* 
 
 
 if. 
 
 PRINCETON, N. J. 
 
 \6^d6n/e^/y. 9h^ Qz^ac^ ^. i^ell^ 
 
 Shelf. 
 
 BV 4253 .M48 1889 
 
 Mercer, Alexander Gardiner, 
 
 1817-1882. 
 Christ and His teachings 
 
C|)rist anti ^i& Ceac|)insfi. 
 
 BEING THE SECOND VOLUME OF SELECTIONS FROM THE 
 
 SERMONS 
 
 OF THE LATE 
 
 ALEXANDER GARDINER MERCER D.D. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH AND CO. 
 
 38 West Twenty-Third Street. 
 
 1889. 
 
Copyright, 1SS9, 
 By Anson D. F. Randolph and Co. 
 
 fflLnibfrsitji press: 
 John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. I Know that my Redeemer Liveth ... 3 
 
 II. Christmas 14 
 
 III. Temptation of Christ. 25 
 
 IV. The Transfiguration 40 
 
 V. The Lord's Supper 52 
 
 VI. The Crucifixion . 61 
 
 VII. Easter 71 
 
 VIII. The Ascension . 80 
 
 IX. Whitsunday 91 
 
 X. The Exaltation of Christ 100 
 
 XI. The Feast of Epiphany 106 
 
 XII. The Character of Christ 117 
 
 XIII. Who is the Son of Man? 124 
 
 XIV. The Scribes and Pharisees 135 
 
 XV. The Judgment 144 
 
 XVI. The Exaltation of the Heart 155 
 
 XVII. The Godlikeness of Man . , 168 
 
 XVIII. The Deception of Sin 181 
 
 XIX. The Obedient Son 193 
 
 XX. Christ and the Gadarenes 204 
 
 XXI. Man's Praise more than God's Praise . . 214 
 
iv CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXII. The Good Samaritan 223 
 
 XXIII. Wider Views OF Christianity 234 
 
 XXIV. The Depths of Satan 248 
 
 XXV. The Office of Judgment 255 
 
 XXVI. God's Rebuke of Appearances 265 
 
 XXVII. The Spirit of Christ 275 
 
 XXVIII. They Rewarded Evil for Good ..... 284 
 
 XXIX. The Power of Will 292 
 
 XXX. The Wisdom of God 
 
 XXXI. The River of Life 
 
 XXXII. Worldliness 
 
CHRIST AND HIS TEACHINGS. 
 
I. 
 
 I KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 
 
 For I know that 7ny Redee7ner liveth, and that he shall stand at 
 the latter day zipott the earth : and though after my skin 
 worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God : 
 whom I shall see for myself, arid mine eyes shall behold, and 
 not aftotherj though my reins be consumed within 7ne. — Job 
 xix. 25-27. 
 
 T 
 
 HE Book of Job has been thought the oldest 
 book in the world. Some scholars assign it to 
 the time of Solomon ; but, be that as it may, I believe it 
 to have been a very ancient tale, coming from the land 
 and time of Abram or his ancestors, or from countries 
 lying in the same direction and from a people of the 
 same race, holding the same pure elements of religion. 
 I take it to be a poem or drama founded on a deep 
 personal experience. 
 
 Job was an Arab chief, or emir, and like Abram 
 seems not so much to have reached just and impres- 
 sive ideas of God as to have inherited them. Abram 
 and his children, the Hebrews, cleared, added to, and 
 held firmly these ideas ; but the ideas themselves date 
 long before them, and to a distant region of the 
 world. 
 
4 / KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 
 
 Most singular to say, these races, holding such con- 
 victions as to God, seem yet to have taken no firm grasp 
 on a future life. From this fact — namely, that they 
 had some clear notions of God and his moral govern- 
 ment, and yet were in darkness respecting a world 
 beyond the grave — arose the greatest perplexity and 
 even agony of their lives. God must be just; and yet 
 look here at the strange injustice, and no other life to 
 bring a remedy ! But such was their confidence in 
 God that they generally forced even this world into 
 an appearance of justice. When, however, these con- 
 flicts rose so high as in this cruel personal experience 
 of Job, who, conscious of uprightness, saw that he 
 and all his were about to perish forever, what should 
 he say? 
 
 According to his belief, when the righteous man 
 was prosperous, then only was God acting justly and 
 in character ; or if a degree of severity was allowed to 
 be intelligible and justifiable, it must be brief, and for 
 some good end now and here. Yet in the face of this 
 creed here was Job, a man without crime, bearing his 
 faculties and fortunes meekly, yet everything going 
 bitterly against him, and with every sign that it was 
 about to end so. 
 
 What a horrible perplexity this man was in ! His 
 troubles mounted up to heaven ; but the agony of his 
 heart was greater than all. He must admit either that 
 God was no true God, or that his consciousness as to 
 his own rectitude was a delusion. In this condition 
 
/ A' AVIV THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 5 
 
 Job seems to mc one of the most interesting sights 
 ever witnessed. His bottomless grief touched even on 
 despair and death ; yet how affectionately he clung to 
 God, at the same time never foregoing his deep con- 
 viction as to his own rectitude ; on the one hand saying, 
 ** Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him," and on 
 the other standing firm in his consciousness of right, 
 and refusing to affect being a sinner, — refusing to lie 
 unto God. 
 
 This was manly, and God approved it, at the 
 same time teaching him that he carried it too far, — 
 that he had ''uttered that he understood not;" and 
 thus he learned to '* abhor himself and repent in 
 dust and ashes." Yet God approved his sincerity. 
 But there was another thing in him, — his faith in 
 God. 
 
 Religious faith, in its most general sense, means the 
 tenacious grasp of the heart on the right and good 
 thing, especially upon its God, and committing one's 
 self to God, whatever is against us, and at all hazards. 
 It is, as Pascal says, " God sensible to the heart." It 
 is " enduring, as seeing him who is invisible." 
 
 This feeling was almost unparalleled in Job, and I 
 take the words of the text to be the grandest expression 
 of faith ever uttered by mortal lips. " For I know that 
 my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the lat- 
 ter day upon the earth : and though after my skin worms 
 destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God : 
 whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall 
 
6 / KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 
 
 behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed 
 within me." 
 
 Some Christian people make mistakes about these 
 words, which so beautifully describe Christ and the 
 resurrection that they think Christ and the resurrection 
 were consciously and definitely before the mind of Job. 
 In substance they were implied, but in fact he meant 
 consciously this : '' My redeeming God will save me, 
 and will do it even upon this earth, will do' it even in 
 this crumbling body, dying and virtually dead, — that 
 is, will be just and merciful, even although it seems a 
 stark impossibility." 
 
 Remember what it was to say this. He believed in 
 his innocence, he believed God must favor the inno- 
 cent in this life; yet he stood bereft of all outward 
 good, his heart breaking, his wife turning from him, 
 herself hopeless and scorning, — '' Curse God, and die," 
 — his friends upbraiding him, his loathsome body, eaten 
 up with incurable disease (the leprosy), sinking into 
 the grave, — he stood, I say, at such a moment, and, 
 in a sort of defiance of all the facts of Nature, declared 
 that an hour of redemption was coming to him, — yes, 
 even to his body. " I know: " '■' I am sure that God 
 is, that he is true, that even now behind the curtain he 
 is there, that he feels, and is a Redeemer; and though 
 utter destruction seems not only probable but actual, 
 * though worms destroy this body,' and though there 
 be no proof or precedent or promise that all this shall 
 or can be reversed " (he stood so early in the world 
 
/ KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 7 
 
 that he knew nothing to sustain him), '* yet I know it 
 will be reversed, and, ' though my reins be consumed 
 within me,' I know that I shall at last see the Redeemer, 
 — with these my eyes see him. Yes, and I shall be 
 clothed again with my flesh, though that flesh be now 
 crumbling before the worm." 
 
 He had in reality such a confidence in the perfection 
 of God his Redeemer, that he knew he would bring a 
 redemption corresponding to the worst exigency, what- 
 ever it might be ; and so I say that this really preached 
 a principle which contained all possible deliverances, 
 and of course that of Christ and the resurrection. The 
 principle is that whatever is demanded of the justice 
 and becoming to the mercy of God shall take place in 
 body as well as soul. If you had asked Job, *' Do you 
 expect that God will come forth as a man, or in some 
 grander material form, and stand upon the earth, his 
 brightness darkening the sun?" — if you had asked 
 him, " Do you expect that your body will actually die 
 and go to dust, and that then a resurrection of justice 
 shall take place? " — he would, I think, have answered : 
 "I know not how, or when, or in what way; I only 
 know that God lives, and is not dead, and that he is the 
 Redeemer of his children ; I only know that, standing 
 back now, he will stand forward, that impossible things 
 will be possible, and that, though all Nature were con- 
 densed into one barrier of iron to stop him, he will go 
 through it to save me, — nay, that in this very scene of 
 sorrow, and in this very body of death, he will make 
 
8 / KNOW THAT MV REDEEMER LIVETH. 
 
 life and joy to live, that eye to eye I shall behold him, 
 even I, a dying worm." Thus he soared he knew not 
 whither, like the hooded falcon, all darkened, but still 
 ascending towards the sun. 
 
 I call that the sublimest thing a human being ever 
 did. Now, how unspeakably has God vindicated this 
 confidence ! The Book of Job closes with the spectacle 
 of one redemption, a personal redemption, one vindica- 
 tion. But the real and great, the universal redemption, 
 of which this personal redemption of Job was but the 
 shadow and symbol, has also in due time dawned ; and 
 how sublime that vindication ! Job's confidence in 
 God's triumphant mercy to soul and body hinted in 
 substance of Christ and the resurrection ; but the great 
 truth was, in fact, as a scroll rolled up. It was reserved 
 for us to see it unrolled. In these latter days the 
 Redeemer has stood upon the earth, — a Redeemer 
 indeed ! The salvation of body and soul, which was 
 but a poor, brief thing in Job's best apprehension of it, 
 we see to be the eternal regeneration of one and the 
 eternal resurrection of the other; and we now know, 
 in a sense unspeakably exalted, that, though worms 
 destroy this body, and though our reins be consumed 
 within us, yet in our flesh shall we see God. 
 
 This view of the words of Job leads me to believe 
 that not only in this case, but in all cases, now as well 
 as then, every moral prediction of the heart, however 
 impossible the event seems, will also surely be realized. 
 But observe, I say nioraL There are many desires, the 
 
/ KNOW THAT AIV REDEEMER LIVETH. 9 
 
 Strongest in the human breast, innocent wishes, for 
 
 example, family wishes for a domestic heaven, — which 
 may be realized, but of that we have no assurance. 
 But the deep demands of the moral heart are, I believe, 
 certain to be fulfilled. To be sure, as to time and 
 manner, our presumptuous ideas will be disappointed. 
 Many people, for example, if they have a just quarrel, 
 personal, national, or of a church, look that all matters 
 shall be shortly set right, forgetting that the just Judge 
 has his own way and his own great times. Why, gen- 
 erations and hundreds of generations have not yet lifted 
 from the earth some of the sorest evils it groans under: 
 " How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge 
 and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? " 
 But do not on this account, as some weak people do, 
 finding that the Lord delayeth his coming, begin to 
 doubt whether there is any right, and in effect blas- 
 pheme God and turn away from him. 
 
 " Careless seems the great Avenger ; . . . 
 Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne, — 
 Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, behind the dim unknown, 
 Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above his own." 
 
 Why judge his slowness or his inscrutable methods? 
 Of one thing can we be sure, — that the deep and 
 sacred demands of our hearts, our consciences, are 
 the same as God's wishes, and that his wishes must 
 one day stand forth as facts. 
 
 This is faith; and to know it is living faith; 
 and of what value, of what power, is it ! To dare to 
 
10 / KNOW THAT MV REDEEMER LIVETH. 
 
 believe that which is thought impossible, to push aside 
 the wisdom of the prudent, and to become in effect 
 a fool, to trust and act with utter disregard of all 
 evidence but the evidence of an enlightened heart, — 
 that is the divine spark in man, and has wrought all 
 the spiritual wonders in history. See here in this case 
 this outburst of Job's confidence in his Redeemer, — 
 perhaps the most magnificent words spoken in history, 
 and of sublime effect. 
 
 I now ask, What is our creed? Have we a living 
 God, a Redeemer? Can we say, " I know that my 
 Redeemer liveth"? The contrast seems shameful; but 
 I must not overstate it. If Job had stood firm in the 
 exaltation of that moment, then indeed the contrast 
 would be overwhelming, and we might despair. But 
 that was far from the case, and this fact might as well 
 be confessed; I think the infirmities of good men one 
 of our greatest aids, for they save us from despair. 
 
 One or two great things the heart of Job never let 
 go, — his consciousness of his own sincerity and his 
 affectionate cry after God ; but everything else wavered. 
 The same man who uttered the sentence of the text, 
 almost in the same breath, in this very chapter, says: 
 ** God hath overthrown me, and hath compassed me 
 with his net. Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am 
 not heard : I cry aloud, but there is no judgment." 
 And so in a hundred other places. It is not just, then, 
 to rate ourselves by the highest feeling of Job; but 
 have we that which he never lost? And have we ever a 
 
/ KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. II 
 
 moment when with our whole hearts and with uplifted 
 hands we can claim that we have a Redeemer and that 
 we know it, — when we can look upon the grave 
 and yet know that none are dead, — a moment when 
 we are sure that God shall root out not only all 
 oppression from the earth, but all wrong and sin from 
 our own hearts, — that his hand shall find out the 
 weeds of the world, as the hand of the husbandman 
 finds the weeds of the field? Do we ever know this? 
 Oh the vast difference between those men who can 
 only say, '* I have heard a rumor from the Lord," 
 and those who have "seen him with the seeine of 
 the eye " ! 
 
 The coming of Christ is a reality. Whether he will 
 stand as a visible figure upon the earth, or whether 
 his coming will be, as many of his past comings have 
 been, in spirit and in power, I do not know. But 
 come he must, and in such eminence that '' every 
 eye shall see him." This will be to the whole world. 
 To each man, of course, the same thing essentially 
 will take place in a {^w days or months: I mean at 
 his death, when he passes forth into the presence of 
 his Judge. Whether in that Judge he will find also 
 a Redeemer will depend on the fact whether the heart 
 realizes and trusts in him. 
 
 Is this our Redeemer a reality to us? If our lives 
 are smooth and prosperous, I fear not. If we have 
 been tried like Job, then possibly we believe like him. 
 Usually the invisible is like the heaven of stars in the 
 
12 / KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 
 
 daylight; but when God makes the dayHght of the 
 world darkness, then heaven comes forth. And usually 
 this will not be done by ordinary griefs, for these make 
 the hold on the world tighter; and I believe that 
 many people never know more than these, and go 
 through life without feeling that sort of trouble which 
 sweeps everything from beneath the feet. When that 
 comes, when the spirit dies in the breast, when we 
 feel that inexpressible divorce between us and all, 
 the agony of utter loneliness and hopelessness, then 
 we are in a manner forced upon a Redeemer; we 
 pour out our tears unto God; we stretch forth our 
 hands towards him, if so be there may be hope. 
 
 Infinitely precious, then, are our troubles, — in- 
 finitely precious is death, — which constrain us to 
 reach out for some one to redeem from trouble and 
 sin and the grave. He slays us, that we may trust in 
 him. 
 
 Unnumbered generations in Christian lands have 
 been carried to their rest under the sound of these 
 sublime words. They meet the dead as they are 
 brought into our churches; they make the dead to 
 speak, saying, *' I know that my Redeemer liveth;" 
 they make the living who survive, respond to the 
 utterance of the solemn and touching consolation, 
 saying, '' Yes, we know that our Redeemer liveth." 
 So over each of us, even of us, and of the children, 
 over us and as if from us and for us, the same voice 
 will be heard. 
 
/ /vAVlV THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH. 1 3 
 
 Will it announce the truth? In our flesh shall we 
 see God? Yes, if we have indeed lived in this faith. 
 How then will the way to the tomb be illuminated! 
 What an indescribable halo of comfort and peace will 
 rest upon the senseless clay! 
 
II. 
 
 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 Lei us now go even ttnio Beihlehem^ and see this thing which 
 is co7ne to pass. — Luke ii. 15. 
 
 O O said the shepherds one to another. The great 
 *^ sight of the universe was at Bethlehem on that 
 day; and thence afterward forever, when men, or 
 creatures above men, would seek the most wonderful, 
 they make their pilgrimage back to that point. So, 
 once more, let 2ls go now even unto Bethlehem, and 
 see this thing which is come to pass. 
 
 The sight was a new-born babe. Look simply at 
 that. Coming in and away from all the regions of 
 wonder which surround Christ, omitting all the won- 
 der that concerned him through the Jewish history, 
 through the whole story of men, or all that far higher 
 story of those inconceivable facts and preparatory eras 
 which, " or ever the earth was," moved forward to this 
 issue; omitting the wonder of this Being as he be- 
 came known, standing in the midst of us a living man, 
 and all that scene of grace and truth and suffering; 
 omitting whatever has followed from him (that Great 
 Cause thrust into time and the world), whatever has 
 come from him up to this moment, and all that must 
 
CHRISTMAS. 15 
 
 come in the periods yet before us, — omit whatever 
 you can omit, and the greatest of the wonders re- 
 mains, — a new-born child sent out from God. Let 
 us now go to Bethlehem and see this one innocent 
 sight. 
 
 For this birth was *' the Word made flesh." Among 
 all the births of God, the births of suns or sun-like 
 spirits, this birth, which had eternally promised itself, 
 now came forward in its order, a thing that had 
 " come to pass." 
 
 Behold it ! Stop and look well at it ! It is the 
 great fact in the history of the universe, and the great 
 fact, if the language be allowed me. in the history of 
 God. One thing is certain: either the birth of the 
 Divine in the form of a babe is an incredible folly, or 
 the most awful and delightful of facts; and that man, 
 advanced as far as he is, does for the most part, and 
 in the face of all the difficulties, believe that fact, is 
 either the greatest scandal or the greatest glory of the 
 human race. But whether he believes or disbelieves, 
 even by these contradictions the w^onder and the in- 
 terest of the event are enlarged. 
 
 Speak not of any other history, — of the w^hole 
 crowd of events behind us. They are as nothing. 
 Speak not even of the truly grand world of truth, 
 which the light of the human eye has illumined for 
 us on every hand. The whole blaze of fact and truth 
 together fades and looks like the light of a candle 
 when the morning sun has come in. 
 
1 6 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 God with us, — made flesh and dwelling among us ! 
 It strikes all as something of unspeakable strange- 
 ness; but it is both necessary and fit that it should 
 appear so. Necessary, for at every step we descend 
 into the deeps of God; his nature and ways must 
 rise up before us with an eternal strangeness about 
 them. And is it not fit as well as necessary? Is not 
 pure wonder a right state of the finite spirit as it 
 stands before the Infinite? And is it not the source 
 whence come blended adoration for the awful great- 
 ness which passes out of our conceptions, and that 
 sublimity of trust, even in the fearful and uncertain 
 darkness, which emotions lie at the base of all religion 
 forever, the very foundation ties connecting together 
 God and the creature? Indeed, to excite wonder, 
 unspeakable wonder, is always the study — I might 
 almost say the artifice — of the Divine Spirit as it 
 moves working in the world around us; for it is pro- 
 viding thus for all the conscious universe the instiga- 
 tion which lifts the forehead in eager aspiring, and 
 bows it in awe, and thus bows it and lifts it forever; 
 with an eternal wish forever lifts it, with an eternal 
 awe forever sinks it, — which makes the worship of 
 spirits, be they men or high as gods. 
 
 The strangeness of this spectacle, then, which angels 
 may bend over, does not deter me. But I must say 
 that the man learned in the history and tendencies of 
 human nature sees here what looks at first as one 
 instance (though it may be he will allow the purest) 
 
CHRISTMAS. 17 
 
 of that idolatrous bent of the heart which must have 
 whatever it thinks divine embodied. He forgets, how- 
 ever, that this powerful bent, and I may say necessity, 
 of human nature to realize God only under sensible 
 forms made it probable that a true manifestation of 
 God would be accommodated to that very need. 
 
 The best manifestation of God is no abstract thing; 
 it is that which gives a pure display of God's nature 
 in the form which best takes hold of man's nature as 
 it is, — that is, which best combines purity with power. 
 And has this not been well done? Is there any pos- 
 sibility within the range of wise thought that it could 
 have been differently or better done than when ** God 
 sent forth his Son, made of a woman"? 
 
 Conceive a man who really feels and knows that 
 in this human form is the very Son of the Highest; 
 he will feel all through him such an influence as the 
 idea of God invisible never has given and never could 
 give him ; and this simply because of the union of 
 spirit with sense impressing a being who is himself 
 sense and spirit, and who cannot, do as he may, rise 
 entirely above himself. But when you add to the 
 mere power given by this union of the divine with 
 the material the means it affords for bringing out 
 the unknown feelings of the Divine Heart, for show- 
 ing God to be what by any other means than God 
 embodied — God suffering — could never have been 
 made known, — I say this, distinctly conceived, gives 
 not only irresistible power to old truth, but pours out 
 
 2 
 
1 8 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 a startling revelation of light from the centre of the 
 Soul of God, which will, like the tide of an ocean, 
 sway back the spirits to their source and home. 
 
 I stand then over the cradle of Christ to-day, with 
 joy not only that here is my Saviour, but that this is 
 he who leads me back to God, who teaches me best 
 what God is, and even through that body of flesh and 
 bones and nerves and senses, even through that, leads 
 me into the hidden secrets of the Divine Heart. 
 
 Did I not speak truth, then, when I said that from all 
 points and places of the future all spirits of whatever 
 height will forever revert to this point and place, and 
 the words of the shepherds be the worlds of all races in 
 all worlds and in all heavens, *' Let us now go even unto 
 Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass " ? 
 But the sight is not ended with the fact of the incar- 
 nation of the Divine Word. There was a divineness in 
 the way in which it was done. Study it for a moment. 
 ''When he bringeth in the first-begotten into the world," 
 it is a matter of the most curious interest how He will 
 do it. 
 
 Hear, then, once more the narrative : *' And so it 
 was, that while they were there, the days were ac- 
 complished that Mary should be delivered. And she 
 brought forth her first-born son, and wrapped him in 
 swaddling-clothes, and laid him in a manger; because 
 there was no room for them in the inn. And there 
 were in the same country shepherds abiding in the 
 field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And 
 
CHRISTMAS. 19 
 
 lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the 
 glory of the Lord shone round about them ; and they 
 were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear 
 not; for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, 
 which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this 
 day, in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the 
 Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you ; Ye shall 
 find the babe wrapped in swaddling-clothes, lying in a 
 manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a 
 multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and say- 
 ing. Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, 
 good will toward men." 
 
 Now, this seems to me a grand epical and a sweet 
 pastoral history; for it is surrounded by sounds as of 
 shepherds' bells mingling with the voices of angels and 
 spirits, and by sights uniting the simplicity and inno- 
 cency of the earth with the regality of the heavens. 
 
 The first thing to which I ask attention here is the 
 style of the supernatural. Had it been left to man to 
 introduce a God, either the manifestation would have 
 been wild and grotesque, or the chief traits, even with 
 the most refined, would have been those of power and 
 exterior magnificence, for these are the things most 
 divine to man. The blending also of the human with 
 the divine would have been awkward and inharmonious, 
 or this would have been avoided only by sacrificing 
 the one to the other; and no doubt, even if it had 
 been the manifestation of an inferior deity, the human 
 part would have been sacrificed to the divine, and a 
 
20 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 lurid light of prodigy would have shone over the whole, 
 — a '* light that never was, on sea or land." Instead of 
 all which we find that though this divine story of Christ 
 came from the bosom of the people, even from the Jews 
 of that day, there is nothing grotesque, nothing of mere 
 prodigy here. 
 
 We, whose taste in the wonderful has been formed 
 and refined and sobered under the Christian ideal of it, 
 can hardly estimate, unless by taking our stand in the 
 mythologies of other religions, or even in the best con- 
 ceptions of the supernatural found in the poetry or 
 philosophy of the world, the marvellous elevation and 
 refinement of this narrative. We do not know, unless 
 by an observation and consciousness of our nature the 
 widest and deepest, how late and how diflEicult a thing 
 it is to touch the supernatural world with dignity. 
 Whoever approaches that mighty sphere seems to 
 suffer some belittling or derangement of faculty. 
 
 So also as to the amount of it. Instead of being 
 lavished, as is nearly inevitable where the whole range 
 of the possible is put within our reach, there is here and 
 elsewhere through the life of Christ a striking economy 
 of the supernatural. There seems just as little of it as 
 the circumstances would allow. 
 
 Observe here the blending of the natural and the 
 supernatural. The human aspect is kept entirely hu- 
 man, the divine is left entirely divine, and neither over- 
 shadows the other. Nor is there an attempt to force 
 the human into a consistency with the divine. I mean 
 
CHRISTMAS. 21 
 
 that there is no endeavor to make this human child 
 Jesus equal to his awful character, — to give to the 
 babe such an air as would harmonize it with the sur- 
 rounding of heavenly songs and angels and the star 
 and the magi ; there is not even a halo of divine light 
 about the head ; he is not depicted as strangling ser- 
 pents in his cradle. There is the babe, and not any- 
 thing but a helpless human babe. 
 
 This was the most original and bold of conceptions, 
 and it does not seem to have been sufficiently observed. 
 None of the wonder or the greatness is in the child, but 
 around it and above it. How new! how unlike all 
 things else in the history of mere wonder ! What im- 
 mense extremes are here brought together without the 
 least gradation of one to the other ! So unlike man ! 
 Yet is this, if it be examined, infinitely graceful, touch- 
 ing, and significant, and sheds, as was intended, divine 
 honor upon our nature as it is, upon womanhood, upon 
 childhood, associating together, as if it were a natural 
 thing, the fairest and highest things of heaven with the 
 simple and humble innocency of a babe. See all the 
 powers of God surrounding it, but not touching it, not 
 raising it to honor it, but honoring it in its simple help- 
 lessness ! Was ever a sight more impressive to the 
 imagination? But its significance is beyond its pic- 
 turesque effect. For here begins that history of a 
 Being who, while called the Son of God, and bearing 
 in his hand the powers of the world unseen, could not, 
 would not, do anything for himself; but who, from the 
 
22 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 babe wrapped in swaddling-clothes by Mary his mother, 
 to the helpless figure lifted and fastened to the cross, 
 " was made in all things like unto us." 
 
 Notice further that the conception here of the true 
 dignity of God is something quite startling. Power 
 and exterior magnificence there were, to be sure, 
 sufficient to illustrate and bear witness of his birth, 
 but observe of how peculiar and subdued a tone were 
 even these. There were blessed beings filling the 
 midnight heavens, not with startling exhibitions of 
 power, but only singing in the ears of simple shep- 
 herds a cradle-hymn sweetly blending with the image 
 of the Virgin's child and his reign of holy inno- 
 cence, and all unlike the regal grandeur of earthly 
 imaginations; this too, quiet as it was, lasting but for 
 a moment, and then the heavens shut, — shut until his 
 coming again, — and the child committed first to a 
 mother's bosom (the only home where the Son of 
 man ever laid his head), but only there that he might 
 be nourished to bear all human infirmities, and with 
 them darkness and poverty and contumely and stripes 
 and death. That is, when God wished to set forth the 
 inmost brightness of his own nature, the express image 
 of the Highest, he sought the lowest forms of humilia- 
 tion to show it in. He dismisses heaven ; he dismisses 
 the white and blazing companies of angels so soon 
 as they have announced him ; he stops the only carol 
 ever sung over him almost as soon as it has begun; 
 he shuts out all the celestial. The Divine inhabits 
 
CHRISTMAS. 23 
 
 the body of a child. It is a child so born that the 
 manger is the place for him, — there is no room in the 
 inn. He lives a human life upon the earth, choosing 
 the lowest and hardest fortunes, but through all think- 
 ing the highest, feeling the purest, working the noblest, 
 and blending all together at last in the death of the 
 cross. This, I say, is God's conception of how God 
 might best live and show the godlike. Behold it! 
 Ye ambitious for the splendors and power of the 
 world; ye selfish, striving sons of men; ye who sac- 
 rifice the things within for the things without, to 
 whom a blazoned name and rank, the shining of 
 gold, and all the equipage of life outshine the pure, 
 generous thought, outshine the quiet humble spirit, 
 the daily and obscure self-denial, outshine the life 
 which, though poor and dark without, is lighted with- 
 in with the glory of God and of the Lamb, — all ye, 
 see ! be rebuked ! be shamed ! Learn ye to-day the 
 kingly style, the Christian rank ; for on this day, by and 
 through this birth, God meant to reverse the whole 
 prejudices of the race, — prejudices which have sunk 
 through and through and saturated the heart, the 
 imagination, and the very ground of the soul. He 
 meant this as a costly overthrow of the taste, of the 
 wisdom, of the vain admirations, of the whole estab- 
 lished ideal of human beings. 
 
 But is it overthrown? The style of the king rules 
 the heart of the people and shapes their lives; but 
 the style of this our King, what heart adores it, what 
 
24 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 life is moulded to it? Ah, if he were our King, his 
 ways, his fashion — may I call it? — would seize our 
 hearts. A little way, indeed, it has penetrated. The 
 whole world should bow down and thank God to-day 
 that a new taste, from the moment of that birth, be- 
 gan gradually to dawn. I own it with joy, that the 
 birth of the child Jesus has not been in vain. I own 
 what he has already done in rectifying the false esti- 
 mates of men, in penetrating through blood, tradition, 
 pomp, to set our hearts upon the value of the spirit, 
 and to teach us to measure ourselves and others by 
 the measures of the soul. 
 
 Let us with the eager hearts of those shepherds 
 revisit in mind that village of Bethlehem, and gaze 
 long and thoughtfully at the sight which is there come 
 to pass. He blasphemes this day who does not re- 
 member Christ with love and adoring awe, with shame 
 for meanness and sorrow for sin, with wishes, and the 
 beginnings of tender hopes. If nothing of this is yours, 
 then the birth of this Saviour is nothing to you. He 
 may have taught in your streets, and eaten and drunk 
 in your presence, but verily I say unto you, he knows 
 you not. 
 
III. 
 
 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 The7i was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the 'wilder?iess to be 
 tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days 
 and forty nights, he was afterwards a hungered. And 
 when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son 
 of God, cojnmand that these stones be made bread. But he 
 answered and said. It is written, Man shall not live by bread 
 alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of 
 God. — Matt. iv. 1-4. 
 
 TN representing this wonderful transaction to our- 
 -■- selves we may without blame, I trust, and with 
 profound reverence, do it in this way. The baptism 
 being over which had publicly set Jesus apart to his 
 great office of world-Redeemer, and new and mighty 
 measures of the Spirit being accorded him, there 
 became at once a necessity that the great temptation 
 of his existence should be placed here, that thus the 
 struggle might be carried into all the experience and 
 call forth all the energies of his nature. 
 
 Perhaps through the whole of this record, or of all 
 the records of man, there is not a more meaning story 
 than this ; and yet there is much mystery and difficulty 
 about it. It is variously conceived. But I shall not 
 enter upon a discussion as to whether it is to be taken 
 literally, just as it stands, or whether the workinc: of 
 
26 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 the spirit of evil in the mind of Christ with such 
 unusual power as his unusual character and work 
 would naturally call forth, aided by the long solitude, 
 fasting, and weakness of body, did not make a mental 
 experience represent itself to him as an outward trans- 
 action, just as is always in some degree found in the 
 experience of men of mighty faith in the invisible, 
 and called through mighty struggles to mighty works; 
 or whether Christ in narrating it afterwards did not 
 use a description or figure which to his hearers seemed 
 literal; or, in fine, whether the narrators themselves 
 intended it to be wholly literal, or in part figurative. 
 This is a most difficult question to determine. What- 
 ever view be taken of it, the spiritual meaning remains 
 the same ; and it is that only which I wish to interpret. 
 
 Conceive, then, the mind of Christ at this period. 
 He had become conscious that he was the Messiah. 
 Think of the solemn depth of excitement aroused by 
 the circumstances of the baptism. Feeling then within 
 an incredible access of Spirit, he was '' led up of the 
 Spirit into the wilderness." 
 
 We can conceive how this would naturally arise, for 
 God does everything as near naturally as may be. A 
 powerful, overmastering impulse was felt for seclusion 
 and preparation. So he was swayed towards the wilder- 
 ness, where for a long period the exalted spiritual con- 
 dition he was in superseded the ordinary wants of the 
 body, or enabled him to triumph over them. During 
 this period of thought and plan the magnificence of the 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 2/ 
 
 powers he felt to be in his possession, and the stress 
 of his sympathy with the popular and universal idea 
 and wish as to the Messiah, must have influenced his 
 mind. When at length, however, in the multitude of 
 his thoughts, growing gradually weaker in spirit and 
 body, doubts of himself began to rise, proportioned 
 in intensity by the greatness of the reaction, — in this 
 condition the united motives of intense hunger and 
 desire to resolve doubt solicited him to make bread 
 in order to allay appetite and prove that he was the 
 Son of God. This he resisted. 
 
 If a full consciousness of his nature and of the future 
 had possessed him at all times, without weakness or 
 doubt, then he could not have lived a human life of 
 infirmity, temptation, and sorrow. Such a conscious- 
 ness would have borne him over all, as a strong wind 
 bears a cloud into the higher atmosphere and holds it 
 there, in sight of the earth, but far out of reach of 
 living sympathy and fellowship with its life. 
 
 Now I see in all this what I believe the Christian 
 world overlooks too much in contemplating Christ, — 
 namely, what his life and peculiar trials were. Taking 
 any view of him we may see fit, there were struggles 
 arising from the peculiarities of his relations which 
 w^ere perhaps his greatest. See what the temptation 
 is made up of, and conceive the intensity of it: "If 
 thou be the Son of God, command that these stones 
 be made bread." 
 
 There was much to say for such a course. First, 
 
28 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 for the relief of doubt. Can we conceive anything so 
 apt to try him? We know that doubts of the Father's 
 faithfulness to him were allowed to come in and flood 
 his soul with darkness in the last hours of his human 
 agony: *' My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken 
 me?" I have the impression that this temptation of 
 doubt, the most terrible temptation, I think, which 
 ever besets the sincere heart, was not through all his 
 life wanting to him who was made in all things like 
 unto us. Here at the beginning of his career as 
 Messiah this doubt was likely to occur with the 
 greatest force. Up to this time he had been living 
 as any Jewish youth, with a growing consciousness, 
 no doubt, of his peculiar relation to his Father, shown 
 strikingly when at twelve years of age he left Joseph 
 and Mary, to be, as he expressed it, about his Father's 
 business; but this, I suppose, was a prominent and 
 rare exhibition of this state of feeling, or it alone 
 would not have been narrated. He grew, I dare 
 say, through a life of beautiful but natural boy- 
 hood and early manhood, until the time came for his 
 showing unto Israel. Then suddenly, at his baptism, 
 he was publicly recognized by John, and by the descent 
 of the Spirit seen by his eyes and felt inwardly by 
 his heart. Under the force of this new revelation of 
 himself to himself he was led up into the wilderness, 
 and there, while yet unconfirmed in this startling, 
 awful consciousness that he, even he, was the Messiah, 
 he was subjected at once to such desertion, such 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 29 
 
 bodily need (and nothing troubles an aspiring soul 
 quicker than the wants of the animal nature), such 
 an inroad of thoughts, doubts, wonderings, that a 
 tempest seemed to shake the very foundations of his 
 consciousness. Oh for light ! give me light ! The 
 devilish darkness seemed to smother him; and then, 
 just then, in this hunger of soul, the voice came, " If 
 thou be the Son of God, command that these stones 
 be made bread, — at once, by a word, satisfy your 
 mind and feed your body; clear all mystery at once, 
 by simply using the powers you have, to turn these 
 stones to bread." 
 
 Now this was a temptation, to be sure. Why should 
 not his divine power be used here? It was his, quite 
 as much as the gifts of a gifted man are his, and 
 infinitely more. The best of men would count it an 
 incredible hardship if he were not allowed to use his 
 talents for his own good or pleasure. He would say: 
 ''lam ready to own that the highest end of my gifts 
 is the good of others and the honor of my Creator; 
 but then, I am to love others as myself, and not more 
 than myself, and so I may use my powers for my 
 own sake also." If we consider the height of the 
 gifts of Christ, and the lowliness and meekness of his 
 position when stripped of them, we can have some 
 thought what an habitual self-denial it was, never to 
 use his powers for his own advantage. 
 
 Here, however, was a case clearly beyond even this. 
 The question was, Would he use his gifts to clear 
 
30 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 doubt? — that first; but beyond that still, to avert 
 death itself? '' I perish with hunger," was his feeling. 
 Could he do a wiser act than to save himself by a 
 simple word? — for see what hung upon that life. 
 Could he not employ one drop of his almighty deep 
 of power to save himself? '' But speak the word, and 
 these stones at your feet will be bread, and body and 
 soul will both go forward in the strength of this 
 food." 
 
 See the stress and reasonableness of the tempter. 
 So much motive would press, even were there no 
 physical temptation ! But the keen pangs of hunger 
 came forward with all the forces of life bent with 
 incredible craving for food, — an instinct of such fe- 
 rocity as to bear down all the humanity before it, as 
 even can make the mother devour her child, — a hun- 
 ger for food, to which, together with the hunger for 
 life, the Creator has committed the preservation of 
 our being, and the blind, resistless strength of which 
 survives and triumphs even over better instincts, and 
 stands as the last and mighty warder of the sacred 
 treasure of life ! 
 
 Hunger! Not one out of millions of beings ever 
 knows anything of it but its first whisper; its moans 
 and cry are unknown even to the imagination. You 
 may hear it, indeed, echoed and imaged in the howl 
 of the beasts at midnight in the wilderness. 
 
 Here, then, was the temptation of the Son of God. 
 Arrayed against his holy will was, first, the power of 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 3 1 
 
 natural doubt that is in the heart, its weakness seek- 
 ing assurance ; second, the power of evil that is in 
 the reason presenting a case in which the highest 
 intelligence, unenlightened and unsupported by the 
 noblest virtue, would have erred ; and, third, the stress 
 of the very inmost of the bodily powers, hunger, — 
 the solicitations of the most refined self-regard through 
 all the range of it, and masked under public motive, 
 — the whole contest and force of the merely human 
 soul, thought, body, centred in one against him ; not 
 against the centre of his virtue, but against the sim- 
 plicity and entire purity of it. 
 
 This was the tempting. I suppose I have over- 
 stated nothing, for all this is implied here, and much 
 more. And now, how was it met? "If thou be the 
 Son of God, command that these stones be made 
 bread. He answered and said, Man shall not live by 
 bread alone, but by every word that proccedeth out 
 of the mouth of God." " Command that these stones 
 be made bread. Use your powers." *'No; for that 
 cause came I not into the world, but to obey as a 
 son ; and in doing this I know my truest life will live, 
 and even my lower will not perish." 
 
 Observe, throughout these temptations, that they are 
 all addressed to him as the Son of God, assuming 
 that he should claim personal privileges on that ac- 
 count. On the other hand, he answers them all, 
 assuming the rank of mere manhood, and refusing to 
 use his divine powers for himself. '* I am here as 
 
32 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST, 
 
 the Son of God in my powers toward men, but as a 
 man only, and with all a man's needs and duties and 
 feelings, in my relations to God." To maintain this 
 position was necessary to his purposes, and consti- 
 tutes, I think, one of the greatest trials, as well as one 
 of the greatest wonders, of his career. 
 
 *' No ; for God has taught me that over, and even 
 against the ordinary ways of nature, should it be 
 necessary, his power will interfere for me if I trust in 
 him. I am perishing with hunger, yet my life is not 
 dependent on bread, but upon the will of God, who 
 can give me manna in this desert, as once he did of 
 old. Why then should I use the power of miracles 
 merely to escape dependence upon God? for that 
 moral life of manhood is a far higher work for me 
 than to succor myself by miracles. He has placed 
 me in a position of need to call forth my trust in 
 him. I shall not make my miracles a means of get- 
 ting clear of my trust, which is a higher act, infinitely, 
 than the use of power. I must be made perfect through 
 sufferings. So far from being distinguished by using 
 power in my own behalf, I should forego power, and 
 commit myself to God more than all others." 
 
 Here, then, he for the first time, and out of the 
 depths of his heart, discerned the wonderful rule for 
 the use of his supernatural powers. He was to make 
 trust his help. Filial love and trust were all he had 
 of power to meet all want, natural or supernatural. 
 What force in this thought ! '' Man does not live by 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 33 
 
 bread alone." *' Show thyself Son of God," says the 
 tempter, " by making bread of stones." '* I show my- 
 self such," Christ replies, *'by refusing to live through 
 the trials of human life with any aids different from 
 those common to all men, and by refusing to exert 
 any power but the divine power of trust open to all." 
 
 We see in this a rule of judgment as to all his ex- 
 periences. Wherever trial was concerned, — and was 
 it not concerned in all? — we must conceive his expe- 
 rience as identical with our own ; impossible perhaps 
 in certain things, but heightened in others. '' The 
 Son of God will be a mighty power, serving himself," 
 says the Devil. *' The Son of God is a mighty trust, 
 serving God," says Jesus. " The Son of God will save 
 himself by physical power." "• I live by trust," says 
 Christ. 
 
 See how w^onderfully opens that divine philosophy 
 of faith afterwards taught to all, and constantly reiter- 
 ated, but which he taught not as a mere rule out of his 
 thought, but which he first lived, and taught to others 
 out of his own heart ! Here he began his public life 
 by showing a divine example of this philosophy, the 
 energy of which is illustrious to the invisible worlds, 
 and only dimly perceived by us. For who can measure 
 the force of the motives which went against all this? 
 Who can measure the measure of that holy energy 
 which saw and worked out the divine ideal of generous 
 trust against the most splendid worldly ideal, and in 
 the face of such solicitation from body, soul, and spirit? 
 
 3 
 
34 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 The intensest power of the universe seemed first drawn 
 into self, and then that self, with all the unimaginable 
 might of its interests, he yielded ; the existence — shall 
 I say it? — of Almightiness itself he seemed ready to 
 sacrifice rather than violate that one element of life, 
 love, which thus seems to be the life — yes, and the 
 power — of Godhead itself. I say here was the trial 
 of God. 
 
 And with what powers did I say it was met? By 
 that power given to us. Look ! through all the 
 thirst of his needs, and though power lay around him 
 like an overflowing river reaching to his lips, he never 
 touched a drop of it, nor cooled his parching tongue, 
 but Hved his life of awful glory merely as a man, and 
 with the powers and faculties belonging even to the 
 meanest. Divine image ! example of supreme height, 
 set forth for us ! 
 
 Now the great lesson here for the human race, and 
 for us, stated generally, is that all temptations are to be 
 met by trust; that in situations where it is actually im- 
 possible to help ourselves, or where, as in the case of 
 our Lord, it would be doing a wrong to help ourselves, 
 — that is, in cases where we are in effect powerless, in 
 cases where we are called to bear, and not to do, the 
 will of God, in suffering now, or in the menace of its 
 coming, — in such cases as these, where the instinct of 
 happiness, or the instinct of life itself, would tempt 
 us to murmurings, to bitterness, to struggling blindly 
 against accident, or evil fortune, or whatever it is in 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 35 
 
 which the will of God appears, or to the use of unlawful 
 or questionable means to relieve ourselves, then we are 
 to say, " My happiness, my life, are not in bread alone, 
 are not dependent on the good thing I now seem perish- 
 ing for, but * by every word that proceedeth out of the 
 mouth of God ' shall man live. My life rests directly 
 and entirely on his word, and I am not made the de- 
 pendent slave of the events or facts or laws of this 
 world. His word spake into being the power of bread 
 to nourish me, and of all natural good to please me, 
 and it now can speak again and feed me anew on some- 
 thing else, providentially by changing my situation or 
 changing my tastes ; or, if it be necessary, miraculously; 
 and if this should not take place, why, then I live still. 
 How? Upon his will. It is his will that my body 
 perish, but that my being shall live in a higher sense ; 
 that as the body flourished and grew, so the blood of 
 my soul should grow vital, and the whole life of my 
 soul expand, feeding in trust upon God himself; and so 
 I rise superior to all ruin, and by means of ruin, living, 
 when I perish, ' by every word that proceedeth out of 
 the mouth of God.' " 
 
 There is something here to meet the very deep- 
 est experiences of our life. Once, many times, in 
 our momentous human story, we too are in wilder- 
 ness and seem to perish of hunger. Earnest, deep 
 wants of our hearts, that will not hear of disappoint- 
 ment, are yet disappointed, and we perish. Through 
 the wilderness, indeed, we go all our days, from the 
 
36 TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 first. Everywhere, in everything, there is a check to 
 our wishes. Through all the facts of life runs a will 
 without us, which is against ours, and resists us and 
 breaks us down at every turn. I mean that from the 
 first cry of the infant, through all the wild outcries 
 of our spirits, suppressed, but all the wilder, deeper, 
 for that, the one fact is proclaimed, that the human 
 being hungers in the wilderness, and like the beasts 
 in this night of nature cries aloud for food unto God. 
 
 But if this cry of want is deep and piercing for what 
 we have not, oh, how deeper, how inexpressible, when, 
 having got, the heart is bereaved of its objects ! We 
 are beings who hunger for that which is not yet, and 
 wail for that which was but is not now ; and these tears, 
 cries of man's hunger, go up constantly before God. 
 What does it mean? Can we not understand, can we 
 not master it? The Head of the race is Christ; and if 
 we would catch the meanings of his life we could un- 
 derstand it, and if we would catch the spirit which he 
 had, we could master it. In the Son of man in the 
 desert, without food, behold yourselves ! Satisfied as 
 we may become at any moment, our natural life as 
 a whole is — and is the most deeply felt to be by the 
 deepest spirits — a hunger. Man is placed there, too, 
 not by blind chance, but is ''led up of the Spirit into 
 the wilderness." Behold in this ourselves. This is not 
 all confusion and meaningless : the Spirit has led us up 
 into this life for great objects, — this, namely, by trial 
 to bring out the vast spiritual powers which are possible 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 37 
 
 to us, and which arc eternal. These are, it seems, con- 
 ditions of the birth of an immortal ; and this our mor- 
 tal life is but the soil and air out of which the plant is 
 called to come and eternally to be. It is for the bring- 
 ing forth of the true immortal man that all the appoint- 
 ments of this natural life, and all its costly sorrows, are 
 not a superfluous and lavish waste of means and a more 
 cruel waste of feeling, but a necessary, and, so far as 
 may be, a merciful and economical preparative. ** The 
 creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but 
 by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope." 
 
 Being, then, led up to this life by the Spirit, to be 
 tempted or tried, our one concern here is to know 
 how to meet it so that these purposes be not frustrated ; 
 for if that be, oh, the waste of the very blood in our 
 veins and the marrow in our bones, — waste of the 
 throbs and agonies and life of our hearts; and then 
 the waste of the spirit itself in the pure hereafter ! 
 With all the energy of attention and wish, then, look 
 to what Christ did. 
 
 '' Satisfy your hunger," says the tempter, " by any 
 means in your power; let your first aim be to appease 
 the cravings of natural life. Even if you have divine 
 powers, prostitute them to this, and command that 
 these stones be made bread." 
 
 This advice prevails ; and see, the whole w^orld follows 
 it. Of all the hungry, how many reflect and say, " Why 
 am I hungry; and has not my Father food enough and 
 to spare, and shall I not return and look to him? " See 
 
7,S TEMPTATION OF CHRIST 
 
 the world all hungry, yet all seeking bread out of 
 stones, some by begging, others by trying to com- 
 mand it, according to their characters and gifts. 
 
 But see Christ, the divine sufferer, the divine con- 
 queror (and all not for his sake, but for ours) ; look 
 at him! Who hungered like him? Yet he kept him- 
 self in his integrity. He reserved his high power for 
 other purposes, and used the worst exigencies of his 
 natural life to raise himself to a nearer trust in God. 
 Go ye and do likewise. If you will forget for what 
 you were sent into the world, and let the bitterness 
 of disappointment harden your heart, or the sweet 
 insinuations of temptation melt it, and persuade you 
 that if you become but a little less pure or honest 
 you can have your wish, — believe not that you will 
 ever reach it. The soul cannot satiate its real hunger 
 anywhere below itself. The stones will never become 
 true bread, do with them what you will. 
 
 There are those who, when they find their worldly 
 wishes hard to realize, lose in the strength of their 
 hunger their scruples as to the means of satisfying 
 it. Do you, in pursuit of any darling object, allow a 
 little strain upon your conscience? Are you less open, 
 less just, less merciful, less pure, that you may reach 
 it? Or does it, at least, absorb all the finer faculties 
 of your nature in its pursuit? Then you have not 
 learned Christ so well as you ought. 
 
 Oh that we might all know it in the centre of us, — 
 that man does not '' live by bread alone, but by every 
 
TEMPTATION OF CHRIST. 39 
 
 word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God," — 
 that in bereavements, or in the vast denial of our 
 wishes, found in every bosom, we would learn to draw 
 very near, and still nearer, to the source of true life, 
 and trust there with all our souls, and gather life from 
 that, though we be alone in a wilderness, and though 
 we have no bread but the stones at our feet ! "■ Seek 
 ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, 
 and all these things shall be added unto you." 
 
IV. 
 
 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 And it ca7ne to pass^ about an eight days after these sayings^ he 
 took Peter ^ and John, and James ^ and went up into a motmiain 
 to pray. Aiid as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance 
 was altered, and his raiment was white and glistering. And 
 behold, there talked with hiin two men, which were Moses and 
 Elias : Who appeared in glo?y, and spake of his decease, 
 which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. But Peter a?td 
 they that were with him were heavy with sleep: and wheji 
 they were awake, they saw his glory, and the two men that 
 stood with him. And it caine to pass, as they departed front 
 him, Peter said imto Jesus, Master, it is good for us to be here : 
 and let us make three tabernacles ; one for thee, and otte for 
 Moses, ajid one for Elias : not knowing what he said. While 
 he thus spake, there came a cloud and overshadowed them : and 
 they feared as they entered into the cloud. Ajid there came a 
 voice out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved Son : hear 
 him. And when the voice was past, Jestis was found alone. 
 And they kept it close, and told no man in those days any of 
 those things which they had seen. — Luke ix. 28-36. 
 
 '' I ^HIS is one of the most singular, attractive, and 
 -*- grand, of all the records of this wonderful Book. 
 The scene was formerly supposed to be Mt. Tabor, 
 the highest peak in Galilee. At all events, it was *' a 
 high mountain." He took by selection three of his 
 disciples into this lofty, removed spot, where there 
 was peculiar solitude ; where they were, as Saint 
 Mark says, " apart by themselves." 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 41 
 
 Now, as to the actual order of the events there 
 is some confusion in the various accounts, but they 
 probably took place as follows : There, while he prayed 
 he was transfigured ; and Moses and Elias were with 
 him. " But Peter and the other two disciples were 
 heavy with sleep." I suppose that here, as in the 
 scene in Gethsemane, while their Lord was engaged, 
 they slept; and so the transfiguration and the high 
 conference took place, and had continued, how long 
 we know not. But they awoke. '' And when they 
 were awake, they saw his glory, and the two men 
 that stood with him." 
 
 Now, this seems but a splendid dream, a divine pa- 
 geant rising in the sleeping visions of some holy soul. 
 It is, in fact, called a ** vision," and there is something 
 about it to tempt us to the impression that it is but 
 a grandly mythical scene. So far, however, as the 
 word '' vision " goes, nothing visionary is implied. Its 
 real- use is, a transcendent sight. It may be spec- 
 tral, but real. The scene opened, may stand out of 
 local habitation in time or space, as in the vision of 
 Saint Paul : '' Whether in the body, or out of the body, 
 I cannot tell ; " but even then, the thing is none the 
 less real. 
 
 If the object of the transfiguration was to introduce 
 once and for a little while a divine glory into the 
 natural and homely life of Christ on earth, it could 
 not be done better; the style of the supernatural is 
 utterly free from the various traits of human origin 
 
42 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 which always accompany the false supernatural. The 
 scene is simple, significant, divinely grand, and without 
 exaggeration or excess. If it seems, from its pecu- 
 liarity and splendor and exaltation, as contrasted with 
 the extreme realness and homely plainness of the ordi- 
 nary history, surprising and like fiction, consider that 
 this could not have been otherwise. To introduce a 
 momentary effulgence into the life of Christ, for which 
 there were most important purposes, must have con- 
 veyed the impression of magnificent fiction and dream. 
 Try your conceptions upon it. Consider, besides, 
 where this narrative is found, — in what Book, I mean, 
 — and consider what Person it concerns, for what pur- 
 poses. The parts of this sacred history of the Lord 
 Jesus Christ are entitled to be judged together; and 
 if so, it is most important that in interpreting any part 
 we remember the whole. Bearing in mind who Christ 
 was, keeping in view the reasons for self-obscuration 
 and humility in general, and on the supposition of the 
 reality of spiritual life, which our senses darken as a 
 veil, and make us absurdly sceptical of, — when we 
 remember how a painter or sculptor who has the genius 
 of his art may take the lowest and most earthly face, 
 and, preserving a certain identity, may remould, re- 
 light, remodulate, so as to exalt it to an ideal grace 
 and majesty, — we can have some conception of the 
 change. *' He was transfigured before them." | 
 
 What, now, were the purposes of this scene? Two, 
 chiefly, I suppose, — a purpose in respect to Christ, 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 43 
 
 and a purpose in respect to these three witnesses and 
 through them to the world. 
 
