their knapsacks. The First -Con-
gress of the United States took measures to increase its circulation.
It was the book on which Washington laid his honest hand when
taking his solemn oath of office. It lies in every court of justice, to
secure the sanctity of oaths; and to-day, a whole nation is instructed
in its precepts.

And all these associations are connected with the mere exterior of .
the Bible. They are distinct from all faith in the origin and authority
of its contents. They are the light which flickers about the very
covers of this wonderful book — a light like the luminous atmosphere
which, according to mythology, encircles whatever is celestial. And
you will observe that the associations of which I have spoken are not
superstitions or prejudices, but the offspring of historical realities.
They are the shadows of actual facts; and though they are external
and incidental, yet are they as real to us as any matters which belong
to our existence. The Bible is not to us the same as any other book.
There is no other book with which are connected such memories and
such varied associations. Say that these associations do not amount
to a demonstration of the truth of the Bible. We admit it, but they
exist; there is power in them. They enter into the very structure
of our minds and hearts. We cannot divest ourselves of them. They
were designed to aid the impression of all which the Bible contains.
They are prepossessions in favor of its authority. They are feelings
which prepare us to listen to its oracular voices.

CONNECTED WITH THE BIBLE. 397

Much has been written, in our days, as to the desirableness of a ncio
translation' of the Scriptures. After all which has been said of the
changes of words, after all admissions as to the result of severe crit-
icisms, we confess ourselves impatient of all proposals fur what may
be called a new version of the Bible. We like not this moderuiziug
of what is ancient — this association of the new with what is old and
venerable, and which, in these our times, cannot be changed without
disturbing the landmarks of centuries, the very standard and anchor-
age of our language. We should as soon think of changing the por-
traits of our ancestors, putting them into a modern dress, or cutting
down the old oaks about the homestead, and substituting poplars and
willows. And we trust, for reasons not at all allied to superstition
or defective scholarship, that the light of the last day may shine
on the very book which to-day, wherever the English tongue is
spoken, reflects the light of God, in our homes and in our churches.

And now, with minds crowded with these lively and afi"ectionate
memories — these manifold associations by which the Bible connects
itself with our personal history, and with everything good, and great,
and hopeful, in the history of the world — we open its pages, and
examine its contents ; and here we find the secret of all that power
which is inseparable from the sacred volume. It is the Word of
God. It is a gift of light from the glory of the throne, to guide the
lost, and relieve the perplexities of the human soul. It contains the
legislation of the Most High for the universe. It pronjulgates a law,
addressed to the heart of every man. It reveals the only way in
which apostate men maybe reclaimed, the life of God in their souls be
rekindled, and, conscious of guilt as they are, may be saved. Pro-
ceeding from God, it is truth ; and herein lies its essential power —
its unmixed and everlasting truth. The Avords which God has
spoken are spirit and life. As a fire and as a hammer are they, to
break the rock in pieces. There is no power like that which divine
truth is capable of exerting on the mind and heart of man. The
great forces of nature, fire and frost, lightning and earthquake, are
but analogies to illustrate that greater power which the Word of
God has exerted, and will exert, upon the human soul. Enforced
by the Holy Spirit, it becomes the exceeding greatness of God's
power. It accomplishes an entire conversion in the interior dispo-
sitions of the individual man, according to the working of the mighty
power of God, which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him

398 EXTERNAL ASSOCIATION^

from the dead. And the change -which it works in the individual
is the pledge and promise of the changes it will work in the world.
There is no abuse which can outlive its power — no mountains of ice
that can stand before its heat. It is the wisdom of God, and the
power of God, unto salvation. Slowly and gradually, it may make
its way in time to come, as in time past. But the spirit of God is
in the wheels. There is no going back to the sun and the seasons.
The year is brought about, and the harvests will be ripened and
gathered. The roots of the great tree, in which the fowls of heaven
build their nests and sing, strike deeper, and spread themselves out
wider, feeling about the foundations of vast evils, working into every
little crevice, and growing slowly and silently, loosening the founda-
tion stones, and overturning them at last, as by the secret power of
God. Nor is there one good to be desired for man, whether for this
life or the life to come, which follows not in the train of that book,
which contains the wisdom, the truth, and the love, of God.

Two things, therefore, primarily should engage our attention.
First of all, receive the Word of God yourself, in a manner be-
coming its authorship — not as the word of man, but as it is, in truth,
the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. Disregard not
those memories which have been graven into your heart, and break
not away from those unnumbered associations by which the God'of .
'the Bible would draw you to a personal faith in its inspired contents.
Think how those recollections will haunt you, exasperating the
stings of remorse, if you should despise what God has. written, and,
with the light so clear, and the voice of God so distinct, you should
perish through neglect of that which was designed to save you.
Honor the Word of God. Love it. Believe it. Search it. Bind
it to your heart. Let it dwell in you richly in all wisdom. Live by
its light, and let your head be pillowed upon its supports when you
are called to die.

What is of value to you, impart to others. Shoio your value of the
Bible by your disposition to distribute it. Flame is not extinguished
by kindling another. Who can frame an objection to the universal
circulation of the Word of God ? It is the cheapest, surest, and most
compendious mode of accomplishing every good, and remedying every
evil, which ever came within the desires or notice of philanthropy and
piety. It is the inspiration of liberty, the fountain of knowledge, the
stability of justice, the cement of society, the reform of mischief, the

CONNECTED "WITH THE BIBLE. 399

impulse to progress, the restraint from excess, the focus of all light
and love, the solution of doubt, the remedy for sin, the source of
hope, the security of the soul, and the written charter of heavenly
citizenship. Give it, then, to all who will receive it ; and when the
history of life shall be unwound, in the day of Revelation, it may be
disclosed what the book which goes forth as your gift shall accom-
plish in the world. Perhaps it goes into some school-house in a
distant settlement, and there trains a group of children in their no-
bility and duty as citizens. Perhaps it goes into some prison, and
there inspires the last hope that God does not forsake even the most
guilty ; or to some alms-house, to comfort some sick and aged victim
of want with the thought of his father's house, with bread enough
and to spare; or to the forecastle of some ship, to preach to the mar-
iner amid the solitude of the seas ; or into the hands of the immi-
grant— the first gift which Christian freedom dispenses, at the enter-
ing in of the gates; or it crosses the ocean, and, within a few weeks,
the missionary will distribute its varied translations in Constantino-
ple, in Ceylon, in Canton, in Africa, and in all the islands of the
sea. And long after you are dead, immortal minds will be weaving
around this very volume those memories and associations which now
encircle your own Bible, investing them with sanctity, with love, and
with power — minds which, sanctified by truth and saved by grace,
you will meet hereafter; amid the glories of your Father's Eangdora.

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niS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 403

"When the siuner deposits his immortal soul into the hands of the
Redeemer, he must entertain a proper estimate of its nature and
value. This is our immaterial and immortal nature endowed with
the high capacity of knowing, loving, serving, and enjoying God.
This is the distinguishing characteristic of man, that he was made
in the image of God, in knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness.
Though sin has defaced this image, and despoiled man of spiritual
life and moral beauty, and impaired his intellectual vigor, still he
retains the remains of his former grandeur, like a palace in ruins.
There is no thought so strongly impressive and afifecting, as that, in
its endless existence, it is the heir of endless happiness or misery.
" What is a man profited if he gain the whole world, and lose his
own soul ? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul ? "
" The redemption of the soiil is precious, and it ceaseth forever."
Yet how thoughtless a.nd regardless are the great mass of mankind
as to their souls, the relations they sustain to God, and the results of
death and opening eternity. " They are of the earth, earthy." They
look to things seen and temporal, and walk in the light of their own
eyes, and after the desires of their own heart." Remaining in this
state, they feel no need of deliverance from the power and effects of
sin, and will make light of^ and neglect, and refuse, the purchased
and proffered salvation of the Redeemer. " They that are whole
need not a physician, but they that are sick."

Hence the sinner, in coming to Christ, and committing his soul
into His hands, must exercise that " godly sorrow which works re-
pentance unto salvation, not to be repented of." This is not that
" sorrow of the world which worketh death," in the mere remorse of
conscience under the terrors of the law, in the fear of deserved
wrath, or the distress generated by the disappointments and trials of
life. But it is a sorrow produced by the renewed principle of love
planted in the soul by the Holy Spirit, and exercised in the
light of divine truth, strictly applied. The law of God, which he
approves as " holy, just, and good, which was ordained to life, he
finds to be unto death." By the law, he gains the knowledge of
sin. He becomes deeply and thoroughly convinced of the guilt and
pollution of sin, which reigns within and over him. He experiences
that it is an evil as well as bitter thing, that he has forsaken the foun-
tain of living water, and " hewn out to himself broken cisterns that
can hold no water." He realizes his desert, and apprehends the

404 THE christian's confidence in committing

peril of his inheritance of everlasting woe. It is not so much to the
outward acts and eiFects of sin that his mind is exercised, and his
heart impressed, as to the inward motives, principles, and aifeetions,
of his soul, and he traces all the streams to the fountain within. It
is in reference to the God of infinite holiness and goodness, as well
as majesty, and in view of His holy and perfect law, the fulfilment
of which is love, and also of all the relations He sustains to us, and
the claims He holds over us, that true conviction and penitence are
induced and exercised. Thus the psalmist, in the penitential fifty-
first psalm, confesses, "Against Thee, Thee only^ have I sinned, and
done this evil in Thy sight, that Thou mightest he justified tohen Thou
speakest, and clear when Thoujudgest." With this confession are
united two prayers, distinctly referring to the two great blessings
comprised in the sinner's salvation, as exhibited in the Gospel, justi-
fication and sanctification. " Wash me thoroughly from my iniqui-
ty, and cleanse me from my sin." " Create within me a clean
heart, and renew a right spirit." Under these convictions, the sin-
ner earnestly institutes the inquiry, *' What must I do to be saved ? "
He finds in himself neither righteousness nor strength. He can
present before God nothing but guilt and spiritual helplessness.
Paul relates his own experience in the seventh chapter of his Epis-
tle to the Romans: " Iwas alive loithout the law once, hut when the
commandment came, sin revived, and I died." Ignorant of the spir-
ituality and strictness of the law of God, he was alive in the pride
of his self-righteousness and his presumed safety. But when the
commandment (which says, " thou shalt not covet ") came, sin re-
vived. The law of God, searching and trying his inward spirit, and
discovering his secret thoughts, motives, and affections, as the springs
of action, and shedding light upon the retrospect of the past, slew
the pride of his fallen nature. '' Sin revived ; " he saw and felt the
working of it within his soul, and traced the fruits of it in his life.
He then died as to his legal hopes and self-confidence, and became
an humble and fervent suppliant for pardoning mercy and saving
grace. Men, in their natural state, are characterized as " being
ignorant of God's righteousness, and, going about to establish their
own righteousness, they have not submitted themselves to the right-
eousness of God." But ^hen the light of divine truth enters the
soul, and the Word, quick and powerful, becomes a discerner of the
thoughts and intents of the heart, the selfish ease and confidence of

HIS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 405

the sinner departs, his legal confidence gives way, and, instead of
taking the attitude and indulging in the boasting of the Pharisee,
he, like the publican, with downcast eye and deeply-sorrowful spirit,
utters, in the fullness of his soul, " God be merciful to me a sinner."
Under deep conviction of sin, the sinner is often long embarrassed
with vain endeavors, in some form and manner of self-righteousness,
to prepare himself for the reception of mercy. He finds himself in-
sidiously betrayed into legal strivings, which prevent him from a ready
and cordial acceptance of the free and unrestricted offers and invi-
tations of the Gospel. A strong sense of guilt and of depravity and
spiritual impotence for a time keep back from the Saviour, instead
of leading at once to Him, as " able to save unto the uttermost." At
last, forsaking every other refuge, and renouncing all attempts at
preparing himself by any labor or exercise of his own to obtain the
favor of God through Christ, he accepts the free gift. of God, "with-
out money and without price ; " and in that acceptance he makes an
entire surrender of himself, to be made " the temple of the Holy
Ghost." He cordially adopts the sentiment —

" Should my tears forever flow,
Should my zeal no languor know,
This for sin could not atone ;
Thou must save, and Thou alone.
In my hand no price I bring;
Simply to Thy Cross I cling."

Now he looks to the Lamb of God, that takes away the sin of the
world, and finds " peace in believing."

" A guilty, weak, and helpless worm,

On Thy kind arms I fall ;
Be Thou my strength and righteousness,

My Jesus and my all."

