iTIIEOLOGlCiVLSEfflNmi prince xn, ..<^««^^^*' ;:^^s-> LIBRARY OF THE Theological Seminary, BV 4501 .K457 Kennedy, John, 1813-1900. ( Work and conflict; or. The divine life in its progresq lioohy WORK AND CONFLICT, THE DIVINE LIFE IN ITS PROGRESS. A BOOK OF FACTS AND HISTORIES. XY THE Key. JOHN KENNEDY, M. A., F.R.G.S. REVISED BY THE EDITOR OF THE BOARD. " This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." The Apostle Paul. PHILADELPHIA: PRESBYTEKIAN BOAED OF PUBLICATION, No. 821 Chestnut Street. PREFACE " The grace of God in tte heart of man is a tender plant in a strange, unkindly soil, and, therefore, can- not well prosper and grow without much care and pains, and that of a skilful hand." These are the opening words of Archbishop Leighton^s " Commen- tary on the First Epistle of Peter ;'^ and the principle which they contain lies at the foundation of much that we have to say of the Christian's '' Work and Conflict." In a former volume we treated of " The Divine Life," with reference, especially, to its nature, and to the manner and means of its origination in the human soul. But the divine life once originated, what of its progress and permanence ? Are these to be left to a sort of spiritual chance, untended and un- cared for ? Are they secured by the spontaneous energy of the inward life itself ? Or are they to be the objects of deliberate painstaking and culture? With Archbishop Leighton our belief is, that inward religion " cannot well prosper and grow without much care and pains." His great Master and ours and the 3 4 PREFACE. chiefest servants of the Master have all taught the same lesson : " Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure :" " Giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue." The new birth may be a sudden work; the quickening of the soul into spiritual life may be instantaneous ; but its onward course, from the weakness of infancy to the strength of manhood, is effected by slow degrees, through many an effort and many a struggle. And God is not pleased to supersede the necessity of effort and struggle, by enabling us to leap at a bound out of our swaddling clothes, and gird ourselves with the attributes of per- fect men in Christ Jesus. The usual method of divine grace is, by a gradual process, to discipline and educate the heart out of its weaknesses and errors. But there must be the " skilful hand'* as well as " care and pains" in the culture of the divine life. True religion in the heart of man may be " a tender plant in a strange unkindly soil," but it must not be treated like an exotic, and sheltered in a hot-house to protect it from unkindly blasts. Let it acquire a hardier character, and learn to encounter the most hostile influences. Confined to the closet or the cloister, it can never be other than sickly : it will find health and vigour in an out-of-door existence, amidst the com- mon pursuits and duties of human life. The holy Samuel Rutherford has given us the counterpart of Leighton's saying: — "Grace is a strange plant, it grows PREFACE. 5 best on the weather-side of the hill/^ This is a first principle in the "skilfur^ cultivation of this tender plant, and it is one of many which it is our endeavour in the following pages to elicit from the teachings of Holy Scripture, and to illustrate and enforce by the example of holy men. In religion all things are possible through the divine help. And with that help so freely promised, so faith- fully rendered, the Christian should be like the tree which is " planted by the rivers of water," " not stinted and dwarfish ; not smitten with rust and eaten with the worm, but sound alike in the body, the blossom, and the fruit; not crooked, knotted, and unsymmetri- cal, but free, expansive, and proportional." Wherever he goes, the world should be able to recognize his char- acter without the requisite of a formal proclamation. The image of Christ should be so impressed upon his whole life, as to render him an " epistle, known and read of all men." It has been said, that two-thirds of the really good earnest people we meet, travel along the high road of duty, like horses badly broken in; they advance, but they are always making little efforts to wander to the right hand or to the left, and so re- quiring the whip and bridle. But the commands and promises of the gospel would lead us to anticipate far other results. There is ample provision made in the motives with which the cross of Christ inspires true believers, and in the grace which the mediation of Christ brings within their reach, to enable them to 1* 6 PREFACE. become '^ partakers of the divine nature," and to '' walk in the Spirit/' Redeemed as they are by the blood of the Lord Jesus is it too much to expect of them that they will aim after that high and spiritual condition in which, to use the words of John Howe, " the soul shall have no other notion of itself than o'f an everlasting sacrifice, always ascending to God in its own flames V CONTENTS. INTRODUCTION. PAGK Christ the perfect man, the Christian's Exemplar— Human nature j pure, fallen, restored — One perfect man — The ideal of the Christian life — DiflSculties : how lessened ; subject to temptation ; to suffering — His life natural, though supernatural 11 |arl Smt—moxh^ CHAP. L— THE SOUL'S WORK. Requisites to its successful prosecution — Its proper end — Simi- litude by Dr. Payson — By Samuel Pearce — The grand principle of Christ's life— Of the Christian's— Exaggera- tion of it by Madame Guyon — The apostle John — Paul — Brainerd — Light — Love — Examples of harmonious good- ness — Moses — Paul — John Howe — Henry Martyn — Brainerd and Fletcher of Madeley contrasted — The patri- archs constitutionally different — The glory of Christ — Practical dangers— The neglect of little things— Perfection made up of trifles — How Christian love is to be cultivated — By the knowledge and contemplation of the Divine character — The necessity of reconciliation — Permanent application of first principles — Edward Bickersteth and Dr. Chalmers — Specific means of spiritual improvement — Written covenants — Resolutions — Self-examination — Private journals — Means of Christ's progress — Prayer — Holy Scripture — Havelock — Gardiner — Henry Martyn — Sarah Martin — Chalmers — George Wagner — Sabbath ordi- nances — John Wesley and the Mystics — Christ and ex- ternal ordinances ■ 23 7 8 CONTENTS. CHAP. IL— THE WORLD'S WORK. PAOK Is it compatible with the divine life ? — Natural similitudes — Testimony of Scripture — Monasticism — Christ's infancy — True idea of Christ's private human life — Did he work with his own hands ? — Significance of the occasion of his first miracle — Alleged asceticism of John the Baptist — Apostolic forewarnings — Conclusions — Enoch — the patri- archs and their discipline — Daniel — Wilberforce — The profession of arms — Hedley Vicars — General Havelock — Common soldiery — Toil and care a spiritual discipline — Extracts from Caird and Whewell 97 CHAP. III.-SOCIAL WORK. No man liveth to himself — What shall I do ? — Christian women — Ancient Rome — A day in the life of Christ — Hannah More — Sir Edward Parry— Havelock — Sarah Martin — Vanderkemp — Intercessory prayer — George Wagner — Little acts — Tertius — Baruch — The one talent — A single hymn — Curse ye Meroz — Montgomery's " Way- faring Man" 141 lart ^ttonb — dl^onflid. CHAP. L— CONFLICT WITH SIN. The language of war — Heathen speculations — The devil — Two extremes — The temptation of Christ — Can we distinguish the assaults of Satan ? — Luther, Bunyan, Job, Peter — No compromise — Conflict with inward sin — Asceticism no cure — Madame Guyon — Death to sin — Colonel Gardiner — Dr. Payson, Pearce, Charles Simeon, Chalmers, Sarah Martin, Bunyan — wretched man ! — Means of deliverance — The spider and the toad — Cultivation of the positive virtues — Self-denial— Andrew Fuller — The untenanted heart — Besetting sins — Charles Simeon — Obsta principiis — A parable — Little sins — Fasting and prayer — Payson — Simeon — Union of humiliation and cheerfulness — The Christian life a battle and a hymn 181 CONTENTS. 9 CHAP. II. — CONFLICT WITH DESPONDENCY AND DOUBT. PAOB Ebb and flow of feeling — Brainerd — Payson — Simeon — How account for such changes — Emotion not a test of spiritual condition — Melancholy temperament— Payson — The rela- tions of mind and body — Cowper — Extract from Douglas of Cavers — Simeon — Distinct causes of despondency — Consciousness of sin — Ignorance, misapprehension, or for- getfulness of truth — Hezekiah — Christian and Hopeful in the castle of Giant Despair — The neglect of duty — Andrew Fuller and his church — Personal afflictions — Job — Disor- ders and irregularities of the world — Positive evidences of the Divine character — Shall we add the sovereign hiding of God's countenance ? — Statements by Dr. Wardlaw — Doubt — Robert Hall — James H. Evans — Robert Alfred Vaughan, Bunyan, Payson, Halyburton — True explanation — Rest- ing-places provided by the Bible — A young Brahman — Ex- tract from Caird — James A. Thomson 231 CHAP. III.— CONFLICT WITH SUFFERING AND DEATH. Jesus Christ a man of sorrows — Their variety and intenseness —Stoicism — Socrates — Lessons from Christ — Christ's reli- gion a religion of joy — The proto-martyr Stephen — Paul as a suflFerer — Common principles — The early church — Pliny the Younger — Patrick Hamilton, Madame Guyon — Martyrs in Madagascar — In India — The ordinary afflictions of life — Bereavements — Aaron, Eli, Job — Captain Allen Gardiner, Richard Williams — No man dieth to himself — The principle of Scripture Biography — Details of the death of Stephen and of Christ — Conflicts of Thomas Ward — Triumph of Dr. Payson — The one Foundation — Conclusion 319 INTRODUCTION. CHRIST THE PERFECT MAN — THE CHRISTIAN'S EXEMPLAR. When we stand on the margin of an unruffled lake, the beauties which surround us are reflected from its placid bosom, as from a polished mirror. The green sward, the fairy flower, the majestic tree, the rock and the mountain, the sun and the golden beams which illumine heaven, are all thrown back on us smilingly. And as we gaze into the waters we see in their depths a world brighter and more beautiful than the real world around us — " As if there lay beneath the wave, Secure from trouble, toil, and care, A world than earthly world more fair." Such was human nature, when, as formed by the divine hand and inspired by the divine breath, it re- flected, purely and unbrokenly, all the excellences and beauties of the divine image. But while looking on the smooth surface of the lake, a storm arises, the waters are troubled, and wave lashes wave in its fury. Where is now the liquid landscape, the reflection of all the glory and beauty and majesty of the scene around ? Y\e gaze, but it is not. Not one fragment of it remains. The agitated bosom of the waters knows nothing of (11) 12 INTRODUCTION. what it had but an hour before exhibited so truly and brightly. Such is human nature when subjected to the disturbing and deranging forces of sin. It is no longer a reflection of the beauty and glory of the divine image. We still stand on the margin of the lake. An unseen power allays the storm. The winds cease, but there is not a perfect calm. The waves subside, but the waters are partially ruffled. And as we gaze we observe the landscape again forming itself on the surface. But not as before. It is now thrown back upon us in fragments. Trees and rocks are incongruously mixed. One object is brightly reflected by the surface of the ripple which is now passing before us, and another by the surface of the next. But they do not appear in their natural relation, and more than half their beauty is thereby lost. We see every thing in parts and pieces, nothing in all its beauty ; and many things so confusedly, that we can scarcely recognize them. Such is human nature under the operation of the gospel. The disturbing force of sin has been subdued; and the image of God is again reflected from living man. But, alas ! it is commonly in most fragmentary forms. Disjointed and broken pieces, rather than a uniform and consistent whole, attest the restoration of the image of God to the soul of man. Once, however, in the world's history, but only once, there appeared a perfect Man. And it is instructive to know that he lived not in the peaceful solitude of deserts, but in daily conflict, for three-and-thirty years, with the wants, and sins, and sorrows of an evil world. He was " brought into relation with every class and character, high and low, rich and poor, learned and ignorant, soldier and priest, lawyer and rabbi, prince ONE PERFECT MAN. 13 and peasant, Pharisee and Sadducee, the devotee of the temple, the student of the schools, and the money- changer of the market- place." And, contemplated in all these relations, " the universal consent is that there is One who is absolutely superior to circumstances — One on whose serene and lofty spirit the changes that aflFect sublunary interests can produce no permanent or injurious impressions — One for whom his friends never had to make an apology, for whom the impartial critic needs not to demand any forbearance, in whom the keenest sighted of his enemies can find no fault — One whom no transient weakness from within, no cunning temptation from without, could divert for a single moment from his onward career of virtue, beneficence, and purity — One, in short, who, tried by the loftiest standards of spiritual excellence, must be pronounced, in the language of a disciple who had seen as much of him as any man whilst he was on earth, ^without blemish and without spot/"* Not only was it the impression of others that Jesus of Nazareth was sinless, but it was his own conscious- ness as well. He cannot be suspected of self-ignorance, for his knowledge was boundless; or of pride, for lowli- ness was one of the most marked traits in his character; yet he never confessed sin. *' He never once reproached himself, or regretted any thing he had ever done or said. He never uttered a word to indicate that he had ever taken a wrong step, or neglected a single oppor- tunity; or that any thing conld have been done or said more or better than had been done or said. He was always calmly, perfectly conscious of faultlessness. *1 do always those things which please the Father.' " All other good men have been forward to confess * Ilenry Rogers : " Defence of the Eclipse of Faith." 2 14 INTRODUCTION. themselves sinners; and nothing gives us so deep a conviction of their true godliness as the ingenuous and hearty acknowledgement of sin. In the case of David, for example, there is nothing he ever did or wrote that satisfies us that the root of true holiness was in him so much as the fifty-first Psalm. This beautiful ode, written on occasion of his repentance of the greatest sins of his life, breathes not the spirit of a criminal trembling at the thought of coming judg- ment, but of a true penitent mourning ingenuously that he has ofi'ended his God and Father. If we find in it a cry of agony for the remission of guilt, we find in it a still more piercing cry for the grace that should sanctify. " Create in me a clean heart, God ; and renew a right spirit within me." And we rise from the perusal of these confessions and prayers with the impression that only a man of God could cherish such sentiments and utter such cries. We expect the same sentiments to enter substantially into the experience of every man of God; while nothing would shake our confidence in a man's piety so conclusively as his dis- avowal of all feelings akin to those that are expressed in the fifty-first Psalm. And yet Jesus Christ was a stranger to them. More devout than any other man, more humble than any other man, he was still uncon- scious of sin. And the fact can be accounted for only on the supposition that he was sinless. Jesus Christ was thus " without blemish." But he was more. He was " perfect and entire, want- ing nothing." The completeness of his character is as remarkable as its faultlessness. The excel- lences of other good men usually put forth their strength in one direction, and are condensed, so to speak, in one grace or virtue ; as if the life and vital COMPLETENESS OP CHRIST'S CHARACTER. 15 energy of a tree were to flow into one branch, giving it much strength and beauty, but leaving other branches in a state of comparative feebleness. The faith of Abraham, the patience of Job, the zeal of Elijah, are examples. Not that these graces stood alone; for all true excellence springs from one root; and where this root exists it will produce many branches and many fruits of true goodness. But still human nature in its best state, that is, regenerated by the grace of God, ordinarily puts forth its greatest strength in some one or two directions. The character of Jesus Christ stands out in marked contrast to this partial and incomplete development of the good in man. " It is not the presence of one or two great qualities in his character that commands our reverence; it is the extraordinary combination of excellences which it displays that constitutes its peculiar attraction. Meekness and majesty — firmness and gentleness — • zeal and prudence — composure and warmth — patience and sensibility — submission and dignity — sublime sanctity and tender sympathy — piety that rose to the loftiest devotion, and benevolence that could stoop to the meanest sufferer — intense abhorrence of sin, and profound compassion for the sinner, mingle their varied rays in the tissue of his character, and produce a combination of virtues such as the world never saw besides, and such as the most sanguine enthusiasm never ventured to anticipate."* When he stood at the bar of the high priest and of Pilate, he never lost his dignity, never parted with his composure. Majestic amid reproaches, calm under injuries, with the port of a sovereign and the serenity of a martyr, he met every assault of his enemies without flinching, and without * Dr. W. L. Alexander: "Christ and Christianity. 16 INTRODUCTION. retaliation, and united with a fortitude that astonished the stern and haughty Roman — a meekness and tender- ness that had all but melted that iron heart. *' View him at any stage of his earthly career, and under any of the circumstances in which the evangelists have represented him, and we see the same completeness of character, the same unparalleled combination of excellences, the existence of any one of which in an ordinary mortal, in the degree in which they all appear in Christ, would draw towards him the admiration of all who knew him." Such was Jesus Christ, without fault, without defect. But he stands absolutely alone, A second like him is not to be found. The appearance of one, and of only one perfect man, amid all the generations that have peopled the earth these six thousand years, is a great mystery, of which no other explanation is adequate but that which is furnished by the evangelical record. So far from being anomalous, the story of his miraculous birth is alto- gether natural. Any thing else would not have been in keeping with the history of the one sinless man. " His virgin mother is a beautiful and simple reality. It would have been incongruous, even offensive, had Tie not been thus physically separated from mankind.'' This conclusion will carry us a step further. We go out among mankind to find, in practice, what is just and true and good; and we find here a fragment and there a fragment of great beauty, and we try to put all the fragments together in their proper place and order, to form a consistent whole ; till at last we come to One in whom virtue and goodness are not fragmentary, but entire, wanting nothing to form the most perfect model of human excellence. But we cannot think that it was for this end alone, or chiefly, CHRIST OUR EXAMrLE. 17 that the course of nature was set aside, and the Holy Ghost overshadowed the virgin mother of our Lord. It was that the human being thus wondrously created might be the visible tabernacle and Shekinah of God among men. The sinless one was " God manifest in the flesh." This is a fact, profoundly mysterious indeed, but also ineffably glorious. And when once this fact is admitted, we are urged on to another conclusion. The end of the indwelling of God in Jesus Christ was not the mere revelation of the being and character of God, but the redemption of man by the great atone- ment of the cross. There are teachers many, and examples many, but there is only one Saviour. Should we go from worthy to worthy among the saints of God, and ask life of them, Enoch, and Moses, and Daniel, and Paul, and John, will each reply, "It is not in me; behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world. He is preferred before us ; his shoes' latchet we are not worthy to unloose : he will baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire." From the admission of the sinlessness of the Lord Jesus Christ, we are thus led forward through an ever-widening circle of truth, till we have embraced the whole gospel of salvation. But our present object is to set forth the sinless One of Nazareth as the IDEAL AND MODEL OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE. He is our Example. Would we rise to eminence in any profession, we shall study the best models, and find in one of them, or form, by a combination of elements scattered over several, the ideal of our future life ; and on the purity and loftiness of this ideal, as well as on the simplicity and earnestness of our endeavour to realize it, will our success depend. Our spiritual ideal is Christ. In the one history and the 18 INTRODUCTION. one character, at once human and divine, of Jesus Christ, the Christian finds the highest type of spiritual excellence ; and into this highest type it is the will of his God that he should be moulded. But this statement may suggest difficulties which will prove a practical hindrance in our following Christ. The union of the human and divine natures in the person of our Lord is a difficulty which must ever meet us in endeavouring to weigh his conduct, and estimate his motives and principles of action, according to the standard of mankind. Practically, however, the difficulty is much lessened by distinctly remembering that Jesus Christ was a true man. How his Godhead was united to or acted upon his humanity we do not know ; but we do know that the one did not destroy the other, or supersede the natural working of the principles and faculties proper to it. And in this fo.ct we must rest. It is not of the God, but of the man we think, when we strive and pray that the life of Jesus may be reproduced and made manifest in our mortal flesh. Even the sinlessness of our Exemplar may itself become a difficulty. That he must be sinless, in order to his offering an acceptable sacrifice for the sins of men, we feel. That, if other than sinless, he could not be a true and perfect model, we feel like- wise. But his very sinlessness seems to create an impassable gulf between him and us. In him there was neither seed nor blade nor fruit of evil. In our natural character there is "no good thing." He may be our ideal, but how can we hope to realize it? And, in our strivings after it, must we not tread a path which he never trod, and pass through conflicts which be never knew ? "JESUS INCREASED IN WISDOM." 19 This difficulty will be removed, in part at least, by remembering, in the first place, that, though sinless, Christ's nature was capable of progress, — spiritual as well as physical and intellectual progress. Entire and sinless purity may be but the basis of endless progress. Adam was without spot as he came from the hands of God; but had he continued holy for one hundred years, and all these years actively served his Maker and resisted every temptation to sin, his holi- ness would have become brighter and stronger. The saints are without spot when they enter heaven; but their holiness grows, as well as their knowledge, amid the services and studies of the heavenly world. Entire purity does not, then, exclude the idea of progress. And as to Christ, the fact is certain. " The child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom : and the grace of God was upon him. — Jesus increased in wis- dom and stature, and in favour with God and man."* Christ's growth " in spirit" was, indeed, in some important respects diflPerent from ours. His progress was an onward and upward growth from a sinless root, perfect and pure at every stage, never needing correction or change, uninterrupted, unmarred, for one moment or in one instance, by inward disease or outward injury. Our true progress begins by a radical change of the original bent and bias of the soul ; and every subsequent attainment costs an efibrt and a struggle, advancement being perpetually checked by inward corruption or outward temptation, and all the attainments actually made exhibiting signs of weakness or defect. The difficulty created by this difi'erence between the great Exemplar and his followers will be mate- * Luke ii. 40, 52. 20 INTRODUCTION. rially lessened by remembering, in the second place, that, though sinless, he was subjected to temptation. " He was tempted like as we are." Let it not be supposed that temptation was nothing to him, because he was all pure. Our first parents were sinless when they were first tempted; and yet they yielded and fell. The temptation of the second Adam was as deep and real, but he yielded not : he was more than a con- queror. His likeness to us, or ours to him, in the matter of temptation, will be spoken of in another place. At present we only remark the fact, that he was tempted; that his temptation was not shadowy, but real ; that, though he " did no sin," he had to fight with sin, and overcame it only by the earnest use of the sword of the Spirit. There is another consideration which lessens the distance between Christ's experience and ours. Though sinless, he was a sufferer. The mystery of a sinless sufferer can be explained only on the assump- tion that he suffered for others, the just for the unjust. His condition of sufi'ering we look at now, however, only in relation to his being the ideal and model of our Christian life. His sufferings demanded the exercise of those same virtues and graces which are required by ours. And how gloriously they were exhibited is known to the most superficial reader of his history. Still it may be said that the life and doings of Jesus Christ were, to so large an extent, supernatural as to remove them out of the circle in which we move and have our being. He entered the world by a miracle, and left it by a miracle. If for thirty years he lived without miracle, that portion of his life is unrecorded. For those three years and a half during which we are NATURAL AND SUPERNATURAL. 21 permitted to trace his footsteps, he may be said to have lived in the supernatural. In the house of feast- ing and in the house of mourning, on the highway and in the temple, on the sea and on the mountain, both visible nature and unseen spirits were subject to his control ; and his mighty powers were put forth on the right hand and on the left. All this is true. But it is not true that all this renders his life so unlike ours that it cannot be our model. No character can stand farther removed than that of Jesus Christ from that of the mere wonder-worker, who dwells in a region foreign to our own, and unapproachable to our spirits. His life is that of a true man. And, amid all his miracles, the man's heart shows itself so constantly, that we can forget the supernatural in the perfect naturalness of all the moral elements and principles of his character. To say nothing of those utterances and doings that were not associated with supernatural signs, his very miracles have thus " left us an example that we should follow his steps." If we cannot say to the widowed mother's only son, "Arise," we can stand by the bier, and bear the widow's sorrows. If we cannot say to the buried Lazarus, " Come forth," we can weep with Mary and Martha, and rejoice, too, that their brother shall rise again at the last day. If we cannot take five loaves, and with them feed five thousand hungry men, we can at least deal of our own bread to the hungry, and befriend the outcast and the naked. If it cannot now be said, in reference to our ministration, " The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, and the lepers are cleansed," we may so follow Christ as to be able to appropriate the words of Job, " The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me : and I caused the widow's heart to sing for 22 INTRODUCTION. joy. — I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame. I was a father to the poor : and the cause which I knew not I searched out."* Thus the example of Christ is not the less natural that it is at the same time supernatural. Nor are we stayed in our progress by any question as to how far it is possible for us to attain his perfection. We may labour to attain ever-growing knowledge, even with the belief that we shall not attain perfect knowledge in this life. We may labour after ever-increasing and ever- improving health, with the belief that perfect health is impossible. Why, then, should it be neccessary to de- termine whether it be or be not possible to attain per- fect exemption from sin, and perfect conformity to Christ in this world, in order to our pressing towards the goal for the prize of our high calling ? It is enough to know that, as Christians, we can tolerate no sin, and be content with no defect. Our ideal is perfect. Whether we may ever fully realize it in this life or not, we shall press towards it. And if we are rightly minded, naught on earth shall turn us aside from the pursuit till we reflect an unbroken image of him who did no sin, and in whose mouth there was no guile. " Oh for a heart to praise my God, A heart from sia set free; A heart that's sprinkled with the blood So freely shed for me. " A heart in every thought renewed, And filled with love divine; Perfect and right, and pure and good ; A copy, Lord, of thine." * Job xxix. 13, 15, 16. PART THE FIRST WORK CHAPTER L— THE SOUL'S WORK. CHAPTER II.— THE WORLD'S WORK. CHAPTER III.— SOCIAL WORK. "My Father worketh hitherto; and I work." Ous Lord Jesus Christ. 23 " Go labour on ; spend and be spent; Thy joy to do the Father's will, It is the way the Master went ; Should not the servant tread it still ? "Go labour on: 'tis not for naught: Thy earthly loss is heavenly gain. Men heed thee, love thee, praise thee not ; The Master praises : — What are men? " Go labour on : enough, while here, If he shall praise thee, if he deign Thy willing heart to mark and cheer, No toil for him shall be in vain." HOEATIDS BONAR. 24 CHAPTER I. THE SOUL'S WORK. Contents. — Requisites to its successful prosecution — Its proper end — Similitude by Dr. Payson — By Samuel Pearce — The grand principle of Christ's life — Of the Christian's — Exaggeration of it by Madame Guyon — The apostle John — Paul — Brainerd — Light — Love— Examples of harmonious goodness — Paul — John Howe — Henry Martyn — Brainerd and Fletcher of Madeley con- trasted — The Patriarchs constitutionally diflFerent — The glory of Christ — Practical dangers — The neglect of little things — Per- fection made up of trifles — How Christian love is to be cultivated — By the knowledge and contemplation of the divine character — The necessity of reconciliation — Permanent application of first principles — Edward Bickersteth and Dr. Chalmers — Specific means of spiritual improvement — Written covenants — Resolu- tions — Self-examination — Private journals — Means of Christ's progress — Prayer — Holy Scripture — Havelock — Gardiner — Henry Martyn — Sarah Martin — Chalmers— George Wagner — Sabbath ordinances — John Wesley and the Mystics — Christ and external ordinances. " Blessed are the pure in heart ; for they shall see God." — Matt. v. 8. 3 25 Along the mountain track of life, Along the weary lea, O'er rocks, 'mid storms, in joy, in strife, Let this my heart-cry be, " Nearer to Thee ; nearer to Thee." This pilgrim-path by thee was trod, Jesus, my King, by thee ; Traced by thy feet, thy tears, thy blood, In love, in death, for me. Oh ! bring my soul nearer to thee. Let every step, let every thought, Sweet mem'ries bear of thee; And hear the soul thy love hath bought, Whose war-cry oft shall be, "Nearer to Thee ; nearer to Thee." Be it the heaven I hope above. To live and move in thee. Oh ! by thy past, thy promised love, Grant these blest words to me, *' AscKXD, FORGIVEN, nearer to ME." 26 THE SOUL'S WORK. This is the hardest work of all, involving more of conflict and continuous eff'ort than any other, but the most blessed in its present satisfactions, and the most triumphant in its issues. Of its conflicts we shall speak hereafter, of its aims and endeavours now. But the very first thing that is required to its suc- cessful prosecution is the conviction that spiritual progress is a icork, and is not to be attained without toil and painstaking. The sun ascends the heaven from dawn to midday : the season advances from dead winter to living spring and ripe autumn : all inde- pendently of the human will. But it is not so with the kingdom of God, either in its external progress throughout the world, or in its internal progress in the individual soul. In some aspects it is " as if a man should cast seed into the ground; and should sleep and rise, night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how." * But in other aspects likewise does it resemble the pro- cesses of husbandry. There must be the plowing, and the sowing, and the watering, and the reaping. There are powers, divine powers, at work in the field, over which the husbandman has no control, although without them his labours will be in vain. But these powers do not supersede the husbandman's labours; and, by the ordinance of God himself, the * Mark iv. 26, 27. 27 28 . THE soul's work. human work is as essential to the production of the harvest as the divine. The language of New Testament piety is not that of mere repose in the power and faithfulness of God : it breathes a spirit of personal and unceasing eflfort : " So run, that ye may obtain. And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown ; but we an incor- ruptible. I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air : but I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection : lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway."* If ever Christian might trust to the force of the first impulse which he received in conversion, or to the spontaneous action of the principles implanted in his soul by the grace of Grod, or to the security afi'orded by divine promises, and give himself no concern about his progress or perseverance, that Christian was Paul the apostle. But he was far otherwise minded. And only on the Grecian stadium, with its hard-disciplined, lightly girt, ^ eager, panting runners and wrestlers, could he find the human emblem of the intenseness of efibrt and vigilance with which he was accustomed to urge onward in his Christian course. " This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. "f And in accord- ance with his own practice were his instructions to others — instructions, not the fruit of his own wisdom, but of divine inspiration — " Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God * 1 Corinthians ix. 24—27. f Philippians iii. 13, 14. THE christian's END AND AIM. 29 whicli worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."* In the same spirit the apostle Peter wrote — " Giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue ; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temper- ance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity Give diligence to make your calling and election sure : for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall : for so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. ""j" Next in importance to the conviction that the soul is not passive, but active, in spiritual progress, and that its activity must be earnest and incessant, is a distinct understanding of the end of its endeavours; an end which may be set forth either in the language of figure and analogy, or in the simpler but less im- pressive form of direct statement. Dr. Payson addressed his flock on one occasion in these words — *' Suppose professors of religion to be ranged in different concentric circles around Christ as their common centre. Some value the presence of their Saviour so highly, that they cannot bear to be at any distance from him. Even their work they will bring up and do it in the light of his countenance; and, while engaged in it, will be seen constantly raising their eyes to him as if fearful of losing one beam of his light. Others, who, to be sure, would not be content to live out of his presence, are yet less wholly absorbed by it than these, and may be seen a little farther off, engaged here and there in their various callings, their eyes generally upon their work, * Philippians ii. 12, 13. f 2 Peter i. 5. 11. 3* 30 THE soul's work. but often looking up for the light which they love. A third class, beyond these, includes a doubtful mul- titude, many of whom are so engaged in their worldly schemes, that they may be seen standing sideways to Christ, looking mostly the other way, and only now and then turning their faces towards the light. And yet farther out, amongst the last scattered rays, so distant that it is often doubtful whether they come at all within their influence, is a mixed assemblage of busy ones, some with their backs wholly turned upon the sun, and most of them so careful and troubled about their many things as to spare but little time for their Saviour." The aim and purpose of the Chris- tian soul must be to press into the innermost of these circles. To be content with a place in any of the circles that are without, will be at once the surrender of privilege and the violation of duty. The Rev. Samuel Pearce, in a familiar letter to a friend, wrote as follows — " What are we, my bro- ther, but so many satellites to Jesus, the great Sun of the Christian system ? Some, indeed, like burning Mercuries, keep near the luminary, and receive more of its light and heat; whilst others, like the ringed planet, or the Georgium Sidus, preserve a greater dis- tance, and reflect a greater portion of his light. Yet if, amidst all this diversity, thei/ belong to the si/stem, two things may be affirmed of all : all keep time to one centre, and borrow whatever light they have from one source. True it is, that the farther they are from the sun, the longer are they in performing their revolu- tions. And is not this exemplified in us ? The closer we keep to Jesus, the more brilliant are our graces, the more cheerful and active are our lives. But, alas ! we are all comets; we all move in eccentric orbits; at THE PRINCIPLE OF CHRIST's LIFE. 31 one time glowing beneath the ray divine; at another freezing and congealing like icicles." Adopting this figure, the aim and purpose of the Christian soul is to move in an orbit as near to the central sun as possible, and to move in it steadily, receiving and reflecting all the light of which its powers render it capable. In other words, the aim and purpose of the Christian soul is to attain the moral likeness of Christ. Now we know the principle which governed the life of Christ. It is disclosed in the prophetic words, " Lo, I come : I delight to do thy will, my God : yea, thy law is within my heart." * The will of God, which he knew immediately and infallibly, was his rule : it was the power which animated and inspired him in action. '* Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's busi- ness ? "-f " My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work." " I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.'^J The life of Jesus Christ was one of perfect obedience ; obedience to the living and personal Author of the law ; obedience, not in the letter merely, but iu the spirit. The surrender of himself to God was full and unreserved. The principle which regulated his actions was not the constraining con- sciousness of a work which must be done, but the free spontaneous impulse of love, moving him to do what his nature would not let him leave undone. His was love to God, and love to man. He drew the copious streams from the divine fountain, not in order to keep them to himself, but that he might constantly, un- weariedly, impart them to others. The character of the Lord Jesus presents to us the harmony of a life * Psalm xl. 7, 8, f Luke ii. 49. % John iv. 34; vi. 38. 32 THE soul's work. which, in action as well as in suffering, was ever equally penetrated with the Spirit of God ; which had its source in the perfect love of God, and realized itself in the highest and most costly love to man. Sin, which is in its very nature antagonistic to God, can find no place where selfishness, which is its essence and principle, is utterly abolished by the full energy of love to God and man. It is not lawful for us, the saved, to be content with an aim short of having our souls attuned, as was that of Christ, the Saviour. We are like him in propor- tion as our will, like his, is in union and unison with the will of God in all things — in the method of our salvation, in the providence which governs us, and in the whole law of our earthly life. " To believe, to feel, to speak, to act exactly as God will have me,'' said the Kev. Samuel Pearce ; " to be wholly absorbed and takeu up with him j this, this, nothing short of this, can make my bliss complete. But all this is mine. Oh ! the height, the depth, the length, the breadth of re- deeming love ! It conquers my heart, and constrains me to yield myself a living sacrifice, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." There are few examples of a will in harmony with Madame Guyon; ^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^«^ ^^^^ illustrioUS than i^^8: ^d^ied J^^e ^^^t of Madame GuYON. But a few 9th, 1717. weeks before her death she wrote to a friend — " Last night my pains were so great as to call into exercise all the resources and aids of faith. God heard the prayer of his poor sufferer. Grace was triumphant. It is trying to nature ; but I can still say, in this last struggle, that I love the hand that smites me." And this is the spirit ERROR OF MADAME GUYON. 