 First, a purpose in respect to Christ. Because of 
 his divineness we forget that he was human. As in 
 Gethsemane ** there appeared an angel unto him from 
 heaven, strengthening him," so here, — confirmed by 
 the fact that the glory began, and perhaps was almost 
 finished, before seen. And so, as if for a moment, 
 the Father took him up into his original dignity, that 
 he might go down again with increased power into 
 the world. 
 
 But more obviously the effect of the scene was 
 designed for others, to manifest forth his glory, that 
 his disciples might believe on him. They needed it. 
 About a week before, the melancholy future had been 
 laid open to them. So he stood before them in his 
 glory, transfigured so magnificently that only their 
 indefinable sense of sameness preserved identity. The 
 countenance and form which were ** marred more than 
 any man" were altered; the face became (erepov) 
 another, raised to such beauty and dignity as would 
 allow one of these sober writers to say that it should 
 be compared with the sun, — *' and his face did shine 
 as the sun," — and his very garments of such purity 
 and splendor that the words used, bring before us the 
 peculiar clearness of pure water, or the polish of a 
 golden shield when it blazes in the sun, or the twinkling 
 of a star and the flash of lightning. 
 
 For one moment '' the King is seen in his beauty," 
 
44 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 seen as a figure fit to introduce pure life and immortal- 
 ity, — for one moment, to indulge a little a being who 
 judges after the sight of his eyes. And not merely that 
 his splendor was designed to impress, but the whole 
 transaction to teach them — the celestial company — the 
 relation in which he was here placed to those figures from 
 the past, as one not divided from the past, or coming to 
 destroy it, but to fulfil ; to show that the past kingdom 
 and the future were not two things but one thing. 
 
 And observe, from out of the past the two figures 
 most significant were selected, — Moses, the estab- 
 lisher and lawgiver of the first kingdom; Elijah, its 
 restorer, representing with Moses the whole com- 
 pany of the prophets. These " appeared in glory " 
 with him. Two figures, glorious themselves and stand- 
 ing in the same atmosphere of glory with him, were 
 a sort of symbolical method by which God owned, and 
 as if enshrined, the past dispensations as his own. That 
 was an important teaching then, and always. But there 
 was another more important, — that these past dispen- 
 sations should be seen by the Jews, but not too glar- 
 ingly seen, vaguely seen, to be merged or lost in him. 
 How is this indicated? Here is the difficulty; for this, 
 the most needed, is the most vague. 
 
 The figures, to be sure, are in harmony; that is 
 something. They are all lustrous, the past as well as 
 the present; that is something more. But what in- 
 forms us who of them are the servants and which the 
 Son? Well, three things. 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 45 
 
 The first and slightest is this: that to these Jewish 
 minds filled with unspeakable awe for Moses and the 
 prophets both these figures are represented as sub- 
 ordinate throughout in small things, such as the order 
 in which they are named. That they stand as mere 
 preparers, though splendid, to the mysterious third and 
 last One, wdio was the " author and finisher," is beau- 
 tifully seen in this. Attend to the narrative : After 
 the disciples had been roused from sleep, and had 
 seen the Lord and the two who were with him, then 
 it seems these two figures of the past began to recede. 
 " And it came to pass, as they departed," or while they 
 were departing, Peter, transported w^ith their presence, 
 cried out as if to detain them, *' Master, it is good for 
 us to be here : let these remain, and let us build three 
 dwellings; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one 
 for Elias." He wist not what he said, but in the 
 wild joy of his heart he spoke out what he felt. But 
 mark: ''While he thus spake, there came a cloud and 
 overshadowed them: and they feared as they entered 
 into the cloud." It was the presence of the invisible 
 God. '' And there came a voice out of the cloud, 
 saying. This is m.y beloved Son : hear him." 
 
 There, it seems to me, is the emphasis of the whole 
 narrative. Let the shadows of departed systems de- 
 part; detain them not; build not for them; build 
 no tabernacles for Moses and Elias; turn from them 
 and from all other names. This is my beloved Son : 
 hear him. 
 
46 THE TRANSFIGURATION. . 
 
 And, last of all, these great figures are presented 
 as looking forward to his death. They "spake of his 
 decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem." 
 This seems to intimate that all God had done before, 
 in the Mosaic and prophetic economies, yet looked 
 forward and pointed to a coming death, as the object 
 of attention, — the death of Christ. They "spake of 
 his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusa- 
 lem," or rather they spake of his " exodus," departure, 
 or, according to the old use, a departing and lead- 
 ing out of bondage, — this word seeming to say that 
 his death was that final and universal redemption 
 from bondage which was rehearsed, foreshadowed, by 
 the great symbol of the exodus of Moses and the 
 people from the foreign bonds and taskmasters of 
 Egypt into the land of liberty and rest. But as that 
 exodus was of the earth, this heavenly, so this De- 
 liverer also was spiritual and heavenly and hence 
 above all, to whom of necessity Moses and Moses' 
 work was a small and carnal thing, and but for a 
 moment. 
 
 If this decease was the great event of interest to 
 these glorious persons, it could only have been because 
 of its spiritual effect upon the world ; and as it was a 
 death to be accomplished, and accomplished at Jeru- 
 salem, the Mount of Expiation, and accomplished by 
 an exalted Being, in a mighty suffering, for spiritual 
 purposes, it was of course in a real sense a sacrifice; 
 and a sacrifice of such substance, of such sort, of such 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 47 
 
 magnitude, that all others became at once mere gross 
 shadows, so spiritualizing, so divinely enlarging the 
 very idea of sacrifice, as of course to terminate and 
 put away and put to shame all other sacrifices, except 
 as mere figures of the true. The temple and altar and 
 sacrifices of Moses, all founded on the idea of death 
 for sin, all necessarily become nothing, and all must 
 disappear, when we see Moses himself speaking of 
 the Lord's death, speaking of such another death than 
 that he had appointed, such other blood from that he 
 had poured out. 
 
 So when Moses, the great institutor of the altar and 
 the victim, spoke of His death, when he who appointed 
 the lamb of the atonement saw before him another 
 Lamb of sacrifice, as it is evident he did, — it is not 
 straining the matter too far to think that it was in- 
 tended to intimate that the old priest who offered the 
 blood of bulls and goats, and the old animal victims 
 themselves which were offered, became nothing, and 
 he who instituted them nothing, and that the whole 
 system was at once fulfilled and lost in a Being who 
 came bringing a divine humanity as an offering to God 
 and man. 
 
 So much, then, as to the significance of this scene 
 in reference to the sacrificial side of the old economy 
 represented by Moses, and then as to the line of 
 prophets whom Elias stood for. They were essen- 
 tially spiritual teachers; in what sense, then, could 
 they look forward to his death as fulfilling and merg- 
 
48 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 ing their function in a higher? I answer that that 
 death, both for light and power, both for instruction 
 and effect upon the human soul, consummated all 
 teaching. The blood of the cross was a voice crying 
 out of the ground, and shaking not the earth only, 
 but also the heavens. What was the whole crowd of 
 prophets to that one Prophet perishing for the race? 
 Was their object deliverance, redemption, to deliver 
 the people from all thraldom without and within, from 
 the bands of folly and crime and sense? Was this the 
 end of their sublime agonies? If so, can you con- 
 ceive anything finer than that this goodly fellowship 
 of the prophets should look forward with unspeak- 
 able solemnity and interest to that death which should 
 ring *' freedom " and '* redemption " into every ear 
 through all the coasts of the earth? The old law, 
 the old holiness and justice, breathed through their 
 lips, was weak when they cried the loudest, the ear 
 was heavy that it could not hear; but here was a 
 death to be " accomplished," which should awe the 
 world ; a death which was itself obedience to all law, 
 honor to all justice at any cost, and the promulga- 
 tion of the new and higher edicts of mercy to man- 
 kind. How full, then, of meaning that these sublime 
 figures, speaking for law, for sacrifice, for spiritual 
 life, should appear with him in glory, themselves 
 glorious, and yet speaking of and looking to that 
 death ! 
 
 This subject will have enough of practical instruc- 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 49 
 
 tion and imoressiveness if we leave it now, having- 
 ' done no more than pass before us the scene and its 
 meaning. 
 
 According to Saint Luke, this scene arose Hke an 
 exhalation from prayer. " As he prayed, the fashion 
 of his countenance was altered." It was one of those 
 occasions of designed, deliberate, lengthened, and most 
 exalted communion with the Father. *' He took Peter 
 and John and James, and went up into a mountain to 
 pray. And as he prayed, the fashion of his counte- 
 nance was altered, and his raiment was white and 
 glistering." This is a picture, as it were, drawn by 
 God, of prayer and its results. And oh that we 
 would know once for all that the outside is nothing 
 to the inside, and that transfigurations far more divine 
 than this sight to the eye take place wherever true 
 prayer rises to God ! 
 
 Observe also, for your consolation, ye who have 
 buried the dead from your sight, and who yourselves 
 must soon be numbered with them, the image here of 
 the resurrection and of resurrection bodies. See this 
 body the same, yet how changed ! and wrought as 
 naturally as you have seen a dark and ragged mass 
 of vapor in the heavens pass into an object of splen- 
 dor fit to be an ornament to that place where dwells 
 the very presence of the Majesty on high. *' So also 
 is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corrup- 
 tion ; it is raised in incorruption : it is sown in dis- 
 honor; it is raised in glory." Yes, fellow-mortals, 
 
 4 
 
50 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 some of us at least shall be transfigured like this ; for 
 *'we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like 
 him ; for we shall see him as he is," — and not only 
 like this splendid transfigured person, but with him : 
 *' Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given 
 me be with me where I am." 
 
 I have said that the sacredness of the old Hebrew 
 Testament was signified in the feeling of Peter as to 
 the common glory of all the three great figures before 
 him : " And as they departed from him, Peter said 
 unto Jesus, Master, it is good for us to be here: and 
 let us make three tabernacles ; one for thee, and one for 
 Moses, and one for Elias." But I reserved to the last 
 the way in which this scene was so contrived as to give 
 the most sublime eminence to Christ. Listen : " While 
 Peter thus spake," — while he was eagerly soliciting 
 tabernacles for all, — " there came a cloud, and a voice 
 out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved Son: 
 hear him," — that is, not Elias and Moses and Christ. 
 This is the King; this is He — this; no servant, no 
 mere delegate, however imperial ; this is a Son ; 
 " my Son ; " *' my beloved Son : hear him." Silence, 
 all other voices ; silence, the voices of lawgivers and 
 sages through all antiquity; silence, ye illustrious lead- 
 ers of the people of God ; silence, Sinai. There is 
 another voice, which " shall not strive, nor cry, neither 
 shall any man hear his voice in the streets." Listen : 
 " The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath 
 anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he 
 
THE TRANSFIGURATION. 51 
 
 hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach 
 dehverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to 
 the bHnd, to set at Hberty them that are bruised, to 
 preach the acceptable year of the Lord." 
 
 We are sinful men; we are grown hard in secular- 
 ity, in sorrows, in sins; but at that still, small voice 
 of hope and tenderness we stop. Yes, Master; speak 
 on, thou voice of mercy ! Speak down into the depths 
 of all human sorrow and sin and hopelessness and 
 fears. Speak with that voice which raises even the 
 dead. 
 
 Friends, many questions may be asked about you, 
 but there is only one of import. Are you listeners 
 to the voice of the Son of God? All duties may be 
 gathered up into one. Do we obey the voice which 
 spake out of the cloud on the Mount of Transfigura- 
 tion? Listen to the resting and strengthening words. 
 Down in the depths of human sin, of human trial, of 
 human sorrow and hopelessness, — in all that cloud 
 of evil and of fear in which mortality is sunk, that 
 voice of the Father always breaks out of the cloud: 
 "This is my beloved Son; hear him." 
 
V. 
 
 THE LORD'S SUPPER. 
 
 This is 7ny body. — Luke xxii. 19. 
 
 TF we did not see every day that men give to the 
 -■- language and acts of one another a color varying 
 almost indefinitely, according to the tone and views 
 of their own minds, — if we were not accustomed to 
 this, we should be astonished at the wide difference 
 of opinion in the Christian world as to the meaning 
 of the New Testament. 
 
 It is not the difference of religious opinions which 
 has made such sad havoc in the Church, but the spirit 
 with which these differences are maintained. So long 
 as there are peculiarities among men, there will be 
 certain degrees and aspects of doctrine better fitted 
 to one class than another. The truly desirable unity 
 in the Christian Church consists not in this, that all 
 men should interpret sacred Scripture in precisely the 
 same way. No ; the unity to be longed for is a unity 
 of spirit, and that Christian people should improve 
 themselves in candor, forbearance, humility, and love, 
 and thus educe a higher unity out of all differences. 
 
 These remarks are naturally suggested by the text, 
 "This is my body." As to what the Saviour meant 
 
THE LORD'S SUPPER. 53 
 
 when he instituted his supper, milHons of men, for 
 several centuries, have disputed, and the fiercest con- 
 troversy is to this day waged concerning it. 
 
 One of the chief distinctions of the Roman Catholic 
 Church is their doctrine upon this subject. It is very 
 precisely expressed in one word, Transubstantiation, — 
 a word first applied to it by Stephen, Bishop of Autun, 
 — that it is the real body and blood. Their evidence 
 for this they find in the words of Christ. He does in- 
 deed call the bread his body, — "This is my body;" 
 just in the same style, however, as *' This is the 
 Lord's passover," *' Which rock was Christ." 
 
 Our Lord uses the very same figure when speak- 
 ing of truth in general, or of his truth : " I am the 
 bread of life : he that cometh to me shall never hunger, 
 and he that believeth on me shall never thirst." In 
 the same style he tells the woman of Samaria that 
 whosoever would drink of the w^ater that he should 
 give him should thirst no more. He seems to have 
 provided against any such interpretation as this, by 
 eating and drinking of the body and blood while as 
 yet he sat by their side. 
 
 I do not say that the doctrine is contradictory to 
 our faculties ; I have never thought so, though the 
 large mass of Catholics and most Protestants view it 
 in such a way as would certainly make it so. Accord- 
 ing to the ordinary view of Transubstantiation, the 
 bread and wine are changed at once into all properties 
 of the body and blood of Christ, and yet are in some 
 
54 THE LORD'S SUPPER, 
 
 respect bread and wine. This would be to disbelieve 
 the eyes and taste, and to deny reason. But many 
 Roman Catholic theologians state the doctrine in less 
 exceptionable terms; namely, that the transubstantia- 
 tion does not occur in the ordinary properties of the 
 bread and wine, but in that substance, or something, 
 which underlies all the properties of matter, — that it 
 is which is changed from the substance of bread into 
 the substance of Christ's body. 
 
 Although this may be an entirely incorrect philoso- 
 phy, which separates between the substance of matter 
 and its properties, yet this view of the subject removes 
 its more obvious objections. But at the same time 
 it really changes, if looked into, the whole doctrine, 
 and makes that which is called matter really spirit, 
 which can only be spiritually received. Wherever 
 throughout the world the officiating priest utters the 
 last syllable of the form of consecration (it is not 
 deemed to take place until that sound), this awful 
 change occurs. *' This is my body," " This is my 
 blood," — at the sound of these creating or at least 
 producing words the mighty production /ollows. 
 
 The strange views and evils into which this doctrine 
 leads I will not notice. One only let me mention, — as 
 the bread and wine become the veritable body and 
 blood of Christ, they are from that moment, until the 
 bread becomes corrupt and the wine dead, regarded 
 and treated with all the adoration due to Christ him- 
 self, and so worshipped everywhere; every crumb 
 
THE LORD'S SUPPER. 55 
 
 and particle is instinct with the Godhead; raised on 
 high on the altar with great pomp to be worshipped; 
 carried in solemn procession to be worshipped. In 
 the vast cathedral thousands prostrate themselves be- 
 fore it, and the knee is bent to it in the crowded street. 
 Now, were it certain, according to their own views, that 
 the real presence of Christ was in these elements, the 
 adoration would be less painful. 
 
 But it was my purpose merely to state the different 
 views. At the aw^aking of mind at the Reformation, 
 Luther, dissatisfied with the idolatry of the bread and 
 wine, and yet believing it to be literally true that the 
 body and blood of Christ were present in the sacra- 
 ment, devised a plan which he thought would avoid 
 difficulties. He taught, therefore, that the body and 
 blood were actually in the consecrated bread and wine, 
 but in, with, and under it, and that the bread and 
 wine remained unchanged. This is called Consubstan- 
 tiation. He thus avoided the worship of the bread and 
 wine; but in point of reason the doctrine appears to 
 me much less defensible than that of Transubstantiation. 
 
 Zwingle, the illustrious Swiss reformer, a man second, 
 in my opinion, to none of the reformers, and to whose 
 name history has not done justice, — Zwingle saw 
 clearly the weakness of Luther's view, but passing to 
 the contrary extreme, reduced the sacrament too near 
 to the nature of a commemorative supper. His view 
 is approached by a very large number of Protestants, 
 and by the Unitarians is reduced yet more; for with 
 
56 THE LORD'S SUPPER. 
 
 them, as I believe, it is strictly and only a solemn 
 and impressive memorial of the death of Christ. 
 
 None of these views can be called entirely erroneous. 
 Each of them ought rather to be considered either as 
 defective only or as the exaggeration of what is really 
 true and important. On the one hand, it is most 
 true, as the Roman Catholic and Lutheran think, that 
 there is a real and actual presence of Christ in this 
 his supper. On the other hand, it is not less true, as 
 some Protestants think, that this is a grand memorial 
 act, — that one of its greatest purposes is to call to 
 mind ; but this is not all. Something important has 
 been dropped. 
 
 Though we must regard both these views on either 
 extreme as erroneous, yet they are not without this 
 value, at least, that each gives especial and emphatic 
 effect to some one aspect of the truth. But what is 
 our view of this matter? It is a view not without 
 great difficulties, and I do not wish to represent it 
 otherwise. We find in our Twenty-eighth Article these 
 two assertions : ** To such as rightly, worthily, and by 
 faith receive the same, the bread which we break is a 
 partaking of the body of Christ, and likewise the cup 
 of blessing is a partaking of the blood of Christ." This 
 alone might mean Transubstantiation. Another asser- 
 tion, however, is added : " The body of Christ is given, 
 taken, and eaten in the supper only after a heavenly and 
 spiritual manner; and the mean whereby the body of 
 Christ is received and eaten in the supper is Faith'' 
 
THE LORD'S SUPPER. 57 
 
 Now, although there is some appearance of con- 
 fusion in this language, it certainly means two things, 
 — that while the wJiole is a spiritual proceeding, yet it 
 still in some way puts us in possession of and union 
 with the body and blood of Christ; that we eat but 
 the consecrated bread and wine, and yet in doing that 
 are united to the whole person of Christ, body as well 
 as soul. This will not appear contradictory if it be 
 thus explained : by the sensible effect of bread and 
 wine presenting vividly to the imagination the Saviour 
 broken and bleeding, — by this, and by the special 
 promise of God, believers in the sacrament are spirit- 
 ually united to Christ in an emphatic and eminent de- 
 gree : their spirit to his. A transubstantiation takes 
 place, but a far more profound one than a change of 
 body, — a changing over of the very substance of the 
 believer's spirit into that of his Lord. This union, 
 thus begun in the spirit, has in it the germ of a union 
 extending down through the whole nature, even by the 
 force of the one divine Spirit, which is able to subdue 
 all things even unto itself. In the words of Arch- 
 bishop Seeker : *' The pious and virtuous receiver 
 eats the flesh and drinks the blood, in the sense that 
 he shared in the life and strength derived from his 
 incarnation and death, and through faith in him 
 becomes by a vital union one with him." Or we 
 might go further: it is through this spirit only, 
 which will work out all its results in due season, — 
 it is through it that we become " members," as the 
 
58 THE LORD'S SUPPER. 
 
 apostle says, " of his body, of his flesh, and of his 
 bones." 
 
 Though no one may conceive rightly as to the mode, 
 it seems clear enough that no other view fully satisfies 
 Scripture language, which on the one hand requires 
 (if we give it anything like its due and natural force) 
 the most intimate union conceivable between Christ 
 and his people, and on the other hand requires no 
 less that the union be not a gross communication of 
 body and blood, but spiritual, or at least begun in 
 spirit. 
 
 When, therefore, the emblem of the broken body 
 is placed in the hand of the humble and penitent be- 
 liever, and he hears the voice of his divine Master 
 saying to him, " This is my body, broken for you," let 
 him realize vividly the presence and forgiveness and 
 love of his Saviour, and surrender his whole being, 
 body, soul, and spirit, into communion and union 
 with him. 
 
 I have now stated as well as I could in so small a 
 space the different opinions of this ordinance, and 
 what we suppose is the true view of it. Let me briefly 
 advert to some of the benefits of it. But these are in 
 no wise to be attained by those who lightly or unad- 
 visedly come to this holy feast. There must be con- 
 sideration, self-examination, unfeigned sorrow for sin, 
 and a humble faith in the Lord Jesus, "whose blood 
 cleanseth from all sin." Without this temper, we but 
 eat and drink judgment to ourselves. I do not say 
 
THE LORD'S SUPPER. 59 
 
 " damnation " to ourselves, as it is in our version, for 
 that by common consent is not the proper translation 
 of the word, and is so awful as only to be fitted to 
 discourage or even destroy the soul. 
 
 Approaching, then, in a fit temper of mind this holy 
 communion, we shall surely find, as I have said, its bene- 
 fits to be great. Nothing could be devised which is a 
 greater assistance to the weakness of faith. We as it 
 were " touch and taste and handle " the Word of life ; 
 the great Sacrifice once offered for the sins of the world 
 is placed in our midst. Here, too, is a lesson of humil- 
 ity and penitence most impressive. Here is the Son 
 of God set forth as made a sin-offering for us. The 
 scene of the crucifixion is lived over again, and we 
 look upon him whom we have pierced, and wail be- 
 cause of him ! It is to this mind that God would 
 bring us. Prayer made to him will then be answered. 
 
 "A broken heart, my God, my King, 
 Is all the sacrifice I bring ; 
 The God of grace will ne'er despise 
 A broken heart for sacrifice." 
 
 But it is not only or chiefly a feast of sorrow; it is 
 a feast of joy, a sacrament of thanksgiving and hope 
 and love. As to thankfulness and hope, in our church 
 service we find that this is ranked as the first and 
 highest of all the acts of worship which the occasion 
 should call forth. 
 
 With joy should we take the cup of salvation. We 
 are admitted to drink of the wells of eternal life. We 
 
6o THE LORD'S SUPPER. 
 
 are admitted to mystical union with Christ. What 
 unspeakable gifts are freely, sensibly offered to all, 
 even to the vilest of sinners. The hopeless, the 
 outcast returning homeward, see here hung out the 
 signals and pledges of peace, of forgiving love, of 
 reconciliation and restoration. 
 
 Besides these things, this is the great sacrament of 
 love. '* Herein was love, that this man laid down his 
 life for his friends." To perpetuate forever before the 
 eyes of the race the sight of his dead body, broken 
 for us, and thus to melt into deepest tenderness the 
 heart, — this was the great purpose of the institution. 
 " This do in remembrance of me." There is in this 
 more to draw and chain the human heart to duty than 
 all the systems of morality ever devised. '' If a man 
 love me, he will keep my words." 
 
VI. 
 
 THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 It was the third hour, and they a'ucijied him. — Mark xv. 25. 
 
 ^ I ^HE law of suffering and effort as a condition of 
 -*- the evolution of character, and of its exhibition 
 and influence, I take to be the widest and deepest law 
 under which all spirits stand. God has prepared a 
 great spectacle of suffering. Why? No suffering is 
 fortuitous, — that God doth not willingly afflict is a 
 great truth, — least of all the suffering of Christ. 
 Why, then? 
 
 First, his sufferings were necessary, not only to mani- 
 fest but also to originate that excellence which seems 
 most divine to our conceptions, and which is, in fact, a 
 new type of the nature of the invisible God. I mean 
 that God, viewed as giving his Son to suffer, and the 
 Son of God viewed as suffering, present an image of 
 moral or divine excellence unspeakably above any other 
 image of the divine nature it is possible for us to think 
 of, and that suffering was the necessary condition 
 through which this exhibition originated and was made. 
 I view the agony of Calvary as the means of a new era 
 in the manifestation of God, in that it presented the 
 divine nature in the position (in some real sense) of 
 
62 THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 trial, of exigency, of painful and indescribable effort in 
 behalf of the creature. " He learned obedience by the 
 things which he suffered." He was made " perfect 
 through sufferings." 
 
 Secondly, the sufferings of Christ were intended to 
 be of infinite value to man as a solace for his miseries 
 in the loneliness of the human soul, especially in its 
 deeper experiences, — and as a guide, incentive, and 
 benign exemplar through the difficulties of his life and 
 death. '* We have not an high priest which cannot be 
 touched with the feeling of our infirmities." 
 
 Thirdly, these sufferings of Jesus Christ were the 
 penalty for the sins of mankind. He was set forth as 
 a sacrifice, the Lamb slain in our place and for us. I 
 do not mean that Christ bore in himself the penalty 
 that we should have borne. Abhorred be the thought 
 that he should feel in his soul any consciousness of 
 guilt, any agony of remorse ! Divinely innocent 
 Sufferer, far be that from thee ! The weak and false 
 fancies of men have made this divine Lamb to bear 
 our precise penalty, both as to the sort of suffering and 
 the degree of it. As to the nature of these sufferings, 
 and how they availed to our acquittance, we can say 
 nothing at present. It is sufficient to know that they 
 were borne purely for us, and that the result of them 
 is freedom, life, salvation, unconditioned and unstinted, 
 to every one who believes. 
 
 In view of all this, I say that the right feeling and 
 comprehension of the sufferings of Jesus Christ con- 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION. 63 
 
 stitutc the whole of the Gospel of God. It is the spe- 
 cial will of God that we should deliberately contemplate 
 it. This is our warrant for intruding into precincts so 
 sacred. 
 
 If I were not forbidden by Christianity to do so, I 
 should suppose the fact of the necessity of suffering 
 reached up even to the divine nature itself, — that 
 God's purposes, in common with those of all the crea- 
 tures made in his image, could only be worked out by 
 sacrifice, by losing the life and finding it again, by effort, 
 through a dark element which is against. Look around 
 you : God certainly seems to be painfully laboring under 
 a heavy opposition in matter and in soul. " The whole 
 creation," and the Creator with it, seems to be " groan- 
 ing and travailing in pain together until now." Indeed, 
 the sacred Scriptures do not entirely deny such a hos- 
 tile element, opposing, and as if frustrating, the divine 
 work itself, for the very name Satan signifies tJiat which 
 is against, — tJie opposcr ; and the New Testament rep- 
 resents that the mastery over that mysterious adverse 
 power is to be effected only ultimately, and through 
 infinite sacrifice. 
 
 This is in accordance with some of the latest results 
 of our modern thought, the conclusions of human phi- 
 losophy seeming to place us substantially on the same 
 grounds with early revelation. All deliverance, I re- 
 peat, is through suffering and blood. We at least are 
 all born to suffer, and to reach, if we reach at all, 
 through trial ; and this whether for ourselves or for 
 
64 ^ THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 Others. It is the divine material out of which a new 
 creation may be made, clear as silver or diamond ; for 
 all our evils may be turned into self-sacrifice, and all 
 self-sacrifice is victory and glory and honor. 
 
 Now in this we — nay, the whole mass of struggling 
 souls — are a wide image of him, the Captain of all 
 salvation, who rendered himself up to death, purified 
 himself through the things which he suffered, and 
 purified and saved others through the same self-sacri- 
 fice and love. Take these last scenes: see how the 
 Redeemer emerges through them. The evangelists, 
 as if sensible that the revelation and power of the 
 Son of God were greatest at the end, and in propor- 
 tion to exigencies and trial, here expand these in 
 order that divine self-sacrifice may be seen, and may 
 redeem the spirit of the world. 
 
 What these sufferings were not can be better told 
 than what they were. To be poor, to be unknown, 
 to suffer much physical discomfort, to be humiliated, 
 as we say, were in themselves no great trials to the Son 
 of God. If he was '' from above, and above all," this 
 sort of trial would bring no heavy sacrifice to him. 
 He had at times no place to lay his head ; but he liked 
 to feel that though " the foxes have holes, and the birds 
 of the air have nests, the Son of man" had no place 
 '' to lay his head " but upon the bosom of the Father. 
 Others were fretted by hunger, others would have ad- 
 mired Martha for attending to their comforts; but he 
 thought Mary had chosen the better part. His meat 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION. 65 
 
 was to do the will of him that sent him, and to finish 
 his work. 
 
 Many will think that his obscurity on the earth, 
 the neglect of the high, were burning humiliations for 
 the Son of God ; but what to his majesty were the 
 opinions and honors of a mass of such beings as we 
 are? His chief sorrows were not of this sort. The 
 sufferings of his crucifixion were partly, no doubt, 
 from the keen pangs of a body peculiarly sensitive to 
 physical pain, but chiefly even then, I think, from the 
 perfection of his heart. If we would have a compre- 
 hensive idea of the things which he suffered, we must 
 think of what he was. If we think, for example, of 
 his relations to the Father, and think of cloud and 
 doubt hiding the Father's face; if we think of his 
 relations to man, — he their Saviour, and yet there 
 the surging sea of deviltry, swaying and dashing and 
 hissing at his feet, these things will give us some idea 
 of the depth of his sufferings. Beyond this I enter 
 not into the consideration of them ; yet I feel the 
 beauty and force of that petition in the Greek liturgy, 
 *' By thy 2inknow7i sorrows, good Lord, deliver us." 
 
 We now approach the last scene. I will omit the 
 stupendous denial of Peter in the high priest's hall, 
 when he said with cursing and oaths that he did not 
 know the man. I will not dwell upon the fact that 
 they all forsook him and fled, or upon the scenes called 
 the trials of Christ, of which there w^ere certainly four 
 and perhaps six, — scenes of unparalleled outrage, in 
 
 5 
 
66 THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 which the victim was awfully harassed and racked. I 
 must omit his divine demeanor through all this, say- 
 ing, however, that God so arranged that when the Son 
 appeared the Jew appeared at his side, to test and 
 bring out by an ideal cruelty the ideal glory of the 
 soul of Christ. There they stood together and will 
 stand, they discovering him and he discovering them. 
 
 It seems to me that God intended to set forth this 
 greatest of transactions by the most wonderful methods 
 that could be devised. He places before us that head 
 on which there are many crowns, covered with a crown 
 of thorns ; he shows us a reed in the hand which for- 
 ever holds the sceptre of the world, — him whose train 
 fills the temple of all this earth coming forth in a mock 
 purple robe, and the eye blindfolded which saw God. 
 
 But look especially at his patience and silence. The 
 apostle James seems particularly struck with his pa- 
 tience, his fathomless endurance: "Ye have heard of 
 the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the 
 Lord." " He did oppose his patience to their fury, 
 and armed himself to suffer, with a quietness of spirit, 
 the very rage and tyranny of theirs." Hope, though 
 usually and singularly paramount in him, is absent 
 through these last scenes. It was simple endurance. 
 I remember but one distinct forward look of hope : 
 " I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, 
 until that day when I drink it new with you in my 
 Father's kingdom." 
 
 Then his silence. His judges, Pilate above all, felt 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION. 67 
 
 this silence with awe. That a man should make no 
 effort for his life filled them with astonishment and 
 fear. But he, knowing that words would avail nothing, 
 was silent, and left it to his cross, to his blood, to his 
 grave, to speak. 
 
 When Pilate found he could not save him but by 
 some sacrifice to himself, he gave the fatal order for 
 the crucifixion, the fatal command, " Ibis ad crucem." 
 He is condemned ; and in a few moments all is made 
 ready for departure to the place of death. 
 
 Of the way to the cross we know little. The Church 
 of the Middle Ages has well called it the Via Dolorosa, 
 and filled the w^ay with tragic traditions all unknown 
 to us. But this we know, — that Jesus could not bear 
 his cross, as criminals were required to do; probably 
 fell under it, and probably was urged and scourged 
 forward, but certainly could carry it no longer. We 
 must remember that he was weakened by suffering and 
 the terrible scourging to which he had been subjected. 
 I must notice here that the Gospels, so far from exag- 
 gerating, give the barest outlines of the chief facts. 
 They say next to nothing about the passage to Cal- 
 vary. Saint Luke, however, does tell us what we are 
 glad to hear, — that amid all this carnival of hell, in 
 the surging of that crowd of enemies or silent friends, 
 there were " women, which also bewailed and lamented 
 him." 
 
 Arrived at last, the cross-beams are nailed together, 
 and while they are lying on the ground the victim is 
 
6S THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 nailed to them. Then, '' Father, forgive them ; they 
 know not what they do." The cross is raised, and 
 with a shock dropped into its hole and firmly planted. 
 There he hung, dying, from nine o'clock until three. 
 The crisis was " about the ninth hour," when he cried 
 with a loud voice, saying, "Eli! Eli! lama sabacthani? 
 that is to say, My God ! My God ! why hast thou for- 
 saken me?" Man first forsook him, — "they all forsook 
 him and fled," — but now, at last, he is forsaken of God. 
 WJiy hast thou forsaken me? TJioil for whose love I 
 am here, art thou gone too? 
 
 Judge his trial when that faith, that trust, which he 
 had without measure, seemed to crumble in his bosom. 
 He was left alone, as if without God or hope, and so 
 descended into the dark, crying again with an exceed- 
 ing loud voice. If that were so, even while it opens 
 a gulf of horror which we dare not look down into, 
 do not think that in him the faith of faithfulness was 
 gone, though the glad and enjoying trust of the Son 
 of man was gone for that moment. God was still 
 " My God ; " he was a God looked to, appealed to, 
 adjured; and though it was a trial which had gone so 
 deep that it tore away the soul, its glad faith, its peace, 
 its hope, still it left the heart in the midst of the infinite 
 ruin, true, clinging to God to the last gasp. 
 
 But what a scene ! There are two great centres of 
 darkness in the history of these sufferings : first, " My 
 soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death; " second, 
 this, and this above all, — that cup which was pressed 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION. 69 
 
 to his lips in Gethsemane, and which was so bitter 
 that he said, '* If it be possible, let this cup pass from 
 me," is pressed to his lips again. Drink, Son of man, 
 drink to the dregs; it is death to you, but it is salvation 
 to all. 
 
 The evangelists say that Nature suffered a revolution, 
 that the earth was dark, and the great " veil of the 
 temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom 
 [as if to open the path from sinful man to his God], 
 and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent, and the 
 graves were opened." And it surely ought to have 
 been so. The spiritual world seemed broken up ; why 
 not the natural? The Lamb of God is dead, trod out 
 of the earth and forsaken of God. So it seemed. The 
 light must darken in the heavens. Nature must cry out, 
 and the earth must wail because oi him, as one waileth 
 for an only son. 
 
 And now I ask, W/ij/ all this? Sin! sin! God was 
 behind, allowing the law of sorrow to do its work of 
 deliverance and redemption in the bosom of the Son 
 of God, — that law which prepares life through death; 
 that law which purified the highest through the things 
 which he suffered, and through him redeemed all the 
 souls which really behold him. And, oh joy ! though 
 sunk so low, the height in purity and power to which 
 he rose was exactly correspondent to the depth to 
 which he went down ; and when he finished his great 
 cry, "Eli!" the everlasting crown was placed upon 
 his head, and the redemption of the earth was begun, 
 
70 THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
 established. Shall not the death of the Lord break 
 the power of sin in us and in all? 
 
 " Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our 
 sorrows: he was wounded for our trangressions, he 
 was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of 
 our peace was upon him ; and with his stripes we are 
 healed. All we like sheep have gone astray ; we have 
 turned every one to his own way ; and the Lord hath 
 laid on him the iniquity of us all." 
 
VII. 
 
 EASTER. 
 
 He is risen; he is 7iot here : behold the place where they laid 
 him. — Mark xvi. i. 
 
 T TERE is the announcement of an angel to simple 
 -^ -*• women. It is singular (I do not speak it in 
 praise, but merely as a fact), — the prominence of 
 women in the Gospels, and their natural affinity to 
 Christ and Christianity in all ages. No ; not singular, 
 but instructive and impressive. A woman washed his 
 feet with tears. A woman said of him, *' Come, see 
 a man which told me all things that ever I did : is 
 not this the Christ?" Women followed him and min- 
 istered to him. Two women were among his closest 
 friends. During the last scene women wept him and 
 also bewailed him. It is pleasing to think that when 
 all else deserted him and fled, the tears of women 
 gave some natural solace to his heart. And we read 
 that at the moment when all was just over, there were 
 women *' looking on afar off; " and there were others, 
 as Saint John states it, just under the cross, — as near, 
 I presume, as the soldiers would let them be; and 
 
^2 EASTER. 
 
 in this company (whether standing near or standing 
 off) were Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of 
 James, '^ and many other women which came up with 
 him unto Jerusalem." It was quite a noticeable fact. 
 And these women kept near, it seems, after life had 
 left him, and watched the descent from the cross, and 
 watched all that was done ; and when at last Joseph 
 took the body to his tomb, two of them followed and 
 v/atched. And at last '* Mary Magdalene and Mary 
 the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid." And 
 then, I presume, they departed. But when the Sabbath 
 was past, these women, having bought some sweet and 
 costly spices (though they were but poor), came that 
 they might anoint him, and to tJiem the first word of 
 the new life came. 
 
 Through the week just past we have followed Jesus 
 up to his cross and his sepulchre, and have seen him 
 dead who was the life of the world. All things 
 seem to have declared for wrong and for supreme 
 cruelty; and holiness and love hung nailed to the 
 cross. It has been '' the hour and power of dark- 
 ness." The crowd dispersed, the priests, much pleased, 
 went back to the temple. The governor was in his 
 palace. On yesterday, which was the Jewish sabbath, 
 the priests and elders and people thronged the courts 
 of the temple ; the blood of two hundred thousand 
 lambs — the usual number — was shed, incense rose, 
 and the grand and solemn worship of the Jews was 
 celebrated. Jesus is dead; the real Paschal Lamb 
 
EASTER. 73 
 
 is sacrificed; and a dusky figure — some Satanic Power 
 — has sat down on the throne ! But — but " very early 
 in the morning, the first day of the week," certain 
 women *' came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the 
 sun ; " and some one said unto them : *' Be not af- 
 frighted : ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was cruci- 
 fied : he is risen ; he is not here : behold the place 
 where they laid him." If the earth quaked at his 
 death, the heavens themselves should have broken 
 open at that announcement ! 
 
 This, then, is the morning of the resurrection. The 
 first day of the era of new life for us and for all 
 creatures has begun. Of this fact I might ofTer posi- 
 tive and elaborate evidence, attesting directly and in- 
 directly and multitudinously ; but it is not necessary. 
 I might show also the harmony of the event with all 
 facts, with all truths, with all human wants. I might 
 show you its justice, its mercy, its beauty, — that it 
 is the desire and the demand of the groaning world. 
 I might show its power. Nay, far more than that. 
 Look at the contrary : if Christ is not risen, — if he 
 is gone, sunk ; if his last wail is forever true, that God 
 has forsaken him, — then, I say, that fact has added 
 a weight against God, against the character, against 
 the very being of God, — has added somewhat against 
 him which is as deep as the earth and wide as the 
 sea ! But the news is that Christ is risen ! He is not 
 holden of death ! The enigmas of Providence and 
 the world — the central darkness — is lit up as by light- 
 
74 EASTER. 
 
 nings. The news is that injustice and wickedness 
 are shown to be but for a moment, and that the right 
 shall have dominion in the morning! The news is 
 that to those who have the spirit of Christ there are 
 properly no more such things as evil and death. 
 Blessed are they, for they shall have part in his 
 resurrection, and upon them no death shall have 
 power. 
 
 If this is true, was there ever heard such news? 
 For if Christ live forevermore, it is possible, probable, 
 pledged indeed, that we shall live forevermore. He 
 is but "the first-fruits of them that slept." Just as 
 the Jews plucked the first delicate corn and grass and 
 fruits and carried them up to the Lord, so he was 
 carried up in this springtime of Easter, as a sign 
 and pledge of the great harvest of the dead coming 
 after. 
 
 If Christ be not risen, every dead body preaches 
 annihilation; or, at least, a deep shadow rests upon 
 the grave. Spite of all the little proofs, little hopes 
 of men, ** it still remains true that there is but little 
 hope, — that the last known and recorded thing of 
 the strongest man is his weakness, of the wisest man 
 is the failure of his powers, of the best man that he 
 has suffered the punishment of sin." Science would 
 leave the world as it was left when Christ said, ** Eli ! 
 Eli! lama sabacthani ? " But now we see Christ risen, 
 and the great things of hope have become the great 
 things of fact, of experience. ** God hath both raised 
 
EASTER. 75 
 
 up the Lord, and will also raise us up by his own 
 power." 
 
 It is very easy to talk of the resurrection — of the 
 boundless relief of the resurrection — in some half- 
 flippant way. Do I feel it? Do I know — have I ever 
 reflected — what the state of man is without Christ 
 raised; v/ithout the hopes of this morning? All our 
 souls, their highest and their natural instincts, yearn 
 for and demand continuance. The whole race demands 
 a rising again. But without Christ risen there is not 
 only no certainty of immortality for us, but many 
 presumptions against it. Christ perished, unraised, un- 
 vindicated, with the wail of desertion on his lips, — 
 that does not leave things as he found them ; that dark- 
 ens the old hope, darkens God, and leaves us to the doc- 
 trine of death. We will die as the beasts ; and why 
 not? We are creatures like the insects, — here we are 
 to-day, to-morrow passed as a mist, — without Christ. 
 I know not how long man has been upon the earth, 
 but long enough for us to know that the generations 
 are but shadows. Oh, our nothingness ! Take the town 
 we live in. Though it is only of yesterday, yet it seems 
 very old and sad when we think of the people who 
 have passed through it, — these very streets occupied 
 and emptied so many times. We are dream-people. 
 
 Yearning for life, but sinking in death, what hope is 
 there? As the world goes on, the hope for us does not 
 increase ! The race advances, but the hope for each 
 man does not advance. After all that modern thought 
 
je EASTER. 
 
 and discovery have reached, the light around the grave 
 thickens. Among our discoveries we cannot discover 
 immortaHty. " The vulture's eye hath not seen It." 
 So, in this dark and gloom of Nature, we cry like chil- 
 dren in the night; we cry aloud, '' Is there any hope? " 
 What answer? Listen! Nothing but silence. That 
 silence is our answer. Like a ship on fire and sinking 
 at sea, we glance for aid from horizon to horizon ; but 
 over and through this frightful waste no help, no man, 
 no God appears, and we are about dumbly to sink, each 
 in his turn, like lead into the waters. There is no hope ; 
 it is all guess. Such is the state of facts without the 
 Easter morning. I repeat, then, that there never was 
 such news as the news of to-day ! The Captain, the 
 Precursor, has gone through ! He has shown us the 
 path of life; and the redeemed race, dying with him, 
 will forever live with him. 
 
 I wish I knew how to speak about such a fact. Only 
 a few of us are real and deep believers. If we did be- 
 lieve we would rejoice, and our miserable lives would 
 be raised up at once. If we did believe, our feeble, 
 failing virtue, always needing fresh strength, would find 
 it here. Our cares and sorrows, always needing fresh 
 consolations, would find them here. Why is it that, 
 standing in such awful need of this fact, we do not grasp 
 it, and give to ourselves some joy on earth? Why? 
 The secret reason is that we know that, to rise as Christ 
 did, we must, like him, '' first die to sin and live to 
 righteousness." It was the heavenly and powerful 
 
EASTER. 77 
 
 Spirit of Christ — *' the Hfe to righteousness" — which 
 raised him up ; it was by and through the Eternal Spirit 
 that was in him, which was too strong for death, as the 
 apostle says; and it is by sharing in the same spirit 
 that we also shall rise. This we do not seem to know. 
 Nor do we know the reverse, — that the man who does 
 not share in the spirit of Christ cannot share the resur- 
 rection of life, for one follows the other. The resurrec- 
 tion morning, then, can only be a joy to those who have 
 at least the beginnings of Christ's spirit in them, — 
 ** Christ formed in them the hope of glory." There 
 must be first a resurrection of real life in the human 
 heart before, and in order to, the resurrection of the 
 body. 
 
 But we don't think enough of this resurrection of our 
 hearts ; we don't think much of the passing from evil 
 to good, from death to life, in the spirit and at this 
 moment; we don't think enough of the triumph of a 
 good thought and feeling over an evil, — to repress 
 hatred by forgiveness, — and that our hearts, like the 
 dissolving lights, should pass from pictures of earth to 
 those of heaven, and all that is small give place to that 
 which is noble; but we think the resurrection of the 
 body a great matter. We say, "Oh yes; the great 
 resurrection ! " 
 
 We mistake. The greatness is in the change of the 
 spirit. It is possible, I think probable, perhaps neces- 
 sary, that the pure spirit of a man, when once formed 
 over into the likeness of Christ, will, in its long history 
 
78 EASTER. 
 
 to come (for we believe that it grows), take to itself a 
 thousand successive or numberless bodies, — always, in 
 a sense, the same body, as the spirit is always the same 
 spirit, — but each body in its details passing away, as 
 the spirit becomes ready for a higher form and needs it. 
 So that the spirit in us, once raised, — that is, come out 
 from the death of sin now and here, — this is tliat first 
 rcsitrrcctioUy compared with which all bodily resurrec- 
 tions are secondary, and will follow as a matter of course 
 whenever the gradual enlargement of the soul needs 
 them. 
 
 I say, then, that every good affection felt in the heart, 
 every good will, every confiding feeling towards the 
 Redeemer of our spirits, is the beginning in us of the 
 noblest resurrection. We must, then, begin to live in 
 our hearts, and then as certainly as Christ lives we shall 
 live also : death is utterly abolished. 
 
 Don't think lightly of the heart. Learn to estimate 
 the value of it by this, — that it is the beginning and 
 fountain of all resurrections. Deny, then, and reject 
 the wrongs of your heart, for that is the resurrection of 
 death, and turn to those opposite feelings which in fact 
 are the resurrection feelings of life, which are so deep 
 in vitality and value that they must bloom out into 
 eternal life. 
 
 The truth I teach is : Your body must go with your 
 spirit; if the one is alive, the other will be alive also. 
 To you, then, who wish to trust in the divine mercy, 
 and would begin at this moment to be what your heart 
 
EASTER. 79 
 
 tells you you ought to be, — rejoice ! Your resurrection 
 begins now, and the resurrection of the body awaits 
 you. This is the day the Lord hath made. The cry 
 of joy is in the tabernacles of the righteous. Christ 
 is risen. 
 
VIII. 
 
 THE ASCENSION. 
 
 And it ca7}te to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from 
 the7n, and carried icp into heaven, — Luke xxiv. 51. 
 
 T T /"E have commemorated the resurrection of Christ. 
 ^ ^ We now commemorate the ascension of Christ. 
 It is well perhaps, as a matter of custom, to review 
 annually these great and interesting facts ; and what is 
 wanting in freshness in such subjects should be sup- 
 plied by the permanent importance they must ever 
 possess to all mankind. 
 
 This event did not take place until forty days after 
 the resurrection and ten days before the Pentecost. 
 It seems at first a very strange fact that the risen Lord 
 should remain for that period of time among men, — 
 among them and yet not of them. Some have sup- 
 posed that his body was passing in that time through 
 *' a slow and physical purification to be meet for ascend- 
 ing; " but such reasons are rather curious than prob- 
 able. Still, there were good reasons for it. It was of 
 the utmost importance, for instance, thoroughly to con- 
 vince and instruct the minds of those who were to be 
 the founders of the Church. His appearance among 
 them might have seemed a delusion if it had occurred 
 
THE ASCENSION. 8 1 
 
 only in one day or a few days. It might then have 
 come to be ranked with many wonderful stories — as 
 to the seeing of spirits. But to see him through so 
 long a time as forty days must have given his followers 
 a sort of certainty and familiarity with the fact which 
 nothing could shake. This is intimated by Saint Luke : 
 '* He showed himself alive after his passion by many 
 infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days." Noth- 
 ing could have so assuring an effect as time. Besides, 
 he spent this time in opening their understandings and 
 speaking to them of the things pertaining to the king- 
 dom of God. He taught them the ancient prophecies 
 as to himself, beginning at Moses and all the prophets ; 
 he showed them the meaning of his mission on earth, — 
 that Christ ought to have suffered these things, and 
 then to enter into his glory. More than this : he im- 
 bued them with the spirit of his religion. One of the 
 reasons that they so slowly believed his resurrection 
 (for he had clearly told them he would rise) was that 
 they could not believe the Messiah could have such a 
 poor, quiet, unimposing resurrection. Their idea of the 
 resurrection was that it was to be a magnificent jubi- 
 lee, at which the Messiah should call up the venerated 
 forefathers of their race, and the splendors of his king- 
 dom begin. Such a notion was not easily uprooted. 
 
 Again: he informed them during this time of the 
 future and their own conduct in it. I think we have 
 very little impression in general of the amount of our 
 Lord's teachings when on earth, and especially little, 
 
 6 
 
82 THE ASCENSION. 
 
 I think, do we know of all that he said and did during 
 these forty days. '' There are also," says John, *' many 
 other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should 
 be written every one, I suppose that even the world 
 itself could not contain the books that should be 
 written." 
 
 Thus, having proved all things and ordered all things, 
 he was ready to ascend. He had corrected and en- 
 lightened their understandings; he had roused their 
 affections ; he had solaced their hearts, infusing courage 
 and hope; he had prepared for the important future; 
 and so he was ready, and then only ready, to ascend. 
 
 He, being with the disciples in some private place in 
 Jerusalem, first laid a strict and peculiar charge upon 
 them, — that they should not depart from that city 
 until there they received the full effusion of the Holy 
 Spirit. Having done this, he led out the company to 
 Mount Ohvet, a short distance from Jerusalem. It was 
 at the base of this mountain that the garden of Geth- 
 semane lay, in which he had lately endured his suffer- 
 ings ; there he had been apprehended as a malefactor, 
 and there, or on the elevated ground just above, he was 
 now to be exalted to heaven as a Prince and King. 
 
 On the top of that mount, below and near which lay 
 the city and temple, surrounded by a company, perhaps 
 a few and perhaps as many as five hundred, he gave 
 his parting commands, and lifting up over them those 
 hands which were never raised save in benediction, 
 he for the last time solemnly blessed them. " And 
 
THE ASCENSION. 83 
 
 it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted 
 from them, and carried up into heaven." 
 
 As "he blessed them, he was parted from them." 
 If this were a mere poetic conception, nothing could 
 be conceived more beautifully. In what fine harmony 
 is it with all his life ! " On earth peace, good-will to 
 men," was the first utterance spoken of him; from 
 his childhood the very atmosphere about him seemed a 
 perpetual and tender benediction ; and his last gesture, 
 the last sound from his sacred lips, was still blessing. 
 
 As one of the objects of this his public ascent was 
 to convince, it was no doubt done in the clearest 
 manner. It seems probable that he was slowly and 
 in a stately manner wafted from them while the last 
 words of his blessing were falling from his lips. So, 
 gradually, he rose until a cloud above '' received him 
 out of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly 
 toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood 
 by them in white apparel, which also said, Ye men of 
 Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same 
 Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven, shall 
 so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into 
 heaven." 
 
 Their attention turned in this touching manner from 
 the sorrow of parting to the joy of an expected meeting 
 and permanent reunion with the beloved Master, the 
 company gradually left the spot, their hearts impressed 
 at once with the deepest sorrow and the most exulting 
 hopes. 
 
84 THE ASCENSION. 
 
 Thus was finished the earthly career of Jesus Christ 
 the Son of God, *' whom the heaven must receive until 
 the times of restitution of all things." ** Lift up your 
 heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting 
 doors; and the King of glory shall come in." 
 