In committing the soul into the hands of the Redeemer, there is a
believing contemplation and reliance on the Saviour, in view of his
designation in the everlasting covenant of peace to accomplish the
work of redemption, as the Mediator and surety of His people, of
His personal and ofl5cial qualifications, as " Immanuel, God with us,"
of the ofl&ces which He executes, the relations in which He stands
to sinners, and of the free invitation and exceeding great and pre-
cious promises recorded in His Word. There is a passage in the

406 THE christian's confidence in committing

forty-fifth chapter of Isaiah, to which Paul has reference in the
second chapter of the Epistle to the Philippians, which is beautifully
expressive on this point : " Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the
ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else. I have
sworn by Myself, the word is gone forth in righteousness, and shall
not return, that unto Me every knee shall bow, and every tongue
shall swear. Surely, shall one say, in the Lord have I righteousness
and strength; even to him shall men come, and all that are incensed
against them shall be ashamed. In the Lord shall all the seed of
Israel be justified, and shall glory." How luminous, instructive,
and attractive, in the light of the Gospel, are the invitations and
promises in the beginning of the fifty-fifth chapter of the same
prophet Isaiah : " Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the
waters, and he that hath no money, come ye, buy, and eat; yea,
come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Where-
fore do ye spend money for that which is not bread, and your labor
for that which satisfieth not. Hearken diligently unto me, and eat
ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.
Incline your ear, and come unto me. Hear, and your soul shall live,
and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, even the sure
mercies of David."

The promises interwoven with the invitations of the Word of God
are said to be in " Christ Jesus YEA and amen," true and faithful.
They are founded upon the finished redeeming work of Christ, in
which the Father is well pleased, and which is the pledge of all
blessings, the fruit of His purchase, and the gift of His grace. It is
in the covenant, confirmed, and ratified in the death of Christ, that
the sinner, by faith, seeks his refuge, and now ''joins himself to the
Lord in a perpetual covenant never to be forgotten." He now "first
gives himself to the Lord, and then to us," the church. Of this
covenant, the royal psalmist at the close of life, commemorating the
vicissitudes of his pilgrimage, says, " Yet the Lord has made with me
an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things, and sure, for this is
all my salvation, and all my desire."

The expressions in the two clauses of the text are of the same im-
port. In the first clause the apostle says, ''I know whom I have
BELIEVED." In the second, he says, " He will keep what I have
COMMITTED to Him." CGmmitting the soul into the hands of the
Saviour, and believing on Him, are therefore identical in import. In

HIS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 407

the first chapter of the Gospel of John, we read, '< To as many as
received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God,
even to them who believe on His name." Faith, receiving the
Saviour in all His saving works and offices, able to save unto the
uttermost, commits the interests of the undying precious soul, in all
circumstances, in time and for eternity, into His hands, with unwa-
vering and cordial confidence. Faith, as justifying and saving, is
simply accrediting the testimony which God has given concerning
His Son, and receiving Him, in His whole character, work, and ben-
efits, as He is therein ofi"ered. " He is made of God unto us wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption." " By grace are ye
saved, through faith." Faith renounces all of self, finding nothing
therein but guilt and pollution, magnifies and trusts the freeness and
riches of divine grace, and accepts and embraces Christ, as the un-
speakable gift of God. This faith, humbling the sin-ner and exalting
the Saviour, comprises in its operation the elements of the new spir-
itual life, and so " works by love, purifies the heart, and overcomes
the world." It receives Christ, and then yields all to Him, in love
and obedience. Faith, receiving Christ as " the end of the law for
righteousness," is prior, in the time and order of evangelical exer-
cise, to its rendering dedication to the service of Christ. These two
exercises, connected as they ever are, are distinct in their nature, as
well as order. The one looks to Christ as the Lamb of God taking
away the sin of the world, is the act of a condemned sitiner receiving
pardon, and restored to favor ; the other is the act of the sinner, quick-
ened and restored to spiritual life, yielding his homage of love and
obedience to Him " who loved him, and gave Himself for him," in
dependence upon the grace of the Holy Spirit. The doctrines of
justification and sanctification are the two grand pillars of evangel-
ical truth, standing side by side, inseparable in the positions they
occupy, yielding mutual influence, yet never to be blended and con-
founded. Faith, receiving Christ, and committing the soul into His
hands, owns Him as a complete Saviour; as " all in all ; " as Prophet,
to receive all his instructions ; as Priest, to rest entirely and contin-
ually on His atoning sacrifice and prevailing intercession ; and as
Kiuff, to yield submissively and obediently to His rule and govern-
ment, in providence and grace. The surrender to Christ, when re-
ceived by faith, connects time with eternity, respects, in their appro-
priate and sure combination, pardon and holiness, grace and glory.

408 THE christian's confidence in committing

When the sinner comes to Christ, resting on his finished redemption,
and pleading the promises, and so finds peace in believing, he can
join in the words —

" Welcome, welcome, dear Redeemer,

Welcome to this heart of mine. '

Lord, I make a full surrender,

Ev'ry power and thought be Thine;

Thine entirely,
Through eternal ages Thine."

II. The persuasion which the believer cherishes of the everlasting
interests of his soul in the hands of His Redeemer.

It is a persuasion founded upon right knowledge. It is a belief of
the truth in the light of which the knowledge to which the apostle
alludes, and the persuasion which he entertains, are formed and cul-
tivated. Persuasion is the gentle and strong influence of the truth,
convincing the mind, moulding the affections, and subduing the will.
The persuasion of which the apostle speaks is therefore one formed
and regulated by the truth, and enlightened in its nature. It is not
the efl'ect of blind impulse, of assumed visions and revelations, or of
any direct impressions on the soul, without the constant and careful
test of divine truth. The apostle, in the eighth chapter of the Epis-
tle to the Romans, says, '' The Spirit itself beareth witness with our
spirits, that we are the children of God," &c., and not to or upon our
spirits. He exhibits in the context, in an instructive and rich
discussion, the fruits of the operation of the Spirit in believers;
and thus the Spirit bears its witness, by shining on His own work
in the soul, mortifying its corruptions, and quickening and nour-
ishing its holy aflfections through the truth. Hence an accurate
acquaintance with the truth, carefully and constantly studied, treas-
ured up and applied, is necessary to the formation, preservation, and
establishment, of the persuasion or assurance spoken of. In the
knowledge of the state, character, and prospects, of ourselves, as sin-
ners, derived from the clear and faithfully-applied knowledge of
divine truth, will spring forth, in increasing tenderness and power,
that "repentance which is unto salvation." In the knowledge of
the Lord Jesus Christ, in His mediatorial character and work, in His
glory and grace, will be called forth that faith which secures and
embraces salvation, and which is the vital and controlling element

HIS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 409

of the Christian life. In the knowledge of the delineation of the
beauty of holiness in all its range and fullness, exhihited in the
Divine Word, and urged by all claims and motives pressed upon the
soul by the love of Christ, who died that we should live, ardent
desires and strenuous efforts to follow after peace and holiness, in the
footsteps of Christ, will be induced. All these fitly coalescing, the
soul will sweetly and firmly rest in this persuasion. The apostle
prays in behalf of the Ephesian believers, " The God of our Lord
Jesus Christ, the Father of Glory, give unto you the spirit of wis-
dom and revelation, that ye may know what is the hope of His call-
ing, and what the riches of the glory of Ilis inheritance." He prays
in behalf of the Philippian believers, " This I pray, that your love
may abound more and more in knowledge and in all judgment." For
himself he says, '' I count all things but loss, for the excellency of the
knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord." This persuasion is the result
of spiritual illumination, as the Spirit opens the eyes of the under-
standing ^' to behold wondrous things out of the law of God." It
is calmly formed, because it is enlightened.

This persuasion rests upon the testimoni/ of the God of infinite
veracity and faithfulness. " This is the record, that God hath given
us eternal life, and this life is in His Son," says the apostle John.
God has given the record sure and imperishable in His own inspired
Word of Truth and Grace, and this record testifies of the gift a£
eternal life which is in Christ Jesus. It is the testimony of this
record alone which can solve the questions which have ever per-
plexed and baffled the loftiest exercise of human reason, which affect
God, man, sin, death, salvation, the results in eternity. Without
the light of this testimony, men remain in the shadow of death,
wandering in devious paths, in the broad way to destruction. But
where the record is unfolded, life and immortality are brought to
light. It is given by inspiration, and stamped with the seal of His
divine covenant faithfulness. Here nothing but the testimony of
God can avail and satisfy; and here, in the record he has given us,
it is found in all its clearness, sufficiency, and practical adaptation.
If in temporal matters we confide our interests into the hands of our
fellow men of tried honesty, clear judgment, and practical wisdom,
with quietness, shall we not, in the higher interests of our souls,
believing the record of His truth, in firm confidence appropriate His
tried Word and faithful promises, and commit our souls into the

410 THE christian's CONFIDENCE IN COMMITTING

hands of the crucified but now exalted Redeemer ? In this record
we have the matter attested — '' eternal life which is in Christ, and
the testimony of God concerning it." Both are needed as a basis
for the persuasion of the Christian, viz : a divine testimony, author-
itative, sure, and satisfying, and the matter attested of inestimable
value, and suited to man's wants and interests in eternal life. The
apostle, in the sixth chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, writes,
bearing upon this point, " God, willing to show to the heirs of
promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath ;
that by two immutable things, wherein it was impossible for God to
lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to
lay hold upon the hope set before us." The truths in this record are
the opened Scriptures, because written on the tablets of the hearts
of Christ's children by the Holy Spirit. There grows a strict cor-
respondence between the experience of the soul, and the teachings
of divine truth which it receives. The believer thus " sets to .his
seal that God is true," and " has the witness in himself." Herein
is found a ground of his full persuasion.

In the progress of the Christian life, the believer rests his per-
suasion and confidence on the same grounds on which he at first, at
conversion, committed his soul into the hands of the Redeemer. At
every stage of his course, he must be " looking unto Jesus." " As he
has received the Lord Jesus Christ, so he must walk in Him." His
experience and language are, " I am crucified with Christ, neverthe-
less I live ; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me j and the life that I now
live in the flesh is a life of faith in the Son of God, who loved me,
and gave Himself for me."

In proportion to the clearness and directness of the views which
the believer entertains of the glory and grace of the Saviour, as re-
vealed in His Word, will be the stability of his faith and the sweet-
ness of his assurance. We are prone to seek within and from our-
selves some ground of confidence in our approach to the Saviour,
substituting our exercises and experience in the place of the finished
work of Christ, and the work of the Spirit forming in us *' Christ
the hope of glory." Our exercises vary through the sympathy ex-
isting between body and soul, and in the decays and fluctuations
incident to the spiritual life. Corresponding with these fluctuations
will be those of the light, peace, and spiritual strength, arising from
the right and vigorous operation of that faith which receives aud

HIS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 411

exalts Christ, and ever draws out of the fullness of His grace. The
native pride of our hearts is insidiously seeking to find what may be
termed an evangelical righteousness of our own, instead of directly
appropriating the righteousness of Christ. All that the Christian
learns from the study of his own heart, and the dealings of the Lord
reviewed, should lead him to a more simple and entire trust in the
Saviour, in the reception of all His grace. It deserves to be remarked,
that the apostle does not say, " I know that I have believed," but
" WHOM I have believed." It is our knowledge of our confidence
and love to the Saviour that defines and characterizes our spiritual
state. In all circumstances of trials without and conflicts within, it
is equally our privilege and duty to go to the Saviour by '' the new
and living way which He has opened and consecrated," and, plead-
ing the promises with a childlike freedom and boldness, " obtain
mercy, and find grace to help in time of need."

It is incumbent on Christians to treasure up the memory of their
experience of the wisdom, loving kindness, power, and faithfulness
of God, in their heavenly pilgrimage. " Thou shalt remember all
the ways in which the Lord thy God hath led thee." The use of
Christian experience, in the review of it, is not to make it a ground
of confidence or source of comfort in itself, but to view it as a proof
and confirmation of the Divine Word, and thus to derive therefrom
encouragement to trust in it with firmer and more unreserved confi-
dence. Paul says, in the first chapter of the second- Epistle to the
Corinthians, referring to past deliverances, " Who delivered from so
great a death, and doth deliver ; in whom we trust that He will yet
deliver." The review of the past is made subservient to the exer-
cise of trust in the providence and promise of God for the future. In
the book of Psalms, which comprises an anatomy of the believing
soul in all the phases of its experience, we find continual reference
to the past, as an encouragement to trust, hope, and comfort, in the
present, and for the future.

In cherishing and cultivating this Christian assurance, while it
must rest on Christ as the only and sure foundation, the Holy Spirit,
whose office it is to take the things of Christ, and show them to the
soul, and who is the great agent in the economy of redemption, in
renewing, sanctifying the soul, and training it for eternal life, must
be specially honored. He is represented as '' sealing us unto the day
of redemption," and as " being the earnest of our inheritance." We

412 THE christian's confidence in committing

are not to grieve this Spirit by failing in dependence upon His
needed and promised gracious influences. How striking is the com-
prehensive and beautiful delineation of the Christian life in the
twentieth and twenty-first verses of the Epistle of Jude : " But,
ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying
in the Holy Ghost ; keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for
the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life." The apostle's
prayer in behalf of the believers at Rome, whom he addressed, was,
"Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace, in believing,
that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost."