33 which animated her long life of active labour and of varied sorrow. To be nothing in herself, to find her all in God, to know, to do, and, as a child, to suffer her Father's will, was the one aim of her prayers and endeavours. With Madame Guyon's views of the harmony of the human will with the divine there was intermingled, however, an error of no small magnitude, an error which has often appeared in forms both less and more extravagant than in her. Jeremy Taylor relates, in one of his sermons, the following legend : — " Saint Lewis the King having sent Ivo, Bishop of Chartres, on an embassy, the bishop met a woman on the way, grave, sad, fantastic, and melancholy, with fire in one hand, and water in the other. He asked what these symbols meant. She answered, ^ My purpose is, with fire to burn paradise, and with water to quench the flames of hell, that men may serve God without the incentives of hope and fear, and purely for the love of God.'" This fanciful personage may be regarded as the embodiment of that religious idea to which is given the name of Quietism, or Mysticism. The idea that the soul is " made perfect in love," only when it loves God ^^ purely," without regard or reference of any kind to the benefits and mercies which it has received from the divine hand ; when it loves God so purely, for his own sake, as to be willing to endure even eternal wrath if it should please him so to ordain — this idea is involved in many of Madame Guyon's writings, and nowhere more affectingly than in her poem, entitled " The Dealings of God, or the Divine Love in bringing the Soul to a state of Absolute Acquiescence." It 34 THE soul's work. " 'Twas my purpose, on a day, To embark and sail away. As I climbed the vessel's side, Love was sporting in the tide : ' Come,' he said, ' ascend, make haste : Launch into the boundless waste.' " And, after being tossed on '^ the boundless waste'' for a season, the soul's courage was tried by being cast on the " briny wave,'^ without ship or visible support of any kind. But instead of resenting this "unexpected turn," or wishing herself on shore, " Be still,'^ she cried : " if I must be lost I will." Other difficulties followed. She cried, but in vain : "Love was gone, and would not hear." The soul's one desire was now that Love would return, content that he should "frown with wrath or smile with grace :" only let him return. But it was not to be. And at last the soul exclaims : — " Be not angry : I resign Henceforth all my will to thine. I consent that thou depart, Though thine absence breaks my heart. Go, then, and for ever too : All is right that thou wilt do." " This" — the poem concludes — " This was just what Love intended : He was now no more offended : Soon as I became a child, Love returned to me and smiled. Never strife can more betide 'Twixt the Bridegroom and his bride." Now this poem indicates states of mind which, if rightly understood, are mutually irreconcilable; a yearning of soul after God as the highest good, and yet a willingness to part with God for ever if that should be his will. And it is only by means of some hidden sophism we can persuade ourselves that we love God as our chiefest good, and yet are willing, and FENELON ON PURE LOVE. 35 that because we love him so purely, to be separated from him for ever. To show our love to God by willingness to endure perdition, what is it but to attest our devotion to him by our readiness to hate hira for ever ? Madame Guyon imposed on herself in this matter. Her heart was right. She longed most earnestly after God ; and to be left at any time without God was the only evil she dreaded. In the prospect of imprisonment in the Bastile for Christ's sake, she wrote : — " I feel no anxiety in view of what my enemies will do to me. I have no fear of anything but of being left to myself So long as God is with me, neither imprisonment nor death will have any terror." And, when in the Bastile, her language was, *^ my God, if thou art pleased to render me a spectacle to men and angels, thy holy will be done. All I ask is, that thou wilt be with and save those who love thee ; so that neither life nor death, neither princi- palities nor powers, may ever separate them from the love of God which is in Jesus Christ." This is not the spirit of one who could say, " I consent that thou depart, though thine absence breaks my heart." Her heart could not be reconciled to the absence of her Lord. The language of her heart, as well as of her pen, was — " Could I be cast -where thou art not, That were, indeed, a dreadful lot; But regions none remote I call, Secure of finding God in all. My country, Lord, art thou alone ; No other can I claim or own ; The point where all my wishes meet, My law, my love, life's only sweet." The friend of Madame Guyon, Archbishop Fenfelon, came nearer the truth on the subject of ^' pure" or "mixed" love in his book, ^' The Maxims of the Saints." 36 THE soul's work. Of the love of God, he says, there are various kinds; or at least there are various feelings which go under that name. First. — There is what may be called mercenary or selfish love, that is to say, that love of God which originates in an exclusive and sole regard to our own happiness. Those who love God with no other love than this, love him just as the miser loves his money, and just as the voluptuous man loves his pleasures; attaching no value to God, except as a means to an end; and that end is the gratification of themselves. Such love, if it can be called by that name, is unworthy of God. He does not ask it ; he will not receive it. It is a love of oneself rather than of God. Secondly. — There is another kind of love, which does not exclude a regard to our own happiness as a motive of love, but which at the same time requires this motive to be subordinate to a much higher one, namely, that of a regard to God's glory. This love is not necessarily selfish and wrong. On the contrary, when the two objects of it, God and ourselves, are relatively in the right position, that is to say, when we love God as he ought to be loved, and love our- selves no more than we ought to be loved, it is a love which, in being properly subordinated, is unselfish and is right. Fenelon admits that it is proper, in addressing even religious men, to appeal to the passions of fear and of hope. " Such appeals are recognized in the Holy Scriptures, and are in accordance with the views and feelings of good men in all ages of the world. The motives involved in them are powerful aids to beginners in religion ; assisting, as they do, very LOVE AS IT IS IN HEAVEN. 37 much, in repressing the passions, and in strengthening the practical virtues." But not to beginners only, but to matured Chris- tians likewise, may these motives be addressed. We must love God for his own sake ; we must love him with heartj soul, mind, and strength, for the glory, excellence, and holiness of his own character. But we may love him at the same time for the blessings of his grace and providence. The former is some- times called the love of complacency, and the latter the love of gratitude. To insist on the former alone, and to exclude the latter, is inconsistent at once with the constitution of our nature and with the simplicity of the gospel. " We love Him because he first loved us," says that disciple who, of all men, may be sup- posed to have best understood '^ the science of pure love." Even the redeemed before the throne sing, "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever." If saints in glory are not so absorbed with the one idea of the divine excellency, as the object of their love, as to overlook or rise above the idea of the benefits which divine grace hath conferred on them, shall we be surprised to find that the most matured saints on earth do not exclude the good they have received, and the good they hope for, from their thoughts, as a motive and stimulus to the love of God? It was in extreme old age, with the experience of sixty years after the outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, with the guidance of inspiration, and when on the verge of heaven, that the apostle John said, " We love him because he first loved us," and made this the foundation of that 4 38 THE soul's work. " perfect love " which " casteth out fear."* In the daily prospect of martyrdom, the apostle Paul, whose Christian life was one of the purest unselfishness, contemplated, with grateful satisfaction, the good that was in store for him in heaven : — *' Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day : and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.""!' David Bratnerd, one of the holiest of men, burned •^ ^ -o • ^ ^ith vehement desire to love God ab- David Bramerd; 1718 : ditd October stractcdly from every other considera- °*^'^'" tion than the glory, excellence, and holi- ness of the divine character. Yet we find in his diary such entries as these : " I found my heart going out after God in longing desires of conformity after him, and in secret prayer found myself quickened, and drawn out in praise for all that he had done for me; yea, for all my trials and distresses Time appeared to me an inch long, and eternity at hand : I saw that a moment would bring me to a world of peace and blessedness." He was longing for " a world of peace and blessedness," that he might love God for his own sake, and without distraction, but certainly not with- out a personal cause for loving him. The very aspect in which he thought of heaven, as a ^^ world of peace and blessedness," involved the consideration of his own happiness. And it is instructive to find in Madame Guyon herself, after all her speculations on " pure love," and the " annihilation of self," that the recognition of the personal good she received from Christ only became clearer and more distinct as she * 1 John iv. 18, 19. f 2 Timothy iv. 8. LIGHT A SYMBOL OF CHARACTER. 39 approached the end of her course. " The greatest satisfaction I can have/' she said, " is the knowledge that the Lord whom I love is what he is; and that, being what he is, he never will or can be otherwise. If I am saved at last, it will be the free gift of God; since I have no worth and no merit of my own." Thus did she connect the hope of personal salvation with her glorying in God. " If I can only be accepted of him," was her thought in the Bastile, *' I am willing that all men should despise and hate me. Their strokes will polish what may be defective in me, so that I may be presented in peace to him for whom I die daily. Without his favour I am wretched. Saviour, I present myself before thee, an offering, a sacrifice. Purify me in thy blood, that I may be accepted of thee." And in her " last will," written a short time before her death, she said : " It is to thee, Lord God, that 1 owe all things ; and it is to thee that I now surrender up all that I am Thou know- est that there is nothing in heaven or on earth that I desire but thee alone. Within thy hands, God, I leave my soul, not relying for my salvation on any good that is in me, but solely on thy mercies, and the merits and sufferings of my Lord Jesus Christ." '^ God is light; " and they who do his will from the heart, as did Christ, bear his image ; they are " light in the Lord." Of all material things, light is the most glorious, (described by the bard of ^'Paradise Lost" as " Ethereal, first of things, quintessence pure,") and therefore the most fit to be the symbol of the divine character. But light is a compound of various rays; and while we admire its bright integrity as it streams from the sun, we admire its component parts m THE SOUL S WORK. as they are seen in the rainbow. In the character of Christ, we find all excellences so commingled and proportioned as to form pure light; but we may, at the same time, study these excellences separately; and then are they beautiful as the variegated hues of the rainbow. In the characters of his followers, virtues and graces are not so harmonized as to produce the effect of pure light. The reflection of his light in them is mirrored forth with manifold variety, according to the differences of various minds, " even as the morning sun comes to us in the hues of the mountain, the waves of the sea, the flowers of the field, and the innumera- ble drops of dew, each vieing with the rest to show forth some beam of the great luminary/' We put the same truth in another form when we say that the love of God in the heart is a many-fruited principle. It is the root whence grow what may be called both the larger and the smaller virtues and graces of the Christian character. And these are found in a great variety of proportions, so that we naturally select individuals as types of particular graces, or their lives as examples of particular lessons and truths. Thus, in a well-known book,* we have chapters on " William Tyndale, or Labour and Pa- tience;" "Richard Hooker, or a Soul in Love with God's Law and Holy Order ; " " Robert Leighton, or the Peacefulness of Faith ; " " Sir Matthew Hale, or Secular Piligence and Spiritual Fervour;" ''John Bunyan, or Spiritual Valour and Victory ; " " Richard Baxter, or Earnest Decision ; " " Matthew Henry, or Meekness of Wisdom; " " George Whitefield, or Seraph- * " The Lights of the World," by the Rev, John Stoughton. EXAMPLES OF HARMONY. 41 like Zeal;" ''John William Fletcher of Madeley, or Intense Devotion ; " " John Newton, or Social Affec- tions Sanctified ; " " Henry Martyn, or Self-Denial." And these might be multiplied indefinitely. All the graces of the Spirit spring from the same root of faith and love in the renewed heart; but they do not all and always grow alike vigorously. And even where they all exist, and that in some good measure, it often happens that one overshadows the rest. Men are found occasionally, however, who may be cited as examples of harmonious goodness, rather than of pre-eminence in particular graces. Among the men of the Bible, Moses and Paul were of this order. Both are very distinguishable from those with whom their names are much associated, as Moses from Aaron, and Paul from John, but it is chiefly in this very respect. " As the mind tries to rest upon the promi- nent points of the character which the career of Moses evinces, we find ourselves baffled," says Dr. Kitto. " We think of the faith of Abraham, of the conscien- tiousness of Joseph, of the contrition of David, of the generosity of Jonathan, of the zeal of Elijah — but v^rhat do we regard as the dominant quality of Moses ? It is not to be found. The mind is perplexed in the attempt to fix on any. It is not firmness, it is not perseverance, it is not disinterestedness, it is not patriotism, it is not confidence in God, it is not meek- ness, it is not humility, it is not forgetfulness of self, that forms his distinguishing characteristic. It is not any one of these. It is all of them. His virtues, his graces, were all equal to each other; and it was their beautifully harmonious operation and develop- ment which constituted his noble, and all but perfect, 4« 42 THE soul's work. character. This was the greatness of Moses : this was the glory of his character. It is a kind of cha- racter rare in any man; and in no man, historically known, has it been so completely manifested.^' Dr. Kitto thinks " the exigencies of even those great affairs which engaged his thought, did not, and could not, call forth on any one occasion, all the high qualities with which he was gifted. It is rarely possible to see more than one high endowment in action at the same time. But we find Moses equal to every occa- sion : he is never lacking in the virtue which the occa- sion requires him to exercise ; and by this we know that he possessed them all.'' The apostle Paul seems to us remarkably like Moses in these respects. It would be difficult to name the virtue or the grace in which he was found deficient. And if any one virtue or grace were named as the dominant quality in his character, it will be found to have been so supported and surrounded by other qualities as not to rise with undue prominence above the common level of his nature; while the common level of his whole moral being was so elevated as to possess the grandeur without the ruggedness of a land of mountains. In decision of purpose he was immovably firm ; but it was not the decision of pride or self-will : where conscientious principle was not in- volved, he was pliant as the willow. In courage he rose to a height of heroism which has never been transcended ; but it was not the courage of a lion-like animal nature, but of a man of gentle and tender spirit, who, like his Divine Master, would not break the bruised reed. In zeal he prosecuted his work with the directness and intense speed with which the arrow seeks the mark; but that zeal never burned JOHN HOWE. 43 with frautic fury : it only glowed, and always glowed with the warmth of a pure and genial love. If the wickedness of a sorcerer elicited the indignant rebuke, '' full of all subtlety and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord ?" the misery to which ungodly men were hasting drew forth bis tears : " Many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.'^ And in both he was like his Lord. The three graces of faith, hope, and love, with the fruits which these produce accord- ing to the circumstances which demand their exercise, will be found in the character of Paul in beautiful harmony. So that, whereas he was once the chief of sinners, we shall not err in calling him the chief of saints. The completeness and comprehensiveness of his Master's character has never been more fully re- produced than in Paul the apostle. Among moderns, John Howe may be cited as an example of harmonious goodness rather . . John Howe ; born than 01 pre-eminence in particular ^'^^i^^' ifos* ^^^ graces. His biographer dwells with en- thusiasm on the symmetry of both his intellectual and spiritual character. Most of those characters which have won the admiration of mankind, Mr. Kogers re- marks, have been marked by a peculiar individualiti/y resulting from the disproportionate, and, in some cases, enormous development of some master faculty. But from the calm firmament of Howe's mind shine forth all the various faculties of the soul, each with its allotted tribute of light, and with a serene and solemn lustre. " Star differeth from star in glory ;" but no 44 THE soul's work. one extinguishes or eclipses the rest. Even so with his spiritual character. His piety determined each faculty to its appropriate objects, and regulated the measure of its exercise. It permitted none of them, so to speak, to break the ranJcSj but led them on in a stately and solemn march in the progress towards perfection. In communion with the supreme good, in contemplation of the noblest forms of spiritual beauty and spiritual excellence, in a diligent prepara- tion for a nobler state of being, he realli/ found the highest pleasures of his existence; he attained as complete an ascendency over sensual and animal na- ture, and as lofty an elevation over the world, as was ever vouchsafed to poor humanity. In all transactions with the world, he exhibited a rare combination of prudence and integrity. In that most delicate task, the reproof of others, he was inflexibly faithful, yet always kind ; and while he remembered what was due to the majesty of truth, never forgot what was also due to the claims of charity. He was frank, yet not rash; and cautious, yet free from suspicion. In his deportment, he knew how to conciliate the utmost elevation of character with the gentlest condescension and the acutest sensibility. Dignified, but not austere, he was "grave without moroseness, and cheerful with- out levity." While he subjected all the inferior prin- ciples of his nature to the control of reason, itself enlightened by the Spirit of God, he was not so absurd as to attempt their annihilation ; nor did the loftiest attainments of intellect interfere with the varied dis- play of all human charities. His devotion was deep, habitual, and intense ; it was not founded on a partial or distorted view of the divine character, but was just the impression likely to be produced by a harmonious HENRY MARTYN. 45 perception of the various relations in whicl^ man stands to God under the gospel economy. His piety was habitual and all-pervading as it was deep. It united the most burning zeal with the coolest judg- ment; the most intense desire for the glory of God with ceaseless efforts for the welfare of man ; the loftiest exercises of a deeply meditative and devotional spirit with the sedulous cultivation of the homeliest graces; that rarest of all combinations, the closest communion with the future and the eternal, with a conscientious and busy discharge of all the duties of to-day. The character of Henry Martyn may be cited as an afifectino; illustration of the grace of self- „ ^ ^ Henry Martyn ; denial ; but it may likewise be cited as i78f;^1ed'oeS)be^r an illustration of that harmony of graces ^^•^^^^• which distinguished John Howe. In his faith, ac- cording to his biographer, there was a singular, a child-like simplicity : great, consequently, was its energy, both in obeying Christ, and in suffering for his name's sake. By this, he could behold blossoms upon the rod, even when it was apparently dead ; and in those events which, like the captain of the Lord's host seen by Joshua, presented at first a hostile aspect, he could discern a favourable and a friendly countenance. Having listened to that tender and overwhelming inter- rogation of his Saviour, " Lovest thou me V his love was fervently exercised towards God and man, at all times and in all places. For it was not like the land- spring, which runs violently for a season, and then ceases, but resembled the fountain, which flows with a perennial stream from the recesses of the rock. His fear of God, and tenderness of conscience, and watch- 46 THE soul's work. fulness over his own heart, could scarcely be surpassed ia this state of sinful infirmity. But it was his humility that was most remarkable : this might be considered as the warp of which the entire texture of his piety was composed ; and with this his other Christian graces were so intimately blended, as to beautify and adorn his whole demeanour. It was, in truth, the accordance and consent of various Christian attainments in Mr. Martyn, which were so striking. The symmetry of his stature in Christ was as surprising as its height. That communion which he held with his God, and which caused his face to shine, was ever chastened, like the patriarch's of old, by the most awful reverence. The nearer the access with which he was favoured, the more deeply did he feel that he was but "sinful dust and ashes.'' No discordance could he discover between peace and penitence : no opposition between joy in God and utter abasement before him. To be zealous without love, or to have that which is miscalled charity, without decision of character, is neither difficult nor uncommon. Mr. Martyn's zeal was tempered with love, and his love invigorated by zeal. He combined, also, ardour with prudence ; gravity with cheerfulness ; abstraction from the world with an en- joyment of its lawful gratifications. His extreme ten- derness of conscience was devoid of scrupulosity 3 his activity in good works was joined to habits of serious contemplation ; his religious afi'ections, which were highly spiritualized, exceeded not the limits of the most cautious sobriety, and were so far from impairing his natural afi'ections, that they raised and purified them. " A more perfect character," says one who bore the burden and heat of the day with him in India, *' I never met with, nor expect to see on earth." BRAINERD AND FLETCHER OF MADELEY. 47 The variety which is tlius exhibited to us, in the harmony attained by some, and in the prominence of particular graces in the character of others, arises from the operation of many causes, some of them involving a degree of blame, and others beyond the power of the will to regulate or control. One of the chief of these is probably to be found in rieteher of Made- ^ •' _ ley contrasted. constitutional differences, and in the action of external training and circumstances, a good example of which may be found in the contrast which is presented to us by the experiences of David Brainerd and of Mr. Fletcher of Madeley. " The life of David Brainerd," says the Bev. Bobert Hall, " exhibits a per- fect pattern of the qualities which should distinguish the instructer of rude and barbarous tribes ; the most invincible patience and self-denial, the profoundest humility, exquisite prudence, indefatigable industry, and such a devotedness to God, or rather such an absorption of the whole soul in zeal for the divine glory and the salvation of men, as is scarcely to be paralleled since the age of the apostles. Such was the intense ardour of his mind, that it seems to have diffused the spirit of a martyr over the most common incidents of his life. His constitutional melancholy, though it must be regarded as a physical imperfection, imparts an additional interest and pathos to the narrative; since we more easily sympathize with the emotions of sorrow than of joy. ^' The life of Fletcher of Madeley affords in some respects a parallel, in others a contrast, to that of Brainerd ; and it is curious to observe how the influ- ence of natural temperament varies the exhibition of the same principles. With a considerable difference in their religious views, the same zeal, the same spirit- 48 THE soul's work. uality of mind, the same contempt of the world, is con- spicuous in the character of each. But the lively imagination, the sanguine complexion of Fletcher, per- mits him to triumph and exult in the consolatory truths and prospects of religion. He is a seraph who burns with the ardours of divine love; and, spurning the fetters of mortality, he almost habitually seems to have anticipated the rapture of the beatific vision. Brainerd, oppressed with a constitutional melancholy, is chiefly occupied with the thoughts of his pollutions and defects in the eyes of Infinite Purity. His is a mourning and conflicting piety, imbued with the spirit of self-abase- ment, breathing itself forth in 'groanings which cannot be uttered/ always dissatisfied with itself; always toil- ing in pursuit of a purity and perfection unattainable by mortals. The mind of Fletcher was habitually brightened with gratitude and joy for what he had attained; Brainerd was actuated with a restless solici- tude for further acquisitions. If Fletcher soared to all the heights, it may be affirmed, with equal truth, that Brainerd sounded all the depths of Christian piety; and while the former was regaling himself with fruit from the tree of life, the latter, on the waves of a tempestuous sea, was 'doing business in the mighty waters.' Both equally delighted and accustomed to lose themselves in the contemplation of the Deity, they seemed to have surveyed that infinite Object under diff"erent aspects; and while Fletcher was absorbed in the contempla- tion of infinite benignity and love, Brainerd shrank into nothing in the presence of immaculate purity and holiness. "The difi'erent situations in which they were placed, had probably considerable efiect in producing or heightening their res} ective peculiarities. Fletcher THE PATRIARCHS. 49 exercised his ministry in the calm of domestic life, surrounded with the beauties of nature : Brainerd pur- sued his mission in a remote and howling wilderness, where, in the midst of uncultivated savages, he was exposed to intolerable hardships and fatigues. The experience of both these holy men would doubt- less have been modified and somewhat assimilated by more comprehensive views of divine truth than each possessed ; for who ever received the whole of divine truth in its integrity and in the due proportion of its parts ? But apart from the difi"erent phases of truth which they contemplated, and the difference of their outward circumstances, we cannot imagine men so various in their constitutional tendencies exhibiting exactly the same type of spiritual excellence. The patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, are very distinguishable from each other, both constitutionally and religiously. In language full of meaning, we are told that " God is not ashamed to be called their God : for he hath prepared for them a city." The expectations which they were encouraged to cherish have been realized, and God's promises to them have been fulfilled. But the discipline of their " pil- grimage " was necessary to prepare them for their " inheritance." And the inspired estimate of their character is applicable rather to the results and issues of this discipline, than to the earlier stages of its progress. When the character of each became de- veloped into maturity and meetness for the better country, of which they were heirs, they may be re- garded as good and venerable in the full meaning of the terms; bright examples of that virtue and holiness of which Bible references to them are so suggestive. 6 50 THE soul's work. But these three men, with a common faith and a common hope, present three types of human nature, and three types likewise of religions character. The character of Abraham, when we first see him, is capable of being vividly realized by our observation of mankind. '' There is nothing in anywise unnatural, mysterious, and shadowy, about him. We at once recognize in him a specimen of one of those strong, and genial, and large-hearted men, whose very exterior, for the most part, is significant of a character which we can at once trust in, and reverence, and love." Abraham was one of those who by constitution are calm, dignified, and moderate in their own conscious- ness of strength ; but who, when occasion requires it, are as inflexible in their assertion of just claims, and as courageous in helping others to defend them. These qualities were very strikingly shown in his reply to the king of Sodom, and again in his concession "of the left hand or the right," to his nephew Lot, compared with his enterprising efforts to rescue the same person, when it was reported that he had been taken captive. So strongly indeed is Abraham's character developed, that we may almost see this dignified and affectionate chieftain of his people when we have read only a few pages of his history.* The son is portrayed in a few words with hardly less vividness than the father. Isaac was '*a man of amiable and gentle disposition ; susceptible to the influence of those around him; governed more by his affections than by his judgment; meditative in his turn of mind; with few wants; good rather than great ; fitted to receive impressions and follow a guide; not to originate important influences, or per- * Q. S. Drew: "Scripture Studies." CONSTITUTIONAL VARIETIES. 51 form deeds of renown. His almost entire silence, as he submissively yielded to his father, when they went together to Mount Moriah; his removal from the wells which he digged until he found another for which they strove not; the expressive statement that he went out into the fields to meditate, or to pray at eventide; his submissivcness under the influence of Rebecca ; — these and other familiar passages in his history, enable us to recognize this man also, in the character which has been ascribed to him." Jacob was very different from both his father and grandfather; and his constitutional tendencies are plainly disclosed in every passage of his history. He was a plain man, and to this extent like his father, that he was of a more quiet and gentle disposition than his brother, content with the home of his parents' tents, and with the peaceful occupations of a shepherd's life. Esau was a man of impulse and impetuosity, who spurned the home pursuits of his brother, and betook himself to the fields and mountains in search of adventure and of game. On several well-known occasions, we see Jacob seeking and attaining his pur- pose by stealthy and subtle management, in part the result of the partial and scheming ambition of his mother, but indicating no doubt a constitutional tendency of his own. "Timid, conceding, and while insignificant in respect of those exterior and personal qualities which produce an immediate impression wherever they are beheld, ambitious nevertheless, desirous of a higher position and wider influence than seemed to be within his reach, and determined also by some means to obtain them, — Jacob is disclosed to us." The constitutional characters of these three men 52 THE soul's work. thus differed much the one from the other; and so, within certain limits, did their religious characters. That they were partakers of a common faith and hope we are assured on apostolic authority, and evidences of it pervade the history of their lives. Under the guidance of the " God of glory," Abraham was separated from an idolatrous household, and led, from a land which " served other gods," into the homestead of the new race of which he was to be the father. Wherever he settled, and for however brief a period, he built an altar to Jehovah, and was habitually conversant with things unseen and eternal. In all this, his son Isaac was in full sympathy with him. When Abraham was called to offer his son on Mount Moriah, the younger patriarch must have concurred in the offering. " It was a joint testimony of their affiance in Him in whom both claimed their highest life." The devoutness of Isaac's spirit was moreover indicated by what we may conclude were its habitual exercises *' in the field at eventide;" and we know that he was favoured with personal communications with the God of his father. The earlier portion of Jacob's history is marred by faithful details of personal delin- quencies. But from the memorable night when, as a fugitive from his father's house, he slept on a stone pillow at Bethel, until the hour when in feeble old age he foreshadowed by the prophetic spirit the his- tory of his twelve sons and their descendants, many proofs were given that in him, as in other patriarchs, devout habits and heavenly principles were habitually developed. But Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, purified and ennobled by a common faith and hope, were not fashioned in one mould, and reduced or raised to a THE GLORY OF CHRIST. 53 common level. Their constitutional differences still remained j and these, along with the circumstances in which they were placed, determined the form and hue of the fruits of that goodness which they had in com- mon, and which distinguished them from the nations among which they passed their pilgrimage. It is the glory of our Lord, we thus see, as compared with the chiefest of his servants — both those who lived before his personal advent, and those who lived after — that "he alone stands at the absolute centre, the one completely harmonious man, unfolding all that was in that humanity equalli/ upon all sides, /«% upon all sides, the only one in whom the real and ideal met, and were absolutely one." Even Moses and Paul, to whom we have referred as examples of harmony in character, stand at a great distance from their Lord. As compared with him, every other man has idiosyn- crasies ; some features of his character marked more strongly than others; fitnesses for one task rather than another; more genial powers in one direction than in another. The three chief apostles were not exempted from this law. Their characteristics were not dissolved by the transformation which made them one in Christ, but hallowed to the work they were best fitted to accomplish in the church of God. As mm, Paul, Peter, and John were very differently constituted; as ai^ostles, they had varied and dif- ferent functions to discharge ; and as Christians^ their graces were exhibited in different combinations and forms. But amidst variety there was unity; unity in the doctrines which they preached, unity in the prin- ciples which animated their hearts, and unity in the virtues which adorned their lives. The differences 6* 54 THE soul's work. between them were only differences in the degree in which certain graces were exhibited in their characters, and in the department of service to which their Master called them. In studying the varied fruits of the one Christian principle in the renewed heart, there are several dan- gers to which we are exposed — either, on the one hand, the danger of discouragement in not attaining the cha- racteristic excellences of men of different tempera- ments; or, on the other, that of self-satisfaction in the neglect of virtues and graces on the ground of their being foreign from our constitutional tendencies, or of their being of minor importance. Luther could not have been what he was but for the natural endowments with which he was gifted, the training which he received, and the circumstances in which he was placed. The gentle child who is nursed in the bosom of an affectionate and enlightened family, and who is sheltered there from every rude wind, from the sins and the persecutions of the world, should feel no discouragement if he is unconscious of the lion-like qualities of the great Reformer. Luther and that child may have in common a true love to the Saviour, and may produce in common those fruits of love to Christ which their respective circumstances demand. And neither should covet to be as the other, provided only that each is fitted for his own place and sphere. The oak cannot be as the vine, nor the vine as the oak; but the one, standing in its own majesty and strength, can resist the storm ; and the other, sheltered from the storm, and sustained by the strength of some friendly support, can produce the rich and nutritious grape. Both are pervaded by OPPOSITE DANGERS. 55 a common life, the gift of their Maker; and by the virtue of that common life they perform the very diflferent functions for which they are severally fitted. In Holy Scripture there are what have well been called elastic promises : " As thy day, so shall thy strength be ;" " My grace is sufficient for thee ; my strength is made perfect in weakness/' The strength required by the reformer is not promised to the child, but to each is secured that which each needs. While some are discouraged by a sense of their deficiency in the characteristic excellences of men of other temperaments than their own, others are apt to rest too contentedly under a sense of such deficiency, as if those duties to which they are, or imagine them- selves to be, constitutionally indisposed, were less binding on them. This involves greater danger in the opposite direction. Carry out this notion to its con- sequences, and it will amount to this, that the easier a duty, the greater its obligation. All duties are strictly of equal obligation. But the less disposed a man is naturally to a particular course of action which it is his duty to pursue, the greater need there is that he should exercise diligence and painstaking in pro- moting his own advancement therein. AVhat is com- paratively easy for one man, may be comparatively difficult for another. If it be a duty in both cases, he who finds it most difficult is bound, instead of neglecting it because of its difficulty, to gird himself with the greater earnestness to its accomplishment. It is with Christian character as it is in sculpture and painting, very much of its beauty depends on little things. It is told of a gentleman who had engaged an artist to execute a piece of sculpture for 56 THE soul's work. him, that, visiting the artist's studio after an absence of several weeks, he supposed that little progress had been made. '^ What have you been doing ?" he asked. " Working on this figure," was the reply. " But I see nothing done since my last visit." " Why/' answered the artist, " I have brought out this muscle ; I have modified this part of the dress ; I have slightly changed the expression of the lip." " But these are trifles," said the visitor. " True, sir," replied the artist, " but perfection is made up of trifles." The Christian contents himself too often with an outline of Christian character, instead of caring for its details. We are governed, it is true, — and the truth is important, — by great principles rather than minute rules. But it is equally true that the Bible por- traiture of the Christian character includes in it most carefully the smaller and less prominent features, as well as the larger. The Bible describes the Christian virtues and graces with great minuteness, and says, '^ Think on these things." But Christians often fail to think on them ; and the consequence is a great lack of symmetry, and beauty, and completeness in their character. Much of the beauty of Christ's character arose from the minuteness and comprehensiveness with which, so to speak, its parts were filled in. There were no blank, spaces, no moral vacancies in him. He was altogether lovely. "A life of great and prodigious exploits would have been comparatively an easy thing for him; but to cover himself with beauty and glory in small things, to fill and adorn every little human occasion, so as to make it divine, this was a work of skill which no mind or hand was equal to but that which shaped the atoms of the world." It was not, however, that he ACTIONS GREAT AND SMALL. 