PM*. 
 
 SUM. 
 
 
 THREE SERMONS 
 
 PREACHED IN THE 
 
 $ CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF ST. PETER’S, 
 If MARITZBURG, 
 
 BY 
 
 THE RICHT REV. THE LORD BISHOP OF NATAL. 
 
 SECOND SERIES : N 0 .? 15 TO 17. 
 
 ® PRICE ONE SHILLING AND SIXPENCE. 
 
 1866 . 
 
[No. L5. — Second Series.] 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 Preached in the Cathedral Church ok St. Peter’s, Maritzih uo, 
 On Sunday Morning, April 29, 1806, 
 
 BY THE 
 
 RIGHT REVEREND THE LORD B1SHOT OF NATAL. 
 
 James 1.16-18. — Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good 
 gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and covieth down 
 from the Father of Lights, with idiom is no variableness, 
 neither shadow of turning. Of Ills own If ill begat lie 
 us with the Word of Truth, that we should be a kind of 
 first-fruits of His creatures. 
 
 There is some doubt by whom this epistle of St. James was 
 written. There were, as we know, two apostles who bore 
 this name. There was James the Great, as he is called, the 
 son of Zebedee and brother of St. John, who was put to 
 death very early in the history of the Church, when, as we 
 read in the Acts — 
 
 * Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the Church ; and 
 he killed James the brother of John with the sword.’ 
 
 The epistle was certainly not written by him, as we gather 
 from its contents, — which imply by its expressions a much 
 later state of things than could have existed in his time, — 
 as well as from the voice of tradition. That voice ascribes 
 it to James the Less, or one of those who are called in the 
 New Testament, according to Jewish custom, the brethren 
 of our Lord, though really the sons of Mary, the sister of 
 the mother of Jesus, and therefore what we should call his 
 first-cousin. This James appears to have filled a prominent 
 position in the Church of Jerusalem in the apostolic times. 
 When Peter was delivered from prison, and went, as we are 
 told, to the ‘ house of John, whose surname was Mark,’ he 
 said to the damsel who came to the door to admit him, 1 Go, 
 show these things unto James and to the brethren.’ When 
 
 B 
 
2 
 
 the first Council was held at Jerusalem, and Barnabas and 
 Paul had declared what God had done among the Gentiles 
 by them, it is James who rises to address the assembled 
 Church, and who suggests the course which was actually 
 adopted. On a third occasion in the Acts James again 
 occupies a foremost place, where the historian writes — 
 
 ‘ And, when we were come to Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly. 
 And the day following Paul went in with us unto Janies: and all the elders 
 were present.’ 
 
 And lastly St. Paul, in the epistle to the Galatians, men- 
 tions that on one occasion he ‘ went up to Jerusalem to see 
 Peter, and abode with him fifteen days/ and he adds — 
 
 ‘ But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother.’ i.19. 
 
 This last statement certainly does not imply any necessary 
 superiority in James, though it shows that he was a con- 
 spicuous member of the Church at Jerusalem. But, in the 
 next chapter, where St. Paul speaks of a second visit which 
 he made to Jerusalem, fourteen years after the first, he 
 places James at the head of those whom he styles the 
 ‘ pillars ’ of that Church, naming him first in order, even 
 before Cephas (Peter) and John : — 
 
 ‘ And when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to he pillars, perceived the 
 grace that was given unto me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hand 
 of fellowship, that we should go unto the heathen, and they unto the circum- 
 cision.’ ii.9. 
 
 And afterwards he speaks of ‘ certain coming from James,’ 
 evidently as deputed by him to observe the proceedings of 
 St. Paul at Antioch. 
 
 There can he no doubt, then, that James filled the office, 
 which the tradition of the Church ascribes to him, as first 
 Head or Bishop of the Church at Jerusalem. But the question 
 then arises whether he was the same as the other apostle James, 
 the son of Alphaeus or Cleopas, — for these are only different 
 forms of the same name. It seems, on the whole, most pro- 
 bable that he was, though the matter is much disputed by 
 even the most orthodox writers. But, whether lie was (lie 
 apostle or not, it is to James the Less, the first Bishop of 
 Jerusalem, the ‘ brother of our Lord,’ and therefore certainly 
 one who mixed very closely with the apostles, that the 
 general tradition of the Church has ascribed this epistle, 
 though not indeed with positive certainty. Thus Eusebius 
 writes, in the middle of the fourth century : — 
 
 These accounts are given respecting James, who is said to have written the 
 first of the General (or Catholic) Epistles: hut it is to he observed that it is 
 
3 
 
 considered spurious. Not many, in fact, of the ancients have mentioned it, 
 nor that either, which is said to be Jude’s, and which is also one of the seven 
 (so called) General Kpistles. Still we know that these also were publicly used 
 with the rest in most churches, ii.23. 
 
 The ‘ accounts’ to which Eusebius refers, and which he 
 had just given, of the life of this James, from the writings 
 of an eailier historian Hegesippus, who lived about a hun- 
 dred years after the time of the apostles, 175 a.d , are very 
 singular, and would throw considerable light on the contents 
 of the epistle, if it was really due to him, llegesippus 
 writes as follows : — 
 
 Front the apostles, Janies, the brother of the Lord, succeeds to the charge of 
 the Church, — that Janies who has been called the Just front the time of the 
 Lord to our own days; for Hurt’ were many of the name of James. He was 
 holy front his mother’s womb, he drank not wine nor strong drink, nor did he 
 eat animal food ; a razor cattle not upon his head ; he- did not anoint himself 
 with oil ; he did not use the bath. He alone might go into the holy place ; 
 for he wore no woollen clothes, but linen. And alone he used to go into the 
 temple, and there he was commonly found upon liis knees, praying for forgive- 
 ness for the people ; so that his knees grew dry and hard like a camel’s, from 
 his constantly bending them in prayer, and entreating forgiveness for the people. 
 On account therefore of his exceeding righteousness he was called 1 the Just,’ 
 and the ‘ bulwark of the people,' and ‘ righteousness,’ as the prophets declare 
 of him. Some of the seven sects, then, which 1 have mentioned, enquired of 
 him, 1 What is the door of Jesus ? ’ And he said that this man was the Saviour ; 
 wherefore some believed that Jesus is the Christ. Now the forementioned 
 sects did not believe in the Resurrection, nor in the coining of one who shall 
 recompense everyone according to his works : but all who became believers 
 believed through James. When many, therefore, of the rulers believed, there 
 was a disturbance among the Jews and Scribes and Pharisees, saying, ‘ 'l here 
 is a risk the whole people will expect Jesus to be the Christ.’ They came 
 together therefore to James, and said, ‘ We pray thee, stop the people, for they 
 have gone astray after Jesus as though he were the Christ. We pray thee to 
 persuade all that come to the Passover concerning Jesus ; for we all give heed 
 to thee; for we and all the people testify to thee that thou art just, and acceptest 
 not the person of man. I’ersuade the people, therefore, not to go astray about 
 Jesus, for the whole people and all of us give heed to thee. Stand therefore on 
 the gable of the temple, that thou mayest be visible ; and that thy words may 
 be heard by all the people.’ . . . Therefore they placed James on the gable of 
 the temple, and cried out to him and said, ‘ O J ust one, to whom we ought all 
 to give heed, seeing that the people are going astray after Jesus that was 
 crucified, tell us what is the door of Jesus’ ’ And he answered with a loud 
 voice, ‘ Why ask ye me about Jesus the Son of Man ? He sits in heaven on 
 the right hand of great power, and will come on the clouds of heaven.’ . . . And 
 they cried out saying, ‘ Oh ! Oh! even the Just is gone astray.’ They went up 
 therefore, and threw down the Just one, and they said to one another, ‘ Let us 
 stone James the Just.’ And they began to stone him, for he was not killed by 
 the fall. But he turned round, and knelt down, and cried, ‘ 1 beseech thee, 
 Lord God, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.’ . . . 
 Then one of them, who was a fuller, took the club with which he beat the 
 clothes, and brought it down upon the head of the Just one. And so he bore 
 his witness.’ 
 
 It is impossible to say bow much of all this story is true, 
 more especially as it differs considerably from the account 
 
4 
 
 which Josephus gives of the martyrdom of James : and it 
 is most probable that we have here — even in this early age, 
 about the middle of the second century — another instance 
 of the rapid growth of mythical and legendary stories in 
 the Church, clustering around the memories of its founders. 
 But this, at all events, seems to be certain that James, the 
 first Bishop of Jerusalem, was martyred, and also that he 
 was eminently noted as ‘ James the Just,’ that he lived 
 himself a strict and holy life, laying more stress upon the 
 practice of righteousness than on the mere profession of an 
 orthodox faith. And this is the very characteristic which, 
 as you are well aware, singularly distinguishes the epistle 
 before us. From beginning to end it is a series of lessons 
 upon the daily duties of common life. Religion and 
 Morality are treated throughout as one and the same thing ; 
 or, if the writer recognises for a moment the notion of their 
 being separated, it is to tell us that — 
 
 ‘ If any man seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth 
 his own heart, that man’s religion is vain,’ — 
 
 it is to bid us — 
 
 ‘ be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving our own selves,’ — 
 
 it is to warn us again and again that — 
 
 ‘ As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.’ 
 
 So strongly was this felt, as you have heard, no doubt* 
 by the great Reformer Luther^who preached so strenuously 
 the doctrine of faith — a simple trust in God’s promises — a 
 childlike dependence on His forgiving Mercies and Fatherly 
 Love — in opposition to the slavish spirit of dependence on 
 rites and ceremonies and priestly mediation, engendered by 
 the corruptions of Rome — that he called this epistle ‘ an 
 epistle of straw in comparison with St. Paul’s writings ’ ; — 
 that is, he did not call it absolutely * an epistle of straw,’ as 
 his words are commonly reported, but only relatively to that 
 rich treasure of evangelical truth — the ‘ gold, and silver, 
 and precious stones ’ — which he found in those of St. Paul. 
 For, indeed, he speaks elsewhere, in his preface to the epistle 
 itself, very highly of its value : — 
 
 This epistle of St. James, although it was rejected by the ancients, I praise 
 and account it good notwithstanding, for this reason that it sets torth no human 
 teaching and presses home the Law of God. However, that 1 may speak my 
 judgment about it, but without prejudice to any one, I regard it as no apostle's 
 writing, and this is my main reason for it. In the first plate, that, in direct 
 opposition to St. Paul and ali the rest of Scripture, it ascribes justification to 
 
5 
 
 works, and says, ‘ Abraham was justified by his works, because he offered up 
 his son,’ whereas St. Paul, Roni.iv.2,3, teaches the contrary, that Abraham was 
 justified without works.’ .... Rut this James does nothing else but urge 
 obedience to the Law and its works, and mixes up so confusedly one thing with 
 another, that it seems to me he must have been some pious man, who as a dis- 
 ciple had caught up and set on paper some sayings of the apostle. 
 