We are exhorted (Hebrews, x, 22) to draw near with a true heart,
in the full assurance of faith, &c. In the Hebrews, sixth chapter,
eleventh verse, we are exhorted " to show the same diligence to the
full assurance of hope to the end." The assurance of faith and the
assurance of hope differ in the same manner as faith and hope them-
selves differ. Faith accredits the divine testimony, and applies the
truth directly and persistently to the soul. In its essential nature
and office, it is appropriating. It regards the truth not merely spec-
ulatively, with mental approbation, and with vague and indefinite
application to mankind at large, but brings the whole soul in indi-
vidual subjection to it, seeking to receive its instruction and partake
its blessings. Hope fastens on the promises, and lays hold on eternal
life set forth therein. It is evident that hope and the assurance of
hope follow in the order of nature and the process of influence, faith,
and the assurance of faith. But the trinity of graces^— faith, hope,
and charity — work and live and grow together. The true way to
gain assurance of hope is to cultivate precious faith, growing into
assurance. This view, rightly entertained and employed, will ani-
mate and strengthen faith, and inspire comfort. This assurance is
the privilege and duty of every Christian, presented in promise and
precept, and none should fail ardently and diligently to labor for the
attainment and enjoyment of it.

The subject teaches us —

1, The glory of the Redeemer, as the great object of faith.

" We beheld His glory," says John, " the glory of the only-be-
gotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, and of His fullness have
we all received grace for grace." His essential glory He had with
the Father before the foundation of the world. He became Im-
manuel, " God manifest in the flesh." His birth was heralded by

IIIS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 413

the angelic host on the plains of Bethlehem, uttering the song,
" Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth, and good will towards
men." He passed through His scene and course of humiliation,
meeting the contradiction of sinners, working wonders of mercy, and
distilling the lessons of wisdom. After the agonies of Gethseracne,
and amid the desertion and tortures of the Cross, He gives up the
ghost, exclaiming, " It is finished." He brake the bonds of death,
rose from the grave, ascended on high, leading captivity captive, and
is now exalted on the throne, to give repentance and remission of
sins. He is crowned Lord of all, having all power in heaven and
on earth, directing and controlling all the events of providGnce, and
head over all things, to save and bless His blood-bought church.
Angels adore Him as their Lord. The redeemed in glory exult in
the song, " "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, who loved us and
washed us in His own blood," &c. It is for us dwellers on earth to
take our place at the foot of the Cross, and look up to the Lamb of
God taking away our sin, and so find peace in believing. lie said,
" I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me." Feeling the at-
tractions of the Cross, let us look upwards to His throne, whence He
dispenses all grace, leading us on to the glory which is to be revealed,
becoming more and more assimilated to His image. " We all, with
open face beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed
into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the
Lord."

2. We learn the inestimable value of the sacred Scrij)tures, which
reveal Christ and His great salvation.

Our Saviour said, in reference to the Scriptures of the Old Testa-
ment, then existing, " Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think
ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of Me." " The
spirit of prophecy was the testimony of Jesus." The scriptures alone,
rendered effectual by the Holy Spirit, " make wise unto salvation,
and furnish unto all good works." *' In the reading of them," we find
" consolation and hope." The matter in the Psalms very impressively
unfolds the efficacy, value, and preciousness, of these Scriptures. The
hundred and nineteenth Psalm, at great length and in varied forms,
expresses the delight of the believing soul in them, and the influence
exerted by them. The Word of God should dwell in us richly, hid-
den in our hearts. Christians fail in making the Word of God the
theme of their daily and continued study, carefully, thoroughly pon-

414 THE christian's confidence in committing

dered and digested, and with prayer strictly applied to their indi-
vidual cases. Then would they be rooted and grounded in love to
Christ, and be built up on their most holy faith. It is said of the
man of God, in the first Psalm, " His delight is in the law of the
Lord, and in His law doth he meditate, day and night." The effect
is described. " He shall be like a tree planted by rivers of water,
that bringeth forth his fruit in his season ; his leaf also shall not
wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper."

3. We learn the freeness, as well as greatness, jp/ «^e salvation
which is in Christ Jesus.

It is, by Christ Himself, dearly purchased through His atoning
sacrifice ; but to the sinner it is the gift of free grace, proffered and
bestowed '• without money and without price." The invitation at
the close of the sacred volume is, " The Spirit and the bride say
come. And let him that heareth say come. And let him that
is athirst come; and whosoever will, let him take the water of
life freely." Jesus declared, <'Him that cometh untp Me, I
will in no wise cast out." Paul (in Romans, iii, 22) states *' the
righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ is unto all
and upon all them that believe, for there is no difference ; for all
have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." Sinners under
conviction are embarrassed, and do not discern and appreciate the
entire freeness of the way of access to God on the throne of
grace through Christ, because they fail to distinguish between the
warrant to. believe iu Christ, and the views and dispositions requisite
to embrace that warrant. The warrant to believe, is simply and wholly
the free ofter of the Gospel, in the freeness and fullness. of the bless-
ings of redemption to all who will accept. It is a faithful saying,
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to
save sinners. His only plea, is, I am a sinner; his only claim, Jesus
is the Saviour, able to save to the uttermost. The views and disposi-
tions requisite to embrace Christ are alone a deep and just conviction
of guilt and sin, an utter renunciation of righteousness of his own, and
the refuge of the soul in the controlling desires to the needed, suit-
able, and all-sufiicicnt salvation in Christ. The convinced and seek-
ing sinner, delivered from his embarrassment,, and discovering the
new and living way, in the freeness of divine grace, conies to Christ
in eutireness of cordial dependence, and free and full surrender.
His language is —

HIS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 415

{ "Just as I am, without one plea,

But that Thy blood was shed for me,
And that Thou bid'st me come to Thee,
Oh, Lamb of God, I come.

" Just as I am, Thou wilt receive,
"Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, reliere,
Because Thy promise I believe,
Oh, Lamb of God, I come."

How -wondronsly great and free is this salvation. " Come, for aU
things are readi/." Well may we exclaim, "How SHALL WE

ESCAPE, IF WE NEGLECT SO GREAT SALVATION ? "

4. We learn that the doctrine of salvation hi/ grace, through faith,
promotes and secures 7ioliness and good works.

The cavils and objections on this point, which have ever been
current in an unbelieving world, were addressed to the apostle in his
day. He at once repels them, with strong emphasis and holy in-
di"-nation. " Do we, then, through faith, make void the law? God
forbid. Nay, we establish the law." " Shall we continue in sin, that
grace may abound ? God forbid. How shall we, who are dead to
sin, live any longer therein ? " Dr. Owen remarks that the doctrine
of divine grace may be perverted and abused by men unacquainted
with its living power, but the principle of it in the soul never can.
The sinner, when united to Christ by faith, is a new creature, with
holy love implanted within him. This love is the fulfilling of the
law. It is this which now guides and regulates and controls the
motives, affections, and will. When the law was first written on
tables of stone, they were placed in the hands of Moses, fell from
his hand, and were broken. They were afterward written anew,
and placed within the ark of the covenant, beneath the mercy seat.
This well illustrates the covenant of works under which man was
first placed, when by transgression he fell, and the covenant was
broken. Under the new covenant of grace, founded on better prom-
ises, the law is ^vritten by the Divine Spirit on the heart of the
believer, and the faithfulness of God in the covenant is pledged.
There are two distinct yet ever united blessings of this covenant
referred to in the Old Testament, and quoted by Paul in the eighth
chapter of his Epistle to the Hebrews. The first is, " T will be mer-
ciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and iniquities will I
remember no more." The second is, " I will put my laws in their

416 THE CHRISTIAN'S CONFIDENCE IN COMMITTING

taiinds, and write them in their hearts; and I will be to them a Grod,
and they shall be my people." Christ's redeemed people are a " pe-
culiar people/' ever zealous in good works. '' The grace of God
which briugeth salvation" ever teaches to deny ungodliness and
worldly lust, &c. Christian experience will always accord with and
appreciate the sentiment in Romans, sixth chapter, fourteenth verse,
"Sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the
law, but under grace ; " not under the law as a covenant of works
unto life, but yet under it as the perfect rule of duty, delighted in
by the exercise of that love which is implanted by the Holy Spirit.

" To see the law by Christ fulfilled,
And hear His pardoning voice,
4 Will change a slave into a child,

5 -. And duty into choice.

■ M

" What shall I do ? was once the word,

That I may worthier grow?
What shall I render to the Lord?
Is my inquiry now."

5. We learn that this Jmoioledge and persuasion, or an assured
faith in Christ, is the spring of true enjoyment and happiness in the
soul. ,

• " Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is staid on Thee^
because he trustefh in Thee." In proportion as the soul of the be-
liever is staid upon Christ, in full persuasion and confirmed faith,
will he have peace, per/ec^ ^mce. In illustration of this, we shall
merely quote three passages from the New Testament. Romans, v,
1 — 5 : " Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God,
through our Lord Jesus Christ ; by whom also we have access to
the grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
And not only so, but we glory in tribulation, knowing that tribula-
tion worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience,
hope ; and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is
Bhed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost." Philippians, iv, G —
7; "Be careful for nothing; but in everything, by prayer and sup-
plication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto
God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall
keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus." Romans, viii,
31—35 : " What shall we then say to these things ? If God be for

niS SOUL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REDEEMER. 417

US, who can be against us ? He that spared not His own Son, but
delivered Ilim up for us all, how shall He uot with Ilim also freely
give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's
elect ? It is God that justificth. Who is he that condemneth ? It
is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at
the right hand of God, who also makcth intercession for us. Who
shall separate us from the love of Christ ? " He whose soul can
cultivate the spirit of these passages is the happy man.

27

THE TWO COURSES. 421

case, despises facts and devotes himself to phantoms; isolates him-
self from the sympathy of humanity, defies the scrutiny of Divinity,
boasts of his freedom from sin, and idles away his life as though
there were no ill to be feared in time or eternity. Surely every man
should pray that, whatever else shall happen, he may never fall into
such madness as this.

We may saij "we have no sin," but we have sin. Deceived or
not deceived, the fact remains the same. The truth may not be in
us, but the sin is in us.

How strange it is, that any should be disposed to deny sin] Look
for a moment at some of the questions connected with such denial.
For instance —

What kind of a book is the Bible, if "we have no sjn?"
Here, in part at least, is the oldest, and in all respects the most
sacred book in the world. Pre-eminently, it is a historical and pro-
phetical book. Its history goes back to the beginning of time; its
prophecy, forward to the end of time. In both relations it is uni-
versal. It commences with our race in its smallest origin, and con-
cludes with its last and greatest expansion. But this history — what
is it ? It is the history of sin and salvation ! And this prophecy —
what is it ? It is the prophecy of sin and salvation ! These are the
all-pervading and all-controlling themes of the whole book — sin and
salvation. Now, if " we have no sin," there is no sin ; and if there
be no sin, there is no salvation; and if there be neither sin nor salva-
tion, this history is a He, and this prophecy is a lie. Nothing can be
plainer than this : if there be neither sin nor salvation, the tvhole
Bible is a lie — for, if sin and salvation be abstracted from the Bible,
nothing is left.

Again : "What kind of a world is this, if " we have no
SIN ? " If the Bible be supposed false, our knowledge of the world
must be derived from the world itself. There is no other authority.
The Maker of the world, if there be any, says nothing. Angels, if
there be any, say nothing. Disembodied men, if there be any, say
nothing. Men in the body are passing shadows, in comparison with
the age of th.e earth. Profane history is all modern history. Mythol-
ogy and poetry are inventions and dreams. The records of science
are recent. The monuments of art are recent. Oral traditions arc
confused and untrustworthy. Nothing is left, as a really-ancient
source of instruction, but the surface of the planet itself.

422 THE TWO COURSES.

True, this is more instructive than it was. Geology opens its
strata, like so many pages of a legible and divine volume. But what
does it teach ? Substantially, it teaches that the world has always
been as full of evil as it is now — always a world of suffering and
death. As to prophecy, if prophetic at all, it teaches that the world
will always remain, as it has been and is, the awful realm of suffering
and death.

What — say you — does not the earth bear testimony to sin ? Not
a word like it ! And does it not intimate a hope of salvation ? Not
a word like it ! How, then, do you account for its suffering and
death ? Not in any way ! There is no use in trying. AVe may
suppose an Almighty Devil made the world, and provided suffering
and death for his amusement ! Without the Bible, we are at an
utter loss to account for anything.

Again : What a strange thing is conscience, if " we have
NO SIN ! " If the Bible be false in its allegation of sin, and nature
silent as to the existence of sin, and the truth is, that ^' we have no
sin," why the condemnations of conscience ? These are known
everywhere. Both sexes, all ages, and all conditions, know what is
meant by an accusing conscience. The stout man trembles, and the
pale woman withers, under' its power. The little child, downcast
and blushing, shows its early influence. Old age, hard-featured and
long-practiced, can scarcely hide the pains it inflicts. The savage
feels it in his most secret haunts, and the refined civilian enters no
social circle where conscience clings not to him, the closest com-
panion and qiiickest respondent in all the group. But how is this,
if, indeed, " we have no sin ? " Can any man tell ?