 And now let me briefly remind you of some of those 
 lessons which this event teaches. In the first instance, 
 if, as I endeavored to prove to you, the resurrection of 
 Christ gives solid evidence of two great facts, namely, 
 the immortality of man, and the final triumph of holi- 
 ness and right, then the ascension is in the highest 
 degree the completion of that evidence ; for in this we 
 see that the power of death was not only overcome, 
 but overcome permanently; and that goodness was 
 rewarded in the person of Christ, not only by his 
 freedom from death, but also by his exaltation to 
 glory. 
 
 We must view Christ as the representative in a sense 
 of the whole race, and the perfect image of those who 
 follow his steps. Every good man in the sufferings 
 of life and in the penalty of death does partake with 
 Christ, in some degree, of that curse which he bore 
 for all ; and in like manner shall those who are truly 
 one with him, grafted in by a living faith, rise up from 
 death, for it is impossible that they should now be 
 holden by it. They too, I say, must in like manner 
 and by the same spirit emerge from the grave and the 
 gate of death ; and not only that, but, still joined and 
 made one with him in his wonderful destiny, must 
 
THE ASCENSION. 85 
 
 pass, as he passed, into the highest place, to meet 
 inconceivable rewards and to penetrate into an incon- 
 ceivable glory. 
 
 With these inducements would that, like him, we 
 could tread firmly in the steps of duty, running "with 
 patience the race that is set before us, looking unto 
 Jesus, who for the joy that was set before him, en- 
 dured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down 
 at the right hand of the throne of God." 
 
 Again, consider the fact that he went into that 
 higher state with a human body. This wonderful fact, 
 like most others in the New Testament, was fore- 
 shadowed by something of a similar nature. '' Enoch 
 was translated that he should not see death," Elijah 
 was swept away in what seemed a chariot of fire, but 
 in both these instances there is an air of distance and 
 remoteness which makes them seem unreal. 
 
 It appears to me that if even the Son of God, who 
 is eminently a spirit, is represented as existing really 
 embodied in the heavenly state, — if it was the intention 
 to impress this most forcibly by taking him away in 
 that form before our eyes, — then we ought to shape 
 our ideas of the future state so as to correspond with 
 this. Must not that be a state, spiritualized indeed, 
 but still one in which we are to appear in real bodies, 
 and as inhabitants of a real external world? I wonder 
 much that any one should be able to think the con- 
 trary. When we see him, says the apostle, we shall 
 be like him; and one point of that likeness is to be 
 
S6 THE ASCENSION. 
 
 the possession of an entire humanity in body as well 
 as spirit. 
 
 You can realize then, if you will, from this ascent 
 of the body of him who is our Forerunner, the same 
 thing which shall actually take place in respect to us, 
 when all those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall 
 hear his voice and arise, and shall enter upon a state 
 of vivid realities, bodily as well as spiritual. 
 
 Think now how delightful a fact this is, — that Christ 
 has ascended in the human form. What a dignity does 
 it lend to every part of our humanity, that in a human 
 body Christ sits at the head of all power, — that all 
 intelligent beings, however high, shall associate with 
 that form, and with all who wear it, an interest, an 
 attraction, of the most peculiar character; so that all 
 who appear in it shall draw forth at once to themselves 
 the love and joy of all other creatures ! Think, too, 
 what high capacities will belong to it when it shall be 
 a temple fit for the Lord, the King, to dwell in ! Think 
 of what enjoyments it must be susceptible when it 
 shall be the very likeness of him who for his sufferings 
 is in that very form reaping the highest joys ! What 
 a triumph over the thought of death does this give 
 the believer! Death to him shall destroy nothing, 
 but shall recreate everything in a higher form. If 
 our faith had force, we should look through the sorrow, 
 the gloom, the destruction of death, as through a short 
 vista opening on a scene of which this is but the image, 
 that the reality; this as if the shadow of the sweet 
 
THE ASCENSION, 8/ 
 
 heavens when reflected in dim and troubled water, — 
 that, those heavens themselves in their solid, eternal 
 beauty and peace. 
 
 In asserting the likeness of the after-glory of the 
 believer to that of Christ, of course I have not intended 
 to make the degree of this glory similar. Of him it 
 is said that ascending he went higher than the heav- 
 ens, far above all of them, into the holiest, into the 
 magnificent or most excellent glory, and there sat 
 down at the right hand of Majesty, from thence ex- 
 pecting or waiting until all enemies shall be put under 
 his feet. 
 
 Let us reflect for a moment on this his peculiar 
 glory. Sitting down at the right hand of God is of 
 course a figure by which we are to understand taking 
 the place of power and dignity, and particularly the 
 place of rule or administration as the chief officer of 
 a kingdom, into whose hands all afl"airs are committed. 
 From that ascension-day all things were put in sub- 
 jection to him, — the ministry of angels, of men, and 
 of events. "■ In him all fulness dwells." " The gov- 
 ernment" is fully ''upon his shoulder." ''There was 
 given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that 
 all people, nations, and languages should serve him." 
 
 Christ there in the seat of power, his eye beholding, 
 his hand controlling all events, — think of it. Nay, it 
 is almost allowable to picture him to the eye, for there 
 is nothing vague or inconceivable now as to him who 
 rules: it is Christ, he who was born in Bethlehem 
 
88 THE ASCENSION. 
 
 of Judea and lived here under this sun and moon a 
 few hundred years ago. He is the Ruler. You cannot 
 be in danger of thinking it too real. He is there to 
 whose wisdom as a ruler, to whose mild justice as a 
 judge, to whose tenderness as a guardian and pro- 
 tector we may all commit ourselves in every event of 
 life with the deepest assurance and peace. 
 
 It is a great thought that Jesus Christ is now actually 
 our ruler, disposing everything that concerns us ; and 
 whatever event happens to us, whether it seem good 
 or ill, — a deep and bitter grief, or prosperity, — let 
 us always remember that that hand, last seen in 
 benediction, has ordered it, to bring us home to 
 himself. 
 
 The Guide of us men has not left us because he 
 has gone away. Indeed it seems, I know not for what 
 reason, that one of the great objects of his leaving 
 the earth and ascending was that the power of the 
 Spirit, and with it all good gifts, might more effectually 
 be granted to us. " It is expedient," he says, with 
 mournful tenderness accounting to his disciples for 
 his absence, — " it is expedient for you that I go 
 away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not 
 come unto you ; but if I depart, I will send him 
 unto you." 
 
 I say it was his purpose in ascending up on high 
 to obtain gifts for men, which he will dispense the 
 more liberally the more freely they are sought. Now, 
 *' whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do." 
 
THE ASCENSION. 89 
 
 In the last place, in view of Christ's ascension we 
 are bound to remember his reappearance, — "Whom 
 the heaven must receive until the times of restitution 
 of all things." He " shall so come in like manner as 
 ye have seen him go into heaven." " In like manner," 
 which I understand literally. He has descended in 
 various forms since his departure: in the power of 
 his spirit and in the power of his providence, in the 
 consolation of his church and in the overthrow of its 
 enemies; but he is yet, it would seem, to reappear in 
 literal verity. He " shall so come in like manner as ye 
 have seen him go into heaven." " Every eye shall see 
 him." He ascended in the presence of only a few 
 friends, whose testimony we believe ; he will come 
 again in grand publicity. " As the lightning cometh 
 out of the east, and shineth even unto the west, so 
 shall also the coming of the Son of man be." 
 
 To that point we are bound to look forward. It 
 is to come. He shall be seen in the clouds of heaven, 
 and all the holy angels with him. And what shall 
 the purpose be of that grand visit? Why comes he 
 in this power and great glory? He has one purpose 
 before him : he will come to sit upon the throne of 
 his glory, and to render to all the recompense of 
 reward ; to them who have done wickedly, " shame 
 and everlasting contempt ; " to them who have worked 
 righteousness, " glory and honor and immortality." 
 
 To that reappearance, which in some sense certainly 
 every eye shall see, let us all look, and for that day 
 
90 THE ASCENSION. 
 
 of the Lord make ready. Whatever it may be for 
 others, to us let it be, weak, struggling, unworthy as 
 we are, joy through eternity. " Come, ye blessed of 
 my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you." 
 " Ye are they which have continued with me in my 
 temptations; and I appoint unto you a kingdom, even 
 as my Father hath appointed unto me." 
 
IX. 
 
 WHITSUNDAY. 
 
 If I depart^ I will send him wito you. And when he is come, he 
 will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, aftd of 
 Judgfnent : of sin, because they believe not on fne; of right eous- 
 tiess, because I go to my Father, and ye see vie no more j of 
 judg77tent, because the prince of this world is judged. — 
 John xvi. 7-1 1. 
 
 /^^ONSIDER this: a poor man and young, sur- 
 
 ^-^ rounded by a few fishermen and the Hke, about 
 
 to suffer as a malefactor, speaking of the Sacred Spirit, 
 
 of that which Hes below and creates the life of the 
 
 soul, as the god of the air would speak of sending 
 
 his winds, or the sun-god of sending his mysterious 
 
 light; speaking of this overshadowing essence which 
 
 " Dove-like, sit'st brooding on the vast abyss, 
 And mak'st it pregnant," — 
 
 of this, as directing it, despatching it from him, and 
 for the sole purpose of revealing and exalting him, 
 illuminating his face to the world, and circling it 
 with a halo of unearthly lights. With no strain, or 
 consciousness of anything unusual, he puts himself 
 up as the director of the Sacred Spirit, and describes 
 it as gathering around him with all its amplitudes 
 of power and light, to subserve and to illustrate 
 him. 
 
92 WHITSUNDA V. 
 
 Think of that, and tell me whether any alternative 
 is left us but to say, as the Jews did, ** This man hath 
 a devil and is mad," or to say, " Truly this is the Son 
 of God." Just think of it for yourselves, putting any 
 meaning on it you choose. 
 
 '' If I depart, I will send the Comforter unto you." 
 And now, its offices. When this awful agent should 
 come, it was to do three things : " He will reprove the 
 world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment; " 
 that is, show clearly the fact of sin, of righteousness, 
 and of judgment. 
 
 I dare not change the order of these divine words 
 of Jesus, but the three great works of the Spirit will 
 be placed in a more natural gradation for our thoughts 
 if we view the one here put second as the first: "He 
 will reprove the world of righteousness,, because I go to 
 my Father, and ye see me no more." 
 
 While Christ himself was in the world he was the 
 righteous light of the world. Since his face is removed 
 from our eyes, and his words from our ears, the vision 
 and the hearing of the heart must be opened, that, 
 we may see him who is now invisible ; that the soul 
 once impressed through the aid of the senses, now 
 made susceptible, vitalized, by the new Enlightener, 
 may commune face to face with spiritual things. Thus 
 the first office of the Comforter was to '' reprove the 
 world of righteousness." Because the Holy One was 
 to be removed from our eyes, its first office was to 
 stand through all time as a substitute for the senses. 
 
WHITSUNDA Y. 93 
 
 as a higher sense through which \vc may behold and 
 touch the glory of Christ and of all his truth. Nay, 
 not only thus to continue the presence of the divine 
 in the world, but to enlarge its front, and to give us a 
 new and more inward possession of it, — to anoint the 
 eyes to see where the light of suns has never penetrated. 
 
 We must observe how slowly were trained the dis- 
 ciples so long as Christ was with them, — how gradually 
 were moulded even those chosen friends and apostles 
 who were constantly about his person, — how ignorant 
 and material and unpurified and Jewish they were to 
 the last ! But when with the signs of fire and with 
 the rushing of the wind the Enlightener came, these 
 very men stood up filled with the new wine of life, 
 their spirits broadened, elate with grand ideas, em- 
 boldened, set on fire, so that common men — as if 
 God were making the very stones to cry out — from 
 that moment moved upon the world, as the Spirit 
 within them had once moved upon the face of chaos, 
 with a power which pervaded, disturbed, but divinely 
 warmed and divinely reconstructed life. 
 
 So you see what mean the beautiful words, " When 
 the Comforter is come, he will show the world clearly 
 of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye 
 see me no more." This we have seen to become a 
 fact in the history of the world, account for it as we 
 may. There are many things about this divine Pente- 
 cost for which it would be presumptuous in any man 
 to attempt to account. What are all the reasons which 
 
94 WHITSUNDA V. 
 
 delayed the coming of this Spirit until the body of 
 Christ was removed, who can say? If our intelligence 
 could see everything in the relations of the first great 
 Spirit to our spirits and to men as a race, our thoughts 
 would be as deep and wide as God's. Some things 
 we can say, however. It was necessary for the humilia- 
 tion of Christ that he should fulfil his course stripped 
 to so great an extent of light and power. Again, in 
 its operations, this Spirit, like all other power, observes 
 many conditions, acting only according to their con- 
 sent. The bodily presence of Christ as an actual man, 
 though vital as a remembrance, was yet, in spite of all 
 miracles, an obstacle to faith, a constant temptation 
 to doubt and to material views. 
 
 There is a far greater dififtculty, but it is common 
 to natural religion, and appears everywhere in the 
 world and in the history of men; namely, that, grant- 
 ing the existence of gracious influences, they should 
 so limit themselves; that seeing, as we do, at Pente- 
 cost and at other epochs in the ordinary history of 
 the world the spirit of man rising as the surface of 
 a flood from the heaving of the oceanic depths, why 
 the advance and recession of this divine good? Why 
 this vast pledging of itself to hope, only to withdraw? 
 Why, when commissioned to reprove the world of 
 righteousness, to discover that aspect which illuminates 
 and recreates spirits, — why to come in like a tidal wave 
 and then retire, leaving us down at the ordinary rate 
 of our poor existence? 
 
WHITS UNDA V. 95 
 
 I know, of course, that our own depraved wills shut 
 God out; I know that there are reasons of moral 
 discipline in this slowly wrought historical progress; 
 I know also that there may be natural as there cer- 
 tainly are spiritual laws which control here; but still, 
 ** How long, O Lord ! " is the natural cry of the heart 
 which feels that it faints, that the race itself withers, 
 without God. ** Creation itself groaneth," waiting for 
 the '* manifestation of the Sons of God." Reprove, 
 O Comforter, reprove the world of righteousness, be- 
 cause the Holy One has left us, and has gone to the 
 Father, and we see him no more ; because it is fit 
 that all creatures should see him, that we above all, 
 we erring and lost men, should know the expressed 
 and redeeming God. 
 
 '' When the Comforter is come, he will reprove the 
 world o( S171 and of righteousness." This is the second 
 great office of illumination, inherent, indeed, in the 
 first; for when he reproves the world of righteous- 
 ness, then be sure he will in that reprove us of 
 sin. 
 
 ''Of sin, because they believe not on me," — that is, 
 because they do not appreciate and lovingly know him. 
 Reproval of sin follows necessarily from the clear 
 showing of righteousness, from the showing of what 
 Christ is, the Righteous One, and so what was the 
 state of our natures which could turn away with igno- 
 rance and distaste. That which exhibits on the one 
 hand righteousness, or Christ as he is, exhibits just 
 
96 WHITSUNDA Y. 
 
 as plainly on the other what we are who cast him 
 out. A man is as his affections, his tastes are. If we 
 do not even know the One who, by all he is and 
 does and has done, is justly nearest to our hearts, and 
 who rises in divine and measureless excellence above 
 our heads, then we are reproved of stupid blindness, 
 of hardness, of meanness of conception, and of a will 
 averse to the express image of perfection ; and we 
 are reproved of a depth of ingratitude and lowness, 
 just in proportion to the cost and extent of the benefit 
 he conferred and the height of the excellence he re- 
 vealed. When, then, that discovering Spirit shines 
 inward and shows us who this Christ is, it describes us 
 who stand opposed, just as light defines darkness, — 
 reveals, and so condemns us, through all the depth 
 of our consciousness, as the unrighteous, sinners; and 
 since all righteousness is centred and shown in him, 
 the insensibility to it comprehends all sin. 
 
 The revelation, by the truths of philosophy, by 
 our better instincts, by unknown influences coming 
 through Nature or our sorrows, of a better good than 
 we have loved or pursued, — this in the moment it is 
 felt casts a light inward upon what we are, and back- 
 ward upon what we have been; it is the tasting of 
 a spirit which gives us instantly " to discern the 
 madness that is in rage, the folly and the disease that 
 are in envy," and the dishonor through the whole 
 of us; and we stand as the first sinning parents 
 stood when the voice of God in the garden awak- 
 
WHITSUNDAY. 97 
 
 ened them, detected by the light, naked and ashamed. 
 This natural experience is but the shadow of that 
 felt when the Sacred Spirit, by drawing back the veil 
 from the face of Christ, draws back also that veil 
 which " lies upon our own faces, the faces of all flesh," 
 and we see ourselves because w^e see him. Thus " he 
 reproves of sin, because they believe not " in him, and 
 thus this second great result of the Spirit — I mean 
 the opening of self-knowledge and self-condemnation 
 in the heart — comes necessarily of showing Christ to 
 the heart. 
 
 The third and closing office in this grand operation 
 is that '' he will reprove the world of judgment," — that 
 in the very showing of sin he will condemn it ; for as 
 soon as we are made conscious of sin we are conscious 
 of something not only corrupt, but essentially and ne- 
 cessarily a wrong and a usurpation, fit to be judged, 
 which ought to be judged, which is inwardly judged, 
 and from its own conscious weakness foreshadows its 
 outer judgment. Sin once revealed to the soul, there 
 is with it the revelation of a judgment-seat and a final 
 total destruction. 
 
 The Spirit not merely reveals judgment in this way, 
 but by showing the world clearly of Christ it shows him 
 as not only the Righteous One, but the Overcoming 
 One. It shows in this one history of goodness, as it 
 appeared in time and on the earth, under every disad- 
 vantage, that where righteousness was perfectly lived 
 it carried with it victory, even in the moment o^ defeat, 
 
 7 
 
98 • WHITSUNDA V. 
 
 and that death itself could not hold it, but that, tri- 
 umphing openly, it ascended as a victor before the 
 whole creation, and that therefore, as partaking of the 
 same spirit with this first-born and Head, all men may 
 place, as he did, all things and all power beneath their 
 feet. 
 
 So human spirits are on the way to be freed ; the 
 race has begun the process of freedom, of divine dis- 
 enthralling from the spirit of wickedness in the world, 
 '' the prince of the power of the air," as it is mysteri- 
 ously and awfully called, that this, first overcome in the 
 heart of Christ, is thence in all who are Christlike 
 broken. The Spirit which shows this shows judgment 
 on a scale as wide as the disorder, for it shows that the 
 spirit of this world is judged. So when the Comforter 
 is come he will reprove the world, bear inwardly upon 
 the hearts of men the sense of righteousness in Christ, 
 of their own sin, and of judgment, — judgment for sin 
 in the heart and in the history of man, judgment 
 upon the power of evil in the world, — " The prince of 
 this world is judged." 
 
 And now, is all this not surely true? Do we not 
 behold this reign of judgment in its noble beginnings? 
 Do we not date from Christ the exalting of righteous- 
 ness from the dust? Has he not given the foretaste 
 and set on foot the impulse which shall place righteous- 
 ness on every throne? Has he not come as a presence 
 of order to all the confusion, unreason, and oppression 
 of men, as if the voice were audible, — 
 
WHITSUNDA Y. 99 
 
 "'Silence, ye troubled waves! and thou deep, peace!' 
 Said then the omnific Word" ? 
 
 That word has been heard, believe me, and *' the wild 
 uproar stands ruled," or begins to be, — for all creations 
 are slow. 
 
 So then hear once more the wonderful words : ** If 
 I depart, I will send him unto you. And when he is 
 come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteous- 
 ness, and of judgment: of sin, because they believe not 
 on me ; of righteousness, because I go to my Father, 
 and ye see me no more; of judgment, because the 
 prince of this world is judged." 
 
X. 
 
 THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 Being made so ?nuch better than the angels, as he hath by in- 
 heritance obtained a more excelle7it narne thajt they. — He- 
 brews i. 4. 
 
 ^RINITY SUNDAY. Trinity, tri-unity, from '' trias," 
 -^ is a word first used in Antioch, and first found in 
 Theophilus in the year 151. The doctrine of Trinity" 
 has played a great part in history, and in some sense 
 justly, as it substantially expresses the whole doctrine 
 of God ; presenting the divine nature fully and ap- 
 propriately in three great aspects, Creator, Redeemer, 
 Sanctifier, — that is, God creating, rescuing, and uplift- 
 ing; the three great offices of God. But it has been 
 much abused, so that we may agree with Calvin when 
 he says that he " would be willing the name of ' Trin- 
 ity ' should be forgotten and buried if only this much 
 would be acknowledged by all, — that Father, Son, 
 and Holy Spirit, each discriminated by a peculiar 
 property, are one God." By " each being discriminated " 
 he must mean that each is distinguished by a peculiar 
 and deep something, which in a rough, popular way 
 we call " personality," — that is, three persons. 
 
 I shall speak not of '* Trinity," but of the New Testa- 
 ment views of the divinity of Christ. As far as I 
 
THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST. lOI 
 
 understand the New Testament, it sets forth Christ on 
 the one hand as of high descent, on the other hand 
 of high ascent, — that is, as we would express it, that 
 he was of the divine by lineage, by blood, by birth, 
 and that he was of the divine also by his own reach 
 and acquirement; that he was divine by his descent, 
 the only-begotten of God, and divine by his ascent, 
 ** perfect through suffering;" being made, having be- 
 come, '* better than the angels ; " nay, having become 
 so much better than they are '' as he hath by inheri- 
 tance obtained a more excellent name than they," — 
 that is, his elevation over the highest spirits is obtained 
 just as much by his own life as by his nature or descent. 
 This seems to be the meaning of the text, the same 
 meaning expressed by Saint Paul in his '' Epistle to 
 the Philippians," where he says, ** Who, being in the 
 form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with 
 God." *' Wherefore," as a recompense, '' God also hath 
 highly exalted him." 
 
 This fact is noticed and dwelt upon very little, so 
 that the Christian Church, throughout its career, has too 
 much insisted on the glory of his inheritance, — that 
 is, his natural elevation, — to the slighting and omitting 
 of what he obtained, or the character and life he worked 
 out on earth. In concerning itself so much with the 
 natural God, with his lofty and beautiful titles as such, 
 it forgets, or rather has not liked to remember, that 
 peculiar and most sacred title, that he made himself 
 *' better than the angels," that his highest title was 
 
102 THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 the life that he lived. It is as if some crown-prince 
 to-day, not content with inheriting the throne, first 
 desired to win the throne by a life corresponding to 
 the greatness of the place to be won. The Hindoo 
 Brahmins had the same high conception. They said, 
 " Through earnestness did India rise to the leadership 
 of the gods." This is a beautiful view; yet I repeat 
 that the Church has not much dwelt upon it. 
 
 I am not much astonished, for men naturally prefer 
 the divine by nature to the divine by achievement. 
 Natural power, a throne in the heavens by nature and 
 not by acquisition, that seems really Godlike; but a 
 divine heart and will, — that seems too human, too much 
 like^ us, to be altogether revered ; so the Church, when 
 thinking of the divinity of Christ, dwells more upon 
 the natural Godship than upon the Godship of effort, 
 the Godship of the divine man. 
 
 I know how full the Bible is of the great things 
 of Christ's nature, and I do not see how any one can 
 be in doubt of the Bible feeling as to Christ. People 
 may doubt whether they find any such statements as 
 are in our creeds; namely, precise and logical state- 
 ments as to the relation and equality of the Father, the 
 Son, and the Spirit; but that the Bible is full of a 
 great sense and impression of Christ every one can 
 see. Even back in the Old Testament I see how full 
 it is of some peculiar event, of some peculiar person, 
 yet to come. I see that its sacrifices, its kingship, 
 its prophets, seem to be a picture of something, of 
 
THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST. 103 
 
 somebody, yet to come, — singular and wonderful, a far 
 more wonderful sacrificial king and prophet. 
 
 In the New Testament I am astonished that any one 
 can deny the apostles' sense of the singularity and 
 divineness of Christ, — the very men who had seen 
 and touched him. There is no description so high, 
 no title so transcendent, which they do not frankly 
 give him, lavishing an adoration which could not justly 
 be given to a creature. But their sense of the height 
 of Christ springs from their sense of the divine heart 
 within him ; their sense of his natural elevation chiefly 
 comes from their sense of his transcendent soul. They 
 felt that '* he had by inheritance obtained a more excel- 
 lent name than they." 
 
 The revelation to them of the dignity of Christ came 
 not from without but from within, — from their own 
 inspired hearts. They saw a beauty which was fairer 
 than the sons of men, fairer than any angels. In all 
 his life — especially in his death — he, in words, in 
 behavior, in feeling, in being, went not only up to, 
 but far beyond, all they had known of God. They 
 felt that this man had a higher, purer heart even than 
 the dread Jehovah whom their fathers worshipped ; 
 his charm was such, so transcendent, so touching, 
 especially in such moments as that when he said, '' This 
 is my blood of the New Testament which is shed for 
 you." 
 
 Their souls were thus literally ravished ; they loved, 
 they worshipped, they said, " My Lord and my God." 
 
104 THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST. 
 
 They said it, not from the Hps, not from the imagina- 
 tion, not from tradition or from creeds, but out of 
 their whole soul. Nay, if their whole souls could 
 have said anything higher, they would have said it, 
 for conception could not set forth any rank too high 
 for Christ. Before him, they and all beings cast down 
 their crowns upon the ground. 
 
 There is in the Old Testament and in the New a 
 vast array of evidence on the subject of the natural 
 divinity of Christ. Long arguments may be made to 
 the head, and we may consent, and say, "■ Christ is the 
 second person of the Trinity; " but what is that to us? 
 Something, no doubt. But only when we see Jesus 
 Christ, when we feel that all external elevation, even of 
 a natural Godhead, all the power, even of Almighti- 
 ness, is nothing to the Godhead of his soul, of his hu- 
 man life on earth; only when we bow our whole self 
 in adoration of that, in gratitude, in unbounded love 
 to him who ''was made so much better than the an- 
 gels," who was made so through his love, through his 
 cost, through his blood, emerging like heavenly gold 
 through much tribulation, and who leads our hearts 
 up after him into his high places, — not until we feel 
 that, whatever else is high, or is called God, this 
 head crowned with bloody thorns, this King of un- 
 speakable self-sacrifice, is and can be nothing else 
 than the highest, '' My Lord and my God." 
 
 That was the apostles' orthodoxy, and doctrine of 
 the Trinity. Man worships everything but the right 
 
THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST. 105 
 
 thing. Even when he has the right God, he finds 
 out the lower parts about him and worships these. 
 He worships, for example, divine knowledge or power, 
 or he worships a great natural Being, the God who 
 creates, who sits on an almighty throne and wields 
 the elements. But the God of gods is the spirit that 
 was in Christ Jesus, — the spirit of mercy and of self- 
 forgetfulness. One who reaches out, rescues, uplifts 
 the world, not easily, but at his own cost, through 
 his own blood ; and if Christ be not that God, where 
 is he? We have no such evidence that the God we 
 see in Nature and reason is so high a spirit, so fine 
 in heart, as the Christ of the New Testament is seen 
 to be. The spirit that was in Christ is identical and 
 at all points one with the very highest conceivable. 
 
 Let us make our creed begin by appreciating him ! 
 All belief will develop grandly out of that. When 
 we learn to adore the Spirit, it will lead us into every- 
 thing that is true. If we feel rightly there, we will 
 think rightly as to everything in religion; for we will 
 know him whom to know aright is truth eternal and 
 life eternal. 
 
XI. 
 
 THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 
 
 A light to lighten the Gentiles. — Luke ii. 32. 
 
 AN Epiphany is a showing of something, a setting 
 forth, a manifestation. Our Epiphany is the 
 setting forth, or showing, of Christ to the Gentiles. 
 This is a signal event, and worthy of our attention. 
 It took place after the resurrection of Christ, and 
 chiefly through the agency of Paul. It was beautifully 
 foreshadowed, however, in an event which for poetical 
 grace and sweetness is not surpassed by anything in 
 the Scriptures, — I mean the worshipping of the Magi. 
 '' Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, 
 came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, 
 Where is he that Is born King of the Jews? for we 
 have seen his star in the east, and have come to 
 worship him." 
 
 This burning star in the far east, far out of the land 
 of Judea, and the Gentile sages kneeling before the 
 young child with their gifts, and gold, and frankincense, 
 is the first Epiphanas of Christ to the nations, and 
 exhibited, as in a splendid symbol, the greater mani- 
 festation that was soon to come. There seems a 
 
THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. IO7 
 
 meaning in the fact that this took place at his birth, 
 as if men were called to take notice that the child 
 was intended from the first as a gift to the world. 
 
 This first showing of Christ to Gentiles seems to 
 many to stand merely as a charming incident in the 
 narrative of Jesus ; but it was, in fact, meant to show 
 from the beginning that Christ was for the whole race, 
 not for any section of it; and thus to relieve, if I may 
 so say, that strict, stern Judaism which in many respects 
 he maintained during his life. He distinctly avowed 
 that he was not sent, but to the Jews ; and there were 
 very important reasons for this ; yet if there had been 
 nothing to break its force, it would not only have 
 fixed the minds of his followers yet deeper in their 
 narrowness, but also it might afterwards have been 
 objected that the extension of the religion to the 
 Gentiles was an afterthought, and not in the original 
 design. How finely wise, then, as well as beautiful, 
 was it, to place this catholic fact and splendid 
 prophecy — for such it was — at the beginning of 
 his history ! 
 
 We come now to the real and great Epiphany of 
 Christ. After his ascension, his religion was opened 
 to all mankind, — the everlasting doors of Truth set 
 wide apart. This was a signal event, and remarkable 
 on many accounts, especially to the great mass of the 
 first disciples, who were Jews. I suppose that if the 
 apostles had been asked, they would have placed 
 this event among the most wonderful ever known. 
 
I08 THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 
 
 They speak of it in language which astonishes us. 
 Saint Paul calls it a mystery, — *' tJie mystery which 
 in other ages was not made known to the sons of 
 men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles 
 and prophets by the Spirit; that the Gentiles should 
 be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers 
 of his promise in Christ." He calls it again a '' mystery, 
 which from the beginning of the world had been hid 
 in God." So unexpected and so wonderful was it, 
 that even after the apostles were enlightened by the 
 especial power of the Spirit, and taught in the pro- 
 foundest spiritual mysteries, this plain thing, so it 
 seems to us, they could not comprehend, — that Christ 
 was to be given to the Gentiles equally with them. 
 Peter was not convinced until he saw the vision at 
 Joppa, and I am inclined to think that he did not (and 
 perhaps also other of the apostles) overcome entirely 
 the Jewish feeling so long as he lived. 
 
 How much of the New Testament refers to this 
 either in one form or another, and how vast were 
 the difficulties in the way of religion on account of 
 it ! We must not think that the entire difficulty lay 
 in offering Christ to the Gentiles at all (that was only 
 the first point in a long series), but in preaching his 
 religion to all people in the independent and absolute 
 form in which we now find it, freed from all Jewish 
 trammels. They reached this last point most slowly, 
 and they seemed to look upon the whole matter with 
 a wonder not less than they felt at the miracles, or 
 
THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 109 
 
 prophecies, or inspiration, or any of the stupendous 
 events of that period. 
 
 There was more than their prejudice to be over- 
 come. That God should become equally related to 
 all, that the Christ was to become equally the Saviour 
 and King of all, that all the God-given institutions 
 of Moses should become at least unnecessary and 
 finally be abolished, — there was enough in this to 
 shock and shake any heart, though entirely free from 
 blamable prejudice. 
 
 We can easily see that such a change as this would 
 at first appear unreasonable, nor can we wonder at 
 their feelings and conduct. They were indeed *' slow 
 of heart," as their Master said; but taking human 
 nature as it usually is, these men were striking monu- 
 ments of the power of God's Spirit, as in other things 
 so also in this ; namely, the extent to which the deepest 
 and most nurtured prejudices were overcome. 
 
 The perpetuity of the old system seemed not only 
 implied in the pains and cost with which it had been 
 built up, but in the very fact that God had reared 
 it. Can that be imperfect which he has established? 
 Shall he pulldown that which he has built? Besides, 
 the old sacred writings are full of expressions as to 
 the perpetuity of Zion, of which we now indeed can 
 understand the deep spiritual meaning, but which 
 they understood only of their own sacred city and 
 temple and ritual. The manifestation, therefore, of 
 the absolutely catholic character of Christ and his 
 
I lO THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 
 
 religion, and the setting aside of all that was local or 
 temporary must have been a terrific change, — almost 
 enough to destroy their faith. Their delays therefore 
 were not wonderful; but I think there has not been 
 so fine an instance of speedy emancipation from deep 
 habit and deep belief since the world began. 
 
 There was not a view or a feeling of the Jewish mind, 
 there was not a trait of the Jewish character, there 
 was not an interest or a hope which was not against 
 the showing of Christ to the Gentiles, against making 
 their Messiah the Messiah equally of all the world. 
 Their souls were against all this ; therefore it is not 
 wonderful that they opposed, but most wonderful to 
 see how their hearts yielded, to see how sooji those 
 close, partial, intense Jewish souls were made un- 
 selfish, made so full of love, made so full of wide 
 and noble thoughts, as to tear down the great wall 
 of partition, to throw open with their own hands the 
 gates of the Temple. 
 
 This was a remarkable event, not only as it chanced 
 to oppose the prejudices of a particular people, but as 
 being in reality a great and unexpected change in the 
 divine dispensations ; for though there were abundant 
 intimations, such as those quoted in the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews, that the Gentiles were in some sense to be 
 brought in, yet not in such sense as the fact proved to 
 be, — that is, not as fellow-heirs of the promise. That, 
 at least, was never stated with such distinctness as to be 
 anticipated, or Saint Paul would not have said that it was 
 
THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 1 1 1 
 
 a '' mystery hid in God." There were, I say, many such 
 expressions as those of Isaiah : " The Gentiles shall come 
 to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising. 
 . . . The abundance of the sea shall be converted unto 
 thee, the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto thee. . . . 
 The sons of strangers shall build up thy walls. . . . Thy 
 gates shall be open continually; that men may bring 
 unto thee the forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings 
 may be brought." I do not, however, see anything in 
 the real force of these expressions, or others of a like 
 nature, which would give ground to anticipate any era 
 when all men should stand alike before God. 
 
 Hitherto the divine Being had confined his revela- 
 tions to a peculiar race ; he now was to appear as the 
 Father of mankind. The Epiphany of Christ to the 
 nations was as if the public reassertion of the great 
 fact that God was the Father, and sought to be the Re- 
 deemer, of mankind. This was a great change, a great 
 advance in the divine proceedings towards men. This 
 was one, and the most signal, of those great changes 
 which occur in God's dealings with the race. At the 
 very moment that religion became fit for all men, that 
 was the moment when it began to be given to all. 
 Whatever may have been the mysterious reasons which 
 kept revelation within a certain limit before this, the 
 great and perfect gift of his own Son he did not con- 
 fine to any people. The work was no sooner completed, 
 than the Spirit of God fell on Jew and Greek and Bar- 
 barian. He who was given for a light to the people 
 
112- THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 
 
 was held up in all lands, spoken of in all tongues. The 
 veil was removed which covered the face of the peo- 
 ple, and the only-begotten of God, shining in peace and 
 truth, was offered, to be seen of all. 
 
 Under the old plan the truth was fenced in ; restric- 
 tion after restriction was added, the people were isolated 
 in various and wonderful ways from their fellow-men. 
 But at the Epiphany of Christ began a great change in 
 God's method: then rose an era, not of limiting, but 
 of extending and expanding; not of hiding, but of 
 manifestation; not of binding, but loosing. Contrast 
 Saul of Tarsus, the scrupulous disciple of Moses, and a 
 representative of the old era, — Saul, who would not fail 
 in one iota of ritual or custom if the heavens fell ; who 
 would regard with unspeakable detestation the thought 
 of giving up anything for the sake of a proselyte, — con- 
 trast him with Paul, who yielded everything, became 
 *' all things to all men," gave up so much that many 
 thought he was no better than an infidel, simply be- 
 cause he would allow nothing that could be put aside 
 to stand in the way of expanding the knowledge of the 
 true God as he was seen in the face of Jesus Christ. 
 Though Christ were preached of contention and strife, 
 still, if Christ were preached, he gloried and would glory. 
 To the Jew he was as if a Jew ; at Rome, he was as if 
 of Rome. The rule was, Christ must be shown ; what- 
 ever stands in the way of that, though it were in itself 
 good, becomes evil, and must be trodden under foot. 
 The Epiphany of Christ has come; he must be set forth. 
 
THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 1 13 
 
 This is the contrast of the two eras. Epiphany — 
 manifestation, a setting and diffusing forth — may be said 
 to be the very name of the present era in God's Church. 
 This has been the principle of his proceedings for 
 eighteen hundred years. Whatever delays his provi- 
 dence has allowed, the Epiphany of Christ is still its 
 one aim, steadily pursued. 
 
 When the Church in its corruptions obscured him, 
 the Reformation gave him again a glorious manifesta- 
 tion. Forward through the future there await the world 
 new and far more grand epochs of the same character, 
 until the great and final Epiphanas, when no man shall 
 say to his neighbor, '' Know thou the Lord," for all shall 
 know him, from the least unto the greatest; *' When his 
 throne shall be set, as the sun in the heavens, and 
 every knee shall bow before him, and every tongue 
 confess." 
 
 Let me now remark that if it be true, as I have said, 
 that this is an era of Epiphany, and that to this great 
 and overbearing purpose minor ones yield, — if it be true, 
 I say, it is an important thought. If the Church had 
 attended sufficiently to this one fact, there never would 
 have been such a thing as a sect known in the world. 
 If the attention had been intensely turned to showing 
 Christ without scruple, if so be that Christ were shown, 
 then, I say, the Spirit of love and wisdom would have 
 filled all hearts into which the blessed vision came, and 
 every minor truth, while it seemed to be neglected, 
 would in fact be in the best manner conserved. Wise 
 
 8 
 
114 THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 
 
 aggression is true conservatism, — that deep lesson the 
 Church has yet to learn. 
 
 Let the few great central truths of the faith be borne 
 inward on the heart, and that once well done, that 
 aggression made, there will be time enough and will 
 enough, and the right spirit then, to attend to and pre- 
 serve all the minor portions of the body of truth. To 
 show Christ, by which I always mean, to show the great 
 features of his religion, is then the first great duty of 
 all Christians, whether they would preserve or extend 
 Christianity. 
 
 We have now seen that the Epiphany is a remarkable 
 event, — more remarkable that among Jews the project 
 should have been set on foot of giving their religion, 
 their Messiah, on equal terms to all men, and that such 
 a project should have been carried into effect by men 
 to whom, in its conception, it was a thought absurd, and 
 hateful beyond all expression. 
 
 The event was also remarkable because it was an un- 
 expected and great change in the dispensations of God, 
 making from that moment the strongest expansion 
 and aggression the vital principle of his Church. It 
 was a signal epoch in other particulars. At the very 
 time that the Messiah was given as a '' light to the Gen- 
 tiles," he was as if withdrawn from his own kindred, 
 and that people, hitherto elevated to heaven in privi- 
 lege, were now thrust down, and the '' nation scattered " 
 with a vengeance such as had never been known on 
 the earth. 
 
THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY, II5 
 
 But though the Messiah is now ours, it seems plain 
 from the Scriptures, that he shall not be hid forever from 
 them. " Though blindness in part is happened unto 
 Israel, this is only to be [Saint Paul plainly says] until 
 the fulness of the Gentiles be brought in." And then, 
 *' all Israel shall be saved." Not only, it appears, are 
 they to be rescued, but it would seem that they are yet 
 to hold some prominent place in the kingdom of Christ. 
 For the same apostle reasons, if ** the casting away of 
 them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the 
 receiving of them be, but life from the dead? " 
 
 Great as is the event of the Epiphany of the Son of 
 God among us Gentiles, his future Epiphany among 
 the Jews shall be (it would appear) a much more splen- 
 did and decisive event. '' Behold, I have graven thee 
 on the palms of my hands, and thy walls are continually 
 before me ! " And the great evangelical prophet Isaiah, 
 alluding to the same event, says, " Whereas thou hast 
 been forsaken and hated, so that no man went through 
 thee, I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of 
 many generations." " The sons also of them that 
 afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee : . . . and they 
 shall call thee the city of the Lord, the Zion of the Holy 
 One." I would not say with too much assurance what 
 all this may mean, but it is hard to give it any other 
 meaning than that which is obvious, and on its front. 
 
 On this account this is an occasion on which the 
 attention of the Church should always be turned with 
 great interest to that wonderful people who, although 
 
Il6 THE FEAST OF EPIPHANY. 
 
 they are yet a nation of outcasts, a by-word and a re- 
 proach, are awaiting perhaps a wonderful future. Or, 
 if this should not be the case, what an affecting object 
 of reflection should they be to us, for we are elevated 
 on their ruins, and by their " impoverishing we are 
 made rich." 
 
 We behold also in them what will certainly be true 
 of us, however solid-seeming our civilization stands, — 
 '* The nation and the people that doth not obey God 
 shall utterly perish, and their light shall be handed 
 over to new people and races, fresh probationers in the 
 great school of God." 
 
 With grateful and most humble hearts let us reflect 
 on the giving of Christ to us Gentiles, that to us, '' who 
 sat in darkness, the light hath shined." Let us con- 
 template with awe both the severity and goodness of 
 God, — severity to them whom he hath rejected, good- 
 ness to us whom he hath chosen and called. This the 
 Church hath appointed as one of her highest festivals 
 of gratitude. '* Rejoice, O ye Gentiles ; laud him, all 
 ye people ! " 
 
XII. 
 
 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 
 
 Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and 
 redeemed his people, — Luke i. 68. 
 
 "^T /"HEN we commemorate the birth of any great 
 ^ ' person, a wide range of topics is opened to 
 the mind. Whatever relates to him and has made 
 his birth signal is matter appropriate to the occasion. 
 
 We usually, as one prominent topic, dwell upon the 
 character of the person. We speak of his superior 
 capacity, of his virtues, what evils he avoided, what 
 good he realized, in what struggles he lived, how he 
 bore himself; and beyond this we notice anything 
 that may have been peculiar in the style of his 
 excellence. 
 
 So, commemorating to-day the birth of Jesus Christ, 
 it would be befitting to show, respecting his character 
 at large, that in him dwelt all the fulness, both of 
 wisdom and knowledge, and that he taught and spake 
 as never man spake. All his words were aimed at 
 the centre of things, so that in every fresh experience 
 of life we are surprised to find his wisdom still taking 
 us by the hand; and as it extends through all our 
 experience now, and goes ever still before us, we may 
 
Il8 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST 
 
 expect it will be so likewise through the higher stages 
 of our existence hereafter. Many things we shall 
 live past, — even knowledge shall vanish away, — new 
 scenes, new faculties, new feelings shall arise ; but the 
 great central laws he has taught our childhood will 
 go hand in hand with us through eternity, illuminating 
 every new region we enter, and surprising us by a 
 glory always new and always old. In this way might 
 one speak of his wisdom. 
 
 Then, as to what is peculiarly called character, what 
 mieht not be said of that? When on such occasions 
 other persons are spoken of, the colors are usually 
 somewhat heightened ; but would one attempt to speak 
 of the character of Christ, the aim must be, not to eulo- 
 gize, but to do justice. The character of Jesus Christ ! 
 It is something quite alone, — a beauty, a grace, a 
 depth altogether peculiar and sacred, as if there were 
 but one star shining in the whole firmament. 
 
 His was a life lived out through the saddest history 
 the world has on record, — lived sweetly out, — not 
 deformed by his unheard-of sorrows, but made perfect 
 by the things which he suffered. He was oppressed 
 and afflicted, but as a sheep before her shearers is 
 dumb, so opened he not his mouth. ''When he was 
 reviled, he reviled not again; when he suffered, he 
 threatened not, but committed himself to him that 
 judgeth righteously." There is an amazing excellence 
 in the characters of some of the apostles ; but the 
 nature of Jesus has in it a peculiarity, a mystery of 
 
THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST II9 
 
 sweet holiness, appropriate only to him. He was 
 ''fairer than the sons of men." There is, it seems to 
 me, that in his character which strongly resembles 
 childhood, so that when our thoughts go back to con- 
 template the child of Mary there is something in our 
 feelings very much the same as when we think of his 
 nature at its maturity. He was in sweet innocency, 
 in holy tenderness, in exquisite simplicity, always the 
 child Jesus, the babe of Bethlehem. Some one, in- 
 deed, has called him the divine child, and, interpreted 
 in this way, perhaps no description will give us a 
 truer impression of him, the Lamb of God. 
 
 On the birthdays of great persons we also recall 
 their achievements and lay them out before us. The 
 great actions of Jesus Christ would afford scope for 
 endless thought. His miracles, — behold them ! He 
 held the secret powers of Nature in his hand. Those 
 ancient and unchanging law^s, the awful and undis- 
 turbed order of God's works, he interrupted by a 
 word. But higher things than these are among his 
 works. He perfectly conquered himself; he lived 
 perfectly his life. That was an achievement. He also 
 so lived as to afford a complete model and example 
 to humanity. That was an achievement. He pre- 
 sented in the truths he gave to the world, in w4iat he 
 did for the world, especially by his death, in the com- 
 bination of light and motive he afforded to the heart 
 of man, — he presented, I say, the opportunity, the 
 means, the way, for the new birth of all things, for 
 
120 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 
 
 the re-establishment of all things on a new basis of 
 glory and happiness as respects both time and eter- 
 nity. So that when we commemorate the birth of 
 Jesus we also commemorate the beginning of the new 
 birth of the world and the great universe, — the palin- 
 genesia of things visible and invisible. This was an 
 achievement. 
 
 When, years after the death of any great and good 
 man, we assemble to honor his memory, we recount 
 not only his acts but the effects of them ; we trace the 
 power of his influence on our affairs; we show the 
 mark he has left upon the world. But what could a 
 mortal tongue say of the influence of the birth of 
 Christ upon the world? His spirit has penetrated into 
 every department of human affairs, and has moulded 
 everything it has touched. I will not ascribe to him 
 all the melioration effected in the condition of man, — 
 other causes have no doubt had their force ; but 
 this one cause stands incomparably above all others 
 that can be named, and marks the beginning of 
 the whole structure of modern civilization. It is 
 all " built upon the foundation of the apostles and 
 prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner- 
 stone." 
 
 This wide world of commerce may not recognize 
 him, but his power is felt at the very foundations of 
 trade. This wide world of labor and art, in whatever 
 form, owes its deepest obligation to his religion. That 
 science which in these times has cast its intelligent 
 
THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 121 
 
 and triumphant glance everywhere through the crea- 
 tion, — it may deny and cast out the name of Jesus, 
 but to him, above the whole united catalogue of its 
 lofty names, it owes its honors. Whence, also, this 
 enlightened comity of nations which is making and 
 going on to make of all the kingdoms but one 
 great commonwealth, — can you tell me whence that 
 comes? Or the widespread humanity which now 
 marks the civilized part of the race, — whence is 
 that? 
 
 In all departments of life there have been those who 
 were illustrious for benefits conferred, and who deserve 
 well of all posterity. Certain men have in certain 
 things elevated the standard of the race, aroused some 
 better feeling, or struck out some better view, which 
 has become a possession to the world forever. Some 
 have reformed a principle of government, and given a 
 larger liberty to men. Some have stood forth nobly 
 in defence of a human right. But we celebrate the 
 birth of one whose life was the head and fount of all 
 benefit, who in all things shows humanity the way, 
 who laid anew the very foundation-stones of all duty, 
 of all right, of all improvement, who pointed upwards 
 to the heights at which men should aim, taught the 
 means to reach them, and communicated the im- 
 pulse. Why, in the one thought, not only taught 
 but planted in the human soul, of the brotherhood 
 of all men, — in that one thought is the secret of 
 progression. 
 
122 THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 
 
 It must be admitted that this truth, as well as all his 
 other truths, has not advanced far in its effects upon the 
 world. At this day we see rapidly in progress among 
 nations and upon a grand scale, by men who believe 
 in him and by men who disbelieve, that very idea of 
 brotherhood which without Christ would never have 
 entered into the convictions of mankind ; but he has 
 sent it down into their hearts, and it works and will 
 work, turning and overturning, until a better order of 
 the world is settled. I recognize, indeed, in the grand 
 fundamental impulse given by Jesus Christ to the moral 
 w^orld something far beyond what is of man ; I see in 
 it the same fine and powerful hand which first gave a 
 planet its motion and direction in the heavens. 
 
 On each of these topics might we dwell exclusively, 
 and on each of them might be opened the grandest 
 views. Nay, we might go far beyond these views, and 
 rise to consider who, in fact, this Being is whose earthly 
 life was so pre-eminent. I might speak of the lineage 
 of Jesus Christ, — for the splendor of ancestry naturally 
 lends something of its lustre to descendants, — and tell 
 that he was of the royal house of David ; or I might 
 rise higher, and announce that God Avas his ancestor, 
 that his origin dated beyond the birth of the firma- 
 ment or the sun. God *' possessed him in the beginning 
 of his way, before his works of old. He was set up 
 from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth 
 was. When there were no depths, he was brought 
 forth ; before the mountains were settled, or the hills, 
 
THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 123 
 
 while as yet the earth was not made, nor the fields, 
 nor the highest part of the dust of the world." 
 
 But all these magnificent topics I have now hardly 
 done more than enumerate, and so dismiss them. 
 
 In all the darkness of our natural state, groping, like 
 the blind for the wall, a veil hung down upon the 
 future, and man ignorant of the destinies of his own 
 soul, lo, '' the dayspring from on high hath visited 
 us, to give light to them that sit in darkness." We 
 know we are ignorant; the wisdom of God is incar- 
 nated for us. Poor, feeble creatures, an angel, and 
 more than an angel, hath descended from heaven to 
 strengthen us. We are conscious that all is deeply 
 wrong within, — we all have gone astray, we have com- 
 mitted iniquity, we have done wickedly; but the 
 Deliverer has come from Sion, who shall turn away 
 iniquity from Jacob. Oh the unspeakable depth of re- 
 joicing, the divine comfort in this thought, —Jesus 
 born to save his people from their sins ! Many pains 
 and sorrows are around us, and death is standing be- 
 fore and not far off from each of us ; but Christ is born, 
 and sorrow, we see, can for each of us be turned into a 
 joy which the world or fortune cannot take away; and 
 death itself is changed into a most glorious gate of 
 hope and life. Yes, the death of a man, which to the 
 mere eye of Nature is the most tragical of sights, may 
 become more divinely calm, of more magnificent joy, of 
 more magnificent hope, than the setting of a summer's 
 sun, an orb enlarging and enriching as it sinks. 
 
XIII. 
 
 WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 
 
 Who do men say that /, the Son of 77zan, ain ? He saiih unto 
 them, But who say ye that I am? And Si7non Peter aji- 
 swered and said, Thou art the Christ., the Son of the living 
 God. — Matt. xvi. 13, 15, 16. 
 
 'T^HE general opinion as to Christ among the Jew- 
 "^ ish populace must have been high. First the 
 question, Who do men say that I am? He sought to 
 find what response, what echo, men gave back to him. 
 While he inquires, he hints the answer, — *' that I, the 
 Son of man;" for this his favorite title is always used, I 
 think, to express the lowness of his condition, and to 
 hint its height. 
 
 But who say ye that I am? And Simon Peter an- 
 swered and said, *' Thou art the Christ, the Son of the 
 living God." Thou art not only in some low sense the 
 Messiah, but the "Son of the living God." The merit 
 of this answer was great. It seems easy to us; but 
 we see all the higher side of Christ, and only that. 
 
 The imagination is a creator, and creates for and 
 against. Here, it was all against. The Christ was a 
 man, — from some province. His relations were known. 
 Simon was daily with him, wearing the same common 
 
WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 1 25 
 
 clothing, eating the same food. The greatest multi- 
 tudes followed Christ for the feeding, the curing, and 
 not alone for the wonder. There was therefore in Peter 
 a special appreciation of the person before him. John 
 loved his Master; so all: I think even Judas. But to 
 the question — all silent! But Peter said, *' Thou art 
 the Christ." 
 
 Now this in general is a very great merit. Next to 
 the hero is the man who recognizes the hero. Next to 
 the high poet who enters is the single voice which in 
 the general silence bids him welcome. But this case is 
 very much apart. To appreciate a style of merit near 
 us is one thing ; but what a taste for the true grandeur 
 had this Galilean fisherman, to believe that this was the 
 Son of God, the chosen flower of the Jewish race, — 
 against all the Jewish imaginings, against all ideas of 
 the grand and beautiful Messiah, — that he so felt, so 
 penetrated to the inner divineness of the man Jesus, 
 that in spite of everything his lips first uttered, " Thou 
 art the Christ." To see the Son of the living God 
 in that most impenetrable of all disguises, nearness, 
 familiarity, and commonness, required an unusual eye, 
 an unusual heart. 
 
