CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Mr. & Mrs, 
 Bernard Berman 
 
Cornell University Library 
 
 BX5133.K55A8 1909 
 
 All saints' day, and other sermons. 
 
 3 1924 007 506 177 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924007506177 
 
ALL SAINTS' DAY 
 
 AND OTHER SERMONS 
 
MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited 
 
 LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
 MELBOURNE 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 NEW YORK ■ BOSTON - CHICAGO 
 ATLANTA ■ SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 THE JMACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 
 
 TORONTO 
 
ALL SAINTS' DAY 
 
 AND OTHER SERMONS 
 
 THE REV. CHARLES KINGSLEY, M.A. 
 
 LATE RECTOR OF EVERSLEY AND CANON OF WESTMINSTER 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 THE REV. W. HARRISON, M.A. 
 
 HECTOR OF BRINGTON 
 
 MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED 
 
 ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON 
 1909 
 
First published by Macmillan ajid Co. January ] 
 Reprinted Se^temher T^'^^o, 1895, 1909 
 
TO 
 THE VERY REV. JOHN HOWSON, D.D., 
 
 DEAN OF CHESTER, 
 
 AND TO 
 
 THE BELOVED CONGREGATION OF CHESTER CATHEDRAL, 
 
 BEFORE WHOM MANY OF THESE SEKM0N3 WERE PREACHED, 
 
 THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED, 
 
 m MEMOET OF 
 
 THEIR SERVANT IN THE LORD, 
 
 CHARLES KINGSLEY, 
 
 SOBfETIME CANON OP CHE8TEE, 
 
" Inheriting the zeal 
 And from the sanctity of elder times 
 Not deviating ; — a priest, the like of whom 
 If multiplied, and in their stations set, 
 "Would o'er the bosom of a joyful land 
 Spread true religion, and her genuine fruits." 
 
 The Exoorsion— Book vi. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 The following Sermons could not be arranged 
 according to any proper sequence. Those, how- 
 ever, which refer to doctrine and the Church 
 Seasons will mostly be found at the beginning 
 of the volume, whilst those which deal with 
 practical subjects are placed at the close. 
 
 A few of the Sermons 'have already appeared 
 in " Grood Words ;" but by far the greater num- 
 ber were never prepared by their author for the 
 press. They were written out very roughly — 
 sometimes at an hour's notice, as occasion de- 
 manded — and were only iutended for delivery from 
 the pulpit. 
 
 The original MSS. have been adhered to as 
 
 O 
 
 closely as possible. 
 
 It is thought that manv to whom the late Rec- 
 tor of Eversley was dear will welcome the publi- 
 
X Preface. 
 
 cation of these earnest words, and find them 
 helpful in the Christian life. 
 
 " Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord 
 from henceforth : Yea, saith the Spirit, that they 
 may rest from their labours ; and their works do 
 follow them." 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 SERSrON PAOH 
 
 I. All Saints' Day. Eev. vii. 9-12, ... 1 
 
 II. Prepaeation fob Advent. Amos iv. 12,. . 9 
 
 III. The Purifying Hope. 1 St John iii. 2, . .20 
 
 IV. The Lord coming to His Temple. Mai. iii. 1, 2, . 30 
 V. Advent Lessons. Eom. vii. 22-25. ... 41 
 
 VI. Capital Punishment. Gen. ix. 1, 3-6, . . 53 
 
 VII. Temptation. St Matt. iv. 3, . . . . 65 
 
 VIII. Mother's Love. St Matt. xv. 22-28, . . 76 
 
 IX. Good Friday. St Luke xxiv. 5, 6, . . . 85 
 
 X. The Image op the Earthy and op the Heavenly. 
 
 1 Cor. XV. 49, . . . . . . 94 
 
 XI. Easter Day. St John xii. 24, 25, . . .101 
 
 XII. Presence in Absence. St John xvi. 16, . . 109 
 
 XIII. Ascension Day. St John viii. 58, . . . 116 
 
 XIV. The Comforter. St John xv. 26, . . . 124 
 XV. Thou ART Worthy. Rev. iv. 11, . . . 134 
 
 XVI. The Glory of the Trinity. Ps. civ. 31-33, . . 142 
 
 XVII. Love of God AND Man. ISt John iv. 16-21, . . 151 
 
 XVIII. Courage. Acts iv. 13, 18-20, . . . .161 
 
 XIX. Good Days. 1 St Peter iii. 8-12, . . .170 
 
 XX. Grace. St John i. 16, 17, ... 181 
 
 XXI. Father and Child. 1 Cor. i. 4, 5, 7, . . . 190 
 
 XXII. God is our Kefdge. Ps. xlvi. 1, . . . 200 
 
xii Contents. 
 
 SERMON PAGE 
 
 XXIII. Pride and Humility. 1 St Peter <r. 5, . . 209 
 
 XXIV. WoKSHip. Eev. xi. 16, 17, ... 217 
 XXV. The Peace of God. CoIos. iii. 15, . . 228 
 
 XXVI. Sins OF Parents Visited. Ezek. xviii. 1-4, . 238 
 
 XXVII. Avenging Law. St Matt. v. 25, 26, . . 247 
 
 XXVIII. St John the Baptist. St Luke iu. 2, 3, 7, 9-14, 256 
 
 XXIX. The Present Eeoompence. Prov. xi. 31, . 265 
 
 XXX. The Kingdom oe Heaven. St Matt. xxii. 2-7, . 274 
 
 XXXI. The Unchangeable Chjbist. Heb. xiii. 8. . 285 
 
 XXXII. Reeoemation Lessons. 2 Kings xxiii. 3, 4, 25, 26, 292 
 
 XXXIII. Human Soot. St Matt, xviii. 14, . . . 302 
 
 XXXIV. National Sorrows and National Lessons. 
 
 2 Sam. xix. 14, .... . 312 
 
 XXXV. Grace and Glory. St John ii. 11, . . 320 
 
 XXXVL Useless Sacrifice. Isa. i. 11-17, . . . 336 
 
 XXXVII. The Surprise of the Eighteous. St Matt. xxv. 34-37, 347 
 
 XXXVIII. The Lord's Prayer. St Matt. vi. 9, 10, . 357 
 XXXIX. The Distracted Mind. St Matt. vi. 34, . 365 
 
 XL. The Lesson oe Life. Hebrews, v. 7, 8, . . 372 
 
 XLI. Sacrifice to C^":sar or to God. St Matt. xxii. 21, 378 
 
 XLII. The Unjust Steward. St Luke xvi. 8, . . 385 
 
 XLIII. The Rich aj«d the Poor. Prov. xxii. 2, 397 
 
SERMON I. 
 
 ALL saints' DAT. 
 Westminster Abbey. November 1, 1874. 
 
 Revelation vii. 9-12. 
 
 "After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could 
 number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, 
 stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white 
 robes, and palms in their hands ; and cried with a loud voice, 
 saying. Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and 
 unto the Lamb. And all the angela stood round about the throne, 
 and about the elders and the four beasts, and fell before the throne 
 on their faces, and worshipped God, saying, Amen : Blessing, and 
 glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and 
 might, be unto our God for ever and ever. Amen." 
 
 To-DAT is All Saints' Day. On this day we com- 
 memorate — and, as far as our dull minds will let us, 
 contemplate — the saints ; the holy ones of God ; the 
 pure and the triumphant — be they who they may, or 
 whence they may, or where they may. We are not 
 bidden to define and limit their number. We are 
 expressly told that they are a great multitude, which 
 no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, 
 and peoples, and tongues ; and most blessed news 
 that is for all who love God and man. We are not 
 told, again — and I beg you all to mark this well — ■ 
 that this great multitude consists merely of those who, 
 according to the popular notion, have " gone to heaven," 
 
2 All Saints' Day. 
 
 as it is called, simply because they have not gone to 
 hell. Not so, not so ! The great multitude whom we 
 commemorate on All Saints' Day, are saints. They 
 are the holy ones, the heroes and heroines of mankind, 
 the elect, the aristocracy of grace. These are they who 
 have kept themselves unspotted from the world. They 
 are the pure who have washed their robes, and made 
 them white in the blood of the Lamb, which is the 
 spirit of self-sacrifice. They are those who carry the 
 palm-branch of triumph, who have come out of great 
 tribulation, who have dared, and fought, and sufifered 
 for God, and truth, and right. Nay, there are those 
 among them, and many, thank God — weak women, too, 
 among them — who have resisted unto blood, striving 
 against sin. 
 
 And who are easy-going folk like you and me, that 
 we should arrogate to ourselves a place in that grand 
 company ? Not so ! What we should do on All Saints' 
 Day is to place ourselves, with all humility, if but for 
 an hour, where we can look afar off upon our betters, 
 and see what they are like, and what they do. 
 
 And what are they like, those blessed beings of whom 
 the text .speaks ? The Gospel for this day describes 
 them to us ; and we may look on that description as 
 complete, for He who gives it is none other than our 
 Lord Himself " Blessed are the poor in spirit ; for 
 theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that 
 mourn : for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the 
 meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed ai-e they 
 who hunger and thirst after righteousness : for they shall 
 be filled. Blessed are the merciful : for they shall obtain 
 
All Saints' Day. 3 
 
 mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart : for they shall 
 see God. Blessed are the peace-makers : for they shall 
 he called the children of God. Blessed are they which 
 are persecuted for righteousness' sake : for theirs is the 
 kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall 
 revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner 
 of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and 
 be exceeding glad : for great is your reward in heaven." 
 
 This is what they are like ; and what we, I fear, too 
 many of us, are not like. But in proportion as we 
 grow like them, by the grace of God, just so far shall we 
 enter into the communion of saints, and understand 
 the bliss of that everlasting All Saints' Day which St 
 John saw in heaven. 
 
 And what do they do, those blessed beings ? What- 
 ever else they do, or do not do, this we are told they 
 do — they worship. They satisfy, it would seem, in 
 perfection, that mysterious instinct of devotion — that 
 inborn craving to look upward and adore, which, let 
 false philosophy say what it will, proves the most be- 
 nighted idolater to be a man, and not a brute — a spirit, 
 and not a merely natural thing. 
 
 They have worshipped, and so are blest. They have 
 hungered and thirsted after righteousness, and now they 
 are fiUed. They have longed for, toiled for, it may be died 
 for, the true, the beautiful, and the good ; and now they 
 can gaze upward at the perfect reality of that which they 
 saw on earth, only as in a glass darkly, dimly, and afar ; 
 and can contemplate the utterly free, the utterly beauti- 
 ful, and the utterly good in the character of God and the 
 face of Jesus Christ. They entered while on earth 
 
4 All Saints Day. 
 
 into the mystery and the glory of self-sacrifice ; and now 
 they find their bliss in gazing on the one perfect and 
 eternal sacrifice, and rejoicing in the thought that it is 
 the cause and ground of the whole universe, even the 
 Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. 
 
 I say not that all things are clear to them. How 
 can they be to any finite and created being ? They, 
 and indeed angels and archangels, must walk for ever 
 by faith, and not by sight. But if there be mysteries 
 in the universe still hidden from them, they know who 
 has opened the sealed book of God's secret counsels, 
 even the Lamb who is the Lion, and the Lion who is 
 the Lamb ; and therefore, if all things are not clear to 
 them, all things at least are bright, for they can trust 
 that Lamb and His self-sacrifice. In Him, and through 
 Him, light will conquer darkness, justice injustice, truth 
 ignorance, order disorder, love hate, till God be all in 
 all, and paia and sorrow and evil shall have been exter- 
 minated out of a world for which Christ stooped to die. 
 Therefore they worship ; and the very act of worship — 
 understand it well — is that great reward in heaven which 
 our Lord promised them. Adoration is their very bliss 
 and life. It must be so. For what keener, what 
 nobler enjoyment for rational and moral beings, than 
 satisfaction with, and admiration of, a Being better 
 than themselves ? Therefore they worship ; and their 
 worship finds a natural vent in words most fit though 
 few, but all expressing utter trust and utter satisfaction 
 in the worthiness of God. Therefore they worship ; 
 and by worship enter into communion and harmony 
 not only with each other, not only with angels and arch- 
 
All Saints' Day. 5 
 
 angels, but with all the powers of nature, the four 
 beings which are around the throne, and with every 
 creature which is in heaven and in earth, and under the 
 earth, and in the sea. For them, likewise, St John 
 heard saying, " Blessing and glory, and honour, and 
 power, be unto Him that sitteth on the throne, and 
 to the Lamb for ever and ever." 
 
 And why 1 I think, with all humility, that the key 
 to all these hymns — whether of angels or of men, or of 
 mere natural things — is the first hymn of all ; the hymn 
 which shows that, however grateful to God for what He 
 has done for them those are whom the Lamb has 
 redeemed by His blood to God, out of every kindred, 
 and nation, and tongue ; yet, nevertheless, the hymn of 
 hymns is that which speaks not of gratitude, but of 
 absolute moral admiration — the hymn which glorifies 
 God, not for that which He is to man, not for that which 
 He is to the universe, but for that which He is absol- 
 utely and in Himself — that which He was before all 
 worlds, and would be still, though the whole universe, 
 all created things, and time, and space, and matter, and 
 every created spirit likewise, should be annihilated for 
 ever. And what is that ? 
 
 " Holy, holy, holy. Lord God Almighty, which was, 
 and is, and is to come." 
 
 Ah ! what a Gospel lies within those words ! A 
 Gospel? Ay, if you will receive it, the root of all 
 other possible Gospels, and good news for all created 
 beings. What a Gospel ! and what an everlasting fount 
 of comfort ! Surely of those words it is true, " Blessed 
 are they who, gomg through the vale of misery, find 
 
6 All Saints^ Day. 
 
 therein a well, and the pools are filled with water." 
 Know you not what I mean ? Happier, perhaps, are 
 you — the young at least among you — if you do not 
 know. But some of you must know too well. It is to 
 them I speak. Were you never not merely puzzled — 
 all thinking men are that — hut crushed and sickened at 
 moments by the mystery of evil ? Sickened by the 
 follies, the failures, the ferocities, the foulnesses of 
 mankind, for ages upon ages past ? Sickened by 
 the sins of the unholy many — sickened, alas ! by 
 the imperfections even of the holiest few ? And 
 have you never cried in your hearts with longing. 
 Almost with impatience, Surely, surely, there is an 
 ideal Holy One somewhere, or else how could have 
 arisen in my mind the conception, however faint, of an 
 ideal holiness ? But where, oh where ? Not in the 
 world around, strewed with unholiness. Not in myself 
 — unholy too, without and within — seeming to myself 
 .sometimes the very worst company of all the bad com- 
 pany I meet, because it is the only bad company from 
 which I cannot escape. Oh, is there a Holy One, whom 
 I may contemplate with utter delight ? and if so, where 
 is He ? Oh, that I might behold, if but for a moment. 
 His perfect beauty, even though, as in the fable of 
 Semele of old, the lightning of His glance were death. 
 Nay, more, has it not happened to some here — to clergy- 
 man, lawyer, phj^sician, perhaps, alas ! to some pure- 
 minded, noble-hearted woman — to be brought in con- 
 tact perforce with that which truly sickens them — with 
 some case of human folly, baseness, foulness — which, 
 however much their soul revolts from it, they must 
 
All Saints Day. 7 
 
 handle, they must toil over many weeks and months, in 
 hope that that which is crooked may be made somewhat 
 straight, till their whole soul was distempered, all but 
 degraded, by the continual sight of sin, till their eyes 
 seemed full of nothing but the dance of death, and their 
 ears of the gibbering of madmen, and their nostrils with 
 the odours of the charnel house, and they longed for one 
 breath of pure air, one gleam of pure light, one strain of 
 pure music, to wash their spirits clean from those foul 
 elements into which their duty had thrust them down 
 perforce ? 
 
 And then, oh then, has there not come to such an one 
 — I know that it has come — that for which his spirit 
 was athirst, the very breath of pure air, the very gleam 
 of pure light, the very strain of pure music, for it is the 
 very music of the spheres, in those same words, " Holy, 
 holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is 
 to come ; " and he has answered, with a flush of keenest 
 joy. Yes. Whatever else is unholy, there is an Holy 
 One, spotless and undefiled, serene and self-contained. 
 Whatever else I cannot trust, there is One whom I 
 can trust utterly. Whatever else I am dissatisfied with, 
 there is One whom I can contemplate with utter satis- 
 faction, and bathe my stained soul in that eternal 
 fount of purity. And who is He ? Who save the 
 Cause and Maker, and Ruler of all things, past, present, 
 and to come ? Ah, Gospel of all gospels, that God 
 Himself, the Almighty God, is the eternal and unchange- 
 able realisation of all that I and all mankind, in our 
 purest and our noblest moments, have ever dreamed con- 
 cerning the true, the beautiful, and the good. Even 
 
8 All Saints Day. 
 
 though He slay me, the unholy, yet will I trust in Him. 
 For He is Holy, Holy, Holy, and can do nothing to me, 
 or any creature, save what He ought. For He has 
 created all things, and for His pleasure they are and 
 were created. 
 
 Whosoever has entered, though but for a moment, 
 however faintly, partially, stupidly, into that thought 
 of thoughts, has entered in so far into the communion 
 of the elect; and has had his share in the everlasting 
 All Saints' Day which is in heaven. He has been, 
 though but for a moment, in harmony with the polity 
 of the Living God, the heavenly Jerusalem ; and with 
 an innumerable company of angels, and the church of 
 the first-born who are written in heaven ; and with the 
 spirits of just men made perfect, and with all past, 
 present, and to come, in this and in all other worlds, 
 of whom it is written, " Blessed are the poor in spirit : 
 for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they 
 who hunger and thirst after righteousness : for they shall 
 be filled. Blessed are the pure in heart : for they shall 
 see God. Blessed are they who are persecuted for 
 righteousness' sake : for theirs is the kingdom of 
 heaven." Great indeed is their reward, for it is no less 
 than the very beatific vision to contemplate and adore. 
 That supreme moral beauty, of which all earthly beauty, 
 all nature, all art, ajl poetry, aU music, are but phan- 
 toms and parables, hints and hopes, dim reflected rays of 
 the clear light of that everlasting day, of which it is 
 written — that " the city had no need of the sun, neither 
 of the moon, to shine in it : for the glory of God did 
 lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." 
 
SERMON II. 
 
 PREPARATION FOR ADVENT. 
 
 Westminster Abbey. November 16, 1874. 
 
 Amos it. 12. 
 "Prepare to meet thy God, Israel." 
 
 We read to-day, for the first lesson, parts of the pro- 
 phecy of Amos. They are somewhat difficult, here and 
 there, to understand ; but nevertheless Amos is perhaps 
 the grandest of the Hebrew prophets, next to Isaiah. 
 Rough and homely as his words are, there is a strength, 
 a majesty, and a terrible earnestness in them, which it 
 is good to listen to; and specially good now that Advent 
 draws near, and we have to think of the coming of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, and what His coming means. 
 "Prepare to meet thy God," says Amos in the text. 
 Perhaps he will tell us how to meet our God. 
 
 Amos is specially the poor man's prophet, for he was a 
 poor man himself ; not a courtier like Isaiah, or a priest 
 like Jeremiah, or a sage like Daniel ; but a herdsman 
 and a gatherer of sycamore fruit in Tekoa, near Beth- 
 lehem, where Amos was born. Yet to this poor man, 
 looking after sheep and cattle on the downs, and ponder- 
 ing on the wrongs and misery around, the word of the 
 Loj'd came, and he knew that God had spoken to him. 
 
10 Preparation for Advent. 
 
 and that he must go and speak to men, at the risk of 
 his life, what God had bidden, against all the nations 
 round and their kings, and against the king and nobles 
 and priests of Israel, and the king and nobles and priests 
 of Judah, and tell them that the day of the Lord is at 
 hand, and that they must prepare to meet their God. 
 And he said what he felt he must say with a noble 
 freedom, with a true independence such as the grace of 
 God alone can give. Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, 
 who was worshipping (absurd as it may seem to us) 
 God and the golden calf at the same time in King 
 Jeroboam's court, complained loudly, it would seem, of 
 Amos's plain speaking. How uncourteous to prophesy 
 that Jeroboam should die by the sword, and Israel be 
 carried captive out of their own land ! Let him go 
 home into his own land of Judah, and prophesy there ; 
 but not prophesy at Beth-el, for it was the king's 
 chapel and the king's court. Amos went, I presume, 
 in fear of his life. But he left noble words behind him. 
 "I was no prophet," he said to Amaziah, "nor a 
 prophet's son, but a herdsman, and a gatherer of wild 
 figs. And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, 
 and said. Go, prophesy unto my people Israel." And 
 then he turned on that smooth court-priest Amaziah, 
 and pronounced against him, in the name of the Lord, 
 a curse too terrible to be repeated here. 
 
 Now what was the secret of this inspired herdsman's 
 strength ? What helped him to face priests, nobles, 
 and kings ? What did he believe ? What did he 
 preach ? He believed and preached the kingdom of 
 God and His righteousness ; the simple but infinite 
 
Preparation for Advent. ii 
 
 difference between right and wrong ; and tlie certain 
 doom of wrong, if wrong was persisted in. He believed 
 in the kingdom of God. He told the kings and the 
 people of all the nations round, that they had com- 
 mitted cruel and outrageous sins, not against the Jews 
 merely, but against each other. In the case of Moab, 
 the culminating crime was an insult to the dead. He 
 had burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime. 
 In the case of Ammon, it was brutal cruelty to captive 
 women ; but in the cases of Gaza, of Tyre, and of Edom, 
 it was slave-making and slave-trading invasions of 
 Palestine. " Thus saith the Lord : For three trans- 
 gressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away the 
 punishment thereof; because they carried away captive 
 the whole captivity, to deliver them up to Edom. But 
 I will send a fire upon the wall of Gaza, which shall 
 devour the palaces thereof" 
 
 Yes. Slave-hunting and slave-trading wars — that 
 was and is an iniquity which the just and merciful 
 Ruler of the earth would not, and will not, pardon. 
 And honour to those who, as in Africa of late, put down 
 those foul deeds, wheresoever they are done ; who, at 
 the risk of their own lives, dare free the captives from 
 their chains ; and who, if interfered with in their pious 
 work, dare execute on armed murderers and manstealers 
 the vengeance of a righteous God. For the Lord God 
 was their King, and their Judge, whether they knew it 
 or not. And for three transgressions of theirs, and for 
 four, the Lord would not turn away their punishment, 
 but would send fire and sword among them, and they 
 should be carried away captive, as they had carried 
 
12 Preparation for Advent. 
 
 others away. But to go back. Amos next turns to hia 
 own countrymen — ^to Judah and Israel, who were then 
 two separate nations. For three transgressions of Judah, 
 and for four, the Lord would not turn away their punish- 
 ment, because they had despised the law of the Lord, 
 and had not walked in His commandments. Therefore 
 He would send a fire on Judah, and it should devour 
 the palaces of Jerusalem. But Amos is most bitter 
 against Israel, against the court of King Jeroboam at 
 Samaria, and against the rich men of Israel, the bulls 
 of Bashan, as he calls them. For three transgressions, 
 and for four, the Lord would not turn away their 
 punishment. And why ? 
 
 Now see what I meant when I said that Amos 
 believed not only in the kingdom of God, but in the 
 righteousness of God. It was not merely that they were 
 worshipping idols — golden calves at Dan, and Beth-el, 
 and Samaria, at the same time that they worshipped 
 the true God. That was bad, but there was more 
 behind. These men were bad, proud, luxurious, cruel ; 
 they were selling their countrymen for slaves — selling, 
 he says so twice, as if it was some notorious and 
 special case, an honest man for silver, and the poor for 
 a pair of shoes. They were lying down on clothes taken 
 on pledge by every altar. They were breaking the 
 seventh commandment in an abominable way. They 
 were falsifying weights and measures, and selliag the 
 refuse of the wheat. They stored up llie fruits of 
 violence and robbery in their palaces. They hated 
 him who rebuked them, and abhorred him that spoke 
 uprightly. They trod upon the poor and crushed the 
 
Preparation for Advent. 1 3 
 
 needy, and then said to their stewards, " Bring wine, 
 and let us drink." Therefore though they had built 
 houses of hewn stone, they should not live in them. 
 They had planted pleasant vineyards, but should not 
 drink of them. And all the while these superstitious 
 and wicked rich men were talking of the day of the 
 Lord, and hoping that the day of the Lord would 
 appear. 
 
 You, if you have read your Bibles carefully and 
 reverently, must surely be aware that the day of the 
 Lord, either in the Old Testament or in the New, does 
 not mean merely the final day of judgment, but any strik- 
 ing event, any great crisis in the world's history, which 
 throws a divine light upon that history, and shows to 
 men — at least to those who have eyes wherewith to see 
 — that verily there is a God who judges the earth in 
 righteousness, and ministers true judgment among the 
 people ; — a God whom men, and all their institutions, 
 should always be prepared to meet, lest coming sud- 
 denly. He find them sleeping. If you are not aware of 
 this, the real meaning of a day of the Lord, a day of 
 the Son of Man, let me entreat you to go and search 
 the Scriptures for yourselves ; for in them ye think ye 
 have eternal life, and they are they which testify of the 
 Lord, of that Eternal Son of whom the second Psalm 
 speaks, in words which mobs and tyrants, the atheist 
 and the superstitious, are alike willing to forget. 
 
 In the time of Amos, the rich tyrants of Israel 
 seem to have meant by the day of the Lord some 
 vague hope that, in those dark and threatening times, 
 God would interfere to save them, if they were attacked 
 
1 4 Preparation for Advent. 
 
 by foreign armies. But woe to you that desire the day 
 of the Lord, says Amos the herdsman. What do you 
 want with it ? You will find it very different from 
 what you expect. There is a day of the Lord coming, 
 he says, therefore prepare to meet your God. But you 
 are unprepared, and you wiU find the day of the Lord 
 very different from what you expect. It will be a day 
 in which you will learn the righteousness of God. Be- 
 cause He is righteous He will not sufifer your unrighteous- 
 ness. Because He is good. He will not permit you to 
 be bad. The day of the Lord to you will be darkness 
 and not light, not as you dream deliverance from the 
 invaders, but ruin by the invaders, from which will be 
 no escape. "As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear 
 met him ; or went into the house and leaned his hand 
 on the wall, and a serpent bit him." There will be no 
 escape for those wicked men. Though they dug into 
 hell, God's hand would take them ; though they climbed 
 up into heaven, God would fetch them down ; though 
 they hid in the bottom of the sea, God would command 
 the serpent, and it should bite them. He would sift 
 the house of Israel among all nations like com in a 
 sieve, and not a grain should fall to the earth. And aU 
 the sinners among God's people should die by the sword, 
 who say, " The evil shall not overtake us." 
 
 This was Amos's notion of tlie kingdom of God and 
 His righteousness. These Israelites would not obey the 
 laws of God's kingdom, and be righteous and good. 
 But Amos told them, they could not get rid of God's 
 kingdom. The Lord was King, in spite of them, and 
 they would find it out to their sorrow. If they would 
 
Preparation for Advent. 15 
 
 not seek His kingdom and His government, His govern- 
 ment would seek them and find them, and find their 
 evil-doings out. If they would not seek God's righteous- 
 ness. His righteousness would seek them, and execute 
 righteous judgment on them. No wonder that the 
 Israelites thought Amos a most troublesome and insolent 
 person. No wonder that the smooth priest Amaziah 
 begged him to begone and talk in that way somewhere 
 else. He saw plainly enough that either Amos must 
 leave Samaria, or he must leave it. The two could no 
 more work together than fire and water. Amos wanted 
 to make men repent of their sins, while Amaziah wanted 
 only to make them easy in their minds ; and no man 
 can do both at once. 
 
 So it was then, my friends, and so it will be till the 
 end of this wicked world. The way to please men, and 
 be popular, always was, and always will be, Amaziah's 
 way ; to tell men that they may worship God and the 
 golden calf at the same time, that they may worship 
 God and money, worship God and follow the ways of 
 this wicked world which suit their fancy and their 
 interest ; to tell them the kingdom of God is not over 
 you now, Christ is not ruling the world now ; that the 
 kingdom of God will only come, when Christ comes at 
 the last day, and meanwhile, if people will only believe 
 what they are told, and live tolerably respectable lives, 
 they may behave in all things else as if there was no 
 God, and no judgments of God. Seeking the righteous- 
 ness of God, say these preachers of Amaziah's school, 
 only means, that if Christ's righteousness is imputed to 
 you, you need not be righteous yourselves, but will go 
 
1 6 Preparation for Advent. 
 
 to heaven without having been good men here on earth. 
 That is the comfortable message which the world delights 
 to hear, and for which the world will pay a high price to 
 its flatterers. 
 
 But if any man dares to tell his fellowmen what Amos 
 told them, and say. The kingdom of God is among you, 
 and within you, and over you, whether you like or not, 
 and you are in it ; the Lord is King, be the people never 
 so unquiet; and all power is given to Him in heaven and 
 earth already ; and at the last great day, when He comes 
 in glory. He will show that He has been governing the 
 world and the inhabitants thereof all along, whether 
 they cared to obey Him or not : — if he tell men, that 
 the righteousness of God means this — to pray for the 
 Spirit of God and of Christ, that they may be perfect as 
 their Father in heaven is perfect, and holy as Christ is 
 holy, for without holiness no man shall see the Lord : if 
 he tell men, that the wrath of God was revealed from 
 heaven at the fall of man, and has been revealed con- 
 tinuously ever since, against all ungodliness and un- 
 righteousness of men, that indignation and wrath, tribu- 
 lation and anguish will fall upon every soul of man that 
 doeth evil ; and glory, honour, and peace to every man 
 that worketh good : — when a man dares to preach that, 
 he is no more likely to be popular with the wicked 
 world (for it is a wicked world) than Amos was popular, 
 or St Paul was popular, or our Lord Jesus Christ, who 
 gave both to Amos and to St Paul their messages, was 
 popular. False preachers will dislike that man, because 
 he wishes to make sinners uneasy, while they wish to 
 make them easy. Philosophers, falsely so-called, will 
 
Preparation for Advent. 17 
 
 dislike that man, because he talks of the kingdom of 
 God, the providence of God, and they are busy — at 
 least, just now — in telling men that there is no provi- 
 dence and no God — at least, no living God. The 
 covetous and worldly will dislike that man, for they 
 believe that the world is governed, not by God, but by 
 money. Politicians will dislike that man, because they 
 think that not God, but they, govern the world, by those 
 very politics and knavish tricks, which we pray God to 
 confound, whenever we sing " God save the Queen." 
 And the common people — the masses — who ought to 
 hear such a man gladly, for his words are to them, if 
 they would understand them, a gospel, and good news 
 of divine hope and deliverance from sin and ignorance, 
 oppression and misery — the masses, I say, wiU dislike 
 that man, because he tells them that God's will is law, 
 and must be obeyed at all risks : and the poor fools 
 have got into their heads just now that not God's will, 
 but the will of the people, is law, and that not the 
 eternal likeness of God, but whatever they happen to 
 decide by the majority of the moment, is right. 
 
 And so such a preacher wiU not be popular with the 
 many. They will dismiss him, at best, as they might a 
 public singer or lecturer, with compliments and thanks, 
 and so excuse themselves from doing what he tells them. 
 And he must look for his sincere hearers in the hearts of 
 those — and there are such, I verily believe, in this con- 
 gregation — who have a true love and a true fear of 
 Christ, their incarnate God — who believe, indeed, that 
 Christ is their King, and the King of all the earth ; who 
 think that to please Him is the most blessed, as well as 
 
 B 
 
1 8 Preparation for Advent. 
 
 the most profitable, thing which man can do ; to dis- 
 please Him the most horrible, as well as the most danger- 
 ous, thing which man can do ; and who, therefore, try 
 to please Him by becoming like Him, by really renounc- 
 ing the world and all its mean and false and selfish 
 ways, and putting on His new pattern of man, which is 
 created after God's likeness in righteousness and true 
 holiness. Blessed are they, for of them it is written, 
 " Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after right- 
 eousness, for they shall be filled." Even Christ Himself 
 shall fill them. Blessed are they, and all that they take 
 in hand, for of them it is written, " Blessed are all they 
 that fear the Lord, and walk in His ways. For thou 
 shalt eat the labours of thine hands." "The Lord is 
 righteous in all His ways, and holy in all His works. 
 The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon Him, 
 yea, all such as call upon Him faithfully. He will fulfil 
 the desire of them that fear Him. He also will hear 
 their cry" — ay, "and will help them." 
 
 Happy, ay, blest will such souls be, let the day of the 
 Lord appear when it will, or how it will It may 
 appear — the day of the Lord, as it has appeared again 
 and again in history^ — in the thunder of some mighty 
 war. It may appear after some irresistible, though often 
 silent revolution, whether religious or intellectual, social 
 or political. It will appear at last, as that great day of 
 days, which will conclude, so we believe, the drama of 
 human history, and all men shall give account for their 
 own works. But, however and whenever it shall appear, 
 they at least will watch its dawning, neither with the 
 selfish assurance of modern Pharisaism, nor with the 
 
Preparation for Advent. 19 
 
 abject terror of mediaeval superstition ; but with that 
 manful faith with which he who sang the 98th Psalm 
 saw the day of the Lord dawn once in the far east, more 
 than two thousand years ago, and cried with solemn joy, 
 in the glorious words which you have just heard sung — 
 words which the Church of England has embodied in her 
 daily evening service, in order, I presume, to show her 
 true children how they ought to look at days of judg- 
 ment ; and so prepare to meet their God : — 
 
 " Show yourselves joyful unto the Lord, all ye lands : 
 sing, rejoice, and give thanks. 
 
 " Let the sea make a noise, and all that therein is ; 
 the round world, and they that dwell therein. 
 
 " Let the floods clap their hands, and let the hills be 
 joyful together before the Lord : for He cometh to judge 
 the earth. 
 
 " With righteousness shall He judge the world : and 
 the people with equity. 
 
 " Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the 
 Holy Ghost ; 
 
 "As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall 
 be, world without end. Amen." 
 
SERMON III 
 
 THE PURIFYING HOPE. 
 
 Everdey, 1869. Windsor Castle, 1869. 
 
 1 John iii. 2. 
 
 ' ' Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what 
 we shall be : but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be 
 like him ; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath 
 this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. " 
 
 Let us consider this noble text, and see something, at 
 least, of what it has to tell us. It is, like all God's 
 messages, all God's laws, ay, like God's world in which 
 we live and breathe, at once beautiful and awful ; full 
 of life-giving hope; but full, too, of chastening fear. 
 Hope for the glorious future which it opens to poor 
 human beings like us ; fear, lest so great a promise be- 
 ing left us, we should fall short of it by our own fault. 
 Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed 
 on us, that we should be called the sons of God. 
 
 There is the root and beginning of all Christianity, — 
 of all true religion. We are the sons of God, and the in- 
 finite, absolute, eternal Being who made this world, and 
 all worlds, is our Father.. We are the children of God. 
 It is not for us to say who are not God's children. That 
 is God's concern, not ours. All that we have to do with, is 
 the awful and blessed fact that we are. We were baptised 
 
The Purifying Hope. 1 1 
 
 into God's kingdom, in the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Let us believe the Gospel 
 and good news which baptism brings us, and say each of 
 us ; — Not for our own goodness and deserving ; not for 
 our own faith or assurance ; not for anything which we 
 have thought, felt, or done, but simply out of the free 
 grace and love of God, seeking out us unconscious infants, 
 we are children of God. " Beloved now are we the sons 
 of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be." 
 It doth not yet appear what the next life will be like, or 
 what we shall be like in it. That there will be a next life, 
 — that death does not end all for us, the New Testament 
 tells us. Yea, our own hearts and reasons tell us. That 
 sentiment of immortality, that instinct that the death of 
 our body will not, cannot destroy our souls, or ourselves 
 — all men have had that, except a few ; and it is a 
 question whether they had it not once, and have only 
 lost it by giving way to their brute animal nature. But 
 be that as it may, it concerns us, I think, very little. 
 For we at least believe that we shall live again. That 
 we shall live again in some state or other, is as certain 
 to our minds as it was to the minds of our forefathers, 
 even while they were heathens ; as certain to us as it is 
 that we are alive now. But in that future state, what we 
 shall be like, we know not. St. John say's that he did 
 not know ; and we certainly have no more means of 
 knowing than St. John. 
 
 Therefore let us not feed our fancies with pictures of 
 what the next world will be like, — pictures, I say, which 
 are but waking dreams of men, intruding into those 
 things which they have not seen, vainly puffed vip in 
 
22 The Purifying Hope. 
 
 their fleshly minds — that is in their animal and mortal 
 brain. Let us be content with what St. John tells us, 
 which is a matter not for our brains, but for our hearts ; 
 not for our imaginations, but for our conscience, which 
 is indeed our highest reason. Whatever we do not 
 know about the next world, this, he says, we do know, — 
 that when God in Christ shall appear, we shall be like 
 Him. Like God. No more : No : but no less. To 
 be like God, it appears, is the very end and aim of our 
 being. That we might be like God, God our Father 
 sent us forth from His eternal bosom, which is the 
 ground of all life, in heaven and in earth. That we 
 might be like God, He clothed us in mortal flesh, and 
 sent us into this world of sense. That we might be like 
 God, He called us, from our infancy, into His Church. 
 That we might be like God, He gave us the divine 
 sense of right and wrong ; and more, by the inspiration 
 of His holy spirit, that inward witness, that Light of 
 God, which lightens every man that cometh into the 
 world, He taught us to love the right and hate the 
 wrong. That we might be like God, God is educating 
 us from our cradle to our grave, by every event, even the 
 smallest, which happens to us. That we might be like 
 God, it is in God that we live, and move, and have our 
 being ; that as the raindrop which falls from heaven, 
 rises again surely, soon or late, to heaven again ; so each 
 soul of man, coming forth from God at first, should return 
 again to God, as many of them as have eternal life, 
 having become like to God from whom it came at first. 
 And how shall we become like God? or rather like Christ 
 who is both God and man ? To become like God the 
 
The Purifying Hope. 23 
 
 Father, — that is impossible for finite and created beings 
 as we are. But to become somewhat, at least, like God 
 the Son, like Jesus Christ our Lord, who is the brightness 
 of His Father's glory, and the express image of His person, 
 that is not impossible. For He has revealed Himself as 
 a man, in the soul and body of a man, that our sinful 
 souls might be made like His pure soul ; our sinful bodies 
 like His glorious body; and that so He might be the first 
 born among many brethren. And how 1 " We know 
 that when He appears, we shall be like Him, for we 
 shall see Him as He is." 
 
 For we shall see Him as He is. Herein is a great 
 mystery, and one which I do not pretend to fathom. 
 Only this I can try to do — to shew how it may seem 
 possible and reasonable, from what is called analogy, 
 that is by judging of an unknown thing from a known 
 thing, which is, at least, something like it. Now do 
 we not all know how apt we are to become like those 
 whom we see, with whom we spend our hours — and, 
 above all, like those whom we admire and honour ? 
 For good and for evil, alas ! For evil — for those who 
 associate with evil or frivolous persons are too apt to 
 catch not only their low tone, but their very manner, 
 their very expression of face, speaking, and thinking, and 
 acting. Not only do they become scornful, if they live 
 with scorners ; false, if they live with liars ; mean, if they 
 live with covetous men ; but they will actually catch the 
 very look of their faces. The companions of affected, 
 frivolous people, men or women, grow to look affected 
 and frivolous. Indulging in the same passions, they 
 mould their own countenances and their very walk, also 
 
24 The Purifying Hope. 
 
 the very tones of their voice, as well as their dress, into 
 the likeness of those with whom they associate, nay, of 
 those whose fashions (as they are called) they know 
 merely by books and pictures. But thank God, who has 
 put into the hearts of Christian people the tendency 
 towards God — just in the same way does good company 
 tend to make men good ; high-minded company to make 
 them high-minded ; kindly company to make them 
 kindly ; modest company to make them modest ; honour- 
 able company to make them honourable ; and pure com- 
 pany to make them pure. If the young man or woman 
 live with such, look up to such as their ideal, that is, 
 the pattern which they ought to emulate — then, as a 
 fact, the Spirit of God working in them does mould 
 them into something of the likeness of those whom they 
 admire and love. I have lived long enough to see more 
 than one man of real genius stamp his own character, 
 thought, even his very manner of speaking, for good or 
 for evil, on a whole school or party of his disciples. It 
 has been said, and truly, I believe, that children cannot 
 be brought up among beautiful pictures, — I believe, even 
 among any beautiful sights and sounds, — without the 
 very expression of their faces becoming more beautiful, 
 purer, gentler, nobler ; so that in them are fulfilled the 
 words of the great and holy Poet concerning the maiden 
 brought up according to God, and the laws of God — 
 
 " And she shall bend her ear 
 In many a secret place, 
 Where rivulets dance their wayward round, 
 And loeauty, born of murmuring sound, 
 Shall pass into her face.'' 
 
 But if mere human beings can have this " personal 
 
The Purifying Hope. 2 5 
 
 influence," as it is called, over each others' characters, if 
 even inanimate things, if they be beautiful, can have it — 
 what must be the personal influence of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ ? Of Him, who is the Man of all men, the Son 
 of Man, the perfect and ideal Man — and more, who is 
 very God of very God ; the Author of all life, power, 
 wisdom, genius, in every human being, whether they 
 use to good, or abuse to ill. His divine gifts ; the 
 Author, too, of all natural beauty, from the sun over 
 our heads to the flower beneath our feet ? Think of that 
 steadily, accurately, rationally. Think of who Christ is, 
 and what Christ is — and then think what His personal 
 influence must be — quite infinite, boundless, miraculous. 
 So that the very blessedness of heaven will not be merely 
 the sight of our Lord ; it will be the being made holy, and 
 kept holy, by that sight. If only we be fit for it. For let 
 us ask ourselves the question, — If St John's words come 
 true of us, if we should see Him as He is, would the sight of 
 His all-glorious countenance warm us into such hfe, love, 
 longing for virtue and usefulness, as we never felt before? 
 Or would it crush us into the very earth with utter 
 shame and humiliation, fuU and awful knowledge of how 
 weak and foolish, sinful and unworthy we were ? — as 
 it does to Gerontius in the poem, when he dreams that, 
 after death, he demanded, rashly and ambitiously, to see 
 our Lord, and had his wish. 
 
 That is the question which every one must try to 
 answer for himself in fear and trembling, for, he that 
 hath this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is 
 pure. The common sense of men — which is often their 
 conscience and highest reason — has taught them this, 
 
26 The Purifying Hope. 
 
 more or less clearly, in all countries and all ages. There 
 are very few religions -which have not made purifying of 
 some kind a part of their duty. The very savage, when 
 he enters (as he fancies) the presence of his god, will 
 wash and adorn himself that he may be fit, poor creature, 
 for meeting the paltry god which he has invented out 
 of his own brain ; and he is right as far as he goes. 
 The Enghshman, when he dresses himself in his best to 
 go to church, obeys the same reasonable instinct. And, 
 indeed, is not holy baptism a sign that this instinct is a 
 true one ? — that if God be pure, he who enters the pre- 
 sence of God must purify himself, even as God is pure ? 
 Else why, when each person, whether infant or adult, is 
 received into Christ's Church, is washing with water, 
 whether by sprinkling, as now, or, as of old, by immersion, 
 the very sign and sacrament of his being received into 
 God's kingdom ? The instinct, I say, is reasonable, and 
 has its root in the very heart of man. Whatsoever we 
 respect and admire we shall also try to copy, if it be 
 only for a time. If we are going into the presence of a 
 wiser man than ourselves, we shall surely recollect and 
 summon up what little wisdom or knowledge we may 
 have ; if into the presence of a holier person, we shall 
 try to call up in ourselves those better and more serious 
 thoughts which we so often forget, that we may be, even 
 for a few minutes, fit for that good company. And if 
 we go into the presence of a purer person than ourselves, 
 we shall surely (unless we be base and brutal) call up 
 our purest and noblest thoughts, and try to purify our- 
 selves, even as they are pure. It is true what poets 
 have said again and again, that there are women whose 
 
The Purifying Hope. 2 7 
 
 mere presence, whose mere look, drives all bad thoughts 
 away — women before whom men dare no more speak, or 
 act, nay, even think, basely, than they would dare before 
 the angels of God. 
 
 But if it be so — and so it is — what must we be, to be 
 fit to appear before Him who is Purity itself? — before 
 that spotless Christ in whom is no sin and who knows 
 what is in man ; who is quick and piercing as a two- 
 edged sword, even to the dividing asunder of the joints 
 and marrovr, so that all things are naked and open in 
 the sight of Him with whom we have to do ? What 
 purity can we bring into His presence which will 
 not seem impure to Him ? What wisdom which will 
 not seem folly ? What humility which will not seem 
 self-conceit ? What justice which will not seem unjust 1 
 What love which will not seem hardness of heart, in the 
 sight of Him who charges His angels with folly, and the 
 very heavens are not clean in His sight ? Who loved 
 Him better, and whom did He love better, than St John? 
 Yet, what befel St John when, in the spirit, he saw Him 
 even somewhat as He is ? — " And I fell at His feet as 
 dead." If St John himself was struck down with awe, what 
 shall we feel, even the best and purest among us ? All 
 we can do is to cast ourselves, now and for ever, in life, 
 in death, and in the day of judgment, on His boundless 
 mercy and love — who stooped from heaven to die for 
 us — and cry, God be merciful to me a sinner. 
 
 Therefore, I have many fears for some who are ready 
 enough to talk of their fulness of hope and their assur- 
 ance of salvation, and to join in hymns which express 
 weariness of this life and longings for the joys of heaven, 
 
28 The Purifying Hope. 
 
 and prayers that they may depart and be with Christ. If 
 they are not in earnest in such words they mock God ; 
 but if they are in earnest, some of them, I fear much, 
 tempt God. "What if He took them at their word? 
 What if He gave them their wish ? What if they de- 
 parted and entered the presence of Christ, only to meet 
 with a worse fate than that of Gerontius % Only to be 
 overwhelmed with shame and terror, because, though 
 they have been talking of being with Christ, they have 
 not been trying to be like Christ ; because they have not 
 sought after holiness, without which no man shall see 
 the Lord ; because they have not tried to purify them- 
 selves, even as He is pure ; and have, poor, heedless souls, 
 gone out of the world, with all their sins upon their 
 head, to enter a place for which they will find themselves 
 utterly unfit, because it is a place into which nothing 
 can enter which defileth, or committeth abomination, or 
 maketh a lie, and from which the covetous are specially 
 excluded ; and in which will be fulfilled the parable of 
 the man who came to the feast, not having on a wedding 
 garment, — Take him, bind him hand and foot, and cast 
 him into the outer darkness. There shall be wailing 
 and gnashing of teeth. 
 
 Assurance, my friends, may be reasonable enough when 
 it is founded on repentance and hatred of evil, and love 
 and practice of what is good. But, again, assurance may 
 be as unreasonable as it is ofifensive. We blame a man 
 who has too much assurance about earthly things. Let 
 us beware that we have not too much assurance about 
 heavenly things. For our assurance will surely be too 
 great, unreasonable, built upon the sand, if it be built on 
 
The Purifying Hope. 29 
 
 mere self-conceit of our own orthodoxy, and our own 
 privileges, or our own special connection with God. 
 
 Meanwhile it has been my comfort to meet with some 
 — would God they were more numerous — who, instead 
 of talking of their assurance of salvation, lived in a state 
 of noble self-discontent and holy humility ; who could see 
 nothing but their own faults and failings ; who, though 
 they were holier than others, considered themselves as 
 unholy ; though they were doing more good than others, 
 thought themselves useless ; whose standard of duty was 
 so lofty, that they could think of nothing, but how far 
 they had failed in reaching it ; who measured themselves, 
 not by other men, but by Christ Himself; and, doing that, 
 had nought to say, save, " God be merciful to me a sin- 
 ner." And for such people I have had full assurance, just 
 because they had no assurance themselves. And I have 
 said in my heart. These are worthy, just because they 
 think themselves unworthy. These are fit to appear in 
 the presence of God, just because they believe themselves 
 unfit. These are thej^ who will cry at the day of judg- 
 ment, in wondering humility, — Lord, when saw we Thee 
 hungry, or thirsty, or naked, or in prison, and visited 
 Thee ? And will receive for answer, — " Inasmuch as ye 
 have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, 
 ye have done it unto Me." " Thou hast been faithful 
 over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many 
 things. Enter into the joy of thy Lord." 
 
 To which end may God of His mercy bring us, and 
 all we love. Amen. 
 
SERMON IV. 
 
 THE LORD COMING TO HIS TEMPLE. 
 
 Westminster Abbey. November, 1874. 
 
 Malachi iii. 1, 2. 
 
 " The Lord, wliom ye seek, shall suddenly come to His temple. . . . 
 But who may abide the day of His coming ? and who shall stand 
 when He appeareth ? for He is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's 
 sope." 
 
 We believe that this prophecy was fulfilled at the first 
 coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that it 
 will be fulfilled again, in that great day when He shall 
 judge the quick and the dead. But it is of neither of 
 these events I wish to speak to you just now. I wish 
 to speak of an event which has not (as far as we know) 
 happened; which will probably never happen; but which 
 is still perfectly possible ; and one, too, which it is good 
 for us to face now and then, and ask ourselves. If this 
 thing came to pass, what should I think, and what 
 should I do ? 
 
 I shall touch the question with all reverence and 
 caution. I shall try to tread lightly, as one who is in- 
 deed on hallowed gTOund. For the question which I 
 have dared to ask you and myself is none other than 
 this — If the Lord suddenly came to this temple, or any 
 other in this land ; if He appeared among us, as He 
 
The Lord Coming to His Temple. 3 1 
 
 did in Judea eighteen hundred years ago, what should 
 we think of Him ? Should we recognise, or should we 
 reject, our Saviour and our Lord ? It is an awful 
 thought, the more we look at it. But for that very 
 reason it may be the more fit to be asked, once and 
 for all. 
 
 Now, to put this question safely and honestly, we 
 must keep within those words which I just said — as He 
 appeared in Judea eighteen hundred years ago. We 
 must limit our fancy to the historic Christ, to the 
 sayings, doings, character which are handed down to us 
 in the four Gospels ; and ask ourselves nothing but — 
 What should I think if such a personage were to meet 
 me now ? To imagine Him — as has been too often 
 done — as doing deeds, speakmg words, and even worse, 
 entertaining motives, which are not written in the four 
 Gospels, is as unfair morally, as it is illogical critically. 
 It creates a phantom, a fictitious character, and calls 
 that Christ. It makes each writer, each thinker — or 
 rather dreamer — however shallow his heart and stupid 
 his brain — and all our hearts are but too shallow, and 
 all our brains too stupid — the measure of a personage 
 so vast and so unique, that all Christendom for eighteen 
 hundred years has seen in Him, and we of course hold 
 seen truly, the Incarnate God. No ; we must think of 
 nothing save what is set down in Holy Writ. 
 
 And yet, alas ! we cannot use in our days, that which 
 eighteen hundred years ago was the most simple and 
 obvious test of our Lord's truthfulness, namely His mir- 
 aculous powers. The folly and sin of man have robbed us 
 of what is, as it were, one of the natural rights of reason- 
 
32 The Lord Coming to His Temple. 
 
 ing, man. Lying prodigies and juggleries, forged and pre- 
 tended miracles, even — oh, shame ! — imitations of His 
 most sacred wounds, have, up to our own time, made all 
 rational men more and more afraid of aught which seems 
 to savour of the miraculous ; till most of us, I think, 
 would have to ask forgiveness — as I myself should have 
 to ask, — if, tantalized and insulted again and again by 
 counterfeit miracles, we failed to recognise real miracles, 
 and Him who performed them. Therefore, for good or 
 evil, we should be driven back upon that test alone, 
 which, after all, perhaps, is the most sure as well as the 
 most convincing — the moral test — the test of character. 
 What manner of personage would He be did He con- 
 descend to appear among us ? Of that, thank God, the 
 Gospels ought to leave us in no doubt. What acts He 
 might condescend to perform, what words He might con- 
 descend to speak, it is not for such beings as we to guess. 
 But how He would demean Himself we know ; for Holy 
 Writ has told us how He demeaned Himself in Judea 
 eighteen hundred years ago ; and He is the same yester- 
 day, to-day, and for ever, and can be only like Himself. 
 But should we know Him merely by His bearing and 
 character ? Should we see in Him an utterly ideal per- 
 sonage — The Son of Man, and therefore, ere we lost 
 sight of Him once more, the Son of God ? Let us think. 
 First, therefore, we must believe that — as in Judea of 
 old — Christ would meet men with all consideration 
 and courtesy. He would not break the bruised reed, 
 nor quench the smoking flax. He would not strive, nor 
 cry, nor let His voice be heard in the streets. He 
 would not cause any of God's little ones to offend, to 
 
The Lord Coming to His Temple. 33 
 
 stumble. In plain words. He would not shock and 
 repel them by any conduct of His. Therefore, as in 
 Judea of old, He would be careful of, even indulgent to, 
 the usages of society, as long as they were innocent. 
 He would never outrage the code of manners, however 
 imperfect, however conventional, which this or any 
 other civilised nation may have agreed on, to express 
 and keep up respect, self-restraint, delicacy, of man 
 toward man, of man toward woman, of the young 
 toward the old, of the living toward the dead. No. 
 As I said just now, He would never cause, by any act 
 or word of His, one of God's little ones to stumble and 
 fall away. 
 
 I used just now that word manners. Let me beg 
 your very serious attention to it. I use it, remember, in 
 its true, its ancient — that is, in its moral and spiritual 
 sense. I use it as the old Greeks, the old Eomans, 
 used their corresponding words ; as our wise forefathers 
 used it, when they said well, that " Manners maketh 
 man ; " that manners are at once the efficient cause of a 
 man's success, and the proof of his deserving to succeed : 
 the outward and visible sign of whatsoever inward and 
 spiritual grace, or disgrace, there may be in him. I 
 mean by the word what our Lord meant when He re- 
 proved the pushing and vulgar arrogance of the Scribes 
 and Pharisees, and laid down the golden rule of all good 
 manners, " Whosoever will be great among you, let him 
 be your minister; and whosoever will be chief among 
 you, let him be your servant." 
 
 Next, I beg you to remember that all, or almost alL 
 the good manners which we have among us — courtesies, 
 
 o 
 
34 The Lord Coming to His Temple. 
 
 refinements, self-restraint, and mutual respect — all which 
 raises us, socially and morally, above our forefathers of 
 fifteen hundred years ago — deep-hearted men, valiant 
 and noble, but coarse, and aiTogant, and quarrelsome — 
 all that, or almost all, we owe to Christ, to the inflaence 
 of His example, and to that Bible which testifies of Him. 
 Yes, the Bible has been for Christendom, in the cottage 
 as much as in the palace, the school of manners ; and 
 the saying that he who becomes a true Christian becomes 
 a true gentleman, is no rhetorical boast, but a solid 
 historic fact. 
 
 Now imagine Christ to reappear on earth, with that 
 perfect outward beauty of character — with what Greeks 
 and Eomans, and our own ancestors, would have called 
 those perfect manners — which, if we are to believe the 
 Gospels, He shewed in Judea of old, which won then so 
 many hearts, especially of the common people, sounder 
 judges often of true nobility than many who fancy them- 
 selves their betters. Conceive — but which of us can 
 conceive ? — His perfect tenderness, patience, sympathy, 
 graciousness, and grace, combined with perfect strength, 
 stateliness, even awfulness, when awe was needed. Re- 
 member that, if, again, the Gospels are to be believed. 
 He alone, of all personages of whom history tells us, 
 solved in His own words and deeds the most diflScult 
 paradox of human character — to be at once utterly con- 
 scious, and yet utterly unconscious, of self; to combine 
 with perfect self-sacrifice a perfect self-assertion. 
 Whether or not His being able to do that proved Him 
 to have been that which He was, the Son of God, it 
 proves Him at least to have been the Son of Man — the 
 
The Lord Coming to His Temple. 35 
 
 unique and unapproachable ideal of humanity, utterly 
 inspired by the Holy Spirit of God. 
 
 But, again : He condescended, in His teaching of old, 
 to the level of Jewish knowledge at that time. We 
 may, therefore, believe that He would condescend to 
 the level of our modern knowledge ; and what would 
 that involve ? It would leave Him, however less than 
 Himself, at least master of all that the human race has 
 thought or discovered in the last eighteen hundred years. 
 Think of that. And think again, that if He condes- 
 cended, as in Judea of old, to employ that knowledge in 
 teaching men — He who knew what was in man, and 
 needed not that any should bear witness to Him of man 
 — He would manifest a knowledge of human nature to 
 which that of a Shakspeare would be purblind and dull ; 
 a knowledge of which the Scripture nobly says that 
 " The Word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper 
 than any two-edged sword, even to the dividing asunder 
 of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is 
 a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart ;" so 
 that all "things are naked and opened unto the eyes 
 of Him with whom we have to do." And consider that, 
 in the light of that knowledge. He might adapt himself 
 as perfectly to us of this great city, as He did to the 
 villagers of Galilee, or to the townsmen of Jerusalem. 
 
 Consider, again, that He who spoke as never man yet 
 spake in Jerusalem, might speak as man never yet 
 spoke on English soil ; that He who was listened to 
 gladly once, because Ho spake with authority, and not 
 as the scribes, at second hand, and by rule and prece- 
 dent, might be listened to gladly here once more. For 
 
36 The Lord Coming to His Temple. 
 
 He might speak here, not as we poor scribes can speak 
 at best, but with an authority, originality, earnestness, 
 as well as an eloquence, which might exercise a fascina- 
 tion, which would be, to all with whom He came in 
 contact, what Malachi calls it, " a refiner's fire " — most 
 purifying, though often most painful to the very best ; a 
 fascination which might be to every one who came under 
 its spell a veritable Judgment and Day of the Lord, 
 shewing each man with fearful clearness to which side 
 he really inclined at heart in the struggle between truth 
 and falsehood, good and evil ; a fascination, therefore, 
 equally attractive to those who wished to do right, and 
 intolerable to those who wished to do wrong. 
 
 Consider that last thought. And consider, too, that 
 those to whom the fascination of such a personage might 
 be so intolerable, that it might turn to utter hate, would 
 probably be those whose moral sense was so perverted, 
 that they thought they were doing right when they were 
 doing wrong, and speaking truth when they were telling 
 lies. It is an awful thought. But we know that there 
 were such men, and too many, among the scribes and 
 Pharisees of Jerusalem. And human nature is the same 
 in every age. Be that as it may — however retired His 
 life. He could not long be hid. He would shortly exer- 
 cise, almost without attempting it, an enormous public 
 influence. 
 
 But yet, as in Judea of old, would He not be only too 
 successful ? Would He not be at once too liberal for 
 some, and too exacting for others? Would He not, as 
 in Judea of old, encounter not merely the active envy 
 of the vain and the ambitious, which would foUow one 
 
The Lord Coming to His Temple. 37 
 
 who spoke as never man spoke ; not merely the active 
 malignity of those who wish their fellow-creatures to be 
 bad, and not good ; not merely the bigotry of every sect 
 and party; but that mere restless love of new excite- 
 ments, and that dull fear and suspicion of new truths, 
 and even of old truths in new words, which beset the 
 uneducated of every rank and class, and in no age more 
 than in our own ? And therefore I must ask, in sober 
 sadness, how long would His influence last ? It lasted, 
 we know, in Judea of old, for some three years. And 
 
 then . But I am not going to say that any such 
 
 tragedy is possible now. It would be an insult to Him ; 
 an insult to the gracious influences of His Spirit, the 
 gracious teaching of His Church, to say that of our 
 generation, however unworthy we may be of our high 
 calling in Christ. And yet, if He had appeared in any 
 country of Christendom only four hundred years ago, 
 might He not have endured an even more dreadful death 
 than that of the cross ? 
 
 But doubtless, no personal harm would happen to 
 Him here. Only there might come a day, in which, as 
 in Judea of old, " after He had said these things, many 
 were offended, and walked no more with Him : " when 
 his hearers and admirers would grow fewer and more 
 few, some through bigotry, some through envy, some 
 through fickleness, some through cowardice, till He was 
 left alone with a Kttle knot of earnest disciples ; who 
 might diminish, alas, but too rapidly, when they found 
 that He, as in Judea of old, did not intend to become 
 the head of a new sect, and to gratify their ambition 
 and vanity by making them His delegates. And so the 
 
38 The Lord Coming to His Temple. 
 
 worldj the religious world as well as the rest, might let 
 Him go His way, and vanish from the eyes and minds 
 of men, leaving behind little more than a regret that 
 one so gifted and so fascinating should have proved — I 
 hardly like to say the words, and yet they must be said 
 — so unsafe and so unsound a teacher. 
 
 I shall not give now the reasons which have led me, 
 and not in haste, to this melancholy conclusion. I shall 
 only say that I have come to it, with pain, and shame, 
 and fear. With shame and fear. For when I ask you 
 the solemn question. Would you know Christ if He 
 came among you ? do I not ask myself a question which 
 I dare not answer ? How can I tell whether I should 
 recognise, after all, my Saviour and my Lord ? How 
 do I know that if He said (as He but too certainly 
 might), something which clashed seriously with my pre- 
 conceived notions of what He ought to say, I should not 
 be offended, and walk no more with Him 1 How do I 
 know that if He said, as in Judea of old, " Will ye too 
 go away ? " I should answer with St Peter, " Lord, to 
 whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words of eternal life, 
 and we believe and are sure that thou art the Christ, 
 the Son of the living God ? " I dare not ask that ques- 
 tion of myself. How then dare I ask it of you ? I 
 know not. I can only say, " Lord, I believe : help thou 
 mine unbelief" I know not. But this T know — that in 
 this or any other world, if you or I did recognise Him, it 
 would be with utter shame and terror, unless we had 
 studied and had striven to copy either Himself, or what- 
 soever seems to us most like Him. Yes ; to study the 
 good, the beautiful, and the true in Him, and wheresoever 
 
The Lord Coming to His Temple. 39 
 
 else we find it — for all that is good, beautiful, and true 
 throughout the universe are nought but rays from Him, 
 the central sun — to obey St. Paul of old, and " -whatso- 
 ever things are true, venerable, just, pure, lovely, and 
 of good report — if there be any virtue and if there be 
 any praise, to think on these things," — on these scat- 
 tered fragmentary sacraments of Him whose number is 
 not two, nor seven, " but seventy-times seven ; " that is 
 the way — I think, the only way — to be ready to recog- 
 nise our Saviour, and to prepare to meet our God ; that 
 He may be to us, too, as a refiner's fire, and refine us — 
 our thoughts, our deeds, our characters throughout. 
 
 And I think, too, that this is the way, perhaps the 
 only way, to rid ourselves of the fancy that we can be 
 accounted righteous before God for any works or deserv- 
 ings of our own. Those in whom that fancy lingers 
 must have but a paltry standard of what righteousness 
 is, a mean conception of moral — that is, spiritual — 
 perfection. But those who look not inwards, but up- 
 wards ; not at themselves, but at Christ and all spiritual 
 perfection — they become more and more painfully aware 
 of their own imperfections. The beauty of Christ's 
 character shows them the ugliness of their own. His 
 purity shows them their own foulness. His love their own 
 hardness. His wisdom their own foUy. His strength 
 their own weakness. The higher their standard rises, 
 the lower falls their estimate of themselves ; till, in 
 utter humiliation and self-distrust, they seek comfort 
 where alone it can be found — in faitlx — in utter faith 
 and trust in that very moral perfection of Christ which 
 shames and dazzles them, and yet is their only hope. 
 
40 The Lord Coming to His Temple. 
 
 To trust in Him for themselves and all they love. To 
 trust that, just because Christ is so magnificent. He will 
 pity, and not despise, our meanness. Just because He 
 is so pure, and righteous, and true, and lovely. He will 
 appreciate, and not abhor, our struggles after purity, 
 righteousness, truth, love, however imperfect, however 
 soiled with failure — and with worse. Just because He 
 is so unlike us. He will smile graciously upon our 
 feeblest attempts to be like Him. Just because He 
 has borne the sins and carried the sorrows of mankind, 
 therefore those who come to Him He will in no wise 
 cast out. Amen, 
 
SERMON V. 
 
 ADVENT LESSONS. 
 Westminster Ahhey, First Simday in Advent, 1873. 
 
 Romans vii. 22-25. 
 
 " I deliglit in the law of God after the inward man : but I see another 
 law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and 
 bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my 
 members. wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me from 
 the body of this death ? I thank God through Jesus Christ our 
 Lord." 
 
 This is the first Sunday in Advent. To-day we have 
 prayed that God would give us grace to put away 
 the works of darkness, and put on us the armour of 
 light. Next Sunday we shall pray that, by true under- 
 standing of the Scriptures, we may embrace and hold 
 fast the blessed hope of everlasting life. The Sunday 
 after that the ministers and stewards of God's mysteries 
 may prepare His way by turning the hearts of the dis- 
 obedient to the wisdom of the just — the next, that His 
 grace and mercy may speedily help and deliver us from 
 the sins which hinder us in running the race set before 
 us. But I do not think that we shall understand those 
 collects, or indeed the meaning of Advent itself, or the 
 reason why we keep the season of Advent year by year, 
 unless we first understand the prayer which we offered 
 up last Sunday, " Stir up, O Lord, the wills of Thy 
 
42 Advent Lessons. 
 
 faithful people," — and we shall understand that prayer 
 just in proportion as we have in us the Spirit of God, or 
 the spirit of the world, which is the spirit of unbelief. 
 
 Worldly people say — and say openly, just now — that 
 this prayer is all a dream. They say God will not stir 
 up men's wills to do good any more than to do harm. 
 He leaves men to themselves to get through life as they 
 can. This Heavenly Father of whom you speak will 
 not give His holy spirit to those who ask Him. He 
 does not, as one of your Collects says, put into men's 
 minds good desires — they come to a man entirely from 
 outside a man, from his early teaching, his youthful 
 impressions, as they are called now-a-days. He does 
 not either give men grace and power to put these desires 
 into practice. That depends entirely on the natural 
 strength of a man's character ; and that, again, depends 
 principally on the state of his brain. So, says the 
 world, if you wish your own character to improve, you 
 must improve it yourself, for God will not improve it for 
 you. But, after all, why should you try to improve ? 
 why not be content to be just what you are 1 you did 
 not make yourself, and you are not responsible for being 
 merely what God has chosen to make you. 
 
 This is what worldly men say, or at least what they 
 believe and act on ; and this is the reason why there is 
 so little improvement in the world, because men do not 
 ask God to improve their hearts and stir up their wills. 
 I say, very little improvement. Men talk loudly of the 
 enlightenment of the age, and the progress of the species, 
 and the spread of civilisation, and so forth : but 
 when I read old books, and compare old times with 
 
Advent Lessons. 43 
 
 these, I confess I do not see so much of it as all this 
 hopeful talk would lead me to expect. Men in general 
 have grown more prudent, more cunning, from long 
 experience. They have found out that certain sins do 
 not pay — that is, they interfere with people's comfort 
 and their power of making money, and therefore they 
 prudently avoid them themselves, and put them down 
 by law in other men's cases. Men have certainly grown 
 more goodnatured, in some countries, in that they dislike 
 more than their ancestors did, to inflict bodily torture 
 on human beings ; but they are just as ready, or even 
 more ready, to inflict on those whom they dislike that 
 moral and mental torture which to noble souls is worse 
 than any bodily pain. As for any real improvement in 
 human nature — where is it ? There is just as much 
 falsehood, cheating, and covetousness, I believe, in the 
 world as ever there was ; just as much cant and hypo- 
 crisy, and perhaps more ; just as much envy, hatred, 
 malice and all uncharitableness. Is not the condition 
 of the masses in many great cities as degraded and as 
 sad as ever was that of the serfs in the middle ages ? 
 Do not the poor still die by tens of thousands of fevers, 
 choleras, and other diseases, which we know perfectly 
 how to prevent, and yet have not the will to prevent? 
 Is not the adulteration of food just now as scandalous as 
 it is unchecked ? The sins and follies of human nature 
 have been repressed in one direction only to break out 
 in another. And as for open and coarse sin, people 
 complain even now, and I fear with justice, that there 
 is more drunkenness in England at this moment than 
 there ever was. So much for our boasted improvement. 
 
44 Advent Lessons. 
 
 Look again at the wars of the world. Five-and- 
 twenty years ago, one used to be told that the human 
 race was grown too wise to go to war any more, and that 
 we were to have an advent of universal peace and plenty, 
 and since then we have seen some seven great wars, — 
 the last the most terrible of all, — and ever since, all the 
 nations of Europe have been watching each other in 
 distrust and dread, increasing their armaments, working 
 often night and day at forging improved engines of 
 destruction, wherewith to kill their fellowmen. Not 
 that I blame that. It is necessary. Yes ! but the 
 hideous thing is, that it should be necessary. Does 
 that state of things look much like progress of the 
 human race ? Can we say that mankind is much im- 
 proved, either in wisdom or in love, while all the nations 
 of Europe are spending millions merely to be ready to 
 fight they know not whom, they know not why ? 
 
 No, my good friends, obey the wise man, and clear 
 your minds of cant — man's pretensions, man's boastful- 
 ness, man's power of blinding his own eyes to plain 
 facts — above all, to the plain fact that he does not suc- 
 ceed, even in this world of which he fancies himself the 
 master, because he lives without God in the world. All 
 this saddens, I had almost said, sickens, a thoughtful 
 man, till he turns away from this noisy sham improve- 
 ment of mankind — the wages of sin, which are death, 
 to St John's account of the true improvement of 
 mankind, the true progress of the species, — the gift of 
 God which is eternal life. " And I saw a new heaven 
 and a new earth : for the first heaven and the first earth 
 were passed away. And I saw the Holy City — New 
 
Advent Lessons. 45 
 
 Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, pre- 
 pared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard 
 a great voice out ,of heaven, saying. Behold the taber- 
 nacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, 
 and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be 
 with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe 
 away all tears from their eyes ; and there shall be no more 
 death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be 
 any more pain : for the former things are passed away." 
 
 Does that sound much like a general increase of 
 armaments ? or like bills for the prevention of pesti- 
 lence, or of drunkenness, — which, even if they pass, will 
 both probably fail to do the good which they propose ? 
 No. And if this wicked world is to be mended, then 
 God must stir up the wills of His faithful people, and 
 we must pray without ceasing for ourselves, and for all 
 for whom we are bound to pray, that He would stir 
 them up. For what we want is not knowledge ; we 
 have enough of that, and too much. Too much ; for 
 knowing so much and doing so little, what an account 
 will be required of us at the last day ! 
 
 No. It is the will which we want, in a hundred 
 cases. Take that of pestilential dwelling-houses in our 
 great towns. Every one knows that they ought to be 
 made healthy ; every one knows that they can be made 
 healthy. But the wiU to make them healthy is not 
 here, and they are left to breed disease and death. And 
 so, as in a hundred instances, shallow philosophers are 
 proved, by facts, to be mistaken, when they teU us that 
 man will act up to the best of his knowledge with- 
 out God's help. For that is exactly what man does not. 
 
46 Advent Lessons. 
 
 What is wrong with the world in general, is wrong 
 likewise more or less with you and me, and with aU 
 human beings; for after all, the world is made up of 
 human beings ; and the sin of the world is nothing save 
 the sins of each and all human beings put together; 
 and the world will be renewed and come right again, 
 just as far and no farther, as each human being is re- 
 newed and comes right. The only sure method, there- 
 fore, of setting the world right, is to begin by setting 
 our own little part of the world right — in a word, setting 
 ourselves right. 
 
 But if we begin to try, that, we find, is just what we 
 cannot do. When a man begins to hunger and thirst 
 after righteousness, and, discontented with himself, at- 
 tempts to improve himself, he soon begins to find a 
 painful truth in many a word of the Bible and the 
 Prayer Book to which he gave little heed, as long as he 
 was contented with himself, and with doing just what 
 pleased him, right or wrong. He soon finds out that 
 he has no power of himself to help himself, that he is 
 tied and bound with the burden of his sins, and that he 
 cannot, by reason of his frailty, stand upright — that he 
 actually is sore let and hindered by his own sins, from 
 running the race set before him, and doing his duty 
 where God has put him. AH these sayings come home 
 to htm as actual facts, most painful facts, but facts which 
 he cannot deny. He soon finds out the meaning and the 
 truth of that terrible struggle between the good in him 
 and the evil in him, of which St Paul speaks so bitterly 
 in the text. How, when he tries to do good, evil is 
 present with him. How he delights in the law of God 
 
Advent Lessons. 47 
 
 with his inward mind, and yet finds another law in his 
 body, warring against the law of God, and bringing him 
 into captivity to the law of sin. How he is crippled by 
 old bad habits, weakened by cowardice, by laziness, by 
 vanity, by general inability of will, till he is ready, — dis- 
 gusted at himself and his own weakness, — to cry. Who 
 shall deliver me from the body of this death ? 
 