 In truth, as Hegesippus says in the passage which I have 
 just before quoted, * there were many of the name of James 
 and it is quite possible that one of these, not James the 
 apostle, nor James the first Bishop of Jerusalem, but some 
 other James altogether-, who was merely, as Luther says, a 
 ‘ disciple’ of the apostles, may have composed this epistle. 
 But in any case there is good ground for believing that it 
 must have been written before the end of the first centurv. 
 And thus we have undoubtedly in this epistle a very early 
 instance of Christian teaching — either of an actual apostle 
 of Christ, or of the first Bishop of the Christian Church, or 
 at all events of one who had lived himself in the very age 
 of the apostles of Christ, and no doubt was personally 
 acquainted with their teaching. And it is certainly remark- 
 able that he lays so much more stress upon righteousness of 
 life than upon correctness of belief — that he lays no stress 
 at all upon the latter, and that, though he would have uttered, 
 beyond all doubt, a severe reproof, if he had found ‘ any 
 man that is called a brother’ to be — 
 
 1 a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an 
 extortioner,’ — 
 
 he does not give the least indication that he would have 
 abjured the society of those who merely differed from him- 
 self in matters of religious opinion, or refused to hold commu- 
 nion with them. Nay, he says that our religion, if it leads 
 to ‘ bitter envying and strife,’ to ‘ wars and fightings,’ can- 
 not be of heavenly birth — it is not the ‘ wisdom from 
 above,’ which is — 
 
 1 first pure, then peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and 
 good fruits.’ 
 
 He tells us that such ‘ wisdom ’ as that, w’hich sends ‘ out of 
 the same mouth blessing and cursing,’ so that — 
 
 ‘ therewith bless we God, even the Father, and therewith curse we men, which 
 are made after the similitude of God,' — 
 
 whatever we may think of it, is f earthly, sensual, devilish.’ 
 He says that ‘ pure Religion before Cod and the Father is 
 this ’ — not the maintenance of an orthodox Creed, or observ- 
 
G 
 
 ance of the ‘ strict law of the Church/ — to ‘ transgress ’ 
 which, says one of our English Bishops, is ‘ simple rebellion 
 against Christ/ — but — 
 
 ‘ To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep one's-self 
 unspotted from the world.’ 
 
 There is also another noticeable fact in this epistle, viz., 
 that the name of Jesus or Christ is scarcely ever mentioned 
 in it, while yet, I need not say, the true spirit of Christ per- 
 vades the whole of it. Twice only in these five chapters is 
 any direct reference made to that name, and then only in a 
 very general manner. Thus the writer begins by describing 
 himself as ‘ James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus 
 Christ ’ ; and again he says — 
 
 * My brethren hold not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, of glory — [that 
 is, either the Lord of glory, as our English Version fills up the blank which 
 exists in the original, or, as others understand it, that faith of glory, that 
 glorious faith,] — with respect of persons.’ 
 
 These are the only instances in which he mentions the 
 Saviour’s name, while yet holding firmly, as we see, ‘ the 
 faith our Lord Jesus Christ/ though he might not have 
 been able to declare his ‘unfeigned assent and consent’ to 
 all the subleties of all the Creeds. He speaks, as we have 
 just heard, of ‘ pure religion and undefiled before God and 
 the Father/ — of our ‘ blessing God, even the Father ’ ; he 
 tells us in the text that ‘every good and perfect gift cometh 
 down from the Father of Lights.’ And I need hardly 
 remind you that, like our Lord himself, like St. Paul and 
 the other apostles, he instructs us ‘ when we pray, to say. 
 Our Father.’ 
 
 ‘ If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that givetli to all men 
 liberally and upbraideth not ; and it shall be given him ; ’ 
 
 ‘ Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you.’ 
 
 Yes ! in this respect, as well others, the spirit of Christ, 
 and of Christ’s divine teaching, pervades the whole of this 
 epistle — that spirit of patient trust in God’s providential 
 care and love, of steadfast desire and endeavour to do our 
 Father’s Will, of tender concern and brotherly-love towards 
 one another, which marks the true Christian, one who is such 
 in the heart and not merely in the head, and which is more 
 pleasing in God’s sight than the most fiery zeal and the 
 loudest profession of love to the Saviour’s Name. And a 
 we may devoutly trust and believe that spirit tube reigning 
 even now by God’s Grace in the hearts of many, who can- 
 
7 
 
 not pronounce the watchwords of this party or that, — who 
 may be given over by their more orthodox brethren to 
 perdition, as heretics or unbelievers, but who are known of 
 Him, who ‘ seeth in secret and shall one day reward openly,’ 
 each man according to his works. Nay, we may believe 
 that there are many, who do not acknowledge the Chris- 
 tian faith at all, and yet have been taught, and are now 
 being led, by the Spirit of God. Surely, there are many 
 such as these, and have been in all ages , — ‘ meek, mOrcilul, 
 pure in heart, peacemakers,’ — men who have been ‘ per- 
 secuted for righteousness sake,’ — and whom Christ himself 
 would have pronounced to be ‘ blessed,’ — though they may 
 not have outwardly confessed him as Lord, though they 
 may not have even known his name, nor the name of the 
 Living God. Inwardly, they have acknowledged the Son 
 of God, the Living Word, who spoke with them all along, 
 as the Lord of their consciences, whenever they chose the 
 good and eschewed the evil. They have bound themselves 
 to His Law so far as it was revealed to them, — so far as 
 as they had light vouchsafed to them from the Father of 
 Lights, wherewith to read it. The spirit of Christ, in fact, 
 may be often ruling there, when his name may not be 
 honoured or even known : while experience too plainly tell 
 us, that the name of Christ may be very much upon men’s 
 lips, while his spirit — that spirit of ‘ love, joy, peace, long- 
 suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance,’ 
 — may be very far indeed from possessing the heart, and 
 exhibiting its fruits in the life. 
 
 It is now, and it was so of old, when St. James wrote the 
 words of the text. There were those then, who professed 
 the faith of Christ, yet lived to dishonour it, and ‘ blas- 
 phemed that worthy name by which they were called.’ And 
 they tried to throw the blame of their sins upon the Blessed 
 God, as if the nature which He had given them, or the 
 circumstances in which He had placed them, had caused 
 them to fall. St. James raises his voice against this: — 
 
 ‘ Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God ; for God can- 
 not be tempted with evil, neither tempteth He any man. But every man is 
 tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then, when 
 lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin ; and sin, when it is finished, bringeth 
 forth death.’ 
 
 We are all prone to do this : we are ever ready to be 
 indulgent to ourselves — to find some excuse for our faults 
 and shortcomings. Few, perhaps, will venture to charge 
 
8 
 
 tlie’r sins and miseries directly in plain words upon Him 
 who made them : though it must be feared that, among the 
 seething mass of untrained thought and feeling of the pre- 
 sent day, — among the multitudes who have been driven 
 from the true comforts and supports of Christian teaching, 
 by the unreal superstitions of some or the hard and cruel dog- 
 matism of others, or who are left without any teaching what- 
 ever through the neglect of those whom God has blessed with 
 light, — such things may too often be heard. But we all 
 indirectly do this, whenever we say of our faults or failings, 
 
 * I cannot help it, I cannot be a saint, if I would,’ — or, 
 ‘ My life is hard, I must rub through the world as best I 
 can / — ‘ Who can keep his garments always clean ? Who 
 cau touch filth, and not be defiled ? ’ 
 
 Rut were you then, indeed, my brother, compelled to sin ? 
 And, if life is hard, and circumstances are trying, — hard 
 and trying more or less for all of us, though in different 
 ways, — yet, if only God’s gracious help is sure, what better 
 school for virtue, for manly energy in resisting evil, could 
 Infinite Wisdom have devised? For, when we use the 
 expression ‘ Our Maker ’ with reference to ourselves as men, 
 we feel that it is an imperfect phrase. All that God has 
 made is good : all His works praise Him : each in its place 
 fulfils His will. But for us, who are His offspring, His 
 Will is our highest — and therefore our moral and spiritual 
 — perfection. And, in order to attain this, we must ‘ work 
 out ’ our own salvation. There is no other road to it : 
 virtue itself would not be virtue, if it were conferred entire 
 and perfect on any creature. We may be sure, then, that 
 God’s way of training His children is best : we may realise 
 the wisdom of St. James’s words when he says — 
 
 ‘ My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations, knowing 
 this that the trial of your faith worketh patience. Hut let patience have her 
 perfect work, that ye may he perfect and entire, wanting nothing.’ 
 
 No ! the trials and temptations of life are meant by 
 Divine Wisdom and Goodness as our very means of educa- 
 tion for the Kingdom of God. Not to harass and distress 
 us merely, are they ordered — still less, to make us fall and 
 bean excuse for our falling — but to prove us, and strengthen 
 us, and perfect us more and more in the spirit of His chil- 
 dren : and, whatever be the trial with which He sees good 
 to try us, as St. James says, ‘ He giveth more grace’ — He 
 gives us strength wherewith to overcome, if we will only 
 
9 
 
 use it. Our sins, he tells us, and the hitter fruits of our 
 sins, were all our own ; though Uod can turn that very 
 bitterness to joy, and make it a healing medicine for the 
 soul. But our goods and blessings ot every kind — our 
 comforts of hope, our feelings of penitence, — our wisdom 
 and virtue, — our intellectual, moral, and spiritual achieve- 
 ments — are all God’s gifts of grace, bestowed on us by the 
 Father of Lights, who is Absolute Goodness, unchanging 
 and unclouded Light. 
 
 ‘ Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift 
 is from above, and cometh down from the Father of Lights, with whom is no 
 variableness neither shadow of turning.’ 
 
 1 do not imagine that any distinction is here meant to be 
 drawn — as some suppose — between 'good gifts’ and ‘ per- 
 fect. gifts.’ In fact, in the Greek original the words f every 
 good gift and every perfect gift’ form a line of poetry, and 
 may very probably have been quoted by memory from some 
 well-known writing. What St. James means to say is, that 
 nothing evil came from God — that what He gives, whatever 
 it may be, must be good and perfect, cannot be itself the 
 cause of sin — that, if we sin in consequence of having 
 received it, it is our lust which has dragged us on — which 
 has conceived and brought forth sin, and then sin has 
 brought forth death. We might apply this to a thousand 
 dilFerent matters in daily life — to the health and strength, 
 the rank and wealth and beauty, the power and influence, 
 mental or bodily, which are bestowed upon different indi- 
 viduals, and which are all * good and perfect gifts ’ as they 
 came from the Father of Lights, and as such should be 
 thankfully welcomed by us, and used to the praise of the 
 Great Giver, though they are frequently abused to His dis- 
 honour. But they are specially applicable to that wonderful 
 increase of Scientific Light, which God has poured around 
 us in this our day, and which it were as sinful to despise 
 and reject, as it would be to shut our eyes to the Light, 
 which streams to us from the pages of the Bible. The 
 revelation to Man of each new fact of Science — Geological, 
 Astronomical, Medical, Critical, whatever it may be — is a 
 ‘ good and perfect gift from above, coming down to us 
 from the Father of Lights.’ And, if we are obedient 
 children of the Living God, true sens and daughters of the 
 Lord Almighty, we shall gratefully receive the knowledge 
 of such facts, and be sure that they cannot harm us — they 
 
 c 
 
10 
 
 cannot lead us into sin, into irreligion, ungodliness, atheism. 
 It is only our corrupt hearts that can do this ; and doubt- 
 less these hearts of ours may abuse this gift of God, as well 
 as any other, and make it an excuse for their own unfaith- 
 fulness. But God’s gifts still — the revelations of Science — 
 are ‘ good and perfect/ and are meant for the setting forth 
 of God’s glory and the advancement of our own highest 
 good. And we shall fail in our duty to the Father of spirits, 
 — we shall war against His gracious purpose towards us, — if 
 we do not cherish, with thankful earnestness and reverence, 
 as a precious token of His favour, the increase of knowledge 
 which He gives us in this our day, remembering that it is 
 ‘ from above,’ and, not as some seem to think, from the 
 abyss of hell, — that it — 
 
 ‘ cometh down from the Father of Lights, with whom is no variableness, 
 neither shadow of turning.’ 
 