57 laboured to make up by outward form and artificial details for the want of inward life and spirituality. Every part of his practical living was the outgrowth of the life that was within. And thus, by giving the most varied possible embodiment to the spiritual life which he has imparted to us, *' it becometh us," like him, "to fulfil all righteousness." But "the act of righteousness which we should select as most worthy of commendation and most demonstrative of piety of heart," to use the words of the Kev. Henry Melville, "may not be that on which the Almighty would fix, when signifying the approval of one of his servants. It may rather be, that some sacrifice which the world never knew, some exertion which was limited to his own home, and perhaps even his own heart, has been the most approved thing in the sight of the Lord, of all wrought by one whose time, and substance, and strength have been wholly devoted to the cause of religion. It may not be when, like Paul, he is fighting 'with beasts at Ephesus;' nor when, like Stephen, he is laying down his life for the truth, that a man of God does what specially draws on him the smile of his Maker. There may have been quiet and unobserved moments, mo- ments spent in solitude and prayer, in which he has fought what God accounted a harder battle and won a nobler victory. And in the arrangements of his house- hold, in meeting some domestic trial, in subduing some unruly passion, he may virtually have displayed a stronger trust, and a simpler preference of the pro- mises of the Most High, than when he stood forth as the champion and confessor, amid all the excitement of a public scene, and gained for himself a deathless re- nown. 'The Lord seeth not as man seeth;' and mightily should it console those who are not so circum- 58 THE soul's work. stanced as to have great opportunity of making efforts and sacrifices on behalf of Christ and his cause, that it is not necessarily the martyr whose self-surrender is most accepted of God, nor the missionary whose labours and endurances are most held in remembrance; but that the private Christian, in his struggles with himself, in his mortification of his passions, in the management of his family, in his patience under daily troubles, in his meek longings for a brighter world, may be yet dearer to his Father in heaven, and be thought to have shown more faith, than many a man who has entered boldly the desert of heathenism with the cross in his hand, or even ascended the scaffold to seal with his blood his confession of Christ." Tn Christian character, then, let it be a first principle that there is nothing '' little," and that no duty can be of seconda?')/ obligation. Constitutional differences will mould and modify our exhibition of the graces of the Spirit; but they afford no warrant for the neglect of any of them. Love to God is the grand principle, we have seen, which assimilates the Christian to his great Exemplar, the root from which spring the many virtues and graces of the Christian character. How, then, is this love to be cultivated ? By what means shall it be nurtured and strengthened? All-important question ! There are some fundamental principles bearing upon it which we can only briefly indicate. First of all, it is necessary that we should know, and, knowing, should study and contemplate the character of God. It is told of a Roman emperor that he was wont to say of his subjects — " Let them hate me, so they but fear me." The only fear that was possible in HOW TO CULTIVATE LOVE TO GOD. 59 these circumstances was the trembling dread of a ruth- less and vindictive oppressor, to whose ears groans were music. But let this tyrant be changed, and let his change of heart be seen in a change of government; let him become just, and generous, and merciful, " the father of his people;" and the sentiments of his sub- jects towards him will change. Love will take the place of hatred in their bosoms. Instead of the lower- ing gloom, and the deep secrecy, and the suspicious evasions of that " fear which hath torment," there will be the open frankness of confidence and the unsus- pecting freedom of love. Now, if men think of God, as the Romans had too much reason to do of their oppressor, or as the heathen have always done of their gods, they will think of him wrongly and falsely; but the efi'ect will be the same : they cannot love, they can only hate and tremble. Let a father, in the education of his child, adopt the system of constraint and terror, all his ends effected by command and coercion, the rod for ever in his hand, the sole instrument of prevention and punish- ment; the child, in such a case, will speedily lose all the easy freedom and open artlessness of childhood. He will be afraid to speak, afraid to act, afraid to look ; timid, jealous, sullen, cringing, hypocritical, kept in incessant awe by the dread of passionate scolding or of bodily pain. But let the parent change his principle, and instead of the system of passionate and severe co- ercion, let him adopt that of love. Let him win the affections of his child ; let him gain his confidence ; let all his instructions, and reproofs, and chastisements be mingled with the meltings of fondness, and the whole of his domestic intercourse be characterized by smiling affection, a corresponding change may be looked for 60 THE soul's work. in the child. For a time^ especially if the opposite system has been long in practice, he may wonder, and suspect, and hesitate, and, like the disciples when they saw their risen Master, " believe not for very joy ;" but as soon as he is satisfied that the alteration is real, his heart will be dispossessed of the tormenting demon of fear by the gentle yet mighty energy of filial love.* In God as a Ruler and Father there is all, and more than all, that the most exalted conceptions of these re- lations can imagine. '^ Just/' and " holy," and " good," are the simple terms in which his character is set forth — inflexibly just, spotlessly holy, ineffably good. Words utterly fail to express his glory as a ruler and a father. But men have wronged him fear- fully. They have conceived of him and felt towards him as if he were such a ruler as that Roman tyrant, and such a father as this we have described. They have trembled, and hated, and defied ; they have shunned, and distrusted, and disobeyed him. And all this they have done under false impressions of his character. Now these impressions must be corrected. They must learn his true character, for only then can they love him. And then they would love him, but for certain evils, more difl&cult to overcome than igno- rance, inherent in their state and condition as fallen sinners. And this introduces us to another fundamental principle touching the means by which love to God is both awakened and nurtured in the human soul. The knowledge of the glorious holiness of the divine na- ture will never awaken love in the regions of the lost. * See " Sermons," by Ralph Wardlaw, d.d , pp. 319, 20. FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES. 61 Nor can it on earth unless such knowledge be accom- panied by the hope of forgiveness. The gospel of Christ combines both, and hence its efficacy. It re- veals God in all the beauty of his holiness ; and it opens to the sinner a way of return to his forgiving Father; it exhibits God as a just God and a Saviour, reconciling men to himself, and with the outstretched arms of love receiving them back to his family. And thus are the rebellious hearts of sinners subdued and melted. With penitential sorrow and grateful love they are constrained to give themselves to God/^ "The blessed light in which the Divine Being is now seen dispels the ' horror of great darkness' from their minds. The blood of sprinkling having given peace to the con- science, and the freedom of grace having unchained the spirit from the fetters, heavy and galling, that bound it in terror and weighed it down to despair, the sinner, exulting in his newly found liberty, 'runs' with gratitude and gladness in the ways of God's commandments." He is no longer a rebel but a servant, and not a servant merely, but a son, a son who in " the spirit of adoption " trusts, and loves, and obeys.* Nothing but faith in the one perfect sacrifice of Christ will enable men thus to draw near to God. " The heathen felt this," says Dean Trench, "and all his propitiations, and expiations, and placatory offerings, were dim gropings after it. The Jew felt this, and the blood of bulls and of goats which he ofi"ered was a weak prophecy of it. The Christian feels it, and the ofi"ering of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all, is the perfect fulfilling of this longing. All have alike felt that there must be some such ground, out of a * See this subject illustrated by examples in "The Divine Life," part iv. 62 THE soul's work. man's self, and beyond him, on which he must rest. For what will a man's mendings of himself do, as affording the materials of a reconciliation ? When once the awful vision of a holy God has flashed upon his soul, never again to be put by, when once the idea of law, and of the transgression of a law, has been revealed unto him, and (which is the same thing) when once the abysmal deeps of his own sinfulness have yawned beneath his feet, how idle then doth every thing of his own appear for the repairing of the past, for the knitting again the bands of the broken com- munion with his God ! His works ! as well might he seek to fill a bottomless pit with pebbles thrown into it one by one, or to pay off at one end a debt with pence, which was accumulating by talents at the other. His works ! he cannot so far lie to himself as to believe that they can be better than the source out of which they flow, and that source is unhealed as yet. " Vain is it, then, for a man to seek in himself the grounds of a restored and renewed intercourse with his God. His doings and his strivings leave him where he was, or leave him further off than before. His sin cleaves to him still ; and all his efforts to dis- engage himself from it serve only to cause it to cling to him the closer : it is to him as the poisoned garment which we read that a fabled hero in an evil hour had put on, and then strove to tear away, but in vain : he could only tear away his own flesh." The fact that Christ has died for men is the ground on which the holy God is propitious to the guilty, and pardons and saves them ; and it is our knowledge and belief of this fact that brings peace to the con- science, and inspires the heart with filial love to FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES. 63 God, and filial confidence in him as our Father and Friend. These principles have to do not only with the origi- nation of love to God in the heart, but with its growth and permanence. The believer in Christ continues to be subject, like other men, to those natural laws which regulate the movements and form the constitution of the human mind. And it is one of the most remark- able of these laws, that all passive impressions on the mind of man become weaker as they are repeated, and that all active principles are strengthened by their exercise in action. " This truth applies to all our affections," says Joseph John Gurney, " and, amongst others, to that pure afi"ection — love towards God, which will certainly wither in the soul, unless it be cultivated and carried forward into action. That divine grace, by which our love to God is maintained, operates through this peculiar law of our nature : by the motive of love, it leads the soul into various acts; and by these acts our love is increased and confirmed." So that " the soul of the believer must be habituated to action : it must maintain a steady energy towards the sovereign object of its desire : it must always be moving forwards in that holy way which leads to God, and happiness, and heaven. Then, although the first blaze of fervour which often distinguishes the new convert may subside into a calm, the pure affection of love to God will be settled in our souls : it will imbue and characterize our new nature: with a perpetual increase of true brightness it will burn for ever." Love to God will be exercised and strengthened by active obedience to every part of the will of God. Studying that will carefully, and cultivating " a con- 64 THE soul's work. science void of offence" in reference both to its prohi- bitions and requirements, the principle of obedience will be stronger and stronger till it possesses all the power of habit. And, " while,'' to use the words of John Foster, "in the great majority of things, habit is a greater plague than ever aflflicted Egypt, in reli- gious character it is eminently a felicity. The devout man exults to feel that, in aid of the simple force of the divine principles within him, there has grown by time an accessional power, which has almost taken place of his will, and holds a firm though quiet domi- nation through the general action of his mind. He feels this confirmed habit as the grasp of the hand of God, which will never let him go. From this ad- vanced state he looks with confidence on futurity, and says, I carry the indelible mark upon me that I belong to God : by being devoted to him I am free of the universe ; and I am ready to go to any world to which he shall please to transmit me, certain that everywhere, in height or depth, he will acknowledge me for ever." Love to God will be strengthened by contemplation as well as by obedience. That love should excite love is a principle which our Maker has interwoven with our very nature. " We love God because he first loved us." And would we nurture our love to him we must contemplate his love to us. It is while with unveiled face we behold, as in a glass, the brightness of our Lord's glory, we are ourselves changed into the same likeness.* And the mirror by which the Lord's glory is most clearly reflected upon us is his holy word- The rays of his love as a Creator, as a Euler, * 2 Corinthians iii. 18. DAILY CLEANSING. 65 and as a Redeemer, shine most brightly in this history of the actual doings and dealings of his love to men. We cannot meditate long on the divine attributes as abstract qualities; but we need never cease to meditate on them as we see them at work and in action in his government and redemption of men. And hence much of the transforming and purifying power which the word of God, as we shall find, has ever exercised over those who have communed much with God in the devout study of its sacred pages. Love to God cannot be awakened in the human heart, we have seen, by the mere knowledge of his character : there must be the hope of forgiveness through the atonement of the Saviour. And this prin- ciple, we have now to remark, is equally essential to the continuance and growth of this divine affection. The character of God, once known and appreciated, must continue to be studied and contemplated: pardon and peace, once received through faith in Christ, must be renewed and sustained by daily application to the Saviour. " If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me," said Christ to Peter. Unwashed by Christ, the sinner is unpardoned, unsaved, unfit for communion with God. But " he that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet" from the dust he has gathered by the way ; and having done so '' he is clean every whit." The outward was ever, in the hands of Christ, the type of the inward. The Christian is " washed," wholly washed, when he looks by faith to the Saviour and is recontjiled to God. But he has to travel over the world's dusty road, and to come in contact with the world's defilement, and thus needs to have his feet washed daily. And only by the constant washing of 6* 66 THE soul's work. the feet is he kept clean. Only thus is his conscience freed from the daily burden of sin, and his confidence towards God maintained. Only thus is he enabled to run with perseverance the race that is set before him. This principle is verified in the daily experience of Christians. " The most eff"ectual inducement to obe- dience/' said Professor Halyburton, " is a constant improvement of the blood of Christ by faith, and a sense of forgiveness kept up in the soul." The biogra- pher of the Rev. Edward, Bickersteth says, in reference to an early period of his life, ^' Mr. Bickersteth had fully received the doctrine of free salvation through Christ; therefore, though cast down, he was not in de- spair; and even in his darkest moments he saw a refuge still open to receive him; but his eye was less fixed on the work the Saviour had wrought out for him, than on the evidences, often imperfect and clouded, of the work that Saviour was accomplishing in him. The aspect of truth most prominent before his mind, was, the heart-searching declaration that ' without holiness no man can see the Lord;' and he had not that full confidence in Christ's pardoning love which enabled him, in his later years, to cast every sin at the foot of the cross, and then to press forward, undistracted by fears as to his own state, to more abundant labours in his Redeemer's cause." The same truth appears frequently, in characteristic phrase, in the diary of Dr. Chalmers — as thus : " April 20, 1840. Began my first waking minutes with a con- fident hold on Christ as my Saviour." " April 21. Let the laying hold on Christ as my propitiation be the ■unvarying initial act of every morning." There are who imagine that, once justified, Christians have no need to pray for pardon. But Christ taught those who THE HOLY SPIRIT. 67 approached God as their " Father in heaven," as often as they said " Give us our daily bread," to say likewise, *' Forgive us our trespasses ;" and nothing can be more essential to the happy and successful prosecution of the Christian life than, in the words of Dr. Chalmers, to let the laying hold of Christ as their propitiation be the initial act of every morning. There is a third fundamental principle that should never be forgotten in the cultivation of love to God, and in the practice of those graces which spring from this root. It is the dependence of the soul on the continual supply of the Spirit of God. " Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure." The inward life of our Lord him- self, sinless as he was, was inspired and directed by the presence and operations of the Holy Spirit. " From the beginning to the end of his earthly course, in all the various circumstances in which he was placed, he was the subject of the special and abundant influence of divine grace. With a consciousness that all things were in his power, and with a prompt and consecrated readiness to act and to suffer continually, he felt, at the same time, as a man, entirely dependent; and it never occurred to him that he had anything, or that he could do anything, out of God. From God operating by his Holy Spirit in his heart he received all wisdom and all strength. ' Behold my servant whom I uphold ; mine elect in whom my soul delighteth. I have put my Spirit upon him.' " How much more do they need '' the supply of the Spirit of grace," who, though made new creatures in Christ Jesus, have still to contend with " an evil heart of unbelief !" 68 THE soul's work. We shall now look at some specific means which have been or may be used for the cultivation of the spiritual life. There are means of spiritual improvement which are of doubtful tendency, means which are sanc- tioned by some of the highest names in devotional literature, but which, in some instances at least, have done more harm than good. Such, for example, is the species of express and written covenant with God which Dr. Doddridge recommends in the seventeenth chapter of the " Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul." As to the duty of an entire and unreserved surrender of ourselves to God, there can be no question, and on this point the author's instructions are good, and his arguments valid. Nothing can be more reasonable than that we should acknowledge God as our Sovereign Ruler, and devote ourselves to him as our gracious Benefactor. Nothing can be more apparently equitable than that we, the product of his power and the pur- chase of his Son's blood, should be his, and his for ever. If rightly minded, our self-surrender will be entire, and cheerful, and immediate. All we are, and all we have, and all we can do, our time, our possessions, will be devoted to him, judging that we are then in the truest and noblest sense our own when we are most entirely his. Dr. Doddridge recommends, however, not only that Christians should thus give themselves to God, but that they should likewise " expressly declare this purpose in the divine presence." " Such solemnity in the manner of doing it," he argues, " is very reason- able in the nature of things; and sure it is highly expedient for binding to the Lord such a treacherous heart as we know our own to be. It will be pleasant WRITTEN COVENANTS. by to reflect upon it as done at such and such a time, and in such circumstances of place and method, which may serve to strike the memory and the conscience. The sense of the vows of God which are upon you will strengthen you in an hour of temptation ; and the recollection may also encourage your humble boldness and freedom in applying to him under the character and relation of your covenant God and Father, as future exigencies may require." " I would further advise and urge/' he says, " that this dedication may be made with all possible solemnity. Do it in express words. And perhaps it may be in many cases most expedient, as many pious divines have recommended, to do it in writing. Set your hand and seal to it, that on such a day, of such a month and year, and at such a place, on full consideration and serious reflection, you came to this happy resolution, that, whatever others might do, you would serve the Lord." To facilitate compliance with this recommendation, Dr. Doddridge supplies two forms of covenant, or of self-dedication, to be adapted to the circumstances of the person who adopts them. ''And when," says the author, " you determine to execute this instrument, let the transaction be attended with some more than ordinary religious retirement. Make it, if you con- veniently can, a day of secret fasting and prayer. And when your heart is prepared with a becoming awe of the divine majesty, with an humble confidence in his goodness, and an earnest desire of his favour, then present yourself on your knees before God, and read it over deliberately and solemnly ; and when you have signed it, lay it by in some secure place, where you may review it whenever you please; and make it a rule with yourself to review it, if possible, at certain 70 THE soul's work. seasons of the year, that you may keep up the re- membrance of it." The sentiments of Dr. Doddridge's " Examples of Self-dedication" are devout. But the benefits of the practice which he recommends are very questionahle. It is certain that in the experience of many it has not promoted hoUness and steadfastness, but has engen- dered bondage. The remarks of Mr. Newton on the subject are wise and moderate: — "Many judicious persons," he says, '-have differed in their sentiments, with respect to the propriety or utility of such written engagements. They are usually entered into, if at all, in an early stage of profession, when, though the heart is warm, there has been little actual experience of its deceitfulness. Frequently, the young convert, like the Israelites when they saw the Egyptians dead upon the shore of the Red Sea, fondly supposes that his warfare is at an end, when it is scarcely begun. They believed in the Lord and sang his praises; little apprehending what a wilderness was before them. Thus in the day when the Lord turns our mourning into joy, and speaks peace, by the blood of his cross, to the conscience burdened with guilt and fear, resolu- tions are formed, which though honest and sincere, prove, like Peter's promise to our Lord, too weak to withstand the force of subsequent unforeseen tempta- tions. Such vows, made in too much dependence upon our own strength, not only occasion a further discovery of our weakness, but frequently give the enemy advantage to terrify and distress the mind. Therefore some persons, of more mature experience, discountenance the practice as legal and improper. But as a scaifold, though no part of an edifice, and designed to be taken down when the building is RESOLUTIONS. 71 finished, is yet useful for a time in carrying on the work, so many young converts have been helped by expedients which, when their judgments are more ripened, and their faith more confirmed, are no longer necessary. Every true believer, of course, ought to devote himself to the service of the Redeemer; yea, he must and will, for he is constrained by love. He will do it not once only, but daily. And many who have done it in writing, can look back upon the transaction with thankfulness to the end of life ; recollecting it as a season of peculiar solemnity and impression, accom- panied with emotions of heart, neither to be forgotten nor recalled.'^ The objection which is taken to written covenants may be taken likewise to written Resolutions as a means of spiritual improvement and steadfastness. And yet examples of such resolutions, as of covenants, may be found in the lives of some of the holiest men. Before Jonathan Edwards was twenty years of age he had written a series of Severity Reso- ^ Jonathan Ed- lutions for the regulation of his heart ^oa^.^diedfn^Tss! and life. They are prefaced with these words : " Being sensible that I am unable to do any- thing without God's help, I do humbly entreat him by his grace to enable me to keep these resolutions, so far as they are agreeable to his will, for Christ's sake.'' The first resolution will show how thoroughly he de- sired to be the Lord's : — " 1. Resolved, that I will do whatsoever I think to be most to the glory of God and my own good, profit, and pleasure, in the whole of my duration ; without any consideration of the time, whether now or never 72 THE soul's work. so many myriads of ages hence. Resolved, to do what- ever I think to be my duty, and most for the good and advantage of mankind in general. Kesolved, so to do, whatever difficulties I meet with, how many soever, and how great soever." No one courted singularity less, and yet if he could not follow the Lord wholly without being singular, his " heart was fixed. '^ The sixty-third of liis seventy resolutions is as follows : " On the sup- position that there never was to be but one in- dividual in the world, at any one time, who was properly a complete Christian in all respects of a right stamp, having Christianity always shining in its true lustre, and appearing excellent and lovely, from whatever part and under whatever character viewed : Resolved, to act just as I would do if I strove with all my might to be that one who should live in my time." Jonathan Edwards was not more illustrious for his genius than for his piety. He occupies a high place as a philosopher, and is entitled to an equally high place as a saint. Few men have more entirely lived as " seeing Him who is invisible.'' But it may be doubted how far his Seventy Resolutions, as such, contributed to this blessed end. It was the result rather of his study of Holy Scripture and his habits of prayer and of self-examination. These are indicated in the resolutions themselves. For example : " 28. Resolved, to study the Scriptures so steadily, constantly, and frequently, as that I may find, and plainly perceive, myself to grow in the know- ledge of the same." ^' 29. Resolved, never to count that a prayer, nor to let that pass as a prayer, nor that as a petition of a prayer, which is so made SELF-EXAMINATION. 73 that I cannot hope that God will answer it; nor that as a confession, which I cannot hope God will accept." Jonathan Edwards's " Resolutions" show the prin- ciples and aims which constituted the foundation of his great and distinguished excellence, and may be studied with advantage by all who are likeminded with him. But it may be questioned whether such resolutions do not always fetter the free action of spi- ritual motives over the soul. That they usually bur- den the conscience is certain; that they promote stead- fast holiness is doubtful. The piety as well as philanthropy of Joseph John GuRNEY is well known. The most remarkable feature of his private me- neyfbo/nm ittsI J , , , f, died in 1847. moranda when twenty years of age, is to be found, according to his biographer, in the anxiety which they manifest, that while study is pursued with regularity and diligence, the culture of the heart and the formation of moral and religious habits may ever be the first object of desire. With this view we find him accustomed to test himself by a series of heart-searching questions, often recording with humiliation a variety of faults, and at other times thankfully noting apparent improvement. The follow- ing will illustrate the general character of the ques- tions. They are from an isolated page of the journal, headed " Qu^STiONES Nocturne." " Have I this day been guarded in all my conversa- tion, saying not one thing inconsistent with truth, purity, or charity ? " Have I felt love towards my neighbour ? " Have I done my part towards my own family ? t4 THE soul's work. " Have I been temperate in all respects, free from unlawful desires, habits, and anxieties ? " Have I been diligent in business ? Have I given full time to effectual study ? " Have I admitted any other fear than that of God? " Have I passed through the day in deep humility, depending constantly upon, and earnestly aspiring after, divine assistance ? *^ And have I in everything acted to the best of my knowledge according to the will of God ? *' Have I worshipped him morning and evening?' "This practice of self-examination," he writes in his autobiography, " was, I think, useful to me, and afterwards resulted in my keeping a regular journal, the writing of a perpetual letter to myself for my own private use. Thoroughly as I am aware of my own deficiencies, I may venture warmly to recommend to all my young friends the two practices to which I thus early habituated myself : — the reading of the Scriptures in the original languages, especially the New Testament, and the keeping of a private journal, chiefly with a view to close self-examination before Him who * searcheth the reins and the heart,' and who will render to every one of us according to our works." " It is possible," his biographer remarks, " that in the early stages of his experience, there may have been, in the habitual use of these questions, somewhat of a bondage to form ; but the honest diligence and earnestness which they manifest are highly instructive." We do not much fear any " bondage" into which such honest self-examinations may lead an enlightened soul. Their effect will doubtless be frequent self- DIARIES. 75 abasement before God. But if the humbled spirit knows how to look for the sprinkling of atoning blood, it will receive peace in the midst of its humilia- tion, and along with peace a fresh stimulus to pursue the onward course. In order to these self-examinings being salutary, however, they must have reference, as in the case of Joseph John Gurney, to principle, and to the practical operation of principle rather than to emotional feeling. The practice of recording the daily vicissitudes of Christian experience has the sanction of many eminent men. " I am convinced," wrote Henry Martyn, " that Christian experience is not a delusion : whether mine is so or not will be seen at the last day ; and my object in making this journal is to accustom myself to self-examination, and to give my experience a visible form, so as to leave a stronger im- pression on the memory, and thus to improve my soul in holiness : for the review of such a lasting testimony will serve the double purpose of conviction and consolation." A diary written wisely for these ends, or as recom- mended by Samuel Pearce, can scarcely be other than beneficial. " Keep a diary ^^ he wrote to a young man who was preparing for the Christian ministry. ^' Once a week at farthest, call yourself to an account ; what advances you have made in your different studies ; in divinity, history, languages, natural philo- sophy, style, arrangement ; and amidst all, do not forget to inquire. Am I more fit to serve and to enjoy God than I was last week V But diaries degenerate too commonly into mere records of the ever-varying tides of feeling; and then 76 THE soul's work. they become a snare. Frames and feelings are unduly magniJBed until they seem the whole or the more im- portant part of Christian experience, and are mistaken for those affections and motives which are the true principles of action. The consequence is often found to be a species of spiritual self-torture which produces no fruits of holiness. As a general rule, it will probably be found a wiser plan to do as recommended by John Foster in his essay " On a man's writing memoirs of himself/' — to review one's life (we should say periodically, or at least frequently), and endeavour not so much to enumerate the mere facts and events of life, as to dis- criminate the successive states of the mind, and so trace the progress of what may be called the cha- racter. " What I recommend," he says, "is to follow the order of time, and reduce your recollections, from the earliest period to the present, into as simple a statement and explanation as you can, of your feelings, opinions, and habits, and of the principal circum- stances through each stage that have influenced them, till they have become at last what they now are. Whatever tendencies nature may justly be deemed to have imparted in the first instance, you would prob- ably find the greater part of the moral constitution of your being composed of the contributions of many years and events, consolidated by degrees into what we call character ; and, by investigating the progress of the accumulation, you would be assisted to judge more clearly how far the materials are valuable, the mixture congruous, and the whole conformation worthy to re- main unaltered." Such a review of the continuous formation of cha- racter, if executed faithfully and devoutly, cannot be MEANS OF Christ's trogress. 77 other than beneficial. It may lead to the discovery of evil influences which are working insidiously^ and which are imperceptibly corrupting and undermining the good. It may stimulate to the more sedulous use of means which are found to be beneficial, and the more earnest cultivation of the varied graces of the Spirit. There are specific means of spiritual progress, ia reference to the propriety and efficacy of which no doubt can be entertained. And, in approaching the consideration of these, it is natural to inquire whether any trace can be discovered in the life of our Great Exemplar of any means that were used by him for the promotion of his spiritual life, or which, being used by him, did promote his spiritual life. AVe do not forget that he never needed " the renewing of the Holy Ghost.'' Born sinless, and growing up sinless, repent- ance and conversion could form no part of his expe- rience. But, although being sinless he was incapable of regeneration, we have seen that he was not incapable of progress. And it may be affirmed, at the least, that his increase in wisdom, and in all the gifts and graces which wisdom includes, was simultaneous with the constant study of the Holy Scriptures and the con- stant practice of prayer. And we are not too bold in adding that the one was the fruit of the other. In the whole tale of the life of Christ we shall find no statement more mysterious than this, "It came to pass in those days, that Jesus went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God ;" * or this, " Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, Sit ye here, while I go and * Luke Ti. 12. 7* 78 THE soul's work. pray yonder;"* "And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down, and prayed."']' The Son of God on his knees ! It is the most mysterious position, save one, in which he was ever seen. Only believe him to be the Son of God, and the most extraordinary events of his life become the most natural. Studying the Gospels from this point of view, we are not surprised to be told of the miraculous manner of his birth. We are not surprised to hear of his turning water into wine, or multiplying a few loaves into the food of thousands. We are not surprised to find such records as the following: — "Great multitudes came unto him, having with them those that were lame, blind, dumb, maimed, and many others, and cast them down at Jesus' feet ; and he healed them : insomuch that the multitude wondered, when they saw the dumb to speak, the maimed to be whole, the lame to walk, and the blind to see : and they glorified the God of Israel."J " The multitude won- dered," and, looking at Jesus as they did, from the human side of his character alone, well they might : by the confession of all, " it was never so seen in Israel." But had they recognized an Incarnate God, they would not have wondered. The incarnation itself would then be the wonder ; and the mighty works of the Incarnate One, even when most supernatural, would be held to be most natural. That the dead should obey the voice of the Son of God and live; that winds and waves should be subject to his word ; that the spirits of hell should flee from the presence of his majesty and purity ; all this we should look for almost as a matter of course. But the Son of God in poverty, * Matthew xxvi. 36. f I^ul^e xxii. 41. X Matthew xy. 30, 31. CHRIST IN PRAYER. 79 the Son of G-od in sorrow, the Son of God in tears, the Son of God in prayer — these are the true wonders in the life of Jesus Christ. And of these the last is per- haps the greatest. We feel ourselves at once in a region of mystery, when we think of the Son of God in prayer. The divine and the human in the person of Jesus Christ, — how they were united, in what relations they subsisted towards each other, — '' without controversy " great is this mystery. And the difficulty which is presented to the human understanding, whenever it dwells upon the twofold nature of Christ, is never brought into greater prominence than in connection with the fact that hu- man prayer was offered by him who thought it no rob- bery to be equal with God. But let us not be guilty of the folly of attempting to solve a mystery that is confessedly too high for us, or of the folly of rejecting it because we cannot solve it. There is not a truer philosophy than that which says, in the words of Dr. Watts, " Where reason fails with all her powers, There faith prevails and love adores." There is nothing more human in the life of Christ than prayer. " Prayer,'^ it has been well said, " differences man from the creatures below and from the creatures above : it is the symbol of the fact, that on the one hand he is infinitely higher than all other mundane works of God j and that he has been made, on the other, a little lower than the angels." So that the prayers of Jesus Christ are a proof of his possessing a true human nature. If Christ truly prayed, then was he truly man. The weakness of infancy, and his growth in wisdom and stature, do not more clearly certify the humanity of Christ, than do the prayers of his riper years. 80 THE soul's work. It is true that in connection witli some of his prayers, and in the very language of others of them, the rays of his diviue glory shine forth. The veil is not thick enough to hide the brightness of the majesty which it covers. When Jesus was '^ baptized, and praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son ; in thee I am well pleased.''* In this instance, while in the act of prayer, there was given a public and mysterious recognition of him as the well- beloved Son, the only begotten of the Father. In the well-known prayer recorded in the seventeenth chap- ter of John, Christ's very words are illuminated, so to speak, with the divine glory. While as a man he pleads with God, yet the very form of his pleading is instinct with the consciousness that he was more than man. But there are prayers of our Lord in which the human element appears alone and exclusively — those especially that were offered on the eve of his betrayal, in the garden of Gethsemane. There he "offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save him from death. "f In Gethsemane we have a true man in mortal conflict with suffering and the prospect of suffering, constrained by the pressure which weighed down his human heart to cry for exemption from the bitter cup, and yet in this, as in all his trials, " without sin," submitting himself to the will of his Father. We cannot but regard those long seasons of devo- tion which we read of in the life of Christ, as means of spiritual strength to his own human heart. When * Luke iii. 21, 22. f Uobrews v. 7. CHRIST IN PRAYER. 81 "he continued all night in prayer to God," many of his petitions were doubtless the petitions of the Great High Priest on behalf of his ransomed church. And prayers oflFered on the mountain side, or on the sea- shore of Galilee, may still be drawing down blessings on the world. But his protracted seasons of devotion were doubtless equally, if not chiefly, seasons of per- sonal communion with his Father in heaven. His soul could not live without such communion. The most ardent longings of the regenerate heart after fellowship with the Father of spirits must be faint as compared with the longings of that heart which needed no regeneration ; which had nothing in it that could clog its aspirations upward, or blunt its sense of the attractions which drew it Godward. Fellowship with God in prayer was thus a necessity of his pure nature. But not a necessity merely. It was a means of his spiritual progress and power. God gave ''not the Spirit by measure unto him."* But does not the analogy of faith justify us in believing that the rich communications of the Holy Spirit to Jesus Christ were connected with his prayers ? Is not this one of those things in which it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren ? It is instructive to observe, likewise, that Christ is represented as giving himself to special prayer in connection with the various emergencies of his life and the various stages of his ministry. Of no one could it ever be said with so much truth, that '' all his works were begun, continued, and ended in God." His piety was not fitful, but habitual. His love to his Father and zeal for his Father's glory were not like the stream of the desert, now swollen by winter * John iii. 34. 