 Let him but utter that cry honestly. Let him once 
 find out that he wants something outside himself to 
 help him, to deliver him, to strengthen him, to stir 
 up his weak will, to give him grace and power to do what 
 he knows instead of merely admiring it, and leaving it un- 
 done. Let a man only find out that. Let him see that 
 he needs a helper, a deliverer, a strengthener — in one 
 word, a Saviour — and he wiU find one. I verily believe 
 that, sooner or later, the Lord Jesus Christ will reveal to 
 that man what He revealed to St Paul ; that He Himself 
 will deliver him ; and that, like St Paul, after crying 
 " wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from 
 the body of this death 1" he wiU. be able to answer him- 
 self, I thank God — God will, through Jesus Christ our 
 Lord. Christ will deliver me from the bonds of my sins, 
 Christ wiU stir up this weak will of mine, Christ will give 
 me strength and power, faithfully to fulfil all my good 
 desires, because He Himself has put them into my heart 
 — not to mock me, not to disappoint me — not to make 
 me wretched with the sight of noble graces and virtues 
 to which I cannot attain, but to fulfil His work in me. 
 What He has begun in me He will carry on in me. 
 He has sown the seed in me, and He will make it bear 
 fruit, if only I pray to Him, day by day, for strength to 
 
48 Advent Lessons. 
 
 do what I know I ought to do, and cry morning and 
 night to Him, the fount of life, Stir up my will, Lord, 
 that I may bring forth the fruit of good works, for then 
 by Thee I shall be plentifully rewarded. 
 
 So the man gains hope and heart for himself, and so, 
 if he will but think rationally and humbly, he may 
 gain hope and heart for this poor sinful world. For 
 what has come true for him may come true for any 
 man. Who is he that God should care more for him 
 than for others ? Who is he that God should help him 
 when he prays, more than He wiU help His whole church 
 if it will but pray? He says to himself, all this knowledge 
 of what is right ; all these good desires, all these longings 
 after a juster, purer, nobler, happier state of things ; 
 there they are up and down the world already, though, 
 alas ! they have borne little enough fruit as yet. Be it 
 so. But God put them into my heart. And who save 
 God has put them into the world's heart ? It was God 
 who sowed the seed in me ; surely it is God who has 
 sowed it in other men ? And if God has made it bear 
 even the poorest fruit in me, why should He not make 
 it bear fruit in other men and in all the world % All 
 they need is that God should stir up their wiUs, that 
 they may do the good they know, and attain the blessed- 
 ness after which they long. 
 
 And then, if the man have a truly human, truly 
 reasonable heart in him — he feels that he can pray for 
 others as well as for himself. He feels that he must pray 
 for them, and cry, — Thou alone canst make men strong 
 to do the right thing, and Thou wilt make them. 
 Stir up their wills, O Lord ! Thou canst not mean 
 
Advent Lessons. 49 
 
 that all the good seed which is sown about the world 
 should die and wither, and bring no fruit to perfection. 
 Surely Thy word will not return to Thee void, but be like 
 the rain which comes down from heaven, and gives seed 
 to the sower and bread to the eater. Oh, strengthen such 
 as stand, and comfort and help the weak-hearted, and 
 raise up them that fall, and, finally, beat down Satan 
 and all the powers of evil under our feet, and pour out 
 thy spirit on all flesh, that so their Father's name may 
 be hallowed, His kingdom come. His will be done on 
 earth as it is in heaven. And so will come the one and 
 only true progress of the human race — which is, that all 
 men should become faithful and obedient citizens of the 
 holy city, the kingdom of God, which is the Church of 
 Christ. To which may God in His mercy bring us all, 
 and our children after us. Amen. 
 
 This, then, is the reason why we are met together this 
 Advent day. We are met to pray that God would so 
 help us by His grace and mercy that we may bring forth 
 the fruit of good works, and that when our Lord 
 Jesus Christ shall come in His glorious majesty to judge 
 the quick and the dead, we, and our descendants after 
 us, may be found an acceptable people in His sight. 
 
 We are met to pray, in a National Church, for the 
 whole nation of England, that all orders and degxees 
 therein may, each in his place and station, help forward 
 the hallowing of God's name, the coming of His king- 
 dom, the doing of His will on earth. We are met to 
 pray for the Queen and all that are in authority, that 
 these Advent collects may be fulfilled in them, and by 
 them, for the good of the whole people ; for the ministers 
 
 D 
 
50 Advent Lessons. 
 
 and stewards of Christ's mysteries, that the same collects 
 may be fulfilled by them and in them, till they turn the 
 hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom of the just ; for 
 the Commons of this nation, that each man may be 
 delivered, by God's grace and mercy, from the special 
 sin which besets him in this faithless and worldly genera- 
 tion and hinders him from running the race of duty 
 which is set before him, and get strength from God so 
 to live that in that dread day he may meet his Judge 
 and King, not in terror and in shame, but in loyalty 
 and in humble hope. 
 
 But more — we are here to worship God in Christ, both 
 God and man. To confess that without Him we can do 
 nothing, that unless He enlighten our understandings 
 we are dark, unless He stir up our wills we are 
 powerless for good. To confess that though we have 
 forgotten Him, yet He has not forgotten us. That He 
 is the same gracious and generous Giver and Saviour. 
 That though we deny Him He cannot deny Him- 
 self. That He is the same yesterday, to-day, and 
 for ever as when He came to visit this earth in 
 great humility. That the Lord is King, though the 
 earth be moved. He sitteth upon His throne, be the 
 nations never so unquiet. We are here to declaie to 
 ourselves and all men, and the whole universe, that we 
 at least believe that the heavens and earth are fuU of 
 His glory. We are here to declare that, whether or not 
 the kings of the earth are wise enough, or the judges of 
 it learned enough, to acknowledge Christ for their king, 
 we at least will worship the Son lest He be angry, and so 
 we perish from the right way ; for if His wi-ath be kindled, 
 
Advent Lessons. 51 
 
 yea but a little, then blessed are they, and they only, 
 who put their trust in Him. We are here to join our 
 songs with angels round the throne, and with those pure 
 and mighty beings who, in some central sanctuary of the 
 universe, cry for ever, " Thou art worthy, Lord, to 
 receive glory and honour and power : for Thou hast 
 created aU things, and for Thy pleasure they are and 
 were created." 
 
 We do so in ancient words, ancient music, ancient 
 ceremonies, for a token that Christ's rule and glory is 
 an ancient rule and an eternal glory ; that it is no new 
 discovery of our own, and depends not on our own 
 passing notions and feelings about it, but is like Christ, 
 the same now as in the days of our forefathers, the same 
 as it was fifteen hundred years ago, the same as it 
 has been since the day that He stooped to be born of 
 the Virgin Mary, the same that it will be till He 
 shall come in His glory to judge the quick and the 
 dead. Therefore we delight in the ancient ceremonial, 
 as like as we can make it, to that of the earher and 
 purer ages of the Church, when Christianity was still, as 
 it were, fresh from the hand of its Creator, ere yet it 
 had been debased and defiled by the idolatrous innova- 
 tions of the Church of Rome. For so we confess ourselves 
 bound by links of gratitude to the AjDostles, and the suc- 
 cessors of the Apostles, and to all which has been best, 
 and purest, and truest in the ages since. So we confess 
 that we worship the same God-man of whom Apostles 
 preached, of whom fathers philosophised, and for whom 
 martyrs died. That we believe, like them, that He 
 alone is King of kings and Lord of lords ; that there is 
 
5 2 Advent Lessons. 
 
 no progress, civilization, or salvation in this life or the 
 life to come, but through His undeserved mercy and His 
 strengthening grace ; that He has reigned from the 
 creation of the world, reigns now, and will reign unto 
 that last dread day, when He shall have put all enemies 
 under His feet, and delivered up the kingdom to God, 
 even the Father, that God may be all in all. Unto which 
 day may He in His mercy bring us all through faith 
 and good works : Amen. 
 
SERMON VI. 
 
 CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 
 
 Eversley. Quinqiuxgesima Sunday, 1872. 
 
 Genesis ix. 1, 3, 4, 5, 6. 
 
 " And God blessed Noah and liia sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, 
 and multiply, and replenish the earth. . . . Every moving thing that 
 liveth shall be meat for you. . . . But flesh with the life thereof, 
 which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood 
 of your lives will I require : at the hand of every beast will I require 
 it, and at the hand of man ; at the hand of every man's brother will 
 I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man 
 shall his blood be shed : for in the image of God made he man. " 
 
 This is God's blessing on mankind. This is our charter 
 from God, who made and rules this earth. This is the 
 end and duty of our mortal life : — to be fruitful and 
 multiply and replenish the earth, and subdue it. But 
 is that all 1 Is there no hint in this blessing of God of 
 something more than our mortal life — something beyond 
 our mortal life ? Surely there is. Those words — " in 
 the image of God made He man," must mean, if they 
 mean anything, that man can, if he will but be a true 
 man, share the eternal life of God. But I will not speak 
 of that to-day, but rather of a question about his mortal 
 life in this world, which is this : — What is the reason 
 why man has a right over the lives of animals ? why he 
 may use them for his food ? and at the same time, what 
 
54 Capital Punishment. 
 
 is the reason why he haa not the same right over the 
 lives of his fellow-men ? why he may not use them for 
 food? 
 
 It is this — that "in the image of God made He 
 man." Man is made in the image and likeness of God, 
 therefore he is a sacred creature ; a creature, not 
 merely an animal, and the highest of all animals, only 
 cunninger than aU animals, more highly organised, 
 more delicately formed than aU. animals ; but something 
 beyond an animal. He is in the likeness of God, there- 
 fore he is consecrated to God. He is the one creature 
 on earth whom God, so far as we know, is trying to 
 make like Himself Therefore, whosoever kills a man, 
 sins not only against that man, nor against society : he 
 sins against God. And God will require that man's 
 blood at the hand of him who slays him. But how ? 
 At the hand of every beast will He require it, and at the 
 hand of every man. 
 
 What that first part of the law means I cannot tell. 
 How God will require from the lion, or the crocodile, or 
 the shark, who eats a human being, the blood of their 
 victims, is more than I can say. But this I can say — 
 that the feeling, not only of horror and pity, but of real 
 rage and indignation, with which men see (what God 
 grant you never may see) a wild beast kill a man, is a 
 witness in man's conscience that the text is true some- 
 how, though how we know not. I received a letter a 
 few weeks since from an officer, a very remarkable person, 
 in which he described his horror and indignation at 
 seeing a friend of his struck down and eaten by a tiger ; 
 and how, when next day he stood over what had been 
 
Capital Putiishment. 55 
 
 but the day before a human being, he looked up to 
 heaven, and kept repeating the words of the text, " in 
 the image of God made He man," in rage and shame, 
 and almost accusing God for allowing His image to be 
 eaten by a brute beast. It shook, for the moment, his 
 faith in God's justice and goodness. That man was 
 young then, and has grown calmer and wiser now, and 
 has regained a deeper and sounder faith in God. But 
 the shock, he said, was dreadful to him. He felt that 
 the matter was not merely painful and pitiable, but that 
 it was a wrong and a crime ; and on the faith of this 
 very text, a wrong and a crime I believe it to be, and 
 one which God knows how to avenge and to correct 
 when man cannot. Somehow — for He has ways of which 
 we poor mortals do not dream — at the hand of every 
 beast will He require the blood of man. 
 
 But more ; at the hand of every man will He require 
 it. And how ? The text tells us, " Whoso sheddeth 
 man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed : for in the 
 image of God made He man." Now, I do not doubt but 
 that the all-seeing God, looking back on what had most 
 probably happened on this earth already, and looking 
 forward to what would happen, and happens, alas ! too 
 often now, meant to warn men against the awful crime of 
 cannibalism, of eating their fellow-men as they would eat 
 an animal. By so doing, they not only treated their 
 fellow-men as beasts, but they behaved like beasts them- 
 selves. They denied that their victim was made in the 
 likeness of God ; they denied that they were made in 
 the likeness of God ; they willingly and deliberately put 
 on the likeness of beasts, and as beasts they were to 
 
56 Capital Punishment. 
 
 perish. Now, this is certain, that savages who eat men 
 — and alas ! there are thousands even now who do so — 
 usually know in their hearts that they are doing wrong. 
 As soon as their consciences are the least awakened, they 
 are ashamed of their cannibalism ; they lie about it, try 
 to conceal it ; and as soon as God's grace begins to work 
 on them, it is the very first sin that they give up. And 
 next, this is certain, that there is a curse upon it. No 
 cannibal people, so far as I can find, have ever risen or 
 prospered in the world ; and the cannibal peoples now-a- 
 days, and for the last three hundred years, have been 
 dying out. By their own vices, diseases, and wars, they 
 perish off the face of the earth, in the midst of comfort 
 and plenty ; and, in spite of all the efforts of missionaries, 
 even their children and grand-children, after giving up 
 the horrid crime, and becoming Christians, seem to have 
 no power of living and increasing, but dwindle away, 
 and perish off the earth. Yes, God's laws work in 
 strange and subtle ways ; so darkly, so slowly, that the 
 ungodly and sinners often believe that there are no laws 
 of God, and say — " Tush, how should God perceive it ? 
 Is there knowledge in the Most High ? " But the laws 
 work, nevertheless, whether men are aware of them or 
 not. "The mills of God grind slowly," but sooner or 
 later they grind the sinner to powder. 
 
 And now I will leave this hateful subject and go on 
 to another, on which I am moved to speak once and for 
 
 all, because it is much in men's minds just now I 
 
 mean what is vulgarly called " capital punishment," the 
 punishing of murder by death. Now the text, which is 
 the ancient covenant of God with man, speaks very clearly 
 
Capital Punishment. 57 
 
 on this point. "Whosoever sheddeth man's blood, by 
 man shall his blood be shed." Man is made in the 
 likeness of God. That is the ground of our law about 
 murder, as it is the ground of all just and merciful law ; 
 that gives man his right to slay the murderer ; that makes 
 it his duty to slay the murderer. He has to be jealous 
 of God's likeness, and to slay, in the name of God, the 
 man who, by murder, outrages the likeness of God in 
 himself and in his victim. 
 
 You all know that there is now-a-days a strong 
 feeling among some persons about capital punishment ; 
 that there are those who will move heaven and earth 
 to interfere with the course of justice, and beg off the 
 worst of murderers, on any grounds, however unreason- 
 able, fanciful, even unfair ; simply because they have a 
 dislike to human beings being hanged. I believe, from 
 long consideration, that these persons' strange dislike 
 proceeds from their not believing sufficiently that man is 
 made in the image of God. And, alas ! it proceeds, I 
 fear, in some of them, from not believing in a God at 
 all — believing, perhaps, in some mere maker of the 
 world, but not in the living God which Scripture sets 
 forth. For how else can they say, as I have known some 
 say, that capital punishment is wrong, because " we 
 have no right to usher a man into the presence of his 
 Maker." 
 
 Into the presence of his Maker ! Why, where else is 
 every man, you and I, heathen and Christian, bad and 
 good, save in the presence of his Maker already ? Do 
 we not live and move and have our being in God ? 
 Whither can we go from His spirit, or whither can we 
 
58 Capital Punishment. 
 
 flee from His presence ? If we ascend into heaven. He 
 is there. If we go down to hell He is there also. And 
 if the law puts a man to death, it does not usher him 
 into the presence of his Maker, for he is there already 
 It simply says to him, " God has judged you on earth, not 
 we. God will judge you in the next world, not we. All 
 we know is, that you are not fit to live in this world. All 
 our duty is to send you out of it. Where you will go m 
 the other world is God's matter, not ours, and the Lord 
 have mercy on your soul." 
 
 And this want of faith in a living God lies at the 
 bottom of another objection. We are to keep murderers 
 alive in order to convert and instruct and amend them. 
 The answer is, We shall be most happy to amend any- 
 body of any fault, however great : but the experience of 
 ages is that murderers are past mending ; that the fact 
 of a man's murdering another is a plain proof that he has 
 no moral sense, and has become simply a brute animal 
 Our duty is to punish not to amend, and to say to the 
 murderer, " If you can be amended ; God will amend 
 you, and so have mercy on your soul. God must 
 amend you, if you are to be amended. If God cannot 
 amend you, we cannot. If God will not amend you, 
 certainly we cannot force Him to do so, if we kept you 
 alive for a thousand years." That would seem reasonable, 
 as well as reverent and faithful to God. But men now- 
 a-days fancy that they love their fellow creatures far 
 better than God loves them, and can deal far more 
 wisely and lovingly with them than God is willing to 
 deal. Of these objections I take little heed. I look 
 on them as merely loose cant, which does not quite 
 
Capital Punishment. 59 
 
 understand the meaning of its own words, and I trust to 
 sound, hard, English common sense to put them aside. 
 
 But there is another objection to capital punishment, 
 which we must deal with much more respectfully and ten- 
 derly; for it is made by certain good people, people whom 
 we must honour, though we differ from them, for no set 
 of people have done more (according to their numbers) for 
 education, for active charity, and for benevolence, and for 
 peace and good will among the nations of the earth. And 
 they say, you must not take the life of a murderer, just 
 because he is made in God's image. Well, I should have 
 thought that God Himself was the best judge of that. 
 That, if God truly said that man was made in His image, 
 and said, moreover, as it were at the same moment, that, 
 therefore, whoso sheds man's blood, by man shall his blood 
 be shed — our duty was to trust God, to obey God, and 
 to do our duty against the murderer, however painful to 
 our feelings it might be. But I believe these good people 
 make their mistake from forgetting this ; that if the 
 murderer be made in God's image and likeness, so is the 
 man whom he murders ; and so also is the jury who 
 convict him, the judge who condemns him, and the 
 nation (the society of men) for whom they act. 
 
 And this, my dear friends, brings us to the very root 
 of the meaning of law. Man has sense to make laws 
 (which animals cannot do), just because he is made in 
 the likeness of God, and has the sense of right and 
 wrong. Man has the right to enforce laws, to see right 
 done and wrong punished, just because he is made in the 
 likeness of God. The laws of a country, as far as they 
 are just and righteous, are the copy of what the 
 
6o Capital Punishment. 
 
 men of that country have found out about right 
 and wrong, and about how much right they can get 
 done, and how much wrong punished. So, just as 
 the men of a country are (in spite of all their sins) 
 made in the likeness of God, so the laws of a country 
 (in spite of all their defects) are a copy of God's will, as 
 to what men should or should not do. And that, and 
 no other, is the true reason why the judge or magistrate 
 has authority over either property, liberty, or life. He 
 is God's servant, the servant of Christ, who is King of 
 this land and of all lands, and of all governments, and all 
 kings and rulers of the earth. He sits there in God's 
 name, to see God's will done, as far as poor fallible 
 human beings can get it done. And, because he is, not 
 merely as a man, but, by his special authority, in the like- 
 ness of God, who has power over life and death, there- 
 fore he also, as far as his authority goes, has power over 
 life and death. That is my opinion, and that was the 
 opinion of St. Paul. For what does he say — and say not 
 (remember always) of Christian magistrates in a Christian 
 country, but actually of heathen Roman magistrates ? 
 " Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For 
 there is no power but of God : the powers that be are 
 ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the 
 power, resisteth the ordinance of God : and they that 
 resist shall receive to themselves damnation." Thus 
 spoke out the tenderest-hearted, most Christ-like human 
 being, perhaps, who ever trod this earth, who, in his 
 intense longing to save sinners, endured a life of misery 
 and danger, and finished it by martyrdom. But there 
 was no sentimentality, no soft indulgence in him. He 
 
Capital Ptcnishment. 6 1 
 
 knew right from wrong ; common sense from cant ; duty 
 from public opinion ; and divine charity from the mere 
 cowardly dislike of witnessing pain, not so much because 
 it pains the person punished, as because it pains the 
 spectator. He knew that Christ was King of kings, and 
 what Christ's kingdom was like. He had discovered the 
 divine and wonderful order of men and angels. He 
 saw that one part of that order was — " the soul that 
 sinneth, it shall die." 
 
 But some say that capital punishment is inconsistent 
 with the mild religion of Christ — the religion of mercy 
 and love. " The mild religion of Christ ! " Do these 
 men know of Whom they talk ? Do they know that, if 
 the Bible be true, the God who said, "Whoso sheddeth 
 man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed," is the very 
 same Being, the very same God, who was born of the 
 Virgin Mary, crucified under Pontius Pilate — the very 
 same Christ who took little children up in His arms and 
 blessed them, the very same Word of God, too, of whom 
 it is written, that out of His mouth goeth a two-edged 
 sword, that He may smite the nations, and He shall rule 
 them with a rod of iron, and He treadeth the wine press 
 of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God ? These are 
 awful words, but, my dear friends, I can only ask you if 
 you think them too awful to be true ? Do you believe 
 the Christian religion ? Do you believe the Creeds ? 
 Do you believe the Bible ? For if you do, then you 
 believe that the Lord Christ, who was born of the Virgin 
 Mary, and crucified under Pontius Pilate, is the Maker, 
 the Master, the Ruler of this world, and of all worlds. 
 By what laws He rules other worlds we know not, save 
 
62 Capital Punishment. 
 
 that they are, because they must be — just and merciful 
 laws. But of the laws by which He rules this world we 
 do know, by experience, that His laws are of most 
 terrible and unbending severity, as I have warned you 
 again and again, and shall warn you, as long as there 
 is a liar or an idler, a drunkard or an adulteress in this 
 parish. 
 
 And if this be so — if Christ be a God of severity as 
 well as a God of love, a God who punishes sinners as 
 well as a God who forgives penitents — what then ? We 
 are, He tells us, made in His likeness. Then, according to 
 His likeness we must behave. We must copy His love, 
 by helping the poor and afflicted, the weak and the op- 
 pressed. But we must copy His severity, by punishing 
 whenever we have the power, without cowardice or 
 indulgence, all wilful offenders ; and, above aU, the man 
 who destroys God's image in himself, by murdering and 
 destroying the mortal life of a man made in the image 
 of God. And more ; if we be made in the likeness of 
 God and of Christ, we must remember, morning and 
 night, and all day long, that most awful and most blessed 
 fact. We must say to ourselves, again and again, "I am 
 not a mere animal, and like a mere animal I must not 
 behave ; I dare not behave like a mere animal, for I 
 was made in the likeness of God ; and when I was 
 baptised the Spirit of God took possession of me to 
 restore me to God's likeness, and to call out and perfect 
 God's likeness in me all my life long. Therefore, I am 
 no mere animal ; and never was intended to be. I am 
 the temple of God ; my body and soul belong to God, 
 and not to my own fancies and passions and lusts, and 
 
Capital Punishment. 63 
 
 whosoever defiles the temple of God, him will God 
 destroy." 
 
 Therefore, this is our duty, this is our only hope or 
 safety — to do our best to keep alive and strong the like- 
 ness of God in ourselves ; to try to grow, not more and 
 more mean, and brutal, and carnal, but more and more 
 noble, and human, and spiritual; to crush down our base 
 passions, our selfish inclinations, by the help of the Spirit 
 of God, and to think of and to pray for, whatsoever is 
 like Christ and like God ; to pray for a noble love of 
 what is good and noble, for a noble hate of what is bad; 
 and whatsoever things are pure and lovely and of good 
 report to think of these things. And to pray, too, for 
 forgiveness from Christ, and for the sake of Christ, 
 whenever we have yielded to our low passions, and 
 defiled the likeness of God in us, and grieved His Spirit, 
 lest at the last day it be said to us, if not in words yet 
 in acts, which there mil be no mistaking, no escaping, — 
 " I made thee in My likeness in the beginning of the 
 creation, I redeemed thee into My likeness on the cross, 
 I baptised thee into My likeness by my Holy Spirit ; and 
 what hast thou hast done with My likeness ? Thou hast 
 cast it away, thou hast let it die out in thee, thou hast lived 
 after the flesh and not after the spirit, and hast put on 
 the likeness of the carnal man, the likeness of the brute. 
 Thou hast copied the vanity of the peacock, the silliness 
 of the ape, the cunning of the fox, the rapacity of the 
 tiger, the sensuality of the swine ; but thou hast not 
 copied God, thy God, who died that thou mightest live, 
 and be a man. Then, thou hast destroyed God's like- 
 ness, for thou hast destroyed it in thyself. Thou hast 
 
64 Capital Punishnent. 
 
 slain a man, for thou hast slain thy own manhood, and 
 art thine own murderer, and thine own blood shall be 
 required at thy hand. That which thou hast done to 
 God's likeness in thee, shall be done to that which 
 remains of thee in a second death." 
 
 And from that may Christ in His mercy deliver us 
 all Amen. 
 
SERMON VII 
 
 TEMPTATION. 
 
 Eversley, 1872. Chester Cathedral, 1872. 
 
 St Matt. iv. 3. 
 
 "And when the tempter came to Him, he said, If Thou be the Sou of 
 God, command that these stones be made bread." 
 
 Let me say a few words to-day about a solemn sub- 
 ject, namely, Temptation. I do not mean the tempta- 
 tions of the flesh — the temptations which all men have 
 to yield to the low animal nature in them, and behave 
 like brutes. I mean those deeper and more terrible 
 temptations, which our Lord conquered in that great 
 struggle with evil which is commonly called His tempta- 
 tion in the wilderness. These were temptations of an 
 evil spirit — the temptations which entice some men, at 
 least, to behave like devils. 
 
 Now these temptations specially beset religious men 
 — men who are, or fancy themselves, superior to their 
 fellowmen, more favoured by God, and with nobler 
 powers, and grander work to do, than the common aver- 
 age of mankind. But specially, I say, they beset those 
 who are, or fancy themselves, the children of God. 
 And, therefore, I humbly suppose our Lord had to 
 endure and to conquer these very temptations because 
 He was not merely a child of God, but the Son of God 
 
 E 
 
66 Temptation. 
 
 — the perfect Man, made in the perfect likeness of His 
 Father. He had to endure these temptations, and to 
 conquer them, that He might be able to succour us 
 when we are tempted, seeing that He was tempted in 
 like manner as we are, yet without sin. 
 
 Now it has been said, and, I think, well said, that 
 what proves our Lord's three temptations to have been 
 very subtle and dangerous and , terrible, is this — that we 
 cannot see at first sight that they were temptations at 
 all. The first two do not look to us to be wrong. If 
 our Lord could make stones into bread to satisfy His 
 hunger, why should He not do so ? If He could prove 
 to the Jews that He was the Son of God, their divine 
 King and Saviour, by casting Himself down from the 
 pinnacle of the temple, and being miraculously supported 
 in the air by angels — ^if He could do that, why should 
 He not do it % And lastly, the third temptation looks 
 at first sight so preposterous that it seems silly of the 
 evil spirit to have hinted at it. To ask any man of 
 piety, much less the Son of God Himself, to faU down 
 and worship the devil, seems perfectly absurd — a request 
 not to be listened to for a moment, but put aside with 
 contempt, 
 
 Well, my friends, and the very danger of these 
 spiritual temptations is — that they do not look like 
 temptations. They do not look ugly, absurd, wrong ; 
 they look pleasant, reasonable, right. 
 
 The devil, says the apostle, transforms himself at 
 times into an angel of light. If so, then he is certainly 
 far more dangerous than if he came as an angel of dark- 
 ness and horror. If you met some venomous snake, with 
 
Temptation. 67 
 
 loathsome spots upon his scales, his eyes full of rage and 
 cunning, his head raised to strike at you, hissing and 
 showing his fangs, there would be no temptation to have 
 to do with him. You would know that you had to deal 
 with an evil beast, and must either kill him or escape 
 from him at once. But if, again, you met, as you may 
 meet in the tropics, a lovely little coral snake, braided 
 with red and white, its mouth so small that it seems 
 impossible that it can bite, and so gentle that children 
 may take it up and play with it, then you might be 
 tempted, as many a poor child has been ere now, to 
 admire it, fondle it, wreathe it round the neck for a 
 necklace, or round the arm for a bracelet, till the play 
 goes one step too far, the snake loses its temper, gives 
 one tiny scratch upon the lip or finger, and that scratch 
 is certain death. That would be a temptation indeed ; 
 one all the more dangerous because there is, I am told, 
 another sort of coral snake perfectly harmless, which is 
 so exactly like the deadly one, that no child, and few 
 grown people, can know them apart. 
 
 Even so it is with our worst temptations. They look 
 sometimes so exactly like what is good and noble and 
 useful and religious, that we mistake the evil for the 
 good, and play with it till it stings us, and we find out 
 too late that the wages of sin are death. Thus 
 religious people, just because they are religious, are 
 apt to be specially tempted to mistake evil for good, 
 and to do something specially wrong, when they think 
 they are doing something specially right, and so give 
 occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme ; till, 
 as a hard and experienced man of the world once said : 
 
68 Temptation. 
 
 " Whenever I hear a man talking of his conscience, 1 
 know that he is going to do something particularly 
 foolish ; whenever I hear of a man talking of his duty, 
 I know that he is going to do something particularly 
 cruel." 
 
 Do I say this to frighten you away from being religi- 
 ous ? God forbid. Better to be religious and to fear and 
 love God, though you were tempted by all the devils out 
 of the pit, than to be irreligious and a mere animal, and 
 be tempted only by your own carnal nature, as the 
 animals are. Better to be tempted, like the hermits of 
 old, and even to fall and rise again, singing, "Rejoice not 
 against me, mine enemy, when I fall I shall arise ; " 
 than to live the life of the flesh, " like a beast with 
 lower pleasures, like a beast with lower pains." It is 
 the price a man must pay for hungering and thirsting 
 after righteousness, for longing to be a child of God in 
 spirit and in truth. " The devil," says a wise man of 
 old, " does not tempt bad men, because he has got them 
 already ; he tempts good men, because he has not got 
 them, and wants to get them." 
 
 But how shall we know these temptations ? God 
 knows, my friends, better than I ; and I trust that 
 He will teach you to know, according to what each 
 of you needs to know. But as far as my small ex- 
 perience goes, the root of them all is pride and self- 
 conceit. Whatsoever thoughts or feelings tempt us to 
 pride and self-conceit are of the devil, not of God. The 
 devil is specially the spirit of pride ; and, therefore, 
 whatever tempts you to fancy yourself something dif- 
 ferent from your fellowmen, superior to your fellow- 
 
Temptation. 69 
 
 men, safer than them, more favoured by God than them, 
 that is a temptation of the spirit of pride. Whatever 
 tempts you to think that you can do without God's help 
 and God's providence; whatever tempts you to do any- 
 thing extraordinary, and show yourself off, that you may 
 make a figure in the world ; and above all, whatever 
 tempts you to antinomianism, that is, to fancy that God 
 will overlook sins in you which He will not overlook in 
 other men — all these are temptations from the spirit of 
 pride. They are temptations like our Lord's tempta- 
 tions. These temptations came on our Lord more ter- 
 ribly than they ever can on you and me, just because 
 He was the Sou of Man, the perfect Man, and, therefore, 
 had more real reason for being proud (if such a thing 
 could be) than any man, or than all men put together. 
 But He conquered the temptations because He was 
 perfect Man, led by the Spirit of God ; and, there- 
 fore, He knew that the only way to be a perfect man 
 was not to be proud, however powerful, wise, and glori- 
 ous He might be ; but to submit Himself humbly and 
 utterly, as every man should do, to the will of His 
 Father in Heaven, from whom alone His greatness came. 
 Now the spirit of pride cannot understand the beauty 
 of humility, and the spirit of self-will cannot understand 
 the beauty of obedience ; and, therefore, it is reasonable 
 to suppose the devil could not understand our Lord. If 
 He be the Son of God, so might Satan argue. He has 
 all the more reason to be proud ; and, therefore, it is all 
 the more easy to tempt Him into shewing His pride, into 
 proving Himself a conceited, self-willed, rebellious being 
 — in one word, an evil spirit. 
 
70 Temptation. 
 
 And therefore (as you will see at first sight) the first 
 two temptations were clearly meant to tempt our Lord 
 to pride ; for would they not tempt you and me to 
 pride? If we could feed ourselves by making bread of 
 stones, would not that make us proud enough ? So proud, 
 I fear, that we should soon fancy that we could do with- 
 out God and His providence, and were masters of 
 nature and all her secrets. If you and I could make 
 the whole city worship and obey us, by casting ourselves 
 off this cathedral unhurt, would not that make us 
 proud enough ? So proud, I fear, that we should end in 
 committing some great folly, or great crime in our 
 conceit and vainglory. 
 
 Now, whether our Lord could or could not have done 
 these wonderful deeds, one thing is plain — that He 
 would not do them ; and, therefore, we may presume 
 that He ought not to have done them. It seems as if 
 He did not wish to be a wonderful man : but only a 
 perfectly good man, and He would do nothing to help 
 Himself but what any other man could do. He 
 answered the evil spirit simply out of Scripture, as any 
 other pious man might have done. When He was 
 bidden to make the stones into bread, He answers not 
 as the Eternal Son of God, but simply as a man. " It 
 is written : " — it is the belief of Moses and the old 
 prophets of my people that man dotb not live by bread 
 alone, but by every word that proceedetlx out of the 
 mouth of God : — as much as to say, If I am to be 
 delivered out of this need, God will deliver me by some 
 means or other, just as He delivers other men out of 
 their needs. When He was bidden cast Himself from 
 
Temptation. 7 1 
 
 the temple, and so save Himself, probably from sorrow, 
 poverty, persecution, and the death on the cross, He 
 answers out of Scripture as any other Jew would have 
 done. "It is written again. Thou shalt not tempt the 
 Lord thy God." He says nothing — this is most impor- 
 tant — of His being the eternal Son of God. He keeps 
 that in the back-ground. There the fact was ; but He 
 veiled the glory of His godhead, that He might assert 
 the rights of His manhood, and shew that mere man, by 
 the help of the Spirit of God, could obey God, and keep 
 His commandments. 
 
 I say these last words with all diffidence and humility, 
 and trusting that the Lord will pardon any mistake 
 which I may make about His Divine Words. I only 
 say them because wiser men than I have often taken the 
 same view already. Of course there is more, far more, 
 in this wonderful saying than we can understand, or 
 ever will understand. But this I think is plain — that 
 our Lord determined to behave as any and every other 
 man ought to have done in His place ; in order to shew 
 all God's children the example of perfect humility and 
 perfect obedience to God. 
 
 But again, the devil asked our Lord to fall down 
 and worship him. Now how could that be a temptation 
 to pride ? Surely that was asking our Lord to do any- 
 thing but a proud action, rather the most humiliating 
 and most base of all actions. My friends, it seems to 
 me that if our Lord had fallen down and worshipped the 
 evil spirit, He would have given way to the spirit of 
 pride utterly and boundler,sly ; and I will tell you why. 
 
 The devil wanted our Lord to do evil that good 
 
72 Temptation. 
 
 might come. It would have been a blessing, that all 
 the kingdoms of the world and the glory of man should 
 be our Lord's, — the very blessing for this poor earth 
 which He came to buy, and which He bought with His 
 own precious blood. And here the devil offered Him 
 the very prize for which He came down on earth, with- 
 out struggle or difficulty, if He would but do, for one 
 moment, one wrong thing. What temptation that would 
 be to our Lord as God, J dare not say. But that to our 
 Lord as Man, it must have been the most terrible of all 
 temptations, I can well believe : because history shews us, 
 and, alas ! our own experience in modern times shews us, 
 persons yielding to that temptation perpetually ; pious 
 people, benevolent people, people who long to spread the 
 Bible, to convert sinners, to found charities, to amend 
 laws, to set the world right in some way or other, and 
 who fancy that therefore, in carrying out their fine pro- 
 jects, they have a right to do evil that good may come. 
 
 This is a very painful subject ; all the more painful 
 just now, because I sometimes think it is the special sin 
 of this country and this generation, and that God will 
 bring on us some heavy punishment for it. But all 
 who know the world in its various phases, and especially 
 what are called the religious world, and the philanthropic 
 world, and the political world, know too well that men, 
 not otherwise bad men, will do things and say things, 
 to carry out some favourite project or movement, or to 
 support some party, religious or other, which they 
 would (I hope) be ashamed to say and do for their own 
 private gain. Now what is this, but worshipping the 
 evil spirit, in order to get power over this world, that 
 
Temptation. 73 
 
 they may (as they fancy) amend it ? And what is this 
 but self-conceit — ruinous, I had almost said, blas- 
 phemous ? These people think themselves so certainly 
 in the right, and their plans so absolutely necessary to 
 the good of the world, that God has given them a special 
 licence to do what they like in caiTying them out; that 
 He will excuse in them falsehoods and meannesses, even 
 tyranny and violences which He will excuse in no one 
 else. 
 
 Now, is not this self-conceit ? What would you think 
 of a servant who disobeyed you, cheated you, and yet 
 said to himself — No matter, my master dare not turn 
 me off : I am so useful that he cannot do without me. 
 Even so in all ages, and now as much as, or more than 
 ever, have men said, We are so necessary to God and 
 God's cause, that He cannot do without us ; and there- 
 fore though He hates sin in everyone else, He will 
 excuse sin in us, as long as we are about His business. 
 
 Therefore, my dear friends, whenever we are tempted 
 to do or say anything rash, or vain, or mean, because 
 we are the children of God ; whenever we are inclined 
 to be puffed up with spiritual pride, and to fancy that 
 we may take liberties which other men must not take, 
 because we are the children of God ; let us remember 
 the words of the text, and answer the tempter, when 
 he says. If thou be the Son of God, do this and that, as 
 our Lord answered him — " If I be the Child of God, 
 what then ? This — that I must behave as if God were 
 my Father. I must trust my God utterly, and I must 
 obey Him utterly. I must do no rash or vain thing to 
 tempt God, even though it looks as if I should have a 
 
74 Temptation. 
 
 great success, and do much good thereby. I must do 
 no mean or base thing, nor give way for a moment to 
 the wicked ways of this wicked world, even though 
 again it looks as if I should have a great success, and 
 do much good thereby. In one word, I must worship 
 my Father in heaven, and Him only must I serve. If 
 He wants me, He will use me. If He does not want 
 me, He will use some one else. Who am I, that 
 God cannot govern the world without my help ? My 
 business is to refrain my soul, and keep it low, even 
 as a weaned child, and not to meddle with matters too 
 high for me. My business is to do the little, simple, 
 everyday duties which lie nearest me, and be faithful in 
 a few things; and then, if Christ will. He may make me 
 some day ruler over many things, and I shall enter into 
 the joy of my Lord, which is the joj'' of doing good to 
 my fellow men. But I shall never enter into that by 
 thrusting myself into Christ's way, with grand schemes 
 and hasty projects, as if I knew better than He how 
 to make His kingdom come. If I do, my pride wiU 
 have a fall. Because I would not be faithful over a 
 few things, I shall be tempted to be unfaithful over 
 many things ; and instead of entering into the joy of 
 my Lord, I shall be in danger of the awful judgment 
 pronounced on those who do evil that good may come, 
 who shall say in that day. Lord, Lord, have we not 
 prophesied in thy name ? and in thy name cast out 
 devils ? and in thy name done many wonderful works ? 
 And then will He protest unto them — I never knew 
 you. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity." 
 
 Oh, my friends, in all your projects for good, as in all 
 
Temptation. 75 
 
 other matters which come before you in your mortal life, 
 keep innocence and take heed to the thing that is right. 
 For that, and that alone, shall bring a man peace at the 
 last. 
 
 To which, may God in His mercy bring us all. Amen. 
 
SERMON VIII. 
 
 mother's love. 
 
 Eversley. Second Sunday in Lent, 1872. 
 
 St Matthew xv. 22-2S. 
 
 ''And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and 
 cried unto him, saying. Have mercy on me, Lord, thou son of 
 David ; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil. But he 
 answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, 
 saying. Send her away ; for she crieth after us. But he answered 
 and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of 
 Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying. Lord, help me. 
 But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's 
 bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said. Truth, Lord : yet the 
 dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master's table. Then 
 Jesus answered and said unto her, woman, groat is thy faith : 
 be it unto thee even as thou wUt. And her daughter was made 
 whole from that very hour." 
 
 If you want a proof from Scripture that there are two 
 sides to our blessed Lord's character — ^that He is a Jude'e 
 and an Avenger as well as a Saviour and a Pardoner — 
 that He is infinitely severe as well as infinitely merciful — 
 that, while we may come boldly to His throne of grace 
 to find help and mercy in time of need, we must, at the 
 same time, tremble before His throne of justice — if 
 you want a proof of all this, I say, then look at the 
 Epistle and the Gospel for this day. Put them side 
 by side, and compare them, and you will see how per- 
 fectly they shew, one after the other, the two sides. 
 
Mother s Love, "jj 
 
 The Epistle for the day tells men and women that they 
 must lead moral, pure, and modest lives. It does not ad- 
 vise them to do so. It does not say, It will be better to 
 do so, more proper and conducive to the good of society, 
 more likely to bring you to heaven at last. It says. You 
 must, for it is the commandment of the Lord Jesus, and 
 the will of God. Let no man encroach on or defraud his 
 brother in the matter, says St Paul ; by which he means, 
 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife. And why ? 
 " Because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as 
 we also have forewarned you and testified." 
 
 My friends, people talk loosely of the Thunder of 
 Sinai and the rigour of Moses' law, and set them against 
 what they call the gentle voice of the Gospel, and the 
 mild religion of Christ. Why, here are the Thunders of 
 Sinai uttered as loud as ever, from the very foot of the 
 Cross of Christ; and the terrible, "Thou shalt not," 
 of Moses' law, with the curse of God for a penalty on the 
 sinner, uttered by the Apostle of Faith, and Freedom, in 
 the name of Christ and of God. St Paul is not 
 afraid to call Christ an Avenger. How could he be ? 
 He believed that it was Christ who spoke to Moses on 
 Sinai — the very same Christ who prayed for His mur- 
 derers, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what 
 they do." And he .knew that Christ was the eternal 
 Son of God, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever; 
 that He had not changed since Moses' time, and could 
 never change; that what He forbade in Moses' time, 
 hated in Moses' time, and avenged in Moses' time. He 
 would forbid, and hate, and avenge for ever. Ajid that, 
 therefore, he who despises the warnings of the Law 
 
yS Mother's Love. 
 
 despises not man merely, but God, who has also given to 
 us His Holy Spirit to know what is unchangeable, 
 the everlastingly right, from what is everlastingly wrong. 
 So much for that side of our Lord's character ; so 
 much for sinners who, after their hardness and impeni- 
 tent hearts, treasure up for themselves wrath against the 
 day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment 
 of God, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of 
 men by Jesus Christ, according to St Paul's GospeL 
 
 But, when we turn to the Gospel for the day, we see the 
 other side of our Lord's character, boundless condescension 
 and boundless charity. We see Him there still a Judge, 
 as He always is and always will be, judging the secrets of 
 a poor woman's heart, and that woman a heathen. He 
 judges her openly, in public, before His disciples. But 
 He is a Judge who judges righteous judgment, and not 
 according to appearances; who is no respecter of persons; 
 who is perfectly fair, even though the woman be a 
 heathen : and, instead of condemning her and driving 
 her away, He acquits her. He grants her prayer. He 
 heals her daughter, even though that daughter was also 
 a heathen, and one who knew Him not. I say our Lord 
 judged the woman after He had tried her, as gold is 
 tried in the fire. Why He did so, we cannot tell. 
 Perhaps He wanted, by the trial, to make her a better 
 woman, to bring out something noble which lay in her 
 heart unknown to her, though not to Him who knew 
 what was in man. Perhaps He wished to shew His 
 disciples, who looked down on her as a heathen dog, that 
 a heathen, too, could have faith, humility, nobleness, 
 and grace of heart. Be that as it may, when the pooi 
 
Mother's Love. 79 
 
 woman came crying to Him, He answered her not a 
 word. His disciples besought Him to send her away^ 
 and I am inclined to think that they wished Him to 
 grant her what she asked, simply to be rid of her. 
 "Send her away," they said, "for she crieth after us." 
 Our Lord, we learn from St Mark, did not wish to be 
 known in that place just then. The poor woman, with 
 her crying, was drawing attention to them, and, perhaps, 
 gathering a crowd. Somewhat noisy and troublesome, 
 perhaps she was, in her motherly eagerness. But our 
 Lord was still seemingly stern. He would not listen, it 
 seemed, to His disciples any more than to the heathen 
 woman. " I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the 
 house of Israel." So our Lord said, and (what is worth 
 remembering) if He said so, what He said was true. He 
 was the King of the people of Israel, the Royal Prince 
 of David's line ; and, as a man. His duty was only to 
 His own people. And this woman was a Greek, a Syro- 
 phenician by nation — of a mixed race of people, notori- 
 ously low and profligate, and old enemies of the Jews. 
 
 Then, it seems, He went into a house, and would have 
 no man know it. But, says St Mark, " He could not be 
 hid." The mother's wit found our Lord out, and the 
 mother's heart urged her on, and, in spite of all His 
 rebuffs, she seems to have got into the house and wor- 
 shipped Him. She " fell at His feet," says St Mark — 
 doubtless bowing her forehead to the ground, in the 
 fashion of those lands — an honour which was paid, I 
 believe, only to persons who were royal or divine. So she 
 confessed that He was a king — perhaps a God come down 
 on earth — and again she cried to Him. "Lord, help me." 
 
8o Mother's Love. 
 
 And what was our Lord's answer — seemingly more stem 
 than ever? "Let the children first be filled: for it is not 
 meet to take the children's bread and cast it unto the 
 dogs." Hard words. Yes : but all depends on how they 
 were spoken. All depends on our Lord's look as He spoke 
 them, and, even more, on the tone of His voice. We all 
 know that two men may use the very same words to 
 us ; — and the one shall speak sneeringly, brutally, and 
 raise in us indignation or despair ; another shall use the 
 same words, but solemnly, tenderly, and raise in us 
 confidence and hope. And so it may have been — so, I 
 fancy, it must have been — with the tone of our Lord's 
 voice, with the expression of His face. Did He speak 
 with a frown, or with something like a smile ? There 
 must have been some tenderness, meaningness, pity in 
 His voice which the quick woman's wit caught instanth", 
 and the quick mother's heart interpreted as a sign of 
 hope. 
 
 Let Him call her a dog if He would. What matter 
 to a mother to be called a dog, if she could thereby 
 save her child from a devil ? Perhaps she was little 
 better than a dog. They were a bad people these 
 Syrians, quick-witted, highly civilised, but vicious, and 
 teaching vice to other nations, tiU some of the wisest 
 Romans cursed the day when the Syrians first spread 
 into Rome, and debauched the sturdy Romans with their 
 new-fangled, foreign sins. They were a bad people, and, 
 perhaps, she had been as bad as the rest. But if she 
 were a dog, at least she felt that the dog had found its 
 Master, and must fawn on Him, if it were but for the 
 hope of getting something from Him. 
 
Mother s Love. 8 1 
 
 And so, in the poor heathen mother's heart, there rose 
 up a whole heaven of perfect humility, faith, adoration. 
 If she were base and mean, yet our Lord was great, and 
 wise, and good ; and that was all the more reason why 
 He should be magnanimous, generous, condescending, 
 like a true King, to the basest and meanest of His sub- 
 jects. She asked not for money, or honour, or this world's 
 fine things : but simply for her child's health, her child's 
 deliverance from some mysterious and degrading illness. 
 Surely there was no harm in asking for that. It was 
 simply a mother's prayer, a simply human prayer, which 
 our Lord must grant, if He were indeed a man of woman 
 born, if He had a mother, and could feel for a mother, 
 if He had human tenderness, human pity in Him. And 
 so, with her quick Syrian wit, she answers our Lord with 
 those wonderful words — perhaps the most pathetic words 
 in the whole Bible — so full of humility, of reverence, and 
 yet with a certain archness, almost playfulness, in them, 
 as it were, turning our Lord's words against Him ; and, 
 by that very thing, shewing how utterly she trusted 
 Him, — " Truth, Lord : yet the dogs eat of the crumbs 
 which fall from their masters' table." 
 
 Those were the beautiful words — more beautiful to 
 me than whole volumes of poetry — which our Lord had 
 as it were crushed out of the woman's heart. Doubtless, 
 He knew all the while that they were in her heart, 
 though not as yet shaped into words. Doubtless, He 
 was trying her, to shew His disciples — and all Christians 
 who should ever read the Bible — what was in her heart, 
 what she was capable of saying when it came to the 
 point. So He tried her, and judged her, and acquitted her. 
 
82 Mother' s Love. 
 
 Out of the abundance of her heart her mouth had spoken. 
 By her words she was justified. By those few words she 
 proved her utter faith in our Lord's power and goodness 
 ■ — perhaps her faith in His godhead. By those words 
 she proved the gentleness and humility, the graciousness 
 and gracefulness of her own character. By those words 
 she proved, too, — and oh, you that are mothers, is that no- 
 thing? — the perfect disinterestedness of her mother's love. 
 And so she conquered — as the blessed Lord loves to be 
 conquered — as all noble souls who are like their blessed 
 Lord, love to be conquered — by the prayer of faith, of 
 humility, of confidence, of earnestness, and she had her 
 reward. " woman," said He, the Maker of all heaven 
 and earth, " great is thy faith. For this saying go thy 
 way. Be it unto thee even as thou wilt. The devil is 
 gone out of thy daughter.'' She went, full of faith ; and 
 when she was come to her house, she found the devil 
 gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed. 
 
 One word more, and I have done. I do not think 
 that any one who really took in the full meaning of 
 this beautiful story, would ever care to pray to Saints, 
 or to the Blessed Virgin, for help; fancying that they, and 
 specially the Blessed Virgin, being a woman, are more 
 humane than our Lord, and can feel more quickly, if 
 not more keenly, for poor creatures in distress. We 
 are not here to judge these people, or any people. To 
 their own master they stand or fall. But for the 
 honour of our Lord, we may say. Does not this story 
 shew that the Lord is humane enough, tender enough, 
 to satisfy all mankind ? Does not this story shew 
 that even if He seem silent at first, and does not 
 
Mother s Love. 83 
 
 grant our prayers, yet still He may be keeping us 
 waiting, as He kept this heathen woman, only that He 
 may be gracious to us at last ? Does not this story 
 shew us especially that our Lord can feel for mothers 
 and with mothers ; that He actually allowed Himself to 
 be won over — if I may use such a word in all reverence — 
 by the wit and grace of a mother pleading for her child ? 
 Was it not so ? "0 woman, great is thy faith. For 
 this saying go thy way. Be it unto thee even as thou 
 wilt." Ah ! are not those gracious words a comfort to every 
 mother, bidding her, in the Lord's own name, to come 
 boldly where mothers — of all human beings — have 
 often est need to come, to the throne of Christ's grace, 
 to find mercy, and grace to help in time of need ? 
 
 Yes, my friends, such is our Lord, and such is our 
 God. Infinite in severity to the scornful, the proud, 
 the disobedient : infinite in tenderness to the earnest, 
 the humble, the obedient. Let us come to Him, earnest, 
 humble, obedient, and we shall find Him, indeed, a 
 refuge of the .soul and body in spirit and in truth. 
 
 Thou, O Lord, art all I want. 
 
 All and more in thee I find. Amen. 
 
SERMON IX. 
 
 GOOD FBIDAT. 
 Eversley, 1856. 
 
 St. Litke xxiv. 5, 6, 
 
 " Why seek ye the living among the dead ? He is not here, 
 but is risen." 
 
 This is a very solemn day ; for on this day the Lord 
 Jesus Christ was crucified. The question for us is, how 
 ought we to keep it ? that is, what sort of thoughts 
 ought to be in our minds upon this day ? Now, many 
 most excellent and pious persons, and most pious books, 
 seem to think that we ought to-day to think as much 
 as possible of the sufferings of our Blessed Lord ; and 
 because we cannot, of course, understand or imagine the 
 sufferings of His Spirit, to think of what we can, that 
 is, His bodily sufferings. They, therefore, seem to wish 
 to fill our minds with the most painful pictures of agony, 
 and shame, and death, aud sorrow ; and not only with 
 our Lord's sorrows, but with those of His Blessed Mother, 
 and of the disciples, and the holy women who stood by 
 His cross ; they wish to stir us up to pity and horror, and 
 to bring before us the saddest parts of Holy Scripture, 
 such as the Lamentations of Jeremiah ; as w^ell as dwell 
 at great length upon very painful details, which may be 
 all quite true, but of which Scripture says nothing ; and 
 
Good Friday. 85 
 
 so to make this day a day of darkness, and sorrow, and 
 horror, just such as it would have been to us if we had 
 stood by Christ's cross, like these holy women, without 
 expecting Him to rise again, and believing that all was 
 over — that all hope of Israel's being redeemed was gone, 
 and that the wicked Jews had really conquered that 
 perfectly good, and admirable Saviour, and put Him out 
 of the world for ever. 
 
 Now, I judge no man; to his own master he standeth 
 or falleth ; yea, and he shall stand, for God is able to 
 make him stand. But it does seem to me that these 
 good people are seeking the living among the dead, and 
 forgetting that Christ is neither on the cross nor in the 
 tomb, but that He is risen ; and it seems to me better 
 to bid you follow to-day the Bible and the Church Ser- 
 vice, and to think of what they tell you to think of. 
 
 Now the Bible, it is most remarkable, never enlarges 
 anywhere upon even the bodily sufferings of our dear 
 and blessed Lord. The evangelists keep a silence on 
 that point which is most lofty, dignified, and delicate. 
 What sad and dreadful things might not St. John, the 
 beloved apostle as he was, have said, if he had chosen, 
 about what he saw and what be felt, as he stood by that 
 cross on Calvary — words which would have stirred to 
 pity the most cruel, and drawn tears from a heart of 
 stone ? And yet all he says is, " They crucified Him, 
 and two other with him, on either side one, and Jesus 
 in the midst." He passes it over, as it were, as a 
 thing which he ought not to dwell on ; and why should 
 we put words into St. John's mouth which he did not 
 think fit to put into his own ? He wrote by the Spirit 
 
86 Good Friday. 
 
 of God ; and therefore lie knew best what to say, and 
 what not to say. Why should we try and say anything 
 more for him ? Scripture is perfect. Let us be content 
 with it. The apostles, too, in their Epistles, never dwell 
 on Christ's sufferings. I entreat you to remark this. 
 They never mention His death except in words of cheer- 
 fulness and triumph. They seem so fuU of the glorious 
 fruits of His death, that they have, as it were, no time 
 to speak of the death itseK " Who, for the joy which 
 was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the 
 shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne 
 of God." That is the apostles' key-note. For God's 
 sake let it be ours too, unless we fancy that we can im- 
 prove on Scripture, or that we can feel more for our 
 Lord than St. Paul did. In the Lessons, the Psalms, 
 the Epistle, and Gospel for this day, you find just the 
 same spirit. AU except one Psalm are songs of hope, 
 joy, deliverance, triumph. The Collects for this day, 
 which are particularly remarkable, being three in 
 number, and evidently meant to teach us the key-note 
 of Good Friday, make no mention of our Lord's suffer- 
 ings, save to say that He was contented, "contented to 
 be betrayed, and given up into the hands of wicked 
 men, and to suffer death upon the cross," but are full of 
 prayers that the glorious fruits of His death may be ful- 
 filled, not only in us and all Christians, but in the very 
 heathen who have not known Him; drawing us away, 
 as it were, from looking too closely upon the cross itself, 
 lest we should forget what the cross meant, what the 
 cross conquered, what the cross gained, for us and all 
 mankind. 
 
Good Friday. 8 7 
 
 Surely, this was not done without a reason. And 
 I cannot but think the reason was to keep us from 
 seeking the living among the dead ; to keep us from 
 knowing Christ any longer after the flesh, and spending 
 tears and emotions over His bodily sufferings ; to keep 
 us from thinking and sorrowing too much over the dead 
 Christ, lest we should forget, as some do, that He 
 is alive for evermore ; and while they weep over the 
 dead Christ or the crucifix, go to the blessed Virgin and 
 the saints to do for them all that the living Christ is 
 longing to do for them, if they would but go straight to 
 Him to whom all power is given in heaven and earth ; 
 whom St John saw, no longer hanging on the accursed 
 tree, but with His hair as white as snow, and His eyes 
 like a flame of fire, and His voice like the sound of 
 many waters, and His countenance as the sun when 
 he shineth in his strength, saying unto him, " Fear 
 not, I am the first and the last ; I am He that liveth 
 and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore." 
 This is what Christ is now. In this shape He is look- 
 ing at us now. In this shape He is hearing me Speak. 
 In this shape He is watching every feeling of your hearts, 
 discerning your most secret intents, seeing through and 
 through the thoughts which you would confess to no 
 human being, hardly even to yourselves. This is He, a 
 living Christ, an almighty Christ, an all-seeing Christ, 
 and yet a most patient and loving Christ. He needs not 
 our pity ; but our gratitude, our obedience, our worship. 
 Why seek Him among the dead ? He' is not there. He 
 is risen ! He is not there. He is here ! Bow yourselves 
 before Him now ; for He is in the midst of you ; and 
 
88 Good Friday. 
 
 those eyes of His, more piercing than the mid-day sun- 
 beams, are upon you, and your hearts, and your thoughts, 
 and upon mine also. God have mercy upon me a 
 sinner. 
 
 Yes, my friends, why seek the living among the dead ? 
 He is not there, but here. We may try to put ourselves 
 in the place of the disciples and the Virgin Mary, as 
 they stood by Jesus' cross ; but we cannot do it, for 
 they saw Him on the cross, and thought that He was lost 
 to them for ever ; they saw Him die, and gave up all 
 hope of His rising again. And we know that Christ is 
 not lost to us for ever. We know Christ is not on the 
 cross, but at the right hand of God in bliss and glory 
 unspeakable. We may be told to watch with the three 
 Maries at the tomb of Christ : but we cannot do as they 
 did, for they thought that all was over, and brought 
 sweet spices to embalm His body, which they thought 
 was in the tomb ; and we know that all was not over, 
 that His body is not in the tomb, that the grave could 
 not hold Him, that His body is ascended into heaven ; 
 that instead of His body needing spices to embalm it, it 
 is His body which embalms all heaven and earth, and is 
 the very life of the world, and food which preserves our 
 souls and bodies to everlasting life. We are not in the 
 place of those blessed women ; God has not put us in 
 their place, and we cannot put ourselves into their place ; 
 and if we could and did, by anj' imaginations of our own, 
 we should only tell ourselves a lie. Good Friday was to 
 them indeed a day of darkness, horror, disappointment, all 
 but despair ; because Easter Day had not j-et come, and 
 Christ had not yet risen. But Good Friday cannot be a 
 
Good Friday. 89 
 
 day of darkness to us, because Christ has risen, and we 
 know it, and cannot forget it ; we cannot forget that 
 Easter dawn, when the Sun of Righteousness arose, 
 never to set again. Has not the light of that Re- 
 surrection morning filled with glory the cross and 
 the grave, yea the very agony in the Garden, and hell 
 itself, which Christ harrowed for us % Has it not risen 
 a light to lighten the Gentiles, a joy to angels and arch- 
 angels, and saints, and all the elect of God ; ay, to the 
 whole universe of God, so that the very stars in their 
 courses, the trees as they bud each spring, yea, the very 
 birds upon the bough, are singing for ever, in the ears 
 of those who have ears to hear, " Christ is risen ?" And 
 shall we, under pretence of honouring Christ and of be- 
 stowing on Him a pity which He needs least of all, try 
 to spend Good Friday and Passion Week in forgetting 
 Easter Day ; try to think of Christ's death as we should 
 if He had not risen, and try to make out ourselves and 
 the world infinitely worse off than we really know that 
 we are ? Christ has died, but He has risen again ; 
 and we must not think of one without the other. 
 Heavenly things are too important, too true, too real — 
 Christ is too near us, and too loving to us, too earnest 
 about our salvation, for us to spend our thoughts on 
 any such attempts (however reverently meant) at ima- 
 ginative play-acting in our own minds about His hang- 
 ing on His cross, while we know that He is not on His 
 cross ; and about watching by His tomb, when we know 
 that He is not in His tomb. Let us thank Him, bless 
 Him, serve Him, die for Him, if need be, in return for 
 all that He endured for us : but let us keep our sorrow 
 
90 Good Friday. 
 
 and our pity, and our tears, for our own daily sins — we 
 have enough of them to employ all our sorrow, and 
 more ; — and not in voluntary humility and will- worship, 
 against which St Paul warns us, lose sight of our 
 real Christ, of Him who was dead and is alive for ever- 
 more, and dwells in us by faith; now and for ever, amen; 
 and hath the keys of death and hell, and has opened 
 them for us, and for our fathers before us, and for our 
 children after us, and for nations yet unborn. 
 
 True, this is a solemn day, for on it the Son of God 
 fought such a fight, that He could only win it at the 
 price of His own life's blood ; and a humiliating day, for 
 our sins helped to nail Him on the cross — and therefore 
 a day of humiliation and of humility. Proud, self- 
 willed thoughts are surely out of place to-day (and what 
 day are they in place ?) On this day God agonised for 
 man : but it is a day of triumph and deliverance ; and 
 we must go home as men who have stood by and seen a 
 fearful fight — a fight which makes the blood of him who 
 watches it run cold ; but we have seen, too, a glorious vic- 
 tory — such a victory as never was won on earth before 
 or since ; and we therefore must think cheerfully of 
 the battle, for the sake of the victory that was won ; and 
 remember that on this day death was indeed swallowed 
 up in victory — because death was the victory itself 
 
 The question on which the fate of the whole world 
 depended was, whether Christ dare die ; and He dared 
 die. Whether Christ would endure to the end ; and He 
 did endure. Whether He would utterly drink the cup 
 which His Father had given Him ; and He drank it to 
 the dregs ; and so by His very agony He showed Him- 
 
Good Friday. 9 t 
 
 self noble, beautiful, glorious, adorable, beyond all that 
 words can express. And so the cross was His throne of 
 glory ; the prints of the nails in His hands and feet were 
 the very tokens of His triumph ; His very sorrows were 
 His bliss ; and those last words, " It is finished," were 
 no cry of despair, but a trumpet-call of triumph, which 
 rang from the highest heaven to the lowest hell, pro- 
 claiming to all created things, that the very fountain of 
 life, by dying, had conquered death, that good had con- 
 quered evil, love had conquered selfishness, God had 
 conquered man, and all the enemies of man ; and that 
 He who died was the first begotten from the dead, and 
 the King of all the princes of the earth, who was going to 
 fulfil, more and more, as the years and the ages rolled 
 on, the glorious prayer which we have prayed this day, 
 graciously to behold that family for whom He had been 
 contented to die ; and wisely and orderly to call each 
 man to a vocation and a ministry, in which he might 
 duly serve God and be a blessing to all around him, by 
 the inspiration of Christ's Holy Spirit ; and to have 
 mercy, in His own good time, upon all Jews, Turks, 
 heathens, and infidels, and bring them home to His 
 flock, that they may be saved, and made one fold under 
 one Shepherd — Him who was dead and is alive for 
 evermore. 
 
 Therefore, my dear friends, if we wish to keep Good 
 Friday in spirit and in truth, we cannot do so better 
 than by trying to carry out the very end for which 
 Christ died on this day ; and doing our part, small 
 though it be, toward bringing those poor heathens home 
 into Christ's fold, and teaching them the gospel and 
 
92 Good Friday. 
 
 good news that for them, too, Christ died, and over 
 them, too, Christ reigns alive for evermore ; and bring- 
 ing them home into His flock, that they, too, may- 
 find a place in His great family, and have their calling 
 and ministry appointed to them among the nations of 
 those vpho are saved and walk in the light of God and of 
 the Lamb. 
 
 I have refrained till now from speaking to you much 
 about missionaries, and the duty which lies on us all of 
 helping missions. It seemed to me that I must first 
 teach you to understand these first and second collects, 
 before I went on to the third; that I must first teach you 
 that you belonged to Christ's family, and that He had 
 called each of you, and appointed each of you to some 
 order and degree in His Holy Church. But now, if 
 indeed you have learnt that — if my preaching here for 
 fourteen years has had any effect to teach you who and 
 what you are, and what your duty is, let me entreat you 
 to go on, and take the lesson of that third collect, and 
 think of those poor Jews, Turks, infidels, and heretics, 
 who still — many a million of them — sit, or rather wan- 
 der, and fall, and lie, miserably wallowing in darkness 
 and the shadow of death, and think whether you cannot 
 do something toward helping them. What you can do, 
 and how it is to be done, I will tell you hereafter ; and, 
 by God's grace, I hope to see men of God in this pulpit, 
 who having been missionaries themselves, can tell you 
 better than I, what remains to be done, and how you 
 can help to do it. But take home this one thought 
 with you, this Good Friday, — Christ, who liveth and was 
 dead, and behold He is alive for evermore, if He be 
 
Good Friday. 93 
 
 indeed precioits to you, if you indeed feel for His suffer- 
 ings, if you indeed believe that what He bought by those 
 sufferings was a right to all the souls on earth, then do 
 what you can toward repaying Him for His sufferings, 
 by seeing of the travail of His soul, and being satisfied. 
 All the reward He asks, or ever asked, is the hearts of 
 sinners, that He may convert them ; the souls of sinners, 
 that He may save them ; and they belong to Him already, 
 for He bought them this day with His own most pre- 
 cious blood. Do something, then, toward helping Christ 
 to His own. 
 
SERMON X. 
 
 THE IMAaE OF THE EARTHLY AND THE HEAVENLY. 
 Eversley, Easter Day, 1871. 
 
 1 Cor. XV. 49. 
 
 " As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the 
 image of the heavenly. " 
 
 This season of Easter is the most joyful of all the year. 
 It is the most comfortable time, in the true old sense of 
 that word ; for it is the season which ought to comfort 
 us most — that is, it gives us strength ; strength to live 
 like men, and strength to die like men, when our time 
 comes. Strength to live like men. Strength to fight 
 against the temptation which Solomon felt when he said : 
 "I have seen all the works which are done under the 
 sun, and behold all is vanity and vexation of spirit. For 
 what has a man of all his labour, and of the vexation of 
 his heart, wherein he has laboured under the sun ? For 
 all his days are sorrow, and his travail grief Yea, his 
 heart taketh not rest in the night. This also is vanity. 
 For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth 
 beasts : as the one dieth, so dieth the other : yea, 
 they have all one breath: so that a man has no pre- 
 eminence over a beast ; for all is vanity. All go to one 
 place : all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. 
 Who knoweth the spirit of man that it goeth upward, 
 
The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly. 95 
 
 aad the spirit of the beast that it goeth downward to 
 the earth ? " So thought Solomon in his temptation, and 
 made up his mind that there was nothing better for a 
 man than that he should eat and drink, and make his 
 soul enjoy good in his labour. 
 
 So thought Solomon, in spite of all his wisdom, be- 
 cause he had not heard the good news of Easter day. 
 And so think many now, who are called wise men and 
 philosophers ; because they, alas ! for them, will not 
 believe the good news of Easter day. 
 
 But what says Easter day ? Easter day says, Man has 
 preeminence over a beast. The man is redeemed from 
 the death of the beasts by Christ, who rose on Easter day. 
 Easter day says. Wherever the spirit of the beast goes, 
 wherever the spirit of the brutal and the wicked man 
 goes, the spirit of the true Christian goes upward, to 
 Christ, who bought it with His precious blood. Easter 
 day says. The body may turn to the dust from which 
 it was taken, but the spirit lives for ever before God, 
 who shall give it another body, as it shall please Him, 
 as He gives to every seed its own body. And, therefore, 
 Easter day says. There is something better for a man 
 than to eat and drink and enjoy himself, for to-morrow 
 he may die, and all be over ; and that something is, to 
 labour not merely for the meat which perishes with the 
 perishing body, but to labour after the fruits of the 
 spirit — love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, good- 
 ness, faith, meekness, temperance. These the life of the 
 body does not give us ; and these the death of the body 
 cannot take away from us ; for they are spiritual and 
 heavenly, eternal and divine ; and he who has them 
 
96 The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly. 
 
 cannot die for ever. And therefore, we may comfort 
 ourselves in all our labour, if only vs'e labour at the one 
 useful work on earth, to be good, and to do good, and to 
 make others good likewise. 
 
 True it is, as St. Paul says, that if in this life only 
 we have hope in Christ we are of all men most miser- 
 able. For we do not care to be of the earth, earthy : 
 we long to be of the heaven, heavenly. We do not 
 care to spend our time in eating and drinking, mean 
 covetousness, ambition, and the base pleasures of the 
 flesh : we long after high and noble things, which we 
 cannot get on earth, or at best only in fragTaents, and at 
 rare moments ; after the holiness and the blessedness of 
 ourselves and our fellow-creatures. But we have hope 
 in Christ for the next life as well as for this. Hope 
 that in the next life He will give us power to succeed, 
 where we failed here ; that He will enable us to be 
 good and to do good, and, if not to make others good 
 (for there, we trust, all will be good together), to enjoy 
 the fulness of that pleasure for which we have been 
 longing on earth — the pleasure of seeing others good, as 
 Christ is good and perfect, as their Father in heaven is 
 perfect. 
 
 To be good ourselves, and to live for ever in good 
 company — ah my friends, that is true bliss. If we can- 
 not reach that after death, it were better for us that 
 death should make an end of us, and that when our 
 body decays in the grave we should be annihilated, and 
 become nothing for ever. 
 
 But Easter day says to us. If you labour to create 
 good company in this life, by trying to make other 
 
The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly. 97 
 
 people round you good, you shall enjoy for ever in the 
 next world the good company which you have helped to 
 make. If you labour to make yourself good in this life, 
 you shall enjoy the fruit of your labour in the next life 
 by being good, and, therefore, blessed for ever. Easter 
 day says. Your labour is not vanity and vexation of 
 spirit. It is solid work, which shall receive solid pay 
 from God hereafter. Easter day is a pledge — I may 
 say a sacrament — from God to us, that He will right- 
 eously reward all righteous work ; and that, therefore, it 
 is worth any man's while to labour, to suffer, if need be 
 even to die, in trying to be good, noble, useful, self- 
 sacrificing, as Christ toiled and suffered and died and 
 sacrificed Himself to do good. For then he will share 
 Christ's reward, as he has shared Christ's labour, and be 
 rewarded, as Christ was, by resurrection to eternal life. 
 
 And so Easter day should give us strength to live like 
 men — the only truly manly, truly human life ; the life 
 of being good and doing good. 
 
 And strength to die. Men are afraid of dying, prin- 
 cipally, I believe, because they fear the unknown. It is 
 not that they are afraid of the pain of dying. It is not 
 that they are afraid of going to hell ; for in all my ex- 
 perience, at least, I have met with but one person who 
 thought that he was going to helL Neither is it 
 that they are afraid of not going to heaven. Their ex- 
 pectation almost always is, that they are going thither. 
 But they do not care much to go to heaven. They are 
 willing enough to go there, because they know that they 
 must go somewhere. But their notions of what heaven 
 will be like are by no means clear. They have sung 
 
 G 
 
98 The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly. 
 
 rapturous hymns in church or chapel about the heavenly 
 Jerusalem, and passing Jordan safe to Canaan's shore, 
 with no very clear notion of what the words meant — and 
 small blame to them. 
 
 But when they think of actually dying, they feel as if 
 to go into the next world was to be turned out into the 
 dark night, into an unknown land, away from house and 
 home, and all they have known, and aU they have 
 loved; and they are ready to say with the good old 
 heathen emperor, when he lay a-dying — 
 
 " Little soul of mine, wandering, kindly, 
 Companion and guest of my body ; 
 Into what place art thou now departing, 
 Shivering, naked, and pale \ " 
 
 And so they shrink from death. They must shrink 
 from death, unless they will believe with their whole 
 hearts the good news of Easter day. The more thought- 
 ful and clever they are, the more they will shrink from 
 death, and dread the thought of losing their bodies. 
 They have always had bodies here on earth. They only 
 know themselves as souls embodied, living in bodies ; 
 and they cannot think of themselves in tbe next world 
 with any comfort, if they may not think of themselves as 
 having bodies. 
 
 And the more loving and affectionate they are, the 
 more they will shrink from death, unless they believe 
 with their whole hearts the good news of Easter day. 
 For those whom they have loved on earth have bodies. 
 Through their bodies — through their voices, their looks, 
 their actions, they have known them, and thus they have 
 loved them ; and if their beloved ones are to have no 
 
The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly. 99 
 
 bodies in the world to come, how shall they see them ? 
 how shall they know them ? how shall they converse 
 with them ? It seems to them in that case neither 
 they, nor those they love, would be the same persons in 
 the world to come they are here ; and that thought is 
 lonely and dreadful, till they accept the good news of 
 Easter day, the thrice blessed words of St. Paul, in his 
 Epistle to the Corinthians, which they hear at the burial 
 of those whom they love and lose. Oh, blessed news 
 for us, and for those we love ; those without whose com- 
 pany the world to come would be lonely and cheerless to 
 us. For now we can say. Tell me not that as the beast 
 dies, so dies the man. Tell me not that as Adam died 
 because of sin, so must I die, and all I love. Tell me 
 not that it is the universal law of nature that all things 
 born in time must die in time ; and that every human 
 being, animal, and plant carries in itself from its be- 
 ginning to its end a law of death, the seed of its own 
 destruction. I know all that ; but I care little for it, 
 because I know rnore than that. I know that the man's 
 body dies as the beast's body dies ; but I know that the 
 body is not the man, but only the husk, the shell of the 
 man ; that the true man, the true woman, lives on after 
 the loss of his mortal body ; and that there is an eternal 
 law of life, which conquers the law of death ; and by 
 that law a fresh body will grow up round the true man, 
 the immortal spirit, and will be as fit — ay, far fitter — to 
 do his work, than this poor mortal body which has 
 turned to death on earth. Tell me not that because I 
 am descended from a mortal and sinful old Adam, of 
 whom it is written that he was of the earth, earthly, 
 
loo The Image of the Earthly and the Heavenly, 
 
 therefore my soul is a part of my body, and dies when 
 my body dies. I belong not to the old Adam, but to the 
 new Adam — the new Head of men, who is the Lord 
 from heaven, the author of eternal life to all who obey 
 Him. Do not tell me that I have nothing in me but 
 the likeness of the old Adam, for that seems to me and 
 to St. Paul nothing but the likeness of the fallen savage 
 and the brute in human form. I know I have more 
 in me — infinitely more — than that. What may be in 
 store for the savage, the brutal, the wicked, is God's 
 concern, not mine. But what is in store for me 
 I know — that as I have borne the image of the 
 earthly, so shall I bear the image of the heavenly, 
 if only the Spirit of Christ, the new Adam, be in 
 me. For if Christ be in us, " the body is dead because 
 of sin ; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.'' 
 And if the Spirit of Him which raised up Jesus from 
 the dead dwell in us, He that raised up Christ from the 
 dead shall also quicken our mortal bodies by His Spirit 
 that dwelleth in us. How He will do it I know not ; 
 neither do I care to know. When He will do it I know 
 not ; but it will be when it ought to be ; and that is 
 enough for me. That He can do it I know, for He is 
 the Maker of the universe, and to Him all power is 
 given in heaven and earth ; and as for its being strange, 
 wonderful, past understanding, that matters little to me. 
 That will be but one wonder more in a world where all 
 is wonderful — one more mystery in an utterly mysteri- 
 ous universe. 
 