 But what is more, note the time when he did it, and 
 note the fulness, unstintedness of the acknowledgment. 
 All the theology of the Christian Church, all that power 
 in Christian history which sprang from the great ideas 
 of Christ and salvation, were wrapped up in that one 
 full burst. It seems like a similar burst of confidence 
 
126 WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 
 
 from a similar spirit in far antiquity, — "I know that 
 my Redeemer liveth." 
 
 You can judge then at once of the feeling of Christ ! 
 It overflows. Why? Humanly, in gratification at being 
 understood, the delight of recognition ; that the good 
 heart should spontaneously find him out; that without 
 leading the good heart should echo his own deep knowl- 
 edge. But the delight of Christ was far above this. 
 The kingdom of God and its King, put in the world in a 
 very peculiar way, was to be believed in, received, not 
 from its splendors and visible majesty, — this kingdom 
 was not to be imposed on the imaginations or even 
 forced on the convictions of the world. Its Prince came 
 in the shape of a quiet, most unworldly man, to be ac- 
 cepted by the right heart as the Highest because he 
 was simply the Best. When Christ came, the earth was 
 to be tested, whether it could love, receive, and enthrone 
 the good because of its goodness. If the human heart 
 was incapable of this, it might be fit for another sort of 
 Prince, but not for the Prince Christ. It was not only 
 virtue, but a very peculiar and unpromising style of 
 virtue, which was presented. And as man nowhere 
 had ever been given to adoring virtue, even in those 
 shapes where it was much more suited to him, would 
 he adore this most divine but most alien Christ? This 
 was the question. 
 
 It was answered in a measure in all those people who 
 had begun to love and vaguely reverence him ; but in 
 the heart of Peter it was first answered full and clear, — 
 
WHO IS THE SON OF MA A'? 1 27 
 
 and this was, that the problem was solved, namely, that 
 absolute, pure virtue, not tricked out and bespangled, 
 borrowing no aid from a foolish imagination, — that this 
 could be loved and adored ; and not by the refined and 
 thoughtful merely, but by the common heart of fisher- 
 men and such like ! The peculiar spirit and design, 
 then, of this most original project was confirmed; what 
 was purely, severely spiritual could be adored, and 
 could be adored by those for whom it was especially 
 intended. The Lord saw, I think, as by a glimpse of 
 lightning, that the heart of Peter prefigured the good 
 and honest human heart everywhere ; that such a king- 
 dom as he proposed was feasible ; that he himself was 
 the fit king of the common, human heart when it was 
 simple and pure; and so it was that, in a sort of rapture, 
 he exclaimed, " Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona." He 
 had not confided in the human heart in vain. He sees 
 Peter step forth, and in him he sees the first of the 
 long series who will confess unto death, '* Thou art 
 the Christ." 
 
 He recognized in such discernment the light of that 
 divine Spirit which illuminates all the good, — ''Flesh 
 and blood hath not revealed it unto thee." This did not 
 come from your mind, Peter, or from the ordinary im- 
 agination and heart of mortals ; it came from a new and 
 instructed spiritual taste which discerned my glory, as 
 the musical ear knows the musical sound ; it is a heaven- 
 descended insight. The keenest eye of mere nature 
 never, never could see it, — could not then, cannot 
 
128 WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 
 
 now. People talk of Christ, and many lavish eulogy 
 upon him ; but no man can truly say that Jesus Christ 
 is Lord, but by the Spirit of God. ''The vulture's eye 
 hath not seen it." It is seen only by a glance from the 
 true heart. 
 
 Simon Peter, then, not only declared and proclaimed 
 who the Christ was, but in doing that revealed his 
 own heart, declared and proclaimed who he himself 
 was, — that he was one of the sons of God, who was 
 capable of knowing the true Son ; that he, Peter, was 
 the first spirit of the coming Church, whose character- 
 istic was to be the discerning and adoring of Christ. 
 
 And so we are now prepared to understand those 
 words of Christ which through the last sixteen centuries 
 have been so terribly abused. The dialogue is this: 
 *' Who am I?" " Thou art the Christ." " And I say also 
 unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I 
 will build my church." That is, you have declared to 
 me who I am, and this enables me to declare to you 
 who you are, — Peter, a stone, a rock of foundation ; 
 that is, you have in you a spirit of such description, 
 of such kinship to divine things, that it can be trusted. 
 This spirit is a rock of assurance, on which I will build 
 my Church. The great honor and dignity which Christ's 
 words gave, were given to that spirit of faith which at 
 that time spoke through Peter, and which Peter repre- 
 sented, — to him and his spiritual (not official) succes- 
 sors. I will build my Church on this Petrine spirit, 
 on this rocky substance. 
 
WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 129 
 
 But this is far from all. Besides this, these words 
 can only be adequately and reasonably explained as 
 a personal promise to Peter, in spite of Protestants. 
 They meant to say that personal dignity was given 
 to him ; that as he gave the first decided enthronement 
 to Christ, he himself was forever to stand as the first 
 foundation-stone of the Church. Many shall confess 
 me, but forever it is unalterable that tho?c art the first. 
 
 The historical priority is always regarded as a matter 
 of weight in the Bible. Men are there as important, not 
 merely from what they do and are, but also from the 
 place they hold in the series. So with Adam, Abra- 
 ham, for example ; the thing is natural. This priority is 
 not small. Among ranks of honor of every sort, in 
 science, literature, empire, the founders have ever been 
 thought of especial dignity. The Protestant world, 
 which has rightly deposed Saint Peter from his false 
 place, has wrongfully deposed him from the place in 
 which he actually stood in the early Church ; namely, 
 as being not only one of the three great apostles, 
 with James and John, but intended to bear in the rule 
 of the Church a certain prominency among the breth- 
 ren, — a somewhat especial respect ; and this, not only 
 because of his age and energy, which made him a natu- 
 ral leader, but because, I suppose, of the position in 
 which the Lord himself had placed him, — I mean, as 
 the first who had clearly acknowledged him. 
 
 So far is but just. Nay, I would go farther than 
 that. Not only was he first in time, but there was clearly 
 
 9 
 
130 WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 
 
 recognized in Peter an eminency in the spirit, and quali- 
 ties fitting him for a prime leadership in the Church; 
 and while true to the spirit of his confession, and just in 
 proportion as he was true to it, was the promise a per- 
 sonal one. The promise, I say, was personal, but not 
 absolute ; it was dependent entirely on the elevation he 
 maintained, in that spirit in which he began. So long 
 as Peter showed the same eminency over all mankind 
 as he did at that moment, being in faith before all, 
 Christ declares he is in rank before all. It was the faith, 
 the love of Peter which gave the rank of Peter. In the 
 natural world gifts and honors are awarded according 
 to many rules, often for no reasons^ or reasons very 
 arbitrary and partial ; but in the spiritual kingdom all 
 God's favors have but one base, — the measure of spirit. 
 No partialities. So long as Peter remained highest in 
 this spirit he was the natural Primate in Christ's king- 
 dom ; but if Peter fell away into another spirit, or even 
 if he grew inferior to other souls, if a Paul should ap- 
 pear, and spread and rule the Church with a finer spirit 
 than Peter, and create it anew with grander thoughts — 
 But why talk of this? It is obvious enough that it 
 is a personal promise, but just as obvious that it was 
 conditional. 
 
 Look at the facts. That it was personal is seen by 
 the history; we see it was actually, personally fulfilled. 
 That it was conditional is seen just as clearly. The 
 Lord interprets it so for himself in this very passage. 
 Read on : "■ From that time forth began Jesus to show 
 
WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 131 
 
 unto his disciples how he must go unto Jerusalem, and 
 suffer many things." Now, this was not at all Peter's 
 view. So '* Peter took him, and began to rebuke him : 
 Be it far from thee, Lord. But he turned and said 
 unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan; thou art an 
 offence unto mxC : for thou savorest not the things which 
 be of God, but those that be of men." No words more 
 intense. It was as if an odor from the pit had shocked 
 his sense : and so everywhere. He treats Peter, and 
 teaches others to treat him, as high or low, an angel or 
 Satan, just according to the spirit he showed. When 
 he sees the right flash, he cries out, " This is the strength 
 and glory of my Church ; " when he sees the common 
 soul, he cries out, '' This is the Satan." 
 
 Moreover, that it was conditional is seen also in the 
 actual history. We see Saint Peter riding in fine 
 supremacy for a time, like Hesperus in the evening 
 sky, until a greater luminary (I mean Saint Paul) 
 ascends and rules the night. 
 
 But enough of this. And yet it is not a trifling 
 matter. A whole Christian world, through a large part 
 of the Christian Era, is built upon this sentence, — 
 these few words the creating edict. And carried so 
 far to-day, it is solemnly declared that the successor 
 on Saint Peter's throne not only rules the Christian 
 Church, but rules it with a divine fulness, an infalli- 
 bility, which did not belong to Saint Peter himself. 
 
 I may say, in general, that these gospel narratives 
 of Jesus Christ can never be interpreted with full truth 
 
132 PFNO IS THE SON OF MAX? 
 
 until there rises up a soul who from such congeniality 
 with this Being, with his most unique modes of 
 feeling and thinking, is authorized to say what he 
 means. The spirit of the Church at large has inter- 
 preted justly, I suppose, the essence of the gospel; 
 but the full interpretation of Christ is yet to come, — 
 in the highest Church of the future, in some highest 
 heart of the future ! 
 
 The last thing to which I would call attention is, 
 that when he had rebuked Peter he turned and said 
 to his disciples, " If any man will come after me, let 
 him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow 
 me." Most impressive is the utterance of these words 
 just here, at this moment. For an instant he had seen 
 before him the heart of Peter, so that he was filled with 
 feehng, — I might say, enraptured; but in one moment 
 he saw the same spirit shrunk up at the mere look of 
 humiliation. The deep self, which lies under us all, 
 the comfortable self, the proud and ambitious self, 
 came forth. Alas! Disappointment, shock, — yes, dis- 
 gust, aversion; so, "If any man will come after me, 
 let him deny himself" 
 
 No matter how glow^ing religious feeling, how clear 
 rehgious insight, how courageous religious confession, 
 the test is, can we stand the cold, hard, grating denial 
 of self? Are. we content to suffer something, to be 
 thought a little less of ? Look at Peter, slipping down 
 from heaven to earth ; and that is the picture of us all. 
 But oh the reality of Jesus Christ ! 
 
WHO IS THE SON OF MAN? 133 
 
 Here, two beings side by side for one moment, 
 seeming to be alike, both exulting in pure spirit. 
 "Thou art the Christ," says one. "Thou art Peter, — 
 a rock," says the other. But immediately the one 
 who is the Master, the one whose destiny from his 
 loftiness would seem to claim some exemption, turns, 
 and speaks of his coming sufferings with no reluc- 
 tance, — embraces them and bows his head to them ; 
 but the other, the servant, at the mere thought of 
 cold reality, of mortification, shrivels up, and is nothing 
 any more. The steadiness and reality of Jesus Christ, 
 who knew and accepted the fact that in the denial of 
 self was his life, — that his life was not outside of that, 
 but in it and by it! 
 
 That is a hard thing to make up the mind to, — 
 that in the denial, death of our lower nature, and by 
 that, is the life of our eternal spirit. Hard, — but 
 once deeply realized and accepted, there is a joy and 
 " peace which passeth understanding." '' I have a lik- 
 ing for tribulation," said Paul ; and this divine Master, 
 the Great Head of all self-denial, speaks often of his 
 peace, — his peculiar peace. And he adds just here: 
 " For whosoever will lose his life, shall save it." What 
 is that? 
 
 He means that for the death we suffer when we 
 mortify self we find even now another life, — that the 
 ereat idea of final resurrection is rehearsed and antici- 
 pated in every moment's experience. Nay, that the 
 more real resurrection of the two — the soul's resur- 
 
134 ^^O IS THE SON OF MAN? 
 
 rection -- is that which is now taking place. By every 
 suffering I willingly accept in resignation to God, or 
 in love for my Master, Christ, my soul springs and 
 blossoms in spiritual life. Awaking to righteous life 
 to-day is the first step of awaking to everlasting life 
 to-morrow ! And the awakening of to-day is as real, 
 and a far more sublime fact, than the awakening of 
 the body from the dust of the earth hereafter ! 
 
 The Lord gave his few friends, then, two great facts 
 of religion : the first, the chilling, sobering fact is, '' If 
 any man will come after me, let him deny himself 
 and take up his cross, and follow me ; " the second, 
 the exhilarating fact, that this denial of a self is in 
 reality the gift of a self, this death is a hidden life, 
 an exchange of a poor and mortal soul for a pure 
 and everlasting soul. *' He that loseth his life shall 
 find it." 
 
XIV. 
 
 THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 
 
 For I say tinto you^ That except yotir righteotisness shall exceed the 
 righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees^ ye shall in no case 
 enter into the kingdom of heaven. — Matt. v. 20. 
 
 A BOLD speech, uttered in the midst of a people 
 where the scribes and the Pharisees were the 
 aristocracy and power ! It seems very important, then, 
 to ascertain what was this righteousness of the scribes 
 and Pharisees, because there is here such a clear state- 
 ment that our righteousness, to be worth anything, 
 must be of a very different order from theirs. I speak 
 of these Pharisees, whose character in every view de- 
 serves the attention of all thinking persons. It is an 
 old and trite subject, but because it reaches so far 
 down into principles it is ever new. 
 
 This sect was so powerful, its vices and errors were 
 so great, and it had such peculiar weight with the 
 Jewish people at that time, that the teaching of our Lord 
 might almost be described as a protest against Phari- 
 saism, and his religion as a doctrine anti-Pharisaic. 
 The two stand opposed to each other, as form to life, 
 show to reality, reason to faith, pretence to substance ; 
 and no one thing will give so much light to Christ's 
 words as the full and constant knowledge of this fact, 
 
136 THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 
 
 namely, that he lived among Pharisees, and that the 
 grandest aspect of his life and teaching was as a 
 protest against them. 
 
 Pharisaism was the most extensive, inveterate, and 
 authoritative form of evil which surrounded our Lord ; 
 he not only taught directly against it, but even in his 
 ordinary instructions he naturally and wisely spoke 
 with a side-glance of opposition to it, — giving to his 
 doctrines the poignancy of contrast, not only to sin 
 in general, but to the peculiar form which it had then 
 taken. In such teaching, for instance, as this, " He 
 came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repent- 
 ance," we recognize at once what was in his mind. 
 In the only place where he is said to have rejoiced, 
 it was because such as they were abased, and the 
 humble exalted. " In that hour, Jesus rejoiced in 
 spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven 
 and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the 
 wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes." 
 
 Indeed, if we once get a clear notion of how great 
 and pernicious a fact Pharisaism was at that time, and 
 then read the New Testament with this idea always 
 before us, we shall find a new meaning and force 
 given to it throughout. 
 
 What distinctly were the Pharisees, and what was 
 their character? They were the most powerful sect 
 among the Jews, who had joined to God's law a vast 
 body of minute additions, partly derived from tra- 
 ditions and partly from the authoritative interpreta- 
 
THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 137 
 
 tions of their doctors, and whose pride it was to 
 beUeve impHcitly, and to obey to a point and through 
 all its endless detail, their vast and Brahminical system 
 of religious observance. While they tithed " the mint, 
 and anise, and cummin, they forgot the weightier 
 matters of the law." The heart of religion, faith and 
 feeling, was eaten out; they made their whole duty 
 to consist in their trifling forms. 
 
 Now, if we wish to realize their characters, let us 
 get clearly before us the idea of a man who by abusing 
 his conscience has come conscientiously to feel that 
 his whole duty, safety, and perfection are secured by 
 certain outward rites and observances, and whose 
 heart is then left free to be just what it may, with 
 not one check of conscience; nay, his conscience 
 indorsing and authorizing whatever he sees fit to do. 
 For, feeling that he is entitled to the peculiar favor 
 of God, and looked on with reverence and wonder by 
 the people, and placed over their heads in Moses' 
 seat, representing his awful religious authority, all 
 the sanctions of religion are lent to give their power 
 to his delusion. Man usually is only wicked against 
 his conscience and every higher impulse; but this 
 class of men feel they have all heaven on their side, 
 let them be whatever they see fit. 
 
 This is a most wonderful condition of the human 
 heart, and not rare ; the likeness of it has often been 
 repeated in the history of the world. There is no 
 wickedness once to be named with this; for here 
 
138 THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 
 
 that angel of light, the conscience, which dwells in 
 the soul of every man, is no longer left as an accusing 
 or reproaching spirit. Uncrowned and deposed, it 
 lingers still in the confines of the heart, but be- 
 comes transfigured into an angel of darkness, and 
 sits in the very seat made vacant by the delegate of 
 God, and issues with the authority of heaven the very 
 laws and liberties of hell ! Church wickedness this 
 is; and Church wickedness then, or at any time, 
 is wickedness which has conscience to back it, or 
 rather which by some legerdemain has introduced a 
 disguised devil in the form of the conscience, and 
 given to it the regal seat of the soul. No delusion 
 can be conceived more hopeless or more malignant 
 than this; and this was the state of the great Phari- 
 saic body in the time of our Saviour. The poor 
 people, awed, as they usually are, by a false show of 
 sanctity, blindly followed their blind leaders. 
 
 You can see now the reason of the peculiar tone in 
 which Christ speaks of the Pharisees. He speaks of 
 this form of wickedness as he speaks of nothing else. 
 He rises to terrible, blasting denunciation as he speaks 
 of them. He withers them with a sort of solemn 
 satire. He calls off the multitude from following 
 them, and though standing in the midst of the land as 
 the recognized aristocracy of righteousness, he points 
 the finger at them, and with sublime courage proclaims, 
 ** Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites ! 
 Woe unto you, blind guides ! Woe unto you ! " 
 
THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 139 
 
 It may seem strange, but I hesitate not to assert 
 that the Pharisees are not dead, have never been, and 
 never will be. This is a character which, with many 
 modifications, belongs to human nature whenever it 
 endeavors to give to its corruptions the sanctity of 
 religion. As there are many reasons why the spirit 
 of man, though merely worldly, does not choose or 
 does not dare to cast off the advantages, or even the 
 obligations, of religion, there is a necessity that it 
 should work out for itself such a union with religion 
 as will allow, under sanctimonious appearances, the 
 indulgence of the corrupt realities. Conscious and 
 entire hypocrisy cannot effect this result half so well, 
 and is not half so agreeable to man, as where he can 
 unite the complacency of a satisfied conscience with 
 the inner wickedness of the heart. In no way can 
 he do this so well as by demanding of himself an im- 
 mense number of outward observances and austere 
 self-sacrifices. For these hardships purchase his own 
 applause, win over his conscience into proud satis- 
 faction, and allow him, while he fulfils punctually his 
 duty in nothings, to omit it in things of weight. 
 Henceforth the man can believe he serves God even 
 while he gives himself wholly to corruption. Here 
 is the whole account of this strange, condition. 
 
 It must be obvious to any one who knows the least 
 of the history of his race or of the human heart, that 
 in the ambiguity of all false religions, and nearly 
 equally so in respect to the one true, divine faith. 
 
HO THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 
 
 there are two grand evils, always present, always to be 
 watched, — disbelief on that hand, formalistic hypocrisy 
 on tJiis. 
 
 These two have, in fact, one common origin, but 
 taking different directions. With infidelity I have noth- 
 ing now to do, though it is a greater foe than we know, 
 and has many forms, and works while we sleep ; but 
 some form of simulated religion is all about us. All 
 that we see in any and every church, and in any and 
 every heart, which is not infidelity strictly, yet which 
 is not love and trust in a merciful salvation, reverence 
 to God, and affectionate obedience to his rules, with 
 an earnest humanity towards the world of men, espe- 
 cially to those in whom shines the divine likeness, — all 
 which is not this is of the nature of the '' righteous- 
 ness of the scribes and Pharisees," which, if we ex- 
 ceed not, we '' shall in no wise enter into the kingdom 
 of heaven." 
 
 I see in some churches the attention and also the 
 heart concentrated and almost merged sometimes in 
 doling questions of church government, and strifes 
 of words ; sometimes in questions of some real im- 
 portance, as to who ought to be the rulers, or as to 
 the order and character of the public worship in the 
 churches, or as to the dogmas of religion, — discrimi- 
 nating nicely and laboriously, and working with all 
 energy to set up a system of opinions in the minds 
 of men. I see others yet, engaged with like earnest- 
 ness in church building, in enlarging bounds, and 
 
THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 141 
 
 supporting and managing the whole mechanism. I 
 see the whole engaged for the heathen. This, of 
 course, is all well ; but it is possible that this all may 
 stand to us much in the same place that religious 
 ceremony, and even *' the phylacteries, enlarging the 
 borders of the garment," stood to less enlightened 
 people. 
 
 Men feel that if they are doing something which is 
 clearly of good result, or which may be so, if they make 
 sacrifices or labor for that which is about religion, or 
 which perhaps they persuade themselves is most im- 
 portant to it, — that if they are actually thus engaged, 
 things are going very well. Sometimes the affairs 
 of the heart indeed are slightly attended to, but soon 
 slurred over, and the man is absorbed again, so far 
 as his religious hours are concerned, in the things of 
 which I have spoken. 
 
 Perhaps this is a picture of much of the religious 
 life of the day; and perhaps it is true, as I have in- 
 timated, that man has still his way of living the life of 
 the world even in the midst of the golden candlestick ; 
 his righteousness, all things being considered, not 
 very far exceeding the "■ righteousness of the scribes 
 and Pharisees." 
 
 The interval between this species of religion and the 
 true is broad and deep as a gulf Is religion a thing of 
 the heart? Is it love, joy, peace in the Holy Ghost? 
 Do we count attendance at church, activity in church 
 affairs, the act of communing, a ready liberality, as 
 
142 THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 
 
 nothing unless they proceed from a living principle of 
 love, God-ward and man-ward ? Yet further, may we 
 not have a sort of religious faith, be interested in the 
 truth and ready to defend it, — and in many matters 
 this faith may regulate our lives, especially in the 
 outward framework of them, — yet all this may not 
 be essentially different from what our Saviour calls 
 hypocrisy? 
 
 No one can state this so strongly as Paul does: 
 '' Though I have all faith, so that I could remove moun- 
 tains." What power of religious belief! ** Though I 
 bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give 
 my body to be burned, and have not charity," — that is, 
 though I have all the outside and not the inside, — I am 
 nothing. Here is the core and vital centre of the whole 
 matter, — love ; and if that be not in the heart, though 
 everything else be there, though all wear so fair an ap- 
 pearance that neither the eye of man nor spirit can find 
 any flaw, — yet before God who knows the heart we 
 are but as the sound of the empty brass and the noisy 
 tinkle of a cymbal. But let nothing now said discour- 
 age ; for it is incomparably easier to be the real thing 
 than to be the false. 
 
 Nature builds her plants, animals, and all her living 
 structures from within outwards. The beautiful soul or 
 principle of life from which she begins, works out and 
 through the fair structure of stem and leaf and blossom 
 and fruit. The life of a Christian must be built in the 
 same manner, from a great, all-shaping principle of grati- 
 
THE SCRIBES AND PHARISEES. 143 
 
 tude, — love, — which shall make all his external acts 
 not only symmetrical, but full of life ; not an empty 
 form, built around the soul of the man, not "the right- 
 eousness of Pharisees," — not the form of a dead man, 
 which, though perfect in every part, the machinery of 
 the heart all in order, has no heart-power, no stream of 
 vitality poured through the system, no warmth in the 
 flesh, no color in the skin, no life in the eye. 
 
 I call all to a vital religion. In that only is there 
 joy and power. " Make clean the inside of the cup and 
 the platter." Cleanse out the bones which lie within 
 the whited sepulchre of our daily lives. Away with 
 religious ostentation, which loves the prayer in the 
 market-place, — with religious ambition, which would 
 seat itself in the chief rooms, — with religious benevo- 
 lence, which sounds its trumpet before, — with the blas- 
 phemous religious pride, which dares in the presence 
 of God to feel that we are not as this publican ; away 
 with religious worships and sacrifices and hard duties, 
 while we have such hearts within us ! O holy name 
 of religion, defied, abused, defamed ! All these things 
 are an " abomination to me, saith the Lord." 
 
XV. 
 
 THE JUDGMENT. 
 
 When the Son of ina7i shall come in his glory ^ and all the holy 
 atigels with him, then shall he sit tipon the throne of his 
 glory, a?td before him shall be gathered all ?tations, etc. — Matt. 
 XXV. 31-46. 
 
 A PICTURE of judgment. Who is the Judge? The 
 Son of man. Especial emphasis is given to the 
 fact that he is to be the Judge of the world. " For 
 the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all 
 judgment unto the Son." A broad commission ! And 
 the Son of man claims to be v^orthy. " If I judge, my 
 judgment is true." And the reason given is his human- 
 ity. Here is the express announcement. '' The Father 
 hath given him authority to execute judgment also, be- 
 cause he is the Son of man." I do not know any fact 
 more striking. As ''judgment " means to test, to reveal, 
 and as the light tests or reveals the darkness, so the 
 perfect human glory of Christ expresses the true char- 
 acter of all other men, and thus judges them. He is, 
 then, not merely the Judge by office and at some com- 
 ing time, but he is by what he is, essentially the test 
 of men. 
 
THE JUDGMENT. 1 45 
 
 Is not every noble person as he stands before our 
 eyes a silent reprover of the base and an approver of 
 the noble? Does not the statue of the Apollo detect 
 and condemn the common ugliness, and countenance 
 the fair proportions which are akin to itself? So Christ, 
 and even while on earth and though men saw him with 
 eyes stupid and bleared by sin and sinful prejudices, yet 
 enough was seen to attract and bring out the good 
 heart and expose the bad. " For judgment," he says, 
 " I am come into this world." Not that he desired or 
 designed to condemn the world ('* I came not to con- 
 demn ; I came not to judge," as he frequently declares) ; 
 but the testing, the judgment of which I speak, was an 
 indisputable fact of his presence. 
 
 And this judgment of the world has gone on in- 
 creasingly since. The more Christ is known, the more 
 utterly the false ideals, the falsely splendid charac- 
 teristics, and all the meanness and sin of the earth are 
 shown and put to shame. He stands as the measure and 
 standard of all the generations as they pass by him ; as 
 the one lawgiver, so also the one perpetual Judge. 
 
 And when the world beholds Christ truly (** and 
 every eye shall see him"), the full sight of that life of 
 his, lived out in circumstances no better than ours, lived 
 out in streets and houses certainly no better than these, 
 lived out in an experience no less trying certainly than 
 our experience, — that glory of humanity, forged in the 
 same workshop where we work, will exhibit in full day- 
 light the possibilities of humanity, and fathom the depth 
 
146 THE JUDGMENT. 
 
 of the fault in all our race. Beyond this, he shows what 
 we are, not merely by what he is in general, but by 
 what he is to us. When the world comes to see him as 
 its redeemer, as one who aimed to rescue and uplift it 
 by such cost and sacrifice to himself, the fairest image 
 creation ever beheld offering himself to us and for us, 
 will he not, if he is once seen crowned with thorns and 
 with the blood upon his body, show us what is the 
 blackness of our cold rejection of him; tell us and tell 
 the universe just what manner of souls we are, and so, 
 and by no arbitrary decision, assign us our place? 
 
 But it is his direct and ofhcial judgment which is now 
 properly before us. And as to that I assert that there 
 is not in the Bible a more profound and beautiful fact 
 than the selection of the Son of man for the Judge of 
 men. Is a mere man fit? An angel? God? Neither. 
 No man, no angel : nay, nor God himself For the 
 purposes of this high justice to come demand not merely 
 that there shall be justice administered, but that it seems 
 (to us and to all) to be justice ; the clearness and im- 
 pressiveness of the justice is a prime point. 
 
 Though God himself is an infinitely just Judge, is the 
 anticipation of his judgment by such a race as ours as 
 clear and salutary to our minds as when we anticipate a 
 judgment by the Son of man? If an invisible and in- 
 comprehensible Being is to judge us, ** whose thoughts 
 are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," 
 people will either think of him with a blind dread if he 
 is supposed to be just, or a blind assurance and ease if 
 
THE JUDGMENT. 1 47 
 
 he is supposed to be a God of love. So on the one 
 hand whole generations of men formerly turned God 
 into a monster of vengeance, and the whole world 
 groaned under a mere brute fear, and so latterly masses 
 of people turn him into a monster of easiness. As to 
 a Being so vague to us as God is, of whom we are so 
 ignorant, if the human mind takes one direction, say 
 as to severity, there is nothing to limit it, our fears 
 drive us on, and he becomes to our eyes implacable; 
 and on the other hand, if we take the other turn, he 
 becomes so placable that he ceases to be a moral Being 
 at all. 
 
 But as to the Son of man, it is impossible from igno- 
 rance to run into these extremes ; we know his heart, I 
 think, better. We have seen him and touched him, and 
 we know how solemn the depth of sin is to him ; that he 
 must ever turn away from it and condemn it, we see by 
 the blood upon the cross, its nature and its results. We 
 see by what he was — one unspeakably '* separate from 
 sinners " — that there must be an everlasting banish- 
 ment of sin, yet we see as distinctly a mercy which will 
 reach us and forgive us so long as we can be reached 
 and forgiven ; that while there is one spot of life in 
 the soul, one redeemable centre, one wish for purity, 
 one longing to obey, aught akin to truth and Christ, 
 so long that Judge will not irredeemably cast out; so 
 that when he does cast out, when the face of Jesus 
 Christ is turned from any creature, when the wrath of 
 the Lamb begins to burn, love itself approves of the 
 
148 THE JUDGMENT. 
 
 justice, and we know that the soul is only fit to be cast 
 out upon the refuse-heap of the universe. 
 
 Here, then, is just what is needed and all that is needed 
 in the Judge of the human race. Think of Christ for 
 one moment as not divine ; think of him only as the 
 purest, wisest, most suffering, and most generous of the 
 sons of men, — that he, such an one, our own brother, 
 should be placed on the throne of judgment to judge us, 
 is the most consolatory of facts. How pitiful and gra- 
 cious to us that God should place him there ! How 
 sure we are of all consideration from him, of all mercy 
 that is mercy ! and yet no false indulgence, no immoral 
 weakness, for he is also the Son of God, calm and holy, 
 of *' purer eyes than to behold iniquity," and whose 
 justice when it must come penetrates the heart like a 
 sword because it is rendered in sorrow, because he is 
 one who weeps over the city he is about to destroy. 
 
 If, then, he condemns me, it is a divine condemna- 
 tion ; and yet he will not condemn me if he can save me. 
 The Judge as he sits there is also the Saviour, the same 
 heart; redemption is his aim, judgment only the neces- 
 sity, and if this be a redeemable spirit of mine he will be 
 sure to find it out, and though he give me the lowest 
 place, so that it scarce seems heaven, still I shall stand 
 far distant but within the circle of the saved ! With 
 these views, I think the sight of the future judgment- 
 seat of the Son of man a sight which more inwardly 
 and touchingly '' reforms me of sin, of righteousness, and 
 of judgment" than any other sight, if I except the sight 
 
THE JUDGMENT, 1 49 
 
 of his cross ! It was fit, then, that the Father should give 
 him authority to execute judgment also, because he is 
 the Son of man. 
 
 As to the circumstances of that judgment, perhaps 
 there is nothing in all which the genius o( man has pro- 
 duced, equal in impressiveness to the scriptural descrip- 
 tions of judgment. They are numerous and various; 
 some of them more simple, some more splendid, but all 
 of a wonderful moral sublimity. One from the twentieth 
 chapter of Revelation, '' And I saw a great white 
 throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth 
 and the heaven fled away ; . . . and I sav/ the dead, small 
 and great, stand before God; and the books were 
 opened ; . . . and they were judged every man according 
 to their works." This is one picture of that great trans- 
 action. In the text we have another, in the simple, 
 almost homely manner of the Son of man ; and yet it 
 seems to me, if possible, more wonderful than the other. 
 All such representations are merely accommodations to 
 the human mind. But if we consider that great event 
 (whether gradual or on some one day, whether public 
 or private) merely as a matter of the soul in the pres- 
 ence of its Maker, that is enough. Once illuminate the 
 spirit with a sense of the holiness which condemns, or 
 of the mercy w^hich saves, and all outward strength be- 
 comes nothing. Or take these awful descriptions and 
 reverse the circumstances. Instead of the noise and 
 commotion of the gathering of men and of nations, let 
 there be simply silence, — the solitude of the soul with 
 
ISO THE JUDGMENT. 
 
 itself and its Judge; instead of the flashings of justice like 
 lightnings from the east to the west, let there be but 
 the clear sight of facts, and we have the Judgment! 
 
 The Test. What is it? *' I was an hungered, 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," — that is, as it is 
 explained, " inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the 
 least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." 
 The spirit, then, which is made the test of judgment, is 
 what? Does it mean general humanity to man? for 
 all men are his brethren. I think it does not ex- 
 clude that meaning, but that it means primarily and 
 emphatically sympathy towards those who are like 
 him, not necessarily for the sake of him, for it seems 
 they were ignorant of any reference to him in the 
 transaction. *'When saw we thee an hungered, or 
 athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, 
 and did not minister unto thee?" The spirit so highly 
 approved, then, so far as I can discriminate, is appre- 
 ciation of and sympathy for truly right people, es- 
 pecially when in distress. I do not say for Christian 
 people, for that is confusing: so many Christians so 
 called — yes, quite prominent and standard Christians 
 — being little or not at all in the true spirit of Christ; 
 and, on the other hand, some I think who have never 
 heard of Christ, and many who for a thousand reasons 
 never formally call Christ Lord, being still in some 
 
THE JUDGMENT. 1 5 i 
 
 real sense his, — his genuine brother at the heart. Now, 
 love of such, succoring such, is a certain test that we 
 are of such ; for our appreciation of others always 
 reveals what we are. 
 
 Once discover what a man's admirations and dis- 
 gusts are, and you measure exactly what he is. If he 
 instinctively turns to whatever is popular and pros- 
 perous, and regards the surface only, he is a man of the 
 surface ; if he instinctively bows and is loyal to the true 
 man and the true thing, no matter how unpromising 
 it all looks, nay, all the more if it be distressed and 
 outcast, if he is disgusted, not at all with bad fortune, 
 but only with the mean heart; if he admires and his 
 heart rises to any show of the pure and beautiful and 
 heavenly tempers of Christ; if he recognizes what is 
 really high and what is really low, and comes forward to 
 take up the truth when it is a stranger or in prison, — 
 that man has the approval of the final Judge. 
 
 The man who has this spirit, though he be ignorant, 
 though unfortunate obstructions keep him away, has 
 yet the seed of the kingdom within him, and will 
 gradually and in better circumstances come forward 
 to all essential truth with the same certainty that the 
 plant in a cell of darkness sends out its shoots to the 
 light. His foundation is of gold, and will stand when 
 the wood and hay and stubble be burned. Yes, the 
 word to him is, " Come ; " while to another, covered 
 over perhaps with correct doctrine, and saying, '' Lord, 
 Lord," but who has no heart in his bosom, — to that 
 
152 THE JUDGMENT. 
 
 other the word is, " Depart ! " It is very strange that 
 this great test should at this day be made so little of. 
 
 Common humanity — humanity to man as human — 
 is coming to be with the world at large the only test 
 I think very much of this spirit of humanity when 
 pure and not politic; it is one of the best of the 
 fruits of Christ. Certainly it is a far better test, and 
 will stand the fire far better than many of the accepted 
 tests. But this stream cut off from the fountain in 
 which it originated — humanity apart from Christ — I 
 am afraid will soon run impure and more impure, and 
 will at last dry up. And certain I am that while 
 Christ may be said to be the author of, and while 
 Christianity lives at the base of, this common humanity, 
 yet the thing which has his special approval is far 
 higher than that; it is sympathy, not merely with man, 
 but with those who are like him, — humanity to the 
 sons of God. The gospel is no leveller of men, as 
 this age aims to make it. Nowhere do I find such a 
 deep discrimination, such a deliberate and marked 
 selection of a class, — the class of the truly noble. 
 Christ chooses them, sets them up, and makes our 
 own characters to be tried by the love and homage 
 we pay them. This seems now to be forgotten. Let 
 us awake to it. 
 
 Where I see the spirit of Christ, let me deeply bow 
 down to it. Where I see a man doing right at a sac- 
 rifice, steady under trials, unselfish, nay, forgetful of 
 self, wronging no man, and magnanimous when he is 
 
THE JUDGMENT. 1 5 3 
 
 wronged; just, just even to his enemy; merciful of 
 heart; uninflated with absurd vanities and foolish self- 
 estimations; despising shows and unawed by public 
 opinion ; a man who, when other men think it Chris- 
 tian to compromise and keep quiet and side with the 
 strong is then only more terrible and inextinguishable 
 against wrong ; a man who with all this is grateful and 
 humble and resigned to his Maker, and above all 
 who turns with an unspeakable adoration to Christ his 
 Master, — this man, or any man who is but a sketch 
 and rudiment of this, if I see him and do not know 
 him, love him ; if I see him '' hungering " and give 
 him no meat; if I see him in prison and come not unto 
 him; when other men cast out his name, if I do not 
 pronounce it, — then I am but a poor creature, call me 
 what you will. Loving not the brother of Christ whom 
 I have seen, I do not — how can I? — love and honor 
 Christ whom I have not seen. By this ladder we 
 ascend to God ; loving his divine image in the creature 
 as the reflection of stars in broken and turbid water, 
 we rise to adore the direct effulgence of the heavenly 
 lights. 
 
 It is affecting and beautiful that the Lord of all 
 should give us so simple and easy a test of a right 
 heart. He did not treat the human heart as many 
 ancient and modern theologians have treated it, by 
 laying heavy burdens upon it hard to be borne, mak- 
 ing a thousand conditions, applying a thousand tests. 
 He reduces religion, for our comfort, to a very simple 
 
154 THE JUDGMENT. 
 
 thing, — loving them who are really like him ; and we 
 will succor them and be kind to them for the sake 
 of him who succored us in our low estate. 
 
 Above all, let us pause a moment at the fact that 
 he, the highest, makes himself absolutely one with 
 his children. ''I was hungry, and ye gave me meat; 
 I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink," etc. He thirsts 
 with the thirst of his meanest and lowest brother; he 
 is in prison and a stranger with him. Therefore, lift 
 up your heads, ye weakest strugglers after the true 
 life, if your heart be right, for your Lord is so one 
 with you that if you bleed he bleeds ; and so precious 
 are you, that the whole race, kings and princes, are 
 to be judged by the heart they have towards such as 
 you. 
 
 I have spoken of the Judge, the judgment, and one 
 of the great tests of judgment. In that dread judg- 
 ment we are all to stand; the face of that Judge we 
 must behold; we near it daily; we shall stand before 
 that great white throne, and one question we must all 
 answer, — Did you love the Lord Christ; did you 
 honor and succor him whenever you saw him (under 
 w^hatever veils of poor humanity) ; did you hold out 
 your hands to him and bear him up? If so, ** Well 
 done, good and faithful servant; enter thou into the 
 joy of thy Lord." 
 
XVI. 
 
 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 
 
 Theji ca7ne to him the mother of Zebedee's childye7i^ ivorshippifig 
 hi?n,anddesirijig a certam thing of hi?n, etc. — Matt. xx. 20-28. 
 
 nr^HIS was just after the plaudits and high demon- 
 -*- strations which the festal caravans on their way 
 to Jericho gave to Christ, and the minds of the dis- 
 ciples were naturally excited as to his coming great- 
 ness, and their part in it. He himself seemed to 
 confirm their material conceptions. " Ye are they 
 which have continued with me in my temptations, 
 and I appoint unto you a kingdom," etc. 
 
 "And he said unto her, What wilt thou? She 
 saith unto him, Grant that these my two sons may 
 sit, the one on thy right hand, and the other on 
 thy left, in thy kingdom." That is, they request 
 that the first position of dignity and power may be 
 theirs. 
 
 In justice, this was not entirely ambition. Remem- 
 ber who they were, — James and John. The best af- 
 fections at once heightened and excused the selfish 
 desire. So often our passions " take the livery of 
 Heaven to serve the Devil in." Especially is it true, 
 that (as to the mother) parental affection and house- 
 
156 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 
 
 hold ties often in a thousand ways foster selfishness 
 to those without, quite in contrast to the beautiful 
 Roman tale of the mother of the Gracchi. 
 
 " But Jesus answered and said, Ye know not what 
 ye ask." Ye know not what dignity it is ; nor the way. 
 Ye are not aware that, like the child which stretches 
 towards the splendid blaze, ye are reaching out for 
 a consuming fire. Nor (seeing that ye seek this as 
 a personal favor) are ye aware of the fine laws of 
 justice, which are my Father's will, and which assign 
 each man his place apart from all favoritism or per- 
 sonal relations to me. So that rank *' is not mine to 
 give, but it shall be given to them for whom it is 
 prepared of my Father." Ye know nothing of the 
 whole. 
 
 But after this general assertion of their ignorance 
 and folly, he being filled with a sense of the magni- 
 tude of his own coming sufferings, and knowing what 
 that dignity they sought to share would cost them, 
 seems to concentrate his surprise chiefly there, and 
 asks, as if the question admitted of no reply, and 
 would test and settle the whole matter, '' Are ye 
 able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and 
 to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized 
 with? They say unto him. We are able," 
 
 An astonishing reply! False self-reliance is in re- 
 ligion, and even in Hfe, weakness; while yet mighty 
 things, at least in this world's affairs, are effected by 
 **We are able." Yet even here, as Lord Bacon re- 
 
THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. l^-J 
 
 marks, " A man is raised up and made more successful 
 who feels himself in the care of the higher powers. 
 Sylla chose the name of Felix, and not that of 
 Magnus ; and it hath been noted that those who as- 
 cribe openly too much to their own wisdom or policy 
 commonly end unfortunate." It is written that Ti- 
 motheus the Athenian, in giving a public account of 
 his services to the State, having used the words, 
 " and in this, fortune or the gods had no part," never 
 prospered in anything he undertook afterwards. And 
 we see ourselves that even the men most self-relying, 
 and with a magnificent sense of personal power, such 
 as Napoleon, where they had no other religion, sus- 
 tained themselves by a deep confidence in a mys- 
 terious agent which they called Fate. Still, no one 
 can deny that the feeling, " We are able," is often 
 sublime when man combats with Nature or with man. 
 When, however, his self-reliance is as to his virtue or 
 religion, it is a shameful weakness compared to the 
 power which comes into him through resting upon 
 God. The same great writer, in his Essay on Athe- 
 ism, has this fine passage: "To be without God de- 
 stroys our power; for, take an example of a dog, 
 and mark what generosity and courage he will put 
 on when he finds himself maintained by a man, who 
 is to him instead of a God, or higher nature. So 
 man, when he resteth and assureth himself upon di- 
 vine protection and favor, gathereth a force and faith 
 which human nature in itself could not attain." And 
 
158 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 
 
 I may add here that this resting upon what is divine, 
 whether upon God as our author or upon God as 
 our Saviour, is the eminent peculiarity of the gos- 
 pel, — is that, in fact, which distinguishes it as a spirit- 
 ual system, so that the gospel may be described in 
 one word as God-reliance or Christ-reliance, not self- 
 reliance. 
 
 Granting, then, that much of a weak self-confidence 
 marked the answer of the sons of Zebedee, yet their 
 spirit, though it needed chastening and humbling, was 
 marked by a devotion which made all things seem 
 possible to them. There was an affection and aban- 
 donment of self, under all their presumption, which 
 endeared them to the Lord; for not the faultless 
 people, coldly correct, are so prized by him as the 
 warm though often foolish heart; as in the Old Tes- 
 tament, not any faultless model, but the warm-hearted 
 David. Viewed on this side, we could wish no better 
 wish for the Christian Church and all its members 
 than such heartiness. *' We can do all things," adding, 
 however, '' through Christ strengthening us." 
 
 So much for them. And now as to Him. At the 
 first hearing of their request his feeling was simple 
 amazement. There is observable in him a sense of 
 the endless distance between him and them. You 
 drink such a cup ! Knowing them, and the little frail 
 human heart in them; knowing the fathomless depth 
 of his own sorrows and exigencies, the fathomless 
 depth of the holy will, and the holy, filial trust that 
 
THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 1 59 
 
 were in him, — so deep that the infinite of trial was 
 met as if by a deeper infinite of submission and pure 
 obedience, — comparing, I say, these poor, ignorant 
 children of the earth, who thirsted to share his throne, 
 with the character and awful history necessary to reach 
 it, we can conceive the feeling, " Are j/^ able? " 
 
 But when they look up to him and say, in their pre- 
 sumptive but simple-hearted confidence, '* We are able," 
 a change like lightning seems to pass through his whole 
 consciousness; he remembers that they too, in their 
 measure, will indeed share his cup. They are poor, igno- 
 rant children; but then, they are his children, and he 
 knows they will be faithful and affectionate unto death. 
 And then he adds in a deep and tender tone, *' Ye shall 
 drink indeed of my cup, and be baptized with the 
 baptism that I am baptized with," adding, however, that 
 rank in his kingdom was not to be dispensed capri- 
 ciously, or by personal favor, but according to his 
 Father's will, — that will which was all justice and all 
 insight, and on which rested all law. 
 
 Consider together the two expressions, ** Can ye drink 
 of the cup that I shall drink of ? " and, '' Ye shall drink 
 indeed of my cup." As I have already intimated, they 
 mean much as if he had said, " I admit you shall share 
 with me trials, in order to conquest, — that, indeed, is 
 yours, — but I have a cup to drink that ye know not of; 
 when I tread the wine-press alone, of the people there 
 shall be none with me." 
 
 Now, here are indicated two of the greatest ideas of 
 
100 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 
 
 Christianity, and which run all through it; namely, that 
 we are as if one with the divine Lord, that '* as he is, 
 so are we in this world," and yet, that he transcends 
 and passes out of our experience. On the one hand, 
 that our cup is as his cup ; and on the other hand, that 
 our cup is not as his cup. 
 
 It is true that like him we are set forth to be purified 
 through suffering, and that the history of every faithful 
 man is the history of Jesus Christ over again. This is 
 one of the most animating and uplifting truths of the 
 gospel. But it is also true that in him there is a 
 superhuman singularity of character, a transcendence, 
 a privacy of work, of suffering, and of destiny. 
 
 There is a cup of which no man has drunk, '' save 
 him who once tasted of death for every man." And if 
 this be true, then if any man claims to have himself 
 drunk of that cup, and to have gone down into that 
 mysterious baptism, — claims, " I am able," that is, that 
 he is his own Saviour (and there are not a few of such 
 in all churches), I have no quarrel with him further 
 than to say that I regret he can spare a Saviour, as 
 many of us feel we cannot, and that if we are to be the 
 Saviours of ourselves, our hope goes out, and the very 
 light in the heavens grows dark. 
 
 " And when the ten heard it, they were moved with 
 indignation against the two brethren." I have no doubt 
 they felt it a just and virtuous indignation, and so most 
 people do who read the narrative. But here speak out, 
 I think, envy and discontent, which are but reversed 
 
THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. l6l 
 
 forms of the same ambition. " They were moved with 
 indignation " that these two aspired above them, which 
 in reahty was the same spirit, though in less degree 
 than that at which they were indignant. And so it is 
 not uncommonly. Our dislikes and hatreds of other 
 people — nay, even our most righteous indignations — 
 are often against conduct which, with a little difference 
 of shading, is just our own. We are engaged in pulling 
 out the motes from other people's eyes, while the beam 
 is in our own. And what a sight it must be to any 
 vision which can see better than ours the proud assump- 
 tions, the intense contempt, the standing apart, like the 
 Pharisee, when essentially the same low feelings are 
 prevailing with all, the accuser as with the accused. 
 *' The ten were moved with indignation." 
 
 The Lord meets this anger, not indeed with rebuke, 
 for he was sparing of rebuke, but by teaching that 
 which, while it quieted their anger, laid the founda- 
 tions of entirely better thoughts. '' Jesus called them 
 unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the 
 Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that 
 are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall 
 not be so among you ; but whosoever is great among 
 you, let him be your minister, and whosoever will be 
 chief among you, let him be your servant." That is, 
 he allows the human ambition for excellence and 
 elevation, but just changes the whole thing aimed 
 for. Be ambitious, not to get, however, but to give; 
 not to be lording, as the Gentiles, but ministering. 
 
 II 
 
l62 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 
 
 Aim for dignities, but the dignities of lowliness. Not 
 the dignities of pride and selfishness, but the dignities 
 which consist in generosity, and which will take the 
 place of a servant if it can confer a benefit, rather 
 than of a king to exact a service. " For [he con- 
 cluded] even the Son of man came not to be min- 
 istered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a 
 ransom for many." The kingship, even of the High- 
 est, was not to sit down upon a throne, selfishly im- 
 posing his will on all beneath, but to stand, as the 
 minister, servant, or even slave (as the word means), 
 to stand as the mighty slave of Love ; giving, giving, 
 until he gave even himself — that is, his life — "a ran- 
 som for many." That is to be the style of the new 
 kingdom. 
 
 In this little speech is the reversal of all the master- 
 ideas of the race, their overthrow, down even to the 
 roots. It is the far-ofi* announcing of the final judg- 
 ment of '* contempt and hissing " upon the whole king- 
 dom of selfishness, from its " turrets to its foundation- 
 stone." 
 
 Having completed the narrative, I will dwell on two 
 thoughts, — how greatness is to be reached, and what 
 the greatness is. 
 
 Greatness is to be reached through tried character, 
 by a soul formed in the fires. Ye sons of Zebedee, 
 who seek to share my throne with me, do you know 
 what it is to share that with me? It presupposes and 
 demands a history and a character, a cup and a bap- 
 
THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART 1 63 
 
 tism. Can you share these with me? Exigency and 
 sorrow are the stuff out of which the first Son worked 
 his sonship to God ; and so, after him and through 
 him, must all other sons, even we. And from this, 
 and this alone, all sitting upon thrones must come at 
 last. The sonship of God is created, as all fine things 
 are created, through opposition. All life, even up to 
 soul, is created through what resists it. In the first 
 and lowest appearance of life in Nature we see it 
 forcing the hard substance of the rocks into moss 
 and lichens, and making flowers out of flint. And 
 so up to soul. This is the law. 
 
 But the last point I wish to fix attention upon is 
 the nature of the greatness man is appointed to reach. 
 Man is not nearly so different from the lower animals 
 as Christ's idea of greatness is different from man's. 
 His thoughts and feelings are those of a distinct order 
 of being. Nay, not merely different, but precisely 
 opposite. He turns the lower pole to the top. The 
 dominion of me upon you, the superiority of me to 
 you, — that is man's idea. *' Ye know that the princes 
 of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they 
 that are great exercise authority upon them [the 
 idea is of a power above imposing its will upon what 
 is below]. But it shall not be so among you." That 
 is, your greatness consists in descending through love 
 down from the throne to the ground, in yielding your 
 will to the will of God and to the good of man; in 
 emptying the soul of self, of its will, of its demands, 
 
l64 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 
 
 and being, henceforth, not one that takes, but one 
 that gives. 
 
 This, which is the most original and revolutionary 
 thought the world has heard or can hear, was elicited, 
 how? Why, just as we see that Christ's heavenly 
 ideas were usually elicited, — by some folly or sin of 
 the common men about him, as a glancing light struck 
 out of some dark and passing cloud. Instead of God's 
 coming forth from the cope of the sky, and with a 
 great noise announcing his idea of greatness to the 
 listening kings of the earth, these great words are 
 spoken with quiet simplicity, on occasion of the fool- 
 ish thoughts of two young fishermen and their mother, 
 — words which have leavened and are leavening the 
 lump of the world, moulding slowly, but moulding 
 surely, the hearts of the human race, and drawing 
 out, as by an almighty power, the very tap-root of 
 all human delusions, drawing it as if out of the very 
 bowels of the earth. 
 
 As to this great idea itself, kingship is service, and 
 the first king is he who is most entirely a servant. 
 That sounds disagreeably enough ; but what is it ? 
 Merely that selfishness, however grand it makes itself 
 to look, and however much spoil it has gathered 
 around itself, and whatever the crowns it puts upon 
 its head, is not the true king. But that disinterested- 
 ness is the true king, though it be deposed and 
 covered with rags. 
 
 This, when it was taught, was the most original 
 
THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART, 1 65 
 
 thing ever uttered as a principle for the world. For 
 the nations so far had even no sense that selfishness 
 was sin, or disinterestedness was virtue. They had 
 their vices and virtues, of course, but these were not 
 among them. Yet these, according to their new 
 Teacher, included all the rest. 
 