Asjain : What a strange thing is human history, if "we
have no sin ! " True, as stated, this is not an ancient history.
Still, it includes several thousand years. Trace it, and what do we
see.? All manner of acknowledgments of sin ! Where there is no
Bible, conscience prompts such acknowledgments. Natural evils
become tokens of the wrath of superior powers whom man has
offended. Storms, earthquakes, volcanoes, are tokens. J]very
eclipse, of sun or moon, is a token. Every drought, famine, pesti-
lence, every ordinary disease, or pain, accident, bereavement, is a
token. Gods multiply in heaven, like the stars. On earth, they
are as numerous as the hills and woods, streams and waves, or even
as the animals in all. There is no end of gods; and every god is

THE TWO COURSES. 423

angry, and every evil a judgment. So, temples are built, altars
erected, priesthoods consecrated, shrines endowed, sacrifices offered,
and all rites of worship established. Are not such the facts of
heathenism, through the whole historic period ? On the other hand,
where the Bible has been known, and even before its existence, ac-
cording to the Patriarchal traditions adopted and sanctioned by it,
what do we see but a corresponding though truer and sublimer
course ? The Patriarchs confessed sin and offered sacrifices ; the Isra-
elites did the same ; Christians, virtuallj', have always done the same.
First came the family altar; then, the national tabernacle; then, the
national temple; and, since these, innumerable cathedrals, churches,
and chapels, all over the world : all symbolizing the same things —
the confession of sin and hope of salvation. How, then, shall we
account for all this, if, indeed, " we have no sin ? "

But, look at one other question, a moment : What kind of a
BEING IS God, if "we have no sin ?" To me, it were as reason-
able to say, we have no God, as to say, " we have no sin." Still, the
text supposes the sinner to deceive himself, not by denying God, but
by denying sin. It is proper to ask, therefore, what kind of a being
is God, if " we have no sin ? "

Why, in addition to all minor fabrications, has He allowed this
great historical and prophetical fiction — this most mischievous false-
hood of the Bible — to be imposed, not only on the ignorant and
vicious, but also On the wisest, best, and noblest of, mankind ? Has
He no concern for His own honor — no regard for our interests? Are
truth and falsehood one to Him ?

Why, also, did He create such an imperfect world as this ? If
there be no sin in it, why so many evi'h ? Could He not have made
it a home of safety, bliss, and immortality ? What good does it yield
Him to breathe the blue famine on a moaning continent ? or let loose
the plague or cholera, to glide like a curse round the globe ? What
pleasure can he find in burning up little infants with scarlet fever,
or strangling them with whooping-cough, or stupefying them with
dropsy on the brain ? Of what advantage is it to Him to consume
the lungs of youthful beauty and genius ? to craze the only son of
the poor widow — driving the one to the madhouse, and the other to
the grave ? to paralyze the father of a family, and lay him helpless
for years in the midst of the dependent group, to whom he becomes
a burden, instead of proving an aid ? or, to take from an affectionate

424 THE TWO COURSES.

old man his last child, and turn the tottering steps of the friendless
survivor to the gate of an alms-house for the shelter of his last sad
days ? Does it please the Omnipotent to shake a city into ruins
by an earthquake, or overwhelm it with the lava of a volcano ? But,
why multiply instances ? Let us pass on.

Why, then, does God set up this power of conscience in our
breasts ? Are not external evils enough ? How can He, in addition
to all these, as if with fiendish malice, enthrone an everlasting liar
and irresistible tormentor within us, to accuse us falsely, and scourge
us pitilessly, day and night, at home and abroad, as long as we live ?
Is not this the very climax of infinite tyranny ?

And yet again : How is it that God has perpetuated this condition
so long? If the Bible be a lie, what an old lie it is ! And as for
the world, even if the Bible be true, how long the world has been in
ruins ! And if the Bible be not true, who can tell how much longer
the world has been in ruins ? And what an ancient oppressor is
conscience ! And as for society, how Protestantism, Romanism, and
Grecianismj Mohammedanism and Judaism; Lamaism, Foheism,
and Buddhism; Brahminism, Parseeism, and Fetichism; and all
manner of religious impositions— and, with these, all manner of
civil despotisms — have crowded the ages, and enclosed, covered,
crushed, and cursed, all nations and generations ! There has beeu
no. respite — none, none ! Still, we speak of an infinitely-perfect God,
as creating, upholding, and overruling, all ! Who can account for
these things, if " we have no sin ? "

Alas, my friends! we have dwelt on these almost irreverent topics
long enough to see, that, '' if we say we have no sin," we do indeed
" deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." The truth is, that the
Bible is trite ! The truth is, that the sin charged against us by the
Bible \fi justly charged, and that all the evils in the world have been
occasioned by sin ! The truth is, that conscience rightly condemns
us ! The truth is, that society has acted properly in confession of
sin ! The truth is, that God has been constrained to manifest Him-
self unto us in ways opposite to those He would have" preferred, be-
cause of our sin ! The denial of sin is the essence of infidelity. If
we deny sin, we deny salvation; if we deny salvation, we deny the
Saviour; if we deny the Saviour, we deny God; and if we deny
God, all faith is gone, and with it all hope, and nothing remains but
the deepest despair of utter unbelief. The Lord save us from such

THE TWO COURSES. 425

an Issue ! From all untruth and all self-deception, let us all unite ia
prayings " Good Lord! deliver us! "

And what now ? If it be so plain that the denial of our sin is the
wrong course, let us turn to the rie/ht course — the confession of sin.

II. The Right Course.

"If we confess our sins, lie is faithful and just to forgive us our
sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

It seems strange that we are so reluctant to confess our sins. True,
in addition to natural depravity, we have peculiarities of personal
wickedness which it may appear best to conceal. The depravity is
common. No one has more reason to be ashamed of that than
another. Besides, it is rather a misfortune than a fault. But our
personal sins are voluntary; and. therefore we feel our responsibility
for them, and the humiliation of them. Still, as every man has
thus sinned; and we are told that " whosoever shall Icecj) the ivhole
law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all; " and so have
cause to believe that there is not as much difference among sinners,
in the sight of God, as might be supposed : it is strange, after all,
that we are so reluctant to make confession.

The fact is, I presume, that, in all ordinary cases, we are so con-
scious of our depravity, and so full of recollections of voluntary
iniquity, that each one thinks himself worse than his neighbor, and
is afraid to let it be known how vile he has been, lest it should be
demonstrated that he is worse. If, however, as already intimated,
all men should freely and fully confess their sins, though a great
diversity of act"? would appear, and some seem much more abomina-
ble than others, I question whether one heart would appear much
purer or less selfish than another. I question whether the principles
of sin would not be found nearly the same in all. Our Lord did not
make much difference between the scribes and pharisees on one
hand, and the publicans and harlots on the other. The pride and
h3'pocrisy of one class, were as offensive to Ilim as the fraud and
pollution of the other. The element of every sin is in every soul.
Education, custom, interest, and other social restraints, modify the
manifestations of sin ; and we cannot allow much more than this.
Let us, therefore, lay aside our reluctance to confess. Surely, cases
of real self-deception cannot be numerous ! Surely, the most of us
must know, that, instead of having "no sin," we are filled with sin,
and covered all over with it !

426 THE TWO COURSES.

The Bible gives two definitions of sin. One is, " a transgression
of the law." And what is the law ? Take the two great summary
commandments — love to God and our neighbor. Who has not trans-
gressed this law ? Or, to be more specific, take the Decalogue.
Reflect upon each of its prohibitions. And who has not transgressed
this law? Nay, who has not transgressed every prohibition in it ?
" Oh ! " methinks some one exclaims : " that is too hard ! I, at least,
am no thief, no liar, no mwderer, no adulterer ! " But is it too
hard ? Open the Old Testament at the Decalogue. .Open the New,
at the Sermon on the Mount. Compare the two. Apply the spiritual
principles, the heart-searching expositions of the law, in the Sermon
on the Mount, to your own conscious history, and see if it is not
harder to tell what you have not been, as a sinner, than what you
have been! For myself — speaking honestly in hope of speaking
usefully — I could not dare to say that there is a single moral pre-
cept in all the Bible, the principle of which I have not violated. I
cannot believe that there is a person present who has not violated
the principle of every moral law. It must be so! Nor only so: but,
when we rcA'iew our lives, from childhood to the present ; when we
recall our overt acts; how many of us must say — There! and there!
and the7-e again ! if not the fully developed crime, if not quite the
equivalent of the crime, still there is a distinct remembrance of
Something of the same nature, and with the same tendency, and
God alone is to be praised that it did not issue in the complete
iniquity ! If it had not been for some divine check, the devil would
have hurried us into horrors which would long ago have destroyed
both body and soul in hell !

But, to confirm our conviction of sin, we must call up the other
definition of it. I mean this : " To him that knowetli to do good,
and doeth it not, to him it is sin." Who has not sinned in this way —
neglecting opportunities of doing good? I was about to say that I
would like to see the man who can stand up and declare himself free
from this form of sin. And yet, on reflection, I could not bear to
see him. What an awful example of self-deception would such an
apparition be ? Opportunities of doing good ! Alas, how many we
neglect every day ! We see the opportunity ;. know the good that
is needed; know how to do it; and yet do it not. It matters not
what prevents : we might do it, but neglect it, and so it remains un-
done. 0, if it were not for the frequency of this sin ; if, instead of

THE TWO COURSES. 427

yielding to it, every man improved every opportunity of doing good
to the utmost of his power; what a heaven upon earth would open
around us ! But we are poor, indolent, uncnergetic, unsucrificing,
selfish, and self-indulgent sinners — good-for-nothing sinners !

And what now ? If thus, in all connections, we know we are sin-
ners— let us confess our sins. But — liow shall we confess ? To the
priest? God forbid! Never let us be caught in such a trap as that!
It were far better to confess to the devil; for he could not take such
advantage of the confession. " Confess your faults one to another,"
said St. James, '^ and pray one for another, that ye may he healed."
This was written to Christians at large, and probably refers to such
faults as occur among those who strive most to avoid faults ; such as
may be discreetly mentioned, for mutual advice, and the holy influ-
ence of united and earnest prayer. It gives no Christian, and espe-
cially no priest, a right to become an inquisitor, even into the faults
of a single brother — much less of a whole church, male and female,
old and young !

As to sins committed hefore repentance, the passage does not ap-
pear to refer to them at all. They may, or may not, be confessed —
according to circumstances. Such confessions are matters of private
judgment. If they may do good, if they are required by the princi-
ples of righteousness, if restitution be necessary, let the confession
be made, either publicly or privately, as shall seem best. But if no
good be promised, I See no necessity for such confessions, at least of
private offences. Public offences are properly confessed in public.
So David cried, most piteously, " Deliver me from blood-guiltiness,
0 God, thou God of my salvation!" And in like manner, St. Paul
wrote to Timothy, that, before his conversion, he was " a blasphemer,
and a persecutor, and injurious;" and so to the Galatians, that,
" beyond measure he persecuted the church of God and wasted it."
The crimes thus alluded to were publicly known, and therefore
properly repented of in public.

Even in ordinary cases, however, in addition to whatever special
acknowledgments may be made to parties concerned in fulfilment
of righteousness, every sinner should unhesitatingly confess that he
is a sinner, and that, as such, he needs the salvation which is in Christ
Jusus. Instead of pretending that he has no sin, he is to be willing,
as a man among men, to be recognised as a sinner.

But, pre-eminently, he must confess to God. He must remember

428 THE TWO COURSES.

tlie holiness of God, the holiness of His law, and His abhorrence of
iniquity. He must also remember, that notwithstanding God's for-
bearance toward him for Christ's sake, and notwithstanding whatever
natural prosperity he enjoys, still, as a sinner, ^Uhe lorafh of God
ahideth on Mm" He must remember, also, how thoroughly God
knows him, how constantly God searches him, how responsible God
holds him ; and, overwhelmed by the heinousness and awfulness of
sin, he must confess his sins in all their fulness and in all their foul-.
ness, and cast himself wholly on the mercy of God in Christ Jesus our
Lord. Then, no longer attempting the slightest self-deception ; ad-
mitting, at last, the whole truth; performing his first duty; in a
word, pursuing the right course, its inestimable advantages will im- "
mediately follow. " If tve confess our sins, God is faithful and just
to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

Look at these blessings. Yn's\,— forgiveness ! God will '' forgive
us our sins." It matters not how great our natural depravity, or
voluntary iniquity — if we confess, God will forgive ! Not one charge
shall remain against us, in all the book of His remembrance. We
shall stand in His sight as freely and fully justified as though we
had never sinned.

But, shall we Jcnow that we are forgiven ? Well, it is easy to
perplex ourselves here. Suppose we could not know it. Still, if
forgiven, we should be as safe as though we did know it. Besides,
we might believe it, if we could not knoio it, and it is the distinction
of the Christian, that he walks " It/ faith, not hy sight." But much
depends on what is meant by knowing it. What, then, is meant ?