 And so, as Easter day has given us strength to live, 
 let Easter day, too, give us strength to die. 
 
SERMON XI. 
 
 EASTER DAY. 
 Chester Cathedral. 1870. 
 
 St John xii. 24, 25. 
 
 " Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the 
 ground and die, it abideth alone : but if it die, it bringeth forth 
 much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it ; and he that 
 hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal." 
 
 This is our Lord's own parable. In it He tells us that 
 His death, His resurrection, His ascension, is a mystery 
 which we may believe, not only because the Bible tells 
 us of it, but because it is reasonable, and according to 
 the laws of His universe ; a fulfilment, rather say the 
 highest fulfilment, of one of those laws which runs 
 through the world of nature, and through the spiritual 
 and heavenly world likewise. " Except a corn of wheat 
 fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone;" — barren, 
 useless, and truly dead to the rest of the world around 
 it, because it is shut up in itself, and its hidden life, 
 with all its wondrous powers of growth and fertility, re- 
 mains undeveloped, and will remain so, till it decays away, 
 a worthless thing, into worthless dust. But if it be buried 
 in the earth a while, then the rich life which lay hid in 
 it is called out by that seeming death, and it sprouts, 
 and tillers, and flowers, and ripens its grain — forty- 
 
I02 Easter Day. 
 
 fold, sixty-fold, an hundred-fold ; and so it shows God's 
 mind and will concerning it. It shows what is really in 
 it, and develops the full capabilities of its being. Even 
 so, says our Lord, would His death. His resurrection. 
 His ascension be. 
 
 He speaks of His own resurrection and ascension; yes, 
 but He speaks first of His own death. Before the com 
 can bring forth fruit, and show what is in it, fulfilling 
 the law of its being, it must fall into the ground and die. 
 Before our Lord could fulfil the prophecy, " Thou wilt 
 not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt Thou suffer Thy 
 Holy One to see corruption," He must fulfil the darker 
 prophecy of that awful 88th Psalm, the only one of all 
 the psalms which ends in sorrow, in all but despair, 
 " My soul is full of trouble, and my life draweth nigh 
 unto hell. I am counted as one of them that go down 
 into the pit : and I have been even as a man that hath 
 no strength. Free among the dead, like unto them that 
 are wounded and lie in the grave, who are out of 
 remembrance, and are cut away from thy hand." So 
 it was to be. So, we may believe, it needed to be. 
 Christ must suffer before He entered into His glory. He 
 must die, before He could rise. He must descend into 
 hell, before He ascended into heaven. For this is the 
 law of God's kingdom. Without a Good Friday, there 
 can be no Easter Day. Without self-sacrifice, there can 
 be no blessedness, neither in earth nor in heaven. He 
 that loveth his life will lose it. He that hateth his life 
 in this paltry, selfish, luxurious, hypocritical world, shall 
 keep it to life eternal. Our Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled 
 that law; because it is the law, the law not of Moses, but 
 
Easter Day. 1 03 
 
 of the kingdom of heaven, and must be fulfilled by him 
 who would fulfil all righteousness, and be perfect, even 
 as his Father in heaven is perfect. 
 
 Bear this in mind, I pray you, and whenever you 
 think of our Lord's resurrection and ascension, remember 
 always that the background to His triumph is—a tomb. 
 Remember that it is the triumph over suffering ; a 
 triumph of One who still bears the prints of the nails in 
 His hands and in His feet, and the wound of the spear 
 in His side ; like many a poor soul who has followed 
 Him triumphant at last, and yet scarred, and only not 
 maimed in the hard battle of life. Remember for ever 
 the adorable wounds of Christ. Remember for ever 
 that St John saw in the midst of the throne of God the 
 likeness of a lamb, as it had been slain. For so alone 
 you will learn what our Lord's resurrection and ascension 
 are to all who have to suffer and to toil on earth. For 
 if our Lord's triumph had had no suffering before it, — if 
 He had conquered as the Hindoos represent their gods 
 as conquering their enemies, without effort, without pain, 
 destroying them, with careless ease, by lightnings, hurled 
 by a hundred hands and aided by innumerable armies of 
 spirits, — what would such a triumph have been to us ? 
 What comfort, what example to us here struggling, often 
 sinning, in this piecemeal world ? We want — and 
 blessed be God, we have — a Captain of our salvation, 
 who has been made perfect by sufferings. We want 
 — and blessed be God, we have — an High Priest who 
 can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, be- 
 cause He has been tempted in all things like as we are, 
 yet without sin. We want— and blessed be God, we 
 
1 04 Easter Day. 
 
 have — a King who was glorified by suffering, that, if we 
 are ever called on to sacrifice ourselves, we may hope, 
 by suffering, to share His glory. And when we have 
 remembered this, and fixed it in our minds, we may go 
 on safely to think of His glory, and see that (as I said at 
 first) His resurrection and ascension satisfy our con- 
 sciences, — satisfy that highest reason and moral sense 
 within us, which is none other than the voice of the 
 Holy Spirit of God. 
 
 For see. Our Lord proved Himself to be the per- 
 fectly righteous Being, by His very passion. He proved 
 it by being righteous utterly against EQs own interest ; 
 by enduring shame, torment, death, for righteousness' 
 sake. But we feel that our Lord's history could not, 
 must not, end there. Our conscience, which is our 
 highest reason, shrinks from that thought. If our Lord 
 had died and never risen, then would His history be full 
 of nothing but despair to all who long to copy Him and 
 do right at all costs. Our consciences demand that God 
 should be just. We say with Abraham, " Shall not the 
 Judge of all the earth do right ? " Shall not He, who 
 suffered without hope of reward, have His reward never- 
 theless ? Shall not He who cried, " My God ! my God ! 
 why hast Thou forsaken Me ? " be justified by having it 
 proved to all the world that God had not forsaken Him? 
 But we surely cannot be more just than God. If we 
 expect God to do right, we shall surely find that He has 
 done right, and more right than we could expect or 
 dream. Therefore we may believe — I say that we must 
 believe, if we be truly reasonable beings — what the 
 Bible tells us ; that Christ, who suffered more than all, 
 
Easter Day. 105 
 
 was rewarded more than all ; that Christ, who bumbled 
 Himself more than all, was exalted more than all ; and 
 that His resurrection and ascension, as St Paul tells us 
 again and again, was meant to show men this, — to 
 show them that God the Father has been infinitely just 
 to the infinite merits of God the Son, Jesus Christ our 
 Lord, — to justify our Lord to all mankind by His triumph 
 over death and hell, and in justifying Him to justify His 
 Father and our Father, his God and our God. 
 
 And what is true of Christ must be true of us, the 
 members of Christ. He is entered into His rest, and 
 you desire to enter into it likewise. You have a right 
 to desire it, for it is written, " There remaineth a rest 
 for the people of God." Eemember, then, that true rest 
 can only be attained as He attained it, through labour. 
 You desire to be glorified with Christ. Remember 
 that true glory can only be attained in earth or heaven 
 through self-sacrifice. Whosoever will save his life 
 shall lose it ; whosoever will lose his life shall save it. 
 If that eternal moral law held good enough for the sin- 
 less Christ, who, though He were a son, yet learned 
 obedience by the things which He suffered, how much 
 more must it hold good of you and me and all moral and 
 rational beings,— yea, for the very angels in heaven. 
 They have not sinned. That we know ; and we do not 
 know, and I presume cannot know, that they have ever 
 suffered. But this at least we know, that they have 
 submitted. They have obeyed and have given up their 
 own wills to be the ministers of God's will. In them is 
 neither self-will nor selfishness ; and therefore by faith, 
 that is, by trust and loyalty, they stand. And so, by 
 
io6 Easter Day. 
 
 consenting to lose their individual life of selfishness, they 
 have saved their eternal life in God, the life of blessed- 
 ness and holiness ; just as all evil spirits have lost their 
 eternal life by trying to save their selfish life, and be 
 something in themselves and of themselves without re- 
 spect to God. 
 
 This is a great mystery ; indeed, it is the mystery of 
 the eternal, divine, and blessed life, to which God of His 
 mercy bring us all. And therefore Good Friday, Easter 
 Day, Ascension Day, are set as great lights in the firma- 
 ment of the spiritual year, — to remind us that we are not 
 animals, bom to do what we like, and fulfil the sinful 
 lusts of the flesh, the ways whereof are death ; but that 
 we are moral and rational beings, members of Christ, 
 children of God, inheritors of the kingdom of heaven ; 
 and that, therefore, I say it again, like Christ our 
 Lord, we must die in order to live, stoop in order to con- 
 quer. They remind us that honour must grow out of 
 humility ; that freedom must grow out of discipline ; that 
 sure conquest must be born of heavy struggles ; right- 
 eous joy out of righteous sorrow ; pure laughter out of 
 pure tears ; true strength out of the true knowledge of 
 our own weakness ; sound peace of mind out of sound 
 contrition ; and that the heart which has a right to cry, 
 " The Lord is on my side, I will not fear what man 
 doeth unto me," must be born out of the heart which has 
 cried, "God be merciful to me a sinner!" They remind us 
 that in all things, as says our Lord, there cannot be joy, 
 because a man is born into the world, unless there first 
 be sorrow, because the hour of birth is come ; and that 
 he who would be planted into the likeness of Christ's 
 
Easter TDay. 107 
 
 resurrection, must, like the corn of wheat, be first planted 
 into the likeness of His death, and die to sin and self, 
 that he may live to righteousness and to God ; and, like 
 the corn of wheat, become truly living, truly strong, truly 
 rich, truly useful, and develop the hidden capabilities of his 
 being, fulfilling the mind and will of God concerning him. 
 Again, I say, this is a great mystery. But again, I 
 say, this is the law, not Moses' law, but the Gospel law ; 
 — the law of liberty, by which a man becomes truly 
 free, because he has trampled under foot the passions of 
 his own selfish flesh, till his immortal spirit can ascend 
 free into the light of God, and into the love of God, and 
 into the beneficence of God. My dear friends, remember 
 these words, for they are true. Remember that St Paul 
 always couples with the resurrection and ascension of our 
 bodies in the next life the resurrection and ascension of 
 our souls in this life ; for without that, the resurrection 
 of our bodies would be but a resurrection to fresh sin, 
 and therefore to fresh misery and ruin. Remember his 
 great words about that moral resurrection and ascension 
 of our wills, our hearts, our characters, our actions. 
 " God," he says, " who is rich in mercy, for His great 
 love, wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead 
 in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace 
 are ye saved ;) and hath raised us up together, and made 
 us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." 
 
 And what are those heavenly places ? And what is 
 our duty in them ? Let St Paul himself answer. " If ye 
 then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are 
 above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God." 
 And what are they ? Let St Paul answer once more ; 
 
io8 Ea^er Day. 
 
 who should know better than he, save Christ alone ? 
 " Whatsoever things are true, honest, just, pure, lovely, 
 of good report. If there be any virtue, and if there be 
 any praise, think on these things." 
 
 Yes, think of these things, — and, thinking of them, ask 
 the Holy Spirit of God to inspire you, and make a Whit- 
 suntide in your hearts, even as He has made, I trust, a 
 Good Friday and an Eastertide and an Ascension Day ; 
 that so, knowing these things, you may be blessed in 
 doing them ; that so — and so only — may be fulfilled 
 in you and me or any rational being, those blessed 
 promises which were fulfilled in Christ our Lord. "They 
 that sow in tears shall reap in joy.'' "He that now 
 goeth on his way weeping, and beareth forth good seed, 
 shall doubtless come again with joy, and bring his sheaves 
 with him." " Blessed is the man whose strength is in 
 Thee, in whose heart are Thy ways ; who going through 
 the vale of misery, use it for a well, and the pools are 
 filled with water. They will go from strength to 
 strength : and unto the God of gods appeareth every 
 one of them in Sion." To which may God in His great 
 mercy bring us all. Amen. 
 
SERMON XIT. 
 
 PEESENCE IN ABSENCE. 
 
 Eversley, third Sunday after Easter. 1862. 
 
 St John xvi. 16. 
 
 " A little while, and ye sliall not see me : and again, a little wliile, and 
 ye sliall see me, because I go to the Father. " 
 
 Divines differ, and, perhaps, have always differed, about 
 the meaning of these words. Some think that our Lord 
 •speaks in them of His death and resurrection. Others 
 that He speaks of His ascension and coming again in 
 glory. I cannot decide which is right. I dare not de- 
 cide. It is a very solemn thing — too solemn for me — 
 to say of any words of our Lord's they mean exactly this 
 or that, and no more. For if wise men's words have (as 
 they often have) more meanings than one, and yet all 
 true, then surely the words of Jesus, the Son of God, 
 who spake as never man spake — His words, I say, may 
 have many meanings ; yea, meanings without end, mean- 
 ings which we shall never fully understand, perhaps even 
 in heaven, and yet all alike true. 
 
 But I think it is certain that most of the early Chris- 
 tians understood these words of our Lord's ascension and 
 coming again in glory. They believed that He was 
 coming again in a very little while during their own life- 
 time, in a few months or years, to make an end of the 
 
I lo Presence in Absence. 
 
 world and to judge the quick and the dead. And as they 
 Waited for His coming, one generation after another, 
 and yet He did not come, a sadness fell upon them. 
 Christ seemed to have left the world. The little while 
 that He had promised to be away seemed to have be- 
 come a very long while. Hundreds of years passed, and 
 yet Christ did not come in glory. And, as I said, a 
 sadness fell on all the Church. Surely, they said, this 
 is the time of which Christ said we were to weep and 
 lament till we saw Him again — this is the time of which 
 He said that the bridegroom should be taken from us, 
 and we should fast in those days. And they did fast, 
 and weep, and lament ; and their religion became a very 
 sad and melancholy one — most sad in those who were 
 most holy, and loved their Lord best, and longed most 
 for His coming in glory. 
 
 What happened after that again I could tell you, but 
 we have nothing to do with it to-day. We will rather go 
 back, and see what the Lord's disciples thought He meant 
 when He said, — "A little while, and ye shall not see 
 me ; and again, a little while, and ye shaU see me, 
 because I go to the Father." One would think, surely, 
 that they must have taken those words to mean His 
 death and resurrection. They heard Him speak them 
 on the very night that He was betrayed. They saw Him 
 taken from them that very night. In horror and agony 
 they saw Him mocked and scourged, crucified, dead, and 
 buried, as they thought for ever, and the world around 
 rejoicing over His death. Surely they wept and lamented 
 then. Surely they thought that He had gone away and 
 left them then. 
 
Presence in Absence. 1 1 1 
 
 And the third day, heyond all hope or expectation, 
 they beheld Him alive again, unchanged, perfect, and 
 glorious — as near them and as faithful to them as ever. 
 Surely that was seeing Him again after a little while. 
 Surely then their sorrow was turned to joy. Surely then 
 a man, the man of all men, was born into the world a 
 second time, and in them was fulfilled our Lord's most 
 exquisite parable — most human and yet most divine — 
 of the mother remembering no more her anguish for joy 
 that a man is born into the world. 
 
 I think, too, that we may see, by the disciples' con- 
 duct, that they took these words of the text to speak of 
 Christ's death and resurrection. For when He ascended 
 to heaven out of their sight, did they consider that was 
 seeing Him no more ? Did they think that He had 
 gone away and left them ? Did they, therefore, as would 
 have been natural, weep and lament? On the contrary, 
 we are told expressly by St Luke that they "returned 
 to Jerusalem with great joy ; and were continually in the 
 temple," not weeping and lamenting, but praising and 
 blessing God. Plainly they did not consider that Christ 
 was parted from them when He ascended into heaven. 
 He had been training them during the forty days between 
 Easter Day and Ascension Day to think of Him as 
 continually near them, whether they saw Him or not. 
 Suddenly He came and went again. Mysteriously He 
 appeared and disappeared. He showed them that 
 though they saw not Him, He saw them, heard their 
 words, knew the thoughts and intents of their hearts. 
 He was always near them they felt ; with them to the 
 end of the world, whether in sight or out of sight. And 
 
1 1 2 Presence in Absence. 
 
 when they saw Him ascend into heaven, it seemed to 
 them no separation, no calamity, no change in His rela- 
 tion to them. He was gone to heaven. Surely He had 
 been in heaven during those forty days, whenever they 
 had not seen Him. He had gone to the Father. 
 Might He not have been with the Father during those 
 forty days, whenever they had not seen Him? Nay; 
 was He not always in heaven ? Was not heaven very 
 near them ? Did not Christ bring heaven with Him 
 whithersoever He wenti Was He not always with the 
 Father, the Father who fills all things, in whom all 
 created things live, and move, and have their being ? 
 How could they have thought otherwise about our Lord, 
 when almost His last words to them were not, Lo, I leave 
 you alone, but, " Lo, I am with you alway, even to the 
 end of the world.'' 
 
 My friends, these may seem deep words to some — 
 doubtless they are, for they are the words of the Bible 
 — so deep that plain, unlearned people can make no use 
 of them, and draw no lesson from them. I do not think 
 so. I think it is of endless use and endless importance 
 to you how you think about Christ ; and, therefore, how 
 you think about these forty days between our Lord's 
 resurrection and ascension. You may think of our Lord 
 in two ways. You may think of Him as having gone 
 very far away, millions of millions of miles into the sky, 
 and not to return till the last day, — and then, I do not 
 say that you will weep and lament. There are not 
 many who have that notion about our Lord, and yet 
 love Him enough to weep and lament at the thought 
 of His having gone away. But your religion, when 
 
Presence in Absence. 113 
 
 it wakes up in you, will be a melaucLoly and terrify- 
 ing one. I say, when it wakes up in you — for you 
 will be tempted continually to let it go to sleep. 
 There will come over you the feeling — God forgive 
 us, does it not come over us all but too often ? — Christ 
 is far away. Does He see me ? Does He hear me ? 
 Will He find me out ? Does it matter very much what 
 I say and do now, provided I make my peace with Him 
 before I die ? And so will come over you not merely a 
 carelessness about religious duties, about prayer, reading, 
 church-going, but worse still, a carelessness about right 
 and wrong. You will be in danger of caring little about 
 controlling your passions, about speaking the truth, about 
 being just and merciful to your fellow-men. And then, 
 when your conscience wakes you up at times, and cries. 
 Prepare to meet thy God ! you will be terrified and 
 anxious at the thought of judgment, and shrink from the 
 thought of Christ's seeing you. My friends, that is a 
 fearful state, though a very common one. What is it 
 but a foretaste of that dreadful terror in which those 
 who would not see in Christ their Lord and Saviour will 
 call on the mountains to fall on them, and the hills to 
 cover them, from Him that sitteth on the throne, and 
 from the anger of the Lamb ? 
 
 But, again : you may think of Christ as ffis truest 
 servants, thoiigh they might have been long in darkness, 
 in all ages and countries have thought of Him, sooner 
 or later. And they thought of Him, as the disciples 
 did ; as of One who was about their path and about their 
 bed, and spying out all their ways ; as One who was in 
 heaven, but who, for that very reason, was bringing heaven 
 
 H 
 
114 Presence in Absence. 
 
 down to earth continually in the gracious inspirations of 
 His Holy Spirit ; as One who brought heaven down to 
 them as often as He visited their hearts and comforted 
 them with sweet assurance of His love, His faithfulness, 
 His power — as God grant that He may comfort those of 
 you who need comfort. And that thought, that Christ 
 was always with them, even to the end of the world, 
 sobered and steadied them, and yet refreshed and com- 
 forted them. It sobered them. What else could it do ? 
 Does it not sober us to see even a picture of Christ cruci- 
 fied ? How must it have sobered them to carry, as good 
 St Ignatius used to say of himself, Christ crucified in his 
 heart. A man to whom Christ, as it were, showed per- 
 petually His most blessed wounds, and said. Behold what 
 I have endured — ^how dare he give way to his passion? 
 How dare he be covetous, ambitious, revengeful, false ? 
 And yet it cheered and comforted them. How could 
 it do otherwise, to know all day long that He who was 
 wounded for their iniquities, and by whose stripes they 
 were healed, was near them day and night, watching 
 over them as a father over his child, saying to them, — 
 " Fear not, I am He that was dead, and am alive for 
 evermore, and I hold the keys of death and hell. 
 Though thou walkest through the fires, I will be with 
 thee. I will never leave thee nor forsake thee." Yes, 
 my friends, if you wish your life — and therefore your 
 religion, which ought to be the very life of your life — to 
 be at once sober and cheerful, fuU of earnestness and full 
 of hope, believe our Lord's words which He spoke during 
 these very forty days, — " Lo, I am with you alway, even 
 to the end of the world." Believe that heaven has not 
 
Presence in Absence. 1 1 5 
 
 taken Him away from you, but brought Him nearer to 
 you; and that He has ascended up on high, not that He, 
 in whom alone is life, might empty this earth of His 
 presence, but that He might fill all things, not this earth 
 only, but aU worlds, past, present, and to come. Believe 
 that wherever two or three are gathered together in 
 Christ's name, there He is in the midst of them ; that 
 the holy communion is the sign of His perpetual pre- 
 sence ; and that when you kneel to receive the bread and 
 wine, Christ is as near you — spiritually, indeed, and in- 
 visibly, but really and truly — as near you as those who 
 are kneeling by your side. 
 
 And if it be so with Christ, then it is so with those 
 who are Christ's, with those whom we love. It is the 
 Christ in them which we love ; and that Christ in them 
 is their hope of glory ; and that glory is the glory of 
 Christ. They are partakers of His death, therefore they 
 are partakers of His resurrection. Let us believe that 
 blessed news in all its fulness, and be at peace. A little 
 while and we see them ; and again a little while and we 
 do not see them. But why ? Because they are gone 
 to the Father, to the source and fount of all life and 
 power, all light and love, that they may gain life from 
 His life, power from His power, light from His light, 
 love from His love — and surely not for nought ? 
 
 Surely not for nought, my friends. For if they were 
 like Christ on earth, and did not use their powers for 
 themselves alone, if they are to be like Christ when they 
 shall see Him as He is, then, more surely, will they not 
 use their powers for themselves, but, as Christ uses His, 
 for those they love. 
 
1 1 6 Presence in Absence. 
 
 Surely, like Christ, they may come and go, even now, 
 unseen. Like Christ, they may breathe upon our rest- 
 less hearts and say. Peace be unto you — and not in vain. 
 For what they did for us when they were on earth they 
 can more fully do now that they are in heaven. They 
 may seem to have left us, and we, like the disciples, 
 may weep and lament. But the day will come when 
 the veil shall be taken from our eyes, and we shall see 
 them as they are, with Christ, and in Christ for ever ; 
 and remember no more our anguish for joy that a man 
 is born into the world, that another human being has 
 entered that one true, real, and eternal world, wherein 
 is neither disease, disorder, change, decay, nor death, for 
 it is none other than the Bosom of the Father. 
 
SERMON XIII. 
 
 ASCENSION DAT. 
 Eversley. Chester Cathedral. 1872. 
 
 St John viii. 58. 
 "Before Abraham was, I am." 
 
 Let us consider these words awhile. They are most fit 
 for our thoughts ou this glorious day, on which the Lord 
 Jesus ascended to His Father, and to our Father, to 
 His God, and to our God, that He might be glorified 
 with the glory which He had with the Father before 
 the making of the world. For it is clear that we shall 
 better understand Ascension Day, just as we shall better 
 understand Christmas or Eastertide, the better we under- 
 stand Who it was who was born at Christmas, suffered 
 and rose at Eastertide, and, as on this day, ascended into 
 heaven. Who, then, was He whose ascent we celebrate ? 
 What was that glory which, as far as we can judge of 
 divine things, He resumed as on this day? 
 
 Let us think a few minutes, with aU humility, not 
 rashly intruding ourselves into the things we have not 
 seen, or meddling with divine matters which are too 
 hard for us, but taking our Lord's words simply as they 
 stand, and where we do not understand them, believing 
 them nevertheless. 
 
ii8 Ascension Day. 
 
 Now it is clear that the book of Exodus and our 
 Lord's words speak of the same person. The Old Testa- 
 ment tells of a personage who appeared to Moses in the 
 wilderness, and who called Himself " the Lord God of 
 Abraham, Isaac and Jacob." But this personage also 
 calls Himself " I AM." " I AM THAT I AM :" "and 
 He said. Thus shalt thou say unto the children of 
 Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you." 
 
 In the New Testament we read of a personage who 
 calls Himself the Son of God, is continually called the 
 Lord, and who tells His disciples to call Him by that name 
 without reproving them, though they and He knew weU 
 what it meant — that it meant no less than this, that 
 He, Jesus of Nazareth, poor mortal man as He seemed, 
 was still the Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 
 I do not say that the disciples saw that at first, clearly 
 or fully, tiU after our Lord's resurrection. But there 
 was one moment shortly before His death, when they 
 could have had no doubt who He assumed Himself to 
 be. For the unbelieving Jews had no doubt, and con- 
 sidered Him a blasphemer ; and these were His awful 
 and wonderful words — I do not pretend to understand 
 them — I take them simply as I find them, and believe 
 and adore. "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my 
 day, and he saw it, and was glad. Then said the Jews 
 unto Him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast 
 Thou seen Abraham ? " One cannot blame them for 
 asking that question, for Abraham had been dead then 
 nearly two thousand years. But what is our Lord's 
 solemn answer ? " Verily, verily, I say unto you, before 
 Abraham was, I am." 
 
Ascension- Day. 119 
 
 " I Am." The same name by which our Lord God 
 had revealed Himself to Moses in the wilderness, some 
 sixteen hundred years before. If these words were true, 
 — and the Lord prefaces them with Verily, verily, 
 Amen, Amen, which was as solemn an asseveration as 
 any oath could be — then the Lord Jesus Christ is none 
 other than the God of Abraham, the God of Moses, the 
 God of the Jews, the God of the whole universe, past, 
 present, aad to come. 
 
 Let us think awhile over this wonder of all wonders. 
 The more we think over it, we shall find it not only the 
 wonder of all wonders, but the good news of all good 
 news. 
 
 The deepest and soundest philosophers will tell us 
 that there must be an " I Am." That is, as they would 
 say, a self-existent Being; neither made nor created, but 
 who has made and created all things ; who is without 
 parts and passions, and is incomprehensible, that is 
 cannot be comprehended, limited, made smaller or 
 weaker, or acted on in any way by any of the things 
 that He has made. So that this self-existiag Being 
 whom we call God, would be exactly what He is now, 
 if the whole universe, sun, moon, and stars, were 
 destroyed this moment ; and would be exactly what He 
 is now, if there had never been any universe at all, or 
 any thing or being except His own perfect and self- 
 existent Self. For He lives and moves and has His 
 being in nothing. But all things live and move and 
 have their being in Him. He was before all things, and 
 by Him all things consist. And this is the Cathohc 
 Faith; and not only that, this is according to sound and 
 
1 20 Ascension Day. 
 
 right reason. But more : the soundest philosophers will 
 tell you that God must be not merely a self-existent 
 Being, but the " I Am :" that if God is a Spirit, and 
 not merely a name for some powers and laws of brute 
 nature and matter, He must be able to say to Hamself, 
 "I Am : " that He must know Himself, that He must be 
 conscious of Himself, of who and what He is, as you 
 and I are conscious of ourselves, and Inore or less of who 
 and what we are. And this, also, I believe to he true, 
 and rational, and necessary to the Catholic Faith. 
 
 But they will tell you again — and this, too, is surely 
 true — that I Am must be the very name of God, because 
 God alone can say perfectly, " I Am," and no more. 
 You and I dare not, if we think accurately, say of 
 ourselves, " I am." We may say, I am this or that ; I 
 am a man ; I am an EngUshman ; but we must not say, 
 " I am;" that is, " I exist of myself" We must say — 
 not I am ; but I become, or have become ; I was made ; 
 I was created ; I am growing, changing ; I depend for 
 my very existence on God and God's wiU, and if He 
 willed, I should be nothing and nowhere in a moment. 
 God alone can say, I Am, and there is none beside 
 Me, and never has, nor can be. I exist, absolutely, and 
 simply ; because I choose to exist, and get life from 
 nothing ; for I Am the Life, and give life to all things. 
 
 But you may say. What is all this to us ? It is very 
 difficult to understand, and dreary, and even awful. 
 Why should we care for it, even if it be true ? Yes, 
 ray friends ; philosophy may be true, and yet be dreary, 
 and awful, and have no gospel and good news in it at 
 all. I believe it never can have ; that only in Revelation, 
 
Ascension Day. 121 
 
 and in the Revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ, can poor 
 human beings find any gospel and good news at all. 
 And sure I am, that that is an awful thought, a dreary 
 thought, a crushing thought, which makes a man feel as 
 small, and worthless, and helpless, and hopeless, as a grain 
 of dust, or a mote in the sunbeam — thai thought of 
 God for ever contained in Himself, and saying for ever 
 to Himself, " I Am, and there is none beside Me." 
 
 But the Gospel, the good news of the Old Testament, 
 thfe Gospel, the good news of the New Testament, is the 
 Revelation of God and God's ways, which began on 
 Christmas Day, and finished on Ascension Day : and what 
 is that ? What but this ? That God does not merely 
 say to Himself in Majesty, " I Am ; " but that He goes 
 out of Himself in Love, and says to men, " I Am." That 
 He is a God who has spoken to poor human beings, and 
 told them who He was ; and that He, the I Am, the self- 
 existent One, the Cause of life, of all things, even the 
 Maker and Ruler of the Universe, can stoop to man — 
 and not merely to perfect men, righteous men, holy men, 
 wise men, but to the enslaved, the sinful, the brutish — 
 that He may deliver them, and teach them, and raise them 
 from the death of sin, to His own life of righteousness. 
 
 Do you not see the difference, the infinite difference, 
 and the good news in that ? Do you not see a whole 
 heaven of new hope and new duty is opened to man- 
 kind in that one fact — God has spoken to man. He, the 
 I Am, the Self-Existent, who needs no one, and no thing, 
 has turned aside, as it were, and stooped from the throne 
 of heaven, again and again, during thousands of years, 
 to say to you, and me, and millions of mankind, 
 
122 Ascension Day. 
 
 I Am your God. How do you prosper ? — what do you 
 need 1 — what are you doing 1 — for if you are doing 
 justice to yourself and your fellowmen, then fear not 
 that I shall be just to you. 
 
 And more. When that I Am, the ■ self-existent God, 
 could not set sinful men right by saying this, then 
 did He stoop once more from the throne of the heavens 
 to do that infinite deed of love, of which it is written, 
 that He who called Himself "I Am/' the God of 
 Abraham, was conceived of the Holy Ghost, bom of tLe 
 Virgin Mary, crucified under Pontius Pilate, rose 
 again the third day, and ascended into heaven, — that He 
 might send down the Spirit of the " I Am," the Holy 
 Spirit who proceed eth from the Father and the Son, 
 upon all who ask Him ; that they may be holy as God is 
 holy, and perfect as God is perfect. Yes, my dear 
 friends, remember that, and live in the light of that ; 
 the gospel of good news of the Incarnation of Jesus 
 Christ, very God of very God begotten. Know that 
 God has spoken to you as He spoke to Abraham, and 
 said, — I am the Almighty God, walk before Me, and be 
 thou perfect. Know that He has spoken to you as He 
 spoke to Moses, saying, — I am the Lord thy God, who 
 have brought you, and your fathers before you, out of the 
 spiritual Egypt of heathendom, and ignorance, sin, and 
 wickedness, into the knowledge of the one, true, and 
 righteous God. But know more, that He has spoken to 
 you by the mouth of Jesus Christ, saying, — I am He 
 that died in the form of mortal man upon the cross for 
 you. And, behold, I am alive for evermore ; and to me 
 all power is given in heaven and earth. 
 
Ascension Day. 1 2 3 
 
 Yes, my friends, let us lay to heart, even upon this 
 joyful day, the awful warnings of the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews, — God, the I Am, has spoken to us ; God, the 
 I Am, is speaking to us now. See that you refuse not 
 Him that speaketh ; for if they escaped not who refused 
 Moses that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape 
 if we turn away from Him that speaketh from heaven ; 
 wherefore follow peace with all men, and holiness, with- 
 out which no man shall see the Lord, and have grace, 
 whereby we may serve God acceptably, with reverence 
 and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire. To 
 those who disobey Him, eternal wrath ; to those who 
 love Him, eternal love. 
 
 Yes, my friends. Let us believe that, and live in the 
 light of that, with reverence and godly fear, all the year 
 round. But let us specially to-day, as far as our dull 
 feelings and poor imaginations will allow us ; let us, 1 
 say, adore the ascended Saviour, who rules for ever, a 
 Man in the midst of the throne of the universe, and that 
 Man — oh, wonder of wonders ! — slain for us ; and let us 
 say with St Paul of old, with all our hearts and minds 
 and souls : — Now to the King of the Ages, immortal, 
 invisible, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, be honour 
 and glory, for ever and ever. Amen ! 
 
SERMON XIV. 
 
 THE COMFOETEB. 
 
 Eversley. Sunday after Ascension Day. 1868. 
 
 St John xv. 26. 
 
 " When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the 
 Father, even the Spirit of trnth, which proceedeth from the Father, 
 he shall testify of me. " 
 
 Some writers, especially when they are writing hymns, 
 
 have fallen now-a-days into a habit of writing of the Holy 
 
 Spirit of God, in a tone of which I dare not say that it is 
 
 wrong or untrue ; but of which I must say, that it is 
 
 one-sided. And if there are two sides to a matter, it 
 
 must do us harm to look at only one of them. And I 
 
 think that it does people harm to hear the Holy Spirit 
 
 of God, the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, spoken of in terms, 
 
 not of reverence, but of endearment. For consider: He 
 
 is the 
 
 " Creator-Spirit, by whose aid 
 The world's foundations first were laid," 
 
 the life-giving Spirit of whom it is written, Thou send- 
 est forth Thy Spirit, and things live, and Thou renew- 
 est the face of the earth. 
 
 But He is the destroying Spirit too; who can, 
 when He will, produce not merely life, but death ; who 
 can, and does send earthquakes, storm, and pestilence ; 
 
The Comforter. 125 
 
 of whom Isaiah writes — " All flesh is as grass, and all 
 the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The 
 grass withereth, the flower fadeth ; because the Spirit of 
 the Lord bloweth upon it." I think it does people 
 harm to hear this awful and almighty being, I say, 
 spoken of merely as the " sweet Spirit," and " gentle 
 dove " — words which are true, but only true, if we 
 remember other truths, equally true of Him, concerning 
 whom they are spoken. The Spirit of God, it seems to 
 me, is too majestic a being to be talked of hastily as 
 " sweet." Words may be true, and yet it may not be 
 always quite reverent to use them. An earthly sovereign 
 may be full of all human sweetness and tenderness, yet 
 we should not dare to address him as " sweet." 
 
 But, indeed, some of this talk about the Holy Spirit 
 is not warranted by Scripture at all. In one of the 
 hymns, for instance, in our hymn-book — an excellent 
 hymn in other respects, there is a line which speaks of 
 the Holy Spirit as possessing " The brooding of the 
 gentle dove." 
 
 Now, this line is really little but pretty sentiment, 
 made up of false uses of Scripture. The Scripture speaks 
 once of the Holy Spirit of God brooding like a bird over 
 its nest. But where ? In one of the most mysterious, 
 awful, and important of all texts. " And the earth was 
 without form and void. And the Spirit of God moved 
 (brooded) over the face of the deep." What has this — 
 the magnificent picture of the Life-giving Spirit brooding 
 over the dead world, to bring it into life again, and 
 create from it sea and land, heat and fire, and cattle 
 and creeping things after their kind, and at last man 
 
126 The Comforter. 
 
 himself, the flower and crown of things ; — what has that 
 to do witli the brooding of a gentle dove ? 
 
 But the Holy Spirit is spoken of in Scripture under 
 the likeness of a dove ? True, and here is another con- 
 fusion. The Dove is not the emblem of gentleness in 
 the Bible : but the Lamb. The dove is the emblem of 
 something else, pure and holy, but not of gentleness ; 
 and therefore the Holy Spirit is not spoken of in 
 Scripture as brooding as a gentle dove ; but very differ- 
 ently, as it seems to me. St Matthew and St John say, 
 that at our Lord's baptism the Holy Spirit was seen, not 
 brooding, but descending from heaven as a dove. To 
 any one who knows anything of doves, who will merely 
 go out into the field or the farm-yard and look at them, 
 and who will use his own eyes, that figure is striking 
 enough, and grand enough. It is the swiftness of the 
 dove, and not its fancied gentleness that is spoken of 
 The dove appearing, as you may see it again and 
 again, like a speck in the far off sky, rushing down with 
 a swiftness v/hich outstrips the very eagle ; returning 
 surely to the very spot from which it set forth, though 
 it may have flown over hundreds of miles of land, and 
 through the very clouds of heaven. It is the sky-cleav- 
 ing force and swiftness, the unerring instinct of the dove, 
 and not a sentimental gentleness to which Scripture 
 likens that Holy Spirit, which like the rushing 
 mighty wind bloweth whither it listeth, and thou 
 hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it 
 cometh, or whither it goeth ; — that Holy Spirit who, 
 when He fell on the apostles, feU in tongues of fire, and 
 shook all the house where they were sitting ; that Hoir 
 
The Comforter. 127 
 
 Spirit of whom one of the wisest Christians who ever 
 lived, who knew well enough the work of the Spirit, 
 arguing just as I am now against the fancy of 
 associating the Holy Spirit merely with pretty thoughts 
 of our own, and pleasant feelings of our own, and senti- 
 mental raptures of our own, said, " Wouldst thou know 
 the manner of spiritual converse ? Of the way in which 
 the Spirit of God works in man ? Then it is this : He 
 hath taken me up and dashed me down. Like a lion, I 
 look, that He will break all my bones. From morning 
 till evening. Thou wilt make an end of me." 
 
 But people are apt to forget this. And therefore 
 they fall into two mistakes. They think of the Holy 
 Spirit as only a gentle, and what they call a dove-like 
 being ; and they forget what a powerful, awful, literally 
 formidable being He is. They lose respect for the Holy 
 Spirit. They trifle with Him ; and' while they sing 
 hymns about His gentleness and sweetness, they do 
 things which grieve and shock Him ; forgetting the 
 awful warning which He, at the very outset of 
 the Christian Church, gave against such taking of 
 liberties with God the Holy Ghost : — how Ananias 
 and Sapphira thought that the Holy Spirit was One 
 whom they might honour with their lips, and more, 
 with their outward actions, but who did not require truth 
 in the inward parts, and did not care for their telling 
 a slight falsehood that they might appear more generous 
 than they really were in the eyes of men ; and how the 
 answer of the Holy Spirit of God was that He struck 
 them both dead there and then for a warning to all 
 such triflers, till the end of time. 
 
128 The Comforter. 
 
 Another mistake which really pious and good people 
 commit, is, that they think the Holy Spirit of God 
 to be merely, or little beside, certain pleasant frames, 
 and feelings, and comfortable assurances, in their own 
 minds. They do not know that these pleasant frames 
 and feelings really depend principally on their ovm 
 health : and, then, when they get out of health, 
 or when their brain is overworked, and the pleasant 
 feelings go, they are terrified and disheartened, and 
 complain of spiritual dryness, and cry out that God's 
 Spirit has deserted them, and are afraid that God is 
 angry with them, or even that they have committed the 
 unpardonable sin : not knowing that God is not a man 
 that He should lie, nor a son of man that He should 
 repent ; that God is as near them in the dark- 
 ness as in the light ; that whatever their own health, 
 or their own feelings may be, yet still in God they 
 live, and move, and have their being ; that to God's 
 Spirit they owe all which raises them above the dumb 
 animals ; that nothing can separate them from the 
 love of Him who promised that He would not leave us 
 comfortless, but send to us His Holy Ghost to comfort 
 us, and exalt us to the same place whither He has gone 
 before. 
 
 Now, why do I say all this ? To take away comfort 
 from you ? To make you fear and dread the Spirit of 
 God ? God forbid ! Who am I, to take away comfort 
 from any human being ! I say it to give you true com- 
 fort, to make you trust and love the Holy Spirit utterly, 
 to know Him — His strength and His wisdom as well as 
 His tenderness and gentleness. 
 
The Comforter. 129 
 
 You know that afflictions do come — terrible bereave- 
 ments, sorrows sad and strange. My sermon does not 
 make them come. There they are, God help us all, and 
 too many of them, in this world. But from whom do 
 they come ? Who is Lord of life and death ? Who is 
 Lord of joy and sorrow ? Is not that the question of all 
 questions 1 And is not the answer the most essential of 
 all answers ? It is the Holy Spirit of God ; the Spirit 
 who proceedeth from the Father and the Son ; the Spirit 
 of the Father who so loved the world that He spared not 
 His only begotten Son ; the Spirit of the Son who so 
 loved the world, that He stooped to die for it upon the 
 Cross ; the Spirit who is promised to lead you into aU 
 truth, that you may know God, and in the knowledge of 
 Him find everlasting life; the Spirit who is the Comforter, 
 and says, I have seen thy ways and will heal thee, I will 
 lead thee also, and restore comforts to thee and to thy 
 mourners. I speak peace to him that is near, and to 
 him that is far off, saith the Lord ; and I will heal him. 
 Is it not the most blessed news, that He who takes 
 away, is the very same as He who gives ? That He who 
 afflicts is the very same as He who comforts ? That He 
 of whom it is written that, " as a lion, so will He break 
 all my bones ; from day even to night wilt Thou make 
 an end of me ; " is the same as He of whom it is 
 written, " He shall gather the lambs in His arms, and 
 carry them, and shall gently lead those that are with 
 young ; " and, again, " As a beast goeth down into the 
 valley, so the Spirit of the Lord caused him to rest V 
 That He of whom it is written, " Our God is a consum- 
 ing fire," is the same as He who has said, " When thou 
 
 I 
 
130 The Comforter. 
 
 walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned \ " 
 That He who brings us into " the valley of the shadow 
 of death," is the same as He of whom it is said, " Thy 
 rod and Thy staff they comfort me ?" Is not that blessed 
 news ? Is it not the news of the Gospel ; and the only 
 good news which people will really care for, when they 
 are tormented, not with superstitious fears and doctrines 
 of devils which man's diseased conscience has originated, 
 but tormented with the real sorrows, the rational fears of 
 this stormy human life. 
 
 We all like comfort. But what kind of comfort do 
 we not merely like but need ? Merely to be comfort- 
 able ? — To be free from pain, anxiety, sorrow ? — To 
 have only pleasant faces round us, and pleasant things 
 said to us ? If we want that comfort, we shall very 
 seldom have it. It will be very seldom good for us to 
 have it. The comfort which poor human beings want 
 in such a world as this, is not the comfort of ease, but 
 the comfort of strength. The comforter whom we need 
 is not one who will merely say kind things, but give 
 help — help to the weary and heavy laden heart which has 
 no time to rest. We need not the sunny and smiling 
 face, but the strong and helping arm. For we may be in 
 that state that smiles are shocking to us, and mere kind- 
 ness, — though we may be grateful for it — of no more 
 comfort to us than sweet music to a drowning man. 
 We may be miserable, and unable to help being miser- 
 able, and unwilling to help it too. We do not wish to 
 flee from our sorrow, we do not wish to forget our sorrow. 
 We dare not ; it is so awful, so heartrending, so plain 
 spoken, that God, the master and tutor of our hearts 
 
The Comforter. 1 3 1 
 
 must wish iis to face it and endure it. Our Father has 
 given us the cup — shall we not drink it ? But who will 
 help us to drink the bitter cup ? Who will be the com- 
 forter, and give us not mere kind words, but strength ? 
 Who will give us the faith to say with Job, " Though 
 He slay me, yet will I trust in Him ? " Who will give us 
 the firm reason to look steadily at our grief, and learn 
 the lesson it was meant to teach ? Who will give us 
 the temperate will, to keep sober and calm amid the 
 shocks and changes of mortal life ? Above all, I may 
 say — Who will lead us into all truth ? How much is 
 our sorrow increased — how much of it is caused by 
 simple ignorance ! Why has our anxiety come ? How 
 are we to look at it ? What are we to do ? Oh, that 
 we had a comforter who would lead us into all truth : — 
 not make us infallible, or all knowing, but lead us into 
 truth ; at least put us in the way of truth, put things in 
 their true light to us, and give us sound and rational 
 views of life and duty. Oh, for a comforter who would 
 give us the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit 
 of counsel and ghostly strength, the spirit of knowledge 
 and true godliness, and fill us with that spirit of God's 
 holy fear, which would make us not superstitious, not 
 slavish, not anxious, but simply obedient, loyal and re- 
 signed. 
 
 If we had such a Comforter as that, could we not take 
 evil from his hands, as well as good ? We have had 
 fathers of our flesh who corrected us, and we gave them 
 reverence. They chastised us, but we loved and trusted 
 them, because we knew that they loved and trusted us — 
 chastised us to make us better — chastised us because 
 
132 The Comforter. 
 
 they trusted us to become better. But if we can find 
 a Father of our spirits, of our souls, shall we not rather 
 be in subjection to Him and live ? If He sent us a 
 Comforter, to comfort and guide, and inspire, and 
 strengthen us, shall we not say of that Comforter — 
 " Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." 
 
 If we had such a Comforter as that, we should not 
 care, if He seemed at times stern, as well as kind ; we 
 could endure rebuke and chastisement from Him, if we 
 could only get from Him wisdom to understand the re- 
 buke, and courage to bear the chastisement. Where is 
 that Comforter ? God answers : — That Comforter am I, 
 the God of heaven and earth. There are comforters on 
 earth who can help thee with wise words and noble coun- 
 sel, can be strong as man, and tender as woman. Then 
 God can be more strong than man, and more tender than 
 woman likewise. And when the strong arm of man sup- 
 ports thee no longer, yet under thee are the everlasting 
 arms of God. 
 
 Oh, blessed news, that God Himself is the Com- 
 forter. Blessed news, that He who strikes will also 
 heal : that He who gives the cup of sorrow, vsdll also 
 give the strength to drink it. Blessed news, that chas- 
 tisement is not punishment, but the education of a 
 Father. Blessed news, that our whole duty is the duty 
 of a child — of the Son who said in His own agony, 
 "Father, not my will, but thine be done." Blessed news, 
 that our Comforter is the Spirit who comforted Christ 
 the Son Himself; who proceeds both from the Father and 
 from the Son ; and who will therefore testify to us both of 
 the Father and the Son, and tell us that in Christ we are 
 
The Comforter. 133 
 
 indeed, really and literally, the children of God who may 
 cry to Him, "Father," with full understanding of all that 
 that royal word contains. Blessed, too, to find that in the 
 power of the Divine Majesty, we can acknowledge the 
 unity, and know and feel that the Father, Son and Holy 
 Ghost are all one in love to the creatures whom they 
 have made — their glory equal, for the glory of each and 
 all is perfect charity, and their majesty co-eternal, be- 
 cause it is a perfect majesty ; whose justice is mercy, 
 whose power is goodness, its very sternness love, love 
 which gives hope and counsel, and help and strength, and 
 the true life which this world's death cannot destroy. 
 
SERMON X?. 
 
 THOU ART WOETHT. 
 Eversley, 1869. Chester Cathedral, 1870. Trinity Sunday. 
 
 EEVELAiroN iv. 11. 
 
 ' ' Thou art worthy, Lord, to receive glory and honour and power ; 
 for Thou hast created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are 
 and were created. " 
 
 I AM going to speak to you on a deep matter, the 
 deepest and most important of all matters, and yet 
 I hope to speak simply. I shall say nothing which you 
 cannot understand, if you will attend. I shall say 
 nothing, indeed, which you could not find out for your- 
 selves, if you will think, and use your own common 
 sense. I wish to speak to you of Theology^of God 
 Himself. For this Trinity Sunday of all the Sundays 
 of the year, is set apart for thinking of God Himself — 
 not merely of our own souls, though we must never 
 forget them, nor of what God has done for our souls, 
 though we must never forget that — hut of what God is 
 Himself, what He would be if we had no souls — if there 
 were, and had been from the beginning, no human 
 beings at all upon the earth. 
 
 Now, if we look at any living thing — an animal, say, 
 or a flower, and consider how curiously it is contrived. 
 
Thou art Worthy. 135 
 
 our common sense will tell us at once that some one has 
 made it ; and if any one answers — Oh ! the flower was 
 not made, it grew — our common sense would tell us that 
 that was only a still more wonderful contrivance, and 
 that there must be some one who gave it the power of 
 growing, and who makes it grow. And so our common 
 sense would tell us, as it told the heathens of old, that 
 there must be gods — beings whom we cannot see, who 
 made the world. But if we watch things more closely, 
 we should find out that all things are made more or less 
 upon the same plan ; that (and I tell you that this is true, 
 strange as it may seem) all animals, however difierent 
 they may seem to our eyes, are made upon the same 
 plan ; all plants and flowers, however different they may 
 seem, are made upon tho same plan ; all stones, and 
 minerals, and earths, however different they may seem, 
 are made upon the same plan. Then common sense 
 would surely tell us, one God made all the animals, one 
 God made all the plants, one God made all the earths and 
 stones. But if we watch more closely still, we should find 
 that the plants could not live without the animals, nor 
 the animals without the plants, nor either of them 
 without the soil beneath our feet, and the air and rain 
 above our heads. That everything in the world worked 
 together on one plan, and each thing depended on 
 everything else. Then common sense would tell us, 
 one God must have made the whole world. But if we 
 watched more closely again, or rather, if we asked the 
 astronomers, who study the stars and heavens, they 
 would tell us that all the worlds over our heads, all the 
 stars that spangle the sky at night, were made upon 
 
136 Thou art Worthy. 
 
 the same plan as our earth — that sun and moon, and 
 all the host of heaven, move according to the same laws 
 by which our earth moves, and as far as we can find 
 out, have been made in the same way as our earth has 
 been made, and that these same laws must have been 
 going on, making worlds after worlds, for hundreds of 
 thousands of years, and ages beyond counting, and will, 
 in all probability, go on for countless ages more. Then 
 common sense will tell us, the same God has made all 
 worlds, past, present, and to come. There is but one 
 God, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. 
 
 So we should learn something of how all things were 
 made ; and then would come a second question, why all 
 things were made ? "Why did God make the worlds ? 
 
 Let us begin with a very simple example. Simple 
 things will often teach us most. You see a flower 
 growing, not in a garden, but wild in a field or .wood. 
 You admire its beautiful colours, or if it is fragTant, 
 its sweet scent. Now, why was that flower put there ? 
 You may answer, " to please me." My dear friends, 
 I should be the last person to deny that. I can 
 never see a child picking a nosegay, much less a 
 little London child, born and bred and shut up among 
 bricks and mortar, when it gets for the first time 
 into a green field, and throws itself instinctively upon 
 the buttercups and daisies, as if they were precious 
 jewels and gold ; — I never can see that sight, I say, 
 without feeling that there are such things as final causes 
 — I mean that the great Father in heaven put those 
 flowers into that field on purpose to give pleasure to 
 His human children. But then comes the question, 
 
Thou art Worthy. 1 3 7 
 
 Of all the flowers in a single field, is one in ten thousand 
 ever looked at by child or by men ? And yet they are 
 just as beautiful as the rest ; and God has, so to speak, 
 taken just as much pains with the many beautiful things 
 which men will never see, as with the few, very few, 
 which men may see. And when one thinks further 
 about this — when one thinks of the vast forests in other 
 lands which the foot of man has seldom or never trod, 
 and which, when they are entered, are found to be full 
 of trees, flowers, birds, butterflies, so beautiful and 
 glorious, that anything which we see in these islands 
 is poor and plain in comparison with them ; and when 
 we remember that these beautiful creatures have been 
 going on generation after generation, age after age, 
 unseen and unenjoyed by any human eyes, one must 
 ask. Why has God been creating all that beauty ? simply 
 to let it all, as it were, run to waste, till after thousands 
 of years one traveller comes, and has a hasty glimpse of 
 it ? Impossible. Or again — and this is an example 
 still more strange, and yet it is true. We used to think 
 till within a very few years past, that at the bottom of 
 the deep sea there were no living things — that miles 
 below the surface of the ocean, in total darkness, and 
 under such a weight of water as would crush us to a 
 jelly, there could be nothing, except stones, and sand, 
 and mud. But now it is found out that the bottom of 
 the deepest seas, and the utter darkness into which no 
 ray of light can ever pierce, are alive and swarming with 
 millions of creatures as cunningly and exquisitely formed, 
 and in many cases as brilliantly coloured, as those 
 which live in the sunlight along the shallow shores. 
 
1 38 Thou art Worthy. 
 
 Now, my dear friends, — surely beautiful things were 
 made to be seen by some one, else why were they made 
 beautiful ? Common sense tells us that. But who has 
 seen those countless tribes, which have been living down, 
 in utter darkness, since the making of the world ? 
 Common sense, I think, can give but one answer — GoD. 
 He, and He only, to whom the night is as clear as the 
 day, to whom the darkness and the light are both ahke. 
 But more — God has not only made things beautiful ; 
 He has made things happy ; whatever misery there may 
 be in the world, there is no denying that. However 
 sorrow may have come into the world, there is a great 
 deal more happiness than misery in it. Misery is the 
 exception ; happiness is the rule. No rational man ever 
 heard a bird sing, without feeling that that bird was 
 happy ; and, if so, his common sense ought to tell him 
 that if God made that bird. He made it to be happy; 
 He intended it to be happy, and He takes pleasure in its 
 happiness, though no human ear should ever hear its 
 song, no human heart should ever share in its joy. 
 Yes, the world was not made for man ; but man, like 
 all the world, was made for God. Not for man's plea- 
 sure merely, not for man's use, but for God's pleasure all 
 things are, and for God's pleasure they were created. 
 
 And now, surely, common sense will tell us why God 
 made all things. For His own pleasure. God is pleased 
 to make them, and pleased with what He has made, 
 because what He has made is worth being pleased with. 
 He has seen all things that He has made, and, behold, 
 they are very good, and right, and wise, and beautiful, 
 and happy, each after its kind. So that, as the 
 
Thott art Worthy. 139 
 
 Psalmist says, "The Lord shall rejoice in His works." 
 And Scripture tells that it must be so, if we only re- 
 collect and believe one word of St. John's that " God is 
 Love "—for it is the very essence of love, that it cannot 
 be content to love itself. It must have something 
 which is not itself to love that it may go out of itself, 
 and forget itself, and spend itself in the good and in the 
 happiness of what it loves. All true love of husband 
 and wife, mother and child, sister and brother, friend 
 and friend, mau to his country, — what does it mean but 
 this ? Forgetting one's selfish happiness in doing good 
 to others, and finding a deeper, higher happiness in that. 
 The man who only loves himself knows not what Love 
 means. In truth, he does not even love himself He 
 is his own worst enemy : his selfishness torments him 
 with discontent, disgust, pride, fear, and all evil passions 
 and lusts ; and in him is fulfilled our Lord's saying, that 
 he that wiU save his life shall lose it. But the man 
 who is full of love, as God is full of love, who forgets him- 
 self in making others happy, who lives the eternal life 
 of God, which is alone worth living, he is the only truly 
 happy man ; and in him is fulfilled that other saying of 
 our Lord, that he who loseth his life shall save it. 
 
 And the loving, unselfish man too is the only sound 
 theologian, for he who dweUeth in love dwelleth in God, 
 and God in him. He alone will understand the mystery 
 of who God is, and why He made all things. The 
 loving man alone, I say, will understand the mystery — 
 how because God is love He could not live alone in 
 the abyss, but must create all things, all worlds and 
 heavens, yea, and the heaven of heavens, that He 
 
HO Thou art Worthy. 
 
 might have something beside Himself, whereon to spend 
 His boundless love. And why ? Because love can only 
 love what is somewhat like itself, He made all things 
 according to the idea of His own eternal mind. Because 
 He is unchangeable, and a God of order and of law. He 
 made all things according to one order, and gave them a 
 law which cannot be broken, that they might continue 
 this day as they were at the beginning, serving Him and 
 fulflUing His word. Because He is a God of justice, He 
 made all things just, depending on each other, helping 
 each other, and compelled to sacrifice themselves for 
 each other, and minister to each other whether they will 
 or not. Because He is a God of beauty. He made all 
 things beautiful, of a variety and a richness unspeakable, 
 that He might rejoice in all His works, and find a 
 divine delight in every moss which grows upon the 
 moor, and every gnat which dances in the sun. Be- 
 cause He is a God of love. He gave to every creature a 
 power of happiness according to its kind, that He might 
 rejoice in the happiness of His creatures. And lastly, 
 because God is a spirit — a moral and a rational Being 
 • — therefore He created rational beings to be more like 
 Him than any other creatures, and constituted the 
 services of men and angels in a most wonderful order, 
 that they might reverence law as He does, and justice as 
 He does — that they might love to be loving as He loves, 
 and to be useful as He is useful — that they might 
 rejoice in the beauty of His works as He rejoices in 
 them Himself ; and, catching from time to time fuller 
 and fuller glimpses of that Divine and wonderful order 
 according to which He has made all things and all worlds. 
 
Thou art Worthy. 141 
 
 may see more and more clearly, as the years roll on, that all 
 things are just, and beautiful, and good ; and join more 
 and more heartily in the hymn which goes up for ever 
 from every sun, and star, and world, and from the tiniest 
 creature in these worlds : " Thou art worthy, Lord, 
 to receive glory and honour and power ; for Thou hast 
 created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and 
 were created." 
 
 Now, to God the Father, who, out of His boundless 
 love, ordains the making of all things ; and to God the 
 Son, who, out of His boundless love, performs the making 
 of all things ; and to God the Holy Spirit, who, out of 
 His boundless love, breathes law and kind, life and 
 growth into all things, three Persons in one, ever- 
 blessed Trinity, be all glory, and honour, and praise, for 
 ever and ever. Amen. 
 
SERMON XVI. 
 
 THE GLOET OF THE TBINITT. 
 
 Eversley, 1868. St Mary's Chester, 1871. Trinity Sunday. 
 
 Psalm civ. 31, 33. 
 
 " The glory of the Lord shall endure for ever : The Lord shall rejoice 
 in his works. I will sing unto the Lord as long as I live ; I will 
 sing praise to my God while I have my being. " 
 
 This is Trinity Sunday, on which we think especially 
 of the name of God. A day which, to a wise man, may 
 well be one of the most solemn, and the most humiliat- 
 ing days of the whole year. For is it not humiliatuig 
 to look stedfeistly, even for a moment, at God's great- 
 ness, and then at our own littleness; at God's strength 
 and at our own weakness ; at God's wisdom, and at our 
 own ignorance ; and, most of all, at God's righteousness, 
 and at our own sins ? 
 
 I do not say that it should not be so. Rather, I say, 
 it should be so. For what is more wholesome for you 
 and me, and any man, than to be humiliated — 
 humbled — and brought to our own level — that all may 
 see who, what, and where we are ? What more whole- 
 some than to be made holy and humble men of heart ? 
 What more wholesome for us, who are each of us 
 tempted to behave as if we were the centre of the uni- 
 verse, to judge ourselves the most important personages 
 
The Glory of the Trinity. 1 43 
 
 in the world, and to judge of everything according as it 
 is pleasant or unpleasant to us, each in our own family, 
 our own sect, our own neighbourhood ; what more whole- 
 some than to be brought now and then face to face with God 
 Himself, and see what poor, little, contemptible atoms 
 we are at best, compared with Him who made heaven 
 and earth ? — to see how well God and God's world have 
 gone on for thousands of years without our help ; — how 
 well they will go on after we are dead and gone ? 
 
 Face to face with God ! And how far shall we have 
 to go to find ourselves face to face with God ? Not very 
 far, according to St Paul. God, he says, is " not far from 
 every one of us ; for in Him we live, and move, and 
 have our being." 
 
 In God, in the ever blessed Trinity — Father, Son, and 
 Holy Ghost — we, and not we only, but every living 
 thing — each flower, each insect — lives, and moves, 
 and has its being. So it is — strange as it may seem, 
 and we cannot make it otherwise. You fancy God far 
 off — somewhere in the skies, beyond suns and stars. 
 Know that the heavens, and the heaven of heavens, can- 
 not contain Him. Kather, in the very deepest sense. He 
 contains them. In God, suns and stars, and all the 
 host of heaven, live, and move, and have their being ; 
 and if God destroyed them all at this very moment, and 
 the whole universe became nothing once more, as it was 
 nothing at first, still God would remain, neither greater nor 
 less, neither stronger nor weaker, neither richer nor poorer, 
 than He was before. For He is the self-existent I Am ; 
 who needs nought save Himself, and who needs nought 
 save to assert Himself in His Word, Jesus Christ our 
 
144 The Glory of the Trinity. 
 
 Lord, and say " I Am," in order to create all things and 
 beings, save Himself. He is the infinite ; whom nothing, 
 however huge, and vast, or strong, can comprehend — that 
 is, take in and limit. He takes in and limits all things ; 
 giving to each thing, form according to its own kind, and 
 life and growth according to its own law ; appointing to 
 all (as says St Paul) their times, and the bounds of their 
 habitation ; that if they be rational creatures, as we are, 
 they may feel after the Lord and find Him ; and if they 
 be irrational creatures, like the animals and the plants, 
 mountains and streams, clouds and tempests, sun and 
 stars, they may serve God's gracious purposes in the 
 economy of His world. 
 
 Therefore, everything which you see, is, as it were, a 
 thought of God's, an action of God's ; a message to you 
 from God. Therefore you can look at nothing in the 
 earth without seeing God Himself at work thereon. As 
 our Lord said, " My Father worketh hitherto, and T 
 work." You can look neither at the sun in the sky, 
 nor at the grass beneath your feet, without being brought 
 face to face with God, the ever blessed Trinity. The 
 tiniest gnat which dances in the sun, was conceived by 
 God the Father, in whose eternal bosom are the ideas 
 and patterns of all things, past, present, and to come ; 
 it was created by God the Son, by whom the Father 
 made all things, and without whom nothing is made : 
 and it is kept alive by God the Holy Spirit, the Lord 
 and giver of Hfe, of whom it is written, " Thou sendest 
 forth thy Spirit, they are created ; and thou renewest the 
 face of the earth." 
 
 Oh that we could all remember this. That when we 
 
The Glory of the Trinity. 145 
 
 walk across the field, or look out into the garden, we 
 could have the wisdom to remember. Whither, God, 
 can I go from Thy presence ? For Thou art looking down 
 on the opening of every bud and flower, and without 
 Thee not a sparrow falls to the ground. Whither can I 
 flee from Thy Spirit ? For Thy Spirit is giving life per- 
 petually, alike to me and to the insect at my feet ; with- 
 out Thy Spirit my lungs could not breathe one breath, 
 my heart could not beat one pulse. In Thee, I and all 
 things live, move, and have our being. And shall I for- 
 get Thee, disobey Thee, neglect to praise, and honour, and 
 worship Thee, and thank Thee day and night, for Thy 
 great glory ? 
 
 If we could but remember that, there would be no 
 fear of our being ungodly, irreligious, undevout. We 
 look too often, day after day, month after month, on the 
 world around us just as the dumb beasts do, as a place out 
 of which we can get something to eat, and forget that it is 
 also a place out of which we can get, daily and hourly, 
 something to admire, to adore, to worship, even the thought 
 of God's wisdom, God's power, God's goodness, God's glory. 
 Oh blind and heedless that we are. Truly said the wise 
 man — "An undevout astronomer is mad." And truly 
 said another wise man, an Englishman — the saintly 
 philosopher Faraday, now with God, — " How could he 
 be otherwise than religious ; when at every step he found 
 himself brought more closely face to face with the signs 
 of a mind constructed like his own, with an aim and a 
 purpose which he could understand, employing ways and 
 means, and tending clearly to an end, and methodi- 
 cally following out a system which he could both per- 
 
 K 
 
146 The Glory of the Trinity. 
 
 ceive and grasp." Such a man's whole life is one act of 
 reverence to that God in whose inner presence he finds 
 himself illuminated and strengthened ; and if there be 
 revelation of divine things on earth, it is when the 
 hidden secrets of nature are disclosed to the sincere and 
 self-denying seeker after truth. 
 
 Yes, that is true. The more you look into the world 
 around you, and consider every flower, and bird, and 
 stone, the more you will see that a Mind planned them, 
 even the mind of God ; a Mind like yours and mine ; 
 but how infinitely diflferent, how much deeper, wiser, 
 vaster. Before that thought we shrink into the 
 nothingness from whence He called us out at first. 
 The difierence between our minds and the Mind of 
 God is — to what shall I liken it ? Say, to the difier- 
 ence between a flake of soot and a mountain of pure 
 diamond. That soot and that diamond are actually the 
 same substance ; of that there is no doubt whatsoever ; 
 but as the light, dirty, almost useless soot is to the pure, 
 and clear, hard diamond, ay, to a mountain, a world, 
 a whole universe made of pure diamond — if such a thing 
 were possible — so is the mind of man compared with 
 that Mind of the ever blessed Trinity, which made the 
 worlds, and sustains them in life and order to this day. 
 
 My friends, it is not in great things only, but in the 
 very smallest, that the greatest glory of the ever blessed 
 Trinity is seen. Ay, most, perhaps, in the smallest, 
 when one considers the utterly inconceivable wisdom, 
 which can make the smallest animal — so made as to 
 be almost invisible under the strongest microscope— as 
 perfect in all its organs as the hugest elephant. Ay, 
 
The Glory of the Trinity. 147 
 
 more, which can not only make these tiny living things, 
 but, more wonderful still, make them make themselves ? 
 For what is growth, but a thing making itself ? What 
 is the seed growing into a plant, the plant into a flower, 
 the flower to a seed again, but that thing making itself, 
 transforming itself, by an inward law of life which God's 
 Spirit gives it. I tell you the more earnestly and care- 
 fully you examine into the creation, birth, growth of any 
 living thing, even of the daisy on the grass outside ; the 
 more you inquire what it really is, how it came to be like 
 what it is, how it got where it is, and so forth ; you will 
 be led away into questions which may well make you 
 dizzy with thinking, so strange, so vast, so truly miracu- 
 lous is the history of every organised creature upon 
 earth. And when you recollect (as you are bound to do 
 on this day), that each of these things is the work of the 
 ever blessed Trinity ; that upon every flower and every 
 insect, generation after generation of them, since the 
 world was made, the ever blessed Trinity has been at 
 work, God the Father thinking and conceiving each 
 thing, in His eternal Mind, God the Son creating it and 
 putting it into the world, each thing according to the 
 law of its Kfe, God the Holy Ghost inspiring it with life 
 and law, that it may grow and thrive after its kind — 
 when such thoughts as these crowd upon you, and they 
 ought to crowd upon you, this day of all the year, at 
 the sight of the meanest insect under your feet ; then 
 what can a rational man do, but bow his head and wor- 
 ship in awful silence, adoring humbly Him who sits 
 upon the throne of the universe, and who says to us in 
 all His works, even as He said to Job of old, " Where 
 
148 The Glory of the Trinity. 
 
 wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth ? 
 When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons 
 of God shouted for joy ? Hast thou entered into the 
 springs of the sea ? or hast thou seen the doors of the 
 shadow of death ? Knowest thou the ordinances of 
 heaven ? Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds, 
 that abundance of waters may cover thee ? Canst thou 
 send lightnings, that they may go, and say unto thee, 
 Here we are ? Wilt thou hunt the prey for the lion ? 
 or fill the appetite of the young lions ? Gavest thou 
 the goodly wings unto the peacocks ? or wings and 
 feathers unto the ostrich ? Hast thou given the horse 
 strength ? hast thou clothed his neck with thunder ? 
 Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom ? doth the eagle 
 mount up at thy command ? " 
 
 When God speaks thus to us — and He does thus 
 speak to us, by every cloud and shower, and by every 
 lightning flash and ray of sunshine, and by every living 
 thing which flies in air, or swims in water, or creeps' 
 upon the earth — what can we say, save what Job said — 
 " Behold, I am vile ; what shall I answer thee ? I will 
 lay mine hand upon my mouth." 
 
 But if God be so awful in the material world, of 
 which our five senses tell us, how much more awful is 
 He in that spiritual and moral world, of which our 
 senses tell us nought ? That unseen world of justice 
 and truthfulness, of honour and duty, of reverence and 
 loyalty, of love and charity, of purity and self-sacrifice ; 
 that spiritual world, I say, which can be only seen by 
 the spiritual eye of the soul, and felt by the spiritual 
 heart of the soul ? How awful is God in that eternal 
 
The Glory of the Trinity. 149 
 
 world of right and wrong ; wherein cherubim, seraphim, 
 angel and archangel cry to Him for ever, not merely 
 Mighty, mighty, mighty, but " Holy, holy, holy." How 
 awful to poor creatures like us. For then comes in the 
 question — not merely is God good ? but, am not I bad ? 
 Is God sinless ? but, am not I a sinner ? Is God pure ? 
 but am not I impure ? Is God wise ? then am not I a 
 fool? And when once that thought has crossed our minds, 
 must we not tremble, must we not say with Isaiah of old, 
 "Woe is me ! for I am undone ; because I am a man of 
 unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of 
 unclean lips : for mine eyes have seen the King, the 
 Lord of hosts." 
 
 Yes ; awful as is the thought of God's perfection in 
 the material world about us, more awful still is the 
 thought of His perfection in the spiritual world. So 
 awful, that we might well be overwhelmed with dread 
 and horror at the sight of God's righteousness and our 
 sinfulness ; were it not for the gracious message of 
 revelation that tells us, that God, the Father of heaven, 
 is our Father likewise, who so loved us that He gave for 
 us His only begotten, God the Son ; that for His sake 
 our sins might be freely forgiven us ; that God the Son is 
 our Atonement, our Redeemer, our King, our Intercessor, 
 our Example, our Saviour in life and death ; and God the 
 Holy Ghost, our Comforter, our Guide, our Inspirer, who 
 will give to our souls the eternal life which will never 
 perish, even as He gives to our bodies the mortal life 
 which must perish. 
 
 On the mercy and the love of the ever blessed Trinity, 
 shown forth in Christ upon His cross, we can cast our- 
 
150 The Glory of the Trinity. 
 
 selves with all our sins ; we can cry to Him, and not in 
 vain, for forgiveness and for sanctification ; for a clean 
 heart and a right spirit ; and that we may become holy 
 and humble men of heart. We can join our feeble 
 praises to that hymn of praise which goes up for ever 
 to God from suns and stars, clouds and showers, beasts 
 and birds, and every living thing, giving Him thanks for 
 ever for His great glory. all ye works of the Lord, 
 bless ye the Lord ; praise Him and magnify Him for 
 ever. O ye holy and humble Men of heart, bless ye the 
 Lord ; praise Him and magnify Him for ever. 
 
SERMON XVII. 
 
 LOVE OF GOD AND MAN. 
 
 FIRST SUNDAY AETEE TKINITY. 
 
 Eversley. Chester Cathedral, 1872. 
 
 1 John iv. 16, 21. 
 
 * God is love ; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and 
 God in him. . . . And this commandment have we from Him, 
 That he who loveth God love his brother also." 
 
 This is the first Sunday after Trinity. On it the Church 
 begins to teach us morals, — that is, how to live a good 
 life ; and therefore she begins by teaching us the founda- 
 tion of all morals, — which is love, — love to God and 
 love to man. 
 
 But which is to come first, — love to God, or love to 
 man? 
 
 On this point men in different ages have differed, and 
 wUl differ to the end. One party has said. You must 
 love God first, and let love to man come after as it can ; 
 and others have contradicted that and said. You must 
 love all mankind, and let love to God take its chance. 
 But St John says, neither of the two is before or 
 after the other ; you cannot truly love God without lov- 
 ing man, or love man without loving God. St John 
 says so, being full of the Spirit of God : but alas ! men, 
 who are not full of the Spirit of God, but only let 
 themselves be taught by Him now and then and here 
 
1 5 2 Love of God and Man. 
 
 and there, have found it very difficult to understand 
 St John, and still more difficult to obey him ; and there- 
 fore there always have been in God's Church these two 
 parties ; one saying, You must love God first, and the 
 other. You must love your neighbour first, — and each, of 
 course, quoting Scripture to prove that they are in the 
 right. 
 