82 THE soul's work. rains, and now dried up by summer heats, but like the mighty river whose waters flow in an unfailing volume. Never had he to confess lukewarmness, or imperfec- tion, or corrupt taint in his motives. Never did he sink into a spiritual condition that should unfit him for any duty or for any emergency. And yet when special duty called, or special emergency was at hand, we find that he gave himself to special prayer. It was so before the choice or appointment of the apostles. "And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God. And when it was day, he called unto him his disciples : and of them he chose twelve, whom also he named apostles."* We cannot suppose that these two facts bore no relation to each other, but that of proximity in time. The selection and appointment of apostles to be his ambassadors to the world, and to lay the foundation of his church in the earth, was an act of the highest moment to his glory and to the future destinies of the world. And to us the fact that, in anticipation of it, the Lord from heaven retired to the solitude of a mountain, and spent a whole night in prayer, is fraught with solemn lessons. The Spirit which rested on these apostles even before the day of Pentecost, and the Spirit which descended on them more abundantly when the day of Pentecost was fully come, the successes which attended both their earlier and their later ministry, the faith which upheld them in times of temptation and of persecution, the graces which adorned their character, the gifts with which they were endowed — these may have been in a large measure an answer to the prayers of those solitary hours of the night which preceded their appointment. * Luke vi. 12, 13. CHRIST AND THE BIBLE. 83 Like Christ, we should be given habitually to prayer. The stream of our devotion should flow beside the stream of our activities; or, rather, the two should commingle their waters. But at the same time, in every occurrence, in every doing, in every suffering, that stands out from the common-place tenor of our life, we shall only be following Christ if we turn aside and give ourselves to special prayer. Whether the occurrence be purely personal, or whether it have relation to public affairs, the example of the Saviour instructs us to withdraw from labour and action, and give ourselves to prayer. At the throne of grace we shall obtain the wisdom and the strength, the power and the love, which the emergency, whether of duty or of trial, demands. Of Christ's early devotion to that word which his own Spirit in the prophets had long before inspired, we have evidence in the only recorded incident of his life as a child — his interview with the doctors in the temple; and in the history of his temptation in the wilderness, in which he appealed three times to what "is written" in one of the books of the Old Testa- ment. And how significant is the fact of Christ's early love of the Bible, and his early communion with its facts and thoughts ! This is the book in which some men see but little divine glory, whose revelations partake too much of outwardness, and are cast in too human a mould. And yet this is probably the only book that ever furnished thought to the pure mind or addressed motive to the pure heart of the Son of God. His mother did as the book itself required : " These words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou 84 THE soul's work. sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risesfc up."* True it is that never before or since had human mother such a child for her pupil. But, wonderful as he was, he sat at the feet of that human mother, and heard from her lips the words of the law of her God, and was taught by her to unroll for himself the blessed volume, and trace its precious lines. From this book the child, the boy, drew spiritual nourishment, and increased in wisdom; and the man still loved the book on which the boy had fed. Admit, then, that the constant study of the holy Scriptures and the constant habit of prayer were simultaneous with the progress of the sinless Jesus, and why should we hesitate to believe that they were the means of that progress, and that in this, made like unto his brethren, he has taught us how we may obtain spiritual strength and make spiritual advance- ment in gift and grace ? Christ's Bible was the Old Testament; and if his pure mind found nourishment and strength there, much more may we. As a book of devotion and experimental piety, it is most precious. '* "Where shall we find such noble examples of a faith which no difficulties could overcome ; of a hope which no disaster could quench, no delays enfeeble; of a delight in God and God's service, which cast all other joys into the shade; and of a serene, abiding religiousness, which looked at all things on their Godward side, and kept the mind that was stayed on God in perfect peace amid all the tumults, and griefs, and shadows of time? * Deuteronomy ti. 6, 7. HAVELOCK. 85 It makes one's heart strong to study them. It breaks up the sybarite effeminacy which, in seasons of tran- quillity, is apt to invest our religious being, and it stirs us up to quit us like men in the never-ceasing spiritual warfare, to read how these men of the old time, amid the twilight of their dispensation, strength- ened each other and themselves in the Lord, and fought their way through to ^ the city which hath foundations,' where they now rest and reign. Most certain is it that, in all times of peculiar danger or darkness, it is to these ancient Scriptures that the church instinctively turns for consolation and for vigour. Most certain is it that all men of strong and deep minds find a peculiar pleasure in the perusal of these writings, and acknowledge in them something to which their own souls cling with a vivid sympathy. Most certain is it that, of those who have borne or achieved great things for the cause of God, the greater part were wont to feed their spiritual energies at the banquet which these provide. It is not safe to neglect such experiences. If we do, we may soon find nothing left to us but to mourn over the days that are gone, and say, ' Our silver is become dross, our wine is mixed with water.' " ■« Were the secret history of illustrious Christians brought to light, we should find, probably without exception, not only that the word of God occupied a large place in their regard, but that it was the especial means of grace which they used and prized. On the announcement of the death of General Havelock, the following communication was made to a public journal: — '' It may interest your readers to be told that, even on such arduous service as the Affghan campaign and 8 86 THE soul's work. the siege of Jellalabad, Havelock invariably secured two hours in the morning for reading the Scriptures and for private prayer. If the march began at six, he rose at four; if at four, he rose at two. Is it any wonder that he was raised up as a deliverer of our people, almost like one of the judges of Israel ?" And we may add, is it any wonder that, in circumstances the most adverse and trying to Christian principle and holiness, he was enabled to adorn the doctrine of God his Saviour, and constrain men to reverence a faith which they did not love ? A hundred years before the days of Havelock, another brave soldier preserved and promoted his spiritual life by means remarkably similar. The cir- cumstances which attended the conversion of Colonel Gardiner, and the decisiveness of the change itself, are better known than the beauty and completeness of the Christian character which he afterwards attained. For a considerable time after his conversion. Colonel Gardiner felt the deep emphasis of those well-chosen words in which the apostle Paul ranks the trial of cruel mockings with scourgings and bonds and impri- sonments. " I ^m obliged to dispute every inch of the ground," he wrote to the pious mother, whose heart had often been wrung by his wicked courses, but was now filled with gratitude and joy; ^' but, all thanks and praise to the great Captain of my salvation, he fights for me ; and then it is no wonder that I come ofi" more than conqueror." The secret of his steadfastness, of his rapid progress, and of his high attainments, is to be found in the habits of devotion and of Bible reading which he formed at the commencement of his religious history, SARAH MARTIN AND THE BIBLE. 87 and which he continued throughout life. It was his custom to rise at four in the morning, and to spend two hours in reading, meditation, and prayer. If at any time he was obliged to go out before six in the morning, he rose proportionably earlier; so that when a journey or a march required him to be on horseback by four, he would be at his devotions at furthest by two. And to those resolute habits of self-denial may well be ascribed his growth in grace. Sarah Martin, the humble seamstress, who has so worthily acquired the title of " the Yarmouth philan- thropist,^^ hated no book as she hated the Bible, before her conversion to God. She hated it partly because she feared it. If a ray of gospel light came across her mind in any way, she turned from it, she says, as from a reptile. The Bible in the hands of her grandmother was a daily terror to her. Two Bibles, which had been her mother's, she removed from their place and hid, that they might not meet her eyes ; and this she did with the idea that, should the Bible after all prove true, the less she knew of it the better it would be for her. But in proportion to this aversion to the Bible was her after-love to it. It was the great foun- tain of her knowledge and of her power. For many years she read it through five times every year ; and she formed a most exact reference-book to its contents. Her intimate familiarity with its striking imagery and lofty diction impressed a poetical character upon her own style, and filled her mind with exalted thoughts. Above all, she applied its truths and lessons to her- self, and that in a manner worthy of universal imitation. " The advantage of resorting to the Bible, in circum- 88 THE soul's work. stances of trial or difficulty, for minute direction and sure guidance has been/' she wrote, '' as- life against death to me. And oft, when my strong impetuosity of feeling and my impatience before God have arisen before an evil, when anger would have assumed the place of patient, enduring love, and when my own sins before God became greater than that which was to be deplored and reproved by me in another, then this divine and perfect book, whilst it supplied and still supplies correction, ever told of mercy.'' To one who complained, *' I make no progress in my Christian course," she replied, " Take your Bible on your knees, plough into it, and you will not stand still," One of the first effects of the conversion of Thomas Chalmers was his regular and earnest study of the Bible. An old and privileged friend, visiting him before the great change, said to him on one occasion, "I find you aye busy, sir, with one thing or another; but, come when I may, I never find you at your stu- dies for the Sabbath." " Oh ! an hour or two on the Saturday evening is quite enough for that," was the answer. But when Chalmers's heart was turned to God, this old friend often found him poring eagerly over the pages of the Bible. The difi'erence was too striking to escape notice, and his friend remarked, " I never come in now, sir, but I find you aye at your Bible !" '^ All too little, John, all too little," was the significant reply. From the beginning of his religious course, Mr. Chalmers was sensitively afraid, we are told by his biographer, lest the truth, as God had revealed it, should come to him distorted or mutilated, because coming in the form in which it was presented by THE BIBLE A BOOK OP THOUGHT. 89 human systems or in theological controversies. "The primary and most earnest effort was to derive his Christianity immediately from the Divine Oracles, to lay his whole being broadly open, to take off from the sacred page the exact and the full impression of divine truth in the very forms and proportions in which it was there set forth.'' His correspondence and journals bear ample testimony to this fact. " If we ask what most characterizes the Scriptures," says Mr. Douglas of Cavers, "it is thought. As the Bible is the book of books, so its contents are the thought of thoughts, demanding, provoking, supplying thought without end. Such we might well suppose to be its character, considering its Author. God is a Spirit; and thought is the action of spirit, and the purest product of mind. But thought is a high exercise 3 painful to our low and earthly faculties, and readily dispensed with where not absolutely necessary. And hence men favour classes who think for them, both with respect to their temporal and spiritual affairs. And hence religious writings are more read than the Scriptures themselves, because here the effort has been surmounted by others; the thoughts are already expanded, and the feelings educed which the meditations upon passages of Scripture were suited to inspire. It is true, the feelings which are merely the reflection of the feelings of others are not so valuable as the original impressions; and nothing can com- pensate for the painful but salutary effort of evolving truth for ourselves. Still, the union of thinking for ourselves, and profiting by the thoughts of others, will jointly produce the most profitable results; and they who meditate mostly upon the Bible will 8* 90 THE soul's work. most value and best appreciate the meditations of others." At the same time it is, and will for ever remain true, that they who "meditate most upon the Bible" will be the highest, holiest, devoutest class of Christians. It is said that if a grape-vine be planted in the neighbourhood of a well, its roots, running secretly underground, wreathe themselves in a net- work around the cold, clear waters; and the vine's putting on outward greenness and unwonted clusters and fruit, is all that tells where every root and fibre of its being has been silently stealing. Even such is the fruitfulness of those who are in constant spiritual communion with the fountain of life. "Blessed is the man Whose delight is in the law of the Lord ; And in his law doth meditate day and night. He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, That bringeth forth his fruit in his season : His leaf also shall not wither ; And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." The Bev. George Wagner presents a beautiful Geor ewa ner- ^^^^^P^^ ^f the Commingling of prayer i8r8;dfed'Feb.io: with all the duties and occupations of life. On the approach of his first great college examination at Cambridge, in 1839, we find him expressing a holy jealousy over his heart in these words : — " My mind is in a frightfully nervous state, thinking of examinations and the attainment of human learning, instead of being calm and composed, and resting upon Jesus." Again : — " Much spiritual blindness : I fear that reading for examination is a very deadening thing. But I hope, by the grace of God, that I shall soon be raised from this sorrowful state, and delivered from so great temptations; and be GEORGE WAGNER AND PRAYER. 91 enabled to worship God in an humble and quiet spirit." The examination came; and beautiful was the pre- paration of heart with which this devoted Christiaa student entered upon what he felt at once to be a duty and a snare. " Got up at half-past five, dressed, read the Bible, and prayed until seven. Went to chapel, and enjoyed it more than usual. After chapel, prayed and read the Bible until eight. Bead Euclid, and went in to the examination in a confused state. This is the first day. Have not done well ; my body has not been well, and there is every sign of breaking down before it is over. Prayed before and after din- ner. This evening my mind jaded. Lord, pardon my manifold infirmities, and grant that I may do all things to thy glory. By the tender mercy of God, have not suffered much from ambition. Shall be thank- ful when it is over. Lord, grant that my mind may be stayed upon thee, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen." And again a few days after : — '^ My mind far too much occupied with this examination. Prayed before and after dinner. . . . This evening my mind dread- fully distracted. My private tutor has just been in, talking about algebra. How happy shall I be when all is over ! How trifling are these things of time compared with eternity ; and yet how the mind dwells on them and magnifies them ! Lord, graciously look down upon me, and purify and make me holy, for JesiK Christ's sake. Amen." His life at home was governed by the same strict rules as those which he imposed on himself at college. He resolutely maintained the practice of early rising, as early as five o'clock when circumstances allowed it; and the time thus redeemed he consecrated to prayer 92 THE soul's work. and the study of the Bible. " I ought to secure two hours at least for these purposes/' he says, " before my day begins." And as the day began, so it con- tinued. " Pray always jive times a day," is the reso- lution he records, "at regular times, besides when moved to it." What is called " ejaculatory prayer" will be found of great spiritual benefit. " If prayer is the breath of the spiritual life," says the author of " Preces Pau- lina?," " then it follows that our devotional acts should be of almost momently recurrence, and not long-drawn respirations to be followed by a deathly or trance-like stillness." We have indeed at stated times to climb the mount of communion, and there inhale the refreshing breezes of a purer atmosphere ; but as we tread our pathway through the vale of ordinary duty, we must be ever breathing out our desires, and drawing in our needed supplies of grace. We may not limit ourselves to ejaculatory petitions, but neither may we neglect them. Our more prolonged devotions are necessary to the life of our soul ; but that life will manifest itself in our briefer suppli- cations, our more cursory entreaties for pardon and guidance. " These form the links of an electric chain, That join the orisons of morn and eve, And propagate through all its several parts, While kept continuous, the ethereal fire." " To me," says Dr. Pye Smith, " it appears that the grand means of maintaining happy cheerfulness, in union with that penitent humiliation which we should ever preserve, is the habit of early but prompt inter- course with God through the divine Mediator, by thought and ejaculation, rejoicing in God through our THE RIGHT USE OP THE SABBATH. 93 Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have received the atonement." The importance of the right use of the Sabbath, and of the appointed ordinances of religion, as means of spiritual strength and progress, is too obvious to need much remark. Some indeed are disposed to plead the hahitual cultivation of piety as au apology for lowering the Sabbath to the level of other days. But such persons do not understand either the urgen- cies of their own hearts, or the wisdom of God in making provision for them. The testimony of Sir Matthew Hale, William Wilberforce, and others, to the value of the Christian Sabbath as a means of grace, has been often quoted. These good men guarded this blessed institution sacredly from the intrusion of the world and of politics, and found in it a fountain of spiritual refreshment and mental invigo- ration. Of Henry Martyn, whose employments were all in a sense spiritual, and who might therefore be regarded as less dependent on Sabbath privileges, his biographer says : " The Sabbath, that sacred portion of time set apart for holy purposes in paradise itself, was so employed by him as to prove frequently a paradise to his soul on earth -, and as certainly pre- pared him for an endless state of spiritual enjoyment hereafter." In the Christian life, "what God hath joined to- gether, let no man put asunder." He has "joined" truth and love, law and freedom ; but men often " put them asunder." Truth, without love, is " dead, being alone ;" love, without truth, is mere worthless sentiment. Law, obeyed without that spirit of freedom 94 THE soul's WOUK. which pardoning mercy imparts, is bondage; a free- dom that shall be independent of law degenerates into self-will and license. In his early spiritual struggles, John Wesley re- sorted to the mystic writers, '' whose noble descrip- tions of union with God and of internal religion,*' he says, " made everything else appear mean, flat, and insipid. But, in truth, they made good works appear so too, yea, and faith itself; and what not? These gave me," he says, " an entire new view of religion, no- thing like any I had before. But, alas ! it was nothing like that religion which Christ and his apostles lived and taught. I had a plenary dispensation from all the commands of God; the form ran thus: 'Love is all; all the commands besides are only means of love; ■ you must choose those which you feel are means to you, and use them as long as they are so.' Thus were all the bands burst at once. And though I could never fully come into this, nor contentedly omit what God enjoined, yet I know not how I fluctuated between obedience and disobedience. I had no heart, no vigour, no zeal in obeying; continually doubting whether I was right or wrong, and never out of per- plexities and entanglements." There are those who, though not professedly mys- tics, would substitute love for law, instead of making it the motive to the obedience of law, or would set aside positive commands on the ground of their being superseded by the one higher command of love. Out- ward ordinances, especially, are, in the esteem of such persons, mere dead things, — material, carnal. Chris- tians should be too spiritual, too heavenly, to make them of any account. But not so thought Christ, and his example has made provision, by prophetic AN UNERRING EXAMPLE. 95 anticipation, against this error. He performed every duty that was prescribed by God, whether in the moral law or in the peculiar institutes of the Mosaic law " under" which " he was born." When an infant, he received the initiatory ordinance of Judaism. He was " redeemed," according to the law, as the ^' first- born" of his mother, though himself the Redeemer of the world. It can scarcely be doubted that he pre- sented every offering that was required of an Israelite, though himself the propitiatory and Paschal Lamb, the archetype and substance of all the shadows of Judaism. He visited the synagogue, and learned and taught there, though himself the " truth." He en- tered the temple, and worshipped there, though him- self greater than the temple, — the human shrine of the Eternal God. The ministry of John the Baptist, under which the old dispensation passed into the new, received at his hands the like honour; and standing humbly before the servant of God, he asked baptism, although he needed no repentance, saying, " Suffer it to be so now : for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness."* Christ's followers must be more spiritual than Christ himself, before it will become them to do otherwise. Faith invariably produces obedience to the will of God in whatsoever that will is known to require. Holy works are its never-failing fruits. " They are no less necessary to its health, growth, and vigour, than motion to that of the body; and like leaves they feed and strengthen the life they spring from." Blessed be God for a divine example which thus meets us at every point of our spiritual course, and * Matthew iii. 15. ■96 THE soul's work. teaches us where and how to walk. In following Christ whithersoever he goeth, we are haunted by no fear that we may be doing the thing that is wrong. We can sit at his feet; we can go with him into soli- tude and into society; we can observe him when he communes with God, and when he deals with man ; we can watch his lips and his emotions when he stands face to face with friend and with foe, with no misgiving that possibly we may be led astray by the unreserved surrender of ourselves to the guidance of his example. If we learn to feel as he feels, and to speak as he speaks, and to act as he acts, being Christ-like, we shall be God-like. His words and acts are " the true stars which stand fast in the heavens," and by whose calm and unchanging light we are led onward from well- doing to well-doing in the way to God and to glory. " Lord, as to thy dear cross we flee, And plead to be forgiven, So let thy life our pattern he, And form our souls for heaven. " Help us, through good report and ill, Our daily cross to bear; Like thee, to do our Father's will. Our brethren's grief to share. "Let grace our selfishness expel. Our earthliness refine, And kindness in our bosoms dwell. As free and true as thine. '* Kept peaceful in the midst of strife. Forgiving and forgiven; Oh may we lead the pilgrim's life, And follow thee to heaven." CHAPTER II. THE WORLD'S WORK. Contents. — Is it compatible with the divine life ? — Natural simili- tudes — Testimony of Scripture — Monasticism — Christ's infancy — True idea of Christ's private human life — Did he work with his own hands ? — Significance of the occasion of his first miracle — Alleged asceticism of John the Baptist — Apostolic forewarn- ings — Conclusions — Enoch — the patriarchs and their discipline — Daniel — Wilberforce — The profession of arms — Hedley Vicars — General Havelock — Common soldiery — Toil and care a spiritual discipline — Extracts from Caird and Whewell. 'Not slothful in business; fervent in spirit; serving the Lord." EOMANS xii. 11. I 91 "Religion is not so much a duty, as a something that has to do with aU duties; not a tax to be paid periodically and got rid of at other times, but a ceaseless, all-pervading, inexhaustible tribute to Ilim who is not only the object of religious worship, but the end of our very life and being. Piety is not for Sundays only, but for all days; spirituality of mind is not appro- priate to one set of actions and an impertinence and intrusion with reference to others; but, like the act of breathing, like the circulation of the blood, like the silent growth of the stature, a process that may be going on simul- taneously with all our actions ; when we are busiest as when we are idlest; in the church, in the world ; in solitude, in society; in our grief and in our gladness; in our toil and in our rest; sleeping, waking; by day, by night — amidst all the engagements and exigencies of life." Eev. John Caikd. THE WORLD'S WORK. The world's work and the divine life ! Are these contrary the one to the other? If by necessity or otherwise they are brought into contact in the same person, is their contact one of mutual forbearance merely, or may it grow into an alliance of friendship and mutual help ? Is the world's work done best apart from the divine life? Is the divine life safest and strongest apart from the world's work? On the answer that is given to these questions will depend the entire structure and complexion of our practical Christianity. One answer will lead us to "flee from man and man's pursuits," and betake our- selves to a monastic seclusion, from which, at a dis- tance, we shall pity the world and hear the murmur of its busy sounds, but not touch it, lest we be defiled. A different answer will not only allow but constrain us to go into the thickest of its society, and the com- monest of its labours, believing that even there we shall be subjected to no necessary defilement, but may serve God in all well-pleasing. Two streams, especially if in rapid motion, may flow side by side for many a mile without mingling their waters. It is so with the Mississippi and Missouri, the line of meeting between whose waters may be traced for miles below the junction of the two rivers. It is so with the Gulf Stream, whose waters preserve a distinctive character, as they sweep along through (9y) 100 THE world's work. the Atlantic, like a stream of oil in the ocean, for three thousand miles It is so with the shallow Arve and the majestic Rhone. The Rhone flows from the Genevan Lake, clear as cr3^stal ; the Arve flows from the " restless grinding glaciers," muddy, and cold as death. Descending from its mountain birthplace, the Arve rushes into the Rhone at right angles, as if in haste to mingle its noisy current with the waters of the lake river; but the Rhone repels its advance, and rushes on by itself. And thus the two rivers flow on without mingling, the cold mud on the one side, and the clear crystal on the other. '' The Arve is the child of night and frost," to use the words of Dr. Cheever, " while the Rhone is the daughter of the day and of sunshine." Now, are these true symbols of the world's work and of the life of God in man's soul 'r* And are these the only fit relations which they can sustain to each other ? Let the appeal be made to Holy Scripture, and such questions are soon answered. The relations and the labours of life are not only tolerated there, but dis- tinctly sanctioned. What Socrates is said to have done in philosophy, the inspired writers have done in religion ; they have brought it down from heaven to earth. We find them now prostrate in adoration before the throne of God, and, overwhelmed with the profound mystery of his being and of his works, exclaiming, " the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!"* And then we find them enforcing a comprehensive and manly regard to all present, personal, and social duty. They inculcate * Romans xi. 33. SOCIAL RELATTONSTTIPS. 101 the transcendant importance of what is spiritual, and say, *' If je then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth."* And then they insist on earthly claims, and place them under the highest sanctions of the Christian faith: "If any provide not for his own, and especially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel.""!* Let men abandon work on a religious pretext, as did certain Thessalonians, and apostles are at once prepared to command, on divine authority, that ^' if any will not work, neither shall he eat. "J The verdict of these divinely guided men on the social relationship of life is equally clear. And we associate the relationships of the world and the work of the world, because they involve and imply each other. When the latter is repudiated as unholy, so are the former. But what saith the Scripture ? Its testimony, full and explicit, will be found in the 6th chapter of the Epistle to the Ephesians. Marriage, instead of being less holy than celibacy, is with the writers of Scripture the chosen sign of the spiritual union which subsists between Christ and his people ; and its duties are inculcated by the highest considera- tions which the mysteries of the gospel can suggest. It is not necessary that we measure and define the exact force of every word in this Scripture, in order to see in it a standing and conclusive argument against monasticism. Its strength and its minuteness leave nothing to be desired. The married woman, instead of being in a less holy condition than the unmarried, * Colossians iii. 1, 2. fl Timothy v. 8. X 2 Thessalonians iii. 10. 9* 102 THE world's work. is the apostolic symbol of the church of Christ, when presented to him in stainless glory, beyond the reach of all earthly defilement. The married man, instead of being in a less holy state than the unmarried, exer- cises in that state an authority which is the symbol of Christ's authority over his church. The love of the husband to the wife, and the tenderness with which he cherishes her, are not of the earth earthy, but find their ideal and their highest motive in the tender love of Christ to his church — the love which has redeemed her, the love which cherishes her, and which will not be content till it has robed her in unsullied and unchanging purity. The duties of the relationship are not to be discharged as a low necessity, but as '' unto the Lord." And the relation, once entered upon, is indissoluble. This is apostolic teaching; but what says monasticism ? Monasticism has not only drawn the unmarried to its cells and solitudes, but has dared to give dispensa- tion to the married to forsake each other for its hijrher and holier life, thus making void the law which God enacted in the beginning, which Christ confirmed by his express authority, and which furnished the apostle Paul with his best illustration of the indissolubleness and the intimacy of the union between the Saviour and the saved. As if prophetically to anticipate this pre- sumption, and to lift up a standard against it, the apostle not only repeats the law of paradise, but asserts its obligation on every "individual;" — "Let every one of you in particular (individually) so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband."* " What God hath joined together let no man put asunder/'f is the divine law. * Ephesians v. 33. t Matthew six. 6. SEPARATION FROM THE WORLD. 103 ''You may break it asunder," the monastery says, ** if you only do it for me." " Husbands, love your wives; wives, reverence your husbands,"* the law says. " Husbands, you may forsake your wives \ wives, you may forsake your husbands," the monastery says, " if you only do it for me." The law and the monastery, then, cannot both be of God. And we are not surprised to find the prohibition of marriage, of which the " Spirit spoke expressly" as one of the cha- racteristics of " latter times," described as a departure from the faith, and the product of seducing spirits. f The duties of rulers and subjects, of masters and servants, of parents and children, are all described and enforced on the same page with the duties of husbands and wives. The existence and permanence of those relations are presupposed. And not only is their law- fulness implied, but their obligations are placed under the sanction of the one great Christian principle of " doing every thing unto the Lord." "What otherwise might be mean and earthly is thus ennobled and exalted by its alliance with the spirit of heaven. Christians, it is true, are solemnly charged to come out from among unbelievers, and be separate, and not touch the unclean thing.J But that the separation is to be a moral separation, practised in the very midst of the world's society and pursuits, is the ex- press assertion of the apostle who commands it. " I enjoined you in my letter not to keep company with fornicators 3 yet, I meant not altogether to bid you forego intercourse with the men of this world who may be fornicators, or lascivious, or extortioners, or idolaters ; for so you would be forced to go utterly * Ephesian.o v. 25. 33. f 1 Timothy iv. 1—3. X '2. Coi iutbiaus vi. 17. 104 out of the world. But my meaning was that you would not keep company with any man who, bearing the name of a brother, is either a fornicator, or lasci- vious, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such a man, I say, you must not so much as eat."* The " going out of the world " in order to avoid contact with its evils was a thing not to be thought of, according to this apostle; and any construction put on his words which implied such aa issue, must be, Paul himself intimates, utterly wrong. Christians are not to flee from the presence of the ungodly, or decline the intercourse which their occu- pations necessitate ; while at the same time they are not to acknowledge the brotherhood of the wicked, or choose them for the friends of their heart. It is not a local or social separation, but a moral and spiritual, that the apostle enjoins, when he says, " I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not con- formed to this world : but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.""]" To sustain our argument, it is not necessary to appeal to the practical corruptions and abuses of the monastic system, and to show how, founded on vows of poverty and celibacy, monastic orders have acquired wealth and practised habits of the grossest self- indulgence and licentiousness. Nor is it necessary to deny the incidental advantages which, in certain cir- cumstances, have accrued to society from their exist- ence. Their principle is fundamentally wrong. The • 1 Corinthians v. 9 — 11. This translation by Mr. Conybeare may help the reader to a clearer perception of the force of the passage. t Romans xii. 1, 2. THE HUMAN IN CHRIST. 105 better the man who sought in them a refuge from the chaos and turbulence of the world, the more was he needed in the world. " What doest thou here, Elijah V said " the still small voice" to the fugitive prophet in his hiding-place in Mount Horeb. " What hast Thou, of all men, to do here ? Thou, whose post in my ser- vice is among the haunts of men, to fight my battles against a perverse generation, and to strengthen the hearts of those who still encourage themselves in the Lord their God ; what hast thou to do in this selfish, moaning solitude ? what hast thou to do here .^" " Go, to the world return, nor fear to cast Thy bread upon the waters ; sure, at last, In joy to find it after many days." This notion, however, with its invariable associate, asceticism, is deeply rooted in our nature. It has grafted itself on all the religions of the world, true and false. Judaism was not proof against it; Chris- tianity has been corrupted by it; and both the creeds and the rituals of heathendom are steeped in it. But it is utterly opposed to the example and teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ. Centuries after his departure from the world, the history of his infancy and childhood was overloaded with legends, which originated in a spirit of blindness that could not perceive the beauty of the human and natural elements of his life. And the Bible picture of his childhood is so human, in the truest and purest sense, that even the most enlight- ened thinkers can scarcely fill up the outline without introducing, in their desire to magnify him, features that are not in keeping with the original. When the poet of " Paradise Regained," for example, represents the Lord as recalling in the wilderness the inward communings of his boyhood, and saying — 106 THE world's work. " Above my years, The law of God I read and found it sweet, Made it my whole delight and in it grew To such perfection, that, ere yet my age Had measured twice six years, at one great feast I went into the temple, there to hear The teachers of our law, and to propose What might improve my knowledge or their own." we consent to the fitness of the meditation. But when he proceeds to say — " Yet this not all To which my spirit aspired. Victorious deed Flamed in my heart, heroic acts, one while To rescue Israel from the Roman Yoke ; Then to subdue and quell, o'er all the earth, Brute violence and proud tyrannic power, Till truth were freed and equity restored," we consent to the comment of one who says — " High resolves, no doubt, worthy of a hero, but only of a hero ; it is ourselves magnified, but only magnified : the pe- culiar element of St. Luke's picture is gone.'' Now, what is that picture? Christ's birth was attended by special forthcomings of divine power and majesty, which attested his glory as the Son of God. But we pass these by, and find him a human child, with all a child's dependence, bodily and mental, under the care of Joseph and Mary, in the despised Galilean town of Nazareth. His parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the passover. And when he was twelve years old, he accompanied them. This is the only circumstance that is recorded of the first thirty years of his life; and in the record there is one sentence which lifts the veil from his humanity; "one sentence which difi"erences the history of Christ from any thing that could have been reported of the life of any other man.'' It is that which contains the words of Christ to his mother : — " How is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's DID CHRIST WORK WITH HIS HANDS ? 107 business ?" or " Wist ye not that I must be in my Father's house ?" Either way, in the mysterious reference to his Father, we see a ray of the divine glory breaking through the veil behind which his majesty for the most part lay concealed; With this exception, 'Hhe tale in no way transcends ordinary ex- perience. The child missed — the parent's alarm — the return to Jerusalem — the search for him in the city — the discovery of him in the temple with the doctors — the reproach of the mother — the submission and re- turn of the son ; all these circumstances, constituting as they do a tale of deep interest, do yet contain no single feature that is not purely human." And this peep into the manner of his human life is most in- structive and most precious. That child, whose under- standing and answers astonished the doctors and other worshippers in the temple, and who claimed a myste- rious relationship to God as his Father, returned to the bosom of the humble family to which he belonged at Nazareth, and "was subject" still, as he had been before, to Joseph and Mary. The honour thus put on the great sacred bond of human society is fatal to the claims of the monastery and the desert to be considered the scene of a higher and holier life than men can lead in the midst of domestic duties. Living in the family of Joseph the carpenter, and sharing in its toils, "Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man."* " Sharing in its toils," we have said. The ques- tion of the people, "Is not this the carpenter ?"f may have been asked because he belonged to a car- penter's family. But the most natural interpretation of it is, that he was himself known to follow the * Luke ii. 52. f Mark vi. 3. 