 Original and grand as this then was, it is hardly 
 less so now. We have indeed grown up to a sense 
 of the immorality of selfishness. We have some 
 glimpse that Christian charity ascends above Roman 
 and Greek virtue and Jewish duty; but until to-day 
 these words, which make it identical with all loftiness, 
 and its opposite selfishness identical Avith all base- 
 ness, — this fact, that it puts the poor laborer, who is 
 in the spirit of Christ, on the highest throne, and 
 puts down the most towering king from his seat, and 
 puts him in the dust and ashes, this is yet far before 
 us, though we admit it in words. We know not yet 
 the meaning of Christ, but we shall know it here- 
 after, — nay, that this Christian disinterestedness (call 
 it charity) included not only all old virtues, but quite 
 a new region and sphere of virtues, which is to the 
 old as heaven to earth. 
 
 What is the man but his soul, and what is the baseness 
 of the soul but its selfishness, and what its dignity but 
 its generosity? Is there anything detestable but selfish- 
 ness in all its disgusting forms of pride, and vanity, and 
 conceit, and mean ambition, and envies, and hates, and 
 treacheries, and cruelties? Is that a king? Is not that 
 
l66 THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART 
 
 a slave? And on the other hand, if we be above barba- 
 rians, is there anything worthy of our admiration and 
 enthusiasm but the soul which has sunk self and glows 
 in devotion to something else? 
 
 What is the Godhead of God himself but this spirit? 
 The one King Eternal and Immortal, the one Lawgiver 
 is himself Z^z^^/ and he who appeared to show him to 
 our eyes, appeared, not ministering to himself, but was 
 in the form of a servant, and died in an act of ser- 
 vice. And is it not true that so far as any creature 
 approaches that, has received that spirit, so far he par- 
 takes of the kingliness of the Divine Nature? Yes, 
 faithful to-day " in few things," his Lord one day will 
 make him " ruler over many things." 
 
 These are laws, not fancies. " Know you not," says 
 the great apostle, "that you shall judge angels?" He 
 meant something. If we wished proof that disinter- 
 estedness is the secret beauty and secret elevation of 
 heaven and of earth, the proof is that, we ourselves 
 being judges, when we see it as it was in Jesus Christ, 
 it stands forth evidently divine, even to us, and we cry 
 out at once that God has been among us, and in some 
 sense all men join in the cry. 
 
 Rejoice, then, in the soul which God has put within 
 you. If you have in your heart but one gleam of 
 Christ's pity, self-sacrifice, and munificence, rejoice in 
 that, for that begins the kingdom of heaven. He who 
 seizes the just view of the temper of the King of kings, 
 he who delights in that, takes that as his portion, while 
 
THE EXALTATION OF THE HEART. 167 
 
 he can believe and must believe that that spirit which 
 God puts in him is the loftiest reality, the imperial fact, 
 and that it is fit and prepared for any outward throne ; 
 yet he can believe this without disturbance, for in the 
 reality he possesses he has lost the taste for vulgar 
 shadows, and would put by all sceptres as playthings, 
 unless through them he could better reach some high 
 end of the heart. He can ever feel (as Jeremy Taylor 
 writes) that '' his crowns and sceptres spring from 
 crosses ; " that it is the cross which is the glory. As 
 the cross stands wrought on the top of the globes and 
 sceptres of earthly kings, and gives them all their glory, 
 so much more of his. But however poorly we from our 
 weakness may be able to combine the consciousness of 
 lowliness with elevation, let us remember always that 
 there stands before our eyes, for our imitation, a being 
 who was at once and naturally '' the meek and lowly," 
 while yet wearing '' on his head many crowns," whose 
 consciousness of height did not impair his modesty, nor 
 his lowliness check an unbounded sense of his dignity. 
 
 Be more like Christ, and then, in your consciousness 
 of oneness with the pure and eternal spirit, in the con- 
 sciousness of some share in that divine heart which 
 loves and gives, and claims nothing, and which will 
 go through Gethsemane or Calvary on its errands of 
 j^grcy, — in that you will know that you are a son 
 and heir of the Highest; and that there is but one 
 exaltation, that of the heart. 
 
XVII. 
 
 THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 
 
 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created 
 he him. — Gen. i. 27. 
 
 ALL the false religions and all the false practical 
 ideals of the world are just the reversing of this. 
 Those great ideas in the Bible that there is one perfect 
 divine Being, God, and that man is formed in his image, 
 and through all disasters is to be re-formed into that 
 image, — these two ideas alone are the seed-principles 
 of an ever-unfolding and transcendent revelation from 
 the Creator to the creature. 
 
 The depth of significance in the one statement now 
 before us that man is made in the image of God can 
 never be exhausted. To develop the meaning of it, to 
 discover this likeness in all its particulars, to realize the 
 fact further and still further in new depths of our won- 
 derful being, — this will be the history, I may say the 
 only history of the spirit through eternity. 
 
 I believe this fact to be much more astonishing than 
 is generally thought. Observe the high emphasis with 
 which it is stated. " And God said, Let us make man 
 in our image, and in our likeness, and let him have domin- 
 ion. So God created man in his own image, in the image 
 
THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 1 69 
 
 of God created he him." After finishing the wonderful 
 work of creation, the whole of which may itself be said 
 to be a stupendous image of the unseen spirit, in infinite 
 shadow, cast from his being; after bringing out the 
 endless hosts of the heavens and earth, an infinitude, an 
 abyss of wisdom, — after this the Great Creating Power 
 pauses, and designs a new and extraordinary creation, 
 and as if nothing had yet been done in all the splendors 
 of the fresh universe which shone and flamed with God, 
 as if nothing had been done to exhibit the pattern of the 
 invisible spirit, " God said. Let us make man in our image, 
 after our likeness." Amazing, inconceivable work ! If 
 all this is as if no image, what is that to be which is to 
 come forth as indeed the image of God ? It was to be — 
 Man ! " So God created man in his own image." 
 
 I do not know how it can be that the infinite Eternal 
 One, whose peculiar name was *' Je-ho-vah," the one that 
 is the *' I am," the Being, a name or a description which 
 while it asserts all reality of him denies and shuts out 
 all attempts at conception, simply responding to inquiry, 
 *' I am," — I know not, I say, how this awful unknown 
 one whose secret can never be penetrated, whose nature 
 could not be described or expressed, could set forth 
 man as the likeness or description of himself. But it is 
 so. He is represented as a new creation, not of or a 
 part of the other creation, but made after it, and made 
 for the express purpose of imaging God. 
 
 If this be so, our first natural thought is, that we 
 must expect to find that God, in every respect of which 
 
I/O THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 
 
 we can think of him, has a wonderful reflection of him- 
 self in us, a wonderful reflection of every characteristic, 
 — a reflection, to be sure, as of the sun and of the 
 whole sky in a bit of broken glass or in a drop of 
 water, still a reflection. And it is so. 
 
 What a glorious image of his eternity is there in the 
 endless life of the human soul, — that immortality which 
 shall be fresh when the newest star shall fade, and be- 
 fore whose unshaken existence this creation or a thou- 
 sand such yet to come forth shall pass away as the 
 morning mists from the summits of the hills ! Do 
 you think that a mean image of the eternity of God? 
 It is the fashion of many minds, and perhaps the preva- 
 lent one now, from a false humility or a false philoso- 
 phy, practically to make light of the image of God in 
 man. But it is too grand and solemn a heritage to 
 be slighted, and I am not willing to believe that he 
 who with such form and deliberation has made man 
 to be in his own image has failed, or has met with 
 inconsiderable success. 
 
 Think of any, even of what theologians call the " in- 
 communicable," attributes of God (for my part I think 
 there is no one of the characteristics of his adorable 
 nature more incommunicable than another : in a sense 
 they are all communicable ; in another sense, none of 
 them are so, but only the images or analogies of them) ; 
 but look, I say, to any, even of the highest attributes 
 of the divine nature, — his omniscience, for example, — 
 that he is the universal day to which the light of knowl- 
 
THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 171 
 
 edge in the soul of any man is indeed but as a few rays 
 from that day struggHng through a crevice into the nar- 
 row and dark room of the human spirit. Here, to be 
 sure, is not hkeness but endless unlikeness, — man not in 
 the image of God. This is, however, but one aspect of 
 it. Consider what a sublime thing it is to have conscious 
 intelligence at all. *' Man is a reed, but he is a think- 
 ing reed," says Pascal. And that one difference places 
 him out of brotherhood with the whole universe, and 
 places it far below his feet, and it leaves him no place 
 or kin in the creation unless in alliance with God and 
 those like God. And when you think that this holy 
 spirit is so bounded and shut within his little tabernacle 
 of clay, cabined, confined, hemmed in, you may be even 
 awed by the force and reach of his thought, and that 
 from its prison it struggles out Into such likeness to 
 divine intelligence. Not born, it seems, for one planet 
 or for one range, this light follows the shining footprints 
 of the creating God wherever they appear, and has built 
 up for himself that enormous and complicated mass of 
 mental achievement which we call our civilization, but 
 which deserves to be called man's creation, — the evi- 
 dence not only of his perceiving, but of his forming 
 power. What will not such a power achieve when eter- 
 nity Is given to It for its growing-time, infinity for its 
 sphere, and freedom from this small organism of the 
 body into a spiritual liberty shall be its condition and 
 state ! Who shall fix the bounds of the circle it will 
 describe? Reflecting thus, we cannot hold in contempt 
 
172 THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 
 
 the fact that in man is also an image, if only an image, 
 of the divine omniscience itself. 
 
 Or take again the incomprehensible statement that 
 God exists everywhere. Have these thoughts and sym- 
 pathies of ours which already can realize and hold 
 before our consciousness beings most numerous, places 
 most remote, — this soul, whose duty and power it is to 
 be in communion with all that is holy everywhere in 
 heaven or on earth, in past ages or in the present or 
 in the time to come, which lives in the communion of 
 the saints, and is now already come to Mount Zion, — 
 is there in this not at least a fine shadow of the paternal 
 image, which in its all-spreading presence communes 
 at once with all that it has made? 
 
 Or look again at the creating power; is there nothing 
 in what man does even like to this, even like the actings 
 of that Being who made from chaos this most beautiful, 
 and I might call it harmonious arrangement of things? 
 For what is this which we call civilization but man's 
 creation, man's world built upon God's world, — whence 
 is it but from man's creating ideas shaping out of a 
 savage crowd a world of society and state, shaping a 
 world of religion and thought and science out of him- 
 self and out of his earth, shaping a world of beautiful 
 things and useful things out of the rude heap he finds, 
 — in all these wondrous workings, to be sure divinely 
 inspired or divinely directed, but yet always a '' co- 
 worker with God," and the result an actual globe apart, 
 a world of its own peculiar nature, built from the 
 
THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 1/3 
 
 thought of man as the worlds issued from the thought 
 of God, and exhibiting in little a beautiful image of the 
 great creating attributes? Some image, then, of the 
 whole of God is to be found within us. 
 
 But it was in the sweetness and innocency of the 
 moral being of man that was to be found the most 
 beautiful reflection of the divine image. What was 
 the precise moral state of the first human being it is 
 difficult for us now to say. There ought to be no 
 doubt, however, among intelligent minds that the first 
 created man was a fresh soul, with all the weakness and 
 temptableness of a human heart and human passions, 
 but yet unsoiled, as yet a happy and pure spirit in a 
 happy and pure body, breathing naturally a childlike 
 gratitude to the Being who appeared in everything as 
 good and parental, and whose benign image stood about 
 him everywhere in this new world on which his eyes 
 were opened. I say this is the most rational view of 
 the state of the first man, apart from the wonderful 
 account in the Book of Genesis. And how sweet a 
 picture, let me say, is all that divine history of the first 
 days of man as the son of God ! It is quite suitable to 
 our ideas as wc find it written there, that at this period 
 the invisible One should delight in some suitable shape 
 to appear and talk with man as with his friend. For 
 the first man, though an innocent and noble creature, 
 was yet ignorant and weak; and it is not only most 
 beautiful to the imagination, but seems a truthful pic- 
 ture of facts, that at the first coming of the sun, or in 
 
174 THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN, 
 
 the cool of the day when the wonderful luminary was 
 sinking, or in the midst of the silent midnight and un- 
 der the shining of the moon or of the more solemn 
 starlight, — that at these times, or when there appeared 
 some new object of fear or wonder or delight in the new 
 universe, it was natural and beautiful and true, I doubt 
 not, that the all-gracious Parent in some celestial shape 
 communed with the first man, who was yet a child with 
 the thought of a child, and that '' solemn troops and 
 sweet societies " of higher creatures were glad to sur- 
 round his steps and supply the first wants of a being 
 who had come among them with all the interest and 
 tenderness which an infant brings into a household. 
 
 But this innocent image of God was but for a mo- 
 ment; man by transgression fell, and his childhood 
 was gone, the divine simplicity of his spirit broken 
 and defaced. But does the great history of the image 
 of God stop here, ending in sad reverse and ruin 
 upon Adam and his seed? 
 
 No ; the fall of man opens a new and grand epoch 
 in the history of God's image in the human soul. 
 The creation of this material frame was finished at 
 the beginning, but the creation of the spiritual life of 
 man is a progressive act; it began then, only to be 
 continued and expanded in a grander style thereafter. 
 The fall of man, the loss of the image of his first 
 innocence, was the moral chaos out of which he calls 
 forth a new heavens and earth. 
 
 Listen to this wonder. You must have been struck 
 
THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 175 
 
 with the sentence spoken by God after the fall of 
 man: ** Man is become as one of us, to know good 
 'and evil." An increase, then, in the image of God; 
 an awful likeness to the divine nature begun even 
 then when he lost his innocence. By sin he gained 
 the (in itself) dreadful knowledge of good and evil, — 
 in itself an unspeakable loss, an unspeakable fall ; but 
 made by the divine goodness the means, the founda- 
 tion on which a new and incomparably loftier image 
 of the divine holiness could be built in the human 
 spirit. Even by the fall he is born still further into 
 the image of God, that dark descent allowing the di- 
 vine mercy to lay deeper foundations and broader for 
 a new building of the divine image. While man lost 
 that innocence which was a sweet reflection of the 
 moral purity of the Godhead, he gained by the en- 
 largement of his experience, and I might almost say 
 an enlargement of his being, the means or condition 
 of building up a new and higher species of holiness, 
 a more perfect image still of the Divine Being. For 
 he who has fallen into the mystery of evil, if he be 
 made capable of rising up from it, knows infinitely 
 better than the innocent being can know the glory 
 of holiness, acquires in that returning process moral 
 qualities of incomparably more energy. But above 
 all by allowing an opportunity for the mercy of God 
 to show itself, acting through the sacrifice of his own 
 Son, the fallen soul is penetrated with a depth of 
 experience of what moral perfection is, as he sees it 
 
176 THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 
 
 showing itself first in the form of an unspeakable jus- 
 tice, and then in the form of a far more unspeakable 
 mercy; and so beholding this transcendent image "he 
 is changed." A soul thus renewed is as much above 
 the image of Adam, as Adam's innocence was above 
 evil. Not a restoration, but an advance. 
 
 Thus wonderfully God wrought good out of evil, 
 and made that which was purely evil but a stage in 
 the process of developing his moral image in the soul 
 of man. This new image of God is not like the 
 childlike goodness, of ignorance of evil, which is but 
 a distant resemblance to God's separation from evil. 
 It has become a separation from evil such as God's 
 is in the knowledge of evil ; and, on the other hand, 
 it has become an incomparable increase in the knowl- 
 edge or appreciation of holiness, because holiness is 
 a light which now shineth out of darkness and in 
 contrast to darkness. 
 
 The innocent creature can know but little of God 
 (whether it be man or angel) ; for what is God? Holi- 
 ness, Justice, Mercy. And who knows the light of 
 holiness that sees not the darkness of sin? Who knows 
 justice that knows not wrong, and who knows mercy 
 that knows not its forgiveness? The innocent crea- 
 ture, be it man or angel, can know little of himself, 
 of his own nothingness and unworthiness, and he 
 who knows not these things may speak of God, but 
 knows him not as the utter rest and all in all of our 
 spirits. 
 
THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 1 77 
 
 How vain these words are to tell of the wonderful 
 image of God formed out of our ruin ! To know the 
 completeness of likeness which man may thus have 
 to God, I point to the fact that the Being who is 
 said to be himself the express image of the invisible, 
 and the very brightness of his glory, he who was in 
 the beginning with God, and was manifest in the flesh 
 as man, — that this image is his; that he is the mould 
 and model of it, and that the Christian soul is made 
 a brother in his perfection and a sharer of every linea- 
 ment of his image. There is something in this more 
 wonderful than it has yet entered into our hearts to 
 conceive. 
 
 And now we have seen that God in the beginning 
 created man in his image, wonderful in all material 
 respects and moral, and we have seen that he not 
 only then created, but still creates; that through the 
 deepest fall he makes new eras of enlarged perfection 
 in this divine image. And what now shall be the 
 future? With such a likeness to himself, thus amaz- 
 ingly created, through such sin, such agony of wretch- 
 edness, and the death of the first-begotten of God, I 
 know not what future may be intended for man. The 
 thing is unspeakable. We know not what we shall be, 
 but this we know, that when he appears, the express 
 image of God, we shall be like him ; and in knowing 
 that I think we know something which the tongue 
 of no angel can utter. 
 
 Therefore, great and precious and albeit incredible 
 
 12 
 
i;8 THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 
 
 promises are left to men. They are to be kings and 
 priests unto God. They are to judge the nations; 
 they are to judge angels; they are to sit with Christ 
 on thrones. " I appoint unto you kingdoms, even as 
 my Father hath appointed unto me." 
 
 I do not so conceive of these promises as if these 
 were to be dignities arbitrarily thrust upon man. 
 Knowing that now the identical spirit which is one 
 with Christ is one also with his people, I must look 
 for this astonishing destiny of man ; for this, if we saw 
 it aright, is but the result of his astonishing character, 
 which is oneness in the style, oneness in the image, 
 of the divine Son of God. 
 
 If then any one be disposed to think meanly of 
 this weak creature of the dust, to smile at his high 
 pretensions, to make light of everything else, such as 
 his knowledge or power, which can connect in likeness 
 the unknown God with this worm, I will waive it all ; 
 but there is one thing I cannot waive. I cannot for- 
 get that the logos of God has been a man, that in 
 the image of man he sits upon the throne, that he 
 has made man his brother in moral glory now and in 
 all dignity hereafter. I cannot deny this; nor do I 
 wish to conceal or belittle it. I believe that the his- 
 tory of the world even so far (and things have but 
 begun) has shown a fathomless meaning in the words 
 which describe the creation of the first human being. 
 '' And God said, Let us make man in our image, after 
 our likeness. So God created man in his own image, 
 
THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. I/Q 
 
 in the image of God created he him." I believe these 
 wonderful words mark not a fact which was finished 
 in Adam, but a fact which is ever finishing, the story 
 of whose progress is the philosophy of the whole of 
 history. 
 
 Let no one by a false humility put aside these 
 things. God means that we should think greatly and 
 yet more greatly of what he designs for the man who 
 is his child. Judged by our desert^ indeed, we should 
 not be worthy to breathe even as worms of the dust ; 
 I believe earnestly that we are not entitled as a matter 
 of right to a single sight of these heavens, to a single 
 enjoyment or dignity even of this earth, but all the 
 contrary. It is not possible for me to abase myself 
 too low before my Judge, my Benefactor, my Saviour, 
 my God ! When I think one moment of God, of that 
 greatness, of that purity, which makes the very heaven 
 of heavens unclean ; when I think of man, — " man born 
 like the wild ass's colt," man *' who drinks up his in- 
 iquity as water," it seems monstrous, blasphemous even 
 to speak of him as in the image of God. It is the same 
 feeling that ancient inspired singer felt when at night 
 under a bright Eastern sky he sat contemplating the 
 grandeur of the heavens, and of the God who formed 
 them, and said, '' When I consider thy heavens, the work 
 of thy fingers ; the moon and the stars, which thou hast 
 ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? 
 and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou 
 hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast 
 
l8o THE GODLIKENESS OF MAN. 
 
 crowned him with glory and honor." The feeling here 
 is precisely the feeling which becomes us. Our deserts 
 we cannot regard too low : what is man ? But the fact 
 of the munificent gift and mercies of God to us, to be 
 revealed in our souls and our destinies, we cannot exalt 
 too high or enlarge too wide ! 
 
 Let us then be of good cheer and great hope ; for 
 when God left the world, he left his image in man, 
 as the image of the sun in drops of dew, or as the 
 shadows on the earth when the sun has sunk. Every 
 day and hour the enticements and low rewards of sin 
 creep towards our hearts. When discouraged and in 
 sorrow, let us remember the words, "God created man 
 in his own image." 
 
XVIII. 
 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 Now the serpent was 7nore subtile than any beast of the field which 
 the Lord God had inade : and he said unto the wo^nan, Yea, 
 hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden, 
 etc. — Gen. iii. 1-24. 
 
 WHATEVER difficulties there may be, and are, if 
 the early part of Genesis be viewed as literal 
 history, or viewed as the imaginary embodiment of 
 primitive and inspired conceptions, it is the most in- 
 teresting record in the world. Nothing can be more 
 weak and unhistorical than to read these narratives as 
 if they were papers presented to a scientific convention, 
 or as reports of a statistical bureau, or even that which 
 we call biography or history. How literal they are no 
 man will ever be able to say ; but that they are truthful, 
 in the deepest sense truthful, that they are a record of 
 the very Spirit of God, no man competent to judge 
 ought ever to doubt. Never was there such childlike- 
 nes.s in the form and the details, suiting the time, united 
 with such dignity and depth of substance. Here is a 
 tradition of the purest and profoundest ideas, issuing 
 from the crude beginnings of the world ; and here in 
 pictured form are laid those great foundations of truth 
 
1 82 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 on which the human race is built, and without which it 
 never could be truly human. 
 
 The Book of Genesis begins with God in action, with 
 the creation of the heavens and the earth ; and if it had 
 stopped with the first sentence, " In the beginning God 
 created the heaven and the earth," — that fact settled, 
 everything is settled (I had almost said), for in that 
 fact is laid the chief corner-stone of all truth ; there is 
 the fountain from which everything else flows. It 
 means that spirit comes not from matter, but matter 
 from spirit, and from such a spirit, an Almighty, which 
 merely wills, and all that is stands up and says, " Be- 
 hold us here ! " — and that this one revelation not only 
 stands first in order, but is so great that all subsequent 
 revelations might be deduced or evolved from it; for 
 if there is really an almighty spirit it must be all-pure 
 also. And when I read that sentence, knowing that 
 that is just the truth with which or without which every- 
 thing must stand or fall, the sentence indeed and test, 
 not merely of a standing or falling church, but of a 
 standing or falling humanity, — I say no one can read 
 it and look around to-day at the spirit of the latest 
 sciences and philosophy, as they confront it, without a 
 sense of heartfelt awe ! After thousands of years the 
 cleverest of the mere thought of the race writes its sen- 
 tence : " In the beginning was the mere possibility of 
 matter." Read that and this : '' In the beginning God 
 created the heaven and the earth." 
 
 The first two chapters, then, present and picture God 
 
THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 1 83 
 
 as Creator, creating the heaven and the earth. But 
 leaving this, I come to the third chapter, which is my 
 proper subject, — the beginning of the story of God in 
 relation to his human child. Here begins the first in- 
 cident of that story, — the fall of man. After just a 
 glance at man innocent, we see man fallen. 
 
 The narrative is a very singular one, and for many 
 years has been subject to much derision. A talking 
 serpent, an apple, a deluded woman ! For a long time 
 this was taken to mean just what its outside looked. 
 The Church has felt so superstitiously as to the Bible 
 that it demanded all to be taken as bald and literal 
 prose. But common-sense and the common taste of 
 mankind show keen reaction from this, as all extremes 
 make extremes, — swing from east to west, from utter 
 credulity to scepticism. After a while, however, a 
 higher order of interpretation arose ; men were trained 
 to value the significant traditions and legends of primi- 
 tive times, and to treat them with reverence. Such 
 critics see here a beautiful traditional poem as the form 
 in which great truths are presented, — the historical 
 symbol of our first parents in the garden, the fall and 
 the expulsion, setting forth the inner history of our 
 spirits as to good and evil, — a history not only true, 
 but the most true; true of them and of each child of 
 theirs. 
 
 Now, an interpreter of this class, while seeing here 
 noble truths, might go further, and see also primitive 
 and local colorings. I mean that he might see in the 
 
1 84 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 history signs of the human feelings and opinions of 
 that far-off time and place. He might say, for example, 
 I see here traces of the ancient Eastern feelings as to 
 the character of woman. Adam in the account is com- 
 paratively innocent, or possibly high and generous, as 
 the East would naturally think, and as our English poet 
 thought, who says that he, seeing she had fallen, re- 
 solved through the vehemence of his love to perish 
 
 with her, — 
 
 " from thy state 
 
 Mine never shall be parted, bliss or woe." 
 
 That is to say, this was a fall of woman, and rather an 
 exaltation than a fall of man. In this way perhaps 
 the narrative reflected the feeling of the time as to the 
 superiority of man. 
 
 Then again, as the placing of Eve first and foremost 
 in the weakness and transgression looks like a reflection 
 from early human prejudices, so also the pre-eminent 
 penalty upon the woman looks as if it sprang from that 
 old Hebrew, and indeed human feeling, which, wherever 
 it finds pre-eminent suffering, feels that it must be ac- 
 counted for by pre-eminent guilt. The old world saw, 
 as we see, that woman is the great sufferer of creation, 
 so it thought that she must also be the great sinner. 
 
 And again ; such a critic might go on to say, I see 
 here the most ancient theory, or rather the most ancient 
 imagination, now extant, of the origin of evil ; namely, 
 an evident tracing of it up gradually from the lower to 
 the higher, from matter at the bottom through the ser- 
 
THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 185 
 
 pent, through the weaker creature woman, up to man 
 at the top. Its mysterious entrance is thus graded by 
 minute steps, and is thus made more imaginable to us. 
 
 In such interpretations as these we get some idea of 
 the tendency of modern criticism as to this narrative. 
 But the Church at large does not consciously go so far. 
 It goes very far to-day, in the fact which it more and 
 more admits, that the form in which the creation and 
 fall are described is a form divinely adapted and ac- 
 commodated to man, and especially to the early ages 
 of the world. Few thoughtful people will now venture 
 to deny this; yet the intelligent application of it will 
 resolve many of the difficulties. 
 
 As to the substance of the story of the fall, all believ- 
 ers concur that it is beautiful and divine. But what is 
 its substance? It means that we are placed here on 
 this earth, from the first man down, with a nature which 
 may listen and ascend, or may listen and descend, 
 capable of standing or falling. It means that the first 
 parent heard a voice, and that we all hear a voice which 
 says, " But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst 
 of the garden, ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye 
 touch it." It means that the warning carries with it 
 solemn forebodings, — who has not heard them? " For 
 in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely 
 die." It means also that there is another voice which 
 assures us and deceives us, — " Ye shall not surely die." 
 So the fruit seems pleasant to the eyes, and glows rich 
 through the foliage. We take ; we eat. Thus seduced, 
 
1 86 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 the first parent ate and died, and we eat and die. As 
 the first man did, so do we ; and more than he, for in 
 some measure we inherit a vicious will, which is entailed 
 upon us. Who can deny all this? Not any one. And 
 is not this original sin, derived sin? And is it not as 
 certain as that the race-traits of the ancestors come 
 down to the children? 
 
 Then, as to the form of the story : if any man does 
 not like it, he must be, it seems to me, strongly wanting 
 in the sense of the beautiful and the significant. Listen : 
 '' Now the serpent was more subtile than any beast of 
 the field which the Lord God had made : and he said 
 unto the woman, Yea, hath God said. Ye shall not eat 
 of every tree of the garden? And the woman said unto 
 the serpent. We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the 
 garden: but of the fruit of the tree. which is in the 
 midst of the garden, God hath said. Ye shall not eat of 
 it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the ser- 
 pent said unto the woman. Ye shall not surely die : for 
 God doth know, that in the day ye eat thereof, then 
 your eyes shall be opened ; and ye shall be as gods, 
 knowing good and evil." 
 
 What children we are to be quarrelling over a story 
 of such deep import as that ! What care I about the 
 garden, this fruit, this talking serpent and his entice- 
 ments ? I know, alas ! that a garden was, and the fruit, 
 and the serpent, and that my first parent eating died, 
 and that because of him and his weakness and sin I eat 
 more readily and die more fully : there is the whole. 
 
THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 187 
 
 I will select two or three of the points of this narra- 
 tive which most strike me. First, the truth of the ser- 
 pent and his lie, — the truth, "Ye shall not surely die." 
 It was true, the serpent had his truth. Strange to say, 
 they did not die, as might have been expected, at once, 
 by the fall of the great axe of justice. They lived on, 
 and in their natural life felt perhaps little change, at 
 least at the time. Again, he said, ** Ye shall be as 
 gods." True also ; and the Lord God acknowledged 
 the truth of the serpent's prediction when he said, 
 " Behold, the man is become as one of us." But see 
 the lie in both cases: first, as to death. Death did not 
 come suddenly, as the crack of a rifle, or entirely; but, 
 shooting and sprouting from that moment, gradually 
 and really it did come, and always comes, entering first 
 the heart of guilt, and creating immortal death there, 
 and then by broken laws often or usually ruining the 
 health and life of the body. And so by sin came death 
 all through ; we see then the serpent's lie. 
 
 Then as to the other point ; namely, of man's becom- 
 ing a god through sin and the opening of his eyes. 
 Alas ! their eyes were opened ; they were as gods in 
 knowledge. They, as it were, doubled their souls; the 
 range of evil was added to the range of good : they 
 became as gods. The old theology, which pictured 
 primitive man not only as innocent but as superior, was 
 not just. Sinful man is a larger creature than innocent 
 man ever could be. Do you think an innocent earth- 
 creature like that could ever have such a history of 
 
1 88 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 intelligence and power as ours, which is the history of 
 a demon-man? Man did become as a god. But now 
 see the lie. The gods standing in good see the evil as 
 outside of them and against Him ; but man, as one of 
 the infernal gods, has gone down in evil, and standing 
 in evil sees good there and evil here, — standing in con- 
 scious wrong sees his lost rectitude. The gods know 
 good and evil, but not in the heart; man knows good 
 and evil by partaking of evil, by sharing in it; and so 
 in proportion to the elevation of his knowledge is the 
 debasement of his soul. Man goes upward in a certain 
 knowledge ; but, passing in some sense upwards in light 
 towards God, in a real sense he passes downwards in 
 his being towards the Devil. That was the godlike ad- 
 vancement, — to have an illumined head but a darkened 
 heart. So sin, the serpent, always palters with us *' in 
 a double sense." He promises the godlike and heav- 
 enly, but after all it is the way down to the bestial and 
 demoniac. 
 
 See, then, what depth of meaning there is in all temp- 
 tation ! There is truth in it, to be sure, but a deeper 
 lie is in it. There is some reality in the most empty 
 things, a seducing charm in all evil, but just enough to 
 lead us and land us in bitter wrong. Ah ! here is the 
 deception, the beautiful and deadly delusion, which lies 
 in the path of all mortals, — wrong, fair at the entrance, 
 but death at the end. No godhead awaits us in that 
 path. 
 
 We have seen that there is a spirit which seems true 
 
THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 1 89 
 
 but is deeply false. See now the seeming falsehood 
 but real truth of God. Adam did not die, and he was 
 no doubt astonished. "In the day that thou eatest 
 thereof thou shalt surely die." Untrue ! They did not 
 die. But yet God was true, most true in substance. 
 Death, a deeper death in fact than they could antici- 
 pate, did follow their transgression, — always does ; and 
 though it was not a sudden and total extinction of be- 
 ing, as they may have imagined, yet even that imagina- 
 tion, though wrong in form, gave them in fact the most 
 truthful glimpse they could have as to it. So not only 
 was the substance most true, but the form, though in a 
 sense false, was true in a far deeper sense ; namely, in 
 giving them an impression the most adequate possible, 
 and the most correspondent to the fact. 
 
 In the beginning of this great record God gives 
 us, if I may say so, this very principle of interpreta- 
 tion, the secret for which we are grasping every day. 
 That is to say, we must always look in the Bible for 
 a truth of substance; but as to the way it is pre- 
 sented, the form may sometimes be such as sacrifices 
 the literal reality to the necessity of giving a truthful 
 impression. If we tell a story to a child, we accom- 
 modate it to his mind, giving to his ignorance the 
 most truthful impression it can receive. 
 
 Revelation was, as it is always, a dawning day which 
 shows us a part of the landscape while the rest is in 
 shadow. The eye of man is a darkened glass, and it 
 cannot be cleared unless gradually and by experience. 
 
190 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 If we look at this third chapter of Genesis, and at all 
 this record of the beginning, what do we see but real 
 and most vital truths, nobly expressed, but expressed 
 to a child? It is so all through the Bible. When God 
 at this enlightened moment says to the world, *' God," 
 " Redemption," ** Immortality," we know his meaning, 
 and yet we do not know it. At every stage of dis- 
 covery, here and hereafter, God, redemption, and im- 
 mortality will change to the eye, — though always the 
 same, yet always widely different ! Just as when he 
 said ''death" to the new-created woman Eve, she knew 
 it and she knew it not. If a little boy — and every 
 little child is like Adam, the man-child of the world — 
 could recollect the lessons of his elders and gather 
 them in a little book called his Genesis, his book of 
 origins or beginnings, he would see the wisdom of his 
 elders, not merely in the substance of the lessons, but 
 even in their form ; he ^'ould see just what we may 
 see in this early Bible, which is God's primer for the 
 childhood of the human race, on whose simple pages, 
 though there are many things to which an archangel 
 might listen with awe, they are often told with what I 
 may venture to call beautiful child-talk. 
 
 The story of the fall suggests another thought. We 
 are saved or we perish by one thing, — this : Have we 
 or have we not trust in God? The Lord God told 
 the woman one thing: ''The fruit is deadly;" and 
 the serpent told her another: "The fruit gives life." 
 The veil was down, she could not see a step forward ; 
 
THE DECEPTION OF SIN. IQI 
 
 but the good voice, which she knew was good, told 
 her that death was behind, and for a time she trusted 
 that voice. But another voice, which was pleasant and 
 seemed also reasonable, said pleasure and life were 
 behind that veil; and though this persuasion went 
 against what she knew to be good, she followed it. 
 Had she but trusted ! 
 
 Trust in the good thing. What is called faith is 
 almost the one thought of the Bible. I might de- 
 scribe the whole of the Bible as the history of faith 
 and of faithlessness, and here on the first page it be- 
 gins. She, the trusting woman, — whose nature is trust, 
 but who, alas ! can often trust as easily in what seems 
 good as in what is good, — she begins the world's woes, 
 and begins them how? Through her perverted trust- 
 ingness. The one secret of keeping and saving Paradise 
 was, that man should rest entirely on what he knew to 
 be good, should hold to that in the face of seduction. 
 And just that also is the secret of regaining Paradise. 
 If I have yielded to other voices, to hear again, though 
 far off, the voice of the Son of God, to trust it, and in 
 delightful, utter, childlike confidence to go back towards 
 Paradise, that is all. 
 
 Know then that our first fall, and all our falls, are 
 in false faith ; that is to say, in trust in the Devil, trust 
 in seeming good, and in want of an honorable, affec- 
 tionate confidence in God and obedience to his sweet 
 commands. Just here, we see, is all descent or ascent, 
 fall or redemption ! 
 
192 THE DECEPTION OF SIN. 
 
 Come, then, let us begin the right trust! Mercy 
 can never be trusted enough. Our redemption ahvays 
 comes through faith, through the faith which reflects 
 and says, " Yes, I am well aware that I have descended, 
 — call it a fall. I am weak in will, selfish and low in 
 affections ; I yield to ' what is pleasant to the eye and 
 seems good for food ; ' and I find that I have become a 
 weak, poor soul, blurred and stained. But I know that 
 the Redeemer liveth, and I will draw near again, for I 
 know what is in his heart; and though I sin and fall 
 from hour to hour, I will, whenever I recollect myself, 
 be sorry for my sin, and say, ' I will trust thy forgive- 
 ness; I will trust thee forevermore.'" This is re- 
 demption, the recovery from the fall ; this is divine 
 ascent, — finding once more the regained Paradise in 
 place of the Paradise which is lost ! 
 
XIX. 
 
 THE OBEDIENT SON. 
 
 Nozv his elder son was in the field : and as he cante and drew nigh 
 to the house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one 
 of the servants, and asked what these things meant. And he 
 said nnto him, Thy brother is come ; and thy father hath killed 
 the fatted calf , because he hath received him safe and sound. 
 And he was angry, and would 7iot go in: therefore ca7ne his 
 father out .1 aftd efitreated him. A fid he., answering, said to his 
 father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither trans- 
 gressed I at any time thy commandment ; and yet thou never 
 gavest me a kid., that I might make merjy with my friends : 
 But as S0071 as this thy son was come, which hath devoured 
 thy livijig with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted 
 calf. And he said u7ito hi7>i. Son., thou art ever with i7ie; and 
 all that I have is thifie. It was meet that we should make 
 I7ierry, and be glad : for this thy brother was dead, and is alive 
 again; and was lost, and is foimd. — Luke xv. 25-32. 
 
 N 
 
 O charge against Christ was more in vogue than 
 that he thought too much of common and guilty 
 people. In the fifteenth chapter of Luke's Gospel we 
 find his defence of himself in respect to his tenderness 
 to the lost, his habit of *' receiving sinners." He an- 
 swers, in effect, *' My feeling is that of the true human 
 heart, and of my Father's heart also ; " and he tells sev- 
 eral tales illustrating this, — of the man who lost one sheep 
 in the wilderness ; of the woman who lost one piece of 
 
 13 
 
194 THE OBEDIENT SON. 
 
 silver; and, above all, that tale which is called the 
 Parable of the Prodigal Son. So he defends himself. 
 
 He evidently thought that not merely Pharisees but 
 even good people might feel justly hurt at the seeming 
 preference for sinners ; and so, to give full voice to this 
 feeling, and then to answer the charge fully, he intro- 
 duced the character of the obedient son, with his com- 
 plaint and the reply to it. This obedient son seems at 
 first an uninteresting part of the parable. It seems that 
 he was in the field, and as he *' drew nigh to the house, 
 he heard music and dancing." It was not altogether 
 unnatural that when he learned how his graceless 
 brother had returned, and that for him was killed 
 the fatted calf, he should at the first moment be angry ; 
 for he knew that in his way he had been true all his 
 life, and none of this joy had ever been shown for him. 
 So he refused to go in. 
 
 Note, first, the faults of this faithful son. He had 
 been loyal, and was now jealous and angry, and more, 
 he was proud and sulky; '' he would not go in." Then 
 " came his father out, and entreated him." But he is 
 still indignant and resentful, and not at all backward to 
 state and perhaps to overstate his own claims: *' Lo, 
 these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed 
 I at any time thy commandment." Nay, worse than 
 all, he is not backward to make a complaint which is 
 as cutting as it is bitter: "Yet thou never gavest me 
 a kid [not to speak of a " fatted calf"], that I might 
 make merry with my friends : but as soon as this thy 
 
THE OBEDIENT SON. 1 95 
 
 son was come [mark the sneer], which hath devoured 
 thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the 
 fatted calf." 
 
 This son and his conduct suggest many thoughts to 
 the mind. A chapter might easily be written on the 
 faults of good men and the virtues of bad men, on the 
 surprises of a good character and of a bad one. The 
 faults of the good have a special ugliness because so 
 unexpected and out of place, while the freshness and 
 surprise of some instances of nobleness in a bad man 
 come on us like the racy taste of wild fruit. I often 
 think that taken together many saints and sinners are 
 not so very far apart as they seem. We should not 
 count that other men are all vicious because we do not 
 like their style of sinning; nor, on the other hand, 
 should we count that we have all virtue because we are 
 respectable in some favorite points. 
 
 Let us consider especially the faults of dutiful people. 
 Men who in the main are right seem on the strength of 
 that to allow themselves in some sorts of fault. There 
 are a thousand instances of this. An irritable man, for 
 example, who feels, and justly, how much should be 
 allowed to a nervous temperament, who knows that his 
 tendency is often worse thought of than it deserves to 
 be, and who confides in his general well-meaning, comes 
 at length to indulge in habits of irritation and to have 
 little or no conscience upon the point. A clergyman, 
 who may be really a devout man, so assures himself on 
 the good that is in him, and sometimes on his mere 
 
196 THE OBEDIENT SON. 
 
 reputation for goodness, as to allow in himself quite a 
 low tone of honor and a certain professional meanness; 
 for all professions and all trades, I am sorry to say, have 
 each their peculiar style of meanness. Again : there are 
 good men in business and in public life who soon learn 
 that in human affairs a certain freedom — shall I say a 
 degree of unscrupulousness? — is most useful ; so these 
 men, though in the main they are just, and often on this 
 very account, soon come unconsciously to a measure of 
 freedom which may be called looseness. I know there 
 is a false and feeble scrupulosity which unfits for life, 
 and which the very best men are rarely subject to; but 
 I am afraid this is a truth scarcely safe to trust in the 
 hands of the world at large. He is a rare statesman, 
 and he is a rare man of business, who without a trace of 
 weak scrupulosity is always truly honorable. Again : a 
 regular and obedient Christian may insensibly take on a 
 certain pride and a certain claim in religion, so that 
 when, for example, he hears the parable about paying 
 the full penny to him who comes in at the eleventh 
 hour, and no more to him who has ** borne the burden 
 and heat of the day," he feels a sense of injustice. And 
 this is the case as to the tale before us ; for while to 
 the mass of men it is the most beautiful word ever ut- 
 tered, I have no doubt that to some very regular and 
 excellent people the part as to the prodigal is not free 
 from distastefulness. They feel as this elder brother 
 felt. The injustice done to himself, to his excellent 
 and hard-worked self, quite swallows up his natural 
 
THE OBEDIENT SON. 197 
 
 joy over his recovered brother, quite treads out his 
 humanity. 
 
 Observe in two or three cases how this self-complacent 
 feeling acts. Regular people, for example, tend to cer- 
 tain extreme prejudices, especially prejudices against 
 particular classes of irregular people, — " sinners." We 
 have our pet aversions in the moral world. The honor- 
 able merchant, who does not steal, feels that theft breaks 
 all the code. The respectable woman is cruel to her 
 outcast sister, and she will not be melted even if the 
 prodigal is penitent. The man who by long years has 
 grown steady in good habits looks with more than sus- 
 picion upon sudden changes called '* conversions." The 
 change of the thief on the cross is not a natural thing 
 to him, and is only believed because it is in the Bible. 
 And so on. 
 
 Now this style of good men need a reprimand ; they 
 are not so good as they seem. Indeed, I must say that 
 as the two figures stand here together, one's sympathies 
 may best go with the young prodigal. 
 
 In the second place, observe the father's treatment of 
 this dutiful son. The son " was angry and would not 
 go in : therefore came his father out and entreated him " 
 to go in, and gave him two reasons. The first is this : 
 " Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is 
 thine," — that is, I have done no injustice ; I am fair to 
 you. This especial overflow of kindness to the prodigal 
 is an occasion, but I am ever with thee ; this music and 
 the fatted calf are a momentary gift, but all that I have 
 
198 THE OBEDIENT SON. 
 
 is thine. You have not asked your portion of goods 
 and squandered it; it is all thine. I welcome, to be 
 sure, my lost son, and it is true that during this moment 
 of joy I value more the lost piece of silver, the lost child, 
 than that which is always with me, — that is human, — 
 and it is true that so far as may be I will reinstate him ; 
 but still the lost heritage returns not: what is lost is 
 lost. Yours is the unlost heritage. 
 
 Now, in this part of the parable, we see, is the neces- 
 sary correction to the lavish kindness, the abandonment, 
 of the prodigal's reception. Far be it from me to neu- 
 tralize the beautiful welcome the Father of prodigals 
 bestows upon his returning children. That " welcome 
 home again " to every soul which cries out, " I will 
 arise," has gone down into the very heart of the world. 
 Every ear hears it, and it lifts, if only for a moment, 
 every drooping head. No deeper revelation has ever 
 been made of the heart of God. That divine Son who 
 has taught us all to say, " Our Father," has here raised 
 still higher the curtain which covers the pathos of the 
 Father's heart. Still, we must not be one-sided. Even 
 the Father's pity cannot do everything. Sin, wrong, 
 even redeemed and forgiven wrong, has a solemn as- 
 pect. Broken laws will have at least something of their 
 vengeance. We see it in nature. A foolish course is 
 changed, the bad man grows better, a new robe is on 
 him, but something of violated law still follows him, and 
 broken health, and lost honor, and wasted fortune will 
 not come back at command. And though the God and 
 
THE OBEDIENT SON. 199 
 
 Saviour in the Gospel is far above nature, far kinder 
 than the God in nature, yet even in that kingdom of 
 kindness — ''kingdom of grace," as we beautifully call 
 it — we see that the man who has abused his soul will 
 thereby suffer loss, even after he has come home. The 
 portion that fell to him is gone, and though he may re- 
 cover much, there are things he cannot recover. Noth- 
 ing can make up for the evil of bad habits. To be sure, 
 a great awakening at the centre, a glowing fire in the 
 heart, may break through the crust of deadly habit for 
 a time; but there is fear that, unless that fire burns in- 
 tensely or very long, old things will resume their place. 
 You may return to the Father's house with the sound of 
 music, but when you are back there and settled, a life 
 of struggle may be before you. You carry back into 
 the temple a desecrated soul, and it must be built again 
 from its own ruins. The region of religion, though it is 
 above nature in that it admits of greater redeeming 
 changes, is, after all, a region of law. It is true that, if 
 the prodigal's gratitude and love are as great as the sins 
 from which he is saved, there may be a good in the 
 calling forth of these qualities which will be more than 
 a compensation for the evil; and I believe that there 
 are renewed souls which reascend higher by far than 
 the more regular and obedient children ; but as a rule, 
 a permanent obedience, good habits, an unperverted 
 imagination, a will for good long strengthened, an un- 
 squandered soul, are better than the fatted calf and the 
 music, however heavenly, of the great sinner pardoned. 
 
200 THE OBEDIENT SON. 
 
 We may reach a higher good by the knowledge of 
 evil, if the Spirit given to us is full enough. There is 
 always hope for the most inveterately wicked. But this 
 is not the rule ; for a prodigality and an inveteracy of 
 evil usually break the very springs of good in the soul, 
 and though such a man may repent and trust and be 
 forgiven, his nature, so far as we can observe it, rarely 
 quite recovers, and it would seem that his destiny here- 
 after will be on a lower level than it might have been. 
 
 The lot of the obedient son is one deeply enviable, 
 and God is not unjust. If, then, you have tried to do 
 your duty, and repine over the fact that your life is un- 
 cheered by music within or without, if your heart is slow 
 and dull, your outward fortunes poor, while you see 
 fortune's favors around you in the world, and, what is 
 worse, even in the kingdom of God, — that is, see sinful 
 men and women coming from afar and reaching as if in 
 a moment what you have been toiling all your life to 
 find, and if you hear the angels of God rejoicing over 
 them and not over you, still, be steady. *' Son, thou art 
 ever with me, and all that I have is thine." 
 
 This, then, is the father's first argument with his obe- 
 dient but complaining son. His next and finer appeal 
 is addressed to the better heart of this son. Listen : 
 *' Son, it was meet that we should make merry and be 
 glad : for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again ; 
 and was lost, and is found," Observe : " It was meet 
 that we'' — you as well as I — ''should make merry: 
 for this thy brother'' — not this my son only — " w^as 
 
THE OBEDIENT SON. 201 
 
 dead, and is alive again." This simple appeal, — not to 
 justice only, or to the generous and tender heart, but 
 this call to family mercy, — this entreaty to human 
 brothers that they should feel he same domestic love 
 the Father feels, — this is a revelation to us all of the 
 heart of the Father of the house. *' It was meet." If 
 there hears me any father or any mother, any parent 
 who has known that heart-break, a lost son, who has 
 seen him squalid and broken, but returning, and who 
 knows what a thrill of tender joy would welcome the 
 lost boy, stained and wasted, but with the tears of peni- 
 tence upon his cheek, coming back and saying, '' Father, 
 mother, I have sinned," that parent's heart will know 
 the deep truth of the appeal, '' It was meet." The 
 regular son, the cold man of duty, needed to be con- 
 verted to something higher, —to love; and so the 
 father says to him, '' It is meet." He is treated with 
 charming wisdom and pathetic sweetness, — no less, I 
 think, than is the prodigal. 
 
 The story is usually called the Parable of the Prodi- 
 gal Son; but it seems to me more properly a tale of 
 the fatherhood of God, or, if it must be named anything 
 else, it should be a tale of the father and his two sons. 
 The whole world, conscious of sin, has risen up in re- 
 sponse to that one vision, — of God seeing afar off his 
 lost son ; but has it seen as clearly the exquisitely bal- 
 anced feeling of the tale, — the father turning now to 
 one child, and now to the other, turning from gross sin 
 to the pride of duty, and entreating that also to return 
 
202 THE OBEDIENT SON, 
 
 and to be humble, merciful, brotherly? If we are 
 charmed that God is such a Father to us as prodigals, 
 we may be charmed also that he is so forbearing to us 
 as conceited and intolerant men of duty. Ah ! we must 
 guard against the vices even of our virtues. Good con- 
 duct is always near to pride, and pride is near to great 
 expectations and claims, and these disappointed are 
 near to bitterness towards God and envy of others : '' I 
 deserved something, and have not got it; he deserved 
 nothing, and see how he prospers." 
 / God seems to me more endearing when he forbears 
 towards pride, and entreats it, than when he forgives 
 open sin. He would have been just had he said, " You, 
 with all your duty, are yet a conceited, selfish, and hard- 
 hearted creature ; you do not serve God for naught, — 
 not you ; you have no feeling for your destroyed 
 brother; you are thinking how much he gets and how 
 little you get ; you want a kid ; you forget the nobleness 
 of your privileges, — * Son, thou art ever with me, and 
 all that I have is thine ; ' you forget the inherent good 
 of the faithful sons of God, — that the Lord is your 
 portion, the lot of your inheritance; and you are an- 
 gry. Go, ingrate, and learn that lowliness is better than 
 proud duty, that mercy to the prodigal is better than to 
 keep all the commandments. Go ! " That would have 
 been just; but that was not the heart of the father. 
 He entreats him to go in, and says : '' Son, thou art 
 ever with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet 
 that we should make merry and be glad : for this thy 
 
THE OBEDIENT SON. 203 
 
 brother was dead, and is alive again ; and was lost, and 
 is found." 
 
 O beautiful vision of God ! most precious to the sin- 
 ful sons of men ! On that hand, for foolish prodigals 
 perishing with hunger, he has *' bread enough ; " and 
 on this hand, if we have tried to do some duty, to toil 
 along in the life of hard work, but are yet, though duti- 
 ful, cold hearts, a sort of miserable officials and com- 
 plainers, he yet bears it, and is more than just to us, 
 and entreats us. This poor race of ours has to thank 
 its Lord and Saviour for many things ; but is there any- 
 thing really so precious to us as this, — to know that 
 whether we be prodigals or sinful men of duty, what- 
 ever we are, we have such a God as this, a Father who 
 knows all our weaknesses and remembers that the best 
 of us are but dust, — that '' this God is our God for 
 ever and ever "? 
 
XX. 
 
 CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 
 
 Then the whole imiltitude of the country of the Gadarenes round 
 about besought him to depart from the^n; for they were taken 
 with great fear. And he went tip into the ship., and returned 
 back again. A'ow., the matt out of whom the devils were de- 
 parted., besought him that he might be with him : but Jesus sent 
 him away,, saying., Return to thine own house, and show how 
 great things God hath done unto thee. — Luke viii. 37-39. 
 
 /^~^HRIST had cast out the devils from this man, and 
 ^-^ had destroyed a herd of swine. Then the people 
 *' besought him to depart from them ; for they were 
 taken with great fear." Here is almost the only in- 
 stance in the New Testament where Christ appears with 
 something of terribleness in his power, so that to the 
 frightened imagination he seemed a vaguely terrible 
 being, and they besought him to depart. 
 
 Fear as to the supernatural, particularly if it spreads 
 through a multitude, as it did here, is the wildest of the 
 passions, and quite overthrows our weak souls. For we 
 are weak, ignorant, and sinful creatures, and precisely 
 because of each of these, — weakness, ignorance, sin- 
 fulness, — we fear. Nay, if even God would afford to 
 our reason every pledge of safety, we should still in- 
 stinctively tremble before unknown power. The Israel- 
 
CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 205 
 
 ites were profoundly alarmed before Sinai; and the 
 apostles could not behold some of the miracles of the 
 gentle and beloved Master without the deepest agita- 
 tion. But here was an act, not only of terrible, but of 
 destroying power; and so " they were taken with great 
 fear." 
 