 The great leader of the first party — perhaps the 
 founder of it, as far as I am aware — was the famous St 
 Augustine. He first taught Christians that they ought 
 to love God with the same passionate affection with 
 which they love husband or wife, mother or child; and to 
 use towards God the same words of affection which those 
 who love really utter one to each other. I wiU not 
 say much of that ; still less will I mention any of the 
 words which good men and women who are of that 
 way of thinking use towards God. I should be sorry 
 to hold up such language to blame, even if I do not 
 agree with it ; and still more sorry to hold it up to ridi- 
 cule from vulgar-minded persons if there be any in this 
 Church. All I say is, that all which has been written 
 since about this passionate and rapturous love toward 
 God by the old monks and nuns, and by the Protestant 
 Pietists, both English and foreign, is aU in St Augustine 
 better said than it ever has been since. Some of the 
 Pietist hymns, as we know, are very beautiful ; but there 
 are things in them which one wishes left out ; which 
 seem, or ought to seem, irreverent when used toward 
 God; which hurt, or ought to hurt, our plain, cool, honest 
 English common-sense. A true Englishman does not 
 like to say more than he feels; and the more he feels, the 
 
Love of God and Man. 153 
 
 more he likes to keep it to himself, instead of parading 
 it and talking of it before men. Still waters run deep, 
 he holds ; and he is right for himself ; only he must not 
 judge others, or think that because he cannot speak to 
 God in such passionate language as St Augustine, who 
 was an African, a southern man, with much stronger 
 feelings than we Englishmen usually have, that there- 
 fore St Augustine, or those who copy him now, do not 
 really feel what they say. But, nevertheless, plain 
 common-sense people, such as most Englishmen are, are 
 afraid of this enthusiastical religion. They say, We do 
 not pretend to feel this rapturous love to God, how much- 
 soever we may reverence Him, and wish to keep His 
 commandments ; and we do not desire to feel it. For we 
 see that people who have talked in this way about God 
 have been almost always monks and nuns ; or brain-sick, 
 disappointed persons, who have no natural and whole- 
 some bent for their affections. And even though this 
 kind of religion may be very well for them, it is not the 
 religion for a plain honest man who has a wife and 
 family and his bread to earn in the world, and has chil- 
 dren to provide for, and his duty to do in the State as 
 well as in the Church. And more, they say, these en- 
 thusiastic, rapturous feelings do not seem to make people 
 better, and more charitable, and more loving. Some 
 really good and charitable people say that they have these 
 feelings, but for all that we can see they would be just 
 as good and charitable without the feelings, while most 
 persons who take up with this sort of religion are not the 
 better for it. They do not control their tempers ; they 
 can be full, — as they say, — of love and devotion to God 
 
1 54 Love of God and Man. 
 
 one minute, but why. are they the next minute peevLsh, 
 proud, self-willed, harsh and cruel to those who differ from 
 them ? Their religion does not make them love their 
 neighbours. In old times (when persecution was allowed), 
 it made them, or at least allowed them, to persecute, tor- 
 ment, and kill their neighbours, and fancy that by such 
 conduct they did God service ; and now it tempts them 
 to despise their neighbours — to look on every one who 
 has not these strange, intense feelings which they say 
 they have, as unconverted, and lost, and doomed to ever- 
 lasting destruction. Not, says the plain man, that we are 
 more satisfied with the mere philanthropist of modem 
 times, — the man who professes to love the whole human 
 race without loving God, or indeed often believing that 
 there is a God to love. To us he seems as unloving a 
 person as the mere fanatic. Meanwhile, plain people 
 say, we will have nothing to do with either fanaticism 
 or philanthropy, — we will try to do our duty where God 
 has put us, and to behave justly and charitably by our 
 neighbours ; but beyond that we cannot go. We wiU 
 not pretend to what we do not feel. 
 
 My friends, there is, as usual, truth on both sides, — 
 both are partly right, and both are partly wrong. And 
 both may go on arguing against each other, and quoting 
 texts of Scripture against each other till the last day ; if 
 they will not listen to St John's message in the text. 
 One party will say. It is written. Thou shalt love 
 the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and soul, and 
 strength, and mind ; and if thou doest that, and thy soul 
 is filled with love for the Creator, thou canst have no 
 love left for the creature ; or if thy heart is filled with 
 
Love of God ajid Man. 1 5 5 
 
 love for the creature, there is no room left for love to 
 God. And then thou wilt find that God is a jealous 
 God, and will take from thee what thou lovest, because 
 He will not have His honour given to another. 
 
 And to that the other party will answer, Has not 
 God said, " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself ? " 
 Has He not commanded us to love our wives, our chil- 
 dren ? And even if He had not, would not common 
 sense tell us that He intended us to do so ? Do you 
 think that God is a tempter and a deceiver ? He has 
 given us feehngs and powers. Has He not meant us to 
 use them ? He has given us wife and child. Did He 
 mean us not to love them, after He has made us love 
 them, we know not how or why ? You say that God is 
 a jealous God. Yes, jealous He may be of our worship- 
 ping false gods, and idols, saints, or anything or person 
 save Himself, — jealous of our doing wrong, and ruining 
 ourselves, and wandering out of the path of His com- 
 mandments, in which alone is life ; but jealous of our 
 loving our fellow creature as well as Himself, never. 
 That sort of jealousy is a base and wicked passion in 
 man, and dare we attribute it to God ? What a thing to 
 say of the loving God, that He takes away people's chil- 
 dren, husbands, and friends, because they love them too 
 much ! 
 
 Then the first party will say. But is it not written, 
 " Love not the world, neither the things that are in the 
 world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father 
 is not in him ? " And to that, the second party wUl 
 answer, And do you say that we are not to love this 
 fair and wonderful earth which God has made for our 
 
1 5 6 Love of God and Man. 
 
 use, and put us into it % Why did He make it lovely \ 
 Why did He put us into it, if He did not mean us to 
 enjoy it ? That is contrary to common sense, and con- 
 trary to the whole teaching of the Old Testament. But 
 if by the world you mean the world of man, the society 
 in which we live — dare you compare a Christian and 
 civilized country like England with that detestable Roman 
 world, sunk in all abominable vices, against which St John 
 and St Paul prophesied ? Are not such thoughts unjust 
 and uncharitable to your neighbours, to your country, to 
 all mankind ? Then the first party will say. But you do 
 away with all devoutness ; and the second party will 
 answer, And you do away with all morality, for you tell 
 people that the only way to please God is to feel about 
 Him in a way which not one person in a thousand can 
 feel ; and therefore what will come, and does come, of 
 your binding heavy burdens and grievous to be borne 
 and laying them on men's shoulders is this, — that the 
 generality of people will care nothing about being good 
 or doing right, because you teach them that it will not 
 please God, and will leave all religion to a few who have 
 these peculiar fancies and feelings. 
 
 And so they may aigue on for ever, unless they will 
 take honestly the plain words of St John, and see that 
 to love their neighbour is to love God, and to love God 
 is to love their neighbour. So says St John clearly 
 enough twice over. "God is love; and he that dwelleth 
 in love dwelleth in God, and God in him." The two 
 things are one, and the one cannot be without the 
 other. 
 
 Does this seem strange to you ? Oh, my friends, it 
 
Love of God and Man. 1 5 7 
 
 need not seem strange, if you will but consider who God 
 is, and who man is. Thou lovest God ? Then, if thou 
 lovest Him, thou must needs love all that He has made. 
 And what has He made ? All things, except sin ; and 
 what sin is He has told thee. He has given thee ten 
 commandments, and let no man give thee an eleventh 
 commandment out of his own conceit and will worship ; 
 calling unclean what God hath made clean, and cursing 
 what God hath blessed. Thou lovest God ? Then thou 
 lovest all that is good ; for God is good, and from Him 
 all good things come. But what is good ? All is good 
 except sin ; for it is written, " God saw every thing that 
 He had made, and, behold, it was very good." Therefore, 
 if thou lovest God, thou must love all things, for all 
 things are of Him, and by Him, and through Him ; and 
 in Him all live and move and have their being. Then 
 thou wilt truly love God. Thou wilt be content with God ; 
 and so thy love will cast out fear. Thou wilt trust God ; 
 thou wilt have the mind of God ; thou wilt be satisfied 
 with God's working, from the rise and fall of great 
 nations to the life and death of the smallest gnat which 
 dances in the sun ; thou wilt say for ever, and concern- 
 ing aU things, I know in whom I have believed. It is 
 the good Lord, let Him do what seemeth Him good. 
 
 Again. Thou lovest thy neighbour ; thou lovest wife 
 and child ; thou lovest thy friends ; thou lovest or wishest 
 to love all men, and to do them good. Then thou lovest 
 God. For what is it that thou lovest in thy neighbour \ 
 Not that which is bad in him ? No, but that which is 
 good. Thou lovest him for his kindliness, his honesty, 
 his helpfulness, — for some good quality in him. But 
 
1 58 Love of God and Man. 
 
 from whom does that good come, save from Christ 
 and from the Spirit of Christ, from whom alone come 
 all good gifts 1 Yes, if you will receive it ; — ^when 
 we love our neighbours, it is God in them, Christ in 
 them, whom we love, — Christ in them, the hope of 
 glory. 
 
 What, some one will ask, when a man loves a fair 
 face, does he love Christ then ? Ah ! my friends, that 
 is not true love, as all know weU enough if they will let 
 their own hearts tell them truth. Tnie love is when 
 two people love each other for the goodness which is in 
 them. True love is the love which endures after beauty 
 has faded, and youth, and health, and all that seems to 
 make life worth having is gone. Have we not seen ere 
 now two old people, worn, crippled, diseased, yet living on 
 together, helping each other, nursing each other, tottering 
 on hand in hand to the grave, dying, perhaps, almost to- 
 gether, — because neither cared to live when the other is 
 gone before, and loving aU the while as truly and tenderly 
 as in the days of youth ? They know not why. No ; but 
 God knows why. It is Christ in each other whom they 
 love ; — Christ, the hope of glory. Yes, we have seen 
 that, surely ; and seen in it one of the most beautiful, 
 the most divine sights upon earth, — one which should 
 teach us, if we will look at it aright, that when we 
 love our neighbour truly, it is the divine part in 
 him, the spark of eternal goodness in him, — what St 
 Paul says is Christ in him, — which we admire, and cHng 
 to, and love. 
 
 But by that rule we cannot love every one, for every 
 
Love of God and Man. 1 59 
 
 one is not good. Be not too sure of that. All are not 
 good, alas ! but in all there is some good. It may be a 
 very little, — a hope of glory in them, even though that 
 hope be very faint. It may be dying out ; it may die 
 altogether, and their souls may become utterly base and 
 evil, and be lost for ever. Still, while there is life 
 there is hope, even for the worst ; and just as far as 
 our hearts are full of the Spirit of God, we shall see the 
 Spirit of God striving with the souls even of the worst 
 men, and love them for that. Just as far as we have 
 the likeness of Christ in us, we shall be quick to catch 
 the least gleam of His likeness in our neighbours, and 
 love them for that. Just as far as our hearts are full 
 of love we shall see something worth loving in every 
 human being we meet, and love them for that. I 
 know it is difficult. It is not gotten in a day, that 
 wide and deep spirit of love to all mankind which St 
 Paul had ; which made him weep with those who wept 
 and rejoice with those who rejoiced, and become all 
 things to all men, if by any means he might save some. 
 Before our eyes are cleansed and purged to see some 
 trace of good in every man, our hearts must be cleansed 
 and purged from all selfishness, and bigotry, and pride, 
 and fancifulness, and anger, so that they may be filled 
 with the loving Spirit of God. As long as a taint of 
 selfishness or pride remains in us, we shall be in con- 
 tinual danger of hating those whom God does not hate, 
 despising those whom God does not despise, and con- 
 demning those whom God does not condemn. But if 
 self is cast out of us, and the Spirit of God and of Christ 
 enthroned in our hearts, then we shall love our brother, 
 
1 60 Love of God and Man. 
 
 and in loving him love God, who made him ; and so, 
 dwelling in love, we shall dwell in God, and God in us : 
 — to which true and only everlasting life may He of His 
 mercy bring us, either in this world or in the world to 
 come. Amen. 
 
SERMON XVIII. 
 
 COURAGE. 
 
 Chester Cathedral, 1871. 
 
 Acts iv. 13, 18-20. 
 
 "Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived 
 that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled ; and 
 they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus. . . 
 And they called them, and commanded them not to speak at all 
 nor teach in the name of Jesus But Peter and John answered and 
 said unto them. Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken 
 unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we cannot but speak 
 the things which we have seen and heard. " 
 
 Last Thursday was St Peter's Day. The congrega- 
 tion on that day was, as far as I could perceive, no 
 larger than usual ; and this is not a matter of surprise. 
 Since we gave up at the Reformation the superstitious 
 practice of praying to the saints, saints" days have sunk 
 — and indeed sunk too much — into neglect. For most 
 men's religion has a touch of self-interest in it ; and 
 therefore when people discovered that they could get 
 nothing out of St Peter or St John by praying to them, 
 they began to forget the very memory, many of them, of 
 St Peter, St John, and other saints and apostles. They 
 forget, too often, still, that though praying to any saint, 
 or angel, or other created being, is contrary both to 
 reason and to Scripture ; yet it is according to reason 
 
 L 
 
1 62 Courage. 
 
 and to Scripture to commemorate them. That is to 
 remember them, to study their characters, and to thank 
 God for them — both for the virtues which He bestowed 
 on them, and the example which He has given us in 
 them. 
 
 For these old saints lived and died for our example. 
 They are, next of course to the Lord Himself, the ideals, 
 the patterns, of Christian life — the primeval heroes of 
 our holy faith. They shew to us of what stuff the early 
 Christians were made ; what sort of stone — to use St 
 Paul's own figure, — the Lord chose wherewith to build 
 up His Church. They are our spiritual ancestors, for 
 they spread the Gospel into all lands; and they spread it, 
 remember always, not only by preaching what they knew, 
 but by being what they were. Their characters, their 
 personal histories, are as important to us as their 
 writings ; nay, in the case of St Peter, even more im- 
 portant. For if these two epistles of his had been lost, 
 and never handed down to us, St Peter himself would 
 have remained, as he is drawn in the Gospels and the 
 Acts, a grand and colossal human figure, every line and 
 feature of which is full of meaning and full of teaching 
 to us. 
 
 Now I think that the quality — the grace of God — 
 which St Peter's character and story specially force on 
 our notice, is, the true courage which comes by faith. 
 I say, the courage which comes by faith. There is 
 a courage which does not come by faith. There is 
 brute courage, which comes from hardness of heart, 
 from stupidity, obstinacy, or anger, which does not see 
 danger, or does not feel pain. That is the courage of 
 
Courage. 163 
 
 the brute. One does not blame it, or call it wrong. It 
 is good in its place, as all natural things are, which God' 
 has made. It is good enough for the brutes, but it 
 is not good enough for man. You cannot trust it 
 in man. And the more a man is what a man 
 should be, the less he can trust it. The more mind 
 and understanding a man has, so as to be able to foresee 
 danger, and measure it, the more chance there is of his 
 brute courage giving way. The more feeling a man 
 has, the more keenly he feels pain of body, or pain 
 of mind, such as shame, loneliness, the dislike, ridicule, 
 and contempt of his fellow men ; in a word, the more of 
 a man he is, and the less of a mere brute, the more 
 chance there is of his brute courage breaking down, 
 just when he wants it most to keep him up, by leaving 
 him to play the coward and come to shame. Yes. To 
 go through with a difficult and dangerous undertaking, 
 a man wants more than brute courage. He v?ants 
 spiritual courage — the courage which comes by faith. 
 He needs to have faith in what he is doing ; to be 
 certain that he is doing his duty, to be certain that he is 
 in the right. Certain that right will conquer, certain 
 that God will make it conquer, by him or by some one 
 else ; certain that he will either conquer honourably, or 
 fail honourably, for God is with him. In a word, to 
 have true courage, man needs faith in God. 
 
 To give one example. Look at the class of men who, 
 in all England, undergo the most fearful dangers ; who 
 know not at what hour of any night they may not be 
 called up to the most serious labour and responsibility, 
 with the chance of a horrible and torturing death. I 
 
1 64 Courage. 
 
 mean the firemen of our great cities, than whom 
 there are no steadier, braver, nobler-hearted men. Not 
 a week passes without one or more of these firemen, in 
 trying to save life and property, doing things which are 
 altogether heroic. What do you fancy keeps them up 
 to their work ? High pay ? The amusement and excite- 
 ment of fires ? The vanity of being praised for their 
 courage ? My friends, those would be but paltry weak 
 motives, which would not keep a man's heart calm and 
 his head clear under such responsibility and danger as 
 theirs. No. It is the sense of duty, — the knowledge 
 that they are doing a good and a noble work in saving 
 the lives of human beings and the wealth of the nation, — 
 the knowledge that they are in God's hands, and that 
 no real evil can happen to him who is doing right, — 
 that to him even death at his post is not a loss, but a 
 gain. In short, faith in God, more or less clear, is what 
 gives those men their strong and quiet courage. God 
 grant that you and I, if ever we have dangerous work 
 to do, may get true courage from the same fountain 
 of ghostly strength. 
 
 Now, St Peter's history is, I think, a special example 
 of this. He was naturally, it seems, a daring man, — a 
 man of great brute courage. So far so good ; but he had 
 to be taught, by severe lessons, that his brute courage 
 was not enough, — that he wanted spiritual courage, the 
 courage which came by faith, and that if that failed him, 
 the brute courage would fail too. 
 
 He throws himself into the lake, to walk upon the 
 water to Christ ; and as soon as he is afraid he begins to 
 sink. The Lord saves him, and tells him why he had 
 
Courage. 165 
 
 sank. Because he had doubted, his faith had failed him. 
 So he found out the weakness of courage without faith. 
 Then, again, he tells our Lord, " Though all men 
 shall be offended of Thee, yet will I never be offended. 
 I am ready to go with Thee both into prison, and 
 to death." And shortly after, his mere animal courage 
 breaks out again, and does what little it can do, and 
 little enough. He draws sword, single-handed, on the 
 soldiers in the garden, and cuts down a servant of the 
 high priest's, and perhaps would have flung his life away, 
 desperately and uselessly, had not our Lord restrained 
 him. But when the fit of excitement is past, his animal 
 courage deserts him, and his moral courage too, and be 
 denies his Lord. So he found out that he was like 
 too many, — full of bodily courage, perhaps, but morally 
 weak. He had to undergo a great change. He had to 
 be converted by the Holy Spirit of God, and strengthened 
 by that Spirit, to have a boldness which no worldly cour- 
 age can give. Then, when he was strong himself, he 
 was able to strengthen his brethren. Then he was able, 
 ignorant and unlearned man as he was, to stand up be- 
 fore the high priests and rulers of his nation, and to say, 
 simply and firmly, without boasting, without defiance, 
 " Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken 
 unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we cannot 
 but speak the things which we have seen and heard." 
 Yes, my friends, it is the courage which comes by faith 
 which makes truly brave men, — men like St Peter and 
 St John. He who can say, I am right, can say likewise, 
 God is on my side, and I will not fear what man can do 
 to me. 
 
1 66 Courage. 
 
 "We will not fenr," said the Psalmist, "though the 
 earth be removed, and though the hills be carried into 
 the midst of the sea." " The just man, who holds firm 
 to his purpose," says a wise old heathen, " he will not be 
 shaken from his solid mind by the rage of the mob bid- 
 ding him do base things or the frowns of the tyrant who 
 persecutes him. Though the world were to crumble to 
 pieces round him, its ruins would strike him without 
 making him tremble." "Whether it be right," said Peter 
 and John to the great men and judges of the Jews, " to 
 hearken to God more than to you, judge ye. We cannot 
 but speak the things which we have seen and heard." 
 We cannot but speak what we know to be true. 
 
 It was that courage which enabled our forefathers, — 
 and not the great men among them, not the rich, not 
 even the learned, save a few valiant bishops and clergy, 
 but for the most part poor, unlearned, labouring men 
 and women, — to throw off the yoke of Popery, and say, 
 "Reason and Scripture tell us that it is absurd and 
 wrong to worship images and pray to saints, — tell us 
 that your doctrines are not true. And we will say so in 
 spite of the Pope and all his power, — in spite of torture 
 and a fiery death. We cannot palter ; we cannot dis- 
 semble ; we cannot shelter ourselves under half-truths, 
 and make a covenant with lies. ' Whether it be right 
 in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than to 
 God, judge ye. We cannot but speak the thing-s which 
 we know to be true.' " 
 
 So it has been in all ages, and so it will be for ever. 
 Faith, the certainty that a man is right, will give him a 
 courage which will enable him to resist, if need be, the 
 
Courage. 167 
 
 rich ones, the strong ones, the learned ones of the earth. 
 It has made poor unlearned men heroes and deliverers 
 of their countrymen from slavery and ignorance. It has 
 made weak women martyrs and saints. It has enabled 
 men who made great discoveries to face unbelief, ridicule, 
 neglect, poverty; knowing that their worth would be 
 acknowledged at last, their names honoured at last as 
 benefactors by the very men who laughed at them and 
 reviled them. It has made men, shut up in prison for 
 long weary years for doing what was right and saying 
 what was true, endure manfully for the sake of some 
 good cause, and say, — 
 
 " Stone walls do not a prison make, 
 
 Nor iron bars a cage ; 
 Minds innocent and quiet take 
 
 That for an hermitage. 
 If I have freedom in my thought, 
 
 And in my love am free, 
 Angels alone, that soar above, 
 
 Enjoy such liberty." 
 
 Yes ; settle it in your hearts, all of you. There is 
 but one thing which you have to fear in earth or heaven, 
 — being untrue to your better selves, and therefore un- 
 true to God. If you will not do the thing you know to 
 be right, and say the thing you know to be true, then 
 indeed you are weak. You are a coward, and sin 
 against God, and suffer the penalty of your cowardice. 
 You desert God, and therefore you cannot expect Him 
 to stand by you. 
 
 But if you will do the thing you know to be 
 right, and say the thing you know to be true, then 
 what can harm, you ? Who will harm you, asks St 
 
1 68 Courage. 
 
 Peter himself, "if you be followers of that which is 
 good ? For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, 
 and His ears are open to their prayers. But if ye suffer 
 for righteousness' sake, happy are ye ; and be not afraid 
 of those who try to terrify you, neither be troubled, but 
 sanctify the Lord God in your hearts. Eemember that 
 He is just and holy, and a rewarder of all who diligently 
 seek Him. Worship Him in your hearts, and all will 
 be well. For says David again, " Lord, who shall dwell 
 in Thy tabernacle, or who shall rest upon Thy holy hill ? 
 Even he that leadeth an uncorrupt life, and doeth the 
 thing which is right, and speaketh the truth from his 
 heart. Whoso doeth these things shall never fall. 
 
 Yes, my friends ; there is a tabernacle of God in which, 
 even in this life. He will hide us from the strife of 
 tongues. There is a hill of God on which, even in the 
 midst of labour and anxiety, we may rest both day and 
 night. Even Jesus Christ, the Rock of Ages, — He who 
 is the Righteousness itself, the Truth itself; and whoso- 
 ever does righteousness and speaks truth dwells in Christ 
 in this life, as well as in the life to come ; and Christ will 
 strengthen him by His Holy Spirit to stand in the evil 
 day, if it shall come, and having done all, to stand. 
 My dear friends, if any of you are minded to be good 
 men and women, pray for the Holy Spirit of God. First 
 for the spirit of love to give you good desires ; then the 
 spirit of faith, to make you believe deeply in the living 
 God, who rewards every man according to his work ; and 
 then for the spirit of strength, to enable you to bring 
 these desires to good effect. 
 
 Pray for that spirit, I say ; for we all need help. 
 
Courage. 169 
 
 There are too raany people in the world — too many, per- 
 haps, among us here — who are not what they ought to 
 be, and what they really wish to be, because they are 
 weak. They see what is right, and admire it ; but they 
 have not courage or determination to do it. Most sad 
 and pitiable it is to see how much weakness of heart 
 there is in the world — how little true moral courage. I 
 suppose that the reason is, that there is so little faith ; 
 that people do not believe heartily and deeply enough in 
 the absolute necessity of doing right and being honest. 
 They do not believe heartily and deeply enough in God 
 to trust Him to defend and reward them, if they will but 
 be true to Him, and to themselves. And therefore they 
 have no moral courage. They are weak. They are 
 kind, perhaps, and easy ; easily led right ; but, alas ! 
 just as easily led wrong. Their good resolutions are not 
 carried out ; their right doctrines not acted up to ; and 
 they live pitiful, confused, useless, inconsistent lives; talk- 
 ing about religion, and yet denying the power of religion 
 in their daily lives ; playing with holy and noble 
 thoughts and feelings, without giving themselves up to 
 them in earnest, to be led by the Spirit of God, to do all 
 the good works which God has prepared for them to walk 
 in. Pray all of you, then, for the spirit of faith, to believe 
 really in God ; and for the spirit of ghostly strength, to 
 obey God honestly. No man ever asked earnestly for 
 that spirit but what he gained it at last. And no man 
 ever gained it but what he found the truth of St Peter's 
 own words, " Who will harm you if ye be followers of 
 that which is good ? " 
 
SERMON XIX. 
 
 GOOD DAYS. 
 
 Eversley, 1867. Westmimter, Sept. 27, 1872. 
 
 1 Peter iii. 8 — 12. 
 
 " Be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as 
 brethren, be pitiful, be courteous : Not rendering evil for evil, or 
 railing for railing : but contrariwise blessing ; knowing that ye are 
 thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing. For he that 
 will love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from 
 evil, and his lips that they speak no guile : Let him eschew evil, 
 and do good ; let him seek peace, and ensue it. For the eyes of 
 the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open unto their 
 prayers : but the face of the Lord is against them that do evO." 
 
 This is one of tlie texts which is apt to puzzle people 
 who do not read their Bibles carefully enough. They 
 cannot see what the latter part of it has to do with the 
 former. 
 
 St. Peter says that we Christians are called that we 
 should inherit a blessing. That means, of course, they 
 say, the blessing of salvation, everlasting life in heaven. 
 But then St. Peter quotes from the 34th Psalm. "For 
 he that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain 
 his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no 
 guile." Now that Psalm, they say, speaks of blessing and 
 happiness in this hfe. Then why does St. Peter give it 
 as a reason for expecting blessing and happiness in the 
 life to come ? And then, they say, to make it fit in, it 
 
Good Days. i 7 1 
 
 must be understood spiritually ; and what they mean 
 by that, I do not clearly know. 
 
 Their notion is, that the promises of the Old Testa- 
 ment are move or less carnal, because they speak of 
 God's rewarding men in this life ; and that the promises 
 of the New Testament are spiritual, because they speak 
 of God's rewarding men in the next life ; and what they 
 mean by that, again, I do not clearly know. 
 
 For is not the Old Testament spiritual as well as the 
 New ? I trust so, my friends. Is not the Old Testa- 
 ment inspired, and that by the Spirit of God ? and if it 
 be inspired by the Spirit, what can it be but spiritual ? 
 Therefore, if we want to find the spiritual meaning of 
 Old Testament promises, we need not to alter them to 
 suit any fancies of our own ; like those monks of the 
 fourth and succeeding centuries, who saw no sanctity in 
 family or national life ; no sanctity in the natural world, 
 and, therefore, were forced to travesty the Hebrew his- 
 torians, psalmists, and prophets, with all their simple, 
 healthy objective humanity, and politics, and poetry, 
 into metaphorical and subjective, or, as they miscalled 
 them, spiritual meanings, to make the Old Testament 
 mean anything at all. No ; if we have any real rever- 
 ence for the Holy Scriptures, we must take them word 
 for word in their plain meaning, and find the message of 
 God's Spirit in that plain meaning, instead of trying to 
 put it in for ourselves. Therefore it is that the VII. 
 Article bids us beware of playing with Scripture in this 
 way. It says the Old Testament is not contrary to the 
 New, for both in the Old and New Testament everlast- 
 ing life is offered to mankind by Christ. Wherefore they 
 
172 Good Days. 
 
 are not to be heard who feign that the old fathers did 
 look only for transitory promises, that is temporary 
 promises, promises which would be fulfilled only in this 
 life, and end and pass away when they died. 
 
 But some one will say, how can that be, when so 
 many of the old Hebrews seem to have known nothing 
 about the next life ? Moses, for instance, always pro- 
 mises the Children of Israel that if they do right, and 
 obey God, they shall be rewarded in this life, with peace 
 and prosperity, fruitfulness and wealth ; but of their 
 being rewarded in the next life he never says one word 
 - — which last statement is undeniably true. 
 
 Is not then the Old Testament contrary to the New, 
 
 if the Old Testament teaches men to look for their 
 
 reward in this Life, and the New Testament in the next? 
 
 No, it is not, my friends. And I think we shall see that 
 
 it is not, and why it is not, if we will look honestly at 
 
 this very important text. If we do that we shall see 
 
 that what St. Peter meant — what the VII. Article 
 
 means is the only meaning which wUl make sense of 
 
 either one or the other ; is simply this — that what causes 
 
 a man to enjoy this life, is the same that will cause 
 
 him to enjoy the life to come. That what will biing 
 
 a blessing on him in this life, will bring a blessing on 
 
 him in the life to come. That what blessed the old 
 
 Jews, will bless us Christians. That if we refrain our 
 
 tongue from evil, and our lips from speaking deceit ; if 
 
 we avoid evil and do good ; if we seek peace, and follow 
 
 earnestly after it ; then shall we enjoy life, and see good 
 
 days, and inherit a blessing ; whether in this life or in 
 
 the life to come. 
 
Good Days. 173 
 
 And why ? Because then we shall be living the one 
 and only everlasting life of goodness, which alone brings 
 blessings ; alone gives good days ; and is the only life 
 worth living, whether in earth or heaven. 
 
 My dear friends, lay this seriously to heart, in these 
 days especially, when people and preachers alike have 
 taken to part earth and heaven, in a fashion which we 
 never find in Holy Scripture. Lay it to heart, I say, 
 and believe that what is right, and therefore good, for 
 the next life, is right, and therefore good, for this. 
 That the next life is not contrary to this life. That the 
 same moral laws hold good in heaven, as on earth. 
 Mark this well ; for it must be so, if morality, that is right 
 and goodness, is of the eternal and immutable essence of 
 God. And therefore, mark this well again, there is but 
 one true, real, and right life for rational beings, one only 
 life worth living, and worth living in this world or in 
 any other life, past, present, or to come. And that is 
 the eternal life which was before all worlds, and will be 
 after all are passed away — and that is neither more nor 
 less than a good life ; a life of good feelings, good 
 thoughts, good words, good deeds, the life of Christ 
 and of God. 
 
 It is needful, I say, to bear this in mind just now. 
 People are, as I told you, too apt to say that the Old 
 Testament saints got their rewards in this life, while we 
 shall get them in the next. Do they find that in Scrip- 
 ture ? If they will read their Bible they will find that 
 the Old Testament saints were men whom God was train- 
 ing and educating, as He does us, by experience and by 
 suffering. That David, so far from having his reward 
 
1 74 Good Days. 
 
 at once in this life, had his bitter sorrows and trials ; 
 that Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Job, all, indeed, of the old 
 prophets, had to be made perfect by suffering, and (as 
 St. Paul says) died in faith not having received the pro- 
 mises. So that if they had their reward in this life, it 
 must have been a spiritual reward, the reward of a good 
 conscience, and of the favour of Almighty God. And 
 that is no transitory or passing reward, but enduring as 
 immortality itself. But people do not usually care for that 
 spiritual reward. Their notion of reward and happiness 
 is that they are to have all sorts of pleasures, they know 
 not what, and know not really why. And because they 
 cannot get pleasant things enough to satisfy them in 
 this life, they look forward greedily to getting them in 
 the next life ; and meanwhile are discontented with God's 
 Providence, and talk of God's good world as if some fiend 
 and not the Lord Jesus Christ was the maker and ruler 
 thereof. Do not misunderstand me. I am no optimist, 
 I know well that things happen in this world which must, 
 which ought to make us sad — so sad that at moments 
 we envy the dead, who are gone home to their rest; 
 real tragedies, real griefs, divine and Christlike griefs, 
 which only loving hearts know — the suffering of those 
 we love, the loss of tTiose we love, and, last and worst, 
 the sin of those we love. Ah ! if any of those swords 
 have pierced the heart of any soul here, shall I blame 
 that man, that woman, if they cry at times, " Father, 
 take me home, this earth is no place for me." Shall I 
 bid them do aught but cling to the feet of Christ and 
 cry, " If it be possible, let this cup pass from me ; 
 nevertheless, not as I will, btit as Thou wilt." Oh, not 
 
Good Days. 175 
 
 of such do I speak ; not of such sharers of Christ's un- 
 selfish suffering here, that they may be sharers of His 
 unselfish joy hereafter. Not of them do I speak ; but of 
 those who only wish to make up for selfish discomforts 
 and disappointments in this life by selfish comforts and 
 satisfaction in the next ; and who therefore take up (let 
 me use the honest English word) some maundering 
 form of religion, which, to judge from their own con- 
 duct, they usually only half believe ; those who seem, 
 on six days of the week, as fond of finery and frivolity 
 as any other gay worldlings, and on the seventh join 
 eagerly in hymns in which (in one case at least) they 
 inform the Almighty God of truth, who will not be 
 mocked, that they lie awake at night, weeping because 
 they cannot die and see " Jerusalem the golden," and so 
 forth. Or those, again, who for six days in the week are 
 absorbed in making money — honestly if they can, no 
 doubt, but still making money, and living luxuriously 
 on their profits — and on the seventh listen with satis- 
 faction to preachers and hymns which tell them that 
 this world is all a howling wilderness, full of snares and 
 pitfalls ; and that in this wretched place the Christian 
 can expect nothing but tribulation and persecution till 
 he " crosses Jordan, and is landed safe on Canaan's 
 shore,'' and so forth. 
 
 My friends, my friends, as long as a man talks so, 
 blaspheming God's world — which, when He made it, be- 
 hold it was all very good — and laying the blame of 
 their own ignorance and peevishness on God who made 
 them, they must expect nothing but tribulation and 
 sorrow. But the tribulation and the sorrow will be thei)' 
 
1 76 Good Days. 
 
 own fault, and not God's. If religious professors will 
 not take St. Peter's advice and the Psalmist's advice ; if 
 they will go on coveting and scheming about money, 
 and how they may get money ; if they will go on being 
 neither pitiful, courteous, nor forgiving, and hating and 
 maligning whether it be those who differ from them in 
 doctrine, or those who they fancy have injured them, or 
 those who merely are their rivals in the race of life ; 
 then they are but too likely to find this world a thorny 
 place, because they themselves raise the thorns ; and a 
 disorderly place, because their own tempers and desires 
 are disorderly; and a wilderness, because they them- 
 selves have run wild, barbarians at heart, however 
 civilised in dress and outward manners, St. James 
 tells them that of old. " From whence," he says, " come 
 wars and quarrels among you % Come they not hence, 
 even of the lusts which war in your members ? You 
 long, and have not. You fight and war, yet you have 
 not, because you ask not. You ask, and have not. 
 You pray for this and that, and God does not give it 
 you. Because you ask amiss, selfishly to consume it on 
 your lusts." And then you say, This world is an evil 
 place, fuU of temptations. What says St. James to that ? 
 " Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted 
 of God : for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither 
 tempteth He any man. But every man is tempted, 
 when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed." 
 
 So it was in the Old Testament times, and so it is in 
 these Christian times. God is good, and God's world is 
 good ; and the evil is not in the world around us, but in 
 our own foolish hearts. If we follow our own foolish 
 
Good Days. 177 
 
 hearts, we shall find this world a bad place, as the old 
 Jews found it — whenever they went wrong and sinned 
 against God — because we are breaking its laws, and they 
 will punish us. If we follow the commandments of God, 
 we shall find this world a good place, as the old Jews 
 found it — whenever they went right, and obeyed God — 
 because we shall be obeying its laws, and they will reward 
 us. This is God's promise alike to the old Jewish fathers 
 and to us Christian men. And this is no transitory or 
 passing promise, but is founded on the eternal and ever- 
 lasting law of right, by which God has made all worlds, 
 and which He Himself cannot alter, for it springs out of 
 His own essence and His own eternal being. Hear, 
 then, the conclusion of the whole matter : God hath 
 called you that you might inherit a blessing. 
 
 He hath made you of a blessed race, created in His 
 own likeness, to whom He hath put all things in 
 subjection, making man a little lower than the angels, 
 that He might crown him with glory and worship ; 
 a race so precious in God's eyes — we know not why 
 — that when mankind had fallen, and seemed ready 
 to perish from their own sin and ignorance, God spared 
 not His only begotten Son, but freely gave Him for 
 us, that the world by Him might be saved. And God 
 hath put you in a blessed place, even His wondrous and 
 fruitful world, which praises God day and night, fulfill- 
 ing His word ; for it continues this day as in the be- 
 ginning, and He has given it a law which cannot be 
 broken. He has made you citizens of a blessed king- 
 dom, even the kingdom of heaven, into which you were 
 baptised ; and has given you the Holy Bible, that you 
 
 M 
 
1 78 Good Days. 
 
 might learn the laws of the kingdom, and live for ever, 
 blessing and blest. 
 
 And the Head of this blessed race, the Maker of this 
 blessed world, the King of this blessed kingdom, is the 
 most blessed of all beings, Jesus Christ, the only-be- 
 gotten Son, both God and man. He has washed you 
 freely from your sins in His own blood ; He has 
 poured out on you freely His renewing Spirit. And 
 He asks you to enter into your inheritance ; that 
 you may love your life, and see good days, by liv- 
 ing the blessed life, which is the life of self-sacrifice. 
 But not such self-sacrifices as too many have fancied 
 who did not believe that mankind was a blessed race, 
 and this earth a blessed place. He does not ask you to 
 give up wife, child, property, or any of the good things 
 of this life. He only asks you to give up that selfish- 
 ness which will prevent you enjoying wife, child, or pro- 
 perty, or anything else in earth, or in heaven either. 
 He asks you not to give up anything which is around 
 you, for that which cometh from without defileth not 
 a man ; but to give up something which is within 
 you, for that which cometh from within, that defileth a 
 man. 
 
 He asks you to give up selfishness and all the evil 
 tempers which that selfishness breeds. To give up the 
 tongue which speaks evil of your fellowmen ; and the 
 lips which utter deceit; and the brain which imagines 
 cunning ; and the heart which quarrels with 3'our neigh- 
 bour. To give these up and to seek peace, and pursue 
 it by all means reasonable or honourable ; peace with 
 all around you, which comes by having first peace with 
 
Good Days. 1 79 
 
 God ; next, peace with your own conscience. This 
 is the peace which passeth understanding; for if 
 you have it, men will not be able to understand why 
 you have it. They will see you at peace when men 
 admire you and praise you, and at peace also when thej' 
 insult you and injure you ; at peace when you are pros- 
 perous and thriving, and at peace also when you are 
 poor and desolate. And that inward peace of yours will 
 pass their understanding as it will pass your own under- 
 standing also. You will know that God sends you the 
 peace, and sends it you the more the more you pray for 
 it : but how He sends it you will not understand ; for it 
 springs out of those inner depths of your being which 
 are beyond the narrow range of consciousness, and is 
 spiritual and a mystery, and comes by the inspiration of 
 the holy Spirit of God. 
 
 But remember that all your prayers will not get that 
 peace if your heart be tainted with malice and selfish- 
 ness and covetousness, falsehood and pride and vanity. 
 You must ask God first to root those foul seeds out of 
 your heart, or the seed of His Spirit will not spring up 
 and bear fruit in you to the everlasting life of love and 
 peace and joy in the holy Spirit. But if your heart be 
 purged and cleansed of self, then indeed will the holy 
 Spirit enter in and dwell there ; and you will abide in 
 peace, through all the chances and changes of this mortal 
 life, for you will abide in God, who is for ever at peace. 
 And you will inherit a blessing ; for you will inherit 
 Christ, your light and your life, who is blessed for ever. 
 And you will love life ; for life will be full to you of 
 hope, of work, of duty, of interest, of lessons without 
 
1 80 Good Days. 
 
 number. And you will see good days ; for all days wiU 
 seem good to you, even those which seem to the world 
 bad days of affliction and distress. And so the peace of 
 God will keep you in Jesus Christ, in this life, and in 
 the life to come. Amen. 
 
SERMON XX. 
 
 GRACK 
 Eversley. 1856. 
 
 St. John i. 16, 17. 
 
 "Of His fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. For the law 
 was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." 
 
 I WISH you to mind particularly this word grace. You 
 meet it very often in the Bible. You hear often said. 
 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. 
 Now, what does this word grace mean ? It is really 
 worth your while to know ; for if a man or a woman 
 has not grace, they will be very unhappy people, and 
 very disagreeable people also ; a torment to themselves, 
 and a torment to their neighbours also ; and if they live 
 without grace, they will live but a poor life; if they die 
 without grace, they will come to a very bad end indeed. 
 What, then, does this word mean ? Some of you will 
 answer that grace means God's Holy Spirit, or that it 
 means what God gives to our souls by His Spirit. But 
 what does that mean ? What does God's Spirit give 
 us ? What is the grace of Jesus Christ like, and how 
 is it the same as the grace of God's Spirit ? 
 
 Now, to know what grace means, we must know 
 what St John and St Paul meant by it, and what the 
 
1 82 Grace. 
 
 word meant in their time, and what the Ephesians, and 
 Corinthians, and Eomans, to whom they wrote, would 
 have understood by this word grace. 
 
 Now these heathens, to whom the apostles preached, 
 before they heard the gospel, knew that word grace very 
 well indeed, often used it ; and saw it written up in 
 their heathen temples all about them. And they meant 
 by it just what we mean, when we talk of a graceful 
 person, or a graceful tree or flower; and what we mean, 
 too, when we say that any one is gracious ; that they 
 do things gracefully, and have a great deal of grace iu 
 their way of speaking and behaving. We mean by that 
 that they are handsome, agreeable, amiable, pleasant to 
 look at, and talk to, and deal with. And so these 
 heathens meant, before they were Christians. The 
 Romans used to talk about some one called a Grace. 
 The Greeks called her Gharis ; which is exactly the word 
 which St John and St Paul use, and from it come our 
 words charity and charitable. But more ; they used to 
 talk of three Graces : they fancied that they were god- 
 desses — spirits of some kind in the shape of beautiful, 
 and amiable, and innocent maidens, who took delight 
 in going about the world and making people happy and 
 amiable like themselves ; and they used to make images 
 of these graces, and pray to them to make them lovely, 
 and happy, and agreeable. And painters and statuaries, 
 too, used to pray to these graces, and ask them to 
 put beautiful fancies into their minds, that they 
 might be able to paint beautiful pictures, and carve 
 beautiful statues. So when St Paul or St John talked 
 to these heathens about grace, or Gharis (as the 
 
Grace. 183 
 
 New Testament calls it), they knew quite well what 
 the apostles meant. 
 
 Did the apostles, then, believe in these three goddesses ? 
 Heaven forbid. They came to teach these heathens to 
 turn from those very vanities, and worship the living 
 God. And so they told them, — You are quite right 
 in thinking that grace comes from heaven, and is God's 
 gift ; that it is God who makes people amiable, cheer- 
 ful, lovely, and honourable ; that it is God who gives 
 happiness and all the joys of life : but which god ? 
 Not those three maidens ; they are but a dream and 
 fancy. All that is lovely and pleasant in men and 
 women — and our life here, and our everlasting life after 
 death, in this world and in all worlds to come — all 
 comes from Jesus Christ and from Him alone. God has 
 gathered together all things in Him, whether things in 
 heaven or things on earth ; and He bestows blessings 
 and graces on all who will ask Him, to each as much as 
 is good for him. He is full of grace — more full of it 
 than all the human beings in the world put together. 
 All tlie goodness and sweetness, and all the graciousness 
 which you ever saw in all the men and women whcan 
 you ever met ; all the goodness and sweetness which you 
 ever fancied for yourselves, all put together is not to be 
 compared to Him. For He is the perfect brightness of 
 God's glory, and the express image of God's person ; and 
 in Him is gathered together all grace, all goodness, all 
 which makes men or angels good, and lovely, and loving. 
 All is in Him, and He gives it freely to all, said the 
 apostles ; we know that He speaks truth, we have seen 
 Him ; our eyes saw Him, our hands touched Him, and 
 
1 84 Grace. 
 
 there was a glory about Him such as there never could 
 be about any other person. A glory as of the only be- 
 gotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. A person 
 whom we could not help loving ; could not help admir- 
 ing ; could not help trusting; could not help giving our- 
 selves up to — to live for Him, and if need be, die for 
 Him. 
 
 And, said the apostles, there was a grace of truth in 
 another of your heathen fancies. You thought that 
 these goddesses, because they were amiable and inno- 
 cent themselves, liked to make every one amiable, inno- 
 cent, and happy also. Your conscience, your reason were 
 right there. That is the very nature of grace, not to 
 keep itself to itself, but to spend itself on every one 
 round it, and try to make every one like itself If a 
 man be good, he will long to make others good ; if 
 tender, he will long to make others tender ; if gentle, he 
 will long to make others gentle ; if cheerful, he will long 
 to make others cheerful; if forgiving, be will long to make 
 others forgiving ; if happy, he will long to make others 
 happy. Then said the apostles, only believe that the Lord 
 Jesus Christ, just because He is full of grace, wishes to 
 fill you with grace, ten thousand times better grace than 
 you ever fancied those false goddesses could give you — 
 of His fulness you may all receive, and grace for grace. 
 All the grace of this world comes from Him — health, and 
 youth, and happiness, and all the innocent pleasures of 
 life, and He delights in giving you them. But, over and 
 above that, comes a deejjer and nobler grace — spiritual 
 grace, the grace of the immortal soul, which will last on, 
 and make you loving and lovcable, pure and true, gra- 
 
Grace. 185 
 
 cious and generous, honourable and worthy of respect, 
 when the grace of the body is gone, and the eye is 
 grown dim, and the hair is grey, and the limbs feeble ; 
 a grace which will make you gracious in old age, graci- 
 ous in death, gracious for ever and ever, after the body 
 has crumbled again to its dust. Whatsoever things are 
 honourable, lovely, and of good report ; whatsoever 
 tempers of mind make you a comfort to yourselves and 
 all around you ; Christ has them all, and He can give 
 you them all, one after the other, till Christ be formed 
 in you, till you come to be perfect men and women, to 
 the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. 
 Come, then, boldly to His throne of grace, to find 
 mercy, and grace to help you in the time of need. 
 
 This was what the apostles taught the heathen, and 
 their words were true. You may see them come true 
 round you every day. For, my friends, just as far as 
 people pray for Christ's grace, and give themselves up 
 to be led by God's Spirit, they become full of grace 
 themselves, court.eous and civil, loving and amiable, true 
 and honourable — a pleasure to themselves and to all 
 round them. While, on the other hand ; all rudeness, 
 all ill-temper, all selfishness, all greediness are just so 
 many sins against the grace of Christ, which grieve the 
 Spirit of God, at the same time that they grieve our 
 neighbours for whom Christ died, and cut us oflF, as long 
 as we give way to them, from the communion of saints. 
 
 Well would it be for married people, if they would 
 but remember this. Well for them, for their own sake 
 and for their children's. "Heirs together," St Peter says 
 they are, " of the grace of life." Think of those words ; 
 
1 86 Grace. 
 
 for in them lies the true secret of happiness. Not in the 
 mere grace of youth, which pleases the fancy at first ; 
 that must soon fade ; and then comes, too often, coldness 
 between man and wife ; neglect, rudeness, ill-temper, 
 because the grace of life is not there — the grace of the 
 inner life, of the immortal soul, which alone makes life 
 pleasant, even tolerable, to two people who are bound 
 together for better or for worse. But yet, unless St 
 Peter be mistaken, the fault in such sad case is on the 
 man's side. Yes, we must face that truth, we men; and 
 face it like men. If we are unhappy in our marriage 
 it is our own fault. It is the woman who is the weaker, 
 says St Peter, and selfish men are apt to say, " Then it 
 is the woman's fault, if we are not happy." St Peter 
 says exactly the opposite. He says, — Because she is the 
 weaker you are the stronger ; and therefore it is your 
 fault if she is not what she should be ; for you are able 
 to help her, and lead her ; you took her to your heart 
 for that very purpose, you swore to cherish her. 
 Because she is the weaker, you can teach her, help 
 her, improve her character, if you will You have 
 more knowledge of life and the world than she has. 
 Dwell with her according to knowledge, says St Peter; 
 use your experience to set her right if she be wrong ; 
 and use your experience and your strength, too, to keep 
 down your own temper and your own selfishness toward 
 her, to bear and forbear, to give and forgive, live and 
 let live. Remember that you are heirs together of the 
 grace of life ; and if the grace of life is not in you, you 
 cannot expect it to be in her. And what is the grace of 
 Ufe ? It must be the grace of Christ. St John says 
 
Grace. 187 
 
 that Christ is the Life. And what is the grace of 
 Christ ? Christ's grace, Christ's gracefulness, Christ's 
 beautiful and noble and loving character — the grace of 
 Christ is Christ's likeness. Do you ask what will 
 Christ give me ? He will give you Himself. He will 
 make you like Himself, partaker of His grace ; and 
 what is that ? It is this — to be loving, gentle, 
 temperate, courteous, condescending, self-sacrificing. 
 Giving honour to those who are weaker than yourself, 
 just because they are weaker; ready and willing, ay, 
 and counting it an honour to take trouble for other 
 people, to be of use to other people, to give way to 
 other people ; and, above all, to the woman who has 
 given herself to you, body and soul. That is the grace 
 of Christ ; that is the grace of life ; that is what makes 
 life worth having : ay, makes it a foretaste of heaven 
 upon earth ; when man and wife are heirs together of 
 the grace of life, of all those tempers which make life 
 graceful and pleasant, giving way to each other in 
 everything which is not wrong ; studying each other's 
 comfort, taking each other's advice, shutting their eyes to 
 each other's little failings, and correcting each other's great 
 failings, not by harsh words, but silently and kindly, by 
 example. And if the man will do that, there is little 
 fear but that the woman will do it also. And so, their 
 prayers are not hindered. 
 
 Married people cannot pray, they have no heart to 
 pray, while they are discontented with each other. They 
 feel themselves wrong, and because they are parted from 
 each other, they feel parted from God too ; and their 
 seliishness or anger rises as a black wall, not merely 
 
1 88 Grace. 
 
 between them, but between each of them and God. 
 And so the grace of life is indeed gone away from them, 
 and the whole world looks dark and ugly to them, be- 
 cause it is not bright and cheerful in the light of Christ's 
 grace, which makes all the world fuU of sunshine and 
 joy. But it need not be so, friends. It would not be so, 
 if married people would take the advice which the 
 Prayer Book gives them, and come to Holy communion. 
 Would to God, my friends, that all married people 
 would understand what that Holy communion says to 
 them ; and come together Sunday after Sunday to that 
 throne of grace, there to receive of Christ's fulness, and 
 grace upon grace. For that Table says to you : You 
 are heirs together of the grace of life ; you are not 
 meant merely to feed together for a few short years, at 
 the same table, on the bread which perishes, but to 
 feed for ever together on the bread which comes down 
 from heaven, even on Christ Himself, the life of the 
 world ; to receive life from His life, that you may live 
 together such a life as He lived, and lives stiU ; to 
 receive grace from the fulness of His grace, that you 
 may be full of grace as He is. That Table tells you 
 that because you both must live by the same life of 
 Christ, you must live the same life as each other, 
 and grow more and more like each other year by year ; 
 that as you both receive the same grace of Christ, you 
 will become more and more gracious to each other year 
 by year, and both grow together, nearer and dearer to 
 each other, more worthy of each other's respect, more 
 worthy of each other's trust, more worthy of each 
 other's love. And then " till death us do part " may 
 
Grace. 189 
 
 mean what it will. Let death part what of them he 
 can part, the perishing mortal body ; he has no power 
 over the soul, or over the body which shall rise to life 
 eternal. Let death do his worst. They belong to 
 Christ who conquered death, and they live by His 
 everlasting life, and their life is hid with Christ in God, 
 where death cannot reach it or find it ; and therefore 
 their life and their love, and the grace of it, will last as 
 long as Christ's life and Christ's love, and Christ's 
 grace last — and that will be for ever and ever. 
 
SERMON XXI. 
 
 FATHER AND CHILD. 
 Eversley. 1861. 
 
 1 CoE. i. 4, 5, 7. 
 
 " I thank ray God always on your behalf, for the grace of God which 
 is given you by Jesus Christ. That in every thing ye are enriched 
 by Him, in all utterance, and in aU knowledge. ... So that ye 
 come behind in no gift ; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ. "Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be 
 blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." 
 
 This text is a very important one. It ought to 
 teach me how I should treat you. It ought to teach 
 you how you should treat your children. It ought to 
 teach you how God, your heavenly Father, treats you. 
 You see at the first glance how cheerful and hopeful St 
 Paul is about these Corinthians. He is always thanking 
 God, he says, about them, for the grace of God which 
 was given them by Jesus Christ, that in everything 
 they were enriched by Him, in all utterance and in all 
 knowledge. And he has good hope for them. Nay, 
 he seems to be certain about them, that they wU] 
 persevere, and conquer, and be saved ; for Christ Him- 
 self will confirm them (that is strengthen them) to the 
 end, that they may be blameless in the way of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ. 
 
 If we knew no more of these Corinthians than what 
 
Father' and Child. 191 
 
 these words tell us, we should suppose that they were 
 very great saints, leading holy and irreproachable lives 
 before God and man. But we know that it was not so. 
 That they were going on very ill. That this is the 
 beginning of an epistle in which St Paul is going to 
 rebuke them very severely ; and to tell them, that unless 
 they mend, they will surely become reprobates, and be 
 lost after all. He is going to rebuke them for having 
 heresies among them, that is religious parties and reli- 
 gious quarrels — very much as we have now ; for being 
 puffed up with spiritual self-conceit; for despising and 
 disparaging him ; for loose lives, allowing (in one case) 
 such a crime among them as even the heathen did not 
 allow; for profaning the Lord's Supper, to such an extent 
 that some seem even to have got drunk at it; for want of 
 charity to each other ; for indulging in fanatical excite- 
 ment ; for denying, some of them, the resurrection of 
 the dead ; on the whole, for being in so unwholesome a 
 state of mind that he has to warn them solemnly of the 
 fearful example of the old Israelites, who perished in 
 the wilderness for their sins — as they will perish, he 
 hints, unless they mend. 
 
 And yet he begins by thanking God for them, by 
 speaking of them, and to them, in this cheerful and 
 hopeful tone. 
 
 Does that seem strange ? Why should it seem 
 strange, my friends, to us, if we are in the habit of 
 training our children, and rebuking our children, as we 
 ought ? If we have to rebuke our children for doina 
 wrong, do we begin by trying to break their hearts ? by 
 Taking up old offences, by reproaching them with all the 
 
192 Father and Child. 
 
 Wrong they ever did in their lives, and giving them to 
 understand that they are thoroughly bad, and have 
 altogether lost our love, so that we will have nothing 
 more to do with them unless they mend ? Or do we 
 begin by making them feel that however grieved we are 
 with them, we love them still ; that however wrong they 
 have been, there is right feeling left in them still ; and 
 by giving them credit for whatever good there is in 
 them — by appealing to that ; calling on them to act up 
 to that ; to be true to themselves, and to their better 
 nature ; saying, You can do right in one thing — then do 
 right in another — and do right in all ? If we do not do 
 this we do wrong ; we destroy our children's self-respect, 
 we make them despair of improving, we make them fancy 
 themselves bad children : that is the very surest plan 
 we can take to make them bad children, by making 
 them reckless. 
 
 But if we be wise parents — such parents to our chil- 
 dren as St Paul was to his spiritual children, the Corin- 
 thians — we shall do by them just what St Paul did by 
 these Corinthians. Before he says one harsh word to 
 them, he will awaken in them faith and love. He will 
 make them trust him and love him, all the more because 
 he knows that through false teaching they do not trust 
 and love him as they used to do. But till they do, he 
 knows that there is no use in rebuking them. Till they 
 trust him and love him, they will not listen to him. 
 And how does he try to bring them round to him ? By 
 praising them : — by telling them that he trusts them and 
 loves them, because in spite of all their faults there is 
 something in them worthy to be loved and trusted. He 
 
Father and Child. 193 
 
 begins by giving them credit for whatever good there is 
 in them. They are rich in all utterance and all know- 
 ledge ; that is, they are very brilliant and eloquent 
 talkers about spiritual things, and also very deep and 
 subtle thinkers about spiritual things. So far so good. 
 These are great gifts — gifts of Christ, too, — tokens that 
 God's spirit is with them, and that all they need is to be 
 true to His gracious inspirations. Then, when he has 
 told them that, or rather made them understand that 
 he knows that, and is delighted at it, then he can go on 
 safely and boldly to tell them of their sins also in the 
 plainest and sternest and yet the most tender and fatherly 
 language. 
 
 This is very important, my friends. I cannot tell you 
 fully how important I think it, in more ways than one. 
 I am sure that if we took St Paul's method with our 
 children we should succeed with them far better than we 
 do. And I think, I have thought long, that if we could 
 see that St Paul's method with those Corinthians was 
 actually the same as God's method with us, we should 
 have far truer notions of God, and God's dealings with us; 
 and should reverence and value far more that Holy 
 Catholic Church into which we have been, by God's 
 infinite mercy, baptized, and wherein we have been 
 educated. 
 
 For, and now I entreat you to listen to me carefully, 
 you who have sound heads and earnest hearts, ready and 
 willing to know the truth about God and yourselves, if 
 St Paul looked at the Corinthians in this light, may not 
 God have looked at them in the same light ? If St Paul 
 accepted them for the sake of the good which was in 
 
 N 
 
1 94 Father and Child. 
 
 them, in spite of all their faults, may not God have ac- 
 cepted them for the sake of the good which was in them, 
 in spite of all their faults ? and may not He accept us 
 likewise ? I think it must be so. For was not St Paul 
 an inspired apostle ? and are not these words of his in- 
 spired by the Holy Spirit of God ? But if so, then the 
 Spirit of God must have looked at these Corinthians in 
 the same light as St Paul, and therefore God must do 
 likewise, because the Holy Spirit is God. Must it not 
 be so ? Can we suppose that God would take one view 
 of these Corinthians, and then inspire St Paul to take 
 another view ? What does being inspired mean at all, 
 save having the mind of Christ and of God, — ^being 
 taught to see men and things as God sees them, to feel 
 for them and think of them as God does ? If inspiration 
 does not mean that, what does it mean ? Therefore, I 
 think, we have a right to believe that St Paul's words 
 express the mind of God concerning these Corinthians ; 
 that God was pleased with their utterance and their 
 knowledge, and accepted them for that ; and that in the 
 same way God is pleased with whatsoever He sees good 
 in us, and accepts us for that. But, remember, not for 
 our own works or deservings any more than these 
 Corinthians. They were, and we are accepted in Christ, 
 and for the merits of Christ. And any good points in 
 us, or in these Corinthians, as St Paul says expressly 
 (here and elsewhere), are not our own, but come from 
 Christ, by the inspiration of His Holy Spirit. 
 
 I know many people do not think thus. They think 
 of God as looking only at our faults; as extreme to mark 
 what is done amiss ; as never content with us ; as always 
 
Father and Child. 195 
 
 crying to men, Yes, you have done this and that well, 
 and yet not quite well, for even in what you have done 
 there are blots and mistakes ; but this and that you have 
 not done, and therefore you are still guilty, still under 
 infinite displeasure. And they think that they exalt 
 God's holiness by such thoughts, and magnify His hatred 
 of sin thereby. And they invent arguments to prove 
 themselves right, such as this : That because God is an 
 infinite being, every sin committed against Him is infinite ; 
 and therefore deserves an infinite punishment; which is 
 a juggle of words of which any educated man ought to 
 be ashamed. 
 
 I do not know where, in the Bible, they find all this. 
 Certainly not in the writings of St Paul. They seem to 
 me to find it, not in the Bible at all, but in their own 
 hearts, judging that God must be as hard upon His chil- 
 dren as they are apt to be upon their own. I know that 
 God is never content with us, or with any man. How 
 can He be ? But in what sense is He not content ? In 
 the sense in which a hard task-master is not content with 
 his slave, when he flogs him cruelly for the slightest 
 fault ? Or in the sense in which a loving father is not 
 content with his child, grieving over him, counselling 
 him, as long as he sees him, even in the slightest matter, 
 doing less well than he might do ? Think of that, and 
 when you have thought of it, believe that in this grand 
 text St Paul speaks really by the Spirit of God, and ac- 
 cording to the mind of God, and teaches not these old 
 Corinthians merely, but you and your children after you, 
 what is the mind of God concerning you, what is the 
 light in which God looks upon you. For, if you will but 
 
196 Father and Child. 
 
 think over your own lives, and over the Catechism which 
 you learned in your youth, has not God's way of dealing 
 with you been just the same as St Paul's with those 
 Corinthians, teaching you to love and trust Him almost 
 before He taught you the difference between right and 
 wrong ? I know that some think otherwise. Many who 
 do not belong to the Church, and many, alas ! who pro- 
 fess to belong to the Church, will tell you that God's 
 method is, first to terrify men by the threats of the law 
 and the sight of their sins and the fear of damnation, and 
 afterwards to reveal to them the gospel and His mercy 
 and salvation in Christ. Now I can only answer that it 
 is not so. Not so in fact. These preachers themselves 
 may do it ; but that is no proof that God does it. What 
 God's plan is can only be known from facts, from experi- 
 ence, from what actually happens ; first in God's kingdom 
 of nature, and next in God's kingdom of grace, which is 
 the Church. And in the kingdom of nature how does 
 God begin with mankind ? "What are a child's first im- 
 pressions of this life ? Does he hear voices from heaven 
 telling little children that they are lost sinners ? Does 
 he see lightning come from heaven to strike sinners dead, 
 or earthquakes rise and swallow them up ? Nothing of 
 the kind. A child's first impressions of this life, what 
 are they but pleasure ? His mother's breast, warmth, 
 light, food, play, flowers, and all pleasant things, — by 
 these God educates the child, even of the heathen and 
 the savage : — and why ? If haply he may feel after 
 God and find Him, and find that He is a God of love 
 and mercy, a giver of good things, who knows men's 
 necessities before they ask, — a good and loving God, 
 
Father and Child. 197 
 
 and not a being such as I will not, I dare not 
 speak of. 
 
 I say with the very heathen God deals thus. We have 
 plain Scripture for that. For we have, and thanks be to 
 God that we have, in such times as these, a missionary 
 sermon preached by St Paul to the heathen at Lystra. 
 And in that is not one word concerning these terrors of 
 the law. He says, I preach to you God, whom you 
 ought to have known of yourselves, because He has not 
 left Himself without witness. And what is this witness 
 of which the apostle speaks ? Wrath and terror and 
 destruction % Not so, says St Paul. This is His wit- 
 ness, that He has sent you rain and fruitful seasons, 
 filling your heart with food and gladness. His goodness. 
 His bounty, — it is the witness of God and of the character 
 of God. There is wrath and terror enough, says St Paul 
 elsewhere, awaiting those who go on in sin. But then 
 what does he say is their sin ? Despising the goodness 
 of God, by which He has been trying to win mankind to 
 love and trust Him, before He threatens and before He 
 punishes at all. So much for the terrors of the law com- 
 ing before the good news of the gospel in God's kingdom 
 of nature. 
 
 And still less do the terrors of the law come first in 
 God's kingdom of grace, which is the Church. They did 
 not come first to you or to me, or to any one in His 
 Church who has been taught, as churchmen should be, 
 their Catechism. If any have been, unhappily for them 
 brought up to learn Catechisms and hymns which do not 
 belong to the Church, and which terrify little children 
 with horrible notions of God's wrath, and the torments 
 
1 98 Father and Child. 
 
 prepared not merely for wicked men, but for unconverted 
 children, and then teach them to say, — 
 
 " Can sucli a wretcli as I 
 Escape this dreadful end ? " 
 
 SO much the worse for them. We, who are Church 
 people, are bound to believe that God speaks to us through 
 the Church books, and that it was His will that we should 
 have been brought up to believe the Catechism. And 
 in that Catechism we heard not one word of these terrors of 
 the law or of God's wrath hanging over us. We were taught 
 that before we even knew right from wrong, God adopted 
 us freely as His children, freely forgave us our original 
 sin for the sake of Christ's blood, freely renewed us by His 
 Holy Spirit, freely placed us in His Church ; — that we 
 might love Him, because He first loved us ; trust Him 
 because He has done all that even God could do to win 
 our trust ; and obey Him, because we are boundlessly 
 in debt to Him for boundless mercies. This is God's 
 method with us in His Church, and what is it but St 
 Paul's method with these Corinthians ? 
 
 Believe this, then, you who wish to be Churchmen in 
 spirit and in truth. Believe that St Paul's conduct is 
 to you a type and pattern of what God does, and what 
 you ought to do. That God's method of winning you to do 
 right is to make you love Him and trust Him ; and that 
 your method of winning your children to do right is to 
 make them love and trust you. Let us remember that 
 if our children are not perfect, they at least inherited 
 their imperfections from us ; and if our Father in heaven, 
 from whom we inherit no sin, but only good, have 
 
Father and Child. 1 99 
 
 patience with us, shall we not have patience with our 
 children, who owe to us their fallen nature ? 
 
 Ah ! cast thy bread upon the waters, — tlie bread 
 which even the poorest can give to their children abun- 
 dantly and without stint, — the bread of charity, — human 
 tenderness, forbearance, hopefulness, — cast that bread 
 upon the waters, and thou shalt find it after many days. 
 
SERMON XXII. 
 
 GOD IS OUR REFUGE. 
 Westminster Ahhey, 1873. 
 
 Psalm xlvi. 1. 
 " God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.'' 
 
 This is a noble psalm, full of hope and comfort ; and it 
 will be more and more full of hope and comfort, the 
 more faithfully we believe in the incarnation, the pas- 
 sion, the resurrection, and the ascension of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ. For if we are to give credit to His express 
 words, and to those of every book of the New Testament, 
 and to the opinion of that Church into which we are 
 baptised, then Jesus Christ is none other than the same 
 Jehovah, Lord, and God who brought the Jews out of 
 Egypt, who guided them and governed them through all 
 their history — teaching, judging, rewarding, punishing 
 them and all the nations of the earth. This psalm, 
 therefore, is concerning our Lord Jesus Christ, to tvhom 
 all power is given in heaven and earth, and who ascended 
 up on high; that He might be as He had been from the 
 beginning. King of kiugs and Lord of lords, the Master 
 of this world and all the nations in it. This psalm, 
 therefore, is a hymn concerning the kingdom of Christ 
 and of God. It tells us something of the government 
 
God is our Refiige. 201 
 
 which Christ has been exercising over the world ever 
 since the beginning of it, and which He is exercising 
 over this world now. It bids us be still, and know that 
 He is God — that He will be exalted among the nations, 
 and will be exalted in the earth, whether men like it or 
 not ; but that they ought to like it and rejoice in it, and 
 find comfort in the thought that Christ Jesus is their 
 refuge and their strength — a very present help in 
 trouble — as the old Jew who wrote this psalm found 
 comfort. 
 
 When this psalm was written, or what particular 
 events it speaks of, I cannot teU, for I do not think we 
 have any means of finding out. It may have been 
 written in the time of David, or of Solomon, or of Heze- 
 kiah. It may possibly have been written much later. It 
 seems to me probably to refer — but I speak with extreme 
 diffidence — to that Assyrian invasion, and that preserva- 
 tion of Jerusalem, of which we heard in the magnificent 
 first lesson for this morning and this afternoon; when, at 
 the same time that the Assyrians were crushing, one by 
 one, every nation in the East, there was, as the elder 
 Isaiah and Micah tell us plainly, a great volcanic out- 
 break in the Holy Land. But all this matters very 
 little to us ; because events analogous to those of which 
 it speaks have happened not once only, but many times, 
 and will happen often again. And this psalm lays 
 down a rule for judging of such startling and terrible 
 events whenever they happen, and for saying of them, 
 " God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in 
 trouble." It seems from the beginning of the psalm that 
 there had been earthquakes or hurricanes in Judea — more 
 
202 God is our Refuge. 
 
 probably earthquakes, which were and are now frequent 
 there. It seems as if the land had been shaken, and 
 cliffs thrown into the sea, which had rolled back in a 
 mighty wave, such as only too often accompanies an 
 earthquake. But the Psalmist knew that that was 
 God's doing ; and therefore he would not fear, though 
 the earth was moved, and though the hills were 
 carried into the very midst of the sea. It seems, 
 moreover, that Jerusalem itself had, as in Hezekiah's 
 time, not been shaken, or at least seriously injured, 
 by the earthquake. But why ? " God is in the 
 midst of her, therefore shall she not be removed." It 
 seems, also, as if the earthquake or hurricane had been 
 actually a benefit to Jerusalem — which was often then, 
 and has been often since, in want of water — that either 
 fresh springs had broken out, or abundant rain had 
 fallen, as occurs at times in such convulsions of nature. 
 But that, too, was God's doing on behalf of His chosen 
 city. " The rivers of the flood " had made " glad the 
 city of God, the holy place of the tabernacle of the most 
 highest." 
 
 Moreover, there seem to have been great disturb- 
 ances and wars among the nations round. The heathen 
 had made much ado, and the kingdoms had been moved. 
 But whatever their plans were, it was God who had 
 brought them to naught. God had showed His voice, and 
 the earth melted away ; and (we know not how) discom- 
 fiture had fallen upon them, and a general peace had 
 followed. " come hither," says the Psalmist, " and 
 behold the works of the Lord, what desolations He has 
 made in the earth." Not a desolation of cruelty and 
 
God is oii-r Refttge. 203 
 
 tyranny : but a desolation of mercy and justice ; putting 
 down the proud, the aggressive, the ruthless, and helping 
 the meek, the simple, the industrious, and the innocent. 
 It is He, says the Psalmist, who has made wars to cease 
 in all the world, who has broken the bow and snapped 
 the spear in sunder, and burned the chariots in the fire ; 
 and so, by the voice of fact, said to these kings and to 
 their armies, if they would but understand it, " Be still, 
 and know that I am God " — that I, not you, will be 
 exalted among the nations — that I, not you, will be ex- 
 alted in the earth. 
 
 Such is the 46th Psalm, one of the noblest utterances 
 of the whole Old Testament. And is it not as true for 
 us now, ay, for all nations and all mankind now, as it 
 was when it was uttered ? Is not Jesus Christ the 
 same yesterday, to-day, and for ever ? Have His words 
 passed away ? Did He say in vain, " All power is given 
 unto me in heaven and earth ? " Did He say in vain, 
 " Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the 
 world ? " I trust not. I trust and I hope that you, or 
 at least some here, believe that Christ is ruling and guid- 
 ing the world, the church, and every individual soul who 
 trusts in Him toward — ■ 
 
 " One £ar off divine event, 
 
 To which the whole creation moves. " 
 
 I hope you do have that trust, for your own sakes, 
 for the sake of your own happiness, your own sound 
 peace of mind ; for then, and then only, you can afford 
 to be hopeful concerning yourselves, your families, your 
 country, and the whole human race. It must be so. 
 If you believe that He who hung upon the cross for aD 
 
204 God is our Refuge. 
 
 mankind is your refuge and strength, and the refuge 
 and strength of all mankind, then, amid all the changes 
 and chances of this mortal life, you can afford to be still 
 calm in sudden calamity, patient in long afflictions ; for 
 you know that He is God, He is the Lord, He is the 
 Redeemer, He is the King. He knows best. He must 
 be right, whosoever else is wrong. Let Him do what 
 seemeth Him good. 
 
 Now I cannot but feel (what wiser and better men 
 than I am feel more deeply), that this old-fashioned faith 
 in the living Christ is dying out among us. That men 
 do not believe as they used to do in the living Lord and 
 in His government, in that perpetual divine providence 
 which the Scriptures call " the kingdom of God." 
 They have lost faith in Christ's immediate and per- 
 sonal government of the world and its nations ; and, 
 therefore, they are tempted more and more, either to 
 try to misgovern the world themselves, or to fancy that 
 Christ has entrusted His government, as to a substitute 
 and vicar, to an aged priest at Rome. They have lost 
 faith, likewise, in Christ's immediate government of 
 themselves ; their own fortunes, their own characters, 
 and inmost souls ; and, therefore, they are tempted 
 either to follow no rule or guidance save their own 
 instincts, passions, fancies ; or else, in despair at their 
 own inward anarchy, to commit the keeping of their 
 souls to directors and confessors, instead of to Christ 
 Himself, the Lord of the spirits of all flesh. 
 