108 THE WORLD^S WORK. carpenter's occupation. And why should we shrink from believing it ? Because it was beneath him ? There was nothing beneath him hut sin. If it was not beneath him to become man, it could not be beneath him to do man's work. We only dishonour the Saviour by supposing that while under the humble roof of Joseph, and, after Joseph's death, that of his own loved and widowed mother, he folded his arms and lived a life of depend- ence on others, himself absorbed in meditation — a life which to his neighbours could appear only as that of an idle dreamer. That he wrought no miracle to supply his family's wants, we know ; and that he was " subject to his parents," we know. Now among the Jews it was considered, at that period, incumbent on a father to bring up his son in some art or trade. And it is the saying of an eminent rabbi, that " Y/hosoever teacheth not his son to do some work, is as if he taught him robbery." Jesus assuredly, occupying the place of a poor man's son, would not eat the bread of idleness. If any one had suggested that he should be exempt from the obligation common to others, his reply would have been, " Thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness." We confess, indeed, to a sentiment of wonder at the spectacle presented to us in that carpenter's shop at Nazareth, the Son of God in human nature enrning his bread with the sweat of his brow. But it is only a part of the great wonder of God incarnate; and while we wonder and adore, we bless him that herein he has left us an example that we should follow his steps : " The disciple is not above his Master, nor the servant above his Lord." There are times when rebel thoughts arise. Toil, we imagine, is beneath us. THE FIRST AND THE SECOND ADAM. 109 What men have proudly called ^' the strong divinity of soul" stirs within our bosoms, and makes us con- scious of a mind that is capable of rising to a know- ledge of God and of his universe, seen and unseen ; and our hearts question, " Shall such an one as I, Tsith a soul allied to the nature of God himself, work all my days in clay and wood, in iron and brass ?" The question may take another form. " Redeemed from among men, made a child of God and an heir of heaven, living on the very confines of glory, is it meet that I should be doomed to a life of perpetual toil, and that in connection with the meanest of earth's mean affairs V The early Christians, just emerging from the shades of ignorance, and awakened by new hopes, were in great danger of being led away by such ima- ginations as these. Feeling an elevation to which they were strangers before, and looking down upon the world around them as the vassals of sin and Satan, they might be easily tempted to imagine the restraint of laws could not extend to persons so highly privileged, and that it was ignominious in the freemen of Jesus Christ to submit to the yoke of idolatrous rulers. Hence probably the bold and emphatic terms in which apostles inculcated subjection to earthly ordinances, "for conscience sake." The yoke of manual labour and physical toil is likewise to be borne " for conscience sake;" and if we need ought to reconcile us to it, there is enough in the fact that it was borne both by the first and by the second Adam. The first, yet perfect, the image of God still untar- nished, while earth and heaven were in unbroken fellowship, and God himself was the friendly visitor of his earthly child — the unfallen Adam — was placed in the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. The 10 110 THE world's work. second, the Lord from heaven, not only sinless man, but incarnate God, spent his dajs not in the king's palace, nor in the philosopher's school, nor in the hermit's solitude, but in the carpenter's shop. AVe need not that the orator or the poet should tell us of the dignity of labour; or the economist, of its neces- sity; or the casuist, of its lawfulness. One visit to Nazareth, and we see it all. "It is enough that the dis- ciple be as his Master, and the servant as his Lord." " Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" said Christ, in explanation of what seemed mysterious to his parents — his converse with the doctors in the temple. They are his first recorded words; and his last before his death are like them — " It is finished." These sayings may be regarded as the moral boundaries of his life, the one at the beginning, the other at the end. He began life by saying that he "must be about his Father's work;" he ended life by saying that his Father's work was accomplished. Now there was nothing in all that life of his that did not form a part of his Father's work. Our minds naturally revert to the glorious teaching of the mount of Beatitudes, the glorious miracles that were wrought by his word, and the still more glorious sacrifice which he ofi'ered on Calvary, and say, " These formed his Father's business." But not these alone : there was not the smallest thread in the whole web of his life that was not put there *' according to his Father's will." He was in his right place in the workshop as well as in the temple. He was doing the right thing when he was obeying the parents of the Nazarene family, as well as when he was commanding the winds and the waves. When with a human heart and human hands he held his THE MIRACLE IN CAN A. Ill place for thirty years in the domestic circle, and shared its toils and cares, he was doing his Father's will as certainly as during those three years that were spent in the open manifestation of his divine Son- ship, and in the direct accomplishment of the world's redemption. In his public life he stands alone; in its mysterious grandeur and peculiar aims he can be followed by neither man nor angel. But in his private life, covering by far the larger space in his earthly sojourn, he is the example of all. Whether they plough the land or plough the sea, wield the hammer or wield the pen, do the work of a master or the work of a servant, they have only to do all "as unto the Lord/' and it will be acknowledged as their Father's business. And in the midst of it, and of the society of the world which it necessitates, they may be as Jesus was, still "separate from sinners." The after-life of Jesus, though devoted to other labours than those of the family and the workshop, teaches the same lesson. His first miracle was per- formed at a marriage feast, and in aid of the marriage festivities — a circumstance which has often occasioned wonder, but which is instinct with meaning. That he should have chosen a marriage feast for beginning to " manifest forth his glory" was not the result of accident; nor can we reverently imagine it possible that in any sense the choice was inconsiderate or unin- tentional. With the history of the church before us, we see in it a prophetic protest against the ascetic habits and monastic vows which have claimed to themselves a higher religious character than can belong to the rela,tions and pursuits of common life. We see in his miracle more than an act of kindness to the indi- 112 THE world's work. viduals whose nuptials were celebrated in that cottage home in Cana of Galilee; we see in it the rendering of transcendent honour to that state which was ''in- stituted of God in the time of man's innocence." The English marriage -service does not exaggerate the import of Christ's act when it says — " Which holy estate Christ adorned and beautified with his pre- sence, and first miracle that he wrought." The Founder of the kingdom of heaven on earth did not begin his work by teaching his followers to break every tie of earthly kindred, and neglect every earthly duty, and flee into solitudes, where they might live the life avowedly of saints, but more truly of worms or of wild beasts. He laid the foundation of his kingdom in that humble household for whose benefit he turned water into wine. Then and there did he claim the family as the first and special sphere for the growth and exercise of the Christian graces and virtues. And the existence of families involves the existence of all the other relations of life, with all their duties and labours. The whole fabric of society rests on the family, and instead of dissolving society, the Christ of God claimed it as the scene of his spiritual reign, to be purified and pervaded by the holy principles of his gospel. Human connections and interests and joys were not abandoned to the princedom of his rival, the devil, but taken possession of for the glory of God. The social life of man was not destroyed, but sanctified by the Lord from heaven. The same truth and lesson are taught by the words in which Christ chid the inconsistency of the Jews. " John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine; and ye say. He hath a devil. The Son of man is come eating and drink- JOHN THE BAPTIST AND CHRIST. 113 ing; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners."* In fulfilment of his vow as a Nazarite, John drank no wine. In harmony with his mission as a minis- ter of " repentance," and with his condition as a poor man, he was clad in a dress which may still be seen every day in Syro- Arabia, — a rough robe of camel's hair, bound about the waist with a leathern girdle. In preparation for his great work, he lived for a time in the wilderness, and was content with such food as the wilderness supplied — locusts and wild honey. From his desert home, where he communed with nature in its wildest aspects, and still more, with the God of nature, the God of Israel, he looked towards the towns and cities of Judea, saw and brooded over their corruptions, and nursed the thoughts and feelings which these awakened, until the time of his appearing to Israel arrived. In all this there was no asceticism. It was only in keeping with the peculiar character of his work, and admirably preparatory for it. But even if in a very modified sense John's manner of life be called ascetic, Christ's may not. And his is the true model of the Christian life. The charge against him, " Behold a gluttonous man, and a winebibber," was false, and was not believed, even by those who made it; but the fact on which it was based, and which Pharisaic enmity perverted into a crime, was admitted by himself: "He came eating and drinking." He did not cultivate an ascetic piety in the seclusion of an oratory, or in the solitude of a desert, but "received sinners, and ate with them;" and while he did so, he was " holy, harmless, and undefiled." He was "separate from sinners" in the way in which * Luke -vii. 33, 34. 10* 114 THE world's work. he wills Ins followers to be, even when he mingled in their society, and ate at their tables. If John's man- ner of life be declared the prototype of the ascetic, Christ must be regarded as the type of the Christian. The lesson which was conveyed by his first miracle at Cana was confirmed by his whole after-life — a life which, while it was the purest ever lived on earth, was spent in social intercourse with mankind, and amid the common pursuits of the world. The Christian life, as it appears in the writings of the apostles, was the life of parents and children, of masters and servants, of rulers and subjects, of buyers and sellers — a life spent in cities, not in solitudes — in the workshop and the market-place, not in cells and cloisters. These writings, moreover, contain a solemn protest against the ascetic practices whose encroach- ments began even in the apostolic times, and whose growing pretensions the prophetic spirit distinctly foresaw. " Since with Christ ye have died ofi" from the rudiments of the world, why, as yet living in the world, do ye suffer such ordinances to be published among you as ^ Touch not, taste not, handle not,' in reference to things which are meant to perish in the use — ordinances which have no higher authority than the commandments and the doctrines of men ? which procedure, indeed, having a show of wisdom in will- worship and humility, and neglecting of the body, not in anything of value, only ministers to the gratifica- tion of the flesh."* " The Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits forbid- ding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, * Colossians ii. 20—23. ENOCH NOT AN ASCETIC. 115 ■which God hath created to be received with thanks- giving."* The whole phenomenon of asceticism, in- clusive of its self-chosen austerities and its abandon- ment of the relations and duties of social life, is "a, huge self-deception, and a reversal of that moral order which God has established." We are now prepared to assert, and to illustrate by examples, the following positions : — First. The world's labour and the heart's piety may co-exist in the same person, each in the highest and intensest degree — sure sign that, at the least, there is no natural repugnance between them, and that they are not hostile the one to the other. Second. The highest motives which Christian piety can supply may be brought to bear on the discharge of the labours connected with the world's work, and with the duties of our social relationships. Third. Those labours and duties may become the means of nurturing and strengthening the virtues and graces of the Christian character. "We need not bid, for cloister'd cell, Our neighbour and our work farewell ; Each trivial round, the common task, Will furnish all we ought to ask; Room to deny ourselves ; a road To bring us daily nearer God." Enoch " walked with God,'' but not in a state of separation from society and the common work of man. He was not an ascetic or recluse. " He married," says the Rev. W. Jay, quaintly but truly, '' earlier than any of his patriarchal brethren, and had sons and daughters. It is not the religion of the Bible that drives men into caves and dens of the earth, * 1 Timothy iv. 1, 3. 116 THE world's work. or thnt tenclies them to counteract the destinations of Providence, or to oppose the nature that God has given them. Is a wretched, dronish monk in his cell, with his horse-hair, skull, and hour-glass, a more amiable, a more useful, a more lioly being than Enoch at the head of an early family, filling up his station, and serving his generation by the will of God?" As it was with Enoch, so with the patriarchs Abra- ham, Isaac, and Jacob. These, we have seen, may be taken as representatives of well-known forms and de- velopments both of human nature and of true piety; so were their circumstances, with the interests of their daily life, identical with those which concern men now. They were " not phantoms dwelling in a cloud-land. Theirs was not an anomalous, or legend- ary, or even a heroic life. They were simply men, living through the ordinary stages of their mortal existence upon earth, in honest and loyal conformity to the order which has been prescribed by God.'^* And that order supplied at once their duties and temptations, and with these their discipline. The glimpses we have into their characters, imperfect but struggling onward, identify them with those who are now living, as they were, amid the duties and trials of social life, " Amidst the distractions and humiliation of those domestic cares, which have been so often represented as unfavourable for the culture and de- velopment of an earnest spiritual existence, we see, in these men, the three distinctive types of human cha- racter gradually rising into fitness for those grand positions in the immortal world which human spirits were meant to occupy. Their course was, indeed, often overshadowed by clouds of infirmity and guilt; * G. S. Drew : " Scripture Studies." THE PATRIARCHS NOT ASCETICS. 117 and yet it was ever ascending; and it continually became clearer and clearer, until, at last, it brightened into perfect day. The majestic, large-hearted nature of the first patriarch, and the gentler, calmer disposi- tion of the second — nay, even that subtle and invent- ive mind of Jacob, of which the faculties were often so unworthily misused — all were rectified and perfected ; and, at length, freed from every thing that was pol- luted, and guileful, and infirm, were prepared for an honourable entrance into the regions of the blessed dead. Thus, thoughtfully contemplating their history, we recognize it as having been set before us to sanc- tion and illustrate the domestic order, as well as to encourage all who are now, amidst the trials of that appointment, earnestly and loyally pursuing their end- less path into the future."* In the life of Daniel we have an illustrious ex- ample of the union of business and „ . , r Daniel ; Becnilar devotion — an example which shames vout^pfltyTn iia?I alike those who flee from business in ^°^^' order to be devout, and those who, professing to be devout, do not imbue their business with the spirit of devotion. The incidents of Daniel's history are well known, and need not be recited. In the very first of them the young man's heart is laid bare before us — and there we find, in full possession of his soul, a tender conscientiousness whose only question is, "What is duty? and whose only fear is sin. This it is that preserves him from defilement. He was still a young man when he rose to the dignity and power of the office of prime minister of the king of Babylon; * G. S. Drew : " Scripture Studies." 118 THE world's work. but his elevation did not injure the purity and sim- plicity of his character. Men often gather the robes of integrity more closely around them while the storm rages, and then wantonly cast them away when the sun shines. Those whom no force of terror can drive from the right path are insensibly drawn from it by the loadstone of pleasure. But, towards the end of the administration of Daniel under Nebuchadnezzar, there appears no change in his character, except the manly ripening of his graces and virtues. The spirit in which he announced to his royal master his ap- proaching doom combines in it all the tenderness and simplicity of the child, with all the heroic boldness and honesty of the man. His words* are the words of one who would have, and who Tiadj a conscience void of offence both towards God and towards man. For thirty years from this period, or thereabouts, Daniel occupies no public post. But he is drawn out of obscurity to interpret the handwriting in the banqueting hall of Belshazzar, and appears at once in his old character — bold in denouncing even royal im- pieties, yet gentle and disinterested as ever. Under Darius, the Median conqueror, he becomes the first of the three presidents to whom the whole empire is rendered subject. He is about to be still further exalted, and to have the entire presidentship put into his hands, when the jealousy of the other presidents and of the one hundred and twenty princes is awakened, and they conspire to ruin him. *' But,'^ says the history, "they could find none occasion nor fault; forasmuch as he was faithful, neither was there any error or fault found in him. Then said these men, We shall not find any occasion against this Daniel, * Dauid iv. 19, 27. DANIEL AS A MAN OF BUSINESS. 119 except we find it against him concerning the law of his God."* Daniel then was a thorough man of business, and a thorough man of God at the same time. He did not think it beneath him to pay attention, minute and exact, to all the affairs and accounts that belonged to his department. And such was his exactitude and integrity, that neither flaw nor error could be found in his administration. But it was the fear of God that made him the good man of business that he was. He might have been able and skilful without it, but pro- bably not faithful. In one year he might have amassed, at the expense of others, wealth which would have served him a lifetime. And had he done so, he would only have been following the universal practice; but among the faithless he was faithful. There was a power of resistance to evil, and a power of constraint to well-doing, in his heart, to which his fellow-presi- dents were strangers; a mighty, all-pervading power wliich purified his heart, and made his life pure like- wise. How the enemies of Daniel would have exulted if they could have gone to their king and said, " Thy first president is very devout; he serves the God of his fathers with much incense and prayer; but he robs thy subjects, he robs thy treasure, king!" But this they could not. They had not the smallest pivot on which to place the lever of their malice. Daniel was a good man in the widest and largest sense of the word, faithful to the sovereign above him, faith- ful to the subjects beneath him. Like Samuel, he could have stood up before the assembled empire and say, ^'Behold, here I am; witness against me before the Lord, whose ox have I taken ? or whose ass * Daniel vi. 4, 5. 12Q THE world's work. have I taken ? or whom have I defrauded ? whom have I oppressed ? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes with ? " And the uni- versal verdict would have been, " Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken aught of any man's hands." No; Daniel was a saint, not more in the oratory of his devotions than in the daily transactions of the Babylonish presidency. There was no pretence about him. He did his duty like an honest man, and by the transparent purity of his -character defied his enemies. A thorough man of God, we have said, as well as a thorough man of business. " We shall not find any occasion against this Daniel," said his enemies, " except we find it against him concerning the law of his God." Was he then unfaithful to his God ? Now that he was clothed with honour and power, had he conformed to the worship of Babylon? No; this would have been no ofi'ence. Let him worship the emperor, or worship the sun, or worship Belus, and all would have been well. But he was faithful to his God. In no instance was there discovered, on his part, any dalliance with idols or with the pollutions of idol wor- ship. Gentle and amiable as he was, he was firm as a rock in all that pertained to the service of his God. And here it was that his enemies found the chance of effecting his ruin. Break him they might, but bend him they could not. And if they might only entrap their sovereign into a decree which would, unwittingly to him, involve Daniel in its meshes, they were sure, they thought, to overthrow the man whose goodness was more hateful than his person. What they did, and how far they succeeded, need not be told. The Babylonish princes could live for WILLIAM WILBERFORCE. 121 thirty, and twice thirty days, without addressing one prayer to a higher than Darius. But Daniel could not; nor could he be guilty of the hypocrisy of seeming to comply with the impious terms of the royal statute. " When he knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed and gave thanks before his God as he did heretofore;" nor had he any inti- mation that Grod would command the lions to do his prophet no harm. The good man concerned himself only with duty, and left all consequences in His hands whose servant he was. Daniel was thus faithful to his God in circumstances of the most opposite kinds. He sat in the president's chair unchanged. The warm sun of fortune (as some would call it) did not melt or soften him down into a pliable courtier, or a luxurious man of the world. Its beams wrought no harm in him. He was still faithful to his God. And then when that sun was clouded, and the man, who had basked in it to the envy of all his compeers and rivals, stood on the very verge of martyrdom, he still pursued the even tenor of his way unchanged. The lions' roar moved him as little as the syren's song. The " world's work " which devolved on William WiLBERFORCE was related to govern- n ^ .1 , -1 • William Wilber- ment as was that of Daniel, though in ^^rce; born in 1759; ' o died in 1838. a different way; and the modern philan- thropist performed it in the same spirit as did the ancient prophet. With as wide a circumstantial diver- sity as can well be imagined, we can trace between 11 122 THE world's work. them a close spiritual resemblance: — liow, when a boy, y/ilberforce was taken away from the care of a pious aunt, to prevent his being infected with the contagion of her religious principles — how he was initiated into the mysteries of the theatre and ball-room, as more fitting for his station — how he spent his youth, at home and at the university, as a devotee of youthful pleasure — how he was returned to Parliament, amidst much popular triumph, as member for his native town, when only one-and-twenty years of age, and was courted in fashionable circles, and flattered by royalty — how, by providential leadings of apparently the most casual order, and by the study of Holy Scripture, he was awakened out of the dream of his youth, and became an earnest-minded Christian, may be read elsewhere. Our present concern with him is at this point of his history, and, henceforward, in relation to the world's work. He had not, even in his most frivolous days, abandoned himself to licentiousness; but the deep guilt and black ingratitude of his past life, to use his own words, forced itself upon him in the strongest colours ; and he condemned himself for having wasted his pre- cious time, and opportunities, and talents. The thought of having so long neglected his God and Saviour brought him into a state of the deepest depression from strong convictions of his guilt. " Nothing'/' he says, " which I have ever read in the accounts of others exceeded what I then felt." How should he act now ? Like so many others, should he flee into a monastery to save his soul ? No ; ^e fled to the cross of Christ, and found salvation and peace there. But, now at peace with God, he must live a new life, such a life as lie had not lived before — a devout life, a spiritual life. WILBERFORCE NOT AN ASCETIC. 123 Must he, in order to this, flee into a monastery to give him leisure for its cultivation, and to save him from the tainted breath of the world's communications? Not so : he will remain in the world, but will not be of it. He wrote to his principal friends, informing them he was not what he had been. " Some treated the announcement as the effect of a temporary depres- sion^ which social intercourse would soon relieve : one threw his letter angrily into the fire : others, knowing that his past life had not been vicious, imagined that he could but turn ascetic, and regretted the expected loss of his social accomplishments and political assist- ance.'^ The statesman, his friend, William Pitt, has- tened to Wimbledon to cheer him out of his fancies. For two hours the friends discussed their differences. The man of the world tried to reason the young Christian out of his convictions, but soon found him- self unable to combat their correctness, if he admitted that Christianity was true. To the mother who, when he was yet a child, rescued him from what she deemed fanaticism, he wrote in terms which breathed affection and decision. If we really make the Bible the criterion of our opinions and actions, he said, '' We must reckon on not finding our- selves able to comply with all those customs of the world in which many who call themselves Christians are too apt to indulge without reflection." Accordingly, he withdrew his steps from every haunt of worldly mirth; but not to shut himself up either in his closet in town, or in his hermitage in the country, and there cultivate a hot-house piety. " No, my dear mother," he wrote; "in my circumstances this would merit no better name than desertion. It is my constant prayer that God will enable me to 124 THE world's work. serve him more steadily, and my fellow-creatures more assiduously. And I trust that my prayers will be granted, through the intercession of that Saviour, by whom only we have access with confidence into this grace wherein we stand ; and who has promised that he will lead on his people from strength to strength, and gradually from thence to a more complete resem- blance to their Divine Original." His duty to his Saviour, and his duty to his fellow-creatures, were performed side by side, or rather were blended into one by the principle of doing every thing as unto the Lord. His progress in that resemblance to his Divine Original, which he says was the subject of his constant prayers, was not retarded by the part which he took in the world's work, while that part was sanctified and ennobled by the Christian motives which actuated him. ^' As a politician, he could no longer wheel round in the circle of party; he could no longer, even to a limited extent, take his opinions in the mass from the faction to which he belonged. ?Ie told Pitt he would still support him when he could ; but that he was no longer to be a party man, even to the same extent as before. ' The first years that I was in Parliament,' he said in after-life, ' I did nothing — nothing, I mean, to any good purpose; my own distinction was my darling object.' But, on his becoming a Christian, he acted on new principles. His powerful mind, his eloquence in speech, his influence with Mr. Pitt, his general popularity, were now all as talents lent to him by Grod. And for his work, whatever it might be, he lost no time in preparing himself. He set about the task of concentrating his faculties, and enriching his intellectual stores; he turned to study with an WILLIAM WILBERFORCE. 12$ earnestness he had never hitherto known ; ahove all, he commenced the careful and uninterrupted study of Holy Writ." The peculiar work which Providence gave him to do in the English legislature was great and glorious ; but, if it had been less so in its own nature, it would still have been holy work, being performed in the fear of God. The spirit which he carried into the senate is well described by Lord Brougham. " He was fearful of giving the least pain in any quarter, even while heated with the zeal of controversy on questions that roused all his passions; and more anxious, if it were possible, to gain over, rather than to overpower, an adversary ; disarming him by kind- ness or the force of reason, or awakening appeals to his feelings, rather than defeating him by hostile attacks." When a well-known popular member designated him, repeatedly and irregularly, as " the honourable and religious gentleman/' Mr. Wilberforce poured out a strain of sarcasm which, says Lord Brougham, " none who heard it can ever forget ; " " not," says his lordship, " because he was ashamed of the cross he gloried in, but because he felt indignant at any one in the British senate deeming piety a matter of imputation." '' A common friend of the parties having remarked to Sir Samuel Romilly, beside whom he sat, that this greatly outmatched Pitt himself, the great master of sarcasm, Sir Samuel replied, ^ Yes, it is the most striking thing I almost ever heard ; but I look on it as a more singular proof of Wilberforce's virtue than of his genius ; for who, but he, ever was possessed of such a formidable weapon and never used it '{ ' " He was a Christian in the legislature as well as at the table of the Lord j and in the one he practised the lessons which he learned at the other. 11* 126 THE world's work. If there is one earthly position more than another in which it might be supposed that true religion could not live or prosper, it is among the temptations of a soldier's life. And yet even this position supplies us with many illustrations of the power and beauty of religion. Be the truth what it may, on the question which has been agitated respecting the lawfulness of war, it cannot be questioned that many warriors have been eminent Christians. The camp and the battle- field do not extinguish the power of religion. And this is the point of our present reference to the subject. It was of a Roman centurion our Lord said, " I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel." And it was in the person of another Koman centurion that the Gentiles were admitted to the full privileges of the Christian church. Cornelius was " a just man, and one that feared God,'^ and was honoured, like the peaceful shepherd patriarchs of the Jewish nation, with a visit by an angel, who was commissioned to tell him, " Thy prayer is heard.'' And it was in reference to this Roman captain and his kinsmen and near friends that Peter said, '' Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we ? " The names of Colonel Blackader, Colonel Gardiner, and Major-General Andrew Burn, have long been known as the names of eminent Christians. And re- cent biography has added largely to the number of godly men who have served Christ in a soldier's life. Captain Hedley Vicars, Sir Henry Havelock, Colonel Mountain, Captain Hammond, Captain Bate, and others, are now well known by their memoirs. We take the history and character of two of this holy band, as CAPTAIN HEDLEY VICARS. 127 *' men representative" of many who are like minded in the great concerns of Christian faith and practice. In approaching the lives of Hedley Vicars and General Havelock, one is forcibly reminded of the words of Cowper's hymn, " God moves in a mysterious way/' One of these Christian worthies was descended from a Spanish cavalier, who came to England in the suite of Katharine of Arragon, the first queen of Henry the Eighth ; the other, according to some local traditions, from a Norse sea-king, or pirate, who crossed the sea and found a home on the coast of Lin- coln, centuries before. Had the Spanish Don Vicaro and the Norwegian Hafluck possessed the seer's gift, it would have puzzled them not a little to understand the character of those illustrious descendants of theirs, whom the Christian England of the nineteenth cen- tury delights to honour. Hedley Vicars was a wayward boy, open-hearted and generous, high-spirited and fear- less, loved and loving, and yet thought- rifiu8?D^e.^7, islel . died before Sebas- less as the idle wind. When twelve to^poi. Maren 22, years old, his father's dying hand was laid upon his head with the earnest prayer, " that he might be a good soldier of Jesus Christ, and so fight manfully under his banner to glorify his holy name." But hope deferred had often made his widowed mother's heart sick before that prayer was answered. For years after he entered the army, he lived a life of general recklessness, chequered with occasional con- victions of sin, which resulted in vigorous though short-lived efforts at reform. But, from the hour of his conversion to Christ, his life was pure and holy. All that was buoyant and genial in his natural temper 128 THE world's work. was sanctified by the grace of God, and won the hearts of all who were not repelled by his religion. At home and abroad his face seenaed a signal for cheerfulness. " He walked in the glorious liberty of the sons of God, and with the free heart of a child enjoyed every plea- sure in the gift of which he could trace his Father's hand j yet was there still the evidence in his daily life of a chastened and sober spirit, and of his steadfast obedience to his Master's word, * Watch and pray.' " " Since Mr. Vicars became so good," said one of the light company of the 97th, years after the great change took place, and a few days before his embarkation for Greece and the Crimea, " he has steadied about four hundred men in the regiment." ''Four hundred?" was repeated with surprise by the lady to whom the statement was made. " I don't mean," said the man, *' that he has made all the four hundred as good as himself. That he couldn't. I know enough of reli- gion to know that God alone could do that. But while he was adjutant, and since too, he has sobered and steadied nigh four hundred of the drunkenmost and wildest men in the regiment. There isn't a better man or a better officer in the Queen's service," The miseries of the winter spent by the English and French armies before Sebastopol have now passed into history. It was in the midst of them, on the mud floors of the hospital tents, that Hedley Yicars's faith was to have its last trial. Sharing as he did, in no small measure, the general toil and privation, with the superadded amount of suffering inseparable from his power of strong sympathy, he was ever fulfilling the apostolic injunction, " Bear ye one another's burdens." His faith was not permitted to waver. Through the long dark night of that winter, its lamp never wanted HEDLEY VICARS IN THE CRIMEA. 129 oil, but burned with a clear and steady light which not only cheered those around, but also cast its bright reflection upon praying spirits three thousand miles distant. It has been remarked, says his biographer, by a keen observer of human nature, who himself passed through the same ordeal, that, in the course of that winter, the individual characteristics of men stood out in more striking colours than could have been seen under other circumstances. The selfish became more tenaciously selfish than before, whilst those who were capable of rising to the heights of self-denial lived a life of daily heroism. Hedley Vicars was one of the last. During the severe cold of that winter, the only bed he allowed himself was made of stones and leaves, until a fur rug arrived from England, which he felt was invested with a kind of claim of friendship to be retained for his own use. Everything else which could bear the name of luxury, or even of common comfort, was given to the deeper necessities of the sufi'ering soldiers. When in command of an outpost, he and his men had to sleep for three weeks in the open air, or at least under roofing made of bushes, through which the wind and rain freely penetrated. At length, however, two tents were pitched, — one for the company, the other for its officer. But that officer gave up his own tent to his men, and continued to rough it in the open air, considering himself more hardy than many of them. The presence of Christ was his support and joy. After some months of '^ weariness and painfulness,'' but of spiritual labours and spiritual enjoyment ^' more abundant,'' Hedley Vicars received a soldier's summons into the presence of God. " The night of the 22nd of March was dark and dreary. The wind rose 130 THE world's work. high and swept in stormy gusts across the Crimea. There was for a time a stilhiess over the three armies, like the calm before the tempest. At the advanced post of the British forces, was a detachment of the 97th Kegiment, commanded bj Captain Vicars. No watch-fire on that post of danger might cast its red light, as aforetime, upon the Book of God. Yet was that place of peril holy ground. Once more the night breeze bore away the hallowed sounds of prayer." When he fell his men fought their way through the ranks of the Russians to defend the parting life of the leader whom they loved, and in their arms they bore him back ; but before they reached the door of his tent with their precious charge his life had ebbed. In Hedley Vicars we see the grace of God in no dim and doubtful manner. " Every one," wrote a fellow-officer, while weeping over his cold corpse the morning after his death, — " Every one liked and respected Vicars ; even those who did not agree with his strict religion ; and those who had known him so long as the leader of every mad riot, when after closely watching him for years, and finding that once enlisted in Christ's army he never flinched, at least gave in, and acknowledged that Vicars, at any rate, was a true Christian." " Rough hands wiped the starting tear away," when the name of Vicars was mentioned on the sad morrow of his death. And now that name is dear to tens of thousands who had not known it while he lived, but have heard of the grace of God in him since the fatal conflict on the heights of Sebastopol. Henry Haveioek ; The life and character of the lamented born at Bishop- wearrnouth^.M>Hi g'j, Henry Havelock illustrate the fel4.T8b7!°^''"- compatability of the highest religious EARLY LIFE OF HENRY HAVELOCK. 131 character with busy occupation in the most adverse of this world's pursuits, and show how the principles of such a character animate and ennoble the perform- ance of this world's duties. In boyhood, Henry Haveiock was distinguished both for fearlessness and for thoughtfulness. The former was exhibited in many youthful feats; the latter acquired for him the title of " old philosopher" among his companions at the Charterhouse School. '' The most important part of the history of any man is his connection through faith, with the invisible world. So of Henry Haveiock it may be recorded, that there were early indications of the strivings of the good Spirit of God in his soul, though Satan and the world were permitted for many years to triumph." So he testified himself in later life. In those early days at the Charterhouse young Haveiock and some of his companions were wont to meet in one of their sleeping-rooms for religious purposes. Sermons were read, and conversations ensued upon the reading, as to the bearing of the truth on their own conduct. But the early promise thus awakened was not immediately realized. In 1815, young Haveiock ^^ yielded," to use his own words, " to the military propensities of his race," by asking his brother, who was then in the army, to get a commission for him. And one month after the battle of Waterloo he was appointed second lieutenant in the rifle brigade. In January, 1823, he embarked for India. And it was on the voyage thither, thirteen years after the grave had closed upon the pious mother who first taught him to lisp the name of Jesus, that he became a decided follower of the Saviour. At the time of his 132 THE world's work. embarkation he was in the position of a man " feeling after God, if haply he might find him." The chief means in leading him to Christ was the conversation of James Gardner, a fellow-lieutenant. And from the time of his religious decision, he was not ashamed to own his Heavenly Master, but was concerned only to walk worthy of his name. He was not less a man now that he was. a Christian, nor less a soldier, but sought to perform his duties as both a man and a soldier in the fear of God. Luther's hymn may be regarded as his motto from this time forward : — " Put thou thy trust in God : In duty's paths go on: Fix on his word thy steadfast eye; So shall thy work be done." " He was a man who really believed, and who, seeing the path of duty, held consequences as light as air. His piety underlaid his whole character. There could be but one path — that of duty ; and therefore he was never undecided. There could be but one object of fear — sin ; and personal danger was as the idle wind. There could be but One that ruled — that was the Most High God ; wherefore exaltation and despondency were alike impossible." About ten years after entering the service, Havelock applied for the vacant adjutancy of the 13th. But his psalm-singing had given offence to some ofiicers of the corps, who did not fail to send unfavourable repre- sentations to Lord William Bentinck to prevent the appointment. On the receipt of these letters Lord William called for a return of the number of punish- ments inflicted on the men in the different companies of the regiment, within a given time, for drunkenness and irregularities ; and he found that the men whose "every inch a christian." 