 Our God is here compared to the Sun, whose bright, pure, 
 light gladdens the whole earth, and is the life and joy of 
 every sentient creature. And the resemblance is even more 
 perfect and beautiful, when illustrated by the modern dis- 
 coveries of Science, than even the writer could have sup- 
 posed : since we now know that pure white light is made 
 up of innumerable rays of different shades of colour, which 
 serve to shadow forth with their faint radiance the various 
 perfections of the Divine Character, but represent together, 
 blended into one, the full bright glory of the ‘ Father of 
 Lights/ that glory unapproachable by human thought, 
 ‘ which no man hath seen or 'can see/ But one difference 
 St. James has noted : the visible Sun shines not with con- 
 stant brightness, glows not with steady power. The light 
 and heat which it bestows are variable quantities : they are 
 subject to change not merely through the daily interchange 
 of day and night, but also from change of place or change 
 of season. With Him there is no ‘ variableness/ — no 
 change from 1 parallax/ as the Greek original expresses it, 
 like the difference of the solar power, perceived by leaving 
 the burning soil of Egypt or Palestine for the colder regions 
 of the frozen North — no ‘ shadow of turning/ like that 
 which we observe while standing fixed in the same place 
 ourselves, and watching the midday shadows change in 
 length, as the Sun approaches his northern or southern 
 ‘ place of turning’ or ‘tropic.’ No! our God and Father, 
 Blessed be llis Name ! is one and the same gracious Being, 
 
— “ the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever,” — Jehovah, 
 the “ Living Clod,” — the God of our fathers, the God of 
 our children. 11 is Love it is which links the ages together 
 by constant streams of goodness and blessing. From the 
 first hour that an intelligent human being breathed upon 
 this earth, He has been graciously revealing Himself more 
 and more clearly and fully to the children of men. One 
 ‘ good and perfect gi t ’ after another has come down to us 
 from above, from the Father of Lights: and by the won- 
 derful gift of speech, and the art of writing by which that 
 gift is supplemented, — both ‘ good and perfect gifts/ like 
 the rest, though often so fearfully abused, — the knowledge 
 of past ages has been handed on to our own ; and we, through 
 God’s grace, are still being blessed with more, which we too 
 must devoutly receive and pass on to others. 
 
 For, as St. James tells us — 
 
 ‘ By 1 1 is own W'ill begat lie us with the Word of Truth.’ 
 
 The ‘ Word of Truth ’ is a seed of life when planted in the 
 soul of man. There is no lite in falsehood, in dead super- 
 stitions, in unreal forms, and formularies which have lost 
 their meaning amidst the clearer light of the present day. 
 The ‘ Word of Truth/ the Truth of God, in the heart and 
 mind, is a living, growing, thing. If we think to shut it 
 up in formulas, in unchanging letters, we shall lose it. As 
 well might we attempt to imprison the sunshine and the 
 common air, as to appropriate the Truth of God to our own 
 exclusive use, by fixing it in some definite unchanging form 
 of words. There was a time when men felt this, and 
 breathed the fresh air, and walked freely in the light of day, 
 under the first teachings of the Gospel. But then came the 
 age of creeds and formularies, when men no longer moved 
 at large on the surface of God’s earth, rejoicing in their 
 birthright as children of God, in ‘ the liberty wherewith 
 Christ had made them free/ but followed age after age in 
 the deep ruts worn by preceding ages, no longer walking in 
 the light of God s Truth, but by the dim lantern-light of 
 human dogmas and Church-articles. Words are indeed the 
 vehicles of truth to us : but words ever tend to change, to 
 decay, to lose their force by use. They need to be dipt in 
 the fresh feelings of the heart, or they will be dead at least 
 to us; and the mind thirsting after truth, after the know- 
 ledge of God, of real being, will be compelled to lay by old 
 forms of belief, in order not to lose that belief which was 
 
12 
 
 once embodied in them To hold, tenaciously, in short, by 
 the old forms, when the meaning is departed, is but feeding 
 on husks instead of living bread. And whatever there may 
 be in our traditionary religious teaching, which bears this 
 character, must be stripped off and swept away, while the 
 precious kernel of truth will still remain. 
 
 For let us not doubt this, that in the past theWord of Truth 
 was all along the seed of life in men’s hearts as it is now. 
 Mixed up with the superstition and ignorance of the early 
 Church — with the myths and legends, the apocryphal gos- 
 pels and epistles, the extravagant dogmas of Augustine, the 
 absurd and lying stories of Jerome, the worship of the 
 Virgin and the Saints, the adoration of relics and images, 
 and all the countless follies and falsehoods which have cor- 
 rupted the simple teachings of Christ, — mixed up with all 
 this, I say, there has been a leaven of Divine Life, working 
 ever insensibly in the hearts of men — not, as they thought, 
 by the agency of marvels and miracles, wrought by the 
 hands, the clothing, or by the bones, of saints, — not by the 
 zeal of fiery Bishops, excommunicating one another, or by 
 the decrees of Synods and Councils, enforcing a belief in 
 creeds and dogmas, and condemning to uttermost perdition 
 those who differed by one iota from them — no, not in this 
 way, by the threat of Divine judgments, or the infliction of 
 temporal ones — not by the wind, the earthquake, and the 
 fire, — but by the still-small voice of God’s Spirit, speaking 
 within the hearts of men — bidding them believe, and hope, 
 and live, in the assurance of a Father’s Love. ‘ Of His own 
 Will begat He them with the Word of Truth.’ In the 
 teaching of the great Fathers of the Church, wrapped up 
 often in a mass of conceit, — of folly, ignorance, and untruth, 
 — of which you have had some specimens brought before 
 you in former discourses, — there was always the precious 
 seed of the truth of God’s Love, as revealed to us in all His 
 dealings with us, and specially by the lips and in the life 
 and death of Jesus our Lord. And this, when received into 
 a kindly soil, into a ‘ honest and good heart,’ under the 
 influences of God’s good Spirit, fructified and grew into a 
 strong and living faith that worked by love — * bearing 
 fruit and bringing forth, some an hundred fold, some sixty, 
 some thirty.’ And so it is, we are sure, in the present day. 
 In all the sects of Christendom, amidst all the varieties of 
 Creed, mixed up, no doubt, in every portion of the Church 
 
with much of infirmity, ignorance, and error, the Word of 
 Truth is still a seed of life, as ever, in the hearts of true men : 
 it is by this they are begotten to a lively hope: bv this 
 they are quietened in faith and love. And our special pri- 
 vilege and joy is this, that, as we are enabled to take wider 
 views of God’s Love than others, while we realise, I trust, not 
 less deeply than they His Truth and His Holiness, we can 
 look around on them as embraced with us iu the Arms of 1 1 is 
 Fatherly Goodness. You may have heard that the Romish 
 Cardinal has just replied — we must suppose in the name of 
 his Church — to those ‘Anglo-Catholic’ Clergy, who have 
 approached his Eminence of late with an address, expressing 
 their desire for communion with Rome, while still remaining 
 priests of the English Church, and who have supported 
 their request by saying — 
 
 Whatever may have been less perfect in the faith of the Flock, in Divine 
 Worship and in Ecclesiastical Discipline, we have improved beyond our hope ; 
 and, not to be forgetful of other things, we have shown an amount of goodwill 
 towards the venerable Church of Rome, which has tendered us suspected in 
 the eyes of some. 
 
 He has replied, indeed, and the voice of Rome is still heard, 
 as in the days of old — 
 
 Whoever separate themselves in any manner from the unity of the faith, or 
 from the society of him (Blessed Peter), such can neither be absolved from the 
 bonds of sin, nor enter the gates of the Kingdom of Heaven. 
 
 There are others in our own Church ready to “ cut off,” 
 as they say, “ from the Church of God,” those who do not 
 hold with them that “ what the Catholic Church, during 
 the first thousand years of her history, declared to be or 
 received as the true Faith, tfuit is the true Faith and must 
 be received as such.” It is our joy to know that no child 
 of man, whose heart has once been quickened by the Spirit 
 of God, whom God has once ‘ begotteu with the Word of 
 Truth,’ can ever be excluded by any human agency like this 
 from the Church of God — that ‘ the gifts and callings of God 
 are without repentance ’ — that He will never cast out a soul 
 that truly loveth Him. And we believe that there are many 
 such souls in the Church of Rome, by which we ourselves 
 are excommunicated, — many such within our own Church, 
 iu the ranks of those whose zeal has outrun their charity, — 
 who yet truly love God in their inmost hearts, and have 
 been * begotten by Him with the Word of Truth.’ And 
 beyond the narrow bounds of our own Church, — yea, beyond 
 the hounds of the Catholic Church of Christ, — we believe 
 
14 
 
 that there are others, sons and daughters of the Lord 
 Almighty, also ‘ begotten by the Word of Truth/ and truly 
 loving and serving God, according to the light vouchsafed 
 to them, of whom we may say, in the words of Richard 
 Eaxter, which I have formerly quoted — 
 
 I can never believe that a man may not be saved by that religion, which doth 
 but bring him to the true love of God, and to a heavenly mind and life. 
 
 But, if our sphere of human love is thus enlarged — if, 
 begotten by the Word of Truth ourselves, we feel that there 
 is room in our Father’s heart for all, — let us never forget 
 that ‘ by His Will’ God has thus begotten us, and that 
 Will is coupled with the purpose, as stated by St. James in 
 the text, ‘ that we should be a kind of first fruit of His 
 creatures/ This is true in the first instance of all Christians. 
 
 As the first-fruits under the Jewish Law — the choicest sheaf 
 of the ripened grain— were offered in the temple, not to dis- 
 credit and reject, but to sanctify, the whole, so Christians 
 have been blessed with more light than others, that they 
 should be the first-fruits of the whole human race — the 
 choicest offering of the whole field of Humanity — not to 
 condemn, but to sanctify, the whole. As St. Paul says, — 
 
 ‘ If the first-fruits be holy, the lump is also holy.’ 
 
 If the ‘ Father of Lights’ of Ilis own gracious Will — not 
 because we loved Him, but because He loved us — has 
 begotten us Christians with the Word of Truth to a hope 
 more bright than that of other men, this is not to cast them 
 off, and doom them, as some think, to endless misery — far 
 be from us such blasphemy ! — but to be to us a sign of hope, 
 of goodwill from above, for them also, — to be a motive for 
 our labouring with heart and soul on their behalf, and a 
 pledge that our Father will be pleased with such work, and 
 will abundantly bless onr labours. 
 
 But especially are these closing words of the text true 
 with reference to those among us, who have received the 
 brighter light of the present day, and have rejoiced in it. 
 
 ‘ Let not our good be evil spoken of:’ nay, rather, let not , 
 the ‘ good and perfect gift/ with which we have been 
 blessed, be without its due effect upon our lives, in deepen- 
 ing our gratitude to the Divine Giver, in quickening our 
 desire and strengthening our resolve to live as the children 
 of God, and in widening our charity to all around us. " e 
 can afford to be patient, forbearing, gentle, towards others, 
 
who yet may condemn us ; for we do not believe that our eter- 
 nal hopes can depend upon our holding this or that particular 
 article of faith. We may well lay to heart St. James’ words, 
 which follow the text, and be ‘ swift to hear, slow to speak, 
 slow to wrath,’ as those who know that in our Father’s 
 Love we are all embraced, and that ‘ the wrath of man 
 worketh not the righteousness of God.’ But let us not be 
 therefore ‘gentle’ to ourselves, ‘forbearing’ in respect of 
 our own unfaithfulness, ‘ patient’ in dealing with our own 
 besetting sins. Let us not thus turn God’s grace into 
 lasciviousness, aud bring down II is merciful judgments 
 upon us. To us, surely, with tenfold power, those words 
 apply which St. James wrote of old for his disciples : — 
 
 “ Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and 
 receive with meekness the engrafted word which is able to save your souls.” 
 