 Yes, the faith which keeps a man ever face to face 
 with God and with Christ, in the least as well as in the 
 greatest events of life ; which says in prosperity and in 
 
God is our Refuge. 205 
 
 adversity, in plenty and scarcity, in joy and sorrow, in 
 peace and war, — It is the Lord's doing, it is the Lord's 
 sending, and therefore we can trust in the Lord — that 
 faith is growing, I fear, very rare. That faith was more 
 common, I think, a generation or two back, in old- 
 fashioned church people than in any other. It could 
 not help being so ; for the good old Prayer-Book upon 
 which they were brought up is more full of that simple 
 and living faith in the Lord, from beginning to end, than 
 any other book on earth except the Bible. It was more 
 common, too, and I suppose always will be, among the 
 poor than among the rich ; for the poor soon find out 
 how little they have to depend upon except the Lord and 
 His good providence ; while the rich are tempted, and 
 always will be, to depend upon their own wealth and 
 their own power, to trust in uncertain riches, and say, 
 " Soul, take thine ease, thou hast much goods laid up 
 for many years." It was more common, too, and I sup- 
 pose always will be, among the old than among the young; 
 for the young are tempted to trust not in the Lord, but 
 in their own health, strength, wit, courage, and to put 
 their hopes, not on God's Providence, but on the unknown 
 chapter of accidents in the future, most of which will 
 never come to pass ; while the old have learned by 
 experience and disappointment the vanity of human 
 riches, the helplessness of human endeavour, the blind- 
 ness of human foresight, and are content to go where 
 God leads them, and say, "I will go forth in the strength 
 of the Lord God, and will make mention of Thy righteous- 
 ness only. Thou, O God, hast taught me fi'om my youth 
 up until now : therefore will I tell of Thy wondrous 
 
2o6 God is our Refuge. 
 
 works. Forsake me not, God, in mine old age, when 
 I am grey-headed ; until I have showed Thy strength 
 unto this generation, and Thy power to all them which 
 are yet for to come." 
 
 But, for some reason or other, this generation does 
 not seem to care to see God's strength ; and those that 
 are yet for to come seem likely to believe Jess and less 
 in God's power — believe less and less that they are in 
 Christ's kingdom, and that Christ is ruling over them 
 and all the world. They have not faith in the Living 
 Lord. But they must get back that faith, if they wish 
 to keep that wealth and prosperity after which every 
 one scrambles so greedily nowadays ; for those who for- 
 get God are treading, they and their children after them, 
 not, as they fancy, the road to riches — they are treading 
 the road to ruin. So it always was, so it always will 
 be. Yet the majority of mankind will not see it, and the 
 preacher must not expect to be believed when he says 
 it. Nevertheless it is true. Those who forget that they 
 are in Christ's kingdom, Christ does not go out of Hi.t! 
 way to punish them. They simply punish themselves. 
 They earn their own ruin by the very laws of human 
 nature. They must find hope in something and strength 
 in something ; and if they wiU not see that God is their 
 hope, they will hope to get rich as fast as possible, and 
 make themselves safe so. If they will not see that 
 God is their strength, they will find strength in cunning, 
 in intrigue, in flattery of the strong and tyranny over 
 the weak, and in making themselves strong so. They 
 want a present help in trouble ; and if they will not 
 believe that God is a present help in trouble, they will 
 
God is our Refuge. 207 
 
 try to help themselves out of their trouble by begging, 
 lying, swindling, forging, and all those meannesses which 
 fill our newspapers with shameful stories day by day, 
 and which all arise simply out of want of faith in God. 
 
 Moreover, it is written, " Be still, and know that I 
 am God.'' And if men will not be still, they will not 
 know that He is God. And if they do not know that 
 the gracious Christ is God, they will not be still ; and 
 therefore they will grow more and more restless, discon- 
 tented, envious, violent, irreverent, full of passions 
 which injure their own souls, and sap the very founda- 
 tions of order and society and civilised life. And 
 what can come out of all these selfish passions, when 
 they are let loose, but that in which selfishness must 
 always end, but that same mistrust and anarchy, 
 ending in that same poverty and wretchedness, under 
 which so many countries of the world now lie, as it were, 
 weltering in the mire. Alas ! say rather weltering in 
 their own life-blood — and all because they have forgotten 
 the living God ? 
 
 Oh, my dear friends, take these words solemnly to 
 heart — ^for yourselves, and for your children after you. 
 If you wish to prosper on the earth, let God be in all 
 your thoughts. Remember that the Lord is on your 
 right hand ; and then, and then alone, will you not be 
 moved, either to terror or to sin, by any of the chances 
 and changes of this mortal life. " Fret not thyself," 
 says the Psalmist, " else shalt thou be moved to do 
 evil." And the only way not to fret yourselves is to 
 remember that God is your refuge and strength, a very 
 present help in trouble. " He that believeth," saith the 
 
2o8 God is our Refuge. 
 
 Prophet, "shall not make haste" — not hurry himself into 
 folly and disappointment and shame. Why should you 
 hurry, if you remember that you are in the kingdom of 
 Christ and of God ? You cannot hurry God's Providence, 
 if you would ; you ought not, if you could. God rmi^ 
 know best ; God's Laws mnist work at the right pace, and 
 fulfil His Will in the right way and at the right time. 
 As for what that Will is, we can know from the angels' 
 song on Christmas Eve, which told us how God's Will was 
 a good will towards men. 
 
 For who is our Lord ? Who is our King ? Who is 
 our Governor ? Who is our Lawgiver ? Who is our 
 Guide ? Christ, who died for us on Calvary ; who rose 
 again for us; who ascended into heaven for us; who sits at 
 God's right hand for us ; who sent down His Holy Spirit 
 at the first Whitsuntide ; and sends Him down for ever 
 to us ; that by His gracious inspiration we may both 
 perceive and know what we ought to do, and also may 
 have grace and power faithfully to fulfil the same ? 
 With such a King over us, how can the world but go 
 right ? With such a King over us, what refuge or 
 strength or help in trouble do we need but Him Him- 
 self ? — His Providence, which is Love, and His Laws, 
 which are Life. 
 
SERMON XXIII. 
 
 PRIDE AND HUMILITY. 
 Everdey, 1869. Chester Cathedral, 1870. 
 
 1 St. Peter v. 5. 
 " God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble." 
 
 Let me, this evening, say a few words to you on 
 theology, that is, on the being and character of God. 
 You need not be afraid that I shall use long or difficult 
 words. Sound theology is simple enough, and I hope 
 that my words about it will be simple enough for the 
 worst scholar here to understand. 
 
 " God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to 
 the humble." Now, this saying is an old one. It 
 had been said, in different words, centuries before 
 St Peter said it. The old prophets and psalmists say 
 it again and again. The idea of it runs through 
 the whole of the Old Testament, as anyone must 
 know who has read his Bible with common care. 
 But why should it be true ? What reason is there for 
 it ? What is there in the character of God which 
 makes it reasonable, probable, likely to be true ? That 
 God would give grace to the humble, and reward men 
 for bowing down before His Majesty, seems not so 
 difficult to understand. But why should God resist the 
 
 o 
 
2 lO Pride and Humility. 
 
 proud ? How does a man's being proud injure God, wto 
 is " I AM THAT I AM ; " perfectly self-sufficient, hav- 
 ing neither parts nor passions, who tempteth no man, 
 neither is tempted of any ? Why should God go out of 
 His way, as it were, to care for such a paltry folly as the 
 pride of an ignorant, weak, short-sighted creature like 
 man ? 
 
 Now, let us take care that we do not give a wrong 
 answer to this question — an answer which too many 
 have given, in their hearts and minds, though not 
 perhaps in words, and so have fallen into abject and 
 cruel superstitions, from which may God keep us, and our 
 children after us. They have said to themselves, God is 
 proud, and has a right to be proud : and therefore He 
 chooses no one to be proud but Himself Pride in 
 man calls out His pride, and makes Him angry. They 
 have thought of God as some despotic Sultan of the 
 Indies, who is surrounded, not by free men, but by 
 slaves ; who will have those slaves at his beck and nod. 
 In one word, they have thought of God as a tyrant. 
 They have thought of God, and, may God forgive them, 
 have talked of God as if He were like Nebuchadnezzar 
 of old, who, when the three young men refused to 
 obey him, was filled with rage and fury, and cast them 
 into a burning fiery furnace. That is some men's God — 
 a God who must be propitiated by crouching and 
 flattery, lest he should destroy them — a God who holds 
 all men as his slaves, and therefore hates pride in them. 
 For what has a slave to do with pride ? 
 
 But that is not the God of the Bible, my friends, nor 
 the God of Nature either, the God who made the world 
 
Pride and Htimility. 2 1 1 
 
 and man. For He is not a tyrant, but a Father. He 
 wishes men not to be His slaves, but His children. And 
 if He resists the proud, it is because children have no 
 right to be proud. If He resists the proud, it is in 
 fatherly love, because it is bad for them to be proud. 
 Not because the proud are injuring God, but because 
 they are injuring themselves, does God resist them, and 
 bring them low, and show them what they are, and 
 where they are, that they may repent, and be converted, 
 and turned back into the right way. 
 
 Remember always that God is your Father. This 
 question, like all questions between God and man, 
 is a question between a father and a child ; and if you 
 see it in any other light, and judge it by any other rule, 
 you see it and judge it wrongly, and learn nothing 
 about it, or worse than nothing. If God were reaUy 
 angry with, really hated, the proud man, or any other 
 man, would He need only to resist him ? would He have 
 to wait till the next life to punish him ? My dear 
 friends, if God really hated you or me, do you not 
 suppose that He would simply destroy us — get rid of us 
 — abolish us and annihilate us off the face of the earth, 
 just as we crush a gnat when it bites us ? 
 
 That God can do ; and more — He does it now and 
 then. He will endure with much long suffering vessels 
 of wrath, fitted to destruction : but a moment sometimes 
 comes when He will endure them no longer, and He 
 destroys them with the destruction for which they have 
 fitted themselves. In them is fulfilled the parable of 
 the rich man, who said to himself, " Soul, thou hast 
 much good laid up for many years ; take thine ease, eat, 
 
212 Pride and Humility. 
 
 drink, and be merry. But God said unto him. Thou 
 fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee." 
 
 But for the most part, thanks to the mercy of our 
 Heavenly Father, we are not destroyed by our pride and 
 for our pride. We are only chastened, as a father chastens 
 his child. And that we are chastised for pride, who does 
 not know ? What proverb more common, what proverb 
 more true, than that after pride comes a fall ? Do we 
 not know (if we do not, we shall know sooner or later) 
 that the surest way to fail in any undertaking is to set 
 about it in self-will and self-conceit ; that the surest 
 way to do a foolish thing, is to fancy that we are going 
 to do a very wise one ; that the surest way to make 
 ourselves ridiculous in the eyes of our fellow-men, is to 
 assume airs, and boast, shew ourselves off, and end by 
 shewing off only our own folly ? 
 
 Why is it so % Why has God so ordered the world 
 and human nature, that pride punishes itself ? Because, 
 I presume, pride is begotten and born of a lie, and 
 God hates a lie, because all lies lead to ruin, and this 
 lie of pride above all. It is as it were the root lie 
 of all lies. The very lie by which, as old tales tell, 
 Satan fell from heaven, and when he tried to become a 
 god in his own right, found himself, to his surprise and 
 disappointment, only a devil. For pride and self-conceit 
 contradict the original constitution of man and the uni- 
 verse, which is this — that of God are all things, and in 
 God are all things, and for God are all things. Man de- 
 pends on God. Self tells him that he depends on him- 
 self. Man has nothing but what he receives from God. 
 Self tells him that what he has is his own, and that he 
 
Pride and Humility. 213 
 
 has a right to do with it what he likes. Man knows no- 
 thing but what God teaches him. Self tells him that 
 he has found out everything for himself, and can say what 
 he thinks fit without fear of God or man. Therefore the 
 proud, self-willed, self-conceited man must come to harm, 
 like Malvolio in the famous play, merely because he is 
 in the blackest night of ignorance. He has mistaken 
 who he is, what he is, where he is. He is fancying him- 
 self, as many mad men do, the centre of the universe ; 
 while God is the centre of the universe. He is just as 
 certain to come to harm as a man would be on board 
 a ship, who should fancy that he himself, and not the 
 ship, was keeping him afloat, and step overboard to walk 
 upon the sea. We all know what would happen to that 
 man. Let us thank God our Father that He not only 
 knows what would happen to such men : but desires to 
 save them from the consequences of their own folly, by 
 letting them feel the consequences of their own folly. 
 
 Oh my friends, let us search our hearts, and pray 
 to our Father in Heaven to take out of them, by whal^ 
 ever painful means, the poisonous root of pride, self-con- 
 ceit, self-will. So only shall we be truly strong — truly 
 wise. So only shall we see what and where we are. 
 
 Do we pride ourselves on being something ? Shall 
 we pride ourselves on health and strength ? A tile fall- 
 ing off the roof, a little powder and lead in the hands of 
 a careless child, can blast us out of this world in a moment 
 — whither, who can tell ? What is our cleverness — our 
 strength of mind ? A tiny blood vessel bursting on the 
 brain, will make us in one moment paralytic, helpless, 
 babblers, and idiots. What is our knowledge of the 
 
214 Pride and Humility. 
 
 world ? That of a man, who is forcing his way alone 
 through a thick and pathless wood, where he has never 
 been before, to a place which he has never seen. What 
 is our wisdom — What does a wise man say of his ? 
 
 " So runs my dream ; but what am I ? 
 An infant crying in the night ; 
 An infant crying for the light ; 
 And with no language but a cry." 
 
 Yes. Our true knowledge is to know our own ignor- 
 ance. Our true strength is to know our own weakness. 
 Our true dignity is to coufess that we have no dignity, 
 and are nobo'dy, and nothing in ourselves, and to cast 
 ourselves down before the Dignity of God, under the 
 shadow of whose wings, and in the smile of whose 
 countenance, alone, is any created being safe. Let us 
 cling to our Father in Heaven, as a child, walking in the 
 night, clings to his father's hand. Let us take refuge 
 on the lowest step of the throne of Christ our Lord, and 
 humble ourselves under His mighty hand ; and, instead of 
 exalting ourselves in undue time, leave Him to exalt us 
 again in due time, when the chastisement has told on us, 
 and patience had her perfect work ; casting all our care on 
 Him, who surely cares for us still, if He cared for us 
 once, enough to die for us on the cross ; caring for Grod's 
 opinion and not for the opinion of the world. And then 
 we shall be among the truly humble, to whom God gives 
 o-race — first grace in their own hearts, that they may 
 live gracious lives, modest and contented, dignified and 
 independent, trusting in God and not in man ; and then, 
 orace in the eyes of their fellowmen, for what is more 
 graceful, what is more gracious, pleasant to see, pleasant 
 
Pride and Humility. 215 
 
 to deal with, than the humble man, the modest man ? 
 I do not mean the cringing man, the flattering man, 
 the man who apes humility for his own ends, because he 
 wants to climb high, by pretending to be lowly. He is 
 neither graceful or gracious. He is only contemptible, 
 and he punishes himself He spoils his own game. He 
 defeats his own purpose. For men despise him, and use 
 him, and throw him away when they have done with 
 him, as they throw away a dirty worn-out tool. 
 
 Not him do I mean by the humble man, the modest 
 man. I mean the man who, like a good soldier, knows 
 his place and keeps it, knows his duty, and does it ; 
 who expects to be treated as a man should be, with 
 fairness, consideration, respect, kindness — and God will 
 always treat him so, whether man does or not : but 
 who, beyond that, does not trouble his mind with 
 whether he be private or sergeant, lieutenant or colonel, 
 but with whether he can do his duty as private, his duty 
 as sergeant, his duty as lieutenant, his duty as colonel ; 
 who has learnt the golden lesson, which so few learn 
 in these struggling, envious, covetous, ambitious days, 
 namely, to abide in the calling to which he is called, 
 and in whatsoever state he is, therewith to be content. 
 To be sure that in God's world, the only safe way to be- 
 come ruler over many things is to be a good ruler over 
 a few things ; that if he is fit for better work than he is 
 doing now, God will find that out, sooner and more 
 surely than he, or any man will, and will set him about 
 it ; and that, meanwhile, God has set him about work 
 which he can do, and that the true wisdom is to do that 
 and do it well, and so approve himself alike to man and 
 
2 1 6 Pride and Htmiility. 
 
 God, humbling himself under the mighty hand of God, 
 that He may exalt him in good time, by giving him 
 grace and strength to do great things, as He has given 
 him grace and strength to do small things. 
 
 Am I speaking almost to deaf ears ? I fear that 
 few here will take my advice. I fear that many here 
 will have excellent excuses and plain reasons, why they 
 should not take it. Be it so. They cannot alter eternal 
 fact. In one word, they cannot alter Theology. They 
 cannot alter the laws of God. They cannot alter the 
 character of God. And sooner or later, in this world or 
 in the next, they will find out that Theology is right : 
 and St Peter is right : that God cZoes resist the proud, 
 that God dots give grace to the humble. 
 
SEKMON XXIV. 
 
 WORSHIP. 
 
 Eversley, September 4, 1870. 
 
 Revelation xi. 16, 17. 
 
 " And the four and twenty elders, which sat before God on their seats, 
 fell upon their faces, and worshipped God, saying, We give thee 
 thanks, Lord God Almighty, which art, and wast, and art to 
 come ; because thou hast taken to thee thy great power, and hast 
 reigned." 
 
 My Dear Friends, — I wish to speak a few plain words 
 to you this morning, on a matter which has been on 
 my mind ever since I returned from Chester, namely, — 
 The duty of the congregation to make the responses in 
 Church. 
 
 Now I am not going to scold — even to blame. To 
 do so would be not only unjust, but ungrateful in me, 
 to a congregation which is as attentive and as reverent 
 as you are. Indeed, I am the only person to blame, for 
 I ought to have spoken on the subject long ago. 
 
 As it is, coming fresh from Chester, and accustomed to 
 hear congregations, in that city and in the country 
 round, reading the responses aloud throughout the 
 service with earnestness, and reverence, I was pain- 
 fully struck by the silence in this church. I had be- 
 fore grown so accustomed to it that I did not perceive 
 
2 1 8 Worship. 
 
 it, just as one grows accustomed to a great many things 
 which ought not to be, till one forgets that, however 
 usual they may be, wrong they are, and ought to be 
 amended. 
 
 Now, it is always best to begin at the root of a 
 matter. So to begin at the root of this. Why do we 
 come to church at all ? 
 
 Some will say, to hear the sermon. That is often 
 too true. Some folks do come to church to hear a man 
 get up and preach, just as they go to a concert to hear 
 a man get up and sing, to amuse and interest them for 
 half-an-hour. Some go to hear sermons, doubtless, in 
 order that they may learn from them. But are there not, 
 especially in these days of cheap printing, books of devo- 
 tion, tracts, sermons, printed, which contain better preach- 
 ing than any which they are likely to hear in church ? 
 If teaching is all that they come to church for, they can 
 get that in plenty at home. Moreover, nine people out 
 of ten who come to church need no teaching at all. 
 They know already, just as well as the preacher, what is 
 right and what is wrong ; thoy know their duty ; they 
 know how to do it. And if they do not intend to do it, 
 all the talking in the world (as far as I have seen) will 
 not make them do it. Moreover, if the teaching in the 
 sermon be what we come to church for, why have we 
 prayer-books full of prayers, thanksgivings, psalms, and 
 so forth, which are not sermons at all ? What is the 
 use of the service, as we call it, if the sermon is the only 
 or even the principal object for which we come ? I 
 trust there are many of you here who agree with me so 
 fully, that you would come regularly to church, as J 
 
Worship. 219 
 
 should, even if there were no sermon, knowing that God 
 preaches to every man, in the depths of his own heart 
 and conscience, far more solemn and startling sermons 
 than any mortal man can utter. 
 
 Others will answer that they come to church to say 
 their prayers. Well : that is a wiser answer than the last. 
 But if that be all, why can they not say their prayers at 
 home ? God is everywhere. God is all-seeing, all-hear- 
 ing, about our path and about our bed, and spying out 
 all our ways. Is He not as ready to hear in the field, 
 and in the workshop and in the bed-chamber, as in the 
 church ? " When thou prayest," says our Lord, " enter 
 into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray 
 to thy Father which is in secret ; and thy Father which 
 seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.'' Those are 
 not my words, they are the words of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ Himself; and none can gainsay them. None 
 dare take from them or add to them ; and our coming to 
 church, therefore, must be for more reasons than for the 
 mere saying of our prayers. 
 
 Others will answer — ^very many, indeed, will answer — 
 we come to church because — because, we hardly know 
 why, but because we ought to come to church. 
 
 Some may call that a silly answer, only fit for 
 children : but I do not think so. It seems to me a very 
 rational answer : perhaps a very reverent and godly 
 answer. A man comes to church for reasons which he 
 cannot explain to himself: just so — and many of the 
 deepest and best feelings of our hearts, are just those that 
 we cannot explain to ourselves, though we believe in 
 them, would fight for them, die for them. The mac 
 
2 20 Worship. 
 
 who frankly confesses that he does not quite know 
 why he comes to church is most likely to know at 
 last why he does come ; most likely to understand 
 the answer which Scripture gives to the question 
 why we come to church. And what answer is that ? 
 Strange to say, one which people now-a-days, with their 
 Bibles in their hands, have almost forgotten. We come 
 to church, according to the Bible, to worship God. 
 
 To worship. Think awhile what that ancient and 
 deep and noble word signifies. So ancient is it, that 
 man learnt to worship even before he learnt to till the 
 ground. So deep, that even to this day no man 
 altogether understands what worshipping means. So 
 noble, that the noblest souls on earth delight most in 
 worshipping ; that the angels, and archangels, and the 
 spirits of just men made perfect, find no nobler occupa- 
 tion, no higher qnjoyment, in the heavenly world than 
 worshipping for ever Him whose glory fills all earth and 
 heaven. To worship. That power of worship, that 
 longing to worship, that instinct that it is his duty to 
 worship something, is — if you will receive it — the true 
 distinction between men and brutes. Philosophers have 
 tried to define man as this sort of animal and that sort 
 of animal. The only sound definition is this : man is 
 the one animal who worships ; and he worships, just 
 because he is not merely an animal, but a man, with an 
 immortal soul within him. Just in as far as man sinks 
 down again to the level of the brute — whether in some 
 savage island of the South Seas, or in some equally 
 savage alley of our own great cities— God forgive us 
 that such human brutes should exist here in Christian 
 
Worship. 221 
 
 England — just so far he feels no need to worship. He 
 thinks of no unseen God or powers above him. He 
 cares for nothing but what his five senses tell him of ; 
 he feels no need to go to church and worship. Just 
 in as far as a man rises to the true standard of 
 a man ; just in as far as his heart and his mind are 
 truly cultivated, truly developed, just so far does he 
 become more and more aware of an unseen world about 
 him ; more and more aware that in God he lives and 
 moves and has his being — and so much the more he 
 feels the longing and the duty to worship that unseen 
 God on whom he and the whole universe depend. 
 
 I know what seeming exceptions there are to this rule, 
 especially in these days. But I say that they are only 
 seeming exceptions. I never knew yet (and I have known 
 many of them) a virtuous and high-minded unbeliever: 
 but what there was in him the instinct of worshipping — 
 the longing to worship — he knew not what, the spirit of 
 reverence, which confesses its own ignorance and weak- 
 ness, and is ready to set up, like the Athenians of old, 
 an altar — in the heart at least — to the unknown God. 
 
 But how to worship Him ? The word itself, if we 
 consider what it means, will tell us that. Worship, 
 without doubt, is the same word as worth-ship. It 
 signifies the worth of Him whom we worship, that He is 
 worthy, — a worthy God, not merely because of what He 
 has done, but because of what He is worth in Himself. 
 Good, excellent, and perfect in Himself, and therefore to 
 be admired, praised, reverenced, adored, worshipped — 
 even if He had never done a kindness to you or to any 
 human being. Remember this last truth. For true it 
 
222 Worship. 
 
 is ; and we remember it too little. Of course we know 
 that God is good ; first and mainly by His goodness to 
 us. Because He is good enough to give us life and 
 breath and all things, we conclude that He is a good 
 being. Because He is good enough to have not spared 
 His only begotten Son, but freely given Him for us, 
 when we were still sinners and rebels, we conclude ffim 
 to be the best of all beings, a being of boundless good- 
 ness. But it is because God is so perfectly and gloriously 
 good in Himself, and not merely because He has done us 
 kindnesses, yea, heaped us with undeserved benefits, that 
 we are to worship Him. For His kindnesses we owe 
 Him gratitude, and gratitude without end. But for His 
 excellent and glorious goodness, we owe Him worship, 
 and worship without end. 
 
 There are some hearts, surely, among you here 
 who know what I mean : some here who have felt 
 reverence and admiration for some great and good 
 human being, and who have felt, too, that that rever- 
 ence and admiration is one of the most elevating and 
 unselfish of all feelings, and quite distinct from any 
 gratitude, however just, for favours done ; who can say, 
 in their hearts, of some noble human being : " If he 
 never did me a kindness, never spoke to me, never knew 
 of my existence, I should honour him and love him just 
 the same, for the noble and good personage that he is, 
 irrespective of little me, and my paltry wants." Then, 
 even such ought to be our feeling toward God, our 
 worship of God. Even so should we adore Him who 
 alone is worthy of glory, and honour, and praise, and 
 thanksgiving, because He is good, and beautiful, and 
 
Worship. 223 
 
 wise Himself, and the cause and source of all goodness, 
 and beauty, and wisdom, in all created beings, and in the 
 whole universe, past, present, and to come. Consider, I 
 beseech you, those glimpses of the Eternal Worship in 
 heaven which St John gives us in the Book of Revela- 
 tion — How he saw the elders fall down before Him who 
 sat upon the throne, and worship Him that liveth for 
 ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying : 
 " Thou art worthy, Lord, to receive glory, and honour, 
 and power ; for Thou hast created all things, and for 
 Thy pleasure they are and were created." 
 
 Consider that — Those blessed spirits of just men 
 made perfect, confessing that they are nothing, but that 
 Christ is all ; that they have nothing, but that they owe 
 all to Christ ; and declaring Him worthy — not merely 
 for any special mercies and kindnesses to themselves, 
 not even for that crowning mercy of His incarnation, 
 His death. His redemption ; even that seems to have 
 vanished from their minds at the sight of Him as He is. 
 They glorify Him and worship Him simply for what He is 
 in Himself, for what He would have been even if — which 
 God forbid — He had never stooped from heaven to live 
 and die on earth — for what He is and was and will be 
 through eternity, the Creator and the Ruler, who has 
 made all things, and for whose pleasure they are and 
 were created. Consider that one text. The more I 
 consider it, the more awful and yet most blessed depths 
 of teaching do I find therein : and consider this text 
 also, another glimpse of the worship which is in heaven, 
 
 " I heard a great voice of much people in heaven, 
 singing Alleluia ; salvation, and glory, and honour, and 
 
2 24 Worship. 
 
 power, unto the Lord our God ; for true and righteous 
 are His judgments." What the special judgment was, 
 for which these blessed souls worshipped God, I shall 
 not argue here. It is enough for us that they wor- 
 shipped God, as we should worship Him, because His 
 judgments were righteous and true, were like Himself, 
 proved Him to be what He was, worthy in Himself, 
 because He is righteous and true. And consider then, 
 again — the text. Before Him, the righteous and true 
 Being who has created all things for His pleasure, and 
 therefore has made them wisely and well ; before Him 
 who reigns, and will reign till He has put aU His 
 enemies under His foot ; before Him, I say, bow down 
 yourselves, and find true nobleness in confessing your 
 own paltriness, true strength in confessing your own 
 weakness, true wisdom in confessing your own ignorance, 
 true holiness in confessing your own sins. 
 
 And not alone merely, each in your own chamber, or 
 in your own heart. That is the place for private con- 
 fessions of sin, for private prayers for help ; for all the 
 secrets which we dare not, and need not tell to any 
 human being. They indeed are not out of place here 
 in church. Those who composed our Prayer Book felt 
 that, and have filled our services, the Litany especiallj', 
 with prayers in which each of us can offer up his own 
 troubles to God, if he but remember that he is offering 
 up to God his neighbour's troubles also, and the troubles 
 of all mankind. For this is the reason why we pray 
 together in church ; why all men, in all ages, heathen 
 as well as Christian, have had the instinct of assembling 
 together for public worship. They may have fancied 
 
Worship. 225 
 
 often that their deity dwelt in one special spot, and that 
 they must go thither to find him. They may have 
 fancied that he or she dwelt in some particular image, 
 and that they must visit, and pray to that particular 
 image, if they wished their prayers to be heard. All 
 this, however, have men done in their foolishness ; but 
 beneath that foolishness there have been always more 
 rational ideas, sounder notions. They felt that it was 
 God who had made them into families, and therefore 
 whole families met together to worship in common 
 Him of whom every family in heaven and earth is 
 named. That God had formed them into societies, 
 whether into tribes, as of old, or into parishes, as 
 here now ; and therefore whole parishes came together 
 to worship God, whose laws they were bound to 
 obey in their parochial society. They felt that it 
 was God who had made them into Nations (as the 
 psalm says which we repeat every Sunday morning), 
 and not they themselves ; and therefore they conceived 
 the grand idea of National churches, in which the whole 
 nation should, if possible, worship Sunday after Sunday, 
 at the same time, and in the same words, that God to 
 whom they owed their order, their freedom, their 
 strength, their safety, their National unity and life. 
 And not in silence merely. These blessed souls in 
 heaven are not silent. They in heaven follow out the 
 human instinct which they had on earth, which all men 
 (when they recollect themselves, will have), when they 
 feel a thing deeply, when they believe a thing strongly, 
 to speak it — to speak it aloud. They do not fancy in 
 heaven, as the priests of Baal did on earth, that they 
 
 P 
 
2 26 Worship. 
 
 must cry aloud, or God could not hear them. They do 
 not fancy, as the heathen do, that they must make vain 
 repetitions, and say the same words over and over again 
 by rote, because they will be heard for their much 
 speaking; neither need you and I. But yet they spoke 
 aloud, because out of the fulness of the heart the mouth 
 speaketh ; and so should you and I. 
 
 And this brings me to the special object of my sermon. 
 I have told you what (as it seems to me) Worship means; 
 why we worship ; why we worship together ; and why we 
 ought to worship aloud. Believe me, this last is your 
 duty just as much as mine. The services of the Church 
 of England are so constructed that the whole congrega- 
 tion may take part in them, that they may answer aloud 
 in the responses, that they may say Amen at the end of 
 each prayer, just as they read or chant aloud the alternate 
 verses of the Psalms. The minister does not say prayers 
 for them, but with them. He is only their leader, their 
 guide. And if they are not to join in with their voices, 
 there is really no reason why he should use his voice, 
 why he should not say the prayers in silence and to 
 himself, if the congregation are to say Amen in silence 
 and to themselves. Each person in the congregation 
 ought to join aloud, first for the sake of his neighbours, 
 and then for his own sake. 
 
 For the sake of his neighbours : for to hear each 
 other's voices stirs up earnestness, stirs up attention, 
 keeps off laziness, inattention, and by a wholesome 
 infection, makes all the congregation of one mind, as 
 they are of one speech, in glorifying God. And for his 
 own sake, too. For, believe me, when a man utters 
 
Worship. 227 
 
 the responses aloud, he awakens his own thoughts and 
 his own feelings, too. He speaks to himself, and he 
 hears, himself remind himself of God, and of his duty to 
 God, and acknowledge himself openly (as in confirmation) 
 bound to believe and do what he, by his own confession, 
 has assented unto. 
 
 Believe me, my dear friends, this is no mere theory. 
 It is to me a matter of fact and experience. I cannot, I 
 have long found, keep my attention steady during a ser- 
 vice, if I do not make the responses aloud ; — if I do not 
 join in with my voice, I find my thoughts wandering ; 
 and I am bound to suppose that the case is the same 
 with you. Do not, therefore, think me impertinent or 
 interfering, if I ask you all to take your due share in 
 worshipping God in this church with your voices, as well 
 as with your hearts. Let these services be more lively, 
 more earnest, more useful to us all than they have been, 
 by making them more a worship of the whole congrega- 
 tion, and not of the minister alone. I have read of a 
 great church in the East, in days long, long ago, in 
 which the responses of the vast congregation were so 
 unanimous, so loud, that they sounded (says the old 
 writer) like a clap of thunder. That is too much to 
 expect in our little country church : but at least, I beg 
 you, take such an open part in the responses, that you 
 shall all feel that you are really worshipping together 
 the same God and Christ, with the same heart and mind; 
 and that if a stranger shall come in, he may say in his 
 heart : Here are people who are in earnest, who know 
 what they are about, and are not ashamed of trying to 
 do it ; people who evidently mean what they say, and 
 therefore say what they mean. 
 
SEEMON XXV, 
 
 THE PEACE OF GOD. 
 Baltimore, U.S., 1874. Westminster Abbey. November 8, 1874. 
 
 CoLossiANS. iii. 15. 
 " Let the peace of God rule in your hearts.'' 
 
 The peace of God. That is what the priest will invoke 
 for you all, when you leave this abbey. Do you know 
 what it is ? Whether you do or not, let me tell you in 
 a few words, what I seem to myself to have learned con- 
 cerning that peace. What it is ? how we can obtain 
 it ? and why so many do not obtain it, and are, there- 
 fore, not at peace ? 
 
 It is worth while to do so. For these are not peace- 
 ful times. The peace of God is rare among us. Some 
 say that it is rarer than it was. I know not how that 
 may be ; but I see all manner of causes at work around 
 us which should make it rare. We live faster than our 
 forefathers. We hurry, we bustle, we travel, we are 
 eager for daily, almost for hourly news from every 
 quarter, as if the world could not get on without us, or 
 we without knowing a hundred facts which merely satisfy 
 the curiosity of the moment ; and as if the great God 
 could not take excellent care of us all meanwhile. 
 We are eager, too, to get money, and get more money 
 
The Peace of God. 229 
 
 still — ^piercing ourselves through too often, as the Apostle 
 warned us — with many sorrows, and falling into foolish 
 and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and 
 perdition. We are luxurious — more and more fond of 
 show ; more apt to live up to our incomes, and probably 
 a little beyond ; more and more craving for this or that 
 gew-gaw, especially in dress and ornament, which if our 
 neighbour has, we must have too, or we shall be morti- 
 fied, envious. Nay, so strong is this temper of rivalry, 
 of allowing no superiors, grown in us, that we have made 
 now-a-days a god of what used to be considered the 
 basest of all vices — the vice of envy — and dignify it 
 with the names of equality and independence. Men in 
 this temper of mind cannot be at peace. They are not 
 content ; they cannot be content. 
 
 But with what are they not content ? That is a 
 question worth asking. For there is a discontent (as I 
 have told you ere now) which is noble, manful, heroic, 
 and divine. Just as there is a discontent which is base, 
 mean, unmanly, earthly — sometimes devilish. There 
 is a discontent which is certain, sooner or later, to 
 bring with it the peace of God. There is a discon- 
 tent which drives the peace of God away, for ever and a 
 day. And the noble and peace-bringing discontent is 
 to be discontented with ourselves, as very few are. And 
 the mean peace-destroying discontent is to be discon- 
 tented with things around us, as too many are. Now, 
 my friends, I cannot see into your hearts ; and I 
 ought not to see. For if I saw, I should be tempted 
 to judge ; and if I judged, I should most certainly judge 
 rashly, shallowly, and altogether wrong. Therefore exa- 
 
230 The Peace of God. 
 
 mine yourselves, and judge yourselves in this matter. 
 Ask yourselves each, Am I at peace ? And if not, then 
 apply to yourselves the rule of old Epictetus, the heroic 
 slave, who, heathen though he was, sought God, and the 
 peace of God, and found them, doubt it not, long, long 
 ago. Ask yourselves with Epictetus, Am I discontented 
 with things which are in my own power, or with things 
 which are not in my own power ? — that is, discontented 
 with myself, or with things which are not myself ? Am 
 I discontented with myself, or with things about me, 
 and outside of me ? Consider this last question well, if 
 you wish to be true Christians, true philosophers, and, 
 indeed, true men and women. 
 
 But what is it that troubles you ? What is it you 
 want altered ? On what have you set your heart and 
 affections ? Is it something outside you ? — something 
 which is not you yourself? If so, there is no use in 
 tormenting your soul about it ; for it is not in your own 
 power, and you will never alter it to your liking ; and 
 more, you need not alter it, for you are not responsible 
 for it. God sends it as it is, for better, for worse, and 
 you must make up your mind to what God sends. Do 
 I mean that we are to submit slavishly to circumstances, 
 like dumb animals ? Heaven forbid. We are not, like 
 Epictetus, slaves, but free men. And we are made in 
 God's image, and have each our spark, however dim, of 
 that creative genius, that power of creating or of alter- 
 ing circumstances, by which God made all worlds ; and 
 to use that, is of our very birthright, or what would all 
 education, progress, civilisation be, save rebellion against 
 God ? But when we have done our utmost, how little 
 
The Peace of God. 231 
 
 shall we have done! Canst thou, — asks our Lord, looking 
 with loving sadness on the hurry and the struggle of the 
 human anthill — canst thou by taking thought add one 
 cubit to thy stature ? Why, is there a wise man or 
 woman in this abbey, past fifty years of age, who does 
 not know that, in spite of all their toil and struggle, 
 they have gone not whither they willed, but whither 
 God willed ? Have they not found out that for one 
 circumstance of their lives which they could alter, there 
 have been twenty which they could not, some bom with 
 them, some forced on them by an overruling Providence, 
 irresistible indeed — but, as I hold, most loving and most 
 fatherly, though often severe — even to agony — but irre- 
 sistible still — till what they have really gained by fight- 
 ing circumstance, however valiantly, has been the moral 
 gain, the gain in character ? — the power to live the 
 heroic life, which 
 
 " Is not as idle ore, 
 But heated hot with burning fears, 
 And bathed in baths of hissing tears. 
 And batter'd, with the shocks of doom, 
 To shape and use.'' 
 
 Ah ! if a man be learning that lesson, which is the 
 primer of eternal life, then I hardly pity him, though I 
 see him from youth to age tearing with weak hands at 
 the gates of brass, and beatmg his soul's wings to pieces 
 against the bars of the iron cage. But, alas ! the 
 majority of mankind tear at the gates of brass, and 
 beat against the iron cage, with no such good purpose, 
 and therefore with no such good result. They fight 
 with circumstances, not that they may become better 
 men themselves, not that they may right the wrongs 
 
232 The Peace of God. 
 
 or elevate the souls of their fellow-men, not even 
 that they may fulfil the sacred duty of maintaining, and 
 educating, and providing for the children whom they 
 have brought into the world, and for whom they are 
 responsible alike to God and to man ; but simply be- 
 cause circumstances are disagreeable to them ; because 
 the things around them do not satisfy their covetous- 
 ness, their luxury, their ambition, their vanity. And 
 therefore the majority of mankind want to be, and 
 to do, and to have a hundred things which are not 
 in their own power, and of which they have no proof 
 that God intends to give them ; no proof either that if 
 they had them, they would make right use of them, and 
 certainly no proof at all that if they had them they 
 would find peace. They war and fight, and have not, 
 because they ask not. They ask, and have not, because 
 they ask amiss, to consume it on their lusts ; and so 
 they spend their lives without peace, longing, struggling 
 for things out;^ide them, the greater part of which they 
 do not get, because the getting them is not in their 
 own power, and which if they got they could not keep, 
 for they can carry nothing away with them when they 
 die, neither can their pomp follow them. And therefore 
 does man walk in a vain shadow, and disquiet himself 
 in vain, looking for peace where it is not to be found — 
 in everything and anything save in his own heart, in 
 duty, and in God. 
 
 But happy are they who are discontented with the 
 divine discontent, discontented with themselves. Happy 
 are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness, that 
 they may become righteous and good men. Happy are 
 
The Peace of God. 233 
 
 tliey who have set their hearts on the one thing which 
 is in their own power — being better than they are, and 
 doing better than they do. Happy are they who long 
 and labour after the true riches, which neither mobs nor 
 tyrants, man nor devil, prosperity nor adversity, or any 
 chance or change of mortal life, can take from them — 
 the true and eternal wealth, which is the Spirit of God. 
 The man, I say, who has set his heart on being good, 
 has set his heart on the one thing which is in his own 
 power ; the one thing which depends wholly and solely 
 on his own will ; the one thing which he can have if 
 he chooses, for it is written, " If ye then 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 ? " Moreover, he has set 
 his heart on the one thing which cannot be taken from 
 him. God will not take it from him ; and man, and 
 fortune, and misfortune, cannot take it from him. 
 Poverty, misery, disease, death itself, cannot make him 
 a worse man, cannot make him less just, less true, less 
 pure, less charitable, less high-minded, less like Christ, 
 and less like God. 
 
 Therefore he is at peace, for he is, as it were, in- 
 trenched in an impregnable fortress, against all men and 
 all evil influences. kxA. that castle is his own soul. 
 And the keeper of that castle is none other than Al- 
 mighty God, Jesus Christ our Lord, to whose keeping 
 he has committed his soul, as unto a faithful and merci- 
 ful Saviour, able to keep to the ntterm.ost that which is 
 committed to Him in faith and holiness. 
 
 Therefore that man is at peace with himself, for his 
 
234 The Peace of God. 
 
 conscience tells him that he is, if not doing his best, yet 
 trying to do his best, better and better day by day. He 
 is at peace with all the world ; for most men are longing 
 and quarrelling for pleasant things outside them, for 
 which he does not greatly care, while he is longing and 
 striving for good things inside him in his own heart and 
 soul ; and so the world goes one way, and he another, 
 and their desires do not interfere with each other. 
 
 But, more, that man is at peace with God. He is at 
 peace with God the Father ; for he is behaving as the 
 Father wishes His children to behave. He is at peace , 
 with God the Son ; for he is trying to do that which God 
 the Son did when He came not to do His own will, but 
 His Father's ; not to grasp at anything for himself, but 
 simply to sacrifice himself for duty, for the good of man. 
 And he is at peace with God the Holy Spirit ; for he is 
 obeying the gracious inspirations of that Spirit, and 
 growing a better man day by day. And so the peace 
 of God keeps that man's heart free from vain desires and 
 angry passions, and his mind from those false and foolish 
 judgments which make the world think tilings important 
 which are quite unimportant ; and, again, fancy things 
 unimportant which are more important to them than the 
 riches of the whole world. 
 
 My dear friends, take my words home with you, and 
 if you wish for the only true and sound peace, which is 
 the peace of God, do your duty. Try to be as good as 
 you can, each in his station in life. So help you God. 
 
 Take an example from the soldier on the march ; and 
 if you do that, you will all understand what I mean. 
 The bad soldier has no peace, just because he troubles 
 
The Peace of God. 235 
 
 himself about things outside himself, and not in his own 
 power. " Will the officers lead us right ? " That is not 
 in his power. Let him go where the officers lead him, 
 and do his own duty. " Will he get food enough, water 
 enough, care enough, if he is wounded ? " I hope and 
 trust in God he will ; but that is not in his own power. 
 Let him take that, too, as it comes, and do his duty. 
 " Will he be praised, rewarded, mentioned in the news- 
 papers, if he fights well ? " That, too, is not in his 
 own power. Let him take that, too, as it comes, and 
 do his duty ; and so of everything else. If the soldier 
 on the march torments himself with these matters which 
 are not in his own power, he is the man who will be 
 troublesome and mutinous in time of peace, and in time 
 of war will be the first to run away. He will tell you, 
 "A man must have justice done him; a man must see 
 fair play for himself; a man must think of himself." 
 Poor fool ! He is not thinking of himself all the 
 while, but of a Dumber of things which are outside him, 
 circumstances which stand round him, and outside him, 
 and are not himself at all. Because he thinks of them 
 — the things outside him — he is a coward or a mutineer, 
 while he fancies he is taking care of himself — as it is 
 written, " Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall 
 lose it." 
 
 But if the man will really think of himself, of that 
 which is inside him, of his own character, his own 
 honour, his own duty — then he will say. Well fed or ill 
 fed, well led or ill led, praised and covered with medals, 
 or neglected and forgotten, and dying in a ditch, I, by 
 myself I, am the same man, and I have the same work 
 
236 The Peace of God. 
 
 to do. I have to be — myself, and I have to do — my 
 duty. So help me God. And therefore, so help me 
 God, I will be discontented with no person or thing, 
 save only with myself; and I will be discontented with 
 myself, not when I have left undone something extra- 
 ordinary, which I know I could not have done, but only 
 when I have left undone something ordinary, some plain 
 duty which I know I could have done, had I asked God 
 to help me to do it. Then in that soldier would be 
 fulfilled — has been fulfilled, thank God, a thousand 
 times, by men who lie in this abbey, and by men, too, 
 of whom we never heard, "whose graves are scattered far 
 and wide, by mount, by stream, by sea," — in him would 
 be fulfilled, I say, the words, " He that will lose his life 
 shall save it." Then would he have in his heart, and 
 in his mind likewise, a peace which victory and safety 
 cannot give, and which defeat, and wounds, ay, death 
 itself, can never take away. 
 
 And are not you, too, soldiers — soldiers of Jesus 
 Christ 1 Then even as that good soldier, you may be 
 at peace, through all the battles, victories, defeats of 
 mortal life, if you will be discontented with nothing save 
 yourselves, and vow, in spirit and in truth, the one oath 
 which is no blasphemy, but an act of faith, and an act 
 of prayer, and a confession of the true theology — So help 
 me God. For then God will help you. Neither you nor 
 I know how ; and I am sure neither you nor I know why 
 — save that God is utterly good. God, I say, will help 
 you, by His Holy Spirit the Comforter, to do your duty, 
 and to be at peace. And then the peace of God will 
 rule in your hearts and make you kings to God. For 
 
The Peace of God. 237 
 
 He will enable you each to rule, serene, though weary, 
 over a kingdom — or, alas ! rather a mob, the most 
 unruly, the most unreasonable, the most unstable, and 
 often the most fierce, which you are like to meet on 
 earth. To rule, I say, over a mob, of which you each 
 must needs be king or slave, according as you choose. 
 And what is that mob ? What but your own faculties, 
 your own emotions, your own passions — in one word, 
 your own selves ? Yes, with the peace of God ruling in 
 your hearts, 3'ou will be able to become what without it 
 you will never be — and that is — masters of yourselves. 
 
SERMON XXVI. 
 
 SINS OF PAEENTS VISITED. 
 
 Eversley. 19th Sunday after Trinity, 1868. 
 
 EzEKiEL xviii. 1-4. 
 
 "The word of the Lord came unto me again, saying, What mean ye, 
 that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The 
 fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on 
 edge? As I live, saith the Lord God, ye shall not have occasion 
 any more to use this proverb in Israel. Behold, all souls are 
 mine ; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine : 
 the soul that sinneth, it shall die. " 
 
 This is a precious chapter, and a comfortable chapter 
 likewise, for it helps us to clear up a puzzle which has 
 tormented the minds of men in all ages whenever they 
 have thought of God, and of whether God meant them 
 well, or meant them ill. 
 
 For all men have been tempted. We are tempted at 
 times to say, — The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and 
 the children's teeth are set on edge. That is, we are 
 punished not for what we have done wrong, but for what 
 our fathers did wrong. One man says, — My forefathers 
 squandered their money, and I am punished by being 
 poor. Or, my forefathers ruined their constitutions, and, 
 therefore, I am weakly and sickly. My forefathers were 
 ignorant and reckless, and, therefore, I was brought up 
 ignorant, and in all sorts of temptation. And so men 
 
Sins of Parents Visited. 239 
 
 complain of their ill-luck and bad chance, as they call it, 
 till they complain of God, and say, as the Jews said in 
 Ezekiel's time, God's ways are unequal — partial — unfair. 
 He is a respecter of persons. He has not the same 
 rule for all men. He starts men unequally in the race 
 of life — some heavily weighted with their father's sins 
 and misfortunes, some helped in every way by their 
 father's virtue and good fortune — and then He expects 
 them all to run alike. God is not just and equal. 
 And then some go on, — men who think themselves 
 philosophers, but are none — to say things concerning 
 God of which I shall say nothing here, lest I put into 
 your minds foolish thoughts, which had best be kept 
 out of them. 
 
 But, some of you may say, Is it not so after all ? Is 
 it not true ? Is not God harder on some than on others ? 
 Does not God punish men every day for their father's 
 sins ? Does He not say in the Second Commandment 
 that He will do so, and visit the sins of the fathers upon 
 the children to the third and fourth generation ; and 
 how can you make that agree with what Ezekiel says, — 
 " The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father." My 
 dear friends, I know that this is a puzzle, and always 
 has been one. Like the old puzzle of God's fore- 
 knowledge and our free will, which seem to contradict 
 each other. Like the puzzle that we must help our- 
 selves, and yet that God must help us, which seem to 
 contradict each other. So with this. I believe of it, 
 as of the two others I just mentioned, that there is no 
 real contradiction between the two cases ; and that some- 
 when, somehow, somewhere, in the world to come, we 
 
240 Sins of Parents Visited. 
 
 shall see them clearly reconciled ; and justify God in all 
 His dealings, and glorify Him in all His ways. But 
 surely already, here, now, we may see our way somewhat 
 into the depths of this mystery. For Christ has come 
 to give us light, and in His light we may see light, even 
 into this dark matter. 
 
 For see : God visits the sins of the fathers upon the 
 children unto the third and fourth generation — but of 
 whom? — of them that hate Him. Now, by those who 
 hate God is meant, those who break His commandments, 
 and aie bad men. If so, then, I say that God is not 
 only just but merciful, in visiting the sins of the fathers 
 on the children. 
 
 For, consider two cases. Suppose these bad men, 
 from father to son, and from son to grandson, go on 
 in the same evil ways, and are incorrigible. Then is 
 not God merciful to the world in punishing them, 
 even in destroying them out of the world, where they 
 only do harm ? The world does not want fools, it 
 wants wise men. The world does not want bad men, 
 it wants good men ; and we ought to thank God, if, 
 by His eternal laws. He gets rid of bad men for us ; 
 and, as the saying is, civilizes them off the face of 
 the earth in the third or fourth generation. And God 
 does so. If a family, or a class, or a whole nation 
 becomes incorrigibly profligate, foolish, base, in three or 
 four generations they will either die out or vanish. They 
 will sink to the bottom of society, and become miserably 
 poor, weak, and of no influence, and so unable to do harm 
 to any but themselves. Whole families will sink thua 
 I have seen it ; you may have seen it. Whole nations 
 
Sins of Parents Visited. 241 
 
 will sink thus ; as the Jews sank in Ezekiel's time, and 
 again in our Lord's time ; and be conquered, trampled 
 on, counted for nothing, because they were worth 
 nothing. 
 
 But now suppose, again, that the children, when their 
 father's sins are visited on them, are not incorrigible. 
 Suppose they are like the wise son of whom Ezekiel 
 speaks, in the 14th verse, who seeth all his father's sins, 
 and considereth, and doeth not such like — then has not 
 God been merciful and kind to him in visiting his father's 
 sins on him? He has. God is justified therein. His eternal 
 laws of natural retribution, severe as they are, have 
 worked in love and in mercy, if they have taught the 
 young man the ruinousness, the deadliness of sin. Have 
 the father's sins made the son poor ? Then he learns 
 not to make his children poor by his sin. Have his 
 father's sins made him unhealthy? Then he learns not 
 to injure his children's health. Have his father's sins 
 kept him ignorant, or in anywise hindered his rise in 
 life ? Then he learns the value of a good education, and, 
 perhaps, stints himself to give his children advantages 
 which he had not himself — and, as sure as he does so, 
 the family begins to rise again after its fall. This is no 
 fancy, it is fact. You may see it. I have seen it, thank 
 God. How some of the purest and noblest women, some 
 of the ablest and most right-minded men, will spring from 
 families, will be reared in households, where everything 
 was against them — where there was everything to make 
 them profligate, false, reckless, in a word — bad — except 
 the grace of God, which was trying to make them good, 
 and succeeded in making them good ; and how, though 
 
 Q 
 
242 Sins of Parents Visited. 
 
 they have felt the punishment of their parents' sins upon 
 them in many ways during their whole life, yet that has 
 been to them not a mere punishment, but a chastisement, 
 a purifying medicine, a cross to be borne, which only 
 stirred them up to greater watchfulness against sin, to 
 greater earnestness in educating their children, to greater 
 activity and energy in doing right, and giving their chil- 
 dren the advantages which they had not themselves. And 
 so were fulfilled in them two laws of God. The one 
 which Ezekiel lays down — that the bad man's son who 
 executes God's judgments and walks in God's statutes 
 shall not die for the iniquity of his father, but surely 
 live ; and the other law which Moses lays down — that 
 God shews mercy unto thousands of generations, as I 
 believe it means — that is, to son after father, and son 
 after father again, without end — as long as they love 
 Him and keep His commandments. 
 
 I do not, therefore, see that there is any real contradic- 
 tion between what Moses says in the second command- 
 ment and what Ezekiel says in this chapter. They are 
 but two different sides of the same truth ; and Moses is 
 shewing the Jews one side, because they needed most 
 to be taught that in his time, and Ezekiel showing 
 them the other, because that was the teaching which 
 they needed most then. For they were fancying them- 
 selves, in their calamities, the victims of some blind 
 and cruel fate, and had forgotten that, when God 
 said that He visited the sins of the fathers on the 
 children. He qualified it by saying, " of them that 
 hate Me." 
 
 Therefore, be hopeful about yourselves, and hopeful 
 
Sins of Parents Visited. 243 
 
 about your childrea after you. If any one here feels — 
 I am fallen very low in the world — here all has been 
 so much against me — my parents were the ruin of me — 
 Let him remember this one word of Ezekiel. " Have I 
 any pleasure at all that the wicked should die ? saith the 
 Lord God: and not that he should return from his ways, 
 and live ? " Let him turn from his father's evil ways, 
 and do that which is lawful and right, and then he can 
 say with the Prophet, in answer to all the strokes of 
 fortune and the miseries of circumstance, " Rejoice not 
 against me, mine enemy : when I fall I shall 
 arise." Provided he wUl remember that God requires of 
 all men something, which is, to be as good as they can 
 be ; then he may remember also that our Lord Him- 
 self says, "Unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall 
 much be required ; " impl3ang that to whom little is 
 given, of him will little be required. God's ways are 
 not unequal. He has one equal, fair, and just rule for 
 every human being ; and that is perfect understanding, 
 perfect sympathy, perfect good will, and therefore perfect 
 justice and perfect love. 
 
 And if any one of you answers in his heart — these 
 are good words, and all very well : but they come too 
 late. I am too far gone. I ate the sour grapes in my 
 youth, and my teeth must be on edge for ever and ever. 
 I have been a bad man, or I have been a foolish woman 
 too many years to mend now. I am down, and down I 
 must be. I have made my bed, and I must lie on it, 
 and die on it too. Oh my dear brother or sister in 
 Christ, whoever you are who says that, unsay it again, 
 for it is not true. Ezekiel tells you that it is not true. 
 
244 Sins of Parents Visited. 
 
 and oue greater than Ezekiel, Jesus Christ, your Saviour, 
 your Lord, your God, tells you it is not true. 
 
 For what happens, by God's eternal and unchangeable 
 laws of retribution, to a whole nation, or a whole family, 
 may happen to you — to eacli individual man. They 
 fall by sin ; they rise again by repentance and amend- 
 ment. They may rise punished by their sins, and 
 punished for a long time, heavily weighted by the 
 consequences of their own folly, and heavily weighted 
 for a long time. But they rise — they enter into their 
 new life weak and wounded, from their own fault. But 
 they enter in. And from that day things begin to mend 
 — the weather begins to clear, the soil begins to yield 
 again — punishment gradually ceases when it has done 
 its work, the weight lightens, the wounds heal, the 
 weakness strengthens, and by God's grace within them, 
 and by God's providence outside them, they are made 
 men of again, and saved. So you will surely find it in 
 the experience of life. 
 
 No doubt in general, in most cases. 
 
 The child is father of the man 
 for good and evil. A pious and virtuous youth helps, 
 by sure laws of God, towards a pious and virtuous old 
 age. And on the other hand, an ungodly and profligate 
 youth leads, by the same laws, toward an ungodly and 
 profligate old age. That is the law. But there is 
 another law which may stop that law — -just as the stone 
 falls to the ground by the natural law of weight, 
 and yet you may stop that law by using the law of 
 bodily strength, and holding it up in your hand. And 
 what is the gracious law which will save you from the 
 
Sins of Parents Visited. 245 
 
 terrible law which will make you go on from worse to 
 worse? It is this, — "when the wicked man turneth away 
 from his wickedness that he hath committed, and doeth 
 that which is lawful and right, he shall save his soul 
 alive." It is not said that his soul shall come in a 
 moment to perfect health and strength. No. There 
 are old bad habits to be got rid of, old ties to be 
 broken, oM debts (often worse debts than any money 
 debts) to be paid. But he shall save his soul alive. 
 His soul shall not die of its disease. It shall be saved. 
 It shall come to life, and gradually mend and be cured, 
 and grow from strength to strength, as a sick man mends 
 day by day after a deadly illness, slowly it may be, but 
 surely : — for how can you fail of being cured if your 
 physician is none other than Jesus Christ your Lord and 
 your God ? 
 
 Oh, recollect that last word. If you will but recollect 
 that, you will never despair. How dare any man say — 
 Bad I am, and bad I must remain — while the God who 
 made heaven and earth offers to make you good ? Who 
 dare say, — I cannot amend — when God Himself offers 
 to amend you ? Who dare say, — I have no strength to 
 amend — when God offers to give you strength, strength 
 of His strength, and life of His life, even His Holy Spirit? 
 Who dare say, — God has given me up; He has a grudge 
 against me which He will not lay by, an anger against 
 me which cannot be appeased, a score against me which 
 will never be wiped out of His book ? Oh foolish and 
 faint-hearted soul. Look, look at Christ hanging on His 
 cross, and see there what God's grudge, God's anger, God's 
 score of your sins is like. Like love unspeakable, and 
 
246 Sins of Parents Visited. 
 
 nothing else. To wash out your sins, He spared not His 
 only begotten Son, but freely gave Him for you, to shew 
 you that God, so far from hating you, has loved you ; 
 that so far from being your enemy. He was your father ; 
 that so far from willing the death of a sinner. He willed 
 that you and every sinner should turn from his wicked- 
 ness and live. For that, Jesus the only begotten Son of 
 God, came down and preached, and sorrowed, and 
 suffered, and died upon the cross. He died that you 
 maj'- live ; He suffered that you may be saved ; He paid 
 the debt, because you could never pay it ; He bore your 
 sins upon the cross, that you might not have to bear 
 them for ever and for ever in eternal death. Now, even 
 if you suffer somewhat in this life for your sins, that 
 suffering is not punishment, but wholesome chastise- 
 ment, as when a father chastens the son in whom 
 he delighteth. All He asks of you is to long and try to 
 give up your sins, for He will help you to give them up. 
 All He asks of you is to long and try to lead a new life, 
 for He will give you power to lead a new life. Oh, say 
 not — I cannot — when Christ who died for you says you 
 can. Say not — I dare not — w^hen Christ bids you dare 
 come boldly to His throne of grace. Say not — I must 
 be as I am — when Christ died that you should not be 
 as you are. Say not — there is no hope — when Christ 
 died and rose again, and reigns for ever, to give hope to 
 you and all mankind, that when the wicked man turns 
 away from his wickedness that he has committed, and 
 doeth that which is lawful and right, he shall save his 
 soul alive, and all his transgressions shall not be men- 
 tioned unto him, but in his righteousness that he hath 
 done shall he live. 
 
SERMON XXVI I. 
 
 AGREE WITH THINE ADVEUSARl. 
 Everslmj, 1861. Windsor Castle, 1867. 
 
 St. Matthew v. 25, 26. 
 
 " Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with 
 him ; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and 
 the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. 
 Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, 
 till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing. " 
 
 This parable our Lord seems to have spoken at least 
 twice, as He did several others. For we find it also in 
 the 12th chapter of St. Luke. But it is there part of 
 quite a different discourse. I think that by seeing 
 what it means there, we shall see more clearly what it 
 means here. 
 
 Our Lord there is speaking of the sins of the whole 
 Jewish nation. Here He is speaking rather of each 
 man's private sins. But He applies the same parable to 
 both. He gives the same warning to both. Not to go 
 too far on the wrong road, lest they come to a point 
 where they cannot turn back, but must go on to just 
 punishment, if not to utter destruction. 
 
 That is what He warned the Jews all through the latter 
 part of the 1 2th chapter of Luke. He wiU come again. He 
 says, at an hour they do not think of, and then if their 
 
248 Agree with thine Adversary. 
 
 elders, the Scribes and Pharisees, are going on as they 
 are now, beating the man-servants and maid-servants, 
 and eating and drinking with the drunken, oppressing 
 the people, and living in luxury and profligacy. He will 
 cut them asunder, and appoint them their portion with 
 the unbelievers. 
 
 In this, and in many other parables, He had been 
 warning them that their ruin was near ; and, at last, 
 turning to the whole crowd. He appeals to them, to 
 their common sense. " When ye see a cloud rise out of 
 the west, straightway ye say. There cometh a shower ; 
 and so it is. And when ye see the south wind blow, 
 ye say, There will be heat ; and it cometh to pass. Ye 
 hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky and of the 
 earth ; but how is it that ye do not discern this time 1 
 If God can give you common sense about one thing, why 
 not about another ? Why can you not open your eyes 
 and of yourselves judge what is right ? " Agree with 
 thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way 
 with him ; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to 
 the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and 
 thou be cast into prison. Verily I say unto thee. Thou 
 shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid 
 the uttermost farthing." 
 
 So He spoke ; and they did not fully understand 
 what He meant. They thought that by their adversary 
 He meant the Roman governor. For they immediately 
 began to talk to Him about some Galileans whose blood 
 Pilate, the Roman governor, had mingled with their sac- 
 rifices (I suppose in some of those wars which were con- 
 tinually breaking out in Judea). I think He meant more 
 
Agree with thine Adversary. 249 
 
 than that. " Suppose ye that these Galileans were 
 sinners above all the Galilaeans ? Except ye repent, ye 
 shall all likewise perish." As much as to say, though 
 ye did not rebel against the Romans like these Galilseans, 
 you have your sins, which will ruin you. As long as 
 you are hypocrites, with your mouths full of the cant of 
 religion, and your hearts full of all mean and spiteful 
 passions ; as long as you cannot of yourselves discern 
 what is right, and have lost conscience, and the everlast- 
 ing distinction between right and wrong, so long are 
 you walking blindfold to ruin. There is an adversary 
 against you, who will surely deliver you to the judge 
 some day, and then it will be too late to cry for mercy. 
 And who was that adversary ? Who but the everlasting 
 law of God, which says. Thou shalt do justly ? — and you 
 Jews are utterly unjust, false, covetous, and unrighteous. 
 Thou shalt love all men ; and you are cruel and spiteful, 
 hating each other, and making all mankind hate you. 
 Thou shalt walk humbly with thy God ; and you Jews 
 are walking proudly with God ; fancying that God be- 
 longs only to you ; that because you are His chosen people. 
 He will let you commit every sin you choose, as long as 
 you keep His name on your lips, and keep up an empty 
 worship of Him in the temple. That is your adversary, 
 the everlasting moral law of God. And who is the Judge 
 but God Himself, who is set on His throne judging right, 
 while you are doing wrong ? And who is the officer, to 
 whom that judge will deliver you ? There indeed 
 the Jews were right. It was the Romans whom 
 God appointed to punish them for their sins. Al] 
 which our Lord had foretold, as all the world knows. 
 
250 Agree with thine Adversary. 
 
 came true forty years after in that horrible siege of 
 Jerusalem, which the Jews brought on themselves en- 
 tirely by their own folly, and pride, and wicked lawless- 
 ness. In that siege, by famine and pestilence, by the 
 Romans' swords, by crucifixiou. and by each other's hands 
 (for the different factions were murdering each other 
 wholesale up to the very day Jerusalem was taken), 
 thousands of Jews perished horribly, and the rest were 
 sold as slaves over the face of the whole earth, and led 
 away into a captivity from which they could not escape 
 till they had paid the uttermost farthing. 
 
 Now let us look at this same parable in the •5th chapter 
 of St Matthew. Remember first that it is part of the ser- 
 mon on the Mount, which is all about not doctrine, but 
 morality, the law of right and wrong, the law of justice 
 and mercy. You will see then that our Lord is preach- 
 ing against the same sins as in the 1 2th chapter of St. 
 Luke. Against a hypocritical religion, joined with a 
 cruel and unjust heart. Those of old time, the Scribes 
 and Pharisees, said merely, Thou shalt not kill. And as 
 long as thou dost not kill thy brother, thou mayest hate 
 him in thy heart and speak evil of him with thy lips. 
 But our Lord says, Not so. Whosoever is angry with 
 his brother without a cause is in danger of the judgment. 
 Whosoever shall say to him Raca, or worthless fellow, 
 shall speak insolently, brutally, cruelly, scornfully to 
 him, is in danger of the council. But whosoever shall 
 say unto him, Thou fool, is in danger of hell fire. For 
 using that word to the Jews, so says the Talmudic tradi- 
 tion, Moses and Aaron were shut out of the land of 
 promise, for it means an infidel, an atheist, a godless 
 
Agree with thine Adversary. 251 
 
 man, or rebel against God, as it is written, " The 
 fool hath said in his heart there is no God." Who- 
 soever shall curse his brother, who is trying to be a 
 good Christian man to the best of his light and power, 
 because he does not happen to agree with him in all 
 things, and call him a heretic, and an infidel, and an 
 atheist, and an enemy of God — he is in danger of hell 
 fire. Let him agree with his adversary quickly, whiles 
 he is in the way with him, lest he be delivered to God 
 the judge, and to the just punishment of him who has 
 not done justly, not loved mercy, not walked humbly 
 with his God. 
 
 But who is the adversary of that man, and who is 
 the judge, and who is the officer ? Our adversary 
 in every case, whenever we do wrong, knowingly or 
 unknowingly, is the Law of God, the everlasting laws, 
 by which God has ordered every thing in heaven and 
 earth ; and as often as we break one of these laws, 
 let us agree with it again as quickly as we can, lest it 
 hale us before God, the judge of all, and He deliver 
 us over to His officer — to those powers of nature and 
 powers of spirit, which He has appointed as ministers 
 of His vengeance, and they cast us into some prison of 
 necessary and unavoidable misery, from which we shall 
 never escape till we have paid the uttermost farthing. 
 
 Do you not understand me ? Then I will give you an 
 example. Suppose the case of a man hurting his health 
 by self-indulgence of any kind. Then his adversaries 
 are the laws of health. Let him agree with them 
 quickly, while he has the power of conquering his bad 
 habits, by recovering his health, lest the time come when 
 
252 Agree with thine Adversary. 
 
 his own sins deliver him up to God his judge ; and God 
 to His terrible officers of punishment, the laws of 
 Disease ; and they cast him into a prison of shame and 
 misery from which there is no escape — shame and 
 misery, most common perhaps among the lower classes : 
 but not altogether confined to them — the weakened 
 body, the bleared eye, the stupified brain, the premature 
 death, the children unhealthy from their parents' sins, 
 despising their parents, and perhaps copying their vices 
 at the same time. Many a man have 1 seen in that 
 prison, fast bound with misery though not with iron, and 
 how he was to pay his debt and escape out of it I know 
 not, though I hope that God does know. 
 
 Are any of you, again, in the habit of cheating your 
 neighbours, or dealing unfairly by them ? Your adver- 
 sary is the everlasting law of justice, which says. Do as 
 you would be done by, for with what measure you mete 
 to others, it shall be measured to you again. 
 
 This may show you how a bodily sin, like self- 
 indulgence punishes itself by bringing a man into 
 bondage of bodily misery, from which he cannot escape ; 
 and in the same way a spiritual sin, like want of 
 charity, will bring a man into spiritual bondage from 
 which he cannot escape. And this, as in bodily sins, it 
 will do by virtue of that mysterious and terrible officer 
 of God, which we call Habit. Habit, by which, we cannot 
 tell how, our having done a thing once becomes a reason 
 for our doing it again, and again after that, till, if the 
 habit be once formed, we cannot help doing that thing, 
 and become enslaved to it, and fast bound by it in a 
 prison from which there is no escape. Look for instance 
 
Agree with thine Adversary. 253 
 
 at the case of the untruthful man,. Let him beware in 
 time. Who is his adversary ? Facts are his adversary. 
 He says one thing, and Fact says another, and a very 
 stubborn and terrible adversary Fact is. The day will 
 come, most probably in this life, when Facts will bring 
 that untruthful man before God and before men likewise 
 — and cry, — Judge between us which of us is right; and 
 there will come to that false man exposure and shame, 
 and a worse punishment still, perhaps, if he have let the 
 habit grow too strong on him, and have not agreed with 
 his adversary in time. 
 
 For have you not seen (alas, you have too surely seen) 
 men who had contracted such a habit of falsehood that 
 they could not shake it off — who had played with their 
 sense of truth so long that they had almost forgotten 
 what truth meant ; men who could not speak without 
 mystery, concealment, prevarication, half-statements ; who 
 were afraid of the plain truth, not because there was any 
 present prospect of its hurting them, but simply because it 
 was the plain truth — children of darkness, who, from long 
 habit, hated the light — and who, though they had been 
 found out and exposed, could not amend — could not 
 become simple, honest, and truthful — could not escape 
 from the prison of their own bad habits, and the net of 
 lies which they had spread round their own path, till 
 they had paid the uttermost penalty for their deceit ? 
 
 Look, again, at the case of the uncharitable man, in 
 the habit of forming harsh and cruel judgments of his 
 neighbours. Then his adversary is the everlasting law of 
 Love, which will surely at last punish him, by the most 
 terrible of all punishments — loss of love to man, and 
 
2 54 Agree with thine Adversary. 
 
 therefore to God. Are we not (I am, I know, may God 
 forgive me for it) apt to be angry with our brethren with- 
 out a cause, out of mere peevishness 1 Let us beware in 
 time. Are we not apt to say to them " Raca " — to speak 
 cruelly, contemptuously, fiercely of them, if they thwart 
 us ? Let us beware in time still more. Are we not, 
 worst of all, tempted (as I too often am) to say to them 
 " Thou fool ;" to call better men, more useful men, more 
 pure men, more pious men than ourselves, hard and cruel 
 names, names from which they would shrink with horror, 
 because theji" cannot see Christian truth in just exactly 
 the same light that we do ? Oh ! let us beware then. 
 Beware lest the everlasting laws of justice and fairness 
 between man and man, of love and charity between man 
 and man, which we have broken, should some day deliver 
 us up, as they delivered those bigoted Jews of old, to God, 
 our Judge, and He deliver our souls to His most terrible 
 officers, who are called envy, hatred, malice, and all 
 uncharitableness ; and they thrust us into that blackest 
 of all prisons, on the gate of which is written, Hardness 
 of heart, and Contempt of God's Word and command- 
 ments, and within which is the outer darkness, into 
 which if a man falls, he cannot see the difference 
 between right and wrong : but calls evil good, and good 
 evil, like his companions in the outer darkness — 
 namely, the devil and his angels. Oh ! let us who are 
 coming to lay our gift upon God's altar at this approach- 
 ing Christmas tide, consider whether our brother hath 
 aught against us in any of these matters, and, if so, let 
 us leave our gift upon the altar, and be first reconciled 
 to our brother, in heart at least, and with inward shame. 
 
Agree with thine Adversary. 255 
 
 and confession, and contrition, and resolution to amend. 
 But we can only do that by recollecting what gift we are 
 to leave on Christ's altar, — that it is the gift of self, the 
 sacrifice of ourselves, with all our selfishness, pride, con- 
 ceit, spite, cruelty. Ourselves, with all our sins, we are 
 to lay upon Christ's altar, that our sins may be nailed to 
 His cross, and washed clean in His blood, everlastingly 
 consumed in the fire of His Spirit, the pure spirit of 
 love, which is the Charity of God, that so, self being 
 purged out of us, we may become holy and lively sacri- 
 fices to God, parts and parcels of that perfect sacrifice 
 which Christ offered up for the sins of the whole world 
 — even the sacrifice of Himself. 
 
SERMON XXVni. 
 
 ST JOHN THE BAPTIST. 
 
 Chester Cathedral. 1872. 
 
 St Luke iii. 2, 3, 7, 9-14. 
 
 " The Word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the 
 wilderness. And he came into all the country about JordaJi, 
 preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. . . . 
 Then said he to the multitude that came forth to be baptized of 
 him, generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the 
 wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of repentance. 
 . , . And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees : every 
 tree therefore that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and 
 cast into the fire. And the people asked him saying. What shall 
 we do then ? He answereth and saith unto them. He that hath two 
 coats, let him impart to him that hath none ; and he that hath meat, 
 let him do likewise. Then came also publicans to be baptized unto 
 them, and said unto him, Master, what shall we do? And he said. 
 Exact no more than that which is appointed yoa. And the soldiers 
 likewise demanded of him, saying. And what shall we do ? And 
 he said unto them. Do violence to no man, neither accuse any 
 falsely, and be content with your wages." 
 
 This is St John Baptist's day. Let me say a very 
 few words — where many might be said — about one 
 of the noble.st personages who ever has appeared on this 
 earth. 
 