133 religious improvement Havelock had been assiduous in promoting were the best behaved, the most sober, and the most orderly men in the corps. When an- nouncing his decision to Mrs. Havelock, the governor- general said, " The complaint is that the men of Have- lock's company are Baptists. I only wish that the whole regiment was Baptist." " Not unlike the case of Daniel," says the Rev. W. Brock, " was the case of Havelock just now. No occasion could be found against him, except it could be found against him con- cerning the law of his God. And when that came to be investigated, it turned out that the men who feared God were the men who honoured the king. The praying soldiers were the soldiers who had not deserved punishment. The fanatics were those who kept them- selves away from the canteen. The enthusiasts were the most sober and the best behaved of all their com- rades. ' The saints,' by the most faithful of all tests — an ofl&cial military return — were the honour and the safety of the regiment in which they served." We do not follow the history of Havelock's military achievements. Enough for our purpose, to sum up bis character in the emphatic, though homely, words of Lord Hardinge : " He was every inch a soldier, and every inch a Christian." To be a soldier of a high order it was not necessary that he should cease to be a Christian ; to be a Christian of a high order it was not necessary that he should cease to be a soldier. Whatsoever reproach or worldly loss he might be called to bear for Christ's sake, he was content to bear it; he had counted the cost. Whatsoever duties devolved on him in the family, in the camp, and in the field, he would discharge them all as under the great Task- 12 134 THE world's work. master's eye. If preserved from death, when horse after horse was shot under him, and when a bag of gunpowder was his pillow, with fiery bullets falling thick as hailstones around him, he acknowledged that it was by the kind protection of his Father in heaven. If, after many hours of heroic fight, himself and his soldiers stood on the deserted battle-field in the proud consciousness of being conquerors, he was not loath, but forward to say, " Away with vain glory. Thanks to Almighty Grod who hath given us the victory." The common soldiery of a standing army is, perhaps, the last class of the community in which we should expect to find the fruits of a true faith. But, blessed be God, even there we find them, and that not to be transplanted into a more genial clime as soon as they have sprung up, but prospering in the most adverse circumstances, amid the withering blights of the worst associations. '' The army," says one* who can speak from experience, '' far from being a desert waste, where weeds and thorns are to be gathered, is a field in which a rich harvest may, with proper culture, be reaped to the glory of God's grace. Such, at least, I have found it to be ; for I can truly say that, during the twelve years that I have been a military chaplain, I have seen far more to encourage me in sowing the seed of eternal life, than during an equal period of my ministry among civilians." It is a well-known fact, that much seed of divine" truth is ^' choked" and rendered unfruitful by " the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the lusts of other things." And solemnly did * Rev. W. Hare, Chaplain to the Forces. EARTHLY DISCIPLINE. 135 Christ say to his disciples, " Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day (of the Lord) come upon you unawares."* In the same spirit the apostle Paul said, " They that will he rich (whose hearts are set on riches) fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. "f But neither Christ nor his servant in- structed men to " flee from men's pursuits,'^ in order to avoid the evils that are incident to them. On the contrary, they would have Christians to glorify God by being "not slothful in business" while " fervent in spirit." And examples might be multiplied without number to show how compatible the one of these re- quirements is with the other. The seaman makes almost every wind that blows, his servant to speed him on his voyage; and ships maybe seen daily meeting each other, and sailing in opposite directions by the help of the same breeze. Earthly care and occupation do become means of spiritual injury, but they may, and by the Christian ought to, be made means of spiritual good. His whole existence on earth is a discipline. The joys and sorrows, and hopes and fears, of this life are designed as means of education for another state. And there must be some mode of so improving worldly labour and care, which form the greater part of the staple of human life, as to convert it from an enemy of spirit- uality into means of grace. " The weight of a clock," says the Rev. John Caird, "seems a heavy drag on the delicate move- ments of its machinery ; but so far from arresting or * Luke sxi. 3i. 1 1 Timothy vi. 9. 136 THE world's work. impeding those movements, it is indispensable to their steadiness, balance, accuracy : there must be some analogous action of what seems the clog and drag- weight of worldly work on the finer movements of man's spiritual being. The planets in the heavens have a twofold action, — in their orbits and on their axes — the one motion not interfering, but carried on simultaneously and in perfect harmony with the other j so must it be that man's twofold activities — round the heavenly and the earthly centre — disturb not nor jar with each other. He who diligently discharges the duties of the earthly may not less sedulously — nay, at the same moment — fulfil those of the heavenly sphere; at once ' diligent in business' and ' fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.' " " No man can become a soldier by studying books on military tactics in his closet: he must in actual service acquire those habits of coolness, courage, dis- cipline, address, rapid combination, without which the most learned in the theory of strategy or engineering will be but a schoolboy soldier after all. And, in the same way, a man in solitude and study may become a most learned theologian, or may train himself into the timid, efi"eminate piety of what is technically called the ^religious life;' but never in the highest and holiest sense can he become a religious man, until he has acquired those habits of daily self-denial, of resistance to temptation, of kindness, gentleness, humility, sympathy, active beneficence, which are to be acquired only in daily contact with mankind. Tell us not, then, that the man of business, the bustling tradesman, the toilworn labourer, has little or no time to attend to religion. As well tell us that the pilot, amid the winds and storms, has no leisure to attend to EARTHLY CARE A HEAVENLY DISCIPLINE. 137 navigation ; or the geueral, on the field of battle, to the art of war. Where will he attend to it ? Keligioa is not a perpetual moping over good books; religion is not even (merely) prayer, praise, holy ordinances. These are necessary to religion : no man is religious without them; but religion (in this life) is mainly and chiefly the glorifying God amid the duties and trials of the world J the guiding our course amid the adverse winds and currents of temptation, by the starlight of duty and the compass of divine truth ; the bearing us manfully, wisely, courageously, for the honour of Christ, our great Leader, in the conflict of life.'' ^' How then shall earthly care become heavenly discipline? How shall the disposition of the weight be altered so as to press the spirit upward towards God, instead of downward and away ?" This can be eff'ected only by Christians cherishing a genuine and real belief in the presence and agency of God in the minor events and details of life. <' To the Christian, who really believes in the agency of God in the smallest events of life, confides in his love and makes his sympathy his refuge, the thousand minute cares and perplexities of life become each one a fine afiiliating bond between the soul and its God. Christ is known, not by abstract definition and by high-raised conceptions of the soul's aspiring hours, but known as a man knoweth his friend : he is known by the hourly wants he supplies; known by every care with which he momentarily sympathizes, every apprehension which he relieves, every temptation which he enables us to surmount. We learn to know Christ as the infant child learns to know its mother and father — by all the helplessness and all the de- pendence which are incident to this commencement of 12* 138 THE world's work. our moral existence ; and as we go on thus year by year, and find in every changing situation, in every reverse, in every trouble, from our lightest sorrow to those sorrows which wring our soul from its depths, that he is equally present, and that his gracious aid is equally adequate; our faith seems gradually almost to change to sight, and Christ's sympathy, his love and care, seem to us more real than any other source of reliance ; and multiplied cares and trials are only new avenues of acquaintance between us and heaven.'^ It is often found difficult to preserve a spirit of deep piety in a life of labour and engrossing care; but it would be still more difficult in a life of indolence. "To pass our lives in a course contrary to nature, even the heathen would have told us, is the sure way to be miserable; and it is the sure way also to be wicked." It would not be good for Christians them- selves to be taken out of the world. All human affections require outward circumstances and condi- tions, not only for their manifestations, but also for their exercise and development. " We may persuade ourselves," says Professor Whewell, " that we have faith ; but our faith is not genuine, except it work by love; and love is not Christian love, except it can live, and love, and work on, through those clouds of indiflPerence, and hatred, and jarring wishes, and op- posing interests, which fill the atmosphere of the world. These clouds are the atmosphere of the world, but they are also the atmosphere in which the Chris- tian spirit is tried. The world breeds them : the Christian temper dispels them, or, at least, parts them, makes its way through them like the sun, and turns them into attendant glories." "to me to live is CHRIST." 139 ^' To me to live is Christ/' said the apostle Paul, and it was in no fit of enthusiasm he said it. He was not standing in the great congregation, and carried away by excitement to use language which a more sober judgment would condemn. He was a prisoner at Rome, when, in the most entire calm and quiet, in his own hired house, in the presence only of his amanuensis, of the soldier that guarded him, and perhaps of his " son " Timothy, he said, ''To me to live is Christ." And he spoke not as an apostle, but as a Christian. And his successors in Christian prin- ciple and in Christian practice are to be found not among martyrs and confessors merely, but among all who love the Saviour. To exempt a man from the obligation of " living to Christ," or deprive him of the honour, would be to doom his heart to find its home and happiness in things seen and material. Every true Christian is a successor of the apostle in the duty and privilege of living for Christ. And it cannot be too earnestly maintained that, in order to realize this highest end of existence, it is not necessary that a man should cease to work with his hands, and give himself up to religious studies, or to a professional religious calling. It is only needful that he should subordinate all his temporal pursuits to the honour of Christ, and prosecute them in obedience to his will and in an unworldly spirit. Necessity may be laid upon him to toil much and long: his family may subject him to incessant care and labour; but while thus employed it is quite possible to be able to say, " To me to live is Christ." The confessor magnifies Christ before kings: the martyr magnifies Christ at the stake; but there is nothing to exclude the humblest Christian from the goodly fellowship : he magnifies Christ in the 140 THE world's work. quiet walks of life, in the daily labours of his hands, and in the sphere of his own domestic circle. And if some are called to shine as lights on mountain tops, illuminating regions far and wide around, private Christians may shine in the secluded valley, and illu- mine, by their holy walk and limited endeavours, some small sequestered spot which the blaze of the mountain light cannot reach. Let no man deprive you, Christian, of the honour and blessedness of say- ing, '< To me to live is Christ." And let your own heart never shrink from the felt obligation, that for this end you have been born again, that Christ may be magnified in your body whether by life or by death. " Teach me, my God and King, In all things thee to see, And what I do in anything, To do it as for thee. " A man that looks on glass, On it may stay his eye ; Or, if he pleaseth, through it pass, And then the heaven espy. " All may of thee partake : Nothing can be so mean, Which with this tincture 'for thy sake* Will not grow bright and clean. " A servant with this clause Makes drudgery divine ; Who sweeps a room, as for thy laws, Makes that an action fine. " This is the famous stone That turneth all to gold; For that which God doth touch and own Cannot for less be told." CHAPTER III. SOCIAL AVORK, Contents. — No man liveth to himself — What shall I do? — Christian women —Ancient Rome — A day in the life of Christ— Hannah More — Sir Edward Parry — Havelock — Sarah Martin — Vanderkemp — Intercessory prayer — George Wagner — Little acts — Tertius — Baruch — The one talent — A single hymn — Curse ye Meroz — Montgomery's Wayfaring Man. " He that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also." — 1 John iv. 20, 21. (141) " He who plowed and who sowed is not missed by the reaper ; He is only remembered by what he has done. Not myself, but the truth that in life I have spoken, Not myself, but the seed that in life I have sown Shall pass on to ages ; all about me forgotten, Save the truth I have spoken, the things I have done. So let my living be, so be my dying, So let my name be, unblazoned, unknown. Unpraised and unmissed, I shall still be remembered; Yes, but remembered by what I have done." HoRATitra BONAB. (142) SOCIAL WORK. *' No man liveth to himself." The most selfish, the most solitary, exercise an influence beyond themselves for good or for evil. The thoughts they think, the words they speak, the very looks they look, however much they may intend them to be bounded by the narrow circle they draw around themselves, pass be- yond that circle without asking their consent, and tell on others whom they have no desire either to benefit or harm. Let them but utter a word and it is gone from them for ever ; they cannot recall it, if they would : it fulfils its mission, whether benign or malign, in some ear and on some heart; and thence it proceeds in its onward progress, cursing or blessing, it may be, to the end of time. And even if men should resolve to speak no word, lest the spoken word should grow and multiply in fruits which they do not desire, their self-imposed silence, the compressed lip, and the unhappy look will produce some impression on those who witness them — an impression which will not ter- minate with itself, and which will verify the social fact that no one liveth unto himself. Our example may be silent and unobtrusive, but it cannot be wholly unobserved. And if the first circle of observers be small, yet each of them becomes the centre of a new circle, and our influence becomes thus difi'used far beyond our control and even our knowledge. What- ever station we occupy, whether we live in the public (143) 144 SOCIAL WORK. eye or in the deepest privacy, whether we are am- bitious to be something or ambitious to be nothing, it is a necessity of our social existence that we cannot live to ourselves. There is no wall of exclusiveness so thick or so high, but that the influence of our cha- racter and conduct, the influence, in short, of what we are and what we do, will penetrate through it or climb over it. It is a solemn fact that we are under the operation of this law of social life, and that its operation is in- voluntary and constant. Life itself is a solemn thing. We may so use it, that it would be better for us we had never possessed it. Or we may so use it, that it shall be " a thing of beauty and of joy for ever." * Such life, with its voluntary and involuntary contri- bution to the common weal or to the common woe, is doubly solemn. There may be some whom we have already unconsciously benefitted, and who have been made more strong, more holy, more happy, by some casual word we have dropped, or some casual deed we have done, of which there is no record in our own memory. There may be others whom some casual word or deed of ours has accelerated in the downward path of unbelief and ungodliness, — some to whose ruin, already consummated, words or deeds of ours gave a fatal impulse, but whom neither labour nor prayer of ours, if persevered in for ages, will now raise out of their slough of eternal despond. The apostolic words, '' None of us liveth to him- self,"f are not, however, the mere declaration of a social fact; they are a declaration of Christian law. * We slightly change the poet's words : — " A thing of beauty is a joy for ever." t Romans xiv. 7. NO MAN LIVETH TO HIMSELF. 145 Our involuntary influence may be either evil or good : it may be the influence of selfishness producing selfish- ness. But the Christian law is, " Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. '^ * " Ye are not your own. For ye are bought with a price : therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's. '^ f The terms selfish Christian, malignant Christian, covetous Christian, are as incongruous and self-contradictory, as the terms lying Christian, dishonest Christian, sen- sual Christian. And the Christian is bound to avoid covetousness, and malignity, and selfishness, as he would avoid falsehood, and fraud, and sensuality. The law, " Let no man seek his own, but every man another's wealth," is of equal obligation with the law, ''Thou shalt not steal." The Christian love, which forms the soul of the law, " no one liveth to himself," may very appropriately " begin" its social work " at home." Let Christians give it full sway in their families. If " there is no place like home," let love destroy those selfish, crooked tempers which mar its peace, — those tempers which break up families, even while outwardly one, into fragments that are brought indeed very near to each other, but are not " like kindred drops which mingle into one." Let all seek within their home circle their first and best sphere of well-doing. It will amply repay their toil. But Christian love, beginning at home, will not be content to be confined there. It is too expansive for that. It will overlap the narrow boundary; or, if it be forcibly restrained within it, it will resent the wrong by dying a natural death in its prison. That it * Philippians ii 4. f 1 Corinthians tI. 19, 20. 13 146 SOCIAL WORK. may live and thrive it must breathe the fresh air of the world, and brace itself with exercise in deeds of mercy. What shall I do ? is probably the question which will be asked by many — a question which has been answered sententiously thus : " Do the duty which lies nearest thee, which thou knowest to be a duty : thy second duty will already have become clearer." And this is only a paraphrase of the inspired saying, " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it," and '•' do it with thy might." Christian love will find objects on which to expend the energy of its well-doing, at the very door, lying in sin and wretchedness, in more desperate case than the man who fell among thieves in the solitary and robber-haunted defile which lay be- tween Jerusalem and Jericho. It will find them in the furthest regions of the earth, all " neighbours," according to our Lord's teaching, everywhere needing and awaiting the application of the same Christian balm. Let it lay its hands of mercy on some of these, and bind up their wounds, and pour in the oil and wine of gospel truth and love. Christian women find it often more difiicult than their brothers do to discover a fitting sphere of be- nevolent activity. But the Bible discloses to us a singular variety of work performed by women in the service of their God. It was the work of Miriam to sound the loud timbrel when Pharaoh and his host sank like lead in the mighty waters. It was the work of certain ^' wise-hearted women" in the camp of Israel in the wilderness, " to spin with their hands and bring that which they had spun, both of blue, THE WOMEN OF THE BIBLE. 147 and of purple, and of scarlet, and of fine linen,'' for furniture for the tabernacle of the Lord. It was the work of Deborah to be more than a " mother in Israel/' to be a prophetess, a captain, and a deliverer. It was the work of Hannah to train her own child Samuel for the service of God. It was the work of certain honoured women in the days of our Lord to minister to him of their substance. It was the work of Mary of Bethany to take her box of precious ointment and pour it on the head of her Lord in token of veneration and love — an unconscious preparation, at the same time, for his approaching burial. It was the work of the poor widow, whom the eye of Jesus singled out from the multitude of worshippers in the temple, to give two mites to the sacred treasury. It was the work of Dorcas to make coats and garments for the poor widows that were at Joppa. It was the work of Priscilla, with her husband Aquila, to take that young, and learned, and eloquent Alexandrian, Apollos, and teach him the way of the Lord more perfectly, and to be at many times, and in many ways, the helper of Paul himself and of other servants of God. In the last chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, we find the apostle sending his Christian salutations to not a few holy women who '' laboured in the Lord." Of Urbane, and Tryphena, and Tryphosa, and Julia, and Persis, and other Roman women thus honoured by Paul, or rather by the Spirit that in- spired Paul, we know nothing beyond the fact of their being Christian '' labourers." Whether they belonged to the plebeian or patrician order, whether they were rich or poor, whether they were young or old, we know not. What their occupations and trials in life, whether they floated along peacefully amid the smiles 148 SOCIAL WORK. and affections of parents, and brothers, and sisters, or had to struggle against the winds and tides of hostile relatives and of adverse circumstances, we know not. !But more precious than the names of their parents, or the number of their years, or their earthly rank, is the statement that they '' laboured in the Lord ;" a statement which makes them forerunners of all, of every age and rank, who, in any sphere, or by any means, " labour" to make known to others the blessed name of Christ. The apostolic church in Rome knew nothing of convents and conventual "sisterhoods;" but the be- loved Persis and Urbane, and Tryphena and Tryphosa, were " sisters of charity" in the highest sense. And the Rome of their day furnished scope, ample and varied, for all their gifts and exertions. It contained within a circuit of twelve miles more than two millions of inhabitants. Among these there were of course all the contrasts which are seen in a modern city, all the painful lines of separation between luxury and squalor, wealth and want, and these on an exaggerated scale. The number of the slaves was perhaps about a million. A vast proportion of the citizens of the plebeian order lived on public or private charity. " Yet were these pauper citizens proud of their citizenship, though many of them had no better sleeping places for the night than the public porticos or the vestibules of temples. They cared for nothing beyond bread for the day, the games of the circus, and the savage de- light of gladiatorial shows. Manufactures and trade they regarded as the business of the slave and the foreigner. Every kind of nationality and religion found its representative in Rome, which was like Lon- don, with all its miseries, vices, and follies exaggerated, A DAY IN THE LIFE OF CHRIST. 149 and without its Christianity." Such a population sup- plied, indeed, a field for '^much labour in the Lord/* but one which was far more difficult to occupy than that which invites the toil and prayers of Christian women in modern England. But let us turn to our Great Exemplar. " My Fa- ther worketh hitherto, and I work," he said — words which naturally and rightly produced the impression that he claimed equality with God. In the language of a faithful and diligent servant, he said, on another occasion, " I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is day : the night cometh, when no man can work." " What would we not give," says an American au- thor, " for a few pages of the private diary of Julius Caesar, or Cicero, or Brutus, or Augustus ; or for the minute reminiscences of any one who had spent a few days in the company of either of these distinguished men ? What a flood of light would the discovery of such a manuscript throw upon Roman life, but espe- cially upon the private opinions, the motives, the aspi- rations, the moral estimates of the men whose names have become household words throughout the world !" There has been nothing left for us to desire, however, in reference to the life of a greater than the Csesars. The history of our Great Exemplar has been written by men who travelled with him, on foot, throughout the length and breadth of Palestine; who partook with him of his frugal meals, and bore with him the trial of hunger, weariness, and want of shelter; who followed him through the lonely wilderness and the crowded street ; who saw his miracles in every variety of form, and listened to his discourses in public and 13* 150 SOCIAL WORK. his explanations in private. Their narrative, though brief, and without adornment or words of eulogy, en- ables us to realize his character and spirit, and manner of life, more vividly and with more of personal sym- pathy, than we can those of any other distinguished person that has ever lived. The history of one day in his life, as told in few and artless terms by those who themselves shared in its pursuits,* will suffice, if care- fully studied, to show us how Jesus Christ " went about doing good." Private kindness, the relief of distress, public teaching, and ministration to the wants of the famishing, filled up the entire day. Let his disciples learn to follow his example. Let them, like him, forget themselves, their own wants, and their own weariness, that they may, as he did, scatter bless- ings on every side, as they move onward in the path of their daily life. Those who are not conformed to Christ in well- doing are none of his ; for " he gave himself for men, to purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealots for good works." " Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us : and we ought to lay down our life for the brethren. But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of Grod in him ? My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth." '^ Freely have ye received, freely give." ^' Love is the fulfilling of the law." Paul and his fellow-apostles, Luther and his fel- low-reformers, Whitefield and his fellow-preachers, Howard and his fellow-philanthropists, Eaikes and * Matthew xiv. 13—21 : Mark vi. 30—44; Luke. ix. 10—17 ; John vi. 1—14. HANNAH MORE. 151 his fellow-sabbath-school teachers, Clarkson and his fellow-labourers, in the abolition of the slave-trade, Carey and his fellow-missionaries, are all represen- tatives and embodiments of the one principle of Chris- tian well-doing. And to write the history of those works of faith and labours of love of which the ad- vent of Christ into our world has been the spring, and the example of Christ the pattern, would be to write the history of the pure and living church of every age. A few instances, however, of holy toil for the spiritual good of mankind may be given to show how, in circumstances varied, and for the greater part unusual, Christian hands have found something to do, and Christian hearts prompted them to do it '' with their might." Hannah More occupies a high place in the litera- ture of her country, but a still higher in the history of Christian well-doino;. born 1745 ; dild •^ O Sept. 7, 1833. At the time when the fame of her writings was echoing throughout the land, the grace of God brought her heart into subjection to a better Master than self or the world ; and thenceforward, constrained by the love of Christ, she lived to do good. She employed her pen, her property, her tongue, all in the blessed service of her Lord. By schools for the poor, and by providing a Christian literature both for the humbler and the higher classes, she accomplished a great work in her day. Ten miles from her residence at Cowslip Green, lay the romantic parish of Cheddar. Miss More and her sister, in exploring its beauties, were grieved to find that its spiritual aspect was dreary to the last degree. They found but one Bible in all the parish, and that 152 SOCIAL WORK. was used to prop a flower-pot. The people were ignorant, barbarous, and brutal. But what could a family of feeble women, residing at a distance of ten miles from the spot, do in such a case ? Nothing but sigh over it, most such women would think. But not so reasoned the Misses More. Something to pierce the gloom of this terrible darkness, something to raise this besotted people, they would attempt. A school was determined on. This school was to be a centre, from which in various ways Christian instruction and influence, as well as secular knowledge, were to be spread abroad. But to establish such an institution was no easy matter. The people did not want it. A great many refused to send their children, unless they would pay for them, and not a few refused because they were not sure of her intentions, being appre- hensive that, at the end of seven years, if they attended so long, she would acquire a power over them, and send them beyond sea. " I was told," she writes, "we should meet with great opposition if I did not try to propitiate the chief despot of the village, who is very rich and very brutal ; so I ventured into the den of this monster, in a country as savage as himself, near Bridgewater. He begged I would not think of bring- ing any religion into the country; it was the worst thing in the world for the poor, for it made them lazy and useless. In vain did I represent to him that they would be more industrious as they were better prin- cipled; and that, for my own part, I had no selfish views in what I was doing. He gave me to under- stand that he knew the world too well to believe either the one or the other." Miss More, however, boldly engaged a house, and had it set in order immediately. "For," she says, writing to Mr. Wilberforce, "the LABOURS or THE MISSES MORE. 153 night Cometh ; and it is a comfort to think, that though I may be dust and ashes in a few Tveeks, yet by that time this business will be in actual motion/' In con- nection with the Sabbath-school, which formed an important part of the scheme, an evening service for adults was established, when a hymn was sung and a simple prayer and sermon read by one of the sisters. The work prospered. A mighty change was effected at Cheddar. The Spirit of the Lord preparing the soil, the good seed took root and bore fruit many-fold. Numbers of both the old and young were led to the Saviour. The desert became a fruitful field. The savages of Cheddar were not only civilized, but many of them were truly christianized. The all-potent influence of the doctrine of the cross transformed their rude homes into the happy and intelligent abodes of peace and love. Prayer and praise arose from many a cottage hearth, whence before had been daily heard the sounds of daring profanity, of wild revelry, and of hateful malice. The Misses More found two mining: villages at the top of Mendip in a state of the most ft'ightful brutality. No constable would venture thither to perform his functions, and they were warned that any attempt to labour there would be made at the risk of their lives. But venture they would and did, and there they had a further proof that the weapon they carried — the gospel — was all powerful to destroy every stronghold of Satan. These are but specimens of the work to which these Christian sisters devoted themselves. As years passed on, school after school was estab- lished, until in 1796 the various schools and societies established by them contained about sixteen or seven- teen hundred persons. They were scattered over ten 154 SOCIAL WORK. parishes, and lay at considerable distances ; so that the Misses More had a diameter of above twenty miles to travel, in order to get at them. ''In some of the most profligate places,'^ wrote Miss More to Mr. Newton, " we have had the most success;" '* and where we chiefly fail, it is with your pretty good kind of people , who do not see how they can be better. I think it has pleased God to give us the most rapid progress in the parish we last took up, not a year ago. This place has helped to people the county jail and Botany Bay beyond any I know of. They seemed to have reached a crisis of iniquity.'' Thus the sisters found themselves charged with a delightful but most laborious and responsible under- taking. The entire cost was, of course, far beyond their own means; but whatever was wanting was readily supplied to them by generous Christian friends. But of the care and labour of super- intendence they could not be relieved ; and the per- secutions to which they were exposed were hard to bear. In periodicals and pamphlets they were accused, for years, of being the abettors of fanaticism, and sedition, and immorality. Under the pressure of this trial. Miss More wrote to a friend : — " Battered, hacked, scalped, tomahawked as I have been for three years, and continue to be, brought out every month as an object of scorn and abhorrence, I seem to have nothing to do in the world." But she could speak also of the lessons learned in the furnace : — " I have learned the true value of human opinion ; and I have learned much of the corruption, not of the world only, but of my own heart. I have gotten stronger faith in the truth of Scripture. I feel a general spirit of sub- mission ; and there are at times, but not often, when I SIR EDWARD PARRY. 155 can even rejoice that I have been counted worthy to suffer in this cause." Her schools survived the storm, and were main- tained by her during the remainder of her life; and she knew what it was to experience the joy of the reaper, as well as the anxiety of the sower. The third and last voyage of Sir Edward Parry, in search of a north-west passage from 1 T". • r» • 11 Edward Parry ; the Atlantic to the Facmc, is memorable born pee. i9. 1790 ; ' ^ died Jxily 8. 1850. as the period (1824-5) in which this illustrious seaman learned to look to Christ as his Saviour. In all his dark winterings in the north, he had made the health and comfort of his men his special care ; but now he was additionally anxious to promote their moral and spiritual improvement. And when, a few years later, he was called to occupy an important post on the outskirts of an Australian forest, amongst the convicts and aborigines of New South Wales, he found wider scope for the principle of well-doing which was implanted in his heart. The people who were then placed under his charge consisted of three classes : first, the oflScers and servants of the Australian Agricultural Company ; secondly, the convicts work- ing also in the employ of the company, or acting as domestic servants in the officers' families ; and lastly, the natives, whose home was in the " bush," and whose encampments were often found within a few yards of the settlement. The almost total want of proper discipline, which had previously existed in the colony, rendered it a matter of no small difficulty to introduce a new system of order and regularity. This, however. Parry was determined to effect, and though there was at the outset much to dishearten, his 156 SOCIAL WORK. judgment and firmness by degrees triumphed over all obstacles, while the genial kindness of his disposition, and iiis evident desire for the general welfare, gained the respect and affection of all. While maintaining his authority as governor, and directing matters of business with the most scrupulous exactness, he regarded nothing as too trivial to occupy his attention which could in any way tend to promote innocent enjoyment, but sought, on the contrary, to draw closer in little things the bond which united him to his people. From the hour of his arrival, Sir Edward Parry's heart was especially afi"ected by the moral condition of his people. The free population were, religiously, almost on a level with the ignorant savages by whom they were surrounded. Immorality and drunkenness prevailed to a fearful extent : schools were unknown : the word of God had not been preached for four years, and all seemed to be living without God in the •world. The first step towards the introduction of a better state of things was the establishment of a regular service on the Lord's day. There was no church nearer than Sydney, nor was there any chaplain in the settlement. Under these circumstances, Sir Edward fitted up a carpenter's shop in the village as a place of worship, and conducted the service himself. Had he been by profession a missionary, he could not have given himself to his spiritual work with more zeal or intelligence. At first, scarcely a score of men were found willing to attend the service, and none of the women. But by degrees the attendance became large and regular. And to this congregation of "bond and free" Sir Edward preached two sermons every Lord's day, one of them being original. He parry's labours in AUSTRALIA, 157 seemed at home, we are told, the moment he entered the reading-desk, and his manner was characterized by deep reverence and feeling. In private as well as in public did Sir Edward and Lady Parry seek the spiritual good of the colony, and their labours were not in vain. The temporal affairs of the settlement were restored to order and prosperity, its moral condition was vastly improved, nor were there wanting specific instances in which the word of God proved mighty to the conversion of sinners. *^It was at the close of a beautiful sabbath-day," says the author of " The Prisoners of Australia," that I once sallied forth for an evening stroll. ... I almost unconsciously wandered to a convict's hut, which stood on the borders of the coast. Attracted by the sound of voices, as if of children reading, I paused to listen; and although still too far from the dwelling to hear the subject of such discourse, I saw through the open doorway what was passing within. The father of the family, a convict, sat near the entrance, with a young child on his knee ; while three older ones were grouped around him, reading from the Scriptures, which, from time to time, he explained to them. . . . Unwilling to intrude upon a family thus engaged, I returned home unperceived by those who had thus attracted and interested me; but on the following day, I heard from the lips of his wife the circumstances of this convict's transportation, etc. . . . Providentially, he had been assigned to the service of the Agricultural Company, and, under the Christian teaching of Sir Edward Parry, both he and his wife had, humanly speaking, been led to see the folly of worldly wicked- ness, and the deep importance of those better things which now formed their highest privilege and consola- 13 158 SOCIAL WORK. tion. . . . These blessings were among the many fruits of the missionary exertions of Sir Edward Parry and his now sainted lady, who both lived in the grateful affections of many a chastened heart, long after they had ceased to take a personal share in the interests of that far distant colony." When, in 1846, Sir Edward Parry was appointed captain superintendent of the Eoyal Clarence Yard, and of the naval hospital at Haslar, he pursued the same path of usefulness, and with similar results. Not a few seamen owed to him, under God, their very souls. As it was with Sir Edward Parry, the sailor, so was it with Sir Henry Havelock, the soldier. From the time of his landing in India, he sought the moral and spiritual welfare of his men. And how much better was it thus to diffuse his light among others, than to withdraw it to shine the more brightly in monastic solitude, where no wanderer's feet should be guided by it into the way of peace ! The Burmese war of the following year supplies an illustration, both of the manner of his devotion to the good of his men, and of the effects which it produced. In the city of Rangoon, which was taken by the English, there was a famous heathen temple devoted to the service of Boodh. Of a chamber in this temple Havelock obtained possession. All around were images of Boodh, in the usual position, sitting with the legs gathered up, and crossed, and the hands rest- ing on the lap, in symbol and expression of repose. Abominable idolatries had often been witnessed there, but it needed no ceremonial cleansings to make it fit for Christian psalmody and prayer. An officer relates that, as he was wandering round about the pagotJa on HAVELOCK IN AN IDOL's TEiMPLE. . 