 This singular exception in the career of Christ 
 forcibly impresses us with the fact of his usual gentle- 
 ness, of his general care not to alarm a creature so 
 easily alarmed. This is well worthy of attention. As 
 it is almost impossible to wield supernatural power v/ith- 
 out exciting alarm, we can see how wonderfully in his 
 hands its terrors were subdued. Take up these Gospel 
 narratives, and we find crowded into a period of from 
 one year to three such an imposing mass of wonders, 
 such displays of more than mortal power, that if they 
 were fully believed in, as they were, they would startle 
 the soul to its depths with terror. But they did not, 
 because of the mild and sympathetic style of the 
 miracles themselves ; also, of the instinctive confidence 
 of the heart, not only in Christ's thorough humanity, 
 but in his humaneness; and because all this mighty 
 force was clearly used, not for personal ends or from 
 personal wishes, but by a being thoroughly righteous. 
 More than this : had he been merely righteous, what to 
 sinful men could have been more terrible than a being 
 of supernatural energies walking among them with a 
 heart of mere justice? From such a being the whole 
 world would fall back. 
 
206 CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 
 
 There must, then, have been inspired, wherever he 
 appeared, such a deep sense of benignity, such a feeling 
 that all this strange power was in the hands of unselfish- 
 ness and mercy, that so, and so alone, the frightfulness 
 of mere might, or even of just might, was covered over 
 and made tolerable and even sweet. It was true of him, 
 as Job sublimely says of God, that he held " back the 
 face of his throne." 
 
 The God in Nature, as we see him working around 
 us, shows the same spirit which was in Christ. As 
 his Father worked, so he worked. Through all these 
 mighty operations in the universe, passing on even now, 
 all is done with unspeakable quietness ; the heavens are 
 held up in silence, the great oceans and rivers are heard 
 in whispers ; the power is hushed, as a mother stills the 
 noises which would alarm a sleeping child. If I were 
 to express what is perhaps the most striking impression 
 of this creation, I should call it gentleness, — a gentle- 
 ness like that of Christ. Without this it is obvious man 
 could not exist, much less enjoy, or be trained for his 
 destiny. It is true this concealment of power seems to 
 be carried far, so that man almost loses the sense of 
 that awful Presence which is among us. Hence God 
 startles us, exceptionally, with events which we call 
 miracles. In these, the very person of God comes in, 
 or stands at the door and knocks. Without something 
 of this we should lose God in the hush of his gentleness, 
 in the soundless harmony of perfect and unchanging 
 law. But the regularity and gentleness are his custom ; 
 
CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 20/ 
 
 and even when it is necessary that he should walk into 
 the scene himself, though he comes with a startle, he 
 comes with no terror, but appears under the sweet 
 humanity and with the humane ways of Christ. 
 
 But the Gadarenes were afraid, not merely because 
 of his supernatural terriWeness, but because of a much 
 more vulgar reason : they saw the loss of property, the 
 drowning of the swine. " This stranger may bring very 
 high things with him ; indeed, that is clear, for he ejects 
 devils; " this could not be denied. But these men were 
 much more sensitive to their lower than to their higher 
 interest. *' Suppose he does come as a dispossessor of 
 devils, — we don't wish our swine destroyed." Look 
 at this fact of human nature: he- came, as we know, 
 bringing wherever he came the very kingdom of God ; 
 but then the swine were destroyed ! So they ** be- 
 sought him to depart from them." They recognized 
 the majesty of Christ, just as multitudes of us do to-day; 
 but then it is disagreeable ; it interferes with property, 
 with pleasures ; and they, as we, wish him away. 
 
 In this, the city and region of Gadara were an exact 
 image of the whole Jewish nation. He came to the 
 Jews at the last hour of their hopes, when the State and 
 the people were sinking into a great gulf, and whether 
 he was the Messiah of the prophets or not, no man 
 can deny that he was the true and only Messiah for 
 them, who, if he had been received, would have given 
 them a divine revolution and purification and power, 
 and established them forever on the tops of the moun- 
 
208 CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 
 
 tains. But the men of Gadara were taken with a great 
 fear, — their swine ; the high Pharisees and rulers at 
 Jerusalem were also taken with a great fear, — their 
 swine: their places, power, prejudices, all threatened. 
 As Gadara was, so was Jerusalem; and as Jerusalem 
 was, so men are in all places and times. 
 
 True; and not merely of Christ, but of every one 
 like him who brings to men something higher than they 
 want, and menaces them with any mean loss. Let it 
 be a patriot, a reformer, a truth-teller of any sort, he 
 must depart. 
 
 All good comes into the unwilling heart as a dis- 
 turber. Every gleam and monition and persuasion 
 which says, " My son, this is the path of life," — all 
 this, terrible or beautiful as the voice may be, is uncon- 
 genial. We are fond of such poor things that the pure 
 and right thing is an interference. But God will inter- 
 fere. He is the sternest of disturbers, for all his mercy 
 prompts to our disturbance. He aims to shake us out 
 of our delusions, though we cry, " Hold ! " He stings 
 and spurs ; and the more he stings and spurs, the more 
 he thinks of us ; and only when he thinks not of us, — 
 when we have become as brutes, — only then he gives 
 us entire ease, and leaves our coasts. 
 
 Here, then, was one prayer and its answer. But we 
 have another: '' Now the man out of whom the devils 
 were departed besought him that he might be with 
 him." Ah, how different the petition ! This was he 
 who had lately said, '* What have I to do with thee? I 
 
CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 209 
 
 beseech thee, torment me not." But the devils were 
 gone now, and he was clothed and in his right mind. 
 He " besought him that he might be with him." 
 
 This stands here to every age a model and an image, 
 as fine as any, of the spirit redeemed, — the power of 
 Satan fallen off, — and the whole heart lifting itself to 
 its gracious Deliverer. This man had passed from 
 darkness to light; from the power of Satan unto God; 
 from the cry, " What have I to do with thee, Jesus, 
 thou Son of God most high?" to "Master, let me be 
 with thee." 
 
 Here, then, were two prayers, — the one embracing, 
 the other ejecting, the Lord of life ; the mass on the 
 one hand, and the rare exception on the other; the 
 poor outcast here, the prosperous citizens of Gadara 
 there. 
 
 Mark the contrast of these two prayers, also their 
 answers. ** They besought him to depart; and he went 
 up into the ship, and returned back again," — a prayer 
 granted. ** Now the man out of whom the devils were 
 departed besought him that he might be with him ; but 
 Jesus sent him away," — a prayer refused. 
 
 The one prayer granted. These " fat and greasy citi- 
 zens," who wanted nothing but the world, had their way, 
 just as they wished it The Lord granted them their 
 request, but sent leanness into their souls. 
 
 But consider the other prayer, — the prayer refused. 
 Here was a poor creature, the man dispossessed, who 
 had been all shaken with his spiritual and bodily pests, 
 
 14 
 
2IO CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 
 
 indeed quite shattered ; and now that he feh the blessed 
 peace and purity of health, and looked on the past 
 
 *' Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream," — 
 
 seeing, in fact, the terrible figures which had possessed 
 him retreating but still menacing, he shrunk frightened 
 to the feet of his Benefactor, and clung there like a 
 child. He was afraid to be left alone; he was most 
 grateful and tender towards the pitiful Being who had 
 relieved him. " Master, I am grateful ; let me attend 
 thee and serve thee wherever thou goest; let thy home 
 be my home. Master, I adore thee; let me be with 
 thee. This night of the devil may return ; with thee I 
 am safe : let me go with thee. These who thus dismiss 
 thee have not known thee ; let me be with thee." 
 
 Could such a prayer be denied, and by the pitiful 
 Lord? It was denied: '* But Jesus sent him away." 
 Scarcely anything in the story of Christ looks sterner. 
 I believe it is the only final denial he ever gave to any 
 affectionate petition for aid. I cannot recall that he 
 ever refused before; and why here? We scarcely know 
 why. It would have saved the poor creature from so 
 much ! But it was denied. We cannot explain the 
 divine ways, whether in Nature, in history, or in the 
 Gospels. They are often very far above, out of our 
 sight. Do we not all know of deep wishes of the heart 
 which, if they could have been granted, would have 
 saved much, not merely of sorrow (for sorrow is a 
 blessed thing), but of guilt? Alas! I cannot explain. 
 
CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 211 
 
 There is, I doubt not, a great end, where all the threads 
 and lines are gathered and drawn in together in one 
 result; and that, I hope, will explain all. 
 
 However, we can see something. Though God trains 
 us, and not according to our methods, yet we can often 
 see that he is the true Master of discipline. In this 
 case it seemed pleasant and safe to be with Christ; but 
 the man needed strengthening of the will, strong habits. 
 God knows it is best that we should struggle through 
 difficulty. Easiness is not for us. The Lord demanded 
 a manhood of the soul. He said to his apostles, when 
 leaving the world, *' It is expedient for you that I go 
 away; " and then, besides, he opened to this man the 
 great resource of doing something: *' Return to thine 
 own house, and show how great things God hath done 
 unto thee. Make good your standing-place here, 
 in the spot where you are; here show forth your 
 gratitude." 
 
 Observe in this the controlled feeling and wisdom of 
 Christ. He yields to none of the weak wishes of love. 
 " Find my presence and safeguard not in this place or 
 that, but in duty, wherever that is ; show your adora- 
 tion and gratitude, and work out the sublime life you 
 propose to yourself, not in the wish to follow me, but 
 just here, in this spot, distant and obscure as it is, and 
 in doing work like mine." So he commits the man 
 to himself, as the bird commits its fledgling to the air, 
 to use its own efforts for flight, and to beat with its 
 own wings against the currents of the strongest winds. 
 
212 CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 
 
 Here, then, was a prayer, refused indeed, but granted 
 while it was refused. The real under-wish of the heart, 
 which was, to be kept safe in the true good, was granted 
 ■ — and best granted — by this refusal. 
 
 So in both these cases the real wishes were responded 
 to : he gave both in reality what they sought. He gave 
 the fat citizens the safe enjoyment of their swine ; and 
 while he told his poor friend that he must leave him, he 
 yet gave himself back to him in a higher manner. And 
 just this God always and accurately does. God is al- 
 ways the hearer of prayer. He hears the wicked as 
 well as the righteous. He hears all prayer but sham 
 prayer, and that is no prayer. Whatever the heart 
 really wants, and persists in wanting, he grants. If we 
 wish him away, we may be sure " he will go up into the 
 ship, and return back again ; " if we really wish to be 
 with him, though he seems to depart, he never departs. 
 Substantially, whatever we want, we shall have. There 
 are but two lives, — the life of the earth and that of 
 heaven. If our prayer is that heaven may disappear, 
 and leave us to the earth, just as certainly as heaven 
 departed from the men of Gadara it will depart from 
 us. *' He that seeketh findeth ; and to him that knock- 
 eth it shall be opened." This is no magic, or exception, 
 or favoritism : it is the law of the spiritual world, and is 
 as certain as our existence. 
 
 Hear, then, again the text, and let its deep spiritual 
 meaning be forever written upon our hearts: "Then 
 the whole multitude of the country of the Gadarenes 
 
CHRIST AND THE GADARENES. 213 
 
 round about besought him to depart from them; for 
 they were taken with great fear. And he went up 
 into the ship, and returned back again. Now, the man 
 out of whom the devils were departed, besought him 
 that he might be with him: but Jesus sent him away, 
 saying, Return to thine own house, and show how 
 great things God hath done unto thee." 
 
XXI. 
 
 MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 
 
 For they loved the praise of 7nen more than the praise of 
 God. — John xii. 43. 
 
 '^ I "HE hunger of praise takes a thousand forms, and' 
 -'- is often disguised; but I think it is the most 
 universal and deepest passion of our hearts, certainly of 
 many hearts, and there is no nature, however dull, 
 which is not keenly alive to it. It breathes through all 
 souls, from the little child up. Not the most distin- 
 guished actor on the most illustrious stage of the world, 
 not the admired woman in the pride of her beauty, or 
 the unadmired woman in the subdued yet eager aspira- 
 tions of her heart, — not these are more marked by it 
 than the begrimed sweep coming out of his home in 
 the chimneys. The hod-carrier honestly prides himself 
 on his quickness and strength, and he too is for having 
 his admirers. We all, in different degrees, wait upon, 
 hang upon, pant for good opinion. The affectionate 
 heart longs for it in its highest shape of kindness and 
 love; the vain long for their petty applause, and 
 those who are too proud to own it, who pretend to 
 rest on themselves, are often half-dying for praise ; but 
 then, it must be in some form choice enough and large 
 
MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 2l^ 
 
 enough to suit their pride. The clackings of a little 
 town or a little newspaper satisfy some ; the trumpet 
 of the ages is the want of others. 
 
 To be sure, some of the higher order of men, in their 
 love for pure truth or for humanity, outgrow much 
 desire for mere praise. The true thinker loves his 
 thought better than the pay or praise. When a traveller 
 visited the study of the illustrious A. von Humboldt, 
 he found all his splendid orders and insignia which 
 were gifts from the most distinguished bodies and men 
 in Europe, — he found them all thrown in a heap in the 
 corner of the room. And yet even Humboldt would 
 have been keenly sensitive to the loss of his true re- 
 nown, and all alive to any real disgrace. Ineradicable 
 is that feeling. In fact, few men ever realize how much 
 it is to them. When deserted by some people we fall 
 back upon the good opinion of some others, and never 
 until we have that rare experience of being deserted 
 by all, and not only neglected but hissed by all, — not 
 until that does any man know the deep dependence of 
 his heart upon the opinion of his fellows. 
 
 So deep a passion must have a great and benign pur- 
 pose. The bad things in this creation of God always, 
 if fairly looked at, betray a deep good below ; and so 
 it is here. Praise sets the whole world in motion to 
 useful ends. There are moments when if we have it 
 fully we feel as if borne upon the most beautiful and 
 softest cloud of the sunset, and sunk to rest within its 
 gorgeous down ; but if we have it not, we are poor and 
 
2l6 MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 
 
 naked. If the work of the world were actuated merely 
 by the hunger and thirst of the senses, all work would 
 stop except mere brutal clutchings, and man's life be- 
 come as poor and cheap as the life of the beasts. On 
 the other hand, were we actuated to work merely by 
 duty, what slack workmen should we be ! How still 
 and nerveless the industry of the earth ! And if we 
 were left to the love of truth or beauty, — the truth- 
 instinct and the art-instinct, — how faint and cold are 
 they, except to a very few indeed ! But when the 
 warm master-passion comes in, then with infinite pains 
 we dress the body to please the eye of man ; we build 
 and furnish fine houses for the eye of man; we sur- 
 round ourselves with splendors of art to meet the eye 
 of man; make science, philosophy, and literature for 
 the applause of man. We are drudges for money to 
 support it all, and so, moved by praise, we build up the 
 world. It is a magical passion, in short, which works 
 more wonders in an hour than all the magicians ; but, 
 like everything else within us, it has gone wrong. Man 
 usurps the whole field of our vision, and God is left out. 
 We love '' the praise of men more than the praise of 
 God." 
 
 There is no blame expressed for our loving the praise 
 of men, but for loving it more than the praise of God. 
 We were made to be alive to the approbation of man 
 as well as of God, not of one but of both, — alive, how- 
 ever, to the lower while under and ruled by the higher. 
 But our whole hearts have gone to man, and we " wor- 
 
MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 21/ 
 
 ship and serve the creature more than the Creator.'* 
 It would not be so bad to sink down and be governed 
 by man's opinion if we confined ourselves to the right 
 sort of men. There is something very high in approv- 
 ing ourselves to the best society of the earth; but 
 usually we care little for that. It is the poor opinion 
 of some little set we care for; and the lower their aims 
 and the lower their taste, so they be in vogue, the more 
 naturally are they our gods; for the worshipper and 
 the god must be somewhat on a level. We hear the 
 slightest whisper of this low, petty opinion as if we had 
 diseased ears ; and we feel the poorest sneer or laugh as 
 if we were cut by the sting of a whip. Oh, teach your 
 child contempt for mean opinion ! Give to his nature a 
 manly hardihood to throw it off as water from a rock. 
 
 I read very early in my youth a novel of which I re- 
 member only the motto, but that is ineffaceable, — 
 ** They say. What say they? Let them say." Where 
 the favor of man is made the object of the soul, ask 
 three questions about it, — What is it? What can it 
 do? How can it be got? 
 
 Is it pure, discerning, judicious opinion we are swayed 
 by? Nay, it is impure, undiscerning, trifling. Or is it 
 honest and heartfeh? Nay, it is shallow and from the 
 lips. Or is it honorable, faithful, steady? Nay, '' favor 
 is deceitful." Alas! who has not felt its changes? I 
 once had near my window a beautiful tree, which became 
 at last like a living, conscious thing to me. I used to 
 watch it in the summer. How graciously the soft airs 
 
2l8 MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 
 
 caressed it and played with it ! But in the winter the 
 airs were turned into raging winds, which tore it and 
 rent it. So the same kindly opinion which in the sweet 
 summer comes as a breeze and whispers about us and 
 moves the world of leaves with beauty and grace, — the 
 same treacherous air soon comes as the winter's wind, 
 seizes and strips the tree, buffets and harasses and 
 strains it, through the dark days and stormy nights. 
 Such are the changes of human favor. 
 
 " Blow, blow, thou winter wind, 
 Thou art not so unkind 
 As man's ingratitude ; 
 
 Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, 
 Thou dost not bite so nigh 
 As benefits forgot." 
 
 And what can this favor do for us? Much, I grant; 
 but can it do anything in great emergencies? If not, 
 then at best it is not beyond a holiday good. And then, 
 see how hard a thing it is to get. A mere chance con- 
 trols it, for the judge who awards it is blind, or corrupt 
 and won't see. Nay, and look at the expense of it, — the 
 expense of sorrow and pain to others who are my rivals, 
 I treading them down ; and then the expensive waste in 
 the prostitution of myself, for no man reaches this favor 
 and keeps it, and keeps also himself unspoiled. 
 
 I might grant, then, that the favor of man is a sweet 
 and good thing, but when it is made the first thing, 
 I see unhappincss follow in every sphere ; I see how 
 this poor mistaken creature, aspiring and aspiring, only 
 
MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 219 
 
 meets disappointments; I see how after a world of 
 efforts and anxieties he is pitilessly forgotten or even 
 sneered out of the world. And oh, think of the sin of it, 
 of the vulgar pride and impudence of success, of the 
 black discontent and malignity of failure ! 
 
 The text was uttered about whom? About the high- 
 est men in Judea. '' Nevertheless, among the chief 
 rulers also many believed on him ; but because of the 
 Pharisees they did not confess him ; ... for they loved 
 the praise of men more than the praise of God." They 
 preferred that the highest Being their eyes had ever 
 seen should go on unrecognized, persecuted, outcast, 
 and exposed to death, because the fashion was against 
 him, and they were afraid to risk anything of their 
 precious position in the synagogue. Yes, and all our 
 best native impulses are thus forced down because we 
 also are afraid. Nay, we sink even below honor and 
 common tone because we are afraid of man. 
 
 And who is this of whom we are afraid, — this crea- 
 ture ignorant in his eyes, and feeble or malignant in his 
 heart? Who is he? What is he? ** Afraid of a man 
 that shall die, and of the son of man which shall be 
 made as grass, and forget the Lord our Maker ! " Oh, 
 we foolish little people who can't be happy and can't 
 even be manly until other foolish people allow us to be ! 
 Trimming our souls to suit others ; harassing ourselves 
 to the bone to meet somebody's approval ; striving with 
 our fellow in a sort of hostile scramble for the crumbs 
 of the world's favor, or pining and bitter if it is lost ! 
 
220 MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE, 
 
 He who waits on God is nothing of this style of per- 
 son. Praise or blame falls off the surface of his soul 
 whose whole being is a love and a fear of something 
 infinitely lovelier than your praise and infinitely more 
 fearful than your blame. He that waiteth on the Lord 
 renews his strength. He likes kindly opinion, of course, 
 especially of high-thinking people, but he can do with- 
 out even that. 
 
 All the world thinks highly of George Washington 
 to-day. His life is a good book to read, especially for 
 Americans. I wish we would read it, and think as we 
 read, for there is far more real religion in his life than in 
 most religious books. The chief thing I find about him 
 is that he had a higher instinct than for praise. At all 
 times, but especially during the struggle of the war, he 
 had hard things to bear. He was misunderstood, un- 
 derrated by inferior men, conspired against, traduced; 
 yet his course is marked throughout by a singular mag- 
 nanimity towards enemies and towards lukewarm friends. 
 Did he not feel? He deeply felt all the baseness, bwt 
 he had a deeper feeling; namely, that he could step 
 down and forfeit everything with equanimity because he 
 sought something higher even than honorable fame, — 
 the good of his country, obedience to duty, the will of 
 God. 
 
 So it is with every Christian man. If there Is a storm 
 without, he knows a divine pavilion whereunto he may 
 always resort. Paul said, " With me it is a very small 
 thing that I should be judged of you, or of man's 
 
MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE, 221 
 
 judgment." That seems like pride. No, it was pure 
 height. It was the same spirit as his Master's. His 
 Master loved true praise, — loved the recognition of 
 right souls. Never was there a more spontaneous out- 
 burst of satisfaction than when he found that Simon 
 Peter recognized him — recognized his value — who he 
 was. *'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God." 
 '' Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood 
 hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is 
 in heaven." Yet he could do without recognition, and 
 when there was not one voice to hail him, when the 
 world was unanimous against him, in that solitude of 
 the earth, "They have left me alone," he said, "yet I 
 am not alone, because the Father is with me." When 
 he heard nothing but one loud hiss from the earth, he 
 said, " I do always those things that please him." 
 
 Who wants peace, then? Who wants dignity of life? 
 Let him follow Christ, approve himself to God, and be 
 at peace. He who does that has reached three things. 
 He can do without man ; that is something. Next, he 
 can be firm and even content if you give him a bad 
 name, — the hardest trial a sensitive spirit ever meets. 
 Nay, beyond this he can say, — at least there was one 
 who could, — "I can glory in shame." 
 
 Oh, if a man can ever live to say, " I care much for 
 good opinion, but I care more to do right, and I care 
 more still for the opinion of God ; I live and labor 
 through the hours of each day^ not so much to be 
 greater in any man's eyes, — to be a little richer, a little 
 
222 MAN'S PRAISE MORE THAN GOD'S PRAISE. 
 
 more distinguished, — but to be a little more just, more 
 magnanimous, more generous, for God loves gener- 
 osity, magnanimity, and justice; and if I strive to do 
 those things he loves, he will be merciful to me in all 
 my sins, even as I am merciful to others, and his di- 
 vine redemption will cleanse me from all stains, — thus 
 loving the praise of God more than the praise of men, 
 thus studying to show myself approved unto God, 
 thus seeking for true honor and immortality, the result 
 will be that, whether living, dying, or dead, I shall 
 have honor and immortality; that is, his gracious ap- 
 proval, his countenance which is life, his reconciled 
 presence where there is fulness of joy and pleasures 
 forevermore." 
 
XXII. 
 
 THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 
 
 And behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tejnpted him, saying, 
 Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life ? etc. — Luke x. 
 25-38. 
 
 A 
 
 CERTAIN lawyer stood up, and tempted 
 him," — put him to the test. Why ? Be- 
 cause the freedom and originality of Christ's words — 
 breaking into sabbatical views, etc. — had made him 
 the great heretic of the day to the orthodox Jew ; so 
 it is quite curious to see the numerous attempts made 
 to test him. This testing was usually from malice, and 
 a wish to destroy his authority, sometimes from curios- 
 ity and fondness for debate, and in the present case 
 possibly from a real desire to learn. 
 
 *' Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" 
 It seems an inquiry personal and serious. And the 
 Master answered, "What is written in the law? how 
 readest thou?" He referred him to Moses; for in the 
 spirit of true progress he assumed as little as possible 
 the position of an original authority, and always based 
 the new gospel on a higher interpretation and develop- 
 ment of the old truth. " And the lawyer, answering, 
 said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
 
224 I^HE GOOD SAMARITAN. 
 
 all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy 
 strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as 
 thyself." 
 
 Now this masterly falling back from Ihe tree to its 
 root, from the whole world of Jewish law, which spread 
 like the branchery of a huge tree, to its two great 
 trunks or roots, and then the naming of these, not fear 
 to God and justice to man, but love, — this magnifi- 
 cent reduction to great principles we often ascribe to 
 Christ; but I think we err in doing so, for it is here 
 found in the mouth of a Jew as a thing commonly un- 
 derstood, and it is clearly found in the books of Leviti- 
 cus and Deuteronomy. Still, though it was known, 
 practically it was not known. It was only grasped at by 
 a few, and not practically realized even by them. But 
 from the lips of Christ it took a new reality. As he 
 spoke it, the moral law was not only brought to its 
 deepest roots and made complete, but it was also made 
 the law of the heart. Yet no ; not quite complete. 
 One great point was still left undetermined. Love to 
 God, love to my neighbor, the substance of the law 
 was. Yes; but who is my neighbor? In the old time 
 under Moses it was, not man, but a brother-Hebrew. 
 Nay, narrower than that, it was confined to Hebrews 
 not unclean, not slaves, etc. Even when ages had gone 
 by, and when prophets seemed to catch wider glimpses, 
 broad lightning-flashes of duty, illuminating a broader 
 neighborhood, a wider landscape of humanity, it was, 
 like the lightning, only for a moment, and then the 
 
THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 225 
 
 broad vision seemed to contract itself again into as nar- 
 row a neighborhood as at the first, so that at the time 
 of Christ the wall of partition still rose around them 
 like a citadel thronged with fiery shapes of hate, of 
 prejudice, of war, against the whole earth. 
 
 The Jews, then, needed two things : First, towards 
 God, they needed the word " love " in place of all other 
 words; Secondly, they needed that the word " neigh- 
 bor" should be interpreted by a wide heart. So the 
 lawyer who asked "Who is my neighbor?" asked the 
 question which the Hebrew race at that critical epoch 
 was bound to answer; for the penalty of the human 
 race was about to fall on the unneighborly, narrow 
 Jew, as upon the hater of the human race. The Roman 
 eagle, turned into the Roman vulture, was waiting for 
 its victim. A question then indeed it was, " Master, 
 who is my neighbor?" The answer is the parable of 
 the Good Samaritan. 
 
 This answer is, in the manner of Christ, a little story, 
 a brief word ; and we will consider it. The answer might 
 have been a dry definition ; but, far from that, it came 
 from Christ's heart in the shape of a story filled with 
 imagination and feeling. ** A certain man went down 
 from Jerusalem to Jericho." Immediately the crowd 
 around him are lost in eager interest. It is to be the 
 story of a man travelling a fearful road, which de- 
 scended from the heights of Jerusalem, and going down 
 through gorges and abrupt defiles was the chosen haunt 
 of wild robbers and was well known as a terror. '' A 
 
 15 
 
226 THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 
 
 certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and 
 fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, 
 and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half 
 dead." It is done ; there he lies, wounded, frightened, 
 helpless. But " by chance there came down a certain 
 priest that way." There was a great station for priests 
 down at Jericho, and one of their number was now 
 travelling up to his duties in the temple. The poor 
 wounded creature, at the side of the road, lying and 
 listening, hears the coming of some one. It is a priest, 
 the first sight of whom seems life ; but — " when he 
 saw him, he passed by on the other side." He instinc- 
 tively shrunk; he would not even go near: ''on the 
 other side." Like many priests, like many people, he 
 caught the scent of distant trouble, and kept clean out 
 of it. No man of impulse he ! a well-controlled person ! 
 the other side suited him better. He '' passed by," and 
 we see him recede up the road with dignified mien. 
 He is on high church duty up at Jerusalem: these 
 things must not stop him. Excuses of course he made 
 to himself, for our great relief is in excuses and reasons. 
 '' To touch blood will make me unclean ; I can't afford 
 this delay; there is danger here, I must hasten on." 
 So he goes. 
 
 And likewise a Levlte came, a sacred person also; 
 but he, '' when he was at the place, came and looked 
 on him." Some touch of nature drew him so far as 
 to come and look, but no farther. I do not know 
 which is worse, — to keep at a distance from the ap- 
 
THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 22/ 
 
 peal of human need, or to be drawn near and then 
 reject it. 
 
 " But a certain Samaritan — " At this point of the 
 story there was a thrill of feeling in every Jewish heart 
 that listened. What will the Samaritan do? You know 
 about the Samaritans : they were mongrel Jews, with 
 a mongrel Jewish religion, intensely hated by the Jew 
 and intensely hating him. So of course there was a 
 thrill of expectation. If the Jew is no brother to a 
 Jew, if the sacred priest and Levite pass by, what will 
 be said of the detested Samaritan? "But a certain 
 Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was; and 
 w^hen he saw him, he had compassion on him, and went 
 to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and 
 wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him 
 to an inn, and took care of him. And on the morrow, 
 when he departed," — he stayed all night there with 
 him, it seems, — "he took out two pence, and gave 
 them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of 
 him : and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come 
 again, I will repay thee." 
 
 Here the parable finishes. Obser\^e the instinctive 
 art in the form of this story, — especially in this, that 
 most of its details are so sober and unromantic. Xo 
 exaggeration, for example, no ovenvrought bad treat- 
 ment on the part of the priest and the Levite, and on 
 the other hand no overAvrought excellence on the part 
 of the Samaritan, no blackening of the bad or ideal- 
 izing of the good, but all kept true to life. This won- 
 
228 THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 
 
 derful Samaritan, the very model and transcendence of 
 humanity for all time, says not one sentimental word ; 
 he is quiet, moderate, a very practical person, as thor- 
 oughly good people are apt to be, and he is altogether 
 unlike what the ordinary novelist would make him. 
 He says nothing beautiful; he does nothing profuse. 
 He does not leave a purse of gold; he gives but two 
 pence, — an adequate sum, no doubt, for present need, 
 but nothing over ; and if more should be required, he 
 will repay it on his return. 
 
 It is just a picture of a worthy traveller on that road, 
 a man nobly kind, but judicious and careful, — a picture 
 reminding us of De Foe. Now, all this instinctive sober- 
 ness keeps the story out of the region of romance, and 
 gives a sense of reality to the substance of it. For the 
 romantic, or imaginative, while it may seem to exalt 
 virtue, makes it at once in a manner unreal and hard 
 to practise, and the whole New Testament is a deep, 
 unconscious protest against the romantic. It is not in 
 the great splendid manner of the prophets, but quiet, 
 because under a fine disguise the imagination is felt to 
 be a real foe to the plain, pure heart of Christ, to the 
 simplicity of righteousness. The good Samaritan is a 
 character which might have been dipped in the hues 
 and splendors of an angel; yet Christ's story makes 
 him but a worthy, homesoun man, all ideal glory 
 veiled. 
 
 Here, then, is a picture of three neighbors, — the 
 priest, the Levlte, and the Samaritan; and here, as I 
 
THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 229 
 
 said, the parable ends, Christ just asking the lawyer 
 which he chooses. '' Which now of these three, think- 
 est thou, was neighbor unto him that fell among the 
 thieves? " 
 
 We must pause here, for this question is curious. 
 The original inquiry of the lawyer was, " Who is my 
 neighbor? — who are these persons whom you say, and 
 the old law says, I must love as myself ? how wide is 
 my neighborhood? what number of objects must I take 
 in?" — the real feeling in the heart being, ''How few 
 can demand my love? how may I make this terrible 
 duty of loving everybody easy by restricting it? " The 
 story in answer to this shows how widely a certain 
 Samaritan felt, shows his beautiful mercy to his worst 
 enemy, so that every heart, however prejudiced, must 
 approve him and say, " Yes ; this heart of unbounded 
 love is the true neighbor, and every one who has need 
 of his love and pity is their fit object; " and so the 
 question is answered, not by showing how few I can 
 confine my love to, how narrow I can draw the line, but 
 showing that true love widens out to all want ; that the 
 neighborhood of man, as the neighborhood of God, 
 spontaneously extends itself to all who need, be they 
 foes or devils. O Jewish lawyer, you who are seek- 
 ing out how little you can do and yet keep the com- 
 mandment; you who try to obey it in some other way 
 than through the wide heart of charity spreading every- 
 where, saying, " How narrow and selfish and hard can 
 I be and yet get through? " you who seek to obey the 
 
230 THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 
 
 law through some other way than love, which is the only 
 fulfilling of the law, and doing it that you may inherit 
 eternal life, and not at all that you care about your 
 neighbor, — I tell you all you are wrong. I show you 
 two pictures of sacred Jews like yourself, — one a priest, 
 one a Levite, who have gone on in your way, in your 
 spirit, and end by being neighbor to nobody but them- 
 selves, and leave the wounded brother dying in the 
 highway ; and I show you another picture of a Samari- 
 tan rescuing a Jew on the road, before whose love all 
 partitions fall down, who, not thinking perhaps of his 
 own eternal life at all, realizes need, and feels for it 
 and goes out to it. 
 
 The chief point which remains to be considered is, 
 that Christ pictures to Jews the true neighbor as a 
 Samaritan. Dwell a moment there. Did you ever 
 think what effect it would have had if, in telling us this 
 story, he had made the neighborly man a Jew, — a Jew 
 who was kind to a Samaritan? Though the lesson 
 would still have been a good one, and taught the Jew 
 to be catholic and pitiful, the effect would have been to 
 sustain his pride and narrowness of heart : a great and 
 hard sort of neighborliness, but at least it was a Jew 
 who did it. Thus a wide pity, though in itself distaste- 
 ful, might have been reluctantly accepted as a Jewish 
 virtue, an act of grace from the proud nation to the 
 world. 
 
 The true neighbor of whom Christ tells us is a 
 Samaritan, and, according to all Jewish belief, half a 
 
THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 23 1 
 
 heathen, half a heretic. It shows, first, Christ's most 
 noble justice in judging enemies, and especially in 
 judging heretics. The highest soul he pictures is in the 
 worst heretic a Jew could think of, a Samaritan. What 
 a lesson of burning shame to those ages which have 
 judged a man, no matter what his heart was, entirely 
 according to his belief! Believe with me and you are 
 right; believe against me and you are wrong. 
 
 This significant fact of the Good Samaritan gives 
 also a just sense of the spirit of Christ where otherwise 
 there would be some doubt. There are some things 
 which he says and does in the Gospels which look 
 Jewish, and we are sometimes tempted to suppose that 
 the portrait of the Son of God, being drawn by Jew- 
 ish hands, has caught Jewish colors; but this parable 
 clears all. 
 
 I wish we could even for a moment view Jesus Christ 
 as he was. It would then need no doctrines of the 
 Church to bring us all to our knees. Christ was a Jew, 
 and in many respects the intensest spirit and aft*ections 
 of a Jew were in him ; but he was so widely and beauti- 
 fully '' the Son of man," that he chooses the object of 
 his admiration — the man who is to represent forever his 
 own soul, the soul of the true neighbor — from among 
 the "■ dogs and enemies " outside, and in the teeth of 
 envenomed Jewish spite he sets a heretic up for love 
 and reverence. No man nowadays can rightly conceive 
 it ; for no man can know the depth of prejudice to be 
 overcome in order to reach such sublime elevation. 
 
232 THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 
 
 Our prejudices are even yet strong enough, but the 
 prejudices of antiquity and of the East are worn smooth 
 in these modern times; the gall is now almost made 
 milk. The spirit of the Good Samaritan has passed 
 from the lips of Christ into the atmosphere of the 
 modern world, so that we do not know what the Jewish 
 spirit was in the time of Christ. So we can never 
 reproduce the force of the fact that Christ made his 
 ideal good man a man who, as to half of the law, was 
 a heretic. He depicts as the highest neighbor the man 
 who can put every prejudice under his feet. Thus he 
 makes the test of the true neighbor that he shall be a 
 neighbor in spite of all that is against it. According to 
 this, let us judge our own conduct. If we are kind to 
 people who are pleasing to us, that is something, I don't 
 deny it ; but until we go much further and are kind in 
 spite of personal, social, and religious prejudice, we are 
 not the true neighbor. ** For if ye love them which 
 love you, what reward have ye? do not even the 
 publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren 
 only, what do ye more than others?" You must be 
 something much higher than this, even ''the children 
 of your Father which is in heaven : for he maketh his 
 sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth 
 rain on the just and on the unjust." 
 
 Who is my neighbor? Look at a Samaritan rescuing 
 a Jew on the high-road. He lifts his worst enemy; he 
 washes the wounds, he helps the bruised and broken 
 man on to his own beast ; he braves all the dangers of 
 
THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 233 
 
 the road ; and then goes his way, ready to do a like 
 service to any one else. Who is my neighbor? Ask 
 the South, the long-afflicted South, covered so long 
 with the pall of sorrow, sprinkled by blood, — ask it to- 
 day, after the scourges of war have afflicted it, ask it in 
 this awful pestilence, "Who is your neighbor?" It will 
 answer, "■ The noble men and women among us who 
 do not desert us, the whole Howard Association, 
 etc." Above all, perhaps it will answer, — God grant 
 it may, — " The North, lately the enemy, lately the 
 hated Samaritan, but now by its grand munificence 
 lifting its bruised and broken Southern brother, washing 
 his wounds, and ministering to his necessities. This is 
 my neighbor." Last of all, if you will know your 
 neighbor, look at the divine Samaritan, Christ. To the 
 human heart he is a Samaritan with "■ no form nor 
 comeliness," something we are averse to, a Samaritan 
 to the proud human race; yet he is the neighbor, " the 
 express image " of the returning God, of the redeeming 
 God, who comes near to suffering humanity, who stoops 
 to lift the wounded, and at the cost of his own blood 
 exhibits, to each of us who need, the infinite mercy 
 and neighborhood which is over all men. 
 
XXIII. 
 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 There was a certain man in Cesarea, called Cornelius, a centurion 
 of the band called the Italian band, a devout man, and one 
 that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to 
 the people, and prayed to God always, etc. — Acts x. 1-48. 
 
 THE subject is the opening of the mind of Peter, 
 and with him, of the Jewish Christians generally 
 (for he was the head, *' the apostle of the circumci- 
 sion "), to the world outside. Christianity among the 
 Jews had two great stages of difficulty : First, when it 
 aimed to enter the Jewish mind at all ; Second, when it 
 aimed to expand the Jewish Christian to the wide views 
 of Christianity as it now is. In fact, these two things 
 are one ; namely, the full conversion of the Jews. 
 But there were many gradations in this great passage 
 from Judaism to Christianity. During the life of Christ 
 some accepted him as a prophet, some as the prophet, 
 and some, like Peter, '' the Christ," advancing once 
 so high as to say that he was '' the Son of the living 
 God." 
 
 But after all, the sense of who he was, and particularly 
 of what his religion was, at the time of the crucifixion, 
 was low and obscure, even to the topmost apostle. And 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 235 
 
 after the Lord had risen, and the disciples were com- 
 missioned and illuminated, — after all this process 
 they stood on the first stage only ; there yet remained 
 the second, namely, to reach the conviction that the 
 Messiah was for all the world equally, that the Jew 
 was no better than the Gentile, that the old sacred 
 faith was to be put aside. 
 
 It was not so difficult to become a Christian as to be- 
 lieve that the Gentiles could become Christians. This 
 was so unexpected, so contrary to every prejudice, even 
 the best, that it seemed the wildest sacrilege, a mere in- 
 fidel radicalism ; and every personal feeling and habit, 
 as well as the whole conscience of the Jew, rose up 
 against it. Separation was the very soul of the laws of 
 Moses. It was not, to be sure, peculiar to the Jews : it 
 belonged to all antiquity, to the Greeks and Latins, but 
 especially in the case of the Jew separation was his 
 glory, and the Hebrew idea was, purity and strength 
 through this exclusiveness ; but the new doctrine of 
 Christ was, purity and power through inclusiveness. 
 
 The old system, with its precious truths at its centre, 
 derived its security from a sort of selfish rejection of the 
 whole world. In the weakness of men as to idolatry, — 
 for we are all naturally idolaters, and this tendency was 
 then the master religious instinct of the world, — the truth 
 and virtue of the unidolatrous religion were only saved 
 by seclusion. Its challenge was, " Stand off! " But the 
 new and more heavenly religion had a different heart; 
 it had a new and strange spirit ; it could afford to em- 
 
236 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 brace all, and give itself to all, with an innocent fearless- 
 ness; it calculated not the dangers of scattering itself 
 through a profane world, but, sublime in generosity and 
 boldness, committed itself to all mankind. 
 
 So unlike this was the ancient system that even the 
 Jewish vineyards could not be sown with divers seeds; 
 for a mingling of seeds and of fruits, it was thought, 
 would defile. The ox and the ass could not plough 
 together, nor a man wear garments of divers materials, 
 as woollen and linen. These every-day customs were 
 emblems of the one great rule of the race, separation. 
 
 Here, however, one may say, " But Christianity is a 
 development of Judaism." The answer is: This is true, 
 but only in respect to the great germs planted in the 
 old religion ; not as to much in the institutions and spirit 
 of the Mosaic law, and certainly not as to the way in 
 which it was held. Christianity in its pure spirituality 
 and in its openness, instead of being a development of 
 Judaism, stands as its precise opposite : the one, of ne- 
 cessity, selfish and timid, — I mean comparatively so, — 
 the other all disinterestedness and boldness and love; 
 the one national, the other for the human race ; the one 
 for some ages and some places, the other for all time 
 and for the whole world. 
 
 Such being the opposite spirit of the two religions, 
 especially then, when God's old faith had dwindled into 
 Pharisaism, they came together with the hiss and explo- 
 sion of fire and water. 
 
 To such a people as the Jews, having been such for 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 21J 
 
 ages, to preach communion, equality, was, next to blas- 
 phemy, the highest irrcligion and the worst immorality. 
 What ! to put aside Abraham and the sacred race ; to 
 put aside Moses and the holy institutions, and to per- 
 mit the awful temple to vanish as a mere architectural 
 mass seen in the clouds at the setting of the sun; to 
 profane the sacred Jewish land ; to break down the 
 walls of partition; to make the holy Jew unclean; to 
 give up every Jewish hope, — in one word, that the Jew 
 should cease to be a Jew, — why, this shocked patriotism 
 and pride, abolished instincts, habits, and hopes, and, 
 far more than all, shook the conscience to its founda- 
 tions; violated, I may say, the bodily conscience as to 
 cleanness and separation, and the mental conscience as 
 to almost everything deemed sacred! Why, if you re- 
 quired the Greek to forget Athens, the Roman to deny 
 Rome, the Hindu to profane his sense of caste, which 
 is as deep as his life, — all this united would not be more 
 than to ask the real Jew to cease to be a Jew ! 
 
 We may think that at the time of which these chap- 
 ters speak, when the Messiah was accepted, this great 
 work of unjudaizing the Jew, unmaking him, had al- 
 ready been done. Not so. When the first disciples 
 accepted the Messiah, this, so far from making them 
 less Jews, only deepened many Jewish feelings and 
 hopes, so that when the true character of Christianity 
 developed itself, and they began to perceive that it was 
 for the world, and that Judaism must be left behind, — 
 then arose that profound struggle the history of which 
 
238 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 is one of the most interesting in the annals of the 
 human mind. So astonishing was the idea that even 
 Paul speaks of it as the mystery which hath been hid 
 from ages, and is now made known, — an idea that is 
 so foreign to the Jewish heart that God, who had great 
 purposes to answer by this ancient religion, could not, 
 from the foundations of the world, risk that even a 
 whisper of this idea should be generally known, or his 
 whole scheme would fly to pieces. 
 
 But as the Jew was thus of necessity narrow, why 
 was it that the Christian seed should be planted in 
 these strait iron vessels, where either the great tree must 
 perish, or the vessel itself be shivered? Why was it 
 not sown at first, and at once, upon the open soil of 
 the world? Because the evidence, and much of the 
 power of our revelation, is in this, — that it is a continu- 
 ation, each part lending force to each through ages, 
 and each stage preparing the heart for the next stage, 
 advantages which a disconnected, an unprogressive 
 revelation could never have. The principle on which 
 God acted was growth, advance. Besides, great as 
 were the obstacles to the full reception and spread of 
 Christianity through Jewish hearts, yet in spite of that 
 there was in the Jew the soil best fitted for it. Not 
 only was his nature peculiarly fitted for the profound 
 reception of religious ideas, but the previous stages of 
 Hebrew education, while these had narrowed them, had 
 yet made, at least some of them, ready, as no other 
 souls were ever ready, for the reception, full appre- 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 239 
 
 henslon, and propagation of this truth. Christianity 
 needed Jewish souls as its apostles and teachers, and 
 could nowhere else have found them. The mediation 
 of this profound Jewish heart between Christ and the 
 Gentiles, the manner in which we see it first used and 
 then cast aside when it interfered with expansion, is a 
 wonderful instance of Providence in history. 
 
 I say, wdien it interfered it was cast aside. And mark 
 now, just at this point, before Judaism was divinely ex- 
 cluded, how imminent was the danger that, if the new 
 religion were longer committed to the Jews and their 
 prejudices, they would reduce and subordinate it, so 
 as to make it but an enlightened Judaism. This was 
 the immense risk; and any one who reads can see that 
 Christianity was just on the edge of a great gulf, and 
 if it had fallen into this there would have been, so far 
 as we can see, thousands of years of delay and disaster 
 to the race. Though this was avoided and Christianity 
 saved, yet it is interesting to see how slowly and by 
 what means it was done, — how Jewish Christians be- 
 came at last Christians purely and only. The high 
 mind of Stephen, the first martyr, gave the world, as it 
 were, the first hint; then at his light the torch of Paul 
 was kindled, or rather this wonderful creature Paul, 
 who would himself have reached forward into all 
 truth, caught, it is likely, the prompting of his first 
 change of thought from Stephen ; and so when Peter, 
 the great head of the Jewish Christians, was still back 
 in the twilight, Paul stood in the open day. 
 
240 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Just at this moment was the danger, when the en- 
 lightened Paul led forward the advanced wing of the 
 church, and when Peter, still a Jew, headed the narrow 
 Hebrew Christians, who hung far back, — just here was 
 the danger that the Christian Church would be rent at 
 its birth, that two ever-separating divisions would be 
 made, Peter's ever sinking back more and more into 
 the old, and Paul's ever moving, perhaps too rapidly 
 and too far, into the new. 
 
 Here, then, was a moment worthy of a divine interpo- 
 sition. Without this, it seems impossible that the church 
 of the circumcision could have been lifted out of that 
 deep Jewish rut; and hence the events here recorded. 
 
 In this tenth chapter of Acts is a knot of miracles, 
 beautifully blended, and pointing to one purpose. Cor- 
 nelius at Cesarea, the representative of the Gentile 
 world, and Peter at Joppa are both led as children by an 
 invisible hand, and brought into communion and final 
 brotherhood: the excellent Cornelius standing for all 
 the world outside, — a world prepared and waiting and 
 leaning forward for the light, — and Peter, the great re- 
 pository of the light of truth which was as yet, we may 
 almost say, burning in a dark lantern, induced now by 
 a divine cogency to open the lantern and give the light. 
 
 You know the little history. Peter's heart was opened 
 first by miracle, second by moral evidence. 
 
 As to this narrative, even if we in this age, so critical 
 of miracles, are to judge of miraculous acts by the im- 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 241 
 
 portance of the purpose, and by the tone and dignity 
 of the acts themselves, we ought to be satisfied with 
 these. The account is very beautiful, and without one 
 disfiguring detail. The significant and poetic beauty 
 of the great vessel, like a globe, as if representing the 
 earth, filled with various creatures all made clean in 
 the new order of things, and so the implied rebuke to 
 Peter the regenerated Jew for keeping up the obsolete 
 and now hateful distinction between the clean and the 
 unclean animal, and much more between the peculiar 
 race of men and all men, — this grand vessel, coming 
 down from heaven to show the common birth of all, 
 and taken back to the bosom of heaven as if all were 
 there held dear, and this done three times, with risine 
 emphasis, for the hungry Peter was eager to eat, but 
 refused to do so, saying, with half-disgust perhaps, or 
 with self-complacency, " Not so, Lord, for I have never 
 eaten anything that is common or unclean ; " the ma- 
 jestic voice replying, ^* What God hath cleansed, that 
 call not thou common," — the scene vanishing the first 
 time, but, to make sure of the effect, heaven opening 
 yet twice more, and the voice repeating its mandate, — 
 nothing could be more finely conceived. On the other 
 hand, at Ccsarea, a resplendent figure at the ninth hour 
 stood '' evidently " before Cornelius, and said, '' Thy 
 prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial 
 before God." 
 
 Observe, God, who at Joppa was declaring to Peter 
 the cleanness of every good man, here at Cesarea was 
 
 16 
 
242 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 acting out the principle towards Cornelius, and so 
 making the one transaction at Cesarea to vindicate the 
 other at Joppa. 
 
 Take notice, in the next place, of this important fact ; 
 namely, that in convincing and persuading Peter the 
 moral evidence, as to the heart of the good Cornelius, 
 is added to the supernatural evidence. The vision 
 opened Peter's mind, to be sure, and when the messen- 
 ger came he went to Cornelius ; but it was not until he 
 saw the good man and his household gathered reveren- 
 tially before him, and heard the humble and devout 
 words, '' Now therefore are we all here present before 
 God, to hear all things that are commanded thee of 
 God," — then at last came the full sense that the Gen- 
 tile heart was not common, that this man was better 
 than a child of Abraham, being a son of God ; and so, 
 at once and honestly, '' Peter opened his mouth, and 
 said. Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of 
 persons ; but in every nation he that feareth him, and 
 worketh righteousness, is accepted with him." At one 
 bound Peter overleaps the limits of the Jew, and goes 
 far beyond many even now. 
 
 Some writers speak of Peter as naturally bigoted. 
 He was a sincere and genuine Jew, — not of the very 
 largest thought, as Paul, and not to be judged by so 
 high a standard ; but still his was an open, teachable, 
 and intrepid spirit. If his age is remembered — a fact 
 of the very greatest importance in judging of such a 
 matter — his forwardness to accept views radically new 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 243 
 
 will surprise any one who knows mankind, will sur- 
 prise as much as that vast conversion of Saul to Paul. 
 He was firm in his beliefs, certainly; and it is a re- 
 markable fact that God chose such instructors as 
 these two men, both so intense in their convictions 
 as to be wrenched out of them only by miracles. It 
 shows us how God values earnestness, and how well he 
 saw that these two Jews, who lived in a burning heat 
 of Judaism, would, when once converted, pour other 
 flames, purer, but not less fervid, into the world, — 
 would burn, in fact, as that fire which the Lord said he 
 was about to '' send on the earth." Yes ; once set on 
 fire by the real truth, they burned as vividly along the 
 rim of the widest circle as they had done at the narrow 
 Jewish centre. 
 
 Call not then such a soul as Peter's the soul of a 
 bigot, and iron-bound. Was he not open, who, of all 
 the earth, first felt the deep appreciation of Jesus, — 
 who first stood forth and said, "Thou art the Christ"? 
 Yes; his heart was open, and his soul intrepid. But 
 his fault, his weakness, as is always the case, lay near 
 his virtue. He was all in the present feeling ; and so, 
 under any new impression, he was ever liable to ex- 
 treme reactions. The man who yesterday led the cir- 
 cumcision, to-day said, '' In every nation he that feareth 
 him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him." 
 But to-morrow this very man — as we read in the Epis- 
 tle to the Galatians — was openly rebuked by Paul for 
 yielding once more to his sympathies for the Jews, and 
 
244 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 possibly to his old Jewish prejudices, and refusing to 
 eat with the Gentile brethren. '' I withstood him to his 
 face," says Paul, '' for he was to be blamed." 
 
 The man who first recognized the Lord, then openly 
 and meanly denied him, ''I know not the man," — the 
 man who saw here so clearly the great vessel descend- 
 ing unto him, who felt that God had stretched out the 
 lines of his household as wide as the encircling skies, 
 yet shrinks from opposing the prejudices of his Jewish 
 brethren; and though he was naturally the bravest 
 man in the New Testament record, yet the only acts 
 of individual cowardice among the disciples there set 
 down are the acts of the brave Peter. 
 
 Here, in these chapters, is the grand encouragement 
 to an unprejudiced and tolerant spirit, — the very spirit 
 of Christ, which is union and not disunion, brother- 
 hood not enmity, and which puts down all small causes 
 of separation between man and man. The rule is for 
 us also, — '* what God hath cleansed, that call not 
 thou common." He hath cleansed whatever he hath 
 created ; whatever he has sanctioned in the natural 
 world as good enough to be his creature, whatever in 
 society and usage he has established and sanctioned 
 (sin and crime always apart), that is good enough to 
 be respected by us. This simple rule sweeps away 
 at once the differences of race, of language, of cus- 
 toms, of occupations, of the orders and classes in 
 social life, — all those myriad walls which shut out 
 the sympathies of one class, nay, one individual, from 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 245 
 
 another. A common fatherhood makes common 
 children. 
 