 Our blessed Lord said, " Among them that are born 
 of women there hath not risen a greater than John 
 the Baptist, notwithstanding, he that is least in the 
 kingdom of heaven is greater than he." These are 
 
Si yohn the Baptist. 257 
 
 serious words ; for which of us dare to say that we are 
 greater than John the Baptist ? 
 
 But let us at least think a while what John the 
 Baptist was like. So we shall gain at least the sight 
 of an ideal man. It is not the highest ideal. Our 
 Lord tells us that plainly ; and we, as Christians, should 
 know that it is not. The ideal man is our Lord Christ 
 Himself, and none other. Still, he that has not mounted 
 the lower step of the heavenly stair, has certainly not 
 mounted the higher ; and therefore, if we have not 
 attained to the likeness of John the Baptist, still more, 
 we have not attained to the likeness of Christ. What, 
 then, was John the Baptist like ? What picture of him 
 and his character can we form to ourselves in our own 
 imaginations, for that is all we have to picture him by ? 
 — helped — always remember that — by the Holy Spirit 
 of God, who helps the imagination, the poetic and 
 dramatic faculty of men ; just as much as He helps the 
 logical and argumentative faculty to see things and men 
 as they really are, by the spirit of love, which also is the 
 spirit of true understanding. 
 
 How, then, shall we picture John the Baptist to our- 
 selves ? Great painters, greater than the world seems 
 likely to see again, have exercised their fancy upon his 
 face, his figure, his actions. We must put out of our 
 minds, I fear, at once, many of the loveliest of them all : 
 those in which Raffaelle and others have depicted the 
 child John, in his camel's hair raiment, with a child's 
 cross in his hand, worshipping the infant Christ. There 
 is also one exquisite picture, by Annibale Caracci, if I 
 recollect rightly, in which the blessed babe is lying 
 
 E 
 
258 Si John the Baptist. 
 
 asleep, and the blessed Virgin signs to St John, pressing 
 forward to adore him, not to awaken his sleeping Lord 
 and God. But such imaginations, beautiful as they are, 
 and true in a heavenly and spiritual sense, which there- 
 fore is true eternally for you, and me, and all mankind, 
 are not historic fact. For St John the Baptist said 
 himself, " and I knew him not." 
 
 He may have been, we must almost say, he must 
 have been, brought up with or near our Lord. He may 
 have seen in Him such a child (we must believe that), 
 as he never saw before. He knew Him at least to be a 
 princely child, of David's royal line. But he was not 
 conscious of who and what He was, till the mysterious 
 itmer voice, of whom he gives only the darkest hints, 
 said to him, " Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit de- 
 scending, and remaining on Him, the same is He which 
 baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And I saw and bare 
 record that this is the Son of God." But what manner 
 of man was St John the Baptist in the meantime ? 
 Painters have tried their hands at drawing him, and we 
 thank them. Pictures, says St Augustine, are the books 
 of the unlearned. And, my friends, when great painters 
 paint, they are the books of the too-learned likewise. 
 They bring us back, bring us home, by one glance at a 
 human face, a human figure, a human scene of action, 
 out of our philosophies, and criticisms, and doctrines, 
 which narrow our hearts, without widening our heads, to 
 the deeper facts of humanity, and therefore to the deeper 
 facts of theology likewise. But what picture of St John 
 the Baptist shall we choose whereby to represent him to 
 ourselves, as the forerunner of the incarnate God ? 
 
Sf John the Baptist. 259 
 
 The best which I can recollect is the great picture by 
 Guido — ah, that he had painted always as wisely and 
 as well — of the magnificent lad sitting on the rock, half 
 clad in his camel's hair robe, his stalwart hand lifted up 
 to denounce he hardly knows what, save that things are 
 going all wrong, utterly wrong to him ; his beautiful 
 mouth open to preach, he hardly knows what, save that 
 he has a message from God, of which he is half-conscious 
 as yet — that he is a forerunner, a prophet, a foreteller of 
 something and some one which is to come, and which 
 yet is very near at hand. The wild rocks are round 
 him, the clear sky is over him, and nothing more. He, 
 the gentleman born, the clergyman born — for you must 
 recollect who and what St John the Baptist was, and 
 that he was neither democrat nor vulgar demagogue, nor 
 flatterer of ignorant mobs, but a man of an ancestry 
 as ancient and illustrious as it was civilised, and bound 
 by long ties of duty, of patriotism, of religion, and of the 
 temple worship of God : — he, the noble and the priest, 
 has thrown off — not in discontent and desperation, but 
 in hope and awe — all his family privileges, all that seems 
 to make life worth having ; and there aloft and in the 
 mountains, alone with nature and with God, feeding on 
 locusts and wild honey and whatsoever God shall send, 
 and clothed in skins, he, like Elijah of old, renews not 
 merely the habits, but the spirit and power of Elijah, 
 and preaches to a generation sunk in covetousness and 
 superstition, party spirit, and the rest of the seven 
 devils which brought on the fall of his native land, and 
 which will bring on the fall of every land on earth 
 preaches to them, I say — What ? 
 
26o 5"/ yokn the Baptist. 
 
 The most common, let me say boldly, the most vulgar 
 ■ — iu the good old sense of the word — the most vulgar 
 morality. He tells them that an awful ruin was coming 
 unless they repented and mended. How fearfully true 
 his words were, the next- fifty years proved. The axe, 
 he said, was laid to the root of the tree ; and the axe 
 was the heathen Roman, even then master of the land. 
 But God, not the Roman Ctesar merely, was laying the 
 axe. And He was a good God, who only wanted good- 
 ness, which He would preserve ; not badness, which He 
 would destroy. Therefore men must not merely repent 
 and do penance, they must bring forth fruits meet for 
 penance ; do right instead of doing wrong, lest they be 
 found barren trees, and be cut down, and cast into that 
 everlasting fire of God, which, thanks be to His Holy 
 name, bums for ever — unquenchable by all men's 
 politics, and systems, and political or other economies, to 
 destroy out of God's Kingdom all that offendeth and 
 whatsoever loveth and maketh a lie — oppressors, quacks, 
 cheats, hypocrites, and the rest. 
 
 The people — the farming class — came to him with 
 " What shall we do ?" The young priest and nobleman, 
 in his garment of camel's hair, has nothing but plain 
 morality for them. " He that hath two coats, let him 
 impart to him that hath none ; and he that hath meat, 
 let him do likewise." The pubHcans, the renegades, 
 who were farming the taxes of the Roman conquerors, 
 and making their base profit out of their countrymen's 
 slavery, came to him, — " Master, what shaU we do ? " 
 He does not tell them not to be publicans. He does 
 not tell his countrymen to rebel, though he must have 
 
Si( John the Baptist. 261 
 
 been sorely tempted to do it. All he says is, Make the 
 bad and base arrangement as good as you can ; exact no 
 more than that which is appointed you. The soldiers, 
 poor fellows, come to him. Whether they were Herod's 
 mercenaries, or real gallant Roman soldiers, we are not 
 told. Either had unlimited power under a mihtary 
 despotism, in an anarchic and half-enslaved country; but 
 whichever they were, he has the same answer to them 
 of common morality. You are what you are ; you are 
 where you are. Do it as well as you can. Do no 
 violence to any man, neither accuse any man falsely, 
 and be content with your wages. 
 
 Ah, wise politician, ah, clear and rational spirit, who 
 knows and tells others to do the duty which lies nearest 
 them ; who sees (as old Greek Hesiod says), how much 
 bigger the half is than the whole; who, in the hour of his 
 country's deepest degradation, had divine courage to say, 
 our deliverance Ues, not in rebellion, but in doing right. 
 
 But he has sterner words. Pharisees, the separatists, 
 the religious men, who think themselves holier than 
 any one else ; and Sadducees, materialist men of the 
 world, who sneer at the unseen, the unknown, the 
 heroic, come to him. And for Pharisee and Sadducee — 
 for the man who prides himself on believing more than 
 his neighbours, and for the man who prides himself on 
 believing less — he has the same answer. Both are 
 exclusives, inhuman, while they are pretending to be 
 more than human. He knew them well, for he was 
 born and bred among them, and he forestalls our Lord's 
 words to them, " O generation of vipers, who hath 
 warned you to flee from the wrath to come ? " 
 
262 ,5"^ John the Baptist. 
 
 At last his preaching of common morality is put to 
 the highest test. The king — the tyrant as we should 
 call him — the Herod of the day, an usurper, neither a 
 son of David, nor a king chosen by the people, tries to 
 patronize him. The old spirit of his forefather Aaron, of 
 his forefather Phineas, the spirit of Levi, which (rightly 
 understood), is the Spirit of God, flashes up in the young 
 priestly prophet, in the old form of common morality. 
 " It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife." 
 We know the rest ; how, at the request of Herodias' 
 daughter, Herod sent and beheaded John in prison, and 
 how she took his head in a charger and brought it to 
 her mother. Great painters have shown us again and 
 again the last act — outwardly hideous, but really beauti- 
 ful — of St John's heroic drama, in a picture of the lovely 
 dancing girl with .the prophet's head in a charger — a 
 dreadful picture ; and yet one which needed to be painted, 
 for it was a terrible fact, and is still, and will be till this 
 wicked world's end, a matter for pity and tears rather 
 than for indignation. The most perfect representations, 
 certainly the most tragical I know of it, are those which 
 are remarkable, not for their expression, but for their 
 want of expression — the young girl in brocade and jewels, 
 with the gory head in her hands, thinking of nothing out 
 of those wide vacant foolish eyes, save the triumph of self- 
 satisfied vanity ; for the spite and revenge is not in her, 
 but in her wicked mother. She is just the very creature, 
 who, if she had been better trained, and taught what John 
 the Baptist really was, might have reverenced him, wor- 
 shipped him, and ministered unto him. Alas ! alas ! how 
 do the follies of poor humanity repeat themselves in every 
 
Si yohi the Baptist. 263 
 
 age. The butterfly has killed the lion, without after all 
 meaning much harm. Ah, that such human butterflies 
 would take warning by the fate of Herodias' daughter, 
 and see how mere vanity will lead, if indulged too long 
 and too freely, to awful crime. 
 
 One knows the old stories, — how Herod, and Herodias, 
 and the vain foolish girl fell into disgrace with the 
 Emperor, and were banished into Provence, and died in 
 want and misery. One knows too the old legends, how 
 Herodias' daughter reappears in South Europe — even in 
 old German legends — as the witch-goddess, fair and 
 ruinous, sweeping for ever through wood and wold at 
 night with her troop of fiends, tempting the traveller to 
 dance with them till he dies ; a name for ever accursed 
 through its own vanity rather than its own deliberate 
 sin, from which may God preserve us all, men as well as 
 women. So two women, one wicked and one vain, did 
 all they could to destroy one of the noblest human 
 beings who ever walked this earth. And what did they 
 do ? They did not prevent his being the forerunner and 
 prophet of the incarnate Son of God. They did not 
 prevent his being the master and teacher of the blessed 
 Apostle St John, who was his spiritual son and heir. 
 They did not prevent his teaching all men and women, 
 to whom God gives grace to understand him, that 
 the true repentance, the true conversion, the true de- 
 liverance from the wrath to come, the true entrance into 
 the kingdom of heaven, the true way to Christ and to 
 God, is common morality. 
 
 And now let us bless God's holy name for all His 
 servants departed in His faith and fear, and especially 
 
264 S^ John the Baptist. 
 
 for His servant St John the Baptist, beseeching Him to 
 give us grace, so to follow his doctrine and holy Hfe, that 
 v(re may truly repent after his preaching and after his 
 example. May the Lord forgive our exceeding cowardice, 
 and help us constantly to speak the truth, boldly rebuke 
 vice, and patiently suffer for the truth's sake ; through 
 Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 
 
SERMON XXIX. 
 
 THE PRESENT RECOMPENSE. 
 Chester Cathedral, Nave Service, Evening. May 1872. 
 
 Proverbs xi. 31. 
 
 " Behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth : much 
 more the wicked and the sinner." 
 
 This is the key-note of the Book of Proverbs — that 
 men are punished or rewarded according to their deeds 
 in this life ; nay, it is the key-note of the whole Old 
 Testament. " The eyes of the Lord are over the 
 righteous, and His ears are open unto their prayers ; the 
 countenance of the Lord is against them that do evil, to 
 root out the remembrance of them from the earth." 
 
 But here, at the beginning of my sermon, I can fancy 
 some one ready to cry — Stay ! you have spoken too 
 strongly. That is not the key-note of the whole Old 
 Testament. There are words in it of quite a different 
 note — words which complain to God that the good are 
 not rewarded, and the wicked are not punished : as for 
 instance, when the Psalmist says how the ungodly men 
 of this evil world are filled with God's hid treasure, and 
 how they have children at their desire, and leave the 
 rest of their substance for their babes. And again, " I 
 
266 The Present Recompense. 
 
 was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity 
 of the wicked. For there are no bands in their 
 death ; but their strength is firm. They are not in 
 trouble as other men; neither are they plagued like 
 other men. . . . They set their mouth against the 
 heavens, and their tongue walketh through the earth. 
 Therefore his people return hither; and waters of 
 a full cup are wrung out to them. And they say. 
 How doth God know ? and is there knowledge in 
 the most High ? " And though the Psalmist says that 
 such persons will come to a sudden and fearful end, 
 j'et he confesses that so long as they live they have 
 prospered, while he had been punished all day long, and 
 chastened every morning. And do we not know that so 
 it is ? Is it not obvious now, and has it not been 
 notorious in every country, and in all times, that so it 
 is ? Do not good men often lead lives of poverty and 
 affliction ? Do not men make large fortunes, or rise to 
 fame and power, by base and wicked means ? and do not 
 those same men often enough die in their beds, and 
 leave children behind them, and found families, who 
 prosper for generations after they are dead ? How were 
 they recompensed in the earth ? Now this is one of the 
 puzzles of life, which tries a man's faith in God, as it 
 tried the psalmists and prophets in old time. But that 
 the text speaks truth I do not doubt. I believe that 
 the prosperous bad man is recompensed in the earth — is 
 punished in this life — often with the most terrible of all 
 punishments — Impunity; the not being punished at all; 
 which is the worst thing in this life which can happen 
 to a sinner. But I am not going to speak of that, but 
 
The Present Recompense. 267 
 
 rather of the first part of the text, " The righteous shall 
 be recompensed in the earth." 
 
 Now is not the answer to the puzzle this : That God 
 is impartial ; that He is no respecter of persons, but 
 causing His sun to shine on the evil and on the good, 
 and His rain to fall on the just and on the unjust ; and 
 so rewarding every man according to his work, paying 
 him for all work done, of whatever kind it may be ? 
 Some work for this world, which we do see, and God 
 gives them what they earn in this life ; some work for 
 the world above, which we cannot see, and God gives 
 them what they earn in this life, for ever and ever like- 
 wise. If a man wishes for treasure on earth, he can 
 have it if he will, and enjoy it as long as it lasts. If a 
 man wishes for treasure in heaven, he can have it if he 
 will, and enjoy it as long as it lasts. God deals fairly 
 with both, and pays both what they have earned. 
 
 Some set their hearts on this world ; some want 
 money, some want power, some want fame and admira- 
 tion from their fellow-men, some want merely to amuse 
 themselves. Then they will have what they want if 
 they will take the right way to get it. If a man wishes to 
 make a large fortune, and die rich, he will very probably 
 succeed, if he will only follow diligently the laws and 
 rules by which God has appointed that money should be 
 made. If a man longs for power and glory, and must 
 needs be admired and obeyed by his fellow-men, he can 
 have his wish, if he will go the right way to get what he 
 longs for; especially in a free country like this, he will get 
 most probably just as much of them as he deserves — that 
 is, as much as he has talent and knowledge enough to 
 
268 The Present Recompense. 
 
 earn. So did the Pharisees in our Lord's time. They 
 wanted power, fame, and money as religious leaders, and 
 they knew how to get them as weU as any men who ever 
 lived ; and they got them. Our Lord did not deny that. 
 They had their reward. He said. They succeeded — those 
 old Pharisees — in being looked up to as the masters of 
 the Jewish mob, and in crucifying our Lord Himself. 
 They had their reward ; and so may you and I. It we 
 want any earthly thing, and have knowledge of the way 
 to get it, and have ability and perseverance enough, then 
 we shall very probably get it, and much good it will do 
 us when, we have got it after all. We shall have had 
 our treasure upon earth and our hearts likewise ; and 
 when we come to die we shall leave both our treasure 
 and our hearts behind us, and the Lord have mercy on 
 our souls. 
 
 But again, there are those, thank God, who have, or 
 are at least trying to get, treasure in heaven, which they 
 may carry away with them when they die, and keep for 
 ever. And who are they ? Those who are longing and 
 trying to be true and to be good ; who have seen how 
 beautiful it is to be true and to be good ; to know God 
 and the will of God ; to love God and the will of God ; 
 and therefore to copy His likeness and to do His will. 
 Those who long for sanctification, and who desire to be 
 holy, even as their Father in heaven is holy, and perfect, 
 even as their Father in heaven is perfect; and who 
 therefore think, as St Paul bade them, of whatsoever 
 things are just, true, pure, lovely, and of good report, if 
 there be any true manhood, and if there be any just praise 
 — in three words — who seek after whatsoever is true. 
 
The Present Recompense. 269 
 
 beautiful, and good. These are they that have treasure in 
 heaven. For what is really true, really beautiful, really 
 good, is also really heavenly. God alone is perfect, 
 good, beautiful, and true ; and heaven is heaven because 
 it is filled with the glory of His goodness. His beauty, 
 and His truth. But wherever there is a soul on earth 
 led by the Spirit of God, and filled by the Spirit of God 
 with good and beautiful and true graces and inspirations, 
 there is a soul which, as St Paul says, is sitting in 
 heavenly places with Christ Jesus — a soul which is 
 already in heaven though still on earth. We confess it 
 by our own words. We speak of a heavenly character ; 
 we speak even of a heavenly countenance ; and we speak 
 right. We see that that character, though it be still 
 imperfect, and marred by human weaknesses, is already 
 good with th.e goodness which comes down from heaven; 
 and that that countenance, though it may be mean and 
 plain, is already beautiful with the beauty which comes 
 down from heaven. 
 
 But how are such souls recompensed in the earth ? 
 Oh ! my friends, is not a man recompensed in the earth 
 whenever he can lift up his heart above the earth \ 
 — whenever he can lift up his heart unto the Lord, 
 and behold His glory above all the earth ? Does not 
 this earth look brighter to him then ? The world of 
 man looks brighter to him, in spite of all its sins and 
 sorrows, for he sees the Lord ruling it, the Lord for- 
 giving it, the Lord saving it. He sees, by the eye of 
 faith, the Lord fulfilling His own promise — " where two 
 or three are gathered together in my name, there am I 
 in the midst of them" ; and he takes heart and hope for 
 
2 70 The Present Recompense. 
 
 the poor earth, and says. The earth is not deserted ; man- 
 kind is not without a Father, a Saviour, a Teacher, a 
 King. Bad men and bad spirits are not the masters of 
 the world ; and men are not as creeping things, as the 
 fishes of the sea, which have no ruler over them. For 
 Christ has not left His church. He reigns, and will 
 reign, till He has put all enemies under His feet, and 
 cast out of His kingdom all that offend, and whatsoever 
 loveth and maketh a lie ; and then the heavenly treasure 
 will be the only treasure ; for whatsoever things are just, 
 whatsoever things are true, pure, lovely, and of good re- 
 port, if there be any valour, and if there be any praise, 
 those things, and they alone, will be left in the kingdom 
 of Christ and of God. Is not that man recompensed ia 
 the earth ? Must he not rise each morning to go about 
 his daily work vs^ith a more cheerful heart, saying, with 
 Jeremiah, in like case, " Upon this I awaked, and beheld, 
 and my sleep was sweet to me ?" 
 
 Yes, I see in experience that the righteous man is 
 recompensed in the earth, every day, and all day long. 
 In proportion as a man's mind is heavenly, just so much 
 wUl he enjoy this beautiful earth, and all that is thereiu. 
 I believe that if a man walks with God, then he can 
 walk nowhither without seeing and hearing what the 
 ungodly and bad man will never see and hear, because 
 his eyes are blinded, and his heart hardened from think- 
 ing of himself, his own selfish wants, his own selfish sins. 
 Which, for instance, was the happier man — which the 
 man who was the more recompensed in the earth this 
 very day — the poor man who went for his Sunday walk 
 into the country, thinking of little but the sins and the 
 
The Present Recompense. 2 7 1 
 
 follies of the week past, and probably of the sins and the 
 follies of the week to come ; or the man who went with 
 a clear conscience, and had the heart to thank God for 
 the green grass, and the shining river, and the misty 
 mountains sleeping far away, and notice the song of the 
 birds, and the scent of the flowers, as a little child might 
 do, and know that his Father in heaven had made all 
 these ? 
 
 Yes, my friends, Christ is very near us, though our 
 eyes are holden by our own sins, and therefore we see Him 
 not. But just in proportion as a man walks with God, 
 just in proportion as the eyes of his soul are opened by 
 the Spirit of God, he recovers, I believe, the privilege 
 which Adam lost when he fell. He hears the Word of 
 the Lord walking among the trees of the garden in the 
 cool of the day ; and instead of trying, like guilty Adam, 
 to hide himself from his Maker, answers, with reverence 
 and yet with joy, Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth. 
 
 Nay, I would go further still, and say. Is not the 
 righteous man recompensed on the earth every time he 
 hears a strain of noble music ? To him who has his 
 treasure in heaven, music speaks about that treasure 
 things far too deep for words. Music speaks to him of 
 whatsoever is just, true, pure, lovely, and of good report, 
 of whatsoever is manful and ennobling, of whatsoever is 
 worthy of praise and honour. Music, to that man, speaks 
 of a divine order and a divine proportion ; of a divine 
 harmony, through all the discords and confusions of men ; 
 of a divine melody, through all the cries and groans of 
 sin and sorrow. What says a wiser and a better man 
 than I shall ever be, and that not of noble music, but of 
 
272 The Present Recompense. 
 
 such as we may hear any day in any street ? " Even that 
 vulgar music," he says, " which makes one man merry, 
 another mad, strikes in me a deep fit of devotion, and 
 a profound contemplation of God, the first composer. 
 There is something more of divinity in it than the ear 
 discovers. It is an hieroglyphical and shadowed lesson 
 of the whole world, and of the creatures of God. Such 
 a melody to the ear as the whole world, well understood, 
 would afford to the understanding.'' That man, I in- 
 sist, was indeed recompensed on the earth, when music, 
 which is to the ungodly and unrighteous the most 
 earthly of all arts, which to the heathens and the savages, 
 to frivolous and profligate persons, only tempts to siUy 
 excitement or to brutal passion, was to him as the speech 
 of angels, a remembrancer to him of that eternal and 
 ever-present heaven, from which all beauty, truth, and 
 goodness are shed forth over the universe, from the glory 
 of the ever-blessed Trinity — Father, Son, and Holy 
 Spirit. 
 
 Does any one say — These things are too high for me ; 
 I cannot understand them ? My dear friends, are they 
 not too high for me likewise ? Do you fancy that I un- 
 derstand them, though my reason, as well as Holy Scrip- 
 ture, tells me that they are true ? I understand them 
 no more than I understand how I draw a single breath, 
 or think a single thought. But it is good for you, and 
 for me, and for every man, now and then, to hear things 
 which we do not understand ; that so we may learn our 
 own ignorance, and be lifted up above ourselves, and re- 
 nounce our fancied worldly wisdom, and think within 
 ourselves : — Would it not be wiser to confess ourselves 
 
The Present Recompense. 273 
 
 foolSj and take our Lord's advice, and be converted, and 
 become as little children ? For otherwise, our Lord 
 says, we shall in nowise enter into this very kingdom of 
 heaven of which I have been telling you. For this is 
 one of the things which God hides from the wise and 
 prudent, and yet revealeth unto babes. Yes, that is the 
 way to understand all things, however deep — to become 
 as little children. A little child proves that aU I say is 
 true, and that it knows that all I say is true. Though 
 it cannot put its feelings into words, it acts on them by 
 a mere instinct, which is the gift of God. Why does a 
 little child pick flowers? Why does a little child dance 
 when it hears a strain of music ? And deeper still, why 
 does a little child know when it has done wrong ? Why 
 does it love to hear of things beautiful and noble, and 
 shrink from things foul and mean, if what I say is not 
 true ? The child does so, because it is nearer heaven, 
 not further off, than we grown folk. 
 
 Ah ! that we would all lay to heart what one said of 
 old, who walked with God : — 
 
 " Dear soul, could'st thou become a child. 
 Once more on earth, meek, undefiled, 
 Then Paradise were round thee here, 
 And God Himself for ever near." 
 
SERMON XXX. 
 
 THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN. 
 Chapel Royal, St Jamei. 1873. 
 
 St. Matt. xxii. 2-7. 
 
 ' ' The kingdom of heaven is like unto a certain king, which made a 
 marriage for his son, and sent forth his servants to call them that 
 were bidden to the wedding : and they would not come. Again, 
 he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bidden. 
 Behold, I have prepared my dinner : my oxen and failings are 
 killed, and all things are ready : come unto the marriage. But 
 they made light of it, and went their ways, one to his farm, another 
 to his merchandise : And the remnant took his servants, and 
 entreated them spitefully, and slew them. But when the king 
 heard thereof, he was wroth : and he sent forth his armies, and 
 destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city." 
 
 This parable, if we understand it aright, wlLI help to 
 teach us theology — that is, the knowledge of God, and 
 of the character of God. For it is a parable concerning 
 the kingdom of heaven, and the laws and customs of the 
 kingdom of heaven — that is, the spiritual and eternal 
 laws by which God governs men. 
 
 Now, what any kingdom or government is like must 
 needs depend on what the king or governor of it is like ; 
 at least if that king is all-powerful, and can do what he 
 likes. His laws will be like his character. If he be 
 good, he will make good laws. If he be bad, he will 
 make bad laws. If he be harsh and cruel — if he be 
 
The Kingdom of Heaven. 275 
 
 careless and indulgent — so -will his laws be. If he be 
 loving and generous, delighting in seeing his subjects 
 happy, then his laws will be so shaped that his subjects 
 will be happy, if they obey those laws. But also — and 
 this is a very serious matter, and one to which foolish 
 people in all ages have tried to shut their eyes, and false 
 preachers in all ages have tried to blind men's eyes — ■ 
 also, I say, if his laws be good, and bountiful, and sure 
 to make men happy, then the good king wiU have those 
 laws obeyed. He will not be an indulgent king, for in 
 his case to be indulgent will be cruelty, and nothing less. 
 The good king will not say, — I have given you laws by 
 which you may live happy ; but I do not care whether 
 you obey them or not. I have, as it were, set you up 
 in life, and given you advantages by which you may 
 prosper if you use them ; but I do not care whether you 
 use them or not. For to say that would be as much as 
 to say that I do not care if you make yourselves miser- 
 able, and make others miserable likewise. The good 
 king will say, — You shall obey my laws, for they 
 are for your good. You shall use my gifts, for they 
 are for your good. And if you do not, I will punish 
 you. You shall respect my authority. And if you do 
 not — if you go too far, if you become wanton and 
 cruel, and destroy your fellow-subjects unjustly off the 
 face of the earth ; then I will destroy you off the face of 
 the earth, and burn up your city. I will destroy any 
 government or system of society which you set up in op- 
 position to my good and just laws. And if you merely 
 despise the gifts, and refuse to use them — then I will 
 cast you out of my kingdom, inside which is freedom and 
 
276 The Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 happiness, and light and knowledge, into the darknesa 
 outside, bound hand and foot, into the ignorance and 
 brutal slavery which you have chosen, where you may 
 reconsider yourself, weeping and gnashing your teeth as 
 you discover what a fool you have been. 
 
 Our Lord's parable has fulfilled itself again and again 
 in history, and will fulfil itself as long as foolish and 
 rebellious persons exist on earth. This is one of the 
 laws of the kingdom of heaven. It must be so, for it 
 arises by necessity out of the character of Christ, the 
 king of heaven. — Infinite bounty and generosity ; but if 
 that bounty be despised and insulted, or still more, if it 
 be outraged by wanton tyranny or cruelty, then — for 
 the benefit of the rest of mankind — awful severity. 
 So it is, and so it must be ; simply because God is 
 good. 
 
 At least, this is the kind of king which the parable 
 shows to us. The king in it begins, not by asking his 
 subjects to pay him taxes, or even to do him service, but 
 to come to a great feast — a high court ceremonial — the 
 marriage of his son. Whatsoever else that may mean, it 
 certainly means this — that the king intended to treat 
 these men, not as his slaves, but as his guests and friends. 
 They will not come. They are too busy ; one over his 
 farm, another over his merchandise. They owe, re- 
 member, safe possession of their farm, and safe transit 
 for their merchandise, to the king, who governs and 
 guards the land. But they forget that, and refuse his 
 invitation. Some of them, seemingly out of mere inso- 
 lence, and the spirit of rebellion against authority, just 
 because it is authority, go a step too far. To show that 
 
The Kingdom of Heaven. 277 
 
 they are their own masters, and intend to do what they 
 like, they take the king's messengers, and treat them 
 spitefully, and kill them. 
 
 Then there arises in that king a noble indignation. 
 We do not read that the king sentimentalised over these 
 rebels, and said, — " After all, their evil, like all evil, is 
 only a lower form of good. They had a fine instinct of 
 freedom and independence latent in them, only it was in 
 this case somewhat perverted. They are really only to 
 be pitied for knowing no better ; but I trust, by careful 
 education, to bring them to a clearer sense of their own 
 interests. I shall therefore send them to a reformatory, 
 where, in consideration of the depressing circumstances 
 of their imprisonment, they wiU be better looked after, 
 and have lighter work, than the average of my honest 
 and peaceable subjects." If the king had spoken thus, 
 he would have won high applause in these days; at least 
 till the farms and the merchandise, the property and the 
 profits of the rest of his subjects, were endangered by 
 these favoured objects of his philanthropy ; who, having 
 found that rebellion and even murder was pardonable in 
 one case, would naturally try whether it was not par- 
 donable in other cases likewise. But what we read of 
 the king — and we must really remember, in fear and 
 trembling, who spoke this parable, even our Lord Him- 
 self, — is this — He sent forth his armies, soldiers, men 
 disciplined to do their dutj' at all risks, and sworn to 
 carry out the law, and destroyed those murderers, and 
 burned up their city. 
 
 Yes, the king was very angry, as he had a right to 
 be. Yes, let us lay that to heart, and tremble, from the 
 
278 The Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 very worst of us all to the very best of us all. There is 
 an anger in God. There is indignation in God. Our 
 highest reason ought to tell us that there must be anger 
 in God, as long as sin and wrong exist in any comer of 
 the universe. For all that is good in man is of the 
 likeness of God. And is it not a good feeling, a noble 
 feeling, in man, to be indignant, or to cry for vengeance 
 on the offender, whenever we hear of cruelty, injustice, 
 or violence ? Is that not noble ? I say it is. I say 
 that the man whose heart does not bum within him at 
 the sight of tjTanny and cruelty, of baseness and deceit, 
 who is not ready to say. Take him, and do to him as he 
 has done to others ; that man's heart is not right with 
 God, or with man either. His moral sense is stunted. 
 He is on the way to become, first, if he can, a tyrant, 
 and then a slave. 
 
 And shall there be no noble indignation in God when 
 He beholds all the wrong which is done on earth? 
 Shall the just and holy God look on carelessly and satis- 
 fied at injustice and unholiness which vexes even poor 
 sinful man ? God forbid ! To think that, would, to 
 my mind, be to fancy God less just, less merciful, than 
 man. And if any one says. Anger is a passion, a suffer- 
 ing from something outside oneself, and God can have 
 no passions ; God cannot be moved by the sins and 
 follies of such paltry atoms as we human beings are : 
 the answer is, Man's anger — even just anger — is, too 
 often, a passion ; weak-minded persons, ill- educated 
 persons, especially when they get together in mobs, and 
 excite each other, are carried away when they hear even 
 a false report of cruelty or injustice, by their really 
 
The Kingdom of Heaven. 279 
 
 wholesome indignation, and say and do foolish, and cruel, 
 and unjust things, the victims of their own passion. 
 But even among men, the wiser a man is, the purer, 
 the stronger-minded, so much the more can he control 
 his indignation, and not let it rise into passion, but 
 punish the offender calmly, though sternly, according to 
 law. Even so, our reason bids us believe, does God, 
 who does all things by law. His eternal laws punish 
 of themselves, just as they reward of themselves. The 
 same law of God may be the messenger of His anger to 
 the bad, while it is the messenger of His love to the 
 good. For God has not only no passions, but no parts ; 
 and therefore His anger and His love are not different, 
 but the same. And His love is His anger, and His 
 anger is His love. 
 
 An awful thought and yet a blessed thought. Think 
 of it, my friends — think of it day and night. Under 
 God's anger, or under God's love, we must be, whether 
 we wUl or not. We cannot flee from His presence. We 
 cannot go from His spirit. If we are loving, and so rise 
 up to heaven, God is there — in love. If we are cruel, 
 and wrathful, and so go down to hell, God is there also 
 — in wrath : with the clean He will be clean, with the 
 froward man He will be froward. In God we live and 
 move, and have our being. On us, and on us alone, it 
 depends, what sort of a life we shall live, and whether 
 our being shall be happy or miserable. On us, and on 
 us alone, it depends, whether we shall live under God's 
 anger, or live under God's love. On us, and on us 
 alone, it depends whether the eternal and unchangeable 
 
28o The Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 God shall be to us a consuming fire, or light, and Hfe, 
 and bliss for evermore. 
 
 We never had more need to think of this than now ; 
 for there has spread over the greater part of the civilised 
 world a strong spirit of disbelief in the living God. Men 
 do not believe that God punishes sin and wrong-doing, 
 either in this world or in the world to come. And it is 
 not confined to those who are called infidels, who dis- 
 believe in the incarnation and kingdom of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ. Would to God it were so ! Everywhere 
 we find Christians of all creeds and denominations alike, 
 holding the very same ruinous notion, and saying to 
 themselves, God does not govern this present world. 
 God does not punish or revrard in this present Hfe. This 
 world is all wrong, and the devil's world, and therefore 
 I cannot prosper in the world unless I am a little wrong 
 likewise, and do a little of the devil's work. So one 
 lies, another cheats, another oppresses, another neglects 
 his plainest social duties, another defiles himself with 
 base political or religious intrigues, another breaks the 
 seventh commandment, or, indeed, any and every one of 
 the commandments which he finds troublesome. And 
 when one asks in astonishment — You call yourselves 
 Christians ? You believe in God, and the Bible, and 
 Christianity ? Do you not think that God will punish 
 you for all this ? Do you not hear from the psalmists, and 
 prophets, and apostles, of a God who judges and punishes 
 such generations as this ? Of a wrath of God which is 
 revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness of men, 
 who, like you, hold down the truth in unrighteousness, 
 knowing what is right and yet doing what is wrong ? 
 
The Kingdom of Heaven. 281 
 
 Then they answer, at least in their hearts, Oh dear no ! 
 God does not govern men now, or judge men now. He 
 only did so, our preachers tell us, under the old Jewish 
 dispensation ; and such words as you quote from our 
 Lord, or St Paul, have only to do with the day of judg- 
 ment, and the next life, and we have made it all right 
 for the next life. I, says one, regularly perform my re- 
 ligious duties ; and I, says another, build churches and 
 chapels, and give large sums in charity ; and I, says 
 another, am converted, and a member of a church ; and 
 I, says another, am elect, and predestined to everlasting 
 life — and so forth, and so forth. Each man turning the 
 grace of God into a cloak for licentiousness, and delud- 
 ing himself into the notion that he may break the eter- 
 nal laws of God, and yet go to heaven, as he calls it, 
 when he dies : not knowing, poor foolish man, that as 
 the noble commination service well says, the dreadful 
 judgments of God are not waiting for certain people at 
 the last day, thousands of years hence, but hanging over 
 all our heads already, and always ready to fall on us. 
 Not knowing that it is as true now as it was two thou- 
 sand years ago, that " God is a righteous judge, strong 
 and patient." " If a man will not turn. Ho will whet 
 His sword ; He hath bent His bow, and made it ready," 
 against those who travail with mischief, who conceive 
 sorrow, and bring forth ungodliness. They dig up pits 
 for their neighbours, and fall themselves into the destruc- 
 tion which they have made for others; not knowing that 
 it is as true now as it was two thousand years ago, that 
 God is for ever saying to the ungodly, " Why dost thou 
 preach my laws, and takest my covenant in thy mouth ; 
 
282 The Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 whereas thou hatest to be reformed, and hast cast my 
 words behind thee ? Thou hast let thy mouth speak 
 wickedness, and with thy tongue thou hast set forth deceit. 
 These things hast thou done, and I held my tongue, 
 and thou thoughtest, wickedly, that I am even such a 
 one as thyself. But I will reprove thee, and set before 
 thee the things which thou hast done. consider this, 
 ye that forget God : lest I pluck you away, and there 
 be none to deliver you." 
 
 Let us lay this to heart, and say, there can be no 
 doubt — I at least have none — that there is growing up 
 among us a serious divorce between faith and practice; 
 a serious disbelief that the kingdom of heaven is about 
 us, and that Christ is ruling us, as He told us plainly 
 enough in His parables, by the laws of the kingdom of 
 heaven ; and that He does, and will punish and reward 
 each man according to those laws, and according to 
 nothing else. 
 
 We pride ourselves on our superior light, and our 
 improved civilisation, and look down on the old Roman 
 Catholic missionaries, who converted our forefathers from 
 heathendom in the Middle Ages. Now, I am a Pro- 
 testant, if ever there was one, and I know well that these 
 men had their superstitions and false doctrines. They 
 made mistakes, and often worse than mistakes, for they 
 were but men. But this I tell you, that if they had 
 not had a deep and sound belief that they were in the 
 kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven ; and that they 
 and all men must obey the laws of the kingdom of 
 heaven ; and that the first law of it was, that wrong- 
 doing would be punished, and rightdoing rewarded, in 
 
The Kingdom of Heaven. 283 
 
 this life, every day, and all day long, as sure as Christ 
 the living Lord reigned in righteousness over all the 
 earth ; if they had not believed that, I say, and acted on 
 it, we should probably have been heathen at this day. 
 As it is, unless we Protestants get back the old be- 
 lief, that God is a living God, and that His judgments 
 are abroad in the earth, and that only in keeping His 
 commandments can we get life, and not perish, we 
 shall be seriously in danger of sinking at last into that 
 hopeless state of popular feeling, into which more than 
 one nation in our own time has fallen, — that, as the 
 prophet of old says, a wonderful and horrible thing is 
 committed in the land ; the prophets — that is, the 
 preachers and teachers — prophesy falsely ; and the 
 priests — the ministers of religion — bear rule by their 
 means ; and my people love to have it so — love to have 
 their consciences drugged by the news that they may 
 live bad lives, and yet die good deaths. 
 
 "And what will ye do in the end thereof?" asks 
 Jeremiah. What indeed ! What the Jews did in the 
 end thereof you may read in the book of the prophet 
 Jeremiah. They did nothing, and could do nothing — • 
 with their morahty their manhood was gone. Sin had 
 borne its certain fruit of anarchy and decrepitude. The 
 wrath of God revealed itself as usual, by no miracle, but 
 through inscrutable social laws. They had to submit, 
 cowardly and broken-hearted, to an invasion, a siege, and 
 an utter ruin. I do not say, God forbid, that we shall 
 ever sink so low, and have to endure so terrible a 
 chastisement : but this I say, that the only way in 
 which any nation of which I ever read in history, can 
 
284 The Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 escape, sooner or later, from such a fate, is to remember 
 every day, and all day long, that the wrath of God 
 is revealed from heaven against all ill-doing of men, 
 who hold the truth in unrighteousness, knowing what 
 is true and what is right, yet telling lies, and doing 
 wrong. 
 
 Let us lay this to heart, with seriousness and godly 
 fear. For so we shall look up with reverence, and yet 
 with hope, to Christ the ascended king, to whom all 
 power is given in heaven and earth; for ever asking Him 
 for His Holy Spirit, to put into our minds good desires, 
 and to enable us to bring these desires to good eifect. 
 And so we shall live for ever under our great task- 
 master's eye, and find out that that eye is not merely 
 the eye of a just judge, not merely the eye of a bounti- 
 ful king, but more the eye of a loving and merciful 
 Saviour, in whose presence is life even here on earth ; 
 and at whose right hand, even in this sinful world, are 
 pleasures for evermore. 
 
SERMON XXXI. 
 
 THE UNCHANGEABLE CHEIST. 
 
 Eversley. 1845. 
 
 Hebrews xiii. 8. 
 "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." 
 
 Let me first briefly remind you, as the truth upon which 
 my whole explanation of this text is built, that man 
 is not meant either for solitude or independence. He 
 is meant to live with his fellow-men, to live hy them, 
 and to live for them. He is healthy and godly, only 
 when he knows all men for his brothers ; and himself, 
 in some way or other, as the servant of all, and bound 
 in ties of love and duty to every one around him. 
 
 It is not, however, my intention to dwell upon this 
 truth, deep and necessary as it is, but to turn your 
 attention to one of its consequences ; I mean to the 
 disappointment and regret of which so many complain, 
 who try, more or less healthily, to keep that truth be- 
 fore them, and shew it forth in their daily life. 
 
 It has been, and is now, a common complaint with 
 many who interest themselves about their feUow- 
 creatures, and the welfare of the human race, that no- 
 thing in this world is sure,— nothing is permanent ; a 
 continual ebb and flow seems to be the only law of 
 
286 The Unchangeable Christ. 
 
 human life. Men change, they say ; their friendships 
 are fickle ; their minds, like their bodies, alter from day 
 to day. The heart whom you trust to-day, to-morrow 
 may deceive ; the friend for whom you have sacrificed so 
 much, will not .in his turn endure the trial of his friend- 
 ship. The child on whom you may have reposed your 
 whole affection for years, grows up and goes forth into 
 the world, and forms new ties, and you are left alone. 
 Why then love man ? Why care for any bom of 
 woman, if the happiness which depends on them is 
 exposed to a thousand chances — a thousand changes ? 
 Again ; we hear the complaint that not only men, but 
 circumstances change. Why knit myself, people wiU 
 ask, to one who to-morrow may be whirled away from 
 me by some eddy of circumstances, and so go on his 
 way, while I see him no more ? Why relieve distress 
 which fresh accidents may bring back again to-morrow, 
 with all its miseries ? Why attach ourselves to a home 
 which we may leave to-morrow, — to pursuits which fortune 
 may force us to relinquish, — to bright hopes which the 
 rolling clouds may shut out from us, — to opinions which 
 the next generation may find to have been utterly 
 mistaken, — to a circle of acquaintances who must in a 
 few years be lying silent and solitary, each in his grave ? 
 Why, in short, set our affections on anything in this 
 earth, or struggle to improve or settle aught in a world 
 where all seems so temporary, changeful, and uncertain, 
 that " nought doth endure but mutability ? " 
 
 Such is and has been the complaint, mixed up of 
 truth and falsehood, poured out for ages by thousands 
 who have loved (as the world would saj') " too well " — 
 
The Unchangeable Christ. 287 
 
 who have tried to build up for themselves homes in 
 this world ; forgetting that they were strangers and 
 pilgrims in it ; and so, when the floods came, and swept 
 away that small fool's paradise of theirs, repined, and 
 were astonished, as though some strange thing had 
 happened to them. 
 
 The time would fail me did I try fully to lay before 
 you how this dread and terror of change, and this un- 
 satisfied craving after an eternal home and an unchang- 
 ing friendship embittered the minds of all the more 
 thoughtful heathens before the coming of Christ, who, 
 as the apostle says, all their lives were in bondage to 
 the fear of death. How all their schemes and concep- 
 tions of the course of this world, resolved themselves 
 into one dark picture of the terrible river of time, rest- 
 less, pitiless, devouring all life and beauty as fast as it 
 arose, ready to overwhelm the speakers themselves also 
 with the coming wave, as it had done all they loved be- 
 fore them, and then roll onward for ever, none knew 
 whither! The time would fail me, too, did I try to 
 explain how after He had appeared, Who is the same 
 yesterday, to-day, and for ever, men have still found the 
 same disappointment in. all the- paths of life. Many, 
 not seeing that the manifestation of an incarnate God 
 was the answer to all such doubts, the healer of all such 
 wounds, have sickened at this same change and 
 uncertainty, and attempted self-deliverance by all kinds 
 of uncouth and most useless methods. Some have 
 shielded themselves, or tried to shield themselves, in an 
 armour of stoical indifference — of utter selfishness, being 
 
288 The Unchangeable Christ. 
 
 sure that at all events there was one friendship in the 
 world which could neither change nor fade — Self-love. 
 
 Others, again, have withdrawn themselves in disgust, 
 not indeed from their God and Saviour, but from their 
 fellow-men, and buried themselves in deserts, hoping 
 thereby to escape what they despaired of conquering, the 
 chances and changes of this mortal life. Thus they, 
 alas, threw away the gold of human affections among the 
 dross of this world's comfort and honour. Wiser they 
 were, indeed, than those last mentioned ; but yet shew 
 I youf a more excellent way. 
 
 It is strange, and mournful, too, that this complaint 
 of unsatisfied hopes and longings should still be often 
 heard from Christian lips ! Strange, indeed, when the 
 object and founder of our religion, the king and head of 
 all our race, the God whom we are bound to worship, the 
 eldest brother whom we are bound to love, the Saviour 
 who died upon the cross for us, is " the same yesterday, 
 and to-day, and for ever ! " Strange, indeed, when we 
 remember that God was manifest in the flesh, that He 
 might save humanity and its hopes from perpetual 
 change and final destruction, and satisfy all those crav- 
 ings after an immutable object of man's loyalty and 
 man's love. 
 
 Yes, He has given us, in Himself, a king who can 
 never misgovern, a teacher who can never mislead, a priest 
 whose sacrifice can never be unaccepted, a protector who 
 can never grow weary, a friend who can never betray. 
 And all that this earth has in it really worth loving, — 
 the ties of family, of country, of imiversal brotherhood — 
 the beauties and wonders of God's mysterious universe — 
 
The Unchangeable Christ. 289 
 
 all true love, all useful labour, all innocent enjoy- 
 ment — the marriage bed, and the fireside circle — the 
 bounties of harvest, and the smiles of spring, and all that 
 makes life bright and this earth dear — all these things 
 He has restored to man, spiritual and holy, deep with 
 new meaning, bright with purer enjoyment, rich with use- 
 fulness, not merely for time, but for eternity, after they 
 had become, through the accumulated sin and folly of 
 ages, foul, dead, and well nigh forgotten. He has united 
 these common duties and pleasures of man's life to Him- 
 self, by taking them on Himself on earth ; by giving us 
 His spirit to understand and fulfil those duties ; by making 
 it a duty to Him to cultivate them to the uttermost. He 
 has sanctified them for ever, by shewing us that they are 
 types and patterns of still higher relations to Himself, 
 and to His Father and our Father, from whom they 
 came. 
 
 Christ our Lord and Saviour is a witness to us of the 
 enduring, the everlasting nature of all that human 
 life contains of beauty and holiness, and real value. 
 He is a witness to us that Wisdom is eternal ; that 
 that all-embracing sight, that all-guiding counsel, which 
 the Lord "possessed in the beginning of His way, 
 before His works of old," He who " was set up from 
 everlasting," who was with Him when He made the 
 world, still exists, and ever shall exist, unchanged. 
 The word of the Lord standeth sure ! That Word 
 which was " in the beginning," and " was with God,'' 
 and " was God ! " Glorious truth ! that, amid all the 
 inventions which man has sought out, while every new 
 philosopher has been starting some new method of hap- 
 
290 The Unchangeable Christ. 
 
 piness, some new theory of human life and its destinies, 
 God has still been working onward, unchecked, unaltered, 
 "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." 0, sons 
 of men ! perplexed by all the apparent contradictions 
 and cross purposes and opposing powers and principles of 
 this strange, dark, noisy time, remember to your comfort 
 that your King, a man like you, yet very God, now sits 
 above, seeing through all which you cannot see through ; 
 unravelling surely all this tangled web of time, while 
 under His guiding eye all things are moving silently 
 onward, like the stars in their courses above you, toward 
 their appointed end, " when He shall have put down all 
 rule and all authority, and power, for He must reign, tiU 
 He hath put all enemies under His feet.'' And then, 
 at last, this cloudy sky shall be all clear and bright, for 
 He, the Lamb, shall be the light thereof. 
 
 Christ is the witness to us also of the eternity of Love, 
 — Of God's love — the love of the Father who wills, of 
 Himself who has purchased, of the Holy Ghost who 
 works in us our salvation ; and of the eternity of aU 
 love ; that true love is not of the flesh, but of the 
 spirit, and therefore hath its root in the spiritual world, 
 above all change and accidents of time or circumstance. 
 Think, think, my friends. For what is life that we 
 should make such ado about it, and hug it so closely, 
 and look to it to fill our hearts ? What is all earthly 
 life with all its bad and good luck, its riches and its 
 poverty, but a vapour that passes away ? — noise and 
 smoke overclouding the enduring light of heaven. A 
 man may be very happy and blest in this life ; yet he 
 may feel that, however pleasant it is, at root it is no 
 
The Unchangeable Christ. 291 
 
 reality, but only a shadow of realities which are eternal 
 and infinite in the bosom of God, a piece-meal pattern of 
 the Light Kingdom — the city not made with hands — 
 eternal in the heavens. For all this time-world, as a 
 wise man says, is but like an image, beautifully and 
 fearfully emblematic, but still only an emblem, like an 
 air image, which plays and flickers in the grand, still 
 mirror of eternity. Out of nothing, into time and space 
 we all came into noisy day ; and out of time and space 
 into the silent night shall we all return into the spirit 
 world — the everlasting twofold mystery — into the light- 
 world of God's love, or the fire-world of His anger — 
 every like unto its like, and every man to his own 
 place. 
 
 " Choose well, your choice is 
 Brief but yet endless ; 
 From Heaven, eyes behold you 
 In eternity's stillness. 
 There aU is fuUness, 
 Te brave to reward you ; 
 Work and despair uot." 
 
SERMON XXXIL 
 
 EEFORMATION LESSONS. 
 
 Eversley. 1861. 
 
 2 Kings xxiii. 3, 4, 25, 26. 
 
 "And the king stood by a pillar, and made a covenant before tbe 
 Lord, to "walk after the Lord, and to keep his commandments and 
 his testimonies and his statutes with all their heart and all their 
 soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in 
 this book. And all the people stood to the covenant. And the 
 king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the 
 second order, and the keepers of the door, to bring forth out of 
 the temple of the Lord all the vessels that were made for Baal, and 
 for the grove, and for all the host of heaven : and he bnmed them 
 without Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried the ashes of 
 them unto Beth-el. . . . And like unto him was there no king before 
 him, that turned to the Ijord with all his heart, and with all his 
 soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses ; 
 neither after him arose there any like him. Notwithstanding the 
 Lord turned not from the fierceness of Ms great wrath, wherewith 
 his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provoca- 
 tions that Manasseh had provoked him withal. " 
 
 Yotr heard this chapter read as the first lesson for this 
 afternoon's service ; and a lesson it is indeed — a lesson 
 for you and for me, as it was a lesson for our forefathers. 
 If you had been worshipping in this church three 
 hundred years ago, you would have understood, without 
 my telling you, why the good and wise men who shaped 
 our prayer-book chose this chapter to be read in church. 
 You would have applied the words of it to the times in 
 
Reformation Lessons. 293 
 
 which you were living. You would have felt that the 
 chapter spoke to you at once of joy and hope, and of 
 sorrow and fear. 
 
 There is no doubt at all what our forefathers would 
 have thought of, and did think of, when they read this 
 chapter. The glorious reformation which young King 
 Josiah made was to them the pattern of the equally 
 glorious Reformation which was made in England some- 
 what more than three hundred years ago. Young King 
 Josiah, swearing to govern according to the law of the 
 Lord, was to them the pattern of young King Edward VI. 
 determining to govern according to the laws of the Bible. 
 The finding of the law of the Lord in Josiah's time, after 
 it had been long lost, was to them the pattern of the 
 sudden spread among them of the Bible, which had 
 been practically hidden from them for hundreds of years, 
 and was then translated into English and printed, and 
 put freely into the hands of every man, rich and poor, 
 who was able to read it. King Josiah's destruction of 
 the idols, and the temples of the false gods, and driving 
 out the wizards and workers with familiar spirits, were 
 to them a pattern of the destruction of the monasteries 
 and miraculous images and popish superstitions of every 
 kind, the turning the monks out of their convents, and 
 forcing them to set to honest work — which had just 
 taken place throughout England. And the hearts of all 
 true Englishmen were stirred up in those days to. copy 
 Josiah and the people of Jerusalem, and turn to the 
 Lord with all their heart, and with all their soul, and 
 with all their might, according to God's law and gospel, 
 in the two Testaments, both Old and New. 
 
294 Reformation Lessons. 
 
 One would have thought that at such a time the 
 hearts of our forefathers would be full of nothing but 
 hope and joy, content and thankfulness. And yet it 
 was not so. One cannot help seeing that in the prayer- 
 book, which was put together in those days, there is a 
 great deal of fear and sadness. You see it especially in 
 the Litany, which was to be said not only on Sundays, 
 but on Wednesdays and Fridays also. Some people 
 think the Litany painfully sad — too sad. It was not 
 too sad for the time in which it was written. Our 
 forefathers, three hundred years ago, meant what they 
 said when they cried to God to have mercy upon them, 
 miserable sinners, and not to remember their offences 
 nor the offences of their forefathers, &c. They meant, 
 and had good reason to mean, what they said, when 
 they cried to God that those evils which the craft and 
 subtilty of the devil and men were working against 
 them might be brought to nought, and by the providence 
 of His goodness be dispersed — to arise and help and 
 deliver them for His name's sake and for His honour ; 
 and to turn from them, for the glory of His name, all 
 those evils which they righteously had deserved. They 
 were in danger and in terror, our forefathers, three 
 hundred years ago. And when they heard this lesson 
 read in church, it was not likely to make their terror 
 less. 
 
 For what says the 26th verse of this chapter ? 
 "Notwithstanding," in spite of all this reformation, and 
 putting away of idols and determining to walk according 
 to the law of the Lord, " the Lord turned not from the 
 fierceness of His great wrath, wherewith His auger was 
 
Reformation Lessons. 295 
 
 kindled against Judah." And what followed ? Josiah 
 was killed in battle — by his own fault too — by Pharaoh 
 Nechoh, King of Egypt. And then followed nothing 
 but disaster and misery. The Jews were conquered first 
 by the King of Egypt, and taxed to pay to him an 
 enormous tribute ; and then, in the wars between Egypt 
 and Babylon, conquered a second time by the King of 
 Babylon, the famous Nebuchadnezzar, in that dreadful 
 siege in which it is said mothers ate their own children 
 through extremity of famine. And then after seventy 
 years, after every one of that idolatrous and corrupt 
 generation had died in captivity, the poor Jews were 
 allowed to go back to their native land, chastened and 
 purged in the fire of affliction, and having learnt a lesson 
 which, to do them justice, they never forgot again, and 
 have not forgotten to this day ; that to worship a graven 
 image, as well as to work unrighteousness, is abomina- 
 tion to the Lord — that God, and God alone, is to be 
 worshipped, and worshipped in holiness and purity, in 
 mercy and in justice. 
 
 And it was some such fate as this, some terrible ruin 
 like that of the Jews of old, that our forefathers feared 
 three hundred years ago. Their hearts were not yet 
 altogether right with God. They had not shaken off 
 the bad habits of mind, or the bad morals either, which 
 they had learnt in the old Romish times — too many of 
 them were using their liberty as a cloak of licentious- 
 ness ; and, under pretence of religion, plundering not 
 only God's Church, but God's poor. And many other 
 evils were rife in England then, as there are sure to be 
 oreat evils side by side with great good in any country 
 
296 Reformation Lessons. 
 
 in times of change and revolution. And so our fore- 
 fathers needed chastisement, and they had it. King 
 Edward, upon whom the Protestants had set their hopes, 
 died young ; and then came times which tried them 
 literally as by fire. First came the terrible persecutions 
 in Queen Mary's time, when hundreds of good men and 
 women were burnt alive for their religion. And even 
 after her death, for thirty years, came times, such as 
 Hezekiah speaks of — times of trouble and rebuke and 
 blasphemy, plots, rebellions, civil war, at home and 
 abroad ; dangers that grew ever more and more terrible, 
 till it seemed at last certain that England would be con- 
 quered, in the Pope's name, by the King of Spain : and 
 if that had come to pass (and it all but came to pass in 
 the famous year 1588), the King of Spain would have 
 become King of England ; the best blood of England 
 would have been shed upon the scaffold; the best estates 
 parted among Spaniards and traitors ; England enslaved 
 to the most cruel nation of those times ; and the In- 
 quisition set up to persecute, torture, and bum all who 
 believed in what they called, and what is, the gospel of 
 Jesus Christ. That was to have happened, and it was 
 only, as our forefathers confessed, by the infinite mercy 
 of God that it did not happen. They were delivered 
 strangely and suddenly, as the Jews were. For forty 
 years they had been chastised, and purged and humbled 
 for their sins ; and then, and not till then, came times 
 of safety and prosperity, honour and glory, which have 
 lasted, thanks be to God, ever since. 
 
 And now, my dear friends, what has this to do Tvith 
 
Reformation Lessons. 297 
 
 us ? If this chapter was a lesson to our forefathers, 
 how is it to be a lesson to us hkewise ? 
 
 I have always told you (as those who have really 
 understood their Bibles in all ages have told men) that 
 the Bible sets forth the eternal laws of God's kingdom — 
 the laws by which God, that is, our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 governs nations and kingdoms — and not only nations 
 and kingdoms, but you and me, and every individual 
 Christian man ; " all these things," says St Paul, are 
 "written for our admonition." The history of the Jews 
 is, or may be, your history or mine, for good or for evil; 
 as God dealt with them, so is He dealing with you and 
 me. By their experience we must learn. By their 
 chastisements we must be warned. So says St Paul. 
 So have all preachers said who have understood St 
 Paul — and so say I to you. And the lesson that we 
 may learn from this chapter is, that we may repent and 
 yet be punished. 
 
 I know people do not like to believe that ; I know 
 that it is much more convenient to fancy that when a 
 man repents, and, as he says, turns over a new leaf, he 
 need trouble himself no more about his past sins. But 
 it is a mistake ; not only is the letter and spirit 
 of Scripture against him, but facts are against him. He 
 may not choose to trouble himself about his past sins; 
 but he will find that his past sins trouble him, whethei' 
 he chooses or not,- — and that often in a very terrible 
 way, as they troubled those poor Jews in their day, aud 
 our forefathers after the Reformation. 
 
 " What ? " some will say, " is it not expressly written 
 in Scripture that ' when the wicked man turneth away 
 
298 Reformation Lessons. 
 
 from his wickedness that he hath committed, and doeth 
 that which is lawful and right, he shall save his soul 
 alive ? ' and ' all his transgressions that he hath com- 
 mitted they shall not be mentioned unto him,' but that 
 'in his righteousness which he hath done he shall 
 live ? ' " 
 
 No doubt it is so written, my friends. And no 
 doubt it is perfectly and literally true : but answer me 
 this, when does the wicked man do that which is 
 lawful and right ? The minute after he has repented ? 
 or the day after ? or even seven years after ? — the minute 
 after he is forgiven, and received freely back again as God's 
 child, as he will be, for the sake of that precious blood 
 which Christ poured out upon the cross ? Would to God 
 it were so, my friends. Would to God it were so easy 
 to do right, after having been accustomed to do wrong. 
 Would to God it were so easy to get a clean heart and a 
 right spirit. Would to God it were so easy to break 
 through all the old bad habits — perhaps the habits of a 
 whole life-time. But it is in vain to expect this sudden 
 change of character. As well may we expect a man, 
 who has been laid low with fever, to get up and go about 
 to his work the moment his disease takes a favourable 
 turn. 
 
 No. After the forgiveness of sin must come the cure 
 of sin. And that cure, like most cures, is a long and a 
 painful process. The sin may have been some animal 
 sin, like drunkenness ; and we all know how difficult it 
 is to cure that. Or it may have been a spiritual sin — 
 pride, vanity, covetousness. Can any man put off these 
 bad habits in a moment, as he puts off his coat ? Those 
 
Reformation Lessons. 299 
 
 who so fancy, can know very little of human nature, and 
 have observed their own hearts and their fellow crea- 
 tures very carelessly. If you will look at facts, what 
 you will find is this : — that all sins and bad habits fill 
 the soul with evil humours, just as a fever or any other 
 severe disease fills the body ; and that, as in the case 
 of a fever, those evil humours remain after the acute 
 disease is past, and are but too apt to break out again, 
 to cause relapses, to torment the poor patient, perhaps 
 to leave his character crippled and disfigured all his life — ■ 
 certainly to require long and often severe treatment by 
 the heavenly physician, Christ, the purifier as well as 
 the redeemer of our sin-sick souls. Heavy, therefore, 
 and bitter and shameful is the burden which many 
 a man has to bear after he has turned from self to God, 
 from sin to holiness. He is haunted, as it were, by the 
 ghosts of his old follies. He finds out the bitter truth 
 of St Paul's words, that there is another law in his body 
 warrins: against the law of his mind, of his conscience, 
 and his reason ; so that when he would do good, evil is 
 present with him. The good that he would do he does 
 not do ; and the evil that he would not do he does. Till 
 he cries with St Paul, " WTetched man that I am ! 
 who shall deliver me from the body of this death ? " and 
 feels that none can deliver him, save Jesus Christ our 
 Lord. 
 
 Yes. But there is our comfort, there is our hope- 
 Christ, the great healer, the great physician, can deliver 
 us, and will deliver us from the remains of our old sins, 
 the consequences of our own follies. Not, indeed, at 
 once, or by miracle ; but by slow education in new, and 
 
300 Reformation Lessons. 
 
 nobler motives, in purer and more unselfish habits. And 
 better for us, perhaps, that He should not cure us at 
 once, lest we should fancy that sin was a light thing, 
 which we could throw off whenever we chose ; and not 
 what it is, an inward disease, corroding and corrupting, 
 the wages whereof are death. Therefore it is, that 
 because Christ loves us He hates our sins, and cannot 
 abide or endure them, will punish them, and is merciful 
 and loving in punishing them, as long as a tincture or 
 remnant of sin is left in us. 
 
 Let us then, if our consciences condemn us of living 
 evil lives, turn and repent before it be too late ; before 
 our consciences are hardened ; before the purer and 
 nobler feelings which we learnt at our mothers' knees are 
 stifled by the ways of the world ; before we are hardened 
 into bad habits, and grown frivolous, sensual, selfish and 
 worldly. Let us repent. Let us put ourselves into the 
 hands of Christ, the great physician, and ask Him to 
 heal our wounded souls, and purge our corrupted souls ; 
 and leave to Him the choice of how He will do it. Let 
 us be content to be punished and chastised. If we 
 deserve punishment, let us bear it, and bear it like men ; 
 as we should bear the surgeon's knife, knowing that it is 
 for our good, and that the hand which inflicts pain is 
 the hand of one who so loves us, that He stooped to die 
 for us on the cross. Let Him deal with us, if He see 
 fit, as He dealt with David of old, when He forgave his 
 sin, and yet punished it by the death of his child. Let 
 Him do what He will by us, provided He does — what 
 He will do — make us good men. 
 
 That is what we need to be — just, merciful, pui-e. 
 
Reformation Lessons. 301 
 
 faithful, loyal, useful, honourable with true honour, in the 
 sight of God and man. That is what we need to be. 
 That is what we shall be at last, if we put ourselves 
 into Christ's hand, and ask Him for the clean heart and 
 the right spirit, which is His own spirit, the spirit of 
 all goodness. And provided we attain, at last, to that — 
 provided we attain, at last, to the truly heroic and 
 divine life, which is the life of virtue, it will matter 
 little to us by what wild and weary ways, or through 
 what painful and humiliating processes, we have arrived 
 thither. If God has loved us, if God will receive us, 
 then let us submit loyally and humbly to His law. 
 " Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth 
 every son whom He receiveth." 
 
SERMON XXXIII. 
 
 HUMAN SOOT. 
 Preached for the Kirhdale Ragged Schools, Liverpool, 1870. 
 
 St Matt, xviii. 14. 
 
 " It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these 
 little ones should perish. " 
 
 I AM here to plead for the Kirkdale Industrial Ragged 
 School, and Free School-room Church. The great 
 majority of children who attend this school belong to 
 the class of " street arabs,'' as they are now called ; and 
 either already belong to, or are likely to sink into, 
 the dangerous classes — professional law-breakers, profli- 
 gates, and barbarians. How these children have been 
 fed, civilized, christianized, taught trades and domestic 
 employments, and saved from ruin of body and soul, I 
 leave to you to read in the report. Let us take hold 
 of these little ones at once. They are now soft, plastic, 
 mouldable ; a tone will stir their young souls to the 
 very depths, a look will affect them for ever. But a 
 hardening process has commenced within them, and if 
 they are not seized at once, they will become harder 
 than adamant ; and then scalding tears, and the most 
 earnest trials, will be all but useless. 
 
 This report contains full and pleasant proof of the 
 
Htiman Soot. 303 
 
 success of the schools ; but it contains also full proof of 
 a fact which is anything but pleasant — of the existence 
 in Liverpool of a need for such an institution. How is 
 it that when a ragged school like this is opened, it is 
 filled at once : that it is enlarged year after year, and 
 yet is filled and filled again ? Whence comes this large 
 population of children who are needy, if not destitute ; 
 and who are, or are in a fair way to become, dangerous ? 
 And M'hence comes the population of parents whom these 
 children represent ? How is it that in Liverpool, if I 
 am rightly informed, more than four hundred and fifty 
 children were committed by the magistrates last year for 
 various offences ; almost every one of whom, of course, 
 represents several more, brothers, sisters, companions, 
 corrupted by him, or corrupting him. You have your 
 reformatories, your training ships, like your Akbar, 
 which I visited with deep satisfaction yesterday — 
 institutions which are an honour to the town of 
 Liverpool, at least to many of its citizens. But how 
 is it that they are ever needed ? How is it — and this, 
 if correct, or only half correct, is a fact altogether 
 horrible — that there are now between ten and twelve 
 thousand children in Liverpool who attend no school 
 — twelve thousand children in ignorance of their duty 
 to God and man, in training for that dangerous class, 
 which you have, it seems, contrived to create in this 
 once small and quiet port during a century of wonderful 
 prosperity. And consider this, I beseech you — how 
 is it that the experiment of giving these children 
 a fair chance, when it is tried (as it has been in these 
 schools) has succeeded ? I do not wonder, of course, 
 
304 Human Soot. 
 
 that it has succeeded, for I know Who made these 
 children, and Who redeemed them, and Who cares for 
 them more than you or I, or their best friends, can 
 care for them. But do you not see that the very 
 fact of their having improved, when they had a fair 
 chance, is proof positive that they had not had a fair 
 chance before ? How is that, my friends ? 
 
 And this leads me to ask you plainly — what do you 
 consider to be your duty toward those children ; what 
 is your duty toward those dangerous and degraded 
 classes, from which too many of them spring ? You 
 all know the parable of the Good Samaritan. You 
 all know how he found the poor wounded Jew by 
 the wayside ; and for the mere sake of their common 
 humanity, simply because he was a man, though he 
 would have scornfully disclaimed the name of brother, 
 bound up his wounds, set him on his own beast, led him 
 to an inn, and took care of him. 
 
 Is yours the duty which the good Samaritan felt ? — 
 the duty of mere humanity ? How is it your duty 
 to deal, then, with these poor children ? That, and 
 I think a little more. Let me say boldly, I think 
 these children have a deeper and a nearer claim on 
 you ; and that you must not pride yourselves, here in 
 Liverpool, on acting the good Samaritan, when you help 
 a ragged school. We do not read that the good 
 Samaritan was a merchant, on his march, at the head 
 of his own caravan. We do not read that the wounded 
 man was one of his own servants, or a child of one of 
 his servants, who had been left behind, unable from 
 weakness or weariness to keep pace with the rest, and 
 
Human Soot. 305 
 
 had dropped by the wayside, till the vultures aud the 
 jackals should pick his bones. Neither do we read that 
 he was a general, at the head of an advancing army, 
 and that the poor sufferer was one of his own rank and 
 file, crippled by wounds or by disease, watching, as many 
 a poor soldier does, his comrades march past to victory, 
 while he is left alone to die. Still less do we hear that 
 the sufferer was the child of some poor soldier's wife, or 
 even of some drunken camp-follower, who had lost her 
 place on the baggage-waggon, and trudged on with the 
 child at her back, through dust and mire, till, in despair, 
 she dropped her little one, and left it to the mercies of 
 the God who gave it her. 
 
 In either case, that good Samaritan would have 
 known what his duty was. I trust that you will know, 
 in like case, what your duty is. For is not this, and 
 none other, your relation to these children in your 
 streets, ragged, dirty, profligate, sinking and perishing, 
 of whom our Lord has said — " It is not the will of your 
 Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones 
 should perish?" It is not His will. I am sure that it is 
 not your wiU either. I believe that, with all my heart. 
 I do not blame you, or the people of Liverpool, nor the 
 people of any city on earth, in our present imperfect 
 state of civilisation, for the existence among them of 
 brutal, ignorant, degraded, helpless people. It is no 
 one's fault, just because it is every one's fault — the 
 fault of the system. But it is not the will of God ; 
 and therefore the existence of such an evil is proof 
 patent and sufficient that we have not yet discovered 
 the whole will of God about this matter ; that we have 
 
 u 
 
3o6 Human Soot. 
 
 not yet mastered the laws of true political economy, 
 which (like all other natural laws) are that will of God 
 revealed in facts. Our processes are hasty, imperfect, 
 barbaric — and their result is vast and rapid production : 
 but also waste, refuse, in the shape of a dangerous 
 class. We know well how, in some manufactures, a 
 certain amount of waste is profitable — that it pays 
 better to let certain substances run to refuse, than to 
 use every product of the manufacture ; as in a steam 
 mill, where it pays better not to consume the whole fuel, 
 to let the soot escape, though every atom of soot is so 
 much wasted fuel. So it is in our present social system. 
 It pays better, capital is accumulated more rapidly, by 
 wasting a certain amount of human life, human 
 health, human intellect, human morals, by producing 
 and throwing away a regular percentage of human soot — 
 of that thinking, acting dirt, which lies about, and, 
 alas ! breeds and perpetuates itself in foul alleys and 
 low public houses, and all dens and dark places of the 
 earth. 
 
 But, as in the case of the manufactures, the Nemesis 
 comes, swift and sure. As the foul vapours of the 
 mine and the manufactory destroy vegetation and injure 
 health, so does the Nemesis fall on the world of man ; 
 so does that human soot, these human poison gases, 
 infect the whole society which has allowed them to 
 fester under its feet. 
 
 Sad, but not hopeless ! Dark, but not without a 
 gleam of light on the horizon ! For I can conceive 
 a time when, by improved chemical science, every foul 
 vapour which now escapes from the chimney of a 
 
Htiman Soot. 307 
 
 manufactory, polluting the air, destroying the vegetation, 
 shall be seized, utilised, converted into some profitable 
 substance ; till the black country shall be black no 
 longer, the streams once more crystal clear, the trees 
 once more luxuriant, and the deserl which man has 
 created in his haste and greed shall, in literal fact, 
 once more blossom as the rose. And just so can I con- 
 ceive a time when, by a higher civilisation, formed on a 
 political economy more truly scientific, because more 
 truly according to the will of God, our human refuse 
 shall be utilised, like our material refuse, when man, 
 as man, even down to the weakest and most ignorant, 
 shall be found to be (as he really is) so valuable, that it 
 will be worth while to preserve his health, to develop 
 his capabihties, to save him alive, body, intellect, and 
 character, at any cost ; because men will see that a man 
 is, after all, the most precious and useful thing on the 
 earth, and that no cost spent on the development of 
 human beings can possibly be thrown away. 
 
 I appeal, then, to you, the commercial men of 
 Liverpool, if there are any such in this congregation. 
 If not, I appeal to their wives and daughters, who are 
 kept in wealth, luxury, refinement, by the honourable 
 labours of their husbands, fathers, brothers, on behalf 
 of this human soot. Merchants are (and I believe that 
 they deserve to be) the leaders of the great caravan, 
 which goes forth to replenish the earth and subdue it. 
 They are among the generals of the great army which 
 wages war against the brute powers of nature all over 
 the world, to ward off poverty and starvation from the 
 ever-teeming millions of mankind. Have they no time — 
 
3o8 Human Soot. 
 
 I take for granted that they have the heart — to pici 
 up the footsore and weary, who have fallen out of the 
 naarch, that they may rejoin the caravan, and be of use 
 once more ? Have they no time — I am sure they have 
 the heart — to tend the wounded and the fever-stricken, 
 that they may rise and fight once more ? If not, then 
 must not the pace of their march be somewhat too 
 rapid, the plan of their campaign somewhat precipitate 
 and ill-directed, their ambulance train and their medical 
 arrangements somewhat defective ? We are all ready 
 enough to complain of waste of human bodies, brought 
 about by such defects in the British army. Shall we 
 pass over the waste, the hereditary waste of human 
 souls, brought about by similar defects in every great 
 city in the world ? 
 