[No. 1G. — Second Series.] 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 Preached in the Cathedral CnuRcn of St. Peter’s, Maritzuukg, 
 On Sunday Morning, May 6, 1866, 
 
 BY THE 
 
 RIGHT REVEREND THE LORD BISHOP OF NATAL. 
 
 Matt. iv. 14-16 . — “ That it might be fulfilled which was 
 spoken by Esaias the prophet saying, The land of Zabul on 
 and the land of Nephthalim, by the ivay of the sea, beyond 
 Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people which sat in 
 darkness saw a great light, and to them which sat in the 
 region and shadow of death light is sprung up” 
 
 Here is an instance of the kind to which I referred in my 
 discourse of last Sunday Evening, where the writer of the 
 Gospel narrative, — whether Matthew himself, in those notes 
 of his which furnished, it would seem, the ground-work of 
 the present Gospel, or more probably the unknown compiler, 
 to whom we owe it as it now lies before us, — has quoted 
 the language of some ancient prophecy, as singularly appli- 
 cable to the later event which he is engaged in describing. 
 And this, in fact, as I explained, is the highest characteristic 
 of true prophecy, that it is “ not of any private interpreta- 
 tion ; ” it cannot be restricted to the age or to the event, 
 with reference to which it may have been originally uttered ; 
 it is an utterance of Divine Truth, of the Living Word of 
 God, which in its essential character is applicable to all 
 times, which is no mere prognostic, foretelling some par- 
 ticular event in the history of one person or of one people, 
 but contains eternal truth for all ages, the result of deep 
 insight into human nature, and into the dealings of God 
 with man, His child, in the past. In this way prophecy is 
 a proof to us of the existence of a Living God — of One who 
 
17 
 
 was and is the God of our fathers, as He is now our God— a 
 proof that one and the selfsame' Spirit is in all ages teaching 
 the spirits of men, — a proof that the human race, amidst all 
 external differences of time and place and circumstances, is 
 yet essentially the same, its relations to the Divine Creator 
 the same, its hopes and fears, its longings and desires, its 
 needs and its experiences, the same substantially, in the ages 
 long ago as now. Then, as now, the “ holy men of old,” 
 the prophets, or preachers of God’s Word, “ spoke as they 
 were moved by the Holy Ghost.” Then, as now, God’s 
 Word came home with power to the hearts of men, — was 
 felt to be truth, — bore its own witness to the conscience, — 
 and was to some “ a savour of death unto death,” to others 
 “ a savour of life unto life.” 
 
 This power of prophecy, appearing in single individuals 
 and often in dark times, has, in fact, surprised the hearers — 
 at least the more devout among them — into a confession of 
 a present Divinity. Such living words, such clear insight 
 justified by the event, seemed to them to prove the presence 
 of something more than human, of a knowledge beyond 
 what belonged to the mere creature of a day, — one who, as the 
 Psalmist says, ‘ cometh up as a flower and is cut down,’ 
 who ‘ fleeth as a shadow, and never coutinueth in one stay.’ 
 Yet is Man justly described as a creature that ‘ looks before 
 aud after,’ — and we shall find that, as the past is his in- 
 heritance, so is the future also. It would not be so if we 
 were living in a Universe which was governed by a capri- 
 cious and changeable being/ instead of by Jehovah, the 
 Living God, ‘ the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.’ 
 The progress of the race, the advancement in science of 
 every kind, the study of philosophy, the results of experi- 
 ence, would not then bring Man nearer to a knowledge of 
 the course of nature or of human history. Of such a Being, 
 miracle, as it is popularly understood, would be the only, as 
 it would be the fitting, manifestation. We should be living 
 in the realm of naked Will, and God would be known as 
 Will alone, as irresistible, incomprehensible, Sovereignty. 
 
 But it is not so. The Father of spirits — the Father of all 
 — reveals Himself by His Word to our hearts and minds as 
 the Fountain of Law — as the Holy Will in the spiritual 
 world, — in the sensible world as the author of this stupendous, 
 yet most beautiful and orderly. Universe. In this latter world 
 of sense, we know, His children, enlightened by Him, by 
 
 o 
 
18 
 
 virtue of those faculties with which He has gifted them, 
 and in accordance therefore with their Creator’s Will, have 
 made acquaintance with the laws of the innumerable orbs of 
 space, and are able to foretell with certainty their motions 
 for a far-distant future. The miraculous portents of former 
 ages have become for us the most regular and orderly events 
 in nature : the comets and eclipses, which struck terror into 
 the nations of old, which frighten the ignorant and super- 
 stitious now, are familiar and foreseen by the astronomer of 
 the 19th century. But these prophecies of Science — the 
 truths and lessons which she teaches — are “ not of any 
 private interpretation.” The sun does not veil his face in 
 disastrous gloom with special reference to any one person, 
 or foretell a time of woe to one particular nation, as men 
 used to suppose. The aspects of the heavens are not partial, 
 as astrology vainly deemed ; nor are the fates of individual 
 men, princes or heroes, written upon the starry skies, so as 
 to be deciphered there. Whatever lessons are taught by the 
 course of events in the natural world, we now know that 
 they are meant for us all, — that they uufold to us more and 
 more of those unchanging laws, by which the whole universe 
 is governed. Even the lower heavens, the world of clouds 
 and winds, which seem so irregular and capricious, are in 
 these days more and more distinctly seen to be subject to 
 Law ; the predictions of the barometer and thermometer 
 cannot he neglected with impunity ; and the weather-pro- 
 phet, although he cannot speak with the certainty of the 
 Almanac, can yet give advice to the sailor and the husband- 
 man, which they do well not to despise. 
 
 But these prophecies, in the realm of nature, are general 
 in their application, — they are “ not of any private inter- 
 pretation,” — they are meant for all. The careful and 
 experienced farmer may know sufficient of the meteorology 
 of his own district and the quality of his own land, to fore- 
 tell the crops, and to wait upon and watch for the season, 
 lie may use such knowledge wisely and well to his own 
 advantage. But no knowledge, that he can thus acquire, 
 will merely of itself bring more profit to him than to his 
 neighbour, or be in the nature of a prognostication of his 
 own peculiar private fortunes. Thus the soothsaying, con- 
 juring, and foretelling of past generations have been trans- 
 figured into an increased acquaintance with the laws of God 
 in nature, available to the wise, the diligent, and the patient, 
 
19 
 
 — elevating, instead of degrading, to humanity, and there- 
 fore more honourable to (rod. 
 
 It is a great thing thus to feel — and, thank God ! it is the 
 growing feeling of our age — that the whole Universe is 
 under Law to God, — that nothing happens by chance under 
 Ilis Government, nothing at random, nothing by arbitrary 
 interference, nothing but what might be expected from the 
 regular and constant action of llis own orderly, eternal, 
 laws, — and to feel that the same thing also is true in the 
 moral world — that sin will inevitably be followed with bitter 
 consequences, and that, amidst all present trials and per- 
 plexities, — 
 
 “ light is certainly sown for the righteous, and joyful gladness for such as are 
 true of heart.” 
 
 It is a great thing to realise the truth of those words, which 
 were uttered two thousand years ago by a Roman prophet 
 — I mean the great orator aud philosopher, Cicero, who 
 wrote as follows : — 
 
 Law, properly understood, is no other than Right Reason, agreeing with 
 nature, spread abroad among all men, ever consistent with itself, eternal, whose 
 office it is to summon to duty by its commands, to deter from vice by its 
 prohibitions, — which, however, to the good never commands or forbids in 
 vain, never influences the wicked either by commanding or forbidding. In 
 contradiction to this Law nothing can be laid down, nor does it admit of partial 
 or entire repeal. Nor can we be released from this Law either by vote of the 
 Senate or decree of the People. Nor does it require any commentator or inter- 
 preter besides itself. Nor will there be one Law at Athens, and another at 
 Rome, one now, and another hereafter ; but one eternal, immutable Law will 
 both embrace all nations and at all times. And there will be one common 
 Master, as it were, and Ruler of all, namely, God, the Great Originator, 
 Expositor, Enactor, of this Law ; which Law whosoever will not obey, will be 
 flying from himself, and, having treated with contempt his human nature, will 
 in that very fact pay the greatest penalty, even if he shall escape other punish- 
 ments, as they are commonly considered. 
 
 If, indeed, we turn from nature, where all is obedience 
 aud submission, — where “ the heavens declare the glory of 
 God, and the firmament showeth His handy work,” — where 
 “ fire and hail, snow and vapours, wind and storm, fulfil His 
 word,” — where the earth, which He “ hung upon nothing,” 
 “ abideth ” even as “ He established it,” — where as the 
 ancient writer in Genesis, with a sure trust in the faithful- 
 ness of God, foretold, — 
 
 “ while the earth remains, seed-time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and 
 winter, and day and night, do not cease,”— 
 
 if we turn, I say, from these things to the world of men’s 
 doings, which we call History, all seems at first compara- 
 
20 
 
 tively confusion, man rebelling against the laws of his being, 
 “ destroying himself” and his kind, and needing all the 
 terrible discipline, of which the suffering and sorrows of 
 countless generations are the fruit, — a discipline which yet 
 seems often to fall blindly, and to destroy the righteous 
 with the wicked. And we may be tempted at times to 
 yield in despair to the fearful thought, that the Judge of all 
 the earth will not do right, that His dealings with Man are 
 not equal, that we shall not be able to trace the Law in the 
 Moral world, and predict the future from the past. 
 
 But no ! amidst the infinite confusions, which the perver- 
 sity of human wills has introduced, we believe in a kingdom 
 of God set up in the moral and spiritual world, as orderly 
 and sure as that which we are certain now exists in the 
 natural world. That kingdom, indeed, as our Lord has 
 said, ‘ cometh not with observation/ — cometh not with 
 pomp and show, and outward signs, and visible demon- 
 strations of its Presence. Yet the principles of it, as 
 St. Paul says, are written in the hearts of all men, — 
 
 ‘ their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile 
 accusing or else excusing one another’ — 
 
 are written not with ink, but with the finger of the Living 
 God. There is a Divine Law, which when brought home 
 to us by the Word of God, we feel at once to be ‘ holy, just, 
 and (rood/ that Law which reions in the Universe of moral 
 being, and binds us to our Creator, in whose image we are 
 made, and binds us all to one another — with respect to which, 
 as Richard Hooker says — 
 
 There can he no less acknowledged than that her seat is the bosom of God, her 
 voice the harmony of the world ; all things in heaven and earth do her homage, 
 the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her 
 power ; both Angels and Men, and creatures of what condition soever, though 
 each in different sort and manner, yet all with uniform consent admiring her 
 as the Mother of their peace and joy. 
 