See ! here is a sinner who has long tried to deceive himself with
the notion that he has no sin. Hitherto, in this relation, there has
been no truth in him. At last, however, he is convinced that it is
utter folly, and an aggravation of his guilt, to continue such a course.
Therefore, accepting all that the Bible says, in relation to sin, and the
Saviour from sin, here — whencesoever he comes and wheresoever
he is going — herb, in the very Capitol of the United States, and in
this Hall of the House of Representatives, on this holy sabbath, the
\st day of April, 1860, he confesses his sins, and trusts in God's
faithfulness and justice for the forgiveness of his sins! Immediately
his conscience is relieved. The load of guilt is removed. He is
strangely light-hearted. " The peace of God, that passeth all under-
standing," apart from experience, becomes plain enough as a matter

THE TWO COURSES. 429

of experience. His soul overflows with it. Directly, passages of
Scripture, often read or heard, but never before properly felt, <;Hde
into his memory, like shooting stars into the sk}', and he exclaims :
" O Lor J, I to ill praise thee ; though fhou wast angry with me, thine
anger is turned away, and thou comfortest me ! " And then he calls
to the church : " Come iinto me, all ye that fear God, and I will tell
you what He hath done for my soul." ^^ As far as the East is from
the West, so far hath the Lord removed my transgressions from me."
Now, I know what the apostle meant when he said : '•' Therefore,
heing justified hy faith, ice have peace with God, through our Lord
Jesus Christ." See ! He knoics that he has faith in Christ — for
this is a fact of consciousness ; he knotos that he has peace with
God — for this also is a fact of consciousness ; and, from these facts
of consciousness, he spontaneously, irresistibly, and undoubtiugly
infers, or believes, or, if you please, knoics, that he is forgiven. Now,
is not this enough ? Is it not all that is ever meant by knowledge ?
We may suppose twenty years to go by, and at the end of them, in
some Christian assembly, or at home on his death-bed, the still
happy believer declares : on the morning of the first day of April,
1860, in the Capitol, at Washington, the Lord graciously set my soul
at liberty. Before that time, I had tried to deceive myself with the
notion that I was not a sinner; but then I saw that all such efforts
were vain and ruinous. I saw and felt that I was a sinner. I con-
fessed my sins ; cast myself, vile as I was, on the mercy of God in
Christ Jesus ; and, from that time to this, I have never doubted that
God then forgave my sins. My heart was filled with peace, and my
tongue thrilled with the rapture of irrepressible thanksgiving. By
the greatness of my relief, and the joyfulness of my new emotions,
"the Spirit of God" bore witness with my spirit, that I was ''a child
of God."

Now, if this be what is meant by knowing that we are forgiven,
certainly we may know it. Certainly, thousands do thus know it.
Certainly, every confessing sinner here may thus know it. But if
you go beyond this; if you assert a distinct, intelligible, inspiration
or revelation of the Holy Spirit, apart from the Bible, apart from
emotional experience, and apart from the conviction thence resulting:
something equivalent to the inspiration of the prophets, in virtue of
which they were enabled to testify — " Thus saith the Lord" — if you
mean this, then all I have to say is, it may be so ; but if it he so, 1

430 THE TWO COURSES.

have not yet known it in my own experience, and therefore cannot
bear personal testimony to its occurrence. Be this, however, as it
may, the doctrine is clear and sure, that whosoever will confess his
sins shall be forgiven, and be unspeakably safer and happier than he
can be without confession. Therefore, I thus preach and urge con-
fession.

But forgiveness is not the only blessing which follows confession.
See ! " If toe confess our sins, He is faithful and Just to forgive us
our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."- This is a still
greater blessing. It relates not only to the condition, but also to the
character ; not only to freedom from sin, but also to renewal in holi-
ness; not only to exemption from punishment for the past, but also
to the improvement and usefulness of the future.

The context declares : " This then is the message which we have
heard of Him, gnd declare unto you, that God is light, and in Him
is no darJaicss at all. If loe say that we have felloioship icith Him,
and walk in darJmess, we lie, and do not the truth : hut if we walk
in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowshijy one toith another,
and the hlood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin."

This, indeed, is a great and glorious work. This is regeneration.
This is xe-creation. This is sanctification. This, though in some
cases commenced, developed, and almost perfected, apparently in a
very short time, remains, nevertheless, a life-long work. Natural cor-
ruption is destroyed. Voluntary wickedness is substituted by habits
of righteousness. It becomes our second, better, and proper nature
to do the will of God. His law is no longer knowingly and wilfully
broken. Its precepts are obeyed; and its principles held in highest
veneration. The Decalogue is not too strict for us now. Even the
Sermon on the Mount is not now a whit too searching. The stand-
ard of perfect love to God and man is not too elevated. Opportuni-
ties of doing good arc not too frequent. The obligations to do good
are not too stringent; and the satisfaction of doing good becomes
infinitely attractive. Day after day, he who was once so base a sin-
ner, grows more and more a saint, and assumes the image of God.
Wherein he remains infirm, or subject to error, or inadvertently falls
into wrong-doing, he is instantly prompted to confession, supplica-
tion, and correction, and proves that the blood of Christ is still as
cleansing as ever, and doubts not that he shall at last put on the
wliite robe in heaven, as the symbol of entire and eternal redemption.

THE TWO COURSES. 431

.Such a man is fully provided for — both as to his condition iu this
world, and his destiny iu the world to come. Having found the
right course, he has only to pursue it, with undeviating fidelity.
Whatever God has promised, for body or soul, of grace or glory, on
earth or in heaven, the Christian is sure of its fullest enjoyment.
He realizes his interest in the sublime announcement of the apostle :
"All things are yours; ivhcther Paxil, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the
world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come: all are
yours; and ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's."

To such a man, the Bible, the world, and conscience, the history
of society and the administration of the government of God, compose
one grand natural and moral harmony, universal, perpetual, and
divinely enchanting. By the confession of sin, he accounts for all
the past; and by the securement of salvation, he anticipates the
vindications of all the future. Hear him narrate the perfection of
the beginning! Hear him forecast the perfection of the conclusion!
See how God is glorified, and man honored, by the whole contempla-
tion ! See how Christ shines forth, as all in all ! Then ask the
triumphant believer, on what he relies for the fulfilment of his hope ?
And hearken to his noble answer !

Do you ask me on what I rely for the fuljilmcnt of my hope ? I
rejoice to tell you. I possess the true solution of the mystery of the
world. It is the promise of God. I hope for all that God has prom-
ised. From the origin of sin, He has always promised, redemption
from sin. And here, in this text, both His faithfulness and Justice
are pledged for the performance of His promise. The universe may
dissolve as a dream ; but what shall impair the faithfulness or pervert
the justice of God? " I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and
in Sis Word do I hope. My soul waiteth for the Lord, more than
they that watch for the morning. I say, more than they that watch for
the morning." The priest in the temple, the invalid on his couch,
and the prisoner at his window, watch for the morning ; the sailor, the
soldier, and the hunter, and how many more, and with how much anxi-
ety, all watch for the morning. The traveller, especially, gone up the
day before, and cowering all night among the summit snows of the
Andes, the Alps, or the Himalayas, how bravely he waits, and how
intently he watches, for the morning ! He hopes, without a promise !
But, does the sun disappoint him ? Never ! At a certain hour, the black
zenith grows blue again, the gray east yellows into amber and flushes
with rose, innumerable scintillant splendo.rs shoot through the rose

432 THE TWO COURSES.

and amber, and spread abroad in the upper blue, and, at the min-
ute— nay, at the moment — there it flashes! rim, half-round, all-round,
filling the world with glory ! And the startled stars veil their faces,
and retire. The sky shows but one light. The mountains put on
their purple and gold, and pay princely obeisance. The living tor-
rents catch the living lustre, and leap with it into a thousand wel-
coming valleys. From coast to coast, the billowy seas uplift their
jewelled arms, and clap their hands for joy. And the soul of the trav-
eller, the greatest thing in all the scene, infinitely greater than the sun
itself, looks out through the calm eyes of his little body, lost like a
snow-flake among the cliff's, with tremulous tongue modulates the thiu
air into the instant music and rapture of thanksgiving, and charms his
Maker, and blesses his race, with the renewal of the angels' song, " Glo-
ry to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toivard men! "

And what now? '^ I wait," not for the sun, but "/o7- the Lord:
my sold doth wait, and in His Word do I hope." I wait with ' tho
promise ! " My soul waiteth for the Lord, more than they that watch
for the morning; I say, more than they that watch for the morning" —
more intensely, more confidently, aud with infinitely more glorious ex-
pectations ! And shall He who made the sun be less punctual than
the sun itself? Is the coming of the Lord less certain than the sun-
rise ? Nevei* ! no, never ! The day, the hour, the moment, is ap-
pointed, and nothing can delay it. Then He, who is " the brightness
of the Father^ s glory, and the express image of His person" — who,
for the present, is detained at the "right hand" of God "in the
heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and
dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, hut
also in that which is to come ; " and who, as He is beloved of the
Father, and adored and worshipped by saints and angels in heaven,
is still " the desire of all nations " on earth — will " appear, ^he second
time, ivithout sin, unto salvation; " not tinting the earth, and seas, and
skies, with the transient beauty of the sunrise, but raising the dead,
changing the living, judging the world, glorifying^ His people, re-
creating heaven and earth, and establishing His everlasting kingdom
of " righteousness, peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost."

Come, then, ye sinners ! one and all ; come, and make confession.
Remember ! " If we say'that loe have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and
the truth is not in us; " but, " if we confess our sins, He is faithful and
Just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

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THE CURISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK. 485

opinion was neither affectedly humble, ou the one hand, nor senti-
mentally morbid, on the other. It was the simple, truthful, and
healthful result of his religious consciousness.

On what grounds, it may be inquired, could he honestly entertain
such an opinion of himself? We answer, on several. First, he con-
sidered himself to have been, previously to his conversion, " the
chief of sinners," especially on account of his bigoted and malignant
persecution of the early church ; a crime which, at no period of his
subsequent history, he could either forget or forgive. He ever re-
called it as a reproach which no repentance and no zeal could efface.
Secondly, the condition of any man, as an awakened sinner, and the
terms on which he is saved, are such as necessarily to produce in
him the spirit of total self-abnegation in the sight of God. Ffom
this stand-point he must inevitably contemplate himself, and from
it make all his comparisons with his fellow Christians. Thirdly,
the more enlightened any one becomes by the grace of God, the
clearer are his discoveries of the depth of his degradation, and the
extent of his indebtedness to divine mercy; and though these dis-
coveries may, in reality, be no greater in him than in other.'?, they
must of necessity always appear so to himself, since it is not possible
for any one to know another in the same sense, or to the same de-
gree, in which it is possible to know himself. Consequently, no
Christian can give a strictly accurate opinion of himself, without de-
preciating himself, with perfect sincerity, below any. other true mem-
ber of the church of God ; without, in the very words of this apostle,
" esteeming others better than himself." Fourthly, Paul's idea of
his inferiority, as a Christian, was greatly intensified by the over-
whelming majesty of his commission as an apostle; for which, it ap-
peared to him, an angel would not have been sufficient, much less so
sinful and imperfect a being as himself. This allusion he evidently
makes in the language before us.

These several reasons, to adduce no others, fully sustain the fitness
and propriety of Paul's apprehension of himself; and it affords a
most useful lesson to all Christians, and particularly to all Christian
ministers. The true and the only standard of self-estimation, to
both, is absolute humility. "lie that humbleth himsel]'," says
Christ, ''shall be exalted, and he that exalteth himself shall be
abased." What a rebuke arc these words to our pride ; to that
ambition which induces one " to think of himself more highly than

486 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK.

he ought to think ; " to desire notoriety amongst his brethren ; to
seek places of preferment and of honor in the church of Christ ; to
inhale with complacency the breath of popular applause ; to listen
•with self-gratulation to the accents of human devotion. Great God !
if Paul, the very seraph of apostles, fulfilling Heaven's high em-
bassy to the world, should con«ider himself " less than the least of
all saints/' what are we doing when, in our subordinate offices, with
our contracted capacities, and our mere fraction of piety, we are so-
liciting to ourselves the admiration of all mankind ! Erom these re-
flections, we proceed to notice ;

II. The apostle's estimate of his commission. A remarka-
ble contrast arrests our attention here. When speaking of himself,
he sinks into nothing. When speaking of his commission, he cannot
sufficiently magnify it. His opinion of the latter is comprised in no
specific form of words, but in the exhibition of those grand objects
which the commission itself contemplates. We shall endeavor to
develop his idea from those objects. Amongst them we consider,

1. The publication of the Gospel, as foremost j its authoritative
declaration to mankind. " Unto me," says he, '' is this grace given,
that I should preach amongst the Gentiles." To preach is necessa-
rily the first and principal design of the great commission. The
Gospel is God's message of mercy to the world. It must be pro-
claimed, as such, in the hearing of the world. And this can be
legitimately and eflPectually done only when proclaimed by divine
authority and with unadulterated simplicity. The preacher is God's
ambassador, and must treat with men, on God's behalf, according to
the tenor of his instructions. In discharging this function, he is
invested with an awful responsibility; a responsibility to which there
is none equal on earth; none greater in heaven. It is not, however,
with the office which the Christian minister holds, that we are con-
cerned to-day. It is with the proper appreciation of the message
which he bears; " the unsearchable riches of Christ."