159 one occasion, he heard the sound, strange enough, as he thought, of siiigino'. The ofl&cer determined to follow the sound to its source. At last he reached the chamber, and what should meet his eye but Havelock, with his Bible and hymn-book before him, and more than a hundred men seated around him, giving earnest heed to his words ! " England, thy soldier brave in fight, With his men of warrior mould, Who had won the rampart's foe-lined height, And crushed the proud stronghold, " Whose victor shouts had rent the air, Wide borne o'er hill and plain, 'Twas they who devoutly worshipped there, In the idol's empty fane." In every idol's lap there was a lamp to illumine the dark chamber. '' There they were, those dumb but significant lamp-bearers, in constant use; and they were there, we may well be assured, to suggest stirring thoughts to the lieutenant and his men. How well the 115th Psalm would be understood there ! How impressively some parts of the first chapter of Romans would be explained ! How earnestly the prayer would be offered that the Burmese might be led, through the power of the Holy Ghost, to cast these and all other idols to the moles and to the bats ! How gratefully would thanksgiving be offered that he, who is our God, is the God of salvation, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ I" The fruits of such endeavours as these to bring his men under the influence of Christian principle were palpable to all. Whilst they were in Burmah, the army was one day suddenly apprised of the near approach of the enemy. The general. Sir Archibald Campbell, sent in great haste to order the men of a particular corps to occupy at once a prescribed post. 100 SOCIAL WORK. Imminent as was the danger, the order was to no pur- pose ; for the men of that corps were so many of them intoxicated, that they were unfit for duty. The position "Was embarrassing, and would presently have become serious. The general knew this well, and he knew too how probably it could best, at least in part, be met. " Then,'' said he, when told that his former order was unavailing, — " then call out Havelock's saints ; they are never drunk, and Havelock is always ready." The bugle sounded; they were immediately under arms; and the general's object was accomplished by the enemy being repulsed. Havelock's efforts to do good to his men were not spasmodic and occasional ; they were his life-long labour and joy. A gentleman, who passed through Cabul when the English army was there, states that he attended one of the meetings of the congregation of pious soldiers, and says that he shall never forget the thrilling sensation he felt in that romantic position, while the men stood up and sang with heart and soul the 100th Psalm, as Havelock gave out the words — " Ye nations round the earth, rejoice, Before the Lord, your Sovereign King; Seive him with cheerful heart and voice, With all your tongues his glories slug." When this gentleman heard, soon after, of the brave defence of Jellalabad by these troops and their com- rades, his mind involuntarily reverted to the little band of Christian soldiers surrounding Havelock in the room at Cabul, and he thought that men thus nerved with the vigour of Christian principle and devotion were prepared to face an enemy and over- come any difficulty. On the completion of the works, Havelock suggested to General Sale the propriety of SARAH MARTIN. 161 assembling the whole garrison for the purpose of offer- ing up thanks to Almighty God, " who had in his mercy enabled them to complete the fortifications that were necessary for their protection.'^ The suggestion was approved, and the necessary command given. " There stood those brave-hearted and hard-handed men, awaiting the direction that might come next. ' Let us pray,' said a well-known voice. It was Have- lock's, ' Let us pray ;' and down before the presence of the great God those soldiers reverently bowed, one and all of them, whilst at the impulse of a devout and grateful heart he poured forth supplication and praise in the name of the great High Priest." In the town of Great Yarmouth, there died, in 1843, a humble sempstress, of whom one of , f, Ti 1- 1 T Sarah Martin; the e;reat ors-ans oi Lnolish literature t>orn June, 1791 : o ^ b ^ died August, 1843. wrote in these strong terms : — ^' It is the business of literature to make such a life stand out from the masses of ordinary existence with something of the distinctness with which a lofty building uprears itself in the confusion of a distant view. It should be made to attract the eyes, to excite the hearts of all persons who think the welfare of their fellow-mortals an object of interest or duty ; it should be included in collections of biography, and chronicled in the high places of history ; men should be taught to estimate it as that of one whose philanthropy has entitled her to renown ; and children to associate the name of Sarah Martin with those of Howard, Buxton, Fry — the most benevolent of mankind." In the beginning of this century, English jails were, in general, academies of crime ; and through their instrumentality, the law itself was the principal 14* 162 SOCIAL WORK. teacher of the '^ science of hiw-breaking." Yarmouth is said to have been one of the last places in the kingdom to become convinced of this fact. The doors were simply locked upon the prisoners ; their time was given to gaming, swearing, fighting, playing, and bad language. There was no divine worship in the jail on Sundays, nor any respect paid to that holy day. The whole place was filthy, confined, unhealthy ; and in the course of a few years, Sarah Martin provided for all the most important objects of prison discipline, moral and intellectual tuition, occupation during im- prisonment, and employment after discharge. Whilst great and good men, at a distance, unknown to her, were inquiring and disputing as to the way and the order in which these very results were to be attained, here was a poor woman, who was herself actually per- sonally accomplishing them all. She had to contend with many difficulties that are now unknown. Prison discipline was then in its infancy : everything she did was conceived in the best spirit, and considering the time and the means at her command, could scarcely have been improved. And who was Sarah Martin, that she should be able to do all this ? A woman of no rank, of no wealth, of no genius, of no learning, — a poor Norfolk dress- maker, with the love of Christ in her heart. Faith in Christ made her a philanthropist. The love of Christ constrained her both to piety and benevolence. But, at the outset, she formed no great schemes, and sought no great patronage; she simply performed "the duty which was nearest to her.^' At every step of her onward progress, her principle seems to have been to attend to " what her hands found to do," and to " do what she could.'' The Sunday-school was her first YARMOUTH PRISON. 163 field of labour. The workhouse attracted her atten- tion at the same time; and in 1810, being only in the twentieth year of" her age, her desire was gratified by obtaining admission to see a young woman who was ill. In 1819, an unnatural mother was committed to jail for cruelly beating her own child. Sarah Martin went to the jail, passed into the dark porch which overhung the entrance, and, in a timid, modest man- ner, asked permission to see her. It was refused; there was " a lion in the way." But the warm-hearted girl was too well assured of her own purposes to be daunted; and, upon a second application she was admitted. The imprisoned mother ^' was surprised at the sight of a stranger." '' When I told the woman," says Miss Martin, " the motive of my visit — her guilt and her need of God's mercy, etc., — she burst into tears and thanked me." These tears and thanks gave the young philanthropist courage. ^' I read to her," she adds, " tlie twenty-third chapter of Luke," which contains the story of the malefactor, who, although suffering justly by man's judgment, found mercy from the Saviour. After this introduction to a life of mercy within prison walls, the door was never shut against her. *' There does not appear to have been any instance of a prisoner long refusing to take advantage of her instructions. Men entered the prison, saucy, shallow, self-conceited, full of cavils and objections, which Sarah Martin was singularly clever in meeting; but in a few days the most stubborn, and those who had refused the most peremptorily, either to be employed or to be instructed, would beg to be allowed to take their part in the general cause. Once within the 164 SOCIAL WORK. circle of her influence, the effect was curious. Men, old in years, as well as in crime, might be seen striving, for the first time in their lives, to hold a pen, or bending hoary heads over primers and spelling- books, or studying to commit to memory some precept taken from the Holy Scriptures. Young rascals, as impudent as they were ignorant, beginning with one verse, went on to long passages ; and even the dullest were enabled by perseverance to furnish their minds and memories with from two to five verses every day." '^ She was no titular Sister of Charity,^' to use the words of a prison inspector, '* but was silently felt and acknowledged to be one, by the many outcast and destitute persons who received encouragement from her lips, and relief from her hands, and by the few who were witnesses of her good works." John Theodore Yanderkemp was, for sixteen years, a dashing officer of dragoons. born'^'^a^^^iuftte?! He was a profone infidel, and the slave dam, 1748; died . „ 1^ South Africa, ot vicc and ungodliness. On marrying, his character improved outwardly ; but his infidelity was only confirmed by his intercourse with the deists of Edinburgh, while studying medicine in that city. After a few years of medical practice in Holland, he retired from active occupation, intending to devote the residue of his days to literary pursuits. But the God, whom he knew not, had other work for him to do. After much restless thinking on the subject of religion, he concluded that it was beyond the reach of his reason to discover the true road to virtue and happiness. This, he says, he confessed to God, and owned that he was like a blind man who had lost his DR. VANDERKEMP. 165 way, and who waited in the hope that some benevolent person would pass by and show him the right path. His hope was realized, not, however, in the first place, by the still small voice, but by the fire and tempest. By a sudden storm he was bereft of his wife and only child, while his own life was rescued as by a miracle. The Sabbath after, he was found in the sanctuary, a broken-hearted mourner. The world was no longer to him what it had been : his home was dark and desolate 3 and there was something in the charac- ter of Jesus Christ that drew him to the gospel for comfort. The sophistries by which his intellect had been warped were gradually destroyed, and within a few short months the gospel was understood^ believed, and loved. Dr. Vanderkemp, now a Christian, could no longer live to himself. He became a missionary to the heathen at fifty years of age, shrinking from no danger and from no toil. During his sojourn in London, on his way to Africa, he passed a brick-field ; and it struck him that a great boon might be conferred on the Hottentots by teaching them to build better houses ; in order to which it would first be needful to teach them the art of brick-making. Accordingly he sought leave to join the labourers, and for some weeks the vener- able apprentice sweltered among the brick-kilns, lightening his labour by the thought of Africa. And when he arrived among the people of his choice, he consecrated himself to their service with the ardour of a lover and the zeal of an apostle. Undismayed by their offensive habits, he took up his abode in the midst of them, and often without any European com- fort — sometimes without hat, or shoes or stockings — he not only taught their children, and preached to them 166 SOCIAL WORK. the gospel, but, "labouring with his own hands," he showed them how, by their own industry, they might support themselves. *' Dr. Vanderkemp was a man of exalted genius and learning, '^ says Mr. Moifat. '' He had mingled with courtiers. He had been an alumnus of the Universities of Leyden and Edinburgh. He had ob- tained plaudits for his remarkable progress in litera- ture, in philosophy, divinity, physic, and the military art. He was not only a profound student in the ancient languages, but in many of the modern Euro- pean tongues, even to that of the Highlanders of Scotland, and had distinguished himself in the armies of his earthly sovereign. Yet this man, constrained by the love of Christ, could cheerfully lay aside all his honours, mingle with savages, bear their sneers, and continually condescend to serve the meanest of his troublesome guests, take the axe, the sickle, the spade, and the mattock, lie down on the place where dogs repose, and spend nights with his couch drenched with rain, the cold wind bringing his fragile house about his ears. Though annoyed by the nightly visits of hungry hyenas, though compelled to wander about in quest of lost cattle, and exposed to the caprice of those whose characters were stains on human nature, whisperings occasionally reaching his ears that mur- derous plans were in progress for his destruction, he calmly proceeded with his benevolent efforts, and, to secure his object, would stoop, with the meekness of wisdom, to please and propitiate those rude and way- ward children of the desert whom he sought to bless/^ In 1806, the colony passed from the Dutch into the hands of the English ; and, under the protection of Sir David Baird, the mission of Dr. Vanderkemp so INTERCESSORY PRAYER. 167 prospered, that, in 1810, the settlement at Bethelsdorp contained nearly a thousand inhabitants, all receiving Christian instruction. Mats and baskets were made in considerable quantities, and sold in the surrounding country. Salt was also manufactured, and bartered for wheat; and, by sawing, soap-boiling, and wood- cutting, the people exerted themselves for an inde- pendent maintenance. Dr. Vanderkemp, who sup- ported himself as a missionary with scarcely any charge to the society, spent nearly a thousand pounds of his patrimony in the ransom of slaves; and his representations to Lord Caledon were the first in a series of movements on behalf of the oppressed abo- rigines, which, in 1828, ended in their obtaining rights and privileges in all respects equal to those of the Dutch and English settlers. There is one means of well-doing which is within the reach of all, but which, it may be safely affirmed, is not valued or practised as it ought; it is inter- cessory prayer. " I thank God," wrote Paul to Timothy, *' that without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night and day."* ^' Now we live," he wrote to his converts at Thessalonica, "if ye stand fast in the Lord. For what thanks can we render to God again for you, for all the joy wherewith we joy for your sakes before our God; night and day praying exceedingly that we might see your face, and might perfect that which is lacking in your faith ? Now God himself and our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way unto you. And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward an- other^ and toward all men, even as we do toward you : * 2 Timothy i. 3. 168 SOCIAL WORK. to the end lie may stablish your hearts unhhTmable In holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints/'* It was not only on behalf of those whom he had seen in the flesh that Paul thus offered intercessory prayer ''without ceasing," but for others as well. ''I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for yon, and for them at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen ray face in the flesh ; that their hearts might be comforted, being knit together in love.""}" Paul had not yet been to Rome when he wrote to the Christians in that city, " God is my witness, .... that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers/'J Prayer was, with the apostle Paul, no apology for the neglect of other means of doing good, but neither was his incessant activity in labour an apology for the neglect of prayer. All his works were '' begun, con- tinued, and ended in God." The command which he was divinely commissioned to send forth for the obe- dience of others, " that supplications, prayers, inter- cessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men/' was habitually and heartily obeyed by himself. The memoirs of the Rev. George Wagner contain many instances of his constant use of prayer for others, and of the delight which he took in it. " Inter- cessory prayer," he said, " is of all kinds the hi/jhest kind of prayer. Do you ask the reason ?" We an- swer, because it is the most unselfish. True religion is always an unselfish thing. One great purpose of the gospel is to destroy self, and to give us the victory over it But there is another thought, which may serve, perhaps, above every other, to impress our minds with the blessedness and elevation of inter- * 1 Thes. iii. 8—13. f Col. ii. 1, 2. % Rom. i. 9. SMALL SERVICES. 169 cessory prayer ; and that is, that it is the only kind of prayer which our great High Priest now offers within the veil. Even when he was on earth, nearly all his recorded prayers are those of intercession ', and now, at his Father's right hand, he offers no other prayers than these. * He ever liveth to make intercession for them.' When, therefore, you plead with earnest intercession for others, it is then that your prayers are most like your Saviour's — then, that they are the nearest echo of his — then that you are engaged in the selfsame way in which he is now engaged in heaven, and that your hidden life is mosjt like his glorified life." These examples are all illustrations of obedience to the command, "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." * " Whatsoever," includes the smaller as well as the larger services performed for. the glory of God and the good of man. The service performed by the little captive maid to her leprous master is not overshadowed by the greater service that was performed by the prophet that was in Israel. " Tertius," the amanuensis of an apostle, was permitted to record his own name f in the holy book, which con- tained the inspired thoughts of his master ; the scribe's work was mechanical, but his heart was in sympathy with it, and the Holy Spirit has placed his name in honourable fellowship with that of Paul. In the Old Testament there is another amanuensis, named Baruch, whose services and trials received still more explicit notice from the God of the prophet whom he served ; and few chapters of the book of Jeremiah are more instructive than the brief one which contains the message of God to Baruch,J — * Ecclesiastes ix. 10. f Komans xvi. 22. % Jeremiah xlv. 15 170 SOCIAL WORK. a message which came during a great crisis in the history of Israel and of the world. Jeremiah was commissioned to address himself to kings and nobles, to prophesy of coming judgments, and even to foretell the future destinies of surrounding empires and mo- narchies. And it was in the midst of these divine communications that God turned aside, as it were, from what we would call his great work, to direct his re- gards to the humble man who sat by Jeremiah's side, with pen in hand. The prophet's secretary, a mere instrument, as it would seem, of recording words, was not overlooked by that divine eye which was surveying all the nations around, and that divine mind which was exercising and pronouncing judgment on their destinies ; and in the midst of those awful oracles which the hand of Baruch was recording, there came to Baruch himself a voice from God — a voice of love, at once searching, faithful, and tender, " Thus saith Jehovah unto thee, Baruch V Though Baruch was the servant of another, he had a heart and soul of his own. He was not, like the pen which his hand wielded, insensible to the words which he was tracing on the scroll before him. His master was a man of sorrow and contention, and sometimes mourned over his lot bitterly ; and the servant seems to have drunk of the master's spirit. " Thou didst say'^ — so runs the message of God to him — " Woe is me now ! for the Lord hath added grief to my sorrow; I fainted in my sighing, and I find no rest." With a deep sorrow that was natural, there was mingled a want of submission to the will of God — to the doom which was impending over Jerusalem and Judea. Though his post was humble, he was a true Israelite, and everything that concerned Israel concerned him. THE prophet's SECRETARY. 171 His own prospects, too, were blighted by the frowns of the court, when, as Jeremiah's scribe, he read in the ears of the nobles the words of the Lord ; and they were doubly blighted by the predicted destruction of the land. The great One, who filleth heaven and earth with his presence, condescended to observe the sighing and the restlessness of Baruch's heart, and to send down a message that should quiet that heart and quell its tumult. " Seekest thou great things for thyself? seek them not : for behold, I will bring evil upon all flesh, saith the Lord : but thy life will I give unto thee for a prey in all places whither thou goest.'^ We are taught by this episode in the prophecy of Jeremiah, that however humble our place may be, either in the state or in the church, we are the distinct objects of the regard of our heavenly Father and Master, and to us his voice comes as directly as to the mightiest potentate in the universe. This is a blessed fact for the door-keepers of the house of God, for the hewers of wood and the drawers of water in the divine service, for the obscurest and humblest whose hand has aught to do with the work of God. Reader, what- ever post you hold in the kingdom of heaven, what- ever function you discharge, whether it be yours to teach a crowd or teach a single child, to minister the one cup of cold water or to consecrate treasures of gold and silver to your Saviour, God does not over- look youj his eye, his ear, his hand, are all open to bless you. " The kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country, who called his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods. And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one j to 172 SOCIAL WORK, every man according to his several ability; and straightway took his journey, , . , After a long time the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them, . . . Then he which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed : and I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth : lo, there thou hast that is thine. His Lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed : thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury. Take therefore the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents."* The Christian's responsibility is in proportion to his means. Our Lord's parable reminds us of the prone- ness of those whose gifts are few to find in this cir- cumstance an apology for the neglect of them. But the one talent is often a very precious contribution to the cause of truth and mercy. The writing of a single hymn, for example — such a hymn as has power to live — what a legacy to the church of God ! The name of Edward Perronet is known to the world only as the author of the hymn, "All hail ! the power of Jesus' name ;" and to discover anything else respecting him, one must search diligently in the by paths of history. But this one noble contribution to the devotion of the Christian church was a great work. It was worth while to be born, to live, and to die, to do this one thing, *' Forty years the heart may have been in battle, and one verse shall express the fruit of the * Matthew xxv, 14, 15, 19, 21—28. LIGHTS AND LIGHT-BEARERS. 173 whole. One great hope may come to fruit only at the end of many years, and as the ripening of a hundred experiences. Thus born, a hymn is one of those silent ministers which God sends to those who are to be heirs of salvation. It enters into the tender imagina- tion of childhood, and casts down upon the chambers of its thought a holy radiance, which shall never quite depart. It goes with the Christian, singing to him all the way, as if it were the airy voice of some guardian spirit. When darkness of trouble, settling fast, is shutting out every star, a hymn bursts through and brings light like a torch. It abides by our side in sickness ; it goes forth with us in joy to syllable that joy; and thus, after a time, we clothe a hymn with the memories and associations of our own life." It is related that the watchman of the Calais light- house was boasting of the brilliancy of his lantern, which can be seen many miles at sea, when a visitor said to him, " What if one of your lights should chance to go out ?'^ " Never," he replied, — "impos- sible ;" with a sort of consternation at the bare idea. "Sir," continued he, "yonder, where nothing can be seen by us, there are ships going to every part of the world; if to-night one of my burners were out, within a year would come a letter, perhaps from India, perhaps from some place I never heard of, saying, ' On such a night, at such an hour, your light burned dim ; the watchman neglected his post, and vessels were in danger.' Ah, sir, sometimes in the dark night, in stormy weather, I look out to sea, and feel as if the eye of the whole world were looking at my light. Go out? — burn dim? — no, never." With similar feelings should every Christian shudder at the thought of proving negligent or unfaithful to his trust 15* 174 SOCIAL WORK. as a light bearer in Lis own sphere^ however humble or limited. For the enlightenment of the world we need the stars as well as the sun and moon. '^ So also for the spiritual enlightenment of the world, God uses the lesser as well as the greater lights. If the man of genius or power, on whose lips tens of thousands are hanging for instruction, is called upon to shine for God, so likewise is the man of the smallest influence, and of the humblest capacity : even the labourer in the fields, the poor woman in her cottage home, and the child at its school. Christianity has ever been spread more by the gentle shining of many little lights than by the brilliant shining of a few greater ones. If you want a light at midnight, it is of no use to you that the sun is shining on the other side of the earth, or that a lamp is burning on the other side of the street. What you want is a flame, how- ever feeble, which you can have near you, and ever ready to show you light. So also the gentle influence of the humble Christian shining hourly upon his neighbour, will do far more to christianize him than the wonderful works of the greatest man whose light does not reach him."* There once resided on the west coast of Scotland a poor widow whose two sons had perished at sea. From the hour of her bereavement, she resolved to do " what she could" to save those who might be tossed on the billows which had engulfed her own children ; and all that she could do was to put her small oil lamp at sunset into her cottage window, if peradven- ture its twinkle might be seen by the storm-driven mariner. And there it shone, that small and humble * " Working for God," by Rev. F. Morse, M. a. GREAT AND SMALL. 175 beacon, night after night, the widow's willing offering to the service of her fellow-creatures. " She did what she could." " Go thou and do likewise." "Nor let the meanest think his lamp too dim, In a dark world : the Lord hath need of him.'' " A high place in the sight of God and man has the physician who remains on the battle-field after the con- quering host has passed on, tending indiscriminately wounded friends and wounded foes; or who plies his task in a plague-stricken city, entering every house where a chalk mark on the door indicates that the in- fection is within. His is an honourable work. Angels, eyeing him as they pass, might envy him the work which he has got in the service of the common Lord. But every one of us might attain a rank as high, and do a work as beneficent. If broken limbs lie not in our way, broken spirits abound in our neighbourhood. Sick hearts are rife on the edges of our daily walk. Although we lack the skill necessary to cure a bodily ailment, we may all exercise the art of healing on diseases that are more deeply set. A loving heart and a wholesome tongue are a sufl&cient apparatus ; and the instincts of a renewed nature should be ever ready to apply them in the time and place of need." In the bloody strife of the battle-field there may be soldiers who concern themselves with their own safety more than with the conquest of the enemy ; who studi- ously combine an all-engrossing desire to shield them- selves from peril, with a prudent aim to hide their cowardice and save their good name from infamy. But where the true spirit of Christian well-doing exists, the Christian's aim will be not to give as little as possible, or to pray as little as possible, or to labour as little as possible, — it will not be to devote fragments of time 176 SOCIAL WORK. and of property to the service of God and man, — but to realize, without stint and without reserve, the apos- tolic ajfirmation and command, " Know ye not that .... ye are not your own ? for ye are bought with a price : therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's."* " To him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." And in most expressive and cha- racteristic form was this sin condemned of old. " ' Curse ye Meroz,' said the angel of the Lord. What has Meroz done? Nothing. Why then is Meroz to be cursed ? Because Meroz did nothing. What ought Meroz to have done? Come to the help of the Lord. Could not the Lord do without Meroz? The Lord did do without Meroz. Did the Lord, then, sustain any loss? No, but Meroz did. Is Meroz then to be cursed? Yes, and that bitterly. Is it right that a man should be cursed for doing nothing ? Xes, when he ought to do something."! The spirit of self-denial goes hand in hand with the spirit of love in well-doing; and of self-denial, selfish as the world is, the history of the church of Christ affords bright and heroic examples in noble-hearted men who have forsaken home and civilized life, and have spent their days among brutal savages in what, but for the presence of Christ, would have been weari- ness and wretchedness, to bring these savages to the knowledge of God and to the possession of eternal life. Even within the borders of civilization, we find self- denial in well-doing practised by men and women, un- known to fame, in circumstances only less trying than those of Vanderkemp and Moffat among Bushmen and Bechuanas. And it should be remembered that the duty and the honour of this grace " have all the saints." Only let men know distinctly what self-denial is. In the matter o^ giving, for example, nothing that we can * 1 Corinthians vi. 19, 20. t Judges V. 23. Children's Missionary Kecord. "l WAS AN HUNGERED." 177 spare without feeling it can be brought under this name. ^' Liberality and self-denial," says Dean Alford, " are two very different things. The man of wealth, whose personal comfort and ease are quite independent of his charitable bestowals, may subscribe and give largely to a hundred charities : in so doing, he is per- forming a sacred duty, and that duty is liberality ; but lie is not self-denying. If, however, that same man, loving his ease, fond of his comforts, fastidious in his tastes, sacrifices that ease, suspends those comforts, offends those tastes, in real laborious personal contact with poverty and misery; is beneficent not only in matters which can be transacted through his cheque- book, but in exertions which cost him time, which cost him perhaps painful revulsions of feeling, which cost him sacrifice of pride and exclusiveness, — then 1 should say that he is not merely liberal, but self-denying also; that he has at any rate begun to walk in the path which his Saviour trod before him, who, from the spotless purity of the Godhead and the light unapproachable, came among sinners, and bore with them, and wit- nessed their vileness, and touched their loathsomeness. Practical self-denial does not belong alone to the wealthy : it is required of us all. It is the undoubted duty of persons whom God has placed above poverty and wretchedness, to flow forth to those who are less out- wardly blessed than themselves, in personal acts and words of kindness; to put aside their tastes, and cherished habits, and worldly pride, and forget them- selves in their Christian duty." Our Lord has connected the most solemn sanctions of the great day with earthly acts of well-doing neglected or performed in his name, and for his sake. '' I was 178 SOCIAL WORK. an hungered, and ye gave me no meat : I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink : I was a stranger, and ye took me not in : naked, and ye clothed me not : sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not." . ..." I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat : I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink : I was a stranger, and ye took me in : naked, and ye clothed me : I was sick, and ye visited me : I was in prison, and ye came unto me."* In his poem of '' A poor wayfaring Man of Grrief," Mr. James Montgomery has aflfectingly embodied the spirit of these divine words. The wayfarer crosses the poet's path, and again and again sues so humbly for relief that the poet's heart is never able to answer, " Nay." In one sorrow after another he sympathizes with him, and out of one difficulty after another he de- livers him. The test of his love and compassion be- comes more severe each time ; but with ever increas- ing zeal and self-denial, he ministers the needed help, till " to try his friendship's utmost zeal," the suffering wayfarer asked him if he would die for him ? The flesh was weak, but the free spirit cried, "I will." And then he found out for whom he had done all this. " In a moment to my view The stranger darted from disguise, The token in his hands I knew, My Saviour stood before mine eyes. He spake; and my poor name he named : 'Of me thou hast not been ashamed, These deeds shall thy memorial be; Fear not, thou didst them unto me.' " * Matthew xxv. 36, 36, 42, 43. PART THE SECOND CONFLICT. CHAPTEH L— CONFLICT WITH SIN. CHAPTER IL— CONFLICT WITH DESPOND- ENCY AND DOUBT. CHAPTER III.— CONFLICT WITH. SUFFER- ING AND DEATH. " Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." Ephjesians vi. 10, 11, 12. 179 •Breast the wave, Christi;m, When it is strongest; Watch for day, Christian, When the night's longest. Onward and onward still, Urge thine endeavour : The rest that remaineth Shall be for ever. right the fight. Christian : Jesus is o'er thee, Eun the race, Christian: Heaven is before thee. He who hath promised Faltereth never : The love of eternity Flows on for ever. Raise the eye. Christian, Just as it closeth : Lift the heart. Christian, Ere it reposeth. Thee from the love of Christ Nothing shall sever, Mount when thy work is done, Praise him for ever." 180 CHAPTER I. CONFLICT WITH SIN. Contents. — The language of war — Heathen speculations — The devil — Two extremes— The temptation of Christ— Can we dis- tinguish the assaults of Satan ? — Luther, Bunyan, Job, Peter — How to use the sword of the Spirit — No compromise — Example— Conflict with inward sin — Asceticism no cure — Madame Guyon — Death to sin — Colonel Gardiner — Dr. Pay- son, Pearce, Charles Simeon, Chalmers, Sarah Martin, Bun- yan — wretched man ! — Means of deliverance — The spider and the toad — Cultivation of the positive virtues — Self-denial — Andrew Fuller — The untenanted heart — Besetting sins — Charles Simeon — Obsta principiis — A parable— Little sins — Fasting and prayer — Payson — Simeon — Union of humilia- tion and cheerfulness — The Christian life a battle and a hymn. " What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh : that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. . . . For if*ye live after the flesh, ye shall die : but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live."— Komans viii. 3, 4, 13. 16 18] " Put off each cumbrous weight ; Renounce each darling sin: lie must be free as air, Who would Faith's victory win. With patience gird the soul : Maintain the strife begun : Be firm unto the end : — On, to the foe, then, on." AVELING. " 'Tis not the skirmish of an hour : Sin yields not at a blow : For pride of heart is ill to slay ; And what seemed overcome to-day Will be to-morrow's foe." Tholuck's "Light from thb Cuoss.' 182 CONFLICT WITH SIN. The records of the gospel of peace are instinct with the language of war. " I have fought a good fight/' said the apostle Paul ; and his words possess a truer sublimity than Ca3sar's famed dispatch, " I came, I saw, I conquered," inasmuch as the subject of the one is sublimer than the subject of the other. The battles of this world will soon be forgotten, except so far as they contribute to the ends of God's providence. The battles of the soul will never be forgotten : their dangers and their victories will be recounted through- out eternity. Never did hero fight more bravely than the apostle Paul. And never has man been better entitled than he to say at the end of his life, " I have fought a good fight." He had fought with fiery and savage perse- cutors, and though he raised no arm against them, he overcame them by " the irresistible might of weak- ness." He had fought with the ignorance, and errors, and sins of the world ; and though their giant hosts were too much for his feeble arm, he deemed it no folly to assail them. That ancient Book with which he was familiar from childhood, contained a story in which he could see as in an allegory the picture of his own position. The disparity between Goliath and David was not more marked than the disparity between the massive and hoary superstitions of the 183 184 CONFLICT WITH SIN. world and Paul their assailant; but, as of old, the arm and sling of David were nerved and guided by the God of heaven, so were now the mind and tongue and pen of Paul. And the weapons of his warfare were mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strong-holds. Paul had to fight at the same time with the corruptions of his own heart ; and his deep con- sciousness of their power is shown in the language in which he describes his warfare with them : " So fight I, not as one that beateth the air : but I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection : lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway."* But these are not the only enemies with which this spiritual hero fought, as we learn from his instruc- tions to the Christians of Ephesus — " Put on the whole armour of God.^f Do not enter into battle with your adversaries naked and defenceless, but take to you arinour : do not cover one portion and leave another exposed, but put on the loliole armour: do not resort to any arsenal of your own, but put on the whole armour of God j " in order that ye may be able to stand against the stratagems of the devil," the great enemy of man, a fiend veteran and malignant. '' For our struggle is not against flesh and blood." It is not the wrestling on equal terms of potsherd with potsherd. It is an unequal contest ; because it is with spirits, fallen spirits, who once occupied positions of rank and prerogative in heaven, and still retain, it may be, a similar place among the hosts of apostate angels. Our conflict is with " the world-rulers of this dark- ness," wary and vengeful antagonists which have * 1 Corinthians ix. 26, 27. f Ephesians vi. 11. WHENCE GOOD AND EVIL? 185 acquired a special dominion on earth out of which they are loath to be dislodged. These "spirits of evil" have to be encountered not on the open field of the world merely, but also on " high" or " heavenly places," the ransomed and consecrated church of God, which they attempt to pollute, divide, and over- throw, and whose members they are continually tempt- ing to sin and apostasy. From this and many other Scriptures '' it is plain that fallen spirits have a vast and mysterious agency in the world, and that in many ways inscrutable to man, they lord it over ungodliness, shaping, deepening, or prolonging the means and methods of spiritual sub- jugation.""^ Ages before the coming of Christ, men had specu- lated on the moral disorders of the universe. They saw good and evil standing side by side in the world, companions everywhere, yet irreconcilable foes ; evil apparently the stronger because the more prevalent. Their moral instincts taught them that the same foun- tain could not send forth sweet water and bitter — that the same being could not be the author both of good and of evil. And from this simple argument they passed to the conclusion that there are two co-equal deities, or at least co-equal principles; and to each of the two, the one good, the other evil, they ascribed a corresponding progeny. In the poetical or mystical form which the theory usually assumed, good was identified with light, and evil with darkness. Erro- neous and dreamy as was this theory, speculation, un- aided by divine teaching, could scarcely come nearer the truth than it did in this instance. The Bible tells that there is a God with whom * Dr. Eadie : " Commentary on the Epistle to the Ephesians." 