 The power, in fact, of the Creator has extended to the 
 production of creatures with wills, to be conformed, but by 
 their own act, to His perfect Will. 1 1 is Wisdom is displayed 
 in overruling the results of the acting of these wills during 
 their imperfect state, so as to bring order out of confusion, 
 peace and love out of strife and selfishness, by orderly ways, 
 however inscrutable to us, which we may hope in a more per- 
 fect state to trace and adore. But this, at least, we can see 
 even here, that, if the fate of any individual could be shown 
 to him beforehand, — if lie could be certain to reap every 
 
material advantage, and to attain the goods of tli is world, 
 its wealth and power, by the exercise of virtue, — there 
 would be no room for virtue to exist at all — the taunt of the 
 old Satan would then he unanswerable, 1 Doth Job serve 
 God for nought ? ” 
 
 But, as in some work of art too close a view shows only 
 confusion, while at the true focus every touch and stroke, 
 every seemingly fortuitous light or shadow, contributes to 
 one perfect and harmonious result, so shall it be when we 
 reach that heavenly height, to which our souls aspire. And 
 even here, in an inferior degree but not less truly, to those 
 who are raised above their brethren, by longer experience, — 
 to those who are gifted with deeper insight, with that keen 
 spiritual vision, which is granted to some beyond others for 
 the sake of all, — the maze of Providence becomes by glimpses 
 clear, — the “ Arm of the Lord is made bare,” — the Lord is 
 seen to “execute judgment”; while the “path of the 
 just,” though perhaps to the traveller himself it may be 
 shrouded for a time in darkness, is beheld by such “ pro- 
 phets” as a shining light, “ shining more and more unto 
 the perfect day.” 
 
 Such is the nature of most of the prophecies contained in 
 the Old Testament, and, in fact of the Sacred Writings 
 generally, which, as one has wisely observed (S.T. Coleridge), 
 are “ everywhere prophecy, nowhere prognostication.” On 
 this view they prove themselves to he indeed Divinely 
 inspired. All through them we see the Lord “ sitting 
 above the waterfloods, remaining a King for ever,” holding 
 the hearts of kings in His hands, making the wrath of man 
 to praise Him, pleading the cause of the helpless. “ Fear 
 not,” said Joseph in the story to his brethren, “ ye thought 
 evil against me : but God meant it unto good, to save much 
 people alive.” Hence the constant exhortations in the 
 Scriptures to “ wait patiently on God,” to leave our cause 
 in His hands, — hence the frequent assurance that, though 
 lying lips may prevail for a moment, yet “ the lip of truth 
 shall be established” — that, though we may have to suffer 
 for a time, when our hearts condemn us not for any evil, — 
 when we are conscious only of having done to the best of 
 our power that which we believe to be right and good and 
 true, — yet in God’s time, which is the best, we shall be 
 delivered, — though now “ sitting in darkness,” as the text 
 says, we shall “ see a great light.” 
 
22 
 
 This does not warrant our folding our hands in indolence. 
 As in higher matters we are to “ work out our own salva- 
 tion 55 because God worketh in us, so in things less vital, 
 but still important to us, in trouble or perplexity of mind, 
 in painful and embarrassing circumstances, it is our duty 
 and privilege first to do our part, and then to take no 
 thought for the morrow, leaving results in the hand of God. 
 We know how the consciousness of something being 
 inevitable, of escape from it being impossible, acts like an 
 opiate upon all the passionate struggles of our nature. But, 
 as Christians, let us add to this the devout confession, that 
 this inevitable blow, which seems such a calamity, is 
 directed by the hand of a Father, whose Wisdom and Love 
 are infinite — 
 
 whose authority, in show 
 When most severe, and mustering all its force, 
 
 Is but the graver countenance of Love , — 
 
 Whose favour like the clouds of spring may lour, 
 
 And utter now and then an awful voice, 
 
 But has a blessing in its darkest frown, 
 
 Threatening at once and nourishing the plant. 
 
 There is nothing like this habitual reference of all events to 
 the overruling Providence of a Father, for inducing this 
 patient hopeful temper. In the case of a conqueror or hero, 
 a confidence in his own destiny, a belief that there is some- 
 thing bright and peculiar in his “star / 5 has often strength- 
 ened his hands, and delivered him from the vacillations and 
 doubts and terrors, which might have ruined the cause of 
 ordinary men. So a filial trust in the Great God may raise 
 the Christian man, who is not otherwise distinguished 
 above his fellows, to a position in which he may be a leader 
 and a support to many. “ In quietness and confidence 
 must be our strength . 55 Our troubles, as well as our joys, 
 being part of the discipline of our lives, are but short, as 
 is fitting for such frail and shortlived creatures. This 
 is but a common-place, indeed, which reappears in innu- 
 merable proverbs and proverbial phrases, hardly worthy to 
 be repeated here. But it becomes a living truth, and heart- 
 felt, when we ascribe it to the ordinance of our Heavenly 
 Father. 
 
 I have made these remarks generally with reference to 
 the prophecies and promises of Scripture; but they are 
 specially applicable to the text before us, where words of 
 Isaiah are quoted, in which the prophet original!} foretold 
 
23 
 
 a gleam of glorious light for his afflicted people, when the 
 judgment of God shall have done its work upon them : — 
 
 *• The people which sat in darkness saw a great light, and to then) which sat 
 in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up.” 
 
 To various memorable occasions in the history of the Jews, 
 and in that of the Church, may these words be applied, as 
 well as to circumstances of daily occurrence in the lives of 
 individuals. In the New Testament they are quoted as 
 illustrating the time, when the great light of our Saviour’s 
 Teaching began to shine upon the world, still lying in com- 
 parative darkness. In the text itself they are employed 
 with reference to that great salvation, which the prophet 
 expected in his own time from some other Deliverer, who 
 should come to “ sit upon the throne of David,” — 
 
 “ to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice henceforth and 
 for ever.” 
 
 We will examine this morning more closely the sense in 
 which this prophecy was originally uttered, reserving for 
 the evening the further consideration of the subject. 
 
 There is no doubt that it refers primarily to the time, 
 when the king of Assyria had already invaded, and was 
 again about to invade, the land of the Ten Tribes, which 
 formed what is called in Scripture the kingdom of Israel in 
 distinction from the kingdom of Judah. We read in the 
 Book of Kings, 2K.xvi.5-9, that — 
 
 “ Rezin, king of Syria, [whose capital was Damascus,] and Pekah, king of 
 Israel, came up to Jerusalem to war ; and they besieged Ahaz, [king of Judah,] 
 
 but could not overcome And Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath-Pileser, 
 
 king of Assyria, saying, I am thy servant and thy son ; come up, and save me 
 out of the hand of the king of Syria, and out of the hand of the king of Israel, 
 
 which rise up against me And the king of Assyria hearkened unto 
 
 him ; for the king of Assyria went up against Damascus, and took it, and 
 carried it captive to Kir, and slew Rezin.” 
 
 Such was the fate of Syria and Damascus. As for Israel, 
 we are told that the same king of Assyria took several of 
 its towns, — 
 
 “ and Gilead, and Galilee, all (he (owns of Naphthali, and carried them cap 
 tive to Assyria.” 2K.xv.29. 
 
 It is plainly to this advent that reference is made in the 
 first verse of the 9th chapter of Isaiah, from which the 
 writer in St. Matthew has quoted a portion, as applicable to 
 the days of our Lord’s ministry. The prophet writes — 
 
 “ Nevertheless, the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when 
 at first He lightly afflicted the land of Zabulon, and the land of Naphthalim, 
 
24 
 
 and afterward did more grievously afflict by the way of the sea beyond Jordan, 
 Galilee of the Gentiles 
 
 The Evangelist has selected, as I have said, only a portion 
 of this verse, as suitable for his present purpose — viz, the 
 description of the locality concerned — 
 
 “ the land of Zabulon and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, 
 beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles.” 
 
 He does not quote the prophet’s account of the disasters 
 which had befallen this part of the land. And, indeed, it 
 is not easy to say what exactly Isaiah does mean in this 
 verse. It reads intelligibly enough in the English version : 
 but the original is perplexed and obscure; and the best 
 commentators are very doubtful as to the true interpretation 
 of the passage. On this point only they seem to be gene- 
 rally agreed, that the English Version does not give here a 
 correct translation of the original Hebrew. This, however, 
 does not affect the general meaning of the prophecy. For, 
 whatever may be the exact sense of the prophet’s words in 
 this first verse, it is certain that he makes some reference in 
 it to the affliction which these northern districts of Palestine 
 had suffered from the Assyrians. And he then goes on to 
 promise them light in their darkness, and deliverance at last 
 from these troubles, when the yoke of the oppressor should 
 be broken, and all Israel — the northern, as well as the 
 southern, tribes — should be gathered once more, as he hoped, 
 in one glorious Kingdom, under the rule of a prince of the 
 seed of David. 
 
 “ The people that were walking in darkness 
 Have seen a great light ; 
 
 The dwellers in the land of the shadow of death — 
 
 Light hath beamed upon them. 
 
 Thou hast multiplied the nation ; 
 
 For it hast thou increased the joy ; 
 
 They joy before Thee as with the joy in harvest, 
 
 As (men) rejoice at their dividing the spoil. 
 
 For the yoke of his burden, 
 
 And the staff of his shoulder, 
 
 The rod of his oppressor, 
 
 Thou hast broken, as in the day of Midian. 
 
 For every boot of the booted (warrior) in the tumult, 
 
 And the mantle rolled in blood, 
 
 Shall be for burning, food for fire.” 
 
 These last words are a more correct translation of the original 
 than that which you would find in the English Bible, where 
 we read, — 
 
 “ For every battle of the warrior is with confused noise and garments rolled 
 in blood : but this shall be with burning and fuel of fire.” 
 
The prophet, however, means to foretell that a time of 
 peace and quietness shall come, when, as he says elsewhere, — ■ 
 
 “ They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, 
 
 And their spears into prun'ng-hooks ; 
 
 Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, 
 
 Neither shall they learn war any more.” 
 
 And this idea he expresses here by saying that the warriors’ 
 boots, and their blood-stained cloaks, should be piled in 
 heaps and burnt, as the common practice was after a great 
 victory. Thus in l’s.xlvi.9 we read — 
 
 “ He make til wars to cease unto the ends of the earth ; 
 
 He breaketh the bow, and eutteth the spear in sunder ; 
 
 He bHrneth the chariot in the fire:" 
 
 and yet more distinctly in Ez.xxxix.9 — 
 
 “ And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on 
 fire and burn the weapons , both the shields and the bucklers , the bows and the 
 arrows , and the javelins and the spears ; and they shall kindle a fire with them 
 seven years.’* 
 
 In the text, however, the reference is made not merely to 
 the destruction of Israel’s enemies, especially the Assyrian, 
 whose “rod” Jehovah would break ‘as in the day of 
 Midian,’ against whom — 
 
 “ The Lord of Hosts shall stir up a scourge, according to the slaughter of 
 Midian at the rock of Oreb,” x.26 — 
 
 but to the permanent establishment of peace, under the 
 powerful reign of the expected prince of the family of David. 
 Thus the prophet Zechariah describes the same glorious 
 time as a time of settled peace, when the arms of war should 
 be “ cut off” from “ Ephraim ” and from “ Jerusalem ” : — 
 
 ‘ Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion ! 
 
 Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem 1 
 Behold ! thy king cometh unto thee j 
 He is just and having salvation, 
 
 Meek, and riding upon an ass, 
 
 Even upon a colt, the foal of an ass. 
 
 And I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, 
 
 And the horse from Jerusalem ; 
 
 And the battle-bow shall be cut off ; 
 
 And he shall speak peace unto the heathen ; 
 
 And his dominion shall be from sea even to sea, 
 
 And from the river even to the ends of the earth.’ ix.9.10. 
 
 And so Micah says, speaking of the same brilliant time, 
 for which so many pious hearts in Israel were devoutly 
 longing : — 
 
 o o 
 
 ‘ It shall come to pass in that day, saith Jehovah, that I will cut off thy 
 horses out of the midst of thee, and l will destroy thy chariots.’ 
 