By " the riches of Christ," we are not to understapd, I suppose,
his personal excellence and wealth as the Lord and heir of all
things. These are sublimely described in the Scriptures ; pertain
inalienably to Christ as the Son of God and the Kedeemer of man-
kind, and for his glory must be asserted in our sermons. For ex-
ample, " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with
God, and the Word was God;" ''The Word was made flesh, and

THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK. 437

dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only
begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth;" "In him dwelleth
all the fullness of the Godhead bodily ; " " By him were all things
created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible,
whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers j
all things were created by him and for him 3 and he is before all
things, and by him all things consist." These, indeed, are the riches
of Christ; the riches of his perfections and of his dominion. But we
are not, I presume, to understand these as referred to in our text.
Wc are to understand the riches of redemption; the blessings of grace
and the rewards of glory, originating from and summed up in Christ;
which he has purchased by his death, and which he confers upon
his people. By these they are enriched with all spiritual posses-
sions in this life, and an eternal inheritance of bliss in the life to
come.

These " riches," the text affirms, are " unsearchable ; " not in the
sense, as already intimated, that they cannot, in any degree, be as-
certained or enjoyed by the people of God on earth; not that they
lie beyond the sphere of immediate participation ; not that they re-
pose in some distant and unapproachable region of the universe,
where, if ever, after ages of pursuit, they may be discovered. No,
my brethren, this is not the character of these riches. On the con-
trary, they are present and accessible to all. They oflfer now their
matchless resources to the wretched sons of want, and impart to the
humble recipient a whole kingdom of "righteousness, and peace,
and joy in the Holy Ghost." Yet, unlike all human possessions,
beyond any possible degree of existing appropriation, however copious
or costly, their stores are enhanced by a " length and breadth, a depth
and height" of abundance and of fruition to be calculated only by
the rule of an infinite progression. They are, so to speak, inex-
haustible in their quantity. No demands and no participation of
earth's redeemed multitudes, through an endless futurity, can lessen,
for an instant, the sum of spiritual and celestial treasures. The
wealth of empires may be wasted or dispersed ; the restless hand of
human enterprise, or the insatiable rapacity of human avarice, may
sweep the subterranean repositories, in which nature hoards her se-
lectest minerals, of their last shining particles ; but " the riches of
Christ" will, after cycles of immeasurable acquisition, continue to
present to the saints, the boon of an undiminished plenitude.

438 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK.

'' The riches of Christ " are, likewise, incalculable in their worth.
In the estimation of wealth, value must be added to quantity.
Quantity without value would be an encumbrance. The real esti-
mate of an estate does not consist of its amount, but of the advantages
which it confers, whether of pleasure or profit. Nevertheless, the
most valuable of all earthly possessions include in their catalogues
many portions both useless and defective. '' The riches of Christ "
are all equally precious, and have an excellence which even trans-
cends the idea of their quantity. No standard of appreciation can
determine their value. No numbers, no symbols, can represent it.
No balances can weigh, no capacity contain, no line can fathom it.
These "riches"' cost the highest price known in all transactions,
human or divine; they consist of the purest and the best blessings
in the magazine of grace ; they impart the richest good of which the
immortal constitution of man is susceptible. In a word, they invest
him with the permanent and imperishable fortune of a nature renewed
in the image of God, and of conditions and agencies perpetually ad-
ministering to its development and augmenting its bliss.

" The riches of Christ " are also incomprehensible in their extent.
Their amplitude confounds not. only our ideas of quantity and quality,
but of space. They spread over an illimitable surface. They are
diffused over a territory of sanctified existence untravelled and unex-
plored; nay, whose exploration will never be fully accomplished.
No foot of saint, no wing of angel, can reach the boundary of that
kingdom which Christ has purchased and replenished for his people.
No seraphic voyager will ever circumnavigate its ocean of delights ;
no flaming adventurer ever scale its pinnacles of glory; no inspired
speculations, no glorified imaginations, will conceive of those blessed
distances which will ever open their attractive avenues to the enrap-
tured progress and contemplation of the elect of God. ^s it is
written, and as it will remain, in a higher sense, forever true, " eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of
man, the things which God hath prepared for them tjiat love him."
These " unsearchable riches " of Christ ; this wealth of grace ;
this " far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory ; " it is the
prerogative, the duty, the honor, of the Christian ministry to offer,
in the name of the great Proprietor, as a sovereign gratuity to an
impoverished world, that it may become their inheritance in time
and in eternity.

THE CimiSTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK. 439

2. Auother object, of scarcely less importance, contemplated by
the Christian ministry, is the vindication of the Gospel. It is "to
make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which, from
the beginning of the world, hath been hid in God/' The Gospel
economy is, in the loftiest sense, a mystery ; a mystery in itself, and
in its successive evolutions. The origin and the purposes of it ap-
pertain exclusively to the unfathomable depths of the divine coun-
sels, and, though partially disclosed in the lapse of ages, it will,
nevertheless, remain to finite beings a mystery still.

In the course of human events, it must inevitably be assailed by
objections arising from alleged and even apparent discordances with
itself and with the constitution of the world. From these aspersions
of its integrity as a system, it is the duty of the Christian ministry
to defend it ; to demonstrate its harmony and consistency, not only
to silence objectors, but to elevate the conceptiods of mankind re-
specting that wonderful arrangement by which the affluence of divine
benevolence is so conspicuously displayed. And it is worthy of
special remark, that the wisdom of the divine economy is eminently
capable of proof. It can be shown, by incontestable evidence, that
the assumed contradictions are the distortions of perverted reason,
and not the deductions of sober truth. It is an undoubted fact, that
" all men," who will, may " be made to see," may be constrained to
acknowledge "the fellowship of the mystery;" the harmony of the
Gospel. The Gospel, my brethren, is full of harmony. There are
no discordances in it. We adduce several instances, for the purpose
of showing the truth of this assertion.

It is in harmony with the perfections of God. All the represent-
ations of the divine character which it gives, and all the legitimate
influence which it exerts, correspond with whatever enlightened
ideas men, in every age, have entertained of Gcd. It has, it is true,
indefinitely unfolded the divine character; it has copiously supple-
mented the intuitions and the inferences of reason, but it has never
once contradicted them. The God of the Gospel and the God of
Nature are demonstrably one and the same.

It is in harmony with the intellectual constitution of man. God
has implanted certain faculties in the human mind, and imposed
upon it established laws of ratiocination, in the exercise of which it
may reach, with sufficient satisfaction, such conclusions, on the great
questions of existence, as come within the sphere of its operations.

440 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK.

The teaching of the Gospel is in accordance with these laws. It
violates none of them. If it seem to do it, the fault is in its super-
ficial apprehension, and not in its inherent contrariety. Rightly
understood, its whole economy receives the unqualified approval of
an unprejudiced judgment. What an unspeakable advantage the
knowledge of this fact gives to a minister of the Gospel ! What a
noble consolation is it to him to know that the understandings of his
hearers are on the side of his message } that he carries their convic-
tions, if he cannot sway their hearts.

It is in harmony with the moral condition of man. Its adapta-
tions, in this respect, are manifestly perfect. Whatever man's moral
nature may have originally been, its present state is not a subject of
doubt. Guilt, depravity, and wretchedness, are its invariable and
melancholy features, certified not only by universal history, but by
universal consciousness. With these painful aspects of humanity,
the Gospel corresponds with an exactness which proves its divine
authority. To guilt, it brings forgiveness ; to depravity, holiness ;
and to wretchedness, peace and hope. It heals man's moral distem-
pers, and restores the counterpart which he lost in the dislocation of
the fall.

It is in harmony with itself. Skeptical perversity has enjoyed a
malignant pleasure in endeavoring to render the Gospel self-contra-
dictory ; to impair its credit by verbal and doctrinal discrepancies.
Such rejoicing, however, is vain. From beginning to end, in
substance and in form, in doctrine and in narrative, theWord of
God is, and has a thousand times been proven to be, one grand
totality of truth, evincing the utterances and the plans of one and
the same eternal Spirit.

It is in harmony with its own successive developments. It was
not communicated to the world all at once and entire, but by a con-
nected and expanding series, in which the germ unfolded itself into
the flower. In these gradations there is no disagreement, but the
most beautiful regularity. It is not improbable that the apostle
refers here particularly to that part of the divine economy which
originally restricted its blessings to the Jews, but which now, re-
moving the restriction, ofiers them, without discrimination, to the
world. This is one of its greatest peculiarities, and it is one of its
greatest harmonies. Mankind, in the earlier period of their history,
were not prepared to appreciate the truth in its fullness. It must

THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK. 441

needs have been gradually revealed, and its first communications re-
quired to be fostered within the limited enclosure of a family, and
then of a nation, that, thus attaining its maturity, it might become
the heritage of all nations and of all time. So far, then, from being
impugned on this ground, it only demonstrates that uniformity which
is inseparable from the adjustment of the Gospel, on a universal
scale, to the nature and the progress of human society. I repeat,
that the Gospel is full of harmony, and that it behooves all ministers
to show, and all men to see, '' the fellowship of its mystery."

3. Yet another object, as indicated by our text, is contemplated
by the Christian ministry j and that is, the organization and the col-
lection of the accredited results of the Gospel into the bosom of the
church. Results, glorious results, will follow well-directed efforts.
God will "give the increase." The kingdom of Christ will be
established on the earth. These trophies of the Cross are not to be
left scattered at random on the field on which they are won. They
must be gathered into the living temple of Christianity. These
sheaves must not be allowed to lie exposed on the soil on which they
are cut down. They must be garnered in their appointed repository.
The conquests of the Gospel must be brought and arranged in its
own consecrated citadel. In a word, converted souls must be intro-
duced into the fellowship of the church militant, to be cherished
and trained for the fellowship of the church triumphant, that the
labor of the ministry may not be lost, and that the concentrated
power of Christianity may achieve results still more illustrious. Min-
isters must consequently become pastors as well as teachers, and not
rest in their pulpit successes, however flattering.

4. The ultimate object contemplated by God in the institution of
the Christian ministry, as announced by our apostle, is of a very
different kind. It is to promote the happiness of the higher orders
of intelligences J and thus to combine, within the range of redeeming
beneficence, the entire population of holy beings, whether in heaven
or Oia earth. The economy of redemption, though primarily designed
and especially adjusted to rescue and restore fallen humanity, has
other aspects and other capabilities, and actually exercises other in-
fluences than those which belong to sinful mortals. It is not iso-
lated. It is a blessing to the universe. Such, we distinctly learn,
was the plan of God in its projection. It is " according to the
eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord," that

442 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK.

thus it should operate. And this purpose of imparting to all orders
of holy beings the beneficial results of redemption, corresponds with
the original unity of those orders in their creation ; since God not
only redeemed man, but also *' created all things by Jesus Christ."
Notwithstanding the difference in nature and condition between un-
fallen angels and fallen man, he who redeemed the latter made both,
and holds to each the common relation of Creator and benefactor.
That sovereign act, therefore, which saves a sinful world, could not
fail to embrace, in the radiant circle of its benefits, those other beings
whom he created, and whom he so highly. endowed, but who did
not forfeit their primeval purity. Hence, the unity of the higher
orders of intelligences with man, by the act of creation, is the ground
of that unity of purpose in the ultimate results of redemption, of
•which our text speaks in the following terms : " To the intent that
now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places, might be
known by the church the manifold wisdom of God." With an hum-
ble endeavor to delineate this last aspect of our subject, we shall have
accomplished our task.

We learn from these oracular words, that somewhere in the vast
universe there are abodes of light and life, called " heavenly places,"
far superior to our own in the character of their provisions and the
profusion of their embellishments. Perhaps, there are myriads of
such places, diversified in magnitude and beauty by the endless con-
trivances of infinite skill. Not improbably, some of those " heavenly
places " are. the stars, whose remote spaces and brilliant orbs do not
contradict our ideas of heaven itself. We also learn, from a source
which has anticipated, by centuries, the conjectures of astronomy,
that those '' heavenly places," wherever located, arc inhabited by
families of intelligent beings, who retain their primitive perfection,
and rejoice and flourish in the maturity and goodliness of upsullied
virtue. Their rank in the scale of the creation is very exalted.
They are not the commonalty, but the native aristocracy of the king-
dom of God. They are " the principalities and powers in heavenly
places -J " celestial princes and potentates, filling their honored
stations, and clothed with the splendors of their imperial ofiices.
By virtue of their endowments, position, and advantages, for thou-
sands of years, their attainments in knowledge necessarily surpass
and confound all human standards. They are the intellectual mag-
nates of the creation, whose easy and ready intuitions pour contempt

THE CimiSTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK. 443

upon that learning and philosophy which are the boast of our age.
To what perspicacity of vision ; to what an elevation of thought, have
they arrived ! And yet they are ever making new accessions to
their stock of information, by the ardor of their studies and pur-
suits.