 Waste of human souls, human intellects, human 
 ■characters — waste, saddest of all, of the image of God ia 
 little children. That cannot be necessary. There must 
 be a fault somewhere. It cannot be the will of God 
 that one httle one should perish by commerce, or by 
 manufacture, any more than by slavery, or by war. 
 
 As surely as I believe that there is a God, so surely 
 do I believe that commerce is the ordinance of God ; 
 that the great army of producers and distributors is 
 God's army. But for that very reason I must believe 
 that the production of human refuse, the waste of 
 human character, is not part of God's plan ; not accord- 
 ing to His ideal of what our social state should be ; 
 and therefore what our social state can be. For God 
 asks no impossibilities of any human being. 
 
 But as things are, one has only to go into the streets 
 
Human Soot. 309 
 
 of this, or any great city, to see how we, with all our 
 boasted civilisation, are, as yet, but one step removed 
 from barbarism. Is that a hard word ? Why, there 
 are the barbarians around us at every street corner ! 
 Grown barbarians— it may be now all but past saving — 
 but bringing into the world young barbarians, whom we 
 may yet save, for God wishes us to save them. It is 
 not the will of their Father which is in heaven that one 
 of them should perish. And for that very reason He 
 has given them capabilities, powers, instincts, by virtue 
 of which they need not perish. Do not deceive your- 
 selves about the little dirty, offensive children in the 
 street. If they be offensive to you, they are not to 
 Him who made them. " Take heed that ye despise 
 not one of these little ones ; for I say unto you, That 
 in heaven their angels do always behold the face of 
 my Father which is in heaven." Is there not in 
 every one of them, as in you, the Light which lighteth 
 every man that cometh into the world ? And know 
 you not Who that Light is, and what He said of little 
 children ? Then, take heed, I say, lest you despise one 
 of these little ones. Listen not to the Pharisee when 
 he says. Except the little child be converted, and become 
 as I am, he shall in nowise enter into the kingdom of 
 heaven. But listen to the voice of Him who knew 
 what was in man, when He said, " Except ye be 
 converted, and become as little children, ye shall not 
 enter into the kingdom of heaven." Their souls are 
 like their bodies, not perfect, but beautiful enough, 
 and fresh enough, to shame any one who shall dare 
 to look down on them. Their souls are like their 
 
3IO Human Soot. 
 
 bodies, hidden by the rags, foul with the dirt of what 
 we miscall civilisation. But take them to the pure 
 stream, strip off the ugly, shapeless rags, wash the 
 young limbs again, and you shaU find them, body 
 and soul, fresh and lithe, graceful and capable — 
 capable of how much, God alone who made them knows. 
 Well said of such, the great Christian poet of your 
 northern hiUs — 
 
 "Not in entire forgetfulnesa, 
 And not in utter nakedness, 
 But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
 From God, who is our home. " 
 
 Truly, and too truly, alas ! he goes on to say — 
 
 ' ' Shades of the prison-house begin to close 
 Upon the growing boy. " 
 
 Will you let the shades of that prison-house of mortality 
 be peopled with little save obscene phantoms ? Truly, 
 and too truly, he goes on — 
 
 "The youth, who daily further from the east 
 Must travel, still is Nature's priest, 
 And by the vision splendid. 
 Is on his way attended." 
 
 Will you leave the youth to know nature only in the 
 sense in which an ape or a swine knows it ; and to 
 conceive of no more splendid vision than that which he 
 may behold at a penny theatre % Truly again, and too 
 truly, he goes on — 
 
 " At length the man perceives it die away. 
 And fade into the light of common day." 
 
 Yes, to weak, mortal man the prosaic age of manhood 
 must needs come, for good as well as for evil. But will 
 you let that age be — to any of your fellow citizens — not 
 
Human Soot. 3 1 1 
 
 even an age of rational prose, but an age of brutal 
 recklessness ; while the light of common day, for him, 
 has sunk into the darkness of a common sewer ? 
 
 And all the while it was not the will of their Father 
 in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. 
 Is it your will, my friends ; or is it not ? If it be not, 
 the means of saving them, or at least the great majority 
 of them, is easier than you think. Circumstances drag 
 downward from childhood, poor, weak, fallen, human 
 nature. Circumstances must help it upward again once 
 more. Do your best to surround the wild children 
 of Liverpool with such circumstances as you put round 
 your own children. Deal with them as you wish God 
 to deal with your beloved. Remember that, as the 
 wise man says, the human plant, like the vegetable, 
 thrives best in light ; and you will discover, by the 
 irresistible logic of facts, by the success of your own 
 endeavours, by seeing these young souls grow, and not 
 wither, live, and not die — that it is not the will of 
 your Father which is in heaven that one of these little 
 ones should perish. 
 
SERMON XXXIV. 
 
 NATIONAL SORROWS AND NATIONAL LESSON& 
 
 On the Illness or the Pkince oe Wales. 
 
 Cfuxpel Royal, St James's, December Vlth, 1871. 
 
 2 Sam. xix. 14. 
 
 " He bowed tlie heart of all the men of Judah, even as the heart 
 of one man. " 
 
 No circumstances can be more different, thank God, 
 than those under which the heart of the men of Judah 
 was bowed when their king commander appealed to 
 them, and those which have, in the last few days, 
 bowed the heart of this nation as the heart of one man. 
 But the feeling called out in each case was the same — 
 Loyalty, spontaneous, contagious, some would say un- 
 reasoning : but it may be aU the deeper and nobler, 
 because for once it did not wait to reason, but was con- 
 tent to be human, and to feel. 
 
 If those men who have been so heartily loyal of late 
 — respectable, business-like, manful persons, of a race 
 in nowise given to sentimental excitement — had been 
 asked the cause of the intense feehng which they have 
 shown during the last few days, they would probably, 
 most of them, find some difficulty in giving it. Many 
 would talk frankly of their dread lest business should be 
 
National Sorrows and National Lessons. 3 1 3 
 
 interfered with ; and no shame to them, if they live by 
 Vmsiness. Others would speak of possible political com- 
 plications ; and certainly do blame to them for dreading 
 such. But they would most of them speak, as frankly, 
 of a deeper and less selfish emotion. They would speak, 
 not eloquently it may be, but earnestly, of sympathy 
 with a mother and a wife ; of sympathy with youth 
 and health fighting untimely with disease and death — 
 they would plead their common humanity, and not be 
 ashamed to have yielded to that touch of nature, which 
 makes the whole world kin. And that would be 
 altogether to their honour. Honourably and gracefully 
 has that sympathy showed itself in these realms of late. 
 It has proved that in spite of all our covetousness, all 
 our luxury, all our frivolity, we are not cynics yet, nor 
 likely, thanks be to Almighty God, to become cynics ; 
 that however encrusted and cankered with the cares and 
 riches of this world, and bringiDg, alas, very little fruit 
 to perfection, the old British oak is sound at the root — 
 still human, still humane. 
 
 But there is, I believe, another and an almost deeper 
 reason for the strong emotion which has possessed these 
 men ; one most intimately bound up with our national 
 life, national unity, national history ; one which they 
 can hardly express to themselves ; one which some of 
 them are half ashamed to express, because they cannot 
 render a reason for it ; but which is still there, deeply 
 rooted in their souls ; one of those old hereditary in- 
 stincts by which the histories of whole nations, whole 
 races, are guided, often half-unconsciously, and almost 
 in spite of themselves ; and that is Loyalty, pure and 
 
3 1 4 National Sorrows and National Lessons. 
 
 simple Loyalty — the attachment to some royal race, 
 whom they conceived to be set over them by God. An 
 attachment, mark it well, founded not on their own will, 
 but on grounds very complex, and quite independent of 
 them; an attachment which they did not make, but 
 found ; an attachment which their forefathers had trans- 
 mitted to them, and which they must transmit to their 
 children as a national inheritance, — at once a symbol of 
 and a support to the national unity of the whole people, 
 running back to the time when, in dim and mythic ages, 
 it emerged into the light of history as a wandering tribe. 
 This instinct, as a historic fact, has been strong in all 
 the progressive European nations; especially strong in 
 the Teutonic ; in noDe more than in the English and 
 the Scotch. It has helped to put them in the forefront 
 of the nations. It has been a rallying point for all 
 their highest national instincts. Their Sovereign was to 
 them the divinely appointed symbol of the unity of their 
 country. In defending him, thej' defended it. It did 
 not interfere, that instinct of loyalty, with their mature 
 manhood, freedom, independence. They knew that if 
 royalty were indeed God's ordinance, it had its duties as 
 weU as its rights. And when their kings broke the law, 
 they changed their kings. But a king they must have, 
 for their own sakes ; not merely for the sake of the 
 nation's security and peace, but for the sake of their 
 own self-respect. They felt, those old forefathers of ours, 
 that loyalty was not a degrading, but an ennobling in- 
 fluence ; that a free man can give up his independence 
 without losing it ; that — as the example of that mighty 
 German army has just shown an astounded world — in- 
 
National Sorrows and National Lessons. 3 1 5 
 
 dependence is never more called out than by subordina- 
 tion ; and that a free man never feels himself so free as 
 when obeying those whom the laws of his country have 
 set over him ; an able man never feels himself so able as 
 when he is following the lead of an abler man than 
 himself. And what if, as needs must happen at whiles, 
 the sovereign were not a man, but a woman or a child ? 
 Then was added to loyalty in the hearts of our forefathers, 
 and of many another nation in Europe, an instinct even 
 deeper, and tenderer, and more unselfish — the instinct 
 of chivalry ; and the widowed queen, or the prince, 
 became to them a precious jewel committed to their 
 charge by the wiU of their forefathers and the provi- 
 dence of God ; an heirloom for which they were respon- 
 sible to God, and to their forefathers, and to their chil- 
 dren after them, lest their names should be stained to 
 aU future generations by the crime of baseness toward 
 the weak. 
 
 This was the instinct of the old Teutonic races. 
 They were often unfaithful to it — as all men are to 
 their higher instincts ; and fulfilled it very imperfectly 
 — as aU men fulfil their duties. But it was there — in 
 their heart of hearts. It helped to make them ; and, 
 therefore, it helped to make us. It ennobled them ; it 
 called out in them the sense of unity, order, discipline, 
 and a lofty and unselfish affection. And I thank God, 
 as an Englishman, for any event, however exquisitely 
 painful, which may call out those true graces in us, their 
 descendants. And, therefore, my good friends, if any 
 cynic shall sneer, as he may, after the present danger is 
 past, at this sudden outburst of loyalty, and speak of it 
 
3 1 6 National Sorrows and National Lessons. 
 
 as unreasoning and childish, answer not him. " Give 
 not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your 
 pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their 
 feet, and turn again and rend you." But answer your- 
 selves, and answer too your children, when they ask you 
 what has moved 3''ou thus — answer, I say, not childishly, 
 but childlike : " We have gone back, for a moment at 
 least, to England's childhood — to the mood of England 
 when she was still young. And we are showing thereby 
 that we are not yet decayed into old age. That if we 
 be men, and not still children, yet the child is father to 
 the man ; and the child's heart still beats underneath 
 all the sins and all the cares and all the greeds of our 
 manhood." 
 
 More than one foreign nation is looking on in wonder 
 and ia envy at that sight. God grant that they may 
 understand all that it means. God grant that they may 
 understand of how wide and deep an application is the 
 great law, "Except ye be converted," changed, and 
 turned round utterly, " and become as little children, ye 
 shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven." God grant 
 that they may recover the childlike heart, and replace 
 with it that childish heart which pulls to pieces at its 
 own irreverent fancy the most ancient and sacred institu- 
 tions, to build up ever fresh baby-houses out of the frag- 
 ments, as a child does with its broken toys. 
 
 Therefore, my friends, be not ashamed to have felt 
 acutely. Be not ashamed to feel acutely still, till all 
 danger is past, or even long after all danger is past ; 
 when you look back on what might have been, and what 
 it might have brought, ay, must have brought, if not to 
 
National Sorrows and National Lessons. 317 
 
 you, still to your children after you. For so you will 
 show yourselves worthy descendants of your forefathers : 
 so you will show yourselves worthy citizens of this 
 British empire. So you will show yourselves, as I 
 believe, worthy Christian men and women. For Christ, 
 the King of kings and subjects, sends all sorrow, to 
 make us feel acutely. We do not, the great majority of 
 us, feel enough. Our hearts are dull and hard and 
 light, God forgive us ; and we forget continually what 
 an earnest, awful world we live in — a whole eternity 
 waiting for us to be born, and a whole eternity waiting 
 to see what we shall do now we are bom. Yes ; our 
 hearts are dull and hard and light ; and, therefore, 
 Christ sends suffering on us to teach us what we always 
 gladly forget in comfort and prosperity — what an awful 
 capacity of suffering we have ; and more, what an awful 
 capacity of suffering our fellow-creatures have likewise. 
 We sit at ease too often in a fool's paradise, tiU God 
 awakens us and tortures us into pity for the torture of 
 others. And so, if we wiU not acknowledge our brother- 
 hood by any other teaching, He knits us together by the 
 brotherhood of common suffering. 
 
 But if God thus sends sorrow to ennoble us, to call 
 out in us pity, sympathy, unselfishness, most surely does 
 He send for that end such a sorrow as this, which 
 touches in all alike every source of pity, of sympathy, 
 of unselfishness at once. Surely He meant to bow our 
 hearts as the heart of one man ; and He has, I trust 
 and hope, done that which He meant to do. God grant 
 that the effect may be permanent. God grant that it 
 may call out in us aU an abiding loyalty. God grant 
 
3 1 8 National Sorrows and National Lessons. 
 
 that it may fill us with some of that charity which bears 
 all things, hopes all things, believes all things, which 
 rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth ; and 
 make us thrust aside henceforth, in dignified disgust, 
 the cynic and the slanderer, the ribald and the rebel. 
 
 But more. God grant that the very sight of the 
 calamity with which we have stood face to face, may call 
 out in us some vahant practical resolve, which may 
 benefit this whole nation, and bow all hearts as the 
 heart of one man, to do some one right thing. And 
 what right thing ? What but the thing which is 
 pointed to by plain and terrible fact, as the lesson 
 which God must mean us to learn, if He means us to 
 learn any, from what has so nearly befallen ? Let our 
 hearts be bowed as the heart of one man, to say — that so 
 far as we have power, so help us God, no man, woman, 
 or child in Britain, be he prince or be he beggar, shall 
 die henceforth of preventible disease. Let us repent of 
 and amend that scandalous neglect of the now well- 
 known laws of health and cleanliness which destroys 
 thousands of lives yearly in this kingdom, without need 
 and reason ; in defiance alike of science, of humanity, and 
 of our Christian profession. Two hundred thousand per- 
 sons, I am told, have died of preventible fever since the 
 Prince Consort's death ten years ago. Is that not a sin 
 to bow our hearts as the heart of one man ? Ah, if this 
 foul and needless disease, by striking once at the very 
 highest, shall bring home to us the often told, seldom 
 heeded fact that it is striking perpetually at hundreds 
 among the very lowest, whom we leave to sicken and die 
 in dens unfit for men — iinfit for dogs ; if this tragedy 
 
National Sorrows and National Lessons. 319 
 
 shall awaken all loyal citizens to demand and to enforce, 
 as a duty to their sovereign, their countrj', and their 
 God, a sanatory reform in town and country, immediate, 
 wholesale, imperative ; if it shall awaken the ministers 
 of religion to preach about that, and hardly aught but 
 that — till there is not a fever ally or a malarious ditch 
 left in any British city ; — then indeed this fair and pre- 
 cious life win not have been imperilled in vain, and 
 generations yet uuhorn will bless the memory of a 
 prince who sickened as poor men sicken, and all but 
 died, as poor men die, that his example — and, it may 
 be hereafter, his exertions— might deliver the poor from 
 dirt, disease, and death. 
 
 For him himself I have no fear. We have committed 
 him to iGrod. It may be that he has committed himself 
 to God. It may be that he has already learned lessons 
 which God alone can teach. It may be that those les- 
 sons will bring forth hereafter royal fruit right worthy of 
 a royal root. At least we can trust him in God's hands, 
 and believe that if this great woe was meant to ennoble 
 us it was meant to ennoble him ; that if it was meant 
 to educate us it was meant to educate him ; that God is 
 teaching him ; and that in God's school-house he is safe. 
 For think, my friends, if we, who know him partly, love 
 him much ; then God, who knows him wholly, loves him 
 more. And so God be with him, and with you, and 
 with your prayers for him. Amen. 
 
SERMON XXXV. 
 
 GRACE AND GLORY. 
 
 Chapel Royal, Whitehall. 1865. 
 Fob the CoNSUMfnvE Hospital. 
 
 St John ii. 11. 
 
 '■' This begiiming of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and mani- 
 fested forth his glory." 
 
 This word glory, whether in its Greek or its Roman 
 shape, had a very definite meaning in the days of the 
 Apostles. It meant the admiration of men. The 
 Greek word, as every scholar knows, is derived from a 
 root signifying to seem, and expresses that which a man 
 seems, and appears to his fellow men. The Latin word 
 glory is expressly defined by Cicero to mean the love, 
 trust, and admiration of the multitude ; and a conse- 
 quent opinion that the man is worthy of honour. Glory, 
 in fact, is a relative word, and can be only used of any 
 being in relation to other rational beings, and their 
 opinion of him. 
 
 The glory of God, therefore, in Scripture, must needs 
 mean that admiration which men feel, or ought to feel 
 for God. There is a deeper, an altogether abysmal 
 meaning for that word : " And now, Father, glorify 
 thou me with thy own self, with the glory which I had 
 with thee before the world was." But on that text, speak- 
 
Grace and Glory. 3 2 1 
 
 iug of the majesty of the ever-blessed Trinity, I dare 
 not attempt to comment ; though, could I explain it, I 
 should. When St. John says that Christ manifested 
 forth His glory, and His disciples believed on Him, it is 
 plain that He means by His glory that which produced 
 admiration and satisfaction, not alone in the mind of 
 God the Father, but in the minds of men. 
 
 Now, what the Romans thought glorious in their days 
 is notorious enough. No one can look upon the picture 
 of a Roman triumph without seeing that their idea of 
 glory was force, power, brute force, self-willed dominion, 
 selfish aggrandizement. But this was not the glory 
 which St. John saw iu Christ, for His glory was full of 
 grace, which is incompatible with self-will and selfishness. 
 
 The Greek's meaning of glory is equally notorious. 
 He called it wisdom. We call it craft — the glory of the 
 sophist, who could prove or disprove anything for gain or 
 display ; the glory of the successful adventurer, whose 
 shrewdness made its market out of the stupidity and 
 vice of the barbarian. But this is not the glory of 
 Christ, for St. John saw that it was full of truth. 
 
 Therefore, neither strength nor craft are the glory of 
 Christ ; and, therefore, they are not the glory of God. 
 For the glory of Christ is the glory of God, and none 
 other, because He is very God, of very God begotten. In 
 Christ, man sees the unseen, and absolute, and eternal 
 God as He is, was, and ever will be. " No man hath 
 seen God at any time ; the only begotten Sou, which is 
 in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him : "— 
 and that perfectly and utterly ; for in Him dwells all 
 the fulness of the Godhead bodily, so that He Himself 
 
 X. 
 
32 2 Grace and Glory. 
 
 could say, " He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." 
 This is the Catholic Faith. God grant that I may believe 
 it with my whole heart. God grant that you may believe 
 it with your whole hearts likewise, and not merely with 
 your intellects and brains. 
 
 But, it may be said, though God be not glorious and 
 admirable for selfish force, which it were blasphemous to 
 attribute to Him, He is still admirable for His power. 
 Though He be not glorious for craft. He is still glorious 
 for His wisdom. I deny both. I deny that power is any 
 object of admiration, unless it be used well for good ends. 
 To admire power for its own sake is one of those errors, 
 which has been well called Titanolatry, the worship of 
 giants. Neither is wisdom an object of admiration, 
 unless it be used for good ends. To worship it for its 
 own sake is a common error enough — the idolatry of 
 Intellect. But it is none the less an error, and a 
 grievous one. God's power and wisdom are glorious 
 only in as far as they are used (as they are utterly) for 
 good ends ; only, in plain words, as far as God is (as He 
 is perfectly) good. And the true glory of God is that 
 God is good. So says the Scripture ; and so I bid you 
 all remember, for it is a truth which you and I and all 
 mankind are perpetually ready to forget. 
 
 Let me but ask you one question as a test whether or 
 not I am right. If the Supreme Being used His power, as 
 the Roman Caesar used his ; if He used His wisdom as 
 the Greek sophist used his, would He be glorious then 
 and worthy of admiration ? The old heathen ^schylus 
 answered that question for mankind long ago on the 
 Athenian stage. I should be ashamed to answer it 
 
Grace and Glory. 323 
 
 again in a Christian pulpit. And when I say good,, I 
 mean good, even as man can be, and ought to be, and is, 
 more or less, good. The theory that because God's morality 
 is absolute, it may, therefore, be different from man's 
 morality, in hind, as well as in degree,, is equally contrary 
 to the letter and to the spirit of Scripture. Man, 
 according to Scripture, is made in God's moral image and 
 likeness, and however fallen and degraded that image 
 may be, still the ultimate standard of right and wrong 
 is the same in God and in man. How else dare Abra- 
 ham ask of God, " Shall not the Judge of all the earth 
 do right ? " How else has God's command to the old 
 Jews any meaning, "Be ye holy, for I am holy ? '' 
 How else have all the passages in the Psalms, Prophets, 
 Evangelists, Apostles, which speak of God's justice, 
 mercy, faithfulness, any honest or practical meaning to 
 human beings ? How else can they be aught but a 
 mockery, a delusion, and a snare to the tens of thou- 
 sands who have fovind in them hope and trust, that God 
 would deliver them and the world from evil ? What 
 means the command to be perfect as our Father in 
 heaven is perfect ? What mean the words that we 
 partake of a divine nature ? How else is the command 
 to love God anything but an arbitrary and impossible 
 demand, — demanding love, which every writer of fiction 
 tells you, and tells you truly, cannot be compelled — can 
 only go forth toward a being who shows himself worthy 
 of our love, by possessing those qualities which we 
 admire in our fellow men ? No. Against such a theory 
 I must quote, as embodying all that I would say, and 
 con-oborating, on entirely independent ground, the Scrip- 
 
324 Grace and Glory. 
 
 tural account of human morality — against such a theory, 
 I say I must quote the words of our greatest living 
 logician. "Language has no meaning for the words 
 Just, Merciful, Benevolent" (he might have added truth- 
 ful likewise) " save that in which we predicate them of 
 our fellow creatures ; and unless that is what we in- 
 tend to express by them, we have no business to employ 
 the words. If in affirming them of God we do not 
 mean to affirm these very qualities, differing only as 
 greater in degree, we are neither philosophically nor 
 morally entitled to affirm them at all. . . . What be- 
 longs to" God's goodness "as Infinite (or more properly 
 Absolute) I do not pretend to know ; but I know that 
 infinite goodness must be goodness, and that what is not 
 consistent with goodness is not consistent with infinite 
 goodness. . . . Besides," he says — and to this sound 
 reductio ad absurdum I call the attention of aU who 
 believe their Bibles — " unless I believe God to possess 
 the same moral attributes which I find, in however in- 
 ferior a degree, in a good man, what ground of assurance 
 have I of God's veracity ? All trust in a Revelation pre- 
 supposes a conviction that God's attributes are the same, 
 in all but degree, with the best human attributes. If, 
 instead of the ' glad tidings ' that there exists a Being 
 in whom all the excellences which the highest human 
 mind can conceive, exist in a degree inconceivable to 
 us, I am informed that the world is ruled by a being 
 whose attributes are infinite, but what they are we can- 
 not learn, nor what are the principles of his govern- 
 ment, except that ' the highest human morality which 
 we are capable of conceiving ' does not sanction 
 
Grace and Glory. 325 
 
 them ; convince me of it and I will bear my fate as I 
 may. But when I am told that I must believe this, and 
 at the same time call this being by the names which 
 express and afSrm the highest human morality, I say 
 in plain terms that I will not. Whatever power such 
 a being may have over me, there is one thing which 
 he shall not do : he shall not compel me to worship 
 him. I will call no being good, who is not what I 
 mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow creatures." 
 That St. John would have assented to these bold and 
 honest words, that such is St. John's conception of 
 human and divine moraUty, the story in the text shows, 
 to my mind, especially. It is, so to speak, a crucial 
 experiment, by which the truth of the Scripture theory 
 is verified. The difficulty in all ages about a standard 
 of morality has been — How can we fix it ? Even if we 
 agree that man's goodness ought to be the counterpart of 
 God's goodness, we know that in practice it is not, as 
 mankind has differed in all ages and countries about 
 what is right and wrong. The Hindoo thinks it right to 
 burn widows, wrong to eat animal food ; and between 
 such extremes there are numberless minor differences. 
 Hardly any act is conceivable which has not been thought 
 by some man, somewhere, somehow, morally right or 
 morally wrong. If all that we can do is, to choose out those 
 instances of morality which seem to us most right, and 
 impute them to God, shall we not have an ever-shifting, 
 probably a merely conventional standard of right and 
 wrong ? And worse — shall we not be always in danger 
 of deifying our own superstitions — perhaps our own vices : 
 of making a God in our own image, because we cannot 
 
3^6 Grace and Glory. 
 
 know that God in whose image we are made ? Most 
 true, unless "we believe rightly the incarnation of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ," "perfect God and perfect man." In 
 Him, says the Bible, the perfect human morality is 
 manifested, and shown by His life and conduct to be 
 identical with the divine. He bids us be perfect even 
 as our Father in heaven is perfect; and He only has a right 
 — in the sense of a sound and fair reason — for so doing ; 
 because He can say, and has said, " He that hath seen 
 me hath seen the Father." 
 
 At least, such is the doctrine of St. John. He tells 
 us that the Word, who was God, was made flesh, and 
 dwelt in his land and neighbourhood ; and that he and 
 his fellows beheld His glory ; and saw that it was the 
 glory of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace 
 and truth. And then, in the next chapter, he goes on 
 to tell us how that glory was first manifested forth — ^by 
 turning water into wine at a marriage feast. On the 
 truth of the story, I say simply, in passing, that I 
 believe it fully and literally ; as I do also St. John's 
 assertions about our Lord's Divinity. But I only wish 
 to point out to you why I called this miracle the crucial 
 experiment, which proved God's goodness to be identical 
 with that which we call (and rightly) goodness in man. 
 It is by the seeming insignificance thereof, by the seem- 
 ing non-necessity, by the seeming humbleness of its 
 circumstances, by the seeming smnllness of its results, 
 issuing merely (as far as Scripture tells vis, and therefore 
 as far as we need know, or have a right to imagine) in the 
 giving of a transitory and unnecessary phj'sical pleasure. 
 In short, by the very absence of that Dignus deo vindice 
 
Grace and Glory. 327 
 
 nodus, that knot which only a God could untie, which 
 heathens demanded ere a god was allowed to interfere 
 in the plot of a tragedy ; which too many who call 
 themselves Christians demand before the living God is 
 allowed to interfere in that world in which without 
 Him not a sparrow falls to the ground. In a moral 
 case of this kind, if you will consider, that which seems 
 least is often the greatest. That which seems the 
 lowest, because the simplest and meanest manifestation 
 of a moral law, may be— probably is — the deepest, the 
 highest, the most universal. 
 
 Life is made up of little things, say the practically 
 wise, and they say true, for our Lord says so likewise. 
 "He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also 
 in much." If you look on morality, virtue, goodness, 
 holiness, sanctification — call it what you will — as merely 
 the obligation of an external law, you will be tempted 
 to say, " Let me be faithful to it in its greater and more 
 important cases, and that is enough. The pettier ones must 
 take care of themselves, I have not time enough to attend 
 to them, and God will not, it may be, require them of 
 me." But if the morality, goodness, holiness be in you 
 what it was in Christ, without measure — a spirit, even 
 the spirit of God — a spirit within you, possessing you, 
 and working on you, and in you — then that which seems 
 most petty and unimportant will often be most impor- 
 tant, the test of the soundness of your heart, of the 
 reality of your feelings. 
 
 We all know — every writer of fiction, at least, should 
 know — how true this is in the case of love between man 
 and woman, between parent and child : how the little 
 
328 Grace and Glory. 
 
 kindnesses, the half-unconscious gestures, the petty 
 labours of love, of which their object will never be 
 aware, the scrupulousness which is able " to greatly find 
 quarrel in a straw, when honour is at stake," — how 
 these are the very things which show that the affection 
 is neither the offspring of dry and legal duty, nor of 
 selfish enjoyment, but lies far down in the unconscious 
 abysses of the heart and being itself: — as Christ — ^to 
 compare (for He Himself permits, nay commands, us to 
 do so in His parables) our littleness with His immensity 
 — as Christ, I say, showed, when He chose first to 
 manifest His glory — the glory of His grace and truth — 
 by increasing for a short hour the pleasures of a village 
 feast. 
 
 I might say much more on the point; how He showed 
 these by His truth; how He proved that He, and 
 therefore His Father and your Father, was not that Z)eus 
 quidam deceptor, whom some suppose Him, mocking 
 the intellect of His creatures by the facts of nature 
 which He has created, tempting the souls of His 
 creatures by the very faculties and desires which He 
 Himself has given them. 
 
 But I wish now to draw your minds rather to that 
 one word Grace — Grace, what it means, and how it is a 
 manifestation of glory. Few Scriptural expressions 
 have suffered more that this word Grace from the storms 
 of theological controversy. Springing fresh in the minds 
 of Apostles, as did many other noble words in that 
 heaven-enriched soil, the only adequate expressions of 
 an idea which till then had never fully possessed the 
 mind of man, it meant more than we can now imagine: 
 
Grace and Glory. 329 
 
 perhaps moro that we shall ever imagine again. We, 
 alas ! only know the word with its fragrance battered 
 out, its hues rubbed off, its very life anatomized out of 
 it by the battles of rival divines, till its mere skeleton is 
 left, and all that gra.ce means to most of us is simply and 
 dryly a certain spiritual gift of God. Doubtless it 
 means that; but if it meant nothing more at first, why 
 was not the plain word Gift enough for the Apostles ? 
 Why did they use Grace ? Why did they use, too, in 
 the sense of giving and gifts, nouns and verbs derived 
 from that root-word, charis, grace, which plainly sig- 
 nified so much to them ? A word, the root-meaning of 
 which was neither more nor less than a certain heathen 
 goddess, or goddesses — the inspirer of beauty in art, the 
 impersonation of all that is pure, charming, winning, 
 bountiful — in one word, of all that is graceful and gracious 
 in the human character. The fact is strange, but the 
 fact is there ; and being there, we must face it and 
 explain it. Of course, the Apostles use the word grace 
 in a far deeper and loftier meaning ; raise it, mathe- 
 matically speaking, to a far higher power. There is no 
 need to remind you of that. But why did they choose 
 and use the word at all — a word whose old meaning 
 every heathen knew — unless for some innate fitness in 
 it to express something in the character of God ? To 
 tell men that there was in God a graciousness, as of the 
 most gracious of all human beings, which gave to His 
 character a moral beauty, a charm, a winningness, which, 
 as even the old Jewish prophet, before the Incarnation, 
 could perceive and boldly declare, drew them with 
 the cords of a man and with the bands of love. 
 
330 Grace and Glory. 
 
 attracting them by the very human character of its 
 graciousness. 
 
 " The glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full 
 of grace." Meditate on those words. "Full of grace," — 
 of that spirit which we, like the old heathens, consider 
 rather a feminine than a masculine excellence ; the 
 spirit, which, as St. James says of God the Father, 
 gives simply and upbraideth not ; gives gracefully, as 
 we ourselves say — in th6 right and happy use of the 
 adverb ; does not spoil its gifts by throwing them in the 
 teeth of the giver, but gives for mere giving's sake ; 
 pleases where it can be done, without sin or harm, for 
 mere pleasing's sake ; most human and humane when it 
 is most divine ; the spirit by which Christ turned the 
 water into wine at the marriage feast, and so manifested 
 forth His absolute and eternal glory. And how ? How ? 
 
 Thus, if you will receive it ; if you will believe a 
 truth which is too often hidden from the wise and 
 prudent, and yet revealed unto babes ; which will never 
 be understood by the proud Pharisee, the sour fanatic, 
 the ascetic who dreads and distrusts his Father in 
 heaven ; but which is clear and simple enough to many 
 a cleaj' and simple heart, honest and single-eyed, sunny 
 itself, and bringing sunshine wherever it comes, because 
 it is inspired by the gracious spirit of God, and delights 
 to show kindness for kindness' sake, and to make happy 
 for happiness' sake, taking no merit to itself for doing 
 that, which is as instinctive as its very breath. 
 
 This, — that the graciousness which Christ showed at 
 that marriage feast is neither more nor less than the 
 boundless love of God. who could not live alone in the 
 
Grace and Glory. 331 
 
 abyss, but must needs, out of His owu Divine Charity, 
 create the universe, that He might have somewhat beside 
 Himself whereon to pour out the ocean of His love, 
 which finds its own happiness in giving happiness to all 
 created things, from the loftiest of rational beings down 
 to the gnat which dances in the sun, and for aught we 
 know, to the very lichen which nestles in the Alpine 
 rock. 
 
 This is the character of God, unless Scripture be a 
 dream of man's imagination. Thus far you may know 
 God ; thus far you may see God as He is ; and know and 
 see that He is just with the justice of a man, only more 
 just ; merciful with the mercy of a man, only more 
 merciful ; truthful with the truthfulness of a man, only 
 more truthful ; gracious with the graciousness of a man, 
 only more gracious ; and loving ? That we dare not say : 
 for if we say so much, the Scripture commands us to say 
 more. The Scrijoture tells us that the whole absolute 
 morality of God is summed up — as our own human 
 morality ought to be — in His Love. That love is the 
 fulfilment of the Moral Law in Him as in us ; that it is 
 the root and cause and spirit of His justice, mercy, 
 truth, and graciousness ; that it belongs not to His 
 attributes, as they may be said to be, but to His essence 
 and His spirit ; that we must not, if we be careful of 
 our words, say, God is loving, because we are bidden to 
 say, " God is Love." 
 
 Thus, the commands. Thou shalt love the Lord thy 
 God — and thy neighbour as thyself, are shown to be 
 not arbitrary and impossible demands, miscalled moral 
 obligations, while they are merely legal and external ones ; 
 
332 Grace and Glory. 
 
 but true moral obligations, in the moral sense, to which 
 heart and spirit can answer, " I rejoice to do thy will, 
 God ; Thy law is within my heart." You ought to 
 love God, because He is supremely loveable and worthy 
 of your love. You can love God, because you can 
 appreciate and know God ; for you are His child, made 
 in His moral likeness, and capable of seeing Him as He 
 is morally, and of seeing in Him the full perfection of 
 all that attracts your moral sense, when it is manifested 
 in any human being. And you can love your neighbour 
 as yourselves, because, and in as far as you have in you 
 the Spirit of God, the spirit of universal love, which 
 proceedeth out for ever both from the Father and the 
 Son to all beings and things which They have made. 
 
 And of one thing I am sure, that in proportion as 
 you are led and inspired by that Spirit of God which 
 showed in our Lord, in the very deepest and truest 
 sense, as the spirit of humanity, just so you will feel a 
 genial and hearty pleasure in lessening all human 
 suffering, however slight ; in increasing all harmless 
 human pleasure, however transitory ; and in copying 
 Him who, at the marriage feast, gracefully and graciously 
 turned the water into wine. I do not, of course, mean 
 that you are to do no more than that ; to prefer senti- 
 ment to duty, to amuse and glorify yourselves by paying 
 tithe of mint, anise, and cummin, and neglect the 
 weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and 
 faith. But I do mean that you are not to distrust your 
 own sentiments, not to crush your own instinctive 
 sjrmpathies. The very lowest of them — that which 
 makes you shrink at the sight of pain, and rejoice in 
 
Grace and Glory. 333 
 
 tlie sight of pleasure, is not natural, and common to you 
 with the animals ; it is supernatural and divine. It is 
 a schoolmaster to bring you to Christ, to that higher 
 inspiration of His, which tells your heart to alleviate the 
 unseen woes which will never come into painful con- 
 tact with your sensibilities, to bestow pleasures in which 
 you yourself have no immediate share. It will tell your 
 hearts especially in the case of this very Hospital for Con- 
 sumption not to be slack in giving, because so much of what 
 you will give — it is painful to recollect how much — will 
 be spent, not in prevention, not even in cure, but in 
 mere alleviation, mere increased bodily ease, mere savoury 
 food, even mere passing amusements for wearied minds. 
 Be it so. If (which God forbid) we could do nothing 
 save alleviate ; if (which God forbid) permanent cure, 
 even lengthening of life, were impossible, I should say 
 just as much, Give. Give money to alleviate ; give, even 
 though what you give were, in the strictly economic 
 sense, wasted. We are ready enough, most of us, to 
 waste upon ourselves. It is well for us to taste once in 
 a way the luxury of wasting on others ; though I have 
 yet to learn that anything can be called wasted which 
 lessens, even for a moment, the amount of human suffer- 
 ing. A plan, for instance, is on foot for sending twenty 
 of the patients to Madeira for the winter. The British 
 Consul, to his honour, guarantees their maintenance, if 
 the Hospital will pay their passage out and home. 
 Some may say — An unnecessary expense — a problema- 
 tical benefit. Be it so. I believe that it will not be 
 such ; that it may save many lives — they may revive : 
 but were it not so, I would still say Give. Let them 
 
334 Grace and Glory. 
 
 go, even if every soul in that ship were doomed. Let 
 them go. Let them drink the fresh sea breeze before 
 they die ; let them see the green tropic world ; let them 
 forget their sorrow for a while ; let them feel springing 
 up afresh in them the celestial fount of hope. We let 
 the guilty criminal eat and drink well the mom ere 
 he is led forth to die — shall we not do as much by those 
 who are innocent ? 
 
 But especially would I say, try to lessen such suffering 
 as that for which I plead to-day, because it is undeserved 
 in the true sense of that word — not earned by any act of 
 their own. These poor souls suffer for no sins of their 
 own ; they have done nothing to bring on themselves a 
 disease which attacks too often the fairest, the seemingly 
 strongest and healthiest, the most temperate and most 
 pure. They suffer, some it may be for the sins of their 
 forefathers, some from causes of disease which science 
 cannot as yet control, cannot even discover. They are 
 objects of unmixed pity and sympathy : they should be 
 so to us ; for they are so to Him who made them. On 
 this disease God does bestow a special alleviation — a 
 special mark of His pity, of His tenderness, in a word of 
 His grace. That unclouded intellect, that unruffled 
 temper, that cheerful resignation, that brave and yet 
 calm facing of the inevitable future, that ever-fresh hope, 
 which is no delusion but a token that God Himself has 
 taken away the sting of death and the victory of the 
 grave, till the very thought of death has vanished, or is 
 looked on merely as the gate to a life of health, and 
 strength, and peace, and joy : — all these symptoms, so 
 common, so normal, all but universal — this Euthanasia 
 
Grace and Glory. 335 
 
 which God has provided for those who, humanly speak- 
 ing, are innocent, yet must, for the general good of 
 humanity, leave this world for another ; — what are they 
 but the voice of God to us, telling that He loves, that 
 He pities, that He alleviates ; and bidding us go and do 
 likewise ? God has alleviated where we cannot. He 
 has bidden us thereby, if His likeness and spirit be 
 indeed in us, to alleviate where we can ; and believe 
 that by every additional comfort, however petty, which 
 we provide, we are copying the Ideal Man, who, because 
 He was very God of very God, could condescend, at the 
 marriage feast, to turn the water into wine. 
 
SERMON XXXVI. 
 
 USELESS SACRIFICE. 
 
 Preached at Sotjthsea foe the Misstok of the Goob Shepherd. 
 
 Octoler 1871. 
 
 Isaiah i. II-I7. 
 
 ' ■' To wtat purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me t saith 
 tlie Lord : . . . When ye come to appear before me, who hath 
 required tljis at your hand, to tread my courts ? Bring no more 
 vain oblations ; incense is an abomination to me ; the new moons 
 and sabbaths, the calling of assembKes, I cannot away with ; it is 
 iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your 
 appointed feasts my soul hateth : they are a trouble to me ; I am 
 weary to bear them. And when ye spread forth your hands, I 
 wUl hide mine eyes from you : yea, when ye make many prayers, 
 I will not hear : your hands are fuU of blood. Wash you, make 
 you clean ; put away the evil of your doings from before mine 
 eyes ; cease to do evU ; learn to do well ; seek judgement, relieve 
 the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. " 
 
 I HAVE been asked to plead to-day for the mission of 
 the Good Shepherd in Portsea. 
 
 I am informed that Portsea contains some thirteen 
 thousand souls, divided between two parishes. That 
 they, as I feared, include some of the most ignorant and 
 vicious of both sexes which can be found in the kingdom ; 
 that there are few or no rich people iu the place ; that 
 the rich who have an interest in the labour of these 
 masses live away from the place, and from tlie dwellings 
 
Useless Sacrifice. ■Xi'il 
 
 of those whom they employ — a social evil new to 
 England ; but growing, alas ! fearfully common in it ; 
 and that vice, and unthrift, uncertain wages, and 
 unhealthy dwellings produce there, as elsewhere, misery 
 and savagery most deplorable. I am told, too, that this 
 mission has been working, nobly and self-denyingly, 
 among these unhappy people for some years past. That 
 it can, and ought to largely extend its operations ; that 
 it is in want of fresh funds ; that it is proposed to build 
 a new church, which, it is hoped, will be a centre of 
 civilization and organization, as well as of religion and 
 morality, for the district ; and I am bidden to invite you, 
 as close neighbours of Portsea, to help in the good work. 
 I, of course, know too little of local facts, or of the 
 temper of the people of Southsea. But I am bound to 
 believe it to be the same as I have found it elsewhere. 
 And I therefore shall confine myself to general questions, 
 and shall treat this case of Portsea, as what it is, alas ! 
 one among a hundred similar ones, and say to you 
 simply what I have said for twenty-five years, wherever 
 and whenever I can get a hearing. And therefore if I 
 seem here and there to speak sharply and sternly, re- 
 collect that I pay you a compliment in so doing — first, 
 that I speak not to you, but to aU English men and 
 women ; and next, that I speak as to those who have 
 noble instincts, if they will be only true to them : — as 
 to English people, who are not afraid of being told the 
 truth ; to English people who do wrong rather from 
 forgetfuLness and luxury, than from meanness and 
 cruelty aforethought ; who, as far as I have seen, need, 
 for the most part, only to be reminded that they are 
 
 Y 
 
33^ Useless Sacrifice. 
 
 doing wrong, to reawaken them to their tetter selves, 
 and set them trying honestly and bravely to do right. 
 
 Let me then begin this sermon with a parable. 
 Alas ! that the parable should represent a common and 
 notorious fact. Suppose yourselves in some stately 
 palace, amid marbles and bronzes, statues and pictures, 
 and all that cunning brain and cunning hand, when 
 wedded to the high instinct of beauty, can produce. 
 The furniture is of the very richest, and kept with the 
 most fastidious cleanliness. The floors of precious wood 
 are polished like mirrors. The rooms have every appli- 
 ance for the ease of the luxurious inmates. Everywhere 
 you see, not mere brute wealth, but taste, purity, and 
 comfort. There is no lack of intellect either: — wise and 
 learned books fill the library shelves; maps and scientific 
 instruments crowd the tables. Nor of religion either ; — 
 for the house contains a private chapel, fitted up in the 
 richest style of mediaeval ecclesiastical art. And as you 
 walk along from polished floor to polished floor, you 
 seem to pass in review every object which the body, or 
 the mind, or the spirit, of the most civilized human 
 being can need for its satisfaction. 
 
 But, next to the chapel itself, a scent of camon 
 makes you start. You look, against the will of your 
 smart and ostentatious guide, through a half-open door, 
 and see another sight — a room, dark and foul, mil- 
 dewed and ruinous ; and, swept carelessly into a comer, 
 a heap of dirt, rags, bones, waifs and strays of every 
 kind, decaying all together. 
 
 You ask, with astonishment and disgust, how comes 
 that there ? and are told, to your fresh astonishment 
 
Useless Sacrifice, 339 
 
 and disgust, that that is only where the servants sweep 
 the litter. But crouching behind the litter, in the 
 darkest corner, something moves. You go up to it, in 
 spite of the entreaties of your guide, and find an aged 
 idiot gibbering in her rags. 
 
 Who is she ? Oh, an old servant — or a child, or 
 possibly a grand-child, of some old servant — your guide 
 does not remember which. She is better out of the 
 way there in the corner. At all events she can find 
 plenty to eat among the dirt-heap ; and as for her soul, 
 if she has one, the clergyman is said to come and see 
 her now and then, so probably it will be saved. 
 
 Would you not turn away from that palace with the 
 contemptuous thought — Civilized ? Refined % These 
 people's civilization is but skin-deep. Their refine- 
 ment is but an outside show. Look into the first back 
 room, and you find that they are foul barbarians still. 
 
 And yet such, literally such and no better, is the 
 refinement of modern England ; such, and no better, is 
 the civilization of our great towns. Such I fear from 
 what I am told, is the civilization of Southsea, beside 
 the barbarism to be found in Portsea close at hand. 
 Dirt and squalor, brutality and ignorance close beside 
 such luxury as the world has not seen, it may be, since 
 the bad days of Heathen Rome. 
 
 But more, if you turned away, you would say to 
 yourselves, if you were thoughtful persons — not only 
 what barbarism, but what folly. The owner and his 
 household are in daily danger. The idiot in discontent, 
 or even in mere folly, may seize a lighted candle, burn 
 petroleum, as she did in Paris of late, and set the whole 
 
340 Useless Sacrifice. 
 
 palace on fire. And more, the very dirt is in itself in- 
 flammable, and capable, as it festers, of spontaneous 
 combustion. How many a stately house has been burnt 
 down ere now, simply by the heating of greasy rags, 
 thrust away in some neglected closet. Let the owner of 
 the house beware. He is living, voluntarily, over a 
 volcano of his own making. 
 
 But more — what if you were told that the fault lay 
 not so much in the negligence of servants as in that of the 
 owner himself, that the master of that palace had over 
 him a King, to whom all that was foul, neglectful, cruel, 
 was inexpressibly hateful, so hateful that He once had 
 actually stepped off the throne of the universe to die for 
 such creatures as that poor idiot and her forgotten 
 parents ? Would you not question whether the prayers 
 offered up in that chapel would have any answer from 
 Him, save that awful answer He once gave ? " When 
 ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes : yea, 
 when ye make many prayers, I will not hear ; your 
 hands are full of blood." 
 
 Oh, my friends, you who understand my parable, has 
 the awful thought never struck you that such may be 
 God's answer to the prayers of a nation which leaves in 
 its midst such barbarism, such heathenism, as exists in 
 every great town of this realm ? And what if you were 
 told next that the laws of His kingdom were eternal and 
 inexorable, and that one of His cardinal laws is — that as 
 a man sows, so shall he reap ; that every sin punishes 
 itself, even though the sinner does not know that he 
 has sinned ; that he who knew not his master's will, 
 and did it not, shall be beaten with few stripes ; that 
 
Useless Sacrifice. 341 
 
 the innocent babe does not escape unburnt, because it 
 knew not that fire burns ; that the good man who 
 lives in a malarious alley does not escape fever and 
 cholera, because he does not know that dirt breeds 
 pestilence ; that, in a word, he who knew not his 
 master's will, and did it not, shall be beaten with few 
 stripes ; but that he who knew his master's will, and 
 did it not, shall be beaten with many stripes ? Then of 
 how many and how heavy stripes, think you, will the 
 inhabitant of that palace be counted worthy, who has 
 been taught by Christianity for the last fifteen hundred 
 years, and by physical science and political economy for the 
 last fifty years, and yet persists, in defiance of his own 
 knowledge, in leaving his used-up servants, and their 
 children and grand-children after them, to rot, body, 
 mind, and soul, in the very precincts of the palace, 
 having no other excuse to ofier for this than that it is 
 too much trouble to treat them better, and that, on the 
 whole, he can make money more rapidly by thus throw- 
 ing away that human dirt, and leaving it to decay 
 where it can, regardless what it pollutes and poisons ; 
 just as the manufacturer can make money more rapidly 
 by not consuming his own smoke, but letting it stream 
 out of the chimney to poison with blackness and deso- 
 lation the green fields where God meant little children 
 to gather flowers ? 
 
 Ladies, to you I appeal, not merely as women, but as 
 Ladies, if (as I am assured by those who know you), 
 ladies you are, in the grand old meaning of that grand 
 old word. 
 
 If so — you know then, what it is to be a lady and 
 
342 Useless Sao'ifice. 
 
 what not. You know that it is not to go, like the 
 daughters of Zion in Isaiah's time, with mincing gait, 
 and borrowed head-gear, and tasteless finery, the head 
 well-nigh emioty, the heart full of little save vanity and 
 vexation of spirit, busy all the week over cheap novels 
 and expensive dresses, and on Sunday over a little 
 dilettante devotion. You know, I take for granted, 
 that whatever the world may think or say, that to be 
 that, is not to be a lady. 
 
 For you know, I take for granted, what that word 
 lady meant at first. That it meant she who gave out 
 the loaves, the housewife who provided food and clothes; 
 the stewardess of her household and dependants ; the 
 spinner among her maidens ; the almsgiver to the poor ; 
 the worshipper in the chapel, praying for wild men 
 away in battle. The being from whom flowed forth all 
 gracious influences of thought and order, of bounty and 
 compassion, of purity and piety, civilizing and Christianiz- 
 ing a whole family, a whole domain. This it was to be 
 a lady, in the old days when too many men had little care 
 save to make war. And this it is to be a lady still, in 
 the new days in which too many men have little care save 
 to make money. Show then that you can be ladies 
 still. That the spirit is the spirit of your ancestresses, 
 though the form in which it must show itself is changed 
 with the change of society. 
 
 To you I appeal ; to as many in this church as are 
 ladies, not in name only, but in spirit and in truth. 
 Say to your fathers, husbands, brothers, sons, and say 
 too, and that boldly, to the tradesmen with whom you 
 deal — Do you hear this ? Do you hear that there are 
 
Useless Sacrifice. 343 
 
 savages aDd heathens, generations of them, within a 
 rifle-shot of the house ? And you cannot exterminate 
 them ; cannot drive them out, much less kill them. 
 You must convert them, improve them, make them 
 civilized and christian, if not for their own sakes, at 
 least for our sakes, and for our children. 
 
 And if they should answer : My dears, it is too true. 
 But we did not make them or put them there, and they 
 are not in our parish. They are no concern of ours, 
 and besides they will not hurt us. 
 
 Answer them : Not made by our fault ! True, our 
 hands are more or less clean : but what of that ? There 
 they are. If you had a tribe of Red Indians on the 
 frontier of your settlement, would you take the less 
 guard against them, because you did not put them there ? 
 Not in our parish, and what of that ? They are in our 
 county ; they are in England. Has man the right, 
 has man the power in the sight of God to draw any 
 imaginary line of demarcation between Englishman and 
 Englishman, especially when that line is drawn between 
 rich and poor ? England knows no line of demarcation, 
 save the shore of the great sea ; and even that her 
 generosity is overleaping at this moment at the call of 
 mere humanity, in bounty to sufferers by the West 
 Indian hurricane, and by the Chicago fire. Will you 
 send your help across the Atlantic ; and deny it to 
 the sufferers at your own doors ? At least, if the rich 
 be confined by an imaginary line across, the poor on 
 the other side will not— they will cross it freely 
 enough ; and what they will bring with them will be 
 concern enough of ours. Would it not be our concern 
 
344 Useless Sacrifice. 
 
 if there was small-pox, scarlet fever, cholera among 
 them ? Should we not fear lest that might hurt us ? 
 Would you not bestir yourselves then ? And do you 
 not know that it is among such people as these that 
 pestilence is always bred ? And if n ot, is not the pestilence 
 of the soul more subtle and more contagious than any 
 pestilence of the body? What is the spreading power 
 of fever to the spreading power of vice, which springs 
 from tongue to tongue, from eye to eye, from heart to 
 heart ? What matter whether they be one mile off or 
 five ? Will not they corrupt our servants ; and those 
 servants again our children ? 
 
 And say to them, if you be prudent and thrifty 
 housewives, Do not tell us that their condition costs 
 you nothing. Even in pocket you are suffering now 
 ■ — as all England is suffering — from the existence of 
 heathens and savages, reckless, profligate, pauperized. 
 For if you pay no poor-rates for their support, the 
 shop-keepers with whom you deal pay poor-rates ; and 
 must and do repay themselves, out of your pockets, in 
 the form of increased prices for their goods. 
 
 And when you have said all this, ladies, and more, — 
 for more will suggest itself to your woman's wit, — say to 
 them with St Paul — " And yet show we unto you a 
 more excellent way," — a nobler argument — and that is 
 Charity. 
 
 Not almsgiving. I had almost said, anything but 
 that ; making bad worse, the improvident more impro- 
 vident, the liar more ready to lie, the idler more ready 
 to idle. But the Charity which is Humanity, which is 
 the spirit of pure pity, the Spirit of Christ and of God. 
 
Useless Sacrifice. 345 
 
 Say then, Even if these poor creatures did us no 
 harm, as they must and will do — civilize and christianize 
 them for their own sakes, simply because they must be 
 so very miserable — miserable too often with acute and 
 conscious misery ; too often with a worse misery, dull 
 and unconscious, which knows not, stupified by ignorance 
 and vice, that it is miserable, and ought to be more 
 miserable still. For who is so worthy of our pity, as he 
 who knows not that he is pitiable ? — who takes ignorance, 
 dirt, vice, passion, and the wretchedness which vice and 
 passion bring, as all in the day's work, as he takes the 
 rain and hail, the frost and snow, — as unavoidable 
 necessities of mortal life, for which the only temporary 
 alleviation is — drink ? 
 
 If the refined and pure-minded lady does not pity 
 such beings as that, I know not of what her refinement 
 is made. If the religious lady will not bestir herself, 
 and make sacrifices to teach such people that that is 
 not what God meant them to be — to stir up in them a 
 noble self- discontent, a noble self-abhorrence, which may 
 be the beginning of repentance and amendment of life — 
 I know not of what her religion is made. 
 
 One word more — I know that such thoughts as I 
 have put before you to-day are painful. I know that 
 we all — I as much as anyone in this church — are 
 tempted to put them by, and say, I will think of things 
 beautiful, not of things ugly ; of art, poetry, science — 
 all that is orderly, graceful, ennobling ; and not of dirt, 
 ignorance, vice, misery, all that is disorderly, degrading. 
 Nay, even the most pious at times are tempted to say, 
 I will think of heaven and not of earth. I will lift up 
 
34^ Useless Sacrifice. 
 
 my heart, and try to behold the glory and the goodness 
 of God, and not the disgrace and sin of man. 
 
 But only for a time may they thus think and speak. 
 Happy if they can, at moments, lift up their hearts unto 
 the Lord, and catch one glimpse of Him enthroned in 
 perfect serenity and perfect order, governing the worlds 
 with that all-embracing justice, which is at the same 
 time all-embracing love, and so, giving Him thanks for 
 His great glory, gain heart and hope to — what ? To 
 descend again, even were it from the beatific vision 
 itself, to this disordered earth, to work a little — and, alas 
 how little — at lessening the sum of human ignorance, 
 human vice, human misery — even as their Lord and 
 Saviour stooped from the throne of the universe, and 
 from the bosom of the Father, to toil and die for such 
 as curse about the streets outside. 
 
SERMON XXXVII. 
 
 THE SURPRISE OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 
 
 Preached at Southsea pok the Mission op the Good Shepherd. 
 
 October 1871. 
 
 St Matt. xxv. 34-37. 
 
 '■ Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye 
 blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from 
 the foundation of the world : For I was an hungred, and ye gave 
 me meat : I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink : I was a stranger, 
 and ye took me in : naked, and ye clothed me : I was sick, and 
 ye visited me : I was in prison, and ye came unto me. Then shall 
 the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we Thee an 
 hungred, and fed Thee ? or thirsty, and gave Thee drink ?" 
 
 Let us consider awhile this magnificent parable, and 
 consider it carefuUy, lest we mistake its meaning. 
 And let us specially consider one point about it, 
 which is at first sight puzzling, and which has caused, 
 ere now, many to miss (as I believe, with some of the 
 best commentators,) the meaning of the whole — which 
 is this : that the righteous in the parable did not know 
 that when they did good to their fellow-creatures, they 
 did it to Christ the Lord. 
 
 Now there are two kinds of people who do know 
 that, because they have been taught it by Holy Scrip- 
 ture, who would make two very different answers to the 
 Lord, when He spoke in such words to them. At least 
 
34^ The Surprise of the Righteous. 
 
 so we may suppose, for they are ready to make such 
 answers here on earth ; and therefore, we may suppose 
 that if they dared, they would answer so at the day of 
 judgment. One party would — or at least might say, 
 " Yes, Lord, I knew that whatever I did to the poor, I 
 did to Thee ; and therefore I did all I could for the 
 poor. I started charitable institutions, I spoke at 
 missionary meetings, I put my name down for large 
 sums in every subscription list, I built churches and 
 chapels, schools and hospitals ; I gained the reputation 
 among men of being a leading philanthropist, foremost 
 in every good work." 
 
 What answer the man who said that would receive 
 from the Lord, I know not ; for who am I that I should 
 put words into the mouth of my Creator and my God ? 
 But I think that the awful majesty of the Lord's very 
 countenance might strike such a man dumb, ere he had 
 time to say those vain proud words, and strike his conscience 
 through with the thought, Yes, I have been charitable : 
 but have I been humane? I have been a philanthropist: 
 but have I really loved my fellow-men ? Have I not 
 made my interest in the heathen whom I have not seen, 
 an excuse for despising and hating my countrymen whom 
 I have seen, if they dared to differ from me in religion or 
 in politics ? I have given large sums in charity : but 
 have I ever sacrificed anything for my fellow-men ? I 
 have given Christ back a pound in every hundred — per- 
 haps even out of every ten which He has given me : but 
 what did I do with the other nine pounds save spend 
 them on myself ? Is there a luxury in which a respect- 
 able man could safely indulge, which I have denied my- 
 
The Surprise of the Righteous. 349 
 
 self? What have I been after all, with all my philanthropy 
 and charity, but a selfish, luxurious, pompous personage ? 
 an actor doing my alms to be seen of men ? I did my 
 good works as unto Christ ? — No ; I did them as unto 
 myself — to get honour from men while I lived, and to 
 save my selfish soul when I died. God be merciful to 
 me a sinner ! That such thoughts ought to pass through 
 too many persons' hearts in this generation, I fear is too 
 certain. God grant that they may do so before it is too 
 late. But it is plain, at least, that these are not the 
 sheep of whom Christ speaks. 
 
 Again, there are another, and a very different kind of 
 persons, who we have a right to fancy, would answer the 
 Lord somewhat thus : " Oh Lord, speak not of it. It 
 may be I have tried to do a little good to a poor 
 suffering creature here and there ; to feed a few huugTy, 
 clothe a few naked, visit a few sick and prisoners. But 
 Lord, how could I do less ? after all that Thou hast 
 done and suffered for me ; and after Thy own gracious 
 saying, that inasmuch as I did anything to the least of 
 Thy brethren, I did it to Thee. What less could I do. 
 Lord ? — and after all, what a pitifully small amount I 
 have done ! Thou did'st hunger for me — for whom 
 have I ever hungered ? Thou did'st suflfer for me — for 
 whom have I ever suffered ? Thou did'st die for me — 
 for whom have I ever died \ And I did not — I fear in 
 the depth of my heart — do what I did really for Thee ; 
 but for the very pleasure of doing it. I began to do 
 good from a sense of duty to Thee ; but after a while I 
 did good, I fear, only because it was so pleasant — so 
 pleasant to see human faces looking up into mine with 
 
350 The Surprise of the Righteous. 
 
 gratitude; so pleasant to have little children, even though 
 they were none of my own, clinging to me in trust ; so 
 pleasant when I went home at night to feel that I had 
 made one human being a little happier, a little better, 
 even only a little more comfortable ; so pleasant to give 
 up my own pleasure, in order to give pleasure to others, 
 that I fear I forgot Thee in my own enjoyment. If I 
 sinned in that. Lord forgive. But at least, I have had 
 my reward. My work among Thy poor was its own 
 reward, a reward of inward happiness beyond all that 
 earth can give — and now Thou speakest of rewarding 
 me over and above, with I know not what of un- 
 deserved bliss. Thou art too good, Lord, as is Thy 
 wont from all eternity. Let me go and hide myself — ■ 
 a more than unprofitable servant, who has not done the 
 hundredth part of that which it was my duty to do." 
 
 What answer the Lord would make to the modest 
 misgivings of that sweet soul, I cannot say ; for again, 
 who am I, that I should put words into the mouth of 
 my Creator and my God ? But this I know, that I bad 
 rather be — what I am not, and never shall be — such a 
 soul as that in the last day, than own all the kingdoms 
 of the world and the glory thereof. Still, it is plain 
 that such persons, however holy, however loving, are not 
 those of whom our Lord speaks in this parable. For 
 they, too, know, and must know, that inasmuch as they 
 showed mercy unto one of the least of the Lord's 
 brethren, they showed it unto Him. But the special 
 peculiarity of the persons of whom our Lord speaks, is 
 that they did not know, that they had no suspicion, that 
 in showing kindness to men, they were showing kind- 
 
The Surprise of the Righteous. 35 1 
 
 ness to Christ. " Lord/' they answer, " when saw we 
 Thee?" 
 
 It is a revelation to them, in the strictest and deepest 
 sense of the word. A revelation, that is an unveiling, 
 a drawing away of a veil which was before their eyes 
 and hiding from them a divine and most blessed fact, of 
 which they had been unaware. But who are they ? I 
 think we must agree with some of the best commentators, 
 among others with that excellent divine and excellent 
 man, now lost to the Church on earth, the late Dean of 
 Canterbury, that they are persons who, till the day of 
 judgment, have never heard of Christ ; but who then, for 
 the first time, as Dean Alford says, "are overwhelmed 
 with the sight of the grace which has been working in 
 and for them, and the glory which is now their blessed 
 portion." Such persons, perhaps, as those two poor 
 negresses — to remind you of a story which was famous 
 in our fathers' time — those two poor negresses, I say, 
 who found the African traveller, Mungo Park, dying of 
 fever and starvation, and saved his life, simply from 
 human love — as they sung to themselves by his bed- 
 side — 
 
 " Let us pity tlie poor white man ; 
 He has no mother to malce his bed. 
 No wife to grind his corn." 
 
 Perhaps it is such as those, who have succoured human 
 beings they knew not why, simply from a divine 
 instinct, from the voice of Christ within their hearts, 
 which they felt they must obey, though they knew not 
 whose voice it was. Perhaps, I say, it is such as 
 those, that Christ will astonish at the last day by the 
 
352 The Surprise of the Righteous. 
 
 words, " Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the 
 kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the 
 world." 
 
 If this be the true meaning of our Lord's words, what 
 comfort and hope they may give us, when we think, as 
 we are bound to think, if we have a true humanity in us, 
 of the hundreds of millions of heathen now alive, and of 
 the thousands of millions of heathen who have lived and 
 died. Sinful they are as a whole. Sinning, it may be, 
 without law, but perishing without law. For the wages 
 of sin are death, and can be nothing else. But may not 
 Christ have His elect among them ? May not His 
 Spirit be working in some of them ? May He not have 
 His sheep among them, who hear His voice though they 
 know not that it is His voice ? They hear a voice 
 within their hearts whispering to them, " Be loving, be 
 merciful, be humane, in one word be just, and do to 
 others as you would they should do to you." And 
 whose voice can that be but the voice of Christ, and the 
 Spirit of God ? Those loving instincts come not from 
 the fleshly fallen nature, or natural man. That says to 
 us, " Be selfish ; do not be loving. Do to others not 
 what you would they should do to you, but do to others 
 whatever is pleasant and profitable to yourselves." 
 And alas ! the heathen, and too many who call them- 
 selves Christians, listen to that carnal voice, and live the 
 life of selfishness and pleasure, of anger and revenge, of 
 tyranny and cruelty — the end of which is death. 
 
 But if any among those heathen — hearing within their 
 hearts the other voice, the gracious voice which says, 
 " Do unto others as you would they should do unto 
 
The Surprise of ike Righteous. 353 
 
 you," — feel that that voice is a good voice and a right 
 command, which must be obeyed, and which it is beau- 
 tiful and delightful to obey, and so obey it ; may we not 
 hope then, that Christ, who has called them, will perfect 
 His own work ; and in His own good way, and His own 
 good time, deliver them from their sin and ignorance, and 
 vouchsafe to them at last that knowledge of the true and 
 holy God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, whom truly to 
 know is everlasting life ? They are Christ's lost sheep : 
 but they are still His sheep who hear His voice. May 
 He not fulfil His own words to them, and go forth and 
 seek such souls, and lay them on His shoulder, and bring 
 them home ; saying to His Church on earth, and to His 
 Church in heaven, " Rejoice with Me : for I have found 
 my sheep which was lost ? " 
 
 Now if we can thus have hope for some among the 
 heathen abroad, shall we not have hope, too, for some 
 among the heathen at home 1 for some among that 
 mass of human corruption which welters around the 
 walls of so many of our cities ? I am not going to 
 make vain excuses for them ; and say they are but the 
 victims of circumstance. The great majority of them are 
 the victims of their own low instincts. They have chosen 
 the broad and easy road of animalism, which leads to 
 destruction. They have sown to the flesh, and they will 
 of the flesh reap corruption. For the laws of God are 
 inexorable ; and the curse of the law is sure, namely, 
 "The wages of sin are death." Neither dare I encourage 
 too vast hopes and say. If we had money enough, if we 
 had machinery enough, if we had zeal enough, we might 
 convert them all, and save them all. I dare not believe 
 
 Z 
 
354 The Surprise of the Righteous. 
 
 it. The many, I fear, will always go the broad road ; 
 the few the narrow one. And all we dare say is, if we 
 have faith enough, we can convert some. We can at 
 least fulfil our ordination vow. We can seek out Christ's 
 sheep scattered abroad about this naughty world, and 
 tell them of His fold, and try to bring them home. 
 
 But how shall we know Christ's sheep when we see 
 them ? How, but by the very test which Christ has 
 laid down, it seems to me, in this very parable ? Is 
 there in one of them the high instincts — even the desire 
 to do a merciful act ? Let us watch for that : and when 
 in the most brutal man, and — alas that I should have 
 to use the words — in the most brutal woman, we see any 
 touch of nobleness, justice, benevolence, pity, tender- 
 ness — in one word, any touch, however momentary, of 
 unselfishness, — let us spring at that, knowing that there 
 is the soul we seek ; there is a lost sheep of Christ ; 
 there is Christ Himself, working unknown upon a human 
 soul ; there is a soul ready for the gospel, and not far 
 from the kingdom of God. But what shall we say to 
 that lost sheep ? Shall we terrify it by threats of hell ? 
 Shall we even allure it by promises of heaven ? Not 
 so — not so at least at first — for that would be to appeal 
 to bodily fear and bodily pleasure, to the very selfishness 
 from which Christ is trying to deliver it ; and to neglect 
 the very prevenient grace, the very hold on the soul 
 which Christ Himself offers us. Let us determine with 
 St. Paul to know nothing among our fellow-men but 
 Christ crucified. Let us appeal just to that in the soul 
 which is unselfish ; not to the instincts of loss and gain, 
 but to those nobler instincts of justice and mercy; just 
 
The Sttrprise of the Righteous. 355 
 
 because they are not the man's or the woman's instincts; 
 but Christ's within them, the light of Christ and the 
 Spirit of Christ, the spirit of love and justice saying, 
 "Do unto others as you would they should do unto you." 
 Do you doubt that ? I trust not. For to doubt that 
 is to doubt whether God be truly the Giver of all good 
 things. To doubt that is to begin to disbelieve St. 
 Paul's great saying, " In me, that is, in my flesh, 
 dwelleth no good thing." To doubt that is to lay our 
 hearts and minds open to the insidious poison of that 
 Pelagian heresy which, received under new shapes and 
 names, is becoming the cardinal heresy of modern dis- 
 belief No ; we will have faith in Christ, faith in our 
 creeds, faith in catholic doctrine ; and will say to that man 
 or that woman, even as they wallow still in the darkness 
 and the mire, " Behold your God ! That cup of cold 
 water which you gave, you knew not why, — Christ told 
 you to give it, and to Him you gave. That night watch 
 beside the bed of a woman as fallen as yourself, — Christ 
 bade you watch, and you watched by Him. For that 
 drunken ruflSan, whom you, a drunken ruffian yourself, 
 leaped into the sea to save, Christ bade you leap, and 
 like St. Christopher of old, you bore, though you knew 
 it not, your Saviour and your God to land." And if they 
 shall make answer, "And who is He that I did not know 
 Him? who is He that I should know Him now ?" Let 
 us point them — and whither else should we point them 
 in heaven or earth ? — to Christ upon the cross, and 
 say, "Behold your God! This He did, this He conde- 
 scended, this He dared, this He suffered for you, and such 
 as you. This is what He, the Maker of the universe, is 
 
35^ The Surprise of the Righteous. 
 
 like. This is what He has been trying to make you like, 
 in your small degree, every time a noble, a generous, a 
 pitiful, a merciful emotion crossed your heart ; every time 
 you forgot yourself, even for a moment, and thought of 
 the welfare of a fellow-man." 
 
 If that tale, if that sight, if that revelation and un- 
 veiling of Christ to the poor sinful soul does not work 
 in it an abhorrence of past sin, a craving after future 
 holiness, an admiration and a reverence for Christ Him- 
 self, which is, vpso facto, saving faith; if that soul does 
 not reply — it may not be in words, but in feelings too 
 deep for words, — "Yes; this is indeed noble, indeed God- 
 like, worthy of a God, and worthy therefore to be at 
 once imitated and adored : " then, indeed, the Cross of 
 Christ must have lost that miraculous power which it 
 has possessed, for more than eighteen hundred years, as 
 the highest " moral ideal " which ever was seen, or ever 
 can be seen, by the reason and the heart of man. 
 
SERMON XXXVIIL 
 
 THE lord's prater. 
 
 Windsor Castle, 1867. Chester Cathedral, 1870. 
 
 Matthew vi. 9, 10. 
 
 "After this manner, therefore, pray ye, Our Father which art in 
 heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be 
 done, on earth as it is in heaven." 
 
 Let us think for a while on these great words. Let us 
 remember that some day or other they will certainly be 
 fulfilled. Let us remember that Christ would not have 
 bidden us use them, unless He intended that they should 
 be fulfilled. And let us remember, likewise, that we 
 must help to fulfil them. We need to be reminded of 
 this from time to time, for we are all inclined to forget 
 it. We are inclined to forget that mankind has a Father 
 in heaven, who is ruling, and guiding, and educating us. 
 His human children, to 
 
 " One far off divine event, 
 Toward which the whole creation moves." 
 
 We are apt to fancy that the world wiU always go on 
 very much as it goes on now ; that it will be guided, 
 not by the will of God, but by the will of man ; by 
 man's craft ; by man's ambition ; by man's self-interest ; 
 
35^ The Lord^s Prayer. 
 
 by man's cravings after the luxuries, and even after the 
 mere necessities of this life. In a word, we are apt to 
 fancy that man, not God, is the master of this earth on 
 which we live, and that men have no king over them in 
 heaven. 
 
 The Lord's Prayer tells us that men have a king over 
 them in heaven, and that that king is a Father likewise 
 — a Father whose name wiU one day be hallowed above 
 all names. That the world will not always go on as it 
 goes on now, but that the Father's kingdom wiU come. 
 That above the will of man, there is a will of God, which 
 must be done, and therefore will be done some day. 
 In a word, the Lord's Prayer tells us that this world 
 is under a Divine government ; that the Lord, even Jesus 
 Christ our Saviour, is King, be the people never so im- 
 patient. That He sitteth between the cherubim, master 
 of all the powers of nature, be the earth never so unquiet. 
 That His power loves justice. That He has prepared 
 equity. That He has executed, and therefore will execute 
 to the end, judgment and righteousness in the earth 
 That Christ reigns in justice and in love. That He 
 has for those who disobey His laws the most terrible 
 penalties ; for those who obey them blessings such as 
 eye hath not seen nor ear heard, nor hath it entered 
 into the heart of man to conceive. That He must reign 
 till He has put all enemies under His feet and delivered 
 up the kingdom to God, even the Father. That on 
 that great day He will prove His royaltj', and His 
 Father's royalty, in the sight of all heaven and earth, 
 and make every soul of man aware, in a fashion which 
 none shall mistake, that He is Lord and King. This is 
 
The Lord's Prayer. 359 
 
 the message which the Lord's Prayer brings — a message 
 of mingled fear and joy. 
 
 But a message of more joy than fear. Else why does 
 our Lord bid us pray for it that it may come to pass? — 
 pray daily, before we even pray for our daily bread, or the 
 forgiveness of our sins — that His Father's name may be 
 hallowed, His Father's kingdom come, His Father's will 
 be done ? 
 