 E 
 
26 
 
 In the words which I have just quoted from Zechariah, 
 you recognise, no doubt, some which are also applied in the 
 Gospels to the history of Jesus, when once he entered 
 Jerusalem in triumph, seated upon an ass ; — 
 
 “ And the multitudes that went before and that followed cried, saying, ‘ Hosanna 
 to the son of David! Blessed is he that cometh in the Name of the Lord ! 
 TIosanna in the highest!’ ” 
 
 But, though it is true, no doubt, that many such passages 
 in the ancient prophets, which predict the glorious time of 
 the expected ‘ son of David,’ may be applied to the facts of 
 our Lord’s history, they cannot all be so applied. And it 
 is plain that the prophets themselves looked for a prince 
 of earthly mould, whose kingdom should “ come with 
 observation,” who should be clothed with royal pomp and 
 power, and set his throne, like that of his father David, 
 above all other thrones, and his people above the surround- 
 ing nations. Thus Micah speaks of the time of the king as 
 a time of “ peace,” indeed, but of peace maintained by the 
 strong arm of power ; he declares that the war-horse and 
 the chariot shall be cut off out of Israel ; but he says also — 
 
 ‘ The remnant of Jacob shall he among the Gentiles, in the midst of many 
 people, as a lion among the beasts of the forest , as a young lion among the flocks 
 of sheep; who, if he go through, both treadetli down, and tcareth in pieces, and 
 none can deliver.' v.8,9. 
 
 And so he says of the same great prince, — • 
 
 “ Thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of 
 Judah, yet out of thee shall he come tprth unto me, that is to be the ruler in 
 
 Israel And he shall he the peace, when the / Issyrian shall come into our 
 
 land : . . . and they shall waste the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land 
 of Nimrod in the entrances thereof . Thus shall he deliver ns from the Assyrians, 
 when he cometh into our land, and when he treadeth within our borders.” 
 
 And, indeed, the passage in Zechariah, which is supposed 
 by many to predict the humility of Christ’s character, 
 because it speaks of him as riding on an ass, was not so 
 intended by the original writer. He meant to describe 
 thereby the calm and quietness which would prevail under 
 the reign of this son of David, but at the same time to 
 express the solemn dignity , the mild majesty, of His govern- 
 ment. ‘ Speak, ye that ride on white asses,’ says Deborah to 
 the judges of Israel, Ju.v.10. The thirty sons of Jair “ rode 
 on thirty ass-colts and had thirty cities,” Ju.x.4 - ; and the 
 forty sons and thirty grandsons of another judge in Israel 
 “ rode on threescore and ten ass-colts,” Ju.xii.l t. Balaam, 
 we remember, rode upon an ass; Absalom and the rest 
 
27 
 
 of David’s sons rode upon mules, 2S.xiii.29,xvni.9, and 
 David himself had his own royal mules, especially known as 
 such, lK.i. 33,38, Ik And, in fact, until Solomou’s time, 
 when horses were imported from Egypt, and were then used 
 principally for war-purposes, they were but little employed 
 in Israel ; and, accordingly, we are told of overseers being 
 placed over David’s ‘ herds,’ and * camels,’ and * asses,’ and 
 ‘ sheep,’ ICh.xxvii. 29-31, but nothing is said about his 
 //uses. I will quote what is said on this point in the Dic- 
 tionary of the Bible, lll.p.xviii : — 
 
 It is almost needless to observe that the ass in eastern countries is a very 
 ditl'erent animal from what he is in western Europe. There the greatest care 
 is taken of the animal, and much attention is paid to cultivate the breed by 
 crossing the finest specimens. The riding on the ass, therefore, conveys a very 
 different notion from the one which attaches to such a mode of conveyance in 
 our own country. The most noble and honourable among the Jews were wont 
 to be mounted on asses ; and in this manner our Lord himself made his trium- 
 phant entry into Jerusalem, lie came, indeed, ‘ meek and lowly’; but it is a 
 mistake to suppose, as many do, that the fact of his riding on the ass, according 
 to our English ideas, had ought to do with his meekness; although thereby, 
 doubtless, be meant to show tire peaceable nature of his kingdom, as horses 
 were used only for war-purposes. 
 
 I repeat, then, the ancient prophets, in predicting the 
 coming of a king, “ the sou of David,” did not themselves 
 foresee that spiritual king, the true son of David, whose 
 word has subdued the stubborn heart, whose Divine Teach- 
 ing has been — 
 
 ‘ a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of God’s people Israel.’ 
 
 They looked only for a temporal deliverer, who should 
 ‘ break the yoke of his burden ’ for Israel, ‘ and the stall 1 of 
 his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor.’ They looked for a 
 peaceful and glorious king, as Solomon the sou of David 
 was pictured of old, whose throne should be established in 
 righteousness, and endure “ unto all generations,” — 
 
 “ of the increase of whose government and peace there should be no end, upon 
 the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it with judgment and 
 with justice from henceforth and for ever.’’ 
 
 This was the king to whom Isaiah’s words directly pointed, 
 when he said in the words of the text — 
 
 “ The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light ; they that 
 dwell in the land of the shadow of death, — upon them hath the light shined;” 
 
 and when he said in those other well-known words which 
 follow the text, and which we will consider this evening — 
 
 “ For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government 
 shall be upon his shoulder ; and his name shall be called Wondei ful, Counsellor, 
 the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of reace.” 
 
[No. 17. — Second Series.] 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 Preached in the Cathedral Church of St. Peter’s, Maritzbvkg, 
 On Sunday Evening, May 6, 1806, 
 
 BY THE 
 
 RIGHT REVEREND THE LORD BISHOP OF NATAL. 
 
 Isaiah ix.2. — The people that walked in darkness have seen a 
 great light ! They that dwell in the laud of the shadow of 
 death, — upon them hath the light shined ! 
 
 I spoke this morning of the circumstances to which these 
 words of the text more directly applied — to which they 
 were meant to apply by the prophet who uttered them. 
 The forces of the king of Assyria had ravaged the northern 
 portions of Palestine, — 
 
 “ the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, by the way of the sea [of 
 Gennesareth] , and beyond the Jordan,” — 
 
 the district which was called “ Galilee of the Gentiles,” 
 that is, ‘ the circle of the nations,’ from the number of Gen- 
 tiles who dwelt within its border, and from the close connec- 
 tion of its inhabitants, generally, with the heathen peoples 
 who lived beyond them. The condition of the country and 
 the blank despair of its occupants, under these dire visita- 
 tions, — some of which had already taken place, while others 
 were threatened, — are strikingly described in the words just 
 before the text : — 
 
 “ And they shall pass through it hardly bestead and hungry ; and it shall 
 conic to pass that, when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themselves, and 
 curse their King and their God — [that is, shall curse Jehovah, their Divine 
 King] — and they shall look upward, and they shall look unto the earth; and 
 lu hold trouble and gloom, dimness ol anguish! and they shall be driven into 
 darkness.” viii.21,22. 
 
20 
 
 Yet the prophet secs an end of all this misery, and exclaims 
 in the language of the text — 
 
 “ The people that were walking in darkness have seen a great light ! They 
 that were dwelling in the land of the shadow of death — upon them hath the 
 light shined ! ” 
 
 He beholds in prophetic vision the nation “ multiplied,” 
 and its joy “ increased,” like the joy of harvest or of those 
 who divide the spoil. He declares that Jehovah has broken 
 the heavy yoke which the people has had to bear, the stall' 
 that was laid upon their shoulder, the ‘ rod ’ wherewith the 
 Assyrian oppressed them, and that henceforth a calm and 
 settled peace should prevail, and all the fierce and bloody 
 panoply of war be burnt in the fire. 1 showed, by quota- 
 tions f rom other prophecies, as those of Micah and Zechariah, 
 that such language was commonly used to express the 
 peaceful character of that glorious time, for which so many 
 pious hearts were longing, when the king, the son of David, 
 should be born, and restore the golden age to Israel, — when, 
 as Isaiah says elsewhere, — 
 
 “ There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, 
 
 And a Branch shall grow out of his roots ; 
 
 And the spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon him, 
 
 The spirit of wisdom and understanding, 
 
 The spirit of counsel and might, 
 
 The spirit of knowledge and of the fear of Jehovah .... 
 
 And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, 
 
 And faithfulness the girdle of his reins. 
 
 The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, 
 
 And the leopard shall lie down with the kid, 
 
 And the calf and the young lion and the fading together ; 
 
 And a little child shall lead them. 
 
 And the cow and the bear shall feed ; 
 
 Their young ones shall lie down together ; 
 
 And the lion shall eat straw like the ox, 
 
 And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, 
 
 And the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’s den. 
 
 They shall not hurt nor destroy, 
 
 In all my holy mountain ; 
 
 For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, 
 
 As the waters cover the sea ” xi.1-9. 
 
 Many of these prophetical expressions are, no doubt, appli- 
 cable to the kingdom of God, which Christ came to set up 
 on earth, — that spiritual kingdom of “ love, joy, peace, 
 longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temper- 
 ance,” of which the most glorious and happy times under 
 human governments are faint forthshadowings. Bat they 
 cannot all be thus applied. I instanced this in the passages 
 which I quoted this morning from Micah, where the pro- 
 
30 
 
 mise of this peaceful king is coupled with the assurance of 
 great temporal glory aud might reserved for Israel — 
 
 “ And the remnant of Jacob shall be among the Gentiles in the midst of 
 many people as a lion among the beasts of the forest, and as a young lion among 
 the flocks of sheep, who, if he go through, both treadetli down and teareth in 
 pieces, and none can deliver.” 
 
 Upon such prophecies as these, interpreted in their own 
 peculiar way, the “ saints” in Cromwell’s time rested their 
 claim to ‘ tread down and tear in pieces,’ to ‘ execute 
 vengeance in anger and fury’ upon those whom they were 
 pleased to call the “ heathen.” I showed how the meaning 
 of Zechariah’s famous prophecy of the “ meek ” king of 
 Israel “ riding upon an ass,” was misunderstood by many, as 
 if the riding on such an animal implied in Eastern countries, 
 what it might in ours, humility and degradation, instead of 
 merely the mildness of his government, the peaceful quiet 
 of his reign. But in all these cases, I said, the prophets 
 themselves had no idea, apparently, of that spiritual king- 
 dom, to which their utterances were in later days applied. 
 They were thinking only of a great temporal deliverance, 
 temporal glory, temporal blessings, for Israel- — a reign of 
 confirmed peace and surpassing glory, under a powerful and 
 vigorous, yet meek and gentle, just and virtuous, prince of 
 David’s line : — 
 
 ‘ He shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, 
 
 Neither reprove after the hearing of his ears ; 
 
 But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, 
 
 And reprove with equity for the meek of the earth ; 
 
 And he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, 
 
 And with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.’ 
 
 And so, that same day, in which this ‘ rod shall come forth 
 out of the stem of Jesse’ and this ‘ branch grow out of his 
 roots,’ is described immediately as a day of triumphant 
 return to their own land for the scattered remnant of Israel 
 and Judah : — 
 
 ‘ And it shall come to pass in that day, 
 
 That Jehovah shall set His hand again the second time, 
 
 To recover the remnant of his people which shall be left, 
 
 From Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, 
 
 And from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, 
 
 And from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea. . . . 
 
 And they shall fly upon the shoulders of the Philistines toward the west ; 
 They shall spoil the children of the East together; 
 
 They shall lay their hand upon Edom and Moab, 
 
 And the children of Ammon shall obey them. 
 
 And the Lord shall utterly destroy the tongue of the Egyptian sea; 
 
31 
 
 A ml with His mighty wiml shall lie shake ills hand over the river, 
 
 And shall smite it in the seven streams, 
 
 And make men go over dryshod. 
 