 I mean not to preach poHtical equality (that depends 
 on circumstances), or social equality, or any individual 
 equality; for Nature puts her ban on all such folly. 
 Does she make any two things equal? Is not her 
 whole kingdom subordination? Is not that the spirit 
 of the gospel? Yet it is also perfect brotherhood of 
 heart, animating and dignifying all, — the lofty willingly 
 coming down from their seat to raise the beggar from 
 the dust, — '' the brother of low degree " rejoicing in 
 the elevation of him that is above him. *' Orders and 
 degrees jar not with liberty, but well consist," said the 
 great Puritan, John Milton. So, resisting all mere level- 
 ling, yet, on the other hand, to use personal or social 
 or political advantages selfishly, to stand apart in our 
 prejudices, to oppress the deserving, to harden our 
 hearts against any of the children of God, — what is 
 all this but to erect again all those devil-built walls of 
 partition which the Lord has thrown down *' with the 
 breath of his mouth"? 
 
 Are you Christians? What Is the meaning of that? 
 ** Into what were ye baptized ? " Into a common sonship 
 to God, into a common redemption by Christ, Into a 
 common heart, into fraternity with man, calling nothing 
 but sin and meanness, In high or low, " common or un- 
 clean." For remember there Is one Redeemer and Elder 
 Brother who hath laid his hand upon us all, and I cannot 
 hope for his forgiveness if I forgive not my brother. 
 
246 WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Then, as to my religious convictions. Wherever in 
 doctrine an imperious dogma is, or a putting of intellec- 
 tual conclusions before charity and brotherhood, there 
 is the spirit of the Jew. Yes, though I justly hold my 
 religious convictions to be of costly value, and though 
 I must strive for the truth at any sacrifice, yet if my 
 brother, whom I see of as good life as myself, or better, 
 whom I see to be as earnest for truth as I am, if he dif- 
 fers with me shall I rule him to be but " an heathen man 
 and a publican"? Shall I call him "unclean" whom 
 God hath cleansed? What is the central test of the 
 Church, given by God ; what points it out to the 
 world? " By this shall all men know that ye are my 
 disciples, if ye have love one to another." Human 
 nature takes any excuse to make a separation, and 
 prides itself upon it : ** I have never eaten anything that 
 is common or unclean." After the Christian world has 
 been baptized into so divine a unity, into the belief of 
 one God and Father of all, and one Lord who is over 
 all, and who was crucified for all, and one Spirit, and 
 one general temper, is it not time we should subordi- 
 nate such differences as are not essential to Christian 
 life to that beautiful spirit, spoken of by Paul, which 
 *' hopes all and believes all "? And while we stand firm 
 for all truth, let us remember that in the great vessel 
 of the world variety and multiplicity are allowed ; *' all 
 manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and wild 
 beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air." 
 
 We still need the lesson. The old times, to be sure, 
 
WIDER VIEWS OF CHRISTIANITY, 247 
 
 are past, when the very tolhng of the church bells 
 seemed to be a tolling for battle. But even now, side 
 by side with a false tolerance, — which only seems lib- 
 eral because it is indifferent, — are also the remains, 
 with some persons certainly, of a blind, unchristian 
 prejudice against all not of their own immediate house- 
 hold. These overlook the injury done to the com- 
 mon faith for the sake of some special views, and really 
 seem to lose the sense of a common Master and a 
 common salvation and a common future in any petty 
 difference. 
 
 But do not misunderstand ; do not think I am preach- 
 ing church equality. I am not a believer in equality, 
 but in distinctions and superiorities of all sorts. Yet 
 when I am found expelling what Christ accepts, refus- 
 ing one of the least of these his brethren, magnifying 
 distinctions, and belittling the things which identify, 
 then I may be sure of one thing, — that that is the 
 precise reverse of Christ and his temper, and that if I 
 have not his temper I am none of his. '' He that is not 
 against us is for us," was his divine declaration ; and his 
 was the voice which majestically announced to his ser- 
 vant Peter, *^What God hath cleansed, that call not thou 
 common." 
 
XXIV. 
 
 THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 
 
 And no marvel ; for Satan hhnself is transformed into an angel 
 of light. — 2 Cor. xi. 14. 
 
 A T Corinth there were, it seems, as we should ex- 
 -^^- pect, " deceitful workers," who gave out that they 
 were the apostles of Christ; and they not only pre- 
 tended to the look and air of apostles, but such was 
 their skill in hypocrisy, the depth of their deceitful 
 working, that they actually seemed better apostles than 
 Paul himself. But this was no marvel, says Paul, for 
 Satan himself, the head malignant of the creation, the 
 worst of the set, appeared to be an angel of light ; for 
 the depth of his mysterious deceit was such that he w^as 
 actually transformed to suit his purposes. 
 
 " I marvel not, then," said the deep apostle, " when I 
 see evil looking as good, because I know that the centre 
 of evil itself, the father of it, the blot in Nature, • — even 
 he may cover himself with grace and name himself the 
 Son of the Morning, and come forward with a shining 
 face among the sons of God." 
 
 I have nothing to say as to the personality of this 
 fountain of evil. It is sufficient to know that there is a 
 dark power pervading Nature and spirits ; and, knowing 
 
THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 
 
 249 
 
 that, let us fix our eyes upon this fact about it, — its inde- 
 scribable deceptiveness. It were better to say, this fact 
 which is at its heart, and which is its life; for evil is 
 deception, and has no existence apart from deception. 
 It gets all its power by looking another thing than it is. 
 
 We know that the apostle speaks of evil as '* sitting in 
 the temple of God, showing himself that he is God," or, 
 as Milton expresses it, " with godlike imitated state." 
 It is a grand and universal mimicry of God or goodness, 
 from the lowest of the forms of good up to the highest. 
 If we were to go through every species of evil that has 
 ever seduced man or angel, the moment of its power 
 would be found to be when it wore a fair mask upon its 
 face ; and the more heavenly the look the mask has, the 
 subtler and more resistless is its charm. If we get at the 
 very core of things evil, it is always an ugly and dis- 
 gusting core ; but around it are often the finest shows 
 and the richest aroma of the creation ; and so in bor- 
 rowed garments it sits in the midst of the temple of 
 God, showing itself as God. All false religions, indeed, 
 in us Christians or in heathendom, are but some heav- 
 enly spirit leavening a satanic mass. 
 
 Some philosophical minds defend this blending and 
 hiding of evil under good, because they say — which is 
 no doubt true — that it relieves the brutality of the evil 
 and saves the conscience. But I answer: first, it makes 
 the introduction of evil easy; secondly, it gradually lets 
 down the mind to any depth. There is a celebrated 
 saying of Burke, in allusion to the splendid vice of the 
 
250 THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 
 
 French court, that " vice lost half its evil by losing all 
 its grossness ; " which is strongly defended by the acute 
 mind of Sir James Mackintosh, on the principle that all 
 disguise is a limitation upon vice. These excellent and 
 illustrious persons did not intend a pernicious state- 
 ment; but a maxim of this sort can be defended only 
 through not adverting to the distinctions just noticed. 
 
 Pure iniquity shocks ; but where some good affection 
 recommends it, then it becomes an angel of light, and 
 serves as a beautiful shell to cover in the satanic centre ; 
 and it is a fearful fact that the deepest sensibilities often 
 serve to make the heart the easier victim of its power. 
 It was the woman's nature that fell first, as the Bible 
 records. Why? Because of her weakness. But wherein 
 the weakness? In the very source of her strength, — 
 the more vivid sensibility, — not only the sense that the 
 fruit was " pleasant to the eyes," but the dazzle of the 
 thought that it would elevate, that it was " to be desired 
 to make one wise," — this dazzle it was that made her first 
 in the transgression. And so it ever is with her. And 
 so it ever is with strong feelings and powerful imagina- 
 tions. I mention this to the young, to all, as a trumpet 
 of warning. 
 
 Now, of this deception our life is crowded with in- 
 stances. The holy affection of parent for child covers 
 up and to some extent justifies to the parent the most 
 arrant selfishness as respects him and his. The indis- 
 pensable virtue of prudence, the necessity for the hon- 
 orable energy which foresees and provides, conceals at 
 
THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 25 1 
 
 this moment from whole masses of men their distrust in 
 God, their reliance on the most unreliable things, their 
 greedy grasp of the world. So the heartless conceit and 
 selfishness of ambition chooses for itself the fairest 
 names and forms to cover it, — glory, patriotism, etc. 
 Wherever we look, war, letters, science, high place in 
 the State, — all gather a thousand artificial and some real 
 grandeurs to cover over with angelic light the various 
 Satans which lie powerful at the centre. That old sor- 
 cerer who once spread out to the purest eye of Christ 
 the kingdoms of the world still covers with his cloth of 
 state all the sordid objects of life; he still calls selfish' 
 grasping honorable aspiration, and the harlotries of 
 vanity shine with the name and as if with the lights of 
 true glory. 
 
 Strip off these fair names and coverings, and we have 
 below — what? Look into the heart of Napoleon, look 
 through into the very heart of that most imperial of all 
 forms which ever awed the world, and what do you see 
 there? A man says he is seeking public good, wealth, 
 power, for honorable ends, or maybe self-culture, or a 
 noble truth and beauty, and so he covers himself with 
 these shining names; but if you look under the drapery 
 you will find a contemptible litde idol, as deformed 
 often as a Hindu god. Nay, every best and purest 
 affection, the love of man to woman, faithfulness to 
 duty, to religious truth, we so abuse as to allow under 
 their holy shelter passions, defects, which would blush 
 in the open daylight. 
 
252 THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 
 
 I do not say we deliberately put ourselves under this 
 deception. For the most part this is not so. We are 
 drawn away scarcely conscious of the delightful lie. 
 But the man alive to duty always detects or may de- 
 tect the cheat. He may; but the song in his ears is 
 a fair song, and the eyes are half willing to close, and 
 the enchanted world is welcomed, for it seems fairer 
 than the common daylight. It is so delightful to look 
 at inferior things in this superior way, to cover them 
 with fair names, to call, for example, our weak, self- 
 indulgent compassion to the poor charity, or to call our 
 ostentation charity, or to call our gross calculations for 
 self charity, — for " the coward to say he is a wary man, 
 or for the miser to say he is frugal." This angel of 
 light so beautifully adorns it all that we close our eyes 
 on the devilish legerdemain. 
 
 I am a proud man, or I am a great self-seeker, or of 
 a bitter temper, with many personal grudges. Now, I 
 may wreak all these tempers, not only without danger, 
 but to great advantage, under the cover of interest to 
 my party or my set. If I am called a Christian, how 
 stirring my public benevolences, so long as they are 
 public ! how keen am I for the truth ! — that is, per- 
 haps, for certain prejudices or superstitions which I 
 have built up between me and my brother and call 
 truth, though it is such truth as will not keep the 
 unity of the Spirit, and breaks the golden bond of 
 peace. Many a church partisan feels covered all over 
 with the armor of a champion of the light; and yet 
 
THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 2 S3 
 
 what is he but a poor deluded creature, working the 
 works of Satan? 
 
 So through the whole. There is not one evil which 
 wears not a face as of a twin brother to some good. 
 When we are making excuses and explanations to our- 
 selves for a course we are bent on taking, then the good 
 gifts of our mind are perverted to smooth the way to 
 sin, and we give occasion to that fine satiric sentence, 
 " So convenient a thing is it to be a reasonable creature, 
 for it enables one to find or make a reason for every- 
 thing one has a mind to." 
 
 The only sort of science, perfection in which is abso- 
 lutely required, is the science of knowing " the depths 
 of Satan." Until we learn more of these depths, let us 
 take this one rule : When there is any tinge or doubt 
 of evil, fear it most where it comes most warm and nat- 
 ural and lovely. Or sometimes when it comes more 
 sacred still, — 
 
 " Breathing like sanctified and pious bonds, 
 The better to beguile." 
 
 In all these cases, fear it. " Abhor that which is evil ;" 
 though it be as lofty in stature as a god, though its face 
 be living with charms as if fresh out of heaven, though 
 it be covered with imperial honors, "the kingdoms of 
 the world and the glory of them," — abhor it ! 
 
 Discriminate; prove all things; try them by the 
 model of Christ, by his divine rules, or better still by 
 his divine temper. I know nothing else in books, noth- 
 ing in men's heads or hearts that can teach us how 
 
254 THE DEPTHS OF SATAN. 
 
 surely to detect Satan. Christ is the one who himself 
 was utterly undeceived, and who looked at all things as 
 they are. Study him, catch his views, get that spirit of 
 most disinterested, humble love for God and the inter- 
 ests of man, and every form of the base and selfish will 
 start up from its myriad disguises, discovered to its last 
 fibre, naked and hideous. 
 
XXV. 
 
 THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 In the image of God created he him. — Gen. i. 27. 
 
 TN many aspects was man intended to be in the image 
 -^ of God ; and they are all interesting and high, and 
 are the claims of our nature to a natural nobility, until 
 we become in part self-degraded and self-deposed. 
 Man was intended as the visible representative of God 
 as '' the Judge of all the earth." We are all, by the 
 very constitution of our spirits, intended to be set in 
 the earth for judgment. 
 
 This fact has been felt by all men throughout their 
 history; but it is most singular to see how the feeling 
 has shown itself. It has not come clearly out in the 
 consciousness of men as a fact true of themselves, true 
 of all men (as it is), but true of kings or patriarchs or 
 divine men only. At the time of the Hebrew patriarchs 
 it was felt that theirs was a peculiar power, of adjudging 
 a blessing or curse, — a judicial power, which sent good 
 or evil down into the life. So it was felt as to prophets 
 and diviners such as Balaam. The feeling of men was 
 that such a power of judging did exist on earth, but 
 that it could only belong to the leaders, the old men, 
 the prophets, the men nearer God. 
 
256 THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 So, in the same way of thinking, throughout common 
 history the profane mass has been denied all the emi- 
 nent glories of humanity, that they might be gathered 
 as aureolas around a few select heads. While the 
 simple truth is that the title of all men to judge is just 
 according to the degree in which God has given them 
 a just heart and mind; just in proportion to that, 
 they share with him by a natural title in his office of 
 judgment, — Christ the supreme judge, after him those 
 who are most like him. But men have ever stripped 
 themselves, as a race, of the finest distinctions of their 
 humanity; and the reason of this has been, that the 
 mass of human kind until lately were in the uncon- 
 scious humility of children as to themselves, but as to 
 their great ones they could believe anything; their 
 sacred ones seemed to them (in their. reverential imagi- 
 nations) to share the mysterious lights and powers of 
 God. 
 
 Of course, all this was based in some cases on a real 
 ground of truth; namely, that some chosen men are 
 somewhat more in the image of God than others. But 
 the same feeling operates throughout history, even where 
 the higher men are really not higher at all. The world 
 has all along bowed down to the decrees of conventional 
 orders of men, artificial classes. Brahmins and priests 
 for example, and their voices only have stood for the 
 judgments* of God. 
 
 But the gospel of Christ broke boldly for the first 
 time upon this delusion, and proclaimed that all men 
 
THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 257 
 
 of the Spirit, that is, all true souls, are kings and priests 
 unto God ; that judgment, the power to " open and 
 shut," receive and reject, bless and curse, belongs to 
 be sure eminently to chosen men, but belongs also to 
 every faithful man. This was the true spirit of the 
 gospel. 
 
 The Christian Church, however, received this great 
 truth but for a moment, and almost Immediately ran 
 back to its old superstitions about leading or official 
 men, and deposited the precious duties and rights of 
 humanity In the hands of an order. So what was at 
 first In the Christian Church a power of divine judg- 
 ment, given to all, but especially and In an eminent 
 sense to apostles and leaders (because to their Illumi- 
 nated hearts It specially belonged), this power, the 
 *' power of the keys " of the kingdom of heaven, to 
 open and to shut, to say what man or what truth should 
 come In or be shut out, to absolve or condemn, — this 
 power gradually and ever since has been grasped and 
 used by the priesthood of that very ancient and power- 
 ful church, the Church of Rome. 
 
 But let me do that priesthood no Injustice. Its 
 priestly powers were not so much grasped by them 
 as devolved upon them by the condition of the mass In 
 Europe from that day to this. The world of Christians 
 In ignorant humility, losing sight of their own claims 
 and duties as born representatives of God upon earth, 
 to judge and guide themselves and others, have willingly 
 yielded up this heavenly prerogative, anxious to get 
 
 17 
 
258 THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 rid of the responsibility of themselves. Yes, and not 
 merely the ignorant, but intelligent people, from among 
 ourselves (so deeply seated is this weakness), pass, even 
 to-day, into the Church of Rome for this very purpose, 
 to discharge themselves of all judgment, to unman them- 
 selves; for it is the true and only manhood of man to 
 continue in the image of God, of which this great office 
 of judgment is one aspect. The high thing is always 
 the hard thing; and this high office of judgment which 
 requires at every step that the whole conscience and 
 will be awake, has been gladly given away and got 
 rid of. 
 
 But we Protestants at least do better, — a little, but 
 not much better. Men have never been high enough 
 yet to be truly men. Are not our judgments of truth, 
 for example, made for us by others? Who has estab- 
 lished theology and bound it upon Protestantism, but 
 a few scholastic heads ? Yet this is pardonable. It is 
 not pardonable, however, that the Christian heart should 
 not learn to judge from its own self at least of the great 
 aspects of truth, and much more to judge Christian 
 practice and morals. 
 
 But one thing more, and worst of all, as to our Pro- 
 testant boast of private judgment. Protestantism, in 
 claiming the right of judgment for the individual, has 
 made one egregious mistake. It has at least permitted, 
 if it has not encouraged, a mistake as to where in human 
 nature the seat of judgment is. Not in the cold head, 
 judging the letter of the Bible, — not there is the seat 
 
THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 -0' 
 
 of judgment. In the cultivated spiritual soul, in the 
 pure heart, brought under the influence of Bible truth, 
 there is the light which judges of all spiritual light, 
 the inipcrium in imperiOy — the top of judgment. Now, 
 the insufficient emphasis of this fact has gradually 
 turned much of Protestant thinking into a mere intel- 
 lectual criticism ; and mere intellect, judging of things 
 spiritual, is scepticism ! So we see on the one hand 
 that the Church of Rome has usurped, in the interests 
 of a class, the judgment God gave to all men ; and we 
 see on the other hand that Protestantism, while seeming 
 to reassert the rights of individual judgment, has done 
 so in part imperfectly and in part mistakenly. 
 
 But next, we ought to be not only judges in this 
 general sense, but more specifically judges of the char- 
 acter of one another in the ordinary sense. We are to 
 be judges of one another, carefully, to be sure, because 
 of our ignorance, benignly because of our brotherhood, 
 but still to judge one another and to " spread plenty 
 of justice and equity upon the earth." I know that 
 the best and most judicial men (aware of their own 
 infirmities, aware how much the pure light of judg- 
 ment which comes down from God into the spirit is 
 dimmed) feel instinctively that they would gladly put 
 away all judgment as to their fellows. As Saint Paul 
 said, " I judge nothing before the time, until the Lord 
 [the king of judges] come." He meant that his ten- 
 dency was, in cases of doubt, not to be arbitrary and 
 foolishly certain, but gladly, and wherever he could, 
 
260 THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 to commit all judgment to Christ; but such cases apart, 
 Saint Paul himself declares that man is gifted with the 
 highest powers of judgment. '' Know ye not that ye 
 shall judge angels?" and as a matter of fact he himself 
 exercised continually the office of a high judge, and by 
 no title but because of the judicial spirit that was in 
 him. And so of all men who share in the same spirit; 
 judgment is asked of them, benign but real, the weight 
 of their approval or disapproval. This is one of the 
 demands upon us as human, as made in the image of 
 God ; we cannot put it off; *' we are appointed there- 
 unto," — appointed to acquit or condemn as one of the 
 delegated judges of the earth. 
 
 This is true. Yet as a matter of fact what do we 
 find? We find a large body of men seize judgment 
 gladly, but only that they may use it selfishly or ma- 
 lignantly, rushing to decisions concerning their fellow- 
 creatures in a bold, selfish, and ignorant spirit, and 
 under the guise of judges taking the place of execu- 
 tioners. The lips of men and women made sweet and 
 sacred to truth and justice are poisoned and black 
 with wrong. This is one side. On the other, there 
 is a class of good but falsely conscientious people 
 who decline the office of judging altogether. Did not 
 the Lord say, " Judge not, and ye shall not be judged "? 
 Yes, to be sure those divine lips spake that; but of 
 course he meant unjust judges and overweening con- 
 demnations. It would be better, I think, if the words 
 stood, not "judge not," but ** censure not, and ye shall 
 
THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 26 1 
 
 not be censured." Whose voice sounds with a louder 
 and nobler ring oi judgment than his? Not any. I 
 know that he censures, but I know that his kindness, 
 while it suffused and limited his justice, never destroyed 
 it; if it had, his mercy would be a curse. 
 
 But you have no right to be judging others, you say. 
 Yes, but you have ; and more than a right, you have a 
 duty. The only question is, how you shall perform it. 
 The world wants justice. The earth mourns and lan- 
 guishes for the want of it. Human affairs need it, in- 
 dividual men need it, and the hearts of some men are 
 half consumed in the thirst for justice. *' I want but 
 justice," they say. Yes, and the way the world is going 
 on, you will want it. Many people will give you scandal 
 and censure but omit the justice, while some good men 
 stand by and will not interfere. '' The world wants jus- 
 tice," I repeat; and the only question is how, in what 
 spirit, right-hearted men shall speak it and act it. 
 
 Now, to know this rightly, we must know that God's 
 judges must have righteous ends in view, and judge 
 without spleen or selfishness. That is first. We must 
 imitate the dignity of the public justice as we see it 
 practised in our solemn tribunals. We must not be 
 hasty, we must demand the evidence, grounds more 
 pertinent than gossip, or else entirely refuse judgment ; 
 and in all points we must let our justice lean towards 
 equity, and our equity lean towards mercy. 
 
 Besides, two thmgs are demanded of every judge, — 
 personal purity and fearlessness. Our judgment must 
 
262 THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 be as pure as an act of religion, and as fearless, with 
 no private meanness or unbrotherhood at the bottom of 
 our hearts. Fearlessness in the pure judge is especially 
 to be admired ; especially, because ordinary people are 
 so cowed by power and influence, so cowed by the 
 slanderer, that justice is kept back through fear. Most 
 strange to say that the unjust men of the world frighten 
 men so much by their calumnies that justice is often 
 silent, and even sometimes pays blackmail to its enemy. 
 I have known, perhaps you have known, whole commu- 
 nities where the worst of slanderers have been treated, 
 if not with respect yet with particular care; just as in 
 some countries the serpent, and in Japan the fox, be- 
 cause supposed to be animals inhabited by demons, 
 are on that account consecrated and worshipped, and 
 enjoy the best of the land, — really devil-worship. The 
 just and fearless judge, who puts under his feet the 
 fear of the slandering newspaper or slandering man or 
 woman, deserves a monument. 
 
 Finally, we are appointed to be judges of ourselves; 
 and the great rule of this judgment is to be merciful to 
 others but severe to ourselves ; for selfish as we are, it 
 is always safe to deduct largely from our indulgence 
 towards ourselves and to add largely to our indulgence 
 towards others. There is an instance of this sort of 
 modesty and equity of heart in the private journals 
 of Sir James Mackintosh, to which I am glad to recur. 
 He says, speaking of a certain person : " This gentle- 
 man has, I think, a distaste for me, which I believe to 
 
THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 263 
 
 be natural to all his family. I think the worse of no- 
 body for such a feeling. Indeed, I often feel a distaste 
 for myself. I am sure I should not esteem my own 
 character in another person. It is more likely I should 
 have disrespectable or disagreeable qualities than that 
 such a person should have an unreasonable antipathy 
 for me." Now, here is the veritable Christian spirit in 
 the judgment of self. The scales of pure justice this 
 man carried into the public courts of his country, but 
 he carried other scales into the judgments of his own 
 heart, — scales swayed and tipped by modesty, by gen- 
 erosity, and by a fine Christian honor. Generosity, 
 then, is the rule in all questions of self towards others. 
 And then, last, as to that still higher judgment, — the 
 judgment of self before God. We need no generous 
 measures, only consciousness of self as it is. I must ask 
 myself simply, What am I? what thoughts do I harbor? 
 what ends do I pursue? what do I love and hate? I 
 am a creature ; am I grateful and humble to the dust 
 before my Creator? I am redeemed from death; am I 
 thankful and trustful and obedient? What is the fact? 
 And remember what you candidly say of yourself to-day 
 and here God v/ill say of you, a little farther on, at the 
 great judgment-seat. " Beloved, if our heart condemn 
 us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all 
 things. Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then 
 have we confidence toward God." 
 
 We have glanced now, only glanced, at the whole 
 range and solemnity of the judgment given to man as 
 
264 THE OFFICE OF JUDGMENT. 
 
 made in the image of God the Judge. I have said 
 that we are appointed judges of truth, — we, and not 
 somebody else, however high and venerable. I have 
 said that we are appointed judges of our fellows, to 
 announce judgment towards them, to set right the 
 wrongs of the world, yet to do it in mercy. I have 
 said we are set for the judgment of self, to rehearse the 
 coming judgment-day of God. Who then recognizes 
 his great place as judge? Who remembers that the 
 constitution of his nature and the example of Christ 
 call him "to do justice and to love mercy; " to judge, 
 but in the Lord's purity, and in his sweetness and 
 mercy, — judging others as we ourselves may hope to 
 be judged? 
 
XXVI. 
 
 GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 
 
 When the viorriing was co7?ie, ail the chief priests ajid eiders 
 of the peopie took coiinsei against fesiis to put him to death. — 
 Matt, xxvii. i. 
 
 '' I "O any thoughtful person, whatever his beHef, there 
 -*" is indescribable interest in the scenes just pre- 
 ceding the death of Christ. The closing of his story, it 
 seems, was meant to be the most impressive record of 
 this world. I mean to speak of this great scene, 
 excluding everything else and everything higher, with 
 but one thought mainly in view, — God's rebuke of ap- 
 pearances, — as a vast illustration of those words which 
 the Lord himself once uttered : '' Judge not according 
 to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment." 
 
 If we consider this scene as it was looked at then, and 
 as it was in fact, we shall see, as we never saw before, 
 the rebuke of appearances, first in showing how guilt 
 may look like virtue, and virtue like guilt. There at 
 that moment was virtue itself, it would seem, in the 
 form of high accusers, standing for God and his law, 
 and ready to vindicate that great cause. Who were 
 they? They were the high dignitaries of the Jewish 
 
266 GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 
 
 people, engaged for religion and order against innova- 
 tion, the venerable protectors of the sacred past. There 
 also was guilt, in the form of a man accused and finally 
 condemned. He seemed to be a singular person, for 
 a time popular with the mass, but one who could not 
 long be popular with any mass; besides, he was de- 
 tested by the great heads, for his views threatened the 
 comfort and respectability of the better classes, and 
 indeed the existing order of things. 
 
 There he stands quite friendless, obviously guilty and 
 accursed; for are not the rulers against him? is not 
 public opinion against him? are not the ardor and cries 
 of the multitude joined with the gravity of the rulers and 
 the aged, — the one vitalizing, the other consecrating 
 the cause? So the man before them is obviously igno- 
 minious; their hearts feel it, and he looks so to their 
 very eyes. Such is the color of power, which can make 
 the blue of the heavens take a different tint. 
 
 So he looked to them, while they looked to them- 
 selves in every point pure and respectable persons. 
 They went not into the Roman *' judgment-hall, lest 
 they should be defiled, but that they might eat the 
 passover." Indeed, so pure, and with this blood upon 
 their hands ! They were also grateful for God's deliver- 
 ances ; at least they religiously kept the passover, and 
 at this moment, when about to eat the paschal lamb, 
 whose blood saved the early Hebrews, they make ready 
 to destroy that other lamb, ** which taketh away the 
 sins of the world." 
 
GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 26/ 
 
 See these merciful, scrupulous, devout, theological 
 Jews, — see how sacred their guilt appears; and see the 
 very highest, holiest, looking so low in the opinion of 
 the moment that every man can spit upon him, and his 
 assigned place is between two crucified thieves. They 
 forget their own history, — the few pure and high 
 against the many low ; they take for granted that what 
 is on top is best; theirs is the old feeling which slew 
 the prophets, namely, this man is not according to our 
 ideas, therefor he is wrong, hateful, fit to be killed. 
 We know something of Jesus Christ: there he is, judged 
 and felt not fit to live. We know this Jewish mob, 
 these scribes and Pharisees : there they all are, swell- 
 ing in the consciousness of virtue and virtuous indig- 
 nation, vindicating religion and saving their country. 
 There were no doubt secret misgivings among them ; 
 and woe unto the man who does not listen when the 
 soul hints he is wrong ! 
 
 There were three parties on this occasion who claimed 
 to have knowledge. The Jewish leaders first: "We 
 have a law." They claimed to know truth. Pilate also 
 claimed to know. When Christ spoke of '' the truth,'* 
 Pilate turned away with a sneering doubt, and said, 
 ''What is truth, — that is, who claims to know? Have 
 not all the minds of all the schools left it where they 
 found it, — in endless uncertainty?" Here spoke the 
 sad result of all Greek and Roman thought, — doubt: 
 '' We know only that we can't know." Pilate felt that 
 he was a master in this matter, that he had reached 
 
268 GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 
 
 the glorious end of all philosophy, and took his seat 
 on nothing. 
 
 The Jew was proudly certain that his half-truths or 
 his falsehoods were God's truth; the Roman was 
 proudly certain that no man knew anything about it; 
 and between these two the thought of the world was 
 then divided. But there was a third Person here. He 
 stood in the presence of the two august authorities in 
 the domain of thought, and of all the results they had 
 reached, and quietly claimed that the truth was with 
 him. ** Then Pilate entered into the judgment-hall 
 again, and called Jesus, and said unto him, Art thou 
 the King of the Jews? Jesus answered, My kingdom 
 is not of this world. . . . Pilate therefore said unto him, 
 Art thou a king then? Jesus answered. Thou sayest 
 that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this 
 cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness 
 unto the truth." A king, but not of this world, — a 
 witness unto the truth, and all they who are of the 
 truth will range themselves under him. 
 
 Contrast the imposing Jewish truth, the learning and 
 refinement of the rabbis and doctors ; contrast the im- 
 posing philosophic doubt of the Greek and Roman 
 world, — contrast all this with the quiet voice of a seem- 
 ing criminal just about to be crucified, who said, amid 
 sneers, that he was the king of the truth; and then 
 remember where Jewish and Roman truth is to-day, — 
 antiquated, dwarfed, swept with the dust into a corner, 
 — and remember that to-day the thought of this crimi- 
 
GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 269 
 
 nal shapes all virtue ; that in the line of his truth the 
 world runs and must run ; that on the certainty of his 
 convictions we stand as on our only rock ; that if his 
 voice were silent, the invisible world would sink back, if 
 not into total darkness, at least into shadows ; the face 
 of God the Father of men would unshape itself into 
 an idol, perhaps into a monstrous nothing, — no God; 
 that if his voice were silent, the whole earth would un- 
 christianize itself, its moral promise wither, and the 
 human heart itself die in the human bosom. 
 
 I see here the Jewish prince, Herod, ** with his men 
 of war," — Herod, the representative of that line of 
 kings who succeeded to the very kingship of God ; here 
 stands Pilate in his judgment-hall, representing the 
 imperial might and the imperial law of Rome; with 
 them stand a unique set of men, rulers and priests and 
 scribes, representing perhaps the oldest, certainly the 
 most singular and by far the highest and most sacred 
 religion of the world, — properly, indeed, its only re- 
 ligion, — in the background the wonderful temple of 
 that religion; all this stands here, and all this is at 
 the moment supported by the popular will of a nation, 
 by the masses of the Jewish people. 
 
 This is imposing, to be sure. This is the appear- 
 ance; but what is beneath it? As to the prince of 
 the Jewish people, he is but a poor worldling and 
 trifler, and plays his high part as judge by using the ' 
 occasion to satisfy his curiosity and to amuse his 
 luxurious leisure ; for when he " saw Jesus he was ex- : 
 
2/0 GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 
 
 ceeding glad, because he had heard many things of 
 him, and he hoped to have seen some miracle done 
 by him." As to the Roman governor representing 
 Roman justice, — the wisest and most impartial jus- 
 tice the world had ever known, — what does he? He 
 is awed and superstitiously impressed by the presence 
 of Christ, says, ** I find no fault in him," yet from 
 selfish fears and selfish interests yields, and *' delivers 
 him to be crucified." And as to the imposing heads 
 of the church of God, whose law was ** to do justice 
 and judgment," so mean and malignant and cruel were 
 their hearts, that it was as if the sacred robe of the 
 high priest covered a monster. Yet how high it all 
 was! And as for Him, — what is he? A thing '' de- 
 spised and rejected." Yet how infinitely difi"erent the 
 fact ! 
 
 Again : I see here how deceptive are the appear- 
 ances of shame and of glory; for manifestly it was 
 true once, and may be true again, that just in that 
 thing where the stain of ignominy seems blackest a 
 peculiar honor may come to shine. 
 
 Nothing in the last scenes of Christ aftects my own 
 mind so much as the shame and mocking, — mocking 
 so keen and contemptuous, — a depth of malignant 
 irony such as I know nowhere else. " Herod with 
 his men of war set him at naught, and mocked him, 
 and arrayed him in a gorgeous robe." Except Pilate, 
 they all mocked, — Herod, the soldiers, the spectators 
 under the cross, the priests, — all. They mocked his 
 
GOnS REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 2Jl 
 
 kingship, and the idea of his power. '* They that 
 passed by reviled him, wagging their heads, and say- 
 ing. Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it 
 in three days, save thyself; " and it was reserved, last 
 of all, for the chief priests with the scribes to mock. 
 I see here, also, how poor are our ideas of success and 
 defeat. At that moment all the world had declared 
 for wrong, and Holiness and Love hung nailed to 
 the cross. The few poor friends of Christ *' forsook 
 him and fled; " and that hour was so awful to them 
 that they felt the earth shake beneath their feet, and 
 darkness was over the w^hole land from the sixth to 
 the ninth hour. It was certainly the hour and power 
 of darkness. The crowd dispersed ; the priests, much 
 pleased, went back to the temple, the governor to his 
 palace. Jesus was dead, and Satan had sat down on 
 the throne of the world. 
 
 It was finished, then, in the blackness of darkness, 
 and just then the universal dayspring broke in the 
 east. From that moment he took, and will take for- 
 ever his place. The Being most ignominious, most 
 mocked, becomes forever — on that continent, on this, 
 to you, to me, and to the child born thousands of 
 years hence — our Master, our Lord, our Lord God ; 
 and to him every knee shall bow ; and his blood and 
 sorrows shall cleanse and heal all sinful and broken 
 hearts forevermore ; his name the Saviour of the 
 world. And those Jews, howling like wolves upon 
 his path, — as they recede from us we see them cov- 
 
2/2 GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES, 
 
 ered with shame and hissing, and his blood, alas ! 
 sprinkled upon them and upon their children. So in 
 , the great magic of Providence the pictures of false 
 glory grow black, its crowns wither, while the image 
 of holiness and love, marred and stained, is set 
 upon a throne which is *' from everlasting to ever- 
 lasting." 
 
 This whole scene I consider as a rebuke of false 
 appearances; for here is exhibited such a profound 
 contrast between reality and show, between what is 
 and what seems, that we almost see an invisible per- 
 son pointing his unmoving finger at the whole. I see 
 here on the grandest scale such complicated irony as 
 I know not of in any record, — the irony of facts ; 
 that is, facts so dramatically organized as to present 
 the most gigantic godlike contempt of the false gran- 
 deurs, wisdom, dignity of man. Man needs hum- 
 bling; the mean greatness of the false heart needs 
 to be exposed ; and this is done at the cross of Christ. 
 How it came to be thus done, I can only explain in 
 one way, — that it was a purposed, deliberate, divine 
 mock of wrong and false men. God is accustomed 
 so to speak and act in the Bible. Why should we 
 be shocked, then, that the divine vengeance, which 
 shines lurid about every wrong deed, should speak 
 most keenly at the death of Christ? 
 
 Shall the solemn scorn at the littleness and blind- 
 ness of sin, which we may see everywhere in history, 
 — in our own lives, indeed, if we look closely, — shall 
 
GOUS REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 2/3 
 
 this not be seen also in that one awful history? There 
 the very ideal of wrong, covered with power, con- 
 fronted the meek and beautiful Spirit of heaven, tow- 
 ered over him, scorned him, ironized him, put a reed 
 in his hand for a sceptre; and shall not the Divine 
 Justice at that supreme moment come forth and re- 
 verse the whole, and present this proud and cruel 
 show to everlasting shame? Yes; a divine Spirit so 
 ordered, and there stands the grand retributive mock- 
 ing. Pilate thought, no doubt, it was his own sneer, 
 when full of contempt he wrote a title, in Hebrew, 
 and Greek, and Latin, '' Jesus of Nazareth the King 
 of the Jews ; " but his sneer is lost in the godlike, un- 
 speakable irony which is behind it. Who does not 
 see divine indignation coming out boldly everywhere, 
 and sculpturing itself in eternal images of scorn? 
 Why, it arrests one almost as much as if God himself 
 had stepped upon the scene. 
 
 What is the purpose in all this? The purpose to 
 shame the soul, — the high and tyrannous and mean 
 soul. This on the one hand, while on the other there 
 is an opposite and just as clear a purpose, — to let 
 the most touching love be so cruelly outraged, to let 
 eyery grace and nobleness of Christ be so treated, 
 made so abject to the eye, spit upon, ridiculed, har- 
 ried, crushed out of life, and cast away as refuse, that 
 from under all this its inmost glory might be forced to 
 the surface, its fragrance of divine patience and pity 
 and boundless loveliness be crushed into the atmos- 
 
274 GOD'S REBUKE OF APPEARANCES. 
 
 phere, that we might see there, standing side by side, 
 sin and its heavenly contrast, midnight and morning; 
 and so that we all with an immortal repugnance might 
 be driven from the one, and with an immortal drawing 
 might turn to the other. 
 
XXVII. 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 
 
 Lift up your heads ^ O ye gates ; and be ye lifted up^ ye everlasting 
 doors ; and the King of glory shall come in. — Ps. xxiv. 7. 
 
 T TAKE the spirit of Christ to be the perfect rule, 
 -■- not only of individual life, but of society, of busi- 
 ness, of government, and of all law; for the spirit of 
 Christ is the ideal of humanity. It is the perfect soul in 
 all its relations public and private, full of justice, fair- 
 ness, wisdom, and self-sacrifice. But that full spirit of 
 Christ is kept out, defeated, or at least limited by vari- 
 ous necessities, but chiefly by human selfishness and 
 ignorance, so that it is the great duty of man, in all the 
 departments of life, to give that spirit fuller and fuller 
 entrance. '' Lift up your heads." 
 
 Christ is kept out of our lives, not only in our prac- 
 tice, but as a rule of living. The men of this age are 
 not living under even a rule of absolute perfection, — far 
 from it, — but under a rule allowed to be more or less 
 loose and accommodated. The rule set up is not only 
 an adaptation, but a compromise ; not only an adapta- 
 tion to the necessary, but an unnecessary compromise 
 with the world. For example, the considerations of 
 
276 THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 
 
 rank in aristocratic communities, while it is right they 
 should modify the rule of Christian brotherhood, do in 
 fact so much compromise and lower the rule towards the 
 mean and poor as to make it not a little unchristian. 
 
 But this non-admission of the pure Christian rule is 
 prominently and painfully evident in international and 
 civil law, in business and society. International law has 
 yet to lift the head of its gates much higher for the full 
 entrance of the King of glory; for hitherto and until 
 lately it has been contracted down to self and the rule 
 of mere power. Even civil law, the boast of the rea- 
 son and justice of men, must yet lift the roof of its tem- 
 ple, if it would let in the full soul of Christ. And as to 
 society and business, they need not be spoken of. The 
 law of the lady and gentleman, the rule of the man of 
 honor and of the woman of fashion, the usage of the 
 merchant, are evidently not illumined by the full pres- 
 ence of the King of glory. 
 
 The reminder, then, to-day is to admit a purer Chris- 
 tian usage into all the great departments of life ; but 
 specially, let me say, in the great relations of rich and 
 poor, the employer and the laborer. Before us appears 
 an insurrection of labor, amounting almost to a revolu- 
 tion. We ask why? Whatever else may be also true, it 
 is clear that the spirit of Christ is not in our business, — ■ 
 at least not in the workshop side of it, — for it is an in- 
 surrection with less cause, less justification, than in any 
 case ever heard of in the history of man. If such are 
 the acts of our people under little, perhaps no oppres- 
 
THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 277 
 
 slon, under little suffering, what ought to be the out- 
 break of the poor English laborer, and what ought the 
 French Revolution to have been, under the cruel, inde- 
 scribable wrongs of that people? Some self-sacrifice, 
 of course, was necessary to our workmen; but to bear 
 nothing to help the country and brotherhood, groaning 
 as it now is under its many burdens, and at the first 
 touch of wrongs (chiefly imaginary) to break from law 
 and destroy, may show at least how much labor is pam- 
 pered and spoiled in America. To many despondent 
 people it seems to show more. They see in the wild 
 outbreak along the avenues of commerce in many 
 States, in the long lines of burning property, in mobs 
 commanding that trade shall stop, — in the horror and 
 glare of all this they see the very face of French com- 
 munism. Yet to tamper with it will, in my judgment, 
 make it a much more serious business ; to speak soft 
 words to it, to fraternize with malefactors, — I mean the 
 real malefactors, for I know that the workman was 
 often innocent or half innocent, — I say for the sake of 
 interest or false pity to be recreant to law on the part 
 of the responsible classes, will show that the real spirit 
 of the law of Christ is not only not in the workshop, 
 but not in the parlor of the president and the director, 
 or the homes of stockholders. Of course, give to the 
 worthy workman full justice. If the times are hard, 
 the Christian will give better wages and sweeten them 
 with kindness; but the spirit of Christianity is not 
 weak, is not a silly mercy. It will, to the misguided. 
 
2/8 THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 
 
 give correction, with pity; but to the thieving incen- 
 diary, the wanton insurrectionist, it gives the cold hand 
 of law, — it gives reluctant but unflinching force. Shall 
 we let such as you ruin the Ark of God? 
 
 I speak in view of great interests injured; but far 
 beyond that, in view of law violated under a free gov- 
 ernment of the people. And my view is that if the 
 wrong be as great and uncalled for as it seems to be, 
 so great and decided and exemplary should be the set- 
 tlement. To be settled fitly, it must be settled, if not 
 by an eminence of penalty as great as the crime, yet 
 the settlement should be exemplary; and if settled 
 otherwise, the spirit of good government is deserting 
 both sides of our business. Law, — law is the only 
 king of a free people ; to withstand it with violence is 
 next to treason, and is, as the apostle says, *' to bring 
 to ourselves damnation." " When I go into a coun- 
 try," Montesquieu once remarked, '' I do not inquire 
 whether they have good laws (for these they have 
 everywhere), but I ask whether these laws are exe- 
 cuted." If we Americans lose the honor of exe- 
 cuted laws, we lose the common honor of Christian 
 civilization. 
 
 After great sacrifices this outbreak will of course be 
 mastered, and the country awake from this hideous 
 dream. But the sign and proof will remain of a deep 
 vice in society, the first great sign among us of the 
 reversal of the evils of old society; that is, tyranny 
 and outrage at the top of society beginning to be 
 
THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 279 
 
 changed to tyranny and outrage from the bottom. 
 And the question is, Has this vice shown itself too 
 late for remedy? Ah! we stood still and allowed the 
 government of our fathers (itself a perilous but most 
 benign experiment), we stood still and allowed the 
 politician to change it into a new experiment, — the 
 experiment of a government of mere numbers. We 
 gave the vote to ignorance and barbarism from abroad 
 and to ignorance and barbarism at home, and are now 
 surprised that power seems to be passing downwards, 
 and begins to assert itself as King at the bottom. It is 
 a call to deep thought. We have allowed to pass from 
 our hands one of our very greatest securities. 
 
 Still, I am not one of those who take too gloomy a 
 view of the future, and who think that in the midst of 
 our rich country we are sitting as Belshazzar at the 
 Feast, while the fingers of a man's hand are writing 
 doom upon the wall. I do not feel in this way. We 
 have a main security left, I think. It is not in the rich, 
 it is not in the poor, but in that enormous class of 
 moderate and small capitalists which makes the real 
 body of the American people, whose interests and 
 sympathies are with order, and whose mass is so great 
 that it can never be shaken by outbreak. Were the 
 nation divided into the few rich and the many poor, 
 there would be no security for one hour; but now in 
 any question between labor and capital that great in- 
 termediate class, which is in effect a mediating class, 
 must declare for order; for they have come up by 
 
28o THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 
 
 acquiring even a little property, they have come up 
 into the class of order. They have undergone the 
 magic process by which the radical becomes a con- 
 servative as if in a moment. They have entered upon 
 civilization. There may be sudden outbreaks of the 
 laborers or the idle, but they can never become vital 
 so long as the interests and feelings of this wide 
 middle mass are against them. So that though there 
 may be, and probably will be, gradual but orderly 
 encroachments on the rights of great wealth, — that 
 is much to be feared, for we have some proof of it 
 already, — yet that will not be great while the perma- 
 nent existence of society and of a government ad- 
 ministered in the interests of the body of the people 
 are, I think, sure. 
 
 So much I am happy to say. With all our shocks 
 and fears, this I believe to be a government as per- 
 manent as any. But to make society something 
 better than this, to make it worthy of the hope with 
 which it began, that is a different thing; for that we 
 have much to do. The spirit of Christ must come in, 
 the heads of the gates, the everlasting doors of the 
 heart, must be lifted, that the King of glory may 
 enter. A nation, I repeat, we shall continue to be, — a 
 nation great in material interests, guarded by the in- 
 stincts of a thriving people; but nothing beyond this 
 is feasible without patriotism towards the State and a 
 Christian heart in our business and society, and spe- 
 cially a Christian heart in that great relation of the 
 
THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 28 1 
 
 poor and the rich. Education, as it is called, will do 
 something; but character, far more Christ, or at least 
 some shadow of Christ, must enter into all depart- 
 ments, — specially, as I have said, into the workshop 
 and the palace, — and turn the hearts of the fathers to 
 the children, and of the children to the fathers, and 
 in the spirit of grateful love from below, and of gen- 
 erous love from above, bind together the mighty 
 opposites of society. 
 
 So far I have spoken as if bearing more against the 
 poor than the rich ; but I have done so simply because 
 here and at the present moment it seems to be just, 
 for power here sways to the side of the poor (after 
 long centuries of injustice and sorrow), and I rejoice 
 at it; and only because it begins to be abused do I 
 denounce the abuse. I speak in the interests not 
 merely of the rich but of the poor man, whom I 
 would save from himself to keep our noble Christian 
 law for his children. Were this England, I hope I 
 should be ashamed to do as the English Established 
 pulpit did, or many of its clergy, for three centuries, 
 and nearly until to-day. I should be ashamed to 
 stand up on the side of place and power, flattering 
 them, and treading into lower submission the brother- 
 hood already so far down. But here and now the 
 case is much changed. England Is growing glorioush' 
 right, and we, in the other direction, are growing 
 wrong. 
 
 I have said enough on the one side, and must turn 
 
282 THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 
 
 before I close for a moment to the other, and exhort 
 the rich to let the beautiful spirit of the King of 
 glory appear in them more and more. And whom 
 do I mean by the rich? I mean not four or five of 
 eminent wealth, — I mean almost all the people before 
 me, nay, those much below the class before me. And 
 I say to all, Let Christ appear in us. There is much 
 'demand for his presence, I assure you. You will not 
 find your duty easy; for the temper of the poor 
 and rich is, if not naturally opposed, easily made so, 
 hide the fact as we may. The interests of labor and 
 capital look to be different. And so the proud rich 
 and the proud poor make a dreadful jar together. 
 Christ's gracious sweetness is the only secret of cure 
 on the part of the rich, and yet it is very hard for 
 them to acquire and keep it. It is easy to be senti- 
 mental about brotherhood, to talk about it in church, 
 but hard facts try it. For the poor and our depend- 
 ents often require of us as much forbearance as chil- 
 dren, without the interest of children; and that we 
 should in the face of all our distastes '' consider " the 
 poor, — his bad birth, his bad education, which have 
 shaped his soul badly, — " consider him and forbear 
 him," that is not easy. For the self-sacrifice of the 
 rich is hard while it is so pleasant and easy to use 
 power indolently and contemptuously. Even with a 
 little of Christ's spirit, there is still no such beautiful 
 brotherhood as might easily be made between poor 
 and rich. Even in this country, where many of the 
 
THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST. 283 
 
 poor are half spoiled, and many of the rich half 
 spoiled, still the heart of the poor man is easily 
 touched by the consideration of the rich man, and 
 the rich man's heart responds quickly to right feeling 
 in the poor. Ah ! if but the shadow of Christ's kind- 
 ness were to fall into either class, it would make life 
 beautiful. Hear then, my high brother, my high 
 sister, and suffer this word of exhortation : " Masters, 
 give unto your servants that which is just and equal, 
 remembering that you also have a master in heaven." 
 Are you already liberal of your gifts and kindness 
 for the good of the poor and for the public good? 
 God be praised ! And is your kindness well con- 
 sidered and wise and graciously given ? God be 
 praised ! And is there no blame for lack of sym- 
 pathy, for proud and unfeeling distance from ** the 
 brotherhood of low degree " ? Then God be praised ! 
 And do you persist in your goodness though ingrati- 
 tude and mean criticism surround you? Then God 
 be most praised ! Well done ! Your heart remem- 
 bers him. You have fulfilled the sweet charge of 
 the divine apostle : " Charge them that are rich in this 
 world, that they be not high-minded, nor trust in un- 
 certain riches, but in the living God ; . . . that they do 
 good, that they be rich in good works, ready to dis- 
 tribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for 
 themselves treasures in heaven ; . . . who being rich, 
 yet for our sakes became poor, that we through his 
 poverty might be made rich." 
 
XXVIII. 
 
 THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 
 They rewarded 7ne evil for good ^ to the spoiling of ?ny soul. — 
 
 PS. XXXV. 12. 
 
 1\ /TAN is made by society; yet unmade also. In 
 ^^ ^ ways suspected and unsuspected each man is 
 really injured as well as benefited by his fellows; and it 
 would be an art indeed, — that of getting the good, and 
 guarding from the evil of society. The amount of this 
 evil is great, and the forms of it are various. Take the 
 case of slighted genius, — " the vision and the faculty 
 divine," — which goes through a whole generation 
 without a smile, while all the rewards of the world are 
 poured into the lap of word-mongers: that surely 
 makes the heart ache. While men of genius are left in 
 garrets, we see the thrones of society occupied with men 
 whose places are in the garrets ! And when, added to 
 this, superior gifts are accompanied with painful labors 
 and preparations, and when they are blended with 
 high characteristics of soul, as in many sorts of ability 
 they necessarily are, then of course the injustice be- 
 comes great, of treating them with a blindness that will 
 not discriminate, or with indifference or neglect. 
 
THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 285 
 
 ** They rewarded me evil for good, to the spoiling of 
 my soul." The thing especially meant by good here 
 is, first, where a man has done or is trying to do his 
 duty in general ; that sort of good when he is conscious 
 that he has done no wrong, or conscious only of simple- 
 hearted good wishes. The young are the most obvious 
 example of this. Most young people of the better 
 sort begin life honestly and with fine wishes and enthu- 
 siasms. Starting thus with high mstincts, abhorring 
 meanness, and expecting from men what they feel in 
 themselves, blow after blow of injustice strikes them; 
 they are awakened into a horrible reality ; dashed, out- 
 raged, and embittered ; then they recover, and are again 
 thrown off and recover, and recover until the recovering 
 power is gone ; or if not so bad as that, if the tenacity 
 of their hearts towards good remains, still the inward 
 spring is much broken, they expect little and will do 
 little, and their justification or excuse for the remnant 
 of their days is spoken sadly, or spoken bitterly : '' They 
 rewarded me evil for good, to the spoiling of my 
 
 soul." 
 