The highest lesson which they learn, our text informs us, is not
on the wide and magnificent theatre of God's handiworks about and
above them, but on the lower level of the earth beneath them. Our
world, physically considered, is but a diminutive and insignificant
speck; is comparatively lost amidst the multitudinous glories of the
Creator's dominions. But it is the scene of events which magnify
and immortalize it into universal importance. Yes, this contracted
habitation of ours, placed in the balances of the eternal sanctuary,
outweighs in value all other worlds put together. It is not the size
of a place which makes it memorable. The deeds performed upon
it consecrate it to posterity. It was not the size of Thermopylae,
of Marathon, of Waterloo, of Bunker Hill, or of Yorktown, that
has given them a perpetual notoriety. Few localities have less of
natural attraction. It was the sublime valor and the pending issues
concentrated, for the moment, within their narrow limits. So it is
with respect to our earth in the system of unnumbered worlds. It
has been dignified above all others, by a transaction which has in-
vested it with boundless interest, and rendered it an exciting specta-
cle to their admiring throngs. That transaction i.? the economy of
redemption, as it has been enacted and embodied in the church of
God. Here alone has it been executed in all its solemn and afi'cct-
ing details. Here alone its august preliminai'ies were settled. Here
alone the advent of the eternal Son transpired. Here alone dwelt
" the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." Here
alone the incarnate God acted and spoke. Here alone did he ofier,
in his adorable person, that "sacrifice for sin which forever perfects
them that are sanctified." And hence alone did he return to " the
heavens which have received him until the times of the restitution of
all things." No other spot records such a history, or offers its com-
petition for such renown. It has been nobly and eloquently said, that
" our solar system is the Judea of the universe, and our insignificant
earth the Bethlehem of this holy land ; " that, under the Gospel
economy, the solar system bears to all other systems the same moral
relations which Judea bore to the world, and that the world now

444 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK.

bears the same moral relations to the solar system that Bethlehem bore
to Judea. The battle, the victory, the monuments of redemption, are
identified with the annals of earth, and will forever emblazon its
fame.

On these accounts, the church on earth becomes not only the re-
pository, but the mirror which, by its history, its memorials, and its
triumphs, reflects " the manifold wisdom of God " from earth to
heaven ; and reflects it as no other medium possibly can. Creative
wisdom appears as richly, perhaps, in more exquisite and gorgeous
forms, in other and distant realms of existence,, in which we may well
suppose its treasures are lavished. It was reserved for the church, by
means of the economy of redemption, to display the wisdom of God in
a new light, in a grander variety of methods, and in more illustrious
degrees, through the amazing instrumentalities which have been em-
ployed and the multiplied ends which have been accomplished by
that economy.

Into this resplendent mirror, " the principalities and powers in
heavenly places," bending from their thrones, perpetually gaze,
" desiring to look into " the bottomless mysteries which it reflects.
To them the church, as the receptacle of the wonders of grace, as the
focus of the divine perfections, is an object full of attractions. It
arrests and rivets their rapt attention, more than the scenes and as-
sociations of their imperial palaces. They are the vigilant spectators
of its fortunes, the ardent students of its lessons, and the willing
instruments of its progress. Throughout their bright gradations,
they witness with transport its successive approximations to that
eventful period when " the kingdoms of this world shall become the
kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ."

Nor do they merely enjoy the gratification of a hallowed curiosity.
They participate in the moral efi'ects of the economy of redemption.
They are benefitted by the spectacle which they behold. Their
superior natures glow with additional fervor at the marvellous revela-
tions which rise to their sight. Their conceptions o^ that God in
whose presence they have always stood, are indefinitely expanded ;
their virtues, long trained by celestial vocations, receive a holier
impulse ; and the anthem of their praise, which .was struck on the
morning of the world's creation, reaches its climax at the announce-
ment of the world's salvation, "as it were the voice of a great
multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of

THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK. 445

mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia : for the Lord God omnipotent
reigneth."

It is now time to draw these reflections to a close, and to apply
them, in some sort, to the circumstances by which we are surrounded.

1. What this whole subject inculcates, with its entire weight, is
the cultivation of humility in Christian ministers. What a pre-
sumption, what a distortion, what a curse, is pride in those who bear
from God to their fellow men " the unsearchable riches of Christ."
What a startling caricature is he who, coming as God's ambassador,
exhibits his person and displays his talents for the admiration of his
iearers; who arrogates to himself the importance of his position,
and converts the ministry into the means of his own aggrandize-
ment; who, instead of fulfilling his commission with scrupulous fidel-
ity, is anxious that he may be considered the greatest of preachers^
and desei-ving the principal honors of the church. Such was not
Paul. Such may we never be. On the other hand, what a charm,
what a happiness, is there in true humility ! We can enter into the
spirit of our work in no other way. It is the appropriate garb of a
minister of Christ. It is the fundamental condition of his enjoyment.
Above all, it is the sanctified source of his power. There lies the
secret of his success. " When I am weak," exclaimed Paul, "then
am I strong." When, in our own eyes, we are " less than the least
of all saints," then are we, in the eyes of God, the greatest in the
Gospel kingdom ; then does " Christ work in us mightily ; " then
does he give " the demonstration of the Spirit and of power" to our
preaching. Oh, "when upon our knees before God, crushed with a
sense of our sins, imperfections, and disqualifications, we wrestle in
an agony of prayer for his blessing, and then go forth to meet the
people in the gate, then God goes with us ; then " the Word of the
Lord has free course, and is glorified ; " then is it made " the power
of God unto salvation to every one that believeth." Let us not, my
brethren, be solicitous about worldly honors. This is not the season
for honors. Let us postpone the whole question until a future period.
They will come in due time ; come when our work is done. Then
will the Lord " call the laborers and give them their hire, beginning
from the last even unto the first."

2. Our subject enforces, in no doubtful manner, the necessity of
our understanding the import and the responsibilities of our message.
We must know it ourselves, if we would make it known to others.

446 THE CHRISTIAN MINISTER AND HIS WORK.

The range of our studies is great, and the means are ample. We
have no time to waste in vain and frivolous pursuits. Our duties
demand that we come full fraught into the sanctuary of God, " thor-
oughly furnished unto all good works.'' We must not only preach
the Word, but we must repel assaults against it ; take a step in ad-
vance of our ordinary occupation ; must show its harmony ; as far as
possible, "make all men see the fellowship of the mystery" of re-
demption. To fulfil this indispensable department of the minister's
vocation, it is obvious that he must become familiar with a new, class
of subjects. He must study to obtain those fundamental facts and
general principles of truth, natural and revealed, which constitute
the basis of the required demonstration. He must be a laborious
student in all that sustains and illustrates the economy of salvation,
as well as in all that explains its authentic import.

3. Let us realize the true grandeur of our commission. Let its
sublime objects animate our souls. We labor not only for the salva-
tion of men ; we labor also for the edification of angels. We labor
not only in the sight of mortals; we labor also in the sight of celes-
tial beings. We preach to two congregations at the same moment;
one below, and the other above us. What are the most splendid
auditories ever convened on earth, compared with " the principalities
and powers in heavenly places," who come down to engage in the
solemnities of our worship. Methinks they are present with us now.
Poised upon celestial pinions, they shed over us the odors of para-
dise. I seem to hear the rustling of their plumes. The air about
us is full of fragrance. Their benevolent countenances beam with
delight, and their eyes, sparkling with supernatural intelligence, are
watching to catch, before we disperse, another proof of '^ the mani-
fold wisdom of God." To use the impassioned strain of a familiar
hymn;

" Angels now are hov'ring round us,

Unperceived they mix the throng,
Wond'ring at the love that crown'd us,

Glad to join the holy song."

May these considerations stimulate us to be " faithful stewards of
the manifold grace of God ; " and unto the Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost, be glory, as it was' in the beginning, is now, and ever shall
be, world without end : Amen.

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LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY. 440

God whieli characterizes him above all otlicr interpreters, even where
his actual power of criticism might have failed, interprets this pas-
sage, simply and correctly, to mean that love is the essence of the
being of God; that God is love, and essentially nothing else than
love. So strongly does he put it as to convert the proposition, and
say that " love is God." John Wesley ^nd others, who may be called
the theologians of the higher Christian life, follow Luther.

And now let me say, that when we have this conception in its ful-
ness, it Jirst satisfies the demand of the heart, and then takes up and
meets that other demand, which was postponed and put aside — the
demand of the intellect. Christianity comes to the heart first, and
seeks to fill it; and when the want of the heart is met once by such
a revelation coming to the soul as a reality, then the fulness of the
heart expands and fills the intellect as well. There is no want even of
the logical faculty left unsupplicd. Let us look into this, and see how
it is. God is love, and essentially love. Does not this imply a personal
God, in the first place ? The great want of the logical faculty is an
absolute. But all experience shows that no course of human inquiry
has resulted in the knowledge of an absolute, and, at the same time,
personal God. The last results, in the older systems, say Hindooism
and Buddhism, are the ideas of absolute quiescence, of rest, or of non-
being. The logical character of this doctrine might be vindicated,
perhaps, as well as any other with reference to God, apart from Chris-
tianity. Later researches, professing to be scientific, have ended in
making the whole universe (not the manifestation of God, but) God
Himself, and thus give us Pantheism, instead of Theism. But take
the proposition, God is love, and let it fill the heart, and let the intel-
lect go to work upon it; and it will find satisfiiction. If God is love,
then God is a personal being. There cannot be love without a personal,
vital activity ; we can't conceive it. So, then, the logical issue of the
proposition in my text is, that there is a divine person, a God, to
whom we can speak and say, " 0 Thou ! " One of the bitterest utter-
ances that I ever heard was the saying of a great philosopher and
divine of Germany, a man of pure and noble thinking faculties, and
of noble moral faculties as well, but who had bewildered himself for
years in mazes of thought, apart from the simple lines of Christian
logic — that is, the logic of the heart. In speaking of this question,
the love of God, he said to a friend of mine, " I have met several
English and American divines and theologians, of the evangelical
20

450 LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY.

school, SO called, and I never met one of them that did not seem to
recognise a personal God." The tears came into his eyes as he con-
tinued : '' If I could do as you do — kneel down at night, and say to
God, " 0 Thoii ! "—if I could say that, and feel it, I should be will-
ing to die, and happy to die." I am very glad to say that his soul
has since emerged into a higher and purer light and experience. But
I state the case to show you what trouble, pain, and sorrow, may
come of not getting this full Christian conception of God, througlx
the experience of the heart.

In saying that "■ God is love," we mean, further, that He is a being
whose very nature is to reveal Himself, to impart Himself, to diffuse
to others His own essential bliss. So, then, we get these two thoughts,
as well as the great richness and fulness of the feeling, God is love —
first, there is a personal God; and second. He is a God that must re-
veal Himself, for love is His essence. Love is nothing if it is not
revealing ; love is nothing if it does not impart itself. Love is al-
ways gushing forth; it dies when it is concealed, when there are no
manifestations allowed, or possible to it. You know, in your own
affections, when they are strongest, they are always going out to-
wards another object. So, then, we get from this idea of God the
divine doctrine of the blessed Trinity — the manifestation of love in
His Son through the Eternal Spirit. Here we find the key of all
these rich, beautiful, yet otherwise mysterious phrases in John's
Gospel, in which it speaks of the eternal love of the Father towards
the Son, and of the glory shared between the Father and the Son,
lona: before the world was. And from this idea of a revealinsr
and manifesting God, we get also the true doctrine of the creation
and of the universe. If " God is love," it is easy to explain the
wondrous beauty and order of the " Cosmos." Love is essentially
creative. Have you ever thought of that ? The very primal func-
tion of love upon the earth is creative and productive. And so, all
the splendor and all the magnificence of the physical universe, with
all its adaptations to the wants and to the culture of humanity, are
fruits of the love of God, the creating, the imparting love. But the
highest manifestation of the creative love of God is that shown in
making man a spiritual being, capable of reflecting God, made in
God's image, endowed with free will and conscience. And the love
was none the less, that this creation included the dread gift of con-
science and of free will, implying the possibility of sin and fall. Of

LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY. 451

the history of that Ml I need not dwell, further than to say that it
opens for us again the highest and richest manifestation of the love
of God, after all. " Herein is love, not that ice loved God, but (hat
He loved us, and sent His Son to he the propitiation for our sins."
In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that
" God sent His only -begotten Son into the world, that ice miijht live
through Him." And what a summing up of our knowledge of God's
love to man is contained in the words, " God so loved the world, that
He gave His onli/-begottcn Son, that ichosoever belicveth in Hini
should not perish, but have everlasting life."