 And there shall be an highway from Assyria, 
 
 For the remnant of llis people which shall be left ; 
 
 Like as it was to Israel in the day 
 
 That he came up out of the land of Egypt.” 
 
 Thus the prophet is plainly speaking of ancient Egypt 
 anil Assyria, and uot of the state of things in the time of 
 Christ ; for the Assyrian empire was overthrown six cen- 
 turies before the birth of Christ, and Herodotus, writing 
 two hundred years afterwards, speaks of the Tigris as “ the 
 river upon which the town of Nineveh former/// stood.” 
 Although, therefore, there are expressions in these pro- 
 phecies, which, picked out and detached from the context, 
 may be and are applied to the times of Christ, yet, it is 
 plain, they were not originally written with this object; 
 they refer directly to the state of things in Israel and Judah 
 in the prophet’s own lifetime: and the king, the son of 
 David, of whom they speak, was in Isaiah’s view expected 
 to be raised up of that royal line, in order to free the laud 
 from the oppression of the Assyrian king. 
 
 And this is also true of that prophecy of which the text 
 forms a part, and one verse of which I reserved lor further 
 consideration this evening. It is that passage so well 
 known to us by the glorious music, with which it is linked 
 in the greatest work of one of our greatest composers, the 
 Messiah of Handel : — 
 
 “ For unto us a child is bom, 
 
 Unto us a son is given ; 
 
 And the government shall be upon his shoulder; 
 
 And his name shall be called Wonderful, 
 
 Counsellor, the Mighty God, 
 
 The Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.” 
 
 So accustomed are we to hear these words applied to the 
 birth of Christ that it has scarcely occurred to us, perhaps, 
 to ask if they ever were meant to have — if they ever could 
 have had — another reference. And yet the context, which 
 speaks of “ the rod of Israel’s oppressor being broker, as in 
 the day of Midian,” will remind us that here also we have 
 to do with those present realities, which belonged to the 
 actual condition of Israel at the time when the prophet was 
 writing. Accordingly, if we turn to the Greek (Septuagint) 
 translation of this passage, — made nearly three centuries 
 before the birth of Christ, and therefore not to be suspected 
 
32 
 
 of any anti-Christian tendency , — we find the original 
 Hebrew rendered as follows : — 
 
 “ For unto us a child was bom, unto us a son was given, and the govern- 
 ment was placed upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called messenger 
 (angel) of great counsel ; for I will bring peace unto the rulers and health 
 to him.” 
 
 This, however, is what is found in one copy of the Greek 
 manuscript. In another the last words are — 
 
 “ and his name shall be called Angel of great counsel, Admirable, Counsellor, 
 Mighty, Strong-One, Prince of Peace, Father of the age to come : for I will 
 bring peace and health ” 
 
 The Latin Version has also f Father of the future age,’ 
 instead of ‘ the Everlasting Father,’ as our English Bibles 
 translate it. And, indeed, it is obvious, on a moment’s 
 consideration, that this latter expression could hardly be 
 applied with propriety to Christ : while ‘ Father of the age to 
 come’ might well be used of a pious prince, who should 
 restore the land to its ancient prosperity, and rule it in 
 righteousness, — as well as of him whose teaching has made 
 all things bright for us, who has “ brought life and im- 
 mortality to light by the Gospel.” It is probable, however, 
 that the Hebrew expression should rather be translated 
 ‘ the perpetual Father,’ who should stand, like the everlasting 
 hills, the firm and constant protector and guardian of his 
 people. 
 
 In both the Greek translations, however, you will see the 
 phrase f the Mighty God’ has disappeared altogether. In the 
 first of them, it is plain that the Hebrew itself was read differ- 
 ently by the ancient Jews, who made the translation ; in 
 the second, it is represented by the epithets ‘ Mighty ’ and 
 ‘ Strong-One.’ And, in fact, the very same Hebrew expres- 
 sion is used in Ez.xxxii.21 ; and there our English Version 
 translates it ‘ the strong among the mighty ’; and so in 
 Ez xxxi.ll Nebuchadnezzar is called ‘ the mighty-one of the 
 heathen,’ but, literally, it stands in the Hebrew f the God 
 of heathen.’ So here, in Isaiah, there can be little doubt 
 that the Greek translators have given the true meaning of 
 the prophets, according to whom this glorious son of David 
 should be called, “ The Admirable, the Counsellor, the 
 Mighty Strong-One, the perpetual Father, the Prince of 
 Peace,” — a series of titles, by which he sets forth the wisdom, 
 and glory, and goodness, and peacefulness of his reign, very 
 much after the ordinary Oriental fashion in such cases. 
 
3:5 
 
 Thus an ancient Greek writer gives a letter from a Persian 
 king to the king of Armenia, which begins as follows : — 
 
 Chosroes, king of kings, lord of lords, master of nations, prince of peace, 
 saviour of men, among gods a man good and living for ever, among men a god 
 most illustrious, most glorious, conqueror, rising together with the sun and in 
 the night bestowing eyes — [giving light, as it were, by day and by night]. 
 
 And, accordingly, in Luther’s translation of the Bible, the 
 words are rendered thus : — 
 
 “ For unto us a child is bom, a son to us is given, whose lordship is on his 
 shoulder; and he .is called wonderful, counsel, might, hero, everlasting (or 
 perpetual) father, prince of peace.” 
 
 It should be noted also that this verse of Isaiah’s pro- 
 phecies is nowhere quoted in the New Testament with 
 reference to Christ, which would be very remarkable if the 
 English Version contained the right translation of it, since 
 nowhere in the Old Testament would the Divinity of Christ 
 be then more distinctly asserted than here. It is probable 
 that the N.T. writers, who (we know) made use habitually 
 of the Septuagint Version in their quotations, (though 
 sometimes with modifications, which show that they did not 
 consider themselves bound to the strict letter of the Scrip- 
 tures,) acquiesced in the Greek rendering of this passage, 
 and therefore laid no particular stress upon it. This seems 
 the more likely, inasmuch as a portion of the context is 
 actually quoted, we see, in the words of the text, as expressly 
 applicable to the time of Christ; and to this we will now 
 direct our attention more parti cularly. 
 
 “ The people which sat in darkness 
 Have seen a great light; 
 
 And they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death — 
 
 Upon them hath the light shined.” 
 
 There are three points worthy of notice in this prophetical 
 utterance. 
 
 (i) First, the prophet recognises a time of “ darkness ’ 
 in the history of his people, when men were “ sitting in the 
 region and shadow of death.” He recognises here a fact of 
 human experience. There are such times in the history 
 both of nations and of individuals. They may arise, as they 
 did in the case of the prophet’s own people, in connection 
 with sin, and as the direct consequence of it. We know in 
 what eloquent words he upbraids them in one place : — 
 
 “ Hear, O heavens ! and give ear, O earth ! 
 
 For Jehovah hath spoken; 
 
 I have nourished and brought up children, 
 
 And they — they have rebelled against me. 
 
 F 
 
34 
 
 The ox knoweth his owner, 
 
 And the ass his master’s crib ; 
 
 But Israel doth not know, 
 
 My people doth not consider. 
 
 Ah sinful nation ! people laden with iniquity ! 
 
 Seed of evildoers ! children that are corrupters ! 
 
 They have forsaken Jehovah, 
 
 They have provoked the Holy One of Israel to anger, 
 
 They have gone away backward. 
 
 Why should ye be stricken any more ? 
 
 Ye will revolt more and more; 
 
 The whole head is sick, 
 
 And the whole heart faint . . . 
 
 Your country is desolate, 
 
 Your cities burned with fire ; 
 
 Your land — strangers devour it in your presence, 
 
 And it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers.” 
 
 Thus lie regards their miseries as the direct chastisement of 
 their sins. A dark day, in fact, had settled down upon the 
 land of Israel. The Assyrians had already ravaged the 
 northern portion of it; and, though at present their king 
 was in league with Ahaz king of Judah, — who, in direct 
 opposition to Isaiah’s urgent remonstrance, had summoned 
 him to his help against the forces of Syria and Israel, 
 — the prophet foresaw that his powerful arms would in due 
 time be turned against Judah and Jerusalem also. 
 
 And so it very soon came to pass. Hezekiah, the son of 
 Ahaz, on coming to the throne, ‘ rebelled,’ we are told, ‘against 
 the king of Assyria, and served him not,’ — that is, he broke 
 the compact which his father had made to pay a certain annual 
 tribute. Thereupon, in Hezekiah’s fourth year, the king of 
 Assyria came up in fury first against Samaria and besieged 
 it ; and at the end of three years he took it, and carried 
 away the population of the Ten Tribes — the kingdom of 
 Israel — as captives into a far-off land. Then, in the four- 
 teenth year of Ilezekiah, the Assyrian host came up against 
 the fenced cities of Judah and took them. And Hezekiah 
 humbled himself, sending to the king of Assyria and saying — 
 
 * I have offended : return from me : that which thou puttest on me will 
 I bear.’ 
 
 Yet still the tide of war rolled on, and reached at length 
 the very gates of Jerusalem. And then indeed was a time 
 of great anxiety. 
 
 ‘ If one looked unto the land, behold darkness and sorrow 1 
 And the light is darkened in the heavens thereof’ ; 
 
 and the people sat down in mute despair, ‘ in the land of 
 the shadow of death.’ 
 
35 
 
 We observe, therefore, that such darkness, when the 
 light of God’s Face seems for a while to be obscured, is not 
 always a consequence of siu. For Hezekiah was a prince of 
 deej) and sincere piety. We are told of him, on his accession 
 to the throne, that — 
 
 ‘ He trusted in Jehovah, the God of Israel: so that after him was none like 
 him among all the kings of Judah, nor any that were before him. For he 
 clave to Jehovah, and departed not from following Him, hut kept His 
 commandments, which Jehovah commanded Moses. And Jehovah was with 
 him, and prospered him whithersoever he went forth.’ 
 
 Yet, after all this promising beginning, we find Hezekiah 
 plunged in deep distress, and sitting in darkness deeper 
 than any which had come down upon his idolatrous father, 
 Ahaz. In one word, righteous persons and peojdes, as well 
 as wicked ones, may be bowed down at times under sore 
 afflictions, — may be called for a while to “ sit in darkness 
 and in the shadow’ of death.” 
 
 (ii) But, secondly, the prophet recognises, with the clear 
 insight of a living faith, that in such darkness men sit not 
 alone. There is One near them, who may make II id Pre- 
 sence felt at any moment, and surely at the right time will 
 appear as the helper of all that put their trust in Ilim. 
 Thus Isaiah was able to comfort the drooping Hezekiah 
 with the assurance, that light would break forth out of the 
 darkness, that Jehovah would ‘ defend his city to save it for 
 His own sake, and for His servant David’s sake.’ Nay, 
 even under the idolatrous Ahaz, he could entertain a con- 
 fidence that, when chastisement had done its perfect work 
 upon the rebellious hearts of God’s children, the favour of 
 Jehovah and the light of His Countenance w’ould be restored 
 to them. With a prophetic glance into the future, he could 
 actually see already this restoration brought to pass: he 
 could even then exclaim — • 
 
 “ The people that walked in darkness 
 Have seen a great light ; 
 
 They that were dwelling in the land of the shadow of death, — 
 
 Upon them hath the light shined.” 
 
 And then he predicts, in the language which we have 
 already considered, the glorious reign of a just and pious 
 prince, under whom this deliverance should be wrought for 
 them. 
 