16* 186 CONFLICT WITH SIN. all goodness originated, and a devil with whom origi- nated evil. But these are not co-equal deities. The one is the Creator, the other is the creature ; and this creature was created holy with the image of his Maker. How he fell into sin we have no means of knowing. It is a mystery which no human intellect has yet fathomed. But that he did fall — that since his fall he has devoted his mighty energies to the propagation of sin, and that, with legions of spirits whom he has drawn with him into the vortex of rebellion, he is now busily occupied in tempting men to evil — we believe on the authority of a divine testimony. With some the devil is only a personification of the principle of evil. But they might almost as well say that God is the personification of the principle of good. There is a distinct living personality ascribed to the devil throughout Holy Scripture. But, from the extreme of denying all real living existence to Satan, some have passed to the opposite extreme of regarding, or seeming to regard, all the evil that is in the world as the direct work of Satan. That is, when man does an evil thing, it is not man that does it but the devil in him. When man's will is perverse, and chooses wrong and rejects good, it is not man himself that does so : his will is under the despotic control of the author of evil. It is scarcely man's will at all, it is the devil's will acting through him. Human evil-doing is, properly speak- ing, diabolical evil-doing. It is human only in form : man is but the instrument, the devil is the real agent. So far is this notion carried, that we might almost suppose that men's minds are now as passive in the hands of Satan as the bodies of men were when pos- sessed by evil spirits in the days of our Lord. But THE DEVIL AND HIS WORK. 187 this must be a great mistake. If it were at all ac- cording to truth, man would be no sinner in the com- mission of his own sins : bis sins would be misfortunes, not crimes : the only true sinner in a world of sinners would be the devil himself. Between these two extremes of making the devil nothing, and making him everything, there lie all shades, not so much of opinion as of feeling in regard to the wicked one and his work. The points that seem essential to truth in regard to it are, on the one hand, that he is a real living being, and that his angels are real living beings, actively engaged in the tempta- tion of man ; and, on the other hand, that when man is tempted successfully, yields to the temptation and does the evil, the sin of yielding and of doing is his own. It is a sin on the part of the devil to seek to draw men into evil : it is a sin on the part of man to be drawn into evil. Whatever amount of influence the tempter puts forth, it is never such as so to overpower the tempted that he is without blame in yielding. He has no such power as God has to touch the inner- most springs of the will and the soul. His power is the same, in kind at least, as that of human tempters. By the voice and otherwise, they present to each other motives and inducements to sin. Without the voice, in some way to us unknown, he too presents motives and inducements to sin. In both cases it is by the presentation or suggestion of evil motives that the temptation is effected. The devil may have immensely readier access to the human mind than men have. But our spiritual nature is not at his mercy; and whatever hand Satan has in our sins, it is still true that we are successfully tempted only when " we are drawn away of our own lusts and enticed." 188 CONFLICT WITH SIN. Of the ^'stratagems" or "wiles" of tlie devil we have many instances in the narratives of Holy Scrip- ture. He unsettled the mind of Eve by representing God as jealous of the happiness of his own creatures, and yet too indulgent to punish their sins; he stirred up the royal and warlike aspirations of David to take a military census and force a conscription as the basis of a standing army ; he inflamed the avaricious and sordid spirit of Judas; and, more wicked and daring than all, he attempted to draw the Son of God himself into sin. The temptation of Christ in the wilderness is one of the most prominent facts in his history, and one of the most mysterious. The supernatural circumstances connected with it form but a small part of the mystery. His Godhead and his sinlessness separate him so far from our condition that we are apt to imagine that his temptation was unreal. Yet we may be assured that that was no mock fight between Christ and Satan which the Gospels record. Christ, as we have often to remind ourselves, was a true man, and, as such, he was assailed at every point at which human nature is vulnerable. He was " in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin."* There is no part of our Lord's life that has a more constant bearing on our daily conflicts with sin than the history of his temptation. The devil still goeth about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. He may find them, as he found Christ, in the very act of receiving the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and along with it such testimony as Christians now have, that they are the sons of God; but he has no respect * Ilebrews iv. 15. THE ASSAULTS OF SATAN. 18& to God's will or to the soul's sanctity to deter him from intruding even there with his foulest temptations. John Bunyan places the Valley of Humiliation imme- diately after the Palace Beautiful in the way to heaven. And from this palace, where Christian's soul was filled with joy and peace, and whence he obtained a distant view of the Delectable Mountains and the promised land, he had to descend into the Valley of Humiliation to encounter Apollyon in deadly conflict. No present spiritual attainment or enjoyment renders us secure from the presence and assaults of the devil. But can we distinguish the assaults of Satan from those temptations in which it may be supposed there is nothing but the hand of a fellow-man and the corruption of our own hearts? Perhaps we cannot. Luther saw the direct work of the wicked one in every evil under the sun. " Whatever resistance he met with ; whatever obstacle to divine grace he found in his own heart or in external circumstances; what- ever event he saw plainly cast in the way of the pro- gress of the gospel; whatever outbreak of a bad or unamiable spirit occurred in the church; whatever strange phenomenon of nature wore a malevolent aspect ;" the hand of the devil was in it all. " The Lord God sends no misfortune into the world/' he said, " except through Satan, from whom comes all affliction, misery, and disease/* But if in this Luther went beyond the " warranty of Holy Scripture," he had the highest authority for saying, *' Satan shoots dreadful thoughts, like fiery darts, into the hearts of those who fear God." x\nd of this he had his own bitter experience. '' It is reported of him, that being tempted to make away with himself, the temptation was so fierce and pressing upon him, that 190 CONFLICT WITH SIN. falling into an agony, and as it were struggling for life, he had no other way to defend himself, but, during the conflict, by frequently urging and repeating over and over again to himself the sixth commandment, * Thou shalt do no murder : Thou shalt do no murder:' that so by encountering this fiery dart, with the con- tinually renewed evidence of the sin offered'fuU and fresh to his faith, in the peremptory express words of the precept, he might relieve his labouring mind against the present violence of that impious sugges- tion." Of this class of temptations John Bunyan had a bitter and varied experience. " For about the space of a month," he says, speaking of the commencement of his Christian life, " a very great storm came down upon me, which handled me twenty times worse than all I had met with before. It came stealing upon me, now by one piece, then by another ; first, all my com- fort was taken from me; then darkness seized upon me ; after which, whole floods of blasphemies, both against God, Christ, and the Scriptures, were poured upon my spirit to my great confusion and astonish- ment." The poor tempted soul was delivered at this time ; but after a brief interval, temptation returned in another form. " Sell Christ, sell him, sell him, sell him," was sounded in his ears as fast as man can speak ; and Bunyan was tortured as upon the rack ; and, trembling with dread lest he should consent thereto, he bent the whole force of his being with unutterable agony against it. At length, one morn- ing there seemed to pass deliberately through his heart, as if he were tired of resistance, this thought, "Let him go if he will;" and from that moment VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. 191 down he fell, " as a bird that is shot from the top of a tree, into great guilt and fearful despair." An expe- rience which probably suggested the description of the passage of Christian through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. " I took notice that now poor Christian was so confounded that he did not know his own voice; and thus I perceived it. Just when he was come over against the mouth of the burning pit, one of the wicked ones got behind him, and stepped up softly to him, and, whispering, suggested many grievous blasphemies to him, which he verily thought had pro- ceeded from his own mind. This put Christian more to it than anything that he met before, even to think that he should now blaspheme Him that he loved so much before ; yet if he could have helped it he would not have done it. But he had not the discretion either to stop his ears or to know from whence those blasphemies came.'^ Bunyan, it is true, was a man of vivid and almost restless imagination, and he had been a man of wicked thoughts and wicked deeds. But this will not account for the blasphemies which rendered two years of his life miserable, at a time when, through the grace of G^d, the whole strength of his soul was set against sin, and his conscience was sensitively alive to all that was offensive to his God and Saviour. Evil thoughts could not spring out of Christ's soul, for he was perfectly sinless ; nor could they originate in his imagi- nation, for it was constitutionally perfect, and abun- dantly replenished with forms of heavenly beauty. And yet he was assailed by evil thoughts ; and these could only come from the personal suggestions of the evil one. And this is the judgment which Bunyan pronounced on his own case many years after, although 192 CONFLICT WITH SIN. at the time ^' he had not the discretion either to stop his ears or to know from whence those blasphemies came." On this point the experience of men recorded in Holy Scripture, and of others, illustrate each other. " Take Job, for example/^ says Dr. Cheever. " If a man say, this experience of Bunyan is all a delusion, it is merely his own imagination tormentino; him, there never was or could be such a reality : we say, Beware : this expe- rience of Bunyan has its original in the word of God itself; it is countersigned, as it were, in Job's history. Or if a man say this experience of Job is figurative; no man ever experienced such dealings in reality : we say, So far from this, other men have experienced such discipline ; it is countersigned, as it were, and illus- trated in the experience of a modern Christian. It is true that in the account of Job the steps are marked by the divine hand; but in the account of Bunyan also the steps are just as clear, with that single excep- tion. They are almost as clear as if it had been said, as in the case of Job, There was a man in the land of England whom Grod would take and prepare for the greatest usefulness of all men living. And Satan said, Let me take Bunyan, and I will tempt him from his integrity, and make him curse God, and deny his very being. And God said, Let Satan try his uttermost upon this man ; and the awful discipline shall only prepare him for greater usefulness and glory. So Satan went forth, and by the space of two years filled the soul of Bunyan with distresses and temptations, and the fiery darts of the wicked one. Is not this the very truth of the matter ? You may say that with Job Satan's temptations were all external, while with Bunyan they were mostly inward. Yes, but let JOB AND PETER. 193 it be remembered that Job had a bosom companion, a treacherous, unbelieving, discontented wife, who would, in the place of the devil, do all the whisperings and the blasphemous suggestions that were needed. Yea, while Job was passing through the valley of tempta- tion, this woman was as a fiend at his ear : ' Curse God and die,' to make it as the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Bunyan, on the other hand, had a good wife, who would do no part of the work of the tempter, but would shield her husband, and help him on to God." Christ warned Peter that Satan would try him to the utmost of his malignity and power. " Simon, Simon., behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat.''* " This is the very renewal of the scene in the Old Testament in regard to Job. Let me but lay my hand, says this sarcastic and malignant devil, upon this Peter, this disciple so hot and zealous for his Lord and Master, and I will make bim blaspheme bis very Saviour. I will make him curse God and die. Yes; and the devil did succeed in making him curse God. Awful, awful truth ! Fearful revelation of the meaning of our Saviour in his warning to Peter, and of the dreadful power of this tempter of mankind ! But he did not succeed in making him die, nor in utterly putting out the light of faith and life within him. No, there again was Satan disappointed, and out of evil still was brought forth good. But why, how, by what agency? Oh, how beautiful, how precious is the explanation ! * Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat; hut I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not.^ So thou shalt yet be saved and strengthened, even though thou shalt deny thy * Luke xxii. 31. 17 194 CONFLICT WITH SIN. Lord ; and ' wlien thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren/ Ah yes, that was the reason I have prayed for thee. And what saint is there that Christ does not pray for? So, if our trust be in him, we are all safe, but not otherwise. And now who does not see that in Peter's case, just as in Bunyan's, these dread- ful storms of temptation were permitted to overwhelm him, that even out of that terrible experience, out of those very depths of Satan, the tempted and fallen disciple might gain a strength in the end, through the good Spirit of God, which not another of the breth- ren, except perhaps Paul, ever manifested ? And hence you can trace in Peter's rich instructive epistles a knowledge of the great adversary, and a warning and a vigilance against him, that sprang from Peter's own dreadful wrestlings with him. Yea, those very blasphemies that Satan made Peter utter turned out to be the most effective weapons in remembrance against himself." If there be temptations in reference to which it would be difficult to say whether there be any tempter other than the human — temptations in which our own hearts are both tempted and tempting — it is still a solemn and alarming thought that Satan mai/ have his hand in them. There is, perhaps, no temptation in reference to which we can say with certainty, "Satan is not here.'' And the possibility of his presence and agency should awaken immediate concern. "I am thankful," says one, " that the existence of Satan has been revealed. Could I tell you, man of business, that in your warehouse there lurks a wretch, whose constant aim is to plunder your property and alienate your supporters, I should lay you under a weight of NO COMPROMISE. 195 obligation and gratitude : you would thank me for information so important and so invaluable. So with reference to this implacable foe to God and man. I thank God that he has told me of Satan's existence, and provided a panoply against which the artillery of hell is powerless." lu our Lord's conflict with Satan we have an example of steadfast resistance to evil without truce or compromise. And the Christian who would stand in the evil day must do likewise. The smallest con- cession may prove the one fatal step that shall be irretrievable. " I have heard it reported," says Dr. South, and whether the story be fact or fable the moral is the same, " of a certain monk or prelate, who for a long time together was continually urged and so- licited, or rather worried and pursued, with three foul and horrid temptations : namely, to commit murder, or fornication, or to be drunk ; till at length, quite wearied out with the restless, vexatious importunity of the tempter, he pitches upon the sin of drunken- ness, as the least of the three, to avoid his solicitation to the other two. This was the course he took to rid himself of a vehement temptation. But the tempter, who was much the better artist of the two, knew how to make the very same course he took to decline it, an effectual means to push it on and enforce it. For, having once prevailed and carried his point so far as to bring him to be drunk, he quickly brought him in the strength thereof to commit both the other sins too. Such are we, when God abandons us to ourselves and our own deluded and deluding judgment. Whereas, had this poor wretch, under his unhappy circum- stances, betaken himself to frequent prayer and 196 CONFLICT WITH SIN. fasting, with a vigilant and severe shunning all occasions of sin, such especially as either his natural temper or his inactive way of living put him in most danger of, I dare undertake that, following such a course, he would neither have worn out his knees with praying, nor his body with fasting, before God would have given him an answer of peace, and a full con- quest over his temptations. We should upon no terms account any sin small ; for whatsoever it may be reckoned, if compared with others of a higher guilt and malignity, yet still, considered absolutely in itself, it is not so small, but that it is an act of rebellion against the Supreme Lord and Governor of the universe, by a direct violation of his law ; not so small, but that by the same law it merits damnation to the sinner in the eternal destruction of his soul and body ; nor, lastly, so small, but that as it merits, so it would actually and infallibly inflict the same upon him, had not the Son of God himself shed his blood and laid down his very life, both as a satisfaction for the sin, and a ransom for the sinner. And, if all this must be owned and submitted to as uncontrollable truth, from what topic of reason or religion can the most acute disputant argue for the smallness of any sin ? Nevertheless, admitting (without granting) that a sin were never so small, yet certain it is, that the greatest and the foulest sins, which the corrupt nature of man is capable of committing, generally enter upon the soul by very small and scarcely observable instances at first. So that, of all the courses which a man in such a state can take, this of capitulating, and, as it were, making terms with the devil, is the most senseless and dangerous : no man having ever yet driven a saving bargain with this great truckler for "mortify your members." 197 souls, by exchanging guilts, or bartering one sin for another." In one respect, Jesus Christ has left us no ex- ample, — and it is his glory that he has not. He has left us no example of conflict with inward or actual sin. He was born without sin, and he was successful in repulsing every assault that was made on his inborn purity. '' Man-soul" in his person (to use the lan- guage of Bunyan's " Holy War") was never entered by " Diabolus." The '* famous and stately castle" within it — " for strength, it may be called a palace ; for pleasantness, a paradise ; for largeness, a place so copious as to contain all the w^orld" — never surren- dered to the arch-assailant : his heart was never other than a most perfect temple of the Most High. How far otherwise it is with Christians may be seen in such apostolic precepts as these : — '* Mortify your members w^hich are upon the earth ; fornication, un- cleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry : ... in the which ye also walked some time, when ye lived in them. But now ye also put ojff all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth,"* The work of purifying, which is here prescribed and insisted on, is one that requires wisdom, earnestness, constancy, with more than mortal strength. Let us try to understand what it is, and how it is to be performed. Asceticism has entirely missed the scriptural meaning of " mortification." In its dogmas and practices, we have an apostle's authority for saying that there is only "a show of wisdom." The body is not ^'kept under," but lacerated and tormented * Colossians iii. 5, 7, 8. 17* 198 CONFLICT WITH SIN. into debility. The appetites are looked upon as in themselves sinful, and fit only to be exterminated. The physical constitution is thus enervated and sickened. Yet its sinful tendencies are only beaten down, not eradicated. The whole process is a car- dinal mistake. The body may be reduced ; and yet the evil bias remain unchecked. A man may whip and fast himself into a walking skeleton ; and yet the spirit within him may have its lusts unconquered, losing only the ability to gratify them. To place a fetter on a robber's hands will not cure him of covetousness, though it may disqualify him for actual theft. To seal up a swearer's mouth will not pluck profanity out of his heart, though it may for the time prevent him from taking God's name in vain. And so to lacerate the flesh, even if it be to the verge of suicide, merely incapacitates it for indulgence, and does not extirpate sinful desire. It is said that an ancient philosopher, a pupil of the illustrious Plato, " would never mention who hia father or his mother was, or where he was born, or anything of that description, because he always ap- peared to be ashamed that he had a body." These men regarded the body as a filthy garment, with which the soul, in its wanderings, becomes accidentally invested for a short time, which can never be rendered a congenial or suitable covering for the spirit, but which that spirit should only loathe, separate itself from, and escape out of as quickly as possible ; and it is this heathen speculation that has poisoned so much of the nominal Christianity of many ages. But " the Holy Scriptures inform us that man's body, no less than his soul, is the work of God, and that he made both of them ^ very good' ; that both are fallen MADAME GUYON's SELF-INFLICTIONS. 199 and polluted bj sin, both redeemed by the blood of Christ, both subjects of sanctification by the Holy Spirit; and that the body is co-heir, with the soul, of that immortal life which is God's promise to us in his Son. No contrast can be more striking than that be- tween the language of contempt and even of hatred in which the heathen sages speak of the body, and the reverential and honourable terms used by the sacred writers on the same subject." The strong hold which false notions respecting the body have taken of the human heart may be seen in the case of Madame Guyon. Even after she had re- ceived considerable enlightenment in divine truth, and could say, '' I had now no sight but of Jesus alone," with a strange inconsistency, the fruit of her Romish education, she inflicted on herself a series of the most painful and repulsive austerities. Every day for some time she disciplined herself with scourges pointed with iron ; she tore her flesh with brambles, thorns, and nettles ; very often she kept wormwood in her mouth, and put coloquintida in her food. When she walked she put stones in her shoes. All that could allure the taste or please the senses was refused to them : all that created the greatest dislike or pain was given them. She aimed to annihilate the distinction between pleasant and unpleasant, sweet and bitter, and to train her senses to a state of perfect indifi'erence to both. Her thirst for pain and sufi"ering seemed unquenchable. These mortifications were practised by Madame Guyon, not as expiatory but as disciplinary. She did not hope to atone for guilt thereby, but to conform her heart and habits to the standard which she had set before herself. But even in this she was mistaken, 200 CONFLICT WITH SIN. as she afterwards discovered. One of the gravest charges against her at a later period of her life was, that she did not value self-imposed penance as she ought. " Is it," said Bossuet to her, " is it a mark, Madam, of Christian lowliness to disregard the prin- ciples and practices which have been sanctioned by the wisdom and piety of many ages ? In your ' Short Method of Prayer' there are some expressions which seem to imply that the austerities and mortifications which are practised in the Catholic church are not necessary/' " I admit,'' she replied, " that my views and practices differ in this particular from those of soniye other persons. I cannot say that I do now, with the views which I have of the power and applications of faith, attach that importance to austerities and prac- tices of physical mortification which I once did. My view now is this : Physical sufferings and mortifica- tions which tend to bring the appetites into subjection, and to restore us in that respect to harmony with God, are of great value : they are a part of God's discipline, which he has wisely instituted and rendered operative in the present life ; but then they should not be self-sought or self inflicted, but should be received and submitted to as they come in the course of God's providence. In other words, crosses are good : our rebellious nature needs them : not those, however, which are of merely human origin, but those which God himself makes and imposes." The apostle Paul, whose guidance we follow im- plicitly, declares that self-inflicted bodily mortifica- tions are not only inef&cacious, having " only a show of wisdom," but that they also produce an effect directly the opposite to their professed design. Their avowed purpose is to lower and abase humanity; and SCRIPTURAL MORTIFICATION. 201 Paul gives them epithets all showing this object; while with sternness and force he adds, in effect, that their only result is to rouse up and inflate unregenerate humanity. When Diogenes lifted his foot on Plato's velvet cushion, and shouted, " Thus I trample on Plato's pride," the Athenian sage justly replied, " But with still greater pride/' The apostle utters a similar sentiment : the carnal nature is all the while gratified, even though the body, wan and wasted, be reduced to the point of bare existence. There is as much pride in cells and cloisters as in courts and palaces, perhaps more; and oftentimes as gross sensuality. Bodily self-inflictions, so far from accomplishing their osten- sible object, really produce the reverse : their humility is pride in its most sullen and offensive form ; and, so far from subduing and sanctifying, they only gratify to satiety the coarse and selfish passions ; nay, as history has shown, tend to nurse licentiousness in one age, and a ferocious fanaticism in another.* The death which the words '' mortify your mem- bers" enjoin as a duty, is a death to all sinful propensi- ties — the apostle being his own interpreter. The lust that uses and debases the organs of the body as its in- struments is to be extirpated. " The lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life," in all their varied forms and fruits, are to be rooted out and abandoned. '' Let not sin reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteous- ness unto sin : but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God."-)- * See Dr. Eadie's Commentary on Colossians: chap, ii, 20 — 23. t Romans vi. 12, 13. 202 CONFLICT WITH SIN. In some well-known instances, Colonel (tARDINEr's for example, this '•' death unto sin'' in its grosser forms has been eflFected with a suddenness which nothing can explain but the power of divine grace. Living for many years in a perpetual round of sensualities, he used to say that Omnipotence itself could not reform him without giving him another body. But from the hour of his conversion " all desire and inclination" to the evils he had so long practised were as entirely removed as if he were an infant. With his old body he lived a new life, loathing those things which had been his heaven before, and not only practising virtue, but by his holiness and devoutness adorning the doctrine of his Saviour. This ^' death unto sin,'' even in its grosser forms, often involves however a protracted struggle and many failures. Instructive instances of this struggle in humble life will be found in the pages of " English Hearts and English Hands" — instances which illustrate very strikingly the diffi- culties of '^ holy living" in large classes of the community. The conflicts of good men with inward sins, and with sins whose outward " manifestations of an un- Christ like spirit" are scarcely noticed amidst the glaring violations of Christian law which prevail in the world, are often the occasion of as much mental suffering as the conflicts of others with '' the lusts of the flesh." At the commencement of his ministerial life we find Dr. Payson often " dis- Edward Payson ; Bh.i^el'^^isi'^^ed couraged by the little which he accom- ^^^^' plishes, and the selfish motives with which that little is defiled." He is assailed by " strong temptations, which drive him to his knees for assist- ance ;" and by '^ frequent recurrence of the same DR. payson's warfare. 203 temptation, which costs him long and severe " struggles before he is favoured with complete victory." This is followed by " increased confidence in God, as able to supply all his need, and, at the same time, with a more humbling sense of his unfitness for the ministry." And, even when he is in a '* lively frame" during several successive days, he is still '' astonished at his slow progress in religion.'' Again, " pride and unbe- lief begin to work, and render him miserable," and for defence against them he resorts " to prayer, pleading various arguments for the space of an hour, before he is able to repress pride and repining thoughts." Nor is this the extremity of his conflict : he has such " a dreadful view of his heart, that he could scarcely sup- port the sight of himself;" while this, "instead of humbling, only distressed him ; so that he is at last obliged to desist, without, as he can perceive, any answer at all." The next day he can cry, "Abba, Father," with all the confidence of filial love. After years of experience and usefulness. Dr. Pay- son wrote these words : — "As you suspect, popularity costs me dear ; and did it not afford me the means of being more extensively useful, I should heartily pray to be delivered from it, as the greatest of all curses. Since the novelty has worn ofi", it affords me no plea- sure; and yet I am continually wishing for more, though it feeds nothing but pride. If we had no pride, I be- lieve applause would give us no pleasure. But no one can conceive how dearly it is purchased ; what unspeak- ably dreadful temptations, buff'eti.ngs, and workings of depravity are necessary to counteract the pernicious effects of this poison. It is, indeed, the first and last prayer which I wish my friends to offer up for me, that I may be kept humble ; and if your too great and 204 CONFLICT WITH SIN. undeserved aiFeetion for me will exert itself in this way — that is, in praying for me — it may preserve your gourd from the blast and the worm/' The experience of other eminent servants of Christ has been of the same character. "A detestable vanity for the reputation of a 'good preacher' (as the world terms it) has already cost me many conflicts," said Samuel Pearce. " Daily I feel convinced of the propriety of a remark which my friend Summers made on his journey to Wales, that *It is easier for a Chris- tian to walk habitually near to God, than to be irre- gular in our walk with him.' But I want resolution ; I want a contempt for the world ; I want more heavenly- mindedness; I want more humility; I want much, very much of that which God alone can bestow. Lord, help the weakest lamb in all thy flock." The Rev. Charles Simeon was conscious of his danger from the same source. Writing to a friend in 1817, with reference to malignant attempts which had been made to injure his character, he said, "■ If I were to attempt to assign a cause for these untoward cir- cumstances having been permitted, I should think it was partly in mercy, to add ballast to my slender bark, and partly in judgment to counteract and punish an undue measure of complacency, which I may have felt in my growing popularity. I certainly have seen, for a long time back, the almost invariable kindness and respect with which I have been treated by all orders and degrees of men in this place ; and it is possible that God may have seen me more gratified with it than I ought to be." Such entries as the following are often found in DR. CHALMERS AND SARAH MARTIN. 205 the diary of Dr. Chalmers : — " Sunday, Dec. 8, 1811. Let all vanity, my God, be crucified within me. Let my sole aim be to win souls; and, though I cannot at all times command a clear and enraptured view of divine truth, let me fill up every interval with works which bespeak the Christian. Bring me closer and closer to Him to whom thou hast given all power, and committed all judgment. Fill me with his fulness; and may I have peace and joy with thee through Jesus Christ my Lord.'^ — " Dec. 10. Let me be peculiarly on my guard against all selfisnness and love of display ; and, my God, let me not satisfy myself with choking up the streams which flov^ from my vitiated heart. Apply the remedy to the seat and centre of the disease. Eenew this heart; sanctify it by the faith that is in Jesus, and form it to thyself in righteous- ness and all in holiness." — " Dec. 17. Let me give more earnestness and application to the secret disci- pline of the inner man ; and, God, assist me in Christ to regulate my thoughts, and to go on joyfully, without perplexity, harassment, or fatigue." Sarah Martin, in the midst of her Christlike efi"orts for the salvation of the inmates of Yarmouth prison, refers to some occurrence in her prison experience in these words of self-reproach and penitence : " Thou, Lord, seest the prayer of my heart respecting the circumstances of this day : oh ! blot out my sins of temper, of unkindness, of ingratitude, of impatience. Oh ! forgive, forgive, I beseech thee. The foe is powerful ; my corrupt nature is on the side of the enemy. Oh that I had returned good for evil, and love and gratitude for good ! Forbid, I pray thee, any evil to others from what I have said ; for when I reproved the sinner, I did it not in love, but in the 18 206 CONFLICT WITH SIN. feeling of human vexation and of human an^er. I did not love the sinner, but felt great dislike, yea, aversion to him. Have pity on the lost and guilty one : teac4i him to pray, and whilst I try thine infinite forbeafance as I do, give me the grace of patience and forbearlfoce to others, I beseech thee, most gracious God, Father, Son, and Spirit.'' John Bunyan, in the end of his " Grace Abound- ing to the Chief of Sinners," says, "I find to this day seven abominations in my heart : (1.) Inclination to unbelief. ( 2.) Suddenly to forget the love and mercy that Christ manifesteth. (3.) A leaning to the works of the law, (4.) Wanderings and coldness in prayer. (5.) To forget to watch for that I pray for. (6.) Apt to murmur because I have no more, and yet ready to abuse what I have. (7.) I can do none of those things which God commands me, but my corruptions will thrust in themselves : when I would do good, evil is present with me." ^' These things," he adds, " I con- tinually see and feel, and am afflicted and oppressed with • yet the wisdom of God doth order them for my good. (1.) They make me abhor myself. (2.) They keep me from trusting my heart. (3.) They convince me of the insufficiency of all inherent righteousness. (4.) They show me the necessity of flying to Jesus. (5.) They press me to pray unto God. (6.) They show me the need I have to watch and be sober. (7.) And provoke me to pray unto God, through Christ, to help me, and carry me through this world." " wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver me from this body of death ?" is the anxious inquiry of every man who, like these worthies, and like Paul, has discovered the extent of sin in his heart. " So " WRETCHED MAN V 207 bound and liampered by the power of sin, I cry for a mighty deliverer to rid me of the intolerable burden, this sinful and degenerate nature, which disturbs my peace, sullies the purity of my renewed mind, and aims at nothing short of my spiritual and eternal death." '' I thank God,'^ — the apostle answered his own question, and with a divine guidance which makes the answer the only true one for others as well as for him, — " I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord." " He, who has begun to deliver me, will, in due time, complete the deliverance through Jesus Christ our Loi'd." The answer is comprehensive. Deliverance from sin will be eflPected by the gospel and the grace of Jesus Christ — not by the law and by the strength of my own will. " Sin shall not have dominion over you," he had said, a few sentences before, " because ye are not under the law, but under grace."* " Conscious," says Doddridge in his paraphrase of the passage, " of the obligations you lie under to Him who hath raised you to this new and glorious life, present all your members and powers to God as weapons and instruments of righteousness to fight his battles, and be for ever devoted to his service. Do it boldly and resolutely, and not as if you feared that your former master should recover his power and prove a severer tyrant, after you had thus attempted to revolt ; for you may, on the contrary, be assured that sin shall not have any more dominion over you, as you are not under the law, a dispensation of bondage and terror, but under grace, under the merciful dispensation of the gospel, which affords such consolations, and inspires such hopes, as may animate the soul to a much more successful * Romans vi. 14. 208 CONFLICT WITH SIN. combat with sin than the law could do, and give a much nobler assurance of a complete victory over it." Instead of sinning as we please, " because under grace," the " grace" of the gospel is our only hope of deliverance from sin ; it provides the only motives that are adequate to the occasion, and opens a channel for the communication of the only^^ozi-er that can render these motives effectual. The law, though a perfect rule of life to those who have a mind to obey it, does not contain, as we have seen in an earlier part of this volume, the means of subduing and winning the rebel heart to God. It is the opening of the door of mercy by the gospel, and the exhibition of the love of God to sinners in the opening of this door, that can do this. The law provides no medium through which the Holy Spirit may be given for the renewing and purifying of human character, but the gospel does. And thus " grace" secures that " sin shall not have dominion" over those who believe in the Mediator, the Lord Jesus Christ. In his daily warfare with sin, the Christian must make daily use of these principles. They are needful not only to the first breaking of the power of sin, but to the continuous warfare with its influences. We must look daily for pardon through the blood of Christ. We must cherish towards Christ daily that same grateful love which was awakened when first we received his mercy. We must daily ask and put our trust in that Holy Spirit, who is the source of all spiritual power and purity. Let any burden of guilt rest on our consciences, or let any spirit of self-con- fidence take possession of our hearts, and either will be fatal to success in our battles with sin. But if we habituate ourselves to apply to the Saviour, in the DAILY HEALING. 209 spirit of children, for the pardon of every known sin and for the hourly supply of divine strength, we shall be more than conquerors. When " Christian's'^ con- flict* with ApoUyon in the A^alley of Humiliation was over — a conflict in which he received not a few wounds — " there came to him a hand,^' says John Bunyan, '^ with some of the leaves of the ' tree of life,^ the which Christian took and applied to the wounds that he had received in the battle, and was healed immediately. He also sat down in that place to eat bread, and to drink of that bottle that was given him a little before : so being refreshed, he ad- dressed himself to his journey with his sword drawn in his hand ; for he said, ' I know not but some other enemy may be at hand.' " John Newton has taught us the same lesson in a form which is not the less efi'ective that it is homely. The spider and the toad engage in deadly conflict. Again and again is the toad wounded, but " by ready instinct taught,'^ seeks the antidote to the spider's poison by cropping the leaf of the herb plantain. At length the spectator of the contest removed the healing plant, and when the wounded toad rushed as before to seek relief, and found it not, it swelled and died. " The toad's an emblem, of my heart," says Mr. Newton, *' and Satan acts the spider's part.'' " Envenomed by his poison, I Am often at the point to die; But He who hung upon the tree, From guilt and woe to set me free, Is like the plantjiin leaf to me. To him my wounded soul repairs: lie knows my pain, and hears my prayers: From him I virtue draw by fiiith, Which saves me from the jaws of death ; From him fresh life and strength I gain, And Satan spends his rage in vaiu. 18* 210 CONFLICT WITH SIN, No secret arts, or open force, Can rob me of this sure resource. Though banished to some dist