Can we fail to draw the inference, with St. Paul, that the love
which makes such a gift will spare no other gift? "iZe that s^Kircd
not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, hoio shall He not
with Him also freely give ws cdl things?" He '^ spared not " Ilis own
Son ! There is no extremity of pain and sorrow that was not put upon
that beloved Son. There is no intensity of anguish and torment that
He did not undergo. God "delivered Him up for us all." "Delivered"
Him ? What does that mean ? It means that He gave Him to
endure every form of evil, and submitted Him to every possible
agent and minister of evil — to evil of mind and heart and soul and
body ; to evil from devils, from bad spirits, and from men — that He
might show His love for sinners. Delivered Him to the evil passions
of men, stirred and empoisoned by the malice of devils ; to their
envy, which surrendered Him ; to their treachery, which be-
trayed Him; to their cruelty, which scourged Him; to their pride,
which scorned Him. " He spared not His own Son ! " He that
spared Isaac in the wilderness when Abraham, his father, was abyut
to lift the knife ; He whose infinite heart of love could not allow the
son of that Arabian wanderer to die a sacrifice, but provided a ram
that should take his place ; He that spared Isaac, spared not His own
Son ! When His hour came, there could not be found in all the
universe a lamb to take His place ; for He was the " lamb slain from
the foundation of the world." We can never weary of looking at
the cross, as the highest manifestation of the love of God. 0, let
us look at it to-day, and say, "God is love!" 0, Lamb of God,
was ever pain, was ever love, like Thine '( It was the infinite love
of the Father manifested in the gift of His beloved Son !

II. The nest point is, the experience of Christianity — the Chris-

452 LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY.

tiaa '■'■ dwelletli in God, and God dwclletli in him." Here we have
tlie theology of the Gospel translated into life for us. The very
essence of the Christian life is, intercourse with God. When we
first come to the cross, and learn that the bleeding Jesus died for
us ; when we are first able to say, 0 Lord, I love Thee for Thine in-
finite love to me, in the gift of Thy dear Son; when our hearts feel
the first throb of love to God because "He Jirst loved us" — then,
too, we have the first emotion of a genuine Christian experience.
And the whole course of that experience, from its beginning,, at
conversion, to its consummation in glory, may he summed up in the
language of the text — the Christian " dwelletli in God, and God in
him." The home of the Christian is in God — the home of his heart,
the home of his afi'ection, the home of his feelings, the palace of his
richest imaginings, and the daily home of his common life. To
dwell in God implies, that all the thought, and all the feelings, and
all the plans, and all the aims, and all the affections of life, are given
to God — lost and swallowed up in God. And not only does the
Christian dwell in God, according to St. Paul, but " God dwelleth in
him." Not only does the true believer find his home in God, but,
on the other hand, He makes the believer's heart His royal dwelling
place on earth. The heart of the sinner — saved by grace — the poor
heart that has been the seat of evil affections and passions — the heart,
that seems so little and mean, is made the home of the infinite God.
He takes up his abode in the humblest soul that is willing' to make
room for Him-, and dwells in it. Do you notice the phrase, and the
force of it? Many people seem to think that religious joy is occa-
sional and spasmodic ; that nothing more than occasional visits from
God can be expected in Christian experience. But this is not the
doctrine of the text. It may be true that even an occasional glimpse
of His ineffable beauty and glory is more than we deserve ; i^ is an
infinite condescension, on the part of God, to '■' visit man " at all. But
His love in Christ goes far beyond this. He not only " visits and
redeems" His people, but takes up His ahode in J:heir hearts.
The Spirit of God makes His home in the soul, and forms its light
and joy in the higher Christian life. A fitful experience, satisfied,
with rare glimpses of the face of God, finding Him -only in occasional
spasms of devotion, and theh returning to the cares of the world —
that it is not the fulness of Christian life or Christian experience.
Mark, I do not mean to say that even an experience like this is not

LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY. 453

a good thins:. I would not venture to quench the smoking flax ;
nay, I pray God to kindle it into a flame in any poor soul that has
but a limited experience of God. But the daily prayer of all earnest
souls is, and ought to bo, '' Fill us with all Thy fulness, Lord."

And when the soul dwells in God, and is filled with '' all his ful-
ness," its experience is not only rich and joyous, but also calming
and satisfying ! How the cares of life vanish, as the soul more and
more becomes filled with the love of God ! How the fever of life
is subdued, as the passions are quenched, or rather baptized, elevated,
and transfigured, by the power and the presence of the love of God !
"0, love divine, how sweet Thou art!
When shall I find my willing heart,

All taken up by Thee ! '

I thirst, I faint, I die to prove
The greatness of redeeming love,
■ The love of Christ to me ! "

III. And now let us glance, thirdli/, at the morals of Christianity,
summed up, in our test, iu the phrase, the Christian "dwells in
love." This is the third element in the trinity of the Christian life.
The believer knows God as he loves Him; he experiences God in
His indwelling Spirit; he works out the love of God within him in
the moral manifestations of his daily life and conduct. He " dwell-
eth in love " — that is the phrase of the text. Love is the atmosphere
that surrounds him. He takes it iu, so to speak, with every breath ;
it is carried, by the working of the heart, into all the circulation,
purifying, strengthening, giving li/e to his whole nature. And it
is light as well as life. All duties, whether in our relations to God
or to man, are clearly discerned in this luminous atmosphere of love.
" We love Him," says the Apostle, " because He first loved us."
There is no trustworthy morality which has not this for its basis and
foundation, for "love "is the fulfilling of the law." When the
shrewd scribe, to tempt our Saviour, asked him, " MaMcr, ivhich is
the great commandment of the law?" the answer came promptly in
the summing up of all ethics in the simple injunction, " Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and
with all thy mind, and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself"
(Matt., xxii, 31).

If you wish to build up a pure moral character in this life, do not
put any altar before the altar of God — not even the altar of your

454 LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY.

natural affections, not even the altar of your love for father, mother,
sister, brother, wife, or husband. There is the rock upon which
thousands have split. You remember the parable of the royal wed-
ding feast; how, even when the banquet was ready, the oxen and
the failings killed, the invited guests excused themselves. One
went to his farm, another was busy with his merchandise, and a
third had married a wife. And this parable is repeating itself in
your personal history to-day. Your heart is set upon your farm,
your merchandise, your wife, rather than upon God ; uiiless you are,
in the language of the text, " dwelling in love." The objects of our
cupidity and of our natural aflFection are pe^rpetually coming between
us and Grod. " But are our natural affections to be crushed ? " God
forbid. Christ wept over the grave of Lazarus, His " friend." In
this, as in many other eases. He displayed natural affection in all its
fulness. There is nothing in religion incompatible with the natural
affections. Nay, you will find that he who loves God most, has tire
strongest and most trustworthy love for kindred and friends; the
human affections are purged of all dross by the fire of love to God.

And so, he that " dwelleth in love" is true, and faithful, and
unselfish, in all the relations of life. Because he loves God, he
" loves his brother also." In men, as iu God, love is essentially
creative and productive. It tends always to impart ; never to with-
hold. The man that " dwells in love," can never be a churl. I am
not now speaking of charity in that narrow sense to which we often
restrict it — money giving; the very restriction showing that we
value money more than all other things. I am speaking of the
charity of a loving heart, full of feeling and of tenderness: — a heart
which cannot help imparting itself. Such a heart prompts to all
good and kind actions, just when they are called for. It will give
tears, when tears and sympathy can bless or sooth ; it will give sac-
rifice, when sacrifice can help or save some suffering soul. Earnest
love to God onust display itself in tender attributes, iu all kind and
gentle ministrations, in all forms of benevolence and personal sacri-
fice. And these things become the more easy, the more we know
of the love of God.

" The Christian dwells in love." Especially will this love show
itself to those who are sharers in the same love. The Christian
feels for those that are " of the household of faith " — an affection
different in kind, as well as in degree, from that which he feels for

LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY. 455

others. ''This is the message that ye heard from the beginning,
that we should love one another." Again, " this is the command-
ment, that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ,
and love one another." Our love to Christians, then, is something
over and above the general duty of philanthropy and charity, be-
cause Christ has made our " love of the brethren " the test and
criterion of our love to Him. I fear we arc losing sight of this, and
allowing the world's maxims to creep into the church. Let us not
prate of Christian experience, if we fail in this very first of Christian •
duties. Do not pi'ofess to " dwell in God," if you harbor any feeling
of envy or uncharitableness for your brethren in the church. How
can we '' love God, if we do not love our brother also ? " " Let us
love one another, for love is of God ; and every one that lovcth is born
of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth iwt, knowcth not God ;
for God is love." /'If a man say, I love God, and hateth his
brother, he is a liar; for he that loveth not his brother whom he
hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" 0
brethren, in this church, members surrounding this altar, partaking
month after month the broken body and blood of Jesus — 0, men of
this church of God, I pray you and command you to love one another!
But Christian morality has its wider sphere. The love of God in
the soul breeds affections that are not and cannot be limited by the
boundaries of the family, the church, or the State. My first care,
indeed, as a Christian, may be to look after thbse of " my own
household," whether after the flesh or after Christ; but my charity,
beginning at home, must not end there. Such a charity, so limited,
is in fact but a refinement of selfishness. But the very ofiicc and
work of Christian morals is to root out selfishness. The natural man
makes himself the centre and the aim of his plans. By this criterion,
we may test ourselves. In the natural life, sclf'i^ the centre of all
the activities, the aff"ections, the aims of the man. If it be so with
you, my friend, then you have not that experience of Christian love
which develops Christian morality. It is the essential mark of the
child of God to make love the governing principle of his life. That
love is inconsistent with this supreme devotion to one's self. And
as to indulging hatred toward any human being, the very mention
of it is absurd. What is hatred ? " It is the opposite of love." I
grant you there could be no hatred if there were no love, just as
there could be no darkness if there were no light. But that docs

456 LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY.

not vindicate hatred. There is no hatred in God. He loves all His
creatures. He hates the ungodliness of men — their crimes, wrongs,
and vices. He hates the wickedness of the world, but the world and
man He loves. What is hate ? It is wrath kept till it gets old. Can
hate consist with virtue or with love ? I do not say that awjer is
always inconsistent with love. Clod is angry with the wicked. But
hate — there is no hate, there can be none, in the pure heart. The
sun can never "go down upon your wrath," if your heart "dwells
in love ; " and so your anger can never harden into hate. If, then,
you hate any man, my friend, pray God to take that evil spirit away;
pray that you may be able to love your brother, as a sign of your
love to God.

If what we have said be true, the science of Christian ethics is
luminous to him who " dwells in love." No questions of casuistry
can long perplex the loving soul. He finds it easy to perform his
duties to God. Submission, trust, obedience — how natural these are,
Avhen the heart tends toward God by the gravitation of a perfect love !
And this love is the surest bond of fidelity and perseverance; we
cannot backslide unless our hearts grow cold. The needle of a gen-
uine love never swerves from its polarity. Nor can abstract ques-
tions perplex the loving soul. It cares not to settle the ground of
moral obligation, to ask Vi^hether its conduct shall sort with the "fit-
ness of things," or with " general utility." Its happy instincts lead
it straight on in the way of right. God never abandoned a loving
heart to permanent perplexity or doubt. And so with our duties to
man. When we love our neighbor, we cannot harm him ; nay, not
content with this negative benevolence, we render him, with sponta-
neous and unconstrained activity, all offices of tenderness and charity.

You have all heard of Lord Bacon's saying, " Knowlecjge is
power." But perhaps you have not all heard of another saying of
Bacon's, " The angels fell by striving to be like God in power ;
Adam, by striving to be like God in knowledge; but neither angels
nor men ever transgressed, or shall transgress, by striving to be like
God in love." Ah ! love is better than power, and better than knowl-
edge, because " God is love." But by choosing the better part, we
get the lesser also. Choose .the lesser, and you shall lose the whole.
If there be knowledge, it shall vanish away; but love never faileth.
The ambition for knowledge or for power^ instead of love, has been

LOVE THE SUM OF CHRISTIANITY. 4')(

the curse of Christian men, of cliurches, and of nations. But for
this sad, Satanic ambition,' there had been no Paradise lost; but for
it, after Christ had opened the way for man to a Paradise regained,
there had been none of the ages of darkness, sin, and sorrow, that
take the place of what should have been the ages of a pure, undoubting
faith. In the first Christian centuries, the Gnostics fell by seeking
knowledge, instead of love; the scholastics in the middle age erred
in the same way; the Pantheists of our time are their modern fol-
lowers.

Let us take warning. There is safety and strength only for those who
" dwell in love." There is knowledge that shall last forever only for
those that " dwell in love." There is power to overcome the world,
and sin, and death, and hell, only for those that '' dwell in love."
There is salvation only for those that "dwell in love." For ''God
is Lovej and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in- God, and God in
him."

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