 He bids us pray for that because it will bring bless- 
 ings. Blessings to every soul of man who desires to be 
 good and true. Because it will satisfy every aspiration 
 which has ever risen up from the heart of man after 
 what is noble, what is generous, what is just, what is 
 useful, what is pure. Surely it is so. Consider but 
 these short words of my text, and think what the world 
 would be like if they were fulfilled; what the next world 
 will actually be like when they are fulfilled. 
 
 " Hallowed be thy name." But what name? The name 
 of Father. If that name were hallowed by men, there 
 would be an end of all superstitions. The root of all 
 superstitions, fanaticisms, and false religions is this — that 
 they do not hallow the name of Father. They do not see 
 that it is a Holy name, a beautiful and tender as well as 
 an awful and venerable name. They think of fathers, 
 like too many among themselves, proud, and arbitrary, sel- 
 fish and cruel. They say in their hearts, even such 
 fathers as we are, such is God. Therefore, they shrink 
 from God, and turn from Him to idols, to the Virgin 
 Mary, or Saints, or any other beings who can deliver 
 them (as they fancy) out of the hands of their Father in 
 heaven. If men once learnt to hallow the name of 
 
360 The Lord's Prayer. 
 
 Father, to think of a father as one who not only pos- 
 sessed power but felt love, who not only had rights 
 which he would enforce, and issued commands which must 
 be obeyed, but who felt yearning sympathy for his chil- 
 dren's weakness, an active interest in their education, 
 and was ready to labour for, to sacrifice himself for, his 
 family — That would be truly to hallow the name of 
 Father, and look on it as a holy thing, whether in heaven 
 above or in earth beneath. 
 
 To hallow the Father's name would abolish all the 
 superstition of the world. And so the coming of the 
 Father's kingdom would abolish all the misrule and 
 anarchy of the world. For the kingdom of God the 
 Father is a kingdom of perfect order, perfect justice, 
 perfect usefulness. Surely the first consequences of that 
 kingdom's coming would be, that every one would be 
 exactly in his right place, and that every one would get 
 his exact deserts. That would indeed be the kingdom 
 of God on earth. The prospect of such a kingdom would 
 be painful enough to those who were in their wrong 
 place, to those who were undeserving. All who were 
 useless, taking wages either from man or from God, 
 without doing any work in return, all these would have 
 but too good reason to dread the coming of the kingdom 
 of God. 
 
 But those who were trying earnest^ to do their work, 
 though amid many mistakes and failures, why should 
 they dread the coming of the kingdom of God ? Why 
 should they shrink from remembering that, though God's 
 kingdom is not come in perfection and fulness, it is here 
 already, and they are in it ? Why should they shrink 
 
The Lord's Prayer. 361 
 
 from that thought ? They will find it full of comfort, of 
 strength, and hope, if they will hut hallow their 
 Father's name, and remember the fact of all facts — that 
 they have a Father in heaven. There are thousands on 
 earth, from the highest to the lowest, who can say 
 honestly — to take the commonest instance — every parent 
 can say it — " I have a heavy work to do, a heavy 
 responsibility to fulfil. God knows I did not seek it, 
 thrust myself into it ; it was thrust upon me. It came 
 to me in the course of nature or of society, and 
 circumstances over which I had no control. In one 
 word it was my Duty. But now that I have my duty 
 to do, behold I cannot do it. I try my best, but I 
 fail. I come short daily of my own low standard of 
 duty. How much more of God's perfect standard of it ! 
 And the burden of responsibility, the regret for failure, is 
 more than I can bear. 
 
 To such we may answer, hallow your Father's name, 
 and be of good cheer. Your Father has given you your 
 work. Because He is a Father, He is surely educating 
 you for your work. Because He is a Father, He will surely 
 set you no task which you are unable to fulfil. Because 
 He is a Father, He will help you to fulfil your task. 
 Your station and calling is His will ; and because it is 
 a Father's will it is a good will. 
 
 And the Judge of your work — He is no stern task- 
 master, no unfeeling tyrant, but Jesus Christ, your Lord, 
 who died for you on the Cross. He knows what is in 
 man. He remembereth that we are but dust. Else the 
 spirit would fail before Him and the souls which He has 
 made. He can be touched with the feeling of our in- 
 
3^2 The Lord's Prayer. 
 
 firmities, seeing that He was tempted in all things like 
 as we are, yet without sin. He can sympathise utterly; 
 He can make all just allowances ; He will judge not 
 by outward results, but by the inward will and desire. 
 He wiU judge not by the hearing of the ear, nor the see- 
 ing of the eye, as the shallow cruel world judges, but 
 He will judge righteous judgment. Trust youi cause to 
 Him, and trust yourself to Him. Believe that if He can 
 sympathise. He can also help ; for from Him, as well as 
 from His Father, proceeds the Holy Spirit, the Lord and 
 giver of life, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the 
 spirit of power and might, the spirit of knowledge and 
 the fear of the Lord, and He wiU inspire you to see your 
 duty, and do your duty, and rejoice in your duty, in 
 spite of weariness and failure, and all the burdens of the 
 flesh and of the spirit. 
 
 " Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." If 
 that were done, it would abolish all the vice of the 
 world, and therefore the misery which springs from 
 vice. Ah, that God's will were but done on earth 
 as it is in the material heaven overhead, in perfect 
 order and obedience, as the stars roll in their courses, 
 without rest, yet without haste ; as all created things, 
 even the most awful, fire and hail, snow and vapour, 
 wind and storm, fulfil God's word, who hath made them 
 sure for ever and ever, and given them a law which 
 shall not be broken. But above them ; above the 
 divine and wonderful order of the material universe, and 
 the winds which are God's angels, and the flames of fire 
 which are His messengers ; above all, the prophets and 
 apostles have caught sight of another divine and wonder- 
 
The Lord's Prayer. 363 
 
 ful order of rational beings, of races, loftier and purer 
 than man — angels and archangels, thrones and dominions, 
 principalities and powers, fulfilling God's will in heaven 
 as it is not alas ! fulfilled on earth. 
 
 And beside them, beside the innumerable company of 
 angels, are there not the spirits of just men made per- 
 fect, freed from the fetters of the gross animal body, and 
 now somewhere in that boundless universe in which 
 this earth is but a tiny speck, doing God's will, as they 
 longed to do it on earth, with clearer light, fuller faith, 
 deeper love, mightier powers of usefulness ? Ah, that 
 we were like to them ! Ah, that we could perform the 
 least part of our day's work on earth as it is performed by 
 saints and angels for ever in heaven ! When we think 
 of what this poor confused world is, and then what it 
 might be, were God's will done therein as it is done in 
 heaven ; what it might be if even the little of God's 
 will which we already know, the little of God's laws 
 which are proved already to be certain, were carried out 
 with any earnestness by the majority of mankind, or 
 even of one civilized nation — when we think — to take 
 the very lowest ground — of the health and wealth, the 
 peace and happiness, which would cover this earth did 
 men only do the will of God ; then, if we have human 
 hearts within us — if we care at all for the welfare of our 
 fellow-men — ought not this to be the prayer of all our 
 prayers, and ought we not to welcome any event, how- 
 ever awful, which would bring mankind to reason and to 
 virtue, and to God, and abolish the sin and misery of 
 this unhappy world ? 
 
 To abolish the superstition, the misrule, the vice, the 
 
364 The Lord's Prayer. 
 
 misery of this world. That is what Christ will do in the 
 day when He has put all enemies under His feet. That 
 is what Christ has been doing, step by step, ever since 
 that day when first He came to do His Father's will on 
 earth in great humihty. Therefore, that is what we 
 must do, each in our place and station, if we be indeed 
 His subjects, fellow- workers with Him in the improve- 
 ment of the human race, fellow-soldiers with Him in the 
 battle against evil. 
 
 But what we wish to do for our fellow-creatures, we 
 must do first for ourselves. We can give them nothing 
 save what God has already given us. We must become 
 good before we can make them good, and wise before we 
 can make them wise. Let us pray, then, the Lord's 
 Prayer in spirit and in truth. Let us pray that we may 
 hallow the name of God, our Father. Let us pray that 
 Has kingdom may come in our own hearts. Let us 
 pray that we may do His will on earth as those whom 
 we love and honour do it in heaven. Let us keep that 
 before us, day and night, as the aim and purpose of our 
 lives. Let us pray for forgiveness of our failures in that ; 
 for help to do that better as our years run on. So we 
 shall be ready for the day in which Christ shall have 
 accomplished the number of His elect, and hastened His 
 kingdom. So we shall be found in that dread day, not 
 on the side of evil, but of God ; not on the side of 
 darkness, anarchy, and vice, but on the side of light, of 
 justice, and of virtue, which is the side of Christ and of 
 God. And so we, with all those that are departed in 
 the faith of His holy name, shall have our perfect con- 
 summation and bliss in His eternal and everlasting glory, 
 to Vhich may He, of His great mercy, bring us all. Amen. 
 
SERMON XXXIX. 
 
 THE DISTBACTBD MIND. 
 
 EversUy. 1871. 
 
 Matthew vi. 34. 
 
 "Take no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought 
 for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 
 
 ScHOLAES will tell you tliat the words " take no 
 thonght" do not exactly express our Lord's meaning 
 in this text. That they should rather stand, " Be not 
 anxious about to-morrow." And doubtless they are 
 right on the whole. But the truth is, that we have no 
 word in English which exactly expresses the Greek word 
 which St Matthew uses in his gospel, and which we are 
 bound to believe exactly expresses our Lord's meaning, 
 in whatever language He spoke. The nearest English 
 word, I believe, is — distracted. Be ye not distracted 
 about to-morrow. I do not mean the vulgar sense of 
 the word — which is losing one's senses. But the old 
 and true sense, which is still used by those who speak 
 good English. 
 
 To distract, means literally to pull a thing two 
 different ways — even to pull it asunder. We speak of 
 distracting a man's attention, when we call him off from 
 looking at one tbing to make him look at something 
 
366 The Distracted Mind. 
 
 else, and we call anything which interrupts us in our 
 business, or puts a thought suddenly out of our heads, 
 a distraction. Now the Greek word which St Matthew 
 uses, means very nearly this — Be not divided in your 
 thoughts — do not think of two things at once — do not 
 distract your attention from to-day's work, by fearing and 
 hoping about to-morrow. Sufficient for the day is the 
 evil thereof; and you will have quite trouble enough to 
 get through to-day honestly and well, without troubling 
 yourself with to-morrov7 — which may turn out very 
 unlike anything which you can dream. This, I think, 
 is the true meaning of the text ; and with it, I think, 
 agrees another word of our Lord's which St Luke gives 
 — And be ye not of doubtful mind. Literally, Do not 
 be up in the air — blown helpless hither and thither, 
 by every gust of wind, instead of keeping on the firm 
 ground, and walking straight on about your business, 
 stoutly and patiently, step after step. Have no vain 
 fears or vain hopes about the future ; but do your duty 
 here and now. That is our Lord's command, and in it 
 lies the secret of success in life. 
 
 For do we not find, do we not find, my friends, in 
 practice, that our Lord's words are true ? Who are 
 the people who get through most work in their 
 lives, with the least wear and tear, not merely to 
 their bodily health, but to their tempers and their 
 characters ? Are they the anxious people ? Those who 
 imagine to themselves possible misfortunes, and ask 
 continually — What if this happened — or that ? What 
 would become of me then ? How should I be able to 
 pull through such a trouble? Where shall I find 
 
The Distracted Mind. 367 
 
 friends ? How shall I make myself safe against the 
 chances and changes of life ? Do we not know that 
 those people are the very ones who do little work, and 
 often less than none, by thus distracting their attention 
 and their strength from their daily duty, daily business ? 
 That while they are looking anxiously for future oppor- 
 tunities, they are neglecting the opportunities which 
 they have already. While they are making interest 
 with others to help them, they forget to help themselves. 
 That in proportion as they lose faith in God and His 
 goodness, they lose courage and lose cheerfulness ; and 
 have too often to find a false courage and a false cheer- 
 fulness, by drowning their cares in drink, or in mean 
 cunning and plotting and planning, which usually ends 
 in failure and in shame ? 
 
 Are those who do most work, either the plotting or 
 intriguing people ? I do not mean base false people. 
 Of them I do not speak here. But really good and kind 
 people, honest at heart, who yet are full of distractions 
 of another sort ; who are of double mind — look two 
 ways at once, and are afraid to be quite open, quite 
 straightforward — who like to compass their ends, as 
 the old saying is, that is to go round about, towards 
 what they want, instead of going boldly up to it ; who 
 like to try two or more ways of getting the same 
 thing done ; and, as the proverb has it, have many irons 
 in the fire ; who love little schemes, and plots, and 
 mysteries, even when there is no need for them. Do 
 such people get most work done ? Far, far from it. 
 They take more trouble about getting a little matter 
 done, than simpler and braver men take about getting 
 
3^8 The Distracted Mind. 
 
 great matters done. They fret themselves, they weary 
 themselves, they waste their brains and hearts — and 
 sometimes their honesty besides — and if they fail, as 
 in the chances and changes of this mortal Ufe they must 
 too often fail, have nothing for all their schemings save 
 vanity and vexation of spirit. 
 
 But the man who will get most work done, and done 
 with the least trouble, whether for himself, for his 
 family, or in the calling and duty to which God has 
 called him, will be the man who takes our Lord's advice. 
 Who takes no thought for the morrow, and leaves the 
 morrow to take thought for itself That man will 
 believe that this world is a well-ordered world, as it 
 needs must be, seeing that God made it, God redeemed 
 it, God governs it ; and that God is merciful in this — 
 that He rewardeth every man according to his works. 
 That man will take thought for to-day, earnestly and 
 diligently, even at times anxiously and in fear and 
 trembling ; but he will not distract, and divide, and 
 weaken his mind by taking thought for to-mon-ow also. 
 Each day he wiU set about the duty which lies nearest 
 him, with a whole heart and with a single eye, giving 
 himself to it for the time, as if there was nothing else 
 to be done in the world. As for what he is to do next, 
 he wiU think little of that. Little, even, will he think 
 of whether his work will succeed or not. That must be 
 as God shall will. All that he is bound to do is to do 
 his best; and his best he can only do by throwing his 
 whole soul into his work. As his day, he trusts his 
 strength will be ; and he must not waste the strength 
 which God has given him for to-day on vain fears or vain 
 
The Distracted Mind. 369 
 
 dreams about to-morrow. To-day is quite full enough 
 of anxiety, of care, of toil, of ignorance. Sufficient for 
 the day is the evil thereof Yes ; and sufficient for the 
 day is the good thereof likewise. To-day, and to-morrow, 
 too, may end very differently from what he hoped. Yes ; 
 but they may end, too, very differently from what he 
 feared. Let him throw his whole soul into the thing 
 which he is about, and leave the rest to God. 
 
 For so only will he come to the day's end in that 
 wholesome and manful temper, contented if not cheerful, 
 satisfied with the work he has had to do, if not satisfied 
 with the way in which he has done it, which will leave 
 his mind free to remember all his comforts, all his 
 blessings, even to those commonest of all blessings, 
 which we are all too apt to forget, just because they 
 are as necessary as the air we breathe ; which will show 
 him how much light there is, even on the darkest day. 
 
 He has not got this or that fine thing, it may be, for 
 which he longed : but he has at least his life, at least 
 his reason, at least his conscience, at least his God. 
 Are not they enough to possess ? Are not they enough 
 wherewith to lie down at night in peace, and rise 
 to-morrow to take what comes to-morrow, even as he 
 took what came to-day ? And will he not be most fit 
 to take what comes to-morrow like a Christian man, 
 whether it be good or evil, with his spirit braced and 
 yet chastened, by honest and patient labour, instead of 
 being weakened and irritated by idling over to-day, 
 while he dreamed and fretted about to-morrow ? 
 
 Ah .' I fancy that I hear some one say — perhaps a 
 woman — " So easy to preach, but so difficult to practise. 
 
 2 A 
 
3 7° The Distracted Mind. 
 
 So difficult to think of one thing at a time. So diffi- 
 cult not to plot, not to fret, with a whole family of 
 children dependent on you ! What does the preacher 
 know of a woman's troubles ? How many things she 
 has to think of, day by day, not one of which she dares 
 forget — and yet can seldom or never, for all her recol- 
 lecting, contrive to get them all done ? How can she help 
 being distracted by the thought of to-morrow 1 Can he 
 feel for frail me ? Does he know what I go through ?" 
 Yes. I do know; and I wonder, and admire. To 
 me the sight of any poor woman managing her 
 family respectably and thriftily, is one of the most 
 surprising sights on earth, as it is one of the most 
 beautiful sights on earth. How she finds time for it, 
 wit for it, patience for it, courage for it, I cannot con- 
 ceive. I have wondered often why many a woman does 
 not lie down and die, for sheer weariness of body and 
 soul. I have fancied often that God must give some 
 special grace to all good mothers, to enable them to do 
 all that they do, and bear all they bear. But still, the 
 women who do most, who bring up their families best, 
 are surely those who obey their Lord's command, who give 
 their whole souls to each day's work, and think as little 
 as they can of to-morrow. With them, surely, the true 
 wisdom is, not to fret, not to plot, to do the duty 
 which lies nearest them, and leave the rest to God ; to 
 get each week's bill paid, trusting to God to send money 
 for the week to come ; to get their children every day 
 to school ; to correct in them each fault as it shews 
 itself, without looking forward too much to how the 
 child will turn out at last. For them, and for parents 
 
The Distracted Mind. 3 7 1 
 
 of all ranks, the wisest plan, I believe, is to make no 
 far-fetched plans for their children's future, certainly no 
 ambitious intrigues for their marriage : but simply to 
 educate them — that is, to bring out in them, day by 
 day, all that is purest and best, wisest and ablest, and 
 leave the rest to God ; sure that if they are worth any- 
 thing, their Father in heaven will find them work to do, 
 and a place at His table, in this life and in the life to come. 
 
 Yes, my dear friends, this is the true philosophy, the 
 philosophy which Christ preaches to us all — to old and 
 young, rich and poor, ploughman and scholar, maid, 
 wife, and widow, all alike. 
 
 Fret not. Plot not. Look not too far ahead. 
 
 Fret not — lest you lose temper, and be moved to do 
 evil. Plot not — lest you lose faith in God, and be 
 moved to be dishonest. Look not too far ahead — So 
 far only, as to keep yourselves out of open and certain 
 danger — lest you see what is coming before you are 
 ready for the sight. If we foresaw the troubles which 
 may be coming, perhaps it would break our hearts ; 
 and if we foresaw the happiness which is coming, per- 
 haps it would turn our heads. Let us not meddle 
 with the future, and matters which are too high for 
 us, but refrain our souls, and keep them low, like little 
 children, content with the day's food, and the day's 
 schooling, and the day's play-hours, sure that the 
 Divine Master knows that all is right, and how to 
 train us, and whither to lead us, though we know not, 
 and need not know, save this — that the path by which 
 He is leading each of us — if we will but obey and follow, 
 step by step — leads up to Everlasting Life. 
 
SERMON XL. 
 
 THE LESSON OF LIFE. 
 
 FiiTH Sunday in Lent. 
 
 Chester Training College, 1870. Wimlsor Castle, 1871. 
 
 Hebkews v. 7, 8. 
 
 " Who in the days of Hia flesh, when He had offered up prayers 
 and supplications with strong crying and tears, unto Him that was 
 able to save Him from death, and was heard in that He feared ; 
 though He were a Son, yet learned He ohedience by the things which 
 He suffered." 
 
 This is the lesson of life. This is God's way of educat- 
 ing us, of making us men and women worthy of the 
 name of men and women, worthy of the name of children 
 of God. As Christ learnt, so must we. If it was neces- 
 sary for Him who knew no sin, how much more for us 
 who have sins enough and to spare. Though He was 
 the eternal Son of God, yet He learnt obedience by the 
 things which He suffered. Though we are God's adopted 
 children, we must learn obedience by what we suifer. He 
 had to offer up prayer with strong crying. So shall we 
 have to do again and again before we die. He was 
 heard in that He feared God, and said, " Father not my 
 will, but Thine be done." And so shall we. He was 
 perfected by sufferings. God grant that we may be so 
 likewise. He had to do like us. God grant that we may 
 do like Him. 
 
 God grant it. That is all I can say. I cannot be 
 
The Lesson of Life. 373 
 
 sure of it, for myself or for any of you. I can only 
 hope, and trust in God. Life is hard work — any 
 life at least which is worth being called life, which is 
 not the life of a swine, who thinks of nothing but feed- 
 ing himself, or of a butterfly which thinks of nothing but 
 enjoying itself. Those are easy lives enough : but the end 
 thereof is death. The swine goes to the slaughter. The 
 butterfly dies of the frost — and there is an end of them. 
 But the manly life, the life of good deeds and noble 
 thoughts, and usefulness, and purity, the life which is 
 discontented with itself, and which the better it is, longs 
 the more to be better still ; the life which wiU endure 
 through this world into the world to come, and on and 
 upward for ever and for ever. — That life is not an easy 
 life to live ; it is very often not a pleasant life ; very 
 often a sad life — -so sad that that is true of it which the 
 great poet says — 
 
 " WTio ne'er hia bread in sorrow ate, 
 "Who never in the midnight hours 
 Sat weeping on his lonely bed, 
 He knows you not, you Heavenly Powers.'' 
 
 You may say this is bad news. I do not believe it 
 is. I believe it is good news, and the very best of news: 
 but if it is bad news, I cannot help it. I did not make 
 it so. God made it so. And God must know best. God 
 is love. And we are His children, and He loves us. And 
 therefore His ways with us must be good and loving 
 ways, and any news about them must be good news, and 
 a gospel, though we cannot see it so at first. 
 
 In any case, if it is so, it is better to remember that 
 it is so. And Lent, and Passion Week, and Good Friday 
 
374 The L esson of L ife. 
 
 are meant to put us in mind of it year by year, because 
 we are all of us only too ready to forget it, and shut 
 our eyes to it. Lent and Passion Week, I say, are 
 meant to put us in mind. And the preacher is bound 
 to put you in mind of it now and then. He is bound, 
 not too often perhaps, lest he should discourage young 
 hearts, but now and then, to put you in mind of the 
 old Greek proverb, the very words of which St. Paul 
 uses in the text, that to. •xa^rnj.ara. iJ.aJrjiJ,a,ra — sorrows are 
 lessons ; and that the most truly pitiable people often 
 are those who have no sorrows, and ask for no man's 
 pity. 
 
 For so it is. The very worst calamity, I should say, 
 which could befall any human being would be this — To 
 have his own way from his cradle to his grave ; to have 
 everything he liked for the asking, or even for the buy- 
 ing ; never to be forced to say, " I should like that : but 
 I cannot afford it. I should like this : but I must not 
 do it " — Never to deny himself, never to exert himself, 
 never to work, and never to want. That man's soul 
 would be in as great danger as if he were committing 
 great crimes. Indeed, he would very probably before 
 he died commit great crimes — like certain negroes 
 whom I have seen abroad, who live a life of such lazy 
 comfort and safety, and superabundance of food, that 
 they are beginning more and more to live the life of ani- 
 mals rather than men. They are like those of whom the 
 Psalmist says, " Their eyes swell out with fatness, and 
 they do even what they lust." So do they, and indulge 
 in gross vices, which, if not checked in some way, will 
 end in destroying them off the face of the earth in a few 
 
 & 
 
The L ess on of L Ife. 375 
 
 generations more. I had rather, for the sake of my charac- 
 ter, my manhood, my immortal soul, I had rather, I say, 
 a hundred times over, be an English labourer, struggliog 
 on on twelve shillings a week, and learning obedience, 
 self-denial, self-respect, and trust in God, by the things 
 suffered in that hard life here at home, than be a Negro 
 in Tropic islands, fattening himself in sloth under that 
 perpetual sunshine, and thinking nought of God, because, 
 poor fool, he can get all he wants without God's help. 
 
 No, my dear young friends, this is good for a man. 
 It is necessary for a man, if he is to be a man and a 
 child of God, and not a mere animal, to have to work 
 hard whether he likes or not. It is good for a man to 
 bear the yoke in his youth, as Jeremiah told the Jews, 
 when, because they would not bear God's light yoke in 
 their youth, but ran riot into luxury and wantonness, and 
 superstition and idolatry which come thereof, they had to 
 bear the heavy yoke of the Babylonish captivity in their 
 old age. It is good for a man to be checked, crossed, 
 disappointed, made to feel his own ignorance, weakness, 
 folly; made to feel his need of God; to feel that, in spite 
 of all his cunning and self-confidence, he is no better off 
 in this world than a lost child in a dark forest, unless 
 he has a Father in Heaven, who loves him with an 
 eternal love , and a Holy Spirit in Heaven, who will 
 give him a right judgment in all things ; who will put 
 into his mind good desires, and enable him to bring those 
 desires to good effect ; and a Saviour in Heaven who can 
 be touched with the feeling of his infirmities, because 
 He too was made perfect by sufferings ; He too was 
 tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin. 
 
37^ The Lesson of Life. 
 
 And, therefore, my dear friends, those words which 
 we read in the Visitation of the Sick about this matter 
 are not mere kind words, meant to give comfort for the 
 moment. They are truth and fact and sound philo- 
 sophy. They are as true for the young lad in health 
 and spirits as for the old folk crawling towards their 
 graves. It is true, and you will find it true, that sickness 
 and all sorts of troubles, are sent to correct and amend 
 in us whatever doth offend the eyes of our Heavenly 
 Father. It is true, and you will find it true, that whom 
 the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son 
 whom He receiveth. It is true, and you will find it 
 true (though God knows it is a difiicult lesson enough to 
 learn), that there should be no greater comfort to Chris- 
 tian persons, than to be made like Christ, by suffering 
 patiently not only the hard work of every-day life, but 
 adversities, troubles, and sicknesses, and our Heavenly 
 Father's correction, whensoever, by any manner of adver- 
 sity, it shall please His gracious goodness to visit them. 
 For Christ Himself went not up to joy, but first He 
 suffered pain ; He entered not into His glory, before He 
 was crucified. 
 
 So truly our way to eternal joy is to labour and to 
 suffer here with Christ. It is true, and you will find it 
 true, when years hence you look back, as I trust you all 
 will, calmly and intelligently, on the events of your own 
 lives — you will find, I say, that the very events in 
 your lives which seemed at the time most trying, most 
 vexing, most disastrous, have been those which were 
 most necessary for you, to call out what was good in you, 
 and to purge out what was bad ; that by those very 
 
The Lesson of Life. 377 
 
 troubles your Lord, who knows the value of suffering, be- 
 cause He has suffered Himself, was making true men, true 
 women of you ; hardening your heads, while He softened 
 your hearts ; teaching you to obey Him, while He taught 
 you not to obey your own fancies and your own passions ; 
 refining and tempering your characters in the furnace of 
 trial, as the smith refines soft iron into trusty steel ; 
 teaching you, as the great poet says — 
 
 '•' That life is not as idle ore. 
 But heated hot with bui-ning fears, 
 And bathed in baths of hissing tears, 
 
 And battered with the strokes of doom. 
 
 To shape and use." 
 
 Yes, you will learn that, and more than that, and say in 
 peace — "Before I was troubled I went wrong, but now 
 have I kept thy commandments." And to such an old 
 age may our Lord Jesus Christ bring you and me and 
 all we love. Amen. 
 
SERMON XLI, 
 
 SA-CRIFICE TO CiESAR OK TO GOD. 
 Eversley, 1869. Chester Cathedral, 1872. 
 
 Matthew xxii. 21. 
 
 " Eender therefore unto Caesar the things which are Ceesar's ; 
 and unto God the things that are God's." 
 
 Many a sermon has been preached, and many a pam- 
 phlet written, on this text, and (as too often has hap- 
 pened to Holy Scripture), it has been made to mean the 
 most opposite doctrines, and twisted in every direction, 
 to suit men's opinions and superstitions. Some have 
 found in it a command to obey tyrants, invaders, any 
 and every government, just or unjust. Others have 
 found in it rules for drawing a line between the authority 
 of the State and of the Church, i.e., between what the 
 Government have a right to command, and what the 
 Clergy have a right to demand ; and many more matters 
 have they fancied that they discovered in the text which 
 I do not believe are in it at all. 
 
 For to understand the original question — Is it lawful to 
 pay tribute to Caesar or no ? we must imagine to ourselves 
 a state of things in Judea utterly different, thank God, 
 from anything which has been in these realms for now eight 
 hundred years. The Csssar, or Emperor of Eome, had ob- 
 tained by conquest an authority over the Jews very like 
 
Sacrifice to Ccesar or to God. 3 79 
 
 that which we have over the Hindoos in India. And 
 what was working in the mind of the Jews was very like 
 that which was working in the minds of the Hindoos in 
 the Sepoy Rebellion — whether it was not a sacred and 
 religious duty to rise against their conquerors and drive 
 them out. We know from the New Testament that 
 both our Lord and His apostles again and again warned 
 them not to rebel, warned them that they would not 
 succeed : but ruin themselves thereby; for that those 
 who took the sword would perish by the sword. And 
 we know, too, that the Jews would not take our Lord's 
 advice, nor the apostles', but did rise again and again, 
 both in Judea and elsewhere, gallantly and desperately 
 enough, poor creatures, in mad useless rebellion, till the 
 Romans all but destroyed them off the face of the earth. 
 But what has that to do with us, free self-governed 
 Englishmen, in this peaceful and prosperous land ? In 
 the early middle age, when the clergy represented and 
 defended Roman pure Christianity and civilization against 
 the half-heathen and half-barbaric Teutons who had con- 
 quered the Roman Empire, then doubtless the text be- 
 came once more full of meaning, and the clergy had again 
 and again to defend the things which belonged to God 
 against the rapacity or the wilfulness of many a bar- 
 baric Csesar. But what has that, again, to do with us % 
 Those who apply the text to any questions which can at 
 present arise between the Church and the State, mistake 
 alike, it seems to me, the nature and functions of an 
 Established Church, and the nature and functions of a 
 free Government. 
 
 Do I mean, then, that the text has nothing to do 
 
3^0 Sacrifice to Ccesar or to God. 
 
 with us ? God forbid ! I believe that every word of 
 our Lord's has to do with us, and with every human 
 being, for their meaning is infinite, eternal, and inex- 
 haustible. And what the latter half of the text has to 
 do with us, I will try to show you, while I tell you 
 openly, that the first half of it, about rendering to 
 Caesar the things which are Caesar's, has nothing to do 
 with us, and never need, save through our own cowardice 
 and effeminacy, or folly. 
 
 "We have no Cssar over us in free England, and shall 
 not have, while Queen Victoria, and her children after 
 her reign ; but if ever one, or many (which God forbid !), 
 should arise and try to set themselves up as despots over 
 us, I trust we shall know how to render them their due, 
 be they native or foreigner, in the same coin in which 
 our forefathers have always paid tyrants and invaders. 
 No. The only Caesar which we have to fear — and he 
 is a tyrant who seems ready, nowadays, to oppose and 
 exalt himself above all that is called God, or is wor- 
 shipped, — patronizing, of course. Religion, as a harmless 
 sanction for order and respectability, but dictating 
 morality, while telling us all day long, with a thousand 
 voices and a thousand pens — " Right is not the eter- 
 nal law of God. Whatever profits me, whatever I 
 Uke, whatever I vote — that and that alone is riffht, 
 and you must do it at your peril." Do you know 
 who that Caesar is, my friends ? He is called Public 
 Opinion — the huge anonymous idol which we ourselves 
 help to make, and then tremble before the creation 
 of our own cowardice ; whereas, if we will but face him, 
 in the fear of God and the faith of Christ, determined 
 
Sacrifice to Ccssar or to God. 381 
 
 to say the thing which is true, and do the thing which 
 is right, we shall find the modern Ca3sar but a phan- 
 tom of our own imagination ; a tyrant, indeed, as long as 
 he is feared, but a coward as soon as he is defied. 
 
 To that Csesar let us never bow the knee. Render 
 to him all that he deserves — the homage of common 
 courtesy, common respectability, common charity — not 
 in reverence for his wisdom and strength, but in pity 
 for his ignorance and weakness. But render always 
 to God the things which are God's. That duty, my 
 good friends, lies on us, as on all mankind still, from 
 our cradle to our grave, and after that through all 
 eternity. Let us go back, or rather, let us go home 
 to the eternal laws of God, which were, ages before 
 we were born, and will be, ages after we are dead 
 — to the everlasting Rock on which we all stand, which 
 is the will and mind of our Lord Jesus Christ the 
 Son of God, to whom all power is given (as He said 
 Himself) in heaven and on earth. And we have need 
 to do so, for in such times of change as these are, there 
 will always be too many who fancy that changes in society 
 and government change their duty about religion, and are,, 
 some of them, sorely puzzled as to their duty to God ; 
 and others ready to take advantage of the change to 
 throw off their duty to God, and run into licence and 
 schism and fanaticism. 
 
 Now let all people clearly understand, and settle it 
 in their hearts, that no change in Church or in State 
 can change in the least their duty to God and to 
 man. If the world were turned upside down, God would 
 still be where He is, and we where we are — in His 
 
3^2 Sacrifice to Ccesar or to God. 
 
 presence. Eight would still be right, my friends, and 
 wrong wrong, though all the loud voices in the world 
 shouted that wrong is right and right wrong. No change 
 of time, place, society, government, circumstance of any 
 kind, can alter our duty to God, and our power of doing 
 that duty. Whatever the Ctesar of the hour may re- 
 quire us to render to him, what we are bound to render 
 to God remains the same. The two things are diffe- 
 rent in hind, so different, that they never need interfere 
 with each other. 
 
 Even if, which God forbid, the connection between 
 Church and State were dissolved ; even if, which God 
 forbid, the Church of England were destroyed for a 
 while — if all Churches were destroyed- — yea, if not a 
 place of worship were left for a while in this or any 
 other land ; yet even then, I say, we could still render 
 to God the things which are God's, and offer to Him 
 spiritual sacrifices, more pleasing to Him than the most 
 gorgeous ceremonies which the devotion, and art, and 
 wealth of man ever devised — sacrifices, by virtue of 
 which the Church would arise out of her ruins, like 
 the Jewish Church after the captivity, more pure, more 
 glorious, and more triumphant than ever. 
 
 What do I mean ? I mean this — that there are three 
 sacrifices which every man, woman, and child can offer, 
 and should offer, however lowly, however uneducated in 
 what the Avorld calls education nowadays. Those they 
 can offer to God, and with them they can worship God, 
 and render to God the things which are God's, wherever 
 they are, whatever they are doing, whatever be the laws of 
 their country, or the state of society round them. For 
 
Sacrifice to Ccssar or to God. 383 
 
 of these sacrifices our Lord Himself said, The true 
 worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in 
 truth : for the Father seeketh such to worship Him. 
 
 Now what are these spiritual sacrifices ? 
 
 First and foremost, surely, the sacrifice of repent 
 ance, of which it is written, " The sacrifice of God is a 
 broken spirit. A broken and a contrite heart, oh God, 
 Thou wilt not despise." Surely when we — even the best 
 of us — look back on our past lives ; when we recollect, 
 if not great and positive sins and crimes, yet the oppor- 
 tunities which we have neglected; the time, and often the 
 money which we have wasted ; the meannesses, the 
 tempers, the spite, the vanity, the selfishness, which we 
 have too often indulged — When we think of what we 
 have been, and what we might have been, what we are, 
 and what we might be ; when we measure ourselves, 
 not by the paltry, low, and often impure standard of the 
 world around us, but by the pure, lofty, truly heroical 
 standard of our Lord Jesus Christ — what can we say, 
 but that we are miserable — that is, pitiful and pitiable 
 sinners, who have left undone what we ought to have 
 done, and done that which we ought not to have done, 
 till there is no health in us ? 
 
 And if you ask me. How is it a sacrifice to God to 
 confess to Him that we are sinners ? the answer is 
 simple. It is a sacrifice to God, and a sacrifice well- 
 pleasing to Him, simply because it is The Truth. God 
 wants nothing from us ; we can give Him nothing. The 
 wild beasts of the forest are His, and so are the cattle 
 on a thousand hills. If He be hungry He will not tell 
 us for the whole world is His and all that is therein 
 
384 Sacrifice to Ccesar or to God. 
 
 But what He asks is, that for our own sakes we should 
 see the truth about ourselves, see what we really are, 
 and sacrifice that self-conceit which prevents our seeing 
 ourselves as God our Father sees us. And why does that 
 please God ? Simply because it puts us in our right 
 state, and in our right place, where we can begin to be- 
 come better men, let us be as bad as we may. If a 
 man be a fool, the best possible thing for him is that he 
 should find out that he is a fool, and confess that he is 
 a fool, as the first, and the absolutely necessary first step 
 to becoming wise. Therefore repentance, contrition, 
 humility, is the very foundation-stone of all goodness, 
 virtue, holiness, usefulness ; and God desires to see us 
 contrite, simply because He desires to see us good men 
 and good women. 
 
 Next, the sacrifice of thankfulness, of which it is 
 written, " I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanks- 
 giving, and will call upon the name of the Lord." And 
 again — By Christ let us offer the sacrifice of praise con- 
 tinually, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks 
 unto His name. Ah ! my friends, if we ofiered that sacri- 
 fice oftener, we should have more seldom need to ofi'er the 
 first sacrifice of repentance. I am astonished when I look 
 at my own heart, by which alone I can judge the hearts 
 of others, to see how unthankful one is. How one takes 
 as a matter of course, without one aspiration of gratitude 
 to our Father in heaven- — how one takes, as a matter of 
 course, I say, life, health, reason, freedom, education, 
 comfort, safety, and all the blessings of humanity, and 
 of this favoured land. How we never really feel that 
 these are all God's undeserved and unearned mercies ; 
 
Sacrifice to Ccssar or to God. 385 
 
 and then, how, if we set our hearts on anything which 
 
 we have not got, forget all that we have already, and 
 
 begin entreating God to give us something which, if we 
 
 had, we know not whether it would he good for us ; like 
 
 children crying peevishly for sweets, after their parents 
 
 have given them all the wholesome food they need. 
 
 Ah ! that we would offer to God more frankly the 
 
 sacrifice of thanksgiving ! So we should do God justice, 
 
 by confessing all we owe to Him ; and so, we must believe, 
 
 we should please God ; for if God be indeed our Father 
 
 in heaven, as surely as a parent is pleased with the 
 
 affection and gratitude of his child, so will our Father in 
 
 heaven be pleased when He sees us love Him, who first 
 
 loved us. 
 
 Next — the sacrifice of righteousness, of which it is 
 
 written, " Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, 
 
 acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service." To 
 
 be good and to do good, even to long to be good and to 
 
 long to do good, to hunger and thirst after righteousness, 
 
 is the best and highest sacrifice which any human being 
 
 can offer to his Father in heaven. For so he honours his 
 
 father most truly ; for he longs and strives to be like 
 
 that Father ; to be good as God is good, holy as God is 
 
 holy, beneficent and useful even as God is infinitely 
 
 beneficent and useful; being, in one word, perfect, as 
 
 his Father in heaven is perfect. This is the best and 
 
 highest act of worship, the truest devotion. For pure 
 
 worship (says St James), and undefiled before God and 
 
 the Father, is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in 
 
 their affiiction, and to keep ourselves unspotted from 
 
 the world. 
 
 2 B 
 
386 Sacrifice to Ccesar 07' to God. 
 
 Yes — every time we perform an act of kindness to 
 any human being, aye, even to a dumb animal ; every 
 time we conquer our own worldliness, love of pleasure, 
 ease, praise, ambition, money, for the sake of doing what 
 our conscience tells us to be our duty, we are indeed 
 worshipping God the Father in spirit and in truth, and 
 offering him a sacrifice which He will surely accept, for 
 the sake of His beloved Son, by whose spirit aU good 
 deeds and thoughts are inspired. 
 
 Think of these things, my friends, always, but, above 
 all, think of them as often as you come — as would to 
 God all would come — to the altar of the Lord, and the 
 Holy Communion of His body and blood. For there, in- 
 deed, you render to God that which is God's — namely, 
 yourselves ; there you offer to God the true sacrifice, 
 which is the sacrifice of yourselves — the sacrifice of 
 repentance, the sacrifice of thanksgiving, the sacrifice of 
 righteousness, or at least of hunger and thirst after 
 righteousness ; and there you receive in return your share 
 of God's sacrifice, the sacrifice which you did not make 
 for Him, but which He made for you, when He spared 
 not His only-begotten Son but freely gave Him for us. 
 
 That is the sacrifice of all sacrifices, the wonder of aU 
 wonders, the mystery of all mysteries ; and it is also the 
 righteousness of all righteousness, the generosity of all 
 generosity, the nobleness of all nobleness, the beauty of 
 all beauty, the love of all love. Thinking of that, 
 beholding in that bread and wine the tokens of the 
 boundless love of God, then surely, surely, our repentance 
 for past follies, our thankfulness for present blessings, 
 our longing to be good, pure, useful, humane, generous, 
 
Sacrifice to CcEsar or to God. 387 
 
 high-minded — in one word, to be holy — ought to rise up 
 in us, into a passion, as it were, of noble shame at our 
 own selfishness, and admiration of God's unselfishness, 
 a longing to follow His divine example, and to live, not 
 for ourselves, but for our fellow-men. If we could but 
 once understand the full meaning of those awful yet 
 glorious words, "He that spared not His own Son, but 
 delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with 
 Him also freely give us all things ? " then, indeed, we 
 should understand that the one overpowering reason for 
 being unselfish and doing good is this — that we are 
 God's children, and that God our Father is utterly 
 unselfish, and utterly does good, even at the sacrifice 
 of Himself; and that therefore when we are unselfish, 
 and do good, even at the sacrifice of ourselves, we do 
 ndeed, in spirit and in truth, "render unto God the 
 thincrs that are God's." 
 
SERMON XLII. 
 
 THE UNJUST STEWARD. 
 
 Eversley, 1866. 
 
 Ninth Subdat aftee Teinity. 
 
 Ltjkb xvi. S. 
 
 " And the Lord commended the unjust steward, because he had 
 done wisely. " 
 
 None of our Lord's parables has been as difficult to 
 explain as this one. Learned and pious men have 
 confessed freely, in all ages, that there is much in the 
 parable which they cannot understand ; and I am 
 bound to confess the same. The puzzle is, plainly, why 
 our Lord should seem, to bid us to copy the conduct of 
 a bad man and a cheat. For this is the usual inter- 
 pretation. The steward has been cheating his master 
 already. When he is found out and about to be dis- 
 missed, he cheats his master stUl further, by telling his 
 debtors to cheat, and so wins favour with them. 
 
 But does our Lord bid us copy a cheat ? I cannot 
 believe that ; and the text I should have said ought to 
 give us a very different notion. We read that the lord 
 — that is, the steward's master — commended the unjust 
 steward. What ? Commended him for cheating him a 
 second time, and teaching his debtors to cheat him ? He 
 
The Unjust Steward. 389 
 
 must have been a man of a strange character — very unlike 
 any man whom we know, or, at all events, any man whom 
 we should wish to know — to have done that. But it 
 is said — he commended him for having acted wisely. 
 Now that word " wisely " may merely mean prudently, 
 sensibly, and with common sense. But if the master 
 thought that to cheat, or to teach others to cheat, was 
 acting either wisely or prudently, then he was a very 
 foolish and short-sighted man, and altogether mistaken. 
 For be sure and certain, and settle it in your minds, 
 that neither falsehood or dishonesty is ever either wise 
 or prudent, but short-sighted, foolish, certain to punish 
 itself. Such teaching is totally contrary to our Lord's 
 own teaching. Agree with thine adversary quickly, 
 He says, while thou art in the way with him, lest he 
 deliver thee to the Judge. If thou hast done -ftTong, 
 right it again as soon as possible ; for your sin will 
 surely find you out, and avenge itself Give the devil 
 his due, says the good old proverb. Pay him at 
 once and be done with him : but never think to 
 escape out of his clutches, as too many wretched 
 and foolish sinners do, by running up a fresh score 
 with him, and trying to hide old sins by new 
 ones. Be sure that if the steward cheated his master 
 a second time, the master was foolish and mistaken, 
 and as it were a partner in the steward's sin by 
 commending him. But if so ; why does our Lord 
 mention it ? What had our Lord to do, what have 
 we to do, with the opinion of so foolish a man ? 
 
 It seems to me that the only reason for our Lord's using 
 the words of the text, must be, that the master was 
 
390 The Unjust Steward. 
 
 right, not wrong, in commending the steward. But 
 it seems to me, also, that the master could be right 
 only, if the steward was right also — if the steward had 
 done the right and just thing at last, and, instead of 
 cheating his master a second time, had done his best 
 to make restitution for his own sins. 
 
 But how could that be ? We know nothing of what 
 these debtors were. All we know is that one believed 
 that he owed the Lord a hundred measures of oil ; and 
 another believed that he owed him a hundred measures 
 of wheat ; and that the steward told one to put down 
 in his bill eighty, and the other fifty. Now suppose 
 that the steward had been cheating and oppressing 
 these men, as was common enough in those days with 
 stewards, and has been common enough since ; suppose 
 that he had been charging them more than they really 
 owed, and, it may be, putting the surplus into his own 
 pocket, and so wasting his master's goods — that the one 
 really owed only eighty measures of oil, and the other 
 really owed only fifty of wheat ; what could be more 
 simple, or more truly wise either, when he was found 
 out, than to do this — to go round to the debtors and 
 confess : I have been overcharging you ; j^ou do not owe 
 what I have demanded of you ; take your bill and write 
 four-score, for that is what you really owe ? 
 
 This is but a guess on my part. But all other explana- 
 » tions are only guesses likewise, because we do not know 
 how business was transacted in those days and in that 
 country. We do not know whether tliese debtors were 
 tenants, paying rent in kind, or traders to whom goods had 
 been advanced, or what they were. We do not know 
 
The Uiijitst Steward. 39 1 
 
 whether the steward was agent of the estate, or house 
 steward, or what he was. But this we do know — that to 
 mend one act of villainy by committing a fresh one, is not 
 wisdom, but foolishness; and we may be sure that our Lord 
 would never have held up the unjust steward as an 
 example to us, or quoted his master's opinion of him, if 
 all he did was to commit fraud on fraud, and make bad 
 worse, thereby risking his own more utter ruin. And 
 this view of the parable surely agrees with our Lord's 
 own lesson, which He draws from it. " And I say unto 
 you. Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of 
 righteousness." But what does that mean ? Wise men 
 have been puzzled by that text as much as by the parable ; 
 but surely our Lord Himself explains it in the verses 
 which follow : " He that is faithful in that which is 
 least, is faithful also in much ; and he that is unjust in 
 that which is leaist, is unjust also in much." He that is 
 faithful. The unjust steward was commended for acting 
 wisely. Now, it seems the way to act wisely is to act 
 faithfully — that is honestly. Our Lord bids us copy the 
 unjust steward, and make ourselves friends of the mammon 
 of unrighteousness. Now, it seems. He tells us that the 
 way to make friends of men by money transactions is to 
 deal faithfully and honestly by them. This then was 
 perhaps why the Lord commended the unjust steward, 
 because he had been converted in time, and seen his 
 true interest; and for once at least in his life become 
 just. He had found out that after all, honesty is 
 the best policy ; as God grant all of us may find out 
 if any of us have not found it out already. Honesty 
 is the best policy. Faithfulness, as our Lord calls it, 
 
392 The Unjust Steward. 
 
 is the true wisdom. And in that, as our Lord says, the 
 children of this world are wiser in their generation than 
 the children of light. The children of this world, the 
 plain worldly men of business, find that to conduct their 
 business they must be faithful, diligent, punctual, accurate, 
 cautious, business-like. They must have practical common 
 sense, which is itself a kind of honesty. They must be 
 men of their word, just and true in their dealings, or 
 sooner or later, they will fail. Their schemes, their 
 money, their credit, their character, will fail them, and 
 they will be overwhelmed by ruin. 
 
 And that is just what too often the children of light 
 forget. The children of light have a higher light, a 
 deeper teaching from God, than the children of the world. 
 They have a great insight into what ought to be ; they 
 see that mankind might be far wiser, happier, better, 
 holier than they are ; they have noble and lofty hopes 
 for the future; they desire the welfare and the holiness 
 of mankind. But they are too apt to want practical 
 common sense. And so they are laughed at (and 
 deservedly) as dreamers, as fanatics, as foolish un- 
 practical people, who are wasting their talents on im- 
 possible fancies. Often while their minds are full of 
 really useful and noble schemes, they neglect their 
 business, their families, their common duties, till thej' 
 cause misery to those around them, and shame to 
 themselves. Often, too, they are tempted to be 
 actually dishonest, to fancy that the means sanctify the 
 end ; that it is lawful to do evil that good may come ; 
 and so, in order to carry out some fine scheme of theirs, 
 to say false things, or do mean or cruel things, not for 
 
The Unjust Stewai^d. 393 
 
 their own interest, but, as they fancy, for the cause of 
 God : as if God, and God's cause, could ever be helped 
 by the devil and his works. And so they cast a 
 scandal on religion, and give the enemies of the Lord 
 reason to blaspheme. So it was, it seems, in our Lord's 
 time — so it has been too often since. The children of light 
 — those who ought to be of most use to their own 
 generation — are sometimes of least use to it, through 
 their own weaknesses and follies. They wUl not remember 
 that he that is not faithful in that which is least, in 
 the every-day concerns of life, is not likely to be faithful 
 in that which is greatest ; that if they will not be 
 faithful in the unrighteous mammon — that is, if they 
 cannot resist the temptations to meanness and unfairness 
 which come with all money transactions, God will not 
 commit to them the true riches — the power of making 
 their fellow creatures wiser, happier, better. If they 
 will not be faithful in that which is another man's 
 — in plain English, if they will not pay their debts 
 honestly, who will give them that which is their own 
 — the inspiration of God's indwelling Spirit ? Would 
 to God all high religious professors would recollect that, 
 and be just and honest, before they pretend to higher 
 graces and counsels of perfection. 
 
 This lesson, then, I think our Lord means to teach 
 us. I do not say it is the only lesson in the parable ; 
 God forbid. But I think that our Lord's own words 
 show us that this is one lesson. That, however pious we 
 are, however enlightened we are, however useful we wish 
 to be ; in one word, however much we are, or fancy 
 ourselves to be, children of light, our first duty as 
 
394 The Unjust Steward. 
 
 Christian men is the duty which lies nearest us — that 
 of which it is written : " If a man know not how to rule 
 his own house, how shall he take care of the Church of 
 God ? " And again, " If any provide not for his own 
 and specially for those of his own house, he hath 
 denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel." Our 
 first duty, I say, as Christian men, is to be just 
 and honest in money matters and e very-day business ; 
 and over and above that, to be generous and liberal 
 therein. Not merely to pay — which the very publicans 
 in our Lord's time did — but to give, generously, liberally; 
 lending, if we can afford it, as our Lord bids us, 
 hoping for nothing again ; and remembering that he who 
 giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord, and whatsoever 
 he layeth out, it shall be repaid him again. 
 
 Yes, my friends, we must all needs take our 
 Lord's advice — make to yourselves friends of the 
 mammon of unrighteousness, that when ye fail, they 
 may receive you into everlasting habitations. When 
 ye fail — literally, when you are eclipsed, as the sun 
 is eclipsed. That must happen to all of us, to the 
 best, the wisest, the most famous. Each must be 
 eclipsed, and passed in the race of life, and forgotten 
 for some younger man. Each in turn must fail. One 
 may fail in money — the mammon for which he toiled 
 may take to itself wings and fly away ; or he may fail 
 in his plans, noble plans, and useful though they seemed; 
 and he may find, as he grows old, that the world has 
 not gone his way, but quite another one ; or he may 
 fail in health, and be cut down and crippled, and laid 
 by in the midst of his work. And even if he escapes 
 
The Unjitst Steward. 395 
 
 all these disasters, he must needs fail at last, by mere 
 old age, when the days come " when thou shalt say, 
 I have no pleasure in them ; " when the sun and the light 
 are darkened, and the clouds return after the rain, 
 when the strong men bow themselves, and those who 
 look out of the windows are dark ; and he shall rise up 
 at the voice of a bird, and fears shall be in the way, and 
 the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail : 
 because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go 
 aboutthe streets. Think for yourselves. What would you 
 wish your end to be — lonely, unhappy, without the love, 
 the respect, the care of your fellow-men ; or surrounded 
 by friends who comfort your failing body and soul on 
 earth, and receive you at last into everlasting habita- 
 tions ? 
 
 Make friends, make friends against that day, whether 
 or not you make them out of the mammon of un- 
 righteousness. If you have been unrighteous, bring 
 friends back to you, as the steward did, by being just and 
 fair, by confessing your faults freely, by doing your best to 
 atone for them. And if you have no share in the 
 mammon of unrighteousness, still make friends. Make 
 them by truth and justice, make them by generosity 
 and usefulness. To ease every burden, and let the 
 oppressed go free, to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, 
 and what the very poorest can do — comfort the mourner; 
 to nurse the sick, to visit the fatherless and widows 
 in their affliction, and so keep ourselves unspotted from 
 the selfishness of the world — This is that true Religion, 
 acceptable in the sight of God the Father — and happy 
 he who has so served God. Happy for him, when he 
 
39^ The Unjust Steward. 
 
 begins to fail, to see round him attached hearts, and 
 grateful faces, hands ready to tend him, as he has 
 tended others. And happier still to remember that on 
 the other side of the dark river of death are other grate- 
 ful faces, other loving hearts, ready to welcome him into 
 everlasting habitations — and among them, and above 
 them all, one whose form is as the Son of Man, full of all 
 humanity Himself, and loving and rewarding all humanity 
 in His creatures, saying, " Inasmuch as ye did it to one 
 of the least of these my brethren^ ye have done it unto 
 Me." 
 
SERMON XLIII. 
 
 THE RICH AND THE POOR. 
 Cliapel Royal, Whitehall, 1871. 
 
 Proverbs xxii. 2. 
 
 " The rich and poor meet together : the Lord is the maker 
 of them all." 
 
 I HAVE been asked to preach here this afternoon on 
 behalf of the Parochial Mission Women's Fund. I may 
 best describe the object for which I plead, as an attempt 
 to civilise and Christianise the women of the lower 
 classes in the poorer districts of London and other 
 great towns, by means of women of their own class — 
 women who have gone through the same struggles as 
 they have, and who will be trusted by them to under- 
 stand and to sympathize with their needs and difEculties. 
 These mission women are in communication with lady- 
 superintendents in each ecclesiastical district. These 
 are, I understand, usually the wives of small tradesmen, 
 or of clerks. They, again, are in communication with 
 ladies at the West End of London, who are willing to 
 give personal help and money for certain objects, but not 
 indiscriminate alms. And thus a series of links is estab- 
 lished between the most prosperous and the least prosper- 
 ous classes, by means of which the rich and the poor may 
 
398 The Rich and the Pooi'. 
 
 meet together, and learn — to the infinite benefit of both 
 — that the Lord is the maker of them all. Considering 
 this excellent scheme, I could not help seeing as a back- 
 ground to it, a very different and a far darker scene. I 
 could not help remembering that during these very days, 
 the poorer classes of another great city had taken up an 
 attitude full of awful lessons to us, and to every civilized 
 country upon earth. We have been reading of a hundred 
 thousand armed men encamped in the suburbs of Belle- 
 ville and Montmartre, with cannon and mitrailleuses, 
 uttering through their organs, threats which leave no 
 doubt that the meaning of this movement is — as some of 
 them boldly phrase it, — a war of the poor against the 
 rich. There is no mistaking what that means. This 
 madness has been stopped for the time, we are told, 
 principally (as was to be expected), by the superior 
 common sense of their wives. But only, I fear, for a 
 time. Such men will go far, if not this time, then some 
 other time. For they believe what they say, and know 
 what they want. They have done with phrases, done 
 with illusions. They are no longer deceived and 
 hampered by party cries against this and that grievance, 
 real or imaginary, the abolition of which the working 
 classes demand «o eagerly from time to time, in the vain 
 belief that if it were only got rid of the millennium would 
 be at hand. They have done long ago with remedial 
 half-measures. Landed aristocracy. Established Church, 
 military classes, privileged classes, restricted suflTrage, and 
 all the rest, have been abolished in their country for 
 two generations and more : but behold, the poor man finds 
 himself (or fancies himself, which is just as dangerous) 
 
The Rich and the Poor. 399 
 
 no richer, safer, happier after all, and begins to see a far 
 simpler remedy for all his ills. He has too little of this 
 world's goods, while others have too much. What more 
 fair, more simple, than that he should take some of the 
 rich man's goods, and if he resists, kill him, crying, 
 " Thou saj^est, let me eat and drink, for to-morrow I 
 die. Then I too will eat and drink, for to-morrow / 
 die ? " And so will the rich and poor meet together with 
 a vengeance, simply because neither of them has learnt 
 that the Lord is the maker of them all. 
 
 This is a hideous conclusion. But it is one towards 
 which the poor will tend in every country in which 
 the rich are merely rich, spending their wealth in self- 
 enjoyment, atoned for by a modicum, of alms. 
 
 I said a modicum of alms. I ought to have said, any 
 amount of alms, any amount of charity. Throughout 
 the great cities of Europe — in London as much as any- 
 where — hundreds of thousands are saying, " We want no 
 alms. We intend to reconstitute society, even at the 
 expense of blood, so that no man, woman, or child, shall 
 need the rich man's alms. We do not choose, for it is 
 not just, that he should take credit to himself for giving 
 us a shilling when he owes us a pound, ten, a hundred 
 pounds — owes us, in fact, all by which he and his class 
 are richer than us and our class. And we will make 
 him pay his debt." 
 
 I do not say that such words are wise. I believe 
 them to be foolish — suicidal. I believe that it is those 
 who patiently wait on the Lord, and not the dis- 
 contented who fret themselves till they do evil, who will 
 inherit the land, and be refreshed in peace. I believe 
 
400 The Rich and the Poor. 
 
 that all those who take the sword will perish by the 
 sword ; that those who appeal to brute force will always 
 find it — just because it is brute force — always strongest 
 on the side of the rich, who can hire it for evil, as for 
 good. 
 
 I only say, that so hundreds of thousands think ; so 
 they speak, and will speak more and more loudly, as 
 long as the present tone of society endures, — good- 
 natured and well meaning, but luxurious, covetous, 
 ignoble, frivolous, ignorant ; believing — all classes alike, 
 not only that money makes the man, but worse far — 
 that money makes the woman also ; and all the while 
 half-ashamed of itself, half-distrustful of itself, and try- 
 ing to buy off man by alms, and God by superstition. 
 
 So long as the great mass of the poor of any city 
 know nothing of the great mass of the rich of that city, 
 save as folk who roll past them in their carriages, 
 seemingly easy while they are struggling, seemingly 
 happy while they are wretched, so long will the rich 
 of that city be supposed, however falsely, to be what the 
 French workmen used to call Tnangeurs d'Jwmmes — 
 exploiteurs d'hovimes — to get their wealth by means of 
 the poverty, their comfort by means of the misery of their 
 fellow-men; and so long will they be exposed to that 
 mere envy and hatred which pursues always the more 
 prosperous, till, in some national crisis, when the rich and 
 poor meet together, both parties will be but too apt 
 to behave, through mutual fear and hate, as if not 
 God, but the devil, was the maker of them all. 
 
 These words are strong. How can they be too strong, 
 in face of what is now passing in a neighbouring land ? 
 
The Rich and the Poor. 401 
 
 Not too strong, either, in view of the actual state of vast 
 masses of the poor in London itself, and indeed of any 
 one of our great cities. 
 
 That matter has been reported on, preached on, 
 spoken on, till all other civilized countries reproach 
 Britain with the unique contrast between the exceeding 
 wealth of some classes and the exceeding poverty of 
 others ; till we, instead of being startled by the re- 
 proach, take the present state of things as a matter of 
 course, a physical necessity, a law of nature and 
 society, that there should be, in the back streets of every 
 great city, hordes of, must I say, savages? neither 
 decently civilized nor decently Christianized, uncertain, 
 most of them, of regular livelihood, and therefore shift- 
 less and reckless, extravagant in prosperity, and in 
 adversity falling at once into want and pauperism. 
 You may ask any clergyman, any minister of religion of 
 any denomination, whether the thing is not so. Or if 
 you want to read the latest news about the degradation 
 of your fellow-subjects, read a little book called " East 
 and West," and judge for yourselves, whether such a 
 population, numbered by hundreds of thousands, are in 
 a state pleasing to God, or safe for those classes of whom 
 they only know that they pay them wages, and that 
 these wages are as small as they can be forced to take. 
 Kead that book ; and then ask yourselves, is it wonder- 
 ful that, in one district, before the mission of the 
 society for which 1 plead was established, the poor used 
 seriously to believe that it was the wish and endeavour 
 of the rich to grind them down, and keep them poor. 
 
 We, of course, know that the poor folk were mistaken : 
 2 c 
 
402 The Rich and the Poor. 
 
 but do we not know, too — some of us — ^that there are 
 political economists in the world, who, though they would 
 not willingly make the poor poorer than they are, are 
 still of opinion that it is good for the nation, on the 
 whole, that the present state of things should continue ; 
 that there should be always a reserve of labour, in plain 
 English, a vast multitude who have not quite work 
 enough to live on, ready to be called on in any emergency 
 of business, and used, to beat down, by their competition, 
 the wages of their fellow-workmen ? Is this theory 
 altogether novel and unheard of? Or this theory also, 
 that for this very reason. Emigration, which looks the 
 very simplest remedy for most of this want, — while 
 nine-tenths of the bounteous earth is waiting to be sub- 
 dued and replenished by the poor wretches who cannot 
 get at it — that Emigration, I say, is an unnecessary 
 movement — that the people are all wanted at home — 
 to be such as the parson and the mission women find 
 them ? 
 
 And it may be that the poor folk have heard — for a 
 bird of the air may carry the matter in these days of 
 a free press — that some rich folk, at least, hold this 
 opinion, and translate it freely out of the delicate language 
 of political economy, into the more vigorous dialect 
 used in the fever alleys and smallpox courts in which 
 the poor are left to wait for work. But if there be any 
 rich persons in this congregation who hold these peculiar 
 economic doctrines, let me recommend to them, more 
 than to any other persons present, that they would 
 support a society which alleviates the hard pressure of 
 their system ; which helps to make it tolerable and prudent 
 
The Rich and the Poor. 4°3 
 
 by teaching the poor to save ; by teaching them, in 
 London alone, — how to save £54,000 in the last eleven 
 years. Let them help this society heartily. 
 
 The children of this world are — in their generation — 
 wiser than the children of light. But how long their 
 generation will last, depends mainly (we are told) on 
 how far they make themselves friends out of the 
 mammon of unrighteousness. 
 
 But if, again, there be rich people in this congregation, 
 as I trust there are many and many, who start, 
 indignant, at such an imputation, and utterly deny its 
 truth — then, — if it be false, why in the name of God, 
 and of humanity, and of common prudence, why do they 
 not go to these people and tell them so ? Why do they 
 not prove that it is not so, by showing a little more 
 human sympathy, not merely for them behind their 
 backs, but sympathy with them face to face ? If they 
 wish to know how much can be done by only a little 
 active kindness, they have only to read the pages of that 
 painful, and yet pleasant, book — "East and West," — 
 which I have just quoted ; and to read, also, an appendix 
 to it — a Paper originally read at the Church Congress, 
 Manchester, by the present Lord Chancellor — a document 
 which it would be an impertinence in me to recommend 
 or praise. 
 
 Bring yourselves then boldly into contact with these 
 classes, and especially into contact with the women — 
 with the wives and mothers. For it is through the 
 women, through them mainly, if not altogether, that 
 civilization and religion can be introduced among any 
 degraded class. It was so in the Middle Age. The 
 
404 The Rich and the Poor. 
 
 legends which tell us how woman was then the civilizer, 
 the softener, the purifier, the perpetual witness to fierce 
 and coarse men, that there were nobler aims in life than 
 pleasure, and power, and the gratification of revenge ; 
 that not self-assertion, but self-sacrifice was the Divine 
 ideal, toward which all must aspire. These old legends 
 are immortal ; for they speak of facts and laws which will 
 endure as long as there are women upon earth. Through 
 the woman, the civilizer and the Christianizer must reach 
 the man. Through the wife, he must reach the husband. 
 Through the mother, he must reach the children. 
 I say he must. It is easy to complain that the clergy 
 in every age and country have tried to obtain influence 
 over women. They have been forced to do so, because 
 otherwise they could obtain no influence at all. And if 
 a priesthood should arise hereafter, whose calling was to 
 teach not religion but irreligion, not the good news that 
 there is a good God, and that we can know Him ; but the 
 bad news that there is no God, or, if there is, we cannot 
 know Him ; then would that priesthood find it necessary 
 to appeal like all other priesthoods, to the women, and to 
 teach them how to teach their children. 
 
 But more. It is not religion only which must be 
 taught through the wives and mothers, but sound science 
 also, and sound economy. If you intend (as I trust 
 some here intend) to teach the labouring classes those 
 laws of health and life, on which depend the comfort, 
 the wholesomeness, often the decency and the morality 
 of the poor man's home, then you must teach those laws 
 first to the house-mother, who brings the children into 
 the world, and brings them up, who puts them to bed 
 
The Rich and the Poor. 405 
 
 at night, and prepares their food by day. If you wish 
 to teach habits of thrift, and sotind notions of economy 
 to the labouring classes, you must teach them first to the 
 housewife, who has to make the weekly earnings cover, 
 if possible, the week's expenses. If you wish to soften 
 and to purify the man, you must first soften and purify 
 the woman, or at least encourage her not to lose what 
 womanliness she has left, amid sights, and sounds, and 
 habits which tend continually to destroy her woman- 
 hood. You must encourage her, I say, to remember 
 always that she is a woman still, and let her teach — 
 as none can teach like her — true manfulness to her 
 husband and her sons. 
 
 And how can you best do that ? Not by giving her 
 shillings, not by preaching at her, not by scolding her : 
 but by behaving to her as what she is — a woman and a 
 sister — and cheering her heavy heart by simple human 
 kindliness. What she wants amid all her poverty and 
 toil, her child-bearing and child -rearing, what she wants, 
 I say, to keep her brave and strong, is to know by actual 
 sight and speech that she is still not an outcast ; not alone ; 
 that she is still a member of the human family, that her 
 fellow-woman has not forgotten her ; and that, therefore, 
 it may be, He that was born of woman has not forgotten 
 her either. That she has, after all, a God in heaven, 
 who can be touched with the feeling of her infirmities, 
 and can help her and those she loves, to struggle through 
 all their temptations, seeing that He too was tempted in 
 all things like them, yet without sin. 
 
 It is only personal intercourse with them — only the 
 meeting of the rich and poor together, in the belief that 
 
4o6 The Rich and the Poor. 
 
 God is the maker of them all, that will do that. But it 
 will do it. 
 
 Only personal intercourse will reconcile these people 
 to their condition, in as far as they ought to be reconciled 
 to it. But personal intercourse will reconcile them to 
 it, as far as it ought, but no further. And I think that 
 the system of personal intercourse attempted by this 
 Society is, on the whole, the best yet devised. It is 
 imperfect, as all attempts to make that straight which 
 is crooked, and to number that which is wanting — to 
 patch, in a word, a radically vicious system of society, — 
 must be imperfect ; but it is the best plan which I 
 have yet seen. I find no fault with other plans, God 
 forbid ! Wisdom is justified of all her children ; and 
 the amount of evil is so great, and (as I believe, so 
 dangerous), that I must bid God-speed to any persons 
 who will do anything, always saving and excepting indis- 
 criminate almsgiving. 
 
 But it seems to me that the soothing and civilizing, 
 and in due time Christianising, effect of personal inter- 
 course cannot begin better than through a woman, herself 
 of the working class, who has struggled as these poor 
 souls have struggled, and conquered, more or less, where 
 they are failing. That through her they should be 
 brought in contact with women of the more comfort- 
 able and cultivated class, who are their immediate 
 employers, if not their immediate neighbours ; and 
 through them, again, brought in contact with women of 
 that class, of whom I shall only say, that if they were 
 not meant for some such noble work as this— and not for 
 mere pleasure and mere display, then for what purpose, 
 
The Rick and the Poor. 407 
 
 in heaven or earth, were they made ? and why has 
 Providence taken the trouble (as it were) to elaborate, 
 by long ages of civilization, that most exquisite of all 
 products of nature and of art — A Lady ? 
 
 Ah ! what the ladies of England might do, and that 
 without interfering in the least with their duties as wives 
 and mothers, if they would work together, as a class ! 
 If they would work as well and humanly while they 
 are in towns, as most of them do work while they are 
 in the country ; as some of them do, to their honour, in 
 the towns already ! But how many ? what proportion 
 do those who do good bear to those who do nothing ? 
 What a small amount of humanizing and civilizing inter- 
 course with some women of the labouring class is there in 
 the case of the wives of rich men who come up to 
 town, merely for the season, and forget that it is their 
 temporary and uncertain stay in London which causes 
 much of the temporary and uncertain employment of the 
 London poor, and their consequent temptation to unthrift 
 and recklessness ! How little humanizing and civilizing 
 intercourse with the poor is carried on by the wives of 
 those employers of labour who surely, surely owe some- 
 thing more to their husband's work people, than to be 
 aware (by hearsay) that they are duly paid every 
 Saturday night ? 
 
 But I shall be told : We need not fear — we can justify 
 ourselves before God and man. I shall be reminded of 
 all that has been done, and done well too, for the 
 poor during the last generation, and bidden not 
 to calumniate my countrymen. True, much has 
 been done ; and done well. And true also it is that 
 
4o8 The Rich and the Poor. 
 
 no effort to make the rich and poor meet together, 
 to bring the different classes of society into con- 
 tact with each other, but has succeeded — has sown 
 good seed — which I trust may bring forth good fruit 
 in the day when every tree shall be judged by its fruit. 
 The events of 1830, startling and warning, and those 
 of 1848, more pregnant, if possible, with warning than 
 the former, awakened a spirit of humanity in England, 
 which was also a spirit of prudence and of common 
 sense. 
 
 But I cannot conceal from myself, or you, that the 
 earnestness which was awakened in those days is dying 
 out in these. The richer classes of every country are 
 tempted from time to time to fits of laziness — fits of 
 frivolity and luxury, surfeits, in which men say, with a 
 shrug and a yawn — " Why be very much in earnest ? 
 Why take so much trouble ? Somebody must always 
 be rich, why should not I ? Somebody must enjoy the 
 money, why should not I ? At all events, things wiU last 
 my time." And that such a surfeit has fallen upon the 
 rich of this land, is a fact ; for that this is the tone of 
 to-day, and that the tone increases, none can deny who 
 knows that which calls itself the world, and calls itself 
 so only too truly ; the world of which it is written, that 
 all that is in the world — the lust of the flesh, and the 
 lust of the eyes, and the pride of life — is not of the 
 Father, but of the world. And the world passeth away, 
 and the lust thereof. But he who doeth the will of God, 
 he alone abideth for ever. 
 
 God grant that we, who have just seen the most 
 cunningly organized and daintily bedizened specimen of 
 
77/1? Rich and the Poor. 409 
 
 a world, which ever flaunted oa the earth siace meu 
 began to build their towers of Babel, collapse and 
 crumble at a single blow, may take God's hint, that the 
 fashion of this world passeth away. Let the idle, the 
 frivolous, the sensual, and those who, like Figaro's 
 Marquis, have earned all earthly happiness by only 
 taking the trouble to be born — let them look back on 
 this last awful Christmas-tide, and hear, speaking in fact 
 unmistakeable, the voice of the Lord. Think ye that 
 they whose blood Pilate mingled with their sacrifices 
 were sinners above all the Galilseans, because they 
 suffered such things ? I tell you, " Nay : but except 
 ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish." 
 
 There are those who will hear such words with a 
 smile, even with a sneer, and say. Such wholesale judg- 
 ments of God, even granting that there are such 
 things, are, after all, very rare : it is very seldom that 
 a whole class, a whole system of society, is punished in 
 mass — and why then need we trouble ourselves about so 
 remote a probability ? 
 
 Then know this — that as surely as God sometimes 
 punishes wholesale, so surely is He always punishing in 
 detail. By that infinite concatenation of moral causes 
 and effects, which makes the whole world one mass of 
 special Providences, every sin of ours will punish itself, 
 and probably punish itself in kind. Are we selfish ? 
 We shall call out selfishness in others. Do we neglect 
 our duty ? Then others will neglect their duty to us. 
 Do we indulge our passions ? Then others, who depend 
 on us, will indulge theirs, to our detriment and misery. 
 
4IO The Rich and the Poor. 
 
 Do we squander our money ? Then our children and 
 our servants will squander our money for us. 
 
 Do we ? — but what use to go on reminding men of 
 truths which no one believes, because they are too pain- 
 ful and searching to be believed in comfort ? What use 
 to tell men what they never will confess to be true — 
 that by every crime, folly, even neglect of theirs, they 
 drive a thorn into their own flesh, which will trouble 
 them for years to come, it may be to their dying day ? 
 And yet so it is. 
 
 Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding 
 
 small ; 
 Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds 
 
 HeaU. 
 
 As those who neglect their fellow-creatures will discover, 
 by the most patent undeniable proofs, in that last great 
 day, when the rich and poor shall meet together, and 
 then, at least, discover that the Lord is the maker of 
 them alL