 " Candid and generous and just, 
 Boys care but little whom they trust, — 
 
 An error soon corrected : 
 For who but learns in riper years 
 That man when smothered he appears 
 Is most to be suspected ? " 
 
 But the same injury occurs all through a man's life, 
 and it is partly an importunate necessity of our state 
 that we should so be treated. Our life and conduct are 
 
286 THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 
 
 always open to misconstruction because of the natural 
 ignorance we have of one another, or because of the 
 weak judgment of many people, or because many are 
 either of poor hearts originally, or they themselves have 
 been spoiled by the same sort of bad treatment long 
 ago, and so are suspicious, and look at everything on 
 the worst side. Here, then, each man is surrounded by 
 a multitude of such judges, a cloud of such witnesses, 
 most of them unauthorized, either by natural fitness, to 
 judge, or uncalled to it by their connection with the 
 thing in hand, '' busybodies in other men's matters," or 
 at least incapable, by their real ignorance of the matter, 
 to bear any testimony or to give any judgment; yet 
 almost all, and usually in proportion to their unfitness, 
 are quick to give decisions or piercing suggestions 
 about the vital concerns of others ! As to which I say 
 in passing, that if contempt could speak down from 
 heaven to this host of officious usurpers of judgment, 
 its speech would be, **Who made you a ruler or a 
 judge? " 
 
 Here then, either from the natural weakness or the 
 common pettiness of men, there is a sort of necessity 
 for much 111 treatment. ** It must needs be that of- 
 fences come." But when to all these natural or at 
 least usual incapacities of treating one another nobly is 
 added the simple fact that your look, demeanor, ways, 
 are not shaped to all men's fancies, or much more, 
 when there is added some personal feeling, — a hurt 
 vanity, an envy, a spiteful grudge, a keen Instinct 
 
THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 2^7 
 
 against another which is awake to watch him, — then of 
 course the ill treatment will (if it dare) go much 
 farther; and how far it then can go, how utterly men 
 can sink even the recollection of justice, almost every 
 one has occasion at some time to learn. The Psalms 
 of David are full of notices of such conduct among 
 those enemies of his: and we, though so much more 
 civilized here, have much of the same thing under 
 smooth pretence and quiet unwarlike manners. 
 
 Whether from the common weakness of men, or from 
 personal prejudices or spite, the offence will come. 
 And it is almost as certain that every time it does 
 come, every time the innocent man meets such treat- 
 ment, it takes off some of his brotherly kindness or 
 hopefulness, and turns some more drops of the sweet 
 milk in his bosom into gall. Every man's personal 
 experience will give him enough instances of this. We 
 can all remember, I suppose, where at some personal 
 sacrifice we intended some worthy thing and w^ere met 
 with unthankfulness, perhaps with even an ingenuity of 
 misconstruction and a wantonness of wrong. We re- 
 member how it touched and shrunk our hearts, and 
 after years have passed, and when we can look back 
 without the least personal feeling, but only in solemn 
 and melancholy review, we murmur to ourselves, ** They 
 did me evil and it injured me." It is true, in this judg- 
 ment we may rate our own cause too favorably, as self 
 usually does; still there are many times when our view 
 of the case is either altogether or mainly just. The 
 
288 THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 
 
 outraged Lear in that great poem which I cannot name 
 
 without seeing its sceptred pall come sweeping through 
 
 my imagination, in that poem which in the grandeur of 
 
 its tragic element seems written by the sublimest genius 
 
 of sorrow, — there, the old king, rent and blasted, no 
 
 doubt because of his proud precipitancy, was himself 
 
 the starting cause of his own woes ! Yet he was but 
 
 just to himself when he said, — 
 
 " I am a man 
 More sinned against than sinning." 
 
 Though he were not clear, yet he was wronged, 
 spoiled, maddened ! Could I open the long roll of 
 cases only less tragical, the long roll of man's 
 fodhsh or malignant wrongs to man; could we but 
 catch a glimpse of the thing as it is now, through 
 empires, cities, streets, and most of all in families; 
 could all the varieties and shades and singularities of 
 this injustice be painted to our eyes; and could we but 
 see how this wrong worked out on all sides grief and 
 wretchedness and every shape of pain, how the better 
 sort of human beings, and often the sweetest and best, 
 were heart-wrung by a harder and baser class below 
 them, — ah ! could we look deeper into the spirits of 
 men, and see the spiritual poison of injustice ; if we could 
 see how the sweet turned at its cursed touch to bitter, 
 faith to distrust, how the generous expansions of the 
 heart were contracted and shrivelled all through, as a 
 cold storm shrivels and blasts the tender germ in the 
 spring; if we could watch the spirit of wrong moving 
 
THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 2S9 
 
 like a night through society, or as a secret pestilence 
 through the great atmosphere of the globe ! Appalling, 
 I say. No talk of it can match it. We are not aware 
 of the black influence poured out by our thoughtless 
 injustice. Take heed ! " Take heed that ye offend not 
 one of these little ones." What does the Lord mean? 
 He means, I think, in its broadest sense to guard the 
 defenceless, the comparatively harmless people from 
 the strong and comparatively unscrupulous, not merely 
 to defend the weak. He means in his mercy to erect 
 a defence for the spirit of man against man. And he 
 adds, — and there are but few things like it among his 
 words, — " It were better for that man that a millstone 
 were hung about his neck and that he were drowned in 
 the depths of the sea." Let us take heed. If we do 
 not follow the sacrifices of Christ, who always gave him- 
 self for others, yet at least we can be of the spirit which 
 hates the baseness of injustice, cannot bear to spoil 
 another's heart, and will be just, and purely just, at any 
 cost ! We can rise to that at least. If I cannot be a 
 Christian, I must at least be as noble as a Roman or a 
 Greek. If it were not that there is a sun that daily 
 rises on this night and purges it; if it were not that 
 there is another spirit descended from heaven and 
 moving on the face of society, which by gracious influ- 
 ences corrects and sweetens, — if it were not for this, 
 justice could not stem the tide, man would destroy man, 
 and all souls perish : which brings me to the second topic, 
 the way the Christian soul is to meet all this evil. 
 
 19 
 
290 THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 
 
 '-'■ But I say unto you, love your enemies." Let wrong 
 not arouse more wrong; but if hell itself invades you, 
 let that but prompt your soul to break out like a new 
 heaven to meet it. There are people who will take one 
 evil and make ten out of it. They are like a broken 
 mirror, and reflect and give back every image of evil 
 from a thousand distorted bits and in a thousand dis- 
 torted aspects. But we must thank God that there are 
 other people who check the tide of wrong, convert it, 
 and transfigure it into good, — people who if it rained 
 curses would turn them into blessings at the moment 
 they touched the ground. '' But I say unto you, love 
 ye your enemies." If you do but do good to them who 
 do good to you again, do not even the publicans so ? Do 
 not even the wretches so? But the children of your 
 Father have a far better style, *' for he sendeth his rain 
 upon the just and unjust." The evil of the earth does 
 not spoil the sweet heavens and make them like iron 
 and shut up their rains ; and shall it spoil you, a child of 
 the heavens? Remember the spirit you are of. The 
 earth has been full of the heroes of hate, but it arrives 
 at last to the heroes of love. There is not an apostle, 
 not a disciple on the pages of the New Testament who 
 is not majestic in mercy. The keener, more vivid, more 
 vengeful and wilful the man, the finer he is touched and 
 made over to a heavenly sort of endurance and pity. 
 See Peter, the impetuous. Recompense to no man " evil 
 for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise, blessing." 
 See Paul. '' Even unto this present hour we both hunger, 
 
THEY REWARDED EVIL FOR GOOD. 291 
 
 and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and have no 
 certain dwelling-place ; . . . being reviled we bless ; be- 
 ing persecuted we suffer it: being defamed we entreat." 
 And oh, above all, remember Christ's majesty of right- 
 eousness and love, what sort and quality that was ; that 
 though they rewarded him evil for good, — such evil for 
 such good, — it was not to the spoiling of his soul. " He 
 was not overcome of the evil, but overcame evil with 
 good ; " and at the very moment when wrong had reached 
 the top, and the cup was full, and he wrung out its bitter- 
 ness, he said, " Father, forgive them : for they know 
 not what they do." They did know what they did, 
 the heavens themselves charged them when it was night 
 over the whole land from the sixth to the ninth hour ; 
 but his divinely generous construction even at that 
 moment hoped and believed that at the centre they 
 were ignorant, and shielded them from the wrath 
 of justice, and said, ''Father, forgive them: for they 
 know not what they do." 
 
XXIX. 
 
 THE POWER OF WILL. 
 
 Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely . — Rev. xxii. 1 7. 
 All things are possible to him that believeth. — Mark, ix. 23. 
 
 T SPEAK first of the power of human will in our 
 -*• life, especially in religious life. It seems to me 
 that the idea of soul-freedom — of a power of choice 
 in ourselves — is a practical necessity; for a man can- 
 not be human, or lead a human life, without con- 
 sciousness of free-will. If this is granted, and the full 
 weight given to it, if we start with the consciousness 
 of such a spirit in ourselves, then all the other great 
 mysteries outside of ourselves which puzzle us so 
 much — the mystery of God, of God acting in miracle, 
 the efficacy of prayer — are intelligible ; but with- 
 out this we must give up all religion, all idea of 
 spirit, shut our Bibles and Moral Codes, — under- 
 standing all such things in a non-natural sense, — go 
 on to reduce the world and God and man to a few 
 simple and eternal brute forces. For if we ourselves 
 are things, not wills, then we can know of nothing 
 spiritual except from ourselves; all else must be 
 things also. As God and spirit and spiritual acts are 
 
THE POWER OF WILL. 293 
 
 all taken from the image of ourselves, then, if we are 
 things, we can know nothing but things. 
 
 The whole outside spiritual world rests on the sure- 
 ness of our consciousness of a spirit in ourselves, — 
 the possession of a will. I mention this merely to 
 show how sure the fact is that we have wills, — for 
 God and a spiritual universe all rest upon that fact, — 
 and I mention it also to give a basis to the exhorta- 
 tion I wish to make ; for if we have such a wonderful 
 power, we should believe in it, and use it to its full 
 extent. 
 
 There is this singularity in this matter; namely, that 
 though our natures are made fret, yet if we do not 
 believe that and use their freedom, if we believe we 
 are the creatures of circumstances, we become the 
 creatures of circumstances, and, as much as we can, 
 we become things; while a full assurance that we can 
 do much, that we are made for a wide sweep of 
 power, gives us the full freedom we were born to. 
 It will not do that we are made free ; we must also 
 believe the fact before we can be free practically. 
 
 Of course there is a limit to the power of will, and 
 only the insane will attempt to go beyond obvious 
 natural bounds. But while we must know that, let us 
 beware of contracting these bounds too closely around 
 us; while we are in fact eagles, made to sweep the 
 great circles of the air, let us not confine ourselves, like 
 the moth or the butterfly, to a few feet of the fields. 
 No man can certainly say where his power stops; or, 
 
294 THE POWER OF WILL, 
 
 if he knows where it stopped yesterday, he does not 
 know how far it will go to-morrow. It is a growing 
 power, which ascends as we use it. In the ordinary 
 concerns of life we exert this power very much, though 
 there are great differences in this respect among men 
 and ages. The will as used in the bettering of our 
 material state, that is, determined enterprise, is a ma- 
 jestic power here in America, and a mere petty power 
 in Spain, and still more petty in the East, and sinks 
 down to its weakest among the low savages. 
 
 But nowhere is the religious will used as it ought 
 to be. To be determined in religion, to be industrious 
 Christians, seem strange expressions. Yet to be de- 
 termined Christians is just what we want, — to set the 
 will " like flint" against wrong; to make ''full proof" 
 of all the religious capacities of our souls; to be 
 bent to exercise all Christian virtues as we exercise 
 our muscles or our business energies; to make an 
 advance every day, as any true worker advances in 
 his knowledge, or in his fortune, and says in the 
 evening, " I have gained so much, I have mastered so 
 much." 
 
 Was there ever in business or war an intenser 
 expression of spiritual energy than when Paul said, 
 "This one thing I do"? He used the whole scope 
 of his will. His poor hard-worked body solicited him 
 for some ease, for some rest, for a little comfort. His 
 poor human heart sunk under discouragements, shrunk 
 from calumny, quailed under fears. Did he pause? 
 
THE POWER OF WILL, 295 
 
 '* This one thing I do." He saw iniquity in the 
 church, Httleness in its leaders, — poor, scattered re- 
 sults, — an opposing world growing greater and more 
 impregnable before him; did he halt? ** This one 
 thing I do." 
 
 A thousand things sapped his faith; for one ex- 
 ample, Christ did not come from the skies as he ex- 
 pected, and that great test of the truth of all his soul 
 rested on failed him. Did he sink? Nay, his faith 
 enlarged; he was surer of God and surer of Christ 
 when his expectations failed than even when they were 
 realized. Let everything fail, I will believe ; and I will 
 believe in a mightier and mightier fashion, for when 
 this and that give way I will fall back on the strength 
 of the dictates of my soul. '' Though flesh and heart 
 fail," I will grow a purer, more disinterested, more 
 believing, more powerful servant of God. I will do 
 it to the end. And he did it, — glory and honor to 
 him ! 
 
 Myriads of creatures are born with this divine will- 
 power. Of course I do not say in the same degree 
 as Paul, but with the same faculty; and they die like 
 great embryonic masses, undeveloped souls, which 
 have never come to anything. Here and there is one 
 man who lives and proves that he is a being with a 
 divine will, — proves it, too, all the more powerfully, 
 when circumstances are all against him. 
 
 These awful things, — circumstances, — whose power 
 is the talk of this age, which are so weighty that they 
 
296 THE POWER OF WILL. 
 
 forbid religion and laugh at morality, — these overpower- 
 ing circumstances, which shrivel us up as before a fire, 
 which will not allow us to have a soul within our 
 bosoms, and which we set up openly with shameless 
 faces as our excuse before man, yes, and before God. 
 *' Circumstances are against us." And what are these 
 circumstances? They are but a shadow wherever there 
 is present a greater circumstance; namely, the pure, 
 unconquerable will, which overrides them, which con- 
 verts them, the worst of them, and makes its dia- 
 monds out of all such charcoal. You are a will, I 
 say, and hence you are, by the very intention of your 
 nature, made to dominate, made for triumph over 
 circumstance. 
 
 We are ever losing our humanity, because to be 
 human means to be under the control of righteous 
 will. We are the prey of almost everything without 
 us, and of almost every vagrant passion within us. 
 We are made to govern ourselves by the righteous 
 law, — not self-degraded mortals, but pure, immortal 
 wills. I speak this, not for the purpose of pride, but 
 that we may be instigated to reject every day the 
 whole world of flesh and self, and to accept whatever 
 is humble, generous, and just, pure, and adoring, — to 
 do this in our thoughts and in our work, being as 
 God-made men in all the details of our living. It is 
 a large and awful work; all the more must we push 
 it while the day lasts. '' I will arise," must be the 
 motto of every moment. 
 
THE POWER OF WILL. 297 
 
 When I think of men, hundreds, almost thousands 
 of milHons, appearing and disappearing every thirty 
 years, what a common, cheap creature man is ! But 
 when I think that each of these men has a will, — is 
 made to enact into existence all righteousness, — that 
 he is formed to work together with God in the awful, 
 universal conflict between good and evil, then I stand 
 back before the meanest man, for he makes the very 
 earth sacred. Oh that some power, some voice would 
 speak to him and make this grand possibility real. 
 But our wishes are worthless if a man does not help 
 himself. 
 
 There are two sources of power in a man, — the 
 God-given will is one, the God-given trust is another. 
 The mere will is cold and cheerless without the trust, 
 and the trust is weak and boneless without the will. 
 Man must add to the power of his own spirit the 
 power of the spirit of God. It is comparatively easy 
 to be a man of will only ; it is comparatively easy to 
 have only the woman's pre-eminent faith and trust: 
 but the duty is to have both working together in our 
 ordinary lives; to cast ourselves, like the most help- 
 less children, upon the parent's breast, — to receive of 
 his fulness, and ''to quit us like men" in the daily 
 strife of temptation and effort. If we do all well that 
 is within our will, heavenly glimpses open, lights and 
 powers stream in, and the spontaneous life of the soul 
 grows. Then " be it unto thee even as thou wilt " 
 must have this other sentence added, '* All things are 
 
298 THE POWER OF WILL. 
 
 possible to him that trusteth." Rest on your soul as 
 if there were no other power in heaven or earth; but 
 your soul must rest on God as if there were no such 
 thing known as will, and " the gates of hell shall not 
 prevail against you." 
 
XXX. 
 
 THE WISDOM OF GOD. 
 
 To the ifite7it that now unto the principalities and powers in 
 heavenly places 7night be known by the church the fnanifold 
 wisdom of God. — Eph. iii. lo. 
 
 '^ I "HE apostle, having been speaking of the myste- 
 -■- rious but wise method of Divine Providence in 
 the rejection of the Jews and acceptance of the Gen- 
 tiles, now states that this and of course all similar 
 instances are intended to instruct other portions of his 
 universe. I say, this and of course all similar in- 
 stances ; for if so small a thing as this mystery was, 
 comparatively, was intended to spread aloft to the high 
 angels of God, we cannot think that the deeper and 
 more significant facts are to be kept private here to 
 man. 
 
 This diffusion of moral knowledge from the earth 
 through the heavens is often stated by Christians as 
 a probable thing ; but I am surprised that that which 
 is here made clear and certain should be spoken of at 
 all as probable. There could be no expression of a 
 truth more explicit. Apart from this direct assur- 
 ance, however, the same thing might have been sup- 
 
300 THE WISDOM OF GOD. 
 
 posed, had we never been told it, from what we see 
 in Nature. 
 
 God everywhere in Nature is economical of his 
 means, and has everywhere established such connec- 
 tions between his works that every portion may be 
 and is used in some way for the benefit of some or 
 all other. Indeed, in the whole of creation, so far as 
 we know, there is not one atom made independent, 
 or put out of sympathy — if I may so speak — with the 
 mass. Every part of our earth, for example, is united 
 with every other part. There is a constant interchange 
 of physical influences through every part of it. 
 
 It is so also with its social and moral influences. 
 There can be no eminent example of good or evil in 
 the condition of one nation that is not influential all 
 round the globe directly or indirectly. So far at least 
 as this region of God's works is concerned, he has 
 designed a close society, and works out his mightiest 
 eff"ects through the power of one part on another. 
 This great principle operates not merely between what 
 is contemporaneous, but also between the past and the 
 future. 
 
 As objects and men the most distant in place may 
 operate on each other to-day, so as to what is most 
 distant in time. The action and events of all past 
 history concentrate their influence in the present. This 
 is undeniable. It is also undeniable that, so far as 
 advance or improvement is made, there is a tendency 
 to perfect the social character of this system. The 
 
THE WISDOM OF GOD. 301 
 
 parts of the earth's surface are brought nearer to- 
 gether; the interchange of interest and influence be- 
 tween all races and tribes becomes fuller and more 
 effective. So, also, as nations advance, the power of 
 the present over the future becomes greater of course. 
 Just in proportion as a tribe of men are sunk in bar- 
 barism are they bereft of a history, of a past, and its 
 power; and just as a people advance in all that is 
 heroic and excellent in one era, that people become 
 powerful over another. 
 
 The clear tendency, then, as men advance, is to per- 
 fect the great design of God in constituting them social, 
 to complete the family idea which God had in view, 
 to bind together most closely every part of the race 
 through all time, in all places. This, I say, seems the 
 undeniable design, so far as this earth is concerned. 
 
 But does this design extend any farther? Is not this 
 globe and every globe — however clearly a social de- 
 sign is shown within it — cut off from any such rela- 
 tions without it? Does not the very fact that worlds 
 are scattered at such immense distances through space 
 evince not a social but a dissocial purpose? I confess 
 that at first it looks so. But if it is so, it is stranee, 
 for God usually maintains a wonderful analogy, or like- 
 ness, between all his works. Everything he does, while 
 it is different, is the same. He never repeats himself, 
 and yet is never unlike himself And as the social 
 principle seems to be one of the very deepest and most 
 cherished of the divine ideas, — if I may so express 
 
302 THE WISDOM OF GOD. 
 
 it, — would it not be wonderful that it should be so 
 completely deserted and given up? 
 
 The probabilities then are evidently against that 
 opinion. The probabilities then are strong, I think, 
 even if we were confined in facts to this globe, — even 
 if we had no instances of union between this globe and 
 other worlds. But in fact we have some grand particu- 
 lars which assure us that the social idea is not deserted, 
 but runs between world and world. No star has ever 
 been discovered, not even the wildest of the comets, 
 which moved alone. The worlds are all made up into 
 splendid groups or families, each influencing each, act- 
 ing in its measure on every point, even from this low 
 point to the farthest bounds of flaming space. The 
 whole incomprehensible, sublime pageant of the heavens 
 moves and acts together. 
 
 It is certain, it is known, that as respects material 
 forces the whole universe interacts ; nay, the mightiest 
 of all material forces (perhaps the one which in- 
 cludes all others) is employed and spent in interaction. 
 Now, if this be so with material forces, is it probable 
 that moral forces, influences, of which the powers of 
 matter are but as the shadows and symbols, — moral 
 forces, which we see so constantly and wonderfully at 
 work between man and man, and nation and nation, 
 and age and age, should be confined and ironed in to 
 this earth? 
 
 I suppose, of course, you observe that there are 
 other races of spirits, not necessarily inhabitants of these 
 
THE WISDOM OF GOD. 303 
 
 visible worlds, though of that the probabilities are re- 
 sistless to my mind ; but whether embodied in these shin- 
 ing mansions or as purer spirits, other races of spirits 
 the Bible everywhere assumes or states. As to these, 
 then, can we think the great law of the family, which 
 in lower nature we see penetrates everywhere and con- 
 trols everything, — that this in the higher nature, among 
 the spiritual tribes, is hemmed in to each, and no race 
 and no moral history of one globe ever allowed to 
 act on another? I know not how it may strike your 
 minds, but to me to state it seems enough. Is the 
 grandeur of God's spiritual house to stand so dwindled 
 by the side of his material house? Or, if the theory 
 of the spiritual universe allows it to be progressive 
 (and who now denies that?), what progression, except 
 one comparatively mean, can be effected, according 
 to God's ordinary way of working, but by the wide 
 interaction of various beings and various experiences, 
 each different in character and history, but each alike, 
 and each reflecting some new and startling depth of 
 the central truths of God? 
 
 As it is justly supposed that the tribes of men lower 
 in the scale are always lifted — if lifted at all — from 
 without, that the higher life or higher ideas possessed 
 by one part of the family are held in stewardship for 
 others, so I suppose that not only races inferior to 
 man, but orders of creatures higher by nature though 
 less deeply experienced than man, shall receive from 
 his history lifting conceptions, such a new element of 
 
304 THE WISDOM OF GOD. 
 
 angelic civilization as shall transform the whole. Now, 
 how grandly intoned with this comes in the decided and 
 sublime statement of Paul, — '* To the intent that now 
 unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places 
 might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of 
 God " ! " To the intent; " as if God's schemes here had 
 not only some bearings beyond, but had their chief 
 reference away high up there among the '' principalities 
 and powers." If this be true, I regard it as a very great 
 truth indeed. 
 
 See, first, the light it casts upon that moral scheme 
 of the world of which Christianity is the development 
 and consummation. In view of the extensiveness of 
 the creation and the littleness of man, there is, at least 
 to many of us, an unfit look in the importance the 
 Bible gives to man in that wonderful story of the de- 
 scent of the Son of God for the redemption of man 
 through his life and death. Of old there was a mighty 
 feeling of wonder that God in his daily providence 
 should seem so intent on man. '' When I consider thy 
 heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the 
 stars which thou hast ordained, what is man that thou 
 art mindful of him? " 
 
 But the later events of the gospel — if this feeling 
 were just at all — ought to carry it to a blank amaze- 
 ment. But all is nobly explained when we learn that 
 this earth is made but as a stage around which all 
 the creatures of the heavens, whatever they be, may 
 gather as spectators of the exhibition of God made 
 
THE WISDOM OF GOD. 305 
 
 there, — gather around it now, and when this material 
 earth and heavens have passed away, the history it 
 leaves shall take its place in the very centre of heavenly 
 interest, — the divinest leaf in the history of God and 
 the creature. *' And the temple of God was opened 
 in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of 
 his testament: and there were lightnings, and voices, 
 and thunderings, and an earthquake, and great hail." 
 
 Again : if this history of God on earth has a uni- 
 versal instructiveness in it as a lesson of races, spread- 
 ing through all spaces, we must believe that its stretch 
 in time is of equal largeness. If God slowly works 
 out his mysteries through long dispensations, even 
 when they concern but the private affairs of one race 
 and one earth, what times ought we to expect him to 
 employ when he is working out the moral history in 
 which Christ appears, — where the deepest dark and 
 the highest light are revealed together ; where the his- 
 tory and nature of good and evil, of God and the 
 creature, is unclosing for the behoof of all places and 
 times? Whenever, then, I see something of awful 
 darkness before which I must bow down, I remember 
 the eternity of God, and the wide, long sweep of his 
 work; I remember that a thousand years in his sight 
 are but as yesterday; seeing that is past as a watch 
 in the night. 
 
 But not only do the width and length of the moral 
 scheme of the world lighten its mysteries, there is given 
 also in that a particular dignity to the truth in Christ. 
 
3o6 THE WISDOM OF GOD. 
 
 The apostle calls it ''the manifold wisdom of God;" 
 the many-folded — the all-various — the wisdom which 
 is the plena or pleroma, the fulness of all aspects of 
 the divine. This is that divine system, so neglected, 
 which shallow, vain man so often glances at only to 
 despise. But it is not Paul's eulogy of the truth which 
 so much describes its grandeur, as the fact he speaks 
 of, that this manifold wisdom was of so wide signifi- 
 cance that it was to be diffused up, even to the 
 " principalities and powers " for their learning. 
 
 I cannot say, it is not necessary to say, how all the 
 truths of our Christianity may be useful everywhere; 
 but I think it might be shown that there could be no 
 conceivable height of finite spirits to whom most of its 
 truths would not be new and impressive. For example : 
 that one lesson of God first seen in weakness ; what a 
 new conception of God ! — a conception not only valu- 
 able to correct our ideal of the truly great, but most 
 needed, I may venture to think, to guard the ideal of 
 those resplendent creatures who though innocent are 
 exposed, without some such revelation, — exposed, if 
 to anything, to false ideas of elevation. For how 
 could they in the deepest manner be taught the truest 
 style of divinity, so long as they knew the highest only 
 as the "blessed and only potentate;" so long as the 
 sight of the highest humbling itself to suffering and 
 emptying itself out of love, — so long as that sight, 
 which I suppose to reveal the deepest deep of God, 
 was kept back from them? 
 
THE WISDOM OF GOD. 307 
 
 But, just glancing at the dignity which this fact gives 
 to truth, I must go on, that I may pause a moment 
 upon the dignity it gives to man and all that concerns 
 him. This his home is now no distant and all but for- 
 gotten spot, but a central region, it seems, a chosen 
 spot of revelation. Man perishing before the moth is 
 an actor where God and angels are the spectators, and 
 is working out every day not merely his own imperish- 
 able lot, but is working out matter for the instruction, 
 for the cheer or the sorrow, of regions where other 
 suns shine, and of ages which shall come on after our 
 ages have passed. Under this body, under this form 
 of heart and mind which belongs to me, the inexpres- 
 sible Word of God did its inexpressible work ; so that 
 there shall go with us — whether we sink or rise — per- 
 haps an altogether peculiar interest, unknown to the 
 highest creatures, gathered from our mysterious fellow- 
 ship with the only-begotten of God. 
 
 '' Upon these creatures," will they say, — '* upon 
 them, by them, and through themi was made an exhi- 
 bition of the divine nature, which, as by a new illumi- 
 nation, has relit every scene of creation and the vision 
 of every spirit. Lo ! this is man ! " 
 
 So associated then with the Lamb of God, carry- 
 ing in our commonest acts and days such a weight 
 of results, — 
 
 " So, and not searching higher, we may learn 
 To prize the breath we share with humankind, 
 And look even upon the dust of man with awe." 
 
308 THE WISDOM OF GOD. 
 
 We may learn, being ^' compassed about with so great 
 a cloud of witnesses," to awake to our calling: in trial 
 to run with patience the wonderful race that is set 
 before us, to fill our hearts with these high incite- 
 ments, each man living as if upon him, even such an 
 one, all the holy and wise faces were turned; as if 
 upon him lay the illustration of all God's scheme, of 
 all Christ's love, — as if upon him. Did I say *' as if" ? 
 Upon him it is laid, that now " unto the principalities 
 might be known " by him, here, to-day, under these 
 ordinary risings and settings of the sun, here, under 
 these familiar, homely names, places, and acts, — by 
 him might be known, by his Christ-likeness, by his 
 showing in himself the whole fruits and glory of the 
 Redeemer and the redemption, — might be known by 
 him, in the few days which run before they carry his 
 body to the dust, — might be made known by him 
 new secrets, even to the '' principalities and powers," — 
 new secrets of the great deep of the manifold wisdom 
 of God. 
 
XXXI. 
 
 THE RIVER OF LIFE. 
 
 There is a river the stremns whereof shall 7nake glad the city 
 of God. — Ps. xlvi. 4. 
 
 ' I ^HE greatest possible gift to the world would be 
 ^ the gift of a nobler and better soul in the bosom 
 of each man. That soul includes everything. For the 
 civilized soul would make of course the civilized society, 
 the civilized government: the quickened and elevated 
 heart alone can put all the faculties of man, all arts, 
 all works, into the highest action, with the highest aims, 
 and turn man's consciousness, his life, his society, his 
 earth, from a weak, impure, and unhappy state, into a 
 state where there is power for feebleness, purity for 
 corruption, peace for disturbance, and so convert earth 
 into the highest conception of heaven. All out of the 
 heart ! As the heart is, everything is : if the heart be 
 a thistle-seed, its whole world will be a sproutage of 
 thistle ; if it be " wholly a right seed," it will spring up 
 into a world of fruit. Our need then is more soul, more 
 light and life of the heart. 
 
 What an announcement then is the text, '' There is a 
 river the streams whereof shall make glad the city oi 
 
310 THE RIVER OF LIFE. 
 
 God." There is a descending flood of renovation ! 
 There is a spirit ! If the wishes of the heart could 
 create a belief, it would be bliss, for this is at once the 
 most rational, poetical, pure, and desirable belief possi- 
 ble to man. So we find that wherever man is pure and 
 high, an era of descending spirit is always looked for- 
 ward to. The Lord himself about to leave the earth in 
 darkness and after a life which seemed a failure, — shall 
 I say? — announced the coming and the reign of spirit 
 on earth. And to make the fact sensible to the eye and 
 ear, as Christians believe, see, hear, the rushing of a 
 m'ighty wind, *' the house shaken where they were 
 sitting," the tongues like as of fire, the little congrega- 
 tion rushing forth and bursting into a various language, 
 each man of the assembled strangers speaking in his 
 own speech the wonderful works of God. See and 
 hear the joy, the excitement, the men almost aban- 
 doned and reckless in a divine delirium; if not '' drunk 
 with new wine," filled indeed with a new and better 
 wine from the grapes of God ! 
 
 That something mighty had taken place was attested, 
 how? By new souls; by the fact that something had 
 made the Christians into powers. Read the letters of 
 Peter and Paul, and you will see that a new race, 
 gigantic, incredible, has been on the earth. And then, 
 their joy. We view the early Christians all on one side, 
 as sufferers. But on the other side, there never was 
 such a period of joy. The footsteps of Astraea seemed 
 to be returning to the world, heaven coming back to 
 
THE RIVER OF LIFE. 3 1 1 
 
 earth. " I will send the Comforter unto you ; " and he 
 was indeed sent. Was ever a promise so rapidly and 
 amply fulfilled? Their joy was full. They had ''with 
 persecutions " a hundred-fold of everything good. They 
 reaped the two great beatitudes : meek, they possessed 
 the earth ; pure in heart, they saw God ! 
 
 Christians believe all this. It is their belief also that 
 this but introduced an era of spirit. That first great 
 moment is gone like a splendid dream. But it is not to 
 be regarded as an anomaly, appearing once, like the 
 sense of beauty in Greece, and to reappear no more. 
 It has prepared the way for new wonders. It has 
 pushed far forward the possibilities of man, has erected 
 standards which will never be taken down, and has left 
 in the world a church, dwelling to be sure in a long 
 twilight of spirit, but awaiting another burst of day. 
 Such is God's way. His truth advances by bursts of 
 splendor, and then by long ages in which the light is 
 worked into the general life. 
 
 But whatever wonders await us, one thing we know : 
 The spirit never will, never does reappear, unless it is 
 waited for, and asked for by some pure spiritual faith in 
 us. There is one sure law, that only '' to him that hath 
 shall be given." God waits for man to feel need. A 
 certain degree of the very gift looked for must first 
 exist. When man rises a suppliant towards the heavens, 
 the heavens will descend towards him, and not until 
 then. 
 
 Now, as to this need and faith the future seems dark. 
 
312 THE RIVER OF LIFE. 
 
 In addition to the usual faithlessness of the worldly soul, 
 has come in the growing belief in matter not in spirit, 
 in law and not in a person ; so that faith which I should 
 define to be trust in the moral soul of the universe, that 
 is, a person, that is, God, — this seems dying out of the 
 soul. But there is hope. I believe, though I cannot 
 now explain, that the empire of natural law which 
 science is now unfolding is the precursor, the condition, 
 the instigation, and the mould, of such an appearance 
 of spirit, of such an empire of God, as has never been 
 dreamed of But this we who are now alive will not 
 see. That vast Pentecost is reserved until after a long 
 process is through, when that which hinders shall be 
 taken out of the way. Meanwhile each of us, for him- 
 self, can, at least in a measure, free himself from the 
 material and worldly spirit of the age and of his own 
 heart ; each one may live with God, and walk with him, 
 and be surrounded by all the powers of the world to 
 come. 
 
 This subject is suggested by the breaking forth of the 
 spring, when Nature stands up created once more, and 
 the spirit is presented so near to us. I would like to 
 see the feast of Whitsunday placed on one of the first 
 and most magnificent days of the spring, when every 
 eye can see the same spirit at work in Nature on the 
 grandest scale. Or, next to that, I would place it after 
 some great summer drought, when the heavens are 
 opened and the rains descend and the change in Nature 
 is such as in one of the Pampas after a South American 
 
THE RIVER OF LIFE. 313 
 
 rain, — odors, grasses, flowers, and gay insects, new life 
 in the eye of man, and freshness and joy among the 
 herds of the field. After a great drought or winter 
 Nature is a picture unrolled from the east to the west, 
 symbolizing all the renewal of God, symbolizing the 
 renewal of human body and spirit yet to come, and 
 especially symbolizing that final spring, when *' Behold, 
 I create all things new," shall be pronounced, and all 
 the creation of God shall say, " Amen, even so, Lord 
 God Almighty ; " and the old creation with all its shapes 
 of sin and grief shall pass away, and '' be no more 
 remembered, nor come again into mind." 
 
 Let us pause a moment before this scene of spirit ! 
 Surely God is in the earth, though we know it not. 
 But some may say it is only motion, heat, light, or 
 subtler forces, poured through the infinite moulds of 
 the world, — that is all. Away with such words. What 
 and whence these beneficent agents we call motion, 
 heat, and light; whence these infinite moulds of wisdom 
 and love and beauty; whence the transmutation of 
 motion and heat up into conscious life? Wake up and 
 see this great sight of the presence of God. Walk 
 around, mark, adore. The awful Beneficence is at 
 work. In the presence of the Everlasting God from 
 whom I come, to whom I go, be still, my selfish heart ; 
 be still, my selfish cares; turn, my poor conceited soul, 
 all into reverence and worship. In this presence I feel 
 my impurity; I confess and cleanse myself from in- 
 iquity A mercy like the mercy of Christ seems spread 
 
314 THE RIVER OF LIFE. 
 
 all through Nature, a redeeming tenderness. I remem- 
 ber the gospel pity and the gospel hopes with new as- 
 surance, and I believe that God will forgive us our sins, 
 and as he has brought Nature from winter, will bring us 
 up also, and all those who sleep in him ! 
 
 " Sin-blighted though we are, 
 We too, the reasoning sons of men, 
 From our oblivion, winter, called 
 Shall rise, and breathe again ; 
 And in eternal summer lose 
 Our threescore years and ten." 
 
 The spirit in Nature at this moment is not only a 
 picture of the final conquests of spirit, but of that joy- 
 ful conquest which is found in the life of every good 
 man, even in his homely days now and here. The 
 usual history of the spirit in the heart is a history of 
 struggle ; the spirit is usually with us in the form of the 
 angel with whom Jacob wrestled at midnight. God 
 does not work as we would ; but if a man is faithful 
 to his light, he will make a spring out of the cold and 
 dark days of the winter, and he will come into a time 
 of conquest and peace. 
 
 And if we really understand the matter, we would 
 make this conquest and peace and springtime perpetual. 
 But we must make a reality of the spirit. To many, the 
 doctrine of the spirit seems a foreign and unnatural thing, 
 a fanatical doctrine. Why should we not be interested 
 in our God? In the beautiful mythology of the Greeks, 
 their gods peeped out from behind the trees, from the 
 floods, and glimpses of them were seen on the hill-tops, 
 
THE RIVER OF LIFE. 315 
 
 and life was full of gods; and where they were not 
 present themselves, they crowded their cities with 
 images of them ; and lest any should be omitted, they 
 erected in one place an altar to the unknown God ! 
 They loved and delighted in their poor gods. We 
 have a God, we have a spirit, yet many of us are 
 ashamed of the unspeakable dignity of knowing him, — 
 of walking in his presence with awe and love and con- 
 fession. That spirit has made and fashioned me, and 
 not made me a beast but a man, and through it I live ; 
 it is in me and around me in benefits and mercies, and 
 it promises forgiveness and life and higher power when 
 I sink into the grave; it is over all. Shall we not 
 rejoice in it, and open our arms wide to it, and live in 
 it and walk in it? *' There is a river the streams whereof 
 shall make glad the city of God." 
 
XXXII. 
 
 WORLDLINESS. 
 
 They are of the world. — i John iv. 5. 
 
 THIS is said, not contemptuously, but despairingly. 
 Your natural impression will be that I am to 
 speak against the world; but that is not the case. I 
 cannot speak against the Creator or his world ; I cannot 
 speak against any part of the nature he has given us, 
 even if it has been injured by sin or criminal excess. 
 It is not wrong, but right, that a man should be what he 
 was born to be, — a creature of this world, fully living 
 in it, making much of it. The time was when the world 
 was thought, and it is now thought by many, a horrible 
 place, to which the spirit was banished for the sake of 
 whipping it into virtue, — a magical garden whose beau- 
 ties we must not enjoy because the Devil is behind them, 
 and into which we are brought that we may say No to 
 everything it contains. 
 
 But we are learning lately that the world is a great, 
 God-given establishment, not to pass away in a moment 
 by any means, full of God's riches ; and that to improve 
 it, to weed out of society and Nature everything which 
 is against man, to make this a place sound and healthy to 
 
WORLDLINESS. 31/ 
 
 the bodies and souls of all its children, even the poorest, 
 for generations to come, to be a man of this world, 
 with these views, living in it intelligently, beneficently, 
 enjoyingly, — this we must not call worldly, but rather 
 heavenly. The unworldly, ghastly man who denies all 
 this is spurious, not a real man, — a singular growth of 
 the Middle Ages, his very pictures hateful to the eye ; 
 and if we had not pity and even reverence for the 
 mistaken, sincere, and often noble soul, we would shut 
 the door upon him, burying him and his history in the 
 grave where he belongs. 
 
 But let me come into some detail of this thought. 
 First, I do not call worldly a love of the beautiful in any 
 of its forms. A sense of the beautiful, a desire for the 
 creation of it, is a part of our '* image of God," our 
 soul's likeness to him who " made everything beautiful 
 in his time." Poetry is not a vimcm dceinoimm; paint- 
 ing and sculpture and architecture are not idolatries. 
 These are not worldly. Nor do I call beautiful houses, 
 furniture, equipage, worldly, where they are not the 
 expression of mere vulgar ambition and vulgar waste. 
 Where they modestly correspond to the situation, they 
 are the fit surroundings of a being who, though he has 
 sinned, is still a natural prince at the head of a beautiful 
 and princely creation, to whom a monkish squalor is a 
 disgrace and indeed a sort of spiritual insanity. 
 
 Nor is taste, even when spent in adorning the per- 
 son in beautiful dress, unworthy. The young maiden 
 adorns herself instinctively; and when this is done with 
 
3 1 8 WORLDLINESS. 
 
 modesty and moderation, who shall tell her Nay? You 
 will remind me of Saint Peter: " Whose adorning let it 
 not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and 
 of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel ; but let 
 it be . . . that which is not corruptible, even the orna- 
 ment of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight 
 of God of great price. For after this manner in the 
 old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, 
 adorned themselves." 
 
 But he speaks of *' holy women," while I am speaking 
 of all people. Moreover, the spirit of this passage is, 
 '* Whose adorning let it not be so much that outward 
 as this inward adorning," just as any sober person would 
 now say, where he saw an excessive vanity of ornament. 
 Such a passage, taken strictly, is one of asceticism, and 
 would reduce men in their habits to monks, and every 
 woman to a nun, and is not at all in accordance with the 
 spirit of Him who came eating and drinking, and who 
 said, *' Consider the lilies how they grow: they toil not, 
 they spin not; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in 
 all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." He 
 who with his own hands painted the wings and crest of 
 the bird, who curves and sculptures every wave cast 
 upon the shore; he who made the beautiful human 
 form and that most exquisite work, a human counte- 
 nance ; he who can do nothing that is ugly, any more 
 than he can do anything that is foolish, — shall we slander 
 him by deforming and disgracing the body, the high 
 temple of the Spirit? 
 
WORLDLINESS. 3 1 9 
 
 But when the splendors of my house or my dress are 
 * the ends of my being ; when I devote work and money 
 and thought to the coverings of a perishing body, and 
 do nothing for the imperishable heart; when everything 
 is done for the eye of man, and nothing for the eye of 
 God, — nay, when every beauty and ornament, through 
 my vanity or envy, discolors and makes ugly something 
 inside of me ; when show destroys substance, and the 
 flash on the surface withers the heart; when love of 
 beauty is really nothing, and inflation of self is every- 
 thing, — then comes in the solemn charge of Saint Peter. 
 
 It is a shame when a man or a society grows so fine 
 outside, and so little and disgraceful within ! The Devil 
 has issued a great order, — " Seem to be, and be not," 
 — and the world is obeying it. When we pass through 
 the streets of palaces in a great city, and far more when 
 we see a dignified-looking man or a beautiful woman, 
 the natural feeling is. What noble persons must live in 
 these fine temples ! And when we find they are the 
 reverse of noble, that their fine houses or beautiful 
 persons have nobody inside, or worse, then again we 
 hear Saint Peter: ''Whose adorning let it not be that 
 outward adorning; . . . but let it be the hidden man 
 of the heart." 
 
 Nor do I call a handsome way of living, or the amuse- 
 ments of life, worldly. The full enjoyment of the world 
 and all it furnishes is ours. God *' giveth us richly all 
 things to enjoy." Take notice that the generous-minded 
 apostle who said this was himself not a luxurious man : 
 
320 WORLDLINESS. 
 
 for Christ's sake he chose to strip himself of all ; but not 
 for all that did he proclaim asceticism as the law of life. 
 
 As to amusements especially, let me pause a moment 
 upon them. The play of human nature is as much 
 needed as its work. From innocent diversions the 
 heart comes back with new delight to its higher objects. 
 A lower joy, if it is used with moderation, does not 
 destroy a higher joy, but creates a new satisfaction in it. 
 We are made for variety. Besides, we who live in the 
 house of a divine Father ought to know that pleasure 
 in itself is right. I am not bound to show that amuse- 
 ments improve even my health. If I enjoy them, as a 
 bird enjoys its flight, that is enough, so I transgress no 
 law. But add to this that a certain amount of pleasura- 
 ble excitement is demanded by human nature, and if 
 lacking in purer forms, will be taken in grosser. 
 
 The only questions are these: Are our controlling 
 passions those which ought to be the masters ; and do 
 they keep the true proportion and order as to the rest? 
 There is a place for them all. It is only the encroach- 
 ment of one upon another which is an evil. If with us 
 the little has usurped the place of the great, if amuse- 
 ments are our business, they are no longer amusements, 
 — the word means relief. If we are beings whose work 
 is to trifle, whose aims are frivolities, our rank is the 
 rank of motes floating in the sun. But no, that were to 
 slander the motes, for their play has business in it. The 
 rule then is, so much play as does not weaken, but 
 invigorates the zest and ability for duty. 
 
WORLDLINESS. 3 2 1 
 
 Then, as to the quality of our amusements. They are 
 worldly if they are of that sort which discountenances 
 better things. If amusements are such, and so exciting 
 as to make insipid quiet studies, sober duties, gentle 
 affections ; if their beauty is of that sort which makes 
 the true beauty of life homely ; if your Tyrian purples 
 make the stuff of duty look gray and homespun, then be 
 sure they are worldly and pernicious. I will give then 
 two rules : Not too much ; and not of that sort which 
 chills our better tastes. 
 
 I am not affected by the usual prejudices on this 
 subject. The prejudices of even good men have swept 
 into indiscriminate condemnation, for example, all danc- 
 ing, all games, all public shows. How foolish this is, I 
 hardly need to say, and indeed disastrous. "Where 
 virtue is, these are more virtuous." There is a dancinsf, 
 to be sure, there are games, public shows, most worthy 
 of condemnation. Paris, London, New York, some- 
 times pour their worst morals on the stage, and 
 husbands, fathers, wives, daughters, sit with open face 
 assisting at these shameless exhibitions. 
 
 As to the theatre, permit me to say a few words. 
 The Christian Church is now and always with much 
 unanimity against it, and the world (so called) is with 
 entire unanimity for it. Very rarely has it occurred to 
 them that they both may be wrong. If there is in it a 
 possibility of much innocent and needed pleasure for 
 the human race, nay, of direct and elevating benefit, 
 then it is the duty of the Church to recognize what it 
 
 21 
 
322 WORLDLINESS. 
 
 might be, and to throw the whole weight of its power 
 against the evils only. It is so great an institution in 
 our life, one which in some shape must stand forever, 
 or as long as man stands, that one would think all men 
 of the Church or of the world would agree to make it 
 such as in some good degree would suit them both, — 
 the Church liberalizing her views and graciously conde- 
 scending, the world purifying and elevating its taste. 
 It should be under the most watchful care of the best 
 Christian conscience (I mean a conscience wise through 
 liberality), and at the same time under a taste large 
 enough to admit all human interests, but keeping far off 
 from the shadow of ill. All advocates of the drama 
 should know that while it is a fascinating figure, yet it 
 stoops so easily to low tastes in the play, and to low 
 lives in the actors, that to keep it honorable, and a 
 minister of sweet and noble influences, it should be 
 watched with chaste and stern eyes. Any attempt to 
 regenerate this powerful muse should have the sym- 
 pathy of the Church, — which, how^ever, cannot tolerate 
 it as it stands ; its sympathy must be reserved for honest 
 effort to make it as it ought to be. So of all amuse- 
 ments. There is nothing in them of necessity unclean ; 
 but as the heart needs the regeneration of Christ, so do 
 all the ways and institutions of man. 
 
 In all amusements and in all our life, let not a mad 
 luxury react to a mad asceticism ; let us not impose 
 the rule for saints or holy men — and a very question- 
 able rule even for them — upon the young, calling that 
 
WORLDLINESS. ■ 323 
 
 sin which is no sin, blackening a world already dark 
 enough, and forcing the live human being to become a 
 mummy. Worse still, if a man finds he cannot live the 
 dry life of a mummy, the effect is to drive him either 
 into a hypocritical sensualism or into an open opposi- 
 tion to religion and to his own conscience, while Christ 
 and his pure religion must bear the reproach of it all. 
 ** Use this world as not abusing it." The mouth is 
 made for laughter, as well as for speech ; everything for 
 use, but nothing for abuse. This is reason ; this is 
 religion. 
 
 I do not call worldly, a regulated desire for advance- 
 ment by gain of money, rank, or reputation. These 
 things are natural, and no natural instinct is created to 
 be extirpated, and these instincts are the basis of the 
 order and progress of the world. When, however, a 
 man forfeits the whole of his widely gifted soul to one 
 object, and his eagerness hardens him into steel ; when 
 his heart does not soften and sweeten as his fortunes 
 grow; when he does not turn with increasing gratitude 
 and humility to God, with increasing brotherliness 
 and generosity to men, sorry for their failures, prompt 
 to meet their distresses, then be sure the man is 
 worldly. 
 
 There is a worldliness, indeed, much deeper than 
 mere enjoyment of the world, and of this few tongues 
 ever speak. I call pre-eminently worldly the men and 
 women who for the sake of the world's good opinion, or 
 of rank in society, sacrifice their better selves, their 
 
324 IVORLDLINESS. 
 
 friends, the truth. Aspirations for good society we 
 must all approve (for our society is one of the highest 
 facts about us) ; but by good society I mean people 
 with refinements and thoughts, above all, with hearts 
 and with an inward nobleness, for that only is good 
 society ; and to sacrifice something to make them friends 
 were wise indeed. 
 
 But the sacrifices I speak of are made to reach a very 
 different society. I will not describe it; but whatever 
 it is, at the best it is but a conventional thing. Yet to 
 reach it, or to live in it, many sacrifice themselves, their 
 minds, deserting all true culture; sacrifice their con- 
 sciences (for to them the rule of fashion is essentially 
 the law of God) ; sacrifice their hearts, the domestic 
 affections become selfish, greedy, striving (I have seen 
 them poising like hawks in the upper air, looking over 
 land and sea for their objects) ; become envious, malig- 
 nant, worshipping what is over their heads, despising 
 what they think under their feet, sacrificing not merely 
 their personal worth, but their peace ; for if we except 
 some flashy excitements, nothing can be more unsatis- 
 factory than their lives. 
 
 This I call worldly ; and I call it worldly also when 
 for the sake of the world people sacrifice their convic- 
 tions. Zadok was the founder of the great sect of the 
 Pharisees, and he left on record this memorable piece 
 of advice, " Separate not yourselves from the majority," 
 which is the fundamental maxim of human nature in 
 everything worldly. If the whole of our best society 
 
• WORLDLINESS. 325 
 
 were turned Buddhists, how long would the worldly 
 woman or man remain Christian? The usual question 
 is, What will he or she do? Are the best people on 
 that side? And so they snap the most sacred obligations. 
 *' They follow still the changes of the moon." 
 
 There are several sorts of worldlings ; but to sacrifice 
 friends and convictions on a cold and heathen calcula- 
 tion is so extreme, so hateful to God, that I could 
 almost wish you would forget all the rest and think 
 only of this one. There is a so-called worldling of the 
 senses, the man who is his own worst enemy, but he 
 may be kind and true at the bottom of his heart. 
 There is the worldling of vanity, the creature of a silly 
 imagination, a painted little butterfly, — no one can be 
 very harsh with that. But worse than these is the 
 heartless worldling, the man (still more the woman, if 
 it be possible) whose soul has been turned into the 
 cold steel of selfishness; the poised, calculating, sys- 
 tematic worldling, who shows a thousand faces and all 
 frightful, who shines in smiles and is all iron below, who, 
 if fashionable interest beck to him, will set his iron heel 
 on the tenderest heart or the most sacred truth, if it is 
 safe to do so, and at any rate will stand aside to let 
 injury be done; the worldling who is perfect in the 
 let-alone principle, perfect in the cold soul of Cain, 
 saying, *' Am I my brother's keeper?" 
 
 I sometimes wish there would appear new apostles 
 on the earth to preach common honor, to preach kind 
 hearts, to preach manliness to men and womanliness to 
 
326 WORLDLINESS. 
 
 women. For, though none of us, I think, can be like 
 the picture I have drawn, yet we are all of us in some 
 degree tainted. It is impossible to stand so near the 
 great ocean of worldliness and not be sprinkled by its 
 spray. 
 
 Of the higher and universal form of worldliness I 
 have not spoken at all. I mean that universal exag- 
 geration of the world that now is, — an exaggeration 
 which seems to belong to us as men ; the forgetfulness, 
 in the present moment and place, of the invisible, the 
 beyond, the hereafter. We are all of us shut up as in 
 a box, ** worshipping and" serving the creature," and 
 seeing nothing outside. We are eager and immersed 
 in the thing of a moment, anxious, fretted. Why so 
 intense? Be quiet "The Lord is at hand." In a 
 moment, in the twinkling of an eye, this great scene 
 must be stripped, and we must stand before the face of 
 the Judge, who judges '' the deeds done in the body." 
 
 Ah, gracious God ! make us a little wiser ; make us 
 to " live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present 
 world ; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious 
 appearing of the great God, and our Saviour Jesus 
 Christ." Amen. 
 
 University Press: John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 

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