 It is not at all improbable that he had Hezekiah himself 
 in view, who was about twelve yeatsold w’hen this prophecy 
 was written, and, like our own Edward ^ I, perhaps gave 
 
36 
 
 abeady plain signs of the tractable and pious spirit which 
 he afterwards displayed. And he was doubtless from the 
 first under the direct influence of the prophet Isaiah, (who 
 is believed also to have been a family connection,) as our 
 own English prince was under that of Cranmer. Or it may 
 be that the prophet looked still further down the stream of 
 time, and saw in some distant age arise ‘ the rod out of the 
 stem of Jesse,’ — 
 
 ‘ of the increase of whose government and peace there should be no end upon 
 the throne of David.’ 
 
 In any case the hopes of Isaiah were not fulfilled in the 
 temporal sense which his words imply, and in which, no 
 doubt, he expected their fulfilment. Never was that grand 
 vision of his generous spirit realised in its literal meaning: — 
 
 ‘ In that day shall there he a highway out of Egypt to Assyria, and the 
 Assyrian shall come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the 
 Egyptians shall serve [Jehovah] witli the Assyrian. In that day shall Israel 
 be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the 
 land : whom Jehovah of Hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt my people, 
 and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel mine inheritance.’ xix.23-25. 
 
 But Assyn’ia and Egypt were never united with Israel in 
 one common worship of Jehovah, the Living God. It is 
 possible, of course, to have recourse to the usual process of 
 ‘ spiritualising ’ these words, and saying that by “ Egypt ” 
 and “ Assyria” must be meant not the countries so-called, — 
 to which, however, they would of course be applied by the 
 very persons to whom Isaiah addressed himself,— but the 
 heathen generally, so that the prediction means no more 
 than that the future Church of Christ should contain 
 believers from different peoples, from every nation under 
 heaven. But why must this particular portion of the pro- 
 phecy be ‘ spiritualised/ whereas others, when it suits our 
 convenience, must be taken literally, and regarded as infallible 
 prognostications of coming events? This is, in fact, to 
 treat the Bible with dishonour, by choosing at our own 
 pleasure what we will regard as actual dona fide predictions 
 of special circumstances, and what we will explain generally, 
 stripping it thus of all its point and force and meaning *br 
 those to whom it was uttered. That orthodox commentator, 
 the liev. Thos. Scott, observes on this passage — 
 
 I apprehend that the grand accomplishment of these verses, and of the latter 
 part of this extraordinary prophecy, is still to be expected : — 
 
 that is, he admits that it has not yet been fulfilled; though 
 how ‘ Assyria ’ can now be joined with ‘ Egypt ’ and 
 
37 
 
 ‘ Israel,’ in a common act of worship, must seem to most 
 persons inconceivable. 
 
 (iii) I observe, then, thirdly, that the true prophetic 
 insight was here exercised, not in prognosticating; the details 
 of future events, but in laying down the great principles of 
 God’s dealings with men, — in affirming the eternal truths, — 
 in uttering the Word ot God, by which the hearts of men 
 in all ages are fed as with living bread. The people did not 
 repent and return to God, as Isaiah expected : the glorious 
 prince whom he predicted did not arise to — 
 
 1 set up an ensign for the nations, and assemble the outcasts of Israel, and 
 gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four comers of the earth.’ 
 
 The people of Israel did not , as he predicted, ‘ lay their 
 hand upon Edom and Moab,’ nor did ‘ the children of 
 Ammon obey them ’ ; nor were Assyria and Egypt ever 
 joined with Israel in the bonds of a holy alliance. In 
 respect of such details, and a multitude of others like them, 
 we must admit that Isaiah and other prophets have been 
 mistaken : while yet the Divine Truths which they taught, 
 the Divine Principles which they announced, — the real 
 signs of their prophetic power, — were the Living Word of 
 God, eternally and unchangeably true. It is true that — 
 
 ‘ Light is sown for the righteous, and joyful gladness for such as are true of 
 heart ’ ; — 
 
 and for such as these the prophet might utter his oracle 
 with the most perfect and unwavering confidence : — 
 
 “ Who is among you that feareth Jehovah, 
 
 That obeyeth the voice of His servant, 
 
 That walketh in darkness and hath no light ? 
 
 Let him trust in the name of Jehovah, 
 
 And stay upon his God.” 
 
 Nay, he might exclaim of them, as one who saw the end of 
 God’s work from the beginning — 
 
 “ The people that walked in darkness 
 Have seen a great light; 
 
 They that dwell in the land of the shadow of death — 
 
 Upon them hath the light shined.” 
 
 But then the Light, which “ cometh down from the Father 
 of Lights” — the Light, which is the Life of men, — the 
 Light that in all ages comforts the sad heart and gladdens 
 the weary eye, — is not the light of this world’s splendour, 
 such as the prophet in the words which follow the text, and 
 in many other parts of his prophecies, expects to be bestowed 
 on his people and their king. It is the Light of Truth, the 
 
38 
 
 Light of Righteousness, the Light of Love. This is that ‘ sure 
 word of prophecy/ of which we were speaking last Sunday — 
 
 “ whereunto we shall do well to take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark 
 place, until the day dawn and the daystar arise in our hearts.” 
 
 And the prophets of old felt this, though they did not fully 
 realise it, as we do now, taught by the lips of Jesus Christ 
 himself. And so Isaiah in these prophecies, while continu- 
 ally insisting upon the return of Israel to their own land 
 and the restoration of their temporal glory, still lays the 
 basis of all their future happiness in the practice of justice 
 and righteousness, by the people at large, and especially by 
 their king. All his hopes lor them were based on this, that — 
 ‘ Zion should be redeemed with judgment, and they that return of her with 
 righteousness ’ — 
 
 that — 
 
 ‘ her judges should be restored as at the first, and her counsellors as at the 
 beginning, and afterward she should be called The city of righteousness, the 
 faithful city ’ — 
 
 that her prince should sit upon the throne of David — 
 
 ‘ to order it and to establish it, with judgment and with justice from henceforth 
 and for ever.’ 
 
 And in the view of this he could address the city of Zion — 
 
 ‘ In that day thou slialt say, O Lord, I will praise Thee ; though Thou wast 
 angry with me, Thine anger is turned away, and Thou comlortest me. Heboid ! 
 God is my salvation: I will trust and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah 
 is my strength and my song ; He also is become my salvation. Hieretore 
 with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.’ 
 
 Alas ! the happy time never came for the people at large, 
 for which the prophet longed so devoutly. Lower and lower 
 dropped the gloom upon the land ; deeper and deeper 
 became the darkness, — relieved at times by a temporary 
 lifting of the clouds, as in the days of Hezekiab and Josiah, 
 but becoming fearfully black in the reign of Manasseli, 
 Ilezekiah’s son, who — 
 
 ‘ seduced them to do more evil than did the nations whom Jehovah destroyed 
 before the children of Israel ’ — 
 
 and in those of Jehoiakim, Josiah’s son, and Zedekiah, 
 Josiah’s brother, each of whom — 
 
 ‘ did that which was evil in the sight of Jehovah, according to all that his 
 fathers had done ’ — 
 
 and under the last of whom the cup of Israel’s iniquities 
 were full, and they were ‘driven away ’ into the thick dark- 
 ness — a darkness ‘ which might be felt’ — into the terrible 
 gloom of the Babylonish captivity. 
 
3‘J 
 
 So far, then, as Isaiah coupled with the promise of ‘ light’ 
 the promise also of national prosperity, Ins words, it must 
 be confessed, were not realised. But the light was there, 
 notwithstanding, for all true hearts. Hezekiah was cheered 
 and enabled to put his trust in the Living God, in the 
 midst of all his griefs and perplexities. Josiah received a 
 message of peace, while the woe was gathering upon the 
 head of his people, — 
 
 1 because his heart was tender, and he had humbled himself before the Lord.’ 
 
 And each pious soul, we may be sure, — our own hearts “ pro- 
 phesy ” this, and all experience confirms it, — was Divinely 
 soothed and comforted in that most gloomy time of trial — 
 was taught to smile amidst its tears, and say — 
 
 ‘ It is of Jehovah’s mercies that we are not consumed, 
 
 Because His compassions fail not. 
 
 They are new every morning : 
 
 Great is Thy faithfulness. 
 
 Jehovah is my portion, saith my soul ; 
 
 Therefore will I hope in Him. 
 
 Jehovah is good unto them that wait for Him, — 
 
 To the soul that seeketh Him. 
 
 It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait 
 For the salvation of Jehovah.’ 
 
 Let us be sure it is so still. In every age, for nations and 
 for individuals, the words of the prophet are fulfilled, that — 
 
 1 They that were walking in darkness 
 Have seen great light; 
 
 They that were dwelling in the land of the shadow of death — 
 Upon them hath the light shined.’ 
 
 The time would fail me now to speak more at length of the 
 numerous instances in the history of the world, in which 
 such a prediction has been eminently fulfilled, as at the 
 time of the return of the Jews from Babylon, at the time of 
 the first preaching of Christianity, at the time of the Great 
 Reformation, — when light has been given from the Father 
 of Lights to dispel the clouds of darkness, which had long 
 beeu gathering and brooding over the hearts of men. But 
 in our own time, too, such light has been abundantly given. 
 For — though it cannot be said that this age, in which we 
 live, is actually dark, as it was before the Reformation, 
 when witches were put to death, and heretics burnt at the 
 stake, as if the Christian’s God, like that of the Jews in 
 Manasseh’s time, was a very Moloch, who required to he 
 worshipped with human sacrifices, — yet surely there is “ dim- 
 ness ” enough within the Church, and “ darkness ” among 
 
40 
 
 the heathen tribes without it; and the pure bright Light of 
 the Everlasting Gospel, the tidings of our Father’s Love, 
 has been darkened in many places with the arbitrary dog- 
 mas, and discoloured with the vain traditions, of men. 
 Yet God, in His Infinite Goodness, has poured forth light 
 abundant^ around us in this our day, — bright and strong 
 enough, we trust, to pierce the thickest gloom of traditionary 
 teaching, and reveal once more the Blessed Face of our 
 loving Father, which has been so long obscured. 
 
 But, while we rejoice in this Light, which is freely given 
 us, let us be careful also to walk in the Light, as children 
 of God, — to “ walk in the Light as He is in the Light,” 
 that we may “ have fellowship with Him” — 
 
 coming to the Light continually, and bringing our doings to the Light, that 
 they may he made manifest that they are wrought in God.” 
 
 It has been said that the Modern Theology will make men 
 careless and godless, — that it may even bring back upon us 
 the times of unbridled license and lust, and all the horrors 
 of the French Revolution. No ! the Modern Theology is 
 in very truth a return to the clear and solemn teaching of 
 Jesus himself. It brings the soul face to face with the 
 Living God, as a Father and Friend : it quickens the con- 
 science in the sense of that Gracious, yet Awful, Presence, 
 which we feel at every instant so near to us. It tells us 
 that our loving Father will not suffer us to sin without 
 chastisement, — that, if we will persist in what we know to 
 be evil. He may withdraw frorrr us altogether for a time the 
 joy of His salvation, ^the .Light of Ilis Countenance. It 
 bids us repent and return at once from the path that leadeth 
 unto death, lest we lose ourselves in guilt and misery : it 
 says to us — 
 
 “ Give glory to the Lord your God, before He cause darkness and before 
 your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye look for light, He 
 turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness.” 
 
 But it speaks also a word of hope and life to the return- 
 ing penitent. It assures us of a Father’s Love, that will 
 meet the poor prodigal on the way, as he comes along 
 drooping and hesitating, stricken through with grief and 
 shame, to his long-forsaken home, — that will embrace him 
 with the tokens of forgiveness, — will ‘ heal him, and lead 
 him, and restore comforts to him and to his mourners.’